mardi 12 juin 2012
Translation will resume
Dear readers of this blog, I will be going back to the translation of my migration Journey, possibly writing a four-hand parallel narration with Anita Sethi, who travelled overland from London to Sydney, through the Middle East and India.
For the moment, if you wish to read more, please go to the French version of this blog, following the link in the right column.
jeudi 1 octobre 2009
mercredi 30 septembre 2009
China, March 3, 2008
In the end we’re taking the Trans-Siberian, then the Trans-Manchurian, to Harbin. Harbin, Little Moscow, the Paris of the East, European city. Like the districts of Qingdao, Tianjin or Shanghai, pieces of China given to the West to develop their industries; but, in the case of Harbin, a city important to Russia because the train to Vladivostok passed through by.
Thus the journey has taken a new turn: we will avoid the Arab countries of Central Asia, all the pseudo-Turk ex-Soviet “-stans” with their blue-and-gold mosques, their mutton soups, and the roof of the world and city furthest from the sea, Urumqi. We’re avoiding them just as I didn’t learn Arabic before leaving for Australia, but Chinese. Just as we avoided the alternative route, through the Balkans, Turkey, then Iraq, Iran, Pakistan, India and Burma, by which we could have reached Bangkok. It’s slightly shorter, but more dangerous, and probably blocked. Less efficient. And yet, the Silk Road, via Almaty then Urumqi, rather more direct as the crow flies, we shall avoid for political reasons, because the trains from Almaty to Xinjiang are sometimes interrupted without warning, and we don’t want to find ourselves spending three weeks on the steppes – at the foot of the Himalayas, unable to cross the border, at least not without spending a fortune. It’s too much for a migration. So Harbin.
We will avoid, at the same time, the Mongolian route, via Ulan Bator. Leaving the city to camp in a yurt? No. We shall take the train of the Sino-Russian alliance, the pre-Soviet train, the train of the Japan War, the train that directly connects Europe with Asia via that borderless country, Russia. It’s also the communist train, that will make us consider, without passing through a Muslim zone, the developments of communism; we will re-encounter Islam only in its Eastern expression, in Malaysia.
Thus the journey has taken a new turn: we will avoid the Arab countries of Central Asia, all the pseudo-Turk ex-Soviet “-stans” with their blue-and-gold mosques, their mutton soups, and the roof of the world and city furthest from the sea, Urumqi. We’re avoiding them just as I didn’t learn Arabic before leaving for Australia, but Chinese. Just as we avoided the alternative route, through the Balkans, Turkey, then Iraq, Iran, Pakistan, India and Burma, by which we could have reached Bangkok. It’s slightly shorter, but more dangerous, and probably blocked. Less efficient. And yet, the Silk Road, via Almaty then Urumqi, rather more direct as the crow flies, we shall avoid for political reasons, because the trains from Almaty to Xinjiang are sometimes interrupted without warning, and we don’t want to find ourselves spending three weeks on the steppes – at the foot of the Himalayas, unable to cross the border, at least not without spending a fortune. It’s too much for a migration. So Harbin.
We will avoid, at the same time, the Mongolian route, via Ulan Bator. Leaving the city to camp in a yurt? No. We shall take the train of the Sino-Russian alliance, the pre-Soviet train, the train of the Japan War, the train that directly connects Europe with Asia via that borderless country, Russia. It’s also the communist train, that will make us consider, without passing through a Muslim zone, the developments of communism; we will re-encounter Islam only in its Eastern expression, in Malaysia.
vendredi 25 septembre 2009
Poland, March 3, 2008
Poland is the only popular democracy that I will pass through, leaving to the south the Czech Republic, Hungary, Yugoslavia, Romania, Bulgaria. Satellite nations of the Soviet Empire, whose populations are moving west, now that they’ve joined the Union. My first popular democracy, then, but also the last country of the European Union, which I’ll leave behind when I cross the Belarusian border – the start of visas.
jeudi 24 septembre 2009
Germany, March 3, 2008
Twice I shall cross the border between West and East, the iron curtain. But after passing through the Brandenburg gate in Berlin, it’s in Thailand only that I will leave the ex-communist world behind me.
mercredi 23 septembre 2009
China, March 1, 2008
Beijing is the marketplace of the Silk Roads. Beijing is the Mongol capital, built recently, several kilometres from the wall. It’s a frontier city of the Middle Kingdom, whose centre is near Wu Han, on the banks of the Yangzi, in the province of Hubei.
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