January 2024 in Review, Part I

New Year's Day Traditions

The first day of the year means one thing here in the post-apocalyptic future: An epic slate of battles taking place at the Thunderdome!

Hope we've backed the right combatants, because Curmudgeon really needs* a new pair of shoes.…

*This last part is no joke. These Converse are barely a year and a half old (with 6-8 months of that exclusively flip flop weather), and have already been repaired 4 times in 3 different countries. Not a good advertisement for the brand. Next time we go back to buying knockoffs, since they last about the same and cost 1/10 of the price.

Good Omens

Waking up to a yard full of curious camels on New Year's morning is a good omen for the coming year, right? That is a thing, right?

Well, even if not, it's at least an undeniably excellent way to start a Monday....

Reading is FUNdamental

Quite a few things are capable of making you feel like you've taken mind-altering substances, despite not actually having done so. Reading this guy's poetry after climbing up a mountain overlooking this particular desert is one of those things....

Google Maps Fail: Black Irish Camp Edition

When you walk through the desert for 3hrs (one-way), because you heard that the Black Irish Camp has the freshest, frothiest Guinness this side of Tabuk, only to find that it's not open on Tuesdays. Or any other day of the week. Typical.... #googlemapsfail

‘90s J-Lo

Can't see dead (or just currently sans foliage?) trees in the desert without immediately thinking of that film The Cell. That's the power of great cinematography, and late ‘90s Jennifer Lopez.

Although full disclosure, this ‘tree’ is actually a 20 centimetre tall bush. That's the power of getting down on your hands and knees putting the camera really close to things....

On This Day in Years Past

This is a repost from last year of some memories from January 3rds past, but last year almost no one saw it - probably because of the foul language, which is still there, but doing the same thing and hoping for a different outcome is a rational way to go about one's business, right?

On This Day in 2009 (in Nouakchott, Mauritania):
"Just wanted to get a pastry this afternoon in Nouakchott, but instead got tear gassed and chased by riot police during a [redacted or else FB will block this post and ban me, because its algorithms inexplicably still don't understand basic context] protest"

On This Day in 2010 (in Goma, DR Congo):
"FYI, Congo is a super expensive shithole. But on the bright side I'm only 20km from a volcano that erupted yesterday and 50km from the frontline with the Interahamwe (aka the militia responsible for the Rwandan genocide)"

Later on This Day in 2010 (still in Goma, DR Congo):
"OK, so one grilled fish dinner (and two pints of local beer) later, and I realise I may have been a little harsh on the place. It's definitely no Rwanda, but I suppose that this little lakeside sliver of the Congo isn't that bad - at least not from the inside of the heavily-guarded compound that I'm in."

On This Day in 2011 (in Harar, Ethiopia):
"Harari coffee makes good Italian espresso taste like shitty Nescafe™ - needless to say I'll be bringing some home...."

On This Day in 2014 (in Muscat, Oman):
"Went to pick up my rental car this morning and got a free upgrade to a brand new Mazda 6 - promptly put 700km on it to show my appreciation......"

On This Day in 2020 (in Cairo, Egypt):
"We're not going to lie, Cairo is an unfathomably chaotic shithole of a filthy 3rd world city with 20 million inhabitants, most of whom seem to be clinically insane, scurrying around like it's the end of times. But for some reason we've loved every second of being here, and it's been the perfect place to start 2020. Does the fact that we've been using Egyptian vodka in lieu of water to make our morning instant coffee(s) take anything away from this positive assessment? Of course not. Why would it?"

At Least 11

How many days in a row can you eat the exact same very simple lunch without getting sick of it? At least 11, and today will very likely make it an even dozen.

It does help if this is your only full meal of the day, and every time you sit down to eat you've just returned from wandering around in the desert for between 3-6 hours. Not only does it help, but it makes it thoroughly tasty and enjoyable.

Total cost: something around €0.50 (with local market bought ‘premium’ humus, tomatoes or cucumbers, spices, olive oil and fresh Arabic bread)

Walking Along Desert Highways

[With this song stuck in your head]

Piggy Bank

Signs you may have spent too much time in the desert: When you come across camel vertebrae and all you can see is a piggy bank....

Rush Hour

Rush hour in the desert earlier this evening. LA? Phoenix? Las Vegas? All good guesses, but no, this is still Wadi Rum....

The Cancellation of James Franco

File this one away under ‘Things you don't want to see when you're out hiking alone (in shorts and flip flops) in the desert’. Especially when your mind is already dividing most of its finite processing power between:

A) Stepping carefully so as to avoid a 127 Hours scenario, and

B) Wondering if James Franco was ever officially cancelled or not.

And now it has to worry about serpents too? Ignorance truly is bliss....

Q Shaman Prison Interview

Our main takeaway from listening to this entire 44-minute 37-second interview with the chap christened the Q Shaman by Alex Jones is pity. Or maybe empathy, since that sounds less patronising.

We feel sorry for him in the same way we'd feel sorry for someone who joined a cult or a grandmother who got swindled out of her life savings by a conman.

So if you only listen to one QAnon shaman related prison interview to mark today's infamous anniversary, this is a pretty good one…..

Here Comes the Sun

Deserts get freezing cold at night. Which means the best time of the day here is the (late) morning, when the sun finally makes it over the mountain and belatedly graces us with its presence.

Sure, the temperature might technically only go from 6° or 7°C to just slightly over 6° or 7°C at this exact moment, but it feels like summer again, regardless of what the mercury says....

On This Day Last Year (in Pachabhaiya, Nepal)

Orthodox Santa brought even better weather today than that jolly fat man who stopped by a couple of weeks ago. And while we hate to take all the credit, we did leave him a plate of his favourite jalebi as well as a big ol' glass of fresh goat milk (generously spiked with his favourite local millet schnapps), so... you're welcome greater Pokhara area....

New Year's Resolutions Are for Suckers

tl;dr According to this article in The Guardian, new year's resolutions are often counterproductive, and you're fine just the way you are (more or less, probably), so don't bother making them in the first place. Most people could also benefit from doing less, rather than more.

Coincidentally, we just read an old book by the chap who wrote the article, called 𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘈𝘯𝘵𝘪𝘥𝘰𝘵𝘦: 𝘏𝘢𝘱𝘱𝘪𝘯𝘦𝘴𝘴 𝘧𝘰𝘳 𝘗𝘦𝘰𝘱𝘭𝘦 𝘞𝘩𝘰 𝘊𝘢𝘯'𝘵 𝘚𝘵𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘗𝘰𝘴𝘪𝘵𝘪𝘷𝘦 𝘛𝘩𝘪𝘯𝘬𝘪𝘯𝘨, which is quite good as well and recommended new year reading.

Although if you don't have time for that, the gist is that Stoics and Buddhists pretty much figured it all out, so be more like Stoics and Buddhists and you'll be happier and less stressed.

Simple and easy - ie the perfect kind of life advice!

Desert Rose, Ya Leil Ya Leil

Try coming across this and not having Sting and Cheb Mami's late '90s banger 'Desert Rose' immediately pop into your head. Impossible...

The Toilet Store

Even after being here for two and half weeks, it's still hard to believe that this background isn't CGI. It's also hard to believe that such a tiny village in the desert has such a well-stocked toilet store. This place truly is unbelievable....

Sky Art (aka Lives That Matter)

Some sky art. Brought to you courtesy of physics and all the airlines that are still avoiding the neighbouring airspace - because you can never be too cautious when it comes to protecting people whose lives actually count for something!

Knowing which side your bread is buttered on

Compared to the ubiquitous camels, cats are a relatively rare sight in this village. But this page knows which side its proverbial bread is buttered on. You're welcome....

Dr Seuss

When real life foliage has you looking around for the Cat in the Hat....

Hi Wadi Rum

There are lots of things to love about Wadi Rum - the surreal desert landscapes in all directions for instance - but the street art scene is most definitely not one of them....

Village Sunset (Out My Backdoor)

Tambourines and elephants are playin' in the band

Won't you take a ride on the flyin' spoon? Dood-n-doo-doo

Wonderous apparition provided by magician

Doo, doo, doo, lookin' out my back door

Good Morning Neighbours….

Practical Campers

When you really want to have a Friday night camp out with the family in the desert, but you also can't be bothered to venture more than 50 metres out if the village....

Dromedary Desert Drama

You can't see them clearly of course, but the two little specks in the desert in the background here are a bedouin and a camel - the former giving chase to the latter, after it decided to wander off, back from whence they'd just come.

When all was said and done, it took approximately an hour for him to finally catch up to the wayward dromedary and lead it back (very begrudgingly) to the small group that was travelling out into the desert.

Exciting, riveting stuff to watch live. Seriously. Never a boring day here....

At least 22

22. That's the answer to the question posed a week and a half ago regarding how many days in a row one could eat the same very basic lunch without getting tired of it. Or rather it should be ‘At least 22’, as we're leaving the desert tomorrow, so that's where the streak will sadly come to an end.

As you can see, it ended with some uninhibited decadent excess though, including both tomatoes and cucumbers (rather than just the usual tomatoes or cucumbers) as well as an extra splash of olive oil on the humus. Can it get any more bougie than that? Not likely. But you only live once, right?

Good Luck, Sacrificial Tree

These photos were taken 28mins and around 2km apart. Good luck keeping the desert at bay, valliant sacrificial tree - looks like you're going to need it!

This Intense and Vital Beauty

“For most of us most of the time, the world of everyday experience seems rather dim and drab. But for a few people often, and for a fair number occasionally, some of the brightness of visionary experience spills over, as it were, into common seeing, and the everyday universe is transfigured....

Here is an entirely characteristic description of this transfiguration of the everyday world:

‘I was sitting on the seashore, half listening to a friend arguing violently about something which merely bored me. Unconsciously to myself, I looked at a film of sand I had picked up on my hand, when I suddenly saw the exquisite beauty of every little grain of it; instead of being dull, I saw that each particle was made up on a perfect geometrical pattern, with sharp angles, from each of which a brilliant shaft of light was reflected, which each tiny crystal shone like a rainbow....

The rays crossed and recrossed, making exquisite patterns of such beauty that they left me breathless.... Then, suddenly, my consciousness was lighted up from within and I saw in a vivid way how the whole universe was made up of particles of material which, no matter how dull and lifeless they might seem, were nevertheless filled with this intense and vital beauty.

For a second or two the whole world appeared as a blaze of glory. When it died down, it left me with something I have never forgotten and which constantly reminds me of the beauty locked up in every minute speck of material around us.’ “

- Aldous Huxley, Heaven and Hell

On This Day in 2011 (in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia)

"Here's probably the coolest postcard I found in Ethiopia - it's a painting by Joseph Habtemariam called 'Girls' and is currently en route to a couple of you."

On This Day in 2020 (over Khartoum, Sudan)

“So long Khartoum - you definitely kept it real! The confluence of the White and Blue Niles, Sufis in cemeteries, deserted pyramids, a million different kinds of falafel, cool graffiti, gorgeous calls to prayer, the friendliest of people around every corner, the rhythmic pounding of heavy artillery and gunfire* to lull you to sleep at night. What more could you ask for in a holiday destination?”

*NB: On what should have been my last day in Khartoum there was a small coup attempt (or more accurately, a mini rebellion cum extortion attempt by factions loyal to the former regime, who got paid off to leave the country when the longtime dictator got ousted the previous year), which completely shut down the city and closed the airport. And in a rather roundabout way, brought me to Wadi Rum the following month.

The Feeling's Mutual

When you're finally on your way out of town, and one of the village dumpsters thoughtfully reminds you that the feeling is mutual. How sweet. Love you too Wadi Rum. Until next time. Inshallah....

No Waking in Fright

After making various Wake in Fright jokes over the preceding weeks, it was both bittersweet and a bit of a relief to finally leave the village in the desert.

And only having to wait a few minutes before catching a ride with a random local headed all the way back to Aqaba was also a pleasant surprise - with the hour-long drive featuring interesting conversation, atmospheric music and stunning scenery....