Salak biography
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Kira Salak facts for kids
Quick facts for kids Kira Salak | |
|---|---|
| Born | (1971-09-04) September 4, 1971 (age 53) Westmont, Illinois, United States |
| Genre | Travel writing, adventure, creative nonfiction, literary fiction, freelance magazine writing |
| Subject | Travel, political troublespots |
| Notable works | White Mary, Four Corners |
| Notable awards | PEN Literary Award, 2004 |
Kira Salak (born September 4, 1971) is an American writer, adventurer, and journalist known for her travels in Mali and Papua New Guinea. She has written two books of nonfiction and a book of fiction based on her travels and is a contributing editor at National Geographic magazine.
Biography
Early life
Kira Salak was born on September 4, 1971, in a western suburb of Chicago, Illinois. Her mother was a waitress and her father repaired mainframe computers. When Salak was 13, her parents sent her to Wayland Academy, a boarding school in Beaver Dam, Wisconsin, where she participated in cross-country
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Salak
Species of palm
For other uses, see Salak (disambiguation).
"Snake fruit" redirects here. For the kakasillo, see Manilkara zapota.
Salak (Salacca zalacca) is a species of palm tree (family Arecaceae) native to Java and Sumatra in Indonesia. It is cultivated in other regions of Indonesia as a food crop, and reportedly naturalized in Bali, Lombok, Timor, Maluku, and Sulawesi.[1][2]
It is a very short-stemmed palm, with leaves up to 6 metres (20 ft) long; each leaf has a 2-metre long petiole with spines up to 15 centimetres (5.9 in) long, and numerous leaflets. The fruits grow in clusters at the base of the palm, and are also known as snake fruit or snakeskin fruit due to the reddish-brown scaly skin, which is removed before eating. The fruit, resembling a ripe fig in size and shape, has a crunchy and moist consistency. The edible pulp inside, often compared to large peeled garlic cloves in appearance, offers a unique flavor profile.
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Kira Salak
Kira Salak has traveled solo to almost every continent, visiting the world's remotest places. In 2002, Salak became the first person in the world to kayak solo 600 miles down the Niger River to Timbuktu in Mali. The first woman to cross Papua New Guinea, she also cycled 800 miles across Alaska to the Arctic Ocean. In 2007, Salak became one of a rare few to successfully complete Bhutans 216-mile Snowman Trekthe hardest high höjd över havsnivån trek in the Himalayas (more people have reached the top of Mt. Everest than have completed the Snowman). Book Magazine has called her "the gutsiestand some say, craziestwoman adventurer of our day." Says The New York Times: "Kira Salak fryst vatten a tough, real life Lara Croft."
Salak is the author of three books. Her novel, The White Mary, published by Henry Holt in 2008, was a Publishers Weekly Pick of the Week. Her nonfiction adventure book, Four Corners: A Journey into the Heart of Papua New Guinea (National Geographic Books), was chosen by The