Travels with My Hat has moved

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                        My blogs have been transferred to a brand new website: www.travelswithmyhat.com

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                                                             Christine Osborne

Preview: for publication in 2012

Travels with My Hat is the memoir of an Australian nurse who through skill and determination, switched careers to become an award-winning travel writer and photographer. It is a colourful record of her experiences defined by travel, undertaken on her own initiative, often without official help, and frequently against all odds. “We don’t know who you are,” she was told by the travel editor of the Daily Telegraph on arriving in London in 1974. “To get a name here, you need to write a book.” Which is exactly what she did. Publication of The Gulf States and Oman in 1977 brought a deluge of commissions on the Middle East. Books followed on Jordan and Pakistan. Christine was invited to visit Iraq by the Ba’athist regime of Saddam Hussein. Since visas were not issued to British journalists, she returned home and obtained clearance from the Iraqi Vice-Consul in – of all places –Bondi! Her journeys to Iraq, Ethiopia, Egypt, Yemen, Pakistan and Morocco are rounded off with letters to her mother who had never left Australia. We join Christine avoiding bandits in Yemen, diving in the Red Sea, and dining with Arab sheikhs in a racy account of forty years of travels when only one of a thousand and one problems, was being a young, western woman working in a man’s world. I have occasionally wished I were a boy, she writes in a chapter on Yemen. Not for the penis per se, but for the freedom it allows a man, since reality for a woman traveller is that her sex presents constraints…

Photos by Christine Osborne

www.copix.co.uk

http://travelswithmyhat.com

Experience, travel and

EDIBLE BUSH TOURS IN AUSTRALIA'S RED HOT CENTRE

Witchetty grubs were on the breakfast menu at Kings Canyon, a rugged gash in the George Gill ranges near Alice Springs, in central Australia. It was not my ideal way to start the day, but I managed to swallow one by pretending it was scrambled egg.

Jacinta, my aboriginal guide, next offered me a green plum (reputed to be the world's richest source of vitamin C) and as we continued our morning walk, she plucked other edibles in what appeared to be inhospitable bush. She found desert raisins and rock figs and pointed out the tracks in a dry creek bed made by a goanna, another aboriginal delicacy. Then suddenly she bent down and scrabbled in the sand.

‘Charlie Quink-Quink,’ she showed me a tiny termite in her hand. 'We put him on our breasts to make them bigger.' Was it ground into a paste like a quandong kernel, or crushed and painted on like milkwood, I wanted to know? ‘He bites your nipple and makes it grow,’ she giggled.

The Northern Territory Conservation Commission grades Outback walks as easy (Emu), moderate (Sand Goanna) and tough (Rock Wallaby).

The walk up Kings Canyon, a height of nearly a thousand feet was all Rock Wallaby, I decided on the hot climb, but my efforts were rewarded on reaching the top to find a great view and an oasis of exotic plants, including pre-historic cycad palms. Two backpackers who had also made it to the canyon rim had stripped off and lay stark naked beside a rock pool.

Sneaking away, I missed the track and spent a frightening hour walking round in circles. It’s easy to become lost in the Outback. Rangers advise you carry a litre of water to drink for every hour you walk, and to leave a note on the car windscreen saying where you’ve gone.

It is three hour’s drive from Kings Canyon to Uluru, the huge monolith which sits on the horizon like a giant cow pat. Climbing it is an equal challenge, but its Anangu custodians would prefer you didn‘t. More than 600 millions years old, it is a sacred site and every nook and cranny has a significance in their Dreamtime.

I felt to climb the rock would be like wearing shoes inside a mosque. But another reason was the gusts of hot wind. As I stood at the base, a variety of headgear came whizzing down from tourists climbing above me: Terry-towelling hats and Akubras landed in the bushes. Even a white canvas hat embroidered Wimbledon 2010 floated down like a lob by Venus Williams.

Sightseeing alternatives to scaling Uluru include peddling slowly round it on a bicycle, flying across it by light aircraft, or drifting over it in a hot air balloon. There are also guided walks lead by softly spoken aboriginal guides who point out bush edibles such as those I sampled at Kings Canyon.

The best time to visit Central Australia is between April and September which corresponds with the local winter. $25 entrance fee to the Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park. Free access to Kings Canyon.

Images from www.copix.co.uk

FROM MUM IN THE GARDEN TO HER MAJESTY THE QUEEN

People often ask how I started out taking pictures. Well, it was with a Kodak Box Brownie at the age of eight when I took a photo of my mother and the family spaniel - captioned 'Mum and Betsy in the Garden.’

From this inauspicious start, I became keen on photography spending hours developing pictures in the blacked-out kitchen and while ultimately my most enthusiastic supporter, there were occasions when Mum grew cross.

‘You never clean up properly Chris,’ was a frequent comment.

My first picture of Djibouti - sold with a story to the Sydney Morning Herald in 1965 -started my career as a travel writer and photographer specialising in the Muslim world.

The Queen received a copy of my first book - The Gulf States and Oman as background reading on the royal visit to Arabia in 1979.

I was also the only woman photographer on the 3 week tour which was action packed - just as Concorde carrying Her Majesty approached Kuwait, my driver went off with my cameras in his car. Fortunately I retrieved them in time, but ever since I’ve never let them out of my sight, turning down many courteous offers to carry my heavy camera bag.

I’ve always specialised in developing countries - mostly in Africa, South Asia and the Arab Gulf where I hope my record of traditional life may have value for future generations.

Gauging your subject's sensitivity is essential to getting a good picture and to protect your equipment. A slight hand movement, or someone carefully putting down their load of melons often means a quick decision on whether to shoot. Or not.

Fortunately there have been few occasions on my travels when someone has become really angry. But occasionally it was touch and go.

Commissioned to photograph a tribal migration in Baluchistan, I stood my ground as the leader walked over waving his rifle. As he got near I grabbed his hand and shook it vigorously but when he uttered, it was not abuse: he wanted a cigarette (I gave him the packet).

One means of acquiring a subject is to give away small items to earn goodwill, or to distract attention. I always carry coins, sweets and balloons which I blow up for nuisance children. Recently I gave one to a youth in Zanzibar who taking it and looking me straight in the eye, asked in fluent English, was it a condom?

I`ve had many different cameras since the original Brownie. Several ‘old mates’ have bitten the dust - a pair of Pentaxes stolen from my hotel room in Palm Springs, another taken at knife point in The Gambia, a Canon smashed when I fell in Fujairah.

Although I endeavour to work unobtrusively, being tall and fair and feminine has not always helped. Frustrated with a crowd of curious men in Jacobabad in Pakistan, I devised the idea of drawing a line in the dust and telling them to stand behind it which they obediently did!

But one of the strangest encounters occurred on top of the National Museum in Sana’a.

I’d climbed up to take the view when a Yemeni holding a Polaroid asked could he take my picture and I noticed his hands were shaking so he couldn't hold it steady.

‘He is an escaped political prisoner and this is his only way of earning a little money. Would you pose for him?’ said my guide.

And as one who has taken thousands of pictures, I naturally agreed.

The Queen with Sheikh Isa in Bahrain, 1979.

Powindah migration through the Bolan Pass, 1981

A market in Tangiers, 1964

www.copix.co.uk

MY BIRTHDAY FROM HELL

A young travel journalist was recently whining on his blog of how lonely he expected to be on a three week trip to America. In response, I felt like saying you don’t take your best pal to work do you? So if travel writing is your chosen metier, please fasten your safety belt and stop complaining.

In fact there is a huge gulf between travel writing and travel journalism. The former sees you away - often for months at a time - in an alien society with no infrastructure other than your wits. The reverse is a quick press-trip with colleagues to Majorca, or wherever, when you’ve barely closed the door and you’re back again.

Real travel writing by its nature, is a solitary occupation as the authors of great narratives will confirm. Missing home and dining alone are inevitable downsides and while grateful for a capacity to be alone, I find that spending your birthday without a companion exacerbates the sense of social isolation.

In a lifetime of travel writing I`ve awakened on 17th October in Sydney, London, Paris, Rome, Amsterdam, Nairobi, Dublin, Tahiti, New York, Marrakesh, Muscat, Provincetown and Algiers. I`ve also seen out three birthdays in Pakistan: my 39th up the Khyber, my 40th in Islamabad and my 41st in Sukkur, an historic town on the river Indus in Sindh.

Knowing I’d be alone in Sukkur, I was determined not to let it get me down. I bought a big bag of sweets for local children that morning and normally skipping lunch, I opted to celebrate with a meal - albeit it in my room as it was Ramadan.

I’d ordered catfish masala, but since my air conditioning wasn’t working and the electric fan had stopped, I called reception to send up an electrician.

In a few moments a sharp knock heralded a short man in navy overalls holding a giant screw-driver. ‘Electric,’ he said and coming in, he switched the fan on, then off, spun the blades (its cage was missing) announced ‘fan heat,’ and picking it up out he marched out again.

A second knock had signalled a waiter with my lunch and taking the tray, I placed it carefully on the bed and pulled up a chair, but before I could take a mouthful, there was another rap on the door. No surprise that it was the electrician.

This time he kicked off his sandals and stepping over the tray, he stood on my pillow and placing a foot against the bed-head, he yanked the air conditioner off the wall, splitting its timber frame and showering my lunch with dust balls.

‘Check,’ he said and taking it into his arms, he had disappeared down the corridor.

Moments later he was back dragging the fan through the door which I had left ajar in anticipation.

‘Wire,’ he declared and kneeling down, he plunged his giant screw-driver into the wall socket.

‘Don't do that!’ I shouted, picturing an incinerated corpse.

‘Problem fix,’ he said and flicking a switch, the fan had started up like a turbo-jet, blowing my birthday curry all over the bedspread.

Images: www.copix.co.uk

My official press pass to visit Zambia in 1994.

Breakfast with Bedouin while researching my first book The Gulf States and Oman (1978).

With houseboat children on the Indus river in Sukkur on 17th October 1981.

17th OCTOBER IS INTERNATIONAL DAY FOR THE ERADICATION OF POVERTY

IBN BATTUTA: the greatest traveller ever

On a visit to Morocco last month I found the tomb of Ibn Battuta, the 14th century Berber Muslim whom many consider to have been the greatest traveller of all time.

Ibn Battuta was born in Tangier in 1304. Aged 21, he completed an arduous pilgrimage to Mecca from where he extended his travels to the Middle East, India, Central Asia and ultimately to China.

My own fascination comes from having visited many of these countries and exotic ports such as Mocha, Basra and other cities mentioned in his journals.

But while I`d been to Tangier on many occasions, I was unaware until this recent trip, that the traveller whom I most admire is buried there.

`Yes, his tomb is here,` said the woman in the tourist office - `Mais je ne suis pas sur -- ou.`

So I set off along the Boulevard Pasteur, crossing the Grand Socco to the Rue de la Kasbah where I began asking: `Pouvez-vous me diriger vers la tombeau de Ibn Battuta?`

`Up the hill and first right,` said a man standing in the doorway of a Tabac.

`Left, then straight on. Suivez-moi,` said a man carrying bunches of mint.

On we went, round this corner, down that alley, up many steps. Then he stopped. Unsure of what he was looking for. But there it was - in a shadowy corner of the medina, washing drying on a line above, a woman filling her jar at a fountain below - the tomb of Ibn Battuta.

I touched it, humbled by the experience: travel in far-off lands is trying enough today. What difficulties and dangers were faced some 700 hundred years ago?

My return to London coincided with the release of the film Journey to Mecca recounting Ibn Battuta`s pilgrimage around 1325-6 to the sacred shrines in Saudi Arabia.

Financed by the King Abdulaziz Public Library and King Faisal Center for Research and Islamic Studies, the short movie essentially illustrates the importance of the hajj to Muslims of whom two million make the annual pilgrimage. (the Qur`an requires that every Muslim of good health and means performs the hajj at least once in his lifetime).

Since Christians are forbidden to visit Mecca - highway signs advise to this effect - the film is a must see for anyone interested in the Muslim rites observed both here and at Medina.

The scene of white-robed pilgrims swirling around the ka`aba in the Prophet`s Mosque is an awesome piece of cinematography. So too are the shots of the 'great Damascus caravan of more than 10,000 pilgrims with 500 camels' embarking on the journey- filmed in stunning locations in southern Morocco.

But while Journey to Mecca is a colourful and emotionally engaging epic, to me it does not rise above a movie made in the Cecil B. de Mille mould.

Considering the amount of bureaucracy which would have been involved, it is likely a miracle the film was made at all, but I feel that Ibn Battuta deserves a far bigger tribute than simply as the subject of a PR exercise for Islam.

BFI Imax Cinema at London Waterloo.

Images: www.copix.co.uk

DELIGHTFUL DRINKS

My list of memorable drinks runs from coffee in a Bedouin tent to pineapple crush under Polynesian palms. While most were genuine thirst quenchers, others were significant for the occasion. Or the surroundings.

I recall a tangy limoonada (fresh lime-juice and 7 Up) in Persepolis after following my guide – an energetic man named Mr. V. Piroozi – up stairways lined with Achaemenian bas-reliefs, under soaring arches into vast audience rooms and along columned halls. Finally I had leant against a huge winged bull – one of the guardians of Persepolis – and declared I was parched.

Loosening his tie, Mr. V. Piroozi agreed it was time for a drink and muttering that it was fortunate it wasn’t Ramazan, he drove at speed to my hotel where I slumped in a chair and listened to ice tinkling in the glass. As the outside temperature passed 45c, Mr. V. Piroozi and I ordered a second, then a third limoonada. Until the hotel finally ran out of limes.

On another warm, if emotional occasion, I discovered horchata while waiting for a train in Spain. A refreshing drink based on almonds, it raised my spirits after my idol - a matador of some repute- announced plans to marry his childhood sweetheart. Devastated, I headed for the station, and to this day I still associate horchata with memories of the bullfight and the hiss of steam, as slowly, interminably or so it seemed at the time, we pulled out of Valencia.

A third memorable drink was on the lush Pacific island of Moorea. I was cycling around the island when my companion – a young Tahitian – had pulled off the road and shinned up a palm. Knocking off a coconut, he slid down again and chopped off the top with his machete and cupping in my hands, I let the sweet fluid flow over my face and into my mouth before diving into the blue lagoon to wash it off.

The interesting aspect about all these drinks is that none of them contained alcohol and leafing through my notes, I see that others are also alcohol-free.

Today even supermarkets stock tropical fruits so why not try mixing your own? All you need is a juice extractor or a blender, and with a little experimentation you can create wonderful beverages for warm summer days. Here is a starter to your own inventions:

ALMOND DRINK

1/2 kilo (1 pound) almonds

500grm (½ pound) sugar (or cup of cane syrup)

1 ½ litres water (warm)

Dash almond essence

Slice almonds and crush in a coffee grinder. Add to a food processor with other ingredients and work until smooth. Strain through a muslin cloth. Chill well and serve in glasses garnished with a cinnamon stick and a rose petal.

c.Christine Osborne

Image: www.copix.co.uk