At the end of The Best Movie of All Time, also known as The Wizard of Oz, Dorothy wakes up muttering while her family and friends stare down at her. None of them really understand what she has just returned from, and she tries to explain, "This was a real, truly live place. And I remember that some of it wasn't very nice - but most of it was beautiful."


For all the years I loved watching the Wizard of Oz, I never really got that scene. Why was she so happy to be back? Oz was way cooler than...
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An article from this week’s New Yorker Magazine on Guinea’s corruption and iron ore industry gives a pretty accurate description of the sticky sensations you get upon arriving in-country:

 “When you disembark from a plane in Conakry, the corruption hits you almost as quickly as the heat. At the airport, a uniformed officer will stop you, raising no specific objections but making it clear, with his body, that your exit from the situation will be transactional. Out on the rubble-strewn...

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