Time to update the ol' house blog with some big news: we've had a change in the personnel here. Long-time resident Antony has thrown in the towel after some five years of co-habitation and headed out on a global sojourn for a year or so. We're terribly sad to see him head off, as we all got quite used to his funny ways, idiosyncrasies and annoying habits. Inspired by this effort, Antony's set up his own travel blog where he's capturing his international backpacking adventures with curt, Hemmingway-esque prose.
But as they say, the great wheel turns and we welcome Alen to our new household!
India has been a shock to the system: no matter how much you brace yourself, the touts are still pretty intense for the first few days. We had the great fortune of being picked up by good ol' Taj at the airport and so were spared the trauma of dealing with the taxis there. Our first night in Pahar Ganj was okay - if a bit noisy - but waking up to see a dozen cows wandering around the market out the front of our hotel (some 300m from New Delhi railway station!) was a spin-out. Monkeys clambering on the powerlines, the occasional camel pulling a cart ... it's like an Indiana Jones movie.
We then spent a couple of nights in Hotel Ajanta - as dodgy a hotel as I've seen. Since the staff are constantly trying to sell you on tours at the expense of providing accommodation, it was more like a high-pressure travel agency with a few beds. So we booked a tour through another agency and arranged to meet our agent at the restaurant to pickup the tickets - the bitch at Ajanta lied to his face and said we'd checked out at 6am! Fortunately, he knew about this practice and spotted us having breakfast. Shame, Ajanta, shame. After that experience, we decided it was worth paying another couple of dollars for a room at Karol Barg.
We got the feel for Delhi, saw the monuments, caught up with Taj, visited his office, met his colleagues and had a few drinks and kebabs. While I haven't physically clapped eyes on Taj in five years, it was amazing how easily we just sort of slipped back into things. On the Friday we went to his place for dinner with his family and his American colleague Shariff. I'd met Taj's Mum and Dad and brother Giri in Australia about seven years ago but it was great to see them in their element. Taj had a new guitar and kindly let us all have a strum - including his Mum who could actually play. (We got a few verses and a chorus of "Hang Down Your Head, Tom Dooley" for our benefit.)
The next day Marie, Shariff and I did an all-day Agra trip to visit the Agra Fort, Taj Mahal and Fatehpur Sikri. The latter is an large fort and complex that was built out in the desert and later abandoned due to lack of water. Whoops! (Even 16th century Moguls were cursed with management consultants.) The "other Taj" (as Taj calls it) is a truly draw-dropping building and well-deserves its reputation. Next time I'm in India, I'll be sure to re-visit at dawn or dusk.
After this, Marie and I embarked on a ten-day trip through the Indian desert state of Rajasthan. We hired a driver and car through the agency, who also arranged accommodation. We whisked though the north and west - Mandawa, Bikaner, Jaisalmer, Jodhpur, Pushkar and Jaipur and back to Delhi. There's something magical about tooling around the desert in an Ambassador. We covered about 2500km on the trip and took in a lot of forts, palaces and historic buildings. Personal highlights for me were the camel research farm near Bikaner, the camel "safari" near Jaisalmer (ie riding around the dunes for a couple of hours at sunset and sunrise), the visit to the spiritual towns of Pushkar (Hindu blessing in the morning) and Ajmer (Muslim blessing in the afternoon), McAloo Tikki Burger and Bollywood movie and the world-famous Raj Mandir Cinema in Jaipur - and learning to drink Old Monk rum Indian-style with our driver, S.K.
A brief note about our driver, S.K. While we hired a driver (and declined the agency's offer of a tour guide), we ended up with a tour guide in S.K. His knowledge of the places was superb, he kept us out of trouble, gave us good advice and generally made the whole trip much less hectic and stressful. Whether it's sorting out our laundry or getting a new city tour guide if he feels the last one was too hungover, he's proven himself on many occasions. He also seems to know everyone - hotel managers, other drivers and tour operators - since he's been doing this for 12 years. While still only a young man, he seems mature beyond his years and is very reliable, a safe and careful driver, and a considerate host. I have had no qualms recommending his services to strangers and my own family alike and heartily suggest readers interested in hiring a driver in Delhi and the north and west of India check out his website to get in touch.
After returning to Delhi for more site-seeing, we shot up to the holy city of Haridwar in Uttaranchal. Here, the Ganges River flows out of the Himalayas and onto the plains. It's the second most holy city for Hindus (after Varanasi) and is a site of major domestic tourism. (Foreign tourists looking for that mystical experience are found up-river at Rishikesh - founded by the Beatles in 1968. If Pushkar is anything to go by, the detritus of Western civilisation can be found wandering around stoned and grubby.) We washed away our sins in the Ganges River and rode on the cable cars to visit the temples atop surrounding mountains. We found it very relaxing and the tout-intensity dropped off significantly owing to the lack of foreign tourists. Even the priests offering the puja were more chilled and less pushy about fees. The river itself was flowing very fast (considering it was the dry season) and was surprisingly blue and fresh-looking (considering what was happening in Rishikesh).
Back in Delhi, Taj's mum Bina took us shopping for a wedding saree for Marie. You see, we'd been invited to a Sikh wedding through Taj's family. The night before, we went to the bride's family's pre-wedding bash at a local officers' mess, where we got re-acquainted with Taj's grandparents. This do consisted of a couple of hundred Sikhs with drinks and finger food. As I looked out, the vista consisted mostly of senior gentlemen with Blazer jackets, turbans, nicely turned out beards and scotch on the rocks. What a great night! Marie and I met a huge number of interesting and accomplished people from business, the military, government, royalty and other walks of life. They were so warm and friendly towards us it was just lovely. We had a buffet dinner at about midnight and there was plenty of Hindipop to keep the dancefloor pumping.
The next morning was the wedding proper. The groom showed up (with his face veiled) and his father's regimental band was playing, resplendent in traditional Sikh uniforms and turbans, tartan sashes and, of course, bagpipes. They finished up with a jaunty Jingle Bells medley. The ceremony took place in a tent and went for about an hour and we returned to the marquee for more drinks, finger food and buffet. Sadly, Marie and I couldn't join the party for afternoon polo(?!) since we were heading north-west to Amritsar
This is the holy city of the Sikhs, in Punjab. We stayed a couple of nights, primarily to visit the Golden Temple (Harimander Sahib). We spent the day admiring this beautiful temple from inside and out. Priests read constantly from the Sikh holy book (Guru Granth Sahib), accompanied by a harmonium and tabla drums. It's a very serene, almost hypnotic setting with its jeweled walls, ragas and lush carpets. On the perimeter, some 30,000 people a day are feed for free from the community kitchen and there's a disturbingly graphic and grizzly museum documenting the traumas of the Sikhs over the year. We returned at night to see the ceremony when the Holy Book is carried over the bridge from the temple.
We couldn't leave without a trip over to the Indo-Pakistan border at Wagah. There's a nightly flag ceremony where each side competes to pack as much pomp into their version as possible. Stadiums on either side are packed with cheering citizens, MCs warm up the crowd with slogans and Hindipop while the soldiers limber up in the background with starjumps and stretches. Once it kicks off, it takes about an hour for the quick-step marching, shouting and general carrying-on to conclude when the flags are finally lowered, folded and march off. The mood isn't that aggro - more sort of good-natured patriotism that one might find at the cricket. (Still, I bet things take on a sour note during times of conflict - but the same could be said of the cricket.)
On our final return to Delhi, we went on a shopping binge to pick up Christmas presents and some other goodies for ourselves. We headed to the Central Cottage Industries Emporium (on Janpath) where we could shop department-style for government-approved handicrafts. (Apparently, this ensures the producers get a fair cut.) While I love the bazaars and chowks, it was a relief to deal with sticker-prices and professional sales employees.
By way of thanking Taj's family, we took them out to dinner at Kareems Restaurant. This was a sumptuous all-meat affair (Taj even vetoed the egg curry on the grounds that we "weren't to have any vegetables") with kebabs and curries and breads. It was delicious and quite unlike any food I've had in Australia.
North Indian cuisine has long been my favourite. Even after eating it three times a day for a month, I can honestly say I'm not sick of it and right now looking forwards to eating some aloo gobi with a paratha soon. The dishes on offer in Punjab, Rajashtan etc are much the same as I've seen before back home, although served a little hotter. I really enjoyed eating in the dhabas (road-side restaurants), street eateries (mmm, kachoris) and fancier places. Like most places, you've got to go where the taxi drivers are eating. And, if you've paid less than a dollar for your meal, you shouldn't be eating meat. The Indian sweets were pretty new to me - while I've been aware of the milk and gram-flour based delicacies and gulab jamun, I didn't realise just how massive the range is and how widespread the shops are. Although I made a point of trying new sweets each day, I could only manage one or two as they are so heavily-sweetened!
We flew out of Delhi and made it safely back to Melbourne (via Bangkok). Amazingly, after seven weeks in Asia (Thailand, Vietnam and India), I can confidently claim:
No illnesses, "Delhi belly", gastro, food poisoning or bad bottom experience.
No "serious" use of the dreaded squat toilet. *shudder*
No victim of / witness to any assaults, muggings, crimes or even swindles.
No experience of / witness to any traffic accidents or near-misses.
How fantastic is that? I'd emotionally braced (and insured) myself for all of these and, apart from losing my mobile phone in a tuk-tuk in the last week, I got away entirely unscathed with just happy positive memories.
Vietnamese airport officials leave you in no doubt that you're entering a communist country: stern, straight-backed officials with massive peaked caps and firm eye-contact. What a relief to bump into Mum and Dexter in the Immigration queue! (I think Mum was in shock for a good ten minutes at the sight of us.)
After a mild snafu with the pickup/luggage, Marie and I met Hoang and his parents Mr and Mrs Nguyen and headed into town. There, we caught up with Mum and Dexter at their posh 5-star hotel for a family get-together in a far-flung land.
We stayed at the excellent Tan My Dinh Hotel in downtown Saigon. (I thoroughly recommend this hotel as having a great location, friendly and helpful staff and good, clean facilities.) Mr and Mrs Nguyen hosted us at an awesome Vietnamese restaurant, where we were toasted and feted like celebrities. We had fantastic food, inclduing some minced-prawn-on-a-sugar-cane-stick delicacies. Just superb!
We caught up with Phuong and Claire too and later Thanh, Khanh and Caitlin who were visiting Khanh's relos further out of town. We also met Dong (Thanh and Hoang's oldest brother) and his family. Mum, Dexter, Marie and I went to the crazy Ben Thanh Market for some cheap-arse clothes shopping.
The next day, we all piled into a 15-seater bus and headed south to Long Xuyen, travelling through the countryside and towns, crossing at various punts and generally averaging about 35 km/h. We checked in at the Long Xuyen Hotel (no great shake) there and met a group of crazy Brits who were riding from Saigon to Cambodia for some charity. Nutters. We had dinner with more relos - uncle and cousins I think - and discovered the delicious local spring rolls.
On Tuesday we rolled out to the small village of Lap Vo. This is where Thanh and Hoang spent their boyhood holidays and went to school for a few months. We were warmly greeted by their four aunts (sisters of Mrs Nguyen) who laid on a fantastic spread of fruits. We went up-river on a boat (Apocalpse Now style) to the family burial plot to pay our respects. Walking through the market in the village was like being Brangelina - the pointing, excited chatter, kids following etc. I was told it was quite likely that most of the kids had never seen an "Ong Tay" (= "Mr Westerner") before. Equally surreal was that Thanh was recognised by villagers from his stay some 30 years ago who stopped for a chat. Bizarre.
Then the four aunts treated us to a huge lunch consisting of many, many courses and giant yabby-like creatures the size of small crayfish. They were very sweet and it was clear to all of us that Thanh and Hoang were the apples of their eyes and those boys were very much loved.
(Incidentally, Long Xuyen will forever be in my memory as the first place I saw Mum ride in first a cyclo and then a motorcycle. Whoo-hoo! She also drank her first beer in two decades in Saigon and took to it like a duck to water. The same can't be said about the karaoke.)
On the trip back, Claire and Caitlin decided to teach Marie and me some Vietnamese. We started with counting to five, which is quite difficult since Vietnamese is a tonal language. This meant that our efforts sounded to them like "One, two, three, constipated, five", as "bong" pronounced differently has different meanings. They found this incredibly funny. For about an hour and half.
On our return to Saigon, we found that President of the US of A (a certain Mr George W. Bush) had rudely taken up residence in the hotel opposite ours. This demanded roadblocks by Very Serious Men with Automatic Weapons (who looked like they were yet to start shaving). Once we left our hotel for a late night apperitif, we couldn't return without the bellboys being summoned to fetch some official papers for us allowing us into the exclusion zone. It was all a bit of a pain. Thanks, Dubya!
The next morning we said our goodbyes and, leaving Thanh, Khanh and Caitlin behind, flew up to Hanoi. Marie and I checked into the Trung Nam Hai Hotel in the Old Quarter, just behind the Cathedral. We then caught up with Alison, who arrived that day via KL. Another run in with a family member while overseas! She suggested we have dinner at a restaurant that she'd visited a few years earlier, but couldn't remember the name. Hoang got a recommendation and took us to Indochine - which turned out to be the very place Al had in mind!
After that, we parted ways as Marie and I were hanging in Hanoi for a couple of days while the rest of the family tripped off to Cat Ba and Ha Long Bay. Marie and I really like Hanoi and it's Old Quarter. We didn't know the rest of the city, so we hired a coulpe of cyclos to take us out to the distant Thu Le Lake and Park (and shitty zoo). Great fun. It was sunny and mild (mid-20s) and though still quite humid made for a pleasant change from the heat of Saigon.
A highlight for us was catching up with Marie's 21 year-old cousin David, who's been backpacking Europe for the last few months with his mates. Needless to say, it was quite a beery occassion. At 10c a beer ("bia hoi") it's hard not to. As for the Long Island Ice Teas ... much fun. I really like the idea of bumping into relos overseas.
Certainly Hanoi is shaking off its frumpiness that I remember five years earlier. Back then, even the tourist bars shut at 11pm and the place was a desolate wasteland after 11:30pm. Now, the bars are still jumping after 2am and the number of motorcycle drivers offering marijuana has increased eight-fold. I still think Saigon has more street life and energy, though.
The rest of our visit in Hanoi was spent lounging around and perfecting the art of "stationary tourism" whereby one holes up in a street-stall sipping coffee and patiently observes the goings on outside. Of course, we visited the Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum where we spent 30 seconds processing past his laminated corpse. We also took in the propoganda at the Museum (a salient lesson for John Howard in political interference in writing the national story) and mocked the ugly communist architecture there.
We also visited the Water Puppets again, this time paying more attention to the music than the puppetry. It's taken a while, but I think I've developed an ear for the high-pitched nasal singing and speed-up/slow-down rhythms. Thoroughly recommended!
Marie and I took our last Vietnamese meal in what has been an increasingly daring round of gastro-intestinal brinksmanship. How we didn't get sick eating sub-$1 crab meat and seafood sold in the gutter is a testament to the powers of wishful thinking. We've been egging each other on into more and more "authentic" (=cheap) meals for some time now. This must stop when we get to India.
It's time to put finger to keyboard and provide an update on some of our travel on this trip.
We've spent the past week in Ton Sai Beach, on the Railay Peninsular near Ao Nang, in Krabi, Thailand. Marie and I were here a, and really enjoyed the long relax. It's relatively inaccessible, requiring access from a long-tail boat. We just spent the week lounging on the beach, drinking coffee at the little bungalows and enjoying the beer and nightly fireshows (and awesome "sea boxing") with the tourists. The beach was almost entirely populated with climbers of various flavours (from dreadlocked to corporate). We've noticed some changes - more bungalows, more development and Ao Nang has the highest density of ATM machines I've ever seen - at least one every 10m on both sides of all the road.
We stayed at Country Side Resort which was pleasant enough except for two irritations - the bed bugs and the generator just 20m away. After a few days, I got used to both and managed to go to sleep to the growl of diesel turning into electricity and awake to a few tidy rows of (surprsingly unitchy) bites. It was okay, but I wouldn't rush to re-book. While it's only 10 minutes from the beach and pleasantly removed from the busier parts, I think there are better options for accommodation.
One highlight from this time was seeing one of the larger rock monkeys descend from the cliffs and hop onto a table in a bungalow. The customer tried to frighten it away but the cheeky bugger just bared his fangs! The waiting staff appeared with slingshots and the monkey, presumably having seen this before, promptly shot up a tree to hide out without a shot fired. While Marie valiantly swam ashore to protect our personal effects, I watched with amusement as a customer threw a rock at the monkey, only to see the monkey catch and throw back the same rock!
After the requisite swimming, eating and sea-kayaking we returned to Bangkok and caught a train up to Ayutthaya. We spent three nights there which, in retrospect, was probably a night too long. It's the former imperial capital of Thailand and the key attraction is a collection of about 20 wats (or temples) in various states of decay. For most of the past 1000 years, Thai kings fought more or less constant battles with their neighbours - mostly from Burma but also Laos and Cambodia - and each victory required the construction of a wat. The Thai's seem to have won about half and on each occassion they put up a commemorative wat. (In some instances there are also condolence wats mourning a loss.) The result is that the area has the wattage of a hydro-electric dam.
We spent our days there cycling around (it's very flat - built on a flood plain at the confluence of a number of rivers), checking out the sites. I was impressed with the elephants, carefully "parked" and awaiting tourists. We stayed at a delightful guesthouse, Baan Suan, run by a very nice gentleman. It was a great place with a well-maintained and much-loved garden. The bungalow (featured on his website) was great - clean, air-con, cosy. The proprietor warmed to us after a day or so and was very helpful. It even had a nice little bar out the front which was packed with locals (well, a dozen - it's tiny).
The only downside is the dogs. Ayutthaya has a terrible problem with local dogs. They roam the streets in gangs, slinking around at all hours, looking for food, often limping or carrying other wounds (and, no doubt, disease). They bark, they fight, they shit and root in the streets. You can't go anywhere without seeing a bitch suckling a litter, or a pack harassing some lizard or something. It's really quite terrible, though they don't seem dangerous to people. The first night, we were both shocked that the barking and fighting went on for several hours ruining our sleep. I'm pretty sure the results of each night's fights are reported in the local press. I spotted a "Bark Stopper 2000" (or similar) supersonic dog control device plugged in and had a chat to the proprietor about his plight. It seems the neighbourhood dogs are protected and there is no civil or criminal redress for their awful behaviour. The poor bloke is at his wits end but it seems the problem is widespread throughout the whole town. That said, the third night wasn't too bad: the site of a run-over dog out the front, it's guts spread out over a couple of square metres, steaming in the hot sun, probably put the mongrels in a more sombre mood.
We returned to Bangkok for two nights, which is a great city to just wander around. We were staying in the Banglamphu area, near the river. We caught a boat up and down the river and just spent a day poking around the markets and "must-see" streets. I especially enjoyed catching a bus back to our hotel (number 53 from Hua Lamphong Station). It took about an hour and went through all the major districts. While I'm no stranger to Bangkok's crazy traffic, this bus trip was something else. Amazingly, the bus employs quantum superposition to enable navigation though Chinatown, where the traffic actually occupies 120% of the available road area. It has to be seen to be believed.
Our hotel for two nights was the New World Lodge Hotel. We found it to be a really nice hotel, well run, clean and comfortable. The location is great, seeing as how it's a few hundred metres from Khaosan Rd. The buffet breakfast was the best I've had in Thailand with a designated egg chef ready to whip up an omlette or over-easy as you please. Okay, so the Muslim ownership means there's no booze - but there's plenty of that around. I will definitely re-book when next in Bangkok.
Speaking of food, in the laneway off from the hotel is a great street eatery where we had the best cheap meals of our trip. Giant prawns, fresh squid, delicious spring rolls all prepared by a flamboyant Thai-Chinese chef right there on the street. You haven't seen showboating with a wok until you've seen this guy working the crowd. Great stuff!
OK - next we're flying over to Saigon (Ho Chi Minh City) to catch up with a large chunk of my family for ten days in Vietnam. Going to be a blast!
It's been a while since we posted, but there has been the arrival last month of a new person: Emily Jane Withers. Congrats to Neal and Penny for making a baby. They both worked very hard from concept(ion) to delivery and can now enjoy the fruits of their labour. (Check out the photos and movies - this is going to be one heavily documented kid!)
We've all been pretty busy at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival. As always, Lawrence and Andy's show - the Somewhat Secret Secret Society Show - has been getting well-deserved rave reviews. Personal favourites this year include Marie Bamford (again!), for the focused, deliberate and public vivisection of her twisted family and colleagues (via insanse characterisations and, well, silly voices); and Rich Hall, for his effortless gags, masterful audience interaction, and sparing use of his Nick Cave-like piano work. I also thought that Dave O'Neil wasn't bad, as far as FM breakfast radio types go.
Geeta reported that Chris Addison was pretty good, and Antony really liked Daniel Kitson's late show - especially when he turned up the house lights and booted out some English hecklers.
Only disappointment for me was Mike Wilmot. He did a great grumpy old man schtick on the television (the gala), but seemed to be about 30 minutes short of material and padded it out with largely unfunny profanity and audience abuse. While I don't object to that per se, in his case, it just wasn't that good. Oh well, maybe I just caught him on a bad night.
I had the traditional family Christmas in Warrnambool - including the monster tent in the backyard. We also had an extended family gathering, augmented as we were with Thanh and Hoang's parents, Mr and Mrs Nguyen. It was great to have a break and just hang out with the family. After a brief stop over in Melbourne, I met Marie and her family at their beach house in Inverloch and spent the New Year weekend there relaxing and walking on the beach.
Highlights from last week included my first solo all-day baby-sitting effort. Luka was returned relatively unscathed and I managed two pooey nappies without vomiting. Looking forward to another visit from the little chappy soon.
We also kicked off the pub night series by trying out the Beer Garden upstairs at the Corner Hotel, Richmond. Nice weather and the menu was pretty good (more emphasis on value than quality IMHO although the vegeterian range was undeniably better than the London Tavern up the road).
I've started a new blog, this time tracking the media frenzy associated with Aussie Rules footballers and their dastardly off-field behaviour:
We seem to be in birthday season at the moment, starting with Gerd. So, alles gutes zum Geburtstag! Next was Marie (hitting the big 28) - happy birthday. In a couple of weeks we have Neal's and then Geeta's, which should keep us busy.
Other news: Antony had his economics exam today and can now commence total immersion training for the Murray River Marathon, where he will paddle over 400 km in five gruelling days.
Lastly, I have reformatted my letters page as a blog called Vent which allows other people to post comments. Kudos to Taj for being first to post a comment, within hours of going live.
Yes, safely back in Melbourne now - thanks to Gerd for his superhuman efforts in getting up at 3:30am (or was it 11:30am?) to get me to the airport on time! It was sad to say goodbye after just a week but I hope to return next year with Marie.
I should wrap up the last few days in Berlin ... as mentioned it was a nice wind-down from the frenetic pace in Rome. (Even though I disciplined myself to keep to only two tourist things a day there, the heat coupled with the Metro strike made it exhausting.)
We had another dinner party, this time with gulasch and dumpings - a specialty of Gerd's - washed down with the appropriate Czech beer (from Pilz) and mousse au chocolat. Got to meet some friends of Gerd's from last time and a couple of new ones. It was a great night and I had some good conversations (auf Englisch, natuerlich).
On Friday we went to see some of the new developments in Berlin. This city is just throwing up buildings like mushrooms after a shower! Apparently they are slowing down now and there are not as many new developments underway. Gerd and I checked out the Chancellor's offices and new Parliamentary library in the government quarter. (Very savvy of the Government to hold out until the end of the ten year program for its own massive buildings.) We also visited the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe - a field of granite stones in the former death strip, about 50m from the site of the new US embassy. While the work is still underway, I must say it doesn't really grab me. Still, I haven't seen the competiting designs.
Friday evening we caught up with Katinka, Marie's friend from Amsterdam, for a beer. It was good to see her again too after a year and find out about her new place and her studies. Later, Gerd, his housemate Josef and I went to the cool bit in Kreuzberg around Oranienstrasse for some beers and middle-eastern influenced cuisine. It was very tasty and I particularly enjoyed the lentil soup. As mentioned, we got home at midnight and slept from about 1am to 3:30am!
I flew from Berlin to Rome and saw two very impressive things that I'd not seen before: the Alps at dawn with giant golden snow fields, razor backed peaks and green valleys with little villages nestled in amongst them; and an oncoming passenger jet passing us a few hundred metres off the port wing at a relative airpseed of 2000 km/h. Easy to see how accidents happen; 747s are fairly big and this thing just materialised out of nowhere and disappeared within a few seconds.
The wait at Rome airport was made tolerable by cappucini, the Finanical Times and using up the last of the phonecard credits. Then it was boarding, waiting for an hour on the tarmac (that's twice now, I swear it's worse than Charles de Gaul - except for the structural integrity), a couple of alcholic beverages (white spirits only), earplugs and I woke up in Hong Kong. Sadly, I then transferred to Qantas which sucks compared with Cathay Pacific: worse food, no individual headrest telly and the cabin crew are not personally apologetic about cramming me into their tiny aeroplane. Transferred at Sydney and found a happy-looking certain someone waiting for me in the arrivals hall at Melbourne :-)
Jet lag hasn't been too bad, though I did put a downpayment on the sleep debt last night. Also, checked the credit card and the holiday hasn't been financially crippling either: I'd been doubling prices in Euro to get to Aussies, but the rate varied from 1.76 to 1.69 over the trip, so that was pleasant suprise too.
So while this year's trip was far too short, I would rate it as very successful: conference and doctoral consortium in Prato was productive and got good feedback, the high-intensity tourism of Rome and Hamburg was stimulating and the more relaxed social catchup in Bremen and Berlin was rewarding and satisfying. I'm feeling motivated to finish my PhD and get over again for another visit next year!
-Greg.
post script: got in at 11pm Sunday and made my 10am Monday tute. No students showed up. Still, I thought that was pretty good, but my supervisor Graeme got in at 4:30am Monday and was at Uni by 9am, proving why he's the professor and I'm the lowly PhD student!
Well, I found out how the genteel city of Hamburg got so refined for a harbour town: it concentrated its seamy side into a strip called the Reeperbahn, in St. Pauli. Named after the ropemakers who furnished the great shipping fleets with the ropes for their sailing vessels it is now the city's nightlife center and red light district. When John Lennon was asked about growing up in Liverpool he replied that he didn't grow up in Liverpool – he grew up in Hamburg. Not hard to see why. This is a strip maybe half a kilometre long with bars, sex shops, dirty cinemas, hip clubs, kebab shops, strip joints, cafes, brothels and restaurants all co-existing quite happily. It looks like Kings Cross but feels like St. Kilda. So, while it is a red light district – complete with girls in windows off the side streets hawking their wares and dozens of streetwalkers grabbing at tourists – it has a very strong family atmosphere at the same time. After dark, it's like any other going-out district with throngs of young people hitting their favourite cafes, bars and clubs. So it's not at all seedy, like the red light district in Amsterdam. I think the very strong licensing rules about prostitution and the extremely visible police presence contributes to this feeling.
Of particular interest is Grosser Freier Strasse (Greater Freedom Street), a little street off the Reeperbahn that hosts the live sex shows. This street is not named for the current trade, but because the city's Protestant leadership decreed that this is the one street where the dirty Catholics could practise their rituals! The church still stands, amongst the girly bars and rent-by-the-hour hotels. Since the selling of indulgences was more or less phased out, it's probably not been doing too well. But maybe some lapsed Catholics are rediscovering their faith there.
So, of course I went out on Saturday to the Herzblut bar (conventional, almost suburban), had a few beers and danced away to the usual hits from the 80s and 90s. I've always had respect for people who could go out to a nightclub by themselves without knowing anyone there, and now I'm one of them!
Sunday I went to Bremen and was met by Anna and Gerd. Haven't seen them in one year but fell back into place like it was last month. I stayed with them at Anna's flat and met her housemates Stone, Michel, Nina and Sabine. I also got to sit in on some house interviews since they were looking for a temporary replacement. They were all very accommodating and made me feel at home. We did some sightseeing in Bremen and saw some old churches and an impressive Rathaus (Town Hall). We also went to the interactive science museum in Bremen, where we learnt about humans, earth and the cosmos through some neat displays and demonstrations. I also got to practise riding a bike on the right hand side sans helmet – the extensive bike lanes made it less dangerous than it sounds and Bremen has more bikes than cars.
On Monday night we went to hear some jazz on a moored boat and have some beers which was very pleasant. When I found out they were students from the hochschule (college) I was worried that it might be whacky avant-garde experimental stuff (a pet peeve of mine) but it was good trad jazz with some beepop and scat thrown in.
Tuesday Gerd and I visited one of Bremen's great industries: the Beck's brewery! Here we toured the brewhouse, watched corporate videos, learnt about the history, ate raw barley, hops and malt and, of course, sampled the finished product. We tried a number of Beck's varieties and certainly got three euro's worth.
Yesterday Gerd and I travelled to Berlin by train (top speed 250km/h) and met his housemate Josef, who is Anna's brother. This morning Gerd went to his job at a company making architectural analysis software and needing English translation work: given Gerd's Aussified English, I reckon there will be some poor Croatian architect wondering about a computer warning message that says „Crikey! You've buggered it“.
Josef and I headed to the MoMA (Museum of Modern Art in New York) exhibition that has travelled to Berlin. Sadly, the queue was 5-6 hours so we bailed and went to see a retrospective of French photographer Henri Cartier-Bresson, who has holiday snaps from six decades and three continents.
I did a whirlwind tour re-orienting myself with the city: Potsdamer Platz, Under den Linden, Brandenburger Tor, Friedrichstrasse, Lustgarten, Berlin Dom, TV Tower and Alexaderplatz in around one hour. Public transport here is fantastic!
Enjoying the city and hanging out with Gerd and his friends, and would love to stay for longer, but sadly I'll be back to dreary old Melbourne and work next week. Still, the weather has been unusually shitty here (overcast, 20 degrees, occasional rain – hardly summertime!) so a wintery Melbourne won't be too much of a shock.
I am now in Hamburg, but will finish up Rome first ...
First, I think I may have jumped the gun re: public transport. They had their monthly strike on Tuesday which meant I had to traipse around the city in the boiling heat. Still, what a city to have to traipse around in!
Went to St. Peter´s Square and Basillica in the Vatican. So very big. So much money. Went up into the Dome and the Cupola. Amazing design and art. No point trying to describe or photograph it - just frickin´ incredible.
I had to come back the next day to see the Vatican Museum - even a quick whiz through by myself and then a guided tour only scratched the surface and I reached art appreciation fatigue after only five hours. Fortunately, I had a enough left to be wowed by Michelangelo´s efforts in the Sistine Chapel. I´m just staggered that he took up painting at the age of 41 after dismissing it as a minor art form suitable only for women (he was a notorious misogynist) and this was his first effort! That was four years well spent. He then came back after a couple of decades and did The Last Judgement on the back wall. In all, he spent about 10 years out of his 70 working in there, mostly alone, with a candle.
What else? Had a tour of the Roman Forum, Circus Maximus and Palatine Hill from a Glaswegian called Ian. Fortunately, my upclose exposure to the accent meant I was able to translate for the benefit of Americans in the group. These are mostly ruins now, but you can get a great sense of Roman geography and history from up there. Ian was particularly excited about Emperor Hadrian and proud that his ancestors were so generally disagreeable to civilised people that they required their own wall.
Also spent a few hours just riding around on buses (when they deigned to operate). This is a sort of "pot-luck" form of tourism as you don´t know where you´ll end up. While this works fine in Rome, I wouldn´t recommend it in Melbourne: Box Hill has it´s own significance and sites of interest but it lacks the impact of, say, the Villa Borghese. One of the more interesting things I saw on one bus trip was The Free Park. This is not an actual park; rather it is the only free car parking spot in Rome. It moves around throughout the day like the Chinese Tile Puzzle while 73,000 cars and Vespas seek it out. I was lucky enough to glimpse it briefly.
Speaking of the traffic, they have zebra crossings here which means that pedestrians just step out into four lanes of heavy traffic hoping that they´ll stop. Not trusting Roman drivers that much, I use nuns as trailblazers, figuring that most Romans have probably had fear and respect for clergy beaten into them as children. Nuns are quite prevalent, especially across the Tiber near the Vatican. Being usually small and old (and hence quite slow) you can´t just follow the same one around but instead go from nun to nun. I call this "nun surfing" and recommend it as a means of getting around town.
As I mentioned, I´m now in Hamburg. Flew up to Berlin and took the train across as it worked out cheaper. It´s a relief to be in a cooler climate - mid 20s and sunny. Yesterday and today I´ve just been wandering around, eating, drinking beer and noticing the differences between southern and northern Europe. Like breakfast: German frühstück is a way better proposition than the Italian colazione. Also, the beer is very interesting here. Each variety has its own little ritual of preparation, particular glass, serving method etc.
Hamburg seems very pleasant. For Melburnians, I´d describe it as what would happen if Collins St became a whole city: trendy (but not Rome trendy) shopping up one end, leafy- green stately up the other. But with more canals (or "fleets") and a big lake. About the size of Adelaide but with less churches and a fair bit more cash. Several hundred millionaires and six billionaires! Something to do with intergenerational ownership of international shipping I guess.
One particular church I visited was St. Nicolai which was largely destroyed during the feuersturm (firestorm) during the summer of 1943 when, over four days and nights, the Allied airforces blew 60% of Hamburg to smithereens, killing over 40,000 citizens. The church has been left as a memorial and I found it very moving to walk around in the remains. While this is not a unique idea, there´s something about the fragility of Gothic architecture - supporting ribs busted apart, blackened stone, smashed vaults - that gives it a big impact.
I´ll be catching up with Gerd and Anna in Bremen on Sunday, and from there the last week will be in Berlin. My efforts at speaking German got off to a good start with the nice middle-aged couple in my train cabin yesterday who were very patient. It´s a bit harder with the locals since my only contact to date is with hospitality staff. I start picking my way slowly through a sentence, get a bit panicky about the dative case and revert to survival German. They of course speak quite good English and, let´s face it, are not paid to provide tutelage to Ausländer. The sensible ones go straight to English once I say "Hallo". The polite ones reply auf Deutsch and let me have one or two "noch einmal" (once again) or "bitte langsam" (slowly please) before giving up. Fair enough. They´re probably dreading the "buchstabieren Sie bitte" (can you spell it please). I know I would.
Still, I enjoyed the bus tour this morning since we got a spiel in German and then English and I was pretty much getting the gist of it. I think the fact that they speak very good German here (as my first German teacher Uli - from Hamburg natürlich - liked to say) is helpful. I´ll have to save my breaking-the-ice phrase for Berlin: Ich verstehe nicht Ihren ländlichen Dialekt. Sprechen Sie richtig. (I do not understand your peasant dialect. Speak correctly.)
