Our first speaker was Mark Honigsbaum, whose talk was entitled
The Fever Trail, after his book of the same name, which documents the
discovery of the Cinchone tree (Cascarilla), which was found between 4,000
& 10,000 ft up in Ecuador. This tree provided the cure for malaria
and was brought back to Europe and then planted in other malarial regions
of the world such as India and Indonesia.
Mark’s slides however showed us a trip he made to Ecuador in April
this year. He travelled into the mountains with a guide following an old
treasure hunter’s trail for seven days and a distance of around
30 km’s. His scenic photo’s reflected this stark area that
the sun hardly seems ever to penetrate, the mountains seemed to always
be covered in cloud. As well as the scenery he showed us the revered grave
of an old treasure hunter, where today’s treasure hunters leave
an offering.
Our second speaker was Toby Green whose talk was entitled Travels
in West Africa to Senegal, Guinea and Guinea-Bissau. Toby’s mission
had been to find the Marabout, who are shamens and charm makers who can
reputedly make you invisible with their ju-ju magic! Toby’s slides
were not for the squeamish as they depicted what goes into the making
of the charms, such as parts of black cats and used funeral shrouds.
Toby heard of cases where these charms were used to cure snakebites,
but this did not stop him coming down with malaria! His pictures showed
us the regions green valleys, volcanic cones and waterfalls and scenes
of village life including millet pounding and tea making. We saw a photo
of a “Magic stone” these stones miraculously come back to
the same place even if removed; this has resulted in dead straight roads
taking diversions around them.
Toby did finally meet a Marabout who for a price would make him invisible,
but he wouldn’t divulge whether he managed it, we’ll all have
to read his book, “Meeting the invisible man” to find out.
The next London meeting will be on the June 8th (the second Saturday
due to the golden jubilee bank holiday weekend). Speaking will be Peter
Eltringham — Travelling in the Maya World and Mary Russell
— Travelling around Syria, digressing to Baghdad.
London meetings are held at The Church of Scotland, Crown Court,
behind the Fortune Theatre in Covent Garden at 2.30pm the ussualy onfirst
Saturday of each month. There is no London meeting in August, but we will
be back on Saturday 1st September. For more information, you can contact
the Globetrotter Info line on +44 (0) 20 8674 6229, or visit the website:
www.globetrotters.co.uk
