Home is where....

Well, here's a to do.

42 years ago I first visited Malaysia, from the UK. That trip lasted 6 weeks.  I was in Sungei Petani, Kedah. I was so enthralled to be in Malaysia that I took copious slide photographs and gave a presentation the art school, on my return back home. I'm now back in Malaysia, in Puchong,  Selangor.

A lot has happened in 42 years. But what hasn't changed is my love for Malaysia. People come and go, not talking of Michelangelo, and this multi-cultural country continues to fascinate me.

One and a half years in Cambodia, two years in England, with a side trip to the Czech Republic, has taught me that it's not where you are born that matters, nor where you end up, but it's where your 'heart' is. Strangely, mine seems to be in this tropical land, full of wonders.

Homes from Home

The house that Martin Built in Perak, Malaysia

The last three years have been different, to say the very least. 

In 2019 I had made six (return) journeys, jetting around from Malaysia to Bangladesh, Cambodia, Ireland etc and back to Malaysia. During 2020 there was a single trip (Malaysia to Cambodia), in 2021 also there was only one trip (Cambodia to the UK) and so in 2022 the only flights I took were fro UK to the Czech Republic and return. Those were the Covid years.

In 2019, I would never have imagined that my days living in Malaysia would have been curtailed by a world devastating pandemic. I had lived in Chennai, India, for a short while, then there, in Malaysia, that South East Asian country previously known for its exports of tin and rubber, and which was rapidly becoming denuded of its ancient rainforest lands in favour of buildings and ‘oil palm’ plantations, for a little over fifteen years. And happily so.

My writing improved there, in that land dubbed (by some marketing company) as ‘Truly Asia’. I grew relationships there. My second book was published there. All in all I had settled into what I had considered to be, a life there, and never imagined not being able to live in Malaysia. I loved the mix of Malaysia food; and for those who know me know just how important good food is to me. I began my magazine there, built a house there, travelled in my ageing Asia Rocsta (4x4) around the ‘mining pool’ lakes watching otters and water buffalo, writing, always writing and being published in local and international newspapers and magazines. It was a good life, and then, it was gone.

In the March of 2020, I travelled to Cambodia for a little volunteer teaching. No sooner had I got there than the Covid 19 pandemic struck, cancelling flights and closing borders. For one year and four months I was waylaid in the country called Kampuchea by its inhabitants. Fortunately I was living in Siem Reap which is close to the ancient Khmer city of Angkor, known for its Wats (temples) and that Angelina Jolie film of the video game featuring the character Laura Croft.

I have to say that Cambodia treated we overstayers well, but then the Khmer government respects its relationship with foreigners and tourists too. There was never any hint that we were going to thrown out onto the mercy of world, which had happened in some other Asian countries. I hired a small apartment, and got on with the business of being separated from all I held dear in Malaysia.

Eating in Siem Reap was both easy and cheap. The local markets had supplied copious amounts of fresh food. Local eateries proffered cheap meals which were a blend of Thai and Vietnamese cuisines and there was, at the time, numerous ex-pat places to get everything from a taco to a dosa, not to mention ‘Eggs Benedict’ and burgers galore. In its own way Siem Reap was a haven. If you have to be stuck somewhere, that’s the place to be stuck.

It’s a truism that good things never last.

In its wisdom, the local council decided that as Siem Reap was not at that moment importing tourists, so it was a good time to dig up all the roads and pathways to attend to the mounting problems of water supply, drainage, sewerage  et al. Chaos ensued. Coping with the dust and virtually impassable roads, plus non-existent pathways, not to mention

 a pandemic, all became too much for this, perhaps not so adventurous, ageing traveller.

Just after the main international airport was re-opened in Phnom Penh, I exited to return to the one country I had never imagined returning to (after eighteen years) - my former home in the UK.

Something smoked fishy

Hello. I was going to say good morning only, upon looking at the time, I notice that it’s nine minutes past midday. So good afternoon. Another year, another blog.

I’ve just got back. From whence I observe you enquiring. From walking in the English Winter rain (a rain that I had formerly described in my very first published book - ‘Buffalo & Breadfruit’ [2012] still on sale at Amazon et al).

Let me explain. It was raining. I knew that it was raining, but I had promised myself to buy fish today. Yesterday I had slow-cooked (for 5 hours) a pot of vegetables (white cabbage, carrots and potatoes chiefly, with a little rosemary, smoked paprika, white pepper, a ham stock cube and some chipotle). I looked forward to tasting it for lunch. I did, it was bland, even with the addition of cheese. Dinner, instead of my usual repeat of lunch, was cheese-on-toast with yellow mustard.

This morning I balked at the very notion of being faced with the very same bland slow-cooked mélange of vegetables for lunch. However I was loath to chuck the remaining meal in the ‘food waste’ container (to be picked up on Thursday morning), so I went through permutations of helpful additions to bring the meal back up to edible status. To curtail a more lengthy ramble - I decided on smoked fish as my final choice. Not tinned, or fish with copious chemical additions but real, and preferably locally smoked, fish.

Having a further choice of an edible meal which incorporated a very wet and cold 2 and a half mile walk, eat the almost inedible or cook something else, my stubbornness clicked in. Well, at the very least, it would be an adventure. Well, not quite so much an adventure as a two and a half mile walk in the rain and cold wind (see Facebook reel) there and back again, but it was worth the effort.

Not wanting to go too much over budget, I rejected the very nice, yellow looking, smoked haddock, didn’t fancy the Lowestoft kipper and preferred the smoked mackerel. However a whole smoked mackerel was not cheap, and too large. In the end I bought a smoked mackerel fillet, smoked on this very island.

Of course I didn’t stop at buying mackerel. I also bought some very fresh cod spine (aka cod loin, as opposed to the triangular shaped fillet) for cooking tomorrow. I’ve not been able to get fresh fish since before Christmas (3 weeks) and I have really been looking forward to having fresh fish as opposed to meat (mostly chicken as it’s the cheapest now), or just veg.

And it was superb.

Journey to Bohemia

It had been over a year since I last travelled. The Covid 19 pandemic had affected many lives, mine included and, once ensconced back in Blighty I became loath to venture out from my old (16th Century) house and my brand new comfort zone.

That was until I was invited to become part of the entourage supporting the Indo-Czech Autumn Festival (the eighth of its kind to celebrate all things Indian in Zbraslav, Prague in the Czech Republic (formerly known as Czechoslovakia).

It was the beginning of autumn, and the days of the Indian goddess Durga. I was also asked to assist with the recording of the ‘Experience India’ Festival, in another area of Prague (Andel). Both Czech festivals were sanctioned by the Indian High Commission to the Czech Republic.

The  thought  of  new  experiences  and  new excitements teased me out of that comfort zone. I left my little island, climbed onto two buses (First and Eastern National), and one (Ryanair) airplane then into a Czech taxi in, which was by then, the middle of the night. Ultimately I was to discover what life, fate or karma had in store for me in the legendary Bohemia (the largest historical region of the Czech Republic).

At Prague’s Václav Havel airport I was met and greeted by two creative young Indian women (Papia Ghoshal, aka Papia Das Baul the Indian artist/poet/filmmaker/performer/singer whose family were part of the Indian Zamindari System, and Bangladeshi actress and filmmaker Shahneoyaj Cacoly). Both are involved with creating art, film and film-making (one concerns herself with documentaries and art films, the other more concerned with Bangladesh popular film-making).

There was wine and women (two), only the song was missing that night as we talked, drank and ate Papia Ghoshal’s amazing Bengali home cooked food until 2am Czech time. After a rest I was intrigued by the slowly brightening morning which had Bohemia screened with an autumnal cool Czech mist. The haziness slowly cleared as the sun arose to reveal rolling hills, and a recently renovated  church (Mnisek pod Brdy) peeking out from the variations of green. Below my window, and emulating the Czech Republic’s longest river (the Vltava), the main road meandered past Ms Ghoshal’s Baul Atelier/ Akhara and into the mysteries of Czech and Slovac lands. Originally those lands had been populated by the Celtic Boii tribe (giving the country its Latin name - Boiohaemum, otherwise knows as Bohemia).

I had visited Prague ‘the City of a Hundred Spires’, or Central is it is locally known, for a weekend some twenty years past. Outside of that city centre Prague and the Czech Republic had remained a mystery to me.

On one Prague website came the answer to something that had been puzzling me all day. I know that Spain’s Salvador Dali (some of whom’s works were then on show in Prague) was partial to Lark’s tongues as well as other more exotic foodstuffs, but here in Prague, on one restaurant menu window display was the dish ‘Moravian Sparrow’. I thought…“Surely not! Sparrows are so small but, there again it’s another country, with its own culture.” And, “hmm interesting.”

The  mentioned  website  (Beyond  Prague) explained that the dish mischievously called ‘Moravian Sparrow’ is in Czech ‘Moravský Vrabec’. Moravian Sparrow is a literal translation for a dish which contains no small avian, but rather consists of a pork cut which is rendered into smallish chunks (the sparrow), marinated, then roasted and served with dumplings and cabbage. I confess to being mildly disappointed by that explanation.

Now, please excuse me for a moment while I wax lyrical about the Czech Republic’s city of Prague. That enchanting city is not only known for Moravian Sparrows, but also for Franz Kafka (1883 – 1924) his ‘Metamorphosis’ (1915), ’The Trial’ (1925) and ‘The Castle’ (1926). Prague is also well known for the stunning posters (Art Nouveau creations) of Alphonse Maria Mucha (1860 - 1939). Okay, well, yes, the city also has the glorious mediaeval stone arch Charles Bridge spanning the Vltava river, which continues to be a marvel to look at but, there again, so is the city’s incredible Art Nouveau architecture. Prague was, last year (2021), voted by Time Out to be ‘The Most Beautiful City in the World’ (something to do with a fifteenth century Astrological Clocks apparently). But for me the Czech Republic will always be the place where ‘The Good Soldier Švejk’ (by Jaroslav Hašek) was published (in Czech) between1921 and 1923, and which I first read way back in my hippie days (1968).

As The Incredible String Band once sung - “Oh lord how happy I am…” (1966).

In Zbraslav I was able to, briefly, meet Josef Vejvoda the jazz drummer (and son of the famous Czech composer Jaromír Vejvoda whose tune ‘Škoda lásky’ became Britain's 'Roll Out the Barrel' and Germany's ‘Rosamunde’). The latter meeting occurred one afternoon when there was a small festival (in the main square of Zbraslav, Prague 5) in his honour. I was fortunate to sit with him, his wife and friends along with Ms Ghoshal to drink Becherovka (a local alcoholic herbal digestive) to his health, in the restaurant named after Škoda lásky.

As if preplanned, the first day of October was an autumnal, murky, grey day which reminded us all of the time of year. The very next day a glorious sun returned to say its forgotten farewell. That day, I had looked out of the Akhara’s bathroom window onto a golden vista of blue fir trees nearer to the house. While gazing down I espied a serpentine road and across and up the magnificent green clad Bohemian forest (Šumava), a blue sky and wispy clouds all sent to embellish Prague's Zbraslav.

‘Time, that takes survey of all the world, must have a stop’ or so said Mr W. Shakespeare. And, as the Czech sun shined brightly on that day of Thor, the ‘Band' dissolved. One member headed back to the UK, three to Berlin, while two remained in Prague 5.

After all the excitement of the festivals, I then, temporarily, became a tourist.

I was leisurely introduced to the Bohemian town of Zbraslav, incidentally not just famous for the music of Jaromír Vejvoda and the art and spirituality of Papia Ghoshal, but also known for King Wenceslaus II of Bohemia, whom had founded an important Cistercian monastery by the name of “Aula Regia”, which later became a burial place for Bohemian kings. I was taken to explore Zbraslav’s new Belveder forest park, as well as the (autumnal) ancient Bohemian Celtic forest (which runs to the border of Germany) and there to gaze upon the beauty of the Vltava river (the longest river in the Czech Republic), running parallel. In the Czech sun I happily skipped on and off of buses, trams and trains too. I was led down scant used roads and over a bridge to the intriguing eatery ‘U Posledního Kelta’ (which Google translates as ‘At last the Celt’) at Zbraslav’s Vltava riverside. That very popular eatery was frequented by lycra-clad  cyclists,  earnest  walkers  and  all manner of healthy Czech people with small dogs, one Indian artist and moi, a British writer of sorts. Fortunately, in that autumn season, the ‘bar and grill’ is renowned for its delicious (non- hallucinogenic) wild mushroom fare. The menu included wild mushroom soup and battered, deep fried, wild mushrooms which were large, succulent and indescribably scrumptious.

Prague Central, with its Charles Bridge and Jewish Cemetery on the other hand, reminded me  of  that  infamous  Oscar  Wilde  Lady Windermere's Fan Quote “I can resist anything except  temptation.”Although  I  have  tried (desperately) to reduce the acquisition of things in my life, acquiescing to Mr Wilde I bought a ‘tote bag’ because it had a nice print on the front proclaiming - ‘Franz Kafka, Prague’. I seem, inadvertently, to be collecting ‘Tote bags’ while also trying to minimise my materialistic tendencies. I didn’t get to see the Kafka Museum or the Mucha Dali Warhol exhibits at the Central Gallery (aka the White Unicorn House), but I did amble across the Charles Bridge, which is named not after the new British King, but Charles of Luxembourg, born as Wenceslaus and, apparently, was the first King of Bohemia to become a Holy Roman Emperor.

My time in Prague was an excitingly busy period,

and so very different from my quiet island life. I delighted in the great privilege to meet countless fascinating people. I effectively gained two Indian sons and a daughter (one tabla player, one harmonium player and a singer) and so many friends, along way.

Next  was  the  monumental  laptop  task  of collating all images and short video bursts captured during my stay in that dreamy City of Prague, in the comforting Czech Republic, and finishing the writing. It didn’t help that my WIFI coverage was impaired when I arrived back. At the time of writing I’m still waiting for it to get back to normal, ho hum!