Category Archive: TRAVEL
The Travelling Egyptologists
1717 map of White Nile and environs by Claude Sicard
Lecture at Adelaide, 21 September 2017 Think Egyptology and the enthusiastic amateur thinks Champollion, Sir Henry Rawlinson, David Roberts, James Breasted, Flinders Petrie, or Howard Carter; possibly Boris Karloff, Kingsley Amis and Robert Conquest. But The Varnished Culture was ignorant of the seminal work of Karl Richard Lepsius (1810-1884). Drawing on the work of Champollion, Lepsius virtually established the discipline of Egyptology, paving the way for the more vaunted discoveries of the early 20th century. The Lepsius expeditions to Egypt and Nubia (Sudan) 1842 – 1845 (sponsored by the King of Prussia, to catalogue, and in some instances loot, the ancient monuments),…
Continue Reading →National War Memorial
Canberra, August 2017 Big planes, subs, tanks…dioramas of the most prodigious quality…enough military paraphernalia to convert the most conscientious objector into a club bore…the Australian War Memorial, a short cab ride up the hill on the other side of Lake Burley Griffin, directly aligned with the walk up the hill to Parliament on the other side of that lake, is well worth a visit, and it is free (gold coin donation encouraged). An eternal flame flickers (see main image) in order to remind us that our forebears died for us, whether we appreciate it or not….
Continue Reading →Raffles in the Midday Sun
6 February 1819 – Thomas Stamford Raffles founded Singapore, continuing a long tradition of the English craze for islands. His short and fairly honourable life is commemorated in the form of that wonderful colonial edifice, Raffles Hotel. The grand relic is a welcome piece of high colonial style amid the relentless humidity, the pungent aroma of durians, the post-modern Singapore of Orchard Road, ‘Planet Hollywood’, ‘Starbucks,’ a Marriott done-up as a thirty-storey pagoda, the clean and un-cerebral Sentosa Island, the welcoming hands of merchants just waiting to grab you and drag you into their shop…
Continue Reading →Pompeii by Mary Beard
A Modern Dog in Pompeii
Mary Beard’s television programmes are about the ancients and not the presenter, which is a nice change. Beard does insert herself into her excellent work, “Pompeii”, but only to ask the questions which the reader would ask. If you want to know what (we think) the Pompeiians ate (they loved dormice and a revolting fermented fish sauce called garum), drank (lots of alcohol), ) and watched (horrible gladiator and animal maulings), then this is the book for you. There is unavoidably, a lot of supposition in the recreation of the life of the ancients. Some of it seems a bit dubious (determining which…
Continue Reading →Lured Down to the Sea
Lure, Fleurieu Peninsula, Spring 2016. The Varnished Culture got in a jalopy, stacked a bunch of CDs in the player and set off under an early Spring murk, down south to Lure, a new Bed ‘n’ Breakfast on the Fleurieu Peninsula, an hour’s drive from Adelaide. It’s an easy-peasy drive: you take the main arterial road, imaginatively called ‘South Road,’ and turn onto the Southern Expressway (now a two-way road, thank god) which conveys you south expressly through the suburban sprawl, and tips you out near Reynella. From there, you can go inland and trawl through the great wineries of…
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