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Travelogue and memoir set across America

12th October 2016

Interstate by Julian Sayarer – travelogue and memoir set across America.

Frustrated at the last minute cancellation of a film project on the East Coast, young British filmmaker Julian Sayarer decided to fill the time he now has on his hands by hitchhiking from New York to San Francisco. An epic journey. But Julian has form in epic journeys – his first book Life Cycles chronicles his 2009 world-record-breaking circumnavigation of the globe by bicycle. He rode 18,049 miles in 169 days. An impressive (and committed) young man – ready for another adventure.

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And adventure (and commitment) he gets. Three weeks of hitching right across the United States. From New York, though New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Kentucky, Missouri, Oklahoma, Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, Nevada, and California – with many a catastrophe along the way. The book is a brilliant read with the US Presidential Election now only weeks away. All is explained to those who cannot comprehend the Donald Trump phenomenon. Many of the people that Julian meets en route are ex-blue collar American workers whose jobs have been exported to China or Mexico, and whose wages – in their new jobs for those lucky enough to find one – have been depressed. A bus driver who used to be a highly paid steel worker. There is real disillusionment with Washington politics, and the changing face of America. These people do not feel listened to. Neither do they feel comfortable with someone asking for rides – the generosity of the past has moved on to be replaced by fear of a stranger. Julian’s best ride comes from an independent Indian truck driver who has no choice but to bend the law to meet the delivery deadlines set by his agent. The alternative (day after day) is not being able to make the next instalment on the loan he has taken out to buy the truck. These people feel the country has passed them by. A bit like the Brexit vote in the UK. The downtrodden underclass are ignored at its peril by the establishment. In the UK they did – and in the States they just might – bite back.

Julian also questions American values. A sign on the Interstate in Missouri ‘Hit a worker – $10,000 dollar fine and lose your licence’  – no concern for the fate of the worker… Or the fact that grain fed to American cattle for the huge meat market could, of itself, pretty much abolish world hunger if distributed to the world’s poor. America appears to be a place where the cardinal sin is not having any money. People can simply look through you as if you were not there. He himself looks pretty down and out for much of his journey… and is ignored by many.

No doubt that Julian is on a mission to inform and influence. This book is not neutral, but it does give one man’s fascinating insight into the America he sees today. It is a view you might not agree with – but I doubt it is a view you can ignore.

Tony for the TripFiction team

You can follow Julian on Twitter and via his website

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