Motorcycle Explorer December 2014 Issue 3 | Page 7

Well now here we are at issue 3 and what a great packed out
issue it is. We have 238 pages for you to flick through and
enjoy and it’s all FREE of charge! Now that’s a bargain that you
don’t have to fight for ... but then should we fight for a bargain
? I’m talking about ‘Black Friday’ and the shameful way that
people behaved in the sale. We ride motorbikes (or you’ve
picked up the wrong mag!) and we love to travel. Travelling for
our reasons but for me it has always been about meeting
people, being in a new culture, looking at amazing sights,
trying new food and drink and allowing the experience to wash
over me. Kindness is around every corner and I’ve been given
a bed for the night from complete strangers when my bike has
broken down in the pissing down rain, 3am in the morning on
some decimated nowhere road in a country I don’t speak the
language.
I watch the news ( to much less a degree these days as I feel I have to pick the truth from the
‘stories’) and I see things like the Red Cross giving aid and the scramble for food to survive –
humans trying to help humans. So when I see people fist fighting and shoving with desperate
panic stricken faces contorted in rage, I thought what the hell happened! Turning up the TV to be
hit with the news that no a bomb had not gone off and no there had not been a release of nerve
agent ... shops, yes shops had a day of discounts!
So in order for humanity to surrender any degree of self worth and dignity you don’t need to
threaten them with wars – chemical, biological or radiological ... oh no! All you have to do is
knock 50% off a pair of damn (I’m being polite) UGG boots. I was ashamed of what I witnessed
and worse than that I felt somehow tainted myself as this was broadcast around the world ... the
great western society at work. What has this got to do with motorcycle travel?
It shows the perceptions that people will have based on limited information dripped out by the
media for a sensational ‘tune in’ sound bite. Of just how important Exploring for yourself really
is. Be that just to another county and have a stereotype challenged or indeed riding around the
world and seeing just how much we are the same – then in that unity... we celebrate and revel in
our differences reporting the ‘news’ as it actually is out there. This is why MEM exists to
showcase some of the amazing stories from riders that are out there and doing it. So please
enjoy and...
Live, Ride, Explore
James
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