The Namib (meaning "open space") Desert in Namibia

After Namibia, the London Underground took my sense of proportion, dragged it through the proverbial hedge backwards and then left it in a crumpled heap on an escalator. All while urging me to move right inside the carriages and to stand clear of the closing doors.

You see, Namibia has a population of 2 million and neighbouring Botswana has only 1.7.

London, however, lilts and lurches around the 10 million mark, (depending on the mood of the official on any given day) and its transport system herds 28 million people beneath the earth each year in order to move them from A to B.

Twenty-eight million.

The social rules are simple, but then, perhaps they have to be: don’t look, don’t talk, don’t stop. And for god’s sake, don’t get in the way.

Usually, I follow them. This time however, just fleetingly, I wanted to freeze that activity and focus on one person. One individual alone among the millions.

Alone Among Millions

The latest in a run of very cool competitions I’ve been told about lately – this one comes from Land Rover and Biosphere and the prize looks well worth the effort.

How to Enter

Send a one minute video clip of you doing something that shows that you have the passion to make a difference (suggested activities include “nursing sick animals back to health, doing charity fundraising or simply picking up litter from local streets.”) Unfortunately, you do then have to canvas people for votes but the good news is that the top 25 videos make it through to the final selection, so don’t be put off if your facebook friend list is small or non-existent.

What’s the catch?

UK residents only, I’m afraid and you have to be over 21. It’s probably also a good idea to make sure that you can make the dates for selection and the trip itself…and the deadline for entries is 23rd September.

Good luck!

Disclosure: Er, I don’t get anything from mentioning this on my blog!

British Weather

In Britain, talking about the weather is an accepted, even expected, way to start, finish and sometimes fill a conversation. Every time it snows, the country grinds to a halt and the press fills its pages with scenes of gridlocked white. Every time the sun shines, people rush to parks and roll up their trousers and sleeves until they turn red. Both extremes are rare.

Instead, the weather in Britain lurches and stumbles through various shades of grey and flattened blue, with clouds, drizzle, fog and mizzle (a word that describes a cross between mist and drizzle in the north of England, which has plenty of both.) In this way, British weather provides citizens with enough small-talk to sustain a conversation for decades.

This year, Lloyds TSB has launched a competition to celebrate Britain’s crazy weather (perhaps as an explanation to outsiders as to why we talk about it so much.)

How to Enter

The British Weather Photographer of the Year is open to all UK residents (except for professional photographers) and is free to enter. First prize is £10 000 and the photographer with the most votes each week wins £100. Get snapping soon as the deadline is 30^th September.

Geese On Ice

You can upload as many photos as you like and the good news is that you can vote without registering a gazillion details in advance. Try it out now by voting for one of my pictures ;)

Or, if you don’t want to do that – just let me know in the comments box which photo you prefer.

Sponsored Post – See the full disclosure policy here.

A bee takes shelter just in time

Ice Swan

Sunset on Ice

As the sun sets over the Okavango Delta...

The Okavango Delta is the world’s largest inland delta. Between reeds and palm trees, “the Delta” in Botswana nurtures crocodiles and herons, impala and elephants, locals and, for a while at least, me.

While wildlife is abundant, electricity is scarce. So, here’s a taste of what I’ll be blogging about in the weeks to come (and apologies for any lapse in cyber-etiquette in the meantime!)

Chunky British Traffic Lights

“Is it weird to be back?”

I hear that a lot each time I return to this jigsaw-shaped island that floats west of mainland Europe. The first answer that springs to mind is “well, yes…and no.”

Since that makes for a spectacularly boring blog post (not to mention conversation), I thought I’d pay my homeland of Britain a little more attention and write about something I have only noticed since I started travelling so much:

Britain is Chunky

Britain is chunky.

Chunky British Signposts

Chunky, not as a euphemism for fat, but as an expression for sturdy, bold and substantial. Britain is the Yorkie chocolate bar of countries. If France and Spain have a tendency for finesse and fiesta, then Britain’s street furniture (don’t laugh, that’s what it’s called) says “no fuss, please.”

Solid red post boxes, block letters on signposts, road markings so thick they could double as a new form of Braille. Huge angular 50p pieces, police helmets like church bells and those cubes in Branston Pickle.

Just imagine a pint of real ale next to a flute of champagne and you’ll understand what I mean.

Chunky British Post Box

So, is it weird to come back? No, not weird. Just chunky.

Spanish Traffic Lights - A Casual Approach

These days, a lot of offers float into my inbox and I’m only one reflex away from the delete button. This email, however, from the Radisson hotel chain really caught my interest (and not just because they offered to pay me. Lots of emails do that but it can’t save them from the ruthless “delete” command.)

No, it’s because this campaign looks like the real deal and something you’d like to hear about.

Win a Year’s Accommodation

Essentially, the premise is this. Radisson Blu is offering 365 nights of accommodation in a double room in any of more than 200 of their hotels  across the world. Even better, it looks as though they’re quite flexible with how you use this if you win. You can extend the offer over 5 years or “gift” a few nights to your friends or family so that you can all go away for a big trip together. You can hoard it all for yourself or donate a few nights to the lovely blogger who told you about this deal…it’s up to you.

How to Enter – Easy Even for Technophobes

Head over to their website, The Greatest Holiday in the World, and nominate yourself. You can type in a few modest words or get creative and upload photos and videos to go with it.

How to Win – Kiss Babies and Canvass

Winning is simple: the person with the most votes on July 24^th wins. You are allowed to vote for yourself (within reason) – but it’s probably more effective to spread the word via facebook, twitter and the staff canteen. Even leave a comment here, if you like, to let me know you’re after my vote!

What’s the Catch?

Location, mainly: you must be an EU-citizen or a citizen of Norway, Iceland, Liechtenstein or Switzerland to enter. Anyone can vote.

Also, age: you must be over 18 to participate.

Plus, the usual rules: no cash alternative offered.

What Are You Waiting For? It’s free to enter, so it’s worth a shot, isn’t it? Let me know how you get on!

Sponsored Post

Read the full, exciting disclosure policy here.

The Sun - NASA

So, yesterday was the summer solstice (in the northern hemisphere at least), an important-sounding and fairly random point in the calendar for pausing for breath and catching up. Back in February, I wrote my New Year resolutions for 2010 (It was the Chinese New Year. I wasn’t late. Oh no.)

Yesterday, I thought it would be fun to have another look at them and see how quickly I abandoned them I was getting along.

To my surprise, I’ve actually been doing fairly well. This must be what happens when you finally grow old enough to realise that there’s no point in adding “go to the gym more often” to the list.

Unusual Journey Interviews

Inside the Travel Lab’s Unusual Journey Interviews have got off to a great start, featuring international choreographer Laila Diallo and adventurous sportsman Rob Forbes. Forbes swam, cycled and ran his way from England to South Africa to arrive in time for the World Cup and did it all for charity. Look out for more inspiring stories coming soon…

Charity

Speaking of which, Inside the Travel Lab has covered a few good causes since the chilly dark days of February. Forbes’ trans-continental journey to raise money for Re-Cycle was one and Tripbase’s Travel Secrets book to help provide drinking water for developing countries was another.

Spreading the Word About CPR

A third involved a cause very close to my heart: the importance of learning CPR. Ten friends completed the Paris Marathon in honour of a friend who died last September of Sudden Cardiac Death. If you’ve read this far, then please, please, please make sure that you (and the people you travel with) know how to do basic CPR. It doubles the chance of survival during cardiac arrest.

Travel More & Have A Lot of Fun

Because, well, we only have one life. Some of my favourite moments from 2010 have been the surprise beauty of Tenerife, the olive harvest in Andalucia, the sunset over Mont Blanc and my stay in Zafra castle. Also the hot chocolate in Krakow and my first ever via ferrata in the Dolomites thanks to dolomitemountains.com…

More of a Red Light for Viajes Verdes

Steady but rather slow progress on delving deep into green travel and how we learn languages. A few surprise bonuses in 2010 added scraps of Polish and Ladin to my rusty repertoire, plus the emergency resurrection of fragments of school German. It can only get better, I suppose!

The Next Adventure

I’m packing my bags later tonight for a Blog Trip to Valencia to take in the Formula One Grand Prix. It’s certainly an experiment for me, I’m not known for my mastery of sporting trivia, but then, that’s the fun of trying something new. I may just find I love it after all…

How are your resolutions going?

NO8DO Tattoo

Now that is dedication!

NO8DO – what’s it all about? Read about it here.

Worse, somehow, is when you can see plenty but none of it’s fit to drink.

Clean Water & Travel Writing

Tripbase, an online travel research company, has put together a series of books that include work from world famous travel writers like Rolf Potts to, er, rather-less-famous-but-hopefully-mildly-interesting writers such as my good self.

A Range of Free Travel Books

Titles include Worldwide Travel, Travel Tips, Foodie Travel, United States Travel, Italy Travel, Worldwide Beaches Travel and Family Travel and you can download free e-copies right here.

For every book you download, Tripbase contributes $1 to charity:water, a charity devoted to providing clean water for developing countries.

To find out more about the work of charity:water, visit their website here. There’s nothing to lose with this offer, other than a few minutes of your time and bandwidth. Read, enjoy, return!

-How would you describe yourself and what you do?

I am a Canadian-born, Bristol-based choreographer. Before embarking on my own choreographic adventures, I was a dancer for 8 years with Wayne McGregor ‘s Random Dance Company, touring  extensively on the international contemporary dance scene.

-Where have you travelled to?

With work… it’s an interesting exercise to try to list destinations without omitting any… to various cities of the United States on a number occasions, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Uzbekistan, Kazakstan, Sweden, Finland, Russia, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Poland, Romania, Bulgaria, Hungary, Albania, Armenia, Turkey, Kosovo, Serbia, Croatia, Macedonia, Germany,  Austria, Italy, Spain, Portugal,  Cyprus, Belgium, Holland, France,  Ireland, Colombia, Kenya, Malaysia, Hong Kong (in 1997…), China,  Japan…

Wow! Which place surprised you the most?

Yekaterineburg, on the eastern side of the Ural Mountain Range in Russia, left a lasting impression. Not exactly surprise but wonder.

-Why?

It felt out of time, otherworldly. It didn’t really match up with any images I might have conjured up in my mind, I guess. I really felt elsewhere.

-Did you know when you got into this line of work that you’d be travelling a lot?

The amount of touring a company gets varies a lot. There was no way of knowing if Random was going to be called to travel or not at the outset.  I am so, so glad that it became part of the work. In fact, towards the end of my time with the company, when I found myself feeling rather blazé about an upcoming trip to Hong Kong, I thought it must be a sign that it was time to look for a change in my career.

-How did you get into this line of work?

Dance is something I somehow stumbled across when I was 11 years old or so. It took me a good few years to really get into it. I enjoyed it a lot, but for me dance was never the one and only thing that I could see myself doing as a grown-up; it was not that kind of all-consuming passion. It was something I was very interested in but I had other interests and aspirations and so the decision to follow this path as opposed to studying something else wasn’t that easy to make. I guess I met teachers, dancers and choreographers during my training and career who have kept me curious and inspired.

 -Would you recommend it to someone starting out now?

It is a difficult question as the market is full of dancers who don’t manage to make a living out of it. It is not an easy career choice. Competition is fierce. But is it not everywhere…? If you are hungry for it, you have to give it a go!  I guess what is useful is to not put all your eggs in the same basket, and to cultivate interests and skills in other areas too. At least that’s what I felt I needed to do when I was starting out.

-Any tips for beginners?

Remember why you have chosen to do what you are doing, what it is about it that you like and keep this close to you. 

Keep an open an inquisitive mind.

-What are the downsides of travelling with work?

Packing and unpacking  repeatedly, of course… And in our line of work, there is the fact that we do spend most of our time, wherever we are in the world, getting the show ready in the black box that is a theatre. So it can be frustrating sometimes when you actually feel you don’t get enough time to enjoy a place as much as you’d like before you have to leave again.

-The upsides?

One of the upside has to be the way it allows you to make contact with people. The interactions are different to those you are likely to develop if you travel as a tourist, I think, and it can make for a different travelling experience.

-What’s the most dangerous place you’ve ever visited?

Mmm… Medellìn in Colombia has a bad reputation but Belgrade on the election night that dislodged Milosevic from power didn’t feel that safe either…

-The most over-rated?

Pass…

-Your favourite? (Ah, you knew that one was coming)

That’s tough. I fell in love with Lisbon when we went there to perform.  I love Lisbon.

-Do you need to take special equipment with you when you travel? How do you do that?

Now that I make my own work and am sometimes invited to perform abroad, at times I have to carry a huge suitcase of props from A to B. Lots of excess luggage charges!

-Who’s the most exciting celebrity you’ve met on your travels?

Well, if a trip to the National Gallery in London counts, Salman Rushdie.

-What makes you shudder about travelling?

The wait at the airport

-How has travel changed you?

It has many times been an occasion of measuring just how vulgar the disparity of wealth is on this planet. It helps me keeping a wider perspective on life, on the “general state of affairs”, it prevents me from getting too comfortable.

-What has been your most poignant moment on your travels?

I can’t put my finger now on a poignant moment. But some vivid memories include a truly amazing tango lesson I took in Ankara, a huge moon on the Pacific on my birthday in San Diego, waking up to discover the mountains outside my window in Almaty, getting off the coach to cross the border from Serbia to Kosovo on foot…

-Would you do it all again?

The travelling yes, the dancing, probably not!

Thanks Laila! To find out more about Laila’s work, visit her website here.  Photo credits: Ravi Deepres & Mike Kwasniak