Posted in Poetry, Travel, Travel Writing, tagged backpacking, donkeys, Fez, medina, Morocco, Poetry, Tannery, Travel, Travel writing on 28/07/2011| 2 Comments »
13. Morocco (Fez)
Dark, narrow, twisting, threatening.
Alleyways in the old town.
Mules push past improbably.
I stumble sideways under another archway.
Nostrils prickle, assaulted by the stench of the Tannery ahead.
Bubbling, mediaeval vats, vivid yellow and red dyed skins, scraped clean on the earth, basking their stink in the bleaching sun.
jpm
Posted in Poetry, Travel, Travel Writing, tagged backpacking, funerals, Indonesia, Poetry, Sulawesi, Toraja people, Travel, Travel writing on 20/07/2011| 7 Comments »
12. Indonesia (Sulawesi)
Seated with care in the esteemed guest’s position,
itinerant strangers shepherded in to honour The Dead.
The squealing of sacrificial pigs exploding up through the floorboards.
There we squirm, eyeballing the black cardboard coffin.
Garlands of flowers, not quite masking the slightly sweet aroma of humid, three day old death.
jpm
Posted in Poetry, Travel, Travel Writing, tagged backpacking, Cairo, Epypt, Giza, Poetry, pyramids, Travel, Travel writing on 13/07/2011| 3 Comments »
11. Egypt (Giza Pyramid)
I’m folded over, shuffling upwards at a 45° angle, my nose inches from the bum ahead. The stifling, dank air nothing to the claustrophobia – which is naught to the dent the 3000 year old roof puts in my head when the man behind me fondles my captive bum, in delight.
jpm
Posted in Poetry, Travel, Travel Writing, tagged aid work, Karachi, kidnapping, Pakistan, Poetry, Travel, Travel writing on 06/07/2011| Leave a Comment »
10. Pakistan
There’s nothing worse than being kidnapped inadvertently. Wrong place, wrong time. Karachi 1995. Dangerous times. Rationalising my heart out until I couldn’t deny it any longer – I was definitely in strife. Until. A mutual realisation of mistaken identity dawned on my accidental captor and me…… Halle-bloody-lullah! Now I can laugh.
jpm
50 words for 50 countries 