Lost Amongst Feranjis

(Feranjis : Amharic for foreigners)

It's no secret that the stars are falling from the sky
its no secret that our world is in darkness tonight
they say the sun is sometimes eclipsed by a moon
you know I don't see you when you walk in the room




So imagine this:
To go seamlessly, like air, unnoticed, invincible, floating, across borders and crashing into lives. With only Nietzsche, John Steinbeck, Paul Theroux and your blank journals to keep you company. Not skulk on the surface and merely scratch it. To sneak in, take off your shoes, and your socks, hey have an ice-cold drink, play at peek-a-boo with the littluns (Lord of the Flies), and then to sit there. For as long as it takes. Days - Weeks - Months. Who knows? To watch, smell, taste and feel and touch. To prod, to question, to provoke, and to listen - Attentively. To imbibe, to jot down, to put to paper, in those blank journals; for blank spaces, to render visceral landscapes not in waterpaints but in wordpaints. To hear words. Spoken. They're sounds you know. Have you ever listened? Timbres? Nuances? Subtleties in meaning? To record dialogue. With wordpaint. Using a fine wordbrush. The chatter of the night. Can you hear it? Precisely. Scribble-scribble. To transport, to transport you my darling, my sweetheart, as if by magic carpet to where I sit; the choking dust, the toxic sun, the verdant bitter harvests; to where I am, to what I feel, what I am thinking, the taste of my fears and the bitterness etched on my tongue. To hold your hand and to take you gently, to take you by your dove white wrists, to take you to partake in me, in being me, at that moment, in time, somewhere. Scribble-scribble. To render a person - to describe the 'essence' of a thing without wallowing in cliche or affectation or pretension to artistic merit. To quite simply see the world through my eyes fogged by my tears and the stink of my sweat. Scribble-scribble.

To feel. To feel the oneness of being alone, in a forest of foreign signs, foreign words and feranji faces. To feel at one with Betelgeuse; up there struggling to be heard through the din of a galaxy of faces, bad faces, unscrutable, malicious faces, burnished and regal; they're all evil-doers you know. Have you ever felt that? That aloneness? Just you. That feeling of primitive man. Ancient cave man. Course you haven't. Nothing but you and the stars. Scribble-scribble.

Love...we shine like a burning star
We're falling from the sky
Tonight.

To feel the listless torpor of waiting. That 'in-between' place weighing heavy on your temples and squeezing your brain through your ears. Waiting. Waiting for the moment of departure at bus depots, at the airport, at the train station. At the airport - where neon is blinding and scratches. You scratch yourself red in boredom. All of life is here. Not going anywhere. Where all is still and nothing much happens and time is on vacation and fear is king; and then the sigh and release of final departure. Your shackles slither away. Is it the journey or the destination I wonder? What matters? Journey or destination?Here's a thought: Can one travel without destination thus emancipating oneself from the banality of travel? Deep stuff. That'e me. That's my experiment. Yes. How so?

Freedom from destination. When there's no destination the mythical destination becomes everything. Here - now - then. The present is everything. No worries. Scribble-scribble

Freedom from time. There! There goes my watch, in the river, down the ravine, down the latrine. Fuck off watch! Hope you drown shitty little watch!

Freedom from luggage. What luggage?

The contents of my luggage

pair of jeans

couple of t-shirts

a poncho

a years supply of contact lenses

compass ;-)

detailed maps (but not so detailed to raise eyebrows with the military authorities)

2-3 books (travel lit. incl 'Grapes of Wrath' by John Steinbeck - who could make the surface of the moon sound mesmerising)

Journals for jotting. For rendering landscapes. For wordpaint. For wordart. My art (excuse the pretension)
passport

funds

camera

What about inspiration? Inspiration comes free. Pick it up on the road.

Departure date: July 27th.
You ready?
Sure?

Do join me. It's free. Just like life!

Love...we shine like a
burning star
We're falling from the sky
Tonight

A man will rise
A man will fall
From the sheer face of love
Like a fly from a wall
It's no secret at all

Yes the sheer face of love
There's no secret to life at all...

Coming soon...Asian trip Itinerary

The plan is to begin with er pukka-style in Mirpur, Azad Kashmir. Why? Well, I spent 2 years there in the mid 1990's and seem to have developed an unfathomable desire to see how much this charmless city, built from British Asian wealth (that I cruelly detested at the time and was really miserable in; as if in purgatory) has changed with the tide of time. It's not a huge city by any means and I'm looking forward to exploring the chowks. A couple of days should do it. I actually went to a school here for about a year 'Chinnar Public School' where I learnt the importance of 'rote' learning, severe discipline, the ignorance of the science teachers and was introduced to the ignoble pleasures of 'Urdu for 4 year olds'. From there I'll be heading into deepest Himalaya; with base camp being in 'Gilgit', where I plan to acquire lodgings with a 'desi' (local) family and their litter of animals, root vegetables and wobbly-toothed grand Daddies. Again, family life affords you a more rewarding experience and a chance to get to know people more intimately. Gilgit will be a good base from which to make forays into the Himalayan heartlands. Later there's the Karakoram Highway into China to look forward to and then farther on, Mongolia, Tibet et al. But more on that later.

Currently reading...The Enchantress of Florence

A sumptuous feast of a book. I spent two whole days devouring this treat and feel pretty full up. The bibliography at the back alludes to the extensive research the author conducted, and as you flick through the rich tapestry between the pages, it shows. It takes some chutzpah to create an Akbar who intones: 'is there a god?' 'are we not members of the religion of our forebears passed down from generation to generation like a family heirloom?' - God forbid an atheistic Akbar?! - Moghul King gone haywire; but you can see Salman had huge fun creating this larger than life personality and giving him a totally unexpected quirk; imbibing him with his own sense of whimsy and the absurdity of creation. To the chagrin of the other female princesses Akbar even goes as far as to magically 'create' an imaginary princess of princesses. Most beautiful, most sexed, and not at all sycophantic like the others; this perfect female creation of his mind is disdainful and rebukes him for his puppy love sickness, teasing him with vicious sex games and clawing at his skin with finger nails. The novel traipses between the Indian city of Sikri and the Florence of Machiavelli (who even manages to make an entrance) - the two cities connected by the magical filigrees of a dainty story about a beautiful princess and a yellow haired charlatan. There is much here to like. Such as the sexual habits of the Moghul court replete with scheming concubines, lecherous wenches, love potions, performance enhancing 'horse testes' rubs, sodomy, sado-masochistic sex, debauchery, and Akbars retinue of advisers; all characters themselves. One thing you come out of this book appreciating, if anything, is how sexed the Moghuls were. No wonder Akbar is believed to have sired hundreds if not thousands of spawns. A virtuoso performance indeed. No, not Akbar, I meant Salman.

A song for a departure