yet more on exploration

Swedish Explorer Mikael Strandberg recently asked me to write some words about what exploration means. Here is an expanded version of what I sent him.

Like the novel, which is supposed to be 'dead' as an artform, yet refuses to go away, so exploration is assumed to be all over, a thing of the past. 

I read that polar explorer Pen Hadow was, even after making the first solo unsupported trip to the North Pole, somewhat reluctant to call himself an explorer. You can see why. Ours is an age where the very word ‘explorer’ excites a hostile snigger, or, at best, an indulgent smile. In one of Haruki Murakami’s novels the hero meets a ‘TV explorer’, a superfluous nitwit with offroad vehicles and all the right clothing. He muses that since the world is all explored then only someone deluded would dare to call himself an explorer. It’s a widespread view- ESPECIALLY AMONGST PEOPLE WHO HAVE NEVER TRAVELLED IN REALLY REMOTE PLACES. Ours is the age of the instant internet know-all, the smartass with a smartphone, attitude and no experiences beyond the suburban. He’s watched a lot of telly though so he thinks that the telly view of the world is the correct one. But what about the places where the telly people never go? There are plenty.

It is quite simple, however, to say who an explorer was in the past- he was someone who went where others had not been and brought back information. That’s what most people will tell you, but in fact this is a modern definition, the scientific definition so to speak. If you look at explorers from Marco Polo to Richard Burton their actions are not so high minded: they were simply people who ‘tried to get places’. No more articulate than that really. They wanted to get to a new place by a new route, a shorter one usually. Their motives were usually economic. Or territorial- claiming land for their own country.

We forget all that now and teach in school that explorers were like modern scientists but in funny clothes. The fact that modern scientists, with aeroplanes and helicopters and skidoos and special clothing can go where any of these old explorers, who suffered such hardships, went, makes the scientists imagine they are cut from similar cloth. Not a bit of it.

The old explorers brought back news, information about things they found, rocks, plants, lost cities- but all this was by the by. They simply wanted to go somewhere no one had been before or get somewhere by a new route, a route no one else had used before. Or no one from their culture had used before.

Explorers are in fact the lineal descendants of those hunter gatherers who went in search of new game and plant rich areas. They were curious, flexible minded and courageous. Courageous because they were going outside the comfort zone of the tribe.

There is survival value in going outside the comfort zone- whether that zone is psychological or physical. It, is, in fact, what explorers do. They explore regions beyond the culture’s comfort zone. Captain Kirk, of course, summed it up rather well, “To boldly go where no man has gone before!” They may or may not bring back their discoveries in a form that is currently called ‘scientific’.

I used to find it odd that Buzz Aldrin in his space suit and tiny rocket capsule and Ranulph Fiennes making the first polar circumnavigation of the planet could both be labeled explorers. Yet they are: both have gone outside the comfort zone of the culture.

Maybe the journey involves an interior path too. Becoming initiated into a remote tribe counts as exploration- with both and internal and external journeying out of the usual comfort zone.

It is a slippery concept, exploration, especially in a world that many, wrongly, believe is fully explored. But what does ‘fully explored’ mean? That it has been photographed for Google earth? That someone has flown over it in a jet plane? That it was driven over in a jeep? We confuse map making with exploration. We have great maps of places that remain unexplored. I’ve used plenty of maps that are 50% fantasy or blank. Even ‘accurate’ maps won’t tell you whether humans have been this way before or not. My own view is that somewhere is not explored until a human being has looked at it closely and moved over it at walking pace. I have been in desert wadis where there are no vehicle tracks. The valley was unexplored- by any definiton- and I was the first person, since the previous wet period 5000 years ago - to visit such a place. That a car passed within two kilometres of this valley but didn’t see it and stop means nothing. They might just have well not have been there.

The other form exploration in the modern world takes, is to do an old route in a new way, or to link up several old routes. To do it using less gear and in a less complicated way counts as exploration- why? Because this is a more intimate way of experiencing the landscape. You find out new things about yourself. You necessarily leave the comfort zone. In the challenge, say, of towing a sledge solo to the North Pole in winter, you discover, because you are the first to sumount this challenge, a whole range of new solutions. That is the discovery element of this exploration.

Discovery without challenge- for example buzzing around Antarctica on snowmobiles looking for dinosaur bones- though fun is more science than exploration. When there is no challenge, physical or psychological, the results obtained don’t ‘change’ the discoverer. He hasn’t ‘earned them’ in the way an explorer has. I think we are drowning in information these days we haven’t earned.

do you hate goals?

In a self-help book I recently read: a goal is best viewed as 'a dream with a deadline'. It also stated that goal setting was more important than goal-getting. 

more exploration algebra

I've been thinking some more on why challenge is so important to a meaningful definition of exploration and why we still call polar athletes and adventurers 'explorers' (rightly it seems to me). I think it has something to do with the super abundance of information in the world. It's a cliche to say we are drowning in it, but we are. The average scientific paper is read by 1.2 people and I've met a few 0.2 people in my time. So on a basic publicity level, attaching challenges overcome to new information (the scientists who battle through the jungle to find a new species of tree frog) works. More than 1.2 people hear about your discovery because there is a human challenge story attached.

But I mean something more fundamental than that. I think we don't value things unless we have 'paid' for them in some way. It could be as simple as money, but often we pay with blood, sweat and time. Lots of time. Spending a lot of time on something you could do in an easier way (say chopper to the north pole) has some sort of virtue all its own in this overfast world. Doing things the hard way not only earns respect, it's a kind of down-payment on the things you do find out along the way. Learning the hard way makes the lesson stick. You change inside in some way. Your demeanor becomes a kind of lesson to others. I don't just mean those frost bitten fingers, I mean what you hold to be important might change. I think this is one way explorers pass on what they have found out.

exploration algebra

Those well meaning but deluded folk who believe that exploration should be an enterprise for scientists in expensive 4x4s might consider the following formula:

E=DC²

Where E= Exploration, D=Discovery and C=Challenge

When Challenge is 0, so is the Exploration value. You have Discovery only, the kind of thing that can happen in a laboratory.

One crucial aspect of exploration is challenge. Why? Because if there is no challenge, no frostbite, or thirst or getting lost then the discoveries made weren't earned. Without challenge it's just another video game and there are enough of those already. That's why a new way to get to the north pole counts as exploration- the challenge factor is high even if the discovery factor is low. Exploration is about seeing new things up close. Experiencing them at first hand. Challenge of a physical kind is needed to get you into the places where new things can be seen. It's so important that it's been raised to the power two...

If you doubt that some expedition has 'discovery' value then you are probably self-censoring. In fact there are always new things to discover as the world is always changing.

When you need to show that exploration has a scientific end, retort that it even has a mathematical basis these days!

rock art expedition to the gilf kebir

The explorer school (of which I am a part) is tentatively putting together an expedition for later 2010 or early 2011 in search of Saharan engravings and rock art in the Gilf Kebir area of Egypt. This will be a proper three week expedition totally devoted to exploration though we will visit the Mestakawi-Foggini Cave and Wadi Soura. The idea is to take vehicles to an area never before explored and then walk each day averaging 20-25km of canyon, mountain and cave investigation. We will meet the vehicles again at night but to minimise their destructive impact (tyre tracks last forever) they will stay clear of the exploration area. As on our other expeditions we need fit, enthusiastic people with a flexible approach. If you think you might qualify let us know (email is on theexplorerschool.com site.) There will be room for a maximum of ten people only. It'll be incredible because there is so much still to find out there. Watch theexplorerschool.com site for more info.

the state we want to be in

The power men, those we are taught to believe will get us to a way of living we want, have an instinct for where the power is and they gravitate towards it. Take Donald Rumsfeld’s love of hi-tech missile shields, recon systems, computer mines, natty drones. It’s a classic power move- technology always beating a human argument in the absence of common sense- or hard earned experience.

It is interesting to speculate on the different power structures in a corporation and in an army. A corporation is ‘at war’ all the time with the competition. The army is mostly not at war. The army has to develop instincts for preventing mistakes, but business mistakes are welcomed- they are a sign of ‘learning’. New risky strategies pay off big time in business- the downside can be minimal. But the downside of new risky strategies in real war is huge. In war winning everytime is the main thing. In business profit is the main thing and winning is just one way of making a profit. The main method is creatively and constantly launching new initiatives until one of them works. New product development. But this is not a war winning strategy.

The problem of politics is not the state that we are in or the state we want to be in, it is the problem of moving from one state to another, that is more desired. It is all in the movement.

eat molokia

The ancient Egyptians swore by it for its aphrodisiac qualities. Five thousand years later, the Japanese and South Koreans are making it into green tea, tofu and even ice cream.

This is molokia, a green vegetable of the jute or mallow family, which is one of  Egypt's most traditional dishes. Perhaps its reputation as an Old Kingdom viagra stems from its amazing growth- under hot conditions such as the Nile delta in summer it can grow up to 25cm per day. Once harvested it is made into a green soup that almost all Egyptians find very delicious. It makes expatriate Egyptians nostalgic at just the mention of it. Sam Habib, an Egyptian born Australian likens preparing molokia to 'the smell of Cairo on a Friday."

Others claim its glutinous, sticky texture and garlicky smell make it a bit of an acquired taste. Many Egyptians may take this view as an insult just as the French would sniff at people ridiculing their traditional snail dishes or smelly cheeses.

The Japanese and Koreans value its amazing protein and folic acid levels- the highest for any green leaf vegetable-it also contains more iron and calcium and magnesium, all essential minerals increasingly hard to acquire in factory farmed spinach and broccoli.

Health conscious Koreans and Japanese, who write it ‘morokeiya’ make it into a savory green tea, a luminous green buckwheat noodle, soya tofu, and a green ice cream that sells alongside other delicacies such as a sorbet made from fresh eels.

The Molokia fad has been growing, especially in the Far East, for the last ten years, even promprting morokhia tourism from Japan to Egypt.  " I came to see the mysterious Egyptian pyramids and to eat the health giving Morokeiya", Kawabata Iku san, a Japanese tourist from Saitama province visiting Egypt said.

Molokia, though native to Egypt, long ago spread to the Levant.

"Our way of making molokia is better than the Egyptian," says a Palestinian woman proudly explaining the superiority of Levantine-style molokia.

"Palestinians, Lebanese and Syrians cook molokia as leaves in the same way spinach is made, which takes away the glutinous, slimy taste and texture of the soup."

Egyptians and Levantines are well known for their heated rivalry over who produces better soap operas, who has the better Arabic dialect and whose molokia is tastier.

Egyptian expatriates are now relieved that they no longer deprived of the traditional delicacy. In the past, molokia was not easily obtainable in many countries. Now, shops in cities as far as Los Angeles and Sydney offer frozen molokia.

Egyptians living in Japan and South Korea are even better off as fresh  molokia can be purchased for the green vegetable grown in both countries. However, Usama Saleh, who has lived in Tokyo for five years claims that Japanese molokia,  “like everything in Japan, has less smell and taste than the Egyptian vegetable.”

Stories abound about the origin of the traditional molokia dish but some may be apocryphal.

It is claimed there are depictions of preparation of mallow leaves on ancient Egyptian tomb walls.

"The Stela of Ahmose depicts Molokhia being prepared. It is also mentioned by Pliny as a favourite dish," says Dr Nevine Medhat, an Egyptologist.

The modern name stems, according to legend, from the time an Arab king was seriously ill and a doctor  made a soup with molokia and cured the king. Since then, people call this soup "King's soup" or molokia, from the Arabic for king: moloch. More earthy accounts suggest it is called after the king because it will make a male lover feel like a king!

One fact is certain, molokia was banned by King al-Hakim Biamr Allah in the  11 th century. Some say the deeply eccentric ruler, aware of the aphrodisiac qualities of molokia, sought to prevent women and men from a possible life of debauchery.