Whether it be the colourful tsechus of Bhutan- so exotic and strange, marked by serendipitous discovery (your guide had heard it from the locals during a pitstop you'd made the day before) and a marked absence of tourists an equally spectacular balloon festival of Myanmar, the Pushkar camel fair of Rajasthan or the rural Naadams of Mongolia- festivals all around the world are a fantastic initiation into a country's culture.

It could be something as touristy as the Rio Carnaval(Urbane Nomads could arrange for you to take part in the Sambadromo if you fancy) or a minor weekly event such as a weekend market in remote Northern Kenya, where you'd feel yourself to be as much part of the spectacle as the event itself, tourists being a rare sight in this part of the country.

Some of these festivals, like the Jambay Lakhang Drup in Bhutan, might seem strange to the Western psyche but wouldn't exotic sights and practices be one of the objectives of the traveller and, in an allusion as to how greatly diversified the world was (still is!) are Marco Polo's last words- 'I did not tell half of what I saw'.