Now in Panchgari, up on a mountain

This is the site where we fly in Kamsheet

Women picking cow dung.
Later, they will mix it with water and form them into
standard sized cow dung pancakes. These are dried in
the sun and sold as fuel.

Kids close to our take off. It is their mothers that pick the dung.

I am still enjoying myself in India, doing a lot of paragliding for a story in Hypoxia, Sweden's paragliding magazine. Today, we moved from Kamsheet to Panchgari, four hours driving eastwards, high up on a montain.

In the new hotel, there is better internet, so I will try to upload some photos.

India is different

It is dawn, and my fifth day in India. The smell of fried eggs with onion
is slowly spreading from the kitchen at Fly Nirvana, the place where I am
staying. The Indian pilots are already up and about, preparing for another
day of paragliding, while the Swede's are still sleeping, no doubt tired
after yesterday evenings party.

This is my first time in India, and I am enjoying it. I am here for two
weeks to go paragliding together with a Swedish group. We are based on the
countryside outside the little village of Kamsheet, a few hours drive east
of Bombay (Mumbai).

This is Fly Nirvana, where I stay.

Although my experience can be described as India light, staying at one
place and having everything organized, there are still many impressions.
There are people everywhere, also on the countryside. Working the fields,
walking their cattle, bustling in the village streets. Everybody are
smiling curiosly when they see me, a foreigner by all standards. The women
are dressed in beautifully colored saris and the men often wear white.
Masny of them have red marks on their forehead from the daily relgious
hindu religious ceremonies and prayers they conduct outside their homes in
the morning. Of course, poverty is everywhere. Simple huts built of sticks
and twigs. Small houses constructed of mud with dirt floors. People taking
care of their daily hygiene along the road.And the infra-structure, in
form of roads and communications, are under-developed. It took me five
days to find this Internet connection, and it is a dial-up, so very slow,
which means no photos.

But I hope I will be able to connecty a few more times during my stay.
No it is time for breakfast, and then some more paragliding!

Basking in the sun (still in Istanbul)

After the lunch, and some skype-chatting with my friend Sara in Brussels (it turns out that she is moving to Bremen in the weekend – at least it starts with Br as well ☺), I walked around the corner to the sunny side of the bridge. Here, it was actually pleasantly warm, so I sat down for a beer and to enjoy the view. I like Istanbul.


Now I am back at the airport, waiting for my flight to Mumbai.

Lunch in Istanbul

Great! Despite that my day started with the Israeli airport security turning upside down on my bags, twice, it is now a happy and smiling Marko writing. I just sat down at a water pipe café in Istanbul, with an enchanting view of the Bosporus just outside the window. My Turkish meatballs are on their way, and I have several hours to enjoy this beautiful city before I have to be back at the airport at five for my flight to Bombay (or should I say Mumbai?).


Right now, the echo of the prayer calls spreads over the water while the ferries hurries in all directions. A pale winter sun reflects in the grey water, and in the eyes of the young woman and her boyfriend, smoking a water pipe opposite me.

The restaurant/café, Aruna, is one of many hiding under the bridge that connects the two European sides of Istanbul with each other – one of my favorite spots in the city.
Ah, here comes the food!

Last day before India

As always, the day before traveling, it has been a busy day. Writing for my upcoming travel blog at MSN (I will link it when it goes on air), packing for the trip, contacting customers to sell stories for next year (sold two!) etc etc.

Tonight, I took out Femke for a nice dinner at a Tapas place in West Jerusalem that we never tried before. It was good! (Sol Tapas Bar, 15 Shlomzion).

Tomorrow: Lunch in Istanbul, then India!

Eid milad said!

Yesterday was a slow day, but still a nice day. In the end, we drove to the Israeli Arab village of Abu Gosh to have lunch at the Elvis Diner there. They make incredible milk shakes and good hamburgers, and the interior design is cool – an American 50’s diner full of Elvis memorabilia.

This morning, Anders left for Sweden. It was great to have him here, we both appreciated him coming to see us, and I hope he enjoyed himself too.



In the afternoon, Femke and me went Christmas shopping in the old city. The Arab boy scouts had a Christmas market with all the things you need to make your home Chistmassy. We also found the funny record with the Lebanese classical star Fairuz singing traditional Christmas songs. Think Tannenbaum and jingle bells in Arabic.
Eid milad Said! (Merry Chistmas in Arabic).

Trying to survive in the wake of Ruby's party

Slowly, we are returning to something that resembles life. Ruby´s party yesterday was wild, and great fun. My Swedish-influenced punch worked fine and soon we were dancing.
Today, we are busy recuperating. Maybe we will do a little excursion in the sunny weather, if we can muster enough energy.

Schools in northern West Bank

Today, I had another field day, going up north with Mazen, our IFAD man,and Naser. With funding from IFAD (a UN program) Mazen have built schools, added classrooms and built houses for youth clubs and womens associations. He needed photos so he called me. A great day out!


In the evening, Femke, Anders and me had dinner at our favorite Japanese restaurant.

Jericho and Jerusalem, then partying

We have had some really poor weather here lately, with lots of rain and cold winds. So I drove down to Jericho with anders to warm up a bit. Surprisingly, it was a bit chilly there too. But we had lunch at the top of the cable car, then visited the Hisham's palace ruins.

On the way back to Jerusalem, I stopped to take some photos of bedouins herding their goats over the barren mountains. Beautiful.




Then we popped by the view point on the Mount of Olives and took more photos.


In the evening, we found ourselves doing some serious yet improvised partying, with me mixing caipirinhas and margueritas, and popping the nice sparkling wine we brought home from South Africa. We finished the evening with live music at the Russian jazz bar.

Tulkarem, a lost car and Mr Arafat

A long workday is nearing its end. We (Anders joined me) started 07.40 from Jerusalem. In Ramallah, we met up with Naser, ANERA’s agronomist and headed north to Tulkarem. Here, ANERA is supporting farmers with green houses, and help them to produce higher quality vegetables for export. I was there to take photos of the farmers and their new green houses.

In Jerusalem, the sun was shining from a blue sky, but in Tulkarem, heaven opened for the first serious rain this winter. We became muddy but all the farmers smiled happily – water is a scarce and valuable commodity in this part of the world.

Farmer Essam Masarwi tending his tomato plants
in one of the green houses provided by ANERA

The members of the local farmer's cooperative listen
attentively to an expert brought in by our program.
We drank yet another cup of coffee.

Late afternoon, we were back in Ramallah. We parked the car downtown and took a little stroll. Anders plays backgammon just like me, so we stopped at a simple yet nice café for a glass of tea with fresh mint and a few games. Nice!

Backgammon and tea in Ramallah

When we walked back to the car again, it was not there. Blimey! Was it stolen? We were in the middle of Ramallah, it was pouring down, and getting dark. What to do? I spotted a few Palestinian police officers in the vicinity and approached them, explaining that my car gone missing.
“What brand and color?”
“A white Isuzu)”
“Ah. We took it away, you are not allowed to park here”

It turns out that lawless Ramallah turned into something very much less lawless overnight, and the cops were towing away droves of cars from the streets. For years, you just parked where you found some space, but lately, it seems that they have been painting the curb stones red&white or black&white to signal where you can park or not. Big surprise for all of us!

Now, it should be said that I have always found the Palestinian police very reasonable. After explaining my situation and that I am working for an aid organization, that I have parked here for the last year, just like everybody else, that I saw no sign forbidding parking and that there was a lot of cars already parked there (and implicating that I am a somewhat stupid but nonetheless kind and good-hearted foreigner) they arranged a lift to the car disposal place, and wrote me a recommendation letter in Arabic. When we came there, I got a warm feeling inside, seeing our car again. I once again told my story for the three policemen in charge and gave them the letter. Ten minutes later we shook hands and drove away, no fine, just smiles ☺

I have been at Yassir Arafat’s grave inside the president compound (the Muqatta) several times, but then they were still building the mausoleum. Now it is ready and we went there to have a look. It is a surprisingly stylish and impressing setup in white stone and strict minimalistic style. If you are in town anyway, don’t miss it.

The mausoleum in the Muqatta.
Yassir Arafat is the one in the middle.

Back in Jerusalem, we picked up Femke at the office and then had smoked salmon and Swedish gravad lax-sauce for dinner, together with dill-boiled potatoes and some boiled egg.
After that, Femke and me worked with a report for two hours while Anders took a nap in the sofa.
Unfortunately, Femke is still working. We wee planning to go to our local Russian jazz bar for a Czech beer, but I don’t know if we still have the energy for it…