Karavansara

East of Constantinople, West of Shanghai


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That second language thing

So, it went like this… yesterday I posted the link to Sasha A. Palmer’s post on the e-Books India blog.
This morning my friend Claire1 did her take on Palmer’s post – you can find her thoughts here.
And I thought, why not?
Sort of like a pinball effect – ideas bouncing back and forth.

pinball

After all I’m doing my writing in English most of the time, nowadays, and Karavansara, that started out as an experiment, has now become my primary blog.
So, here’s my own take on writing in what is still my Second Language, and the benefits thereof. Continue reading →


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Google: Maps or Earth?

Putting together equipment and supplies for the Karavansara Reading Challenge 2016 means – like with any exploration project – getting maps.
As I mentioned in a previous post, I’ll use two folding paper maps as reference, but will rely on Google for a lot of quick-and-dirty geographical information. I’d like to plot the course of our virtual travel, following the steps of Maillart & Fleming – maybe linking the posts and other external contents to the map.

China-Silk-Road-Map-full

And as I was trying to learn how all those marvels are done, I stumbled on a nice question: Google Earth or Google Maps? Continue reading →


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The Prisoner

The Prisoner was one of my favorite TV shows when I was a kid, and remains one of my faves today: the mix of mystery, the weirdness, science fiction and paranoia, the colors, costumes and locations… cast!
Perfect.

prisoner

A few days back stumbled on this interesting documentary from 1984 (interesting year for doing a Prisoner revival, what?) and I thought I’d share.

Enjoy!

 


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Pulp History: Our Man in Peking

edmundbackhouseHis index entry in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography is short and to the point…

Backhouse, Sir Edmund Trelawny, second baronet (1873–1944), Sinologist and fraudster

Born in 1873, the son of a banker, Edmund Trelawny Backhouse arrived in China in 1899. He soon hooked up with George Ernes Morrison, correspondent for the Times. First he worked as a translator – he knew Russian, Japanese and Chinese, Manchu and Mongolian – and later as a provider of insider information from the Chinese Imperial Court – him being a close friend of the Grand Councilor Wang Wen-shao, the Grand Eunuch Li Lien-ying, Viceroy Hsü Shih-ch’ang, Prime Minister Tuan Ch’i-jui, Finance Minister Liang Shih-i, etcetera.
The only problem being, of course, that he had no contacts whatsoever in court.
He was making things up. Continue reading →