7th September 2002 London meeting Review
by Padmassana
We had two excellent speakers who both captured the essence of the countries
they talked about with some fantastic photographs.
Our first speaker was Marion Bull who showed us the N’Afjer
plateau in the Algerian Sahara. This area is the site of the world’s
oldest rock paintings, some dating back 12,000 years. Marion explained
that although UNESCO protects the paintings, many have been damaged over
the last few years by Arabic graffiti, and as there have been few tourists
to this area, the government has not protected them. The slides of the
rock paintings Marion showed us depicted prehistoric scenes of long extinct
animals, pastoral scenes of grazing cattle, newer pictures of what appeared
to be a boat and fishermen and paintings of chariots being pulled by animals.
This area of Algeria is also the site of The Forest of Stones, which
look like streets and stretch for 35 miles. These “streets”
of rock have spectacular pinnacles, which Marion said were difficult to
photograph due to the shadows cast by neighbouring towers of rock. But
Marion did these wonderful formations justice with her colourful slides.
We were lucky that Marion was able to show us these wonderful images,
as when she was leaving the area her plane had a little mishap, and she
had to spend another night in her sleeping bag on the runway tarmac.
Our second speaker was Julian Webster who treated us to some
glorious images of India. These included pictures of the Ganges high in
the Himalayas, right down to India’s southern tip, showing us a
lifeguard complete with a pointy “Go Faster” swim hat! We
saw colourful images of religious India including temples in Kerala, Buddhists
in the north, Christian nuns and Oracles who treat the local people with
their magic. Julian moved onto India at work, from the washing Ghats in
Bombay (Mumbai), where we saw clothes being beaten clean on stones, Fish
markets, Railway station bookshops with English sounding names and even
the office of “The World Famous Sex Therapist”! Julian finished
with some of the classical images of India such as holy cows and the Taj
Mahal.
On Saturday 5th October, Eamonn
Gearon will give a talk called “Walking to Siwa – and
then staying there!” This features solo camel trekking in the Libyan
desert and life in the Egyptian oasis of Siwa, past present and future.
This is an extract from just one of Eamonn's expeditions in North
Africa – he is already planning his next to Sudan/Liberia.
After the break, Tahir Shah will give a talk entitled “In
search of King Solomon’s Mines.” Tahir is the third generation
of his family to become obsessed with King Solomon's mines. He travelled
to Ethiopia to a remote cliff face monastery where visitors are pulled
up by rope, the ruined castles of Gondar, to rock-hewn churches of Lalibela,
an illegal gold mine, and the hardest leg to the accursed mountain of
Tullu Wallel, where legend says the shafts to the entrance to King Solomon's
mines. All class competition for Rider Haggard's classic adventure
novel!
London meetings are held at The Church of Scotland, Crown Court,
behind the Fortune Theatre in Covent Garden at 2.30pm the first 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
