Keane Music Argentina: RICHARD´S LATIN AMERICA PHOTOBLOG

airborne / monday / 1500 mexico time; 2100 uk

we’ve been looking forward to this tour for 18 months – since we were last here. it’s a shame we couldn’t fit in more new countries, though it’s gonna be very cool going to Bogota, Colombia for the first time. my apologies for missing off accents in place names, by the way – i can’t work out how to do it. anyway, the only downside of this tour is that to get around we have 16 flights to do in three weeks. we hate flying. i wish there was a better way to get to mexico, but there isn’t. not that we have time for, anyway. so place your bets – how many of our flights will be delayed or cancelled? so far we are 1/1, having left London about two hours late. Colin (Jesse’s hero) is already in contingency-planning mode in case we miss our connection to Guadalajara. i love any place name that has 5 “a”s in it. can’t think of any others though. it’s 1504 (in Mexico) and i just took these pics on my phone:

Canada looks cold:

this could be the worst pic i've ever put on the blog, but it's tim, and i thought you might like to see him...

the nearest town shown on the map is called Chicoutimi. i can’t be sure where it is – maybe Nova Scotia, or Quebec? one day i want to go to Godthab – it’s always on the map, somewhere in Greenland – we see it every time we fly across the atlantic. i wonder what it’s like. anyway, we are on our way to Mexico. hello Canadians! hello Maher Arar. our ground speed is 563 mph and we have exactly 2600 miles to go (four and a half hours).

i started writing what i’d been doing on the flight, but it is basically a list of time-using things, and it’ll probably sound very boring. but that’s flying for you...

took off! slept, approx 1 hour. read chapters 3&4 of the great war for civilisation; the conquest of the middle east by robert fisk. it’s so depressing to read sentences that talk about the soviets in afghanistan that you hear repeated today, only with the current occupying army instead of the soviets. our so-called leaders learn nothing from history.

listened to democracy now (www.democracynow.org/) and kcrw’s excellent left right and center www.kcrw.com/lrc. i was very saddened by the news of the death of Gerry Niewood, the famous saxophonist - we knew of him from Simon and Garfunkel's Concert in Central Park. He and bandmate, guitarist Coleman Mellett were killed in a plane crash near Buffalo, NY, a crash that took the lives of 50 people, including the peace activist Beverly Eckert http://www.democracynow.org/2009/2/17/beverly_eckert_1951_2009_9_11 and Rwandan expert and Human Rights investigator Alison Des Forges http://www.democracynow.org/2009/2/16/human_rights_investigator_and_rwandan_expert

caught up on some emails; watched a series of short rock climbing films called committed; then began writing this, listening to beirut – nantes is a cracking song. and in the time i’ve taken typing away we have covered a ridiculous 250 miles, at 581 mph and we are flying towards places called Timmins and Kapuskasing. now listening to Aladdin Sane.