Tag Archives: Around the World 94

Moonsky Star ’94

Posted on by

On September 11, 1994, we boarded a train in Beijing that would take us to Ulaanbaatar, which is about 1,200 miles. That was the first leg of taking the Trans-Siberian, though the company which arranged our trips called the route the Trans-Mongolian, as it didn’t originate in Vladivostok. A quibble.

One thing do to before the train left was visit the engine.

And stand on the front, to pose for pictures. I think the woman stepping off the front was Iris, a Swiss we met on the train and corresponded with for a few years afterward. Of course, I had to pose as well. Yuriko didn’t want to do anything that silly.

The booking company was called Moonsky Star, located in Hong Kong, as noted on the self-printed booklet we received when we booked passage from Beijing to Moscow, about 4,880 miles all together. After Ulaanbaatar came Irkutsk and then Moscow.

The booklet was most informative about the trains, the accommodations, the cities and other places along the route, visas, and more.

The chimp was the company’s cartoon mascot. Formed in the late ’80s, as passage across Eurasia had become somewhat easier, Moonsky had offices in the warren-like Chunking Mansions in Kowloon, which I understand is still there, and about the same as it ever was. Looks like the potential for a terrible deadly fire.

Some years ago, I checked, and Moonsky Star was still doing business; but today I checked again, and it seems to have closed up shop. Could be too many other ways to get tickets these days; or the pandemic as last-nail-in-the-coffin; or the fact that Russia’s at war at the moment, and demand to ride the Trans-Siberian might be in a slump; or who knows what else. Maybe the proprietor retired or died.

Too bad in any case. I don’t have a bad thing to say about the company, which delivered the goods for us, allowing us to spend about two weeks getting from a remarkable point A to a remarkable point B with much in between.

Judith with the Head of Holofernes, Postcard Version

Posted on by

I sent this card to my brother Jim in December 1994, on the day that we visited Windsor Castle.

The British postmark is where it should be. The USPS thoughtlessly postmarked the image. Nice going, USPS. Just another example of disrespecting postcards.

As this account of the 1992 Windsor Castle fire says, only two of the castle’s artworks were destroyed by the fire, not including the one depicted on the card, “Judith with the Head of Holofernes” (Cristofano Allori, 1613) which was part of the Royal Collection at Windsor. It still is.

At the time, I didn’t know anything about Allori or the painting. The Royal Collection Trust notes: “According to his biographer Baldinucci, Allori painted this work in part as an autobiographical account of his love affair with Maria de Giovanni Mazzafirri, which ended badly. The figure of Judith, Baldinucci claimed, resembles ‘La Mazzafirra,’ the servant in the background her mother, and the severed head of Holofernes is a portrait of the artist himself.”

I had seen “Judith I” (Gustav Klimt, 1901) in Vienna earlier that year, and of course the story of Judith came up in my studies, but I also didn’t really know how popular Judith was in artistic depictions. This I found out later. Nothing like a story of deception, a fetching feme, a drunken fool and a beheading to inspire art, I guess.

As for the work at Windsor, most recently — as in, last week — I read how it came to be in the Royal Collection. Acquired by Charles I, probably from the Gonzaga collection, Mantua, the trust says, which lead me to read further about the Gonzaga collection. If I had heard about it before, and I might had, I’d forgotten.

The long and short of it is that the House of Gonzaga, after much effort, put together a splendid art collection, only to sell it when they needed cash — to King Charles in the late 1620s, well before that monarch’s grim fate, in a deal facilitated by one Daniel Nijs.

The lesson here? Postcards are educational.

Fuzzy Jungle Pictures

Posted on by

We spent late August and early September 1994 at Taman Negara, the sizable national park on the middle of the Malay Peninsula. It’s a place of jungle walks.Taman Negara 1994

We stayed where many people do, at Kuala Tahan on the Tembeling River. I’ve read that a road runs to that settlement now, but that wasn’t the case 25+ years ago — you took a boat much of the way.Taman Negara 1994

Had a basic snapshot camera in those days, so I got basic snapshots of the Tembeling. Fuzzy pics to go with fuzzy memories.

Taman Negara 1994

Taman Negara 1994Taman Negara 1994

Remarkably, whoever took the Wiki picture of the Tembeling River did so from the exact same vantage as I did a few years earlier, including what looks like the same tree in the foreground. Must be a rise on a path near the river, but I don’t remember specifically.

Vietnam 1994, But the Postcard Picture is Much Older

Posted on by

Tremendous rain on Saturday morning. By later in the day, most everything was dry, including my deck. The storm had left behind humidity but also enough wind to lessen that sticky feeling. The rest of the day was cloudy and about 75 F. A fine time to sit outside and do something close to nothing, and otherwise be a bit too leisurely.

From the postcard files: one I sent from Vietnam, dated June 29, 1994. I must have gotten a collection of cards somewhere, maybe a postcard vendor in the street — they were usually older children — and sent all of them. This one says it’s No. 8.

Vietnam Postcard Vietnam Postcard

The card says it depicts the central market in Rạch Giá, a city southwest of Saigon, by a photographer named Nadal. It has the look of earlier in the 20th century, and it seems that one Fernand Nadal was active with a camera in this part of the world ca. 1930.

We went that direction to visit the Mekong Delta, but didn’t make it down to Rạch Giá. I sent the card anyway, contrary to my usual practice, probably because I didn’t have that many cards. You couldn’t count on running into postcard-wallahs just anywhere, even in Vietnam.

Suzhou 1994

Posted on by

A postcard I sent from Suzhou in May 1994.Suchou Suchou

Jim must have asked me about zoos and natural history museums, two kinds of places he likes to go. In Beijing, we did visit the main zoo, including a look at its moth-eaten pandas, but no natural history museums. We didn’t do that until we got to Mongolia.

Suzhou is famed for its gardens, and we visited a few. As far as I can tell, I took only one picture in any one of them.Limited film and the prospect of months on the road inspired that kind of parsimony in me, I guess.

Jana Seta Tallinn

Posted on by

This looks like a promising way to ease into proto-spring. Or, as you notice the crunch of snow under your feet give way to squishing sounds, the Mud Season.

That’s just the near-term weather forecast for where I live, and thus a very narrow focus. I am glad — for any number of reasons, including Siberian weather — I don’t live in Irkutsk. The days ahead for that place:

Which pretty much looks like here during February until a few days ago, except we had more snow. Another difference is that I expect the rest of the spring is going be much colder in Irkutsk than here.

Then again, for year-round pleasant weather, I hear the place you want to be is Medellín:

That does look pleasant, just keep a sweater around for the evening. Reminds me of Mexico City in December, except there wasn’t a bit of rain.

One more map (for now): Tallinn. Nice town, Tallinn, at least in 1994, and I expect it’s done well for itself in the generation since casting off the Soviet yoke.

The map front is simple enough, and reminds everyone where Estonia is in the greater scheme of Europe. Guess some people need to be reminded of that kind of thing.

The map is the product of Jana Seta, “publishing house, maps and art gallery” in Riga. I’m happy to report that it’s still around, and has a web site that tells me that the company had just started business the same year we visited Riga, which was just after we were in Tallinn. Unfortunately, we didn’t visit the map store.

“We started on the 19th of April 1994 when the specialized map and travel literature outlet — Jana Seta Map shop — opened its doors to the first customers in the newly renovated Berg’s Bazaar building in Riga,” the site says. “At that time it was the first and only specialized map shop in the Baltics.

“Together with the constant in-going and out-going tourism development in Latvia, our shop has grown to become one of the leading map shops in the whole of Eastern Europe. Many trips around Latvia and abroad have started at the shelves of our map and tourism literature.

“The former USSR army general staff topographic map and city plans (published 1949-1991) have a special place in our assortment.” Hm.

One side of the map is a wider view of the city, while the other has a detailed map of the historic center, plus an index and advertisements for the kinds of things that tourists and business travelers might want, mostly in English. Looks like Jana Seta was quick to pick up the ways of private enterprise. The map key and other information are in English, Russian and (I assume) Latvian.

This is the inset for the historic center of Tallinn.

A fine old place to visit, though we stayed in cheaper accommodations out from the center, in a Soviet-era block of flats, and rode the convenient trolley into the old town. I see that I marked a few places of interest in purple ink, including one I labeled “puppet theater.” As much as I’d like to say that we went to a puppet theater in Tallinn, I’m afraid we didn’t.

“The Historic Centre (Old Town) of Tallinn is an exceptionally complete and well-preserved medieval northern European trading city on the coast of the Baltic Sea,” says UNESCO, which put it on the World Heritage list in 1997. “The city developed as a significant centre of the Hanseatic League during the major period of activity of this great trading organization in the 13th-16th centuries.

“The upper town (Toompea) with the castle and the cathedral has always been the administrative centre of the country, whereas the lower town preserves to a remarkable extent the medieval urban fabric of narrow winding streets, many of which retain their medieval names, and fine public and burgher buildings, including town wall, Town Hall, pharmacy, churches, monasteries, merchants’ and craftsmen’ guilds, and the domestic architecture of the merchants’ houses, which have survived to a remarkable degree. The distribution of building plots survives virtually intact from the 13th-14th centuries.”

One more thing I learned just now from Jana Seta’s site: “Mars has three craters named for places in Latvia: Auce, Rauna and Talsi. Now you know.”

Nelles Bangkok

Posted on by

Bangkok is one of those cities hard to navigate even with a map. But I guess the challenge and the thrill of finding your way around in a place where most of the signs aren’t in a roman script is a thing of the past. Even if I ever went back there, I’d take my box, with its connection to nifty electronic maps and transliterations.

We had a good map: Nelles. It wasn’t the only place where we used that brand.

Craenen, a European map distributor, says of Nelles: “Nelles Verlag is a German publisher of maps and guidebooks. The Nelles maps are well known and appreciated for their reference precision and quality…


“Places of interest, including historical sites, beaches, national parks or protected area, etc. are highlighted both on the main map and on the accompanying street plans or enlargements…. The extensive range consists of a large number of destinations for which it is difficult to find other good maps. Asian destinations in particular are very well represented, and in recent years, more coverage has been given to both South America and Africa.”

Look Right (Or Else)

Posted on by

Some years ago, I scanned one of the pictures I took in London in December 1994, a streetscape. I forget where exactly. Something inspired me to scan it in black and white, which captures the December gloom all the better.

Noir London

Not that London’s a particularly gloomy place, in December or any other time. But old movies on long-ago Saturday afternoons conditioned me to think of old London in foggy black and white, and I caught something of that in the image. Maybe not London in 1994, but 1934.

Looking at the image again, I noticed LOOK RIGHT painted on the edge of the road. Sound advice, I’m sure. When did that message start being painted to warn visitors whose first instinct is to look the wrong way?

A 1991 NYT article mentions the paintings in the context of pedestrian deaths in London, but it only says, “this city has always been tough on foreign pedestrians, who can often be observed at street corners wearing the slightly startled look of deer edging alongside a freeway. It was for them, mostly, that London officials years ago began painting reminders along curbs suggesting that pedestrians ‘look left’ or ‘look right’ before venturing into the street.”

Perhaps for the influx of U.S. soldiers during WWII. That would be my guess. Of course, the hazard is present for Britons visiting our side of the Atlantic as well. After all, Winston Churchill almost bought the farm in New York in 1931 because he failed to look the right (correct) way crossing a street.

Kek Lok Si Temple, Penang

Posted on by

In July 1994 we spent a pleasant, and sweaty, few days in Panang. In George Town, that is. To avoid confusion: Panang is one of the 13 states of the federation of Malaysia, consisting of Penang Island in the Straits of Malacca, and a mainland component called Seberang Perai. George Town is capital of the state, located on Penang Island. UNESCO tapped its historic core — long after we visited — as a World Heritage Site, along with Malacca. I just thought it was a charming old dump.

“Georgetown turned out to be a low-rise, whitewashed, somewhat seedy town, good for walking after the heat of the day died down, and early in the morning,” I wrote about the visit. “I took a couple of good walks before Yuriko woke. Over the next few days [we] took in Ft. Cornwallis (nice clock tower), wandered around the Komtar Mall, saw the Kek Lok Sri [sic] temple, climbing its pagoda, swam at Batu Ferringhi beach, and rode the cable railway up Penang Hill.”

Here’s the view of George Town from Kek Lok Si, which is on a high hill in the suburb of Air Itam.
Penang
I’m surprised I didn’t take a picture from below, but that’s the way things were in those days — limited film, as opposed to the practical infinity of digital images.

“Ayer Itam’s most recognizable landmark is the Kek Lok Si temple. Also known as the Temple of Supreme Bliss, it is the largest Buddhist temple in Malaysia,” says Penang 500 Early Postcards. “The founder of KLS was Abbot Beow Lean (1844-1907), from the Kushan Abbey in Fujian, China… The KLS, sited at the foot of the Penang hills, consists of many prayer halls, pavilions, carved pillars, tortoise and fish ponds, and flower gardens linked by winding and ascending pathways.”

Along with a pagoda in a mix of styles: Chinese, Thai and Burmese. It’s behind Yuriko here.Penang

And what’s a Buddhist temple without some Buddharūpa?Penang

This monumental statue, depicting Guanyin, didn’t exist — or at least wasn’t in its present physical form — when we visited. As I understand it, Guanyin is a bodhisattva associated with compassion. Sounds like a good fellow to have around.

Wat Phra That Hariphunchai

Posted on by

You’d think I’d remember Wat Phra That Hariphunchai in northern Thailand, near Chang Mai, better than I do. But after a quarter-century and then some, I don’t remember much, not like I recall the Wat Phra Kaew, home of the Emerald Buddha, in Bangkok.

But we were there in June ’94, during the few days when we stayed in Chang Mai, and took a few pictures. Such as of me, dwarfed by the main chedi.
Wat Phra That HariphunchaiBelow, the part of the temple known as Viharn Phra Chao Thunjai, according to this site, which has much more about the temple grounds, whose original stupa goes back to the 9th century, with a major expansions in the 11th and later centuries.Wat Phra That HariphunchaiThe bell tower.
Wat Phra That Hariphunchai
For whatever reason, we didn’t make an image of the temple’s distinctive, pyramid-shaped Pathumvadi Chedi, or the Ho Trai, which houses Buddhist scriptures.