Close your eyes and think of Ireland: what do you see? Is it rolling hills of ethereal green and the Ring of Kerry, or perhaps tall, stark, jagged precipices descending into crashing waves, like the Cliffs of Moher? On a recent escorted journey through Ireland with Insight Vacations, I found all these and more, but what captured me beyond the green, grassy countryside were the furry and feathery fauna of the Emerald Isle. Beautiful, … [Read more...]
About Tanja M. Laden
I am a culture and travel writer based in Los Angeles. Along with co-founding and publishing Pop Curious, I'm also a regular contributor at TravelAgeWest, VICE, KCET Artbound, Atlas Obscura, The Kind, LAist, Discover Los Angeles, and The Huffington Post. I was a longtime editor with the LA editions of Flavorpill and Flavorwire, and have been published in LA Weekly, Los Angeles Times, Juxtapoz, Bluecanvas, Backstage, Lomography Magazine, Vs. Magazine, Whitehot Magazine, and DAME Magazine, and have worked as a new-media consultant with 20th Century Fox, MGM, Disney, MTV, and NBC. I hold a Bachelor of Arts in History from Occidental College and have volunteered as a mentor and associate anthology editor with the nonprofit teen writing organization, WriteGirl.
Fiji: Still the Cannibal Isles
My strange fascination with cannibalism began while I was studying history in graduate school. In a book whose title I have since forgotten (which might indicate why I quit grad school altogether), I read that Nelson Rockefeller's son Michael Rockefeller disappeared when he was 23 years old and that he was possibly cannibalized in Melanesia. At the time, I didn't know which came as a bigger surprise: that the young Rockefeller was most likely … [Read more...]