Categories
Book Fiction Travel

The Alchemist

Paulo Coelho


Rating: 8.5 out of 10.

The Alchemist is a joy to read. Quite upset to get to the end.

It will not to be to everyone’s liking, especially the cynics, but as a parable it has a number of wonderful lessons.

Everybody seemed to have a clear idea of how other people should lead their lives, but none about their own.

Purpose

“What is the world’s greatest lie” the boy asked, completely surprised. “It is this; at a certain point in our lives, we lose control of what is happening to us, and our lives become controlled by fate. That is the world’s greatest lie.”

Self-imposed barriers

“No,” the alchemist answered. “What you still need to know is this; before a dream is realised the Soul of the World tests everything that was learned along the way. That’s the point at which most people give up. it is the point at which, as we say in the language of the desert, one ‘dies of thirst just when the palm trees have appeared on the horizon.”

Perserverance

If you start out promising what you don’t even have yet, you lose your desire to work towards getting it.

Motivation

I am like everyone else — I see the world in terms of what I would like to see happen, not what actually does.

Bias

The hills of Andalusia were only two hours away but there was an entire desert between him and Pyramids. Yet the boy felt that there was another another way to regard his situation; he was actually two hours closer to his treasure…the fact that two hours stretched into an entire year didn’t matter.

Progress

Don’t forget that everything you deal with is only one thing and nothing else.

Focus

As he mused about these things, he realized that he had to choose between thinking of himself as the poor victim of a thief and as an adventurer in quest of a treasure.

“I am an adventurer, looking for treasure,” he said to himself.

Reframing and Positivity

“You should pay attention to the caravan” the boy said to the Englishman, after the camel driver had left. “We make a lot of detours but we are always heading for the same destination.

“And you ought to read more about the world” answered the Englishman. “Books are like caravans in that respect.”

Education

“If I have to fight, it will be just as good a day to die as any other. Because I don’t live in either my past or my future. I am only interested in the present. If you can concentrate always on the present, you’ll be a happy man. You will see that there is life in the desert, that there are stars in the heavens and that tribesman fight because they are part of the human race. Life will be a party for you, a grand festival, because life is the moment we are living right now.”

Carpe Diem

“We have to take advantage when luck is on my side, and do as much to help it as it’s doing to help us. It’s called the principle of favourability. Or beginners luck.”

Momentum

“When you possess great treasures inside you and try to tell others of them, seldom you are believed.”

Self-Aggrandizing

“I’m going away” he said. “And I want you to know that I am coming back, I love you because…”

“Don’t say anything,” Fatima interrupted. “One is loved because one is loved. No reason is needed for loving.”

Love

“If a person is living out his destiny, he knows everything he needs to know. There is only one thing that makes a dream impossible to achieve: the fear of failure.”

Fear of failure

How do I guess at the future? Based on the omens of the present. The secret is here in the present. If you pay attention to the present you can improve upon it.

On being present

“I am an old superstitious Arab, and I believe in our proverbs. There is one that says, ‘Everything that happens once can never happen again. But everything that happens twice will surely happen a third time.”

On the future
Categories
Book Fiction Travel

The Beach

Alex Garland


Rating: 9 out of 10.

On it’s 25th anniversary, Garland’s debut novel, The Beach, remains as frenetic and brilliant as it ever was but now it benefits from nostalgia.

A true classic and not just in the travel genre.

It has been 25 years since Alex Garland arrived on the literary scene with his applauded debut, an anti-tourism novel which was quickly adopted by backpackers and travellers everywhere.

The story was inspired by the author’s time in the Philippines, particularly the beaches of Palawan island but he chose to set it in Thailand due to the greater familiarity of the travelling community.

25 years later the book has also become somewhat of a prophecy as we grapple with climate change, consumerism, over-consumption and the destruction of biodiversity, which are the fears of the anti-hero narrator Richard and his psychological companion, Mr Daffy Duck.

Daffy warns Richard that humans will destroy the Beach, a sanctuary for travellers who are bold enough to find it, travellers like him and his friends; Etienne and Francoise. Richard descends into a Colonel Kurtz-like madness becoming estranged from wider society that seems alien, perverse and hedonistic.

If you have not read it then I will not spoil the end but suffice to say, anything humans touch cannot remain unspoiled since they are predisposed to sharing and boasting which encourages ever greater numbers to arrive and upset the balance.

The writing is frantic and fast-paced but never disjointed. The dialogues are short but filled with emotion. Some members of the beach community lack characterisation but that could be because Richard is an unreliable narrator and relatively disinterested in some of them as people.

The true star of the novel is Richard’s interactions with Mr Daffy Duck, his psychological alter-ego who goads Richard into seeking masculine danger, inspired by the war he was promised in his youth Vietnam movies, Gulf War 1) but never volunteered for and his love of computer games.

If you have not read it then I would absolutely recommend it as a must-read but be warned, the novel is also the last great time before mass communication was enabled.

As an early millenial who grew up with an analogue childhood and a digital adulthood, The Beach was published at the point when such adventures could likely never happen again. The world is too saturated in mobile devices, cameras and instant communication.

In 1996, in order to communicate, we were still reliant on physical mail, long distance telephone or finding an internet cafe to send the occasional Hotmail or Excite email.

It was entirely plausible that someone could disappear into South East Asia for 6 months with minimal contact back home and only have a dozen grainy photos to show for their experience.

Today; such a world is just a memory.

In 2018 I visited Koh Samui with a friend and independent travel was extremely hard to find; I took my moped, against regulations, into the interior jungle, down unmarked trails, following locals who lived amongst the sweltering conditions and I still found intagrammers posing at rock formations.

We organised a boat incursion for snorkelling and travelled an hour to the marine park island of Koh Tao. Upon arrival we were dismayed to find over a hundred people posing specifically in the surf whilst taking selfies.

My friend Tony shrugged and said ‘it is a years worth of photos‘. I wasn’t sure I understood and asked him to explain further.

Instagrammers will take 200 or 300 photos and then drip-feed them into their feed every day so it looks like perpetual travel. This is just a job for them.

In that regard, The Beach has become a prescient prediction of everything that it feared. Masses of tourists, dumping tonnes of waste into biodomes for kudos and bragging rights.

As the stoic Jed asks partway through the novel –

One day I would like to ask the authors of Lonely Planet, what is so fucking lonely about the Khao San Road?

It is a brilliant read, but don’t be surprised if it leaves you disillusioned and yearning for a time that can never be regained.