Episode Details

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Tommy Sabbatical has been to places most travel YouTubers will not go. And then he sits across from Julian Dorey and tells the truth about what he found. This segment covers the full arc of the most alarming and most personally significant chapter of his travel career — Zanzibar polygamy and his first viral video, Nigeria the second most corrupt country in the world and going viral on Nigerian national news, Iraq's holy sites and Shia militant checkpoints and the most generous country he has ever been to, the Yazidis who were enslaved by ISIS and called devil worshippers finding them across the Middle East and going to the holiest place in Yazidism, three weeks in Israel after October 7th and the majority of Israelis he met, and Palestine's travel restrictions and Lebanon's civil war history.

The Tanzania Zanzibar and polygamy thread is the episode's most immediately entertaining and most personally revealing opening contribution. Tommy Sabbatical's I Was Forced Into Polygamy in Rural Tanzania video has 8.4 million views — one of the most watched travel videos he has ever produced. Julian Dorey gets the full story behind it including what the Zanzibar experience produced and what his first viral video revealed about what his audience actually wanted from a travel YouTuber willing to go deeper than the surface.

The Nigeria thread is the episode's most culturally alarming and most immediately significant contribution. Nigeria is the second most corrupt country in the world. Tommy Sabbatical went and called it insane in the most complimentary possible way — the most alive and most chaotic and most demanding country he had encountered to that point. He went viral on Nigerian national news. If you can make it in Nigeria you can make it anywhere. The specific experience of 200 million people knowing your face without your knowledge or consent is the most personally significant and most immediately alarming element of the Nigeria story.

The Iraq holy sites and Shia militant checkpoints thread is the episode's most geopolitically significant and most personally alarming contribution. Tommy Sabbatical hit a Shia militant checkpoint and was completely shook. He stood at the holy sites of southern Iraq. He found the most generous country he has ever been to. And he came back saying Baghdad is safer now — the most important and most consistently underreported single data point about the present-tense reality of Iraq.

The Yazidis thread is the episode's most humanly devastating and most historically significant contribution. ISIS called them devil worshippers then enslaved them — systematically capturing Yazidi women and girls and selling them into sexual slavery in one of the most documented genocides of the 21st century. Tommy Sabbatical found them scattered across the Middle East went to Lalish the holiest place in Yazidism and found very kind people on the other side of a genocide that the world watched happen and largely failed to stop.

Inside This Clip:

Zanzibar polygamy and Tommy Sabbatical's first viral video — the story behind 8.4 million views

Nigeria the second most corrupt country — insane in the best possible way

Going viral on Nigerian national news — 200 million people knowing your face

Iraq's holy sites and Shia militant checkpoints — completely shook and most generous country

The Yazidis — ISIS called them devil worshippers then enslaved the