The Atlantis Enigma

Suggestions for the location of Atlantis have varied from the Pyrenees in France and Spain, Morocco and Bahamas, to Mexico, Bahamas and Antarctica. Now it appears the Azores might be home to this legendary underwater city following the recent discovery of a mysterious giant underwater pyramid near Terceira Island in the Azores.

According to Plato, Atlantis was a great island in the Atlantic Ocean somewhere to the west of the ‘Pillars of Hercules’ (now known as the Straight of Gibraltar). It apparently sunk into the ocean around 9650 BC. Many scholars believe Atlantis never existed and Plato used the island as a political allegory. However given the location of the Azores, this new discovery could give credence to his writings, but sitting at a depth of 40m, it may be a while before this site is properly excavated.

Atlantis has it all; it’s an ancient thriving city with ambiguous plans to be a super power and then disappears somewhere into the ocean – perfect fodder for the imaginative theorist.

Atlantean Crystals

The renowned psychic Edgar Cayce first mentioned Atlantis in a reading in 1923. He proposed Atlantis was an ancient, now-submerged, highly-evolved civilization with ships and aircraft powered by a mysterious form of energy crystal.

This crystal was an Atlantean power crystal which gathered solar, lunar, stellar, atmospheric, and Earth energies as well as unknown elemental forces. Cayce believed the Atlanteans used the crystal initially to rejuvenate their bodies and so had a youthful appearance despite being several hundred years old. Later the energy was used to power crafts and vehicles which could travel on land, in the sky and under the sea at the speed of sound.

In the early 1970’s, this theory became popular again when a naturopathic practitioner from Arizona, Dr Ray Brown, allegedly found a mysterious crystal in a pyramid when he got separated from friends whilst diving from the edge of a submarine drop-off called ‘The Tongue of the Ocean’ in the Bahamas.

Brown entered the pyramid and even though there was no direct light source it was apparently well lit. Inside, he found a metallic rod with a red gem and a crystal sphere in a pair of metal bronze-coloured life sized hands. As he left the pyramid, Brown apparently felt a presence and heard a voice telling him never to return. He didn’t tell authorities about the find or his experience until 1975 when he exhibited the crystal for the first time.

The Egypt connection

In one of Cayce’s readings, he stated the civilization of Atlantis had entrusted their knowledge and technology to the ancient Egyptians and even predicted that parts of Atlantis would rise in 1969. One of today’s experts on the Giza pyramids, Mark Lehner started his Egyptology career as a follower of Edgar Cayce. Lehner first went to Egypt in the 1970’s in search of the Atlantian ‘Hall of Records’ which Cayce believed was buried beneath the right paw of the Sphinx.

Lehner converted to more traditional Egyptology after his initial journey to Egypt and went on to study in the American University in Cairo. He is now involved with projects such as the Giza Mapping Project.

The Nazi Quest

The Nazi’s pretty much touched base with every ancient legend/civilisation in their quest for seeking the origins of the ‘Aryan’ race and world domination by harnessing super natural powers. Atlantis was no exception.

Himmler was a member of the Thule society, named after the mythical land of Hyperborea-Thule. Some of the devotees believed Thule was the remnants of Atlantis. In 1935 the Ahnenerbe Forschungs und Lehrgemeinschaft (Ancestral Heritage Research and Teaching Society) was formed by Himmler with task was to provide scientific, anthropological and archaeological evidence to support the theories of the Thule Society and, in so doing, determine the origins of the ‘Aryan’ race.

The science fiction writer Edward Bulwer-Lytton, referred to the Thule in his novel ‘The Coming Race’ and inferred would-be world conquerors would receive psychokinetic power called vril.

The Thule Society believed the mythical land of Thule lay between Greenland and Iceland. However, one follower, Karl Haushofer was convinced that the key to the harnessing of the power of vril lay in Tibet and in 1938 the Nazi’s lead an expedition to explore the theory further.

Other world origins

The writer Alan Alford makes for the case of Atlantis not being of earthly origins. Going back to its Egyptian roots, Alford claims Plato’s Atlantis was a political allegory or possibly an allegory for the creation of the universe.

He has suggested that Atlantis was in fact a metaphor for the primeval underworld and was destroyed by a planet which blew up in some ancient era.

He writes: “This example of Atlantis, illustrates how the implications of an exploded planet cult in ancient Egypt extend well beyond the boundaries of Egyptology itself, leading to a radical reappraisal of the so-called ‘gods,’ which came down from heaven to Earth. The identification of these gods (the Anunnaki, the Nephilim, the Builder Gods of Edfu, for example) as meteoric planetary fragments inevitably begs the question of whether God, the son of God and the angels of God are also echoes of this ancient and profound inter-planetary creation cult.”

The Entertainment factor

Never let the facts get in the way of a good story, and the legendary underwater city has been the inspiration behind, books, TV series and Hollywood films; some even made for reasonable entertainment (think Captain Nemo, Man from Atlantis and the latest BBC series, Atlantis), and some, well sank (think Kevin Costner in Waterworld).

Even James Bond, in The Spy Who Loved Me, had an Atlantis element; my favourite secret service agent saved the earth from arch-villain Karl Stromberg, a powerful shipping magnate whose scheme for world domination was to blow up the land leaving the chosen few living safely beneath the ocean.

Digital may be instant, but your newspaper comes with some free extras

Despite digital news being easier to access and far more current, the humble newspaper is still on top when it comes to holding our attention according to recent reports in The Australian and The Times. I’m relieved as this means advertisers will take note and the newspaper may continue for a bit longer.

We’re continuously being told how much better and easier it is to have everything delivered to our screens, but as I spend all day staring at it, I personally love getting away from it in my down time.

Being a home worker, I enjoy a morning walk to the newsagents to buy my several printed sheets and later in the day, I’ll leave my desk to lounge on the sofa with cup of tea to read them. If I’ve got time, I’ll do the crossword and the sudoku and if these are unfinished, I’ll leave the page hanging around for a couple of days hoping there will be a ‘light bulb’ moment and ‘2 Down’ will finally come to me without the need of a thesaurus.

As well as stimulating the little grey cells, there are a few other benefits of having the odd newspaper kicking about the house. Where would we be without a stack of newspapers when it comes to drying wet shoes, ironing wax out of carpets, keeping the kids amused by making papier mâché objects (sorry, ignore that one, the kids are too busy playing on their DSs or iPads), and lining cat’s litter trays and bird cages? I’ve been more than thankful for the pile of papers ready for recycling when I’ve broken some china, needed to clean a window, or cover the floor when doing a bit of DIY.

A newspaper’s insulation properties are also great – can you wrap your tub of ice-cream in a tablet when you’ve forgotten a cool box? And I’m sure a few tramps will feel decidedly colder under a blanket of tablets. Furthermore, if everything goes digital, what will James Bond or Private Investigators discretely hide behind when staking out street corners? Villains will also have to diversify and find an alternative in which to surreptitiously hand their accomplice a fire arm.

I could go on and wax lyrical about a used newspaper’s ability to help with lighting wood burners and stuffing scarecrows, however I will leave digital news/tablet reader advocates with a couple of challenges:

1. Swat a fly without damaging the window or your tablet.

2. Use a tablet to successfully steady a wobbly table.

Please, don’t keep telling me digital is best – why would I give up all the free extras which come with a newspaper?

Skills you never knew you had

Some colleagues and I got onto the subject of computerised games recently when one colleague remarked they couldn’t remember when the last played solitaire with a real pack of cards. As a communications consultant, you get used to thinking laterally and the conversation lead to pondering if playing Farmville could give you skills to include on your CV.

For those of you not familiar with the game, Farmville is Zynga’s social network farm simulation game on Facebook; you basically build and manage a virtual farm in pretty much the same way a real farm operates – but without getting your hands mucky. You buy seeds/trees, plant and harvest them within a certain time period (failure to do so results in withered crops) to earn Farmville money. Livestock are also for sale and you increase your income by regularly milking, shearing, or collecting eggs etc. As well as earning Farmville money you also gain experience points, which when a certain amount has been accrued, will move you to the next level.

As your level increases, so too does the range of crops you can plant and livestock you can buy. You can also expand your farm, and purchase more buildings, machinery and decorations. Farmville helpfully suggests you send out requests to invite Facebook friends to play Farmville, as the more Farmville neighbours you have, the more beneficial it is to you; you can work collectively with your friends, and also send gifts and buy goods from them.

Of course, there is a monetary side to this game. Should you not have enough money in your virtual farm bank account, you make purchases using real money.

The game is highly addictive (as demonstrated by the 62 million or so people playing it) and I confess to getting sucked in and playing it for a while. My god-daughter in UK sent me a request and begged me to play so she could start to expand her farm. I dutifully hit the ‘accept’ button and found myself inundated with gifts of pigs, horses, apple trees and the like, and found myself deciding on whether to plant rice or corn.

Fortunately my god-daughter lost interest, but not before I’d found myself calculating when I could next log on to play the game; this was important as it would determine which crops to plant as harvesting time varied from two hours to four days. Since I have stopped playing, somewhere in a virtual world there are cows with aching udders, sheep suffering from wool blindness and chickens perched high on towers of uncollected eggs. The fields are just patches of brown dirt and my tractor will need jump leads and a good dose of WD40 to get it going again.

So with my limited Farmville experience, here’re a few ‘tongue in cheek’ suggestions of how to transfer your Farmville skills to the real world.

• Communication skills: I frequently leave little notes in my neighbour’s farms telling them I’ve been there, as well as inviting people to join me with special tasks. Plus I let my friends know what I’m up to by publishing my Farmville achievements to my news flow.
• Ability to organise and prioritise, and meet deadlines: Running a farm, real or otherwise, requires you to perform tasks on a daily basis as cows need milking and if crops aren’t harvested within a set time frame they die. Plus it’s imperative you plant crops to coincide with your time to play Farmville.
• Ability to work as a team: I regularly ‘visit’ other friends’ farms to help out with tasks such as collecting eggs or fertilising crops. In addition, I am part of a ‘co-op’ and together we grow crops for mutual benefit. As a little extra for my team mates, I surprise them by sending unusual, but helpful gifts such as gates and hay bales. I’ve event sent the odd nutcracker from time to time too.
• Demonstrated project management skills: As my farm has expanded, I have managed several projects concurrently. For instance, I have successfully built within budget stables, a piggery, and a cow shed. I am also currently in the process of building several orchards and will shortly be erecting a villa.
• Ability to multi-task: I’ve often had to juggle harvesting times with other tasks such as shopping, socialising and my work commitments.
• Proven Business development skills: Besides growing crops and tending livestock, I have worked hard to diversify my farm. I now sell products from my wine business and also run a successful flower stall. In addition, I am successfully propagating a range of new seedlings in my greenhouses.
• Strategic planning skills: Strategies for expanding my Farmville farm include growing more trees; unlike crops which wither if you don’t harvest them, fruit trees never die, so you’re always guaranteed a return on them. Plus as more trees fit into one plot, you increase your per plot yield increases.
• Qualifications: I have received numerous ribbons from Farmville for my achievements. This includes ribbons for collecting decorations for my farm and adopting lost animals.

I could go on, but it is at this point I will put in a disclaimer: If you include any of the above on your CV, you are highly unlikely to get as far as the interview stage. However, you’ll probably lighten up the day for the HR department.

Bunnies, bilbies, whips and witches… a bit of Easter trivia

I love a bit of trivia and think my ideal job would be a researcher for the UK TV program QI. With the Easter break coming up, here are a few details to impart to friends, relations, colleagues, and random people on the bus over the long weekend.

Easter is more than just a day off to eat hot cross buns, chocolate eggs and rabbits; it is the most significant event on the Christian calendar, celebrating Christ’s resurrection.

However it takes its origins from a pagan celebration of renewal and rebirth.

Celebrated in the northern hemisphere’s early spring, it honoured the pagan Saxon goddess Eostre. When the early missionaries converted the Saxons to Christianity, the holiday, since it fell around the same time as the traditional memorial of Christ’s resurrection from the dead, was merged with the pagan celebration, and became known as Easter.

So why the eggs and rabbits? A feast of eggs was used to honour Eostre as it has always been a symbol of new life; coloured eggs would be rolled over fields in the hope of having a good harvest later in the year. According to the legend, Eostre’s favourite animal was a large bird. However one day the bird angered her so she changed it into a rabbit. Thus we have the combination of rabbits and nests with coloured eggs.

Around the world, Easter celebrations have different traditions. In Czech Republic and Slovakia, women can expect a whipping from willow tree sticks as this apparently increases their beauty! Meanwhile the women in Hungary traditionally get a bucket of water poured over them.

In Nordic Easter folklore, apparently witches cavort with Satan at this time of year, so in Sweden and parts of Finland, expect to see something akin to Halloween, with little girls dressed as witches with a copper kettle looking for treats.

In Australia, we have the Easter Bilby delivering eggs on Easter morning. This tradition stemmed from an attempt to raise awareness of the country’s dwindling population of its little rabbit-sized marsupial.

Regardless of faith and country, I’m sure we’ll all have a sense of renewal this weekend simply because we’ve taken an extended break from work.

But stay safe this holiday; anyone who watched the Australian TV series the Gruen Transfer a couple of years ago may remember a spoof advert convincing us to give up our public holidays. For those of you who didn’t see it, in this advert we were advised the less time you were at work, the more you were at risk.

These were the stats given to back up the statement:

–           There were 41% more car accidents on a public holiday

–           You were twice as likely to be injured doing DIY

–           There was a 20% increase in domestic violence

–           Alcohol related accidents rose by 25%

–           Severe sunburn cases increased by 25%

Forget Viagra, I’ll have a bunch of blue lilies and a jar of honey.

There will no doubt be plenty of ‘loving’ going on with it being Valentine’s day, and although Viagra was launched onto the market in 1998 as the new wonder drug for virility, what the makers didn’t realise, it’s actually been around naturally, and has been used for, oh, at least as long as the pyramids. In ancient Egypt, the blue lily was linked to fertility and sexuality. Thanks to a chemical analysis by the Egyptian section of Manchester Museum, it appears there is a scientific reason for this link – the chemical make-up of this plant contains phosphodiesters, the active ingredients of Viagra.

The blue lily wasn’t the only libido-booster used by the ancient Egyptians. Lettuce rated highly and was said to be the favourite food of the fertility god Min. Fennel dates back to Egyptian times as a stimulant as does ginger, pomegranates and radishes mixed with honey. Honey has long been an ancient Viagra and with good reason – it contains boron, which stimulates the sex hormones in both males and females.

The Egyptians were also fond of coriander or pearls dissolved in wine and one I’m not so sure of; apparently baboon faeces were added to enhance aphrodisiac ointments. Perhaps this is because not only was the baboon admired in Egypt for its intelligence but also for its sexual appetite.

Those ancients were a saucy lot and the ancient Egyptians were not alone in their quest of finding virility enhancing substances. Indeed, the father of medicine, Hippocrates and the Greek philosopher Aristotle recommended lentils to help out in the bedroom. Aristotle also apparently advised Alexander the Great to ban his soldiers from drinking mint tea during campaigns because he believed it to be an aphrodisiac. Hippocrates would disagree with Aristotle on this one though, as he believed the frequent eating of mint diluted sperm, hindered erection, and tired the body – either way, probably best not to let soldiers drink mint tea when they are about to go into battle.

A few years later, the Greek historian Plutarch suggested the way to a strong libido was to eat fassolatha (a bean soup and the national dish of Greece). Other ancient Greek libido-boosters include onions, garlic and leeks although one wonders if the partner in bed would agree with this…. however, they were often eaten with other libido-boosters, honey and sesame seeds.

Oysters are renowned for increasing libido, and in a satire written in the 2^nd Century AD by the Roman writer Juvenal, he described ‘the wanton ways of women after drinking wine and eating giant oysters’. Another legendary aphrodisiac from ancient Rome which has withstood the test of time are truffles and they are still among the most prized ingredients in the culinary world today.

Moving across Asia, Chinese culture has always regarded sexual activities as very sacred, but it still needs a bit of help from time to time. The appropriately named horny goat weed and ginseng were (and still are!) recommended, and deer antler is another ancient Chinese remedy for sustaining stamina in the bedroom. Liquorice also has its roots in ancient Chinese medicine and it is one for the girls. Apparently chewing on its root is meant to augment one’s lust. Another highly prized aphrodisiac by Chinese women was nutmeg – but be warned, if eaten in quantity, it can have an hallucinogenic effect.

Even the Bible proffers advice and makes mention of the root mandrake for its potent qualities.

Weird, wacky or unusual as they seem, as the analysis of the blue lily shows, under the scrutiny of modern science many of these ancient aphrodisiacs may have chemical stimulants which contribute to maintaining sexual hormone levels and/or sparking neurotransmitters that trigger feelings of love or sexual arousal.

However, maybe baboon faeces aren’t the way to go if you’re on a hot date tonight…..

A funny thing happened to me on the way to the forum…

This phrase sprung to mind when I was recounting to friends a series of incidents which occurred recently when I went to sit my Australian citizenship test. The night before the test, I found myself doing something which I hadn’t done since sitting exams at school – I slept with the Australian Government issued information book to help with the test, under my pillow. My cunning plan worked. The entire booklet was ‘absorbed’ into my brain overnight, (possibly with a bit of help with me reading several times) and I passed the test with 100%. Although I have yet to receive the paperwork, for all intents and purposes, I’m now an aussie citizen.

Sitting the test was the easy part – it was the 45 minutes lead up which were not. I woke up calm and collected, did a bit of work and then double checked I had all the documents I needed for verification so I could sit my test. On re-reading the invitation letter, it was then I had a heart stopping moment when I realised the appointment time for the test was earlier than I remembered. I had to leave now if I had any chance at all of making it to the test on time. I have no idea how the tests work, and began wondering what would happen if I was late. If I missed my allotted time slot, would I have to wait to be sent another time slot on a different day and spend another night sleeping on a book?

It was peak hour traffic, but it was moving fairly steadily and I was able to keep my steadily rising panic somewhere below my stomach. The radio traffic update highlighted a major crash and traffic jams at a main intersection. I altered my route accordingly, along with the rest of Adelaide’s commuters. In a cruel twist of fate, I seemed to be catching every red light along this new route. My panic had now risen to my stomach, so I decided to cut my losses, and parked the car at the first available 2-hour free parking spot (you can take the girl out of Yorkshire….).

I had 10 minutes to get to Currie Street which was three blocks away. My not-so-sensible-but look-good thongs, (I can’t call them flip flops now, I’m an aussie), were unsurprisingly a huge hindrance to speed. Needs must and at times like this, forget what other people think. I took off the thongs, and ran the three blocks in 30 plus degree heat barefoot. By the time I got to the building, not only was my heart about to explode, my underarms resemble a galah’s, and several streams of sweat were running down my back, but the panic had pretty much risen to throat height.

I was five minutes late. I should be OK I told myself as I headed for the lift.

However fate took my panic levels to a new height when I exited the lift on the wrong floor. No problem I reasoned, I’ll take the stairs to the next floor. The sign on the fire exit door said ‘Stairs. No re-entry’. Having been stuck in a fire exit stairwell in another building a few years ago, I decided against this option. I waited for another lift but suffered another incorrect memory recollection; I pressed the level 4 button, thinking this was the floor I should be on. This resulted in the lift refusing to move, or indeed open the doors. After what seemed like an eternity, and me manically hitting the ‘door open’ button, the doors eventually opened and some very surprised looking ladies who on seeing my red, stressed face with slightly manic eyes, politely informed me I needed to be on level 3, not 4. (Level 4 apparently is inaccessible from these lifts, hence the lift’s refusal to move.)

When I finally got to where I was meant to be, I was now 12 minutes late – and the tests were running 30 minutes late. Perhaps after all, lady luck was on my side I thought as I slunk into a chair and sat in a sweaty heap and waiting for my name to be called.

I am however wondering what happens on level 4. In my euphoric state of achieving 100%, I forgot to look at the building level index as I left. Am I now under surveillance after been secretly filmed in the lift trying to access the inaccessible level 4 of Immigration?

 

Communications – the ancient way

Sporting events are big business. Spectator numbers and general awareness equate to sponsorship deals and with the UCI WorldTour cycling race, the Tour Down Under taking place in Adelaide this weekend, promotions for the event over the past few weeks has been immense.

Having worked on the communications for several exhibitions, shows and sporting events I speak from experience. If it’s a big event, the ‘ability to multi-task’ is a necessity on the job description. Fortunately there is usually a team to help coordinate the multitude of print and broadcast media as well as updating the website, facebook and twitter at regular intervals.

In amongst the mobile phone’s dulcet tones and manically hitting the ‘send’ or ‘update’ button, being a bit of an ancient history nerd, I have occasionally pondered how promoting an event and communicating results to the masses must have been in ancient times.

For one thing, the communications manager (if there was such a thing) would probably have been a lot less stressed as there were fewer ways of getting the message out there!

In ancient Greece and Rome, to get current news, unless you were ranking high enough to be sent a piece of papyrus, you’d have to wander down to the local agora (market place) and look for carved messages on walls or listen to the local town crier (known as a stentorian).

As an aside, the word stentorian is thought to derive from the Greek warrior Stentor, a herald in the Trojan War. His voice was apparently as powerful as the voices of 50 men.

Having found out the news from the local stentorian, thereafter I assume it would have been word of mouth. Instead of an instant click of a pc or mobile phone button, there would be a whisper in the ear and it would be several hours before the whole city knew about it, and probably a few days to reach neighbouring towns .

For a forthcoming event, I’m guessing there would have been a lot of advanced planning in its promotion. Many ancient events such as the Olympic Games were based on rituals and hence scheduled around planetary activity. In some cases ancient mechanical calendars were used to decide on the date of the games. Once the date was established, with travelling time as it was back then, it could take several months to get the message to the appropriate audience. Not too much has changed here given the deadline of some print publications.

The first postal system was developed by the Persian King Cyrus the Great to help control his new empire and it was improved a generation later by Darius I of the Achaemenid Empire. He extended the road network across the Persian Empire and this enabled both troops and information to move by comparison, at lightning speed. The royal road from Susa to Sardis, about 3200 km, had posting stations where new men and fresh horses would be available at any moment to carry a document the next leg of the journey.

This system sped up the time a message spent in transit enormously and some messages travelled up to 200 miles a day.

The ancient Egyptians were the first to domesticate pigeons and the ancient Greeks used pigeons to deliver messages from at least 5BC. Genghis Kahn developed their potential fully, using them to carry news of each new conquest to back to Mongolia.

Beacons were used to denote victory or a warning, but fire was also used as part of the first semaphore system as described by the Greek historian Polybius (203-120 BCE). Both parties would have a set of five tablets on which the alphabet had been divided into groups of five letters. To send a message, the signalman raised a torch one to five times on his left side to signal the tablet from which the required alphabet would be obtained. He then signalled one to five times on his right side to denote the position of the character on that tablet.

As for circulating event results, the Romans established a pretty elaborate display of gestures which could be read from afar where voices wouldn’t carry. However for non-local fans, they would just have to wait to see if their favourite athlete or gladiator had won.

And if their hero did win, then I’m guessing they thought some things were really worth waiting for.

The great affair is to move

“For my part, I travel not to go anywhere, but to go. I travel for travel’s sake. The great affair is to move.” Robert Louis Stevenson Travels with a Donkey, 1879.

This quote recently came to mind when my husband and I were on a rather long road trip from Adelaide to Canberra recently. Apparently road trips, like long haul flights, can be boring. However for me, this road trip reminded me of why I like the physical time spent getting from A to B; it actually gave me the luxury of time.

I grew up in Britain, and our family spent several summer holidays driving round Europe. We didn’t have a DVD player in the back of the car and I couldn’t read as I used to suffer from travel sickness; the only thing I could do on the long drive from Shrewsbury to Dover, and beyond, except argue with my sisters, was to look out of the window and lose myself in my imagination.

Driving from Adelaide to Canberra took me back to that childhood state. I was sat in a car for the next two days, so couldn’t worry about the daily grind of life and clutter my brain with jobs which needed doing: the washing up, painting the back room; searching for more work, sort through the piles of paper which seem to be taking over floor space ….

All I could do was to sit back and look at my surroundings. We passed through some glorious countryside with olive and orange groves, rice, maize, and recently harvested golden fields, stopped off at little country towns, stayed at some great little campsites and met interesting people.

My imagination was stimulated. Why was there a heritage brown sign pointing to a historic lookout in the middle of nowhere? What secret was hidden in that higgledy piggledy house with an even higgledy piggledier yard? Even the long stretches of open plain, where the odd piece of tumbleweed rolling across the road would’ve made headlines in the local newspaper had something to offer: long conversations with my husband about just about everything – something of a luxury in our busy lives.

Apparently an arts and design college in Israel has developed technology that transforms a car door window into a touch screen for games – and gives kids the ability to scrawl messages or images with their fingertips. With the aim of overtaking portable DVD players and other forms of in-car entertainment, the Belazel Academy’s “future lab” was commissioned by North American car maker General Motors to give kids “a richer experience on the road”.

Really?

What can be richer for a child than looking out of the window and seeing the world as it is instead of through a screen, or using their own imagination instead of being stimulated by someone else’s? Or dare I say it, having a conversation with the real people in the car rather than trying to ‘connect’ with so called ‘friends’ via social media….

Our time in Canberra was great; we caught up with friends and saw Australia’s capital, but it was the time spent on the road I really cherished. It gave me time to think about the novel I’m writing and quality time with my husband. We talked about wacky concepts and even came up with another idea for a book – so watch this space in a few months’ time!

Turkey, Christmas and a glass of orange juice

With the Christmas season well and truly upon us, and only four (yes four!) more shopping days upon us, I was reminded the other day of a certain Turkish ancient site with Christmas connections.

Situated on the Lycian Coast, Myra’s main claim to fame is its associations with Saint Nicholas, aka Santa Claus. St Nicholas was the Bishop of Myra in the 4^th century. His many endeavours include a tax reduction for Myra from Emperor Constantine and the destruction of many of Myra’s temples, including its renowned temple of Artemis. He was also apparently thrown into prison by Emperor Diocletian and rumour has it he participated in the Council of Nicaea.

The cult of St Nicholas spread, and as his various deeds which included his secret gift giving (hence the Father Christmas associations), resurrecting children who’d been killed by a butcher, and assisting sailors. And so he is now, amongst many, the patron saint of children, sailors, merchants and those unjustly imprisoned as well as the patron saint of Greece and Russia.

When St. Nicholas died, Myra became a rich pilgrimage centre, but in 1087, his relics were transported by Italian sailors to Bari in Italy during a Seljuk invasion. Bari also is a pilgrimage site although in 2009, Turkey requested the relics be returned to Myra.

When I was a tour leader for an adventure travel company, we would visit the ancient site at Myra and the Church of St Nicholas before heading into the mountains. I’d give my spiel about its history to the group, explaining although an outer wall is thought to date from 5 BC, there are no records of the city before the first century. Myra played an important part in the Lycian Federation, and was said to be one of the six leading cities of the Lycian Union (the other five were Xanthos, Tlos, Pinara, Patara and Olympos).

Apparently the city was a veritable metropolis in early Christian times, with a bustling harbour and a population of some 50,000. Even before St Nicholas was on the scene, Myra had Christian connections with Saint Paul changing ships in the harbour en route to Rome, and a visit from St Luke apparently too.

Under Theodosius II, (408 to 450) Myra became the capital of the Byzantine Eparchy of Lycia but it began to decline and a combination of plagues, numerous Muslim raids and the harbour eventually silting up led the city to be abandoned in 11^th century.

Having given my little talk about the history, I’d explain what people could see in the site. Much of the site is actually unexcavated, but there are some great, accessible (and several very inaccessible) Lycian rock tombs and a number of interesting carved stone masks. There is also an impressive theatre and I would sit looking at the now ruined stage, trying to imagine what the city would have been like in its heyday.

But it wasn’t an image of Santa Claus which brought this lovely ancient site to the forefront of my memory. It was a glass of freshly squeezed orange juice on a recently hot day in Adelaide. Why a glass of orange juice I hear you ask?

Myra is situated in a very fertile valley. There are many greenhouses growing tomatoes, eggplant (or aubergine for my British readers!), orchards, and orange groves.

As you exit the ancient site of Myra, there is a huge line of orange juice traders who are desperate to relieve you of the tourist dollar – and on a hot day, you will gladly part with it.

Christmas really does comes to some Myra traders every time a tourist bus draws up.

A tribute to the Royal Mail

Having recently returned from a short spell overseas, (hence a bit of a gap in my blogging), I was reminded just how remarkable and enjoyable the postal system is. I can’t help but think how amazing it is that by handing over a relatively small sum of money and putting a piece of sticky paper on a postcard/letter/parcel, this usually ensures the eventual delivery of the item to the person who’s name and address is written on the it, particularly when the said person is in another country.

When I was working in a rural area of Yunnan Province, China, I inadvertently tested the system when I couldn’t quite remember the house number or street of the person I was sending a postcard to in the UK. After writing their name on the address side of the card, I wrote a description of the house, directions from a notable landmark in the village, the name of the village followed by the county and country.

I was seriously wondering whether the postcard would actually make it at all to UK when I posted the card in a very tiny post office in the remote Chinese village. How many people would handle that postcard en route to its destination I pondered? There was the man behind the counter, then the person taking it to the larger office in a town a few hours driver away. Then it had to find its way to an airport…. And hopefully it would get on the right plane. Once in UK, it would once again have to be sorted to find its way to the right county and then the correct village.

On my return, I discovered the post card had indeed found its way to my friend, and the diligent postman had actually knocked on the door to check the name of the person in the house before handing over the postcard!

Now that was personal service. In this digital age where everything is instantaneous and we need instant gratification people seem to have forgotten to know what it’s like to wait. In my days of travelling, I wrote a weekly letter home to tell my mother I was safe and what I’d been up to. Sometimes my mother received a weekly letter but more likely, especially when I was travelling in a less developed country, she didn’t hear from me for three or four weeks. Then of course, she’d receive several letters on the same day a few weeks later.

As a backpacker to collect my post overseas, it meant queuing up at the Post Restante part of the post office in the hope that now you were out of sight, your friends hadn’t put you ‘out of mind’ and your friends had not only bothered to write a letter, but they had gone to the post office to post it as well.

Call me old fashioned, but there is something special about receiving a hand written letter or postcard from a friend or colleague. While I was away, I sent some postcards back to nieces and nephews who apparently were very excited to be handed a postcard when they collected the post. It saddens me that the art of letter/postcard writing is dying out for an instant text message, or worse still, for the rather impersonal cc’d email to all. Whatever happened to the personal touch?

But there is one major advantage of hand written letters over email, as highlighted by my postcard from China – if you’re not sure of an address, or if you happen to misspell a name, generally the posted letter will find its recipient. Plus if there’s a power cut, you can still access the contents.