The Wrong Way Home

The Wrong Way Home
by Peter Moore
Reviewed by Adelynn
 
The predecessor to Vroom With a View (see previous entry). This time, the author plots to take the hippie trail (he thinks) from London back to Sydney without hopping upon an aeroplane.

Along with his humorous takes on the people he meets along the way, he also weaves in the current, and sometimes historical, political situations in the Third World countries.

There are nice, trusting people who do not think twice about offering him a free room under their roofs; there are perverts who make him squirmy. There are a handful of developed countries but mostly, they are undeveloped/underdeveloped countries which are war-torn, dangerous for foreigners, polluted or all of the above. Singapore gets barely a two-page mention. No great love there then (I think it's too modernised and pristine for his liking).

I particularly like the part where he has not enough value in his phonecard to make a international call in Tibet to his mum, but enough to call the Australian embassy there to play a prank on the unsuspecting lady.

Does he actually fulfil his wish of travelling home overland all the way? That's for you to find out. I, for one, am inspired to go to Ko Phangan in Bangkok for an idyllic retreat.