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Post by onlymark on Jun 3, 2011 17:56:13 GMT
I forgot to add the next question from Anthony. It was - “Have you ever had anyone on a trip who hated it?”
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Post by Deleted on Jun 3, 2011 18:02:09 GMT
Oh, you're going to have some great stories about that!
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Post by cheerypeabrain on Jun 3, 2011 19:39:06 GMT
I hope that you don't think that ALL 54 year old ladies would behave like your unfortunate munchausen lady..... Mind you I couldn't manage without a shower and a flushing toilet these days. but when I was younger (much younger...) I would have loved to go on a trek like this....
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Post by onlymark on Jun 4, 2011 15:42:24 GMT
Kevin was a thug. He walked like a thug, he talked like a thug and he looked like a thug. From this the only conclusion I could draw when I first met him was that he was a thug, and I was sure I was right. He was about five feet six inches tall, that is around one metre sixty seven, and suffered from what could only be called, “small man syndrome.” This is a completely unmedical term but one that seems to cover the number of smaller men who compensate for their height by being more aggressive.
Throughout life they have felt to be at a physical disadvantage, starting at school where they feel that they have to prove themselves to be as tough as anyone else. Well, its my theory anyway, as uneducated as it may. Kevin had probably worked hard to promote the image of being tough and there was no let up as he got older. He was now in his mid twenties and felt no sympathy for lesser mortals.
He had very short cropped fair hair, like a skinhead, a slightly prominent jaw and eyebrows giving him a Neanderthal look. He had a bullet shaped head with no neck, perched on his shoulders as though when he was built someone dropped his head onto his body from a great height and because it was full of lead instead of brains his neck disappeared into his torso and was never seen again. He had small furtive eyes that seemed to follow you everywhere without his head turning, and they always seemed to follow pretty girls around.
One ear was in the shape of a cauliflower, caused during a fight in the middle of a rugby match, I had asked him what injuries the other guy had, Kevin said proudly, “I don’t speak ill of the dead.” He had a muscular body with short arms and legs and a barrel shaped chest. The chest he puffed out as often as he could like a latter day Mussolini whenever he was saying something he thought impressive about whatever he had done.
His manners left a lot to be desired as he seemed to believe that as all men and women are equal then he couldn’t be criticised for using his strength to push to the front of any queue he found himself in. Also when eating he usually only used a spoon to shovel in to his mouth whatever food was available, feeling free to burp and fart at will, he quickly alienated the girls in the group.
We were all sitting around chatting in a campsite a couple of nights in to the trip and finding out what people do for a living. Kevin was asked and he said he was still a student. “Studying what?” was the next question, “English Literature” was the answer. Spontaneous laughter broke out, as he was the last person we could imagine being involved in that subject. Kevin, realising he was being laughed at, flew into a rage, started shouting and swearing and stormed off not to be seen again until the next morning.
Over the course of the first few weeks of the trip he became more and more abrasive, never enough to cause real problems, just that no one wanted to be in his company. Nothing he ever saw was impressive to him and when we were in India he couldn’t believe how people could live like they do, especially the poor. I said to him that maybe they had no choice. His answer was that they should either get a job or leave the country.
I asked if he would be willing to accept them into his own country, just the odd five hundred million or so that it would take to relieve the pressure. “No way.” He said. “I don’t want those thieving bastards anywhere near my home.” “Ah hah.” Said I, “A true humanitarian.” My sarcastic humour was always lost on him but I found it funny anyway.
We were travelling between Nepal and Egypt, this involved crossing between Pakistan and Iran at a small place out in the middle of nowhere. A village split in the middle formed the border, one side being called Mirjaveh, the other side, Taftan. The Pakistan immigration formalities involved at one point queuing up at a small window where you would hand in your passport to a clerk that would fill out a register. During the busy morning period there would be a crowd of people pushing and jostling to try and pass through their documents. It was easy to tell the westerners, as they were the only ones to actually try and form a queue.
It was common practice to just try and approach from all sides and thrust your arm forward as best as you could. When we arrived I could see thirty or forty people already around the window and we tagged on and settled in for a long wait. But every time one of my group got near he or she would be forced to wait further as numerous arms snaked over them and passports were plonked through the window.
The locals seemed to know that we wouldn’t do anything to protest or cause a scene. But they didn’t know we had a secret weapon. Kevin.
I saw Kevin had been champing at the bit for some time so I asked him if he thought he could get to the front. His eyes lit up with pleasure and after cautioning him to be gentle he began to force a path through. I followed behind him and behind me came the rest of the group getting along as best as they could. Eventually we reached the window, Kevin stood to the right side and I to the left. Between us we marshalled the rest of the male members to form a rough semi-circle with the girls in front of us.
The clerk finished one passport, looked up to be confronted by a small sea of eager white faces and immediately stood up and walked out of sight to the rear of the darkened room. Typical, I thought, just as we get here it’s time for his lunch break or something. A minute or so later he returned with another man, both then sitting down at the table inside the window. I passed the first one my passport and he made an impatient gesture to get another one.
I passed him Kevin’s and he handed it to the second man, both then writing furiously in their respective registers. My groups passports were all handed through in a short amount of time while the males held off the locals from getting their arms near. As guilty as I felt for doing this I knew that we would probably still be there now waiting for a convenient opportunity to get through. We all, en masse, moved away back to the truck.
I sent off four of the group to do some food shopping, asked another four to stay with the truck to prevent any pilfering and told the rest to be back in an hour. Halfway through the village is a shop I knew where you could get ice cold drinks and I headed away to it for some peace and quiet. The shop was no more than a large room split down the middle by a counter. The walls were covered in shelves upon which were numerous items of tinned, bottled and packets of food. Scattered around were other household articles and on the floor were sacks of flour and rice.
A small corner was taken up with a display of spices, the aroma of which wafted throughout the room whenever someone entering through the open doorway sluggishly moved the still hot air. The only noise to break the peace was that of three or four flies who were buzzing around in a desultory way as though it was too hot for them as well but they felt they ought to make the effort to flit from here to there occasionally.
There were no lights inside the shop and when entering from the bright sunlight it would always take several minutes for your eyes to adjust. When I gratefully slipped inside to the cool interior I knew where I was going. Over in the far corner was always a small upturned crate set at the side of an old chest freezer. Automatically swerving around a couple of rice sacks I made my way over to it. I nodded a greeting to the small Pakistani owner who was propped up behind the counter reading a newspaper on my way through.
Electricity was intermittent at the best of times so it was always a bit of pot luck as to how cold the drinks in the freezer were going to be, I hoped today they would be nice and cold as the temperature outside was probably in the low forties centigrade. There was a system, which had to be adhered to when getting a drink out of the freezer. Normally in western society you would open the door, see what the type of drinks were and then ponder as to what selection to make, select one and then close the door. Thus releasing a lot of the cold air. No real problem as the freezer motor would then kick in and replace it. Here was different. The nearest place to here in Pakistan that could boast a somewhat regular supply of electricity was Quetta, over six hundred kilometres away.
Hence here it was expensive, only used when necessary and not to be wasted. So you would approach the freezer, open the lid and immediately close it again, hoping that you had a glimpse of what was inside. You would then think about what you would want, pull open the lid, quickly grab the bottle you wanted and close it again. Usually there was only a selection of cola, orange or lemonade anyway so the choice was never too difficult. I already knew what I wanted so I grabbed the nearest bottle of cola and closed the lid. Luckily it was very cold so I popped off the cap and sat down on the nearby crate.
I sat there in the quiet for a while, the only sounds coming from the odd truck horn away in the distance, the dry rustle of a page being turned by the shopkeeper and a couple of the flies who probably after having been sitting around bored came over to have a better look at me. I sat and contemplated the meaning of life, the way my sweat was beginning to dry and how dusty my feet were when disaster struck. Kevin walked in to the shop.
The advantage I had was that he couldn’t see me. He had come from the bright light into the gloomy interior and I was in the far corner of the room. He started looking on the shelves behind the shopkeeper but couldn’t seem to find what he wanted. He said to the man, “Toilet roll.” The man looked up from his paper but said nothing. Kevin repeated his request, “Toilet roll.” I knew the man didn’t understand English at all and he just raised his arm and motioned it in front of him as though to say, “This is all there is, see if you can find what you want” and looked down to start reading again.
Kevin started to loose his cool and raised his voice saying, “Toilet roll, f*****g toilet roll!” This I could see intimidated the man who began to point at things on the nearby shelf with a vain hope that something there was what Kevin wanted. Kevin started to go red in the face, throw his chest out and generally look as if he were pumping his body up. Kevin shouted, “I WANT F*****G TOILET ROLL!” The little shopkeeper must have understood some word or other because he grabbed hold of a packet of tissues from the counter and offered them up. This made Kevin even more angry.
He grabbed hold of them, put them up to his face and shouted, “THESE ARE FOR BLOWING YOUR F*****G NOSE YOU STUPID PAKI, NOT FOR WIPING YOUR F*****G ARSE!” Kevin made the motion of going to the toilet and using toilet paper, saying slowly and deliberately, “ I F*****G WANT TOILET PAPER!” and threw the tissues back on the counter. Kevin looked as though all he wanted to do was drag the man over the counter and beat seven shades of crap out of him. The man shrunk back wanting to get as far away from Kevin as possible. All this only took a second or two and I felt it was time to intervene.
“Kevin” I said. He turned to peer into the gloom and saw me sitting there. “Maybe he doesn’t understand English.” “Well he f*****g should do.” said Kevin. I said, “Also maybe they don’t use toilet paper.” “Well how the f**k do they go to the toilet?” “The same as anyone else except at the end they use their left hand and water". “That’s f*****g disgusting” said Kevin.
“After all these weeks and all the toilets you’ve been to have you never wondered why there was no paper and just a bucket of water or a tap?” “No” said Kevin. “I just thought all the bastards had run out of paper. I’ve had to keep using mine and now I’ve run out. This is a f*****g backward country.” I said, “Your best bet is to buy the tissues and if you do run out then do as the locals do.” “No f*****g way” he said. “I’d rather save it all up until I get home.”
With a smile on my face to soften the message I said, “I always thought you were full of shit.” He did though buy all the tissues he could find in the shop and we left after I gave the shopkeeper a small shrug and smile of apology. He waved his hand as though to say, "Think nothing of it." I think he understood.
"What would happen if you get to a border without a visa?" asked Anthony.
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Post by onlymark on Jun 4, 2011 15:43:28 GMT
I hope that you don't think that ALL 54 year old ladies would behave like your unfortunate munchausen lady..... Cheery, when you reach that age in about 15 years, let me know then.
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Post by mich64 on Jun 5, 2011 0:51:18 GMT
Okay, I am buying the book. I have to read this in its entirety. Thank you, Mich
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Post by cheerypeabrain on Jun 5, 2011 6:47:46 GMT
<simper> ;D
Seriously tho Mark...this is bloody good stuff...and what's more important is the fact that you communicate it so well. You have a way with words that both engages and amuses the reader. I know that it's probably been said before...but you could publish and make your fortune my dear... ;D
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Post by onlymark on Jun 5, 2011 8:41:09 GMT
Mich, as you please but it will be put up here more or less in it's entirety anyway. I can always send a PDF of it to any address for nothing. There will be bits I miss out as I'm tailoring the chapters in there for here. I think the books on the site they are on are overpriced anyway, especially any that have any drawing or photos in them.
Cheery, as you may have guessed from mich, it is a book. It's not made me my fortune though as it wasn't designed to do that, it was done for my family and kids to see what I got up to. When I was in the Police my family said, after I'd come out with some anecdote, I ought to write them down. But I never did and soon forgot them. I didn't want to forget again so I wrote this the year after I finished, eight or nine years ago now.
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Post by onlymark on Jun 5, 2011 9:23:04 GMT
Everyone needs a visa to be able to enter Pakistan. This is what I had been told and I had never seen any information to the contrary. But then I didn’t know Katrina.
Katrina was from Iceland, a small country of only around a quarter of a million inhabitants. Normally visas were a tit for tat thing. What I mean is that when one country begins to require that the inhabitants from another country have a visa to enter the first country then the second country soon make their own requirement that occupants of the first country need a visa to enter the second country. Know what I mean? Clear as mud I suppose, but when country A places a restriction on the entry of people of country B, country B does the same to A. Normally anyway.
On a trip from Egypt to Nepal we were to pass over the border between Iran and Pakistan, myself and sixteen others. Part of my responsibility was to ensure that the group had the required visas, dependant on their nationality, to enter all the countries we were going through. Myself and others of the group had told Katrina that she needed the visa for Pakistan but she was adamant that she didn’t. I had checked with the Pakistan Embassy in London who said she did, Katrina had also checked with her Embassy in Iceland though who told her she didn’t. I had tried to reason with her that if anyone knew for sure it would be the Pakistan Embassy themselves, but she was unwilling to accept this.
I hoped at the back of my mind that she was right because I foresaw only problems ahead. I suggested that maybe it would be wise to get one anyway when we were in Turkey. She flatly refused saying it would be a waste of money as she was certain it was not required. Katrina was a student, 19 years old, and this was her first major trip. Her parents were separated, her mother living in Iceland, her father a policeman in New York in North America. She had spent most of her time shifting between the two and understandably had not had a very happy childhood.
She seemed emotionally quite unstable and was prone to mood swings at the drop of a hat. She was also the type of person to latch on to others so she had a feeling of belonging to one group or another. I had seen her over the course of the first few weeks following around different members of the group for several days and then changing allegiance to someone else. She would then hardly speak to her first “friends” and even be critical of them to her new “friends”. This made her none too popular and as such she was quickly being alienated.
She also declared herself to be a Vegan, this being where she was sworn off eating and even wearing animal products. No one else on the trip had these personal restrictions and as such it always was a problem at meal times when she required different food to everyone else, the cooks each day being members of the group who took turns on a rotational basis. If someone had an allergy to a particular item, or was unable to eat something for a medical reason then I had every sympathy for them and would make sure that they were catered for.
But when it was a personal choice, it was something they just disliked, then I left it up to them to sort it out. I didn’t ensure a special meal was prepared for them and felt that if they didn’t like part of the meal then they should just leave it out. Otherwise it could become far to complicated with a large group of people and everyone having their own preferences. I tried to make it clear that when it was your turn to cook then you made whatever you wanted as long as allowances were made for anyone with a medical problem, otherwise if it was a personal choice and you didn’t like it, then leave it. I had an aversion to pasta, so I never dictated that it shouldn’t be prepared, I just didn’t eat it if it was. Later on, in India, Katrina had one of her turns to cook. She made what she always made which was pasta and a tomato sauce. Anticipating this I had previously bought some bread and with this in hand I approached the serving table.
Katrina was serving out the pasta and as I got to the head of the queue she went to offer me some. I said no thank you and moved to get some of the tomato. Katrina said to me, “Don’t you want any pasta?” I said, “ No thanks, I don’t like it.” “I hate fussy eaters.” She said. “But you are the one that is the Vegan!” I said. “Yes, but that is out of choice.” “Well I choose not to eat pasta.” I said. “Why do you have to be so difficult?” she asked. “I think you’ve missed the point here.” I said, “I eat everything but not pasta, you seem to eat nothing BUT pasta. Who is the one that is being difficult?”
I knew I couldn’t win so I stared to move away. Behind me was a tall, blond, athletic Canadian guy who Katerina had taken a shine to. She loaded his plate up with the pasta and said, “There you are sweet thing, you have plenty, you know good food when you see it.” An ironic half smile formed on his lips as he passed by me.
Anyway, I digress. We had travelled all the way through Iran and had reached the Pakistan border. It was Katrinas turn to go through the Immigration procedure to enter Pakistan. Predictably they refused her entry because of not having a visa. I know she would have protested quite strongly but I wasn’t there to witness it. All I knew was that the Immigration Official was firm in the requirements and would not allow her entry. The problem was then that to continue she had to get a visa. Luckily about eighty kilometres back in to Iran was a town called Zahedan, which had a Pakistan Embassy.
Unfortunately it was now mid afternoon so I quickly arranged a local man with a pick up to take Katrina and myself back to the town. On arrival we found that we were just too late and the office had closed. There was no alternative but to spend the night there. I had been quite apprehensive about doing so as the place had a threatening air to it. It was close to the border with Pakistan and Afghanistan and near to the main drug smuggling routes. The town was full of unsavoury characters and we sought refuge in what looked to be a reasonable hotel. As we tried to book in for the night the receptionist asked to see our passports.
We gave them to him and he said we would receive them back in the morning. They had to be seen by the military and police in the town. Katrina was not happy with this, snatched hers back and demanded that she give her photocopy and keep the original. This was not acceptable so an argument began between the receptionist and Katrina. I knew it was a risk but it was beginning to get dark and I didn’t want to be wandering around this town at night. The receptionist finally persuaded her when he said, “If you want to keep your passport then you don’t stay here. You must find somewhere else, we don’t have to give you a room.”
I asked her if she wanted to search for different accommodation, she didn’t so she handed back her passport. The next problem we had was that we had no food for the evening, there being non available in the hotel, this entailed a foray in to the streets. By now it was dark but I had seen a small restaurant nearby. We walked quickly to it but on entering Katrina realised that as most Iranian meals involve meat, her being a Vegan, that she didn’t want to eat there and she would just buy something from a shop.
At first we were in a fairly quiet area but as we moved on there were more and more people around, or rather more and more men around, no women to be seen. We managed to find a shop cum takeaway and while Katrina bought some biscuits I had a very nice kebab and pickles thank you very much. On stepping out of the shop a tall hard looking Afghani man came up behind Katrina, in between me and her and sweeping his arm up from low down he grabbed her between the legs. Katrina let out a yelp and he let go.
I turned to face him, I don’t know what I was going to do but I was very angry. Katrina grabbed hold of my arm and began to try and drag me across the road, the Afghani walking away with a cruel smile on his face. She was right, discretion being the better part of valour. We made it back to the hotel without incident and decided not to venture out again.
Early the next morning we left the hotel, with our passports, and made our way back to the Pakistan Embassy. It was more like a bungalow set in its own garden in what looked like a better area of the town. The reception was open so we got the required application form and sat down with several other locals, all I assume going through the same process. After Katrina filled out the form we handed it back to the receptionist and I asked how long it would take to issue the visa.
She asked our nationalities and I explained the visa was just for Katrina, from Iceland, but I was British. She said it would be ready today probably. We had nowhere else to go so we settled down to wait. And wait we did....and wait.....and wait. There was nothing to read so I examined my passport from cover to cover in minute detail, I counted all the bricks in the walls, paid great attention to my fingernails, stood up and paced off the room, did mental calculations as to area and volume, worked out that if the room was filled with coffee then it would take the average person one hundred and sixty four years, seven months and five days to drink it at an average consumption of one litre per day.
But then I thought the milk would probably be sour by then and I realised I had not taken in to account the volume of sugar required and if it would fully dissolve or how much I would need to factor in to the equation. I gave up. Whilst all these thoughts were happening it was difficult not to notice that the heat was gradually building and building. The room had open windows but there wasn’t a breath of wind. Sweat was beginning dampen all my clothing and I was sure I was starting to get something like bedsores on my backside from sitting for so long.
Just as it couldn’t seem to get any hotter I saw the receptionist go outside and close the room shutters plunging us into darkness, relatively anyway from the bright sun light. The room quickly got even more stuffy and as she returned I asked why we were now closed in. Sand, she informed me. A second or two later I understood. The wind rose and a smalls and storm had arrived. I could hear the sand battering at the shutters and walls outside and I realised that that was also why there wasn’t a shred of paint anywhere on the outside of the building.
A few minutes later it died as quickly as it had started and the shutters were opened once more. The heat was still intense as a man I had not seen before popped his head around the corner of the room and beckoned for Katrina and myself to follow him. This is a problem, I thought, as normally when applying in person for a visa you just sat and waited in the reception until the formalities were done and eventually handed back your passport.
We were led to the rear of the bungalow and shown in to another room the door quickly being closed behind us, our escort staying out side. There were several differences between this room and the first. This one was an office with soft furnishings and a large wooden desk. Sitting behind the desk was a Pakistani man, about fifty years old and smartly dressed in a suit. One major difference was that this room had air conditioning, the unit blowing out, or rather spluttering out as it seemed quite old, a steady stream of cold air.
The man behind the desk asked us to sit down. There were two comfortable arm chairs next to his desk and in between was a small, highly polished wooden table. I noticed on this was a tea set, a flask of water and a plate full of biscuits and small cakes. The man introduced himself as the Deputy Ambassador and asked that we help ourselves to refreshments adding that the water was quite safe as it was bottled and very cold.
He actually cautioned us not to drink the water too quickly as it would make us ill being so cold! This was a bit unbelievable, the drastic and sudden change in circumstances. I was going to make the most of it but I was still wary and unsure why he wanted to see us. It was not polite to ask straight away so we sat and made small talk for some time. I noticed he was more interested in talking to me and was asking me about Britain all the time, maybe, I thought, he had relatives there.
Eventually I plucked up the courage and asked if there was a problem with the visa application for Katrina. He assured me that there wasn’t and it would be ready in due course. I was still perplexed but decided to have some more tea and cake to pass the time. He was asking me about where I had travelled to, where I was going and had I travelled around Britain at all. He then asked me if I had been to Glasgow. “Yes” I said, wondering if this was where his relatives were.
I knew that Glasgow had a bit of a reputation of being a tough place and certain areas were difficult to live in. He then said, “I am soon to be promoted and posted there, can you tell me about it, I’ve never been to Britain?” Oh dear, thought I. This is the reason he has invited us in. Do I tell him the bad bits with the good or shall I keep him sweet because at the back of my mind I had this thought about the messenger of bad tidings being killed in ancient times. I decided to play it safe knowing that it was unlikely I would ever bump into this man again. Also I noticed that Katrinas passport was sitting on his desk in front of him along with several others. “It’s a wonderful place.” I said. “There is very little crime and the people are very friendly and welcoming.” He began to ask me more specific questions about schooling for his children, about health care, the cost of housing, how much a car would be and the cost of living. I tried to paint a rosy picture for him all the time hoping that the visa would be ready as soon as possible. After a further half an hour or so he seemed to be satisfied with my answers and ran out of questions. Just then the first man I had seen, the escort, knocked and came into the room with a sheet of paper.
The Deputy Ambassador took it from him, scanned down the page, signed it and handed it back, the man then departing. I don’t think Katrina saw it but I recognised it as being her visa application. He then picked up her passport from the desk. opened it and as I leaned over towards him I saw him sign the visa stuck inside. He then handed it to me, apologised for the wait and said, “If you leave now you will catch the border before it closes.”
We thanked him for the tea and refreshments and just as we were leaving he said, “Maybe we will meet again in Glasgow.” I bloody hope not, I thought. I ushered Katrina out the door and we made a quick exit.
Anthony asked, “What are those holes for?”
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Post by mich64 on Jun 5, 2011 16:53:49 GMT
Holes, hmmm, that does sound intriguing. It is amazing to me how unpleasant people can be. But, if there were not people like this, there would not be interesting stories to read and to be entertained by. Cheers, Mich
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Post by Deleted on Jun 5, 2011 17:54:35 GMT
If the holes are in the vehicle, I can imagine (incorrectly most likely) a number of possible reasons.
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Post by bjd on Jun 5, 2011 18:29:36 GMT
I just got here after a few days away to find this interesting set of tales. Good stuff, Mark. Many of the countries you talk about are places I would have liked to visit but unfortunately never got around to doing so. This is not a travel book, but it's the next best thing.
I'm sure your kids and grandchildren will enjoy reading this. I'm sure you will too, since the reading will bring back memories of funny stuff. It's interesting how we often remember the funny stuff, even though at the time, it's the difficult bits that seem important.
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Post by onlymark on Jun 5, 2011 18:33:07 GMT
You're right bjd. Lonely Planet et al have travel books, and usually they are very good. I just wanted to jot down a few stories.
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Post by bjd on Jun 5, 2011 18:36:38 GMT
Actually, by "travel books" I mean books in which someone talks about going somewhere and describes the place, people as well as talking about his impressions of the place. I don't mean guide books.
Your stories are more about the people you were driving and nannying, with occasional descriptions of places which really describe it well -- like the border with people shoving their arms into the window, or the shop with the freezer.
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Post by onlymark on Jun 5, 2011 18:39:40 GMT
Here's a clue -
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Post by Deleted on Jun 5, 2011 18:43:13 GMT
Well, that's not the vehicle. That makes me guess at unsuccessful attempts at wells.
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Post by onlymark on Jun 5, 2011 18:44:17 GMT
I understand what you mean now. Those tend to follow a journey and describe well things about it, be it people or places etc. There was no one journey I did (apart from one example at the end of this) that had numerous interesting things about it. I just grabbed hold of different memories from loads of them and stuck them together with a general theme of Anthony ( a real bloke by the way who did ask me all sorts of things) bringing them out.
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Post by onlymark on Jun 5, 2011 18:46:38 GMT
That makes me guess at unsuccessful attempts at wells. Looks like they needed a diviner, no? But don't you think they look like craters from a 'stick' of bombs? Out of a B52 or some such plane?
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Post by onlymark on Jun 5, 2011 18:48:20 GMT
I forgot, I wasn't shot at, but it came close one time (if that's what you were thinking) - story later.
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Post by Deleted on Jun 5, 2011 19:17:25 GMT
Much too perfectly aligned for bombs, as far as I am concerned.
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Post by onlymark on Jun 5, 2011 20:08:01 GMT
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Post by bixaorellana on Jun 5, 2011 23:58:29 GMT
Aaaarrrrgghhh ~~ I was sort of screaming inside while reading this installment.
Having been through the paperwork process repeatedly here, before finally getting permanent residency, I always caution people going to immigration to take every bit of documentation with them. Inevitably there are few who will insist, "But they didn't tell me to take such&such." Sheesh, take it anyway, what can it hurt?! The next time I see the person, amazing to relate, it turns out they had to make an extra trip in order to present some document they stubbornly refused to take along on the previous visit.
I was mentally shaking Katrina and yelling in her face, "Just get the #!%^&! visa!!"
Gad, I don't know how you put up with it all. The part that really got me was where you drove 80 km back to the town with her, leaving the others to shift for themselves, and then she denied you a meal in a sit-down restaurant because she didn't want to eat there.
The Deputy Ambassador (how big was this town, anyway?) was interesting. What's so dreadful about Glasgow, that you felt you had to sugar-coat it?
This is my absolutely favorite kind of travel writing -- the kind with the non-glamorous stuff included -- and you do a bang-up job. More, please, sir?
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Post by onlymark on Jun 6, 2011 8:19:29 GMT
The town had a population of about half a million. But because it was close to the border it had an embassy. Glasgow has a reputation of being quite rough and violent. No one in their right mind would really want to live there.
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Post by onlymark on Jun 6, 2011 8:37:25 GMT
For all the bad press Iran gets I actually rather like it. The people are amongst the friendliest anywhere I have been, the history is amazing and the scenery, being mostly desert, suits me fine. There are areas of green, lush vegetation but usually it is a rocky and desolate place, not a desert in the rolling sand dunes interpretation of the word but grand vistas of nothing with hills and mountains sprinkled around for added interest.
When you travel around Iran you see many doughnut shaped mounds of earth looking very much like a crater. These you see one after another in long lines cutting through the countryside. When I first saw one of these lines I stopped and went to look. I saw a circle of earth about ten metres in diameter, about one to two metres high with a large hole in the middle. The circle nearly always had a small break in it where the ground had been packed firmly down forming access from outside the circle.
It looked like some giant in the distant past had formed a doughnut out of the earth, took one bite out of it then thrown it down in disgust. Or better still there were any number of giants whose favourite game was the one where you throw a ring from a distance over a small post thrust into the ground. They then got fed up with it and moved on fifty metres leaving behind the ring but taking the post and starting again. This they did over and over until there was a line of holes and rings stretching in a straight line for a few kilometres to a nearby village.
The hole in the centre I saw to be very deep, I threw a stone down but couldn’t hear it land. I tried again and this time heard a faint “thunk” as it hit the bottom. Trying to remember my schoolboy maths as to the speed of a falling object and acceleration due to gravity I was going to time the fall and try and work out how deep the hole was. After screwing my eyes up, breaking out into a sweat, mumbling about the Leaning Tower of Pisa I eventually gave up and we came up with a better and more accurate solution. We used a stone tied onto a length of fishing line from the kite we flew from time to time and lowered it down until we hit the bottom.
We then marked off the line, pulled it up and strung it out on the floor. We paced the distance off and found the hole to be eighty five metres deep. We all then took a step or two back from the edge in respect. The craters we could see set out perfectly straight heading towards a village. We repeated the measurement with the next two and found them to be of about the same depth. Not then knowing what these were for we all had a theory.
The best was that they were a legacy from the Iran/Iraq war when some plane had released a set of bombs to target and destroy the village. We walked back to the road to discuss the mystery further when a car pulled up to us. It was one of the old style originally English made Hillman Hunters with a family in it. I don’t mean the English made the family as well, only the car. I’m sure that the Hillman factory sold to Iran all their old tooling when they went out of business. All around the country you see masses of Hunters and the crappy Hillman Avenger, still probably being made in great quantities.
Anyway, I digress. The family was in fact typically Iranian. All curious, all smiles, wanting to know if we needed help, always carrying water and food, which they would always offer to us and wanting to invite us home for a good Persian meal. The truck drivers I found to be the same. Whenever you passed a lay-by they would always be drinking tea and shout to you to stop, offering their glass to you. Part curiosity, part religion and part friendliness.
I assured the family as best as I could we were fine then pointed to the craters with a quizzical look on my face. The man paused for a second or two as though he was thinking about how he could explain it to me how they were made without words and then jumped out of his car and went quickly around to the boot and flung it open. I was curious to know if he had an unexploded bomb or something similar in there.
My imagination started up again as I was wondering if Iran was so dangerous that it was common practice to carry the odd piece of artillery and anti aircraft gun around with you when going out for a quiet Sunday drive. Maybe it was a factory fitted extra when you bought the car. But no, he pulled out a container of water, pointed to it and then the line of craters.
I still looked puzzled so he then went into an elaborate pantomime with us all gathered around him. It was the strangest game of Charades, in the strangest place, I had ever played. The British television programme of “Give us a Clue” had nothing on us as we attempted to decipher the story. We were in the middle of a dusty nowhere, in forty five degree heat jumping up and down and slapping each others backs as we understood more and more.
He was gesturing to the hills where the line seemed to begin, pointing to the water and nodding his head up and down. Then turning to face the village where the line ended and shaking his head side to side. We understood, the hills had water, the village didn’t. He then mimed a man digging and digging a large hole near the hills and jumping for joy when he found the water. He mimed digging hole after hole, wiping the sweat from his brow and having a glass of tea after each one, in towards the village.
I couldn’t understand though at first that the digger had only found water at the first hole and no subsequent one. A bit of a waste of effort I thought. Then he continued with the mime. He went down the hole in the village and dug through underground to the bottom of the next hole, popping up, so he mimed, for yet another glass of tea. This he continued all along the line until the last but one hole.
He then mimed taking off his clothes, digging through to the last hole where the water was, and swimming then down stream all the way back to the village, popping out like a cork. The village then had water. The swimming bit I think the man was having a joke with us about but it all made for a good ending. He then mimed having parties feasts and dancing to celebrate the coming of the stream.
So at last we understood, though the method of construction was debatable. The family, after giving us a bag of sweets piled in to their car and drove of to a loud blaring of the horn and plenty of waving goodbye.
Anthony asked, “Have you ever been arrested?”
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Post by onlymark on Jun 6, 2011 8:43:12 GMT
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Post by Deleted on Jun 6, 2011 9:47:47 GMT
Ah, so my unsuccessful guess was that they were an unsuccessful attempt at wells rather than a successful one. It does seem like a lot of extra and unnecessary work to dig so many holes.
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Post by onlymark on Jun 6, 2011 11:36:01 GMT
Technically, splitting hairs etc, they are not wells as individually they don't have water, only the first one has and they build a tunnel to channel it to the town. But I know you know that.
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Post by bjd on Jun 6, 2011 11:38:27 GMT
Glasgow has a reputation of being quite rough and violent. No one in their right mind would really want to live there. Glasgow has improved. My daughter spent a year there at university and really liked the place.
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Post by bjd on Jun 6, 2011 11:39:55 GMT
I can understand your liking for Iranians too -- all those I have met, abroad of course, have been extremely nice and friendly people.
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Post by onlymark on Jun 6, 2011 12:29:59 GMT
I'm glad Glasgow is changing. It's about time.
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