Przewalksi’s Wild Horses

I’ve been speaking at a United Nations Development Program event in Ulaan Baatar, the capital of Mongolia. It’s a city I know well (I wrote a best selling guidebook about traveling throughout Mongolia two years ago) and I’m pleased to be back, old friends to see, and some catching up to do. The conference is fine and goes off well. Mongolia is a beautiful country, and although I know the weather is going to be chilly, I’ve tacked on an extra four days to go see the Mongolian wild Pzrewalski’s Horses in Hustaai, to the west of UB, and then to take a quick trip south into the Gobi. The horses are endemic to Mongolia, and are quite different from domesticated horses. They also very nearly became extinct – the world population was down to just 17 animals (3 stallions) in the 1970’s. Still very rare, there are about 350 of them in the Hustaai reserve.

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Unawattuna

It’s only a short hop from Chennai, on India’s south-east coast to Colombo in Sri Lanka, and the home of my good friend, Simon and his wife Pauline. Retired now from positions in both Kenya and China, Simon lives in Kandy, Sri Lanka’s central city, and is slowly building for himself on about 10 acres of land at Nuala a ranch from which he can pontificate upon life, the comings and goings of the local wild elephant, the remarkable plumage of the Indian Pita, and all while downing a chilled pink gin. Lucky bugger. However, I don’t have the time to catch the train to Kandy, and am instead to meet with him in Colombo, but not before I’ve taken a five day rest in the wonderfully named Unawattuna resort in the far south of the island, a little further on from Fort Galle.

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Mumbai Recovers

After the media frenzy of my published comments on China Briefing concerning the unintentional leaking of the Chinese governments RMB/US exchange rate position, February was spent mainly in India assessing our local market position and reflecting on business confidence, particularly in Mumbai following the November terrorist attacks on the city. My firm has been investing in India – we have five (albeit small) offices there, and the global financial crisis, coupled with the Mumbai attacks, had lead to questions over how much progress we would be able to make during 2009. Happily, I found Mumbai in a resilient mood, albeit one that was still showing off its scars. The Taj Hotel, wish had been the scene of much bloodshed, has reopened, and Leopold’s café, a popular haunt amongst locals and tourists alike, was packed, even with bullet holes in the pillars, plate glass windows and holes in the floor where grenades had gone off. The attitude was a mix of defiance, and of fatalism. Still, it was sobering as I knocked back a lime soda to think of what had happened to the people directly in the firing line of the bullets. 

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Tchaikovsky’s Operas  

This winter has taken on a distinctly Russian theme, as temperatures plummet to -10, and the lake at Chaoyang Park (opposite to where I live) freezes over. In watching the perennial Tchaikovsky ballets that do the rounds at this time of year, I was struck – and not for the first time, about how seasonal there are. Further research lead to me Tchaikovsky’s operas, and an entirely new world opened up. 

I used to sing amateur opera (once even for a British Opera North production in Leeds many years ago) and am a natural tenor. Meggie also has a love of opera (well, she is Italian), so it was with some delight we purchased, from the State Music Store at Wangfujing a collection of various operas that had been held at St. Petersburgs Marinsky Theatre, a building described by my friend Alan Babington-Smith as “the most beautiful building in the world”. So, armed with Eugene Onegin, The Queen of Spades, and Mazzepa, we settled in for some long winter nights and a series of Russian classics. Several things struck me when comparing them with Italian opera – firstly, the sheer length – the Russians love to talk and the average opera extends for well over three hours – and the far higher degree and competency of the choral singing, as opposed to the Arias for which Italian opera is so rightly famous. Plus, of course the dread of Russian winters – their operas always seem to hinge on tragic pistol duels at dawn during which the hero gets mortally wounded. The count down during Eugene Onegin as the second counts out the paces – one – two –three – and then a shot rings out, is utterly chilling. Then the simple words “Mort” to signify the death of his opponent and the end of act two. It doesn’t get much more somber, and of course Pushkin, (on whose poem the opera is based) wasn’t exactly a barrel of laughs in describing the lot of the average Russian in the days of the Tsar. But still, it is a wonderfully morbid piece, and quite suitable for melancholy, cold evenings. 

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