CNN
 — 

On a typical day, British photographer Rosie Lugg and her mother, Hayley Champion, spend almost every moment together.

“My mum is pretty much my best friend,” Lugg tells CNN Travel. “We’ll have breakfast together. We go to the gym together. We go for walks together. Just chat about pretty much anything and everything.”

So when 22-year-old Lugg started planning a three-month travel adventure to Southeast Asia — her first long-haul trip with her boyfriend — she immediately shared the travel ideas with Champion.

In turn, Lugg’s mother started sharing memories of her time in Thailand and Malaysia, where she worked for a period back in the mid-1990s. Champion had a bunch of photos from her time there, she told her daughter, buried in a box somewhere.

Lugg encouraged her to hunt out the shots: she was interested partly as a photographer, and partly because she loved the idea of getting a glimpse into her mother’s younger years and her parents’ love story. She knew her mother and father met in the 1990s, while teaching scuba diving in Malaysia, but not much else about their time there.

“So mum took me through all of her film photos that she has in the attic — boxes and boxes of film photos,” recalls Lugg.

The prints were taken on a Olympus mju, a small silver film camera that first went on sale in 1991 and which Champion carried in her bag through most of the ensuing decade.

This compact point-and-shoot has had a bit of a renaissance on eBay in recent years, thanks to its Instagram-ready aesthetic. But Lugg fell in love with her mothers’ Olympus mju pictures not only because of the way they captured the light and their grainy vibrancy.

More than anything, she just loved seeing her mother in her early 20s, smiling into the camera, eating dumplings, exploring markets and walking on sandy beaches. It was a wonderful insight into her mother’s life and travels three decades prior.

What also struck both women, that day in the attic, was their striking mother-daughter resemblance. Lugg and Champion two knew they looked alike, but in these pictures it was undeniable.

“I get told I look like her now, but it’s when I look at pictures of her when she was my age that it’s really obvious,” says Lugg.

In many of her mother’s 1990s Southeast Asia shots, “it was like looking at a picture of myself, which is so bizarre,” says Lugg.

As she thumbed through the prints, marveling at the physical similarities (“even the way we stand…”) an idea started brewing in Lugg’s mind. She turned to her mother:

“It would be really cool if I could recreate these photos,” she said.

This idea was cemented when Champion discovered she still had that Olympus mju, even though she’d long retired it in favor of her iPhone and it was “full of sand, on its way out,” as Lugg puts it.

So Lugg stuffed the 30-year-old Olympus into her backpack and boarded her flight to Thailand.

Lugg arrived in Southeast Asia armed with the vintage camera, pictures of her mother’s photos saved on a phone and no plan beyond seeing where the project — and her travels — would take her. She began her trip in Indonesia, intending to explore Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Vietnam and the Philippines.

Lugg didn’t have the exact locations of Champion’s 1990s photos (“she can’t remember a lot of them because we didn’t have Google Maps pins at the time,” Lugg explains). So instead of attempting to find the exact spots where the original photos were taken, Lugg decided just to look out for places that reminded her of the places in the mother’s photos.

She wanted to worry less about the specifics and more about capturing a similar moment in time.

Take, for example, one of the 1990s pictures where Champion is captured walking away from the camera on an empty, sandy beach.

Champion thinks this picture was taken on the Thai island of Ko Phi Phi Don. Three decades later, Lugg found herself sitting on Selong Beach in Lombok, Indonesia, looking out at the horizon. She noticed the coastline was a similar shape to that in her mother’s photo. While Ko Phi Phi Don is some 2,600 kilometers (1,615 miles) away from Lombok, Lugg felt there was an aesthetic similarity that was worth capturing. The sky was similarly blue. She also felt the relaxed happiness that the original photo seemed to capture.

Lugg quickly set up the shot in the “exact right position” then passed the Olympus camera to her boyfriend (“he’s very good at being a human tripod,” she laughs). Then she started walking away from the camera, just like her mother in the 1990s shot.

The nature of film photography meant Lugg couldn’t overthink the result — her reel of film only had 36 pictures. Her boyfriend couldn’t snap dozens of options. He had to press the shutter button and hope for the best.

“Every single picture, we only did one try,” says Lugg, who adds this limitation was also part of the simplicity of her recreated picture project: “I really wanted it to be just that memory captured as it is.”

The Olympus camera offered none of the instant gratification of a smartphone, Lugg had to wait until the film was developed to see the results. She knew there was a chance they might be “out of focus or blurry” but embracing this unknown was part of the fun.

“That’s the magic of film,” says Lugg. “The fact that you can’t look back at the pictures instantly, and you have to look forward to getting them developed to see how it came out.”

Later in her trip, while in the Philippines and Vietnam, Lugg got a few of her rolls of film developed and got her first glimpse at her recreations. She was delighted with the results, and immediately messaged some of the pictures home to her mother in the UK.

“It was really fun getting them whilst we were still traveling, and then obviously being able to send them home whilst we’re still there, like little postcards,” says Lugg.

Her mother loved seeing the pictures, says Lugg. The familial resemblance had never been more apparent. Paired together, it was often hard to tell if the photo was of Lugg or Champion, taken in 1994 or 2024.

“It was really fun to recreate them and see how similar we actually are,” says Lugg.

Recreating the photos also helped Lugg in the moments when she missed her mother — given how close they are, it was “a really strange feeling, going away for such an extended amount of time.”

“It was the longest time I would have been away from her, and we were both very aware of it,” Lugg adds. “But this was such a fun way to feel even more connected to her. Recreating memories that she’d had felt a lot like being close to her.”

Once she was back home in the UK, Lugg spent long evenings swapping stories with her mother, and comparing their respective photos.

“They’re not the exact same locations. They’re not the exact same experiences,” stresses Lugg. “But they’re really similar, and when you see them, physically in front of you, side by side, that’s a really cool feeling.”

She’s since shared the photographs on her social media, where she posts her photography projects @rambosphotos. Lugg is also considering framing the pictures, side-by-side.

At some point on Lugg’s trip, her mother’s Olympus mju camera finally broke. Lugg’s glad it lasted for so long, but she wasn’t quite ready to say goodbye to it just yet. Now she uses another new-old Olympus mju, purchased on eBay, and is excited for future travel adventures and future photo recreations.

In the meantime, Lugg, now 23, is enjoying being back in the UK, sharing pictures, stories and memories with her mother.

She feels closer to Champion than ever, even after spending a few months on the opposite side of the world.

“It tells you more about who they are,” she says of looking at her parents’ old photos and hearing their travel stories.

“I feel like every child will get this with their parents when it’s a huge realization that they had a life before you. And it’s such a strange feeling. The more stories they tell, the more I’m like, ‘Wow, you really did a lot before I was here.’”

Moscow
Reuters
 — 

Three police officers were killed and at least four people were injured when gunmen opened fire on police in the southern Russian region of Dagestan on Monday, regional authorities said.

Sergei Melikov, the leader of Dagestan, said the shooting occurred as the traffic officers had tried to pull over the car the assailants were driving.

The attack occurred around 2 p.m. local time in the regional capital Makhachkala, the interior ministry said.

Two of the shooters have been killed, a spokesman for the city administration wrote on Telegram. He identified them by name and said they were both born in 2000.

It was not immediately clear how many shooters were involved. Other perpetrators fled in a car, state media reported.

Video published on Telegram channels and verified by Reuters showed multiple bodies lying on a city street beside a police vehicle. As passersby stopped to examine them, more gunshots are heard down the street.

Two other shooters, two police officers and several injured civilians, including a 17-year-old girl, were brought to hospital, where at least one of them later died, according to state media. Authorities have opened a criminal case into the incident.

Dagestan, a mainly Muslim region, has suffered several deadly attacks in recent years.

In March, counter-terrorism forces killed four militants affiliated with the Islamic State (ISIS) who authorities said were plotting to attack a regional branch of the interior ministry.

Editor’s note: Sign up for Unlocking the World, CNN Travel’s weekly newsletter. Get news about destinations, plus the latest in aviation, food and drink, and where to stay.

CNN
 — 

Air traffic controller staffing shortages have been causing major flight disruptions for a week at New Jersey’s Newark Liberty International Airport, a United Airlines hub.

Numerous factors, including runway “rehabilitation work” and outdated technology, have also contributed to the massive delays, which are just the latest major issue to hit US air travel.

United Airlines has just cut 35 daily roundtrip flights from its schedule to minimize disruptions, the airline said over the weekend.

Newark officials have urged travelers to check with airlines about flight status before coming to the airport.

Whether it’s staffing shortages, a technical meltdown or a weather system that wreaks havoc on schedules, here’s some advice on what to do if your flight is delayed or canceled.

As bad as it is to find out your flight has been delayed for a long time, or worse, canceled, it’s better to find out from the comfort of home or a hotel room.

“Check your flight status before you go the airport. Most of these notifications are not happening at the last minute,” said Scott Keyes, the founder of Going.com. “Save yourself the drive to the airport.”

Other tips from Keyes:

Sometimes, the delays and cancellations happen after you’ve arrived at the airport.

Keyes said to head as fast as you can to the airline agents’ desk. “It’s going to make a difference who arrives first. It’s first-come, first-serve. Positioning yourself close to the desk can pay off,” Keyes said.

Then you might want to call up your carrier while you’re waiting. It might be faster to get through to a call center. “Whatever happens first, great,” he said.

Other tactics you can try:

Attitude and research matter

Whether you’re dealing with an agent in person or over the phone, how you approach things can make a big difference.

“Honey attracts more flies than vinegar,” Keyes said. “Look at this from the airline agents’ perspective. … The agent is the one who has the most ability to help you. Asking nicely and sympathetically is far more likely to get what you want than being a jerk about it.”

He had another tip when it’s your turn to talk to an agent about making new arrangements: “Come prepared to offer your own options already. Doing your own research is absolutely helpful.”

Other considerations:

Cooperation between airlines could work in your favor.

“When flights are canceled, many airlines have the option of putting you on another carrier’s flight because they have interline agreements,” Lousson Smith, product operations specialist at Going.com, told CNN Travel.

“This means, for example, if Delta is having service interruptions but American is running a flight to your destination, you may be able to get on that flight.”

Thanks to changes in frequent flyer programs over the past several years, airlines often still have flights available with miles even when demand is high during a weather event, Julian Kheel, founder and CEO of Points Path, told CNN Travel in an email.

“You’ll need to be prepared to spend a lot of miles, and you may not get the best value for them. But you could save yourself some significant cash if you’re trying to evacuate away from a storm,” Kheel said.

“Most US airlines now allow you to cancel flights booked with frequent flyer miles without any fee or penalty right up until departure time. That means you can book multiple alternate flights on different airlines using your miles in case one of them ends up delayed or canceled.

“But don’t try to book alternate flights on the same airline, as duplicates can be automatically canceled. And don’t forget to cancel the remaining flights you don’t end up using so you can get your miles back.”

What do you do if it looks like you’re not going to be able to fly out until the next day and you’re not in your home city?

This depends on the specifics of your situation — in the US, for example, airlines aren’t legally required to put you up in a hotel. US-based airlines have their own individual policies for situations “within the airline’s control” that are tracked by the Department of Transportation, here.

But requirements in other countries are different. In the United Kingdom, for example, you’ll likely be automatically entitled to food and drink vouchers and accommodation. You can read all the details at the UK’s Civil Aviation Authority (CAA)’s website.

Your canceled flight will be covered by UK law if it was supposed to be departing from the UK, no matter who you were flying with.

And if your flight was supposed to be arriving in the UK, you’ll be covered by UK law as long as you were traveling on an EU or UK airline. This document from the UK’s Civil Aviation Authority explains all the ins and outs of these rules.

Despite this, sometimes airlines can’t help everyone, as the CAA says, “this can happen when staff are stretched during major disruptions.” The CAA advice is to organize “reasonable care and assistance yourself, then claim the cost back later. If you end up paying for things yourself, keep every receipt and do not spend more than is reasonable.”

Other things to consider:

Travel insurance and receipts

Consider buying travel insurance, advised Airport Parking Reservations in an email to CNN Travel.

It said “most travel insurance policies provide additional cover for travel uncertainty. Additional [coverage] usually becomes applicable if your flight is postponed by more than 12 hours due to a strike, adverse weather or a mechanical breakdown.”

The site also advises that you keep any receipts of airport purchases. You can try to get the money back from the airline later.

Airlines in the United States are now required to give passengers cash refunds if their flight is significantly delayed or canceled, even if that person does not explicitly ask for a refund.

The Department of Transportation says the final federal rule requiring that airlines dole out refunds — not vouchers — went into effect on October 28, 2024. Find out the details here.