The Bicycle Diaries: The Prologue.

I recently endeavoured upon a trip from my current residence in Sheffield, North England, to my family home in St. Clears, South Wales, equipped with only my bicycle and pannier to mark my 25th birthday on the 21st of April 2013.

A few days prior to setting off, I found both comfort and inspiration in stumbling across a reference from the Canterbury Tales that claimed April to be the fairest month for a pilgrimage. This sentiment was welcome as I began to stress over the prospect of cycling amid the never-ending 2013 winter of zero-degree temperatures and heavy snowfall.

I therefore took it upon myself to snap out of my early-April shivers by basking in the sense of optimism that spring was nigh, and decided to recite Chaucer's 'Preamble to the Canterbury Tales' to myself as a source of inspiration [I also bought a pair of lycra cycling leggings as back-up].

However my enthusiastic planning for the trip may have blurred my interpretation of the original poem, as you may be able to spot in my own adaptation of it ...

Geoffrey Chaucer's Canterbury Tales
The Prologue in Modern English

The Preamble [Adapted]

When fair April with his sunny showers sweet,
Has swept the snow of March to its old retreat,
And bathed each vein in liquid of such power,
Its strength creates the newly springing flower;

When the West Wind too, with his sweet breath,
Has breathed new life – in every copse and heath –
Into each tender shoot, and the young sun
From Aries moves to Taurus on his run,
And those small birds begin their melody,
(The ones who 'sleep` all night with open eye,)
Then nature stirs them up to such a pitch
That folk all long to go on a bike pilgrimage

And wandering travellers tread new shores, familiar strands,
Seek out far shrines, renowned in many lands,
And specially from every shire's end
Of North England to South Wales he will wend
The abode of his family there to seek,
Where the young son will end his weary week!

Chaucer feat. Bowen

 Subsequent blog post and weather report to follow in due course ...

Comrades in Competition...

Seeing tourists stepping off a bus into a Cuban city somewhat resembles a Hollywood movie premiere.

As a set of old white Westerners dragging their wives and weary eyes are suddenly plunged into unwanted celebrity, mobbed by jineteros offering everything under the sun in exchange for but a pittance of these aliens’ perceived wealth. Jineteros are those natives on the streets so intent upon illicitly offering their accommodation, restaurants and, in fact, anything to travellers. These are your average adults trying to make a living with what little entrepreneurial capacity they have. These are people learning how to make money …

Of course, things are different in Cuba. They have long been a communist country, built upon the foundations of Fidel and Che’s victory against all odds, for the equality and prosperity of the nation’s people in defiance of the US’s imperialism. Us against them. Patria o muerte. Indeed, the bottom line of communism is that of unity; whereas capitalism leads to competition – wouldn’t you agree? But this is where the lines blur, as walking along Cuban streets will poke and pester you into seeing how Cubans are now fumbling among themselves between communism and capitalism. And they are leaning from the left to the latter ...

Cuba is still bearing a heavy hangover from the 1990s’ período especial with the collapse of their Soviet support system and their fallen sugar and coffee industries compounded by countless embargoes that have devastated the country’s trading. Shops’ shelves were left bare, restaurants were rationed supplies, resources and technology were doomed to the 20^th century and employment plummeted as factories folded by the dozens. And for those who have clung on their jobs, their work ethic is markedly oppressed by their pitifully low incomes and the sheer lack of any prospects in pursuing a promotion or career. At least the guerrillas’ aims have been realised in ensuring a level playing field for all, except that strategic errors have left their comrades deep in the trenches, desperately fighting their way out.

And the only feasible way of getting out is by their unintentional harassment of tourists. Cuba opened its doors to the world at the turn of the millennium – effectively dangling the carrot of capitalism to its people, who duly began biting the hands off these tourists. Households tidied up a room to become hospitable casas particulares, and worthy state-owned restaurants became paladares in feeding foreigners un-rationed food. This initial taste sparked a nationwide hunger for Western wealth, as comrades morphed into jineteros, creating a peculiar paradox of unity and competition between themselves ...

It becomes a tribal turf war, with mini-cartels of friends and family competing against one another, armed with sneaky sales talk and the odd outrageous lie in chasing your pesos, advising you that “your booked stay at Señora García’s won’t happen as she recently passed away, and her business now comes to our casa”. It’s the same when asking for directions around town, with the jineteros spotting an opportunity to intercept your custom for their own. However, this quickly breeds a deep sense of distrust, as the tourist becomes weary of the hustlers’ tireless talk and bleached white lies.

And this is all before you step into one of Havana’s nightclubs, where you have never felt so irresistible a man as when a flock of beautiful cubanas greet your entrance by pulling your arms in different directions for a cheeky dance. That’s until you click that they’re prostitutes, pretty women with a price, seeking a ‘financial gift’ in return for their services. And you also discover this isn’t a brothel. It’s just that sex tourism has boomed in Havana, and prostitutes make themselves seen within the bar scene, mojito in hand ready to fulfil withering old Western men’s sexual dreams. Although their clients may not be handsome, their pay certainly is, as a good week’s clientele reportedly brings in twice as many pesos as a Cuban doctor earns in a month.

And there lies the disparity – both health and sex tourism are booming in Cuba, but the money only reaches those who are at the very front line in serving the tourists. And the front line’s hopefuls are tugging at each other’s sleeves in their collective struggle to live, everyday guerrillas against Fidel’s outdated communist ideals. But with the Castros aging and the Cuban streets hustling, the nation hangs in the balance, awaiting their new revolution …

hostel life.

Luxury apartment. Hotel. Hostel. Camping. Park bench.

If you asked the average holidaymaker how they would list their preferred accommodation for a well-deserved holiday, I imagine this would be the popular response. And bang in the middle is the hostel, sitting pretty as a cheap and cheerful bridge between privacy and poverty, pomp and penury. However, the hostel is now shaking off its age-old reputation as a poor man’s hotel for, well, the poor, and is embracing its new life as the place to stay for young backpackers. And having lived and worked in one for 10 weeks, I can see why…

Upon stepping into reception, you realise that a hostel is a somewhat odd entity, as it resembles some form of international social portal. With its continuous check-ins and check-outs, and the lugging of bags and tired eyes, it may look like an exclusive Club 18-30 airport. And with its multi-national clientele shoving their passports into the desk staff’s faces, it may appear to be some kind of all-in-one international embassy. But once you’ve grabbed your complementary map and are sat in the common room, you immediately become the new neighbour in the community, the latest mystery guest who no-one knows where he’s from or where he’s going next. And this is when the portal really opens its doors, as you quickly immerse yourself in an exchange of travel tip-offs and tales between seasoned travellers and rookie adventurers that defy the crazed myriad of accents and languages…

Where Russian meets Spanish, English meets Korean, French meets Dutch. The clash of languages is one bruising barrier to breach, or at least stumble over, within this social circle. Some conversations prosper with the help of hand signals and gestures, whilst others fall by the wayside in an awkward pile of elongated pronunciations and raised voices. But if we can’t manage to share a conversation, we’re inevitably going to be sharing everything else…

In abandoning the privacy of an exclusive hotel room, embracing the communal nature of a hostel entails the sharing of bedrooms, kitchens, bathrooms, food, drink and cultural customs.

And hand in hand with this cosy set-up are the universally accepted codes of conduct that have been written in invisible ink on each and every hostel wall;

Label or lose your food.

Be social, or be shunned.

If you come back in at 4am; don’t wake us up, and don’t throw up.

Keep stealth sex quiet, and snoring quieter.

And, of course, offer any leftover food to the hostel staff.

Stick to these rules, and you’ll avoid making any enemies. In contrast, you’re likely to form those oddly instantaneous short-term friendships that occur within the hostel common room. Idle chit-chat about places been & to-be-seen, food eaten, and great nights drunken echoes from every corner of the room, as stories, Facebook pages and tomorrow’s sightseeing schedules are exchanged. However, the quiet is soon disrupted by the teaching and sharing of each nation’s favourite drinking game before the pub crawl swings by for its latest victims. And fast forward to the next morning [as most of the pub crawlers’ memories do], the hostel staff go about their work in cleaning each dorm room and reluctantly waking up those guests who have missed their check-out time, and often their booked flight. I have performed this duty, and it also works a treat as a practical joke. So unprofessional…

But this is what a hostel offers, and a hotel doesn’t. The youthful vibrance, verve and vigour of a hostel far outscore the luxuries of high-rise hotels with their inflated prices and Mickey Mouse Michelin stars. Okay, so you wouldn’t bring your family or dear Grandmother for a hostel stay in the backstreets of Sarajevo [though exceptions have been made], but for those wanting to add that edgy, international feel to a stopover a hostel is your best bet.

Oh and just remember to leave leftover food to the staff. Or did I already mention that?

Dan Bowen.

Off the beaten track...

When you venture abroad, do you consider yourself to be a tourist or a traveller?

The tourist that visits the big cities’ main attractions for those carbon copy postcard photos, or the traveller that breaks away from the crowd to explore the hidden depths lurking beneath the tourist’s radar? For the past three months I became that traveller, or rather, I became a fully fledged ‘Workawayer’. Let me explain..

Workaway is one of many non-formal organisations that have developed worldwide networks of projects and volunteers, effectively becoming interfaces for both parties to contact one another with a view to working on mutually beneficial terms. The volunteer is able to seek out suitable projects, where he or she then lends a helping hand in return for food and accommodation. However, the exchange goes much deeper than this, effectively transcending into an exchange of culture, knowledge, ideas, skills, and languages that both volunteers and hosts gain extensively from. Sound good?

Having recently graduated from university, I was searching for a cost-effective way to travel through Europe that allowed me to settle in foreign environments for weeks at a time whilst learning new skills. The Workaway experience was therefore perfect in meeting these criteria. I spent a month apiece in Bulgaria, Portugal and Spain between January and March of this year, working on a variety of projects that included various workloads and a diverse range of people as company. I had also tactfully arranged my placements with due consideration to their seasons and climates; wanting to experience a snowy Bulgarian January, a wet and windy Portuguese February, and the beginnings of a sunny Spanish Spring in March. Living and working in such diverse conditions from day to day was a big learning curve for me with regard to my own adaption, and was especially satisfying reflecting upon the -23°C Bulgarian temperatures from my deckchair in Southern Spain!

I originally set off on this venture in order to broaden my horizons and to get back in touch with what – I believe – the current, conditioned way of Western living has suppressed since my childhood. The goal was to get truly re-integrated back into nature, and to re-engage with the sophistication of the simple things in life. So the experience definitely assisted me in realising this objective with regard to working outside every single day, learning about the intricacies of nature, and working within the varied and beautiful surroundings of waterfalls, woodlands & mountains. The work also varied daily, ranging from animal care and rabbit hut-building to path-building and gardening depending on the seasons and what projects the hosts are working upon. Furthermore, I found myself relying on various sources of sustainable energy over the three months; dining upon the smallholding’s home-grown produce in Bulgaria, relying upon solar energy for heating and showers in Portugal, and drinking pure tap-water fresh from the Alpujarras mountain springs in Spain. How much more earthy can it get?

With regard to the travelling itself, I managed to fit in the grand cities of Veliko Tarnovo, Porto, Granada and Barcelona in between placements, whilst also visiting countless small towns and villages on my well-earned days off. Exploring these hidden pockets proved immensely refreshing in enabling me to embrace their local cultures away from the flashing of cameras, where I could engage in the events and traditions that just don’t get a mention in the travel guides.

So why not try it yourself, venture away from the beaten track with this alternative form of travelling that is easy on the bank balance yet provides you with much more than you bargained for...

Sun, Sangria & the Sierra Nevada

Hola! I now find myself being the latest in a long line of willing workers that have made their way to La Casa del Viento amongst the Las Alpujarras mountain range in deep Southern Spain. I'm currently 'volunteer travelling' my way through Europe, this being the ultimate placement of my initial three months before taking a well-deserved vacation.

Before setting off on my travels, I intentionally pinpointed Spain for March so that I could experience the Andalusian springtime and hopefully catch up with some sun after a snowy Bulgarian January and a rainy Portuguese February! And yes, Lanjarón has gladly delivered on that front.. Even though it does still appear to have a nasty hangover whilst the area recovers from a whitewashed, landslide-laden winter that has left its scars on the mountainside. But, the weather does seem to have turned the corner with some breezy, sunny days followed by cool, starry nights. I've even managed to go about my work casually dressed in just wellies & shorts!

Which leads on nicely to the volunteering I'm doing here.. I must admit I wasn't quite sure what kind of work I'd be doing at a holiday house accommodation, but I've been pleasantly surprised with what has been required of me. I started off with some general maintenance work; where I was rendering the rustic casita walls, fixing things here and there, wood chopping, path building, and moving things around as clients came and went.. But once the sun showed its face, I was then entrusted with undertaking some serious gardening work in order to get my Green Gym fix.. Firstly, I got myself re-acquainted with a strimmer in order to prep the garden for the spring before I then went about working on 'Jardin de Dan'. Yup, my very own vegetable patch which I prepared and fertilized before planting the seeds that will – hopefully - produce some excellent carrots, lettuce and beetroot for future volunteers & clients alike. I then moved straight on to revamp Silvia's composting heap into another vegetable patch that has been named, in Welsh-Italian spirit, Gardd Grandiosa.. I have also been lucky enough to get some barman & hospitality experience whilst I've been here, where I was on drinks-serving duty during the evening meals with the clients. But having always been on the drinking side of the bar up until this month, Ann quickly pointed out that I was a little too generous with my wine servings! However, I never did get any complaints from the clients, and isn't the customer always right...

So for all this work, what am I getting in return? My preferred method of payment.. Food. I believe the key to a volunteer's efforts is found in his stomach, and wood-chopping & digging never so seemed so breezy in anticipation of what awaits at mealtimes here. Ann definitely gets the best out of me with her own excellent stamp upon Spain's national delicacies, whilst also mixing in some prime Sunday roasts as a reminder of home. And having voluntarily adopted a raw vegetarian diet during my previous placement, I am almost overwhelmed by the quality and quantity of the food served up here in its insatiable ability to satisfy my extensive appetite. The sangria and tinto de verano played their part too in helping me wind down after a long day in the sun! There is also the entertainment of the animals here at La Casa del Viento; where two dogs and five cats make up a motley crew that never fail to appease the guests with their playful brawling and mischief around the living room. Such antics are a staple of mealtimes here, providing a homely environment that can't be found at sterile high-rise touristic hotels with their Mickey Mouse Michelin stars.

And although Lanjarón is beginning to open up to such hotels with its increasing tourism, I was very relieved to see that this hasn't impacted upon the town's general atmosphere and ambience. It is still very much a typical little Andalusian town with its compact community, independent family-run shops, and friendly locals happy to chat over an evening's tapas. The area is also blessed with its famous drinking water distributed amongst little fuentes around the town, which is surrounded by some breathtaking scenery that allow for very nice vistas as you walk along the Sierra Nevada's many trails. Developing my Spanish was a prime objective in coming here too, and little did I know that I was setting myself quite a challenge in acquainting myself with the Andalusian accent. Their preference against pronouncing syllables at the end of certain words definitely helped in refining my now excellent pronunciation of 'no entiendo'! But I have gained a lot from my little chats with the campesinos, and also from the weekly intercambio sessions that I race down the mountainside for after work each Friday. Yet getting back up the mountain to Casa del Viento's pretty little perch is another challenge, with my own personal best being 24 minutes from the Municipial Market's door to Ann's door. Beat that future wwoofers..

And with setting this challenge, I now near the end of my stay here at Lanjarón.. I shall be shortly moving on to take a month's break from volunteering after my three months' efforts,. where I shall be indulging in a sabbatical siesta of snowboarding, festival-going, Amsterdam, and a little piece of home for the Easter period.. Deserved? Yeahhh..

Paz y amor,
Dan.

More than I signed up for...

The Awakened Life Project. A permaculture & meditation project based upon the fundamentals of community values. Hmm, it sounded interesting. And it was..

I spent just about a month at Quinta de Mizarela, and being a part of the project's daily running definitely exceeded my expectations in terms of what I would experience within its little pocket of Central Portugal. The diet, the meditation, the environment, the people, animals, my own development, solar panels & compost loos; where to start…

I set off on this Workaway crusade of mine in order to expand my horizons and to get back in touch with what – I believe – the current, conditioned way of Western living has suppressed since my childhood. The goal was to get truly re-integrated back into nature, and to re-engage with the sophistication of the simple things in life. So this placement definitely assisted me in realising this objective with regard to the challenges & benefits of living off-the-grid, living in a yurt, learning the intricacies of the eco-cycles at work within the quinta, and working within the beautiful surroundings of waterfalls, woods & land terracing in the middle of Serra do Açor..

And then there are the dietary adjustments I dived into! Just to set a premise; I have always been a meat-eater, and this is a raw-vegetarian joint. Yikes! Also, having been fed a standard issue, modern, omnivorous diet whilst at my previous hosts in Bulgaria for the previous month, I wasn´t able to prepare myself for this test in any way. So I really was going from one extreme to the other, with no bridge to fill the void. But – to my surprise – I did enjoy the new diet being served up, and as long as there was a cooked side-dish on offer every once in a while, my extensive appetite was happily fed! Although, on two or three occasions, my detoxing stomach wasn´t quite as amused in adjusting itself to such changes! But what I really appreciated was that I was able to see what was being served at meal-times whilst working in the garden, I was eating fresh produce rather than barcoded products, and I was participating in the whole cyclic process of the earth-to-mouth food chain. I also learnt so much about different foods from the guys at Quinta de Mizarela, so I´m definitely walking away a more knowledgeable and will be a more ethically responsible eater.

Then, of course; if I was eating, I was working. That´s the deal, right? Whether I was digging ponds (the amphi-bian-theatre is worth a visit by itself), composting fruit trees, erecting polytunnels, laying down new vegetable beds, collecting donkey poo, chopping wood, clearing land, or feeding the donkeys, I loved it. The work I was entrusted with ranged from the physical & methodical to the creative & technical, so I was always kept on my toes with what I was doing without getting bored. Plus, the physical side of it definitely saves you some Euros on gym costs; digging ponds & barrowing earth-tonnes in the Green Gym strips fat & gets you ripped! I also learned so much about the dynamics of a garden e.g. how the trees and grassland feed the donkeys, the donkeys then proceed to “feed” the vegetable patches, which ultimately feed us. And although you learn this kind of stuff in Biology whilst at school, being out amongst it all beats theory hands down!

Away from the work, a key factor which attracted me to this placement was the fact that Pete and Cynthia engage in a lot of meditation & spirituality; which have I always been intrigued by, yet unable to explore at home without any real guidance. So I gave it a go. And in all honesty, I found meditation tough to begin with. I don´t think I have ever sat still for 45 minutes, let alone be at rest with my mind for that long, so it was a whole new experience for me. However, after a month of meditating every two or three days, I now feel very comfortable in meditating and have had some fascinating experiences/insights in the process.

What set me at ease was the way it was all explained to me – such as the principle of just being – in enabling me to grasp a better perspective to view the practice from. A lecturer once described how the thinking brain can be seen to resemble a set of structured blocks; so when you are really learning, these blocks are moving around to assume new positions, thus causing confusion that ultimately leads to more clarity in the shape of better arranged levels of understanding. So I think it´s safe to say that the little game of Tetris going on upstairs had a thorough re-shuffle having lived in such a dynamic environment!

Ultimately, I think I gained so much from living and interacting with Pete, Cynthia, Billy, Mim, and the natural environment. They all provided me with a strong support network that has helped me explore a range of issues I have always been interested in discussing and practicing. For example, they have all been a great help in holistically assisting my self-issued “slowing down” process, which has begun to eradicate the frantic thought and speech patterns that have troubled me for years. And in contrast, being entrusted with the carrying out of some unsupervised, technical work in the garden instilled a great deal of confidence within me that only mutually trusting relationships can generate. My own perspective on life has also shifted, veering away from a solely results-based outlook to one of appreciating and focusing more on the present “means” rather than just the “end”.

So even though I prospectively signed up for a sunny (slight mis-forecast on my part there!) month of gardening and living in a yurt in Portugal, it turned out to be a hugely rewarding experience of living off-the-grid in the company of some pretty cool, like-minded, liberal people…

Paz e Amor,
Dan