Category: travel

In Siberia

“‘I’m looking at Siberia.’
‘And what do you see?’ He gestured out of the window. ‘Anything?’ Into my silence he pursued.
‘What did you expect, Nikolai?’
‘Nikolai, it’s too long ago to remember!’ But I had been looking for patterns, of course I wanted their security. I wanted some unity or shape to human diversity. But instead this land had become diffused and unexpected as I travelled it. Wherever I stopped appeared untypical, as if the essential Siberia could exist only in my absence, and I could not answer Nikolai at all.”

Unlike most of the other travel writings I’ve picked up in recent years, Colin Thubron’s In Siberia isn’t that fun armchair travel romp that I’ve more or less learnt to expect from travel-related books. Instead, Siberia strikes me as such a lonely, sad place full of desperation and despair. One that I probably would never want to travel to, and not just because of the blood-curdling temperatures. The people who live there seem to be barely clinging onto their existence, and all the history and culture of times ago is crumbling or has disappeared due to lack of funds (a clavichord cherished by Maria Volkonskaya, wife of a leading Decembrist languishes in a warehouse in St Petersburg where it had been sent for restoration 3 years before as the town cannot pay its bill). Religion seems to be flourishing today in Siberia, and it’s quite remarkable to read of how they kept religion alive within them under Communism. While the subject matter itself isn’t the kind you’d leap into with joyous abandon, I have to admire Thubron’s adventurous spirit, his eye for detail and his seeming ability to chat up and befriend most everyone he meets. These acquaintances, whether those he lodges with or just meets on the train, come alive with his observations and insights. Thubron’s book isn’t exactly what I might know as a travel book but it is rare specimen of brilliant writing, careful observation, great insight and storytelling.

Stranger in the Forest: On Foot Across Borneo

“During our stay I had a familiar sensation in my stomach, the one we all get when we return to a familiar and loved place. I felt as though I had ‘come home’. If a two-week visit was so full of wonderfully strange events, what would it be like to live in Sarawak?”

It’s funny how Eric Hansen’s decision was based largely on a rather rowdy, drunken, crazy party that started out with him having to hit all the partygoers’ heads with a live rooster (no, that’s really what it says) in an Iban longhouse that lasted several days. Six years later, in 1982, he returns to Borneo and begins his journey with many false starts, as Hansen’s first attempts to make it inland show his lack of preparation and knowledge about what he was getting himself into. For instance, he buys 10 kg of salt as he hears that it is in demand in the interior, days later, he returns with it and has to sell it to the hotel. He speaks no Malay and his maps are incomplete because the terrain is largely unexplored by westerners and non-tribal people. The blanks on the map are partly what tempts him to make this trek. (Just a little snippet of information about Borneo: it is the third largest island in the world, and – at least at that time – was 80% rain forest. Its people are divided into some 12 tribal groupings such as the Iban, Kenyah and Penan.)

“Travel is the act of leaving familiarity  behind. Destination is merely a byproduct of the journey.”

In Hansen’s case, it is a case of the completely unfamiliar:

“Nothing had prepared me for the terrain through which we slowly traveled. The rain forest felt magical and enchanted as long as I was sitting still, but the moment I began walking it became an obstacle course of steep razorback ridges, muddy ravines, fallen trees, slippery buttressed tree roots, inpenetrable thickets of undergrowth, and a confusion of wildly twisting rivers running in every direction.”

What makes the journey more tricky is that he intends to travel in the most traditional way possible, that is, hunting and gathering:

“I learned to adapt my appetite and tastes to such foods as bee larvae and rice soup, roasted rattan shoots, boa constrictors, lizards, monkeys, bats and the large animals – pigs and deer.”

I mean I really have to give it to this crazy white man who is willing to submit his stomach to such, erm, delicacies and his daily life to the whims and wildness of the rain forest. Stranger in the Forest: On Foot Across Borneo is a truly fascinating account of Hansen’s forays into the jungle, sometimes relying on guides, sometimes on his own, depending on the generosity of the village headmen and villagers for lodging and shelter (usually in exchange for some gifts and goods), some of whom stiff him for as much as they can get. He traveled some 1,500 miles over 7 months. I have to credit him with his honesty about his inadequacies in this unfamiliar territory and culture, and continually marveled at his courage and determination to make his way overland. A perfect read for the armchair traveler!

Hansen’s book Motoring with Mohammed: Journeys to Yemen and the Red Sea sounds like it’ll be another fun read, and I look forward to checking that out soon.

The Caliph’s House

“There was a sadness in the stillness of dusk. The cafe was packed with long-faced men in robes sipping black coffee, smoking dark tobacco. A waiter weaved between the tables, tray balanced on upturned fingertips, glass balanced on tray. In that moment, day became night. The sitters drew deep on their cigarettes, coughed, and stared out at the street. Some were worrying, others dreaming, or just sitting in silence. The same ritual is played out each evening across Morocco, the desert kingdom in Africa’s northwest, nudged up against the Atlantic shore. As the last strains of sunlight dissipated, the chatter began again, the hum of calm voices breaking gently over the traffic.”

“The backstreet cafe in Casablanca was for me a place of mystery, a place with a soul, a place with danger. There was a sense that the safety nets had been cut away, that each citizen walked upon the high wire of this, the real world. I longed not merely to travel through it, but to live in such a city.”

Tahir Shah uproots his wife Rachana and two young children from England to Morocco, where his grandfather lived and died. They move into Dar Kalifa or the Caliph’s House and this book chronicles their first year in Casablanca, a story of jinns, exorcisms, house renovation, living next to a bidonville (a shanty town) and a gangster. Sounds entertaining enough.

It does start out well, mostly because I love the setting of Morocco and it was intriguing to read of someone who dared to take that leap and live in this beautiful, very different country. It was especially interesting to read about the refurbishing of the house, learning about how the artisans put together the traditional Moroccan bejmat tiles and the traditional plasterwork tadelakt, which required the purchase of many eggs. Shah was able to bring out all the little nuances of life, interactions and relationships with the people of Morocco.

The Caliph’s House is a pretty humorous read, although a lot of times I can’t help but wonder what goes on in that head of his. He makes a lot of silly mistakes, like wiring the architect the full amount he demands before the work is completed, and ordering a crateful of furniture from India after one drink too many. It can be a bit frustrating reading this book, for me, the height of bizarreness was when some “psuedo friends” arrive to stay, take over their bedroom resulting in Tahir and his family checking themselves into a hotel. I’ve never heard of anything like that before! These people are rather frustrating (and I don’t mean the pseudo friends). It makes for some entertaining reading, but in the end, got a bit too much for me.

But what I found most disconcerting was the seeming non-existence of his wife in this book. She appears only very occasionally, mostly to complain about something or give a little feedback (usually just a sentence). And then disappears again for pages and pages. I was unable to grasp a single idea about who she is, except for the fact that she’s from India. Oh and that on one occasion she cooked a lot of chicken curry. Really? It’s as if she doesn’t live there at all. We know far more about the jinn Qandisha than we do about his family. The experience of his family,  was sorely missing in this book, and for me, resulted in an incomplete story. Pity.

This is  my second read for the Moroccan leg of the Reading the World Challenge, and while  a better read than the first one, it still was lacking something.