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Cinema has always been one of the best ways to travel without going away from our chair. Who has never dreamt about being an Indiana Jones in Petra or an Audrey Hepburn in front of Tiffany´s window on the 5th Avenue? Luckily, we don’t have to go as far as Jordan or New York to get the feeling of being in the silver screen.

Here are movies offering travels from another point of view.

Le fabuleux destin d’Amélie Poulain

Paris has always been known as THE city of love, but since this movie has come out, Paris became “Amélie’s city”.
As a result, the coffee place: Le Café des deux Moulins, Amélie’s working place, turned out to be an inevitable stopover while visiting the French capital.
M. Collignon’s grocery, where Amelie did her shopping, has kept the sign from the shooting and has become one of the most famous in France.

Life is beautiful and Tuscany

Since 1997, year of its release on the silver screen, the city of Arezzo became famous to be the place chosen to shoot this story, directed and acted by Roberto Benigni. Arezzo is a city in Tuscany, 47 miles away from Florence. You could walk around its streets and visit the church place, the theatre or the school where Guido’s mother gave classes.
But the city of Arezzo offers also other interest places, such as San Francisco Basilica, or the Plaza Mayor by Vasari.

Movies shot in Barcelona.

Before that Woody Allen chose it to shoot his last movie, Vicky Cristina Barcelona, the city of earl, a lot of movies were shot. Pedro Almodovar had chosen it as backdrop for his former works.
The beach of Barceloneta, the Park Güell, the Sagrada Familia or la Boqueria market have been protagonists on the silver screen.

@ twenty_questions

Nowadays, traveling to some countries without being vaccinated should be unthinkable.
However, each year, hundreds of travelers jump in this adventure. A single bite, in a tropical country, can waste your holiday and your plans for the future.

Some diseases are grave, such as the yellow-fever (spread via South American and African mosquitoes), the dengue-fever (mostly city area in South America, Africa, and Asia), or the Malaria (South America, Africa, Asia), among others.

Du to globalization, diseases travel easily from a country to another. Via people going back to their own country, or via mosquitoes, taking a flight, landing on another continent and spreading these diseases.

We also know viruses are able to mutate and to get worse, such as the West Nile Virus in 1999 in New York.
To sum up, viruses, bacteria, parasites, fungus travel freely at an international level. We have, as travelers, the mission of preventing this disease-spreading with vaccines and going for regular checkups.

Warning!! Because of the climate change, some mosquitoes are now able to reproduce in more places (more northern); the best is to ask your doctor or in a vaccination center.

@ poil0do

Some vaccines, such as hepatitis A and B, have to be administered some weeks before the departure. It is also better to do a check up some month after being back; moreover, for some diseases, such as Malaria, there is no vaccine. The only way is taking pills everyday. But theses pills are not fully reliable: only 60 % and symptoms can appear later.

Also, some vaccines are mandatory to get into a country, such as the yellow-fever in India or some part of Africa.

Traveling to tropics well vaccinated, would avoid worries and would allow spending relaxing holiday.

Never forget this common saying: “Prevention is better than cure!”

The New York Times has published a list of 44 places to go in 2009. The selection is already given, but the list is interactive and you can vote for your favorite one, in order to advise other travelers.

From this selection, made by the North American newspaper, classical places are, obviously highlighted, such as Las Vegas, Berlin, Rome, but also others interesting destinations to discover such as Kazakhstan, Beirut,The Philippines or Bhutan.
Oddly, Cuba is in this list where as Americans are not allowed to go to this island: none planes take off from the US to Cuba. Actually, if they wish to see Havana and Cuban beaches, they must catch a plane from another country (Canada, Mexico…) and ask to not get a stamp on their passport.
Destinations are also classified by categories: luxury, family, ecology, culture, etc.

And you, where would you go this year?