‘Please treat the church and houses with care; we have given up our homes where many of us lived for generations to help win the war to keep men free. We shall return one day and thank you for treating the village kindly.’
There was something special about Takayama. I could feel it in the air as soon as I stepped off the train – crisp, fresh mountain air, so refreshing after the heat of Kyoto.
I think it was in Syria that I first fell in love with the huge open skies of desert landscapes. I felt I could sit and look out of the bus window quite happily for hours …
I went to Syria in 1996, when it was a very different country. Today I can’t help wondering about the fate of the people I met there.
History, they say, is told by the victors. But what if there are no victors? What if the war never technically ended? Then, perhaps, each side feels free to tell its own version of history, a version in which they were triumphant.
Mahn and Mohn are mother and daughter. They were separated after Mohn was born, and sold to two different riding camps. Two years ago they were reunited at MandaLao, where elephants rescued from tourist camps and logging find sanctuary.
When I told people that we were going to North Korea, or the DPRK as they prefer us to call it, I got one of three reactions. From our traveller friends, ‘wow, that will be interesting’. From others, either ‘why on earth would anyone want to go there?’ or ‘gosh, you’re brave – hope you come home again!’
‘Excuse me, may we ask you some questions?’ The three school girls spoke in chorus, politely and in good English. We naturally agreed and, armed with a clip-board and a work-book with a set of these questions, they proceeded to ‘interview’ us.
On a recent visit to Swaledale I became obsessed with capturing the patterns created by the drystone walls dissecting the fields above the valley and the stone barns scattered across the green landscape.
The road twisted and turned up the mountain, winding through what seemed to be quite ancient woodland, and emerged on to the grasslands above. The crumbling hulk of the monument loomed above us, the last wisps of cloud just drifting away.