NGS' Traveler: Best of 2009

National Geographic Traveler's Editor-in-Chief Keith Bellows presents his favorite pictures published in his magazine throughout 2009. The audio slideshow features 14 photographs made by various photographers in countries ranging for Malaysia to Peru.

I'm always intrigued how photo editors choose the photographs that are published, but I haven't learned much from Bellows' narrative. This collection actually mystifies me...sure, there is a bunch of lovely photographs but many are pedestrian and unimaginative, to say the least. The photograph of the four women on a bench in Shanghai is one of those. I looked at it for a while, trying to figure out the reason(s) for its inclusion here, but honestly couldn't.

I don't know if this was rush job put together by novice interns, but it's certainly not a shining effort by the National Geographic.