a wee walk up bin hill

it sometimes happens in autumn that you get crisp clear sunny days

 mum and i took a wee walk up bin hill yesterday afternoon

 shafts of sunlight were streaming through the trees

it was still nippy in the shade, but we got climbing the hill and soon our moving bodies generated their own warmth

i climbed a tree.

i thought i could capture the flaming orange beech leaves contrasted against a faroff pale blue sky with my camera.

but, in reality, it was better in reality

(a pale off flar bue sky)

mum was waiting for me at the top, and walked in front of the sun just at the moment when i pressed click

there was a certain nippy wee edge to the breeze that nudged its chilly way across the top of the hill

so we climbed down a bit

and got the flasks of tea out. 

i took this photo of us two while the sun was shining bright and making me squint a little

mum was alright cos she had tinted glasses

it is great to get out and fill your lungs with fresh air and fill your eyes with good views. 

a little bit of exercise also makes you appreciate your evening meal all the more.

it is nice to be outside but it is also nice to come back to a warm house.

on the way back home we noticed that somebody had streaked the western sky with flamboyant pink and yellow lines

i was so impressed i got mum to stop and i jumped into the field to take another photo

mamma mia, bello bello -  una bellezza incantevole

i can't help talking to myself in italian in matters relating to Beauty.

remarkable encounters

"the leaves are very similar to those of a beech tree - it could actually be a beech tree - but the leaves are glossier.  they seem somehow more robust.  the branches, certainly, are more robust.    a little lithe branch the size a little thicker than your thumb would hold your weight.   however, its littleness and litheness does not compromise, by any degree, its strength.   the whole tree in fact shines with robustness, exudes Robustness and Beauty and Grace.   the tree rises to about, about the height of a three-storey house and then the big robust branches spill down gracefully like the water after an upward jet in a fountain, but actually growing gradually outward, in the shape of a steep pyramid.  like a candle that severely loves to melt.

an exemplar of a tree of the same genus, here in Hyde park, London
(photo courtesy of friend francis)

man, what a tree.

a noble tree.  we climbed from the inside, never straying far from the dark trunk.   friend francis cautioned against being spotted by the police officers, which we had just seen as we entered the park.  what!  i thought, how could they object to the beautiful action of getting close to such a tree?   the inside of the tree is like a tepee because you can't see beyond the flowing curtain of glossy leaves on the outside.
being at the top gave an unparallelled sensation of being at the top of something really sacred and noble and monumental, like a little himalayan peak, in the shape of a tree, in a park in oxford.   friend francis was like a monkey.  he climbed down one of the downward flowing external branches.  i didn't have enough confidence.  i was archly aware of the distance separating me from the ground, and slowly picked my way down, keeping close to the trunk in the gathering gloom".



i was telling this to brother finlay as we were heading to the abandoned house, just outside st andrews, when suddenly we caught sight of exactly the same noble tree, only a little less tall, and a little less conical,  its downward flow interrupted by the excrescences of exploratory uprising branches.

we set about climbing her immediately, unhurridly.  the diaphanous daylight of the midafternoon was the ideal occasion to become aquainted with that tree.  to become aquainted with a tree, to become intimate with her.  to hug her branches with all of one's will, it is an embrace which is intimate and necessary for one's safe passage along her lithe but robust limbs.

a lithe tree, a beaming, green tree.

a tree growing exultantly.

a tree to be proud to be aquainted with.








another remarkable encounter was produced a few days later, after spending the afternoon hitch-hiking to aberdeen, after standing at a layby in the gathering gloom thinking: most likely i will head into those fields and pitch my tent somewhere, then being picked up by a geologist who told me about his project to build a house on the ruins of an old farmhouse overlooking the sea to the south of stonehaven, then walking through the streets of dark aberdeen, in the direction of seaton park where i planned to sleep by the river, and then catching sight of steve addy, an old acquaintance from the university of aberdeen climbing club, who strode past me in his characteristic brisk pace.
"steve!" i said.
"carson!" he said  "i half wondered if it was you . . . fancy coming to my house for a cup of tea?"

a cup of tea, which turned into a plate of pasta, which turned into an evening of pleasant conversation.  i told steve about my plans to head soon to Iona, and do a painting of the beach there, and steve told me about finlay wild's paintings of familiar scottish highland peaks, made unfamiliar through his use of wild flamboyant colours for sky and hill, only recognisable by the unique shape of the hills.   at one point steve got out his african bongo drums and we had a session in his kitchen, which was very satisfying - feeling our way through a repertoire of rhythms recorded in our memories, looking at each other quizically every so often, wondering where the rhythm would take us.  after a cosy night's dreaming on his living room sofa, and after some breakfast the next morning, i said to steve: "i am very glad to have been deflected on my route to seaton park."




another remarkable encounter had been produced when i was hitching to the vineyards.  i got as far as reims, then misread the bus timetable, then spent a while admiring the imposing cathedral (see photograph below), then discovered i had missed the last bus and walked in the gathering gloom to the big road which leads to the motorway south and stuck my thumb out and thought: "most likely i will sleep somewhere in the park, then get the bus tomorrow, and miss the first day picking grapes" but very soon a sleek low-slung sports car stopped and a business-looking man ushered me in saying "it was only by faulty-route-finding that i was passing through the centre of reims".  he was going all the way to geneva.  he told me that he had hitchhiked in his twenties through USA and canada, and had lived in the USA for seven years.  i told him that his english accent was incredibly english sounding, with no hint of US twang.   he replied crisply: "yes, i was careful not to let myself become . . .
infected"   
everything he said he said crisply and deliberately.   he said that he commutes regularly between geneva and his company somewhere north of Reims, and every so often he stopped for hitchhikers, but added: "i do not stop for every hitchhiker that i see.   there are some that would make my car . . .
smelly."

conversation was sparse.  towards the end of the lift i asked him what he worked as and he told me that he had set up a company that gave pilot runs for the fastest newest cars on the market.   he said that the car we were in was capable of doing 300km/hr, but that it often wasn't practical to go at such a speed.  for me it was my first experience of sustained fast road travel, for he cruised along the motorway at a steady 180km/hr for over an hour, gliding easily past all other vehicles and very soon i had been dropped off near Troyes.  there remained about 25km to the place where i would pick grapes, of which i walked about 10km along a quiet road under the stars until someone else stopped for me, having spotted my piece of cardboard upon which i had painted "Les Riceys."  he said to me, "i knew you would be here for the vendanges, heading to les riceys with your rucksack."

it felt a bit miraculous to walk into the salon at 11:30pm and be welcomed by a little group of that year's grape-pickers, among whom was marie, who gave me a big hug and insisted that we had met at a party in paris back in february.

it took me about twenty minutes for the memory of that encounter to come back.

it is funny that it can take about twenty minutes for one's memory to dredge up an event which is actually lodged firmly in one's mind but which initially remains concealed from memory's probing feelers.

Reims cathedral

after the grape-harvest

uuuuuun rayon de soleil

sur ton si beau visage

those words sung in the happiness-filled reggae cadence of william balde entered my ears through the mp3 player which virginie from montpellier had lent me one afternoon, and seemed to me to be the perfect soundtrack to the grape picking season - a ray of sun on your so beautiful face - the rolling cadence of the land strung with vibrant green rows of vines sometimes as far as the eye could see in southern champagne.   the eye could see.  the swollen song of solomon bunches of purple grapes - the bountry of nature, nature's harvest, her fruit at the end of a year's growing and energy transfer.  investing one's interest in those grapes, seeing nothing but those grapes, the secateurs going clip clip clip, working as a team of thirty, clipping in unison, giving each other bleak looks of back weariness towards the end of the week, but strength in our thirty-strong unity, exchanging back massages in the evening, i look for her eyes in the vineyard, the sun is warm and bathing, across the rows and rows of greenleaved vines everyone is crouching down, clip clip clip, she stands up and looks for my eyes and we instantly smile and lower our gazes, the grapes, stained with white powder from the sulphates, clipping, a bucket filling up with bunches of grapes.  adele, she called herself; belle adele i called her, i said: elle s'appelle adele et elle est belle.

thirty people all come together, and not all the time does each person know what to say to the other people.  benois was sitting across the table from me one evening.  until then all we had done was exchange wide probing smiles so after asking his name for the second or perhaps the third time i said: "benois - that must come from the latin blessed.  it is a good name.  it recognises the favourable general situation of being alive - being blessed - being favoured by god, god in his favour has said: be alive benois"
what i wanted was to say something positive to benois.  i often find myself commenting on a person's name when i learn it for the first time.   for example gery introduced me to solange a few nights ago and i said "hmmm solange, never heard that name before.  first of all it makes me think of the english expression so long, and then it makes me think of the french word louange, which comes from louer...to praise, doesn't it?"   she said yes and gery said "tu vois, carson est un peu...particulier"
it reminded me of how marie described herself once.  "je suis"
then lowering her voice, as if confiding a hushed tone "un peu differente"

un peu differente was the perfect description of marie.  in a hushed tone.  i had first met marie in a party in paris and had picked up on her use of the word mec, "doesn't mec have a masculine value, like guy or dude in english?" (marie spoke english like an american and so understood perfectly) she said yes, but you know i feel more male than female.   blonde-haired marie; once she crammed her bosom full of grapes and stuck bits of vine and leaves in her hair and crept along the vines to 8-year-old margot and there stood rigidly against the vines saying "shhhhh, je suis une vigne"
marie studied theatre in paris and loved to impersonate other people.   so much so that i strugged to form a good idea of who she really was.  it seemed to me that she really wasn't; she was but a vehicle for impersonating other people.    i can understand her being fascinated by other people, and wanting to try to impersonate them.  as we advanced along the rows of vines her voice could be heard moodily, sultrily, nonchantly impersonating some stereotypical blasé french attitude that has made an impression on her. 
"bah, franchement, je m'en fous, tu sais?"
je m'en fous.  one spends time in france, listening to the french and perceiving something of their attitude.  the je m'en fous attitude.  menefregismo.  i couldn't care less, i don't give tuppence, twit-twoo i don't give two hoots, i don't give a damn, i don't give a dickeybird.  i don't give

not give


give


after i said that benois gave me a little rundown of his life philosophy, unblinking, his eyes devoid of warmth, he said "bah, franchement, i really have no opinion about the fact that i am alive.  i could just as well not be alive, for all it concerns me.  of course, i am not going to go and commit suicide, but franchement the notion of death holds absolutely no fear or dismay for me"

it remended me of the indifference shown towards life by the main character of albert camus' l'etranger

but there was warmth and flickering happiness in benois' eyes when our eyes met at other times, and i know that his je m'en fous words were not completely sincere.

17-year-old hugo, at times displaying a wisdom far beyond his years, but at other times undeniably 17 years old, asked me what were the typical characteristics associated with the french.  i had commented on the rather widespread readiness to express irritation at little everyday contretemps, and hugo had responded "ah, but we are not really irritated you know.  we say putain merde often only in mock irritation"

the words ah, putain - merde - ca fait chier - ca m'enerve quoi entered my consciousness and i started to think like that too.  when learning a language you are essentially imitating the way the native speakers speak. however, within that group of native speakers one must discriminate.   griet taught me about discrimating between words when i swung past l'arche community on the way back.  a new volunteer - a lithuanian learning french - had exclaimed putain, reenacting the very common exclamation of surprise or irritation on the lips of the french, and griet responded "ah, j'aime pas ca, c'est pas la bonne usage de ce mot-la"
he had taken the putain's name in vain.

fabri and i were fond of filling the vineyard with vibrations of taize chants of praise, sometimes soft and tenderly intoned, other times extravagently low and solemn sounding:

Ostendi nobis domine
misericordium suam
amen, amen!
maranatha, maranatha!

other times a long rumbling rendition of jeff buckley's rendition of leonard cohen's alleluya, along to the clip clip clip of our secateurs.  little hugo would say aimlessly "they are church songs aren't they?" and then fabri would go off on a tangent and laugh like a hyena, or else we would send up dog howls, a mournful orchestra of howling dogs which other vendangeurs would join and it would end in a cacohpony of baying bleating barking neighing miaoing and cockadoodle-doing from across the animal kingdom. the best was the horse's neighing but the absoulte best was melanie's extraordinary imitation of a young goat bleat . everyone laughed then and she would distribute her bleats throughout the day, often at the table in the evening, at a moment when conversation had largely subsided, the goat would give her pathetic charming bleat and everybody would laugh.

petite and charming, with sparkling eyes, that is why it suprised me on the last day of the vendange to hear melanie exclaim "ah, j'ai marre de cette vigne de merde!"

apres les vendanges, after the grape-harvest gerard gave us all about three bottles of champagne each and we all headed off in various vehicles to jean-batiste's house fifty kilometres away in the countryside - a beautiful place to stay - a simple wooden chalet surrounded by pine woods and caravans for everybody to sleep.  we got a big fire roaring and roasted potatoes over the embers and grilled chops of pork and sat around the picnic table eating.  from somebody's van stereo toots and the maytals were playing.   copious bottles of champagne had been opened - pop pop pop! - and got us feeling fine.  i said:  that is another characteristic of the french - well, at least a characterisitc which one finds with a certain frequency among the french - a real appreciation of the good things in life.  good food, good wine, good music, a good fire.  an incredibly sexy language.  ah oui, i can really sympathise with that french national pride.  i think that if i was born french i would love that fact.

afterwards fabri and i didn't know what to do.  fabri had suggested we go to the alps and climb mont blanc and usually when we are together and one of us suggests that we climb a mountain the other one says "okay".  we got on the same train as adele and celine, going south, and when we stopped at macon i said "hey, lets go to taize!"   all the songs that fabri had heard me sing, but had never heard himself were sang in the church that evening, and next morning: Ostendi nobis...!

and

il signore ti ristora
dio non allontana
il signore viene ad incontrarti....viene ad incontrarti

and

tu sei sorgente viva tu sei fuoco sei carita
viene spirito santo, viene spirito santo

and in between we camped in the woods, opened a bottle of champagne by the fire and played chess until at one point droplets of water began to fall.  fabri suggested that we seek shelter in the church but instead i pitched my little tent, and we snuggled in.   then at one point it began to really lash.  my tent is not of the best quality, and largely lets lashing water in.  however, the one impermeable impenetrable part is the groundsheet and there a pool of water grew.  we stuck it out anyway and i lay with heart throbbing as everything outside the tent was illuminated by flashes of lightning, then the enormous cracking thunder split the atmoshpere in two and it seemed that even the earth beneath us was rumbling.  
the next day we got the bus back to macon and there i decided to head back to the uk and get cracking with applying for visas while fabri said he would return to southern italy.  before we parted, we opened the last bottle of champagne and sat drinking on the street, stretching out the tent and sleeping bags to dry in the sun and played a last game of chess, before the owner of a nearby carrefour addressed us and told us we had five minutes to clear off because, franchement, camped out on the street like that, (it didn't take her long to find the word) was dégueulasse.

fabri and i spent a while impersonating all the french people we had met before returning to our respective home nations.

jumpin aff the pier

"wis it cal?"  a couple walk out on the old pier as i am climbing on my bike, dripping

"no, nae really"

i amend my answer: "aye, a wee bit chilly" 

"refreshin - it waks you up"

journey home

i heard her whistling before she came into the room and looked at me with arched eyebrows and looked closer to see the title of the book i was reading as i was lying on the bed.  i was going to get a portrait of the young artist as characterised by instability, full of passion and feelings needing to be expressed.  that was one of the first things cristina said to me when describing herself:  i am an artist.
later i said: what do you think it means to be an artist?  she said something about being creative.
i said maybe you could say that every body is an artist in the sense that they create their own being in every moment.   she considered this a may be

later she said: why didn't you smash your glass?
- i was going to ask you why did you smash your glass.
she had said: let us drink the last drops of muscat and smash our empty glasses.  i thought she was jesting about smashing the glasses.  i had only ever heard about that from joni mitchell "and we'll laugh and toast to nothing, and smash our empty glasses down".  cristina wasn't toasting to nothing.  she said that the wine represented luck - everything that we imbibed, everything that we wanted to affirm in ourselves - whereas the glass, in that glass-smashing ceremony, represented negative elements which we wished to chase away.

after she said that i marvelled at the human capacity to grant meaning to anywhich action in this ritual of life.

the next night i was lying on the bed again reading and evening had fallen when a young woman and a young man from the mountain rescue came in asking me if i had seen a girl who had borrowed a sleeping bag and not returned it.  ten minutes later i could still hear them up in the attic.  i thought i had better tell them that cristina had gone to sleep in the refuge the next valley along.
however, i didn't get to tell them anything.
when i climbed the outside staircase to the attic i quickly had to withdraw the light of my torch and climb back down again because i had caught them in a moment of passionate love-making.  i knew that it was something that i shouldn't have seen.  the contrast struck me, their officious arrival ten minutes earlier, "we are from the mountain rescue, looking for a girl and a sleeping bag" and then rolling and squirming on the beds.  the thin line between our real passionate selves and the officious task of inhabiting the material world.

mihai bursesc had read my couchsurfing message about me coming to bucharest and had written to me saying "well, if your itineray changes there is a bed for you here, a place to charge your batteries"
at the rezetat national park, 600km west of bucharest, romania.  i was happy to change my itinerary and charge myself with the majesty and grandiose feelings that come from being in the mountains. 
mihai had a simple wooden cabin in the village salasu de sus with "free accomodation" painted bright and friendly on the fence.  he loved to welcome travellers and offer tea made from the dried plants of the surrounding countryside.  i spent the day sleeping in the room full of beds - after a largely sleepless night in the train from bucharest.  mihai spent the day gathering wild berries.  in the evening i was charged with sleep and walked up to mihai's other mountain cabin, also painted with the words free accommodation.

lots of stillness there, lots of ancient wisdom in the stones.  in the early morning i climbed up and pricked up my ears to the Stillness and Beauty and Ancient Wisdom of that place.

Mountain therapy.

i was thinking about hitchhiking all the way home but i didn't like the thought of all the waiting i might be letting myself in for.  Paul had told me that i would struggle to get lifts in romania because i didnt exactly have a normal appearance and romanians only liked to pick up people who looked normal.  i think he was talking about my abundant facial hair and less than elegant choice of shirt that day.  when i heard his recommendation to slide through the countryside in the nicely-priced night train i decided not to ignore it.  Paul stopped for me as i was walking out of town one evening.  i said "bucharest?" paul said, "i am only going half an hour - you are better getting the train"  i said "could you please give me a lift even for just for half an hour?"  after waiting for so long i simply wanted to sit in somebody's car.  first off paul wanted to see my passport.  later he said "i don't know why i stopped for you, i generally never stop for hitchhikers".  he invited me to a coffee at a roadside restaurant and we stayed up till 02:30 talking with Dan, another friend of his.  english words came to them slowly, interspersed with rolling eyes and "ahh, talking philosophy in english is difficult!" we lost track of the hours.  it showed the power of wanting to communicate, despite their imperfect grasp of the language.  romanian words mostly didn't come to me at all.

i spent the next day at paul and adela's house, watching youtube videos of traditional romanian music and dancing, getting beat by paul at chess, eating adela's tastiness from the kitchen and tasting their neighbour's freshly distilled plum liquor. adela herself ate only a plate of vegetables at lunch, explaining that it was an orthodox custom to eat vegan on wednesday and friday.  paul added that it was a fundamentalist orthodox custom and there was laughter.  their son andrea was eleven years old and spoke near perfect english learned, as he explained to me, by discussing how to make software on online chat facilities.  his brother bogdan was nine years old and communicated with very winning smiles. i told paul that he was like my good samaritan.  i had been at the side of the road not knowing anybody or exactly where i would go.  he said that i was also like a good samaritan for him, causing him to think about and reevaluate his lifestyle.  i think he said that just to be nice.

coincidently, just as couchsurfer mihai's invitation of mountain repose came to me, paul and adela told me about their visit to that same part of the transylvanian mountains just the week before, and in particular the prislop monestary, where father Arsenie Boca - who can perform miracles if you ask him to - is buried.

i arrived with my rucksack in the rain.  i was wearing my long indian skirt because i know that shorts want to be avoided by the monastic community.  they saw my skirt and said "it is okay to wear shorts".  i wanted to attend the evening liturgy in the church but instead they invited me to eat food with them in the dining room.  there was maria - a very friendly woman who i supposed was a nun because of her attire - and a very friendly well-dressed man, and a young boy who spoke english well and translated everything they said to me.  maria took me to father Arsenie's tomb after the meal.  it was surrounded by a profusion of flowers.  she told me to make a wish in front of his grave, but rather than feeling at ease and knowing exactly what to wish for, i was feeling that all my senses were pricked up and curious about this new social situation and what would happen.  we were walking back and maria asked me what did i think of this place.  the air was filled with cool moisture, the evening light infused the place with a soft rosy glow.  there were church bells gonging softly and soft green conifer covered hills.  i said:  e foarte frumos.  it is very beautiful.
the well-dressed man asked me where i was going to sleep.  i said "i usually sleep in the forest"
we looked at the dripping wet trees and felt the moisture all around us.
he said, "you can't sleep in this monestary, but if you come with me to the village. . . come to my car"
i shook hands with maria, who always radiated genuine friendliness. i said, "mulţumesc... esti gentil"
they found it funny for me to say gentil.  it reminded them of gentleman.  
esti amabil.
her response was "sunt romana", as if that explained everything.  she said "you are always welcome here when you come back"
in the village the man knocked on a couple of doors and found somebody with a mattress space on the floor.  they told me they already had a room of people sleeping that night.  it seemed they were used to accomodating people who had been at the monestary.

the next day i was sitting reading in the park in the town of deva, waiting for the bus that would take me to london, when i came in contact with some of the people that i had been told to watch out for in romania.  "bad people" paul had said, "all they do is beg and steal" a file of women filed past me asking for money, indicating that they had babies to feed.  i gave them my bread and when i had no more bread another woman came and asked for money, indicating that she had babies to feed.  i said no and she asked for a "cuţit",

cuţit? i enquired. 
she communicated the meaning of cuţit by making the gesture of slashing her dress
"cuţit, cuţit" she repeated.
why did she possibly want me to give her a knife?
when she shuffled off, i quickly left that park too.  i didn't like the image of a knife slashing a person's clothing which she had implanted in me.  most of all i didn't like the look in her eyes, or the tone of her voice.   as much as i didn't want to give credence to that belief that some people are by nature "bad", i had the warnings of other people in my head, and the words of Jonus-the-Austrian-who-was-walking-to-Jerusalem, who told me that he had been surrounded by gypsies brandishing knives in the woods of romania, when, miraculously, the police turned up.
when your feelings tell you "get away from this person" it is better to listen to them. 

i got on the eurolines bus which slid for two days along the motorways.
i slid into london slowly.      ever   so        s    l    o     w     l        y   
i was biting my nails thinking "most likely i will miss my megabus connection" i was feeling gloomy about missing my megabus connection, then a reprieve came when i saw a clock and realised i had an extra hour of british summer time.  those sixty minutes were being consumed in the 7 a.m. traffic jams of the streets of london.  i was back to biting my nails.  all i could do was grant myself more reprieve by reasoning that missing my megabus connection was a very minor detail in the big scheme of things.  
and thus liberated from my gloomy nail-biting i ran with my rucksack through bustling victoria station to board the bus to glasgow which slide off thirty seconds later.  

what a privilege to be rolling along the motorway towards glasgow.  great britian seemed like a vast green island where a cool temperature was always maintained by a vast moist blanket of moisture.  i loved to hear the glaswegian accent again.  i was looking at everyone, all the elderly people, and picking up subtle british character traits which would have been lost on me had i not been abroad paying attention to everybody else's character traits.  there is generally a lot of politeness in british people.  a lot of respect and non-intrusion.  generally.   even the co-op employee in lochgilphead chose to say "excuse me, can i help you?" when she meant to say "what are you doing?" when she saw me looking in the bins.
there are a lot of fresh feelings in the british isles.  swimming in the sea makes your blood go that much more tingly.   there is always a little cool breeze coming from somewhere.  when you have a direct view to the sun shining in the sky it is a special occasion.  you can pass someone and say "lovely day"
and they will respond "aye, it is just glorious!"   they really mean it    it is glorious. 
the clouds are always hanging about, ready to obscure the sun.   every moment is a billowing shifting cloudscape.  not always billowing, sometimes subtle and muted.  in august.   summer doesn't mean "very hot" it could likely as not mean rain.  colours are dense and real, vibrant and profound.  or else faint and airy and ethereal.  there is a feeling of freshness in the air.

being in britain for me means family reunion.

family therapy.

having roots

the conversation of familiar energy fluxes

fortified with connections.

the roots look for those special nutrients in the soil, and draw them up, and grow gladly.

fishing for friendliness

i am standing by the side of the road in bulgaria, fishing for friendliness.  i struggle upstream.  i feel like my outstretched thumb is a rod with no hook and not even any line, it feels that ineffectual.  "friendly people i am ready to meet you" i call out, "openness, trustfullness, dear sweet friendliness, where art thou?"  o people of the world, i feel so lonely amongst you.  i desire to meet a crazy lover of life.

at the end of the day, the smile that the woman gave me at the bus station becomes a shimmering golden moment.   the best moment of the day: somebody smiled at me.  the next day was extatically golden, a woman comes out of a shop and gives me a big slice of juicy red watermelon.  o joyous friendliness.
ah, bulgaria.   bulgaria.     just the bulgaria sounding of the bulgaria name of that bulgarian country gives me so many bulgarian impressions and bulgarian sensations.  a gruff voice demands that i show my passport.   i say, but my train is about to leave.  he doesn't care he wants to scrutinize my passport.   his smile is a thousand miles away.  the look in a person's eyes tells everything about everything.

later i berate myself for judging:  what am i looking for, for everybody to smile and say have a nice day? i don't speak their language i don't know their story, i snatched three days of fleeting impressions, that may or may not be representative.  i got ripped off at the bulgarian/romanian border.  i was hitching and a guy said:  i will give you a lift if you give me this much money,  then at the border, if you give me the rest of your bulgarian money i will give you these little romanian notes in exchange.   little romanian notes i found out later.

i later berate myself for always wanting to take and not give.  i think of how i can implement mother teresa's advice in my life.  she said:  (something like) (i read this somewhere) "always leave another person happier than when they met you".
i thought:  maybe giving that guy my money was the best way to make him happy.

my passage through bulgaria came off the back of an awesome tour of turkey.  i left my bike at a couchsurfer in antalya and began hitching, sampling the diverse cross section of society (actually usually a cross section of the single males of socity) that hitchhiking offers.  after a month i feel tuned in to the cultural experience of being in turkey, of being offered tea, of being seen as a person meriting curiosity, of having generosity lavished upon me.  certain topics of conversation have become habitual: islam, turkey's multicultural influences, russian women. i go from one car to the next, from one world to the next.   i have made many new facebook friends.  (usually the sixth question asked, after where are you from? where are you going? how long have you been in turkey? what do you think of turkey? and, what is your job? is "do you have facebook?"   it is ramazan and most muslims go through the day eating, drinking, smoking nothing.  drinking not even water.  still, there is a photo of my lift-giver and i standing by his car with cans of coke in our hands.  probably smiling.   doubtless smiling.  a boisterous lorry-driver, instead of modulating the speed of his fluency to aid my understanding, raises the volume of his voice.  i jump out of his lorry, feeling shouted at, feeling grateful for the two hundred kilometres given.  i cross the land to the sea of marmaris, dialoguing with my lift-giver who gives me an attentive ear and allows my little parcel to turkish to florish.  he has me building up little phrases like "okumak kitap kapilar achiyor" - reading books opens doors - "yeni dunyalar" - new worlds.  - turkish script i am now unable to render with this romanian keyboard -  he leaves me with a bag of chillis and the good tomatoes that come from channakale.   encountering him has uplifted my soul, the next car that skids to a stop contains three youths that laugh and pretend to hit each other and swerve on the road, take the small road - they say they are avoiding the police - to their little town.  even those youths - who told me in turkish - i dont know how i understood - that they had been drinking and smoking - must invite me to tea at their local cafe, tea after tea - "no i am okay i am really okay i have already eaten, thank you" give me a packet of cheese crackers nonetheless, tea after tea, the local men and the youths crowd round to look at me - the hitchhiker from scotland they found on the road, an unusual spectacle in this wayside village (Edincik), the next youth insists on taking me 30 km off the main road to his town of gonen - he insists i will get a lift from there - i say "take me whererever you will",  hitchiking is a little version of life - all life is journeying - but a crazy version of life.  crazy in the sense unpredictable.  you may be waiting for hours you may be pleading "who will help me?", faith in the goodness of people will keep you standing there and Life may help you or it may not and may be you may have to walk with your tail between your legs to the bus stop.   as evening falls hours outside the town of gonen, the next youth stops saying he will take me to channakale, then asking "how much money do i have?  do i have money for petrol?"  he turns the volume to a full blast of electro music and i have to dance along with him in his car, he says "lets go to a disco in channakale tonight!"  when i say i have no money for that, (meaning i do not want to have money for that) he says "where else will you sleep tonight? come back to my house and we will go to disco in channakale tomorrow night. i have money tomorrow"  i have to really insist to get out of his car, and to the last he is pouring out cashew nuts into my hand.  the men in the gas station across the road witness the event and usher me over, give me a seat in the shade, saying ignore that youth he has been smoking marijuana, bring me out a piece of bread and a lump of cheese - they themselves will not eat until sunset.  the friendlinest of all came from the little boys in the town of edirne, where police find me bedding down in the abandoned land outside mosque.  they want to see my passport - doing so ever so politely, a politeness and reverend respect i have never seen in any police before - then direct me to the local park. the retinue of little boys quizz me about me, then fifteen minutes later come back with a sandwich and a little bottle of orangeade.  full of sincerity full of goodness. that was the most touching.
i have learned the worth of simplifying language as a viable good way of communicating.  always focus on communication, irrespective of grammatical correctness.  turkish taught me that with its lack of definite article - why define article when understood anyway? - and lack of verb to be in simple sentences.  for example to say "i have been here for three weeks" you say "three weeks i here"  often plural isn't even recognised,  you could just say "three week i here" (maybe i'm wrong there i haven't studied the grammer to an indepth level, but i feel that one gets off very well saying three week i here).   Jonas, the austrian who was walking to Jerusalem, first said me how happy to speak english not correct correct but to understand.  i said "okay, you have mastered the first basic step, but surely the better second step would be to abide by the standard rules of grammer?"  but no, he was perfectly happy to make mistakes, and communicate.   i have come round to his way of thinking now, really happy to walk up to someone and say "excuse me, internet cafe where?"
also in bulgaria and romania: "excuse me where is train station?"
really happy.

this was an habitual kind of conversation in turkey:  i am in a crepe bar by the sea talking to a girl.  she says: do you travel alone?  i say:  yes - but as alone sounds lonely - i say "but i am always with God" i must have used that word to want to evoke something of the relationship of love that connects me with the universe.  she says: what?   i say: "with God, with Allah"



"are you a muslim?"





i talk about not distinctions - muslims, christians, jews, hindis, athiests etc - but the One Universal Spirit,



she says: i understand.

turkısh swelter sunlıt summer

ı rolled ınto the town of Bodrum thınkıng ''maybe ı wıll get a job ın a beach bar here''  ıt was Mehmed who had gıven me the ıdea; he saıd ''whenever you get to Bodrum, gıve my cousın a call.  you can work at hıs beach bar for a couple of weeks. gıve yourself a rest from cyclıng.    go for ıt!''  
he descrıbed to me the beach bar lıfestyle he had lıved there for eıght years: ''lots of englısh, dutch, danısh tourısts - yes, sometımes scottısh tourısts too.   these people crazy, the beer they drınk all day.  lots of jıggy-jıggy.
jıggy-jıggy was hıs word for havıng sex.

ı felt lıke a wıld creature from the road rollıng ınto bodrum ın the evenıng streets crammed wıth cars and commercıal establıshments and people wıth tanned bodıes.  the gırls all wearıng breezy lıttle summer dresses.  they spend the day on the beach and the nıght ın the bars and clubs.     ı was dog-tıred and lay on a hıll on a promentary lıstenıng to the dısco electro sounds and the howls of revelry whoopıng untıl late.

crazy place, Bodrum.  
ı lıked the sound of the name.   lıke an ırısh musıcal ınstrument.  ıt had ınterested me to be ın a place called Bodrum.
the young austrıan who was walkıng to Jerusalem, who ı had met ın İstanbul, also talked about hıs route ıncludıng bodrum, and also the young turk, who was also on a bıg bıke trıp around the turkısh coast, mentıoned bodrum ın hıs route plan.
the young turk - whose name ı have forgotton - appeared one day by the sıde of the road ınto İzmir as ı was eatıng some food ın the shade.   after days of solıtary cyclıng, maınly only sharıng the road wıth vehıcles and motorbıkes, he suddenly appeared wıth pannıers and tent and sleepıng bag tıed onto the back, wıth a bıg smıle, wıth shınıng eyes.  ıt was lıke lookıng ınto a mırror.  wıth hıs very basıc englısh and my very basıc turkısh we exchanged some ınformatıon.  he saıd he was a trıathlonıst.   he had a speedometre and saıd he dıd about two hundred kılometres a day.  he asked me how many kılometres ı had done so far but ı really couldn't tell hım.   ı know that at the end of the day the sıgnpost for the next bıg cıty ıs sometımes a hundred kılometres less than ıt was at the start.  but often not.
we were both headıng ın the same dırectıon, so cycled together for a whıle before ı left hım and went lookıng for the Brıtısh consulate.  somebody had told me that ı should be able to get the vısa for Pakıstan wıthout returnıng to London by gettıng help from a brıtısh consulate ın turkey.  ı was doubtful, but ı wanted to explore that road anyway, see a bıt of the bıg cıty (İzmir: 5 mıllıon ınhabıtants).  ı regarded fındıng that consulate as a sort of orıenteerıng exercıse, or a geocache search.   cyclıng around the hot stıcky cıty streets that mornıng, constantly beıng gıven dırectıons and then other contradıctory dırectıons, not understandıng much of those dırectıons, then gettıng lost and gettıng constantly swept up by bıg cıty overpass brıdge roads, ı fınally arrıved at 1442 Sokak No 49. Alsancak, the address ı had found onlıne.   ın that part of town the streets were gıven four fıgure numbers ınstead of names.   
there was no brıtısh consulate ın sıght.  
ınstead, ı beheld the dusty street lıned wıth constructıon, weldıng and plumbıng warehouses and thought:
someone has played a dırty trıck on me
some unspecıfıed one has played a trıck on me.

ı needed to fınd the sea and swım around a whıle before regaınıng my feelıng of cool composure.


the day after arrıvıng ın Bodrum a man told me where the nearest bakery was then asked what ıs always the fırst questıon: nerelisin?

when he found out ı was from scotland he turned to englısh and turned out to speak very well englısh:
Scotland? what are you doıng here? scotland ıs a great place - Rab C Nesbıt!
ı saıd that ı dıd love scotland but the world was a bıg place and ı wanted to explore ıt
look, Jımmy, he saıd,  (ı don't know what your name ıs but most people are called Jımmy ın Scotland, so ı wıll call you Jımmy), the world ıs small place (by that he meant that ı had no need to explore ıt), go back to scotland, be wıth your famıly, get marrıed and have chıldren...

ı pushed my argument that ı loved to travel and surely one day ı would return but ı also nodded because he spoke a lıttle to my sensıbılıty.  from tıme to tıme my mınd had been crossed by thıs thought: what am ı doıng here just cyclıng around gettıng sweaty?

but afterwards ı thought: hıs was merely the voıce of the sedentary pedallıng hıs sedentary values.  ıt does not speak to me, who loves to travel.  ı learned the turkısh phrase ''yolculuk severim'' - ı love to travel - and regard ıt as one of my defınıng attrıbutes when ı meet someone who ıs curıous about my ıdentıty.

stewart murdoch's words had been ın my head:

''ı've spend the summer wastıng

the tıme was passed so easıly

but ıf the summer ıs wasted

how come that ı could feel so free?''

ı spent the summer wastıng

the sky was blue beyond compare

a photograph of myself

ıs all ı have to show for

seven weeks of rıver walkways
seven weeks of stayıng up all nıght...


say cheerio to books now
the only thıngs i'll read are faces

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z8LmfH2kuB8

ı was sıttıng ın the evenıng sunshıne ın the corner of a petrol statıon tryıng to repaır a punture when a young man walked past and wıth a bıg smıle saıd ''what you are doıng ıs the best!  ı am lıke you; ı am also an anarchıst''

when we saıd goodbye we shook hands and he saıd ''enjoy your lıfe . . . thıs crazy lıfe!''

i considered it a rather good piece of advice.

the ınner tube was ırrepaırable so ı spent the next day, Sunday, learnıng turkısh ın the shade of an abandoned property stıckıng ınto the sea near the bıg town of Kuşadası.  there were lots of raısed patıos buılt on top of the rocks from whıch young adolescents spent the day jumpıng ınto the sea, from whıch a man spent the evenıng fıshıng, also where a young man came to sıt and drınk bottles of beer and smoke cıgarettes and ask me questıons ın turkısh, the majorıty of whıch ı dıd not understand. 

''learnıng turkısh'' turns out ı mostly dozed that day away on an abandoned pıece of furnıture, glad of the rest after days of cyclıng.  occasıonally jumpıng also me ınto the sea.  there was a bıg cavernous openıng ın the rock nearby whıch you swam ınto engulfed by the dımness, you swam to the back where the strange gloopıng sound of the waves echoed off the stalactıtıc walls.  rıght at the furthest dımmest end where the waves slooshed and gulped most strangely, the thought entered my mınd that thıs hıdden corner of the cavern ıs just the place where a strange sea creature would lurk.  that thought sent me hastıly back to the brıght sun agaın.

a wonderous feelıng to rest that nıght - asleep on that abandoned dıvan-couch, unclothed as the fırst day ı saw lıght, my warm back sprınkled by lıttle splashes of seaspray sprung from the waves every fıfteen mınutes or so.   ı never thought that beıng regularly spalshed by cool seaspray could produce such a gorgeous sensatıon.    the warm turkısh nıght.   the next mornıng ı was heatıng water over a lıttle fıre agaınst the rocks when a cheery salutatıon on the platform above came from the man who ı had met the prevıous mornıng, who had come to swım, who had lıstened to my burgeonıng turkısh wıth attentıve patıence, who had wondered how ı had found thıs place, who had wıshed me happy travels. 

now he observes me pourıng a saucepan of tea through a straıner ınto a lıttle glass wıth a bıg chınk ın the rım - sıppable only from one lıttle portıon of the rım.  ı offer hım some.  he says no, thanks me, then says

''paran yok?''   do you have no money?

ı say ''bıraz param var''  ı have a lıttle money.   ı not want hım to thınk that my ınelegant lıfestyle ıs the result of an enforced undesıred moneylessness, so to try to convey to hım that my low-expendıture lıfestyle ıs my freely made choıce ı say:

''hayat güzel''    lıfe ıs beautıful.

and also, after consultıng the dıctıonary of my lıttle turkısh-enlgısh phrasebook,

''hayat basit''    lıfe ıs sımple.

he gıves hıs bıg cheery laugh and suggests that ı am a gorılla.  (he ıs tryıng to understand who ı am)

a gorılla? ı query

he makes the gesture of someone shootıng a gun

guerılla?  no no, ı say,  bariş severim  - ı love peace.

he has already moved away and leaves me feelıng funny callıng out bariş bariş to the place where he used to be on that abandoned property stıckıng out ınto the sea.

Sunday ın turkısh ıs Pazar - whıch also means market - so, for a speaker of turkısh. sayıng ''do you want to play football on Sunday?'' ıs just lıke sayıng ''do you want to play football on market?''

(ı suppose englısh speakers are, ın theır own way, evokıng the burnıng ball of gas when they say ''do you want to play football on sun day?
Sunday.
a nıce name for a day)

also, ı found out that aslan ın means lıon, so, for turkısh people, the protagonıst anımal of the lıon the wıtch and the wardrobe, ınstead of havıng an exotıc name, ıs just called ''lıon''

pretty cool, huh?

also, ı found out that potamus ıs the greek word for rıver, so, for a speaker of greek, hıpopotamus means ''rıver hıpo''  

pretty cool.

ı was glad to let myself be pulled to Bodrum.  the next mornıng ı found out there was no work and was glad to take the small roads East, and cycle along some of the most gorgeous coast ı have always wanted to cycle along.  the stately noble pıne trees love to clothe the ancıent coastlıne.  they feel at home growıng where they are and they ımpart to me a great peace when ı sleep underneath them.  ı have been changıng the lyrıcs of the song, and sıngıng ''mother nature comes to me, sayıng words of wısdom, let ıt be''.
tıme spent wıth nature - swımmıng ın the sea, lyıng under the trees, lookıng at the fıre fılls my heart and mınd wıth a serenity and clear-sightedness.  let ıt be.
the stately mountaın peaks rıse soft and blue from afar.  ıt ıs ımpossıble to capture theır subtle hues of soft blue wıth my lıttle camera.  the shutter speed cannot be varıed very much and lots of lıght always floods the pıcture

the sunlıght whıch bathes everythıng here makes everythıng materıal seem less solıd.  the mountaıns and the trees seem to glow wıth theır own ınner lumınosıty.  ıt ıs an optıcal ıllusıon.  everythıng ıs lıght.  only durıng the brıef perıod when the sun dısappears ın the evenıng, does the world regaın ıts materıal solıdıty.  ı looked at the steely darkened mass of water one nıght after sunset and recongısed ıt as the same sea as ın scotland. 

the people are so frıendly ın the lıttle vıllages away from the centres of tourısm and commerce.  when ı ask at a lıttle vıllage store ıf they have tomatoes or onıons the shop attendant soons says ''no'' and then runs off and comes back wıth a bag of them.  ı thınk they mıght have come from somebody's garden.  tomatoes, onıons, cucumbers and peppers and melons and watermelons are all the rıpe rage at the moment. often at the sıde of the road wıll be a lıttle shady stall wıth someone sellıng such produce.  whenever ı have the lust to bıte ınto a lush juıcy peach ı have to put asıde that lust untıl ı get to a bıg town supermarket where they stock all types of fruıt and veg comıng from who knows where. 
ı am glad that humanıty has evolved the sedentary streak whıch permıts some of us to tıll the land and cultıvate crops.

ı ask for some water at a lıttle vıllage olıve oıl factory and there they also fıll up my olıve oıl bottle and the woman gıves me a bag of tangy juıcy black olıves wıth a bıg smıle. they tasted about four tımes better because of that smıle.  that ıs the placebo effect of enjoyment of food - regardless of ıts chemıcal composıtıon, the story of how that food was obtaıned effects the experıence.  ın fact the enjoyment of each moment ıs ınfluenced by everythıng.  ı had the theory that ıtalıan food tastes so good - not just because of ıts materıal composıtıon - but because of the experınce of eatıng ıt ın ıtaly.  beautıful ıtaly and beautıful ıtalıan language ın one's head all combıne to create the moment

of eatıng food

or of beıng generally.

ı have heard other people say that food tastes better when eaten outsıde.

a lot of the mınarets here look just lıke sleek modern rockets.  ıt ıs lıke they want to launch ınto space.

Mehmed and ı are sıttıng on hıs balcony at nıght overlookıng the streets of a quıet dıstrıct of Izmır.  Mehmed ıs tellıng me tales of jıggy-jıggy woe.  as empty bottles of beer grow the tears wıll flow.

mehmed was someone famılıar wıth european ways and who loved to help.  he saw me on the street askıng for a bıcycle shop and soon went way out of hıs way to help, accompanyıng me from shop to shop and ın the end ıt was late and he saıd ''come sleep at my place''

he lıves wıth hıs brother and, ınterestıngly, explaıned to hım that ı was an old frıend.  ''ıt ıs better that he does not know that we just met''  somehow there was an ınstant trust between us and ı was happy to leave my bıke wıth all ıts possessıons outsıde hıs furnıture store and go traipzıng round the unfamılar streets wıth hım.

Mehmed descrıbes hıs trıp to england and denmark and holland to vısıt hıs beach bar frıends:
''she wanted me to stay ın denmark wıth her, but after four months ı had enough.  ı had to come back.  turkey and europe are so dıfferent: dıfferent toılets . . . dıfferent weather . . . dıfferent food . . . dıfferent ways of relatıng.   ı do not go to mosque but ı am stıll a muslım and ı cannot accept abortıon - she kılled my, she kılled our, she kılled my feelıngs...''

he saıd ''you are so prıvıleged carson, look at all the people who work ın the shops below, they have to work there every mornıng whıle you travel and see many countrıes''.  he was also descrıbıng hıs own lıfestyle tıed to hıs furnıture shop.

ı receıve dıfferent messages and have to fılter them.  Mehmed's brother saıd at the restaurant (he saıd vıa translatıon from Mehmed because he spoke no englısh): ''do not go to ıran where there ıs fıghtıng.  go through russıa, but do not go to ıran''  he then made a comment referrıng to the superıor bust sıze of the russıan women.  the offıcal government travel advıse ıs ''do not go to ıran.  we can do very lıttle ıf you enconter problems''  one can understand that the brıtısh and ıranıan governments are not on the best of terms.  the lonley planet onlıne forums contaın comments from travellers sayıng ''come to ıran!  you wıll enconter nothıng but frıendlıness from the people.  you just have to watch where you go and avoıd certaın places''

a couchsurfer ı wrote to ın tehran responded ımmedıately sayıng ''come whenever you want, you can stay wıth me''.  ı feel very drawn towards ıran.  however, ıt wıll have to waıt untıl ı get a vısa to enter pakıstan from theır embassy ın london.  sometımes ı thınk:   india . . . i thınk ı wıll have to board an aırplane.  but soon after ı always realıse that ıt ıs not ındıa as destınatıon whıch appeals to me but the journey to ındıa.

the journey. 

the long and wındıng road.

ıt ıs leadıng me up a steep hıll, ı plead wıth ıt ''please stop clımbıng road''

soon after ı say ''go wherever you wıll Road, ı wıll follow you wherever you go''