Interview Time with Simon Reeve
This month Rob Savage had a chat with the BBC’s Simon Reeve about his epic trip around the world, following the Tropic of Cancer. You can watch the series for yourself on BBC2 every Sunday, but in the mean time here’s what happened when the pair discussed drug busts in Mexico, penis soup in Madagascar, making the most out of global trekking and more!
Ok just to warm up ‐ if you had to sell yourself in the desperately seeking section, using 25 words or less, what would you say?
I'm married (!), but ... Second‐hand TV presenter up for grabs: chassis intact but with multiple scrapes and dents; high mileage but low running costs; seeks careful owner.
Your new BBC2 travel series ‐ Tropic of Cancer has been hailed as the best TV program in the past five years. How did it come about?
Nearly five years ago I set off on a journey around the Equator, exploring the line that marks the centre of Earth’s Tropical region. The idea with all of my TV programmes has been to blend travel with current affairs and global issues, so viewers see my journey and watch me meeting wonderful people and eating strange food, but they also learn a bit more about the countries I’m travelling through.
The resulting TV series, also called Equator, seemed to go down pretty well with viewers and reviewers. So the BBC agreed to send me around the Tropic of Capricorn, the line that marks the southern border of the Tropics.
After finishing that series it would have been crazy not to complete the set, so last year I set off on a journey around the Tropic of Cancer, which marks the northern border of the Tropics.
We left the biggest, toughest journey to last! I followed the Tropic of Cancer through 18 countries, crossing the Caribbean, the Sahara, the deserts of Arabia, the jungles of Asia, and borders in North Africa that have been closed to foreigners for decades. It was an amazing experience that was exciting, frightening, fascinating, and exhilarating. Often all at the same time.
And which stop was the most memorable, and why?
Tough one. I can honestly say there wasn’t a single day on the road when I wasn’t learning something new or being awed by what I was seeing or people I was meeting. But if I had to pick out one country it would be Bangladesh. We only tend to think of Bangladesh as a place of flooding and tragedy, and while it is definitely poor and packed, it’s also a vibrant, beautiful country with some of the warmest, friendliest people on the planet. I loved it.
You’ve visited 70 countries in the past six years alone. Do you ever find it hard to keep track of what you’ve accomplished and the people you’ve met?
I haven’t accomplished that much! And while I’m pretty good at remembering people I meet on the road I’m not so good at remembering where or when I met them. In that way I’m a bit like a goldfish going round the bowl, because I’m forgetful and so each time I’ve circled the planet it’s felt fresh, new and exciting.
Describe what it was like to join a Mexican SWAT team for a drugs raid.
Frightening! I don’t follow the Tropic of Cancer obsessively, because the idea is to zigzag along it and use the line as a way of exploring and learning more about the countries on the northern edge of the Tropics. But the beauty of the journey ‐ for me anyway ‐ is that zigzagging along it will still take me to places that I wouldn’t normally visit, and into strange situations. So one day I would be following the Tropic through a touristy bit of the planet, and the next I would be following it through a city at the heart of Mexico’s ongoing drug war. Which is basically what happened.
The line runs near Culiacan in Mexico, which is the headquarters of one of the main drug cartels. I wanted to find out a bit more about the drug war, so I met‐up with a local journalist, went to a cemetery where dead drug gang soldiers are celebrated and buried in two or three‐storey mausoleums with air‐conditioning and furniture. And then we met‐up with an elite SWAT team who were heading out to patrol the streets. They were heavily armed, and we all had flak‐jackets, but the cartel gunmen are also heavily armed, often with armour‐piercing ammunition, so it didn’t feel safe. The SWAT team raided a house that they thought was a cartel safe‐house, but fortunately for everyone ‐ especially us ‐ there was just one guy inside who didn’t fight back.
Your book ‐ Osama bin Laden and the Future of Terrorism predicted the rise of Al Qaeda and a new age of terrorism. For the benefit of the backpackers who haven’t read it ‐ how?
When I left school I got a job working as a post boy on a national newspaper, and then gradually started doing research at the paper in my spare time. Research led to writing and investigations, and when I was 21 I began looking into the background of the first World Trade Centre bombing (in 1993) the same day it happened. Over the next few years I met lots of spies, intelligence agents, militants and assorted dodgy characters who gave me information that showed the existence and growth of the group we now call al Qaeda. It was clear to me that this group was unlike almost every other terrorist group, and was actively planning how to launch apocalyptic attacks. That was the conclusion of my book, which came out in 1998. Unfortunately hardly anyone read it and nobody took any notice of it, until the attacks of 9/11, when it suddenly became a bestseller.
From what I’ve seen of the series it’s not all helicopters over Dubai and kite surfing in the Western Sahara ‐ you also encounter some of the most impoverished people in the world, battling climate change, the aftermath of war and more. What was it like to encounter that ‐ first hand?
It’s tough, upsetting, and unsettling. But it’s also a privilege to learn more about the reality of life experienced by most people on the planet, who aren’t as rich and well‐fed as us lucky Europeans. And it’s also a huge responsibility, because often I’m visiting a part of the world where foreigners rarely visit, let alone TV crews, and the people I’m meeting are keen that the rest of the planet hears what they’re going through.
On a lighter note ‐ what is sand bread and is it as bad as it sounds?
It’s delicious! I ate this on the Tropic of Cancer journey in northern Mauritania, in the absolute middle of nowhere. Basically you start a fire in the sand, and then you break down the wood into embers, knead your dough for bread, bury it in the sand and put the embers over the top so the bread cooks in the sand. Yes, it’s got a bit of a sandy, gritty taste around the edges. But that’s probably good for digestion. It’s certainly not as bad as the other delicacies I’ve had to eat on the telly, ranging from a breakfast of grilled squirrel and fried caterpillar in Laos, to penis soup in Madagascar. Now that was bad.
How did you come to combat a female wrestler in Mexico?
Good question. My guide Pepe thought it would be very amusing to get me into a training session with The Princess, a female Mexican wrestler. They’re mad about Lucha Libre wrestling in Mexico, where the wrestlers wear masks and take the role of good or bad superheroes in the ring. Anyway I thought the wrestling was a form of pantomime, and The Princess wanted to prove otherwise. She had me down on the ground and jumped up and down on my chest, and then she brought in her tag partner and two of them battered me! I had bruises for nearly four weeks on parts of my body that I couldn’t show the camera…
You advise people not to travel blind ‐ to open their eyes and learn about the countries they visit. In your extensive experience, what would you say is the best way of doing this?
A Big Trip is an amazing experience and should be one of the most memorable events of your life. So the main reason I’d suggest people open their eyes and learn about where they’re going is simply because it’s more interesting and makes for a much more memorable adventure!
How you do it is by planning your trip in advance. Don’t just hop on a plane. Get a guide book and read it. Plan where you want to go and what you want to do. Then ask questions, get a local guide, eat in local restaurants, get out of your hotel ‐ explore! Also learn a bit about the local language and customs. You don’t need anything excessive, but you’ll have a much better time if you can say ‘thank you’, ‘sorry’, ‘I’ll have three beers’, and ‘she’s paying’.
Whatever you do try not to be lulled into just lying by a pool with your iPod on. You can do that at home lying under a sun‐bed, and your memories of the trip will only last as long as your tan.
Finally it’s worth remembering that The World is a welcoming and hospitable place. The media delights in telling us that it’s dangerous and scary, but really it’s very friendly.
Happy travels ‐ Simon.
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