Ben Zabulis

Born to emigrant parents in 1957, my early years were spent in Sherwood, Nottingham, attending the Haydn Road primary school, initially, followed by the Claremont secondary. At age 16 (1974), having endured a miserable GCE campaign, an engineering apprenticeship (at a Colwick-based steel fabricator) rescued me from the rigours of further education. It wasn’t until some years later that I re-gained academia by undertaking, age 21, a degree course in Civil Engineering at Trent Polytechnic. Armed with a BSc and feeling somewhat liberated (1982), a few jobs up and down the country failed to compete with a growing thirst for adventure and, surprising all, I applied (madly, most surmised) for a post in Nigeria; of course, nobody was more surprised than my parents who would easily recall how, as a child, I would fall lamentably homesick when barely a stone’s throw distant.So, aged 26 (1984) I departed for the Dark Continent employed as a civil engineer to work on a variety of projects, typically a university campus, a biscuit factory refurbishment and a new chicken farm. A baptism of fire they called it and they were right. Two and a half years later, sanity in tatters, I returned to civilisation (same company) to attain chartered status and also buy a house, but that could never be enough. The call of exotica remained ever-enticing and, just a few years later (1990), a design job in Tokyo beckoned, needless to say, addicted to adventure, I was off. Japan would be totally different, clean, law-abiding, quirky and extremely photogenic, a must, to satiate my other great desire - photography. Although Japan didn’t disappoint, the land of the rising sun’s work ethic took some getting used to and, realising that any sort of a life was preferable to karoshi (Japanese for death by overwork) I jumped ship after two years to re-join my previous company who, by this time, had become firmly entrenched in Hong Kong. Now Hong Kong was a different proposition entirely, east meets west, all the interest of the Orient but with a slightly rakish undertone. Seconded as a civil works advisor to the China Light and Power Co. Ltd. it suited me well enough for twelve years (1992 to 2004); long enough to morph slowly into an out and out Sinophile, enthusiast of all things Asian, gain the right of abode and meet partner Hilary, also from Nottingham - both of us having travelled to the other side of the globe to find each other!In 2004, influenced by the passing of my mother and property to sort out, we opted for a break from Asia and returned to Nottingham, spending several years in Arnold before moving to Kirkby-in-Ashfield. Neither of us had jobs to go to and, embracing frugality, it remains so; seems we’d retired by accident! Being a keen reader of travel literature and with time - amidst the decorating - to spare I decided to have a go myself. It was a daunting idea, I’m an engineer by training, not a writer; could I really pull it off? I was used to preparing engineering reports; anything else was limited to admittedly well-received, short, travel articles for a company magazine. Nevertheless I could see concrete foundations, so to speak, of a tale worth telling; afternoons thus spent with fingers dancing busily upon a computer keyboard. Despite a cottage industry for the genre, travel would be key, an injection of my own personal experience and humour making the difference; perhaps I could do for engineers what James Heriot did for vets. Consequently, it was only in 2012, after a few years of doubt, hesitation and re-writes, that a publishing consultant offered the thumbs up, as did a professional reader who suggested that documentary producers and film makers might even show interest; well, if it happened to Salmon Fishing in the Yemen it could happen to Chartered Territory - An Engineer Abroad – I live in hope.