Month: June 2011
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Who Is Jumber Lezhava? (And Why Should You Care?)
He’s sitting behind a paper-strewn desk in a unlit office with faded pastel-green walls, surrounded on all sides by boxes and files which obscure the room’s sparse furnishings. A woman in full-length furs is comfortably installed behind a flickering computer screen, clicking noisily away while talking on the ‘phone. The stocky, white-haired lecturer rises to […] Continue reading →
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Writer’s Blog: The End Of The Beginning
It took quite a bit longer than expected, but suddenly, yesterday, I felt that the end of the book had appeared on the horizon. The hope is to finish the first draft within the next few days. Without much idea of how it would turn out, I began writing three months ago, shortly after returning from […] Continue reading →
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Microadventure: A Pedal/Paddle/Pedal Experiment
I must have misread the map, because the road to Pilton turned out to be a rutted bridleway. No chance of riding the road bike down there, I thought, so I continued along the narrow country lane, knowing that sooner or later I’d reach the River Nene anyway. The plan was extremely simple: cycle to […] Continue reading →
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This Is What Travel Filmmaking Is Supposed To Look Like
My brother, who emigrated to Canada a few years back, has just introduced me to a Canadian TV series called Departures. Three old university friends, three round-the-world tickets and a video camera. If only anything I’d filmed on the road resembled the visual beauty of this. (The episodes themselves are even more stunning!) [youtube width=“720” height=“405”]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GkIdtzXmpYk[/youtube] […] Continue reading →
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Early Adventures — An Interview on Armenian TV
If for no other reason than to laugh at our ridiculous beards and mops, have a look at the short interview that Andy and I did for the Armenian TV network H2 back in 2008, after we’d pedalled through the wintry Caucasus on our way to Iran. I’m afraid there are no subtitles, which means you’ll […] Continue reading →
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Summer’s Here — New Tools For The Toolbox
When a little crack began to appear in the frame of my trusty old Kona Explosif, I wasn’t too surprised. The thing had been dragged fully-loaded more than ten thousand miles across large swathes of Europe, the Middle East and Africa, including more than a couple of rather large deserts, and along thousands of miles […] Continue reading →
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On Seeing An Old World With New Eyes
It wasn’t that anything had changed much. A few shops had changed hands, and a couple of new shiny buildings had popped up in the place of old dilapidated ones. But the amiable backwater of Exeter still exuded precisely the same understated, sleepy essence it did when I departed six years ago clutching a degree […] Continue reading →
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A Scary Thing That Happened To Me
I sat in the middle of the dim, wood-panelled corridor. Lined up along each wall stood a handful of people I vaguely recognised from some previous occasion. I wondered why nobody else had decided to sit down while we waited outside the closed door. Then, as the assembled men and women muttered amongst themselves, the […] Continue reading →