I flew / In my dream
I flew In my dream Striding through the night fields My pliable legs grew to spindles And I left the pursuers and their furrows And I watched myself, beside myself, with my spindled legs below Striding through the night fields And then “Forget the legs” And they retracted As I flew In my…
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Movies on a ship
I never liked that whole thing of bringing your music along. It can be funny, listening to James Brown while driving through the Jordanian desert, but I always thought it was a con. You’re just giving yourself a bogus lifeline in the turmoil of travel, setting one movie in your head against another, like they’re…
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South
On 13th January 2016 I’m due to fly from London to Cape Town, alongside a BBC TV crew and BBC presenter Peter Gibbs. There we’ll join the RRS (Royal Research Ship) Ernest Shackleton, for a two-week voyage south across 2,500 miles of the roughest seas in the world, to reach the British Antarctic research station Halley in the…
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The rise and rise of Jordanian cinema
A wonderful recent assignment in Jordan, writing about the growth of independent cinema. Here’s what I wrote on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/matthew.teller.9/posts/10207684410218422 Copy/pasting the FB status here: I had such fun writing this article on Jordan’s emerging film industry, and the work of the amazing Nadine Toukan as creator, mentor, guide and inspiration. It’s an article I’ve been…
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Naked diplomacy – digital in Beirut
I was lucky to visit Beirut recently to make a documentary for BBC World Service radio about the remarkable outgoing British Ambassador, Tom Fletcher. You can listen to it here, or alternatively, download it as an MP3 podcast here (or via iTunes here). I wrote an accompanying piece for the BBC News website – click here to read it. Full…
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BBC Front Row on Theeb
After a few tweets and a bit of pestering, I was lucky enough to be invited by presenter Samira Ahmed onto Front Row, the main daily arts programme on BBC Radio 4 in the UK, to talk about Theeb, a new and – in my entirely humble opinion – brilliant film by Jordanian director Naji…
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Jordan Pass – don’t pass on it
Yesterday – oddly, yesterday in the late evening, Jordan time – I spotted, by chance, this Facebook status by Adel Amin, director of marketing at the Jordan Tourism Board. It announced the Jordan Pass, a unified ticket for many of Jordan’s historical sites that is an attempt to help revive the country’s desperately struggling tourist trade. Looking…
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The churches of Dubai
When I knew I would be stopping over in Dubai on a recent trip, I began casting around for story ideas. I wouldn’t be there long. Food? No, kind of done it. Old Dubai? Well, maybe, but what, on a short trip? I’d never yet made it to the Hindu temple which I knew stood…
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Halley. Back to the desert.
I’m going back to the desert. The cold desert. This was the tweet that started it all, one evening back in November 2013: @matthewteller Forget the cold. It'll melt your heart. — Peter Gibbs (@PeterGWeather) November 23, 2013 I recognised Peter Gibbs from the telly – he is one of the BBC’s weather presenters – but we’d only…
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Jordan visa changes – update
A brief update to my post yesterday on Jordan’s visa changes. The Minister of Tourism, Nayef Al Fayez, tweeted me shortly after I posted to say the changes will come into effect between this month (May) and September 2015: Thank you @matthewteller some will come into effect this month and all by September.And there will…