Awhile back, I wrote a post about how Langston Hughes' train trip to Mexico to visit his father influenced his poem "A Negro Speaks of Rivers." I recently heard that Katherine Anne Porter's writing is also connected to travel to Mexico, but years before Langston made his way there.

Because May 15 was Porter's birthday (She died September 18, 1980) Garrison Keillor presented a short retrospective on her life during yesterday's "Writer's Almanac . "

Travel changed Porter's life. Prior to her trip to Mexico, on the invite of Mexicans who told her about the revolution that was about to blow, Porter had never been out of the U.S.--she hadn't been much further than Texas where she was born. To head to Mexico in 1919, as a female and alone, was rare.

With the success of her short stories inspired by her Mexico experience, Porter later headed to Europe where she began to write about Texas. As she found, often when you leave your home, that's when you can truly see it and have something to say about it that has any meaning.

The collection Flowering Judas and Other Stories was a result of her Mexico travels. She wrote her novel set in Texas, Noon Wine, in Europe.

Here's a quote from Katherine Anne Porter to enlighten your day as a traveler.

"Miracles are instantaneous, they cannot be summoned, but come of themselves, usually at unlikely moments and to those who least expect them."

In case you are sick of what art museums have to offer (I am with you; there is only so much Monet one can take in a lifetime,) you should try one of the truly bizarre museum options out there.

Here are a few tips from the site Atypical Events:

• Mütter Museum aka "Random body parts", Philadelphia: museum of historical pathology containing about 20,000 fluid-preserved anatomical and pathological specimens, models, medical instruments, and memorabilia of famous scientists and physicians (the secret tumor of Grover Cleveland, the thorax of John Wilkes Booth and a really big 9-foot colon, for example)
• Museum Vrolik aka "Dead babies in a jar", Amsterdam: It contains more than 5,000 specimens of congenital anomalies, human and animal anatomy, embryology and pathology.
• Phallological Museum aka "Penisland", Húsavík, Iceland: museum completely devoted to the field of phallology, the supposed ancient study of the penis and its role in society and history. Home to 200 penises and penile parts.
• Meguro Parasitological Museum aka "Parasites, warms and leeches", Tokyo. Glass jars filled with formaldehyde preserve these pesky parasites, while terrifying photographs like that of a Japanese dude with elephantiasis of the scrotum depict the damage that they are capable of (see photo)
• Museum of Menstruation and Women's Health, Maryland. The museum walls were covered in tampon and pad advertisements, while female mannequin torsos dressed in rubberized panties and menstrual belts hung from the ceiling or sat on tables in a similar fashion.

Menstruation? Maybe Monet is not so bad, after all.

[via Eventective.com]

Cash and Treasures, as mentioned in a previous post, is a Travel Channel show that often features kid friendly places. Host Kirsten Gum, an engaging sort, heads to where you can dig up treasure. I've been watching every Wednesday for the past several weeks, finding out more and more about the bounty one can find above and below ground. The finder gets to keep all of it for a price.

Episode: Digging for black opals

What are they? Stones of a variety of color ranging from black to blue with the shades in between that shine up into various patterns and designs. The design influences their value. Most of the opals in the world--95% come from this part of the world.

Location: Lightning Ridge, Australia--a small mining town that's a bit of a poke to get to. Gum said it took 11 hours through the Outback.

Digging details: Gum started her quest by heading to Black Opal Tours located in Lightening Ridge. This tour establishment is a place to find out about the various types of opal patterns and their value, as well as the history of opal mining in the area. While Gum was in Lightning Ridge, besides digging, she hob-nobbed with some of the miners and downed some beers, "stubbies," to find out about the miners experience and secrets. They kept the secrets to themselves. None of them looked like they are getting rich.

I've been wandering around Tokyo for the last week or so and its been an eye opening experience. The culture is rich, the city endless and terrifying and gray and intense. Every day I'm astonished by the differences between our societies and the way that the Japanese operate, horrified by the varieties of food that we eat and warmed by the hospitality around me.

It is an experience far from what I had predicted, I am pleased to say. Back in New York we had broad, naive expectations formed by our guidebook scouring, stories from friends and films we had seen at the theater. They're beliefs held by many Americans, I feel, and I thought that sharing my experiences would help clear some of these ideas up. Take a look at the biggest five myths I've found about traveling in Tokyo:

• You won't be a tall monster in Tokyo. While the national height average is a little lower in Japan, tall people do exist here and are not uncommon. Unless you get on a particularly short subway car, you won't be able to see end-to-end with your friends. Similarly, your feet shouldn't hang off the bed by 6" when you check into a hotel. Three out of three of my mattresses so far have been fine for me and I'm pretty tall.
• Electronics aren't crazy awesome and cheap. While Electric City does have a ton of electronics with a remarkable variety, much of it is the same as US equipment and the price is also on par. I was looking at an IBM x40 Thinkpad for about 250$ this week, which you can get on Ebay for about 270$. Factor in the Japanese keyboard and having to carry it all of the way back to the States, and it isn't really worth it.
• People won't stop to ask for your pictures. I've been with two tall people (over 6'4"), a nerdy African-American lawyer and a blond girl from Long Island, and have yet to be stopped for a picture. Some schoolchildren did ask for a photo at a temple in Osaka, but it was part of their homework assignment.

I never really fell in love with the Sound of Music. But other people did, and I am sure that those people will be excited to know that the original von Trapp family house is being turned into a hotel.

If you're having trouble remembering the true story that the movie was based off of, there was an aspiring nun (played by Julie Andrews) who did a whole lot of singing and somewhere between "do" and "fa," won the hearts of Baron von Trapp and his seven children.

The von Trapp family lived in the house from 1923 to 1938 when they fled Austria during the Nazi takeover; eventually they made their way to the US where the youngest of the children operates a Vermont lodge. Now Salzburg will get the von Trapp touch, and starting this sumer, visitors to Villa Trapp visitors will be able to sleep in family members' former bedrooms or even choose to exchange vows in the chapel. Located just outside of Salzburg, Austria, the hotel will open sometime in July.

Building a hotel that capitalizes on the fame of a movie really isn't that crazy and sometimes hotels even star in movies themselves. Salzburg tourism officials say that actually 40% of overnight stays are made by fans of the Sound of Music. So if you are one of those fans, now you too -- for only 100 euros a night -- can practice your singing skills right in the von Trapp household.

I recently found out that Leuven, Belgium has trumped Cincinnati, Ohio. In 2007, Epybird, the two guys that orchestrate mentos geysers, turned Fountain Square into more than 500 bottles of simultaneously shooting Diet Coke.

On April 23, 2008, a group of Belgian students donned blue raincoats, and, with the help of Epybird, turned Ladeuzeplein Square in Leuven into a mentos Diet Coke mess. It's reported that 1,360 people participated in this latest Guiness World Record-breaking endeavor.

As I'm pawing through warm weather clothes and putting winter clothes away, I'm casting some of them off. Eventually, they may end up on the racks at a charity store in Columbus or in a pile at a market someplace in Africa.

Oprah, though, has enough cast-off clothes that she recently opened a store in Chicago so we can buy them. We can also buy her shoes. I have maybe two pairs of shoes that I could let someone buy. Usually, by the time I get rid of shoes, no one would want them. Oprah, though, has dozens. Clothes range from things she's worn to some that maybe hung in her closet until she decided they are a no show--except, of course, on you. They are sold in the Oprah's Closet section of the Oprah Store in Chicago.

To capitalize on all things Oprah, the Oprah Store also has Oprah inspired items--things that a person really needs like items peddled on her Web site. The thing is, I have so many Jamie things, that if I bought an Oprah thing, my house would explode.

If you do buy Oprah's old things, the money does go to Oprah's charity--the Angel Network. My stuff is heading to Volunteers of America. They'll come get it. [Listen to recent Weekend Edition story on NPR]

This shot taken in Seoul, South Korea by Traveling Dutch, captures what one doesn't see every day while traveling in Asia. I never have. I don't think I've ever seen a person holding a "Free Hugs" sign ever. I am wondering about the face mask. Has this person decided to not worry about germs? Is this an act of defiance? No matter. Here's sending you a hug on this wonderful Wednesday.

If you have a photo with which you'd like to befuddle or bemuse us, send it our way at Gadling's Flicker photo pool.

If you're looking for a cheap way to travel, and a cultural experience that will bring you past wandering in a country, hoping something significant in your life happens, here's an organization that looks like a promising possibility.

I read about it in a travel blurb and then headed to the Web site to check it out. Bridges for Education is a short term program where participants teach conversational English in exchange for cheap room and board and a week of cultural tours at the end of the teaching obligation.

The premise of the organization is that, by using teaching English as a tool, tolerance and understanding between cultures is fostered. Originally set up to answer the need for English language acquisition programs in Eastern Europe, the reach has expanded to Zhangzhou, China.

Norfolk, Nebraska, hometown of Johnny Carson of the Tonight Show, will host the first ever Great American Comedy Festival as a tribute to Johnny and the stuff that makes us laugh. Comedy big time professionals like Robert Klein and Eddie Brill will perform throughout June 16-22. Others have been performed in venues like the Tonight Show, David Letterman and the Last Comic Standing.

For people who aspire to break into comedy there's a chance for you to get discovered at the Amateur Hour Competition.

If you want to hone your craft, there are workshops to help make you more funny than your friends tell you that you are. Eddie Brill who is David Letterman's talent coordinator is offering a one-day workshop. For speech and drama teachers, there's a free improv workshop. If you want to up your odds on making it on a game show, there's even a workshop to help you do that.

If you're between 14-19, you can attend a week long comedy youth camp. This looks like a terrific opportunity for some young person, and as week-long camps go, the price is right. Now, if they'd only do an adult version.

The festival is designed so you can see as little or as much of it as you want. You pay for tickets to the events you want to see and some are free.