Fast Friday Review: “World Travel” | Anthony Bourdain

Anthony Bourdain is the reason you’re reading this right now. He’s the reason a person like me, who grew up in a town of 900 people in the middle of nowhere with parents who couldn’t cook for shit, ended up going to culinary school. On the first day of class, when I put a boning knife right through my pinky finger and had to get six stitches, my first thought was “I wonder what Tony would make of me?”.

Reading his travel books was the reason I, just like him, parlayed my cooking experience into travel - becoming a travel agent who spends every day with her mind in some far off place, the next adventure. He’s the only celebrity death I ever cried over, the only stranger’s passing who ever made me stop and think about my own life and what I was doing with it.

So when “World Travel: An Irreverent Guide” was announced - a travel guide cribbed together by his long time assistant Laurie Woolever from notes, unfinished scripts, and other bits of his writing left behind after his passing in 2018, I immediately pre-ordered it. Although its not the kind of book you’re supposed to read cover to cover, I did just that, and its the focus of this week’s Fast Friday Review.

Each section breaks down a city - cities he loved, cities he had a connection to - and highlights restaurants and sometimes a few other places of note in each. I appreciate that the book doesn’t go out of its way to be obscure - he was never cool just for the sake of being cool, and sometimes a touristy place is worth visiting. Asian cities get particular love and the sections on Hong Kong and Singapore had my mouth absolutely watering (and adding some Wong Kar-wai films to my watch list!). I imagine this book is like having a little miniature Bourdain sitting on your shoulder saying stuff like “Does that menu have pictures on it? Haven’t I taught you anything?” as you wander around a new city, showing you the tidbits (Nasty Bits anyone?)

If I had to list a criticism of the book, its that the transportation notes for each city (public transportation access, airports, etc.) seemed unnecessary. This isn’t a Lonely Planet type of book that you’re throwing in your backpack and actually taking with you and referencing. More restaurants or a few extra cities would have been a better use of paper.

I was also surprised that no Scandinavian cities made it into the book. France gets 4 cities - Montana of all places gets a chapter - but Copenhagen is left out? Ah well - maybe that would have tipped the book too far away from “cool” territory for the casual reader. (Ignoring, of course, that Bourdain loved Chef Rene Redzepi’s Copenhagen restaurant Noma so much that he devoted an entire episode of No Reservations to a single meal there.)

Ignoring Scandinavia aside, World Travel is a good scratch for the travel itch everyone is still feeling, as we go into our second summer of covid. But as restrictions start to lift and we can begin to plan travel again it provides much-needed inspiration for new cities to visit, authentic experiences to have there, and a reminder to be the traveler that Anthony Bourdain would want you to be.