Jamie Dobson

Last week, I uploaded some photos to FaceBook. I wrote in the description box, ‘Holiday in Taghazout. Was filthy, hot, smelly, shitty – no one avoids the runs in Arabia – the government is oppressive, the poverty rank. In short, it was quality’.

I kept a diary, sometimes in detail, others brushing over the surface. I was not sure I’d painted a coherent narrative, yet, when I went over it, as I copied it into the computer, I was surprised, maybe because I ramble too much, maybe because most journals are self-absorbed dross, that I’d produced a reasonably succinct piece. I captured what I thought well.

The first days I entered a Mark Renton style detox, ‘As soon as a become aware ay the sickness gripping me, if effortlessly moves from the uncomfortable tae the unbearable. A toothache starts tae spread fae ma teeth intae ma jaws and ma eye sockets, and aw through ma bones in a miserable, implacable, debilitating throb’. Panics of the past were not far behind.

The middle days find me asleep and the latter days running around. At each stage, however, the poverty of the place gnawed at me, and, unpredictably, but not unsurprisingly, I was pulled gently back into 1980s Hull. I found myself thinking of school friends, my step-father and his old van, and, not without George Orwell tapping on the inside of my head, I dreamed about societal maturation/degradation.

What I never mention, however, because it was obvious to me, was how much fun I was having. If I was reviewing our holiday for a newspaper, it would get 5 out of 5. And so, for those who are interested, I want to post an entry a day, to try and build up the place as it revealed itself to me. I will start tomorrow, Wednesday the 29th of September, exactly two weeks after I left.