Rory Stewart walked long stretches of several countries, including Pakistan, Iran and Afghanistan. He was therefore struck by the absence of people when he did a sea-to-sea hike along Hadrian’s Wall.

I love the apparently not uncommon sight of men on carpets in Iranian orchards, offering you tea from battered pots; and the sprinting Nepalese delivery men.  Probably some of the healthiest humans on the planet, and low carbon to boot.

‘It had been different in Asia. Each orchard in Iran had seemed to contain a man on a carpet, willing to share the contents of his battered metal teapot. In Nepal, men in peaked hats and tight cotton trousers had sprinted past me with parcels for villages that stood five days from the nearest vehicle road.’

Source: Rory Stewart, The Marches: Border Walks with my Father (London: Vintage, 2017), p. 251

Photo credit: sweetlouise at pixabay