Amazing Train Journeys

- Season 2

(2012)

Beginning of the journey in the south of Thailand at Hat Yai: 8.00 am national anthem at the railway station.Thailand is the only country of South-East Asia which not has been colonized.In the station the portrait of Rama V who introduced the railways in Thailand.In the train to Phatthalung Philippe meets a policeman who wears talismans.Then Philippe joins the Western coast at Ko Libong, there he visits the islands of Trang and they are looking for swallow nests (a very precious food and also expensive 2.000 Euros for 1 kilogram of nests)..Then from Trang to Bangkok ...

La Paz-Oruro-Uyuni-Sucre-Potosi-Santa Cruz-San José: a journey through Bolivia: pleasant talks in the trains, encounter of Cesar in the Salar of Uyuni, travel in the bus-travel from Sucre to Potosi, great encounter with Richard , a miner of this town, visit of his daily work in the mine.Then travel to Santa Cruz where Philippe takes a train to San Jose de Chiquitos: pleasant talks with the drivers and then at the kilometer 41 from San Jose Philippe meets a Mennonite farmer with his carriage who presents him his family and Philippe will discover the life of these ...

Beginning of the travel in Istambul.First Philippe goes to the barbershop in the train station: a very kind barber who enjoys his job.Then Philippe goes to the west of Turkey,to Alpullu; near this town there will be a feast of Turkish wrestling, something like Greco-Roman wrestling but the body of the fighters is oiled with olive oil.Return to Instanbul.Philippe visits first Hagia Sophia , a Christian Church constructed in 537 which is now a museum and then goes to the Blue mosque , constructed between 1609 and 16l6 where he listened to the imam of the mosque calling ...

Beginning of the journey in Iasi (or Jassy): Phillipe takes the train to Burdujeni (Bukovina): talk about the identity of the Romanian people (they are the most Latin of the Latin people).In the Bukovina the monasteries have nice murals.Philippe goes to a church: Orthodox mass, then picnic in the cemetery, later a great dinner of the people of the village (they like their pope).Then Philippe visits the pope who is also builder( the pope says that God teaches us the pray and the work).Later Philippe speaks with farmers who are working with their plow and a horse (to ...

Beginning of the journey in Alor Setar: Philippe takes the train to Padang Besar: a woman is speaking of the beautiful landscapes of the rice fields with its serpents.So Philippe will meet Zinudine, serpent hunter: in the middle of a rice field Zinudine catches a cobra (he catches every week 14-15 serpents in this area), they go to his house: Zinudine explains that he keeps alive the serpents for educational purposes, he also extracts the venom of the cobras to send it to a university where they produce antivenins.Then Philippe takes the train from Butterworth to ...

A journey beginning at the Iguazu waterfalls: a little touristic train lets the tourists very near of these waterfalls.Then Philippe takes the train to Buenos Aires: a pleasant talk with an Argentinian about the mixture of the cultures in Argentina.Philippe takes then the Buenos Aires underground with its wooden wagons, the oldest metro still in use since 1913.In the neighborhood of La Boca Philippe visits a gay tango school.Then a salt to the Recoleta cemetery were is the mausoleum of Eva Peron (called also Evita Peron), not far a wink to the tomb of Raul ...