Marko Polo Travels

This was originally conceived as a travel website, but things have changed in the last week.

I’m primarily a travel writer, but politics has always been my passion.  I’ve spent the last few years traveling the world and writing about the important social issues I’ve seen, and until just a few days ago I was set to write a blog about crewing ships around the world.  But now I see that the real action is happening at home, in the streets of America.

I’m talking about Occupy Wall Street.  We’ve reached a crisis point, and the Occupy Wall Street movement is reflecting the growing exasperation that ordinary people are feeling around the country.  The mainstream media has largely ignored the protest and dismissed their complaints as too radical to consider.  But with problems so grave before us, we can not afford to dismiss any solutions.

As I write, the movement is spreading across the country via Facebook and Twitter and more and more people are joining the demonstrators each day.  Police have retaliated with force, macing protesters already under custody and beating protesters with batons.

I’ve seen similar protests in Spain with the M15 activists launched a nation-wide sit-in to protest austerity measures.  Across Europe, the Middle East and America, people are taking democracy to the streets and – whether we like it or not – the status quo is changing.

I refuse to watch from the sidelines.  My close friend, photographer Drew McGill, is coming with me to New York this week, and together we will attempt to interpret the raw sentiment of the protesters.  From what we’ve seen in San Diego, the movement lacks focus and articulation, and we hope to lend our words and pictures to that end.

I won’t pretend to have all the answers – I just know something is wrong with the current global economic system.  I hope to spend my time in New York talking to as many different people as possible, trying to elucidate the current situation as best I can.  We are going to use this website as a platform to communicate what we see, hear and experience as we travel to the nerve center of this eruption of political passion and follow it where it may go.

We invite you to join us on the adventure.