12 March, 2013
Prague might be a seedy old town, especially if you hang out on the tourist strip on either side of and upon the Charles Bridge. But it also has some unexpected corners and surprises.
Refreshing to see the old man mixing it in with the pastel buildings:
Appropriately, road workers were pulling and repairing tram tracks:
So what’s in Prague 3? That would have to include the Prophets of Prague …
9 November, 2012
The Germans are a strange people, as anyone can attest. Take the trains. At each entry door one finds the following image:
It took me a while to figure this one out. And then the insight came: in order to board a train, you need to pull your head into your shoulders, lean right back and then lift a leg to board the train. Quite a feat with some heavy baggage, either external to your body or as a result of devoted consumption of those ubiquitous Würste. I understand this approach does wonders for your lower back.
30 October, 2012
Two weeks of perpetual motion thus far: Beijing, along the Chang Jiang (‘Yangtze’) for three days, Wuhan, Frankfurt and then all night (unplanned) on trains and stations in the Romanian countryside, Baia Mare in Transylvania, and then more trains to Berlin. A few preliminary images; reflections later.
Heartwarming to see Lenin posters about. There should be more, many more.
I guess you can really do this only in China.
But now it gets a little more interesting:
For this is none other than the bed of the younger Mao and his wife – when they lived in Wuhan. So this is, as I observed when we were ushered in, where it happened.
Couldn’t resist sharing the same space … until I was sternly reprimanded by the staff.
I really must get a sign like this for home.
But then, after 60 hours of travel, most of it on multiple trains, I was in Romania.
I spent some time hanging out with the locals in Transylvania, in the mountains and villages.
From the old woman’s house, we stumbled across the local distillery.
That small mug was full of Palincă, plum brandy. He handed it to me and said ‘drink up’ …
Which is probably why I agreed to wear some local winter gear.
Thankfully, I was not alone in enjoying such delights.
30 September, 2012
Another travel story on Voyages on the Left, this time about the long-haul rail journey I have done most, more times than I care to remember – the XPT train between Sydney and Melbourne.
2 June, 2012
Each time I go to China I enjoy it all the more, so much so that it is one of the places in the world where I can easily imagine living
This time we received something of a rock-star welcome to the Nishan Forum at Confucius’ home town:
The nuance was perhaps not clear to all … but more was to come:
When one drew near, they ushered one in:
At a few moments, I was able to catch the excited teenagers beneath:
Being the official Australian VIP representative at an event that was as political as it was intellectual, I made a mental note to let Julia G know I had not put in one good word for her.
Which means:
But after a few days of rubbing shoulders with former presidents, advisers, ambassadors and communist government officials, of police escorts and road closures wherever we went, of a massive press battery filming and snapping, of being mobbed for endless photos with students (I kid you not), I had had enough.
I was keen on more ordinary life, whether with a group of old musos in a park at night:
Some local Shandong food from around the lake::
A lift in a beaten up motorised tricycle (the only suspension on them is what flesh you might have on your bum, although they will soon be a thing of the past):
Or indeed a glorious squat toilet on the slow overnight train I took from Jinan to Xi’an:
I was after some decent Chinglish:
The more esoteric, the better:
At one moment I realised I could no longer rely on pinyin, for in a quiet corner I found a toilet and stood bamboozled. No pinyin, no symbol for male and female; only Chinese characters. I guess you always have a 50% chance of being right, but I’d prefer to be able to read that script.
I must admit that I pondered whether the chubby ruling class women of the Tang Dynasty of 618-907 (for that was the aesthetic then) had very flat ears after sleeping on pillows like this:
By this time I was in the old imperial city of Xi’an, where I had to sing for my supper and accommodation at Shaanxi Normal University:
Supper consisted of a comprehensive walk along the endless ‘snack street’ – street food steaming, boiling, frying in all manner of fashions. Hadn’t dared until now, but my hosts tucked in. So I did too.
Finally I met an old friend who reassured me it was all perfectly good for you:
12 January, 2012
Roland Boer lists the top ten tips for using toilets on Chinese trains on an Australian travel advice website.
“Grab firmly the handrail directly before you,” he writes.
“It is there for a purpose. Even though it may look as though previous users have balanced on one foot blind-folded while the train is racing around a curve, you should by no means try to emulate them.”
Sent a shitload of traffic to the Aussie travel site.
3 December, 2011
Many people in that strange country between Canada and Mexico like to deride their national rail line, Amtrak. But having crossed four of the six continents on the globe that you can cross by train, Amtrak stands up bloody well. It’s relatively cheap, comfortable and efficient. And probably to best way to see the country. On this crossing it was the California Zephyr from San Francisco to Chicago, and then the Lakeshore Limited on to Boston.
As slow as a Romanian train on a bad day, rolling over wooden sleepers and rocking rails, by canyons and mesas, the ghosts of cannibals and their victims at in the Sierra Nevada, Butch Cassidy territory, Mormons and their harems, masses of divorcees in divorce-friendly Reno and the national cowboy poetry festival in Elko (Nevada) – the California Zephyr took us through some of the most spectacular landscape of the USA. The first and perhaps still most famous of the cross-continental railway lines, completed in 1869, the Zephyr traverses towering ranges, 3000 metre mountain passes, glaciers, wide deserts and lush plains. The Lakeshore Limited is a popular service, skirting the great lakes, through the maples and hippies of up-state New York and then into that other USA, Massachusetts.
A few pictures (click on each to see a larger version):
30 November, 2011
Budapest Keleti station, late October 2011, before boarding an overnight to Berlin, via the Czech Republic and Slovakia.
29 October, 2011
As some of you may know, I have recently spent a week in Transylvania with some of the best hosts in the world. It began in Bucharest, from where I took the ‘express’ to Baia Mare, the second last stop on the route.
‘Express’ meant it stopped at every second station, and in between it rolled along at a very leisurely pace – absolutely the best way to travel. 14 hours it took, for 690km:
Once in Transylvania (Maramureş to be exact) I enjoyed the mating rituals of the locals:
Was intrigued by the burial practices:
Was drawn to diabolically spicy Reformed churches:
And even more alluring Orthodox churches in the villages:
I even went to a rock concert:
But what really intrigued me was the fact that students and professors have different toilets – the professors a type of unisex arrangement:
Throughout this time, I kept being offered clear liquid in plastic bottles, which I naturally thought was water. Ţuică is its name, I was told, although I couldn’t figure out why it was served in small earthenware vessels and had a rather fiery taste. Which is probably why I thought this was the main road home:
By the time I realised I had been swilling the 60% proof plum-brandy, the locals were ready to celebrate my departure with gay abandon:
Can’t wait to return …
15 September, 2011
We should have but one slogan – to learn the art of war properly and put the railways in order. To wage a socialist revolutionary war without railways would be rank treachery.
Lenin, Collected Works, vol. 27, p. 108
