Farflungplaces

Spitzbergen. Remote and beautiful.

Running the printing presses to create money the Trobriand way.

Banana leaf currency is still widely used here. In this matriarchal society one village elder will hand press the damp banana leaf over a unique engraved Duba board.

What's to stop rampant inflation and a massive increase in money supply you ask? Well, that already happened 100 years ago when the elders moved from hand engraving each leaf to more mass production techniques with wooden presses

Since then the value has been maintained as it takes so long to produce. Only one type of banana leaf tree is suitable, and that is a days trek Then with drying taking three days with the risk of rain wiping out the batch, and then the more unusual problem of rats eating the drying currency. The Federal Reserve never has these problems...

Venice is a Fish caught on a line.

From 35,000 Feet.

The small village in France that remains a time capsule from the Second World War and its horrors.

https://www.farflungplaces.net/2020/05/oradour-sur-glane-walking-into-nazi.html

Our top 10 things to do in Tirana, including some hidden statues of Lenin And Stalin, slightly damaged as they were pulled down

http://www.farflungplaces.net/2020/02/everyone-out-to-get-you-build-city.html

Deep under the suburbs of Tirana is Hoxha's hidden city built in the Cold War. A place large enough for the government to sit in a purpose built assembly, as well as having luxurious accommodation for the leader.

http://www.farflungplaces.net/2020/02/everyone-out-to-get-you-build-city.html

Far Flung Places: Everyone out to get you? Build a city underground like Enver Hoxha. Tirana

Visiting Wolf's Lair, Hitlers secret WWII HQ for the war on the eastern front 10km's from the Russian border. How to get there and where to stay for an unforgettable trip back in history

Stalin, a man not celebrated too much in most of the world is still very popular in his tome town of Gori in Georgia. You can even buy gold statues of him in gift shops.

https://www.farflungplaces.net/2019/10/celebrating-local-hero-josef-stalin-gori.html

The cool mountain city in Georgia where the locals hid from the Mongols, but sensibly continued to make wine.

https://www.farflungplaces.net/2019/08/hiding-from-mongols-inside-mountain.html

Visiting Hitler's secret hideout near the Russian border 75 years since Von Stauffenberg tried to kill him there in a failed assassination attempt. Still very eery, made more so by the massive cracks in the thick above ground bunkers caused by allied raids.

They may be rusty and old, but it as an experience you will never forget. Climb aboard a cable car from the 1950's that is still operating, somehow, in Chiatura, Georgia.

https://www.farflungplaces.net/2019/07/riding-stalins-cable-cars-chiatura.html …

Far Flung Places: Riding Stalin's Cable Cars. Chiatura # #

The house where it all began. A decrepit Tbilisi house where Stalin began his career, printing revolutionary material in a hidden cellar reached by climbing down a well.

https://www.farflungplaces.net/