The Hotel Travel is a real establishment located in Chinatown . Not a place for family accommodation. Rather it is a karaoke club of dubious repute. Thus named due to the incidence of restless souls contained in both the book and the hotel.
Essentially these are traveller's tales, which describe the dysfunctional and disruptive lives of Western backpackers exploring and working in a contemporary Asia . The environments are constantly consuming, sometimes dangerous and often bewitching. Each story has its own narrative set piece but the story group is themed by the tangible and intangible journeys of the protagonist, Sean Dinan.
The stories describe the adventures of foreigners and locals at a transitional time in their lives and also that of the places they lived. Melbourne , Calcutta , Taipei and the locations visited in getting there and back are the settings. Humour, sex, drugs and physical and psychological violence were an inescapable part of these lives in these places.
I have taken from real events and real places, which I have been fortunate to observe from the privileged positions as a journalist and a diplomat over the past ten or so years. The situations and characters in these stories have inhabited my mind for several years. During the course of the writing, it happened that the best way to proceed was to let these personalities escape and populate the pages as they knew best rather than manipulating the stories piece by piece in a set time fashion.
These stories have had a long gestation period having started in early 1993 after my return from the Republic of China and only recently completed during a period of personal travel with my generous wife, Anggia Anggraini, including stays at Casa Casinta art gallery in Yogykarta and at a villa in the foothills of Teggalalang which lies more than 15 kms outside of Ubud. The hospitality was provided by Australian and Indonesian friends. The stories were waylaid while I worked for five years in the capital including the historic period of economic crisis and political reformation.
The bulk of the writing in two spurts have been done in the bluestone and brick 104 year old house in Hawthorn that my grandparents and my father lived in and now is home to Anggie, our daughter Renee, son Jaya and myself.
I hope the reader finds these stories enjoyable and evocative.
Tony Akbar 23 April 2005
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