We are sorry to say that Mac is not very well, but he is still e-mailing strong and recently sent the Beetle a collection of travel reminiscences.

A friend of mine reading my Guam notes was also stationed in Guam whilst working in the Navy. He told me something interesting about a couple of Japanese soldiers that had hid in the jungles for many years not knowing the War was over. He said that one was something like a private and the other a Corporal and they had some kind of disagreement between them and did not speak to each other for a period of twenty years while hiding out in the jungle. Ha!

I am still enjoying reading A Sense of Place about travel writers by Michael Shapiro. I was surprised to learn that India is Rick Steves favourite country although he writes and conducts tours mostly in Europe. He said he would never take a tour group to India as it is unpredictable: “I wouldn’t want to be in charge of making twenty people happy in India”.

Me: I visited India three times taking India rail pass and loved it and found it fascinating, but like Rick Steves, I would not recommend it to others for fear they might get ill and blame me! Rick Steves says the Reichstag (new one) building in Berlin is a new glass dome that is open and free all the time so people can literally look over the shoulders of their legislators and know what’s on their desk and keep an eye on them. He has a building in Edmonds Washington where he employs sixty people. Here, I thought it was just him with a backpack on his back roughing it through Europe, well, maybe along with a photographer! He says his tour guides for his tours are the best paid in Europe. I suspect his tours would be good for someone wanting to be with a group.

One of my favourite writers is Jan Morris. I started reading her when he was James Morris. Morris had sex change operation in Casablanca. He had been at one time an Intelligence officer in the British Army and accompanied the 1933 Everest expedition that reached the summit for the first time. He was married with four children. His wife and he still live together in Wales. I was disappointed when I heard he had become a woman as I prefer male travel writers. I guess I will have to reread his earlier work when he was a male to see if I can notice any difference in his travel writing as a woman.

The travel writer Eric Newby spent thirteen months in POW camps in World War II. He escaped in September 1943 immediately after the Italian armistice. A sympathetic Italian commander who was later beaten to death by the Germans let the prisoners escape. Newby who had recently broke his ankle left atop a mule. A Slovenian couple with anti-Fascist sympathies sheltered Newby who became smitten with their daughter Wanda. When it became unsafe for Newby to stay with Slovenian family, he sought shelter in the maternity hospital of a nearby hospital. But as the Germans closed in father of the family risked his life to drive Newby through Parma to a mountain hideout in the Po Valley. Ultimately Newby was recaptured and returned to prison camps but survived the war. Interesting accounts (to me)!

On continuing on the theme of travel writers, I’ve been reading Fodors’ Exploring India Author Fiona Dunlop 1998. On page 14, she says, “When a desert woman in Rajasthan (the most colourful and interesting section of India to me. Mac) dons a pido, a yellow veil with a large red spot, it announces her pregnancy and acceptance by the community. Simply being fertile is however not enough. Vedic verses honour sons followed by more sons but never daughters. When a boy is born conch shells are blown in Bengal and Assam and drums are beaten in Makargshtra. When a girl is born the women of Rajasthan retreat behind their veils and wail. In traditional Hindu households throughout India an ancient rite to produce a male child is still performed over pregnant women”.

In the 1980s a survey revealed that of 8,000 abortions carried out in India after prenatal sex determination only one was a male foetus. On page 15 the author talks about Muslims, who, unlike Hindus believing in resurrection after death and in the existence of heaven and hell. It is customary for Muslims to bury rather than cremate their dead.

If you would like to contact Mac, he can be e-mailed on: macsan400@yahoo.com