Don't Tell Mum I Work on the Rigs, She Thinks I'm a Piano Player in a Whorehouse
by Paul Carter

Paul Carter attended a few courses in advertising and copy writing when he was in Sydney and not working on the rigs, the result of all those excellent writing skills gained is this hilarious laugh out loud book with an equally catchy and amusing title.

The book details some really amusing incidents in Paul Carter's life in his various stints at oil fields around the world. If I remember correctly from the book Paul has worked on oil rigs around the world right from Brunei, Philippines, Cambodia, Nigeria , China , Russia , Japan and of course the Australian Outback.

So this book is not only a memoir of living in these diverse places but it doubles up as a travelogue giving us an account of his travels on cheap shit economy flights around the world.

There are some really hilarious fun moments in the book, like when Paul keeps a monkey in his house as a pet and the Monkey locks him in the toilet and runs away with the key. As it happens in times like these , this door happens to be a heavy duty one and opens inside, so breaking the door is not the easiest option out, instead he peels off the carpet from under the door , and tries a whole lot of things before finally coming out after taking off the latch with some crude tools.

Then there are accounts of his life in Nigeria , where you would see Ak47 s and hand guns as commonly as you would see mobile phones in Australia, and he goes on to suggest that for the African market Nokia should develop a HandgunPhone instead of a CameraPhone. Moving on there are accounts of diverse things like rowdy brawls in pubs around the world, running away from the police in China, the utter lawlessness in Nigeria, rampant mugging in Cambodia, Driving in the Australian Outback, Stoned out drunk backyard parties in Perth (where his electrician friends tape him to the floor naked with duct tape), Crazy betting on Big Scorpion vs tiny Mouse fights in Brunei (Where the agile Mouse beats the hell out of the poisonous scorpion by running around and cutting its tail off before the scorpion can take aim to sting), accounts of crazy deadly accidents working in oil rigs, and lots more.

I picked this book because of its title from a library shelf, I doubt If I would pick it from a bookstore. This is not the type of book with "Enduring Value" but is definitely worth a single read, and you better get ready to Laugh out LOUD !

Who we are - A miscellany of the New Australia
David Dale

The cover of this book shows a map of Australia with a pair of worn out slippers. In many ways an international symbol for the Aussie Backpacker.

I love statistics and numbers especially when they are presented in a way that makes sense, and this book is filled with such interesting titbits and pieces of information that help us decipher "Australia"

For exact statistics on any topic about Australia have a look here > the website of the Australian Bureau of Statistics. This is where most of the info in this book is sourced from.

The Book is full of numbers and percentages, on topics right from Population to demographics to languages spoken , religion, qualification , smoking habits , to cars , credit cardsdiseases, causes of death, top products used in households, most popular movies, books, music, world records, important dates, animals, inventions , periodicals and every other thing that matters.

To present some interesting numbers from the book,
85% of Australian population lives within 50 Kilometers of a beach ,
1% of Australian population lives on a Farm,
43% of the all marriages are likely to get Divorced
87% of the population are Mobile owners
60% use the internet at least once a week
75% live in a home with three or more Bedrooms
Newzeland , China and India are the biggest source of Migrants Now More info on this here
Cancer Causes 29% of all deaths in Australia.

Apart from plain numbers , there are good facts about Australia, like the defining moments in Australia's history, Important speeches, national anthem etc. There is also a small essay where the author describes a typical day in the life of an Australian family in terms of the products they use.

In all its a very good read and gives a quick snapshot of Australia as we know it.

Yakety Yak: Bombay to Beijing by Bicycle

By McGilton Russell

Russell McGilton, You are bound to like this man by the end of the book, I have been searching the net for ages looking for ways to contact Russell to thank him for writing such a hilarious travelogue. As usual it got to my reading shelf being a travelogue with a difference, Bombay to Beijing on a bicycle, well technically speaking he did not do the complete trip on a bicycle, but frankly speaking I don't think it would matter unless you are one of those who go back an verify every little thing that they read.


Read the initial introductory pages of this book which explain why Russell started on this trip here.

From there on the books gets even more interesting as he actually sets on his trip and arrives in Bombay. On the flight sitting next to him is an inquisitive Indian who doesn't understand why must one cycle when there are trains, while Russell learns that the local politicians had just changed the name of the city from "Bombay" to "Mumbai" and along with the old name plates go his dreams of the title of his planned Book, "Bombay to Beijing". Once in India just like all foreigners he is dismayed by the poverty and difference in classes, the crazy honking traffic, pollution and the general hustle bustle of Bombay.

Hailing from India it makes it all the more interesting for me to read about my home town when viewed from a different perspective. Especially when no matter where he goes he is pestered with a single question " Hello Sir , Which country?"

The book then moves on a swiftly , with Russell's experiences as he meets another cyclist and they join to cover the route till Kathmandu together. In Kathmandu he is joined by his beautiful blonde girlfriend with whom he then cycles to Ladakh. On the way things don't quite well and the stress of the journey and the pressure of Indian pestering takes its toll, with Russell breaking up with his Girlfriend. Then he moves on by flight to Hongkong and from there rides on to Beijing.
In between these pages are hilarious accounts of his experiences with villagers, bad hotels with peeping toms, cycle breakdowns, friendly people to assist in roadsides, frustration over his inability to find a single private moment in a country crowded with a billion people, fighting freezing cold and snowfall on roads in China. In China is when Russell gets lucky again and hooks up with another petite babe who takes his nude picture on the great wall of China.

This is a very fast moving humorous book , especially when coming from a horny and pervert author:) He paints a factual not so pretty picture of India as it really is, I recommended it to another cyclist and he got through it in less than a week and came back with genuine compliments for the book . In all an excellent, hilarious, must read book !

Spotted in France
by Gregory Edmont

I just finished one book on France, and this is the next in line. Picked it from the France section in the library mainly because it is a Moto-Travelogue with a difference, The cover showed that Gregory on a Vespa Scooter with a Dalmatian and I could make out that this was an on road journey through France. If you don't know the French just Love DOGS and this books makes it all the more evident. The book is filled with hints on how much the French love their dogs, Did you know that the French have mating shops or to put it more crudely animal brothels where one can take his pet to be "trained" just in case if breeding does not come naturally to his pet. Did you know that French dogs eat out at restaurants with their owners and are often given their own chair at the restaurant table, with their own dish.

Having just finished an Excellent book on the French last week I was hoping this one to be just as good and it was. The book starts with "I knew my life was missing something . . . I just didn’t know what, ...." I always wanted to have a pet dog and this book just gave me a hundred more reasons why I should hurry up. You can read a brief outline of the story in one of the reviews here which broadly give you an idea of the story.

Gregory's life truly changes for the better with the dog, everywhere he goes people are more friendly , strangers come and talk to him and compliment him about the dog. He is invited into homes, fed and treated well , offered assistance , showered with innumerable smiles and the like just because he and his dog strike a gentle chord in people's hearts wherever they go.

In the 2 years Gregory also gets too attached to JP as he calls his dalmatian, and they share a lovely relationship. The book is filled with cute one page hand sketches of JP and the environment of the chapter which are sort of a prelude to what's in the chapter and really add a sort of a suspense and good feel to the book. This book is very well written in a simple and lucid manner, and can be easily read in a few hours. Apparently there is a movie in the making on the book, I'm looking forward to the movie now.

Notes from a Small Island
By Bill Bryson

Bill Bryson is what I was looking for , I am smitten after reading his excellent travelogue about Australia and was looking for more of his books. The fact that he is a very popular writer is clear from the fact that this book has 256 reviews on Amazon.com and believe me that is something !

If you have read any of his travelogues before you would know he has his own distinct style of humor and that is visible in every page in the book. It is his interactions with strangers and his descriptions of people that I like the most. He has the ability to bring out laugh out loud jokes in seemingly mundane everyday encounters.

Also he has a penchant for picking up details about history that you would not normally hear of from other sources or read in typical travelogues, stories like the a psycho duke who had a fear of people so severe that his servants would communicate with him in letters. Or the Crazy man on the train who bored him to death with details about Engines used in trains, their piston sizes , manufacturing sites, model year details and stuff like that. I especially loved a sentence where he says "and then the man took off to count rivets on trains". Another exceedingly humorous passage is when he describes in not so polite words the "Vodafone man" who makes pointless calls to tell people he’s on the mobile, on the train and will be home in so many minutes (1995: 187). There are many such funny / witty instances in the book like the time when Bryson was a journalist when Rupert Murdoch buys the company and the printers and typesetters go on strike. There are picketers everywhere blocking roads and terrorizing people and how Bryson barely manages to escape from being kicked in the ass by some picketers.

He did this journey throughout England primarily on public transport going to places with strange names that I have never heard of, most of which (place names) I managed to forget before turning the page. Well I must admit I know very little about places in England and of all he describes except for a few city names, Stonehenge was the only tourist place I was quite familiar with.

It is his idiosyncrasies that make the book interesting , this book does not have as much factual information or a lot of lasting value as a guide book but it is just one of those Non Fiction books that can be read once for a decent laugh. To say it shortly he sums it up as "British towns are a deck of cards that have been shuffled and endlessly redealt--same cards, different order." Throughout the book he complains consistently about bad architecture ruining the Victorian or traditional look and feel of the cities and when he complains he does not restrict himself to architecture, very often in a timely manner he has enough disdain for everyone right from public transport authorities, fast-food check out clerks, Ticketing clerks, to poor old men with hard hearing.

Overall I would read this book once and that would be it. It did fall short of my expectations in the sense that I am not a lot more knowledgeable about England having read this book unlike what happened before when I was enlightened with information about Australia last time. On the back cover of this book was a one line review that said "This book has as much Bill Bryson in it as much as it has England." I could not agree more.

A Year in the Merde
by Stephen Clarke

I found this book about a Brit's impressions on life in Paris, very very entertaining, Its a genuinely laugh out loud kind of a book with written in style by Stephen Clarke under the pseudo narration by a character Paul West. For those who don't know Merde is not the name of some posh suburb but actually is the french translation for "Shit"

I picked it up because it promised humour starting from its cover, the back cover said "A Year in the Merde is an almost-true account of things that may or may not have happened to him in the ten years he has lived in France, depending on who is asking the question. He originally published the book in an edition of 200 copies, with the intention of selling them through his website, giving them away to friends or offering them as fuel for his neighbour's Bastille Day barbecue."

Well I can't really write anything better than what has been written about this book in so many places, to get the hang of the storyline see this or go here to read a better informed review on the book.

For my part I just enjoyed the book thoroughly, the way he takes potshots at the French and their language , work(or actually Strike) culture and their little idiosyncrasies. For someone like me whose idea of night life is a good book or some good company , he paints a good picture of the hot an happening night clubs in Paris and his sexual misadventures. In all I found it immensely entertaining and can be a good read if all you are looking for is a hearty laugh.

In a Sunburned Country
by Bill Bryson

This book was given to me by an American friend; I mention this because the book is not available in the said title outside America,
My friend said it’s a very good travelogue about Australia and anyone new to Australia should read it, so he read it and handed over to me to read it. I looked up Bill Bryson online and found that he was an American, Frankly speaking, I was a bit let down when I learnt that the author “Bill Bryson” was an American, In fact the last time I had seen his travelogues in the library I did not pick them. After all Americans in general aren't really known for their knowledge and appreciation of world culture and history. Have a look here to see what I mean. I have tried hard to get rid of my set prejudices about America, as none of the Americans I have met personally are the snobbish; I am better, richer and hence better than you types. Every American I have met personally has been polite, friendly and fairly knowledgeable about external affairs, but the stereotype still remains. I guess it’s just that the country as a whole that displays that rude image but individually the people are just as just as likeable as anywhere else.

Anyway now coming back to the book , I started this book with a strongly biased viewpoint and Bryson was initially living up to my expectations, of Americans being snobby , self centered, and indifferent to the rest of the world, have a read through his first chapter here and you will see why. He starts the book saying how he again forgot who Australia's prime minister was and telling us how little Australia matters to America and hence to the rest of the world. Saying that the Australian Economy is about equivalent to Illinois and that China grows its population by about 1 Australia every year. He gives statistics explaining the abysmally small number of articles about Australia that appeared in the American media in the past few years. And By taking the number of articles in newspapers as a benchmark for importance, he says Australia is about as important to Americans as Bananas but not nearly as important as Ice-cream. And Imagine reading all this in the first 2 pages with the prejudices I have, it was just getting enough for me to put the book down.

Well , luckily for me I did not put this book down then because he tries to highlight this as an issue to put things in perspective, to highlight where "Australia" stands in American minds as a subject. He exhorts the reader that things shouldn't be this way because he finds Australia a lot more interesting than what is currently projected outside. The next few pages are devoted purely to tell us why Australia is so much more interesting than the media would have us think. He mentions so many interesting facts about Australia that I doubt even a lot of Australians wouldn't know of. Say for example facts about the Australian Wild life , Did you know that, of the 10 most poisonous snakes in the world all the ten are native to Australia, There are has more things in the Australian wilderness that can kill you than any other place on the earth. 80% of all the wildlife that exists in Australia is so unique to itself that its not to be found anywhere else on the planet. Australia is a place so arid, so flat , so hot and so deserted that there is no other place on the planet except Antartica that is perhaps more forbidding to life, in spite of this, it has perhaps the largest inhabitation of yet to be discovered species of insects, animals and wildlife anywhere in the world because it is so huge that there are just not enough scientists / biologists around to cover it all. He made such an interesting case for Australia that I had shed all my initial inhibitions and in the first few pages was glued to the book.

From there on the book follows his journey across Australia, by train, car and on foot. Bill can be incredibly funny when he wants to be and there are so many moments where you can literally laugh your heart out on the incidents he narrates. He goes on describing his stay in Sydney , Melbourne, various other road trips and train ride on the INDIAN PACIFIC RAIL ROAD (Called so because it reaches out from the Indian ocean all the way to the Pacific ocean) running across Australia connecting Sydney on the east coast to Perth on the west coast across over 4000 kilometers, second only in length to the Trans Siberian railway.

The book has a lot of history about Australian Exploration starting with James Cook(the first western sailor to land on Australia in recent history, for the record he was a Lieutenant not a Captain when he discovered Australia), and then going on about other explorers who dared to go into the arid inland, he gives us detailed accounts of their experiences and what they found and faced in the Australian “Outback”. He writes about various other Australian adventurers like Kingford Smith and people and incidents in contemporary Australian history.

He covers all the major Australian cities, starting from Sydney, Canberra (ACT), Melbourne, Perth, Alice Springs, Darwin and many other smaller towns and paints an interesting picture of each of them. He also does long road trips across the outback and the coastal roads in Australia.

Frankly speaking I haven't read a better travelogue than this ever. Mind you this is not a book with lists of places to / see / eat / buy stuff. This book is about seeing Australia through Bill Bryson's eyes. Reading it is like experiencing the country for yourself and doing a short course on Australia with hard facts and detailed glimpses into Australian History, Geography, Botany and even some current affairs.

Then he tells us about the stolen generation and goes to depths devoting many pages to the cause of the Aboriginals and the injustice that was done to them in the past, the book has indeed a very poignant description of the atrocities done upon the Aboriginals. Since this is a shameful part of Australian History like the White Australia policy that you don’t read or hear a lot about it, so this makes it even more interesting.

Towards the end there is an Appendix with about 10 articles that Bill wrote for the Sydney Morning Herald, while he was invited over to cover the Sydney Olympics in 2000. These few pages are like a bonus to an already very interesting book, and are good read by themselves.

The Book does not have any photos within its pages, only 2 pages of rough maps showing the route taken by the author. For me this is a big thing in itself as it’s the first travelogue book that I have read without even a single photo. It shows that the author doesn’t need the photos to lean on to help the reader visualize what he describes.

In all I have to agree with my friend who gave the book to me and said, "Any visitor to Australia MUST read this" and I AGREE!

Hats off to Bill Bryson.

Off The Rails.
by: Tim Cope and Chris Hatherly

If you call long distance motorcycle travel as an Adventure , what would you call a similar distance
(10,000 Kilometers) bicycle tour.

"Adventure" is too small a word to describe Cycling 10,000km from Moscow to Beijing. Yes I have not added Zeros wrongly , they cycled TEN THOUSAND Kilometers through some of the harshest terrain and weather.
The Cyclists both have done a fair bit of adventure in the past, so they did have some good experience before starting off on such a journey. Tim has cycled around Australia and Chris was a member of a wilderness guide course.

The book is an excellent read and a real Mega adventure. The Guys cycle through Russia, Siberia, Mongolia and then on to China. Their experiences in such an epic journey are stuff of legend.

The book is very well written , at least reading it you can feel the pain and the difficulty of such a long journey. You can see the snow bogging down the wheels and the cold freezing off the toes. You can see the colorful personalities of the people they meet on the way. The pleasure of interactions with helpful and kind strangers and the pains of being arrested in China and being robbed in Russia. The best part here is their experiences with the Russian Babushkas, the motherly women in Rural Russia who take care of and feed the boys for days together when they are struck with frost bite.

Also the host of people they meet along the way , Mongolian horsemen, Chinese students, Russian drunkards , the Land Mafia, and a whole lot of policemen. All these profiles come alive with character as you read this book.

I think the judge of if a book is good enough is to see whether it rouses your emotions , do you feel being a part of whatever it is that you are reading. This is easier, if say you are Nancy Friday writing about men's sexual fantasies, but writing about such a hard grueling adventure and keeping it interesting is tough. And Tim and Chris do very well in this.

They both have fairly different personalities and this is evident in their writing styles, the chapters are alternatively written by Tim and Chris, each with his own ideas and reasons for being on the road. Though at times they don't get along too well on the road, I think it can be expected for they have been together for almost 2 years on the road, with only each other for company. They have petty fights and arguments over small things but the good thing is that they are honest about their experiences on the road. There is no effort to sugar coat their experiences in order to be seen as Politically correct (or in this case make a god impression)

The book overall is very very readable and I recommend it heartily to everyone interested in adventure travel. They also have a TV documentary Off the Rails.

In general a very good adventure travel book, though the book didn't motivate me to pick up my push bike and start pedaling around Australia it did kindle the desire to travel far off , visit strange places, meet different people.

So, as they say in the biker's world, See you on the road some day.

Two for the Road
by Shirley Hardy-Rix and Brian Rix

56671 Kilometers, 27 countries, one dream is the enticing tag line of the book. I practically kissed the book when I found it just as I was browsing through the travel section Melbourne city library. I was so happy to have found the book that I read the complete book some 325 pages of it and their travelogue on the website in the next 24 hours flat. So that does say something about the book, doesn't it ?

This couple has done the sort of a ride every biker worth his name dreams of but never comes around to actually doing. Shirley and Brian are a police couple from Melbourne, with Brian being a Policeman and Shirley a crime reporter / writer. They shipped their bike to England and rode it back all the way overland from London to Singapore from where they flew to Darwin and rode further on to Melbourne.

On the way passing through 28 countries and sending 350 days on the road. They have a good website which typically covers all the sections in the book in a little less detail. So its worthwhile having a look here before you decide to buy the book.

The interesting thing for me is that, this couple too was motivated by another US couple passing through Australia on their RTW on a motorbike: Chris and Erin. When Chris and Erin stayed in Melbourne with them. Chris and Erin must have motivated hundreds of people in their journey spanning 4 years , I know at least of one another friend of mine, Srinidhi, who was inspired by Chris and Erin when they stayed with him, and who is doing his own RTW now.


This motorcycle travel bug is like an Epidemic, and spreads like wildfire when like minded people meet. I had felt so enthused when I hosted a Motorcycle traveler - Linda Bick at my residence in Pune. Good to see that Brian was motivated by Chris and Erin and set off. I really appreciate their guts to have left everything behind and take the step ahead to leave for an RTW, to follow his dream. I know most bikers dream of following in their footsteps someday.

The book as such is alternatively written by Shirley(writing a Major Chunk, the Impressions of the places , the people and stuff) and Brian ( writing the Bike part, its repairs, problems , navigation , procedures, etc). I found the writing pretty easy going good to read but at places very touristy.

They did have their fair share of interactions with locals, but the couple (being reasonably well to do, I assume) stayed most of the time in Hotels, resorts , etc . This luxury might have somewhat limited their exposure to the locals, but still the book is filled with experiences of hospitality received from strangers and some funny anecdotes and the like. The detailed description of the Race day at Isle of Man is too good, you can also have a look at their website to get an idea of what I am talking about.

The practical advice in this book would be really helpful for someone planning a similar trip, for example they describe in detail their battle with Singaporean bureaucracy and have One line of Strong advice for any one planning to ride on to Singapore " Don't do it " the paperwork and the troubles to take the bike in Singapore is simply not worth it, one would be better off shipping out from Malaysia.

Today I got a reply for My email to the Authors sent from their regular email address, the other email address that I sent my mail to is fairly inactive (I guess since they did the trip a couple of years ago). And yeah I forgot the mention , Hardy Rix, owns a classic Standard Enfield Bullet in Melbourne.

Considering the authors are based in Melbourne, I hope to meet them for coffee some day, will update my post after that experience.

For Love and a Beetle - A tale of two journeys.
by Hodge, Ivan and McGovern, Petronella


Hundreds of people have done the overland journey from UK to India via the Europe> east Europe> Turkey > Iran > PAK > Ind > SE Asia > Singapore> Australia.

So what makes this journey special? Well many things,

1) Firstly this is the second time for the couple they did the same journey in the same Beetle in 1961, when it was newly bought in the UK and sold to his mother in Newzeland,
and again in 1996 when they shipped their old Beetle back to UK and repeated the journey from UK to India Overland.
2) They are both in their Sixties and so to speak on their Second Honeymoon.
3) They are doing a journey which is perhaps a legendary distance for a vehicle 35 years old.

The book is interspersed alternatively with their recordings of the 1961 trip and with their current travel experience. We get to see the how the same places have changed in the past 35 years , they have attempted to travel along the exact route that they traveled on 35 years ago.

My Favourite in this book is a page with 2 Photos which shows Ivan Hodge in Turkey with a watch tower and his beetle in the back ground one taken in 1961 and the other in 1996.
The caption below the first photo reads:

The Beetle My sweater , and a camel tower, Iran 1961
The second photo reads
Same Beetle, Same sweater , and a the same camel tower, Iran 1996.

The only difference in the photos is that Ivan and the tower show some effects of Old age , the tower being a bit weathered and Ivan with his old age paunch.

If nothing else this book should surely be read to see the spirit of adventure in a 60 year old couple having the guts to travel around the world.

A Tankful of Time
by Michael P Fong

This books takes you on a journey from the concrete jungles of Singapore to the deserts of the Sahara by road and on a 1989 BMW 900 GS motorbike. Travel with the author on a road tour across the 3 continents , the book does not bother us with menial details like the formalities of border clearances and their difficulties, trials tribulations etc, difficulties with the bike , the journey , husband wife quarrels etc.

Instead This is more of touchy feely book with lovely profiles of places visited and people they met on the way. He makes an RTW(Round the world ) motorbike trip look very easy, reading this book you end up feeling just like as if the author was on a short ride on a long weekend.

The Author, Michael Fong comes across as the friendly guy next door , a very down to earth practical person. The book is very Motivating especially when he describes how he was initiated into motorcycling , when his school principal had arranged for another legendary motorcycle traveller passing through Singapore to address the students. If the purpose of him writing this book was to motivate others I am sure he has more than achieved the same.

You can follow the writer and his pics and travelogue here.

Being Indian
by Pavan K Verma

"Ethos" as per the dictionary means "the distinctive spirit of a culture or an era" and the Indian ethos is what this book is all about. A true feast for Indians and foreigners alike, this is a must read for anyone interested in the Indian culture. The book describes precisely the inner workings of an Indian mind, why the Indians are the way they are?

I haven't read anyone else describing an abstract concept like "Indian ethos" so very well. The book is filled with anecdotes and accounts of various glaring contrasts and contradictions that make India.

The Author, Pavan K Verma was High Commissioner for India in Cyprus and has held other assorted positions in the Indian Diplomatic service. Coming from such a very learned man of such high social standing the book is surprisingly down to earth. When you read, It becomes obvious that the author has had his ears very close to the ground. Personally I liked the book and I recommend to any one who seems interested / curious about Indians.

Best of all , I had written a small mail to Pavan, generally thanking him for writing the book, and he was courteous enough to reply back. I got a reply the very next day :

thank you hari for your appreciation for my book. i wrote as honestly as i could, and i am glad some people have liked what i have said. we shd certainly try and meet when i am next in mumbai or pune, best, pavan

Now this might seem a small thing , but well I am impressed. By the book and by the Author.

Hats off to you, Sir!