Stay tuned, back in February.

Baracoa—The Other Side of Cuba

Baracoa is Remote and Isolated. You don’t just stumble upon Baracoa on travels through Cuba. That’s because Baracoa lies on the island’s easternmost tip, more than 500 miles from Havana. Heck, even Miami is closer to the capital. The Viazul tourist bus, which is how most visitors get around Cuba, takes almost 22 hours from Havana to Baracoa and requires a transfer in Santiago de Cuba for the once-a-day onward passage to Baracoa.

- Go Nomad

Cuba's Sparse and Poetic Storefront Windows

Storefront window displays typically reflect the dreams and desires of consumerism and late capitalism. Under communist rule in Cuba, they reveal a very different story. From the Revolution through the “special period” following the fall of the Soviet Union and Castro’s death, window-dressers employed by the island nation's government-run advertising bureau were tasked with transforming actual scarcity into utopian visions of surplus and industry.

- Vice

Maurice, patron du dernier ciné X de Paris : "J'aime pas trop les films de cul"

La première fois qu'il a voulu se rendre au Beverley, Maurice Laroche s'est trompé d'adresse. Et s'est pointé devant le Grand Rex. Les deux cinémas sont distants d'une petite centaine de mètres ; et pourtant. Deux salles, deux ambiances. Dans l'obscurité du Beverley, feu Le Bikini, les films érotiques et hard s'invitent sur le grand écran. C'était il y a 34 ans. Une succincte offre d'emploi parue dans le magazine professionnel "le Film français" avait attiré l'attention de celui qui était alors projectionniste de films traditionnels.

-Rue89

Sous les pavés de Paris, un monde secret

Des centaines de kilomètres de catacombes s’étendent sous la Ville Lumière à l’insu de bien des Parisiens. Elles sont interdites et difficiles d’accès, mais de plus en plus de gens s’y aventurent. Bienvenue dans un univers qui tente de garder ses secrets.

- ici Radio Canada

Anarchy united them, but nudity tore them apart

How a splintered group of self-defined outcasts lost a battle of “nudes versus prudes”.

The trouble with Glennis, reasoned three residents of the late 19th century commune, was that it was just too rigid — the rules too numerous, the process of interpreting them too contentious. So the trio, who were among the the last remaining residents of the settlement, got into a hand-built boat in Washington’s Puget Sound, and rowed away. The year was 1896. With twenty dollars between them, they bought a plot of land on Joe’s Bay and established there an anarchist colony, free of rules. They called it Home.

- Timeline

It was sex all the time at this 1800s commune, with anyone you wanted and none of the guilt

Life at the Oneida Colony was kind of a like a key party, but no one had cars and everyone was doin’ it for Jesus. 

Do angels have sex? John Humphrey Noyes thought so. Related question: If they do the nasty in heaven, is it really so nasty after all? Noyes reasoned not. These were the basic philosophies that animated the creation of Noyes’s Oneida Community, a 19th century colony of so-called Bible Communists who believed that free love and ecstatic sex would bring them closer to God.

- Timeline

Google’s true origin partly lies in CIA and NSA research grants for mass surveillance

Two decades ago, the US intelligence community worked closely with Silicon Valley in an effort to track citizens in cyberspace. And Google is at the heart of that origin story. Some of the research that led to Google’s ambitious creation was funded and coordinated by a research group established by the intelligence community to find ways to track individuals and groups online.

- Quartz

America’s Secret Airline is Seeking Flight Attendants

No amount of air miles will get you seat aboard “Janet”– the US government’s top secret airline that runs a daily service ferrying secret government workers to and from their jobs at the National Security Site also known as Area 51. The secret passenger fleet operates out of Las Vegas from a restricted terminal and consists of 18 planes, including six Boeing 737s, all painted white with a thin red stripe down the fuselage and no other markings. The “Janet” call sign is thought to stand for “Just Another Non-Existent Terminal” or “Joint Air Network for Employee Transportation”– nobody knows, and the organisation has been shrouded in mystery ever since the service began in 1972. But every once in a while, just like any other airline, Area 51 Airways is looking for a new flight attendant.

- Messy Nessy Chic

FRÉDÉRIC BEIGBEDER, L’IMMORTALITÉ DE L’HOMME

Rencontre au Pays basque avec l’écrivain quinqua parti à la recherche d’une vie éternelle très humaine.

Depuis quelques mois, Beigbeder s’est installé à demeure sur la côte basque de ses vacances d’enfance. Dans cette principauté atlantique à arcs-en-ciel magnétiques, il cultive l’art d’être à nouveau père à la cinquantaine, met à niveau un train de vie auto-réduit et coupe un peu avec le fatras mondain parisien où il évoluait en poisson-pilote, à tu et à toi avec les naïades en pléiade et les requins à sequins. Par contre, il s’évite le surf au large de Guéthary, «les doubles otites» lui salant les tympans.

- Libération

L’absinthe au Québec, une histoire méconnue

Longtemps interdite, auréolée de mystère, l’absinthe effectue un retour remarqué dans nos verres. Le démarrage d’absintheries en sol québécois ravive d’autant plus l’intérêt pour cet alcool aux notes herbacées. Or, on sait peu de choses sur la trajectoire de l’absinthe au Québec.

- Le Devoir

A Philosopher's Advice For Managing Midlife

Many of us are casualties of the midlife crisis, striving to achieve what seems worthwhile, succeeding well enough, yet at the same time restless and unfulfilled. How to manage middle age? Here are lessons I learned while researching and writing my book, Midlife: A Philosophical Guide

- Forbes

GREAT QUOTATIONS ON THE MYSTERIES OF TIME

As 2017 slides into 2018, we pause for a moment to ponder this mysterious thing called time. You can’t hold it in your hand. You can’t stop it, slow it down, or speed it up. You can’t see it any more than you can see the wind. But you can see its effects. Here, we present insights into the elusive nature of time as captured in words and images.

- Who.What.Why

“OH MY GOD, THIS IS SO F---ED UP”: INSIDE SILICON VALLEY’S SECRETIVE, ORGIASTIC DARK SIDE

Some of the most powerful men in Silicon Valley are regulars at exclusive, drug-fueled, sex-laced parties—gatherings they describe not as scandalous, or even secret, but as a bold, unconventional lifestyle choice. Yet, while the guys get laid, the women get screwed. In an adaptation from her new book, Brotopia, Emily Chang exposes the tired and toxic dynamic at play.

- Vanity Fair

TOP 10 PHOTOS OF THE YEAR

It was a relentless year for news. For many, the beginning of Donald Trump’s polarizing presidency in January set a tone of heightened tension, but it went beyond that. The wildfires and mass shootings, hurricanes and wars—tragedies and milestones that could happen in any year—felt amplified.

Maybe it was the sheer amount of imagery that emerged—the images we scroll past on Instagram when we wake up and browse before bed, the ones we Like and Love and Sad-Face on Facebook, the ones we flip past in newspapers and magazines and are bombarded with online, on line at the grocery store and on the walls of coffee shops, in restaurants and our own homes.

- Time Magazine

Nicola Bertellotti Explores Fascinating Abandoned Castles Across Europe

Nicola Bertellotti is a talented 41-year-old self-taught photographer, artist and adventurer currently based in Pietrasanta, Italy. Nicola is a real castle-hunter travelling around the Europe to capture the crumbling ruins before they are reclaimed by nature or vandalised beyond recognition. He studied History at the University of Pisa, where approached Jonh Ruskin’s philosophy and where the sense of the transience of everything is deeply rooted in his vision of the world.

- Photogrist

Who was Janus, the Roman god of beginnings and endings?

January 1 can be a day of regret and reflection – did I really need that fifth glass of bubbly last night? – mixed with hope and optimism for the future, as we make plans to renew gym memberships or finally sort out our tax files. This January ritual of looking forward and backward is fitting for the first day of a month named after Janus, the Roman god of beginnings and endings.

- The Conversation