00:00.89 alexei sayle Hello everybody, welcome to LexisL podcast and i always obsessively say what number it is, what number is it? sixty nine sixty

00:08.27 Talal K Oh, I thought we were going to record an intro later.

00:09.60 alexei sayle Oh yeah, you're right, yeah, fuck that.

00:10.19 Talal K We're just here with...

00:11.56 alexei sayle Alright, never mind.

00:11.56 Talal K Here we are. Sebi...

00:12.60 alexei sayle Hello, welcome.

00:13.25 Talal K Sebi...

00:14.71 alexei sayle And ah this was ah initiated by Talal and it's Sebby Cycles and Seb is, well Sebastian is cycling around the world and ah well, but more than that, tell us your story.

00:31.04 alexei sayle Please.

00:31.36 seb Yeah, Sebi Cycles, aka Sebi Bikes.

00:33.47 Talal K Sebi bikes. Sebi bikes.

00:34.68 seb yeah

00:34.90 alexei sayle Sebi Bikes, you confused me.

00:35.82 seb yeah

00:37.07 Talal K it

00:37.22 alexei sayle You said it before, Sebi Bikes.

00:38.33 seb Well, I mean, I guess the premise is the same. Yeah, yeah. So so now would be the moment where you want me to say what I'm up to?

00:47.93 alexei sayle Yeah, please.

00:49.83 seb Okay, sure, yeah. So um for the last year, i am on my bike that if people can watch is right behind me, um cycling against borders.

01:02.35 seb um I have a little flag sticking out from the back of my bike, which is cycling against borders because I'm trying to, first I wanted to get to India. Now I think it's going to be Japan, but I want to get there and talk about passport privilege.

01:17.38 seb um because my Dutch passport is the third strongest in the world. I can basically go anywhere. um But for example, I was just in Iraq a couple days ago, and they have one of the worst passports in the world.

01:29.97 seb um

01:30.10 alexei sayle Right.

01:30.60 seb And so, yeah, I was just trying to learn about borders. Why are they there? What kind of world do they make? And and and how do we fight them?

01:41.09 alexei sayle Yeah, well, it's, so i mean, it's it's something, I suppose.

01:41.32 Talal K Yeah.

01:43.45 alexei sayle I know that, um for instance, Ocalan, the kind of Kurdish theorist and the founder of the PKK, turned against violence. He sees a lot of the the the the world's problems has really been ah related to the nation state. Would you, I guess you are the same opinion?

02:03.79 seb Yeah, funny story about Ötchalan. I just got to got a haircut like three hours ago and there were like 10 guys with very clean shaven heads and we started talking about the fact that they're Kurdish. And turns out there was a big shrine in the corner of the barbershop just dedicated to Abdullah Ötchalan.

02:19.06 alexei sayle Really?

02:20.45 seb Yeah.

02:21.60 alexei sayle we should point out you're in a park somewhere in in Turkey, which is, I mean, miraculous in itself.

02:21.61 seb Yeah.

02:26.62 seb Yeah, or northern Kurdistan, if you if you ask the Kurds.

02:28.35 alexei sayle Northern Kyrgyzstan. ah where So what town are you?

02:31.07 seb Yeah.

02:31.88 alexei sayle What's the name of the town you're in?

02:34.26 seb Sirt, it's ah ah about a hundred kilometers from the Iraqi ah border. I am now three days ago that I was there.

02:45.71 seb um

02:47.63 alexei sayle Actually, just to give us the text technical spec of your bike, really. Years ago, I actually had a rally bike. If you know them, made me a ah ah ah they made me a bike when I was when i was really famous. and it was um I think it was the one that Jupp Zuttermilch won the Tour de France on.

03:07.96 alexei sayle Is that right? Jupp Zuttermilch!

03:08.96 seb a Yeah, yeah, I think, you zteer is also how all the podcasters and announcers would say his name. Yeah, so actually, i'm I'm sorry to disappoint that I'm not a big bike guy, but I'm um learning.

03:22.74 alexei sayle Yeah.

03:22.77 seb um But I think this is a Canadian company, Kona, and it was just...

03:28.39 alexei sayle Oh, Kona. Yeah, I've got a Kona. I think they're Korean.

03:31.08 seb I don't know.

03:31.29 alexei sayle Aren't they Korean? I've got a Kona. That's amazing.

03:34.42 seb Oh, yeah, see, I...

03:34.64 alexei sayle I mean, so so it's just like a pretty basic kind of alloy hybrid.

03:38.90 seb Yeah, it's a steel bike, so it weighs like like insanely heavy.

03:41.50 alexei sayle Yeah.

03:43.06 seb But I figured it was probably better for it to be steel because in case something breaks, then you know wherever I am in the world, they can weld it.

03:43.33 alexei sayle Yeah.

03:49.41 seb And it's just like the the most stock components, you know, like no ah hydro brakes or you know just like super basic things.

03:50.17 Talal K Mm-hmm.

03:50.27 alexei sayle Right. Yeah.

03:53.21 alexei sayle Shimano or something. Yeah.

03:56.97 alexei sayle I think that's... ah there was ah This is a terrible... doubt there's I remember reading a book years ago, which was fascinating, called The World Beneath My... think it was called The World Beneath My Wheels.

04:08.02 alexei sayle And it was written by... can't remember his name, but it was a German prisoner of war, who after the war... decided to ride around the world, and about obviously in the 1940s, in a very ah very basic steel bicycle.

04:21.74 alexei sayle But there's a scene I remember, and I understand that he, he ah yeah an Egyptian, I think it's an Egyptian customs officer or something, tries to get a bribe off him, and he won't pay, so he jumps on his bike and rides off.

04:22.74 Talal K So.

04:35.13 alexei sayle And then the the the Egyptian... jumps on his bike and chases him. So there's these two guys on these really basic, and the chase goes on all night. They chase each other across cru possibly the Sinai Desert all night.

04:51.02 alexei sayle um a sadddle And just just it's also sort of like a nightmare. and't whether the I mean, you must have had a lot of ah adventures, really.

04:59.73 seb Yeah, although my my crossings of borders have basically always gone incredibly smooth. you know like They look at my blue eyes and my Dutch passport and I'm never searched.

05:08.95 alexei sayle Yeah.

05:10.17 seb I never have any questioning. It's it's it's pretty remarkable, actually, the level of privilege that I carry with me around this trip.

05:17.87 alexei sayle Yeah. I remember all the Palestinians I know, they all wanted to marry an Irish girl because they thought that that was the that was the past pass passports.

05:26.90 Talal K Yeah.

05:27.62 alexei sayle But also probably probably maybe more... I mean, it's different now, but in the in the days of hijackings, it was also probably the most... Hijacking proof, you know, you could, if they hijacked a plane, you could say, look, I'm Irish.

05:40.80 alexei sayle And they say, you're all right, you can get off.

05:42.97 Talal K yeah

05:43.34 seb i mean Irish is the same password strength as ah as Dutch

05:47.34 alexei sayle Really. How's the UK passport?

05:48.42 seb yeah

05:49.77 Talal K um

05:51.20 alexei sayle That was that.

05:52.46 seb ah Dutch I can go to 121 countries without a visa i can just roll up and 114

05:55.94 alexei sayle Yeah.

06:00.40 alexei sayle So slightly less.

06:01.06 Talal K Wow, even less.

06:03.62 seb yeah

06:04.10 alexei sayle Yeah, well, would you want us in your country?

06:04.26 Talal K There's some... Hmm.

06:08.33 alexei sayle I would. So, um you i mean it's you you were I mean, particularly you've been in places like i Iraq where many people would force where to go, I suppose.

06:20.52 alexei sayle What was that like?

06:22.10 seb Well, Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, they've been incredibly lovely countries. um I was in Damascus for three weeks.

06:32.85 seb I was absolutely blown away by the Syrian people.

06:33.86 alexei sayle I know it well. Yeah. yeah

06:37.11 seb i have i have never witnessed something like this, especially as a Dutchie.

06:40.89 alexei sayle Yeah.

06:41.76 seb Holy moly.

06:42.44 alexei sayle Yeah.

06:43.72 seb It was really remarkable.

06:45.59 alexei sayle Do they still have that?

06:45.91 seb out

06:46.43 alexei sayle Because when I was there, they have that... Every bottle of beer is slightly different. yeah You get a lots of beer with kind of sediment in It's very live. I don't know. It wasn't sort of standardized, really. Yeah.

06:57.37 seb Yeah, yeah. And it's also true that now that Al-Sharaa is in power, there's less and less alcohol being served. I spoke to quite some young people and also people of the queer community.

07:03.94 alexei sayle Right.

07:07.74 seb And and they were like, well, you know, less and less bars are are are serving us beers and the vodka and the Rocky that we used to drink.

07:13.89 alexei sayle Yeah, that process.

07:14.83 Talal K I was curious about that. Yeah, because he's very adamant that he's not going to have a religious government and religious law. But I guess you can't trust that fully then.

07:26.70 Talal K Or is it out of fear that they're not serving the booze and stuff?

07:30.26 seb I think it's out of fear. And I think it's, I mean, i'm I'm no Syria expert. I read one amazing book, The Burning Country, that if if anyone is interested in how the civil war, which not all Syrians call a civil war went, I really urge them to read it.

07:45.00 seb So I'm no Syria expert, but I think it stands for it for for more a broader shift of values maybe, and maybe there's no mandates determining bars to stop serving alcohol but i guess it's a general mood that is uh that is shifting in the country at least that is what the young people told me that i spoke to

08:00.13 Talal K a

08:01.77 alexei sayle and there are there are so And there are certainly, I think I've heard from my contacts, that there are there are killings every day in Latakia, for instance, in the Alawite areas.

08:13.86 seb yeah yeah they're still going on not reported but still going on yeah

08:17.09 Talal K yeah

08:17.59 alexei sayle Yeah, so all is not well. I mean, yes, that is, I mean, does this sound terribly kind of... um ah kind of colonial and please pull me up listeners on this if it is but I just always think about Arabs really if that's true I said how can you be so fucking lovely and be so terrible to each other on occasion it's the most extraordinary kind of contradiction you are so genuinely fantastic you know so hospitable and amazing and yet you do such terrible things to each other really

08:53.22 seb Well, if I can take a tiny bit of space here to to talk about kind of what I've learned about borders, because that's a really big part of my trip.

08:56.32 alexei sayle Mm-hmm.

09:01.08 seb It's showcasing my own learning process. And one of the things that in the last months I am very much interested in is how has the West intervened to make the world as it is? And you guys, as socialists, should you know you should know this better than anyone. that the force of capital in in shaping how the world is looking.

09:23.68 seb And I think the Middle East is really no exception. That was one main takeaway that I that i took out of the burning country. It's that there was nothing fated about the sectarian breakdown. You know, same in Iraq, the Sunni-Shia divide, you know, there were intermarriages. that this This was not an actual divide and it only got weaponized and and activated because of the US invasion and because of the US war.

09:48.80 seb And this is a story that is that is so widespread across the region that um i I would kind of push back on and your characterization of, you know, that's just what the Arabs do.

10:01.14 alexei sayle Sure, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. No, I did you know i i said it, but I you know ah don't stand by it.

10:03.02 seb Because, so yeah.

10:07.95 Talal K Well, you have ah one as your co-host here.

10:08.16 seb like Okay, well, there we go.

10:09.91 Talal K and

10:10.31 alexei sayle Yeah, yes, that's true.

10:11.81 Talal K And any time another Arab...

10:13.37 alexei sayle No, it's interesting. Well, it was also, wasn't it? I mean, the again, I mean, everything i mean every everything is Britain's fault, really. i mean it's ah I mean, it was also that, as I understand it, was was she called Gertrude Bell or some woman who was basically through the borders of Iraq and the British, they prioritised the...

10:20.32 Talal K Yeah.

10:35.16 alexei sayle Sunni um minority to you know they ah to rule over the sheer majority really in the end. Yeah.

10:44.41 seb Yeah, well, at the yeah at the Berlin Conference of 1885, know, where a lot of the lines were drawn, this was also partially the goal.

10:44.86 alexei sayle you know

10:52.65 seb It was to see how they can pit different sects against each other to keep to keep the countries, this is, for example, the case in Syria, to keep it manageable as a quote-unquote mandate, a colony for the British.

10:56.10 alexei sayle yeah

11:05.07 alexei sayle Yeah.

11:05.50 seb you know So it it it was kind of very much the point, at least there. I don't know about Iraq, but it's not unthinkable that was the same there, you know.

11:14.01 alexei sayle I think it was. Yeah. Yeah. God, we were bastards. I mean, this this adoration for the empire and for Britain. I mean, it's not, well, we're not bastards. Our ruling class were bastards.

11:24.86 alexei sayle Absolute monsters.

11:25.53 Talal K Same with the Arabs. Like the Arabs are nice people, but it's the ruling class.

11:27.68 alexei sayle Yeah. Yeah.

11:29.17 Talal K And when power takes over and especially if you've been planted there by a Western power, ah you you do.

11:34.37 alexei sayle Yeah.

11:35.51 Talal K And it's that it's like even my mom and dad remember a time when Syria was multi-faith and inter, everyone would inter, ah coexist in such peace and and Jewish communities.

11:50.21 Talal K And it was, ah even Even when the with the Zionist argument is that like ah the Jews were forced out of the Middle East and that's why Israel was such an important place.

12:00.36 Talal K It was it was a big part of that was Zionists, terrorists bombing synagogues around the Middle East, creating this fear and this...

12:08.55 alexei sayle Yeah.

12:09.49 Talal K this division where there was none before. And there was intermarriage and and you know my my mom remembers people would babysit each other's kids and they'd be Sunni, Shia, Christian, Jewish, doesn't matter.

12:14.61 alexei sayle Yeah. Yeah.

12:23.17 Talal K um it's the power It's the powerful and the rich that fuck it for everyone.

12:27.30 alexei sayle Yeah, it is. You're right there, comrade. It is the wealth thing, and we need to we need to do something about that.

12:29.96 Talal K Thank you comrades.

12:33.51 alexei sayle um but So where do you sleep at night? No,

12:37.28 Talal K Not how, where.

12:37.19 seb oh

12:39.70 alexei sayle you sleep well, presumably.

12:40.79 seb It's a very very logistically minded question there. Well, I was going to get a hotel, but then I went to two hotels and the price was like 50 euros a night. So I'm just going to close my laptop after this conversation and head out like maybe 10 kilometers from this town, just find a spot on a hill.

12:49.52 alexei sayle Shit.

12:57.10 seb in I have a tiny tent and a sleeping bag. um Because ah you know it's it's not like I get sponsored by ah by some sort of nice company. you know

13:08.49 alexei sayle No.

13:08.48 seb It's all... so It's all bus driver money, actually. I'm a bus driver in Amsterdam, which pays pretty well.

13:14.21 Talal K Wow.

13:14.42 alexei sayle Really?

13:14.50 seb and

13:14.90 alexei sayle Hop aboard my bus.

13:16.62 seb yeah yeah yeah Yeah, yeah.

13:17.22 Talal K Alexi.

13:17.31 alexei sayle 15 guilders.

13:18.89 seb Usually free.

13:19.97 alexei sayle Hop aboard.

13:19.88 seb I'm a very very kind bus driver in that sense.

13:20.77 alexei sayle How much is a bus in?

13:24.06 seb But yeah, so no, just in the wild mostly, sometimes with people. um

13:28.17 alexei sayle Yeah.

13:29.26 seb yeah

13:30.03 alexei sayle That's okay.

13:29.92 seb The Kurds have been especially nice as well. it's It's really lovely to to to see the Kurdish hospitality.

13:37.44 alexei sayle Yeah.

13:37.46 seb Before you know it, you're drinking tea and you get serve some pilaf and

13:41.12 alexei sayle Yeah, amazing, in the hospital. i Years ago, I had a flat in Borough in East London, or not East, South East London, and mike I had a Ralfa Romeo, which the number plate was PKK, and that used to...

13:49.81 Talal K Mm-hmm.

13:58.86 seb yeah

13:59.33 alexei sayle I went to a Kurdish bar, but interestingly, he talked about how... um His grandparents, I think, remembered Sikh soldiers. Because, course, what the British did in Kurdistan were particularly wicked. is They didn't want to station troops there, but they would.

14:17.71 alexei sayle And they did this in Iraq with the Kurdish minorities particularly. what they would They used flying columns of armoured cars and also aircraft to um to bomb the Iraqi Kurdish tribes.

14:32.09 alexei sayle And it was they kind of had a full know there lot of British aircraft in the sort of 20s and 30s were called kind of colonial aircraft. And would that was their role, really, was to to head out from a baseball.

14:43.15 alexei sayle And they also worked on the but Brave Boys in the area for these time-delayed bombs, so bombs that would be dropped and then would explode. that yeah Obviously, when they saw the planes, the Kurdish people would go into the caves.

14:53.86 alexei sayle They would come out a few hours later, and that's when the bomb would go off. But so he just reminisced about how he was them, his...

14:57.81 seb Wow.

15:01.68 alexei sayle grandparents were being terrorized by British Sikh troops, which is a...

15:05.51 seb It's not even five minutes later and we are again at the point where we conclude, wow, the British really are the most awful people on Earth, aren't they?

15:10.99 alexei sayle Yes, we are. I'm sorry. I'd like to issue an apology to just say I'm sorry. I mean, again, it's just my ruling class. It's not me, but I'm sorry.

15:20.66 seb Well, same for the Dutch, though. The Dutch were also unimaginably evil in world history.

15:24.09 alexei sayle That's true, yes. you've And you've tended to get away with him

15:25.66 seb It's quite impressive.

15:27.14 alexei sayle Yeah, yeah. Of course, the Belgians were the worst. I mean, if the crew, yeah, that is the worst empire of all.

15:30.53 seb Leopold.

15:33.22 Talal K So Seb, you left Amsterdam. Tell us your route and any memorable adventures that happened along ah long this route to where you are now.

15:41.40 seb Sure. So I did a lot of Europe um and then I cycled through the Balkans. Albania was very nice. and in wintertime, I ended in Bulgaria, right at the European border. So in this town called Harmanli, maybe 50 kilometers from from the border to Turkey.

16:02.75 seb um And there I volunteered for three months with this organization called No Name Kitchen. They're like anarchists helping people on the move.

16:13.62 seb um So they have bases set up along the migration route. And the first one is in Bulgaria because that's where people cross um from Turkey into Europe through these you know dense forests.

16:25.44 seb And I was there for for three months. ah There is also a refugee camp in Harmanli. So I was working with you know A lot of Syrians that just arrived after i don't know the third or tenth time of trying and getting pushed back and beaten and their stuff stolen. And then they you know they finally made it and they still had this immense long journey to go. And we were there to hand out shoes or clothes and play games.

16:50.13 seb And this was this was this is incredible. um And it really informed, I think, a lot of my politics as well, like my anti anti-border politics. Made some friends.

17:01.01 seb ah Bashar Assad fell, realized I wanted to go into Syria. And then I cycled down into Turkey, took a boat to Lebanon. I want to avoid flying.

17:11.52 seb And then was in Beirut for five weeks, exploring ah you know the Palestinian diaspora there. And Lebanon as well is a heck of a story. Oh, my goodness. a Very complicated.

17:24.64 Talal K oh yeah go on

17:24.67 seb From there into Syria. Sorry?

17:27.39 Talal K Go on, yeah, what why is that? What happened in Lebanon?

17:30.65 seb Well, I mean, it's fascinating. they they They don't have a shared history curriculum after 1948. So, yeah.

17:41.17 Talal K Huh.

17:41.67 alexei sayle really Right.

17:41.59 seb right so yeah so So there's no shared understanding of history. And of course, you have ah you know like a quarter is is Christian, and you have the Shias, and you have the Sunnis, and you have some Druze.

17:54.58 seb And so each group has a completely different read on what happened. and And this makes it a total mindfuck to be in.

18:04.04 alexei sayle Yeah.

18:05.26 seb its it It was very absurd. and But yeah, learned a lot. And then from there went into Syria. cycled across the desert in Jordan ah where it was 45-50 degrees and then through Iraq same, I cycled in the night because it was just really unbearable during the day and now it's maybe like 35 degrees during the daytime now that I'm in in northern Kurdistan or Turkey depending on how you call it and

18:34.11 alexei sayle And you've never you've never had any ah trouble with anybody, ever?

18:40.61 seb Well, look, before i tell before i I had one, one quite serious one.

18:43.57 alexei sayle Maybe it's the vibe you give off, you know?

18:48.07 alexei sayle yeah

18:49.22 seb um okay When I was in Bulgaria working with No Name Kitchen, we had a lot of shit with ah Bulgarian border police. They would take us and interrogate us. But that was all part of the part of the like expectation. What happened in Lebanon?

19:05.17 seb you know In Beirut, you again, it's a very divided city. So the Christians live there and then the Shias live there. And um the Shia part of of South Beirut is called Dahyeh.

19:16.22 seb And this is the part that Israel is just bombing to smithereens. They have a whole doctrine, the 2006 Dakhya doctrine, where they bomb residential buildings.

19:23.99 alexei sayle Yeah.

19:25.48 seb Ah, you know Yeah, so they bomb resident residential buildings in the hope that the population turns against Hezbollah in this case, and they use it elsewhere too.

19:27.02 alexei sayle Yeah.

19:32.47 alexei sayle All

19:34.25 Talal K Right.

19:34.33 seb um ah Completely absurd and, you know, psychopathic. But, so Dakhya is the part that gets bombed. So any footage that comes out of Dakhya is very sensitive, because Israel is very interested to see who moves where, you know, they can...

19:50.10 alexei sayle all right.

19:50.32 seb take the video.

19:50.62 alexei sayle Yeah.

19:51.95 seb I guess you see where this is going.

19:54.50 alexei sayle All right.

19:54.48 seb They can download the video, use facial recognition, you know, whatever. um And I, without knowing it, was had just entered Dakhir. And I filmed and then I, you know, some hez Hezbollah guys took me and they took my phone and then they interrogated me and then the police interrogated me and after like 20 hours I was cleared as you know know having no ties to quote unquote Israel um but that was ah that was my only episode that was that was unpleasant and and the whole thing was fine I completely understood why I was there my fault I had no hard feelings really about it so

20:17.48 Talal K right

20:18.31 alexei sayle All right. Okay, good. Yeah.

20:31.92 alexei sayle Because I have a friend who was chained to a radiator for five years by Hezbollah, so...

20:39.13 seb going now gonna Can you take that for a drink?

20:40.10 alexei sayle He got off pretty light, really.

20:40.41 Talal K bloody hell

20:42.21 seb Have something to eat or a drink? It's not much but... No, no, no, I'm fine. No, I'm fine. For a cola or a Fanta, please. No, my love, it's okay. You take it and take care, okay? Travel safely.

20:53.27 seb Nice to meet you. Bye. Oh, my goodness. Bye. yeah

20:57.22 Talal K What the hell?

20:58.87 alexei sayle Been giving shit?

20:58.96 seb Well, that's, yeah, there was this this Scottish lady and and her family that inquired about me. They were sitting right, you know, like three meters in front of me. She lives here for ah for six years and she just gave me this, ah it's Ataturk, I think, Kemal Ataturk.

21:17.76 seb But that's, you know, that's enough to buy a falafel.

21:18.55 alexei sayle 100.

21:19.81 seb So

21:22.07 alexei sayle Whoa. So what's your route?

21:23.45 seb there you go.

21:25.17 alexei sayle Tell us your route from now on then. We're next.

21:29.46 seb Sure. Yeah, um'm um' I'm rushing to get to Georgia ah because I have some friends that are that are coming and we're going to bounce around. i I'm really exhausted, actually, because I i not only bike, but you know i I try to make videos that are like meaningful and informative and anarchist-oriented in their politics. And that takes a lot of brainpower.

21:49.82 alexei sayle yeah

21:49.77 seb um So I'm pretty beat. So I'm going to have a holiday for a couple of weeks.

21:53.47 Talal K Yeah.

21:54.48 seb And then was going to go through Armenia and through Iran. Iran has been on my wish list for basically six years now. um But yeah, I guess that's, you know, I just want to say all all solidarity and and compassion with the Iranians.

22:05.72 Talal K yeah

22:10.61 alexei sayle Absolutely. i mean, yeah is the border closed? I mean, in inbound to it. Yeah, it's probably the best.

22:16.38 seb I don't even know, but um I'm in some WhatsApp groups with travelers and ah you know the situation doesn't look good. there's There's some people missing and heavy interrogations.

22:24.61 alexei sayle Right.

22:25.23 seb And it's it's also like morally, like, why would I go there now? It it would just be so wrong. I mean, just some statistics, right? Like so far, 3,400 people injured in like, what, 10 days, 865 killed.

22:34.90 alexei sayle Yeah. Yeah.

22:39.13 seb so yeah

22:40.29 alexei sayle That's gone up. Yeah. Shit.

22:43.38 Talal K Yeah, it's like fucking...

22:43.96 alexei sayle So Armenia and then Georgia, Armenia, and then where after that?

22:49.62 seb Yeah, after Iran, I was going to go through Afghanistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan...

22:53.69 alexei sayle You're a glutton for punishment. Are really going to go through

22:58.01 Talal K the

23:00.05 alexei sayle Afghanistan? Are you sure?

23:03.63 seb Yeah, well, you know, the US occupations don't do magic for for stable democracies. So the moment they left, the country actually you know turns remarkably more stable, even though there's still a massive humanitarian crisis going on.

23:10.86 alexei sayle No.

23:16.36 alexei sayle That's true, yes. that The Taliban for... Yeah.

23:19.63 seb The US is withholding 9 trillion or 9 billion US dollars that belongs to the Afghans.

23:23.71 alexei sayle Yeah.

23:27.20 seb But yeah, it's...

23:28.15 Talal K But that's also part of the point of what you're doing is you're going to these countries that we would never, in the West, would we've been told to think you would never dream of going to these places, but it's just full of regular people who are often very nice and welcoming and and you're exposing that, that you know everyone, we share more than we and we don't around the whole world. And I'm sure Afghanistan will be beautiful. I know people who've been to Afghanistan and similar to the Arabs, like the, you're going to eat well and you're going to be, you know, treated pretty well, unless like in Lebanon, you know, you, you cross a line that you didn't know was there or you just get really fucking unlucky.

24:09.47 alexei sayle Yeah. um so ah

24:11.30 Talal K Um,

24:12.59 alexei sayle so So, yeah, Afghanistan, then where was it? And then...

24:17.34 seb If I can just add on to to to what Talod just said, it's you know I try not only to to to show the beauty of humankind wherever we live, but taking Afghanistan, like in the 60s, Afghanistan was an immensely popular destination for like hippie people to go and you know smoke like really high quality marijuana.

24:19.58 alexei sayle Yeah. Yeah.

24:34.67 Talal K Mm-hmm.

24:38.99 seb um And, you know, classic US most brutal states, most terrorist state that there ever was, completely tore the country to shreds.

24:41.62 alexei sayle and Indeed.

24:49.01 seb um And these kinds of stories of of Western involvement are also exactly the ones that I'm then i'm interested in, in how they have shaped um our perception of the countries and how they've shaped the material conditions of the countries. Because when I told my mom I was going into Syria, she burst into tears. she Because in in in her mind,

25:09.60 seb She's you know progressed from now, but in her mind, Syria is just war. but It's just war. It's a country that's black war. There's nothing else. um And so so, yeah, that just as an addition, like, yes, there's beautiful people everywhere, but also politics are everywhere.

25:26.86 seb um Western interventionism is is everywhere.

25:27.36 Talal K Yeah.

25:30.32 seb We see it happening now again in Iran. um Sorry, that just adds a little.

25:34.39 alexei sayle No, no, it's very, very good point.

25:34.56 Talal K yeah

25:36.79 alexei sayle very very

25:38.36 seb Yeah.

25:38.81 alexei sayle I think the chimes with the, it's very on brand for this podcast. um So, ah ah and then do you pat when do you think you'll get back to the Niddle? then

25:49.64 seb Well, I think in like one and a half years.

25:53.39 alexei sayle and Can you go back What's your bus route? ah post What what route you drive?

25:59.51 seb Actually, all. Like 30 different ones. i have favorites, though.

26:02.20 alexei sayle Oh, really? They don't, like, just drive the 11 or something?

26:03.09 seb I have a top three. No, that'll be hella boring. No, actually, the planners make sure that your shift is always varied. You always have at least two lines.

26:11.87 alexei sayle really?

26:12.91 seb Yeah, it's mind-numbing otherwise, Alex. yeah I mean, have have you ever driven a bus?

26:16.75 alexei sayle No, my best friend was a bus driver, though, and he just drove the same...

26:18.98 seb No.

26:21.29 seb Oh, wow.

26:21.56 Talal K There's a beauty to that too. This is my route. I know it better than anyone. and i know that

26:25.32 alexei sayle I suppose yeah the ah the routes were a lot longer in London, so, you know, he drove the... He's mostly on the seventy three s or the 9s, I think, so through the West End, Kensington High Street, terminating in Hammersmith Garage.

26:38.67 Talal K what's What's the tech like on ah on a Dutch bus? Do have GPS?

26:41.85 alexei sayle Good, presumably.

26:43.83 seb What's the tech like?

26:45.24 Talal K on On the Netherlands buses, on the Amsterdam buses.

26:46.47 alexei sayle Wouldn't need GPS, would they? Why would they need GPS?

26:49.44 Talal K If you're changing route every day,

26:49.38 seb Ah, well.

26:51.51 alexei sayle No,

26:52.89 seb No, there so the the Netherlands has this tendency to like over-technologize everything. um And then that is that is sold as the customer experience. We have this in the public transport and, you know, the trains.

27:05.48 seb and Everything is super high-tech and and looks nice, but it's unaffordable. ah but but But you're like gaslit to think that it works really well and, you know, that that that that it's very premium. But it's just like,

27:17.99 seb you know And that's why i let I let people drive for free all the time. Because like a but basic bus ticket is, when I was still working there, like €3.50.

27:26.47 Talal K Oh my god.

27:26.76 seb Which is like insane. So, yeah. um the tech so So, the tech is very high tech. Very high tech. Yeah.

27:35.75 Talal K Sounds like the the buses in Newcastle.

27:35.80 seb Yeah.

27:38.37 Talal K Have you seen these, Alexi? The standard buses.

27:40.11 alexei sayle No.

27:41.80 Talal K They've got wireless charging, ah USB ports, the...

27:45.36 alexei sayle No, you get down some of the 63 here.

27:46.69 seb Thank you.

27:47.10 alexei sayle All right.

27:47.92 Talal K The screens on the bus tell you all the interchanges. Like if you're going to a train station, it tells you when the trains are leaving.

27:54.43 alexei sayle i don't know

27:55.67 Talal K is If you're going to the airport, wait, where have I seen the airport ones? It will tell you like flight details. it' like insanely high tech. And I'm like, wow, this is not what you expect in Newcastle. And that's, yeah. um I want you to tell Alexi and our listeners. Oh, you have something to say?

28:13.38 seb Yeah, it's a technical point. um i So the the way I got my hotspot to work was by plugging in my phone. But my battery also needs power. um And my ports are full. So it's either I take out the microphone or I take out my phone.

28:29.08 seb Is it okay if I just try to plug out my phone and see if we disconnect so that I can charge my laptop?

28:34.21 Talal K Oh.

28:36.95 Talal K ah Yeah, we can try it.

28:37.49 alexei sayle yeah

28:38.88 seb Wait, no, no, because then maybe the recording gets bugged.

28:45.17 alexei sayle i well to be ah

28:45.30 Talal K is your Is your laptop going to die?

28:45.42 seb Okay, yes, let me...

28:48.97 alexei sayle i think we're coming I think we're coming to the end of our time together.

28:49.11 Talal K okay

28:52.40 seb Well, it's at 4% and I don't want to risk 3% 2%.

28:55.12 alexei sayle Yeah, no, we'll say goodbye now. it's ah it's a Technology has let you go in your way.

29:00.97 seb two percent

29:01.70 alexei sayle We've took 2%. two percent were