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Published: July 13th 2011
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Tha Khaek
Mekong river front in Tha Khaek "Mr. Tim Harford-Cross I presume?" "Yes, that is me, who is asking?" "Ah, my name is Ralf and I have been looking far and wide for you. For a while I thought I had caught up with you in the immeasurable vastness of Central Asia, but somehow you eluded me. I followed your track up the snowy heights of the Pamirs and through the empty desserts of the Taklamakan. I there discovered to my dismay that you were last sighted entering the hidden autocracy of Northern Korea and so I too had to go that way. However once again I was too late and you had left, up the Yangtze so the rumours suggested. Into far Yunnan the whispers pertaining to your presence took me and then down the mighty Mekong river where I was told that you were lurking amongst the tribe of expats that call Phnom Penh their home. So I went down this river and here at the banks of the Mekong I finally find you in the old French trading station of Pakse." "But why on earth have you been following me?" "I write for a wider community Tha Khaek
French architecture on Tha Khaek's main square called TravelBlog and took it upon me to seek you out and write about you. Also if you look closely you might recall meeting me in Kazakhstan. I know my physique has much changed since that time due to the strains of finding you, but we travelled for a short while together on the steppes of Kazakhstan where a gypsy foretold our futures."
And so I bring you the story of a man named Tim, also known as
TouristTim who I met the first time in wintry Kazakhstan where he had just been wrestling with a bear. He at the time bore the marks of that fight in the form of a leather jacket with claw marks in it. He was however deft at sewing and whilst he told me of his adventures on the train up to frigid Astana he slowly but meticulously fixed up the slashed jacket. We wandered around northern Kazakhstan for two weeks before we parted ways promising that we would meet up again in half a years time in Kyrgyzstan.
Half a year came and went and I never made it to Kyrgyzstan in the designated time. Tim patiently waited as long
Tha Khaek
More colonial buildings as he could, but eventually he had to make a dash for it a week before I arrived in Bishkek. It seemed the KGB had found his lair and once again he was on the run. Through his writings on TravelBlog I discovered he was making his way through China and so I followed him, hot on his heels but never catching up. My money depleted, I eventually had to return home without ever getting a glimpse of this elusive traveller.
A second chance however was offered me when I found out that he had settled down for a while in Phnom Penh, Tim's funds too weren't limitless and he had found himself a cushy job in sultry Cambodia. Again I went out, determined to find him this time round. Almost I failed yet again, but just as all hope seemed lost he broke the bonds of working life and biked up to Pakse where we were reunited for a brief while. Brief because I am about to end my trip and had only a week or two left before returning home and Tim was about to continue on his journey down to the pirate infested waters of the
Tha Khaek
Playing petanque Indonesian archipelago.
And so for the second time on my travels through Asia I have met up, after a long period of time in a totally different part of the world where we first met, with somebody I have had the pleasure of travelling with before. It doesn't happen that often, because most people simply don't travel as long as me. But every now and again I do find myself in the company of someone like this. The first time this happened was in India when I met up with Claudio and Fernando from Brazil, fellow TravelBloggers (
2Brothers3Continents) just like Tim. I had met them the first time 2 years earlier in Bulgaria and Turkey and since that time they had travelled through much of Africa and Asia before our paths crossed once again. And now there is Tim, first met in Kazakhstan one and a half year's ago under totally opposite climatic conditions.
It is always interesting and fun to meet up after such a period of time, especially when you have been following their blogs. By the way, I do of course meet up and bump into other people I have met on the road before,
Savannakhet
Colonial house but those are during the course of one trip and mostly within the space of a month or maybe two months on whatever particular route I am taking. For instance I kept meeting the same people in Central Asia when I was doing that trip, or here in Laos I tend to see the same faces over and over again as I make my way down. Meeting up with somebody after two years or so is more rare however and that is why I am writing a blog about it.
Will Tim and I meet again? And where will we meet if we do? For answers to these questions you will have to stay tuned to a possible upcoming sequel in two years time. It might look something like this: 'Tim and Ralf sail the high seas of the Pacific while fending off pirates and sharks!'
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2Brothers3Continents
Claudio e Fernando
The world is round and spins.
Hey Ralf! You did it again! I wish I could write like you! Nice to hear you are fine and meetind felow travelers again and again! In this little world every two long paths may cross many times! I'm happy to see you ON the beaten track once in a while, haha, it's nice and relaxing! Drink a beer for me and my brother, (he is back in Brazil now!) Keep travelling, our tracks might cross again! Fernando