Cadaques, Spain

If I had a moped I wouldn’t have to think as hard. Walking back home from Kixa’s the world changes and the cold creeps through my jacket. The rain pooling in dark corners and the street fuzzy from darkness, both make me think. The bright lights of cars pass occasionally, illuminating the rutted track and allowing me to see. If I had a moped I could speed around the bends, clattering down the semi-paved hill with my broken muffler sending muddy dogs into frenzied barking. I could concentrate on my driving and the wind in my hair. As it is my hands are wedged into pockets and I am forced to consider things I usually try and avoid as the road stretches before me.

I want to go onwards and finish this quarter and yet everything gets harder. Steve shows it more than me, his posture slightly stooped, moods erratic, idiosyncrasies more pronounced. The truth is we had fully believed things would become less of a struggle for me, for instance that any mood swings I had would have diminished or vanished. Instead I still fly from one extreme to another and as my workload increases so does my reaction. In other areas I scrape past, my math skills still hopelessly inadequate and my physical fitness level now steadily dropping.

If I had a moped then maybe I could focus on the positive. When I ride with Yuma or Maya, legs banging against theirs, one hand jamming the tiny helmet against my head, then I feel brilliant. Flying along darkened roads I can remember that last week I completed two papers, that the week before I stayed in a library for three hours without break to get the research I needed for school. My Sat score is manageable and I have time to see my friends every other day.

Of course I don’t have a moped. Most nights then, I take the long trip home on foot with leaky Blunstones getting my socks muddy. and alone, wishing for a chance to ride into oblivion.

Fez, Morocco

The noise that wakes me is as foreign as the chants from a Bangkok temple were two years ago. The sun sits lazily on the horizon, its rays not yet warming the cobbled streets of inner Fez. From dented megaphones atop elegant green towers come noise, the tirade of a preachers voice propelled over the waking city. “God is great” they say in Arabic, the noise echoing through our broken window. However wonderful it was I would prefer that they not announce this so early, my clock reading 5:30 AM.

Waking, we make preparations for leaving the room. Laptop, passports and money are hidden under a wardrobe while I scrounge around for breakfast. Finding only stale bread and olives I suddenly remember that it is Ramadan. The month of holy fasting, Ramadan is meant to remind all who worship Islam that they are not too different from beggars and the destitute. As it is illegal for anyone to eat on the street during the day I have been struggling with this and sneaking food to our room like a naughty schoolboy hiding tuck. After my unsatisfactory meal I clamber into dirty clothes, the product of failed negotiations to get our laundry washed for less than it would take to do it ourselves.

On the street things are in full flow. Stepping out of our door and narrowly missing a pile of rubbish, I feel slightly like Indiana Jones. Around me flows a stream of people, many in weird and wonderful garb, from flowing robes to strange KKK-esq pointy hoods. Every building seems to be an open-air shop selling something random, doorknobs and electrical wires for instance. Every local, from shopkeepers to beggars seems to want us to one of the following:
(A) Buy something from their shop, usually something semi-useless or overpriced
(B) Converse with them in French about how brilliant Fez is
(C) Move Out of the way of their donkey that is carrying anything from rubbish to coke bottles on its scraggy back.

I loved Morocco. The people smiling and shouting “Bonjour” at us, the sticky Ramadan treats made from fig syrup, the artisans making pottery and the view from the rooftops onto a tanning factory. Everything was foreign and yet familiar, reminding me of Asia and Central America mixed together. Although I built up an aversion to squat toilets, fasting and creepy hostel owners with fatal coughs my first experience in Africa was extremely enjoyable.

Cordoba, Southern Spain

With every day we come closer to Africa, Cordoba shrinking behind and an unknown continent looming ahead. To be on the road again feels uncomfortable, calmly moving towns, swapping hotel rooms and generally moving on like a couple of spies. Now we are on our final train, olive plantations passing on the left and freshly plowed fields on the right. A small-whitewashed farmhouse offers visual relief from a stark environment and a hovering bird of prey makes me smile as the sun glints off its dark feathers.

I was watching Motorcycle diaries on my way to Granada and a line of Che’s struck me, “ Por esa vagar sin rumbo por nuestra mayuscula America me ha cambiado mas que queria. Yo ya no soy yo. Por lo menos, no soy el mismo yo interior.” Loosely translated by Steve it reads “But this journey lacking a fixed course through the greater America has changed me more than I intended. I am no longer I. At least I am not the same I on the inside.”

As we continue our journey down through Spain, the more I can relate to the statement you just read. Those who fret about my political stability shouldn’t worry; it is not likely that I will become a communist revolutionary any time soon, at least until I can grow a beard.
I am changing though; my ideas altering from the months spent studying with a fervent idealist like Steve. I am becoming more readily eloquent, able to express ideas in words that used to be confined solely to paper. Combine this skill with something new to say and I feel unstoppable as I turn my attention to things currently bothering me. The major vent for my scorn has been the Christian eradication of Islamic thought in Spain and the negative affect it produced.

We just seen the second of the three Islamic wonders of Spain and like the first it has been converted religiously. Standing in the many-pillared hall of the Mezquita mosque in Cordoba I felt awed at the simple continuation of the whole structure, red and white topped pillars extending like a forest of poplars in every direction. Later, walking into its center I found a church, an edifice of pink marble and candles that was at odds with the surrounding structure and that had obviously been transplanted there.

Why this massive plagiarism, building a church inside a mosque and thereby taking claim to something that is not theirs? The Islamic court in Spain welcomed people of any faith and Christians, Jews and Muslims studied side by side to achieve higher learning. The fact that this, one of histories most tolerant institutions were replaced by an Christian inquisition that would inspire fear from all of Europe for hundreds of years is purely shocking and something for anyone who reads this to think about. I am not saying that you, the reader should change your core beliefs and I am certainly not Muslim, but please do not infringe upon others, however foreign and threatening they may seem.

Granada, Southern Spain

Imagine a Spanish Palace, its towers soaring into the blue void of space. This is a place of tranquility, where the sound of trickling water greets visitors, where cats lounge on tiled floors upon which, Spain’s ruling caliphs once trod. Walking over a mottled bridge above Granada I found such a place in the Alhambra, a fortress-city and gateway to another time. Stepping through the gateway and wandering through light flecked halls, detailed patterns eye catching with every step, I have found something beautiful and calm.

Nothing like this is untouched, and as I explore, so do maybe a thousand other tourists, moving past each other to snap pictures like ants foraging through a kitchen. I may join them in their journey but I still feel shame as I stand under an arch to have my picture taken, feeling like Hitler posing before the Eiffel tower. This feeling of guilt comes not from something I did but of acts committed by others hundreds of years ago.

The Spanish did not build these halls, this palace and the university of Cordoba. These are Muslim buildings, the Arabic on the colored tiles faded but still visible. And where are they, the men who built this palace, whose creative scope flows from every wall and surface? They are gone, their mosque flattened and a monstrosity of a church built over it. They are gone, thrown out, evicted not from a town but from a country, for the simple crime of being Muslim. In today’s media driven world many tend to look at Islam as a religion of hate followed by fanatics ready to die for any cause. How can we forget the learning that5 Islamic scholars introduced into Europe? How can we forget the royal courts of the Caliphs where Jews Christians and Muslims intermingled freely?

Now I am on a bus, heading through a land of olive and palm, of wandering goats and hardened shepherds, the heart land of Spain around me. This is Andalusia and ahead is Cordoba and after that the straights of Gibraltar and all of Africa. This is a history book of terrain, a land marched by Moors and Carthaginians, roads that have seen Hannibal’s elephants and Franco’s shock troops. This then is Spain and I am traveling through it towards Morocco, following the trail of Islamic influence towards its source, keen to find some meaning in all I have already seen.

Nice, France

“Ask for the number nine” Steve presses, urging me towards the bus which is preparing to depart the underpass where we have been sheltering. “nine, I don’t know nine” I insist “Une, Deu, Twua, Cat, Sanc, Sies, ummm, Nope”. As the bus departs Steve glares at me and together we search the gloomy streets for a taxi.

Had it just been the case of a missing bus at a Nice underpass(The city was Nice, the underpass was anything but) this trip might have looked normal, but amusingly the past two days have been those of confused backpacking as we made our way to France for the ACT.

Two nights ago and we first reached France and the coastal town of Cebere aboard a battered commuter train. Our brief three hour stay was quite boring and mentionable only for the sheer dodgyness we encountered upon exiting from the darkened station. From brightly lit train it was but twenty steps before a darkness of flickering street lights and murmuring shadows took over. For ages we navigated through foul tunnels and water filled streets to the waterfront and a bench. With no sea view to speak of and the bars shooing out their last patrons we retreated. Later in the station and with my laptop offering salvation from the doldrums, we watched Good Morning Vietnam in the fringes of freight yards while Doberman pinchers looked at our shins with longing.

All this effort and the ACT exam hall looks deserted, thin sheets of rainwater forming in the carpark and no possible test takers in sight. After five minutes the rusted steel gates popped automatically open and a mousy looking teacher hurried us inside, the garish pink of the painted concrete making me feel like a child in Disney land. And it almost was for I was the only student enrolled for the ACT and enjoyed the relaxed test taking environment in which I flourish. Alone in the schools I.T room the whole production to get there seemed such a anticlimax and I felt almost relaxed with the test (until I came to the math section, of course).
Now we are heading through Italy, the sea cloudy as our train ploughs along the Riviera the test done and my stomach rumbling in time to the beat of train against track.

Barcelona, North East Spain

The minutes tick quickly out of my reach and I am still lost within the test. My hair has lengthened and hangs shaggily over the collar of the clubbing shirt recruited for the S.A.T. Surprisingly even with this unorthodox look I am not out of place, as I might be in some cold American test facility in New England. The Spanish students surrounding me wear clothes that make them look good rather than excessively formal. The atmosphere is tense (of course some things never change) but friendly and we seem more like good friends sitting down for dinner in a trendy restaurant rather than strangers in a dusty conference room taking the S.A.T.

It is the proving ground, this exam that can secure you a place within the walls of academia or bar you from the same. Steve has helped me prepare to combat this test, coached me through the many math sections until the gibberish started to make sense. Unfortunately nothing prepares for the real thing and my fingers tap restlessly against the desk, my eyes riveted to the square wall clock. Its like a starters gun, the moderator up at the front calmly saying ‘you can begin’ as we scramble to open the booklets and start writing.

Later I stand up feeling bruised and sore, finish the last tick box, hand in the paper and walk slowly down the stairs as shaky as if I had escaped Lorcas, ‘Shipwreck of blood’. In the test centre restaurant Steve sits and waits for me, then together we escape the Orwellian looking test center and exit onto the street, the trees a leafy green above us.

Cadaques, North East Spain

The cloudy grayness of last week has given way to a sun that now warms worn terracotta roofs and lazy cats lolling outside doorways. The light washes down across the bay, and makes shadows upon the water flutter and dance. In the garden, a slight wind buffets the potted palm in its outside pot, complimenting the light and demanding that a watercolor of the scene be drawn.

From the garden terrace I can really appreciate Cadaques in all its whiteness, at times when it seems ancient and a little magical. To stand on the hill and look down upon the town is like sitting in the gods at the theatre, watching some vast exquisitely propped play as time speeds by. The clouds roll in, the sun descends behind olive green peaks and the moon rises elegantly to cast its light upon the sea. The street lamps go on across the beachfront, the shops close and the bars open, one half of the populous makes room for the other half. Soon the sun rises again, casting her pink flame over the crags and rocks of Cap De Creus, hitting the lighthouse before cutting gracefully to her place high above the Casino and the olive trees.

We watch all this from our hill, binoculars and naked eyes scanning the road that snakes along the waterfront, removed by vegetation from any activity past our garden walls. A few streets distant scooters buzz through the cobbled streets, on the beach tourist boats crash against the shore, cooks and waiters take a quick cigarette break before plunging back to the steaming inferno of the kitchens dotted around town. Up here however an air of scholarly seriousness looms over everything. A cardboard box is tacked up against the window, taped calendars and timetables replacing the view of church spire and garden poplar with proof of our academia. Our math work is temporarily laid aside, SAT books replaced by reams of poetry translations for our next project, the writing of a five page paper. And outside the sun drags lower in the sky and activity trickles downwards in tempo as the night appears.


Steve on the hill above Cadaques

Cap De Creus, North East Spain

Running feet pausing briefly upon the dirt, taking off again, hurried like worried grouse fleeing death in a far away land. A shoe lands in a miniscule cloud of dust, the earth lifting skywards only to submit to harsh gravity and come down again in a puff of friction.

Running I can see. The sky is purple, heavy hues splashed lightly onto the canvas of ancient rock. My gaze swings between sky and ground, each footfall jolting my vision slightly, sweat stinging at eyes and neck. Ahead on the rocky path is Steve. With little effort my teacher turns neatly round the corner, skipping over dusty brambles before jogging onto the length of a once-used dam. I follow, feet scrambling for purchase, head starting to ache with effort, hands balled into tight fists.

Running, I feel free. The wind blowing and serenading, the sun burning brightly as it launches from the horizon, upwards above the sparkling ocean. My lungs may ache, pain may shoot from my legs, but none of that seems to matter when I run. My feet float almost gracefully and I will everything to give me speed, to hurl me forward into the next turn. Broken buildings, their shells cracked and torn appear to the left before we pass them in a second, the smell of aniseed thick around us.

Running, I forget. Memories are replaced with the present while grudges and fears slide off into the dust behind me. Any problems from the previous days are forgotten as my joints loosen and I can think clearly again. Work and stress, arguments and fights, all is forgotten as I run, the sky the limit, nothing unattainable in those brief moments.

Cadaques, North East Spain

The thunder has gone, clouds shifted from above the town, the sun revealed if only temporarily. We have been here in Spain for a week and yet I have not written before now, hopefully to the vague disappointment of my readers. Looking out of the dirt stained window I can see the hills rise away in the distance around the town, forming the stage for this expedition and looking perfect for me to sketch at some later time.

Now though, I plug in my headphones, switch on A Beautiful Day by U2 and start writing again. This week feels like years, every day intermingling then slipping slowly away like the sailing boats heading from the harbor and out to sea. Every day we work from the kitchen table, piles of schoolbooks confronting us with their serious print and boring titles. We read through these, figuring out mathematical problems that to me have no point other than to act as stepping-stones for applying to collage. Could we not, I wonder, figure out problems to deal with world hunger and racial injustice, calculate food usage in Africa instead of figuring out how many eggs Jill has if she buys five more? A thick layer of test papers lies like fresh snow upon all this and finally some are starting to be filled in with scrawled pen marks.

Sitting here, my thoughts wander to France where we went for the day to see some Matisse’s on show in the local gallery. The sun low in the sky we strolled down leafy avenues and drunk coffee after touring the art gallery. In France I saw so much to write about, both for my blog and serious reference papers. I wrote briefly on crossing the border:

France seemed an extension of the dusty Catalonian landscape as we crossed the border above a wide ravine. Continuing though the olive tree covered countryside I saw subtle differences, the French number plates of the car in front and the indecipherable signposts sliding by. Catherine was quick to point out random snippets of information ‘Here’s the pass used by Hannibal’s elephants’ or ‘Quick, look, that is where a princess used to throw her lovers out of windows and down the cliffs’ followed usually by a good natured laugh as we cruise deeper into Europe, the sun shining and thunder clouds no where to be seen.

Clapham Common, London

London is humid, the heat sickly and clinging and the rain still frustratingly absent. Even deep in the earth on the tube, rattling along inside the mysterious iron tunnels the air was warm and foul, like I had been sucked down into some giant maw. It was my first time in London since the dreadful bombings and things felt slightly different in the tube, like a cloud of mistrust was lurking underground. It was with relief then that I arrived at my stop, flung my bag onto sweaty shoulders and climbed the stairs to the street.

Being in London is a wake up call for me, my last few days in Britain and on holiday for three months. In about 48 hours I will meet my friend and tutor Steve, board a plane and be in Spain by nine a clock that night. In Spain we get to work, studying high school curriculum with the aim of graduating me by Christmas. Shackleton may have closed and, although I have not graduated I have not failed either. So instead of studying at school Steve and I will be cast loose in Spain. We will therefore set up our own place of learning in Es Puig, my families summer house that will become our school

We will be based in Cadaques, a town perched by the mountains and fronted by sea. This artistic community should provide us with a base and the chance for me to improve my writing and enrich my future posts and entries. Everyday I will learn, from cooking traditional food to riding challenging paths on my mountain bike to studying poetry to algebra.

Now I am still in London. I hear sirens and glance outside, staring at the lush green of plants and the hazy spire of some church next door. Already I have left behind my usual innocence and am ready for the change in schedule a city trip demands. Instead of walking through wheat fields I will dodge pedestrians in crowded streets, instead of eating at home I will eat out. I will have to keep doors locked and watch out for pickpockets, things rarely done in Aberdeenshire. And then in two days when I am just settling down I must swap London for Barcelona and the known for the new and frightening.

Aberdeenshire, North East Scotland

Familiar figures whirl around me, their countless shadows sprayed liberally across whitewashed walls. The light comes raining down from two immense candelabras surrounded by red coats of arms, these adorned by more finery in the form of painted wooden spears. Down below the band is about to start again, the musicians trooping back amid socialites crowding the dance floor with their Smalltalk and glasses of Champaign. The great and the good, close friends and acquaintances, hundreds of people fill the “Coo Cathedral”, that grand palace of a barn in rural Aberdeenshire, they fill it with laughter and merriment, gathered here today for the annual Abboyn Ball.

Suddenly as groups of friends eagerly scrawl on dance cards, introduce each other and try to make up for lost time a fiddle is drawn. A single fiddle yet the noise turns to a murmur and from the front comes a calm voice, “Ladies and Gentlemen, please take your places for the reel of the 51st division.”

White Tie and Evening wear, elegant dresses sweeping the ground as their wearers form long lines down the dance floor. Kilts in uncountable tartans and sporrans made out of unidentifiable animal heads with staring glass eyes. Both dresses and kilts move slightly as the men bow and the women curtsy, step forward….

In this last moment I walk quickly through the gathering crowd searching for the partner I have completely lost, a very sweet girl from England who I hope is also trying to find me. As the music starts and with my partner still absent, a wide eyed and slightly unnerving young woman completely unknown to me (who had seconds ago announced herself taken) decides she has been abandoned and I lead her into line.

…..The music starts and years of practice take over:

Forward step, bounce bums with my partner, cast off one (go behind the man next to me) set to my partner and quickly clap my hands before spinning her.

Mental instructions fly though my head as I look at my partner and try to remember her name. Next to me is James and further down Sam, both dancing with glamorous friends of ours clad in pashminas and expensive jewellery. As we spin each other the dancers whoop and stamp, laughter fills everything, more champagne corks are popped and I catch the faint smell of breakfast from somewhere off the dance floor.

Going back to school it is the dances I remember most. Leading girls by the arm, shaking hands and kissing cheeks, Rose’s laugh as the line disintegrates around us and dancers wheel erratically in every direction. James doing press ups in the middle of a circle to the angry stares of the older generation. We dance and flirt, laughing and making the most of this day for there are precious few times when we see each other, the youth of upper-class Aberdeenshire however much we deny it.

This time though, as the final dance ends and God Save the Queen is sung, all is not as jolly inside my head. All that I have just written about, the grandeur and the expensive tickets, it all contradicts with the way I try to live outside the U.K. I guiltily think of what Mama Mendoza in Guatemala would think of all this wasted wealth, money that could go into the community or something useful, or even what my school friends would say if they saw me here. In the end of the day of course, I am not going to renounce this life, these friends and this way of living. Instead I do my service work, visit poor countries, write my blog and keep each contradicting compartment in my life completely separate from the rest.

Corrybrough, Tomatin, Northern Scotland


Back from the highlands, washed, shaved, and reunited with the internet I finally have the opportunity to return to my writing and report on what I have seen. My time up north has left me with an urge to type reams of blog entries about beating, each featuring Dickensian characters living in a highly dramatized and equally stylized world. About the place, the rolling hills I could write much but it was the people who evoked the most emotion in me, the beaters and the keepers that I remember more than anything else.

There were two major factions working on the estates, both of which I had to interact with on a daily basis. Standing on the moors whilst we beaters were eating lunch you could see the presence of these two sides immediately. On the grass banks behind the lunch hut all those that have previously been working together immediately split in half and headed for opposite sides of the hill.

On one side, leaning against pieces of peat, talking loudly and wearing florescent rain gear are the Eastern Europeans. These are migrant workers brought in for £30 a day plus food and board, with no contract or loyalty to the estates. I live with them in an estate bunk house and am technically one of them. The following is a basic description of a average working morning in the granary.


The lower bunk beds are small, barely enough head room to even lie down on, let alone sit on the edge. Under the bunks, belongings are crammed, rumpled fleeces spilling loose change onto the floor as Eve, with her pigtails and prominent mole, yells at the occupants as she tries to hoover. The twelve in the room troop slowly down stairs to join others waiting on the long table marred with grease stains and marks as plates of dripping bacon buns are carried before them. Into such a vivid environment come characters, many straight from the pages of Orwell and Dickens.

Over by the fridge, Karel, a Czech with curly blond hair and a smile like the Joker, studies half eaten salami and bottles of orange juice. Satisfied that everything is in order he grabs a plate of soggy cornflakes and slurps them down noisily.

Sitting in the ripped chairs, Petra and several other Babushka like women are getting into waterproofs, braiding their hair and rolling sandwiches up in blue paper hand towels which they shove into coat pockets.

At the table, “Army boy” dressed in camouflage, and with his binoculars ever ready, quietly in Czech to his girlfriend as he steals orange juice for lunch.
Machek the Pole notices the theft and complains about the lack of juice due to the couple as they walk from the room. Presently a pockmarked Scottish youth with a near-shaven head named Ben comes down the narrow stairs lugging several guns and bandoliers of ammunition which the Czechs eye with worried expressions. Davie is next into the room with Bob the chef, ordering the beaters to “load up” into the backs of several land rovers already half filled with dogs.
Out side at the land rovers, beaters jostle for good position while oblivious dogs slide in between their legs to take up muddy station on the seats. We climb in, slam the doors and are soon being bumped and jolted into the hills and away to work.

Clune, The Highlands, Northern Scotland

Alone on the hill time passes slowly. Harsh winds blow cold and furious, driving thin sheets of rain into the gullies around me. Clumps of purple heather and the brown mess of peat hags carpet the ground, punctuated only by grey scree.

Minutes pass without break and the smallest change in the environment (A spider moving slowly across my leg) becomes immediately apparent. Later a sound, sharp like the crack of a whip (belonging to a waved flag), fills the void of silence and I slowly stand. Following it comes a shouted command, “Come on” rising as I clamber to my feet. Now standing it becomes apparent that I am in a line, small figures extending left and right across my vision, each clutching the plastic flag with its handle of faded wood.

This could be any number of days, the landscape almost indistinguishable from any other on the moors. In rain and sun, with biting winds at my face I have stood in line upon similar hills and waved my flag, sometimes with gusto, usually with deliberate slowness.

Stamping along, avoiding mud and rusted wire, the occasional Grouse is startled upwards into the air. These small brown birds, worth £95 per brace (for two) are our targets. Us in the line, the “beaters”, wave and snap our flags, driving the startled animals over the hills until the noise of firing shotguns looms ahead. Those with the guns have precious few seconds to fire at the frightened birds as they hurry away from the beaters and many birds fly on unhampered.

From my spot on the line I can see the guns firing, the “flankers” and the “Picker-up-ers” working dogs behind those shooting. A bird is hit and seems to freeze in midair before falling earthwards, feathers billowing over the heather. “Get back in line” screams a red faced Davie, “Stop looking at the guns”, his harsh words forcing me from my reveries and back into the monotony of my work.

Nearing the butts (dugouts for the guns to sit in) Davies radio comes alive as somewhere Susan tells the line to “Blow the horns”, signalling the guns to stop firing in front so they don’t hit the approaching beaters. Soon, after we have passed the butts and all shooting as ceased the entire line sinks to the ground and unwraps any food we have been carrying in our packs. We eat hurriedly, knowing that we will have to repeat all I have written of four more times before our daily wages are handed out.

Invernesshire, The Highlands, Northern Scotland

“Next stop Inverness, the line terminates next stop” whispers the tannoy system as the train barrels on through fields and past whiskey distilleries, their mounds of empty barrels sitting outside. Several minutes later the train hisses and stops, the doors open and I am expelled alone onto a chilly platform like some forgotten soldier, dragging my bags behind to the front of the station. I had travelled for three hours, carrying sleeping bag and boots, hats and spare clothes, intent on reaching Inverness and starting my job.

One month ago I had rung up Kallum, the Head Game Keeper of the Corrybrough Estate and asked for a summer job beating. Expecting a long interview I was very happy when after two minutes he said “See you at the estate on the 11th then, hope you don’t mind but everyone else is an Eastern European” and hung up.

It is the 11th of October, the night before the Glorious 12th which is traditionally the start of the grouse shooting season. In big houses across the country guns are laid out in their sleeves, Shoffel and Barber jackets taken off their pegs, cartridge bags filled and electronic earphones loaded with batteries.

On the estates harried keepers race across the moors in Land Rovers, on quads and clinging to the back of Argos, trying to finish last minute preparations. Flags and jugs of juice are loading into vehicles and over at Corrybrough Ben is going over the route for tomorrows drives.

In Inverness, perched like a buzzard upon my bags I catch sight of several Land Rovers parked out front near the old hotel. Taking my bags towards them I can see a large red faced man sitting in the left hand vehicle, dressed in tweeds and looking impatient. Seeing my dishevelled figure he raises one arm in greeting and motions for me to dump my bags in the back of his truck.

Later, from sitting talking with him and listening into others conversations I will learn much more about the countryside than I do about Davie. As we drive towards the estate I gather only that he works on the estate, owns a dog and is disappointed with the awful state of the shooting season. After twenty minutes (Davie being the slowest driver in the North) of uncomfortable silence and stilted conversation we reach Tomatin which I understand will be my local town for a month.

Ten seconds later we are though it, the whole place consisting of a post office, a large pub and twenty houses that leave me disappointed. The pickup truck skirts fields of bored looking sheep, drives under two road bridges and over a rickety wooden one before pulling up in a empty yard. A sign on one of the buildings reads “The Granary-Corrybrough”, and through the lighted windows I see people moving around in a sparsely decorated room. Grabbing my bags I hasten to the door and set my sights on finding a good bed and something to eat, knowing nothing about what’s in store for me over the following weeks.

Cadaques, North East Spain

The evening sun sinks slowly behind terraced hills and terracotta roofs, gently touching the opening doors of Cadaques only church. From her perch high upon waves of golden filigree the Virgin Mary is slowly brought earthward. Slowly, conveyed by four pairs of loving hands she is gently carried outside though the already thronging crowds.

Imagine that you are this figurine, this statuette taken out to perform your sacred duty to the townsfolk. Every year you are carried down the sloping alleys and crowded streets to a tiny harbour that perches upon the south shore. From there a fishing boat conveys you around the bay from the main beach to the lighthouse that looms high on grey cliffs half a mile distant. This is your annual journey:


Out of the Church and down past a ruined house, its doors pockmarked with woodworm, cats fleeing into its caved interior.

Cadaques lies at the feet of weather-beaten mountains. Strands of olive trees grip to the hillside by way of stone terraces made long ago by locals you can glimpse in faded postcards. Those that inhabited Cadaques then depended on fish and olive oil instead of the sarongs and beach balls that their children’s children now sell in the Plaza.

Right by the clockwork toyshop, hand puppets hanging from hooks on the wall.

In the “Casino”, in reality a glorified social club empty of gamblers, one can see black and white pictures of the great frosts and snows that over fifty years ago killed thousands of olives and thus wiped out this towns livelihood until tourism was introduced.

Over the spot where craggy old women in black shawls once hawked live fish from a rusty barrow.

Past the stone mermaid set in concrete that fronts an obscure seafood restaurant.

Looking down from the eyes of an ever-wheeling gull, the town is a mass of orange roofs broken by the cracks of streets and alleys. Towards the outskirts new property leaps ever upwards, a mass of concrete oozing slowly up beige foothills.

Salvador Dali, famous for paintings of oozing clocks and warped elephants once called this town home (as is evident by his penis shaped swimming pool over the hills in Port Legat). His statue guards the square, eyes towards the heavens and moustache neatly preened. There are pictures somewhere, pictures of Kevin and myself clinging to Dali’s form, just minutes before he and Robin waved goodbye and left Spain (Kevin not Dali).


Past tourists sitting astride walls, their cameras clicking and recording in time with the music.

Through the plaza where huge crowds ebb and flow among the shady trees.

Onto a boat bobbing slowly against the quay where half the local population stands expectant, crossing themselves as you pass.

Half an hour later you bless Sasabolia and are serenaded by the squawks of sea gulls, the hoots of locals with foghorns and the crash of dark brakers hitting against the cliffs.

In a world where fishing boats can be plucked beneath the seas with all hands lost, Religion and superstition become extremely important. Thus a statue of Mary must make her annual trips to old and mostly forgotten fishing coves, blessing the grounds in the hope that no men will die at sea during the following year.


Afterwards you are returned to the church, stowed safely by the alter and forgotten until next year. From the other side of think oak doors the hoot of a trumpet and the buzz of ever-present mopeds can be heard on the breeze as town life carries on into the fading daylight


Leaving the harbor


Procession of the ships


The view from the bay


The Virgin nearing the cathedral

Cadaques, North East Spain

I am back, feet stepping upon red tiles and hands pulling random tomes from the shelf next to my bed. This is my room and yet I have not lived here or even called Es Puig my house for two years. This summer house with its stucco and ivy strewn walls, my room with the mosquito net looking like some fairies wedding dress out to dry, they exist in a time warp, their memories of me long out of date.

The pictures on the wall show a boy, either scowling sourly with contempt in his eyes or trying nervously to smile. The books on the shelf belonged to someone with small views, the toys in the corner to a virtual child, the person I once was.

Now I feel very different from the last time I was here, stepping into and retying my shoes within five minutes of arrival as I prepare to go out. My back is straighter, my movements less manic and my conversation less self centred. Unpacking my bag I pull out journal entries that I could not have dreamed of writing, an art case full of paints I am now comfortable using, a scarf that has travelled with me from a crowded market in Asia.

Not everything has changed. Even now I do not always have the drive or the willingness to improve the way I think, interact and live daily or even weekly. I can still be as selfish and mean, as stupid and clumsy, as shy and timid as I was last time I arrived at Es Puig. The difference is I have the skills and the confidence to change things, to realize my mistakes and work on putting them right, even if it takes me longer than most people.

And so I walk out the door, down past the poplars and lavender, opening the gate and waiting for Jamie, my life very different from the last time I did so.

Girona, North East Spain

The road that carries us, my family and me, that carries our bags and packs, our bagpipes and handbags, it is a road I know well. Through the window is Catalonia, the landscape at once comfortingly familiar and worryingly foreign.
The road flashing by prompts familiar images, snippets of scenery appearing like flashcards shown to me from above, there and gone within seconds.

We are on holiday, the flights made and baggage collected, the taxi given directions. Now comes the hour-long drive to Cadaques, the extracurricular pilgrimage of my life. Nearly every year we take this drive over the mountains to my holiday home in Cadaques. Travelling from either Barcelona or Girona, the road changes only slightly with each coming visit and thus the scenery is as familiar as the rolling hills and grey mountains of rural Aberdeenshire.

A recognizable grove of poplars appearing on our left makes me smile and yet my family do not notice them. Perhaps it is just I who know the stately trees, the same ones we have seen with every trip we make to Spain. I look through the grove as we speed past, their planted rows and lines so formal, resembling soldiers on parade much more than mere foliage.

The field of drooping sunflowers appear soon after, their heads sunk as if disgusted by the weather, their trunks mottled from pesticide use. Now dying in the heat they are abandoned, no farmers walking slowly among them or tractors riding over them, the wilted plants adding stillness to the land. The fields of cane are soon to follow yet I barely notice them for I am waiting for the Concrete building that is the lair of King Kong.

And there he is, the mountains looming behind his fibreglass bulk, his face set in a primeval glair. How strange really, that here in rural Spain lies a factory making fairground attractions, its grassy yard home to brightly painted dragons and guerrillas, each a slide or roller coaster carriage. King Kong of the Amusement Parks gives me a final look of fury and then we are gone, past the mini golf and into the hills towards Cadaques.

The Royal Mile, Edinburgh, Scotland

Freeze the scene at the march, just for one second allow surrealism to triumph. Police horses and riders paused, anarchist chants silenced, complete stillness as feet wait before falling to the cobblestones. Now that silence wafts though the hordes of protesters there are no distractions to keep me from talking about topics that I was at first tempted to ignore.

I admit that I was socially compelled to march, eager to show my compassion and attempt to woo members of the opposite sex with my stories. As I travelled on the train however, I thought of places I had already been, people I had already met and causes I would support by being there and I began to feel somewhat selfish for my previous motivations, although not enough to stop them I am ashamed to say. My consolation is that when I did talk about my travels and the people I had met, I did not dumb down their struggle, did not hide the more uncomfortable facts. As my mentor Steve Nelson once said “Feel Guilty”.


Children hobbling from lack of a leg, orphans dragging water from a well so I could have a drink, families that opened their doors in kindness, these people live in material “poverty”. They have harboured, befriended, relied and doted on me, people who will never know I was marching in part for them for them, for a world in which life could become slightly easier for them and slightly harder for me.

The G8 March, Edinburugh Scotland

Imagine the noise, the mess, the pure feeling of excitement created by tens of thousands of people, marching together like one massive white being around Scotland’s Capital. As they march past look at the buildings lining a route of steel barricades and traffic cones.

Romanesque architecture built with Scottish Stone, modern shops with boarded up windows to deal with rioters and yet still operational. Above Jenners apartment store and its lovely façade hovers a solitary helicopter, its camera capturing the scene bellow.

Looking closer and you are a policewoman; hand on truncheon and face emotionless. You stand to the side of Princes street, protected by a cast iron fence and Kevlar vest. From your station at the fence watch the people slide past, their faces contrasting with their white tee-shirts so they look like leaves afloat on a moving river. Look from her eyes, this police woman on the seashore and see the people walk past in a mass of difference; a red shirted socialist clutching vicious propaganda, Muslim women in traditional garb, whistle blowing hippies and society girls marching side by side.

One of those marching is Sondra, the pretty university student and sister to Alan, marching with her handbag and skirt as me and her brother carry various protest signs over our shoulders, swapping frequently:
“Make Poverty History”
“Trade Justice”
“More and Better Aid”
“Drop the Debt”
“Islamic Relief”
“Bush: Number one dictator”


. From the castle on its mound, if you looked carefully, you could see a light ribbon of white tee shirts, completely encircling the city centre. At the meadows where thousands sit, stand and sleep, one announcement booms out above all others “the goal is complete”, the message sent to the eight leaders of the worlds richest countries that “enough is enough”

Edinburgh, Scotland

“Where poverty persists there is no true freedom” Nelson Mandela

“He’s been beaten badly by at least ten policemen…. disgusting comments…do you want to make poverty history?” Alan Sheriff

The night is not yet dark as we stand in the street, two ex-schoolboys interviewing a horde of florescent-jacketed policemen, businesslike even as they restrain a raging drunk in full view of the public. We appear self-sure and professional and one could never tell that we were teenagers taking a five-minute breather from clubbing. The camera pans as Alan conducts the first interview, the constables confused by our photographic interest in their job.

Alan’s commentary, juxposed by moving sirens and muffled curses gives our own twisted insight into that night. He is the star of our two-man news show, our equipment nothing more than a camera phone and two nice shirts, our mission to report on the G8 march in Edinburgh.

Before that, before we sat eating oranges with Sondra and watched one hundred thousand people march by, and before that I was travelling. Sitting on the train, backpack straps dangling above like synthetic creepers I thought of girls, parties and protesting.

Harry calls me on the train, the ring tone irritating and electronic as I dig it out of my pocket and listen to his far away voice,
‘Hey Tom, look I’m sorry but I’ve left town and am heading home.” I groan, deprived of not only company but also a bed “Give this number a ring and speak to Alan, he can give you a place to stay”

Before that I was hunched in front of my computer reading the following:

“On Saturday 2 July, as leaders of the worlds richest countries gather in Scotland for the G8 summit, tens of thousands of campaigners will rally in Edinburgh city centre to send this message to the G8 leaders:
Enough is enough. We want trade justice, Debt cancellation, and more and better aid for the world’s poorest countries.
Be there. Make your voice heard.
MAKE HISTORY in 2005
MAKE POVERTY HISTORY”

Twelve hours after that I am in Edinburgh, beer in hand and sitting on a sofa overlooking the police blockade surrounding Scottish Parliament, chatting to Harry’s friend Alan. Tomorrow is the march and at this late stage my plan is thus: Wake up sometime before ten, put on a white tee-shirt (required) and join more than a hundred thousand people on the streets.

Drumtochty Highland Games, Aberdeenshire, Scotland

Standing in the field, the grass soft under my bare feet, I get ready to run. I see my family; sitting on the fresh hay bales laid around the arena, my sister absent as she tightens the skin of her tenor drum somewhere behind the shows colourful facade.

Here at the Drumtochty Highland games in northern Scotland, everything is how it should be. The smell of wet grass overrides that of cooking meat, and the solitary bagpiper pacing the competition line drowns out the groans from the tug of war teams competing in the field.

Toss the caber, high jump, long jump, 400 metres, 800 metres, shot put. Walking through the scramble of events, the starters guns pointed to the sky and the kilt-clad judges like moth-ridden vultures, I feel very glad to be Scottish. To be part of this event that could be taking place a hundred years ago, that is special to me.


Suddenly, as I wait for my moment, the crowd’s attention is drawn, suddenly and hypnotically, to a brightly bannered entrance carved in-between the dark yellow bales.

It is not a band that emerges into the field, but a fearsome gang of kilted figures, their blood red cockades rising far above the crowd. Together dozens of pipes sing out at once, their melody haunting and ancient, the hairs on my mothers neck standing straight out. Leading the procession are the pipe majors, their batons and uniforms gilt and gaudy, epaulets and outrageous facial hair in full display. Moving smartly behind come the pipers and drummers, the latter beating staccato rhythms in time with their own marching feet.

Dotted through the procession are smaller figures in blue kilt jackets, the tops of their heads in line with the other players shoulders. My sister flits to and from my sight, occasionally lost behind massive swaths of tartan and serious pipers, concentrating as without her glasses she struggles to navigate the arena. It is something to be proud of, these twelve year olds, scowls of concentration, marching on parade, fearsome just by the sounds they create.

Bourtie House, Scotland

On a rainy Sunday afternoon in New England, sitting before a crowd of those I value as much as anyone, I watched Shackleton close. The school, which had helped me so much over the past years, could do so no longer due to a total lack of funds. I sat at the front; my face tilted upward, more the product of a starched collar than any internal discipline or “stiff upper lip” mentality.

Since then, from catching the plain to London to taking the train through Eastern Europe, I have been thinking of writing in homage to Shackleton. Yesterday I spent several hours by the computer, fingers prodding the keys half-heartedly. How could I sum up the school, the friendships forged, lost and strengthened, those days spent perched at the top of Blood Hill and desert gullies, all in a page?

The following list of “I had nevers” illustrates just some of my experiences from Shackleton. Together they are a tribute to time spent learning in four countries, over thirty American states, numerous ecosystems and several cities.

I had never climbed part of the Appalachian Trail. I remember as I scrambled to the top of a mountain and looked down upon all I had done that day, letting the sun fall down on upon my face and knowing that I had achieved something. Two weeks into the school year and one week into wilderness orientation, lying back against the rocks with my hat over my eyes I felt better than I had in years, my body was fit and my mind calmer.

I had never worked at a ski resort. Leaning head on into the door, staggering through and flopping down upon a chair, I understood what work was like. I slipped off my gloves and, slamming my hands against the counter, was almost able to defrost my fingers. The seconds passed, someone fell over and again I was up, lunch forgotten as I ran to the lift ramp, slamming my hand against the metal STOP button.

I had never taught Mexican immigrants their rights once in the U.S. I remember standing on rust and rubbish, a stack of business cards in my pocket and a few words of Spanish somewhere in the back of my head. Before me stood people, Smugglers and their human cargo, the former confident in leather jackets and oversized belt buckles, the latter worried and scared, holding bottled water and children as we stepped forward with our cards.

Now, that stage of my life is over but the sense of adventure and exploration is not. As I grab my pen and note pad, sling a backpack strap over my shoulder and head out the door I know that whatever mistakes I make, I am still very much the Student at Large of my blog.

Bratislava, Slovakia

Strobes blink convulsively and the people dance and are lost, swept away for a second under the blanket of noise, alcohol and constant flickering light. Behind the strobes darkness has triumphed, disorientating and shrinking, my horizon turned to a single room, the hold of a dingy houseboat.

Click, Flash, Pause

The photos we took that day tell more than I ever could, the digital time-pauses convey the details replaced in my memory by a cocktail of adrenalin, bravado and testosterone. Flicking through them, looking closely at each one I can attach the textures, voices and sounds that make these pictures mean something more, remind me of time I did something new and different.

Click

Tristan has sleep in his eye, our grins are lopsided and psychotic and our fleeces seem smeared by a thin sheen of filth. A clock would be paused at 5:30 AM, the few people about taking care to avoid us. Backpackers, packs and bags on the ground by our feet, boots scuffed to the point of mutilation, my “slouch” pulled down above my Cheshire- cat grin.
Tourists, his camera dangling and a guide book in the crook of his arm, my photo camera making my jean pocket bulge.
Friends for a day, we are filled with cockiness at having travelled to Slovakia with no plan in mind and no reason for going. We stand there in the relative warmth of the central bank, and as they wont except zlotys we pose with promotional cardboard
cut-outs and run when security approaches.

Click

A group photo, seven of us standing upon cobbled streets, half looking at the camera and smiling. 2:30 AM one day and several adventures later. The wind is biting and cold, our grins slightly forced, our fleeced arms holding each other tightly together. The facial expressions are those of people thrust from the warm womb of a club into the streets biting air, of people impatient with the fumbling of the camerawoman as she stairs in blank amazement at the bleeping displays and complicated buttons before her.
It doesn’t matter who they are, that half those in the picture are forgotten, their names gone for me, their roles simple footnotes in the book of my trip. For that moment, resting against me, we are all there is, all we need, these five tourists and our two unlucky female locals, seemingly amused by our comradely.
In this background the flash lights a stucco wall, the plaster hiding the viewer, shielding you from the rest of Bratislava, the high tower and murky Danube, lights on the water and trams in the street.

Click

The club, the strobe frozen between flashes and the music between beats. Anna, pupils dilated by the change in light, her hair tied back and lips parted slightly. Nails are painted, her hand carefully holding a drink, the lights reflecting off the glass and ruining the shot. Her teeth are white and her eyes dark brown, her gaze fixed straight ahead, the expression slightly mocking behind the liberal application of makeup and lipstick.

Click

5:30 again, the picture shows a paint-flecked door, the side of a scuffed train that has known thousands like me. By the door I wait, my bag wedged beneath stained jeans, the halogen lights my enemy as my eyes refuse to flutter and close. My hand holds the camera and a ticket, the thin paper yet to be stamped or inspected. Nearly out of focus is the time board, thick black letters smudged by distance, the words Wien (Vienna), 5:45 quite invisible from this far away.

Auschwitz, Poland

Through the centre of the camp is a railway, the very one from which they came, staggering not only with their belongings, but also with the fear of those who have lost everything.

Auschwitz is barren; the sky downcast and grey to the point of black, a lone deer walking stately though forests of crumbling brick and rotting wood, and in the distance wind blows Emily’s hair lightly against her cheek.


Imagine, the smell of sweat, the tears of defeat and the cries of anguish, echoing though a crowd of thousands. Through this I walk, the ghosts almost brushing against my coat, crossing the railway to the steady Click of a camera shutter behind me.

My friend is beside me, the American marine who has swapped gun for a camera and stands, near emotionless by a pond containing the ashes of thousands. Click, he brings the camera to his eye and freezes the image but not the feeling, the moment of utter hopelessness, staring ahead, unsure of what to do, feeling awful.

As I turn, looking down an avenue of ruins, past the bombed out gas chambers and the communal latrines I catch sight of her, Emily. Angel in the darkness, some life in this place of death, an Australian student, looking at me with tears in her eyes. She stands on one side of the wire, me on the other and I can see her hair fluttering lightly in the breeze, her face drawn from the effort of being here, seeing all that has been lost and that never can be found.

Later, walking hand in hand through the gate, the words “work will set you free” passing above our heads I think that maybe, just maybe some good has come out of this place.

In the square that night, in a tower far above our restaurant a trumpet player suddenly stops half way through his tune, the age-old ceremony to remember the wars Krakow has lost and recovered from. Emily sits opposite me, the candle lighting up her face as she tries to explain, to salvage something between us after my failed attempt to kiss her. We manage, sitting and eating, the thoughts of the death camps still echoing though our heads, as I pay the waiter and walk her home.

That night, fuelled with the memory of my failure and that of the world to stop a holocaust, I go out. We walk in a cluster, our whoops and yells carrying through deserted streets, the locals wise enough to leave room for this group of wild Britons. Like barbarians of old we barricade one club after another, the security chasing us back as we run off laughing, not some load of football hooligans but most of us students, transformed into these dervishes by alcohol and adrenalin. Memories now, a grinning Roland mooning the security office, the Polish-speaking blonde trying to get into a club with my library card as I.D. The beers clanking together, wild laughs and finally silence as I collapse into bed and wait for morning, glad not to be sleeping on a train.

Prague, Czech Republic

The building is painted a faded yellow, the colour custard powder turns after years in a dusty cupboard. On its worn façade, dark brooding Germanic script tries to convey something vital, its meaning lost however by my lack of Czech.

Crossing the empty street with its thin sliver of tarnished tramlines I wonder what I am doing here. Through the door and sitting down, flicking though a menu written in Czech, the feeling stays with me. After all, what do I know about Eastern Europe, its individual countries and the myriad of intricate customs attached to each one? As I get the waiters attention and nod my head vigorously in the direction of pig drawn upon the menu I know the answer: Nothing.

Why Prague, a city I knew only from picture postcards and others hazy recollections of drunken ramblings. I came here with Alex, his wife and “Jelly”, travelling through rolling plains and past sluggish windmills, retreating from the regal expenses of Vienna. The car chugged along and urban sprawl was replaced by grape orchards, Austria for the Czech republic and I started to become slightly homesick.

Prague youth hostel, a dank door sunk into a mouldering edifice of a once proud building. Alex carries my bag while Mike smokes outside and avoids this traveller’s tomb. Once inside and with Alex gone pottering down the street, old skills start to emerge and my brain begins to work double time.

Ten minutes later. I walk briskly, swerving around gothic towers and small billboards, chatting with my new friends, two sisters from Australia and an American medical student. In the hostel I had introduced myself and quickly persuaded them to let me “tag along” to better digs as we head through Prague, taking the escalators downwards into the gloom of a communist era subway. As we decent into the concrete depths they debate constantly, the student trying in vain to convince me that sliding downwards will give him the orthodontic experience he craves and is thus a necessary endeavour.

Inside the next hostel and again its almost a reflex, passport out and open to the photo page, money in hand, take the room key, test the bed and drop the backpack. This is my life, this series of actions and reactions, pure spontaneity as I sit down and look at my map. My “map” is one of the whole of Europe and shows large cities and rivers and yet it is the best I have. After dinner I meet another American and a Russian crayfish scientist and with ice cream to share we stand on a bridge and look down upon the Danube, content just to be silent and think.

Vienna, Austria

Eleven a clock at night, somewhere along the Danube, and I am standing perfectly still. Beside me the rough-hewn steps of the Canal lock are slowly rising, the water retreating from the grimy concrete. As the last step disappears so do my chances of escape and my mood is downcast as I head below decks.

I am a teenage prisoner in a middle-aged jail, this boat with its greasy buffet, 60s disco and dodgy crew. Around me are my fathers high school friends, partying it up on the end night of their reunion, most in various stages of decay. I manage to snaffle the Champaign to help ease my suffering but am unable to prise the boat doors open and escape. Finally I can doge fate no longer and end up doing the twist with my mother, waiting for the moment where the boat slides against the quay and I am running up the gangplank to safety.

Later, sitting in a bar surrounded by frightening sixteen-year-old girls I have time to think about tomorrow. As this is the last night of a three-day reunion my parents will be leaving Vienna, heading to Spain and leaving me stranded in Austria. This leaves me in a situation, the regal city of Vienna being extremely expensive. The plan is simple and one designed by Dad and myself: Go to Eastern Europe come back by Friday.

Before I can plan anything detailed my night spins out of control. Though a series of strange events I find myself in a strip club where Viennese hen partiers try and steal my underwear tags. From there I end up in a house, sipping plum vodka with some Latvians while a bearded Italian backpacker dances around in his underwear. Escaping from the suburbs I am waylaid by spiteful Croatian bus drivers and collapse in my bed (designed for Vietnamese boat people it would seem from its diminutive size) at four with no plan for the morning.

Shackleton School, Ashby, Massachusetts, U.S.A

I have a paper to write and it is raining, dark gashes of water superimposed upon the windowpane above my head. Apart from this window, with its Germanic view of brown treetops and grey skies my view is restricted by wooden partitions, my horizons shrunk to a half eaten apple core, my computer and assortments of various rubbish

“I have a paper to write” Sitting here, longing to be a Mozart of writing, I resemble more of the mad scientist, bent as I am into my workstation, hair askew with rock music blasting around me. People stream past and deep in thought I hardly notice them, fingers forming a staccato beat upon the keyboard. I want to write, to capture and release, transport the reader with every word, transform my page into an ocean, a council flat, a jungle. Instead I am forced to write, to talk about serious matters,

I Wake up; slide from the bunk and onto a floor littered with refuge, realizing all the time that I have a paper to write. Get some trousers and a tee shirt, don’t even bother to slide shoes on properly, as lurching forward I burst out of the door and into the rain. “I have a paper to write” a dull mantra repeating inside my head, following the beat of my jaw, as chewing away on a slice of buttered toast I try desperately to work out the way my individual limbs should be working this early in the morning.

I have a paper to write and yet I am not grabbed, no not want to be, by figures and facts, the staples of a good research paper. How can I even try to express love, anxiety, fear of boarding school and the romance of a Khmer temple in such a paper. Can I? Could I at once shed light on mental issues in Iraq and still present it like a story.

I can try to use words that enchant, that tell the facts without embellishment but still make it feel like you are there, standing in a hospital ward, rubbing off sweat with one hand and calming patients with the other. And in the end is that not what my blog is, real life told as if in a story, descriptions of things that matter, that I care about?

Shackleton School, Ashby, Massachusetts, U.S.A

I look out today and I see incredible beauty in a thousand forms, a land of serenity disturbed only at the horizon, where the gaunt shape of Boston looms beyond forest.
My hands on the rough wood of the balcony I can stare at an ocean of trees, waves of pastel, fiery crests where maple’s touch the hill tops and cascade down, into valleys distant and far. In these woods, these ancient temples of nature, can I feel safe, free of my fears if only for a short time.

It is my world, the one of the woods, for some a barbaric harshness, for me a place of rocky outcrops and wet leaves underfoot, of colors and textures so subtle only a deer could appreciate them fully, the rich tapestry of nature. There, as I walk over rotting logs above dappled streams, I transition, from boy to man, from burdened to free, from alone to a companied, if not by something I can see and understand then by nature itself.

There, in my eye’s I am no longer the Clown, clumsy and laughably innocent, as easy to corrupt and use as anyone. I am no longer the “Spy” or the “Rat”; choosing my morals over my friends, in their eye’s condemning people to awful lives though my actions.

Through thickets I can run, chasing animals as I vault this tree, a thin mist of dew drops cascading from above. Primeval it is, this world of magic in the deserted tree houses clinging to rough bark, their steps worn down and rotten thought years of neglect. There is nature, stamped into the ground by the hoof of a deer, the wood chips from a beaver desecrated tree.

There can my issues dissipate, disappear with the breeze along with the constant leaves, upwards and away. I can grow, relax my arms, perhaps even let out a scream and the odd tears, confident that no one is watching.

So follow me into my kingdom of anarchy, the forests that I can enter but not control. Walk with me as we make our own paths, stepping over saplings to reach a brook, see what I see, hear what I hear, and maybe then, maybe then will you see me.

Interviewing a farm manager

New England U.S.A

It takes some effort for me to sit down, lean back and start to write again.
I had consigned myself to the fact that, with my travels over, there was nothing to describe, picture and tell to other people and thus no point in writing. So my writing withered out of me with sheer lack of use, when all I had to do was look around for things to look at, find people to learn from and start up my computer.

Think about my room

The floor lies covered in crumbs, fluff, several hats and a calling card to a Cambodian guesthouse, while the posters hang lopsided from cratered walls. A fake Hawaiian lei is strung from one bedpost while a collection of maps poke dejectedly from behind the broken chest of drawers. Quietly I heft my bags and turn out the light, leaving a dirty floor and an unmade bed as I close one door and open another.

Think about my friends

Ashley, yesterday rollerblading with a pink shawl and tinted Ray Charles-esque glasses, looking like some chain-smoking French artist called Fabian or Dominique. From behind closed doors there is Chris, nursing another soda-induced bout of withdrawal. Moodily, he consoles himself with a computer game while Communist Corey sits in bed and jeers the world in general.

Think about leaving

Carry bags in one hand, laptop clenched in the other. Swing up on the ladder and climb, balancing on the roof rack and tying things down with bungee cords as from above clouds open that emit fierce bouts of snow/rain. Stalk around the bus; check the lights, the fuel, the brakes. Start the engine and remove the chocks.

Think about our bus

There is a sound, a grumble almost; the dragons roar emminating from beneath feet that are curled up, together with the rest of us, on rickety green seats. Those that sleep have slightly screwed up faces, caused I imagine by stuffing your body into a space as small as a newborn babies crib.

Past the sleeping bundles is a mass of shelf, boxes and coolers. Somewhere within this wooden tangle stooped figures bump to and fro against storage bins, knives in hand as they prepare piles of lettuce, meat and cheese. Someone grips a seat and swings themselves forward towards the front, shouts the word “Lunch” and retreats back to their lair.

Think about arrivals

Sometimes I get off the Shackleton bus and can’t help but act child-like; nearly jumping with excitement when the door slides open and I can look around our new environment, whatever and wherever that is.

Maybe a field, a thousand shades of possible green, maybe a lake, textured water, a sunset-clad afternoon fresh with the noise of birds. There could be a dirt-stain of a backpack slung over one shoulder, a laptop grasped under an arm. This is one of those times, as rumbling slowly, the bus circles a grassy knoll and I see a small whitewashed cottage ahead.



Think about changes

Bags in hand, running for the “best” bed, opinions differing with each Goldilocks like session of experimentation.

Swap a block for a house, dirty for clean, lonely for company.
Swap a dorm for a room, the difference in personality and warmth, a room a sacred thing, the dorm a necessity.
Swap cooks, from a professional conisure of asparagus and hollandaise sauce, curries and hams, salads in a dozen varieties to a student with a bowl of pasta at their disposal.
Swap A school of 35 for a crew of 9, a community for a microcosm of the later.

Think about class

A farmyard, muddy with car use and cow dung, hurried looking workers shuffle, forming a small stream of humanity which flows into a sea of bovines, cows, dozens lined like some farce of an army against the steel fences which hold them. “My sword is my pencil, my shield my notebook”, taking notes here, scribbling rants there, trying to focus on the speaker. “Be a sponge” absorb information in preparation for P.O.L’s, the time for squeezing that information out and soaking others with knowledge.

Think about an educator

Ask Nikki and Nelia, find out information from smudged reference books and photocopied sheets of paper, listen. Hear what a cow farmer is saying, don’t take things at face value and write notes. Take advantage of experts in the field; literally so at this point, find someone and speak to them with the purpose of adding to what you already know.

Think about asking questions

“How many people do you employ?” “What’s your definition of sustainable agriculture?” “What is A.I?” “How long have you been farming?” Scrawl down illegible notes, keep eye contact, try to appear like you know things when the replies come “Twenty five” “a system of growing plants that will last for our children”, “artificial insemination” “eight years”.

Think about endings

At the end there is the bus, engine humming gently in the chill air. Through a corridor of hands waiting to be shook, giving out tee shirts as I walk. Swing, up through the doors as the bus rolls forward and picks up speed. From somewhere inside there is music, the tinny kind from laptop speakers, the bus dwindles and is gone.


Getting close and personal with automatic milking


Dinner with the crew


Circle of chow


An automatic head scratcher for cows


Donated accomidation and bath, Vermont


Endings

Cloud Forest, Costa Rica

Sweating in the darkness, wandering the rain forest at six in the morning, the crew halt. Above us though the trees, faint rays of sunlight are slowly appearing. Lindsey pulls out binoculars and focuses on far away trees—our teacher lost to the wilderness for a while. Behind me, Chris is asleep on his feet, swaying slightly as we glance around.

There is a second of peace among the trees as the group spreads out with our notebooks drawn. Then, as soon as it began, a howl reverberates through the creepers. The ghostly sound forces Chris’s eyes open as binoculars swing around in search of the culprit.

Through the bush we see movement and a lone howler monkey appears and vanishes among leaves far above. These creatures, with the loudest cry of any animal on earth, are soon serenading us en mass, putting off my attempts to take notes. As Cory creeps past, camera out and ready, I jot down as much as possible.

The howler monkey is small black and racoon sized. They inhabit the upper reaches of trees in Costa Rica and other rain-forested states along the equator. They live in tribes where the younger male is made dominant by killing all the other young. To attract mates, the males have developed their roar, which now brings me back to the jungle and the end of this entry.

San Jose, Costa Rica

Today dawned as if with reluctance, the clouds opening only slightly to let the sunshine out. I climbed from my mattress, and, by moving several tons of clothes I was able to dig up those garments worth wearing. In the hallway of what must have once been a grand colonial residence I stepped loudly past sleeping bodies and to the kitchen. Corry stood with tousled hair and slowly spooned pancake mix onto a saucepan, with a very Dickensian air.

After eating and chatting up some American backpackers, I threw random objects into my bag and departed the hostel with my crew in tow. We trod to the nearest park in a tight bunch, Damian habitually grabbing at me as I veered over the pavement into oncoming traffic.

After half an hour of bus journeys we arrived in a neighborhood far removed from the grubby urbanism of downtown San Jose. The houses here were still barred but there were more trees and I felt at peace as I wondered down the leafy streets. To my left looms a bright yellow house with sloping tile roofs and an air of tranquility around it. Through the gate an elderly gardener smiles and continues to prune. The building we are ushered into is that of a small Spanish school which we are visiting for a lecture.

For two hours of learning we explored the roots of Costa Rican politics and history. Afterwards, with heads filled with conquests and coups, dictators and liberators we climbed back on our bus and headed into the smog. Looking though the window at the dusty streets I thought about the Ticas and all they have achieved. As men wearing football shirts clambered over my legs I was amazed with this country I had found myself in. A place where traditionally the ruling class worked the fields alongside peasants. A country which was given independence without wanting it, and that only found out they were free from Spanish rule several months after the agreement was signed.

Several days ago I would not have said this but truly I am happy to be here, free from the chains of Western culture.

Tranquilo Backpacker Hostel, San Jose, Costa Rica

French, German, Dutch, Swedish, Hebrew, Hungarian, Spanish and English, the accents and voices are my own exotic soundtrack. I loll in a hammock, coke in one hand, notes in the other and try to study for class. Playing dice at night, my educator Steve with his new beard and French Legion boots welcomes others to our group of merry gamblers. Soon he succeeds in getting a myriad of characters involved, most probably escaped from the pages of the Quiet American. There is:

The stocky, topless and extremely loud French man with his blonde lover on one arm and various beers, cigarettes and dice clenched in the free hand.

The lost Australian with dark tousled hair who moves from group to group with an air of intense bemusement.

A large bunch of French Canadians with exotic names and strange hairstyles. Their chief preoccupation seems to be that of tittering behind my back in unintelligible French.

The Hungarian thirty year old with his ravishing girl friend who is my age and apparently his lover and avid backgammon opponent.

Among all these I feel safe and secure for those that follow my BLOG will know that the intrigue passion and laughter (imagined or not) of a youth hostel appeal to my inner romantic and are the reasons I feel at home where others are so uncomfortable.

San José State Museum, San José, Costa Rica

Through dusty stone artifacts of exotic creatures I go on my quest. I walk forward, ready to bolt, and then I am through the door and inside, the inner sanctums of the San Jose state museum open to me. The academics and researchers I suddenly encounter there seem very surprised by my sudden presence in their office.

Looking back I can imagine that it must be quite uncommon for the workers in the department of archeology and restoration to get many tourists demanding instant tours (especially with the head of the department)

Likewise the members of the Organization for Public and Private Unions seemed surprised as we turned up unannounced at their door requesting an audience. We had found out about this organization from a taxi driver when Steve was asking his opinion on free trade agreements and he promptly took us to meet the experts.

It says a lot for Costa Rica that in both cases we gained what we wanted and that I now feel personally enlightened. The people we encountered were so passionate about their different fields that one felt bombarded by facts and enthusiasm to the point where I would exit the meetings struck dumb with what I had learned.

Now as I woefully tramp the corridors of my hostel I feel an urge to teach what I have learned. I am compelled to sit down and start conversatings with “Did you know…?” and lecture for hours. It is only with great effort that I do not tell of the mysterious stone balls on the Costa Rican hills, of CAFTA, which will destroy the superior government systems here, of shamanic rituals and Spanish conquest. And really when you get down to it, of Costa Rica its self.