Jay Maclean – författare

Today, the Pacific islands reflect the best and worst in western society. On the one hand are the bravery and persistence of early European navigators, missionaries, and government officers; the early, well-meaning efforts by many westerners to help the islanders become ‘civilized’; the assistance readily given in times of natural disasters; and the grants and concessional loans to help Pacific countries develop into independent economic entities, to name but a few. On the other hand are the persistence in demolishing the islanders’ tropical culture and turning them into unwilling citizens or dependents of temperate countries, like puppets; the arrogance of assuming that modern western democracy and societal norms, which date back but a few generations, must replace the islanders’ far longer-standing societies; and the continuation of all these efforts to westernize them and their countries in the face of growing awareness in those Pacific countries of the value of their own well tried-and-tested lifestyles—to name but a few.

What if history had gone another way? What if the Pacific islanders had taken over Europe instead? That would have been impossible, of course, or would it?

Mostly in Economy Class continues the ups and downs of flights and sights in Europe revealed in—and reveled in—Sometimes in Business Class, but this time in Asia—where adventure, surprise and wonder are around every corner, in incidents and events from the apparently trivial to the exotic to the erotic.

Mostly in Economy Class begins with an adventure in China in the early 1980s that may or may not have ended in a dangerous escape to the west; the reader must decide. After the secret world of China, the tales move on to Thailand before and after its temples were overrun by tourists; two faces of Japan in the 1980s; Angkor Wat, Cambodia at a time when Khmer Rouge guns could be heard in the distance, and later after the guns were silenced; South Korea before it emerged as an economic powerhouse, when the country seemed to be almost in a parallel universe; life and poverty in Bangladesh; footpath etiquette in the quaint French quarter of Hanoi; post-Mcdonald’s China; and more. Read on!

Moving away from home, leaving the nest, could be the beginning of a voyage that ends in a faraway country we would not have even considered when we set out—until we got there and discovered its secrets, its culture, its undiscovered paradises. Half a lifetime ago, the author ended his voyage of discovery in the Philippines, a country with one foot in the world of fairies and spirits, and where every event has an unusual twist, whether wedding or funeral, kidnapping or vasectomy, getting a driver’s license or getting a haircut. There are fascinating destinations far from the beaten track and a vibrant music scene that is everywhere present, even in the operating theater. Typhoons and earthquakes add a different kind of excitement. These events and experiences, sometimes comic or tragic, always compelling, are described herein.

The strange death of three young children in a small coastal village in far away Papua New Guinea in March 1972 did not rate a mention in the territory’s annual report that year to its Australian governors—let alone make a ripple in international ponds. Yet, it was an event of incredible proportions. It marked the end of a chain of knowledge that extended back more than 45,000 years; it heralded the beginning of an era of immense, baffling phenomena and disasters around the world; and it marked the rise of a deadly toxin from the seabed that would spread from country to country.

The book works back in time to discover the origin of the toxin’s host, traces its emergence and bizarre spread from country to country with resulting deaths, and projects into the future the likely, unsettling to horrific, consequences for the world’s food security, already set irreversibly in motion.

It is a story that encompasses much of the globe, from the Pacific islands to Asia—Brunei Darussalam, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia and the Philippines—to the Middle East—Persian Gulf and Red Sea, and the Egypt of the Pharaohs—to the Pacific and Atlantic coasts of the Americas, and to Australia and Antarctica.

It is a detective story too, about who or what killed the three children, taking us in helicopters, light planes, speedboats and a naval patrol vessel, and on underwater explorations.

It is a romance spanning a period from the tail end of the Palaeolithic era, pausing for a less ancient exodus, that of the Jews from Egypt, and for Cleopatra’s—incredibly expensive as we will see—dinner with Marc Antony, and leap-frogging through events over the following two millennia via connections with Spanish kings, Napoleon Bonaparte, and the most famous pair to play the part of Cleopatra and Marc Antony in modern times: Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton.

Finally, it is the story of a young scientist sent unknowingly as a spy into Papua New Guinea shortly before its independence. How did he find himself enmeshed in the threads of this strange puzzle and what did he discover?

Which Asian country had a killer fish designed as a counter insurgency measure, a president who took over an island to make a private family game park of African wild animals; a revolution involving millions of people without bloodshed; coup plotters who took phone messages for you; more earthquakes, eruptions, floods, landslides and typhoons than just about any other country; a mountain where the bizarre becomes the ordinary; cities and villages where poverty and death display an innocent cheerfulness; corpses that are rented out to gamblers; and coral reefs that are home to more kinds of corals, fish and other marine life than anywhere else on the planet?

Crying Trees, Killer Fish and Rental Corpses: Only in the Philippines follows a journey of discovery in this exciting country during the 1980s and 1990s, before globalization began to strip away its culture along with charming folk beliefs, corner stores and local markets.

Here is a perfect book for airplane and armchair travelers; an alternative view of airlines, flying and destinations. Many people fly around the world from meeting to meeting, soaking up wine and the attention of airline stewards and stewardesses, clocking up free mileage, and working out tax breaks or how to sock away their travel allowances. But, as these stories about 1990s travel show, there is much to be learned along the way, from the airline wine tasters'' ramblings, to the mystery of brown dogs in Dutch 17th century paintings, to the bus terminals beneath Rome''s Augustine Gate, and possibly the real story behind the last tango in Paris.