OK, so we don’t have a lot of imagination. Two weeks off … and we were on the plane to Paris. Yes. Just like last year. And, if things work out, like next year, too. I mean, it’s Paris. If it ever gets old … well, it’s hard to imagine. So, Thursday night, out to […]

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It wasn’t long ago that the nation of Bangladesh routinely was included on lists of “basket-case” countries with little or no chance of ever escaping grinding poverty for its masses of people. That was the global shorthand for Bangladesh. Where everyone is starving to death. Things may be looking up. A little. The per-capita income […]

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While researching the concept of “great sports venues” in Asia, it was deeply impressed upon me how enormous was the scope of the topic. Daunting, even. How to know about that grand old place in what is now Kazakhstan? Or the charming race track in Mongolia? Or whatever it is that Nepal, Uzbekistan, Georgia or […]

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This is pretty good stuff, if I say so myself. However, I didn’t link to the Europe part of this, a couple of days ago, and South America is coming up for Tuesday morning. So let’s catch up with that. Got any guesses at our top three venues for Europe and South America? Let’s link […]

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Part 3 of the series in The National about the best sports venues in the world. Broken out by continent. In Monday’s editions: North America! Interesting, how the voting went. I will tell you who won: Augusta National. Even the Brits in the room know about “the course like no other” or whatever it is […]

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To celebrate the addition of “cricket” to my categories, I have decided to give you some cricket “game story play-by-play” from this morning’s editions of The National. Remember, hundreds of millions of people understand this. Completely. And for those of you who don’t get it … go ahead and read. If just for the comedy […]

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We at The National are selecting — and writing about — the planet’s best places to see a sports event. Stadiums, arenas, race tracks (horse and motors), even a “Gulf.” This was the idea of Robert Mashburn, the sports editor here, who had a brainstorm a few months back to rank the top 10 venues […]

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Someone was banging on the outer door of the Teeny Apartment. I was there to pick up a few things, and just sit for a moment, and I had a visitor? I unlocked the door, and there was a man I had never before seen. Perhaps 35. Almost certainly from the subcontinent. And he was […]

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I have watched the Dodgers from afar. Not as the fan I was as a kid (see, “Done Bleeding Dodger Blue” from back in April), but as someone who has followed the Dodgers for half a century. After a few decades, it’s what you do, even if a team has gone badly wrong. I have […]

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A few days ago I noted on this blog how drag racing seems to have followed us over to the Gulf, and to the UAE and Qatar, in particular. And now we have seen that Little League Baseball, is here, too. I wrote about Little League for the Tuesday editions of The National, catching up […]

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