Meeting Paul Theroux
Sometime in 2001, I discovered my mother’s copy of The Great Railway Bazaar. It was an old Penguin edition, hiding on her bookshelf outside my parents’ room. Many of the pages had...
Category: books
Notes on the Ubud Writers and Readers Festival 2013
This year I attended the Ubud Writers and Readers Festival, but since it happened in October and it’s already close to the end of the year, I’m sure I’m the last person...
Books: Video Night in Kathmandu
I bought my copy of ‘Video Night in Kathmandu’ some time back, maybe it was five years ago, I honestly can’t remember. This was after I’d given up looking for it, having spent months...
Books: The Great Railway Bazaar
I’ve written about books here and here, but I thought I should go back a little and have a look at those which first inspired me to travel. In short, books which told me to wake up,...
Chat-up lines in 15 languages
Yes, there really is a way for you to learn chat-up lines and other “raunchy phrases” in more than 15 languages: This is a really funny book which I bought for a good laugh. The book...
Books: Istanbul, Memories of A City
I found Orhan Pamuk’s ‘Istanbul: Memories of a City’ at a bookshop on my last day in Istanbul. This is a joke, I thought, as I turned the book over in my hands. A cruel joke. I’m...
Ditch that guidebook, grab something else!
Guidebooks like Lonely Planet, Frommer’s and The Rough Guide are usually the first books you grab when you start planning a trip. And why not? When they come complete with suggested itineraries and packing...
