Journey of a Golden Soul

On today’s show, travel writer and former documentary filmmaker Martha Ezell joins co-hosts (and Hidden Compass co-founders) Sivani Babu and Sabine K. Bergmann to chat about beautiful insects, generational wisdom, and the testosterone-filled art scene of New York City in the 1980s. But first, journey with us, as Martha takes us to takes us to the sacred fir forests of the Trans-Mexican Volcanic Belt to be awed by the “Journey of a Golden Soul.”

Storyteller: Martha Ezell is a freelance travel writer based in Petaluma, California. A former social worker and filmmaker, Martha has worked on documentaries about expressionist art, the Wright Brothers, and elephant seals, and written about the summer that changed everything. Read more of Martha's work on her Hidden Compass profile page, https://hiddencompass.net/journalist/martha-ezell.

Find her story, "Butlin's Bognor Regis and the Summer that Changed Everything," at https://gadling.com/2012/07/27/butlin-s-bognor-regis-and-the-summer-that-changed-everything/.

Watch her short children's documentary, "A Visit to the Elephant Seals of Año Nuevo," at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=06YV6l4a2dk

Story: “Journey of a Golden Soul” first appeared in the Portrait department of Hidden Compass, The Magazine in our spring 2020 issue. It won a Bronze Award at the 15th Annual Solas Awards. Read the full piece — and see the accompanying photos — at https://hiddencompass.net/story/journey-of-a-golden-soul/.

Monarch Butterflies: Scientists estimate that Eastern and Western monarch populations have declined by 80% and 99% respectively in the last 30 years. To learn more about this important pollinator, including how you can help their numbers recover, visit https://xerces.org/monarchs.

Hidden Compass, The Magazine: If you like the stories you hear on this podcast, you’ll love our magazine, which brings you more stories, alongside stunning photography and bespoke artwork. And you get to be a part of it! See the faces and hear the voices of the people behind our stories, and help us forge an alliance to turn storytellers and explorers into heroes and champion a new age of discovery. Learn more at hiddencompass.net, and sign up for our newsletter at https://mailchi.mp/8539a03c8c0c/hclanding2020-explorers.

See you next week, when we’ll go with queer Jewish-Russian refugee Sonya Pevzner to the siege of Leningrad, and its aftermath, to honor a family story as wrenching as heartbreak and as “Sweet as Challah.”