News from Jupiter
From My Notebooks In 1976: A Fortress In Ceylon
December 7, 2024
May I remind you that I am reproducing here, word for word, the notes I took on my so-called Jupiter Journey, frequently disjointed, sometimes almost incomprehensible, even to me. At this point I am still in Ceylon [Sri Lanka today] at Trincomalee, on my way to Sigirya, an ancient fortress. October 7th Back seems bit better. Walk to Fort Frederick – lots of big, […]
From My Notebooks In 1976: India and Ceylon
November 30, 2024
We have a holiday season ahead of us and I’d like to contribute to the fun. I still have stack of my Camera book, and I’d like to see them go. I have no problem saying it’s a beautiful book and I’m sure you all know someone who’d like to have it, so for the next two weeks I’ll knock $20 off the price. It […]
Photos from 50 years ago in Sudan and Ethiopia
November 24, 2024
Good day, everyone. I’ve been working at my photo albums, trying to rationalize them. It’s a lot more work than I bargained for, and I haven’t had time to properly prepare for this weekend. So I’m offering you instead some pictures to drool over. I hope you find them as evocative as I do. They are from my journey, almost exactly 50 years ago, in […]
From My Notebooks In 1976: Pondicherry and Auroville
November 15, 2024
It’s the end of September 1976 and I’m in Pondicherry on the East coast of India, but for some reason I wrote nothing about that week. I came to Pondicherry principally to visit Auroville. I can’t remember now how I heard about Auroville, but it was already well-known to anyone taking an interest in Indian philosophy or culture. It is situated in the part of […]
From My Notebooks In 1976: Still with Colonel Murari, trying to recover my equilibrium
October 27, 2024
Journeys, I have come to believe, are made in the imagination. When the mind is distracted by physical discomfort and unsatisfied cravings it is difficult to appreciate the beauty and significance of scenery and events as they unfold. After ten weeks in France and England I was still cluttered by the desire for the meat and wine of Europe; my skin was uncomfortable in the […]
From My Notebooks In 1976: Into India
October 20, 2024
[My arrival in India could not have been more fortunate. I had an introduction. Three years earlier an Indian friend living in London had invited me to stay with his uncle, Colonel Murari, retired, whose home was in the outskirts of Madras. I had anticipated that disembarkation from the Chidambaram would be an endlessly frustrating affair, so I was happy to find it was only […]
From My Notebooks In 1976: Leaving Penang for India on the MV Chidambaram
October 13, 2024
There was one passenger ship, the MV Chidambaram, that regularly crossed from Penang to Madras (now Chennai) and I was booked on it. Originally the ship had been named Pasteur and was a small luxury liner that crossed the Atlantic. It was known, I believe, to be a popular ship for wealthy gamblers. Some of that luxury was still visible in the upper decks, in […]
From My Notebooks In 1976: Smack Alley in Penang
October 6, 2024
On my way back to the Choong Thean hotel. June 19th I didn’t mean to get to the border [between Thailand and Malaysia] so soon, but I’m loath to start any new adventures. How tepid – and here I am at the frontier. Another set of forms in quintuplet, and a pink one, and yet another, all laboriously filled out by the same young man […]
From My Notebooks In 1976: Leaving Kata
September 29, 2024
[I forgot to mention that a few weeks ago I dinged my scooter (and myself) doing a silly thing on a hill in the village. We met a concrete wall, at very slow speed. It was enough to loosen the left mirror, scratch the screen, and hit a nerve somewhere in my left hip. I was persuaded, against my will, to get an X-ray. The […]
From My Notebooks In 1976: Thailand
September 22, 2024
[Everything in these notebooks is, of course, personal, but some of what I wrote is so intimate and revealing that I was tempted to edit it out. I have resisted the temptation because the introspection that plays out inside the helmet on a solitary journey is a valuable part of the experience. My thoughts and judgements were necessarily fleeting and not what I might think […]