The Tao of Travel

by Paul Theroux

  — Living to Tell the Tale (2004), translated by Edith Grossman

  JAN MORRIS: ALTERCATION ON THE ZEPHYR

  I had pleasant companions at breakfast on the California Zephyr — a girl from Fresno who had never been on a train before, and two railroad buffs who kept me informed about the state of the track. However, I did have one altercation in the dining car. My ticket, I had been told, entitled me to anything I liked on the menu, but when I asked for cornflakes and scrambled eggs I was told that I was entitled to one or the other but not both. I called for the supervisor to expostulate, but I did not get far. I had got it wrong, the functionary said, not unkindly, and I quote him word for word: “You’re not from this country. You don’t understand the lingo.” But the girl from Fresno thought the man had been rather rude, and one of the train buffs offered to share his scrambled eggs with me — only fair, really, because I had already urged upon him some of my Cooper’s Oxford Marmalade.

  — Contact! A Book of Encounters (2010)

  Travel Wisdom of

  HENRY FIELDING

  In terms of travel, Henry Fielding was, as a youth, a student at the University of Leiden, and after he earned a law degree in London he became a circuit judge. His life (1707–1754) was short and turbulent, but he was productive, first as a writer of satirical plays, and after these were declared unlawful he wrote political pamphlets and the great novels Joseph Andrews (1742) and Tom Jones (1749). His ill health burdened him: he suffered from asthma, liver disease, gout, and dropsy (oedema), which he refers to repeatedly in his Voyage to Lisbon. I feel that his illnesses heightened his sensibilities and contributed to his close observation and the bite of his satire. He set sail for Lisbon looking for health, but the meandering voyage sickened him further and he died soon after he arrived. These paragraphs are from his Voyage to Lisbon, which was published the year after his death.

  There would not, perhaps, be a more pleasant, or profitable study, among those which have their principal end in amusement, than that of travels or voyages, if they were writ, as they might be, and ought to be, with a joint view to the entertainment and information of mankind. If the conversation of travellers be so eagerly sought after as it is, we may believe their books will be still more agreeable company, as they will, in general, be more instructive and more entertaining.

  If the customs and manners of men were everywhere the same, there would be no office so dull as that of a traveller: for the difference of hills, valleys, rivers; in short, the various views in which we may see the face of the earth, would scarce afford him a pleasure worthy of his labour …

  To make a traveller an agreeable companion to a man of sense, it is necessary, not only that he should have seen much, but that he should have overlooked much of what he hath seen. Nature is not, any more than a great genius, always admirable in her productions, and therefore the traveller, who may be called her commentator, should not expect to find everywhere subjects worthy of his notice.

  4

  Murphy’s Rules of Travel

  A TRAVELLER I HAVE ADMIRED FOR MOST OF my travelling life is the writer Dervla Murphy, who was born in 1931 in Lismore, Ireland, where she still lives. I began reading her in the 1960s, with her first book, Full Tilt (1965). In Singapore in 1969, I met an Englishman who claimed to have met her. He had asked her how she’d managed, as a woman, to travel through Ethiopia, for her book In Ethiopia with a Mule (1968). She replied, “It was simple. I went as a man.” ¶ Self-educated (she dropped out of school at the age of fourteen to look after her ailing mother), she mentions in her early memoir, Wheels Within Wheels, that at fifteen she was able to levitate herself. This fascinated me. But when I asked her about it, she told me that many people have written to her to relate similar experiences of levitation. As she grew older she lost this magical gift. And when her mother died, she set off on her Full Tilt journey, riding a bicycle from Ireland to India, suffering many dangers and indignities — snow, near drowning, being stoned by mullahs in Iran.

  “By the time I arrived at the Afghan frontier,” she writes in that book, “it seemed quite natural, before a meal, to scrape the dried mud off the bread, pick the hairs out of the cheese and remove the bugs from the sugar. I had also stopped registering the presence of fleas, the absence of cutlery, and the fact that I hadn’t taken off my clothes or slept in a bed for ten days.”

  In India, after enduring these hardships — but being Dervla — she worked in a home for Tibetan refugees.

  Though she has never married, she had a daughter, Rachel, whom she raised alone and took everywhere, including India, Baltistan, South America, and Madagascar. She writes, “A child’s presence emphasizes your trust in the community’s goodwill.”

  She has written twenty-three travel books, including books about England and Ulster. All her travel has been arduous, mainly solitary, and terrestrial, her preferred mode of travel an inexpensive bicycle. She never complains, never satirizes herself or the people she is among, and though her writing often contains infelicities, it reflects the woman herself: downright, patient, truthful, reliable, never looking for comfort but always the rougher experiences of the road; a wanderer in the oldest tradition. I find her admirable in every way, and her advice to travellers, “to facilitate escapism”, is full of the wisdom of a life of journeying:

  CHOOSE YOUR COUNTRY, USE GUIDEBOOKS TO IDENTIFY THE AREAS MOST FREQUENTED BY FOREIGNERS — AND THEN GO IN THE OPPOSITE DIRECTION.

  This advice reeks of political incorrectness; it’s “snobbish” to draw a clear distinction between travellers and tourists. Yet it’s also realistic. The escapist traveller needs space, solitude, silence. Tragically, during my lifetime, roads have drastically depleted that natural habitat. Ads for phony “adventure tours” make me grind my few remaining teeth. For example, “England to Kenya by truck! Overland adventure! See five countries in six weeks!” Who in their right mind wants to see five countries in six weeks? How not to escape … I always try to get off the beaten track. One favourite place where I did so was a trek from Asmara to Addis Ababa. Things are different now, but most people I encountered then had never seen a white person before. Even on more recent trips, in Russia and Romania — where I took fairly obvious routes that certainly weren’t uncharted land — I always stayed away from the tourist trails.

  MUG UP ON HISTORY.

  To travel in ignorance of a region’s history leaves you unable to understand the “why” of anything or anyone. For instance, Castro’s Cuba [the subject of Murphy’s book The Island That Dared: Journeys in Cuba, 2008] must baffle visitors uninformed about the five-hundred-year lead-up to Fidel’s revolution. Heavy sociological or political research is unnecessary, although if you happen to fancy that sort of thing it will add an extra dimension to your journey. Otherwise, enough of current politics will be revealed as you go along. And in those happy lands where domestic politics don’t matter to the locals, you can forget about them.

  Before your trip, learn as much as possible about religious and social taboos and then scrupulously respect them. Where gifts of money are inappropriate, find out what substitutes to carry. In Muslim countries such as Afghanistan, a code of conduct toward travellers prevents acceptance of money from guests, so I often buy gifts for children at the local bazaar.

  TRAVEL ALONE OR WITH JUST ONE PREPUBESCENT CHILD.

  In some countries two adults travelling together may be perceived as providing mutual support, making acceptance by the locals less spontaneous and complete. But a child’s presence emphasizes your trust in the community’s goodwill. And because children pay little attention to racial or cultural differences, junior companions rapidly demolish barriers of shyness or apprehension often raised when foreigners unexpectedly approach a remote village. I found this to be the case in all my travels with my young daughter, especially when we travelled through Kodagu in southern India.

  DON’T OVERPLAN.

  At
sunrise, it’s not necessary, or even desirable, to know where you are going to be at sunset. In sparsely inhabited areas carry a lightweight tent and sleeping bag. Elsewhere, rely on fate to provide shelter: dependence on those you meet en route greatly enhances escapism, and villagers are unfailingly hospitable to those who trust them. I have been welcomed into villagers’ homes everywhere I’ve cycled or walked, and was always grateful for what was typically a space on the floor. “Trust” is a key word for relaxed travelling among people whose different way of life may demand adaptability but should prompt no unease or suspicion.

  BE SELF-PROPELLED, OR BUY A PACK ANIMAL.

  For long treks far from roads and towns, buy a pack animal to carry food, camping gear, kerosene for your stove if firewood is scarce — and of course your child, should he or she be too small to walk all day.

  When organizing such a trek, allow for spending a week or ten days at your starting point, inquiring about the best source of pack animals. Take care to find a reliable adviser as well as a horse trader preferably an adviser unconnected to the trader. In Ethiopia in 1966, I was lucky to be advised by Princess Aida, granddaughter of the then emperor, Haile Selassie, and half a dozen mules were paraded around the courtyard of a royal palace for my inspection. A decade or so later, in Baltistan, I bought a retired polo pony to carry Rachel, my six-year-old daughter, and our camping gear and supplies, including two sacks of flour, because in midwinter in the Karakorum, the villagers have no spare food. In Peru, as a nine-year-old, Rachel rode a mule named Juana for the first six hundred miles from Cajamarca, but a fodder shortage necessitated her walking the remaining nine hundred miles to Cuzco: poor Juana had become so debilitated that she could carry only our gear.

  It’s important to travel light. At least 75 per cent of the equipment sold nowadays in camping shops — travel clothes lines, roll-up camping mats, lightweight hair dryers — is superfluous. My primary basics, although it depends on the journey, are a lightweight tent, a sleeping bag suitable for the country’s climate, and a portable stove.

  IF ASSISTED BY A PACK ANIMAL, GET DETAILED LOCAL ADVICE ABOUT THE TERRIAN AHEAD.

  And remember, a campsite suitable for you may be a disaster area for a hungry horse or mule. Then you must press on, often to a site hardly fit for humans but providing adequate grazing. People can do the mind-over-matter bit, and resolve never again to let supplies run so low, but an equine helper doesn’t have that sort of mind. If there’s no fodder at six P.M., the mule cannot have consoling thoughts about stuffing it in at six P.M. the next day. And there is nothing more guilt-provoking than seeing a pack animal who has worked hard for you all day going without sustenance.

  CYBERSPACE INTERCOURSE VITIATES GENUINE ESCAPISM.

  Abandon your mobile phone, laptop, iPod, and all such links to family, friends, and work colleagues. Concentrate on where you are and derive your entertainment from immediate stimuli, the tangible world around you. Increasingly, in hostels and guesthouses one sees “independent” travellers eagerly settling down in front of computers instead of conversing with fellow travellers. They seem only partially “abroad”, unable to cut their links with home. Evidently the nanny state — and the concomitant trend among parents to overprotect offspring — has alarmingly diminished the younger generation’s self-reliance. And who is to blame for this entrapment in cyberspace? The fussy folk back at base, awaiting the daily (or twice daily) e-mail of reassurance.

  DON’T BE INHIBITED BY THE LANGUAGE BARRIER.

  Although ignorance of the local language thwarts exchanges of ideas, it’s unimportant on a practical level. I’ve wandered around four continents using only English and a few courtesy phrases of Tibetan, Amharic, Quechua, Albanian, or whatever. Our basic needs — sleeping, eating, drinking — can always be indicated by signs or globally understood noises.

  Even on the emotional level, the language barrier is quite porous. People’s features, particularly their eyes, are wonderfully eloquent. In our everyday lives, the extent to which we wordlessly communicate is taken for granted. In “far-flungery”, where nobody within a hundred miles speaks a word of any European language, one fully appreciates the range of moods and subtle feelings that may be conveyed visually.

  BE CAUTIOUS — BUT NOT TIMID.

  The assumption that only brave or reckless people undertake solo journeys off the beaten track is without foundation. In fact, escapists are ultracautious: that’s one of their hallmarks and an essential component of their survival mechanisms. Before departure, they suss out likely dangers and either change their route — should these seem excessive — or prepare to deal with any reasonable hazards.

  Granted, there’s a temperamental issue here: is a bottle half empty or half full? Why should your bones break abroad rather than at home? Optimists don’t believe in disasters until they happen, and therefore are not fearful, which is the opposite of being brave.

  INVEST IN THE BEST AVAILABLE MAPS.

  And whatever you do, don’t forget your compass.

  5

  Travellers on Their Own Books

  THE WRITING OF A TRAVEL BOOK IS, LIKE THE trip itself, a conscious decision, requiring a gift for description, an ear for dialogue, a great deal of patience, and the stomach for retracing one’s steps. It is very different from fiction, the inner journey, which is an imaginative process of discovery. In the travel book, the writer knows exactly how the story will end; there are no surprises. The privations of the road become the privations of the desk. Because the travel book is a recounting of the journey, there is always the chance that the traveller will embroider, for effect or merely to stay awake. ¶ In a fit of candour or self-consciousness, many travel writers have felt the need to explain how or why they wrote their books, and in doing so they reveal a great deal about themselves. Here are some travellers reflecting on their work.

  HENRY FIELDING: “IGNORANT, UNLEARNED, AND FRESH-WATER CRITICS”

  Now from both these faults [plagiarism and hyperbole] we have endeavoured to steer clear in the following narrative: which, however the contrary may be insinuated by ignorant, unlearned, and fresh-water critics, who have never travelled either in books or ships, I do solemnly declare doth, in my own impartial opinion, deviate less from truth than any other voyage extant; my Lord Anson’s alone being, perhaps, excepted.

  — Voyage to Lisbon (1755)

  SAMUEL JOHNSON: AN HOUR SPENT HATCHING THE IDEA OF A BOOK

  I sat down on a bank, such as a writer of Romance might have delighted to feign. I had indeed no trees to whisper over my head, but a clear rivulet streamed at my feet. The day was calm, the air soft, and all was rudeness, silence, and solitude. Before me, and on either side, were high hills, which by hindering the eye from ranging, forced the mind to find entertainment for itself. Whether I spent the hour well I know not; for here I first conceived the thought of this narration.

  — A Journey to the Western Islands of Scotland (1775)

  C. M. DOUGHTY: “THE SEEING OF AN HUNGRY MAN”

  We set but a name upon the ship, that our hands have built (with incessant labour) in a decenium, in what day she is launched forth to the great waters; and few words are needful in this place. The book is not milk for babes: it might be likened to a mirror. Wherein is set forth faithfully some parcel of the soil of Arabia smelling of sámn [clarified butter] and camels … And I rise now, from a long labour accomplished, with grateful mind and giving thanks to those learned men who have helped me, chiefly in the comparison — no light task — of my Arabic words, written from the lips of the people of Nejd, with the literal Arabic …

  As for me who write, I pray that nothing be looked on in this book but the seeing of an hungry man and the telling of a most weary man; for the rest the sun made me an Arab, but never warped me to Orientalism.

  — Travels in Arabia Deserta (1888)

  DAVID LIVINGSTONE: “IT IS
FAR EASIER TO TRAVEL THAN TO WRITE ABOUT IT”

  As to those literary qualifications which are acquired by habits of writing, and which are so important to an author, my African life has not been favourable to the growth of such accomplishments but quite the reverse; it has made composition irksome and laborious. I think I would rather cross the African continent again than write another book. It is far easier to travel than to write about it.

  — from the original Introduction to Missionary Travels in South Africa (1857)

  PAUL DU CHAILLU: “IT IS MUCH EASIER TO HUNT GORILLAS THAN TO WRITE ABOUT THEM”

  The long and tedious labour of preparing this book for the press leaves me with the conviction that it is much easier to hunt gorillas than to write about them — to explore new countries than to describe them. During the twenty months which I have passed in the process of writing out my journals since my return to the United States, I have often wished myself back in the African wilds. I can only think that the reader, when he closes the book, will not think this labour wasted.

  — Preface, Explorations and Adventures in Equatorial Africa (1861); these lines were probably inspired by Livingstone (see above), whom he acknowledges in the text of his book