Category: Middle East & Africa 2009
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From The Cutting Room Floor #4: Cycling from Aswan, Egypt, to Wadi Halfa, Sudan
This scene recounts all the chaos of a classic experience which all who head down Africa’s east route will negotiate: the weekly ferry crossing of Lake Nasser, from Aswan (of Dam fame) in the south of Egypt to the tiny port of Wadi Halfa in northern Sudan. Deep within the historic region of Nubia, this is the only overland route between the two nations, who are still unable to agree on who actually owns the inhospitable tract of empty desert in between. The ferry sails just once a week, and tickets can only be procured by visiting the agency in… Continue reading →
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Egypt As You’ve (Probably) Never Seen Her
Now for something less cringy than a film about myself: another photo round-up from the Middle East. While following the Nile from Cairo to Aswan on my bicycle, I was continually struck by the complete absence of other travellers. I’d always thought Egypt was supposed to be one of the world’s top tourist destinations. Continue reading →
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Stunning, Stormy Jordan
I got stoned in Jordan. I also got tomatoed, window-framed, slapped and sworn at. When you’re alone, language-less, and unable to understand why you’re on the receiving end of several daily doses of hurtful xenophobia, it’s pretty tough on morale. Continue reading →
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Look at Syria
Apparently some bad stuff has happened in Syria recently. I hope that those I met and who helped me so memorably on my ride through the country are doing O.K. — but then they’re the probably the lucky ones, living in the rural regions rather than the political hot-spots. Continue reading →
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The Ravaged, War-torn, Peaceful, Gentle & Stunningly Hospitable Country of Sudan
In my last post I asked what readers wanted to see more of. At the top of the list was more photographs. An excellent choice, as I’ve recently been reviewing my raw images from the road. And no other month in my life was more eye-opening than the one I spent trundling through the sun-baked deserts, Nile-side hamlets and roasting savannahs of Sudan, from Egypt in the north to Ethiopia in the south-east. Continue reading →
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Revisiting Sudan As The South Prepares For Independence
Sudan has recently held a referendum on the issue of the independence of southern Sudan, a geographically and ethnically distinct region of the country which, in 1956, was — thanks once again to the good old British Empire — lumped in with the northern tribes to form a single independent nation. Civil war has been the de facto lifestyle ever since. I was happy to hear, then, that 98.83% of votes were in favour of independence. Anyone who knows something of the history of Sudan’s civil conflicts and of the acts that the current government has committed will be unsurprised at… Continue reading →
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Video: 3½ Years Into 3 Minutes
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A super-short blast through my time away from the UK, from bolshy beginnings in 2007 to humble homecomings a few weeks ago. [vimeo]http://www.vimeo.com/18113861[/vimeo] Look out for more video coming very soon. Merry Christmas! Continue reading →
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Perception Versus Reality In Travel
It was late April and the Ethiopian highlands had been rolling beneath my wheels for several days. Inching towards Djibouti, I consulted detailed road-engineers’ maps of the country to plan my route, and found an enticing-looking dirt track through the Afar region of the infamous Danakil Depression. I’d developed something of a romantic fascination with this remote bruise in the planet’s surface, a few hundred kilometres inland from the Horn of Africa. For it was here that it is widely thought that, hundreds of thousands of years ago, before farming, before writing, before metallurgy, the ancestors of you, me, Ghenghis… Continue reading →
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The Final Steps
I climbed the stairs to a small flat in a back alley of central Tehran and rang the doorbell. Tenny opened the door, stared at me blankly for a second, then jumped out of her skin in shock. Minutes later we were laughing happily together. The journey was over. We would spend the next few days tentatively getting used to being with each other again after six long months apart. In the two years since I left England I have had plenty of time to think about how life on the road has affected me. I don’t remember experiencing any… Continue reading →
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Political Conundrum Affects Man On Bike (Again)
Just as Tenny’s parents were readying the documents needed to issue a formal invitation for me to obtain a visa, the Iranian presidential elections took place, followed by a fortnight of diplomatic sniping which left Anglo-Iranian relations even more strained than before. I woke every morning to silence from the Iranian Foreign Ministry, and gradually my hopes of visiting Tenny’s family in Tehran began to dwindle. I cursed the idiotic squabbling of these children who are supposed to be our world’s leaders, and, like Andy a few months ago, began to look into alternative ways to get back to my girl.… Continue reading →