Travels with my Hat

Travels with My Hat - book available soon!

2013-09-18T19:34:00.000-07:00

Travels with My Hat, the book about my adventures as a travel writer will be published in October. Beautifully designed, it is lavishly illustrated with photographs and maps. Stay up-to-date for the publication date on my blog: travelswithmyhat.com and at www.twitter.com/mudskipper.

Travels with My Hat has moved

2012-09-12T02:19:00.001-07:00

Hello, thanks for dropping in.

My blogs have been transferred to a brand new website: www.travelswithmyhat.com

Please look me up.

Christine Osborne

RED SEA ADVENTURE: EXCERPT Chapter 2 TWMH

2012-08-14T17:05:00.000-07:00

This is a taster of Chapter 2-- Red Sea Adventure-- from my new book Travels with My Hat. Seeking winter sunshine, I had gone back to Hurghada, a small fishing village with one hotel in 1964. I wondered if it was still there...

...‘I want to find the Funduq Sheraton,’ I told my taxi-driver, a young man wearing designer stubble and a David Beckham 7 football shirt.

‘Road closed.’ His brow knitted in the rear vision mirror.

‘Izmi Hurghada thirty years ago!’ I tapped my chest with a certain pride since I had clearly graced Hurghada before he was born. But he was right. The old road was blocked by a rusty, corrugated iron fence plastered with posters advertising an ‘Eid Concert’ at the Ministry of Sound and other extravaganzas for the imminent Muslim feast of sacrifice.

‘Funduq Sheraton!’ he suddenly exclaimed, pulling up beside a crumbling circular building surrounded by leaning lamp posts and dusty trees. Grey, shabby and clearly unloved, I recognised it as the old Red Sea Tours Hotel, a large Marriott which had risen beside it being one of 160 new hotels since my visit all those years ago.

Hurghada’s long main street was still known as Sharia Sheraton, even though a new Sheraton had re-located to Soma Bay, far away from bungee jumping, kite-surfing, glass-bottom boat rides, submarine tours and other entertainments for holidaymakers flocking to the popular Red Sea resort. Wherever I looked there were hotels, cafes and shops selling tourist tat, but a sign, Harrads Hurghada, captured my attention.

On the pavement outside, glass water pipes, brass trays, wooden animals, leather pouffes, and camel backpacks were displayed beside baskets of karkady—the dried red hibiscus flowers that Egyptians make into tea. As I raised my camera to take a picture, an intense looking man who clearly hadn’t shaved for days, got up from a dirty white plastic chair. ‘Everything inside 1GBP,’ he said, holding up a finger.

Going into his shop, I picked up a fish from a display of onyx marine life. ‘Fish 4 GBP,’ he quickly corrected himself. Removing the stopper, I sniffed one of the half-filled, urine-coloured flagons of perfume lining a shelf. ‘Perfume 10GBP for100 grams.’ He cleared his throat. Then all of a sudden he flew into a rage.

‘Tourist just lookin’. No buy anythin!’ Flecks of spit appeared in the corners of his mouth as he shouted. ‘ Every tourist fuggin Russhin. Old woman wantin sex. Fuggin rubbish. Only lookin! Pay nothin! Russhin Fuggin! Fuggin! Fuggin! Oh Allah! What we do?’

He clasped his hands together and concerned my presence might bring on a seizure, I left him shouting to continue my walk along the Sharia Sheraton.

Every second shop I passed was stuffed with souvenirs. In the window of a leather-ware store, a lizard skin handbag, including the head, half-chewed away by insects, was marked 145 Egyptian pounds. I wanted to buy a plain white T-shirt, but everything had either a shark or a pyramid on it…

MORNING STAR

2012-08-13T00:26:00.000-07:00

I saw when you first rose beyond the hills
And sharply glanced upon the covert lake
Where night still held its secrets.
Watched as you rode higher, paling your consorts,
Striking with sword of silver witchery across the dark water
And watching, wondered...
You were a riddle, insoluble, remote
An icy eye mocking with timeless stare
Man’s latest solemn pledge and plan
Viewing dispassionately the night’s grim deed
The spring of hope.
Or was there in your steadfast beam a well
Where men might drink of constancy and courage
to go anew?
Such were my thoughts and more, but nought resolved
Save this that as I watched you soar,
still brilliant,
In a pearling, windswept sky, higher yet
Above the orange glow that fired the hills dark rim,
I knew at last I looked upon a scene that cleansed,
And brought refreshment to a wearied soul.

J.K.Osborne: 1946.

2012-08-13T00:25:00.001-07:00

A HARD DAY'S FRIGHT

2012-07-31T18:31:00.000-07:00

Most travellers have hotel adventures, but few will have been frightened out of their wits by a couple climbing into bed with them in the middle of the night. This happened to me in Morocco when they mistook their room and I did the unthinkable—I forgot to lock my door.

A hotel is a home away from home for travellers and especially for travel writers. So I don't deny to being fussy about the standards. Will my room overlook the motorway or the market? Will I be over the kitchen, or under the discotheque? Will there be an Indian wedding in the garden or a buffet around the pool? IS THE HOTEL STILL UNDER CONSTRUCTION!

Do you suffer from xenodociophobia—a fear of foreign hotels? An airline stewardess I know will never sleep on the ground floor after finding a snake in her room in Darwin while an interior decorator friend will not stay higher than the ninth floor in case fire traps him in his Calvin Klein’s. My London postmastman said his own particular dread was finding hard pillows on his annual holiday in Bournemouth.

Hard pillows, lumpy mattresses, slow room-service, no room-service—room-service banging in with breakfast—these are common complaints.

I always carry a personal pillow, but my own phobia is the colour orange drives me mad. Why does a sunburnt country like Australia have so many motels with a hot, orange décor? The same is true, I have discovered, of many hotels in the Arab world. After being out in the desert, I want the décor to be cool green. Or blue.

Do you agree that many hotel bathrooms leave much to be desired? Do you scald yourself under the mixer tap for instance? Well, that's nothing. When I stayed in Hunza in the Northern Areas of Pakistan, the bearer-wallah brought me water to wash in a bucket filled from a dripping glacier.

I had many adventures while researching a book on Pakistan. At a canal rest-house in Dera Ghazi Khan, I awoke in the night to find the room had been invaded by saffron-coloured frogs. More than 40 were leaping about when I turned on my torch (there was no elecricity). Then in Balakot, in the Kagan Valley, I was disturbed by bush-mice chewing the orange flavoured vitamin C tablets in my wash-bag.

The service in some hotels can be truly disturbing as well. Leaving a hotel in Tangier recently, my bags were carried out to a taxi by the porter, smoking a cigarette. (who was angry that I requested he put it out).

In the 1980s when I was working in Khartoum, we had a power failure every night. On one occasion I was trapped for hours in an elevator with a 7ft tall Dinka man. Then in another hotel, this time in Port Sudan, I opened the window for a breath of air and the entire thing crashed into the courtyard.

Happily most places to stay have improved dramatically in the intervening years, but I’m sure all travellers have their tales of hotel holiday hell: what are yours?

Images: www.copix.co.uk

The Terrible Cafe Lemsid

2012-07-27T19:51:00.000-07:00

Excerpt from Chapter 7 of my forthcoming book ---Travels with My Hat, 85,000 words 8 pages pictures. Chapters on Ethiopia, the Royal Tour of Arabia, Pakistan, Egypt, Iraq, Yemen. Pictured is the terrible Cafe Lemsid in the Western Sahara, from the final chapter on Morocco.

...I’ve often thought I’d found the middle of nowhere on my travels, only to realise that I was on the edge of somewhere, but the Café Lemsid was definitely in the middle of nowhere. Caramel and raspberry red, it resembled a giant lolly that had fallen off a desert transport and surrounding it lay the detritus of local civilisation: burst tyres, perished fan-belts, broken lobster-traps and empty port-a-gas cylinders. A rug was stuffed in a hole in the wall to keep out wind-blown sand, and among items stacked behind its counter were boxes of Gunpowder tea, flour, candles, packets of “Tide”, balls of string and inevitably— tinned sardines. It’s owner said fresh fish arrived daily from Boujdour, so that even in this god-forsaken place I was able to sit down at a broken table for lunch (grilled dorade). A lame, fish-eating chicken hopped about for scraps: it would never be killed and eaten, I decided; it was much too horrible. As I settled my bill, a grand-taxi pulled up and I half expected it to disgorge a host of characters from a Fellini film—dwarfs, transvestites and dancing bears—but they were merely crushed passengers from Dakhla, relieved for the chance to stretch their legs on their long journey up to Agadir...

2012-07-27T19:44:00.001-07:00

MINIMALIST FISHING

2012-06-02T21:49:00.000-07:00

Unique to Sri Lanka are the stilt fishermen of Ahamgama, a pimple sized town on the island`s palm-lined derriere, roughly 100 miles south of capital, Colombo.

It is a thrilling sight when driving along the coast to come upon a group of them perched on poles and flicking their rods in and out of the surf.

The remarkable thing about the stilt fishermen is that they don’t use any bait. A tenacious local fish like a small herring, or a sardine, bites on a bare hook and is whipped up and dropped into a bag: the best fishermen can catch as many as fifty in an hour.

Stilt positions are passed down from father to son and good sites are highly coveted. Jammed into the reef, the poles protrude about ten feet at low water when the men wade out and climb up to fish the incoming tide.

Their only equipment is the cane rod and a hook tied on a length of line. Being constantly drenched by spray means that dress is also minimalist - a turban, a g-string and the odd T-shirt donated by a tourist who was grateful for the picturesque photo opportunity.

Photos: Dominic Sansoni and Christine Osborne

www.copix.co.uk

Memorable Drinks

2012-05-02T16:17:00.000-07:00

My list of memorable drinks runs from coffee in a Bedouin tent to pineapple crush under Polynesian palms. While most were genuine thirst quenchers, others were significant for the occasion. Or the surroundings.

I recall a tangy limoonada (freshly pressed lime-juice and 7 Up) in Iran. I’d been taking pictures of Persepolis, the ancient Persian capital, following my guide – an energetic man named Mr. V. Piroozi – up stairways lined with Achaemenian bas-reliefs, under soaring arches, into vast audience rooms and along columned halls. Finally I leant against a winged bull – one of the guardians of Persepolis – and declared I was parched. Loosening his tie, Mr. V. Piroozi agreed it was time for a drink and muttering that it was fortunate it wasn’t Ramazan, he drove at speed to my hotel.

In air-conditioned surroundings I slumped in a chair and listened to the tinkling of ice in a glass. Outside the temperature passed 40c as inside, Mr. V. Piroozi and I ordered a second, and then a third limoonada. Until the hotel ran out of limes.

On another warm, if emotional occasion, I discovered horchata while waiting for a train in Spain. A refreshing drink based on almonds, it raised my spirits after my boyfriend - a celebrated matador – had announced plans to marry his childhood sweetheart. Devastated, I headed for the station, and to this day I still associate horchata with memories of the bullfight and the hiss of steam, as slowly, interminably it seemed at the time, we pulled out of Barcelona.

A third memorable drink was on the Polynesian island of Moorea. I was cycling around the island when my companion – a young Tahitian – pulled off the road and shinned up a palm. Knocking off a coconut, he slid down again and holding it between his knees, he chopped off the top with his machete. Cupping it in my hands I let the sweet fluid flow over my face and into my mouth – then I dived into the blue lagoon to wash it off.

The interesting aspect about these drinks is that none of them contained alcohol and leafing through my notes on other memorable beverages, I find neither do they.

Today even supermarkets stock tropical fruits so why not try mixing your own? All you need is a juice extractor, or a blender, and with a little experimentation you can create wonderful beverages without the need of alcohol to make them taste better.

Here is a starter to your own inventions:

ALMOND DRINK

           1/2 kilo (1 pound) almonds
           500grm (½ pound) sugar (or cup of cane syrup)
            1 ½ litres Water (warm)

Dash almond essence

Slice almonds and crush in a coffee grinder. Add to a food processor with other ingredients and work until smooth. Strain through muslin to remove any solids. Chill well and serve garnished with a cinnamon stick and a rose petal. Serves: 4

Images from www.copix.co.uk

ROWING IS A BIG LEG-PULL IN BURMA

2012-04-11T18:13:00.008-07:00

Rowing a boat with your leg is quite a difficult feat, but the leg-rowers of Inle Lake are well balanced men.

Inle Lake lies in in the Shan state of north-east Burma at a height of 880 metres above sea level. The shallow blue lake, covering an area of 116 sq kms, is known for its unique leg-rowing fishermen who are never known to fall overboard.

Known as Inthas, local people numbering about 70,000, live in four towns bordering the lake, in stilt-perched villages around the edge, and on floating islands on the lake itself.

Micro-gardens flourish in the mud beneath their houses where chickens and other livestock forage for food. There are also large floating vegetable gardens made from lashed reeds and anchored by bamboo poles which rise and fall with changes in the water level, and so are resistant to flooding.

The Intha’s basic diet is rice and fish. Fruits and vegetables along with necessities are sold in the ywa-ma, a miniature floating market which circles the lake, visiting all the villages, every few days.

When not cooking and gardening, Intha women weave colourful tote bags which are sold to visitors in the corridor leading to the Phaungdaw-U pagoda overlooking the lake. They also produce hand-woven silk textiles and the cotton longyi, a sarong-type garment worn by men.

Intha men have a constant battle to keep the pagodas above water level as the floating islands on which many are built slip beneath them. Graceful leg-rowers glide by carrying mounds of mud to prop them up. Water hyacinth, a major problem, must also be cleared.

In October a spectacular water carnival takes place when a golden Buddha accompanied by flower-laden hlays is taken in a procession around the lake. Leg-rowing races with 10-12 men, all rowing on one leg to a boat, are a highlight.

With tourism on the rise, the best advice is to visit this special part of Burma before it changes. A luxury hotel with bar, spa and bicycles for hire has already been built on the lake-shore. Access is from HeHo Airport, 35 kms via a domestic flight from Rangoon or Mandalay.

Images: www.copix.co.uk

EPIC WALK - GREAT READ

2012-03-28T21:52:00.015-07:00

SAHARA: by Paula Constant

It is with regret that I have reached the end of SAHARA, the account by Australian writer Paula Constant of her epic walk across the Western Sahara, to Mali and ‘not quite’ Niger where authorities forbade her to continue across this volatile belt of Africa with on-going Tuareg dissent and latterly, an active al-Qaeda cell.

Indeed God knows what might have happened had she continued her journey. While courageous, the plan must be seen as politically naïve considering the events, sometimes tragic, that have befallen travellers in this desperate part of Africa.

SAHARA is long — almost 400 pages, but I found it gripping from beginning to end, and while I hold the above view, I found it a rivetting read.

Though haunted by a failing marriage (the least interesting part of the book) and plagued by difficult guides, perpetual interest in herself — as a lone white woman walking with camels — burrs catching in her clothes and a urinary tract infection about which she is brutally frank—Paula still managed to write a diary after walking an average 25kms a day, from well to desert well.

Her writing is achingly descriptive of a landscape that often has little to describe. And it is never repetitive. We encounter the nomad tea-making ritual on a dozen occasions, but something colourful is always included to make it different to the last one.

Her character comes across as tough, honest and determined, and her writing flows easily from page to page, like the great dunes she crosses with her camels.

I particularly loved the part where on hearing the evocative music of the Saharoui, she and her two guides jump up, stamping out a rhythmic dance on the desert sand. “Madani and I dance with our arms up and out to the sides ..he stamps his feet and cocks his hand over his head…I hold my arms out and turn my hands, my hips roll and twist beneath my melekhva.” ( the sari-like dress worn by Saharoui women).

Paula Constant is one cool head and one helluva writer and I feel her publisher—Bantam— might have done her better in the choice of paper, and a cover that does not buckle up.

And while the writing can stand alone in this powerful account of ‘love, loss and survival’ it begs for pictures of the splendid and maddening people she met en route. Especially her nomad guides— M’Barak, Madani, Mohammed, Ali and Ibrahim.

Bantam 2009— ISBN: 978-1-74166-929-9

Images of the Western Sahara: www.copix.co.uk

Thoughts and Truths on Travel Writing

2012-03-18T22:33:00.007-07:00

It is my belief that the days of freelance travel writers doing a quick tour of a place, sponsored by this airline, or that hotel are over. Finished. Dead in the water.

Future travel guides are likely be written by a local since all things considered, sending a travel writer out from London or Sydney, to write about somewhere, thousands of miles away, is curious. Even arrogant. And certainly costly.

Travel writers must accept there are good regional journalists, both local and/or expatriate, who need only follow the publishing brief. And should their writing fall short, it can always be polished by an editor.

A former travel guide writer, I was always conscious that ‘Joe Public’ normally only gets one annual holiday. I therefore made damn sure my advice was correct. In Bali, I once drove 50 miles to check an hotel when the owner didn’t even offer me a drink. And I waited an hour to meet the owner of “Rick’s Café” in Casablanca. Ditto.

Such energies were not always supported by the publisher. As writer, I had first refusal to an update when due to editorial ignorance, I was not always free. Like requiring a revision on a Muslim country during Ramadan. Or a giving a three week deadline to update Malaysia, during the rainy season.

A major UK publisher went ahead, without my knowledge, and reprinted my Seychelles guide, three years after the original printing. The new edition bore my name, but it had not been updated. The reason given was that it was not cost effective…

I had a similar experience with a guide to Oman, a country whose development I’ve followed since 1975. The publisher did a reprint, eight years after the first edition which I only found while browsing in a bookshop. When I called to query what was going on, the editor said they’d done a ‘desk job.’

A desk job! On a country such as Oman where change is like a thunderbolt.

I will say no more, except to suggest that the comments of the paying public on an internet site tend to have more credibility that many a guide-book.

Images: www.copix.co.uk

Visit to the Ogaden: Excerpt from Chapter 1 Ticket to Addis Ababa

2012-03-08T15:41:00.021-08:00

..Only the political correspondents were invited to the evening banquet in Menelik’s old Imperial Palace in Addis Ababa. Back at the hotel, I added my name to the list of journalists wanting to visit the famine belt, and next morning, escorted by Ethiopia’s portly Minister for Relief, we took off for Gode in a chartered DC3.

Gode lies in the Ogaden, a vast tract of south-east Ethiopia bordered by Kenya and Djibouti, and sharing a historically disputed frontier with Somalia. A semi-desert region, it supports only scraggy shrubs and trees, but the Webi Shebelle River crosses it before flowing into the Indian Ocean, more than 1,000 kilometres (500m) from its source in the Ethiopian highlands.

‘We’ve had no response to our appeal for medical teams,’ Shimalis told us in the Gode refugee camp where one skinny doctor, two tired nurses and three overworked dressers were attempting to care for 12,000 starving victims of the famine.

‘She will die,’ murmured the doctor of a wasted mite whose arms were no thicker than my fingers. ‘There have to be mass graves before anyone wants to help, and once you find fresh graves, we have lost our battle against the drought.’ He sighed deeply.

Times are never normal, or good in this god-forsaken corner of Africa, where Somali nomads roam in a perpetual search for sustenance. Both for themselves and their herds.

Shimalis frowned. ‘They are a primitive people who eat food on the hoof, using a special curved knife to slice steaks off the living animal, then packing the wound with mud.’

Hammered by the sun and buffeted by sand-laden winds, it had been five years since the Ogaden had received a drop of rain. Wherever I looked, sun-bleached bones punctured the desert landscape. Even the hardy camel herds were dying. Walking away from my colleagues, I came upon a small group moaning softly around a dried up water hole. One was a mother with two young whose hump had shrunk to a flab of skin.

She salivated, rolling her tongue, as the twins butted her udder in frustration. As I watched, she sank to her knees and rested her chin on the sand. A buzzard took off from a twisted acacia, then another and looking up, I saw other scavengers circling in the washed out sky. I had encountered many unpleasant situations on my travels when I’d tried not to cry, but conditions in Gode brought on tears... ..

www.travelswithmyhat.com
Images: http://www.copix.co.uk/

Coelacanths, moonshine and the scent of ylang-ylang

2012-02-03T22:19:00.003-08:00

"When I hauled in the net …..I saw the strange fishtail sticking out and realised that it was different from anything I had ever seen...the fish was a coelacanth believed extinct for millions of years.” wrote Captain Hendrik P. Goosen of catching the first coelacanth off the Comores in 1938.

Publicity surrounding the ‘living fossil,’ - pre-dating dinosaurs by 100 million years - brought attention to the Comores, an Indian Ocean archipelago, originally peopled by Shirazi settlers who arrived with their African slaves. Comorians are descended from these early mixed migrations: 99 per cent are Muslim.

The three islands - Grand Comore, Anjouan and Moheli - lie in the Mozambique Channel. A fourth, Mayotte, while geographically part of the archipelago, opted to remain with France when independence was granted in 1975.

Moroni the Comorian capital, is located on the largest island of Grand Comore. It remains a sleepy, old ‘Indian Ocean Coast’ style town of coral-stone houses lining narrow lanes descending to a harbour filled with wooden ngalawas used for in-shore fishing. A second coelacanth caught in 1985, is displayed in Moroni’s National Museum and in order to protect the island’s only claim to fame, the government declared a section of ocean a National Coelacanth Reserve.

The Karthala Volcano on Grand Comore rises to a height of 2361 m. During a big eruption in 2005, lava ran right down to the sea and due to a shortage of building material, some village houses are entirely constructed of volcanic rock.

The south coast of Grand Comore is lined with coconut palms and pandanus trees leaning over turquoise bays. 1000 year old cycad palms are among several exotic species flourishing in rain forest in theinterior. On coastal clearings, maize, bananas and rice are grown along with the ylang-ylang flower. The Comores are the world’s biggest producer of ylang-ylang, an essential oil in many perfumes. But it takes a lot of flowers -nearly a ton - to distil a single litre.

Island life is low-key except on the occasion of a grand mariage when custom dictates the first born daughter gets a big send off.

As soon as a baby girl is born in the Comores, her family begins building her a house although it may take as long as twenty years, and their life savings, to complete. The groom reciprocates with money, jewellery and livestock. He is also responsible for the wedding feast lasting several days, with hundreds of friends and relatives invited.

Traditional dancing is central to celebrations. Slow at first, it grows ever wilder, but is always performed in step. Women, their faces painted with white paste which is considered alluring, perform the energetic wadaha miming island chores - milling grain, sweeping, fetching water - all tasks in store for the new bride.

Images from: www.copix.co.uk

LA MAJORELLE: MAGIC GARDEN IN MARRAKESH

2012-01-21T17:12:00.001-08:00

As a child, I used to imagine a door set in a high wall and on pushing it open, I could pass into a peaceful and sweetly scented haven.

Visiting Marrakesh many years later, I found just such a place - not as you might imagine, in the old medina - but in the Nouvelle Ville built during the French period of administration in Morocco. Set in a high rose-pink wall was the door of my imagination, and while only steps from busy souks, inside was a thousand miles from the madding crowd of faux-guides and salesmen.

Carrying a basket of lycra cycling shorts, a final persistent tout had followed me along the Avenue Yaccoub el Mansour, imploring me to spend my dirhams.

“Pour votre mari madame, pour votre fils!” he cajoled, until eager to be left in peace, I told him my husband was dead and unfortunately so too was my son, and that as a middle-aged woman, I had no use for such apparel.

Following a dramatic pause, he pulled a Rolex out of his pocket but I was already pushing open the door of my childhood fantasies.

Inside I found myself in a lush oasis of still pools surrounded by exuberantly growing plants –groves of bamboo, banana trees and date-palms, hedges of golden lantana, pink and scarlet bougainvillea, cascades of pale blue plumbago and lilac wisteria. Every shade was represented yet the overall colour was blue: not the turquoise of Moroccan ceramics, but a rich cobalt blue covering pavilions, pergolas, pots, and poolside structures and known as bleu Majorelle.

The original plot was created by the late nineteenth French artist Jacques Majorelle who travelled widely in a quest of beauty before settling in Marrakesh. An enthusiastic botanist, Majorelle made frequent trips into the nearby Atlas mountains to collect plants for his little paradise on the hot red plains and as his interest developed, he exchanged specimens with green-fingered colleagues in other parts of the world. Plants from five continents now flourish among indigenous species.

When Majorelle died in 1962, his widow sold the garden, but subsequent proprietors allowed it to become overgrown until the late fashion designer Yves Saint Laurent and his partner Pierre Berge, purchased it in 1980 and began reclaiming it from wilderness.

Although La Majorelle lies in the middle of urban Marrakesh, inside its walls you are close to nature. I glimpsed a chameleon sunning itself on a branch, while a large green frog sat motionless on a lily-pad. The garden hosts some fifteen species of birds attracted to its water and greenery. Resting on a bench beneath fragrant jasmine, I heard the trill and coo of bul-buls and turtle-doves and a gardener, on seeing my interest, explained you can sometimes catch the magic warble of a nightingale.

Majorelle’s former studio has been converted into a small museum housing Moroccan arts and crafts. These include silver jewellery worn by Saharan tribes, Berber rugs woven on hand-looms in the Atlas, woodwork and ceramics from the personal collection of YSL whose ashes were scattered in the garden following his death in 2008.

The garden is open all year: 8am-12 noon and 2.00 to 5.00 during winter and 8.00 until 18.00 summer. Admission: 40 dirhams.

TRAVELLING HAT RECIPE

2012-01-01T03:26:00.004-08:00

THAI ROAST DUCK CURRY

½ Chinese-style roast duck, chopped and with loose bones removed

4 tablespoons olive oil

1 large onion, finely sliced

1 teaspoon of turmeric, ½ teaspoon curry powder

2 cubes crushed garlic

1 tablespoon crushed fresh ginger root

1 stick bruised lemon grass

2 sliced and seeded small red chillies

50 m chicken stock

100 m coconut milk

5 tablespoons of grated coconut block

Juice of half a fresh lime

Dash of nom-pla (Thai fish sauce)

Fresh coriander leaves

Preparation

Heat oil in a pan and fry onion, garlic and raw chilli until soft. Stir in all the spices and simmer for 3 minutes. Add the lemon grass and pour in the hot chicken stock. Add the coconut milk and the cream of coconut, the lime-juice and finally the pieces of chopped duck. Allow to simmer for 10 minutes on a low heat. Remove when hot and garnish with fresh coriander leaves. Serve with steamed Thai rice.

Serves 3-4 persons

Images: www.copix.co.uk

BALI BEHIND THE MASK

2011-12-26T06:51:00.001-08:00

In the mountains of central Bali lies the village of Kintamani, a magical, almost spiritual place, a world away from the crowded coastal resorts.

Standing there at dusk I inhaled a scent of pine-log fires and listened to sounds drifting up from the valley: the dull clonk of cow bells, the hoarse cough of a herdsman and the soulful cry of the kik-kik-kir bird. Suddenly the mist parted revealing Gunung Batur, one of several volcanoes smoking gently in the island core and Kala –God of Darkness, plunged Kintamani into night.

Nehru called Bali ‘The Morning of the World’. Other visitors, equally smitten, have described it as ‘paradise’ and by the end of my own stay, I truly felt that Bali offers a challenge to the general concept of whatever this means.

The island was unknown outside Indonesia until discovered by hippies in the 1960s when hotel development began along the beaches of Sanur and Kuta. Such tourist resorts are today found everywhere, but close observation shows traditional Balinese life continues.

Sanur is the stage for a colourful daily pageant regulated by the moon and tides.

The curtain rises at dawn when people wade through the lagoon netting tiny fish to sell to hotel aquariums. Act II begins around seven when fishermen put to sea in long-prowed gadjaminas. At eight the bait-men start burrowing in the beach for worms and within an hour only their hats are visible above the sand. The stall-people unlock their shacks around nine and lay out batiks and kites for passers-by, then at noon, the satay-people start cooking kebabs over charcoal fires. Interval occurs during the hot afternoon, but when night falls the ‘shrimp men’ arrive with lamps and nets when the black lagoon ripples with lights as they tramp back and forth flipping prawns into baskets on their backs. Finally, at high tide the bait men return to fish until dawn when the play begin all over again.

Superstition inhibits the Balinese from having more contact with the sea. They believe the coastal lowlands are inhabited by spirits of the underworld, that the middle-world is for humans and that mountains are the dwelling place of Gods.

The best way to explore Bali is to hire a motor-scooter and follow ‘byways’ to its rural heartland. On either side, terraced rice-fields climb like stairways to the sky, ribbons of water cascade over velvety banks and armies of ducks sift the mud for eels. The Balinese are Indonesia’s best rice-growers and wherever you look, farmers are either planting or harvesting their crop.

On the road to Bedugal, about 1,500 metres above sea level, you notice a nip in the air. Rice gives way to cabbages and coffee and fog closes over the sugar-cane. Reindeer-like cattle graze on the hillsides and a Peter-Pan like child sits on a rock playing a wooden flute.

Suddenly the rippling cords and pounding drums of a gamelan fill the air as rounding a bend comes a procession of people bearing flowers and fruits to be offer at a temple ceremony. In their midst a barong covered in shaggy hair, flashing mirrors and jingling bells leaps and dances like a circus prop. A mythical lion, it is revered as an antidote to evil. Then as abruptly as it has appeared, the procession disappears through a wall of bamboo.

Only two miles separate Bali and Java, but the Balinese have preserve their unique form of Hinduism against Islam practised elsewhere in Indonesia. Each village has several temples where gods and spirits must constantly be appeased and every house has a shrine where offerings of rice, flowers and fruits are made together with fragrant incense.

Balinese-Hinduism aims to maintain a balance between good and evil. Life moves in harmony with nature which manifests itself in natural artistic expression. In villages such as Mas and Ubud, every family member is an artist carving, weaving and making silver jewellery.

Painting is the most exuberant local talent. In past times it was channelled into large, decorative panels in temples and palaces, for religious scrolls and astrological calendars. A good example is the exuberant ceiling of the Kerta Gosa, Hall of Justice, in the eighteenth century capital of Klungkung.

Ten days is an ideal time to spend on Bali. Ten weeks later you may want to stay ten years, or even a lifetime as many foreign artists did - among them Walter Spies, Rudolf Bonnet and the Australian painter Donald Friend.

Images: www.copix.co.uk

HAIL TO THE HAT !

2011-12-14T08:14:00.001-08:00

Since I activated the website about my forthcoming book - TRAVELS WITH MY HAT - several people have enquired about “The Hat”of the title.

The original blue denim hat, noticed by Her Majesty on our tour of Arabia, was wrenched off my head during a monsoon squall and sank beneath waves in the Bay of Bengal.

The present Hat has been my travelling companion for twenty-five years. And I still wear it. Most recently on a visit to the Western Sahara. But now that it has become famous - its picture is on Twitter - I'm naturally nervous that it too, might fly off when least expected.

Hopefully not. For it must be around for any book signing when I shall certainly wear it. I wouldn’t dare not.

Hail to The Hat! Some of the countries it has visited include India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Tahiti, Oman, Egypt, Singapore, Malaysia, Korea, Thailand, Tanzania.

Like the original one, it was bought at “River Island” in Oxford Street, London which now sells hideous headgear. No sign of anything in blue denim ...

Images of The Hat from left to right:

1 In the Luangwa Valley in Zambia

2 Tiger-fishing on the Zambesi

3 With Masai elders in Kenya

4 On safari in Amboseli National Park

5 When the Hat was young--- Federated Tribal Agencies of Pakistan

www.travelswithmyhat.com

THE LEGENDARY LYRE FROM UR

2011-12-10T07:51:00.002-08:00

Excerpt from Chapter 4: Middle East Nightmare

The next day, I took a taxi to the Iraq National Museum founded by Gertrude Bell, the great Orientalist, political officer and archaeologist who spoke both Arabic and Persian. Here under a single roof, I could finally feast on treasures from Mesopotamia and forget the crude public relations exercise of previous days. And evidently satisfied I could do no harm, the minder sat on the steps smoking a cigarette, leaving me free to explore alone.

The museum was deathly quiet except for my footsteps on the wooden floor. I passed the Warka Vase, a giant alabaster vessel engraved with processions of naked men bearing offerings to Inana, the Sumerian Goddess of Love and War. Glass cases displayed ancient pottery and sculptures, cuneiform tablets from Sumerian and Babylonian times, and stunning stone reliefs from the palace of the Assyrian king Sargon II at Khorsabad. Among this abundance of priceless objects, I wanted to find the Golden Lyre from the burial chamber of Queen Pu-Abi, who lived in the celebrated city of Ur.

Excavation of the royal tombs by Sir Leonard Woolley in 1929 had discovered a munificence of grave goods: a head-dress made of golden leaves; extravagant necklaces and belts; a chariot adorned with lioness’ heads in silver along with golden rings and bracelets. The legendary lyre had been found standing upright against a wall of the pit. Beside it lay the bodies of thirteen maidservants with beautiful adornments—retainers sacrificed to serve their mistress in another world.

‘It would seem,’ said Sir Leonard ‘as if the last player had her arm over the harp, certainly she played till the end.

Suddenly picked out by a shaft of sunlight, I saw the lyre encrusted with lapis lazuli and with the gold-bearded bull on the front representing Shamash, the Sun God and hopeless at anything musical myself, I shivered with excitement as I imagined Sumerian fingers plucking its strings some 5,000 years ago.

My thoughts were interrupted by the minder creeping up behind me. In order to reach Hatra before dusk, he indicated we had to leave. Now! He was the same pock-faced man who had shadowed me since my arrival in Baghdad and the only time he spoke on the journey north was when we passed Tekrit.

‘Saddam Hussein!’ he said, jerking a finger at the town where Saddam was born in 1937 and where Saladdin with whom the Iraqi president liked to compare himself, had been born 800 years earlier...

From a visit to Iraq in 1980: c. Christine Osborne

THAI SPICY PRAWNS from the Travelling Hat Recipe Book

2011-12-07T09:26:00.001-08:00

Serves 2-3

16-18 medium-size green prawns, shelled but leaving tails

3 medium cubes garlic

1 tps sambal paste

Black pepper and salt to taste

Coconut milk

Lemon

Thai fish oil/Nom pla

½ tin of chopped tomatoes

Butter

Cup Basmati rice

Place the crushed garlic, pepper and sambal in a tablespoon of

butter and cook for one minute, shaking the skillet all the time.

Cool slightly, then throw in the prawns and cook quickly

until pink on both sides. Do not overcook them. Remove to cool.

To the skillet, add a tea-cup of coconut milk, a tea-cup of tinned tomatoes, a

splash of fish oil, and a squeeze of fresh lemon. Stir and heat, but do not boil.

Add the prawns and stir until hot enough to serve.

Serve with boiled rice.

Garnish: chopped coriander leaves.

Preview: for publication in 2012

2011-09-10T17:09:00.003-07:00

Travels with My Hat is the memoir of an Australian nurse who through skill and determination, switched careers to become an award-winning travel writer and photographer. It is a colourful record of her experiences defined by travel, undertaken on her own initiative, often without official help, and frequently against all odds. “We don’t know who you are,” she was told by the travel editor of the Daily Telegraph on arriving in London in 1974. “To get a name here, you need to write a book.” Which is exactly what she did. Publication of The Gulf States and Oman in 1977 brought a deluge of commissions on the Middle East. Books followed on Jordan and Pakistan. Christine was invited to visit Iraq by the Ba’athist regime of Saddam Hussein. Since visas were not issued to British journalists, she returned home and obtained clearance from the Iraqi Vice-Consul in – of all places –Bondi! Her journeys to Iraq, Ethiopia, Egypt, Yemen, Pakistan and Morocco are rounded off with letters to her mother who had never left Australia. We join Christine avoiding bandits in Yemen, diving in the Red Sea, and dining with Arab sheikhs in a racy account of forty years of travels when only one of a thousand and one problems, was being a young, western woman working in a man’s world. I have occasionally wished I were a boy, she writes in a chapter on Yemen. Not for the penis per se, but for the freedom it allows a man, since reality for a woman traveller is that her sex presents constraints…

Photos by Christine Osborne

www.copix.co.uk

http://travelswithmyhat.com

Experience, travel and

Travels with My Hat: from Chapter 3 Member of the Royal Press Corps

2011-08-14T18:28:00.001-07:00

...The Concorde bringing the Queen to Saudi Arabia touched down in Riyadh......Suddenly there was pandemonium. Everyone, including the State Guards, was running this way and that and after years of working alone, I forgot our strict orders not to leave the press group. Dashing outside the airport, I hailed a passing taxi.

‘Quick! The Nasirya Palace!’ I told the driver.

The Queen and the Duke were to stay here while the Britannia sailed to Dhahran, in the Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia. A photo-call at the palace was not on our itinerary, but I hoped to sail in on a bit of bluff. Especially since I was an honorary man!

The Indian taxi-driver entered into the spirit of the moment as though his country was still under the British Raj. Speeding along the sandy highways and byways of Riyadh, he screeched to a halt in front of a mammoth building flying the Union Jack. And above it, fluttering in the desert wind, was Her Majesty’s personal standard.

‘This is the Nasirya Palace memsahib,’ he said, reversing the dented red Datsun in between gleaming black limousines.

Racing up the palace steps, I nodded at the Bedouin guards. Did they think I was an advance on the ladies-in-waiting? Without asking, they waved me inside a vast foyer lit with chandeliers the size of flying saucers.

It took courage to stand there surrounded by many princes of the estimated 7,000 members of the House of Saud: tall, erect men all wearing the bisht edged with gold, the mark of nobility. My eyes roamed over onyx tables and huge vases of flowers, but my flashlight sparked a buzz of conversation and feeling vulnerable, I wound my long black scarf around my face like one of their own women.

When a Rolls Royce drew up at the palace steps, attention shifted from me to the Queen. Trained not to flinch, Her Majesty passed me with only a brief look of surprise. Had I gone completely native? Trailing behind her, the Duchess and Lady Susan looked perturbed. Could Buckingham Palace have erred? Should they too be veiled. Dresses brushing the marble floor, they swept towards the majlis and before anyone could enquire why I didn’t follow them, I scampered back to the taxi.

‘It's the most exciting day of my life!’ said the old Indian. ‘Finally something to write home about from this god-forsaken country.'

Back at the Riyadh Inter-Continental, my luck was in when a helpful MEA pilot offered to take my films to London. My editor, Ita Buttrose, had been insistent we beat rival Woman's Day to press. Leaving Riyadh at midnight, the films were collected next morning from the Kensington Hilton in London and were Sydney-bound that afternoon.

A week later my article - CARRY ON DOWN THE GULF MA'AM - THE SHEIKHS LOVE YOU! captured attention 'Down Under’.

Image: Her Majesty is welcomed by King Khalid at Riyadh International Airport.

LONDON RIOTS: THE RISE OF THE DISAFFECTED AND JUST PLAIN BAD

2011-08-10T19:28:00.001-07:00

This blog is not an analysis of the British riots. It is a brief take on my own experience of living 35 years in a mixed society in South London.

In 1983, I moved from leafy Putney to Lambeth Borough to be nearer the West End. None of my friends lived there, however I was happy. My flat was across the Thames from the Tate Gallery, only three tube stops to Green Park, and I loved the river walk to the London Eye. But by the 1990s, I noticed a change.

Aggression was common. Searching for a hairdresser one day, I entered a shop to enquire the cost of a blow-dry. “Stick with your own kind,” said its black receptionist.

Spitting had increased. But while TB was up 40%, no one thought to educate refugees that the habit is potentially deadly. This not withstanding, the refugees -mainly Somali - were likeable people and a traveller to the Horn of Africa, I would often stop for a friendly chat with them.

By now I was noticing the increasing number of children of ethnic Caribbean origin. I learned that Jamaicans who father many kids are considered virile. They’re called “Baby Farmers” I was informed of someone who knew of a man who had sired thirteen children by seven different women.

I began to clock the youths who gathered outside the tube around five. They wore lots of bling and drove big BMWs, but pushing drugs was the only opportunity for such tragic kids, products of casual sex, often without a birth certificate, and with no educational qualifications.

Blame for current disorder is attributed to government cutbacks on public services, but the benefits system has been milked for years. In the Post Office, I was alone in buying stamps. One day a man in the queue boasted he sent his £300 allowance “right back to de folks in Kingston.”

By 2000 the rise of gang culture was evident. Carried by many, knives were used with impunity. Coming home at 4.30 one afternoon, a neighbour had her face slashed for her mobile phone.

Burly, unmuzzled dogs wearing spiked collars then became the gang weapon of choice. Half a dozen hoodies, parading such animals saw pedestrians scatter. En route to the dentist one morning, I inadvertently stepped in front of a big black man who picked me up by the elbows and lifted me out of his way.

The owners of small businesses along the high street - the Eritrean in the deli, Algerians in the Pound Store, Afghans in the hardware, Pakistanis repairing computers, expressed concern at the growing belligerence. We agreed the root problem was a hole where family life should offer support. But with no father and a rejection of rules for decent behavior laid down by a struggling single mother, many black youths had morphed into ferals existing outside normal community life.

By 2010-11, anger and resentment was simmering, a potent ingredient in the quickening decline being white " low life" telling their kids to “shut up ” and to "fuck off". “Fuck off” said a six year year old boy I saw stealing sweets in Sainsburys. On another occasion, I came upon two teens riding bicycles around the toiletries counter. Yes. Inside the supermarket!

Away at work, the professional minority where I lived missed such goings-on. Or if they knew, their lips were sealed in fear of being called a racist. But the Indians who owned the newsagent knew. They moved to America. The Cockney fishmonger sold up --- ‘ad enough -- he told me - and astonishingly, a mini-cab driver said he was returning to Nigeria (it was safer in Lagos!).

Finally I too decided to withdraw before the in-balance erupted into urban violence and it is with a special sadness I have watched this happen from far away Australia.

Thank you.

MOVE OVER MARRAKESH- Taroudant is the hot new property spot in Morocco

2011-07-03T05:01:00.000-07:00

On a recent visit to Morocco to write about real estate, I nearly ended up buying a house! It was a lovely old-style village house, completely renovated, with 3 BR, living, dining, patio-garden and swimming-pool. Price EUR120,000 (approx. £95,000).

The property was on sale in Taroudant, a quiet Berber market town in the Souss, the long valley extending inland from the Atlantic coast to the Anti-Atlas mountains.

While the popular resort of Agadir is only 40 miles distant, Taroudant has never really caught on with tourists. Why? Largely because the town itself is dry. There is no nightlife, and while its ramparts are among the best preserved in Morocco, there are no big monuments to catch the eye. Tourists either visit on a day-trip, or rush through it en route to the Sahara.

Taroudant is how I remember Marrakesh sans touristes in the sixties. The pace is slow, people shop in traditional souqs, and in spring the entire town is bathed in a scent of orange blossom from surrounding orchards.

“Taroudant is a magic place. Only 3-4 places in the world have the same effect,” says Sibyl de Beaufort, one of the first to buy and convert a house. In fact she bought two houses. The second was demolished to provide a swimming pool for Dar-el-Hana, her lovely riad tucked away in a corner of the medina.

Unlike Marrakesh whose medina numbers nearly 1000 foreign-owned riads, properties for sale in Taroudant are located in outlying douar (villages) whose owners are moving into modern flats. Rather like farmers do in rural France.

Leading local agent Immobiliere Taroudant has 300 such places on the market priced from from EUR42,000 (£37,000). Clearly they require renovation, but labour is cheap. A skilled artisan costs only £12 a day. A handyman less. And everything from tiles to taps (and alcohol!) is available in Agadir.

Until now buyers are mainly middle age, middle class French looking at retirement. Or as an investment.

The first five years are tax exempt after which tax is levied on the annual rental value. If sold within five years, capital gains tax is charged at 20% of profit and while values have slipped 20-30% in Marrakesh, 15% + is guaranteed in Taroudant. I heard of one man who bought a village house for EUR 15,000, did nothing to it, and sold it 8 months later for more than double this price.

One of the most ambitious projects was tackled by Marc Caburet, a former pastissier from Lausanne, who has transformed 4 acres of land into Dar Zitoune, a superb rural-style riad whose 12 de-luxe bungalows stand in gardens of fragrant plants, fruit and olive trees.

The bone-dry climate of the Souss is ideal for gardeners and arthritis sufferers will feel in heaven on earth. My advice is to leave your glucosamine behind and take advantage of current bargains. A select group of property owners includes Farah Diba, former Imperial Empress of Iran, who owns several houses in Taroudant and surroundings.

www.dar-el-hana.com

www.darzitoune.com

http://www.immo-taroudant.com/