Travel
The age-old elixir.
Heaps of stuff on here so pick and choose as you very well please.
Longform travelogues
If I slotted these in here they'd make the whole webpage unbearably long, but they are jam-packed full of sharp insights and meandering witticisms. I promise. Check 'em out.
If a shorter read tickles your pickle, you can see some swifter pieces down here.
Ooh lah.
Big up Benny Franklin
What a resplendent Riviera.
Scenes from a sodden city.
From Dublin to Cobh.
Four details. Feast your eyes.
Thanks a lot, Sturgeon.
Sparkly and full of cheese.
Mad country, trust me.
Shorter pieces
For when you've got 6 or 7 measly minutes to pass and the doom-scroll just isn't quite cutting the mustard.
Between Spaces: north on the 63
I woke up, walked through the living space and swung open the dew-riddled window. The clouds had packed their fluffy bags and disembarked in great numbers overnight, leaving the steep faces of the fjordside to contrast stunningly with the crisp blue sky. The greenness that had yesterday been muted and obscured now rendered Geiranger a postcard of abundant life. I could see for hundreds of metres down the icy waters of the famous, winding fjord. The scene was as healthy and stimulating as the most fertile of snapshots.
The thing about writing of Norway’s splendour is that you’re at constant, titillating risk of delivering sickening, over-romanticised articulations. The other thing is that they’re pretty much always true; if anything, you’re under-egging what your eyes see and your brain grapples to process. Black coffee is even something altogether more special when you’re steeped amid the majestic, metamorphic valley of a UNESCO Heritage Site. That fragrant, wakening vapour rises in the foreground; those waterfalls plummet beyond.
We drove north towards Trollstigen. Being en-route somewhere new is almost always a privilege, but taking that on to the tune of snaking, mountainous roads is something else entirely. Were we high or were the clouds? Or both? Wispy, misty numbers slinked over the car and the sheer scale of the landscape led us to stop more than once. In new light we hit a patch of flat land, and in the distance once more the regularity of snow capped peaks increased. These commanding cornices cast their eyes over large lakes and dotted settlements. This is the central western region of Norway, but it could well be heaven. We stopped by a freezing cold stream; its surface kissed the wind and shivered. We chowed down on Ritz crackers and smoked mackerel fillets in a sweet tomato sauce. Onwards through the labyrinth of lakes, past the absurdly picturesque Eids Vand, by ferry from Eidsdal to Linge, and eventually alongside Alnesvatnet. All seemingly shrug with disinterest, content in their own enduring glory.
​Between Spaces: Oslo airport to Bodø to Å
Last night I slept at Heathrow. Tonight I am sleeping in a cold hard corner of Oslo airport. This is, I’d like to think, a nice little binary to the scenes that Lofoten will undoubtedly hurl at me in less than twenty-four hours. It is a narrative necessity. In the absence of conflict we turn to contrast. Around me, people settle into their own necks. They jostle and shimmy and shiver, for the perpetual hour of the airport kip has touched down. It never took off.
I sit upright on a chair and jot a petty poem:
This marble floor
reflects up
the carefully marketed
emblems on self-serve
kiosks.
It reflects down and echoes back,
The squeeks of feet that drop —
post-half-caring polish
by the fellow on the machine,
with his legs crossed
and hand on chin.
Big white canvases
on the ceiling,
waiting for something to happen.
Waiting, as a notion, is almost entirely negligent of the present, isn’t it? And you can attempt to ameliorate that negligence, say, by reading or writing or enjoying music, but ultimately these are just tools providing means of a more soothing wait. Hell, writing about waiting is hardly me seizing the possibilities of now.
Now’s gone again.
And again.
My eyelids have put on weight, but Bodø ferry port has been rather beautiful today. There’s hardly a cloud to be seen. I revel at just what becomes of that old waiting phenomena (7 hours, might I add) when you’ve got bright blue water before you, people coming and going, and some nice little settlements to spot and zoom on beyond the bay. Ergonomically, as aesthetically, ‘isklar’ bottled water is amongst the best in modern memory — not only does it hydrate in the (confusing) chilly heat, but it has a marvellous crystalline design and caters to the natural grooves of one’s hand.
Enough of this.
On the ferry at last, I revel in the folding of the water before us, and speak to a fellow from Germany who’s also travelling solo. He has just broken up with his fiance, and in the ensuing crisis of confidence booked a one way ticket to Scandinavia. He tells me that nature is his tonic, and that he never ever wants to speak to his ex again. I don’t ask any pressing questions. I tell him about Oslo airport and enquire as to his view on waiting.
The journey across Vestfjord is so scenic as to be resplendent. It takes between three and four hours, but this time doesn’t drag. My eyelids, it would appear, have engaged in some circuit training, and are shedding some pounds. Once we arrive at the port, I bid farewell to my new German friend and embark on my tod, on foot, from Mosekenes to Å. Though weary, the weight on my back is eased by the views to my left as I hug the 5k route by the shoreline. The fading light lends the sky a pretty pink hue, foregrounded by rorbuers of crimson reds and vivid yellows.
Now there’s a map on the table to my left, next to wonky candles on a slate slab and a coffee-stained cup of once-white tin.
The Lofoten Islands are a scintillating, sporadic strip of semi-land off Norway’s northwestern coastline. The Islands are a gem of nature, an almost incomprehensibly beautiful scene of winding coastal roads and jagged peaks, strutting up out the fjord waters like benevolent watchmen. I’m here to spend a week in its southern towns.
Tomorrow I will head to Reinebringen. It’s closed off but it’s not, if you know what I mean. I’m hopeful of sweeping views across the blue waters surrounding Reine, beyond the flapping Tibetan prayer flags of various colours. For now, I need to do something about my eyelids.
​The lake slightly west of Å
The lake slightly West of Å is Z, you’d have thought, or perhaps alphabets don’t run backwards.
Nonetheless it’s astounding and vast, with lingering, low clouds that drift in over the mountains at the far end. I meander on loosely-defined paths to a mound about a third of the way up the northern side, where I settle and watch the birds fly their rotational routes. The breeze-led water renews itself indefinitely. I play the Interstellar soundtrack. It is, as per, doused in wonder. The realm surrounding me is likewise, but its richness and simultaneous quiet prevents me from absorbing or responding to the music with any concise purity. I am immersed in the chasm of the lake, the light lap of water on the valleyside but a servant to the otherwise total silence. A chill flicks my cheeks.
A bit away, there’s a small building dark brown against the mucky green of the late summer shrubs. Unlike in the fishing villages — where lines of bright fishermen rorbuers hug the fjordsides — this building is the only semblance of human life for hundreds of metres.
After half-hour, a number of photographs and some shorts from Borges’ exquisite Labyrinths, I continue with slippery steps through odd marsh to see a gentleman stood outside the brown house, motioning rhythmically with his hands beneath the doorway. Drawing closer, I make out the small switchblade in his left hand and the fish in his right. His downward swipes rid the large catch of its scales; some swirl in the lake-wind and fall dorment on scarce trodden land, others drop into a bucket on a stone plinth beside him.
‘Hello’.
‘Hi’.
‘Any trouble with the neighbours recently?’ — I smile to mask a mild wince.
‘They are pretty quiet’.
I laugh and introduce myself. He does the same. His name is Per.
Built strong, his close-crop brown hair greys at the points it furls from his fishing beanie. With small spectacles half way down his nose and grey overalls beneath a thick navy jacket, he responds to my comments on his relative seclusion, on its certain peace and simplicity.
‘It is not so like it’. I throw a quick glance around me at nothing but air and shimmering grassland. Noting my sarcastic move, he continues. ‘I know. Here is very peaceful. I fish and read, mostly. I see some people every day, like you, walk past ‘til it gets dark, then I cook and sleep. But the villages and trails are taking more tourism. They need care.’
Sensing his direction, I ask how long he’s lived here (‘in this hut four years, but I’ve spent most of my life on Lofoten’), and then whether he’s seen the landscape change much in recent times. He pauses for a second, swipes the last few scales off the fish in his hand, and continues.
‘Yes. I have. It’s not terrible, but it’s happening. Many feet means more er…erosion’.
He stutters a touch, unsure of his enunciation. ‘Some days in summers I see lots walking. They enjoy the cliffs, sure, and the fish, but some leave trash behind. Only some. I do wonder…when they take off their boots — do they care about the village of Å? About Reine, Moskenes or Hamnøy ? Or do they care for how it looks in their photos?’.
I think of the camera in my backpack, and nod in a sort of instinctive, ironic, and self-denying motion. I am unsure what to say. He puts the fish aside and enters the doorway. For a second, I wonder if that is it. Fine, Scandinavian brevity. He returns with a black sack slack from his scaley hand. It is full of plastic and other content cast aside in the past month. In July he’d filled up three. I’ve no wince mask now. My stomach drops, as do his eyes. I want to reassure him. I want to come up with something wise and touching, but I just stand there and look around a little.
As a result, I linger for longer than is ok. He takes this well, asks me if I’d like coffee, and we sit on two low chairs by his doorway. For a while we talk about Norway, about England, about fish, literature, and the admirable, perilous provision of free University tuition. Per used to be an academic in Tromso.
From the lake’s depths creeps dusk, and over the peaks it meets us. I shake his hand strongly and apologise for delaying his dinner.
‘Great to meet you, Per’.
A minute in Barcelona
I am currently sitting in the 'silence and seclusion' section of Basilica de Sagrada Familia. It is stunning here. The murmur of tourism is all around. I am on my own and silent. Ahead, clergy seats and a purple hue of marble steps lead up to the altar, above which an elaborate stone crucifix is surrounded by an ornate parasol. The parasol is inscribed with red letters, and from the shelter falls little orange lanterns all around the age-old figurine. Christ on the cross looks up.
As do I.
The stained glass windows mock a rainbow’s spectrum for being primitive. Toward the ceiling, there is an appearance of a light mist, a distortion of the sun coming in through the yellows and reds and lingering just there, accepting eyes and thoughts. The coloured glass gets more translucent further up the height of the basilica.
The roof is unbelievably intricate, adorned with symbols and symmetrical shapes that point to the cathedral's structural beams, all the way down to me, a non-believer in awe of the aesthetics.
Attached to some of the central columns are small crosses with unlit candles beneath them. On the left side — beyond the altar as I face it, heat beams in bright yellow and blinds me. The stained glass holds names of saints. There are more camera phones to the heights than eyes.
...a few minutes more than that
I didn’t sleep for very long at Manchester Airport. I kept coming to. Looking up dreary eyed I’d see my reflection in the glass roof.
The comings and goings of a nail salon at an airport are really very weird have you ever noticed? Many many women spanning from young partygoers to the faux-glitz elderly came and went worrying about the way the little hard bits at the end of their fingers are coloured and getting advice from a woman about the right shade or maintenance and upkeep.
Beyond that there's a ridiculous atomic fiery background on a Duty Free poster — ‘Be seductive...and feel special'. All in a bottle, that. Or a little glass vessel. The 'be' is highlighted in pink. Active voice, lovely lovely stuff.
​
***
On the train from Barcelona airport to my friend’s apartment in the city, draped shades of oranges and reds and some greens slack from the verandas of tall thin housing blocks. Washing blows lightly in the wind. Everywhere there’s discoloured brick, and round the curve sit squat trees and lines of lettuce or cabbage in pale brown dirt. Three guys around me also look out for a stop they're not sure of.
Eventually there stands Marta, primary school teacher extraordinaire, multilingual madam of wander and sonder. Big red coat, big gold earrings, smile beaming and a big embrace. We have lunch and a coffee with a cigarette outside. She draws a map. It has a key.
I work my way through the metro trying to decipher the key. Failing somewhat, I lean on my common sense. This has never been a particularly good idea. Paral-lel. Sagrada familia. L5, not L10. Dufus! Diagonal. That's the actual name of a station. Fontana. Streets here look cool. I am very tired though because I was staring at the altogether underwhelming roof of Manchester Airport all night. I will sleep.
Marta's flat is largely wooden and old, so I have a glass of milk. Big oak beams line the ceiling, and there's a little dust on the bookshelves next to Spanish encyclopaedias and select fictions. When she gets back, we have beer and listen to jazz in the front room. Out to a square for a couple, where I learn how to ask for two beers in a glass in Catalan. I enter the top 10 most cultured souls on planet earth, but for a mere twelve seconds, because Marta corrects my pronunciation and I’m a desolate, ignorant sod. We go to a tapas bar called Gastarea. Now this place is very lovely and I think I love it very much. Standing by the far bar, we eat a selection of delectable dishes, none more so than Iberian tenderloin in mustard sauce. 'You see, Gracias is Spanish but Merci is Catalan'.
After some red wine in Sol de Nit and some cigarettes on the stone floor at Placa del Sol, we listen to Perota Chingo and Manu Chao back on the balcony, and all there is to mull over is just why I’ve never learned other languages. Filter some water and head to bed, for the weekend lies ahead.
***
The window in the kitchen broke for a short time, leaving us more immediately in touch with the stacked homes beyond it. Neither of us woke up before we had an espresso, which begs the question who made the espressos required to wake us up. Passeig de Gracia is ripe with affluence. Gaudi designed many homes on the street in his signature wavey style and many of these are now museums or hubs for delicious delicacies. Casa Battló is one such marvel; La Pedrera is another. We got a little lost. In a square we come across various artists sell their work. One woman fills in a crossword in her paper, glancing through small square specs on the bridge of her shnoz. Later, for luncheon, we head toward the port and stop at Arrosseria l’Arròs for paella and a crisp lager beer. The food is quite special, in fairness to it, and to its catchers, and to its cooks, and to us for paying for it. Black inked rice, baby cuttlefish and artichokes in a big bubbling clay pot. Phwoar.
Siesta needed; not granted. Now there is a piece of shell lodged in between two tight bottom teeth, so we say Hola to mojitos and sit pretty still, mutually aware that being by the sea is mostly happy, peaceful and good. Sí.
'One is literally called Kenneth. Another one is called O'Donnell. There are loads of Pablo's and Javier's. I have no idea what that refers to but it’s staying in because I can’t help but sense it’s important.
No one has their phones out here. I am in essence a sore thumb, my own sore thumb, sore from snapping and opening Notes to capture some of this. There is a list of Gin & Tonic variations that flanks an entire side of a menu some place. How did I, just now, before 2am, vividly envisage and impulsively feel to do parkour off the balcony onto the market tops across the narrow lane? In a way.
I can't hope to pinpoint. But I think I can clarify to a certain extent. It's not about getting away from a certain place; it is about, rather, being in a new environment, enticed by new visuals and sounds, a regular medley of un- or faintly-familiar stimuli that brighten and enhance your view of your time on planet erf. To see a friend is obviously wonderful, but the new space. This apartment — how would it treat a man were he to retreat, to find comfort on the old wooden chair, to sit at the bureau by the double doors to the shallow balcony, book or pen in hand, and break now and then for a cold drink or slow stroll round the square? It's not to pursue alienation. It's to pursue a challenge. Something you can document, learn from, grow close to, and then set away from once more for something anew. To be on the move is this, for me.
​
Silly degree of exposition.
***
It's late morning and the sun is struggling to breach the clouds. Marta is putting on a show of multilingualism on the phone to her network provider, then her Ma, then the network provider again, then to me, telling me to stop staring in awe, then back to someone else in some other tongue. We are going to go to Sagrada Familia today. It's allegedly very beautiful.
It is. Gaudí is buried in a crypt below. I think some things.
It is so windy outside. The shutters of the closed market clatter now and then. The door creaks against the metallic defiance of the lock bolted across it. Bon Iver soundtrack much of this time away.
In the midst of last night's micro-epiphany I decide I’ll one day write for National Geographic. The things I learned by reading the single issue in the flat — remarkable progress of medical care for the eye (‘winning the fight to see'). Not only is the eye as a whole an "outpouching of the brain", but Somalia contains a contested zone, toxic algae that (arguably) kills many fish and whales can be linked to higher water temperatures, and you, Sam, can travel and immerse and learn and write.
'Most gains will be hard-won and incremental. Many a miracle cure will prove fleeting'.
Marta is putting in work on a Harry Potter theme chatterbox for her kids at school. She cares and she is kindly and she is enjoying the city, but tells me “it’s not challenging enough”. I understand what she means but is it not that attitude which undermines the complexity of children and leads inevitably to shortages of genuine smart folk, aspirants, and legends in the profession? Anyway: aubergine chips with honey and feta. We are in a bar called simply Old Fashioned, where the music is of a mellow jazz variety. We talk about our futures, and there are quite a few silences.
***
It's early morning and the sunrise blesses the lower clouds with a pink wink. I hug Marta goodbye and take the Renfe through the city. There is more glass out this way, but the buildings are more sporadic and the sports pitches more packed. Backsacks full of the day’s take thus far on farmers in fields. A free shuttle has taken me on the carriageway to T1, and for some unknown reason I purchased an (albeit ‘Iberian’) ham sandwich for €8,50. I was sat next to a zealot and a bigot on the plane. He slunk out a few accusations of 'foreign bastard' when he jumped the queue to board, and he did so in English, so he must have been unaware that in fact he was foreign on this land, and that he should keep his silly little mouth closed. This was obviously the world’s way of bringing me full circle, cos I stared at the roof of the cabin to prevent engaging, and longed to be back at Manchester Airport.
Looks like we're going to Lyon
So I attended my work Christmas party until 2am and headed to Bristol airport at 4am, which was quite enough of a nightmare if I'm honest. The flight to Geneva was scheduled for a few hours later. At least 70% of subsequent scenes were seen out in a state of semi-groggy discomfort through delusional, dreary eyes. Quite right too.
​
So what was not quite right? This can't just be a drab account of you recovering from a hangover and catching some shut-eye en route to the Alps. Well, as we started our descent over a stunning Lake Geneva, the turbulence became what I can only describe as ‘a madness’. A singular, frenetic madness like God smashing the dust out an old rug.
Long story short: this quite extraordinary turbulence didn’t cease as we lowered. No no, it worsened. Bumpin’ around and jostling shoulders and staring out the window and saying no prayers because there’s no-one out there to help us all, Jamie laughed kinda uneasily. Me? I resolved to focus instead of my impending death on the dryness of my palate and throbbing head. Sweet relief.
Ok, it was rocky and raucous and rumbling, and upon touchdown of thy single wheel on Geneva’s blessed runway, the guy up front with the qualifications and the technique and our trust decided to abandon the landing. The loop around for attempt deux was shaky, but we headed back down through the swashbuckling, swirling winds to the general vicinity of the airport. We all know what we want to happen: we want the single wheel to be followed by the other wheels (I don’t know how many there are, three?) and the whole absurd vestibule to stabilise so we can get off and go skiing. Or just throw up in a quiet corner. Quite naturally, there would be no such scenes, because we touched down and took back off all over again. Like a weird ginormous metal plastic yoyo.
And there wasn't enough fuel for another loop, naturally. So it looks like we’re going to Lyon. And there's no such problem landing there — smooth as anything. Blessed be the French air, because it was an absolutely sublime landing, actually. Anyway, we sat in the cabin for 4 hours with little information to go on, but we had some moonshine vodka courtesy of two friends we made in the row. Somehow my body felt ready for it. Somehow there’s something about a hair and a dog and that being a good thing?
The Pilot came down but wouldn’t sing any Christmas songs with us, which we thought was a bit cruel to be honest. He did have the time and the vocal range to hit us with a heap of conjecture, though, which was nice of him. All his vague coverage did was lead to additional confusion and delirium among the baying masses. Recognising rising frustrations and unstable souls, he had a little whisper with the head of his cabin crew and everyone got a nice small tube of paprika Pringles. After a really lovely time in Lyon, we were wheels up. Everyone on the plane immediately became a live monitor and commentator re: the returning turbulence. We were drunk on moonshine vodka and there were no more Pringles around.
WheelS (capitalised pluralisation by design) down in Geneva about 5 hours too late, and about 4 hours prior to the next transfer. Decent knick.
Pai Valley
There is a small village towards the North-Western tip of Thailand where travellers can be free of most Western burdens. That’s not to say many of its patrons aren’t on the complex existential curve from being humans to being sellers — visitors bring financial gain, and financial gain stokes growth, which allows for more visitors. It’s a tale as old and told as Thai time. But whilst tourism ironically shepherds in a degree of familiarity — be it in dishes, shop-bought products or evening rituals — Pai maintains its distinctly Thai feel and its stunning rural idealism. It remains paradisiacal in its simplicity.
One day there, I went out exploring.
It’s easy to hire all kinds of vehicles in Pai. Now I’m what you would likely consider on the upside of height. My centre of gravity leaves a lot to be desired; I find maintaining balance on two feet to be a genuine challenge at times. Anything with a motor or an engine, then, was out of the question. Those things add another seemingly unpredictable element to the equation of life, and I can’t be doing with it. I have however cycled very much and very often throughout my life, so I quite happily settle for a bicycle. This is — I would argue — a premium vessel for exploration. It is entirely at your mercy. It is stable and fun and tiring and rewarding. Bicycles really do have everything, but that’s a piece for another day.
I pedal the roads at the bottom of the village. In the storefronts and yawning restaurants, late morning slumber gradually dissolves into a series of episodic routines. Dogs and cats and chickens of the street rise and fall again a couple of metres further away, preparing their laboured limbs for another day of tropical heat. A few people walk out of their guesthouse, rub their reddened eyes as they glance skywards, hover for a second, and wander back indoors. It’s warm out already.
It takes between three and five minutes for my legs to adapt to two wheels. It’s been a while, and this particular number has a lower frame and clunkier pedals than I’m used to. But the wheels turn and I glide on and the spokes kiss the hot air to signify freedom, so it’s no bother really. I straighten my back — its gnarly column of bone unburdened by a giant bag — and press onwards. Intermittent clusters of cabins and shacks line the street, fronted by wooden signs and bohemian salutations. As I reach the bottom of the main village road I hook to the right and round a corner. An ashy firepit from the night prior kicks up light flecks of matter. There’s a small wooden bridge ahead, moping over the Pai River. I cross it, and wind up at the base of a large hill-climb. Now this is altogether too soon, if you ask me. I inhale deeply, the hot air entering and prompting early spots of moisture on my forehead and around my eyes.
Now as beautiful as being on this bike is, let’s make no mistake — it’s a pretty shoddy piece of machinery. It’s in a pretty high gear. Let’s say a 7/10. And despite my wrist twisting to alleviate some of the pressure on my quads and calves, it doesn’t really get any easier; it janks and grinds a bit which slows me down but the chain seems to default to that same cog so I hop out of the seat and pump to make the top. My thin white shirt is already en route to translucent, but I’m on an upper precipice of the Pai Valley, and I can’t tell for sure because I’m sweating and panting, but the air feels a little cooler at least. Surrounded by trees, my glances are met with a stunning blanket of greenness. A break in this trend comes as I reach a small opening, and to my left I catch a glimpse of the lazy village. There are four long rows of buildings, topped by wooden slats and corrugated iron, flanking the two ‘main’ roads. The scene sprawls out in minimalist style into the middle distance, where it all turns to green once again. I continue pedalling, pushing closer to a small cluster of clouds up the road.
Eventually, the road curves and levels out. By this point I’ve had quite enough of working nigh-on flat out. If my intentions for this little venture had been to get completely sodden with my own salty sweat then I have succeeded. If It had been to escape and relax and feel at peace I have some work to do. Take nothing away, mind, from the sheer glory of the landscape.
I pass a number of stray dogs waddling and drifting along the road. Like them, I am gasping. Like them, I don’t waste energy shooing the wildlife on my face. My bicycle’s slender (yet somehow really heavy?) frame and attached basket seems more suited to the pulse of relaxation and intermittent decadence in Paris, but it continues to serve its function as I cruise along the valley side. By this point, the path is narrow and only lightning undulating, so the high gear is turning rather lovely, and I can stop pedalling for stretches as I look down at the village adjacent. The grass passes in shades of green ever more vivid. The trees are higher and thicker and less sculpted than further back on the trail.
I stop for a while and sit cross-legged on a bamboo platform that protrudes from the valley side. The river, which has meandered alongside the path, coasts and slooshes below the platform. After a quick dip, I watch some small children play with fishing nets and tease one another. Further on, there’s a small luxurious resort foregrounded by a plethora of flowers, rich yellows and pinks which kick up specks of blossom in the humid highground breeze. I get off my bike and turn right up a stone walkway. A man, bare-chested in loose, tattered beige trousers, climbs and clings to a tree. Reaching out his tan brown arms, he plucks unripe Mangos from its dry branches.
At the top of the walkway is another path, this one narrower and dustier still. It diverges every hundred or so metres to small homes, in and around which life spools from doorways and unfolds in the yard. I slow myself. The basket on my vehicle rattles on the scree beneath my feet, and echoes for metres in its emptiness. A building ahead — at first distorted by a flickering mirage rising off the tracks — becomes clearer as I step towards it. Fruits and veggies in adapted wooden pallets. Hand-carved ornaments hanging from the awning. A couple of hounds lounging in the shade. I prop my bike up next to it and head inside. There’s a small freezer and three shelves of goods and snacks — savouries, sweets, jars of sauce and the likes. Quite naturally I make a beeline for the freezer, lever open its lid, and dip my head into the heavenly air.
At the counter, a Thai man plays gently with a small baby sat on a stool, precariously balanced but quite comfortable, it would seem, swathed in a crimson blue cloth and clinging to a wooden block. I place a Snickers bar on the counter and reach inside my pocket for some loose change. How much for this? — I enquire. The man turns, the baby’s giggles fade to a wispy groan. I place the coins on the counter and all three of us look at them. I fidget a little. The man looks at the baby, who looks at me, and then straight back at the man, who is also looking at me. We all look back down at the money. He pulls some coins towards him, thirty-five baht in total. He smiles and nudges the Snickers in my direction, before turning his attention to the baby, whose eyes follow the coins as he places them somewhere below the counter.
Kòp kun, I say. The baby giggles. I walk outside and get back on the bicycle.
Holi Unnerving
Given the time in our lives, eight thirty a.m. seemed altogether too early. Despite the event and the excitement, some little temporal calibration inside us was jarred. No matter. The breakfast in Jaipur was much the same as the places preceding it — a buffet selection of plain cereals, somewhat stale pastries, butters, jams, breads and yoghurts, as well as the freshest tarka dal, roti, tomatoes and peas. And, of course, the flasks of coffee and chai. If either or (heaven forbid) both of these liquid delicacies were to be withdrawn from India, the entire country would be plunged into disarray.
This particular morning though — March 17th 2014 — the roti was just right, a little crisp on the outside but doughy and soft throughout. The cereal wasn’t actually stale at all, which we all found genuinely mental. The dal was nice and spicy (at our request) and brought forth a bead. And the eggs. My oh my the eggs. The yolks jiggled and jostled atop perfectly fried white, and when you came at that round golden glory it broke under optimum fork pressure, proceeding to ooze a golden nectar that pretty much screamed at us: ‘YOU’RE GOING TO HAVE AN INCREDIBLE DAY’.
We were fine. Our temporal calibrations were absolutely fine. Our tongues and our buds and our tummies were all absolutely wholeheartedly splendidly fine, thank you very much indeed.
Miles stepped outside momentarily to check over the day’s plans with Anil — a guide and dry-witted friend we’d come to know and love. Both returned laughing, their hair and t-shirts covered in patches and clumps of coloured powder. All this served to do was reinforce the message the roti, dal, cereal and eggs had earlier given us. The day of the Holi Festival was underway.
We stepped out the front of the hotel equipped with numerous small pouches of powder — bright blues, greens, oranges, yellows and reds — as well as enough beers to see us through the festivities for a little while. (We’d purchased these at a frenzied little cellar round the corner from our guesthouse the night prior. The place had been abuzz with flailing arms and indiscernible alco-calls, like an organised riot but instead of smashed windows it was jovial cheers and clinking bottles. A few doors down from the cellar was one of those typical Indian sell-all spots that you never quite realised you needed but now couldn’t do without. There, we’d gotten some cheap water guns, seeing in them quite fantastic potential to enhance our colour dispersing abilities).
Out front, It took all of three point five seconds for the hotel staff to maul us and leave us with a healthy layer of colour on our plain white garments. Needless to say, this had us right in the mood to throw some luminescent powder over very many people, and so commenced our peregrinations amid the joyful locals and soaring celebrations of ‘the Pink City’.
In this state of zeal, we hopped in Anil’s wagon of glory and headed down Jaipur Rd (no less) in the direction of the quite magnificent City Palace. Not the Premier League fixture, you understand, the ornate royal residence. On this journey a quite unfortunate incident unfolded. The spirit of the day was coursing through our veins. With whim and the warmest intentions, we threw paint out of the windows and shouted ‘Happy Holi!’ at TukTuks or open windows or people already plenty colourful walking on the pink pavements. In pretty much every instance the response was chirpy — a smile, a call-back, a reciprocated hurl of powderpaint our way (which Anil wasn’t mad about (in either sense)).
One particular TukTuk we passed had — I don’t know — perhaps seven men jumbled and jammed into it. Each of them sported an entirely white outfit. We didn’t target them directly because we were too busy comprehending the physics of their fitting in there, but some spattering of orange powder reached them in the cross-wind. This time the response was far less amicable, much to our immediate and jarring chagrin. Their disgruntled glares, wags of fingers, and groans of disgust all combined as if to say ‘HOW DARE YOU STRIKE ME WITH YOUR PAINT YOU INSOLENT TOURIST THUGS’. Which becomes a fairer point the longer you think about it. Anil exclaimed — in his adorable broken English — ‘ah, these mens are Muslims, these do not celebrating the Holi’. We shared a nervous laugh.
Holi Festival is celebrated by Hindus the world over. It is the Festival of Colours, Love and Spring, and is also widely believed to indicate the triumph of good over evil, dating as far back as the seventh century. Whilst Holi caught the attention of the imperial British and is now appropriated by non-Hindus across the globe, it is not traditionally a multi-cultural celebration, and in this respect we had made a mistake. No two ways about it.
Two hundred metres down the road, we rolled to a stop at perhaps the first set of traffic lights ever installed in India. Several hands started smacking against my passenger side window. There they were — or a few of them, at least — lining up to claw at the window and door handle, fuming and pointing to the small speck of orange on one of their Jubbahs. The number of fellows accumulating next to the car seemed to rapidly increase over the next fifteen seconds. They gesticulated and shouted and surrounded our stationary vehicle. Anil released the locks and they opened the door.
Anil attempted to explain the situation but they grabbed at my shoulder and ordered us all to get out. By this point, the three of us sensed that the end was nigh and uttered a foolish secular prayer for salvation beneath the continuing fury. I repeatedly glanced up at them, then back at Anil, then back at them, all the while holding both hands out, palms turned out towards them, the universal gesture for ‘sorry’. There was at this point, no doubt, an increasing concern evident in my jumpy movements. Anil continued his attempts to secure our future on this planet. The men insisted we’d disrespected them. Please bear in mind that amidst the ruckus, India’s first and only traffic lights had once again turned green, so the scene was now accompanied by beeping horns and glares from vehicles swerving round us. Ideal. A traffic police officer stopped behind us and dismounted his moto. He strolled through the swelling, amassing crowds of people checking out the situation, through the raging men, and up to Anil’s window.
By this point I was certain of two things and two things only. One — the eggs had been wrong, and we had been too easily fooled by their perfection. Two — this fellow here with his police stash on was about to abandon his post of urban responsibility, join the mob, and condemn us for our foolish indiscretion. The bags of powder on my lap started to spill over.
The policeman exchanged words with Anil who — judging by his body language and the very little Hindi I could figure out — admitted our mistake but took sole blame. Now that is heroic. That is far more heroic than any of the Marvel characters in their absurd resurgence. It is far more heroic even than the antics of Shrek, who in all his unconventional heroism does in fact cut many of the genre’s corners. Anil is a true-life hero and a scholar and a kind human. We, quite to the contrary, are weak and silly. The angered men were ushered from around our car and the worrying scenario was defused.
We indulged in a simultaneous and almighty sigh of relief. There was perhaps a stifled giggle at the scale of the scene, too, but we waited til after the one, only, and apparently genuinely adhered-to set of traffic lights in India. We should, I suppose, have checked in with Anil before that breakfast spread to see who we could imbue with our paint, when we could do it, and who we should avoid.
Undeterred, from here we headed to a small opening in the backyard of what looked like either a community centre or an elaborate household. It contained a number of tourists and just as many already tipsy locals (men, of course, only men). The ritual of welcome and well-wishes was as such: First, you would have powder rubbed slowly and somewhat sensually into your face and body. Secondly, you’d be cuddled by the person. I feared for some there this took on more the form of a bamboozling grope and stroke than an authentic Western embrace. Finally, you’d share a small shimmy or dance with the person and a loud exclamation of ‘Happy Holi’. One elderly native gent present at this opening was sloshed beyond all rationality at the hour of ten or eleven a.m., and he spurred the rest of us on to greatness with his boogying.
The festivities stopped short just after midday. This is when the local Hindus and those celebrating go home to their wives and children and continue celebrations in a slightly more subdued manner — perhaps with a Berocca and a nap, or perhaps with a large meal and religious offerings. Until then, however, we were given drinks, we were photographed, we danced, we laughed and we absolutely, diligently and passionately avoided throwing colour at people we weren’t sure would like it very much. The festival was and is about respect and friendliness, after all. The powder fuelled debauchery is just a kindly corollary.
Choeung Ek
Up and out to explore a recent, troubled passage of history. A vehicle of questionable security takes us south from Phnom Penh, through the incessant hum of the urban core into the rural fringe. Here, we drive down deserted tracks which kick up spirals of dust and obscure the hazy horizon. Tight alleys of housing turn to sudden corners and traffic ridden wooden bridges. Bursts of car horns pass and we arrive at the Choeung Ek Genocide Memorial. This is one of the sites known collectively as ‘The Killing Fields’.
It’s April the seventeenth in the year of 1975. A sea of Khmer Rouge militants enter Phnom Penh, flanking and breaching the city’s outer reaches with a simplicity befitting of their sheer numbers. They set up blocks to prevent the population from fleeing. Streets are occupied, and homes ransacked. Pol Pot enters amongst a convoy of vehicles from the North West of the country. He glances around him with a wicked smile. The country’s his.
We walk into the grounds. There is not much security, and the ticketing is managed by a couple of gentlemen in a small cubicle to the right of the gates. We hang the multilingual audio-guides around our necks and press forward slowly into the site, already feeling subdued.
In a meticulous display of selective expulsion, Khmer Rouge militants — many of them young men hardened by guerrilla wars — march hordes of the city’s citizens out of Phnom Penh. Some patrons are hauled into the back of jeeps and driven to the countryside. Others are made to walk there, ushered by armed men. They have excruciatingly few of their personal belongings. Pol Pot stands on the porch of the City Hall, his eyes closed, revelling in the murmur of distant gunfire.
The Memorial Grounds are significant in size, and there are still patches of flat ground, laden with rows of plants and trees. In our ears, we hear that Pot’s intention was to create an idyllic Communist nation, driven by a focus on agrarian labour and the just division of spoils. “Instead, the countryside was used for innumerable and unforgivable atrocities.”
A guard ushers the jeeps arriving from Tuol Sleng. They glide then judder through the gates. The doors are swung open and the blindfolded men, women and children are heaved onto the ground. These are the apparent dissidents. The different or defiant. The innocent. They are forced in their numbers to the brink of a large hole dug into the earth. Allegiant Khmer Rouge soldiers line them up, raise their automatic weapons and open fire, sending the bodies sprawling and lurching through the air into the dirt below. Pot, their leader and visionary, rarely visits the mass graves. He enforces his policies through countless powerful party figures. Today, though, he stands on site. With his hands behind his back, his chin turned up slightly, and his watchful eye shimmering with a cruel pride, his expression is unmoved as his soldiers massacre his fellow countrymen.
We round the grounds slowly, absorbing the brief, poignant information on various placards. The caverns dug into the soil remain. The remnants of bone, teeth, hair and scraps of clothing remain, untouched by all but the whistling wind that crawls the surface as we silently hover above them. We’re shaded by a large Sugar Palm tree. I look up towards the other tourists. Their faces are sombre, their stances respectful.
One gentleman is overcome by fear, and his shrieks of shock turn into a sharp run towards the gate. ‘Stop him’, Pol Pot bellows. He remains rooted to the spot, and slowly raises a thick finger in the direction of the fleeing man. A pair of guards seize the dissident and bring him over. The dictator growls at the man as he’s forced to his knees. Pol Pot reels around and tears a frond from the Sugar Palm tree behind him. Swinging back, he holds the serrated strand to the neck of the dissident. The man gasps his final breath, and an exhaled mist lingers in the late Autumn air. Ground mercilessly from one side of the neck to the other, the densely clustered spikes carve the skin.
Any historical biography of the man is bound to conjure claims of flawed ideology, mental deficiency and innate cruelty; this terrifying trifecta accounts for the unforgivable actions of his regime. The Khmer Rouge, under Pot’s orders, killed over two million of the Cambodian population from 1975-1979. One thing, however, is clear — elucidated by accounts in numerous museums, first-hand tales in historical documentaries, and the slow, sure trickle of scrutiny through the vines of history — an immense paranoia broiled at Pol Pot’s very core.
Following the incident with the fleeing man and countless others like it, Pol Pot sent out a broadcast to his factions throughout the country. He ordered them to treat any subversive act — no matter how minute — completely mercilessly. If this required the killing of children in order to send a message to the nation, then so be it. Opposition to the regime by any single individual, regardless of age, political preference, or status, would not be tolerated. This was a fundamental clause of his power, and of his ceaseless vision of social engineering. After finishing the broadcast, Pot sits in his office, opulent and bare. He tilts his head back and begins to breathe more slowly.
Choeung Ek captures and conveys a number of the horrific acts that became commonplace during the Khmer Rouge’s four-year reign. On the plain furthest from the gates, a tree with a sign underneath it expounds yet another dark past: this is ‘The Killing Tree’ — executioners beat children against it. In the centre of the grounds there is a memorial stupa, within which sit over two thousand skulls of victims. As we surround it, tears materialise and trickle down the cheeks of visitors. Visiting the site is a largely individual experience — I had walked around alone, muted and aghast. But it is also an experience of unity and respect — visitors from around the world come to learn, remember, and condemn the fatuous fascism that had reigned just fifty years prior.
I — as thousands never could — slowly walk towards the gate to exit.
10 Years On: Arugam
The rattling engine of the TukTuk slows to an irregular churn. The most hospitable driver has been cranking at the metallic gear pole and straining his body to turn the vehicle for about three hours. We’d set off slap bang in the middle of the night. Now, morning light flirts with the base of the horizon.
Eventually the machine slides and screeches to a halt. He turns around and mutters the price. You hand over too much. You don’t want any of it back, for it equates to about twelve British Pounds, a price far too small for the distance you’ve just covered.
The tarmac is already hot, and its cracked irregularly. You grab your 17kg life out, haul it onto your back and you set off in search of a place to rest. Your temple is caressed by a bead of sweat almost instantaneously as the breeze subsides and you’re out there in the open. As you always do when you enter somewhere new, you take in the immediate vicinity — the huts lining the narrow road, the fading signs marking niche eats and ageing accommodation, the number of people, if any. Hot wind rushes your side as a small group of children glide past on their pushbikes, their shining faces simultaneously excited and intrigued by your presence on the road.
You keep going; glancing down the stonewall flanked alleys, dust rising in whirls of heat and settling again amongst the haze. You walk down some of them, enquiring with half-asleep guesthouse owners how much they’re charging for a night. You take a look at some rooms, decide to keep going and give it a shot elsewhere. They all long for your custom, even though it seems such a miniscule amount. It is low season, after all.
Dried shrubs creep out of cracks in wall corners. You’re somewhat absorbed by the stifling stagnancy of the entire place. Debris remains scattered around some corners, ignored or delayed by the people, not forgotten. The memory of the wave rises and crashes in the silence. You place your bags on the floor of the room you choose. Walking out beyond the shacks you try, try and not surprisingly fail, to envisage a time when this calm was a distant and unrealistic hope for the locals.
An asterisked series of British Lake content
Forget the world. Don't bother. There are places in this country that lay claim to such outstanding natural splendour that one could sit there and write a dissertation of superlatives with their eyes alone. Now I’m not saying Coniston is one of these, but Coniston is a region and village in the southern reaches of the Lake District, and the Lake District is definitely one of these. The village is a very peaceful place, with souvenir and vintage shops and potted plants. With crooked walls lining country pubs and the sense that locals can’t walk to get some milk without being apprehended by a distant neighbour and asked about an obscure town hall renovation that’s long overdue. Very peaceful.
Onwards through the Wrynose Pass — a road with increasingly astonishing hills around. About half way along this pass we turn off onto another pass, the Hardknott Pass, a pass that you should need a pass to get into because this is too fine for the eyes of philistines. Its beauty is equal to if not slightly above that pass we just passed through. At times, the few clouds that clung to the idea of existing cast a small shadow on the top of the valleys and the colour differentials were pretty cool. We stopped at points to admire the bodacious curves of Mother Nature and to trace ramblers doing some bits on winding paths, up past the sheep and toward the rocky peaks.*
* Talking of rocky peaks, just after my final year exams I went with a couple of friends to Friar’s Crag where we sat and I ate a slice of cold leftover pizza. This is an inconsequential detail but I’m keeping it nonetheless. In a perfectly apt timelapse, water rippled towards us from the sweet view — a locomotive train of canoes on water and tourists in wooden boats and peaceful skies. We left this place wanting a rocky peak to climb. That’s the link. That’s why we’re on the topic of rocky peaks. We were at the base of a hike and its name I can’t recall, but it was a fair incline. Didn’t take very long, mind. Sweaty in the heat and unstable on the scree, but by goodness and my goodness the view at the zenith. The complete and utter peace of it all. We had finished our degrees, and it was a pleasure to mark it with those folks**.
** Talking of folks, another time I’d passed through the Lakes I’d gone with my actual folks to Kirkstone Pass, where we took a first touch, glanced over our shoulder, swivelled past the approaching defender and opted for a pass out wide, by which I of course mean we hydrated ourselves and nibbled on pork pies at a remote cragtop vista. Then too you could spot, with a keen eye, the dwarfing power of nature — hikers on the surrounding peaks mere specks on the landscape***.
*** Worth some coverage as an additional aside, actually: landscapes in general. Back in 2014 landscapes existed just as they exist now, except better, because with each passing day us here humans find some way of soiling what luck and goodness has given us. Back in 2014 I was just about to start at university, and went for a day of exploring around and about the Trough of Bowland. Then the forest of the same name. Then eventually past numerous farms and sheep and lambs to Dunsop Bridge — a proper twee settlement consisting of a small cafe, a pub, and, well, a bridge. All these landscapes opened my eyes instantaneously as to what was on my doorstep. I can not remember who I was then. I must have been different. More inquisitive perhaps? Exhibiting greater patience and kindness than now? These are the landscapes of the soul, but I’m in the business of big meandering ridges and tall, slightly-swaying trees, so that day was special to me. Dunsop Bridge is, according to GPS coordinate calculation, the settlement at the very centre of the British Isles. Now you know. I remember Ma wasn’t feeling too smart, or at least wasn’t certain her ailment could do justice to the beautiful scenery, so we got the wheelchair out and that provided a whole bunch of entertainment on the uneven terrain. We went pretty far down the snaking path, between the astounding, whispering pine trees and alongside the Langden Brook. When we stopped to turn around we all sat with our feet hanging over a rocky outcrop, the stream slooshing over eddies below us. It was peaceful and I felt very happy****.
**** You know what makes me happy? Wild camping. One of my favourite wild camping experiences was at the top of Haystacks, which itself looms over Lake Buttermere. That day, we climbed the mountain in a couple of hours in the mid-afternoon heat; a bit of a slog with a heavy overnight bag summoning all kinds of sweat on my back but up up, burning calves in tow, to false peaks and through valleys and around to stare down at the beauty of the lake and the greenery and the rising corridors into the distance. At the summit we rested for a while and basked in the view, before a brief downhill stretch (unfathomable mercy and benevolent anti-cramp) to set up the tent in a little alcove next to Anonymite Tarn. This is a small body of water where the glacial nose used to be, and where Wainwright’s ashes were scattered by his wife when he died. It was a really stunning spot, and a really stunning evening. Back up at the valley view, we watched as the sun did the sky favours for free. A drone buzzed for a while and you could hear a distant shutter or two as well as jovial voices across on another peak, but we just watched in silence and it was a scene of genuine serenity and I’m no Wordsworth but I know words are worth a shot when it comes to these things. Emblazoned it was. You could see over to Ireland in the dusk. In the morning, following our ascent, passing cyclists and cars slowed to glimpse my pallid frame wading into the lake.
I guess all this frenzy of asterisks is to say that you should explore the Lake District more than I have. If that’s feasible, right. It’s not always, but when you’re walking down an irregular path and the only sounds are the odd tree-dwelling bird and that dusty crunch underfoot and your own light panting and the semi-distant cries of a sheep herder then things are pretty good.
The Black Mountains
The day passed in a series of brief taillights and looming mountains. Joe has a business idea founded by the frustrating size, bulk, and occasional itchiness of labels in underwear, t-shirts, and other select garments. Replace the label with a mere flat QR Code. Scan it for all the product information and washing guidance. QArse. By six p.m, we were pulling into the stone driveway of ‘The Chateau’, a gorgeous little AirBnb between Glangrwyney and Crickhowell.
The lusciousness of the garden and the main house and the chateau itself in the early evening sunshine was a right corker of a start, I’ll tell you that. The key turned to a bottle of Prosecco and a glass of it in that golden green garden. Very quickly — upon realising we really ought to make the most of dry daylight — we departed to walk up Sugar Loaf. It was up a few semi-steep roads and through farmers’ fields, for the most part. This included stretches next to streams, past vast swathes of sheep, over styles, and diagonal cuts across hill faces, pausing to cool ourselves sporadically and sipping on a can of beer. This part of the story is called ‘chasing the sunset and beating it’. The clouds obscured our right to a real blazon number, and the fresh wind sent our sweat a bit sticky and chilly, but the patchwork fields were all around us — a full 360 kind of deal — and it was blissfully quiet. The light became a bit pink and a bit blue and we had some tunes on for the descent an hour later. We creased as we jolted our knees down little crevasses and tried to act warm and welcoming to little lambs. It was post-10pm by the time we got back: pitch black. Our Superhost (!) had left a pack of local bacon in the fridge and we destroyed a sarnie each. The little cottage was quaint but more than adequate, and its bedrooms — adorned as they were by largish spiders — were sound enough to lend us seven-or-so-hours ahead of the hilariously incessant downpour.
Sometimes forecasts are correct. Sometimes — and this is very rare indeed — the weather is not a conspiracy theory nor a deceptive little prick. All things considered, you can’t help but laud the consistency of the Black Mountains in their wielding of woeful weather this particular Saturday.
After a Yorkshire brew for breakfast, we packed some bits for the hike. By ten we were rounding the back of the RAF training ground up and over the road into a sort of British rainforest. Through a heap of different gardens and fields and pathways, a stenchy farm, up a steep slippy grassway or two, through more than one body of water, and eventually to the summit of Table Mountain, which wasn’t our final destination but it was a welcome false peak. Here, the wind started to pay us some pretty unwelcome attention, and we couldn’t shift its wandering fingers as we crossed the dip valley to another peak — Pen Cerrig-calch. Fortunately, sideways rain hadn’t lost its invite, so it was a proper party now. We both offered up a single ‘what’s the point’, before pressing on and past two other humans — the only ramblers we’d see all day. Our elected peak was in fact an absurdly underwhelming stone marker. No name on it even! Washed out by the absolute party atmosphere. Howling winds and sideways hail and muddy marshes and us two city-dwellers.
Here, in the earliest stages of the descent, my innovative plastic-bag-over-sock technique was compromised by a toe breach on both feet. In the minutes that followed my tootsies became soaked through. I was treading water but the party rolled on. We were fighting against serious sog across the whole body, and it’s a fight we both lost. Back down past the two peaks, the rain subsided and the wind stopped smiting our feverish faces. A major positive at this juncture was that no single movement or series of complex motions could render our clothing any more saturated, and there’s a sort of hollow joy in that fact. Only laughter could really emerge from such a scenario. The last few kilometres were quiet, and the training rainforest was a blur of luscious dripping leaves and winding vines. I was half expecting some camo man to haul ass out and join the final moments. They could’ve been part of our party and we could've become part of a fun little drill on resolve and ‘how not to be seen’. No such dice.
In the evening I watched a spider crawl and explore the wooden underbelly to the staircase. We ate carrot cake. I went the whole 36 hours without my toothbrush. Using your finger just isn't the same. We must’ve brought a whole host of wet critters back to the city on our dank garms.
Not Travelling Anywhere
(06.12.15)
This is quite remarkable. Lancaster has fallen victim to floods, and the city has descended into complete powerless, waterless darkness. I have very little battery remaining on here. Very little food. No signal, no phone. Not an inkling, really, as to the ongoing situation. Bar of course the vast pools of muddy riverwater at the bottom of town. That is absolutely an ongoing situation. Among the stranded masses there are whispers that we’ll remain in this interesting Neanderthalian situation until Tuesday evening. Let the fun begin.
(09.12.15)
Assignments, assessments, assistance — hell, University as a whole — has been cancelled until next term. The Substation was entirely submerged, allegedly, and the power was out for all of around sixty hours. Let’s pull a little non-linear number out of our hineys shall we. A riveting narrative tool!
​
Before
Saturday morning I woke up and it was raining outside. It continued in this vein as I underwent all kinds of mechanic weekend motions. This included weeing in the toilet, preparing and eating toast, conversing briefly and vacuously with some human beings, writing some words down, backspacing, and heading out to do and get some things. That last bit is important; don’t brazen over it. I braved the lashing water in order to get some supplies for the last week of term. As the afternoon reluctantly gave way to the evening, media sources reported the build-up of flood waters at the bottom of town. On or just before 11pm, an incredibly average Liam Neeson picture (we were absolutely scrambling for answers, and not in a good way) was swept from before us, as was all other power, light and sound, besides the incessant screech of alarms. Obviously this was very exciting, and we peered out the window at, well, nothing really. The City had become a sheet of black, save some sparse, faint emergency backup lights. What a feeling it must be for them, by the way. Laying in wait, barely used and under-loved; these lights come into their own when the core dissolves, when the usual corners and centrepieces can no longer fulfil their function. And despite their life as waiting’s plaything, they do their job and they do it with minimal fuss. I have since started a worldwide Backup Lighting Fan Club, and the regular lights are doing all they can to take us down.
Righto, only one thing for it! As we walked out and amongst it all, the early excitement was apparently not restricted to the residents of our grungey flat. It wasn’t unbridled exuberance, though, among the swelling masses, it was a kind of childhood zeal wrapped up in a grubby little sheet of intrigue. We walked down towards Church Street and New Road, where people were gathering and tinkering towards Damside. The mucky water there was all but engulfing the crossroads at the bottom of town. The Bus Station must have been under a good four feet. Cable St. properties were up to their doorknobs. We lingered and commented and pointed, much like everyone else there. One man ploughed through the water on his bike, and it takes all my energy to not turn this little account into an ode to his quadriceps! I thought there was a red cup floating upside down in the water, but it was actually the peak of a traffic cone. Emergency services attempted to retrieve people from their homes. The scene was very new to me; you hear of flash floods on the news every now and then, but this incident, as it became apparent, was a part of record breaking rainfall, and you sensed the consequences were grimly nascent.
As a student with a student’s sleeping pattern, I saw less daylight than I’d have liked, and by early afternoon the mise en scene and others that followed were once again reduced to a palette of greys and blacks and muted beige. It’s worth adding, too, so there's no confusion over how primitive conditions felt during this time, that our piping was shot. The filtering had some nasty water coming out the taps, so besides our toilet down the hall, there wasn’t much cleaning to be done or had. A patch of concrete amounting to around three metres squared, up on the hill by Lancaster Castle, was the only place in town with a vestige of signal. People figured it out and flocked there and there went that chance at comms. Is signal saturation a thing? Always fucks you at festivals I find. Anyway that’s ok let’s lean into this odd neo-atavism. Pretty much all of campus was without power, and thus deemed unsafe due to the fire alarms not being functional, and thus evacuated, and those unable to get home thanks to the thus thus transport scenario were housed in the the Great Hall, like a big weird Harry Potter reenactment but in the midst of a different kind of darkness.
Saw a few people that evening. Fascinating. Interaction was undisturbed by the things interaction is usually disturbed by: a glance at one’s phone, a call to answer, one eye on the TV in the corner. There is also a serious case to be made for candlelight, kudos to all romantics and frugal friars that live and swear by the shimmering flame.
Everyone I spoke to seemed pretty clued up, so I of course deduced that no one knew what the hell they were talking about. “Oh yeah it’ll all be back to normal come Tuesday”. “Yeah full power back tomorrow I think”. Can you very well imagine my surprise as I awoke on Monday to light. Artificial, bedside light. And Liam Neeson back on the TV at the exact place we’d left him! And not a singular repercussion from the whole absurd trip! Dry as a bone the city.
No no. But power was restored. I was weirdly downtrodden by that, having prepared myself to go the distance and perhaps even live forever in this refreshing way. Alas, just so you’re aware, the Neeson picture was average at best. I can’t even remember the name of it, so that warning is entirely useless. You gave me an unloaded guuiieuuhhhn?
What fun. It would seem that everyone became overzealous at the return of ‘modern life’, and the temporary generators just couldn’t handle it. By Monday night it was backs to the wall and night vision goggles. I read the final sections of O’Brien’s The Things They Carried via candlelight, including a visual linear account of the Vietnam War. I then watched Superbad on a device that had battery, ate tepid and slightly furred grapes, and a whole packet of full-size Cheddars. I even managed to stretch a small pot of pasta across 36 hours. This must be what untouched and untarnished tribes live like.
Tuesday morning everything seemed back to normal, which was of course hugely disappointing. I look back at Lancaster’s damp quasi-apocalypse with real fondness. This is on account, entirely, I’d have thought, of not living in an area that got flooded, therefore retaining my material possessions and avoiding the heartbreak and hassle.
The camaraderie and unity it invoked was beautiful, though.
With little to do and even less motivation to get ahead of the game in terms of work, we decided to actually explore the city we study in. Up to Ashton Memorial we went. To those gorgeous forests and the walkways surrounding the monument. A gloom hung over us in a packed cloud. We wandered and wandered around and abouts, back, down, towards an idea of where the city was. We were wrong, and ended up on a dirt track flanking the M6. But the air of nature leaves you not really caring, and the three hours or more that we spent on foot were a burden in absolutely zero ways.
What would Neeson have done?
Select scenes from on and off skis
It’s hard to elucidate what skiing is like, and to attempt to do so would be to bastardise those who are more experienced, competent and thus authorised, but it is an exhilarating and refreshing tale — one of focus and adrenaline and fear and sights of relative splendour.
My first ever day on those precarious things was a nigh-on whiteout. Visibility faded with the hours. Little did this matter eventually though, because Tartiflette is an Alpine classic, or so I’m told. It’s hard to elucidate just how delicious Tartiflette is, and to attempt to do so would be to bastardise those that truly know and love Tartiflette, but nonetheless I’ll press ahead. What we’re staring down the barrel at is essentially boiled/roasted potatoes doused in lardons and a bit of onion and plenty of reblochon cheese melted on top. Way to complete the creamy dreamscape.
The next day, sharp, stunning skies took us down pistes nice and easy. By nice and easy I of course refer to incessant snow-ploughing and several borderline patella dislocations. Pine green cascades and jutting rocks rise to white caps that weren’t just caps, evidently, for they trickled down and took humans aboard for the ride.
At some junctures we’d stop at cafes at the base of slopes for beer or coffee with baileys or a smoke or a bite to eat or all four plus more. We’d sit in little deck chairs before the stacks of ski’s against wooden frames and watch as people whizzed down from behind, in front, every which way pisted or otherwise. The mountains rose with the most remarkable imposition of grace and effortless magnitude that I sat in semi-silence for a long time just thanking my lucky stars for a spot on Planet Earth.
I liked Mossettes quite a bit — a meandering 3k run down to one such eatery. Challenging enough to instil a sense of achievement, calm enough to retain a sense of control, and an unceasing portal to views of the sorts I’ve not seen before. White and dark oscillating zeniths, undulating valleys and low clouds from here to as far as even the keenest eye can see. We enjoyed the run so much first time round that we hit it again immediately afterwards, during which we sat down by the side and revelled. That silky, woven horizon was like a naughty promise. Some rookies with greater faith on knees took on minor jumps and not one went particularly well, unless the evaluation criteria was laughter.
One day later in the week, we ascended a lift in pretty torrid conditions. Rah diddly it was fucking chaos. Highest winds I remember being in. Ever. Swiping sidewinds, the likes of which I couldn’t stand up comfortably in. Us novices laughed at first then became rapidly despondent. Our friend Ed — a former GB freeskier and keen mountaineer — thought this would be a good time for all of us to take on an inaugural red run. We could not physically see the start of it. We were confused. Someone took off their goggles to try and see the start of it and their goggles rolled off down the mountain. My numb mind just about imagined an image of certain obstinate souls cooped up on the sofa in the chalet, smug as shitheads, sipping hot tea and chortling jovially at something on the television.
Evenings seem deserved when you go skiing. Not that you ever don’t deserve an evening, per se, but the spirits are discernibly higher when you’ve navigated slopes for many an hour prior. Our evenings were all about tending to well-worn muscles with less than prodigious remedies, eating good food and playing good games around good people, with some warming whiskey or six to match.
I don’t know if I’ll ever be so fortunate as to ‘get into the swing’ of life on two slippy sticks, but I went again to Morzine and Avoriaz and the likes the next year. I do rather love it. You quickly regain a degree of confidence — spurred on in no small part by hip-flask sips, squished sandwich lunches and grand biers avec peche. So you re-glove and nod at your mate and get on your merry way again. Aha to all the familiar friends: Proclou, Lindarets, Mossettes, Brocheaux, other such runs of mostly blue, somewhat red, and never any darker.
One evening that year we all dressed up in female clothing to mark a birthday. This involved pizza, games of Mexico, Mafia, Perudo and more, plus the first iteration of Chalet Olympics — arm wrestling, sock-wrestling, egg-tossing, toboggan racing. All these words and commas add up to bravado and camaraderie and outlandish testosterone, piled in with raucous atmospherics beneath the high ceilings and within the warm wooden walls.
My body did feel the effects — not of any grand stack, you understand, but of the relentlessly bent knees and soles of feet digging into ski boots, clutching, gripping, turning, straining, readjusting, drinking, poling, eating. A day ‘off’ was necessary. I stylise ‘off’ as such mostly because we carried on doing a lot of those things.
Another fun equation:
altitude x no real regard for what I do to myself = a justified languor.
Back at it I felt a rush of warmth (ironically) and gratitude and — oddly but also justifiably — a guilt at being fortunate enough to warrant this kind of trip. Guilt gave way to genuine fear for Ed took us up a steep lift that for some reason didn’t go back down, so you had to ski it, which feels like an organisational oversight if you ask me. Quite naturally unperturbed, he brought us down this sheer run with all the blind reassurance of a seasoned veteran. And by ‘brought’ I mean continually misled, and by ‘down’ I mean sliding on my bum for about the last 30 metres after failing to make a turn. On the bright side, I managed to avoid catching an edge on my absurd descent, as such preventing my knee from piercing my forehead.
One place we go to in town each time is proper decadent. L’Etale, I think it’s called. Proper smorgasbord. Hunks of a steak on a meat tree or if you’re so inclined a personal hot plate upon which to slap lashings of duck, steak, bacon, chicken. All, quite naturally, alongside chips, cured meats, salad, bread. Obviously bread. Sweaty atmosphere in there. A few groggy expressions following a sizeable session at après-ski. I simultaneously entirely recommend and do not recommend if you are already highly inebriated.
As is custom, my very good friend Jack and I would settle down to about 10 minutes of nonsense and giggles before we passed out. He would talk about his love, me about mine. He would talk of his existential angst, me about mine. He would talk about his bowels, me about mine. Then we’d occasionally get onto the point of that ever-advancing shadow of gloom threatening to engulf our planet, but we’d change the subject and laugh and go on quite contented in our middle class ways, because cognitive dissonance is a fundamental pillar of modern existence.
Typically, on the final day, I’ll panic buy a few poor gift items.
We’d been playing real life Cluedo, and it was reaching its conclusion. I got killed using a carrot in the living room. I’d previously killed someone with a ski sock in the cable car. There were people dropping fairly sporadically, but above all else there was widespread distrust and doubt. That’s what you want from such a soiree, isn’t it?
Everyone was looking fat, grim, and completely, utterly happy. We flew home this way.