one of the advantages of cycling is that it automatically prevents a journey from becoming an Expedition.

apartheid still hangs in the air like a poisonous cloud left over from chemical warfare.

The more I see of life in these 'undeveloped countries' and of the methods adopted to 'improve' them, the more depressed I become. It seems criminal that the backwardness of a country like Afghanistan should be used as an excuse for America and Russia to have a tug-of-war for possession.

Sunnis consider Shias a pack of unwholesome fanatics and Shias consider Sunnis a gang of lukewarm no-goods - there's nothing like religion for spreading brotherly love!

The Irish have a flair for wringing from death the last drop of emotion and they do not quite understand those who react otherwise.

... strong bonds are forged in high emotional temperatures.

On my tenth birthday a bicycle and an atlas coincided as gifts, and a few days later I decided to cycle to India...However, I was a cunning child so I kept my ambition to myself, thus avoiding the tolerant amusement it would have provoked among my elders.