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#2 Rob Twigger on zen slackerism, South Korean TV, and partner appraisal strategies
43 Plays7 months ago
Rob Twigger is a UK-based author of 16 books, many of which are travel. He and I discuss:
A book Rob admires: The Colossus of Maroussi
A travel book Ken admires: Big Dead Place
* Rob’s philosophical movements: Micromastery and Zenslackerism
* The Refusal of Work by David Frayne
* American listeners get a primer on what Guy Fawkes is.
* We make 2024 US presidential election predictions. (One of us is wrong, the other feels too inept to predict.)
* Rewilding Britain, yea or nay?
* Banter about toilets (Ken thinks British toilets are terrible; Rob questions very existence of toilets).
* Rob is addicted to South Korean TV dramas.
* How neither of us like that noodle-slurping sound.
* Yet more chatter on South Korean fertility rates. The lowest in the world!
* Suits, the TV Show, may have things to teach us about humanity.
* We discuss appraising prospective wives by watching how they get over a barbed-wire fence.
* Relationship expert, Dr. John Gottman, and his theory of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse
* Gear recommendations: Rob likes Rovince’s anti-tick trousers. Ken likes super durable trash bags to keep backpacking gear dry inside backpack.
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Transcript
Introduction and Interview with Robert Twigger
00:00:00
Speaker
Hi everyone, Ken here. This is a podcast interview with friend and travel writer Robert Twigger.
Ken on Trump's Election and American Politics
00:00:07
Speaker
But before we get to the interview, I feel compelled to process some of the election results I just woke up to. um So Trump won, I'd like to make four point four points that are on my mind. The first word that comes to mind is incomprehensibility. There is part of me that will just Never understand the appeal of trump ah as hard as i try to understand it the audio of him trying to pressure that georgia secretary of state to find him how many was it eighteen thousand votes like that's enough reason for anybody to be like i'm never voting for the sky.
00:00:46
Speaker
And, you know, even if we grant that the republican Republicans have reasonable positions, whether that's um tariff Chinese tariffs or stiffer immigration or reinvigorating manufacturing, it's just like Trump's objectively lousy character and the way he threatened the democratic process, that should be enough for voters to be like, okay, we want these policies, but we're going to seek another person to carry them out.
00:01:17
Speaker
My second kind of thought is, ah this this is the president we deserve. You got the president you deserve. And I think this election says more about the American character than the president's character. We clearly want something as a country other than what I think would have been the positive kind of incremental progress that we probably would have gotten under Harris. So We have to bear the weight of cra of of the cross that we carry with Trump, but the thing is we built that cross and we pounded ourselves to it. So what comes next is our cross to carry. Three. just disappointment with the Democrats for how they went about selecting Harris and Waltz. And I was fine with Harris and Waltz. I thought they would be competent president and vice president of good character. You know, I wasn't excited or energized by them, but I don't need to really be excited or energized. I just want positive, slow, incremental progress.
00:02:23
Speaker
um But, you know, were they chosen by any Democratic voters? um No, Harris was not chosen by voters to be vice president or president. We had no say in waltz and suddenly we're putting people who haven't gone through a democratic process um up for the presidency. So yeah, disappointment there.
00:02:46
Speaker
and Lastly, I'm just pissed at progressives. I am progressive. I lean kind of towards the left. and you know I spent a week at Occupy Wall Street back in 2011. Let me tell you something about progressives.
00:03:02
Speaker
Many of them just, they don't give a shit how they come across. ah They can be angry, radical, pious, uncompromising. It doesn't matter if they appeal to either you know Democrats or Republicans at all. And I think a lot of the cultural vibes progressive culture has sent out in the last 10 years has been politically damaging.
00:03:28
Speaker
And I'm talking about not being able to have like an adult conversation in polite society about immigration. If you question immigration policy at all, you're liable to be called a xenophobe and a racist, and I think that's unreasonable.
00:03:43
Speaker
I think men have been culturally degraded and denigrated for the past 10 years. I think we've been mislabeled with things like patriarchy and white privilege. I think huge chunks of the male population, whether you're white or black, um those those terms don't apply. And I think men have been annoyed to the right. And I think what we're going to see in the returns is a lot of men voting for Trump And just like DI, DI can be so annoying when it's just kind of shriveled down our throats and the shows that we watch and the movies that we watched, we were just kind of rolling our eyes and just feeling that either we're out of touch or the larger culture is out of touch. So I just think it's incredibly off-putting and I'm guessing this is a reason why a lot of people either
00:04:35
Speaker
sat in on election day or just said sent a big F-U vote for Trump. So those are just some thoughts as I'm going through the grieving process. As you can tell, it's it's mostly ah anger at this point, but um yeah,
00:04:55
Speaker
onto the show.
Robert Twigger's Childhood and Travel Writing Insights
00:05:01
Speaker
This is the Out of the Wild podcast with Ken Ilgunis.
00:05:15
Speaker
So Rob Twigger, you are the author of 16 books, many of them travel books. You've been on expeditions to find the world's biggest snake. You've retraced an 18th century Canadian voyage in a birch bark canoe, and you learn martial arts with the Tokyo riot police.
00:05:36
Speaker
Rob, I know from your work that these adventurous roots kind of begin in your boyhood. Could you start by painting a picture of the natural environment of your boyhood? Of course. and And first of all, hello and thank you for having me on your brilliant show. um Okay. Well, when I was a kid, I grew up in Warwickshire in the Midlands of England, and it was at the height of kind of pesticide use and sort of um, you know, really on eco methods of farming. So all the streams where where we lived were all dead. You know, there's not a single fish in any of them and there were no snakes, no tadpoles. So I grew up in this strange kind of almost like a post-apocalyptic world, but we played all the time outside. So we're playing on all these streams, which were actually just downstream of a sewage plant. So there was this kind of like pond we used to play in. It was literally about, you know,
00:06:34
Speaker
400 meters from the from the sewage plant. So it must have been overflowing for a minute. It was all bright green. you know It was this weird, weird green color. And we'd sort of splash around in it, make rafts, muck around. um I don't think I ever took a mouthful of it. I mean, I knew it was bad stuff. But um yeah, so it was this it was this odd odd kind of um denatured nature that I grew up in.
00:06:59
Speaker
It was a denatured nature, but, you know, I read your four-part comic series and it just seemed full of adventure, full of kind of hijinks out on the outdoors. Oh, yeah, yeah. No, there's a lot of hijinks. I mean, we always building tree houses and damming streams. I mean, you in your notes, you said, think of a childhood adventure. One of my most favorite things would be damming a stream and flooding, you know, perhaps an entire field.
00:07:29
Speaker
You know, like creating a humongous lake. It sounds like you probably fertilized the farm field that way. Yeah, yeah yeah probably. Yeah. Yeah. yeah so So you're the author of 16 books, many of which are travel books to you. I'm going to ask you two questions here, answer whichever one you want, however you want, but to you, what makes a good travel book or what makes a bad travel book? Okay. A bad travel book.
00:07:59
Speaker
of which there are many, is usually one where the author does not reveal themselves. The place they go through, however interesting it is, they somehow manage to turn it into a magazine article and ah they talk to people with the ah kind of phony kind of um desire to sort of reveal something about the sugar beet industry in Mexico or, you know, or, you know, the self contrived nature of of conversations, but which don't reveal anything about, about themselves or, or humanity. Um, I mean, one of my favorite travel books of all time, I mean, quite possibly is my favorite travel book is Colossus of Marusai by Henry Miller. And in it, um, it's real encounters with people.
00:08:55
Speaker
And people he knows quite well, so it's not just superficial. And you get a ah wonderful feeling of the place that he's in. And so it's truth really, you know, a good travel book is full of truth about them so the person and the place and a bad travel book skates that and has a sort of pseudo realism, which I really don't like. You know, a good travel book that came to mind while you were talking is this one that's probably relatively unknown to everybody, but it's called Big Dead Place. And I forget the author's name, but he lived at that McMurdo station in Antarctica. And the tone is so kind of morose and dark and melancholic and self-deprecating. And there was just something, there was just an original voice, but there there was like this dark humor just kind of behind everything. And I later learned that
00:09:53
Speaker
This poor guy, he he took his life um afterwards, but you can you can see it a little bit in the prose, but it was just such a waste because I thought this guy could be a terrific kind of travel writer. um And I remember you and I had a discussion about Robert McFarlane, and I forget whose words these were. They may have been mine, they may have been yours, but or maybe it was just Envy, because Robert McFarlane, who wrote The Old Ways, is a wildly kind of bestselling author.
00:10:23
Speaker
But I think we we came to the conclusion that he's kind of a bit safe, you know a little bit unrisky. Whereas with with your books, I see so much of you on the on the page, whether it's your ideas, your philosophies, your spirituality, your you know your blunders. I'm guessing that's all very deliberate when you write. Yeah.
00:10:50
Speaker
i mean I was thinking about this because you because you we've talked about it before. How much do you reveal? you know How much do you reveal? and um And I remember your your reluctance to, you know you you'll if you could go back and re-edit, you don't want too much masturbation in in a travel book. There's some information you don't want to hand out to what you. You want to try too frequently. But I do think you want to know what the guy thinks and what he what he genuinely feels. So he's not scared.
00:11:20
Speaker
to say what he really thinks. And I think that if you come from an academic bu background, you are always cognizant of the fact you may well be mocked. You may well be thought of as not very bright or a bit thick if you have ideas which aren't sort of mainstream academia. So I don't suffer from that because I'm not an academic. And also, I think of the books that I really like, which are written 100 years ago or 200 years ago, and they still have a resonance today, and those are the ones where the people are not scared to say what they really feel and what they really think. And as a result, the blunder stuff, I put that in, I could easily present a doctored portrait of what a brilliant guy I am, but I i want to feel that everybody knows that things aren't quite perfect. and And actually an author I quite like in that respect is Paul Theroux. I always get a feeling
00:12:20
Speaker
He doesn't dwell a huge amount on the mistakes he made makes, but you you do get a ah feeling a feeling that it's really happening, you know that that he is really making that journey and um he isn't doctoring it too much. Where won't you go in in your books? like What are some things you leave out? For instance,
00:12:41
Speaker
ah You know, you you really do put your soul on the page. I don't think I've ever seen you kind of write about like family dynamics or love life or any masturbatory behavior. is that ah is that Are those things you've just kind of decided to keep out? I don't i i don't want to put anything in that will that would be embarrassing in a conversation. So I put in the stuff that I i talk about. So my books, aren't there are some people and they're really effective books where you meet the person And they're really bland and timid. And then then when you read that book, it's like, whoa, they're telling you everything. So my kind of thing is the writing is an extension, not completely, but pretty much an extension of of the talking for travel books anyway. So because I've got to go out and live in this world, you know, I'm often writing about real people too. So I have, you know, in my first book, I did say things about people and their lives.
00:13:41
Speaker
ah Which came back to this sort of hit me, you know, and I and you know one guy didn't speak to me for 20 years because ive said things about him So I'm slightly careful about revealing Stuff that will really put someone in the shit Family stuff partly that's my narrative position. I mean as you know if you're getting you start the book and you kind of right from the beginning you have a certain distance from the material and you probably want to you do want to maintain that distance so that you get an evenness of tone. And my kind of position with the text is usually I'm a lone guy out there writing, walking. I'm i'm a self-contained unit. And that's the kind of conceit of 20th century travel writing. you're the You're the adventurer, you're the nomad, you're the man on his own. You don't have any friends or family. You're just out there. And of course you do have friends and family, like everybody, but they are
00:14:42
Speaker
diminished because you're kind of standing in for the reader as a kind of lone person encountering newness and strangeness. So that also has a function as well, because they just, I mean, I have put my wife into a couple of my books. um This hasn't been wholly successful.
00:15:05
Speaker
It sounds like you got
Twigger's Philosophy on Creativity and Work
00:15:06
Speaker
burned. more yeah got burn um Well, kind of going back to the, ah you know, being brave as a writer, being on risky as a writer, you seem to be just ah drawn to kind of, you know, developing kind of like these working philosophies, which have a lot of kind of intellectual background, but that could be.
00:15:25
Speaker
say, applied to to your life and and how you live. And I'm thinking of things like um anti-decartism, analog, activism, micro-mastery. And micro-mastery, you wrote a whole book on that, and please correct me if I'm wrong. Yeah, that's correct, yeah. it's kind of like Um, you master a small skill that's really satisfying, like making an omelet as kind of a way in to like a broader discipline. So you can really get into cooking if you get really good at making an omelet. Um, are you, are you thinking about anything else these days? Are you developing any other kind of working philosophies? Um, well, the micromastery one, I, I, I kind of stand by that. I kind of use that all the time and ah all the time.
00:16:13
Speaker
when I start something new, because it's just a just a much easier way of getting into something. But am I am i doing anything now I was thinking about this? um I am sort of into work avoidance, ah kind of the philosophy of, um I don't know if you know that book by David Frane, Refusing Work. That's a pretty good book, actually. It's quite nice to read an academic going on and on about how it's really good to be a skiver and a person not working.
00:16:43
Speaker
um and And I did this book, actually one of my books, it's a very short book ah and it's only and available now as an e-book on Amazon, but it's called Zen Slacker. And I wrote that as a kind of repost to this feeling I had at the time that I should be extremely kind of busy and productive. And Zen Slacker is is full of these sort of ways of trying taking the heat off because I realize as a writer, it's not good to be kind of under pressure. So, um, I mean, are you living up to this philosophy? I mean, I know you're, you're always working on a book. You're doing book coaching. I think the last year time you told me you're you're doing a little gardening on the side. Like are are you a Zen slacker? I'm not a, I'm not work shy. Um, and I enjoy.
00:17:42
Speaker
I've quit the garden job, by the way. But I did do it for a year i did do it for a year for a book. That's for a book about work, because I've been thinking generally about work. And um ah it was really interesting to to be outside and doing this work, you know, 60 years old, which is how old old odd I am now, um you know, doing work that sort of should be done by 20-year-olds. So I was quite knackered a lot of the time. But it was only for two days a week, so I could really go for it. But anyway, no, the zen slacker thing,
00:18:11
Speaker
Um, I am thinking about it in terms of, uh, cause I'm totally into this Zen thing that you should do ordinary jobs, like hall water, chop wood. He's a really good for you. And I really believe in them. But what I really hate is the idea of having a job where you work for someone, where you end up lying to the person about how much work you do. Cause basically the job becomes boring. So you start slacking off or you want a day off. So you end up inevitably lying. And one of the really good things about my, and you have to lie cause I always get fired.
00:18:42
Speaker
But what I like about my job writing is I don't have to lie. you know even Even if I haven't delivered the manuscript, I just say to the publisher, I haven't done it. That's it. So I just thought, how can I you know so start thinking about this life where you can do these things, um but you're not trapped into this nine to five lark? Because what I find with writing,
00:19:07
Speaker
um When I start a new project, I always muck around. I never get into it. I might do an hour here, hour there, but it gradually builds, gets more and more intense. Then I do longer and longer hours. And also during the week, so the Monday, I might do hardly anything. Tuesday, it's building up. Wednesday, yeah, doing loads more. And sometimes so I can write like a huge amount on the Saturday or the Friday or Saturday. So it's just that organic way of doing certain tasks. And I remember reading in Birmingham.
00:19:38
Speaker
before it became all in, um it was industrialized, but it wasn't sort of turned into a kind of nine to five culture that the guys making, um you know, screws and rivets and all the metal products that they used to make literally used to sometimes start on a Tuesday and work longer on a Wednesday, more on a Thursday. Sometimes they used to work all through the night on a Friday to deliver everything they need to deliver on Saturday. Then they all go go can get go and get completely drunk.
00:20:08
Speaker
On Saturday, I have a massive hangover that probably lasted till there on Monday. So it just seemed, so it's that sort of thinking. Cause I just, you know, this this whole nine to five thing, man. It's that sort of like ah thinking, but who is this for? Because, you know, the, the, the everyday average Joe worker only has so much power, power over schedule. Is this more for like the corporations to to be more relaxed about how we spend our, our working hours?
00:20:38
Speaker
But they should be, they should trust people far more. But of course the kind of people who work in corporations and gravitate up them are usually control freaks. And um all they want to do is like mess with people and and sort of move them here and move them there. I think that the corporate environment is an extremely unattractive one to anyone who's got a brain. um I mean, obviously there are very yeah ambitious people who want to just like win, like in suits, you know, the Harvey Specter type people.
00:21:06
Speaker
And, um, I've been watching suits as well, you know, um, as well as K dramas and, um, we'll get to K drama. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm ahead of the game. But anyway, the point is that it seems that the people I respect after a while, they work out a way to sort of get out of the corporate corporate world. And they either do that by by becoming the boss or they kind of have two days a week doing that and they do something else or.
00:21:34
Speaker
you know, people work their way around things that, you know, you, you know, you you start work when you're 20, it's perfectly acceptable to be to be sort of pushed around by the man. But you know, after about 10 years, surely you've worked something out, you know, you should have got your own side gig, or you become self employed, or my new mantra, which is, everybody should start their own business of some sort, you know, just doesn't have to be creative, just to get control of their lives. So they're not going to You know, when you you see these people being interviewed and they're saying, oh, I can't even afford efficient chips, you know, I'm at home, I got no Netflix. You just think, oh God, you poor sod, you know, start some kind of business, get some more money.
00:22:15
Speaker
Let's switch gears. It's November 5th, 2024. It's a special day for for both of our countries.
The British Perspective on US Elections
00:22:22
Speaker
One, it's, my daughter calls it bonfire night. I don't think that's the correct term for it. I don't think it's a Guy Fawkes night. Some people call it bonfire night. Oh, it is called, okay. Well, but let's, and it's also the night of the US election between Kamala Harris and Donald Trump. that Much less important. Yeah. Let's start with the much less important thing.
00:22:45
Speaker
What are your thoughts, feelings, predictions? Just how does it all appear to someone from the British point of view? Well, my prediction, Kamala Harris is going to win. Why? Because I'm a huge fan of Alan, is it Lichterman or Lightman? Lightman, the guy who always predicts it correctly. He's called Kamala Harris. So either he's really scared or he's going to be right. So I'm going to go with that. Okay.
00:23:14
Speaker
the weird thing is over the last 20 years, Brits have become more and more focused on the American elections. I mean, when I was a kid, just kind of like something that happened, you know, it was just like in a foreign country, nobody nobody really cared. um But now the media is so sort of centralized. I mean, The Guardian has sells editions in America, you know, it has lots of US news, you know, they kind of treat the readers as if we're supposed to be equally cognizant of American culture as as as of our own. you know And actually, we're some kind of 53rd state that got pushed to the wrong side. We're not on the Hawaii side, we're on the other side. We're just catching up. And um and that's very prevalent. you know and and And so this sort of growing prevalence of American culture, um I've really noticed. And so so English people seem very, very interested in
00:24:11
Speaker
And of course, it does have some effect. It has obviously an effect on foreign policy. um How can it possibly really affect Britain or England in any way, shape or form? I don't see it how it can. Nevertheless, I too have been following eagerly the the the whole thing as if I'm involved. um So it's all pretty strange. But for English people, we all think Trump is obviously completely barking mad. um There are a few oddballs in England, kind of low empathy, slightly weird people who think, well, what did Trump really do? and What did he really do? That was so bad. and um And they completely seem to disregard the fact that he's incredibly divisive in an age where we're already divided. you know It just seems like what a really silly thing to be doing.
00:25:06
Speaker
um I'm not any fan of Kamala Harris. you know I mean, I would much prefer Bernie Saunders to be the the victor. Well, of course he never will. And he probably balls it up too. you know Um, I was in the States last week, so I got an early voting. I voted for Kamala Harris. Um, I don't really have a prediction because where I was, which was kind of suburban Western New York, a kind of comfortable, you know, suburban rural place. I just saw Trump signs to Harris signs 30 to one, you know, for every Harris sign, I saw about 30 Trump signs. My God. Yeah. And the, and the polls are like 50, 50. So, and my finger on the pulse of, you know, American life and politics is kind of, you know, lifting off that pulse now that I'm in the UK. So I can barely offer a prediction that I feel is worthwhile and it and it's not, you know, I completely got the 2016 one wrong. In the end, I'm optimistic regardless of who wins.
00:26:11
Speaker
I think Harris will just kind of be kind of a humdrum positive kind of incrementalist, you know, just kind of slowly improving things and that, you know, halting way that we do. And if Trump wins, you know, I do think there's the potential he could do some damage to American democracy, but Americans in their hearts, they're not fascist. And even if Trump is a fascist, I think it's only going to last so long. like i think i If they vote for this guy, who I think is narcissist, madman, charlatan, you know I can't believe you're even voting for them. If America votes for him, it's just like, you kind of you guys get, you deserve him. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think that too, yeah. Yeah, so it's just like take your bed, medicine,
00:27:03
Speaker
um You know, get that bad taste in your mouth and then let's just kind of so spit him out and get back to making this country a better place.
British Traditions and Critiques of Modern Trends
00:27:11
Speaker
But yeah it's also Guy Fawkes night. Can you, can you do a little Guy Fawkes aside? why Why, why are there fireworks going off outside of my home right now? And what's the air smoky as you walked home? it hey It's got that nice kind of smoldering fireworks. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I smelt i smelt it on the way home too. I thought, great.
00:27:32
Speaker
No, bonfire night was a huge thing when I was a kid way more than Halloween. Halloween, again, is like the American election. It's been creeping up over the last 20 years, but it was Halloween is is just, I think it originally comes from Ireland, but the current trick-or-treating and all that nonsense, that's all American flim-flam-ery. So when I was a kid, it was bonfire night. It was 5th of November, and it celebrates the failed attempt to blow up parliament.
00:27:58
Speaker
by a Catholic called Guy Fawkes. He snuck into Parliament with like a hundred barrels of gunpowder, which he snuck under the floorboards. And he was about to light it. And that would have been one hell of a bang. I mean, it would have blown the whole of Parliament's kingdom come. Unfortunately, I don't know, somehow, I don't know the full story. Somehow he got rumbled or whatever. What did he have against?
00:28:22
Speaker
the government. what What did he want to to do? Or was he just an anarchist? who just well he was loath stuff fuck He was a Catholic and he was against the Protestant government and King. It's a bit extreme. God, I don't even know my history here. Anyway, he was a Catholic and that was the main problem. and he And Catholics were being persecuted at that time. So he had a massive grudge against the you know the the powers that be. So, I mean, he was way more than successful than most modern terrorists. I mean, in terms of the amount of sheer quantity of of explosives he got in there. But anyway, they rumbled him. So he was he was not only hanged, he was some drawn, which means has his guts taken out and quartered. And so each quart of his body was attached to a horse and dragged through the streets. So they really um did the worst with him. And then I think they stuck him on a bonfire as well, which is hence Guy Fawkes' night. But that might not even be true. Anyway, he ended up on the bonfire.
00:29:21
Speaker
as a thing, but bonfires, burning effigies on bonfires, of course, is as old as pre-Celtic, you know, we're talking, you know, it's the Wicker Man. And that's what I really loved about it as a kid, because as a kid, you could, you made this kind of effigy out of old clothes, stuffed it with straw or paper, you made a face, and often you've got a mask, which, you know, there's Viva Vendetta masks, you know, you could stick one of those on. And then you'd go around the streets with this thing on an old pram. And you could say, penny for the guy. And people you could collect money for yourself you know in that way. It was not even for charity. It was just for yourself. And um and then on on on on the nights, on bits of waste ground around towns, over the preceding months, people had been just like throwing old oh pallets and wood and even tires, you know all kinds of crap, making these massive bomb fires. Some of these were official.
00:30:17
Speaker
like be a rugby club or a rotary club or something. But some of them were completely unofficial. They were just kind of like some kind of housing estate. And then other people who were slightly more well off would have them in their gardens and yeah build these big, big bonfires. And I had this friend, he his dad was a builder, so they had loads of spare wood. And he he actually had a really big garden. And and so the bonfire was humongous.
00:30:42
Speaker
and it had a wire, his dad would put a fence wire, it's a strand of fence wire from the center of the bonfire to this really tall tree that's quite a long way away. And and then he put a rocket on a kind of wire kind of hanger. So it would be like a zip wire. And then at the start of the bonfire, the bonfire would be doused in petrol. So he'd light this rocket, it would shoot down this wire, and then boom, the bonfire would burst into flame.
00:31:09
Speaker
and um Yeah, it was mesmerizing. It was fantastic. And then you'd watch the guy gradually disintegrate, you know, I think it burns away and his face would melt or fall. So this whole thing was just, just wonderful. You know, and then you had all the fireworks, tons of fireworks and things like that. You know what I, this is going to sound like the weirdest thing you've ever heard, but I once had a self effigy fantasy and it was, it was just a couple of years ago. It was kind of right when I was in the middle of.
00:31:38
Speaker
you know, so a lot of heavy parenting. I really had to put my career and time and hobbies to the side. And it felt like a ah dissolution of of self, like my old self had just kind of dissolved and fragmented and kind of floated up to the ether. And I thought, maybe I can kind of move on to this stage if I kind of ceremoniously kind of wish wish my kind of past self uh, often give him a fond farewell. But honestly parenting gets a lot easier and I feel, I feel like I've reclaimed a bit of my old self, but yeah, I had a sofeage wild man fantasy. So what are you going to do? Like burn, and burn an effigy of yourself on a, on a fire. I figured I'd just make like a scarecrow out of my clothes and that would be good enough.
00:32:25
Speaker
wow Okay. Okay. Um, okay. I think I understand Guy Fawkes Knight a little bit better. Um, and I've been here for six years in the United Kingdom and I'm beginning to comprehend this country better. And I've kind of picked out a few things I really like and don't like about this country. And I just want to get your, your, your take on a few of the things that annoy me about Britain. Is that all right?
00:32:55
Speaker
probably annoy me too. And also you're in Scotland, so it could be specific to Scotland. it's It could be specific, but I'm guessing um we all share some of these characteristics. So I'm going to start with the things going from five to one about yeah things that most annoy me. Low maintenance gardens in the UK,
00:33:18
Speaker
Um, it's common for someone to just kind of put pebble all over the garden, you know, in the U S we'd call these lawns or just huge concrete paving stones. It looks ugly. It's mother's nature. I don't know how people could do it. I have fantasies of throwing like these seed bombs in there just to get a bunch of weeds to grow amongs all the pebbles. don't I'm really into that. I see that as a kind of Zen thing.
00:33:43
Speaker
Okay. can i and Um, number four, it's just, it's just too cold inside homes. These homes are not draft proof and a lot of the windows, they're single pane. So this is like two things. They're too cold, but sometimes they're too cold because they're registered. I remember once Astra and I, we were looking for a place to live in Dunbar, Dunbar high street.
00:34:10
Speaker
And one of the houses was registered, meaning, you know, it has historic value and can't be changed just for nothing. But the thing is, there was there was just nothing extraordinary. It was just like a normal, boring building on this high street and you couldn't exchange single pane windows for double panes. I just think that's absolutely ridiculous. And I think Britain sometimes has a less than perfect relationship with nostalgia. Can I, can I come back to that? Yeah. Okay.
00:34:40
Speaker
Okay, so I don't want to spoil your flow, but what you do there, like you, first of all, you, you can get like the windows, you know, in Sean's house, I mean, Sean has these, these sash windows, which look really old, but they're actually plastic. And you can get plastic windows that are just look just like the old style windows, but they're expensive. And you put them in without telling anyone.
00:35:09
Speaker
No, okay. And no one will ever notice, right? And unless you've got, you've fallen out with your neighbors, nobody will ever notice. So that is the way we're on that problem. Secondly, the dampness, it is true. And in fact, I met this Swedish guy. He said he had never been so cold. And this is a guy who's been to Siberia. He said, I've never been so cold as ah as a winter I spent in Mosside in Liverpool, or it may have been in Manchester, another place in Manchester, Toxtuff or something. I don't know. No, I think that's Liverpool too. But anyway, he had been up north and of course it was because probably no heating in the house.
00:35:39
Speaker
And it's really damp here because it never goes below zero. But as you know, if it goes below zero, it gets dry. yeah you know If it hovers around five degrees, you've got massive humidity and it's not um and it's b blow and it's really cold. and And that kind of cold just gets right in your bones. you know and There's only one way around it, and that is to wear pure wool underwear all the time, like long johns and top. If you do that, you'll be completely sorted. So that's what you've got to get.
00:36:08
Speaker
gotcha I was hoping you were going to give me another civil disobedient solution to this, but I guess I can just wear thermals.
Environmental Concerns and Rewilding in the UK
00:36:19
Speaker
Number three is the biodiversity crisis in this country. This country badly needs to be rewilded. There needs to be a lot more forests up here in Scotland, a lot fewer.
00:36:32
Speaker
Sheep, deer, there needs to be apex predators, lynx, wolves, bears, um and of course it's the same down south in England. and Any thoughts on that? The thing is, south of Birmingham is basically a massive suburb. I mean, it's so densely populated down here. um I do not think that it would be very wise to to bring in new species. I'm generally not in favour of bringing in new species like, for example, red kites. They're a complete menace in my view, because they're from Spain. No, they're not. They're not, you know, they're foreign. Anyway, but the um up north, I completely agree with you about Scotland. It's kind of a wasteland, really ugly sort of forestry commission, monoculture plantations.
00:37:23
Speaker
um Get rid of those deer. The deer population in Britain is humongously high. It's apparently I've no reason to disbelieve this read somewhere that it's the highest it's been since the middle ages. And deer are a really good meat. And of course, deer spread ticks. And that's the big problem we've got. So I think, you know, massacre that deer population.
00:37:45
Speaker
um
00:37:48
Speaker
And if you if that means bringing in wolves, so be it. But, you know, I just think bringing in reintroducing species is really silly and stupid because there are just so many unintended consequences. I mean, we haven't had wolves here since 1600 or something, 1700. And I just think it will be extremely difficult. But I do agree with everything else you're saying. um Number two, white van drivers. And by white, I'm not talking about Caucasians, I'm talking about actual white vans. like yeah ah Here, I kind of live in like the semi-country and these are like winding roads
00:38:29
Speaker
yeah with hedgerows on the sides, no shoulders. And I'm going like 45 miles an hour. It's like already faster than I want to go when the speed limit is actually 60 on these roads. And I always have this white van driver, these working vans, right on my ass. um it's It's so annoying. Yeah. I actually used to drive one of those vans for a job. Did you? did you tell did Were you right on someone's tail and those things? no ive ah Maybe a little bit. the yeah The main thing is our roads are really narrow and because of stupid manufacturing regulations about, um but you know, safety related, I mean, it's probably a really good idea, but vans have become bigger and bigger and bigger. So they just occupy more and more of the road. I mean, cars have become bigger and brakes have become better so people can go faster. So it's just a whole whole big problem.
00:39:24
Speaker
But you're right. There is a sort of dumb macho culture of van driving, but you just have to just slow right down. That's what everybody tells me. And I just, I just struggle doing that mess mess with them. You know, okay now for my, the thing that most annoys me about Britain yeah um um is the toilets. It's the toilets. oh What's wrong with our toilets? americans on the field are they No, I mean, see when an American,
00:39:52
Speaker
You know goes to take a number two they sit down they do their thing they flush the toilet and that's it. That's it. and that what when they do that when When this happens in the UK it's oftentimes you have it's a big kind of theatrical performance one the toilets are designed so.
00:40:14
Speaker
The poo kind of slides down the porcelain, so you you have to get. your and and so And sometimes in public toilets, they have toilet brushes because you're expected to clean the porcelain off the toilet in the porcelain. And then it takes you three times just to flush it down.
00:40:36
Speaker
This, this is it. This is everywhere up in Scotland. It was in the home I bought. It's in the public places. And I feel like British toilet manufacturers, they're, they're quality control guy. He just like, he flushed it. It's like, okay, it just took three times. It's good enough. Go ahead and put it out and sell it to customers. And the thing is like, I feel like the British don't even know that this is weird. It's just like, oh yeah, I got to flush it three times just to get it to go down.
00:41:05
Speaker
You go into an American bathroom and you push the toilet lever and it's like a jet taking off. You know, it might like suck your arm down with it. So yeah, that's my, well, you know, my thinking is I, I'm just, I just think toilet is absurd in any way, shape or form. You know, this is an interesting take. I didn't know you were going to go here. I think, I think that, um, you know, when you get to the middle East and you know, of course there you've got,
00:41:34
Speaker
you know toilets in most people's houses, but traditionally it's a hole in the ground. When I was in Japan, a hole in the ground with two kind of footprint things, you sit, you squat, it goes down into that hole and um you use water, a water squirter to clean your ass. There's no paper. you know This is, and then that shit is taken away in a night soil van in Japan and used to fertilize growing crops. That is so sensible. you know They don't have proper sewers in Japan because of the possibilities of earthquakes, so they don't have all that nastiness leeching in, all that wasted water. You know, I know those American Lou's do sound amazing, but I bet they use a ton of water. And the fact is, if you've ever used, I mean, to go back to Sean's, the Lou's in his house, they've got the system high up, which is traditionally what used to be in English toilets, believe it or not, when I was a kid, the system used to be right high up.
00:42:30
Speaker
And so you've got way more gravity. So you actually did get that massive flush and a ton of water. So if you go to his house, it is literally one flush, but, uh, concerns about the waste of water and so on has made the system size smaller and smaller and smaller. And they, they, and also it's probably much cheaper to do it like this. They put those little systems low down now. And of course it's only about a foot above the blue. So of course it's got no pressure.
00:42:59
Speaker
um So you don't get any power. So it's partly a kind of feeble attempt to reduce the amount of water. Not that I'm making any real excuses, but that is it. So um I'm just saying in the past, there are there were you know fully engineered lose that I'm sure would have satisfied even the discerning American arse. And in mine is very discerning. But yeah, it's just like, let's save the water. So let's, let's come up with, you know, small basins, but oh, you know, you got to flush it three times. So you just end up using more water. But anyways, we're, we're, we're, I'm flogging a dead horse here. um I just want to quickly run through, I don't want this to be negative. So I just want to quickly run through five things. I'm delightfully surprised about Britain.
00:43:45
Speaker
You don't get shot going to school. That that should be in my top 10. Somehow that didn't end up in my top 10. Number five is your political scandals in the UK. They're just like naively innocent and kind of low key. Like, oh, Boris Johnson bought some curtains with government money or.
00:44:09
Speaker
Um, they had parties during COVID, you know, like things like that. Like even up here in Scotland, it's just like, uh, the Scottish national party may have kind of misused some money and it comes to like less than a million pounds or something like that. It's like, if you want to see a political scandal, I'll show you one. Like we stormed the Capitol in January, 2020. That's a political scandal. yeah yeah Yeah. Um, okay. Number four, some things are surprisingly cheap here. It's just like.
00:44:38
Speaker
Home insurance, I only pay like a hundred, 200 pounds a year. it's It's not much. My phone costs me like 20, my phone plan costs me like 20 pounds a month. My broadband 20 pounds a month. Like my American friends are are so jealous when they hear that. Three, your dogs are like the politest in the world. You've got really polite.
00:45:02
Speaker
dogs I think that's because they're well trained. Number two, your towns are so walkable. And number one, um British charisma. Like if you could export anything, I don't know what this country exports, but if you could export anything, it's British charisma.
Ken's Love for Britain
00:45:17
Speaker
I love the self-deprecation. I love the politeness. I even love, you know, there's a warmth here. um And those are things that make me really happy I'm living here. ah I'm too touched, man.
00:45:32
Speaker
Um, yeah. So I want us to each kind of share something we're consuming in the media. Why don't, why don't you go first? Well, I have been consuming, uh, way more than I should or really wanted to, but there we are. It became addictive. Korean dramas, modern Korean dramas. And I started with the glory, which is this incredibly, um, uh,
00:45:59
Speaker
powerful story of bullying. And if you think bullying is bad in an American high schools, you should see what happens in Korean high schools. It's insane. And it's all about the very meticulous revenge of this woman. So then I graduated to um all the kind of hit shows. There's one called Crash Landing on You, which is about someone who accidentally goes from South Korea into North Korea. And that's brilliant too. And then there was um The Penthouse, which is an insane story of ambition. It's kind of like Dallas, but charged times 20.
00:46:32
Speaker
um and And then I got into this drama called My Mister, which is actually and even an even better k-drama, because not only is it highly dramatic, it's really well written, and it's really human. And and this is the thing I really like about k-dramas is that they're really looking at all aspects of what it is to be a human being, which is in American dramas, you know, everyone's hard and cold as ice, you know,
00:46:57
Speaker
tough or else they're having a nervous breakdown or something. that there's no kind of you know You don't have someone in in an American drama saying, oh, I'm sitting next to my coworker and I'm going to really try hard not to be nasty to them um because it's really good for me to not to not look blow off steam. Now, of course, in an American drama, they might say that for a second and they'll blow up, but in a K drama, they'll do that for a year. They're trying to be good you know and you'll have people um just doing uh, just really, really ordinary things. Like a lot of, a lot of time in K drums, they're having, they're having food together and like munching down. and And I have to say, one of the things I don't like is that Korean men tend to eat in a really kind of sloppy kind of oh way. Yeah, I can't, I couldn't stand that. I couldn't live in some of those countries just because of that. But then every night again, you get a K actor who eats really nicely. I mean, the women all do, I have to say the women tend to eat really nicely.
00:47:52
Speaker
but the men's kind of all smacking their lips. and so They suck up those noodles. yeah Sucking up those noodles, man. You recommend that I watch an episode of my liberation notes and I'm kind of picking up on what you're saying. It just seemed very mature. yeah it It seemed like ah a show for a popular audience, but it was just very mature. It's like what I would want my country to be watching. And it's about you know young folks and they're starting off in their career dealing with relationship drama. And it's like, it's, it's right on the verge of being mellow drama, but because of that maturity, I guess we can kind of subtract the mellow from the drama. It's just, it's just a good drama. Yeah. No, you're a good critic, man. Yeah, you nailed it. Um, my liberation notes is pretty out there as well, because it goes through quite a sort of, I mean, almost not boring, but just cause you keep watching, but I mean, there's not much going on. And then suddenly something happens, which is just
00:48:52
Speaker
what Where did that come from? you know i'm a bit I'm a bit surprised that you're watching these shows and i'm I'm curious why it sounds like you're kind of just liking the kind of realistic depiction of life and the kind of the mundanity of life. Is this just something you're not getting from kind of British American media? Well, British media is all rubbish. There's nothing good in British media at all. Don't try to defend it.
00:49:21
Speaker
Um, the only good thing is master chef and master chef, the professionals. That's the only two things I think are worth watching. Everything else is complete rubbish. Um, American TV obviously got some good movies and some of those series, as I said, I have been looking, I'm a late convert to suits, which I see. I mean, it's obviously silly. It is obviously silly, but I see it as an incredible kind of morality tale because everything stems from this one.
00:49:50
Speaker
act of, it's kind of like Lord Jim, one act of um illegality, where this guy pretends to be from Harvard and he isn't, and everything kind of spirals from that. you know So I think that's kind of fascinating in a way. ah But at the same time, the the people are just so false and ridiculous. They've got no mates. They spend all their time at work, which is obviously lunacy. um Whereas the Korean dramas are ah just real And also I'm finding out about career and I've become kind of obsessed about career. I just think it's a fascinating place um in a way. Yeah.
Discussion on South Korea's Low Fertility Rate
00:50:25
Speaker
And I want to talk about Korea for a second because, you know, in my liberate my liberation notes, you know, these people are dating, they're breaking up. You can kind of see that they're all kind of, you know, trying to rise up and their core corporate careers and
00:50:43
Speaker
This is in my other podcast with Sarah Heppola, we talked, I can't believe we're talking about the South Korean fertility crisis and ed two podcasts in a row, but I think South Korea is, it's interesting because they have the lowest fertility rate in, um, I think the world it's, um, so replacement level is you have every woman has to have.
00:51:07
Speaker
2.1 children. In South Korea, it's 0.72. And Seoul, the capital city, it's 0.55. Do you have any thoughts about that? Well, you get the impression in these films, these women are very sort of strong minded. They're almost like, um well, you know, they don't act as if they're kind of crazed feminists, but they they have within them the kind of fiery temperament of somebody who's going to I don't want to ah commit to a you know a man and having a kid and being told what to do. you know They're very into that. you know So you know it's it's playing out. you know they They are becoming career women, you know literally, because they're from Korea. ha ha um But you know it's it's it's hard to understand why why it should be so. I mean, you watch these the Korean men and they are
00:52:02
Speaker
pretty uncommunicative in in the dramas. You know, they don't seem to be doing much talking. So maybe it's not much fun hanging out with them. I don't know. So it's a combination of things. I mean, I've never been to South Korea, but just from what I'm reading and what I'm seeing, it's just like highly educated women, highly empowered women. They're all dedicated to their careers. The men are just kind of lacking something. And, you know, your 20s go by and your 30s go by. it Maybe it doesn't even matter. It sounds like having kids may not even be a huge priority. I think that from my, here we are anthropology through telly, but the impression I get is it's extremely expensive to you know to have a family. you know to They don't seem to earn a huge amount of money and yet they've got really expensive apartments and know they've they've got to send them to a really good school and then they've got to send them to a really good university. and It seems tremendously important what university do you've been to. I mean, much more so than
00:53:02
Speaker
the UK and US. And you're guaranteed if you've gone to top university, you will definitely get into a top company. And then this whole kind of idea that ah which still seems prevalent in Korea, but it's kind of disintegrating the rest of the world, you'll be looked after for life, you know, and you'll be on this elevator to success. um So these people kill themselves to try and get their kid into the best kindergarten, because then they'll get into the best lower school and an upper school and so on. So I think there's a huge amount of pressure if you want to play the game.
00:53:31
Speaker
and um And maybe that's that's just the impact. you know People just think, shit, I can't afford kids. you know I'm just going to do what I'm doing. I did some half-assed internet research and I came across that a few years ago, they raised the paid paternity leave to 10 days for men. I'm like, if that's if that's an accomplishment, um maybe that's maybe that's part of the problem. um But speaking of yeah dating and mating, I know you've been married for a while.
00:54:08
Speaker
what when you were back When you were a bachelor, did you have any strategies for appraising prospective partners? Appraising prospective partners? um Well, I did. i mean One of the rules was to see ah make sure you go on a walk and make sure there would be some kind of barbed wire fence. I'm not talking about like a coldest, great escape kind of fence, not a Steve McQueen fence, but Just kind of like a, ah you know, a two-strander, you know, and just see if they could get over it. Could they handle it? Do they understand how you'd sort of bring it down and were they phased by it? Or could they get under it? Some girl that went out with this girl, she's so small, she just like scampered under it. It was like, you know, without a problem. And it sounds like you weren't demonstrating. No, no, I'd hold back just to see how they did it. Anyway, I realized late, but I realized my wife actually failed that test. Isn't it isn't it interesting? The woman I married failed the test. She wasn't interested in that sort of thing.
00:55:05
Speaker
And, but she did pass a much more important test, which was generosity. That's my new one. Do they, do they give you a gift? Do they give other people gifts? Are they, are they generous with their time? I think that it's, it's just, it's just bad news. If you're married to a tight wood and, um, in lots of ways, because I find tight woods, lack of generosity also seems to spill over into a lack of courage so that people who are miserly with their sort of money and times also seem to lack lack courage. I don't know why the there seems a connection there. So I think it's a good benchmark. that's my That would be my new one if I have to. if i you know Hopefully, I won't be thrust back onto the dating market too soon.
00:55:51
Speaker
Well, i hope' home ever I hope we have some South Korean listeners and you can kind of bump up their rate by a a decimal point. Oh, right. Yeah, yeah right on. um So as I'm kind of figuring out how to do this podcast. well Do you have one? Do you want to share with us? When things are going well, um make things not go well.
00:56:16
Speaker
And what I mean, what I mean by that is sometimes things are kind of going so dreamily, so swimmingly. It's okay to just kind of. insert just a tiny little bit of drama to see how it goes. Because you got to test if this is worthwhile. you know yeah yeah and And the biggest thing is um conflict resolution. how you not Not even just resolution, how a conflict is is managed and if it can be managed in a mature and adult way. And yeah and remember, my wife and I, when we were dating,
00:56:52
Speaker
um I was really frustrated with her as like a listener because i'm kind of slow and halting and i get like a sentence in and then she would just jump in and i get really flustered cuz i really wanted like to to express myself and. You know i communicated this to her and and she completely adapted there's this wonderful.
00:57:11
Speaker
ah A psychologist, his name is John Gottman. And um he he says there's the four horsemen of the apocalypse, which can kind of predict the end of a relationship. He studied like hundreds, thousands of couples. He'd kind of monitor them. And he said he could kind of predict which couples would be divorced.
00:57:35
Speaker
um ah with a lot of confidence within like the first five minutes of observing them. And he said, yeah if if they're kind of exhibiting exhibiting traits of the four horsemen in the but that bad but but apocalypse, yeah then they're screwed. And those four horsemen are criticism, contempt,
00:57:58
Speaker
Stonewalling which is just where you kind of don't respond and in defensiveness where you just kind of like someone complains about something But then they say hey you but you don't do the dishes so ah When I'm having a conflict I think about those and i I try to really try to catch myself if I'm not doing that stuff But as I'm kind of ending these podcasts I'm not really sure how to end them am I asking for a show recommendation a movie I kind of want to maybe tailor it to each um guest. And you being such an adventurer and outdoorsman, I'm wondering if you can kind of offer some advice on a piece of kit that that you like. For sure. and And I thought about it. And my bit of kit is a pair of Rovints tick-proof trousers. There's nothing that will make you feel more
00:58:54
Speaker
at ease in the wilderness than wearing tick-proof trousers. And ever since I've been wearing them, and I've done quite a lot of walking in Scotland, and tick-infested areas in England, I have never had a tick. So, you know, that they they they do work. um And I think the German army were, you know, the same, that it's not made by Romans, but the material they use is the same ones that were given to the German army. And there they went from having 10,000 tick incidents a year to one. okay So they are seriously a good piece of kit. Okay. I came up with one. I came up with a Glad Force Flex trash bag. um One of the things I noticed about UK trash bags is they're very kind of weak and you know it's easy to poke a hole in them.
00:59:46
Speaker
I like a nice American sturdy trash bag, which probably has a much higher environmental cost, but I use trash bags to keep my my gear nice and dry when I'm out um hiking or whatever. Like you're your outdoor, you're cover your backpack cover, it's only going to do so much. If it's a heavy rain, the rain's going to find its way in there. But if you have a really good trash bag inside of your rucksack. Everything's going to stay nice and dry inside. That's really good, but the Brits are one ahead of you there. Our trash bags are weak, but there are these things called rubble sacks that you buy from B&Q and other DIY centers, and rubble sacks are exactly what you're describing. and In fact, I use rubble s sacks on some of my expeditions instead of dry bags. Okay, so that means I no longer have to traffic in American trash bags when I come
01:00:43
Speaker
ah sketch buy five they You buy a pack of five rubble sacks and they're really strong. Okay. Sorry, I've undermined you your thing, but anyway, nevermind. It's all right. Rob, it's been absolutely wonderful talking to you. Thank you for coming on the Out of the Wild podcast. Thank you for having me. It's been a lot of fun. Thank you.