It broke my heart to say goodbye to Mika and Khensani. Mika wanted to know why we hadn’t stayed with them for the full 10 days. And I don’t think I will ever meet another seven-year-old who is as special as Khensani. On the flight we were seated near a Gujarati family who proceeded to “capture” all the nearby empty window seats and then yell across the aisles to each other. We flew back to Mumbai with frequent cries of “Meena, ay Meena” echoing from the seat in front of us. (more…)  Read More →

Lion. Leopard. Elephant. Buffalo. Rhinoceros. The Big Five that top every African tourist’s been there, seen that list. After yesterday’s health scare, I’m feeling slightly more charitable towards Willem. I don’t envy his job – he’s under constant pressure to seek out the biggies. And I think I just made it worse by telling him I’m a Lion person. (more…)  Read More →

I don’t know what we were expecting but it certainly wasn’t an Afrikaner with a Tom Selleck moustache, a blond ponytail and a tatoo high on his left thigh that doubled up as his visiting card: Master Tracker it read, like the pieces on a scrabble board, one word vertical, one horozontal with the “a” common to both and the face of a tiger thrown in for good measure. (more…)  Read More →

Remember 1976? India was in the midst of a long vacation from democracy – we were trapped in the Emergency – but for South Africa this year marked the first real landmark in the struggle against Apartheid. The uprising that started in Soweto in 1976 gathered momentum and spread all over the country for the next 10 years or so. We’re spending the day in Soweto, the township that was born more than 100 years ago when living in the city became out of bounds for black workers who powered the mines and other industries. It was the hub of segregation and it... (more...)

It’s been three days since we crossed the Atlantic. We’re pros now at three-hour nights: grab whatever little sleep you can on board, somehow stay awake the entire day after you land, and finally sink into a long, exhausted sleep. It was a nine-hour flight from Brazil to South Africa. The wife was particularly happy because she finally got an Asian vegetarian (no fish or eggs) meal, after being rebuffed in South America (”Sorry, we have discontinued vegetarian meals,” was the frosty response from a TACA, Trans American Airlines, flight attendant... (more...)

I paid 50 times as much as I normally do for the haircut. But, I also had my hair washed four times and had an attractive – if somewhat stressed – Brazilian woman fuss over it for an hour, holding it between her fingers and snipping it off strand by strand. Ah, the pleasures of a haircut in an alien land. Between the woman who washed my hair, the hairdresser herself and the fashionable owner who emerged to chat and help interpret what I wanted – nothing more than a standard army buzz cut – I had three women involved in my long overdue haircut.... (more...)

As we exit the land of the Incas and all those other Indians, I dredged up some photos from my camera. They were previously missed or all those shaky cybercafes in remote towns didn´t let me upload them. Here they are. Also, four posts have gone up today, so please take a look at the One-Way Ticket home page. Photo, above: I´ve rarely seen more carefree children than in Peru. Many, as young as three, walk around unsupervised, dwadling on their way home. This lot was older and were prancing along through a town square. Photo, above: A Hamara Bajaj moment. Somewhere on... (more...)

Considering this is the city where middle aged women zip around in Bajaj autorickshaws labelled The Tigers of San Miguel and curvy bikini-clad women on signboards exhort you to drink Brahma beer, it shouldn´t have surprised us that we bumped into Gandhi (see the man himself above) at Lima´s Chinatown, right? Oh well, it was one of those perfect holiday days. When we landed in Lima two weeks ago, our launch pad for a whirlwind tour of Peru, we thought it looked like East Delhi. Perhaps it was because it had been raining. This time round, with one day to go before... (more...)

Let me use what I hate to, an adjective. Incredible. That was the view at lunch today — facing the azure waters of the world´s highest inland sea. As I ate my freshly fried trout, I could see snow-clad peaks about 22,000 feet high (Everest is just under 30,000). I could see ferries coming and going over the cliffs, creating triangles of wake, looking from this height like those insects that skim water. Where we had huffed, the local men walked easily, knitting as they strolled over the rocky mountain paths. Yes, the men of Taquile island — the largest... (more...)

Take a look at the furry little fellow above with his good-luck garland. He’s a baby alpaca. I had him for lunch. Well, not him literally, but a bigger, tougher, less fortunate cousin, or brother, or whatever. I met this furball at a rest stop for lunch on another long, mountain road journey in the high Andes, this time on a bus service called — what else — the Inka Express, just under 400 km from Cusco to Puno, a grey city that is the base for Lake Titikaka, the highest navigable lake in the world. This is the start of something we’ve never... (more...)