Travel Narratives
People fascinate me. Perhaps that is why I love working as a GP. When I travel, I always want to ask questions and know what life is really like for everyone I meet. Sadly, I am not much of a linguist but I smile and gesticulate a great deal and make the effort to communicate. Given enough time, it is remarkable how connections can be made
I explore, try to understand and write about difficult issues including corruption, prejudice, exploitation, caste and poverty. I know that for some this makes uncomfortable reading and even risks demystifying and undermining the image some travellers have of the simple natural existence of the rural poor in emerging nations. Nevertheless I fervently believe these issues should be understood by all who travel so my aim is to present the facts as sympathetic engaging stories about real people. I am frustrated by the look-and-point approach to travel, but I hope I don't preach. I write of my adventures and enthusiasms and of colour and beauty so that my readers can enjoy my travel experiences as much as I do.
Travel Health Guides
Within minutes of arriving in the sleepy town of Khairpur in Sindh, I was faced with a medical crisis. I'd been qualified as a doctor for a few years but was new to expatriate life, and I was travelling with my firstborn, three-month-old son. A guy who was expecting to work with my husband announced that he needed to be evacuated because he was desperately ill. I introduced myself as a GP and offered help. Quickly I realised that my new friend was not suffering from some horrendous tropical pox but that he just had a nasty attack of sinusitis. It made him feel awful with frontal headache that recalled having a screwdriver rammed into his eyeball. Labelling it with a diagnosis made it less scary, though, and we found that the correct antibiotics were readily available over the counter in the local bazaar. By the next day my patient was well on the way to recovery.
That was the first time I really had to think about travel health. What this, my first real travel medicine ‘case’, made me realise is that even the calmest and most sensible of travellers will nearly always become disproportionately worried about themselves when taken ill. In my friend’s case, he didn’t know much about the local health service and didn’t know where he could find a doctor he could trust. He just wanted to get home to his friendly British GP. That experience showed me how liberating and empowering information can be and motivated me to start writing accessible straightforward travel health advice. I began work on a manual that was distributed amongst expatriate engineers, and soon after wrote my first travel health feature for Wanderlust magazine. It was - of course - on diarrhoea.
How to Shit Around the World
"helpful tips on how to have trouble-free vacations"
The Arizona Republic
50 Camels and She's Yours
What an excellent book - full of adventurous amazing stories. Highly recommended. I really enjoyed reading it.
SE
A Glimpse of Eternal Snows
A beautifully written true story, skilfully read by the author which made it all the more poignant. It’s an amazing heart-breaking account of a baby born with major health issues. Yet David was able to enjoy remote Nepali life and the people around him, the sounds of nature and his loving family members. Jane—the tale is from her point of view—is a super-woman coping with a never-ending string of challenges from her baby’s health care in the UK and living abroad. Even trekking for days at a time with her entire family high in the Nepali mountains where oxygen levels were low.
The tale is rich with description of the vegetation, wildlife and locals’ everyday life—as well as Jane’s—with plenty of fascinating anecdotes. Her older son provides much entertainment with his observations and questions. The book is scattered with humour from either Jane or Alex throughout. Her husband’s job as a water engineer and Jane’s attempts at introducing health education give insight to the patriarchal mindset and complex cultural differences of a people resistant to change. I cannot recommend the book highly enough. It was so gripping it only took me three days to listen to it—all 15 hours.
Xenon
Your Child Abroad: a travel health guide
“Essential handbook for the more adventurous family traveller”
Junior magazine