Egg Trees in India ?As the uncle who disappeared for lengthy periods, usually in winter time to India, I was curious about what my very young nephew thought I might be finding in such a place. It may have been his exposure to the enigmatic Scottish poet Ivor Cutler, but he only had to …
- Story behind the Picture #12 Please, what is this fellow saying . . .
For the benefit of the uninitiated, arrivals in India will encounter a deluge of offers, entreaties and unexpected, labyrinthine connections that will leave them reeling, or laughing their heads off. I heard that J.K.Galbraith described India as ‘functioning anarchy’ as depicted in the postcard I found in Goa. I also …
- Just one of those things…
Just some of those things that you think you’ve forgot, but they’re some of those things you cannot (after Jimmy Durante), and sung badly by Bob Cranwell ! Legends of Madras, the heat and humidity sits like a weight on my already swimming head, driving me under the cooling …
- Story behind the picture #10 Et in Arcadia ego: Fathers’ Day
I am on a sandbank in northern India. There is a full moon. The Ganges is the most sacred river of India if you speak to a Hindu for whom it is a goddess itself, bringing spiritual power from the abode of Shiva, creator and destroyer. It is a monumentally …
- Svartisen 2
Over the years that I took groups up to Anton Svartisdal’s small patch of heaven, recalls Bob Cranwell, we had some glorious hikes up to the glacier, and also up the side valley that led toward the pass into Blakkådalen, as well as nightly barbeques and campfire chit chat.
- Pondicherry 2: Á la recherche du temps perdu
Before your start reading this, I’d like to say a couple of things. This is a departure from the other pieces you can read about on the AE site in so far as it is not about actual events, the events portrayed are generalised to form a picture – Bob …
- Story behind the Picture #6 Oh! for the Open Road !
There are sights that immediately tug at the heartstrings for many people, perhaps more than we imagine. To my mind, a sight of the open road is a symbol of freedom, of potential; of the choice to go or to stay, to feel that one’s personal space extends beyond the …
- Comrade Bob in the Steps of Tamerlaine
I had completely forgotten that my name might arouse some amusement, to say the least, when I went on a trip to Central Asia. Bob, you see, means a bean in Russian (also Hungarian for that matter), and a polite but wry smirk crossed the face of every Intourist guide …
- Plus ca change; plus c’est la meme chose
Chennai / Madras. From outside the hotel traffic noise begins to filter into my mind around 6.30am, though I’d known of and had felt people moving through the city all night, sporadically waking and sleeping in time with passing truck horns. It seemed that it took until this time of …
- Swat, Pakistan
We arrived at Saidu Sharif which was the terminus, because it was the local office of the PTDC – (Pakistan Tourism Development Corporation), also the poshest hotel in Swat. Despite the manager offering us discounts, saying breakfast and heating free, it was still Rs 220 – three times the price …
