The One Way Ticket Show

On this episode, we welcome back to the program, journalist and author, Joshua Hammer who was our guest back on episode 112 in September 2016.

Joshua's career has included serving as Newsweek Bureau Chief in, Nairobi, Buenos Aires, LA, Berlin, Jerusalem and Cape Town. His work has appeared in the New York Review of Books, The New Yorker, National Geographic and the Smithsonian just to name a few publications.

He is a New York Times bestselling author of six books, including The Falcon Thief and The Bad-Ass Librarians of Timbuktu (which we talked about in our last conversation).

Joshua's just released and latest book is: The Mesopotamian Riddle: An Archaeologist, a Soldier, a Clergyman, and the Race to Decipher the World's Oldest Writing, published by Simon & Schuster.

In the course of the conversation we dive deep into this fascinating book – everything from the Royal Asiatic Society's 1857 Great Cuneiform Challenge and the gentlemen who took part in it, to the difficulty of the digs in the Near East, to the "Assyrian Fever" (as Joshua calls it) that swept London in 1851- 1852, to the origins of the British Museum, to the topic of cultural appropriation of a country or people's national patrimony, and more.

In keeping with the theme of the show, should he take a one way ticket back in time, Joshua shared what he would tell scholars and archeologists in the mid 19th century about how their work resonates today.

As for Joshua's own one way ticket destination, it's still to Manhattan in 1967.

Do check out Joshua's other books: Chosen by God: A Brother's Journey; A Season in Bethlehem: Unholy War in a Sacred Place; and Yokohama Burning: The Deadly 1923 Earthquake and Fire that Helped Forge the Path to World War II.

Alberto Nicheli is the Founder of the travel operator, TransAfrica.

For the last 40 years, Alberto, who was born in Italy, has made the West African nation of Togo his home. He knows Africa intimately, having done his first Trans-Sahara expedition in 1972 and having developed an expertise on West African tribes and art. Over the decades, he's shared his knowledge with authors and filmmakers who want to better understand that part of the world.

Our conversation with Alberto took place in a very lively New York City restaurant while he was in town for the Travel & Adventure Show.

In our chat we cover everything from voodoo to photography to TransAfrica's 55 day Great Expedition, to tribal Africa, to some unexpected destinations to visit in West Africa (including Liberia and Ivory Coast), to my upcoming trip to Guinea Bissau with TransAfrica, and a whole lot more.

We begin with Alberto sharing his one way ticket to scouting in West Africa. He features how scouting is an "artistic way of doing things", how he breaks the ice when approaching a village for the first time, and how for him "adventure is culture". Plus, Alberto offers why he never scouts without a corkscrew!

For information on TransAfrica's fascinating journeys, visit: https://transafrica.biz/en/

Our latest guest on The One Way Ticket Show is world-renowned Garden Designer, Madison Cox. The interview was conducted in September 2024 in the Willis Pavilion, beside the house today known as Villa Oasis which was built by French Orientalist painter, Jacques Majorelle in the 1920s, and later owned by Yves Saint Laurent & Pierre Bergé. Adjacent to the home is the famed Majorelle Garden.

Madison was born September 23, 1958, in Bellingham, Washington, and raised in San Francisco and Marin County, California. As a garden designer and author of books about gardens, he has traveled extensively across the United States and Europe as well as to Japan, China, Russia, India, North Africa, and Australia.

Madison's passion for garden design has also extended to lecturing, leading garden tours in France and Italy, and book publications. He has lectured across the United States and Canada: at the Smithsonian Institute in Washington, D.C. and the Art Institute of Chicago, as well as at the Portland Garden Club and the Art Gallery of Ontario in Toronto. Madison Cox is the author of Private Gardens of Paris (Harmony Books, 1989), co-author of Gardens of the World (Macmillan, 1991), and with photographer Erica Lennard, of Artists' Gardens: from Claude Monet to Jennifer Bartlett (Abrams, 1993), and Majorelle: A Moroccan Oasis (Vendome Press, 1999). Cox wrote the preface for The Gardener's Garden (Phaidon, 2014).

He was the first American to design a garden at the Chelsea Flower Show in London in 1997, and won a Silver-Gilt Medal.

Madison is a member of the following institutions:

- President, Fondation Pierre Berge – Yves Saint Laurent, Paris, France

- President, Foundation Jardin Majorelle, Marrakech, Morocco

- Co-Chairman of the American Schools of Tangier and Marrakech in Morocco

- Advisory Board Member, The Aangan Trust, Mumbai, India

- Patron, American Friends of Blérancourt, France

- Board of Directors TALIM (The American Legation in Morocco)

In our conversation, Madison shares his one way ticket destination of choice is to Morocco. His first visit to the country was in 1979. While he was a student in Paris, Yves Saint Laurent and Pierre Bergé invited him as part of a small group down to Marrakech for a long weekend.

During our sit-down, Madison covers:

- The difference between Marrakech in the 1970s and today

- The nostalgia for Tangier (where Madison has a home)

- The rich backstory behind Villa Oasis and the Majorelle Garden

- Yves Saint Laurent's love for Morocco (he first visited in 1966) and how the country significantly impacted his work

- The Pierre Bergé Museum of Berber Arts which is housed in the former painting studio of Jacques Majorelle, in the garden

- The Yves Saint Laurent Museum in Marrakech

- How Morocco has impacted his own approach to designing gardens.

Plus, J. Paul Getty, Edith Wharton, Winston Churchill, FDR, and the photographer Horst, all make appearances in the interview.

On this episode of the podcast, we're joined by Frédéric Sola, the founder and owner of Fez's Riad Laaroussa and Fez Real Estate.

In our conversation, Fred shares his one way ticket journey to mental health stability which manifested in Fez. He opens up about his own experience suffering from depression -- which began in his mid 30s amidst a successful career in finance in London and Paris – and how he has worked to live with and manage it all these years later.

He went on to describe how he fell in love with Fez on his first visit in 2003, so much so, that he bought Riad Laaroussa in 2005. After 18 months of intensive renovations on the 17th century structure whose past life included serving as a koranic school, he opened the riad as a hotel-spa-restaurant in October 2006. It is, what I describe as, "Morocco meets minimalist chic".

For Fred, the allure of Fez is not only visceral, but therapeutic. He offers that in Fez "you can feel this medieval atmosphere, a feeling of being surrounded by a cocoon. Or being in a cocoon. Or let's say a riad can create the feeling of a cocoon."

After settling into his new surroundings, in 2007, Fred met his future wife, Cathy Bellafronto, an American diplomat working in project development in Morocco. They married 3 years later and between 2011-2013 adopted 4 children from the Fez orphanage.

Our interview features many thoughtful comments from Fred about what makes Fez magical, the importance of community, travel (he, Cathy and the kids took a year off and drove down the Pacific coast from the US to Chile in a mobile home) and mental illness (where he believes "part of the recovery is accepting your disease").

Fred's story really typifies what The One Way Ticket Show is all about – interesting people, doing interesting things, with something interesting to say. On top of that, Fred is truly living his one way ticket journey!

Fred closes the interview with one piece of advice: "Enjoy the present, that's all we have".

Frédéric Sola on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/frederic-sola-20a0b87b/, Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/frederic.sola1

Riad Laaroussa: https://riad-laaroussa.com/

Fez Real Estate: https://www.fez-realestate.com

Journey Beyond Travel: https://www.journeybeyondtravel.com

Given Jew-hatred and virulent anti-Israel rhetoric spiraling out of control, particularly on college campuses, we've invited Shai Davidai to be our featured guest on this episode of the program.

Shai is Assistant Professor in the Management Division of Columbia University Business School. His research examines people's everyday judgments of themselves, other people, and society as a whole.

Born and raised just outside Tel-Aviv, Shai received his Ph.D. from Cornell in 2015. Before joining Columbia Business School, Shai spent a year as a post-doctoral fellow at Princeton and 3 years as an Assistant Professor of Psychology at The New School for Social Research.

Following the barbaric October 7th 2023 terrorist attack on Israel, Shai has faced deplorable treatment from Columbia University for standing up for Israel and the rights of Jewish students on campus. Today, he's a leading face and voice in the fight against Jew-hatred and Israel-bashing.

Our conversation begins with Shai sharing his one way ticket to the safety of his late Grandmother's couch in Givatayim, just outside of Tel Aviv. While on weekend breaks from his university studies in Jerusalem, Shai would visit his Savta (Grandmother) Lydia. Together they would talk, smoke, drink Turkish coffee and enjoy her signature Romanian cheesecake. And at some point, Shai would fall asleep on her couch.

Shai shares that Savta Lydia, who was from Bucharest, was studying to be a doctor. Aged 19 and after her first year of university, despite good grades, she was called into the Dean's office and told she wouldn't be able to continue her studies because the university met its quota of Jews. That, plus her being a woman, didn't fit the university's agenda. Realizing she had no future as a Jew in Romania, she packed up and traveled solo to Israel to chart a new course. Her biggest regret in life, Shai offers, is that she didn't become a doctor.

We continue our chat with Shai highlighting:

1) How the first protests at Columbia supporting the October 7th attack (organizing began the evening of October 7th while terrorists were still in Israel!) took place at the university on October 12th before one IDF soldier set foot in Gaza and four days after Hezbollah's unprovoked attack on Israel's north. On the 12th, approximately 800 students, faculty and staff came out to celebrate "the historic day" (their words). They used slogans like "resistance by any means necessary" (which for them meant rape, murder and kidnapping civilians was "necessary"). For me, not sure what the need was for resistance since Israel had left Gaza 18 years before and thousands of Gazans would cross into Israel daily to work.

2) The Kafkaesque treatment he's received from Columbia University, simply for speaking out, not against the protestors or their hatred, but against Columbia's administration for allowing the hatred to fester and take root. For exercising his first amendment rights, he's been banned from Columbia's campus. This includes the Columbia Hillel.

3) His goal in speaking out is to push the message that we have a problem for support of anti-Jewish, anti-Israel and anti-American terrorism in academia.

4) How US professors openly support US designated terrorist groups, e.g., Hamas and the Houthis, but only ones that target Jews (you won't see support for Boko Haram). How the same professors and others remained and remain silent on, for example, the October 7th attack and the burning of synagogues worldwide.

5) Jewish students being verbally and physically attacked on campuses and denied entry into their public campus spaces.

6) The silent, slanted and biased behavior of international aid organizations like the Red Cross (which to this day has not visited one single hostage), UNRWA, or Amnesty International which engages in historical revisionism.

7) How the anti-Israel and Jew-hating protests are in fact anti-democratic and also anti-American.

8) What starts with the Jews doesn't end with the Jews.

This is a powerful episode to be heard more than once and shared widely.

For more from Shai, tune into his podcast: Here I Am With Shai Davidai.

Also, follow Shai on all social media: @shaidavidai

Sebastian Copeland is a polar explorer, climate analyst, photographer and author. In 2017, he was named one of the world's top 25 adventurers of the last 25 years.

Noted as a photographer "who has produced works that are of outstanding artistic merit and communicates messages of urgent global significance," Sebastian has led numerous record-setting expeditions, documenting the endangered Polar regions while covering more than 10,000 km on skis over the ice.

Since 2000, he has warned of systemic transformations taking place in the polar regions and their geo- economic consequences. Sebastian has addressed audiences at the United Nations, institutions and governments globally, as well as Fortune 500 companies, about the urgent need for a market transformation towards a sustainable economy.

He is a fellow of The Explorers Club, and member of the International Glaciology Society, the American Polar Society, and a founding member of Artists for Amazonia.

Sebastian's books have sold in over 70 countries. He was named four times Photographer of the Year, including twice in 2020 (IPA and TIFA) for Antarctica: The Waking Giant (Rizzoli 2020). In 2024, he released his sixth monogram titled: The Arctic: A Darker Shade of White (Rizzoli) with a foreword by Dr. Jane Goodall.

In 2018, Sebastian received a Bambi award in Germany, in the "Our Earth" category. He was named a Knight twice by the French government: in the National Order of Merit, and in the Order of Arts and Letters.

Our guest on episode 228, Sebastian returns to the program to quickly revisit his one way ticket destination before talking about his sensational new book, The Arctic: A Darker Shade of White (Rizzoli). In the course of the conversation, we cover:

• The changes in the Arctic and its impact on our lives outside the region
• Svalbard Global Seed Vault
• The Arctic as home to some of the oldest known life-forms (FYI: In 2011, scientists discovered 750-million-year-old bacteria trapped in ice)
• His approach to taking award-winning photos (and the importance of patience in the process)
• How icebergs are like people
• The wildlife found in the Arctic
• The connection between the peoples of the Arctic and the landscape, and the strains placed on their maintaining their traditional way of life
• Dr. Jane Goodall writing the forward to the book and her influence on his work
• Tourism's impact on the polar regions
• What we all can do to help the environment.

The Arctic: A Darker Shade of White made the NYT & the New York Post Best Holiday Gift Guide lists!

Aryeh Lightstone served as the Senior Advisor to U.S. Ambassador to Israel, David Friedman, from 2017 to 2021. During his tenure as Senior Advisor, he played a critical role in advancing bilateral U.S. - Israel relations with a focus on economic development & technology cooperation.

Aryeh was appointed as the Special Envoy for Economic Normalization. In that role he was an integral member of the Peace to Prosperity team, leading the inaugural Abraham Accords Business Summit, directing the Abraham fund, and serving as point person in the Middle East for the actualization of the Abraham Accords.

Today, he is the CEO of the Abraham Accords Peace Institute, the author of "Let My People Know" the inside story of the Abraham Accords. Aryeh is a proud father of four and husband to a very patient wife, Estee.

On this episode, Aryeh shares his one way ticket to go back in time to be with Abraham. In the course of the conversation, Aryeh draws on Abraham's life which provides inspiration for meaning, value, purpose and sacrifice in our own lives.

Aryeh also provides perspective on the U.S. - Israel relationship and underscores how apart from Israel being an economic and technological powerhouse benefiting American companies, it has also provided the U.S. with intelligence which has saved American lives; the genesis and benefits of the Abraham Accords; why he's bullish on the Middle East and doesn't know if there will be a more exciting place to live outside of the U.S. than the Middle East in the next 25 years.

Dickie Arbiter began his broadcasting career in Zimbabwe (Southern Rhodesia) in the mid-1960s.

Following a return to the United Kingdom in the early 1970s he joined LBC News Radio/IRN (Independent Radio News) as a newscaster and program presenter.

During late Queen's 1977 Silver Jubilee he was asked to report on the British royal family.

In 1981 he was responsible for organizing the UK's commercial radio coverage as well as taking on as lead commentator of the wedding of Prince Charles to Lady Diana Spencer.

With the success of the Royal wedding coverage, he was appointed IRN's Court Correspondent with accreditation to Buckingham Palace – being only one of two such correspondents with continuous and unfettered access to the Palace.

His new role meant travelling extensively both at home and abroad, covering the British monarchy, his area of expertise.

In 1988, he joined the Buckingham Palace Press Office, serving not only as press spokesman to the late Queen Elizabeth II but also spokesman for The King, when he was The Prince of Wales and his late wife, Diana Princess of Wales.

In addition to his role as Royal press spokesman, Dickie was responsible for the media management of ceremonial occasions.

These included all major state events inside Buckingham Palace and Windsor Castle inward State Visits, the late Queen's major UK engagements and the operational media requirements for royal funerals, including that of the late Diana, Princess of Wales.

For his service to the crown, In the 1996 Birthday Honors, he was appointed Lieutenant of the Royal Victorian Order (LVO).

Since retiring from Royal duty, Dickie went back to his broadcasting roots as a television commentator.

Having spent going on fifty years covering royalty, heads of state, and other globally recognized figures, his knowledge qualifies him to bring his own personal insight into the public forum as a royal analyst and international lecturer.

On this episode, Dickie shares his one way ticket to Whitefish, Montana to horseback ride and enjoy a cowboy lifestyle.

In our conversation, we also cover a wide swath of topics including:

1. The role of the Monarchy

2. A window into the late Queen's personality

3. The Republican movement in the UK and 13 realms where the Sovereign is Head of State

4. His tea with then Prince Charles & Lady Diana Spencer three days before their 1981 wedding…and what their relationship was really like

5. Lovely anecdotes of time spent with Diana during royal engagements

6. Behind the scenes look at managing the press for Diana's funeral

7. The painstaking details that go into an overseas royal tour

8. How the King is navigating his relentless schedule despite his cancer

9. The U.S. President the late Queen tolerated and the U.S. First Lady with which she had a frosty relationship

10. The drama surrounding Harry and Meghan

11. The late Queen's last days

12. What he really thinks of the Netflix series "The Crown".

Born and raised on the West Coast of the US, Lucas Peters now makes Tangier his home. He's a travel writer and photographer and the author of the Moon Guide Book for Morocco. Together with his very accomplished wife, Amina, they own and operate Journey Beyond Travel, one of Morocco's most successful, sustainable tour companies.

Lucas' expertise isn't limited to Morocco though. He also wrote Moon Guide Book's Grand European Journeys: 40 Unforgettable Trips by Road, Rail, Sea & More.

In November 2024, Lucas is releasing the Moon Guide Book for Sevilla, Granada and Andalusia.

When he's not writing or planning remarkable journeys for his clients, Lucas, together with Amina and their two kids, spends time traveling around Morocco, exploring the small towns dotting the national roads, difficult-to-access mountain villages and crumbling kasbahs of the Sahara.

On this episode, Lucas shares that in 2009, he bought a one way ticket to Morocco and never left – so he's truly on a one way ticket journey!

Also in the conversation, Lucas and Host, Steven Shalowitz, touch on each of the destinations Steven visited on his recent four and a half week journey through Morocco which Lucas orchestrated. They included: Rabat, Tangier, Tetouan, Chefchaouen, Volubilis, Moulay Idriss, Meknes, Fes, Ifrane, Erfoud, the Sahara, the Atlas Mountains, Essaouira, Marrakech and Casablanca.

Plus, the two highlight everything from riads to hammams, Morocco's rich Jewish heritage to Moroccan cuisine, the method to Moroccan aesthetic madness to the proliferation of cats throughout the country, and more.

For further information on Lucas, visit: http://lucasmpeters.com.

And for curated, bespoke visits to Morocco, Andalusia and select other destinations, visit: http://journeybeyondtravel.com

Sophie Ibbotson is a Central Asia specialist who has worked in the region since 2008, focusing on economic development — in particular tourism development — and water security. Through her company Maximum Exposure, she is a consultant to national governments and to the World Bank, and is Uzbekistan's Tourism Ambassador to the UK.

Sophie is the author of six guidebooks for Bradt Travel Guides, and has written for Lonely Planet, National Geographic Traveller, and Culture Trip, amongst many other publications.

She is also Chairman of the UK's Royal Society for Asian Affairs, founded in 1901 as the Central Asia Society.

On this episode of the show, Sophie shares her one way ticket destination is to Samarkand in the early 1420s, when Ulugbek - a grandson of Amir Timur (Tamerlane) - was governor. Sophie points out that at this point, before he became the Timurid Emperor, Ulugbek had just finished constructing his madrassa and astronomical observatory, solidifying Samarkand as one of the great intellectual and cultural centers of the Islamic world.

In our conversation, Sophie also highlights:

• What surprises most visitors to Uzbekistan
• Why the Registan (central square) in Samarkand is one of the top 5 places in the world to visit along with Angkor Wat and the Taj Mahal
• Tashkent's dazzling subway
• Bukhara's unique Jewish community and the city as the most beautiful on the Silk Road
• The backstory behind suzani textiles
• The world's second largest collection of Russian avant-garde art is housed in the Savitsky Museum in the Karakalpakstan capital of Nukus (thus making it known as the Louvre of the Steppe!)
• The gem that is the walled city of Khiva
• What makes Sudan such a fascinating destination – apart from it having more pyramids than Egypt.

We wind down the conversation with Sophie sharing her philosophy on travel which is: "If you have the opportunity, go"!

Follow Sophie on Instagram & X: @uzambassador

For more on Sophie, visit: www.uzbekistan.travel/en &

www.maximumexposure.co