♪ felt the cool rain on my shoulder ♪ ♪ found something good in this beautiful world ♪ ♪ i felt the rain getting colder ♪ ♪ sha la la la la ♪ sha la la la la la ♪ sha la la la la ♪ sha la la la la la lal this, i think it's fair to say i was at a turning point in my life. i promised some people i'd come back, and i am back. my life has changed a lot. how much have their lives changed? kuala lumpur. happy to be here, but brimming with mixed emotions. surrounded by all the sights, smells, and flavors i remember so well. this is where a wandering soul such as myself can dive right in and get some of that straight chinese food i've been missing. first order of business, dinner. been on a plane for, like, i don't know, this long. very long. saw, like, five mark wahlberg films. i can't tell you how excited i am about the prospect of getting some black pepper crab, and some pork gladed noodles and a regional beverage. reasonably cold. i don't even know what this is. i love you, noodles. don't want to get all heavy and philosophical at this point, but why i'm here, what my mission is, what i expect to find, basically me tracing my steps and all that. we'll talk about that later. right now, no

♪ felt the cool rain on my shoulder ♪ ♪ found something good in this beautiful world ♪ ♪ i felt the rain getting colder ♪ ♪ sha, la, la, la, la, ♪ sha, la, la, la, la, la ♪ sha, la, la, la, la, ♪ sha, la, la, la, la, ♪ sha, la, lat. ♪ >> over the years i've let a lot of extraordinary landscapes recede into a blur outside my windows. i've looked, maybe seen, maybe noticed, then gone. we all carry different experiences inside us. we see things differently, don't we? madagascar -- exotic, unspoiled paradise or microcosm for the end of times? antananarivo, tana for short, madagascar's crowded chaotic capital city. >> how are you doing, man? base camp. >> wow, that's quite a rain. i don't know. i'm not sure if i can be in front of the camera. >> just ignore them. >> i'm so used to controlling everything. >> darren aronofsky, director of the films "pi," "the wrestler," "black swan," and as it would turn out, sort of appropriate to our location, "noah." he asked me if he could go along on a trip with us. i said where do you want to go. >> madagascar, i knew almost nothing about it. i knew it was an animated film i've seen a lot of times in my car. >> it is one of the more extreme places that you hear about but you kno

♪ felt the cool rain on my shoulder ♪ ♪ found something good in this beautiful world ♪ ♪ i felt the rain getting colder ♪ ♪ sha la la la la ♪ sha la la la la la ♪ sha la la la la ♪ sha la la la la la lauage ] ♪ ♪ ing ♪ ♪ >> admit it. you hear the name, ethiopia, and you think starving children with distended bellies. you think dust and famine and despair so awful you frankly don't want to even think about it anymore. but take a look. addis ababa. capital city of ethiopia. a cool high altitude urban center that will both confirm and confound expectations. fueled largely by direct foreign investment and a returning ethiopian diaspora eager to be part of the new growth, things are changing in addis. it's one of the fastest growing economies in the world. it's not the first time the place has gone through a growth spurt. in the 1950s emperor haile selassie known as the king of kings embarked on a similar program of massive public works. this was supposed to be the legacy of ethiopia. the future. but the next time ethiopia found itself in the headlines it was for this. and for many of us, that was the end of the story. so i'm looking forward to this week. >> i can't wait to show you ethio

♪ felt the cool rain on my shoulder ♪ ♪ found something good in this beautiful world ♪ ♪ i felt the rain getting colder ♪ ♪ sha la la la la ♪ sha la la la la la ♪ sha la la la la ♪ sha la la la la la lan a turbulent year for turkey. and i arrive in istanbul at the moment of a critical election. the question on everyone's mind is whether the current president and his ruling party will win a large enough majority to change the constitution, potentially allowing him to stay in power indefinitely. these have been good times for some. particularly in the construction and development business. and fearful ones for others. they are particularly concerned about what happens next, for instance, in the kurdish parts of town. ♪ >> our polls are opening. turkey's voters choose a new parliament which could lead to big changes in the country's political system. >> the ruling justice and development party expected to take most of the seats. >> but how much power the president actually has will be determined by the success or failure of the kurdish party. >> the hdp, originally a kurdish political party, has sought to unite the disparate voices calling for change in response to 13 years of what has

♪ felt the cool rain on my shoulder ♪ ♪ found something good in this beautiful world ♪ ♪ i felt the rain getting colder ♪ ♪ sha la la la la ♪ sha la la la la la ♪ sha la la la la ♪ sha la la la la la lat year for turkey. and i arrive in istanbul at the moment of a critical election. the question on everyone's mind is whether the current president and his ruling party will win a large enough majority to change the constitution, potentially allowing him to stay in power indefinitely. these have been good times for some. particularly in the construction and development business. and fearful ones for others. they are particularly concerned about what happens next, for instance, in the kurdish parts of town. ♪ >> our polls are opening. turkey's voters choose a new parliament which could lead to big changes in the country's political system. >> the ruling justice and development party expected to take most of the seats. >> but how much power the president actually has will be determined by the success or failure of the kurdish party. >> the hdp, originally a kurdish political party, has sought to unite the disparate voices calling for change in response to 13 years of what has essentially

♪ felt the cool rain on my shoulder ♪ ♪ found something good in this beautiful world ♪ ♪ i felt the rain getting colder ♪ ♪ sha la la la la ♪ sha la la la la la ♪ sha la la la la ♪ sha la la la la la laving here after all you see on tv these days that libya is, in fact, functioning at all. but it is. the fountains across from the corniche are operating. traffic works, kind of. at the radisson, club sandwiches arrive on time in the lobby. the occasional flash of camo and a security scanner are really the only discordant notes. >> you don't want to take the video. >> oh, you don't, okay. inside the old part of the city men slaughter a camel while a girl rorsd it with her ipad. >> no? okay. he said no. kids are setting off fireworks in the medinah. incoming. tomorrow is the prophet muhammad's birthday, and people who have not known freedom for nearly 50 years are ready to celebrate. martyrs square is filled with families, kids, teenage skater boys and hotshots on motorcycles. it's wild. and almost giddily happy. young men in the camouflage pants of the militias, most of whom were civilians until last year, do their best to sporadically keep order or just join in the fun. every kid above

♪ felt the cool rain on my shoulder ♪ ♪ found something good in this beautiful world ♪ ♪ i felt the rain getting colder ♪ ♪ sha la la la la ♪ sha la la la la la ♪ sha la la la la ♪ sha la la la la la lachanging. we all know it. you can't stop it. were you born here? >> yeah, both generations of my grandparents are from san francisco. my dad's side came out after the gold rush. so came here in the 1850s. >> author john irzog grew up in this town and he's a close observer of the changes happening here. when i first came out to san francisco, i was making all the same sort of tired jokes that everybody from new york makes. in fact, that's really nothing could be further from the truth. san francisco is like a righteously dirty town. it's grimy. you guys have actual street hookers in the center of town. you know, it's a two-fisted, heavy-drinking, mean martini, big steaks, heavy smoking, old school '20s mentality town still. >> but it's managing. google is not too far from here. >> according to many locals, the whole character of the city is being leached out by an invasion of tech people, a flood of tech money. it's the triumph of the nerds. out with the old, in with the new. no place e

♪ felt the cool rain on my shoulder ♪ ♪ found something good in this beautiful world ♪ ♪ i felt the rain getting colder ♪ ♪ sha, la, la, la, la ♪ sha, la, la, la, la, la ♪ sha, la, la, la, la ♪ sha, la, la, la, la, la, lad of my childhood, a cultural petri dish from which regularly issues forth greatness. new jersey, in case you didn't know it, has got beaches, beautiful beaches, and they're not all crawling with roid raging trolls with reality shows. i grew up summering on those beaches, and they are awesome. jersey's got farmland, beautiful bedroom communities. where that woman from "real housewives" who looks like dr. zeyas does not live or anyone like her. even the refineries, the endless clover leaves of turnpikes and expressways twisting in unknowable patterns over the wetlands that are somehow beautiful. to know jersey is to love her. ft. lee, you may have heard of it. some of governor christie's minions allegedly conspired to jam up traffic for a few days. it's a town with a joky history of corruption. it's also where my beloved hiram's is. opened since 1932 and pretty much unchanged ever since, my dad started bringing me and my younger brother, chris, here in the '50s and they still honor trad

♪ felt the cool rain on my shoulder ♪ ♪ found something good in this beautiful world ♪ ♪ i felt the rain getting colder ♪ ♪ sha la la la la ♪ sha la la la la la ♪ sha la la la la ♪ sha la la la la la labeer? harder stuff? what's going on? >> i usually go with a budweiser and a jagermeister. >> budweiser and jagermeister. any notion of going local right out the window. >> two jagers? >> yeah, two jagers. cheers. good seeing you. >> the firsts one's never good. the first one is never good. but it gets easier after the first one. >> so, look, this is not my first time to charleston, as you know. i did do a show here before, and i'm still taking [ muted ] about it. apparently i really [ muted ] up the first time i came here because i made a number of errors. apparently none more egregious than going out -- like, doing an oyster roast and drinking champagne. >> i never heard of such a thing. well, champagne and beers is okay with the oysters. >> so it must have been a -- >> got confused somewhere. >> anyway, i got it wrong. this time i'm getting it right which is why i've come to you. ♪ >> you can be forgiven for underestimating sean brock first time i met him. i know i did. i saw a scruf

♪ felt the cool rain on my shoulder ♪ ♪ found something good in this beautiful world ♪ ♪ i felt the rain getting colder ♪ ♪ sha la la la la ♪ sha la la la la la la ♪ sha la la la la ♪ sha la la la la laost beautiful places in europe, a place whose roots are very much the roots of the town where i live, but somehow, i've never been able to get it right. to tell the story, any story of sicily. it's the biggest island in the mediterranean. two main towns of palermo and catania on opposite sides. i'm done a show in palermo before. it was an epic goat rodeo, a failure of humiliating scale. this time i was going to get it right. there's the sicily we know from films, an evocative, deeply felt history that's not quite reality but cool anyway, right? there's the simple fact of its location, tucked away under the boot of italy, part of but not really part of that country. its own language, culture, its own history of norman, arab, spanish, roman, turkish, egyptian interlopers, all leaving their mark and their influence. i grew up in new jersey, which was pretty much sicily on the hudson. the italian-americans next door weren't from milan, i could tell you that much. i guess what i'm telling y

♪ felt the cool rain on my shoulder ♪ ♪ found something good in this beautiful world ♪ ♪ i felt the rain getting colder ♪ ♪ sha la la la la ♪ sha la la la la la la ♪ sha la la la la ♪ sha la la la la laactly about this place? over the past century the system here, the tradition, whatever it is that took hold here, churned out a tremendous number of the world's most important chefs. chappell, bocuse, toisgros, and as importantly, influenced nearly all the rest of them. >> why lyon? why is this such a gastronomic capital? why bocuse here? why troisgros? why all of these great chefs? >> because lyon is really positioned between the north and the south. >> right. >> you're locked in between burgundy and rome. >> lyon is the second largest city in france, situated in the southeast of the country midway between the alps in the east and the mediterranean to the south. >> this was also a bottleneck when cars became the mode of transportation. >> goes right to the heart of the michelin driving the destination on the way to -- >> completely. >> out of that system came chefs like this guy, daniel boulud. like prince or madonna, he needs really only one name. in new york or anywhere in the chef

♪ felt the cool rain on my shoulder ♪ ♪ found something good in this beautiful world ♪ ♪ i felt the rain getting colder ♪ ♪ sha la la la la sha la la la la la ♪ ♪ sha la la la la ♪ sha la la la la la laom of granada. one of the oldest, most complex, magically surreal places in spain. and one of the most beautiful. granada is tucked against the sierra nevada mountains of andalusia in southern spain. it's not like barcelona. it's not like san sebastian. it ain't madrid. any reasonably sentient person who looks at spain, comes to spain, eats in spain, drinks in spain, they're going to fall in love. otherwise, there's something deeply wrong with you. spain is the sort of place that never really made any sense anyway, and in the very best possible way. this is the country that gave us the spanish inquisition. also anarchy. this is where devout catholicism mixes with surrealism, modernist cuisine with traditional tapas. christianity and islam traded places, shared space. the effects and influences of all those things are right here to see. you can almost look back through time and through the mists of history and see the phoenicians marching up across the vega, or are those feral hippies?