My first visit to Oslo was in 2006. That time, it was for work and we were some distance away from town. I remember the flight in gave a dramatic impression, and I remember sitting in the conference centre, looking over the hill side, breathing in the thick scent of pine watching the sun slowing crawl toward the horizon at about 11pm. I only got into town the once, on the last night, and saw little of it which I was disappointed about. My second visit to Norway was to Trondheim and I enjoyed that as well.

So I was looking forward to visiting Oslo again, for a few days, doing the tourist thing. But I am afraid that I have been disappointed again; this city has not really grabbed me. The architecture is impressive at points, but there is a random, thrown-together quality about the city overall; nothing to rival the magnificence that is Grainger Town in Newcastle. And some of the signature buildings are, again, just okay; the Opera House has a roof you can walk up, but that seems to be it. The night time is subdued to say the least, and the food is okay at best. The only stand out feature seems to be an extra-ordinary number of sculptures — mostly bronzes, and often not famous people. Lots of nudes in heroic poses; the number involving seals is also distinctly above the average.

Of the two best things I have seen are, first the Sculpture Park. Very classically laid out garden, but with some really very good sculpture, full of character and life. And seals. And second, the folk museum, which shows Norweigian life and buildings at different stages of history. I have to admit, though, that I was at a loss to see the difference, because over the last 4-500 years, this seems to basically have involved making robust, timber buildings on stilts. While the museum is good, I think, having less buildings, but better explained would improve it. When you get down to it, one wooden farmhouse looks very like another, especially when you can see it only from the outside.

Perhaps the biggest surprise though has been the accessibility for pushchairs. In Oslo, this is never an afterthought; they just have not thought about it at all. The tram doors slam on you if you take too long, which may happen if, say, you are struggling to get a heavy, unwieldy, pram-shaped object through a narrow door. My visit to the Opera House was limited to walking around the lobby, as walking up a sloping roof, with nothing but “slippery when wet” signs to break a clear run to the fjord is not my idea of fun. My visit to the National Gallery involved 20 steps to get in, to discover that the pushchairs are banned in the exhibition area; still, hey, you can visit the shop. Looking through the door of the National Museum (only 10 stairs up) and I could see a line of buggies next to the security guard. I didn’t even bother.

This blog has been alive now since Feb 2006. It started with a relatively uneven tone, as many blogs do, moving between the personal and the professional, the and the, erm, less trivial; the first posts were a mildly witty observation about an airport, a review of Breakfast at Tiffany’s and a discussion on semantic enrichment of literature which seems as true then as now.

I think that it has now reached a more even state — it’s generally moving in a more professional blog while, perhaps ironically, my profession has moved more toward blogging. It contains very little of my personal life for reasons explained earlier.

I would like to beg the indulgence of my readers, both of whom know this anyway, by using my blog to announce the birth of our son, Sean Maioli Lord on 7th Dec 2010. He was 3.42 kg at birth

That’s it. I have no intention of this becoming a mawkish, baby-related blog. I do have one post that I may or may not write on the biology of babies. Please feel to stop me if it goes on too much.

Elba was a lot of fun; it’s very biased toward beaches, but there are plenty of these, they are easy to get to and, generally, free. For my money, the best of these ones that we went to were Aquavivata (or something like that) and Sansone (next to each other — I swam to the latter) and Capo Bianco. Both of these are withing spitting distance of Portoferraio. which is the biggest town. It turns out that Capo Bianco is part of a marine reserve, which explains, with no fishing; this probably explains why the place was so rich with life that otherwise would have ended up on pasta. But, with a pebble beach, a slow sloping seabed still only 1 or 2m in depth some 50m from shore and with many rocks, and a headland it’s ideal for swimming and snorkelling.

As well as Elba, I got to Pianosa. This is an ex-penal colony, with no permanent residents. It’s a strange place, full of mystery and excellent snorkelling. It’s also full of history, occuring in two of my favorite books; first, Posthumous Agrippa was exiled and later killed here, as is told in I, Claudius. The exact site isn’t known, but the seem to have found his swimming pool. And, secondly, Pianosa is the setting for Catch-22, although it in reality, it’s too small to have contained the events; I didn’t manage to find out whether it was occupied during the war, but it didn’t have a airbase. The whole place is a marine reserve, and the snorkelling was the only place which beat Capo Bianco. Beautiful though Pianosa is, there is a fly in the ointment, which is the Zecce on the island; the place is infested with ticks, which means that you have a reasonable chance of coming home with a blood-sucking monstrosity attacked to any accessible capillary.

After Elba, I’ve come to Lake Garda. All the Italians are complaining that it’s caldissimo; of course, back in Newcastle, they all complain it’s not hot enough. Never satisfied with the weather; just like the British.

The last holiday that I went on produced a long stream of blog posts; this one, I suspect will result in only one or two, which reflects the different character of places. India is a place of conflicts, confusion and excitement; Elba, on the other hand, is a holiday resort, universal beautiful, relaxed; in short, wonderful for swimming, sitting on the beach and general relaxation, but not so wonderful for writing about on a blog.

I took the train from Rome to Piombino Maritima; as with other times, the Italian trains beat the British equivalent easily. While, in some ways, they are not quite as nice inside, they are plentiful, ontime and cheap; the 15 Euro I paid for a three hour journey would hardly get me past the platform in Britain. Piombino itself, appears to be a scenic chemical factory, while Piombino Martima is a working ferry terminus, which says it all.

Elba itself is much, much prettier; a small island, with a large mountain range in the middle. A lesser nation would have built towns around the edge, but, as this is Italy, there are also improbable towns cemented onto impossible slopes, with hair-pin roads snaking inbetween. At this time of the year, though, the focus is on the beaches; I’d love to attempt the 1000m walk to the highest peak, but in this climate, the water, sun-tan cream, and sun umbrella would just weigh me down too much. I think coming back in April for hills, plants and geology would be excellent, though.

Speaking of the beaches, well, there are many. Many of these are hopelessly over-crowded, but some are a little quieter, without motor boats. The swimming is, on the whole, excellent; I bought some flippers which I’m having great fun with; I can dive deeper and stay down far longer, whizzing along through the shoals of fish.

Marciana Marina, where we are staying, is lovely, with a long promenade, several sheltered harbour beachs, and a pebble beach at the end, open to the sea. There is a jazz festival on in the main square; I get the impression they have pretty regular events there, but we’ve lucked out here. The standard has been very high, covering big band, modern trios and a jazz harpist. I’ve enjoyed it all; the crooner with the big band sang standards with a Italian accent, which was strange, but good.

In the relaxation of a beach holiday, I’ve been thinking daft ideas, which I may write about later. One was language teaching related — it’s got a crazy acronym which is Progressive Inculcation of Language by Listening to Stories (PILLS). The second was a design for inflatible flippers, which would work in the water but would also be good for walking outside. And, finally, an idea for domesticated bats as a method for insect control.

Maybe, I’ll write about them. Or, maybe not.

For the third year in a row, I managed to the Northern Rock cyclone this weekend. It was a lovely occasion as before; the weather was cool in the morning with a brisk wind, but it warmed up a little and the wind dropped by the end of the day. The numbers have gone up slightly and it was good to see so many cyclists around.

Compared to last years’ ride I was way down. I just cleared 5:30 in the saddle, or 6 hours elapsed, which is about 1 hour slower (although the route is, apparently, 2 miles longer than last year). Not unexpected, given the absence of training; this is my longest ride of the year, 40 miles being the longest otherwise. Having moved house early in the year, and with an F1 in the works, I just haven’t found the time.

This really is a great event; at the moment, it’s big enough to be an event, but small enough to still feel personal. I hope that it will get bigger, although the roads mean that it could never rival the GNR, because this sort of mass participation event will help to bring cycling up the agenda. However, having done the GNR, I know that this would almost certainly lessen the pleasure of it.

Managed to see “On What a Lovely War” on Friday, at the northern stage. I’ve not see it before although I’ve been aware of the play since they did it while I was at school. I guess that being based on World War I, the show starts from an emotional strong point, but the mix of light-hearted and optimistic songs, set against the deaths of millions works as well as it ever did; this version of it was magnificent, with the instrumentation on stage, as props, actors moving backward and forward between playing, singing and acting. Perhaps the most moving section was the 1914 football match in no mans’ land, ironic as it has no music over it.

The whole play is encapsulated, though, by its version of “Keep the Home Fires Burning” — the original is a light and jaunty number, although with a melancholy for home. Here, it is performed by a lone nurse, lending it a poignancy that is in the song, but which is hidden in most versions; the combination of the simple lyric and delicate melody is heart-breaking.

I knew that it was an Ivor Novello song; I didn’t know that it was his first big hit and defined his career to the extent that his grave reads “Ivor Novello 6th March 1951 Till you are home once more“. Nor did I know that this epitaph are the words of another — Lena Guilbert Ford, an American poet who wrote the lyrics, but has otherwise moved through history leaving only this song and a forlorn edit page to show her passing. A little more digging got me to an archive from New York Times:

London, March 12 — Two bombs were dropped together on the house of Mrs. Lena Guilbert Ford, the American poet who was killed in the air raid last week, and on the adjoining dwelling, an army expert testified at the inquest today. The bombs exploded simultaneously.

The Coroner’s jury found the death of Mrs. Ford, best known as author of the war song, “Keep the Home Fires Burning,” and that of her son, Walter was due to “suffocation from the collapse of a house caused by the explosion of bombs from a hostile aircraft”.

— New York Times (1918)

The rest of the article is a distressing account of the inquest, which tried to determine whether the mother outlived the son which had implications for inheritance.

She made little more impact on history because she was in it for only a short time more, dying in the declining years of World War I, a civilian casualty of a new form of warfare. One more tragedy among 20 million.

As one person said of my blog, it’s a bit weird, what with you thinking you’re still in India. It’s been a long time now, that we’ve been back, and I’ve had a lot of time to reflect on the experience. Writing the blog has served it’s purpose though; since I’ve been back, I’ve marked exams, taught two modules, run a meeting and submitted a paper. The holiday seems a long time ago, but the notes I took for the blog has helped me to remember the experience; for this reason, even though I wrote most of these reflections while travelling, I’ve decided to write these from the present, as opposed to the past present tense all the other posts have used.

I’ve also noticed that my page view stats have plummeted to the point that they are flat-lining around 1 a day (which is probably google). Perhaps I should get back to wittering about ontologies.

One of the most pervasive parts of the experience was the architecture; we saw many different styles and many different buildings. It was magnificent, finely wrought and cleverly details. This seems to reflect a wider delight in design and ornamentation, which you seem everywhere. The women’s clothes are brightly coloured, even when they are digging holes in the road. The tuk-tuks are covered in flowers. Even the mud huts in the agricultural areas have intricate and sweeping patterns inscribed in the cow dung. It’s all in stark contrast to both the garishness of the Bollywood experience and the surrounding environment.

The food mostly lived up to my expectations. From the home cooked food in Agra, the Shanti Restaurant in Jaislmer to the thali in Mehrangarh fort, we had some really good meals. On the whole, it wasn’t a new experience. The food is not that far removed from the UK curry, although with a few unique ingredients — the Rajastani desert beans — and the careful use of coconut. Like my experiences with Italy the best thing about the food is that it’s easy to get. Everywhere you go, good food surrounds, you don’t have to hunt for it and it’s not expensive. It’s just expected, as a matter of course. Compared to the 3 quid, ready-packed, pub food that we get here, it’s magnificent. I think we have a lot to learn from India.

The poverty and degradation has been grinding — much less so in India than in Dhaka, and it’s not the first time that I have seen it, but it’s always depressing. I suspect that we only see the edges of it, and the worst of the Shantis were away from the road, but this was enough for me.

I heard less music while I was there than I would have liked—the percussion was limited to tourist and ceremonial occasions, the rest was garish Hindi pop which totally lacks in appeal to me. So, much like home then.

The pollution I expected, but India, or at least the part of it that I say, was a very dirty place. — no where is clean, with animals on the street, rubbish everywhere, and the in-town midden being the most common disposal path. I guess the cows makes some sense, as they at least dispose of the organic material and produce something useful, if smelly. Even in Delhi, just outside of our, relatively posh, hotel the place was a mess, with sand heaps everywhere, an unusable pavement, and around the corner raw sewage was spilling onto the streets from a broken pipe. I have a relatively high tolerance for this sort of thing, but really this was too much. It will remain, I suspect, till they treat their public space like their private space.

A more pleasant aspect of India was the diversity of smell. Herbs and spices fill the air, both as a byproduct of the cooking and from incense. Back home, we everything that we use is chemical, even for strong smells such as lemon. Coming back to the UK, my senses where heightened to nasal assault that my own society has turned into; it’s pointless and we should stop it.

India is becoming a world power; I thilannk it’s clear that this century will be defined by it and China; I’m glad to have visited it, particularly at the time that I have. I’ve seen many good things here; but, then, many less good. I hope that India finds solutions for its problems and builds on its strengths; ultimately, it is going to have a larger and larger impact on this society as I get older.

My favourite memories of the journey; chilling out in the Shanti resturant looking over the desert from Jaislmer, the bus journey, hideous, crazy and dangerous though it was, and finally in Jaipur the observatory and the kites from the Wind Palace.

Outside the Hotel le Roi is a messy street, but inside it’s nice. The drive here was hectic and smelly, with many miles of crawling through traffic. Not nice at all. We had another near accident when a lorry in the lane next to us lost a tyre and the car was hit with large chunks of Rubber.

We came from the Taj Mahal. It’s been described in detail by many others; the sunlight scintillates of the marble facade, leaving you speechless; but, not if it’s foggy. Despite this, it is a magnificent building and visiting it is well worth while. I guess nothing can quite live up to is reputation once it becomes a world icon.

Just had to phone reception. The room heating controls don’t work, with the room getting colder and colder, so they have bought up a fan heater.

And that’s it; tomorrow, we go to the airport and fly home.

We started off today at the Amber fort in Jaipur. For some reason, the hawking here seems particularly heavy, a theme that was to continue. The Amber fort, though, is magnificent — it’s a labyrinth of connecting rooms, built through the walls of several connecting courtyards. Strange for me, the most interesting bit was the latrines (historical, not modern day, I hasten to add) and the water system. They had underground storage facilities, a system for elevating the water. In general, though I had a great time wandering through the rooms, finding new places.

After that we drove to a Agra Fort; we were short of time, but we managed to see much of it — the rooms were strange, over built over several levels. Finally, we saw the mosque at the back with relentless hawking, including demands for money in exchange for shoe guarding.

Finally a hellish journey into Agra — it was foggy and polluted, worse in the cold snap I suspect than normal. The driver didn’t know his way, and his relentless stopping resulted in a bike crashing into this rear end; minor injuries, fortunately, no worse. We finally got to the Garden Villas guest house, where we were staying. This was inside a drab, gated community, but inside the rooms were good with a warm welcome and an excellent, home-cooked curry. No complaints there.

As a city Jaipur is like many that we have been too — busy, polluted and unattractive, and also very in-your-face; yes, thank you, I am sure that are many elephants, but I still don’t want your tuk-tuk. We did see the Jantar Mantar observatory. This is a magnificent place, full of angles and careful measurements — Jai Singh thought that bigger was better. Each instrument had a careful description, telling you what it measured and what this measurement was for; although the signs kept of mixing up “accuracy” and “resolution” which bugged me a bit. The thing that confused me was that most of the instruments fall into two categories; those for measuring angles and sundials for measuring time. Time and space all sorted, it seems, but time only measurable during the day and space only measurable at night.

The city palace is okay; there are some good things inside, but it’s not as well done as Jodphur. The Wind Palace on the other hand is just a big building, but it’s fun to climb and the view from the top is great. Today is a saturday, and the place is full of tourists — many want to talk and I’ve been asked my name and photographed with many people. But the image that is going to stick in my mind are the kites circling overhead — hundreds of them fluttering in the wind, steered by intensely concentrating kids, perched on the sprawling rooftops. I have a grainy photograph which was the best I could do.

Finished off with dinner in the hotel cafe; the last time I had a curry with no spices at all was in Canada. That time, at least, it was served hot. If you stay in the Hotel Arya Niwas, well, avoid the food. Otherwise, it’s pretty nice.

The bus journey wasn’t that bad as it happened. The environmental conditions inside were okay; the heat disappeared pretty quickly; the temperature was nice till sundown, then I put more and more clothes on until I ran out. My feet got cold, but the rest of me was okay. The motion was a bit wierd and rolling, but in general I like travelling overnight and with horizontal. If there was some kind of night bus in the UK, I think that I’d take it pretty often; obviously I’d prefer something that wasn’t packed to the rafters and has some basic safety standards.

Oh, and a toilet.

The Aussies were made; the bus is squalid. There are seats and bunks. The posh option is a upper bunk over the seats, with sliding windows on both sides. The opposite side is a single bunk which is open. The seats are if you are really poor. The temperature inside the bus is rising from hot to, well, hotter. I have no idea what this must be like when we are not in the middle of a cold spell.

Turns out the seats are not if you are really poor; this is standing up. The bus is now heaving full of people on two different levels. Combined with the general madness that I’ve seen on the road, I would be nervous if there was anything at all I could do about it. People don’t moan about health and safety in India; there isn’t any to moan about.

Oh and it’s not non-smoking. The group of Americans opposite us are really not happy people.

Here we go…

This morning, went to the Jain temples I missed yesterday. There are five, as it happens, interlocking, interconnected, criss-crossing the streets. They’re very good, closeted and enclosed after the airy, openness of Ranakpur.

This afternoon a camel “safari” — on the way, we stopped off at a Mausoleum and then another Jain temple which we didn’t actually go in. The safari was a camel ride for two hours to some dunes, where we had fresh-cooked pakora, biscuits and a snack which tasted like a cross between poppadoms and monster munch. It was really fun in a donkey ride kind of sense. The town is the middle of a cold snap which made the desert pleasant.

We’re still on the waiting list for the train. We have a backup plan now involving a bus; apparently, without the tickets, we can’t travel anyway. I’d rather take the train, although some other Aussies (they get everywhere!) said the bus isn’t too bad.

The town of Jaisalmer is nice, with lots of great, intricate architecture; the lattice work is everywhere. The rest of the fort is actually a bazaar — to some extent, once you have seen one, you have seen them all. There are some Jain temples, though, which are impressive from the outside, although shut by the time we got there.

We eat food in the unpromising named “Shanti” restaurant, drawn in by the far more promising odour. It’s combination Nepali and India food, on the edge of the fort, with a view out over the desert. Best food so far by a long, long way.

Overnight from Jodphur was actually okay — the train was a bit of a tight fit, but fine. We arrived at the hotel just before 6am and kipped on the roof till breakfast. We are staying in the shadow of the fort. We should get a room and see what the day holds.

Still no reservations but apparently if they don’t come through, we can still travel, but with no sleep; better than nothing.

From the distance, an incredible noise shakes the town; it turns out to be a military jet.

Today, visited the Mehrangarh fort in Jodphur. It’s a wonderful place, excellent restored and with quality audio guide and signs. Apparently, when they started to restore it in 1972 one source of income was from selling the bat guano that have accumulated, which is an unusual start to a museum. Finished off the tour with an excellent veggie thali that went down very well.

Then moved onto a lightening tour of the outside of the palace — the tuk-tuk man expected to clean up on the return journey, but we already knew it would be shut by the time we got there. It was good, though, from the outside, and lovely at sunset. The tuk-tuk man on the way back tried to take us for 150 rupees back to the hotel; in the end we settled on 60 to the clock tower (5 minutes away).

Now in the train station waiting for a sleeper to Jaisalmer — I’m slightly nervous as we are travelling sleeper rather than AC2 — which is the first class — as there were no tickets. An aussie at the hotel mentioned that his sister lost her bags in the sleeper after someone gassed the entire carriage. The train station is not good; there are people everywhere, spread across the floor, sleeping on the stone while waiting. We’ve gone for the AC2 lounge (which technically we shouldn’t, I guess), which has seats at least.

We still don’t have reservations from Jaisalmer — we’re front of the reservations list, waiting for a drop out — apparently, we have a good chance, but I don’t want a good chance, I want tickets.

Food last night filled a whole but was otherwise disappointing.

This morning, I awoke to a cacophony; constant chanting from a nearby Hindu temple competing at sun break with the Muezzins’ call to prayer, as well as the ever present horn blowing and engine noise.

We are on the rooftop in a ramshackle building under a large crag with a fort on top. The crag is peppered with basking monkeys and topped by circling birds. The air is cool, clear and sweet smelling. I expect all of this will change.

Today started with a hairy car journey to the Ranakpur Jain temple. I know very little about the Jain religion except for extreme veggie tendencies. One thing is clear, though — they make very impressive temples. It was a place of singing and joy. As with as the religious and tourists, there were a bunch of school children from Bali — they were expect at posing, 10 of them could form up in an instant and they delighted in having their picture taken.

Bali turned out to be a village 30km away as we found out on the journey; it was bumpy, unpleasant and, erm, thrilling. The horn beeping was constant until night fell, then we drove with dipped lights until the a car or lorry approached in the opposite direction, when full beams were used. Indicators were constantly deployed, also, but I have no ideal with what meaning. We saw two crashes. One was between two lorries, side-on, and the other a lorry that had been rear-ended by a tuk-tuk. There’s no way that everyone walked away from these. A sorry sight.

No real idea about Jodphur until we got out — the last leg of the journey was by tuk-tuk as the guest house in inaccessible by car because of the narrow streets. It’s a dramatic place and seems to be clean. Food is to come.

A day late, but got here eventually. It’s much warmer than Delhi. The hotel is good enough and a blessed relief after last nights mouse pit.

Udaipur is a city on the lake; Octopussy was filmed here, but you can’t blame the setting for the rubbish movie; it’s striking and beautiful here with two buildings in the lake itself — a hotel and a temple.

We see a native dance show — the Goan dance was rather camp, with one guy in a dress riding on the back of another, while a third pranced around stage. The others were graceful rather than athletic, with the dancers in magnificent colours. Afterwards, we found a slightly dodgy rooftop restaurant; the place was a bit of a dump, but the food was excellent.

Sadly, we have less than 24 hours here.

Got fogged off and missed our connection. Now stuck in Delhi. The airport was chaos. It took us over 2 hours before we got a new ticket, and then a hotel transfer. The hotel is, well, a genuine cultural experience. Hot water — at least if you turn the boiler on first. The room not too clean with a strange smell. And no heating, which is unfortunate in the middle of winter.

Food was good though — we all went veggie — everyone else to be on the safe side. Took me a while to convince them that the chick peas would make up for the lack of protein. I didn’t point out the mouse running free by then, as it wouldn’t have helped. Explains the strange smell.

I’m hoping that my DEET is effective against insects other than mosquitos.