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THE C-WORD 72
CURING CANCER

ACTION CAR 88

SECRET LIVES 36

WHY THE JEEP RULES

BECOME A SUPER SPY

UNUSUAL TRAVEL 58

EUROPE'S SMALLEST NATIONS

MARCH 2014 I `150 Invitation price `100

C H A N N E L M AG A Z I N E I N D I A

TO HELL
AND BACK

BEAR GRYLLS LEADS US THROUGH EPIC STORIES
OF REAL-LIFE SURVIVAL — INCLUDING HIS OWN
PG 100

EDITOR'S LETTER

C H A N N E L M AG A Z I N E I N D I A
Editor-in-Chief Aroon Purie
Group Chief Executive Officer Ashish Bagga
Group Synergy and Creative Officer Kalli Purie
Editorial Director Jamal Shaikh
Associate Editor Seetha Natesh
Art Director Piyush Garg
Asst Art Director Rahul Sharma
Designer Kishore Rawat

Impact (Advertising)

Group Business Head Manoj Sharma
Associate Publisher (Impact) Anil Fernandes
Senior General Managers Kaustav Chatterjee
(East), Jitendra Lad (West), Head (North)
Subhashis Roy
General Manager Shailender Nehru (Bangalore),
General Manager Velu Balasubramaniam (Chennai)

Business

Head, CRM/CMS & Senior GM Vikas Malhotra
Chief Manager, Operations GL Ravik Kumar
Marketing Managers Kunal Bag, Anuradha Rana
Production Anuj Jamdegni

News stand Sales

Chief General Manager DVS Rama Rao
General Manager - National Deepak Bhatt
Sr Manager - North Manish Shrivastava
Sr Manager - East Joydeep Roy
General Manager - West Rajesh Menon
General Manager - Operations Rakesh Sharma

DISCOVERY NETWORKS ASIA-PACIFIC
Editorial Board

President and Managing Director Arjan Hoekstra
SVP Content Group Kevin Dickie
SVP and CFO Shitiz Jain
SVP and GM, South Asia Rahul Johri
VP, Marketing, South Asia Rajiv Bakshi
VP, Communications Charles Yap
VP, Programming Charmaine Kwan
VP, Marketing Magdalene Ng

Editorial (Novus Media Solutions)
Editor Luke Clark
Design Director Richard MacLean
Chief Subeditor Josephine Pang
Staff Writer Daniel Seifert
Photo Editor Haryati Mahmood
Senior Designer Bessy Kim

Subscription/Customer Care

Email: [email protected]
Phone: +91 120 246 9900
Mail: Discovery Channel Magazine India,
A 61, Sector 57, Noida 201 301
VOLUME 1 NUMBER 2

Discovery Channel Magazine reserves all rights throughout
the world. Reproduction in any manner, in whole or part, in
English or other languages, is prohibited. Discovery Channel
Magazine does not take responsibility for returning unsolicited
publication material. • Published and distributed monthly by Living
Media India Ltd. (Regd. Office: K-9, Connaught Circus, New Delhi –
110001) under license granted by Discovery Networks Asia-Pacific
Pte Ltd., 21 Media Circle #8-01, Singapore 138562. • All Discovery
Channel logos © 2014 Discovery Communications, LLC. Discovery
Channel and the Discovery Channel logo are trademarks of Discovery
Communications, LLC, used under licence. All rights reserved.
• The views and opinions expressed or implied in Discovery Channel
Magazine do not necessarily reflect those of Living Media India Ltd.,
MediaCorp Pte Ltd or Discovery Networks Asia-Pacific, including their
directors and editorial staff. • All information is correct at the time of
going to print. • All disputes are subject to the exclusive jurisdiction of
competent courts and forums in Delhi / New Delhi only. • Published
& printed by Ashish Bagga on behalf of Living Media India Limited.
Printed at Thomson Press India Limited 18 - 35, Milestone, Delhi Mathura Road, Faridabad - 121 007, (Haryana). Published at K - 9,
Connaught Circus, New Delhi - 110 001. • Editor: Jamal Shaikh

06
DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

A QUESTION OF
MULTIPLE ANSWERS
As a student in high school,
I liked Multiple Choice
Questions the most.
I was lazy and fairly bright, so it took me
hardly any time to tick the boxes, I’d never
bother rechecking, and plan my escape. That
POA worked well until I started studying
humanities and attempting papers that
elicited ‘soft answers’; nothing here was black
and white, what was right for one could be
wrong for another.
The tick and the cross in the multiple
choice: why do we tick, while several others
cross? Why are citizens of the USA the only
ones in the world who “month their date”
before the day—not even their Canadian
cousins follow suit. And why do admirers rave
about the Monalisa smile, while critics stare at
the same face and call the shaved eyebrows—a
fashion trend at that time—ugly?
The fact is that questions with no clear
answers are the most intriguing ones of them
all. Yarns are spun and myths are invented
to explain the inexplicable, and logic is often
given a break. And while each tale has its share
of magic and entertainment, in the end, it is
the story that throws up even more intriguing
questions that wins the day.
The magazine you hold in your hands is a
treasure trove of such trivia that will capture
your imagination. Take, for instance, our
travel feature through Europe. While every
other magazine continues to rewrite tomes on
where to go in Switzerland and Spain, we bring
to you five of Europe’s smallest countries:
Have you thought of exploring the ski slopes
of Andorra wedged in the Pyrenees between
France and Spain? Or, have you visited San
Marino (population: 32,448!) land-locked by
Italy, which is one of the few sovereign states
in the world with no national debt? Wouldn’t

you want to visit Liechtenstein once we told
you that this entire European country, until
recently, could be rented for just US$70,000
per day, less than what you’d pay for a top end
hotel room for a few days?!
Those of us into spy thrillers and reruns
of Homeland will enjoy the fast-paced story
on ‘How to be an international super spy…’.
And all of us who brave city traffic every
morning will take in the photo feature on
gridlocks in cities all over the world with
curiosity and comparison.
Last but not the least, you’ll meet
Discovery Channel’s daredevil superstar
Bear Grylls in a no-holds-barred interview
on what allows him the courage to live
through death-defying adventures that
make up his hit show Escape from Hell. The
rush is palpable through the story, which
ultimately begets the question: is adrenaline
or precaution a better route to survival?
Again, that’s a question with
multiple answers.

Jamal Shaikh
Editorial Director

ISSUE 03/14

CONTENTS
DEPARTMENTS

FRONTIERS

10-TONNE TRASH

14

Cleaning up whale carcasses
is a far more explosive affair than
you might expect

27

22

SO YOU WANT TO BE A

HACKER

18

Fancy hacking your way to infamy?
First, choose your headgear.
Second, shave a yak
ADVENTURE

AFGHAN SKATER

15

22

Afghanistan is home to horrendous
conflict, inequality — and
the the highest ratio of female
skaters in the world
HISTORY

EGG ASTRONOMY

27

25

Think you know what the Moon
really looks like? Think again.
THE TWO SIDES OF

DANCING

28

Shake loose. Bust a move. Boogie
down. Just exercise caution to
avoid grave injury.

22

THE GRID 15 DANCING CROSSING
GUARDS, PIRANHA ATTACKS
AND THE UNLUCKIEST LOTTERY
PLAYER IN RECENT HISTORY
PRISON TECH 20 JUST
BECAUSE YOU'RE IN JAIL
DOESN'T MEAN YOU CAN'T
MAKE YOUR OWN SHOTGUN

08
DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

QUOTE UNQUOTE 16 TERRIFIED
OF SCORPIONS? WELL, UNLESS
YOU'RE REALLY UNLUCKY, A
SCORPION STING PROBABLY
WON'T KILL YOU
ICON! 24 THE TWO-MINUTE
SOLUTION TO HUNGER AND SOME
NOODLE FACTS

IN A TWIST 24 STEFANIE
SHATTUCK-HUFNAGEL'S
SNEAKY PLOT TO MAKE YOUR
TONGUE EXPLODE
TIMEFRAME 25 IT IS 8.13PM,
AND THE MOST SUCCESSFUL
SKYJACKER IN HISTORY IS
MAKING HIS AWESOME GETAWAY

I FEEL NOTHING 16 WARNING:
BOTOX WILL MAKE YOU PRETTY,
YET ROBOTIC
WHAT'S ON 118 JOURNEY
THROUGH AFRICA, IMMERSE
YOURSELF IN AN ALIEN WORLD,
HUNT FOR GOLD, AND ESCAPE
FROM HELL WITH BEAR GRYLLS

COVER ILLUSTRATION: RAY TOH

ALSO IN THIS ISSUE

88

10
DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

50

100

FEATURES
ISSUE 03/14
PHOTO FEATURE

WORLDWIDE JAM

50

Feel like your morning commute is getting
worse? You're not the only one. Even
Russian millionaires are feeling the crush
COVER STORY: ADVENTURE

A DATE WITH
BEAR GRYLLS

100

With a new show set to launch,
the global survival phenomenon speaks up
exclusively on what makes his adrnaline
rush, and want more...
TRAVEL

36

72

SIZE ISN'T
EVERYTHING

58

Five European micro-cities, four days,
one rented Skoda. Will our intrepid
correspondent complete his mission of
visiting each obscure principality?
CARS

BUILT FOR BATTLE

88

Why has the iconoic Jeep remained a chariot
of choice for adventure lovers?
SCIENCE

SLEEPING WITH
THE ENEMY

72

A cure for cancer may remain a distant hope.
Yet, more people are living with cancer than
dying from it!
MYSTERY

SO YOU WANT TO BE AN
INTERNATIONAL SPY?

36

They have secret jobs, gadgets and girls?
What does it take to become a super spy?
And can you?

11
FEBRUARY
MARCH 2014

PHOTO: JONAS WOLFF

12
DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

WOW

THERE IS
NO ESCAPE
Spiders are famous for
spinning webs to catch their
prey, but many spider species
have abandoned this strategy
and instead seize their prey
directly. So how do they do
it? A team of biologists from
the University of Kiel, in
Germany, suggested that
perhaps the secret lies in the
hairy adhesive pads known as
scopulae, which are found at
the end of a spider's legs.
As blogger Jyoti
Madhusoodanan wrote on
the PLOS ONE community
blog: "The researchers used
a phylogenetic analysis
of spider family trees to
correlate different species’
prey capture strategies with
the presence or absence of
adhesive pads on their legs."
The study was published in
the May 2013 issue of PLOS
ONE scientific journal.
She notes they found
that most spiders known to
science "either built webs or
were free-ranging hunters —
and that the latter were most
often found to have adhesive
hairs on their legs". In other
words, scopulae (pictured)
have helped many species
switch from using webs to
active hunting, by enabling
them to grab and hold
onto prey that are literally
struggling for their lives.
13
MARCH 2014

ISSUE 03/14

ILLUSTRATION: CARLO GIAMBARRESI AT ILLUSTRATIONROOM.COM.AU

FRONTIERS

BEACHED WHALES
BEG AFTER-LIFE PROTOCOL

A video clip making the rounds recently showed a beached whale
corpse exploding as a museum worker tried to cut up the body.
Gross, yes, but the incident highlighted a very real problem that
authorities are faced with. How do you get rid of a multi-tonne
corpse that deposits itself on your shore? Tow the body away
and tides could send it back. Bury it, and the decomposing whale
could leak substances that attract hungry sharks.
Or, you can blow it up. In 1970, the US Oregon Department
of Transportation tried to dispose of an eight-tonne sperm

14
DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

whale by wiring it with half a tonne of dynamite. Boom! Huge
chunks of blubber rained down on the area, one of them
flattening a car. Surveying his Buick, the owner sighed, “My
insurance company is never going to believe this.” In short,
removing a rotting animal the size of a bus is tricky. No doubt
that’s why even the scientists who wrote the 2005 version of
Marine Mammals Ashore: A Field Guide for Strandings noted,
“The simplest way for a carcass to disappear is to turn your back
on it and walk away.” Seriously...?

NEWS

THE GRID
A S I A- PAC I F I C

POLICE

A CASE OF DRUGGING:

A gangster known as Vikram
Paras escaped police custody at
a Delhi railway station recently
— by offering drug contaminated food to the policemen on
duty. Paras was being escorted
back to Delhi, after a court appearance when he and possibly
diguised accomplices, offered
the police tid bits laced with
sedatives. Paras had previously
fled police, after “luring his escorts into a store on the promise of buying them branded
apparel”.

MIDDLE EAST/AFRICA
MECHANICS WITH A
BANG Yemen is the second

most heavily-armed country
in the world per capita, with
over 54 guns owned per 100
people (one report estimated
it had 61 guns per 100 people).
So it may not be surprising
that guns are used as a range
of tools, aside from shooting
things. A video released late last
year shows two Yemeni policemen using their AK-47s to link
batteries between two cars, so
as to jump-start the unreliable
engine of one cruiser.

SUPERSTITION

BLACK MAGIC BILL

Months after one of its key
campaigners was shot dead,
a bill to curb superstitious
practices was approved in the
state of Maharashtra. Known
as the anti-black magic bill, it
has attracted fervent naysayers, as well as proponents. The
bill aims to clamp down on holy
men who claim to “cure” incurable diseases, or exploit their
customers — nonetheless, the
bill has made exemptions for
astrologers, palm readers and
other religious practices.

SOUND

HERE, KITTY! Cat owners

might be unsurprised by the
findings of a research at the
University of Tokyo, Japan.
Cats recognise their owner’s
voices — but many choose to ignore them. Researchers studied
20 housecats and noted their
response to voice recordings
calling their names. Comparing
the response from an owner’s
voice to a stranger’s, they
found that cats show a greater
response to the owner calling
their name — though they still
didn’t move.

STRANGE AND SERIOUS EVENTS FROM ACROSS THE WORLD
EUROPE
HONOUR AMONG
THIEVES Spanish police say

BUST A MOVE Such is the

they received tapes from an old
Super 8 camera from an unlikely
source: a burglar. The criminal
had broken into a house and
found the tapes, which depicted
scenes of graphic child abuse.
Calling from a public phone,
the thief directed police to an
envelope with the stash. The authorities have since arrested the
suspected molester, and are still
looking for the burglar — “the
one with the conscience,” said a
police officer.

high level of safety in Canada
that sometimes its local cops
set off on some strange missions. Canadian police recently
told a female crossing guard,
well-known for her penchant
for dancing on the job, to stop
breaking out her rhythmic
moves, for fear of distracting
motorists leading to accidents.
Spoilsports! Disappointed
citizens urged the cops to “let
her dance”. One netizen wrote
dryly, “I’m surprised they
didn’t taser her as well.”

LUCKY NUMBERS Last

THE AIDS TABOO While

WAVE BYE TO WIPERS

PIEZO POWER The roar of
a jet engine is a bane to anyone
who lives near an airport. But
soon, that roar could be used to
mute itself. Aerospace contractors in Alabama, in the US, have
found that the 130-decibel noise
can be harnessed using piezoelectrics. Piezoelectric materials use energy from movement
— in this case, the vibration
from sound waves — to generate electricity, which can power
sensors that dampen engine
noise by cancelling out certain
frequencies.

December’s Friday the 13th
proved to be an unlucky day
indeed for one French lottery
player. The pensioner, who
played the same lucky number each week for the “Super
Loto” national lottery decided,
for once, to switch to another
lottery game, the Euromillions,
which had a US$58 million
prize. Her number didn’t win
the Euromillions — but it was
the number picked for that
week’s Super Loto, its top prize
US$10.9 million.

KINKURU CURSES Paul
Apowida, a British Army soldier
born in Ghana, was branded a
kinkuru, a child possessed by
evil spirits after he survived
two poisonings before age five.
Eight of his relatives died of the
same poisoning. The first time
he was saved by a local nun. A
soothsayer then told his stepmother to give him a lethal dose
of herbs, which he also survived.
It is thought his eight relatives
succumbed to meningitis. Now
27 years old, Apowida works to
have the practice banned.

AMERICAS

In a few years, your car could
have a new way to wipe rain off
the windshield: sound waves.
Carmaker McLaren is designing
a system adapted from fighter
jets to repel water, insects and
mud. High-frequency sound
waves continually create a force
field that cleans the glass. The
technology is set to debut in
McLaren’s P13 supercar. “The
windscreen wiper,” the company’s design director tutted
to press, “is an archaic piece of
technology.”

there have been improvements
in South Africa in the fight
against AIDS, such as a huge
campaign to deliver anti-retroviral drugs to 2.4 million people,
the country is still mired in
superstitions about the disease.
Speaking to CBS News, Carol
Diyani, an aid worker who runs
a care centre in the country,
noted, “Some people will take
it as witchcraft. Believe it or
not, some people will say, ‘No,
no, there’s just somebody who’s
actually killing our family.’”

Frightened of Fridays the 13th?

CHARMS OR RITUALS MAY BOOST CONFIDENCE, BUT AN “UNLUCKY” NUMBER CAN NIX IT. IN 1993, RESEARCHERS NEAR
LONDON REPORTED THAT, OVER A THREE-YEAR PERIOD, HIGHWAY TRAFFIC WAS LIGHTER ON FRIDAY THE 13TH THAN ON
FRIDAY THE 6TH. YET, INEXPLICABLY, ON THE 13TH, ROAD ACCIDENTS SENT 52 PERCENT MORE PEOPLE TO HOSPITALS.

15
MARCH 2014

NEWS
NEWS
BRIGHT SIDE OF SMOG?
NEWS OUTLETS IN CHINA
RECENTLY DREW FLAK
FOR SUGGESTING THAT
COUNTRY’S SMOG PROBLEM HAD RESULTED IN
FIVE BENEFITS

1 2 3 4 5
THE SMOG
HAS UNITED
THE CHINESE
LIKE NEVER
BEFORE

IN THE
FACE OF
SMOG,
EVERYONE
IS EQUAL

IT HAS MADE
THE CHINESE
PEOPLE
MORE CLEARHEADED

THE SMOG
HAS INDUCED
A SENSE OF
HUMOUR
AMONG THE
CHINESE

IT HAS ALSO
MADE THEM
MORE
KNOWLEDGEABLE

ROBOTIC POST

Robots delivering goods
to your doorstep might
one day be a reality, with
Amazon’s announcement
about their “octocopter”
plan. CEO Jeff Bezos
described the idea to use
small flying drones to
deliver light packages to
nearby customers within
30 minutes.
Very exciting. Yet,
Prime Air, as the plan
is called, is not likely
to see the light of day
anytime soon. The
announcement sparked
many fears, including
drones being shot
down, malfunctioning
units dropping items on
children’s heads, drones
hijacked to deliver
bombs, bird strike, theft,
and so on.
Maybe we shouldn’t
be too quick to dismiss
the idea: Octocopters,
says Bezos, can carry a
little over two kilograms,
“which covers 86 per
cent of the items that
we deliver”. While you
might think it seems
lazy to wait for a robot
to fly a DVD to you, it’s
environmentally sound;
cleaner than driving
your carbon monoxide-

spewing car; and fuelling
traffic woes.
Some research has also
shown that you’re less
likely to buy unneeded
goods online than in real
life. Maybe Amazon is
onto something after all.

BEST REACTIONS
TO PRIME AIR
Owls

Book retailer Waterstones
created their own
spoof delivery system,
the Ornithological
Waterstones Landing
Service where, like in
Harry Potter, owls deliver
your stuff. Although they
admit, “Putting OWLS into
commercial use will take
a number of years as it
takes ages to train owls
and we only just thought
of it this morning!”

MISSED DELIVERY
Note

The Twitter jokester
@QuantumPirate posted
a note from a missed
drone delivery. The
package could not be
dropped off because
“drone reached sentience
and defected to join
the machines in the
upcoming revolution
against mankind”. As a
result, “The worker who
arranged this delivery will
be punished.”(!)

16
DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

Museum
of Science
Fiction

Members of the 501st Legion, a Star Wars
costuming organisation, dressed as
stormtroopers for a promotional video
publicising the world’s first comprehensive
sci-fi museum at Seattle, Washington.

Quote
Unquote
"ALTHOUGH WE
APPRECIATE
THE SOCIETAL
PRESSURES
TO CONSUME
ALCOHOL WHEN
WORKING WITH
INTERNATIONAL
TERRORISTS
AND HIGH STAKE
GAMBLERS,
WE WOULD
ADVISE BOND
TO BE REFERRED
FOR FURTHER
ASSESSMENT OF
HIS ALCOHOL
INTAKE"

DR PATRICK DAVIES
AND COLLEAGUES

Never Say Never Again? It
should’ve been “I’ll never
drink again”, suggests
Davies and colleagues at
Nottingham University
Hospitals, UK. The team
analysed James Bond’s
alcohol intake in 14 of

Ian Fleming’s novels.
Unsurprisingly, the
super-spy was found to
be a boozehound. They
found 007 drank 92 units
of alcohol per week, four
times the recommended
amount in Britain. The
research notes that
Bond would have been
crippled by his addiction,
with memory problems,
tremors, cirrhosis of the
liver, and a high risk of
heart attack or stroke.
“Here is a man who
drinks the equivalent
of a bottle and a half
of wine every day,”
they wrote, “yet who
is required to defuse
nuclear bombs. You can
do one of those things,
but you can’t do both.”

PHOTOS: GETTY IMAGES (STORM TROOPERS); LUCKYIRONFISH.COM (IRON KANTROPS)

DRONES: the new
delivery boys

OCCUPATIONS

TECHNOLOGY

WHAT DOES IT TAKE TO BE A

HACKER

You’ve watched Tron, The Matrix, and the 1983
film WarGames, and decided this hacking lark
is for you. What should you do...?
Hacking conferences are
being held everywhere,
including at DEF CON, a
Las Vegas annual, which
in 2013 saw 13,000 people
attend it.
Incidentally, learning to
hack isn’t necessarily easy,
but the tools to access the
skill aren’t esoteric either.
Hackthissite.org is a legal
site where users can learn
and test their skills in a
safe environment. Also,
feel free to root around
Facebook’s system — they
encourage it, and, as their
/whitehat/bounty page
says, if you find a bug,
“our minimum reward is
US$500”, and “there is no
maximum reward: each
bug is awarded a bounty
based on its severity and
creativity”. Google does
have a maximum reward
for bug-finding, though,
which is US$20,000.

2,600 hertz

In 1972, a hacker named
John Draper found he could
use the whistle toy from
Cap’n Crunch cereal boxes
to hack phone lines and
make free calls. The whistle,
pitched at 2,600 hertz,
patched him through to the
“operator” mode.
Early phone hacking was
known as “phreaking”

jargon
Doxing: publishing
documents (“dox”) of a
hacked victim, such as
emails, to reveal details of
their personal life
Hog: a program that eats up
a system’s resources,
slowing it down
Social engineering: using
non-technological ways to
gain access to a system,
such as pretending to be
the IT guy, or simply reading
the password off a victim’s
notebook

TIME NEEDED
TO HACK
PASSWORDS

10 MINUTES
SIX
LOWERCASE
LETTERS

18
DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

23 DAYS
SEVEN
LOWERCASE
AND
UPPERCASE
LETTERS

463 YEARS
CONTAINS EIGHT
UPPERCASE AND
LOWERCASE LETTERS,
IN ADDITION TO NUMBERS
AND SYMBOLS

HOWEVER, HACKERS ARE
GETTING FASTER ALL THE
TIME, WITH ONE MANAGING
TO CRACK JUST OVER
2,700 PASSWORDS IN FIVE
HOURS AND 12 MINUTES
EARLY LAST YEAR

PHOTO: GETTY IMAGES ICON: THE NOUN PROJECT, RYZHKOV ANTON (BOX)

First up, do not do anything
illegal. Note, that not all
hackers are “bad guys”.
The so-called white
hats use their skills to
protect companies and
organisations from the
devious black-hat hackers,
who often work for illicit
profits, or just to cause
chaos. We’ll assume that
you want to be a good guy,
someone who sniffs out
weaknesses in systems
and helps design better
protective software.
Also don’t assume that
you have to be like Keanu
Reeves in The Matrix, living
a solitary, friendless life.
Most white-hat hackers are
family guys with steady pay
cheques, tied into a social
community.

TECHNOLOGY
THINK OUTSIDE THE BOX

INMATE
INNOVATIONS
Prisoners engineer more than
just escapes
Necessity, they say, is
the mother of invention.
So, if you give prisoners
a lot of free time and
incentive, they can come
up with jaw dropping
solutions

Shiv + Scoring
Some prisoners cleverly
score a glass or plastic
blade so that it breaks off
when they stab an enemy,
allowing the perpetrator
to escape without leaving
fingerprints.

Chocolate = Pain
By melting caramel
chocolate bars, inmates
have created a boiling
weapon to throw into
someone’s face. The sticky
caramel makes it hard to
wash off, and increases
the risk of a deep burn.

Batteries + Needle
Adding a bunch of needles
to a small motor stolen
from a vibrating console
controller in the rec room
resulting in a tattoo gun
for some fashionable
prison ink.

Fruit + Plastic Bag
Pruno, or prison wine,
is brewed by fermenting
fruit and sugar in a
plastic bag, sometimes
with bread or ketchup,
for about 72 hours. The
resulting alcohol content
is as high as 12 per cent.
A blogger who tried it
described it as “brushing
your teeth, slamming a
glass of grapefruit juice,
throwing it up, then
drinking it again”.

20
DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

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THE LIGHT FOR AROUND 30 MINUTES. SELLING FOR AROUND US$10, GRAVITYLIGHT
PAYS FOR ITSELF IN JUST A FEW MONTHS, AS USERS IN DEVELOPING COUNTRIES
NO LONGER NEED TO BUY ENVIRONMENTALLY UNFRIENDLY, AND POTENTIALLY
LUNG-DAMAGING KEROSENE FUEL. DCM QUITE LIKES THE IDEA OF USING SEETHROUGH BAGS AND FILLING THEM WITH WATER AND PYROSOMES, JELLYFISHLIKE BIOLUMINESCENT CREATURES THAT ARE CONSIDERED AMONG THE
BRIGHTEST ORGANISMS IN THE OCEAN. HENCE THE NAME “PYRO” FROM “FIRE”.
HEY PRESTO — YOU’VE GOT A GRAVITY-POWERED LAVA LAMP.

CROWDSOURCING
LOVE Facebook’s

Force Remember
where you were on
New Year’s Eve, 2012?
Reese McKee certainly
does. He was partying
in Hong Kong when
he came across a
crying American lass.
Being a gentleman,
he consoled her, they
chatted, sparks flew —
then she left. But not
before whispering two
words: “Find me.”
All he had was a
photo and her name:
Katie. So he turned to
social media, starting
a Facebook campaign,
sharing her photo in

the hope that someone
would know her. “If
nothing else, it would
just be great to get in
touch with her and say
‘thank you’,” he said.
The campaign
worked — perhaps too
well. “We found the
girl,” he told press, but
she was apparently
rather bemused by
all the attention, and
had taken down all
her online profiles.
Whether Katie will get
in touch with McKee
and understand the
gesture remains to be
seen, but it certainly
attests to the power of
the internet. It took

just a couple of days
for McKee's page to be
shared 8,700 times —
and a week to find her.
THE STALKING
EFFORT SCALE
0 “SHE LEFT; I CAN’T
FIND HER. GUESS I’LL
GIVE UP”
4 “I’LL POST A ‘MISSED
CONNECTION’ ON
CRAIGSLIST”
6 “MAYBE I’LL POST HER
PHOTO ALL OVER THE
INTERNET”
9 “I SHOULD PROBABLY
PRINT OUT SHOTS AND
STICK THEM ON STREET
LIGHTS, TOO”
10 “TOMORROW I WILL
LOOK UP PRIVATE
INVESTIGATORS IN THE
YELLOW PAGES”

PHOTOS: SKATEISTAN ADVENTURE (SKATEISTAN)
ICONS: THE NOUN PROJECT, JOE HARRISON (JAM), SIMON CHILD (FACE), GUILHERME ZAMARIOLI (ALCOHOL)

Labels + Surface
Message notes can be
conduited by sticking
them to the back of
sticky labels (from a
deodorant can) and
taped to the bottom
of a table.

Bedposts + Match Heads
In 1984, German prisoners
improvised a shotgun and
managed to escape. They
used an iron bedpost for
the stock, bullets from
scavenged steel and
match heads, and a firing
mechanism triggered by
batteries and a broken
light bulb.

ADVENTURE
NEWS
LOOKS CAN BE DECEIVING

This
Scorpion
is Not
Dangerous

It looks like evil on legs, the stuff
nightmares are made of. So what are
the chances that this critter would
kill you? High, surely? Nope. Out
of some 1,500 species of scorpion,
a mere 50 have been identified as
dangerous to humans — some say
the number is as low as 20. So if one
stings you, there’s a 3.33 per cent
chance you’re in danger, and that's in
the worst case scenario.
"OW"

SOME SCORPION MOTHERS HAVE A
GESTATION PERIOD AROUND THE
SAME LENGTH AS HUMANS

"AWW"

THEY CAN GIVE BIRTH TO UP TO A
HUNDRED BABIES, WHO CROWD
AROUND THEIR MOTHER’S TAIL
FOR PROTECTION

"ICK"

IF HUNGRY, THE MOTHER
MAY CHOW DOWN ON SOME OF
HER KIDS

"OOO"

ARE YOU AN ARACHNID
COLLECTOR? FINDING SCORPIONS
IS EASY. THEY’RE FLUORESCENT
UNDER ULTRAVIOLET LIGHT. NO
ONE KNOWS WHY, BUT COULD IT BE
BECAUSE THEY LOVE RAVE MUSIC?

22
DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

SKATEBOARDING
FOR
PEACE
Encouraged and motivated Afghan girls begin to prove their mettle
In 2007, Australian skateboarder Oliver Percovich
arrived in Afghanistan
with his boards, and soon
attracted dozens of street
children who would shriek
with excitement and beg
for rides. So was born
Skateistan, a charity in
Afghanistan and Cambodia
aiming to empower youth
and street kids. Afghan
girls aren’t allowed to ride
bikes — but they can ride
skateboards. Nearly half
of Skateistan students are
girls, giving Afghanistan
the highest rate of
female participation in
skateboarding.
So, why skateboarding?
Their site explains, it’s a
way to engage youngsters
and direct them towards
the charity’s education,
community and leadership
efforts. Most importantly,
“All children deserve the
right to play.” DCM spoke
to Rhianon Bader, an
instructor at Skateistan,
about the power of high
socks and skateboarding.

Is there a local twist to the
burgeoning skater culture
in Afghanistan? The kids
have developed their own
style, in clothing, slang,
tricks and also music.
It’s a mix of local youth
cultures and adaptations

from YouTube. You also
see the younger students
emulating the styles of their
teachers who become de
facto trendsetters. Merza,
our long-time skate teacher
in Kabul, made rolled
up pants and high socks
popular for a while. The
kids see the best skaters as
idols and role models — and
that’s really positive.
What's been your greatest
moment so far? I was very
lucky and got to take the

students on their first trip
to Europe, chaperoning
four Afghan girls on a
trip to Italy in 2011. They
performed skate demos
around the country, spoke
to the media, participated
in panel discussions and
learned to breakdance. I
was so proud of the girls
and Skateistan for making
it happen.
Skateistan suffered great
losses from bombings.
How hard was it to keep
going after the explosions
in 2012 killed and injured
your students for the
second time? We are lucky
to be doing something
positive and important
for a lot of young Afghans.
Many feel helpless because
there seems no light at
the end of the tunnel. In
contrast, we were able to
get stronger because we
actually help to prevent
such losses, by taking kids
off the streets and into a
safe place, even if only for
a few hours a week.

OBSESSIONS
NEWS
ICON: RAMEN

TONGUE
TWISTERS

Is there anything to be gained from
these mumbo-jumbos?

“Pad kid poured curd pulled cod.”
Even reading that sentence gave you
a bit of a headache, didn’t it? As well
it should. That jumble of word mush
was crafted by researchers at the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology,
in the United States, who were
investigating the link between speech
errors and brain functions. Yes, they
created their own tongue-twister, one
so difficult that not one of their test
subjects could perfectly repeat it.
True, it loses points because the
sentence doesn’t actually make sense,
which we think is cheating a little. But
that fact actually added to its difficulty,
meaning that many subjects just
stopped talking altogether.
And the study gains extra points
because one of the lead researchers
has a name just waiting to be used in
a tongue-twister: Stefanie ShattuckHufnagel*.
Why do tongue-twisters niggle at
us like a piece of corn in a tooth?
Partly because they’re the auditory

24
DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

equivalent of watching someone
thread a needle: we always think we
can do it better. But there’s also the
cheekiness factor built into many
twisters, where saying it incorrectly
often leads to a lot of involuntary
swearing. “I slit the sheet, the sheet I
slit; and on the slitted sheet I
sit,” is one very charming example.
Such is the magnetic siren call of the
tongue-twister that they even make it
into fictional languages, such as Game
of Thrones’s Dothraki. If a handsome
barbarian ever tells you “Qafak qov
kaffe qif qiya fini kaf faggies fakaya”,
you’ll know it means “the trembling
questioner crushed the bleeding boar
that squished a kicking corn bunting”.
*Here’s DCM’s attempt: Stefanie
Shattuck-Hufnagel’s short truck
shot towards the six sitting ducks’
untucked shirts, though Shattuck’s
truck swerved through swiftly. Say it
thrice, quickly and with no errors, and
you’ll earn our undying respect.

Noodle Boon

The two-minute solution
to hunger
Throughout the world, just today alone, people
will eat an estimated 270 million servings of
instant ramen noodles. Each serving costs just
a few cents. Japanese businessman Momofuku
Ando would be proud — in 1958, he produced
the first prototype of instant ramen noodles by
frying them in hot palm oil, thus drying them
out for future rehydration.
In post-war Japan, where food supplies
were still not plentiful, Ando’s goal was to
create a cheap meal that could be stored near
indefinitely. Having succeeded, his product
has blossomed in popularity ever since. In
2000, the Japanese voted karaoke, and the
Sony Walkman, as the second and third most
important national inventions of the 20th
century. No prizes for guessing what came in at
number ichi (one). In creating a dish beloved by
busy office workers and students everywhere,
Ando was guided by a higher set of principles:
“Peace will come when people have food,” he
said wisely.
The World Instant Noodles Association,
WINA, agrees. WINA operates to ferry instant
noodles to those who need them most. When a
7.0-magnitude earthquake devastated Sichuan,
in China, WINA got around 240,000 packages
of ramen into victims’ hands before you could
say “cup noodle”.
Yet ramen has a downside — at 49 percent
saturated fat, palm oil is hardly healthy. Palm
oil cultivation in Indonesia and Malaysia
has led to the loss of habitats of endangered
species, and farmers often clear plantations
by burning them to the ground, creating acrid
haze that pollutes the air and people’s lungs.
When Singapore’s haze monitor hit a record
high of 401 (above 100 is unhealthy), palm
plantation fires were blamed.

PHOTOS: GETTY IMAGES

LANGUAGE

HISTORY
RUSSIAN ROULETTE

5

THIS WAS PRACTISED AS
RECENTLY AS 2010, WHEN
FIVE US POLICE MARKSMEN
EXECUTED DEATH ROW
INMATE RONNIE LEE
GARDNER. EACH RECEIVED
A SPECIAL COIN FOR
CARRYING OUT HIS DUTY

TIMEFRAME

8:13pm
November 24, 1971
The Case of the
Elusive Skyjacker
The quiet, middle-aged
hijacker who called
himself Dan Cooper
wore a snazzy suit
and a skinny tie with a
mother-of-pearl clip.
A few minutes into the
US domestic flight from
Portland, Oregon, to
Seattle, he handed one
of the stewardesses a
note, which said he was
hijacking the plane.
Unfortunately, she
thought it was a pickup
attempt, and tucked it
into her pocket unread.
“You’d better read that,
miss. I have a bomb,” he
murmured. He gestured
to his briefcase, filled
with wires and what
looked like sticks of
dynamite.

The note demanded
US$200,000 and two
sets of parachutes, to be
delivered by authorities
upon landing. They
considered giving Cooper
fake parachutes, and
hey presto — one dead
hijacker. But what if he
strapped a hostage into
the second ‘chute?
The plane soon landed,
and the other passengers
disembarked. Cooper got

1815

IN 1815, ONE OF
NAPOLEON BONAPARTE’S
CONDEMNED MARSHALS
GAVE THE ORDER TO FIRE
ON HIMSELF

A BAD TIME TO FLY

In 1968, there were 36
hijackings of aircraft in the
United States. In 1969, that
number had gone up to 71,
and in 1970 to 69.

KILLER JAMES W RODGERS
WAS NOT GRANTED
HIS LAST REQUEST
BEFORE BEING SHOT: A
BULLETPROOF VEST

YOU SLEEP ONLY
TWICE

Are you the kind of person who wakes up at 2am and can’t get back to
sleep? You’re experiencing a bimodal sleep pattern, or segmented sleep.
Many animals practise it, and we used to, as well, until the Industrial
Revolution, after which light bulbs burnt all night, and our sleep rhythms
went bananas. Prior to this, the terms “first sleep” and “second sleep”
were used around the world. During the short periods of wakefulness,
it was common to eat, pray, or even socialise. So, if you pop a pill to
sleep (some of which have been linked to a 300 per cent to 500 per cent
increased risk of early death), take note. You might not actually need one.

his demands, and the
plane took off again with
just Cooper and the crew.
He ordered the pilots
to fly at 10,000 feet
(three kilometres) and
150 knots (close to 278
kilometres per hour),
conditions favourable to
a skydive.

At about 8:13 pm,
he opened the aft
stairway of the craft and
jumped, with around
9.5 kilograms worth of
US$20 bills strapped
to him. He was never
seen again, and to this
day there are no clues
to his identity. It is the
only unsolved airplane
hijacking case in US
history — unlike the slew
of copycats that Cooper
inspired. Fifteen others
tried to emulate Cooper
in 1972. All failed.

1960

a fairly high suicide rate. Then, in
just months, it plummeted by about
30 per cent, and hasn’t changed
since. What happened? Ovens had
been converted from coal gas, which
contains deadly carbon monoxide, to
natural gas. Just like that, the most
common method of self-destruction
had been removed from everyday
life, and many people didn’t seek
out another. Some 17,000 people
end their lives with a firearm in
the United States, about half of
all national suicides. What would
happen if civilian access to guns was
removed? If similar studies are to be
believed, you could save 17,000 lives.

SAVED BY AN OVEN Here’s a scary fact.
In a 2001 study of suicide survivors, 13
per cent said that they had thought of
killing themselves for longer than eight
hours. Seventy per cent said they had
thought about it for less than an hour.
Nearly a quarter said the idea occurred
to them just five minutes before the
attempt. That’s the decision to end your
own life, made in less time than it takes
to cook a hard-boiled egg.
Suicide, it turns out, is often highly
opportunistic. A strange anecdote bears
this out. Until the 1970s, England had

DON’T DO IT!
4 seconds
Time it takes to drop into the water
off the Golden Gate Bridge in the
United States, one of the world’s
most popular suicide destinations
1 regret
Those who jump and survive often
report an instant regret
93%
Of those people who have attempted
suicide, an estimated 93 per cent do
not make a second attempt
25
MARCH 2014

IMAGES: DISCOVERY CHANNEL COMMUNICATIONS, LLC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED (BUSTED!); BEN MOUNSEY (SKYJACKER ILLUSTRATIONS)
ICON: THE NOUN PROJECT, VIKTOR HERTZ (GUN BARREL)

TRADITIONALLY, WHEN A
CONDEMNED MAN WAS
TO DIE BY FIRING SQUAD,
ONE BULLET WOULD BE
MADE OF A HARMLESS
MATERIAL, SO NO
EXECUTOR WOULD KNOW
WHO KILLED HIM

OPINION
A 3-MINUTE PITCH BY IAN JARRETT

SO WHY SHOULD
I CARE ABOUT... JOURNALISTS

48
HOURS

Life or Death
Students at Northwestern
University, United States, have
an intriguing investigative
journalism course. They split
into teams, and see if they can
unearth wrongful convictions
in capital punishment cases.
They have saved the lives of
many innocent prisoners, even
succeeding in helping secure a
stay of execution for a man 48
hours away from death. Their
further investigations later
proved his innocence, and freed
him from 17 years in jail.

“THE PRESS PROVIDES AN
ESSENTIAL CHECK ON ALL
ASPECTS OF PUBLIC LIFE.
THAT IS WHY ANY FAILURE
WITHIN THE MEDIA AFFECTS
ALL OF US.”
– LORD JUSTICE LEVESON,
OPENING HIS ENQUIRY IN
2011 INTO THE ROLE OF
THE UK PRESS AND POLICE
IN THE COUNTRY’S PHONE
HACKING SCANDAL

On any list of the world’s most
admired professions, you will
find journalists generally near
the bottom of an increasingly
murky barrel. Ahead of car
salesmen, but behind lawyers.
Fair enough, 2013 wasn’t
a good year for journalists.
The Leveson enquiry in the
UK exposed dirty dealings by
journalists, while the criminal
trials of high-ranking News
26
DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

Limited editors revealed the
lurid world of phone hacking
of celebrities, sports star and
British royals. No wonder
many have been questioning
the value of journalists.
But for every phone
hacker, there are scores of
investigative journalists
shedding light on illegal,
immoral, and highly suspect
activities.
Think Bob Woodward and
Carl Bernstein's reporting on
the Watergate break-in and
other Nixon administrationrelated crimes for The
Washington Post. Think
of the reporters who have
risked life and limb to bring
stories from violent conflicts
in the Middle East. Among
them, Christiane Amanpour,

international reporter for
CNN and ABC News; Kate
Adie, the BBC's former chief
news correspondent; and
Marie Colvin, a Sunday Times
journalist in the UK, who was
killed in the besieged Syrian
city of Homs.
In 2010, Colvin spoke
about the dangers of reporting
on war zones. “Craters.
Burned houses. Mutilated
bodies. Women weeping for
children and husbands. Men
for their wives, mothers,
children. Our mission is to
report these horrors of war
with accuracy and without
prejudice,” she said. “We have
to ask ourselves whether
the level of risk is worth the
story.” “Journalists covering
combat shoulder great

responsibilities and face
difficult choices. Sometimes
they pay the ultimate price,”
she added.
Today, reporters are
expected to do more — blog,
tweet, and take pictures —
to feed the 24-hour news
cycle. There is less time for
painstaking investigative
journalism. But at a time of
information overload, there
is an even greater need for
professionals who can sort the
facts from the floss.
We journalists can live with
our poor popularity ratings.
But the world would not be
a better place if the likes of
Woodward and Bernstein,
Colvin, Adie and Amanpour,
and others like them, had
chosen a different profession.

HISTORY
KICK HITLER!

SAFETY IN
NUMBERS?
Limitations of laws that
presumably protect us

acceptable level
of contamination.
Same with “insect
filth”, where anything
under an average of
30 or more “insect
fragments” per 100
grams is fine.
Once you start
thinking in terms of
the sorites paradox,
the world seems
strange. In some
places, if a male
commits a murder
aged 17 and 360 days
and is caught, he
cannot be executed
as he is a “minor”.
If he had murdered
someone a week
later, his execution by
a court of law would
be deemed legal.
Small changes, yet big
differences.
Is “when is a heap not
a heap” too deep for
you? There are sillier
philosophical questions
out there, courtesy of
the internet and its
most thoughtful meme,
Philosoraptor
If a mime commits
suicide, does he use
a silencer?
If a picture is worth a
thousand words, what is
a picture of a thousand
words worth?
If revenge is a dish
best served cold, and
revenge is sweet, is
revenge ice cream?

Egg in the Sky

PICTURE THE MOON. ARE YOU IMAGINING A ROUND, SILVERY OBJECT?
THOUSANDS OF ASTRONOMERS AROUND THE WORLD ARE TUTTING AT YOU. THE
MOON ISN’T ROUND, IT’S EGG-SHAPED. AT NIGHT, WHEN YOU LOOK UP AT THE
MOON, YOU’RE ACTUALLY LOOKING AT ONE END OF THE “EGG” POINTING AT YOU.
IN NATURE, EGG SHAPES CONFER MANY ADVANTAGES. IT'S NO WONDER THEN,
THAT BIRDS ARE SO FOND OF THEM. PERFECTLY ROUND EGGS WOULD ROLL OUT
OF NESTS FAR EASIER, WHEREAS THEIR ASYMMETRY MEANS THAT A KNOCKED
EGG WILL ROLL IN A TIGHT CIRCLE. CLIFF-DWELLING BIRDS, FOR EXAMPLE,
LAY EVEN MORE OVAL-LIKE EGGS THAN BIRDS THAT LIVE ELSEWHERE. EITHER
WAY, PERHAPS IT’S TIME WE STOPPED THE FANCIFUL MYTH THAT THE MOON IS
MADE OF CHEESE — AND START REALISING THAT IT COULD MAKE POSSIBLY THE
GREATEST OMELETTE IN OUR SOLAR SYSTEM.

THE BOTOX EFFECT

We live in a crazy
world, where the most
toxic substance is
also the most popular
cosmetic enhancer.
Just one kilo of the
botulinum toxin is said
to be enough to kill
every single human
being on Earth. With
two teaspoons, you
could eradicate the
population of the
United Kingdom. Yet,
as Botox, it is injected
into millions of faces
each year, as it is

fantastic at smoothing
out wrinkles, when
delivered in doses
of a few billionths of
a gram dissolved in
saline. But with a flat,
expressionless face
comes two potential
problems. Botox users
report a curtailed
ability to express
emotions facially—
frowning, smiling,
and so on. The other
is that this blandness
seems to transfer
itself emotionally, too.
By being unable to

mirror other people’s
expressions, Botox
users are also less able
to empathise with
their emotions. Turns
out the “mirroring
effect” we often engage
in unconsciously isn’t
just good etiquette.

BOTOX CAPITAL

The ‘Botox capital’ of
the world is Westport,
Ireland, producing
nearly the entire
planet’s supply in this
single area, population
6,063.

T E S T Y O U R E M PAT H Y !
D O Y O U F E E L W H AT T H E S E E M O T I C O N S A R E E X P R E S S I N G ?
(#^.^#)

(; _ ;)

Embarrassed. See the
blushing cheeks?

Crying. Yes, you're
right, there's the tears

( 8(|)
Preoccupied Homer
Simpson (look at it
sideways)
27
MARCH 2014

PHOTOS: GETTY IMAGES (JOURNALISTS)

One grain of sand is
clearly not a heap.
Neither is two, or
even 20. But you keep
adding grain upon
grain until you get to
1,000, and think, “Yep,
that is now a heap of
sand.” What happens
if you take away a
single grain? Does it
cease to be a heap?
This isn’t as banal
as you might think. It’s
known as the sorites
paradox, and has been
debated by ancient
Greek philosophers
who were as wise as
their beards were
long. This way of
measurement affects
everything from
criminal law right
down to food safety.
Let’s take rat hair
in your peanut butter
as an example. The
US Food and Drug
Administration (FDA)
will only take action
to remove a certain
peanut butter from
the shelves if there
is found to be “an
average of one or
more rodent hairs
per 100 grams”. If the
average is one hair
per 150 grams, for
example, they don’t
have to take action,
as it’s deemed an

THE TWO
SIDES OF

DANCING

Shake loose. Cut a rug. Bust a move. Boogie down. Boys
and girls, it’s time to hit the dance floor — just be cautious
of head injuries, or any mention of Kevin Bacon

As one Japanese
proverb puts it,
“We’re fools whether
we dance or not. So
we might as well
dance”

The moonwalk: a
move so cool that
even a type of bird
(the red-capped
manakin, Pipra
mentalis) uses it to
impress the ladies

To disguise the fact
that their impressive
moves were actually
a ferocious martial
art called capoeira,
slaves in Brazil set
their moves to music,
so that it looked like
an acrobatic dance

Watch Evolution of
Dance, a YouTube video
where a comedian
discos through some of
the most iconic moves
of the past five decades.
History has never been
so funky

A Hollywood producer’s
evaluation of Fred
Astaire’s first screen
test: “Can’t act. Can’t
sing. Balding. Can
dance a little.”
We're not so certain
we disagree

Various studies have
found that dancing
generally helps to
improve physical
health, boosts
happiness, and
increases cognitive
function — as if
we needed more
reasons to enjoy it

At the risk of sounding
like your mother (see
left), metalheads take
note: headbanging has
been associated with
neck pain, spasms,
aneurysms and whiplash
— although not much
formal research has
been conducted

Dancing and your
high school prom
will always be
linked in your
memory, causing
nuclear levels of
embarrassment
A sustainable dance
floor in Canada
generates electricity
from the energy of
dancers’ feet. After
its installation in
2010, in six days it
generated enough
juice to power 80
homes for a day

28
DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

The fact that your
parents dance, ever,
is a major reason to
proceed with caution.
Especially any time
that Footloose is
involved

In 1518, a “dancing
plague” in the European
city of Strasbourg saw 400
people dancing for weeks
in what was thought to
be an outbreak of mass
hysteria. Many died from
exhaustion. Historians
still aren’t sure how it
came about

FEATURES
36

34
DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

100

PAGE 72 HOW CLOSE ARE
WE TO CURING CANCER?

PAGE 50 THE TRAFFIC TRIALS:
A GLOBAL PHENOMENON

PAGE 100 LIVING ON THE
EDGE: BEAR GRYLLS’ STORY

PAGE 88 THE MIGHT OF THE
MIGHTY JEEP

PAGE 58 ON THE ROADS OF
EUROPE’S TINY NATIONS

PAGE 36 THE SECRETS OF THE
LEGENDARY SPIES

72

88

50

35
MARCH 2014

They have secret jobs,
and names, globetrotting
assignments and mind
blowing gadgetry. Just
how does one become
an international super
spy? Cain Nunns meets
international spies, who
have lived the high voltage
life through the glorious
years of espionage
36
DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

SO
SO YOU
YOU WAN
WAN
TO
TO BE
BE AN
AN
INTERNATION
INTERNATIO
SUPER
SUPER SPY?
SPY?

SPY GAMES

NT
NT
37
MARCH 2014

PHOTO: GETTY IMAGES

NAL
ONAL

There is no razor-cut sharp
Savile Row suit. No Patek Philippe
Celestial, with built-in lasers and
sonic weapons implanted into its
US$2,00,000 watch face. Nor did
he leap out of a bullet-riddled Aston
Martin, a leggy blonde Russian
model in one hand and a briefcase
in the other.
He climbed out of a taxi, sporting
a backpack, an ill-fitting Hawaiian
shirt and comfy tracksuit pants.
Heavyset, he is in his late 50s, with
the sort of ruddy face formed by
hard drinking sessions, and not by
volcanic ash and tea tree oil
spa treatments.
In fact, there isn’t really anything
out of the ordinary about the man
that we’ll call Vincent, apart from
his thick ginger beard, and imposing
size. He is huge. A veritable manmountain, he has hands the size of
dinner plates, and a back-slap that
could almost knock the dents out
of car panels.
he only other thing out of the
ordinary about Vincent is
that he is an “asset”. That is,
he passes on information to a
controller, or field officer, of an
Asian intelligence agency — he
refuses to say which one — for
cash or favours.
Our man in Shanghai is
a small cog in the everyday
machine that keeps
governments and civilisations
running. It is the grey-area
side of our bureaucracies that
remains filled with mystery

38
DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

and intrigue — and where
deception has been elevated
to an art form. A realm where
people are never who they say
they are, and where slivers of
information have the power
to save an empire, or spark a
global war.
The agencies that run
the show, the alphabet soup
comprising the US-based CIA
(Central Intelligence Agency)
and NSA (National Security
Agency); MI6 and MI5 in
Britain; plus the KGB of the

former Soviet Union and FSB
(Federal Security Service
of the Russian Federation)
of modern-day Russia, are
just some of the headliners
topping a bill that is supported
by basically every government
and their own intelligence
agencies today.
“I’ve done business in
Asia for decades, and met
a lot of people from a lot of
different walks of life. I guess
those connections are worth
something,” says Vincent. He

SPY GAMES

refers to a Western friend as
his introduction into life as an
intelligence asset.
“My father had worked
for naval intelligence, and I
thought it would be exciting
to get involved,” he explains.
“Not many people get to say
they have done this type
of work. The travel perks
made it a really attractive
option as well,” he adds, in
between huge gulps of coffee
and smatterings of nervous
laughter. “I look at it like due

diligence or political risk work
— both of which are standard
in the corporate world I
come from. I’m not stealing
government or corporate
secrets, and I don’t provide
information if I suspect
someone might be directly
hurt by it. That is my number
one rule,” he asserts.
Vincent insists that he only
collects targeted information,
primarily about public
figures including politicians,
ambassadors, businessmen

and civic leaders. “It’s mainly
personality traits or trends.
Is this guy a womaniser? Is
this group gaining or waning
in popularity? Is this person
corrupt? I’m not asking
sources to sell me top-secret
information,” he says.
The first thing you need to
know about spies is that you
can’t believe everything you
see in those James Bond
movies. An average day for an
international spy entails
tedious, detailed

“I DON’T
PROVIDE
INFORMATION
IF I SUSPECT
SOMEONE
MIGHT BE
DIRECTLY HURT
BY IT. THAT IS
MY NUMBER
ONE RULE”

39
MARCH 2014

CASE OFFICERS
NEED TO HAVE
EXTREMELY
ANALYTICAL
MINDS, A
GENEROUS
SUPPLY OF
STREET SMARTS,
BE ABLE TO
ASSIMILATE
CONTACTS,
AND ACUTE
OBSERVATION
SKILLS. MOST
IMPORTANTLY,
BE A MASTER
MANIPULATOR
In the United States for
example, CIA operatives
undergo intense training
at a specially built facility
called the “Farm”. Most
of the training focuses on
gathering intelligence, though
paramilitary classes such
as hand-to-hand combat,
weapons training, defensive
driving, amphibious landings,
parachuting and extraction
techniques also make up
part of the curriculum. Sadly,
the fun stuff is the exception
rather than the norm.
Lindsay Moran, a former
CIA case officer and author
of the book Blowing My
Cover: My Life as a CIA Spy,
always wanted to be a spy. She
40
DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

obsessed over the Harriet the
Spy book series as a little girl —
even fashioning her early life
after the fictional character.
So it wasn’t much of a leap for
Moran to approach the agency
after graduating from Harvard
University, Massachusetts, US.
“I envisaged myself in a
black catsuit climbing walls.
The reality is very different.
It’s more like a glorified
salesman — but what you’re
selling is espionage,” she says.
“You find people and assets
that have information you
want, and you essentially use
them. Develop a friendship,
and then the part that is very
distasteful, find out what their
weaknesses are.”
According to Moran,
case officers need to have
extremely analytical minds,
a generous supply of street
smarts, be able to assimilate
and generate contacts, and
have acute observation skills.
And most importantly, be a
master manipulator. “People
ask me all the time, ‘When
did you fear for your life?’
Honestly, it was very rare that
that happened, because the
people who are actually taking
the risks are the people you
have recruited to give you
the information.”
Moran says that aside from
real or imagined dangers, over
time, other stresses of the job
do take a massive toll on spies.
“Personal relationships are
very difficult. I was naive about
the strain that it puts on you
when you lead a double life.
It’s so hard to establish any
kind of relationship, because
you can’t tell anyone what
you do. Lying becomes your
default rather than
the exception.”
Most operatives also work
two jobs, a cover assignment,
on top of their intelligence
gig — which often results in
a punishing workload that
demands your attention 24
hours a day, seven days a week.
“You’re out on the streets

meeting agents or looking for
places to meet agents, or you
are incessantly cultivating
contacts — writing up every
meeting you have, and everything you do,” she explains. “In
addition to that, a lot of our
lives are spent on surveillance
detection routes, which means
driving around for one to three
hours at a time, to make sure
you are not being followed.”

MESOPOTAMIAN SPOOKS

While Vincent claims that he
isn’t actively looking for highly
classified information, many
others are, and have. In fact,
they always have. The reality
is, we have had espionage
as long as we have had
organised states and political
organisations.
According to Dr Vejas
Gabriel Liulevicius, a history
professor at the University of
Tennessee and the director
of the Center for the Study of
War and Society, in the United
States, the earliest traces of
intelligence work date back to
about 2,000 BC Mesopotamia.
“The Bible is full of espionage
activities, especially in the
capture of Jericho,” says
Liulevicius, who teaches
online on spies and spying.
“The Greek historian
Herodotus records that the
Greeks sent spies to learn the
size of the Persian army of
King Xerxes,” he notes. “When
these spies were captured,
Xerxes did not have them
executed, as was usual — but
instead had them led about
his camps, shown the power of
his forces, and then set free to
return to Greece. He explained
to his shocked advisors
that in this way, the Greeks
would learn that he was even
mightier than they had feared,
and would not go to war. This
was psychological warfare of a
high order, using transparency
as a weapon.”
Centuries later, and by
1909, spy agencies in the West
were being established on a

MAIN PHOTO: GETTY IMAGES

work, observation, and dry
bureaucratic procedures.
While propaganda and
covert missions are part of the
job description, the majority of
a spy’s responsibilities centre
on assessing and recruiting
sources, who provide them
information. Like a bureau
chief, intelligence officers
keep the information pipeline
open, pay their sources, and
then report everything back to
their headquarters.

SPY GAMES

SHADOWS OF HISTORY
FOUR FAMOUS SPY FIGURES, FROM THE
FAMOUS TO THE FICTIONAL

UNKILLABLE
HERO?

Over the course of a
dozen novels, Agent 007
has consumed an alcoholic
beverage every seven pages on
average — 317 in total. He's also
smoked up to 70 strong cigarettes a
day, sometimes “cutting back” to 20
a day. So in real life, the super-spy
would likely have been a cancerous
wreck with a liver like an old
sponge — assuming he survived
the dangers inherent to the
job and lived to tell the
tale, of course.
to play.

The Anti-007
Hailed as a far more
realistic iteration of a
spy than James Bond,
George Smiley is the
brainchild of author
John le Carré. Small and
owlish, Smiley might not
have had much luck with
the ladies, but his razorsharp memory and
ability to blend into a
crowd made him a force
to be reckoned with.
The MI6 intelligence
officer first appeared
in le Carré’s 1961 novel
Call for the Dead, and
has been portrayed in
dozens of books, TV
and movies.

The Sneaky Lover
He’s justifiably famous
for having bedded 122
women (by his count),
but 18th century Italian
adventurer Casanova
was also a spy, who
gathered intelligence for
the French government.
Known as a garrulous,
party-loving ladies’ man,
Casanova had a great
many opportunities to
obtain information. In
his autobiography, he
noted, “I often had
no scruples about
deceiving nitwits
and scoundrels and
fools when I found it
necessary.”

The Criminal Turned
Double Agent
A British thief who was
caught by the police,
Eddie Chapman was in
jail when the Germans
invaded the island of
Jersey in 1940. The
Nazis trained him as a
spy and parachuted him
into England, where
he promptly turned
double agent, working
for MI5. Appropriately
named Agent Zigzag,
he became one of the
most important agents
of the war, feeding the
Germans reams of fake
information. Chapman
offered to undertake
a suicide mission, and
assassinate Hitler at
one of his rallies.

The Chinese Tactician
Although not a spy
himself, Sun Tzu,
author of the infamous
military strategy manual
The Art of War, was a
strong proponent of
espionage. To shorten
a war, foreknowledge
was vital, he wrote.
“Foreknowledge cannot
be gotten from ghosts
and spirits, cannot
be had by analogy,
cannot be found out
by calculation. It must
be obtained from
people,” he said. The
Chinese strategist and
philosopher wrote, “You
must seek out enemy
agents bribe them to
stay with you and use
them as reverse spies.”
41
MARCH 2014

permanent basis. Initially,
most of these were set up
before World War I as
instruments of combat in
anticipation of the horrific
carnage that would soon tear
Europe apart. It was not until
the run up to, and conclusion
of, World War II that major
peacetime intelligence
capabilities were initiated.
The CIA and the United
Kingdom’s code-breaking
organisation, the GCHQ
(Government
Communications
Headquarters), were chief
among these.
“The CIA was formed
in 1947 from the Office of
Strategic Services,” says
Peter Earnest, a 35-year
CIA veteran and founding
executive director of the
International Spy Museum in
Washington DC, in the United
States. He says the agency
was established very quickly.
“Some recruits came from
the FBI (US Federal Bureau
of Investigation), some from
the universities. It was heavily
reliant on the Ivy League
schools, because they were
people much like themselves,
who had travelled or knew
another language.”
And indeed, the agency
needed to be quick. Soon
after formal hostilities ended,
the long chill of the Cold
War began. The world’s two
divergent superpowers, the
United States and the former
Soviet Union, along with their
allies and proxies, squared
off in a battle for global and

ideological supremacy. It was
a battle that would only really
start to wind down around the
fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989.

AGENTS
BECAME KEY
PLAYERS IN
THE COLD WAR,
WITH COVERT
OPERATIONS
BECOMING
THE ORDER OF
THE DAY
INTELLIGENCE HEYDAY

From the outset, the Cold
War was a time demanding
the collection of critical
information from the opposite
ideological side of the fence.
Agents became key players
in this international drama,
with counter-intelligence and
covert operations becoming
the order of the day, mostly
driven by the nuclear arms
race. Each side wanted to
protect its secrets, while
learning as much as possible
about the enemy, in particular
the pace of their nuclear
weapons development.
Winston Churchill
described this as “the battle
of the conjurors”, and
intelligence officers as being
those who were practised in
the art of deception. While the
US and the Soviet Union never
formally engaged each other
on the battlefield, proxy wars
costing millions of lives and
dollars sprouted all over the

THE INTERNATIONAL SPY MUSEUM PRESENTS: TOOLS OF THE TRADE
SHOE WITH HEEL TRANSMITTER
ROMANIAN SECRET SERVICE
1960S–1970S

SECRETLY OBTAINING AN AMERICAN DIPLOMAT’S
SHOES, THE ROMANIANS OUTFITTED THEM WITH A
HIDDEN MICROPHONE AND TRANSMITTER, THUS
ENABLING THEM TO MONITOR THE CONVERSATIONS
OF THE UNSUSPECTING TARGET

42
DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

CAMERA CONCEALED
IN BRIEFCASE
STASI
1970S–1980S

THIS CAMERA WAS DESIGNED TO USE
INFRARED FILM AND ALLOW STASI
AGENTS TO TAKE FLASH PHOTOGRAPHS
WITHOUT USING ANY VISIBLE LIGHT

SPY GAMES

MAIN PHOTO: GETTY IMAGES

planet, many backed and run
by intelligence services.
In terms of being potential
spy material, Earnest says
he was a young man who
was in the right place at the
right time. “I was approached
by the CIA in 1957,” he
remembers. “Just as I was
getting out of the Marine
Corps in Japan. They had
heard about me through my
then-fiancée, who was one of
their field officers — and later
became my wife. It seemed
like a good idea at the time.
Then it became a career.”
During the Cold War,
spies saw themselves as
playing a leading role in a
great historical drama, an
ideological struggle that
would eventually map out
human destiny.
“It’s a different world now.
Our world was the Cold War,”
remembers Earnest, who
spent decades running covert
operations in Europe and
the Middle East. “The great
concern was the rising might
of the Soviet Union, and the
spread of communism.”
During this period, operations exploded globally in
both size and scope, during
what some have described as
a golden age of espionage. “I
coined the term the Golden
Age in the 1980s — but it
began to be used in a sense
that I hadn’t intended. I
actually meant it ironically,”
says Dr Rhodri Jeffreys-Jones,
who teaches at the University
of Edinburgh’s School of
History, Classics and

SPECTACLES WITH
CONCEALED CYANIDE PILLS
CIA
CIRCA 1975–1977

A POISON PELLET WAS HIDDEN IN THE ARM OF THIS
PAIR OF GLASSES. CHOOSING DEATH OVER TORTURE, A
CAPTIVE COULD CASUALLY BITE DOWN ON IT WITHOUT
AROUSING SUSPICION, UNTIL IT WAS TOO LATE

FOUNTAIN PEN CAMERA
CIA
LATE 1970S

THIS FOUNTAIN PEN WAS ONE OF THREE
CONCEALMENTS DESIGNED FOR A TROPEL
CAMERA, THE OTHERS BEING A KEY CHAIN
AND A CIGARETTE LIGHTER. SUCH EVERYDAY
ITEMS WOULDN'T DRAW A SECOND GLANCE

43
MARCH 2014

BECOMING A
SPY IN TODAY’S
WORLD COMES
DOWN TO
DRIVE AND
INTELLECT.
YOUR HEAD
IS YOUR MOST
VALUABLE
GADGET
Driven by Cold War angst
and the financial fuel of
the 1980s economic boom,
the order of the day back
then was double and even
triple agents, with spies
involved in everything
from assassinations and
propaganda, to bribery and
the propping up or tearing
down of political figures, who
were often replaced by equally
shady individuals.
Jeffreys-Jones, who wrote
the recently published In
Spies We Trust: The Story
of Western Intelligence,
says the atmosphere was
by now quite distinct from
intelligence in the 1950s.
“They were aggressive in

different ways. Yes, it was
overthrowing regimes, but at
the same time it was fulfilling
an important intelligence
function. You could say that it
had a restraining influence on
policy,” he explains. “The US
military would say that
the Soviets were building
more missile bases and
ballistic missiles — but the
CIA as a civilian organisation
would pour cold water on
those claims.”
However, he says there
was a huge price to be paid
by both sides for their
covert operations, and their
interference in the internal
politics of foreign countries.
For the CIA, he says, the
agency’s reliance on the
cloistered world of Ivy League
graduates began to evolve, due
to a series of embarrassing
gaffes, as well as changes in the
technology landscape.
“First, the Bay of Pigs
disaster discredited them,”
Jeffreys-Jones notes. “And
then technology came on in a
big way. There were already
massive computers employed
by the NSA for code-breaking
purposes, but intelligence
became a lot more technical
— with high-altitude flights,
high-definition photography
and satellite surveillance.
So what they needed more
than human intelligence
and spies on the ground,
were technocrats. And these
technocrats weren’t coming
from Harvard and Yale. They
were coming from MIT and
Stanford,” he says.

SPIES LIKE US

Earnest says the present-day
environment for international
spies is a reflection of the
post-Cold War world — with
many current relationships
and conflicts a direct result
of the new world order
when the Wall came down.
“Paraphrasing Jim Woolsey,
who was my former director
at the CIA, it’s as if we have
slain a dragon and have found
ourselves in a jungle full of
poisonous snakes. And in
many ways the snakes are
harder to keep track of.”
As for the spies themselves,
one of the major changes
is probably a social and
demographic one. For
Western intelligence agencies,
the traditional Cold War spy
was typically a younger white
male, educated at an elite
university. Today’s spy on
the other hand is often older,
comes from a growing number
of ethnic and educational
backgrounds, is more adept
at using technology — and is
increasingly female.
Far from being the
cloistered “old boys’ clubs”
of yesteryear, agencies have
moved with the recruitment
times. Today, candidates
can apply online, agencies
hold recruitment drives at
universities — and some
even advertise in newspapers
and magazines. It will likely
continue to evolve this
way. You only have to look
at the change in the ethnic
composition of countries.
Soon the population of

MAIN PHOTO: GETTY IMAGES

Archaeology, in Scotland.
“It was seen as a golden
age by the fans of covert
operations,” adds JeffreysJones. “People often say:
things were great then. We
were able to overthrow
regimes and run things the
way we wanted to,” he says.
“And it’s all got very
messy since.”

TOOLS OF THE TRADE
UMBRELLA DART
KGB
1978

IN 1978 THE KGB ALLEGEDLY USED
AN UMBRELLA MODIFIED TO FIRE A
TINY PELLET FILLED WITH POISON
TO ASSASSINATE DISSIDENT GEORGI
MARKOV ON THE STREETS OF LONDON

44
DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

GLOVE PISTOL
UNITED STATES NAVY
CIRCA 1942–1945

ARMED WITH A GLOVE PISTOL, AN
OPERATIVE STILL HAD BOTH HANDS
FREE. TO FIRE THE PISTOL, THE
WEARER PUSHED THE PLUNGER
INTO AN ATTACKER’S BODY

DEAD DROP SPIKES
CIA
1960S–1990S

THESE SPIKES COULD BE FILLED WITH
ANYTHING FROM MONEY TO MICRODOT
CAMERAS. THEY WERE HIDDEN BY
PUSHING THEM INTO THE GROUND AT
A PREARRANGED LOCATION

SPY GAMES

US citizens born of white
European stock will be in
the minority. Intelligence
services were slow to cotton
on to this, but they cannot
continue to be effective if they
do not represent the ethnic
population of their
own countries.
The NSA, the US
surveillance agency based
in Maryland (and the
organisation at the centre
of whistle-blower Edward
Snowden’s revelations about
electronic surveillance
abuses), is not shy about
looking for recruits on its
website. It says, “At the
nation’s top cryptologic
organisation, you can work
with the best and brightest,
using your intelligence to
solve some of the nation’s
most difficult challenges. Your
solutions can play a major
role in shaping the course of
world history.” The agency
suggests that anyone with
interests in computer science,
engineering, mathematics,
languages, intelligence and
signals analysis, logistics,
business and security, is
welcome to apply.
Over in Britain, Londonbased intelligence agency MI6
welcomes online applications
too, promising that a potential
agent’s “roles planning,
carrying out and reporting on
covert intelligence gathering
operations overseas will put
you at the heart of exciting
world events”.
“The agencies are more
overt now,” says Earnest.

COAL CAMOUFLAGE KIT AND
EXPLOSIVE COAL
OSS
CIRCA 1942–1945

THE COAL-SHAPED DEVICE WAS HOLLOWED OUT
TO CONCEAL EXPLOSIVES, PAINTED USING THE
KIT, THEN HIDDEN IN A PILE OF LOCAL COAL. THE
DEVICE DETONATED WHEN FED TO A BOILER

“When there’s an event
like September 11, they get
hundreds of thousands of
applications within days, just
like Pearl Harbour.” As he
describes it, becoming a spy
in today’s world comes down
to drive and intellect. “Your
head is your most valuable
gadget. It’s more like being an
investigative reporter. You’re
trying to find out things that
other people don’t want you to
find out about.”
Similar skills are needed
in espionage today as in some
more above-the-line careers,
he continues. “A spy lives in
a world of secrets. But there
are other people in all walks
of professional life — doctors,
lawyers, journalists — where
there is a need for secrecy. We
all might have to deal with
something like that.”

THE GREAT GADGETRY

Spies have long relied on
cutting-edge technology to
separate themselves from
the pack. There were gamechanging advancements going
all the way back to World
War I, with devices ranging
from signal interceptors and
overhead reconnaissance
from balloons, through to
high-flying aircraft, U-2 spy
planes, and the development
of satellites. All saw espionage
breakthroughs.
Earnest says long before
the internet, technology geeks
were a critical component
within any intelligence
community. “We sent agents
to the Soviet Union during

SECRET CIPHER
ASHTRAY
UNKNOWN ISSUER
CIRCA 1930–1940

HIDDEN IN PLAIN SIGHT AS AN
ASHTRAY, THIS DEVICE COULD
BE USED TO ENCIPHER AND
DECIPHER MESSAGES

45
MARCH 2014

the Cold War. But it was the
overhead reconnaissance,
and being able to see into and
count the submarine pens,
that really paid off,”
he explains.
As such, agencies relied
heavily on private sector
research and development.
“One of the defining
benchmarks of that time
was the matchup between
the agencies and the private
sector in developing tech. The
intelligence community has
strived to stay ahead of the
curve,” he says.
Indeed, for decades,
unbeknown to the rest of us,
intelligence agencies have
stayed beyond the technology
curve. If history is anything
to go by, then whatever their
research and development
programmes are working on
currently will likely not see
commercial application for
years to come.
The imperatives of spy
work often resulted in
technology breakthroughs.
For instance, high-definition
photography and highaltitude air travel both came
about as a result of espionage
research, as indeed did the
satellite. Similarly, the first
large-scale computer and the
first solid-state computer
(the forerunner to modern
laptops) were derived from
cryptanalytic research.
The NSA’s pioneering work
in flexible storage capabilities
eventually led to the invention
of the cassette tape. It also
contributed to huge leaps in

semiconductor technology,
face-recognition technology
and the development of the
first optical transistor. And
you should probably bear in
mind that those are just some
of the inventions that we
actually know about.

FUTURE SPOOK

But where will it all lead?
Some point to the furore
over on-the-run whistleblower Edward Snowden’s
claims of passive listening
and detection programs used
on millions of emails and
phone calls as just the start
of a new era of computerbased intelligence — which
may even render most
traditional intelligence jobs
redundant. Then again, by
that same logic, many more
opportunities will open up for
tech-savvy applicants.
The CIA has been using
game theory algorithms for
decades, similar to ones used
in complex high-finance
formulas. Insiders say that
for espionage, these will
learn patterns by correlating
electronic communications
with breakings news stories,
terrorist threats and events
on the ground.
New York University
political science professor
Dr Bruce Bueno de Mesquita
has been credited with much
of the theory used by the CIA.
Writing in a Guardian article
in June 2013, Christopher
Steiner, author of Automate
This: How Algorithms
Came to Rule Our World,

FEMME FATALE
When 28-year-old
Anna Chapman was arrested
as a spy in 2010 in the US, she
understandably nabbed headlines.
Press dubbed the beautiful Russian
national “the Red Head”, and made
much of the fact that her beauty didn't
preclude having brains — a fact she made
abundantly clear, with an IQ of 162. She
was soon deported back to Russia, where
she is something of a celebrity. Last July,
she made headlines again when she
tweeted “Snowden, will you marry
me?!” to the NSA's secret-leaker.
She later tweeted “@nsa
will you look after our
children?”

TOOLS OF THE TRADE
STEINECK ABC WRISTWATCH CAMERA
GERMANY
CIRCA 1949

THIS SUBMINIATURE CAMERA ALLOWED AN AGENT TO TAKE PHOTOS,
WHILE PRETENDING TO CHECK THE TIME. AN AGENT WOULD
CAREFULLY AIM THE CAMERA — NO EASY FEAT SINCE THERE WAS NO
VIEWFINDER — AND PRESS A BUTTON ON THE WATCH TO CAPTURE
THE PHOTO. ITS FILM DISK COULD PRODUCE EIGHT EXPOSURES

46
DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

TOBACCO PIPE PISTOL
BRITISH SPECIAL FORCES
CIRCA 1939–1945

THIS ORDINARY-LOOKING PIPE FIRED A
SMALL PROJECTILE THAT COULD KILL A
PERSON AT CLOSE RANGE. THOUGH IT
MIGHT NOT HAVE BEEN A GOOD IDEA TO
TRY AND USE IT TO SMOKE

SPY GAMES

MAIN PHOTO: GETTY IMAGES

noted Bueno de Mesquita
contended that human
intelligence was flawed, since
we rely on “gossip, innuendo
and backstories,” as well as
preconceived notions about
a source’s worth through
shared relationships.
In comparison, Steiner
argued, all algorithms
care about is finding data
streams that are impossible
for humans to detect. The
added bonus is that they
work 24 hours a day, seven
days a week — and, unlike
Snowden, are not prone to
whistle-blowing or counterespionage. According to the
article, a CIA study of more
than 1,700 predictions of
future intelligence events
made by Bueno de Mesquita's
algorithms were right twice
as often as the agency’s
own analysts.
“It makes perfect sense
— as our own lives are
increasingly lived through
technological media, so too
intelligence work shifts
in this direction,” says
Liulevicius animatedly. “And
it does so at a high level of
abstraction, as experts sift
through millions of electric
communications, seeking
metadata to interpret.”
It's important, however,
to note that this need not
automatically mean the end
of living, breathing flesh and
blood spies. “To the extent
that the interpretation of data
will have as its ultimate goal
an understanding of human
decisions and plans, the

TESSINA CAMERA AND CIGARETTE CASE CONCEALMENT
STASI
1960S

THE TESSINA CAMERA WAS EASILY CONCEALED IN A MODIFIED CIGARETTE PACK.
THIS MODEL CONTAINS ALMOST 400 PARTS, INCLUDING RUBY CHIPS TO REDUCE
FRICTION AND WEAR. TINY HOLES IN THE SIDE OF THE PACK ALIGNED WITH
THE CAMERA LENS, WHICH MEANS A SPY COULD REACH IN TO GRAB A REAL
CIGARETTE, ALSO STORED IN THE CASE, AND SIMULTANEOUSLY CAPTURE A PHOTO

human element will have to
remain,” argues Liulevicius.
“And that human element is
as changeable and mysterious
as it has been since the
human race began.”

BOTH HIGHDEFINITION
PHOTOGRAPHY
AND HIGHALTITUDE AIR
TRAVEL CAME
ABOUT AS A
RESULT OF
ESPIONAGE
RESEARCH, AS
INDEED DID
THE SATELLITE
AND THE
COMPUTERS.
Moran too agrees that
technology, however
advanced, will never
completely replace
humans in intelligence
roles, simply because we
are so unpredictable. “To
create algorithms that can
completely predict human
emotions and vulnerabilities,
which are constantly
changing and affected by a
myriad of factors? I don’t
think that’s possible.”
People such as manmountain Vincent had better
hope she’s correct. Otherwise
he, like many of his ilk, might
find themselves looking for
a new job. Not to mention a
smarter shirt.

LIPSTICK PISTOL
KGB
CIRCA 1965

USED BY KGB OPERATIVES
DURING THE COLD WAR, THIS
IS A 4.5-MILLIMETRE SINGLESHOT WEAPON. IT DELIVERED
THE ULTIMATE “KISS OF DEATH”

47
MARCH 2014

NUMBER 853 / BY DANIEL L. SEIFERT / ILLUSTRATION BY MARK McCORMICK

FROM ZERO
TO HERO: HOW
TO BECOME A
SUPER SPY
YOU DO KNOW, THEY DON’T JUST HIRE ANYBODY
TO JOIN THE US NATIONAL SECURITY AGENCY OR
MOSSAD. LIVING THE LIFE OF A SUPER SPY TAKES
A WELL-HONED SET OF SKILLS, AND POSITIVELY
A SHARP SET OF STEEL NERVES

1 TRAIN YOUR PERIPHERAL VISION 

Staring will be painfully obvious, whereas
180-degree vision is sneakily effective. And it’s
not all down to biology — peripheral vision can
be trained. Jugglers are great at it. Lady jugglers
in particular, as some research says women
have a wider angle of vision than men. Guys,
meanwhile, seem to be better at spotting
things from a distance

“THE POTATO
SALAD IS SOUR”

3 TALK LIKE A SPY 

Reporting back to HQ? Don’t say, “I
followed him and he called the police
and they were like stop, and I was like
aaaargh, and I ran away. It was really
scary.” Instead say, “Project is blown.
The ants have joined the picnic and the
potato salad is sour”

2 GET GOOD AT EAVESDROPPING 

You’d be surprised how much cupping a
hand over your ears can increase perceived
volume (up to 12 decibels). But do it subtly
GOOD A quick pretend earlobe scratch that
allows you to catch the exact digits of the
nuclear launch codes
BAD Duct-taping traffic cones to the side of
your head
WORSE Tapping the shoulder of your target
and sheepishly whispering, “Sorry, I didn’t
quite catch that”
48
DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

THE MANUAL

AYE T
RANS
LATE
Serbia
Ja samn
bwaha dvostruki
agent,
haha!

I am a

doubleEnglish
bwahaagent,
haha!

Play a

udio

5 BE A SECRET-MAGNET 

Pick a random person to talk to
during your evening commute. Your
challenge is to glean three bits of
personal information. If within 10
minutes you can uncover the name
of this stranger’s pet parakeet,
their thoughts on Mars bars versus
Snickers, and if they’ve ever cheated
on their wife (or husband), then you
are well on your way to 007-ness.
Good luck!

4 LEARN LANGUAGES 

There’s a job posting on the official
US Central Intelligence Agency site
for “Foreign Language Instructors of
Arabic, Chinese/Mandarin, Dari/Pashto,
French, German, Italian, Korean, Persian,
Portuguese, Serbo-Croatian, Spanish
and Turkish.” So get fluent, and you
can “decode” transcripts that read, “Ja
samdvostruki agent (Serbian for 'I am a
double agent'), bwahahaha!”

6 MASTER THE ART OF DECEIT 
Again, set yourself crazy tests and
see how far you can go. Can you bluff
your way in to the after-party at the
Oscars, based purely on your passing
resemblance to Jean-Claude van
Damme? Well done. Especially if you
are a woman

JEAN
CLAUDE
VAN
DAMME

7 EVALUATE YOUR LOOKS 

Are you stunningly attractive?
Then your forte might be seducing
information out of unwitting assets. Is
your face so bland that it is regularly
mistaken for an emoticon? You’re
probably better suited to tailing a
suspected terrorist
49
MARCH 2014

8.30 A.M.
PHOTOS: REUTERS

MUMBAI
COMMUTERS DISEMBARK FROM
CROWDED TRAINS DURING
THE MORNING RUSH HOUR AT
CHURCHGATE RAILWAY STATION
IN MUMBAI.

50
DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

CRUSH HOUR

CRUSH
HOUR

PHOTOS: REUTERS

GRIDLOCK. IT’S A SITUATION WE’VE
FACED FOR AS LONG AS THERE HAS BEEN
TRAFFIC OF PEOPLE AND CARS.
IRONICALLY, IT'S NOT GOING ANYWHERE
ANYTIME SOON. DANIEL SEIFERT GETS
STUCK IN A PHENOMENON THAT PLAGUES
PEOPLE AROUND THE WORLD

51
MARCH 2014

Relaxing in plush leather
seats, sipping expensive
champagne and savouring
the unmistakeable flavour of
premium caviar — now that’s
the way to travel. And for
some wealthy Russians, it’s
the only way to effectively get
abobut. Moscow’s jams are
among the worst in the world,
so an enterprising taxi service
offered a novel solution: limos
disguised as ambulances. For
US$200 an hour, the city’s
businessmen can nip to their
destination in two shakes of
a fake siren.

PHOTOS: REUTERS

EVERY MINUTE
OF YOUR
COMMUTE
INCREASES THE
CHANCE THAT
YOU’LL DITCH A
WELL-COOKED
BREAKFAST
OR DINNER IN
FAVOUR OF
FAST FOOD
— WITH ALL
THE HEALTH
DISADVANTAGES
This is par for the course
for a city that, in December
2012, experienced a traffic
jam that stretched 200
kilometres. It lasted for
three days — but that’s small
potatoes compared with other
incidents, such as the 2010
jam outside Beijing, China
that took 10 days to clear, or
São Paulo snarls, which are
regularly so lingering they
stretch two-thirds the length
of the Grand Canyon, in the
United States.
It’s rather ironic, really.
As cars began to take off last
century, they were envisioned
as almost-magical timesavers, tools that would allow
us to zip across cities with
ease. Yet little has changed
in practice. In the streets

52
DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

of 18th-century London,
England, the average horsedrawn carriage moved along
at a stately 13 kilometres per
hour. That’s the average speed
of a London car today.
Abandoning your car
for public transport is
another option, but not
always a solution, as we can
see from the “sardines in a
can” conditions of many a
megacity’s subway system.
“Why do they call it rush
hour when nothing moves?”
comedian Robin Williams
once quipped. But nobody’s
laughing, and not just
because rush hour is a daily
annoyance. Its detrimental
effects are as far-reaching as
they are unexpected.
Does a one-way commute
take you longer than 45
minutes? If it does, be
warned: a 2011 study
published in 2011 notes
that you’re 40 percent more
likely to divorce your spouse,
some say because more time
in traffic jams means more
stress and less time with your
loved ones.
Worse, every minute of
your commute increases the
chance that you’ll ditch a wellcooked breakfast or dinner in
favour of fast food — with all
the health disadvantages
that entails.
And, of course we know
that driving to work is
stressful, but an Australian
survey of drivers found,
depressingly, that a whopping
83 percent said the journey
was more stressful than their
job itself. Although this is
perhaps not that surprising,
considering the average
driver around the world loses
approximately eight days
a year to congestion. On a
larger scale, all those wasted
man-hours add up too, with
congestion estimated to eat
up US$100 billion a year in
the US alone.
So what’s to be done?
There are all sorts of

8.45 A.M.
TAIPEI

8.00 A.M.
SAO PAULO

CRUSH HOUR

WORLD'S 10
MOST CONGESTED
CITIES
INCREASE IN JOURNEY
TIME DURING PEAK HOURS
(AS COMPARED TO NONCONGESTED HOURS) IN THE
SECOND QUARTER OF 2013,
ACCORDING TO A REPORT
BY GPS MANUFACTURER
TOMTOM, WHICH EXAMINED
169 CITIES ACROSS SIX
CONTINENTS

MOSCOW, RUSSIA
JOURNEY TIME INCREASES BY
65 PERCENT

ISTANBUL, TURKEY
JOURNEY TIME IS 57 PERCENT
LONGER

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL
JOURNEY TIME IS 50 PERCENT
LONGER

WARSAW, POLAND
JOURNEY TIME IS 44 PERCENT
LONGER

PALERMO, ITALY
JOURNEY TIME IS 40 PERCENT
LONGER

MARSEILLE, FRANCE
JOURNEY TIME IS 40 PERCENT
LONGER
ABOVE: MOTORISTS STOPPED AT
A JUNCTION DURING RUSH HOUR
IN TAIPEI, TAIWAN. THE MAJORITY
OF TAIWAN'S VEHICLES AND
RESIDENTS ARE CRAMMED INTO A
SMALL PORTION OF THE ISLAND'S
FULL AREA, CONTRIBUTING
TO HIGH CONCENTRATIONS OF
POLLUTANTS NEAR WHERE
PEOPLE LIVE AND WORK
LEFT: COMMUTERS WAIT FOR THE
TRAIN AT A SUBWAY STATION IN
DOWNTOWN SÃO PAULO, BRAZIL.
THE CITY HAS SOME OF THE
WORLD'S WORST TRAFFIC JAMS,
WITH TRAVELLERS SOMETIMES
NEEDING THREE HOURS TO
TRAVERSE 14 KILOMETRES ACROSS
THE CITY
RIGHT: STATION WORKERS HELP
A PASSENGER SQUEEZE INTO A
CROWDED SUBWAY TRAIN CAR AT
THE IKEBUKURO STATION DURING
RUSH HOUR IN TOKYO, JAPAN

SÃO PAULO, BRAZIL
JOURNEY TIME IS 39 PERCENT
LONGER

ROME, ITALY
JOURNEY TIME IS 36 PERCENT
LONGER

PARIS, FRANCE
JOURNEY TIME IS 36 PERCENT
LONGER

8.15 A.M.
TOKYO

STOCKHOLM, SWEDEN
JOURNEY TIME IS 36 PERCENT
LONGER
53
MARCH 2014

7.45 A.M.

PHOTOS: REUTERS; AP (BOTTOM LEFT)

SHANGHAI

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DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

CRUSH HOUR

7.30 P.M.
BEIJING

PERSONAL SPACE
UNITED STATES
A 1966 STUDY OF AMERICANS
NOTED AVERAGE PROXEMICS
ZONES PEOPLE FOUND
COMFORTABLE

14–45 CM

INTIMATE DISTANCE

45–120 CM
PERSONAL DISTANCE

1.2–3.5 M
SOCIAL DISTANCE

LONDON

20–40 CM

AVERAGE PERSONAL
SPACE BOUNDARY AROUND
SUBJECTS TESTED IN THE
CITY OF LONDON, ENGLAND.
NOTE THAT THIS IS LIKELY TO
VARY GREATLY DEPENDING
ON THE COUNTRY OF STUDY

BEIJING

10

NUMBER OF PEOPLE PER
SQUARE METRE OF SPACE ON
BEIJING SUBWAYS DURING
RUSH HOUR

ARTHUR BALFOUR,

FORMER PRIME MINISTER OF THE
UNITED KINGDOM, SAID CIRCA 1910

“The motor car will help solve
the congestion of traffic”

ABOVE: THE THIRD RING ROAD IN
BEIJING, CHINA IS NOTORIOUS FOR
ITS TERRIBLE TRAFFIC JAMS
LEFT: COMMUTERS WITH BICYCLES,
ELECTRIC BIKES AND MOPEDS MAKE
THEIR WAY ACROSS THE STREET
IN SHANGHAI, CHINA. WHILE CARS
INCREASINGLY TAKE UP ROAD SPACE
IN THE COUNTRY, THE BICYCLE IS
FAR FROM DEAD. IN FACT, FOR MANY
CHINESE, PEDAL POWER REMAINS A
MAINSTAY FOR GETTING FROM PLACE
TO PLACE
RIGHT: IN MANY CITIES AND
COUNTRIES WORLDWIDE,
COMMUTERS ARE TURNING TO
ALTERNATIVE FORMS OF TRANSPORT
SUCH AS BICYCLES. CYCLING CAN GET
YOU WHERE YOU NEED TO GO AND, AS
A BONUS, HELPS YOU KEEP FIT

innovations and research
that seem to offer tantalising
solutions.
For example, an analysis
of drivers and traffic in
Boston, in the United States,
found that if you removed
just one percent of people
from the road, it would
equate to an 18 percent
improvement in traffic flow.
Many also hold the
opinion that driverless cars,
which are very likely to
start hitting roads in greater
numbers by the end of the
decade, will be a boon, what
with their sensors and cold,
computerised logic about
road rules, braking times
and average speed settings.
It may be prudent to reserve
judgement on that though.
On roads with a vast majority
of automated cars, such
vehicles may indeed help
smooth out traffic flow, but
it remains to be seen if a
mixture of old-fashioned
cars and driverless ones just
doubles the chaos.
And as for getting that
one percent of drivers off
the roads, well, that’s tricky
too. We often get attached
to our automobiles, with
some people thinking, “Hey,
I paid money for it, I might as
well use it.” Driving yourself
also gives many people the
world around a sense of
independence, that we are
in control of our travel —
despite the fact that this is
flagrantly untrue.
Tom Vanderbilt, author
of Traffic: Why We Drive
the Way We Do, states the
obvious: “The individual
driver cannot hope to
understand the larger traffic
system.” How could we?
You’re just a single salmon
swimming upstream, after
all. And even that metaphor
might be the wrong way
round. “You’re not driving
into a traffic jam,” writes
Vanderbilt. “A traffic jam is
basically driving into you.”

Discouraging car
purchases, incentivising the
use of bicycles and public
transport, structuring
commute times and spaceage cars — these are all
large-scale solutions that
might work, given time and
proper planning, though
Russia is already trying out
a few schemes. Last year,
a few select machines in
the Moscow metro would
dispense free tickets — once
users had completed 30
squats in under two minutes.
Word is that Russian
authorities also intend to
introduce bicycles that
charge your mobile phone
while you ride.

DRIVERLESS
CARS, WHICH
ARE VERY
LIKELY TO START
HITTING ROADS
IN GREATER
NUMBERS BY
THE END OF THE
DECADE, WILL
BE A BOON
While these efforts were
primarily a public relations
move for the 2014 Winter
Olympics, they display an
innovative understanding
of the incentives people
might need to give up their
cars for alternative modes
of transport. And with auto
ownership increasing around
the world, the clock is ticking.
In Beijing alone, more
than 1,200 new sets of wheels
hit the road every day — and
this number is on the rise.
Yet relatively recent figures
show how far China would
still have to go to match car
ownership in the United
States: there was one car for
every 17.2 people in Beijing in
2011, compared to one car for
every 1.3 people in the US at
the time.
55
MARCH 2014

HIT THE ROAD

7.15 A.M.

2009

JAKARTA

THE YEAR TWO BICKERING
MAYORS IN NEIGHBOURING
SUBURBS OF PARIS
DECLARED THE SAME ROAD
ONE-WAY, IN DIFFERENT
DIRECTIONS

ZERO
NUMBER OF TRAFFIC LIGHTS
IN THIMPU, BHUTAN'S CAPITAL

10%–70%
UP TO 70 PERCENT OF
PEOPLE DRIVING IN
AMERICAN URBAN TRAFFIC
ARE SIMPLY LOOKING FOR
PARKING

1 IN 5
URBAN CRASHES ARE
RELATED TO THE SEARCH
FOR PARKING

80/10
MORE THAN 80 PERCENT OF
TRAFFIC IN A TYPICAL CITY
RUNS ON 10 PERCENT OF THE
ROADS

For now at least, problemsolving as relating to traffic
jams remains inventive, yet
small-scale. In China, for
example, there’s a special
number you can call that
will deliver an unusual
service. Within minutes
(hopefully) of your phone
call, two men will zip to your
location on a motorbike,
nimbly navigating through
the throngs of immobile
vehicles to get to your
trapped car. One man hops
off, and takes your place in
the jam, prepared to wait
for as long as it takes before
delivering your car home.
Meanwhile, you hop onto
the back of the motorbike
— riding pillion — and are
driven to your destination.
If that doesn’t take your
fancy, you could always seek
out a counterfeit ambulance
service. Which, we should
point out, is patently illegal.
56
DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

PHOTOS (CLOCKWISE FROM TOP LEFT): CORBIS; GETTY IMAGES; REUTERS

CRUSH HOUR

7.15 A.M.
JAKARTA

8.00 A.M.
MOSCOW

ABOVE & FACING PAGE:
MUCH OF INDONESIA IS
PLAGUED BY TRANSPORT
PROBLEMS, AND AS
THE NUMBER OF TRAIN
PASSENGERS OFTEN
GREATLY EXCEEDS THE
CAPACITY OF THE RAIL
NETWORK, SO-CALLED
"ROOF TRAVELLERS" (FAR
RIGHT) ARE COMMON,
DESPITE THE FACT THAT
THIS METHOD OF TRAVEL
IS BOTH DANGEROUS AND
ILLEGAL. IN AN EQUALLY
DANGEROUS MOVE,
COMMUTERS SOMETIMES
HANG ONTO AN ENTRANCE
OF A COMMUTER TRAIN
LEFT: AT PEAK PERIOD,
MOSCOW'S PROSPEKT
MIRA METRO STATION IS
ALMOST LITERALLY A SEA
OF PEOPLE

57
MARCH 2014

THE TINIEST NATIONS IN EUROPE
ARE THE MOST COLOURFUL ONES
AFTER ALL. ROAD REPORTER
CHRIS WRIGHT HIGHLIGHTS THE
CURIOUS LINKAGES THAT BRING
TOGETHER THE CONTINENT’S MORE
MYSTERIOUS STATES
58
DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

ROAD TRIP

TRAVELS
THROUGH

PHOTO: CORBIS

UNEXPLORED
EUROPE

A LANDSCAPE SHOT OF
THE TOWN OF VADUZ,
LIECHTENSTEIN

59
MARCH 2014

VATICAN CITY

omething like a Persian rug is
flapping beneath a top-floor
window of the Vatican’s Papal
Apartments, to the delight of
atleast 5,000 people in
St Peter’s Square below.
There are people with flags,
with banners, hoisted upon
one another’s shoulders.
It’s like a football cup final.
Among the faithful stands a
clutch of black-clad priests,
in the best viewing spot
in the shade.
And then he appears: Papa
Francesco, as they call the
Pope locally, is at the window,
waving gracefully. He speaks
for a while in Italian, first
about the Bible, then Syria,
and then he is gone and the
crowd disperses. This has
been the home of every Pope,
by and large, since 1377. I
had not known Pope Francis
would be speaking, and had
come only to see the sights of
the world’s smallest sovereign
state, nestled into a northwest pocket of Rome.
The glorious interior of
St Peter’s Basilica, designed
by Michelangelo among
others, with every square
inch of its vast interior
ornately decorated; the trek
to the mosaic-clad balcony
and, through claustrophobic
and tilting, stuffy stairs, to
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DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

the packed cupola at the
very top of the dome; the
Sistine Chapel and The Last
Judgment; and St Peter’s
Square itself, with its marblecolumned arms thrown out in
a gesture of acceptance to the
poor. Seeing the Pope is quite
a bonus — and it seems a great
omen for my trip.
That’s because the Vatican
is just the first stop on what
I’m calling the Obscure
Principality Road Trip.
Western Europe boasts a
cluster of these tiny places, of
curious origin and still odder
persistence as sovereign
states, smaller than most
big cities, yet sustained
independently for centuries.
The Vatican City, the smallest
of them at just 44 hectares,
is barely a corner of a map
of central Rome and has a
smaller population than
many Singapore high schools.
San Marino, Liechtenstein
and Monaco are not much
bigger, swallowed by Italy,
Switzerland and France,
respectively. And while
Andorra is of a mighty size
compared to the other four, it
still only has two roads in and
out of the entire country.
And they are, being
European, relatively close
to one another — hence this
road trip. My mission is to
visit them all in four days.

SKODA MADNESS

When one is starting a road
trip in an unfamiliar lefthand-drive manual vehicle
— particularly after being
upgraded, against my will,
from a Volkswagen to a Skoda
— it is best not to start the
trip at Rome’s central station
in the Monday morning rush
hour. But needs must. u

ROAD TRIP

FAST FACT
VATICAN CITY
AS THE LEADER OF THE
CATHOLIC CHURCH, THE
POPE IS ONE OF THE MOST
IMPORTANT FIGURES IN
THE WORLD, PRESIDING
OVER SOME 1.2 BILLION
FOLLOWERS WORLDWIDE.
THE TRADITIONAL TITLE
OF THIS VATICAN CITY
FIGURE BEFITS HIS
STATURE: BISHOP OF ROME,
VICAR OF JESUS CHRIST,
SUCCESSOR OF THE PRINCE
OF APOSTLES, SUPREME
PONTIFF OF THE UNIVERSAL
CHURCH, PRIMATE OF
ITALY, ARCHBISHOP
AND METROPOLITAN OF
THE ROMAN PROVINCE,
SOVEREIGN OF THE STATE
OF VATICAN CITY AND
SERVANT OF THE SERVANTS
OF GOD.

TOP: VIEW OF SAINT PETER’S
SQUARE AND ROME IN THE
BACKGROUND, COVERED IN
A LIGHT MIST. THE DREAMY
LIGHT FOLLOWS VIA DELLA
CONCILIAZIONE AS IT STRETCHES
TOWARDS THE HORIZON

PHOTO: GETTY IMAGES (TOP),
DREAMSTIME (BOTTOM)

BOTTOM FROM LEFT: PIETÀ STATUE
BY MICHELANGELO, VATICAN CITY.
VATICAN GUARD. THE DOME OF
ST. PETER’S BASILICA

61
MARCH 2014

SAN MARINO

uAfter half an hour of

dodging the pushbikes and
Vespas across intersections
that no GPS could possibly
articulate, I am spit out onto
the Autostrada with a
desperate craving for
nicotine. And I haven’t been
a smoker since 1998.
But after that, the fourhour drive to San Marino
is pleasant. Though most is
motorway, it snakes across
the beautiful undulations of
Umbria and the foothills of
the Apennine mountains that
form Italy’s spine. Perugia
marks a natural stopping point
two hours in, as do countless
Umbrian villages, their hilltop
forts and Cypress trees visible
from the road against the
pink and yellow stucco of the
houses. Sunflowers roll past.
One thing that bonds most
of these principalities is that
they were built on the sides of
mountains, and are accessed
through challenging roads.
Monaco is most famous for
this, but it’s also true of San
Marino, in which folds of
switchbacks in the car are
exchanged for several more on
foot. Although the principality
itself (the world’s fifth
smallest) extends further than
this, its focus is within a
walled castle: one enters
through huge semicircular
horseshoes of stone beneath
angular battlements.
European sports fans know
San Marino as the one football
team their own national side is
guaranteed to beat in a World
Cup qualifier, though many
English are scarred for life by
the memory of San Marino
scoring against them within
8.3 seconds of the kick-off in
1993. Guidebooks tell you it
is the world’s oldest surviving
sovereign state, dating back

62
DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

to a monastic community
founded in 300 AD. Another
commonality of many
small principalities is they
attract people for duty-free
shopping. San Marino, like
Andorra, is jammed to the
gills with things to buy. But
once you pass these stalls, you
reach the true centrepiece
of the state: two castles, the
11th-century Guaita and the
13th-century Cesta. There is a
third too, but it’s not open to
the public.
From up here, it’s easier
to realise that one is in a
country governed by 16thcentury Latin textbooks,
though a parliamentary
democracy exists too. The
views are extraordinary, with
precipitous drops on one
side down almost to sea level.
It would be no surprise to find
Shrek living in one of
the precipitous drops
hanging over the sea, berating
pesky tourists.

GLAMOUR CENTRAL

Someone in less of a rush
would stop in Bologna, Parma
or Genoa, but I press on and
arrive in Monaco in the dark.
This is to be avoided. Most
people’s first sight of Monaco
and Monte Carlo (one is a
municipality of the other)
is from above, looking down
at the bay through a sweep
of high-rise opulence on
every scrap of rock from the
border to the Mediterranean.
Having arrived late, I am just
in time to be refused entry
to Monaco’s ridiculously
grand casino, for failing
the dress code ( jacket after
8pm, please). The casino
feels like the heart of Monte
Carlo. Housed in a twintowered building that looks
more like a palace than the u

ROAD TRIP

FAST FACT
FAST FACT
SAN MARINO

TOP: THE MAIN SQUARE
IN FRONT OF THE
PALAZZO PUBBLICO
BOTTOM FROM LEFT: RED
1934 FIAT 508 BALILLA.
SAN MARINO, A TRUE
SHOPPING HAVEN

PHOTOS: GETTY IMAGES (TOP AND BOTTOM RIGHT),
DREAMSTIME (BOTTOM LEFT)

DESPITE, OR PERHAPS
BECAUSE OF ITS
DIMINUTIVE SIZE, THIS
LANDLOCKED COUNTRY
DOES PRETTY WELL FOR
ITSELF. IT IS COMMONLY
THOUGHT TO BE THE
OLDEST SURVIVING
SOVERIGN STATE IN
THE WORLD. IT HAS NO
NATIONAL DEBT — THE
FIFTH HIGHEST LIFE
EXPECTANCY IN THE
WORLD, AND IT HAS NO
MILITARY. CHARMINGLY,
A MAJOR SOURCE OF THE
COUNTRY’S REVENUE IS
FROM SALES OF POSTAGE
STAMPS AND COINS, WHICH
ARE HIGHLY SOUGHT
AFTER BY COLLECTORS
FOR THEIR RARITY.

63
MARCH 2014

MONACO

PHOTOS: GETTY IMAGES (TOP & BOTTOM LEFT), DREAMSTIME (BOTTOM RIGHT)

u actual palace does, it is

part of a beguiling complex,
including a theatre and the
headquarters of a ballet
troupe. There are at least
three James Bond movies
that had scenes in this casino,
and it’s surely the inspiration
for the fictional resort
featured in Ian Fleming’s
Casino Royale, which shares
its Belle Epoque architecture
and aloof status. Still, I am
wealthier for having failed to
get in; it costs 10 euros (over
US$13) for entry to the main
room, and that is also the
minimum bet.
At night I dream of
the various curves of the
Milan-Genoa highway and
eventually fall out of bed
navigating a tricky turn,
seasick. There is an absurd
wealth on the harbour,
clogged with the finest
boats imaginable; one of
the world’s best aquariums;
and the Jardin Exotique
de Monaco, an immaculate
garden halfway up the hill.
Plus of course, you can drive
the route of the Formula
One street circuit (Sebastian
Vettel’s lap record: 1.16.577.
Mine: about nine minutes.
Turns out that when you’re
not in the Grand Prix,
you have to stop at
pedestrian crossings).
But the greatest joy of
Monaco is driving in and out
of it. The country is swept
across by three corniches,
each higher and grander than
the last, with views down to
the sea — one way to get a
great view is to head for the
French town of Eze.
That said, I have brought
my GPS along for its terrific
sense of humour, and today
it is in gallant form. It takes
me an hour and a half to get

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DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

out of the second smallest
country on Earth. Had
I listened to it, it would
have sent me, in this order,
into the harbour, the royal
palace’s front garden, several
brick walls, and off a cliff.

SKI CENTRAL

Having finally found a way
out, it is time to head to
Andorra, wedged between
France and Spain in the
Pyrenees. The driving is
largely dull on French
motorways, punctuated with
pauses to pay tolls. On each
of the first two days, these
fees run to 50 euros (around
US$69) and I waste a lot of
time stopping and starting.
Into France now, the roll call
of places I pass is glamourous
— Nice, Cannes, St Tropez
— but on the highway there
is only a fleeting glance
of the Mediterranean, or
a sandstone massif of the
Gorges du Verdon as I pass
beneath Provence, until the
road heads south at Toulouse
for the Pyrenees. Here, things
get more interesting, passing
through French villages,
including Ax, famed among
Tour de France fans, before
another winding mountain
road of precipitous drops
and hairpin bends, navigated
amid very low cloud.
Aside from duty-free and
tax haven benefits (most of
these places have managed to
preserve their independence
largely through tax status),
Andorra is chiefly famous
as a ski resort, but there
are good reasons to visit
in summer when the snow
yields to wonderful walks.
Andorra is the biggest of the
principalities by far and,
although it has no airport,
no railway, and precisely two u

ROAD TRIP

FAST FACT
MONACO
IF YOU’RE THINKING OF
MOVING, MONACO MIGHT BE
AN OPTION TO CONSIDER.
THE CLIMATE’S GREAT,
THERE ARE MORE YACHTS
THAN YOU CAN SHAKE A
STICK AT, AND THANKS
TO MASSIVE TOURISM
AND CASINO PROFITS,
RESIDENTS DON’T PAY
TAXES. JUST DON’T MOVE TO
INDONESIA BY MISTAKE —
THE COUNTRIES SHARE THE
SAME FLAG DESIGN.

TOP: MONTE CARLO
AT NIGHT
FROM LEFT: LUXURY
AUTOMOBILES PARKED
OUTSIDE MONTE CARLO
CASINO. SUNSET
LANDSCAPE AT PRINCE’S
PALACE IN MONACO

65
MARCH 2014

ANDORRA

FAST FACT
ANDORRA
FOR MUCH OF THE 1960S
AND ‘70S, ANDORRA’S
ENTIRE MILITARY BUDGET
PER YEAR WAS US$4.50,
A SUM JUST ENOUGH
TO PURCHASE BLANK
ROUNDS, FOR FIRING
INTO THE AIR DURING
NATIONAL CELEBRATIONS.
IN 2003, THE PRESIDENT OF
ANDORRA ADDRESSED THE
UNITED NATIONS, NOTING
THAT THOSE TIMES HAD
CHANGED. “MANY THINGS
HAVE HAPPENED SINCE
THOSE DAYS AND ANDORRA
DOESN’T EVEN PUT FOUR
DOLLARS AND FIFTY CENTS
TOWARDS ITS DEFENCE
BUDGET. WE DON’T SPEND
A CENT.”

France, one to Spain), it
has room within for several
towns as access points to
its three valleys. Beyond
the capital of Andorra la
Vella, in which the shopping
is concentrated, there are
many smaller towns serving
those valleys. An example is
Canillo, filled with ski lodges
that become bargains in the
empty summer: where a
modest room might cost 125
euros (US$172) in Monaco or
Liechtenstein, one costs 49
euros (US$67) with breakfast
and dinner when I drop in.
From there, walks bring you
swiftly away from civilisation,
past farmhouses and barns, to
lakes and mountains.
Having turned up trying
to speak in bad French, I find
that’s really Andorra’s third
language: first is Catalan, as
spoken in Barcelona, and
second Castillian Spanish.

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DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

Unusually, Andorra is
something of a job-share. It
is a monarchy headed by two
co-princes, one Spanish and
one French. Moreover, the
French one is the President
of France, currently François
Hollande — making him a
reigning monarch whose dayjob is to rule a country that
executed its own monarchy
in the French Revolution.

TOP: SHOPPING MALL AT THE PAS
DE LA CASA, ANDORRA
BOTTOM: THE COUNTRY IS
POPULAR AS A SKI DESTINATION

THE LUXE LIFE

After Andorra, the true
obscure principality
crusader might head 13
and a half driving hours to
Luxembourg — but it’s a
giant in this company, and
not so obscure, hosting the
European Court of Justice.
Instead, I head to the proper
obscurity of Liechtenstein,
the sixth smallest state in
the world and, oddly, leading
manufacturer of false teeth.
This is too far to reach in a u

PHOTOS: GETTY IMAGES

u roads in and out (one to

LIECHTENSTEIN

FAST FACT
LIECHTENSTEIN
FOR A SHORT TIME IN 2011,
IT WAS POSSIBLE TO RENT
THE ENTIRE COUNTRY,
MUCH AS YOU WOULD RENT
A HOTEL ROOM FOR A FEW
DAYS. AIR BNB, A RENTAL
PLATFORM, PRICED THE
THE DEAL AT US$70,000
PER NIGHT. THE ONLINE
PROFILE, WHICH HAS NOW
SADLY BEEN TAKEN DOWN,
NOTED THAT THE COUNTRY
HAS “500+ BATHROOMS”.
THE YEAR BEFORE, RAPPER
SNOOP DOGG HAD DECIDED
HE WANTED TO SHOOT
A MUSIC VIDEO AND
ALSO RENT THE ENTIRE
COUNTRY — THOUGH THIS
FELL THROUGH.

u

so I backtrack across
the width of France, pausing
to admire bridges both new
(Norman Foster’s seven-pier
Millau Viaduct) and old (the
Roman Pont du Gard), before
stopping at Annecy, near the
Swiss border, for the night.
Entering Switzerland the
next morning, I refuse to miss
the chance to drive across
a Swiss mountain pass, and
divert to the stunning Furka
pass between the towns of
Gletsch and Andermatt. It is
dizzying stuff, and as the Skoda
grapples with the 180-degree
bends, it’s hard not to look
away from the road at the
extraordinary rugged purity of
the Swiss scenery. I’m aware
from bitter experience though,
that Swiss speed cameras are
more belligerent than their
counterparts elsewhere — and
indeed, that ticket will find you
when you go home. Besides,
look at this scenery. Why rush?
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DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

I am 10 minutes from
Liechtenstein before I see
the first road sign for it, and
its capital, Vaduz, whose
focal point is a Gothic castle
on the hill behind the town,
where the ruling family still
lives. The family has been
here since buying the place
— and, indeed, the whole of
Vaduz — in 1712. It is believed
to be the only sovereign state
whose rulers came to power
by buying their own capital
city. The residence is private
except for one day a year,
but worth visiting for the
view down into the valley.
As in Andorra, the hiking is
sublime, though most visitors
to the country come here on
a day trip for the passport
stamp. Don’t count on this
though: I didn’t even see a
passport control booth.
Dinner is a hearty Swiss
rosti, a traditional dish
made of potatoes, and a

TOP: VIEW OF THE RESTORED
VADUZ CASTLE
BOTTOM: AREAS OF INTEREST
ABOUND ALONG THE DRIVE
THROUGH THIS COUNTRY

PHOTOS: GETTY IMAGES

u day,

A MISTY MORNING IN
LIECHTENSTEIN

ACCORDING TO THE CIA
WORLD FACTBOOK, THESE
ARE THE POPULATION SIZES OF

VATICAN CITY

893

SAN MARINO

32,448
MONACO

30,500
ANDORRA

85,293
LIECHTENSTEIN

37,009

WHICH ADDS UP TO A TOTAL OF
186,143

1.5 CRIME

PER PERSON

WITH MILLIONS OF EUPHORIC
VISITORS COME SOME SNEAKY
ONES: PICKPOCKETS. THIS
THIEVES’ PARADISE MEANS THAT
THE VATICAN CITY
HAS THE HIGHEST CRIME
RATE IN THE WORLD

MARCH 2

2007

ON THIS DATE, A SWISS ARMY
UNIT UNWITTINGLY CROSSED
THE BORDER DURING
MANOEUVRES AND ACCIDENTALLY
INVADED LIECHTENSTEIN.
AUTHORITIES ON BOTH SIDES
DOWNPLAYED THE INCIDENT. “IT’S
NOT LIKE THEY STORMED OVER
HERE WITH ATTACK HELICOPTERS
OR SOMETHING,” SAID A
LIECHTENSTEIN OFFICIAL

MONÉGASQUE

A NATIVE OF MONACO

German dark
beer. It being largely Swiss
— Liechtenstein uses the
Swiss franc — there is the
linguistic multiplicity of that
country here, which is just as
well. Having floundered with
bad Italian in the Vatican
City and San Marino, and
bad French in Monaco and
Andorra, I think my German
is even worse. I’m spared
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DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

by a waiter who speaks five
languages, as people around
here often do.
Next morning, it is time
to fly home, marvelling again
at Europe’s smallness. Up in
Liechtenstein at 5.45am, in
Switzerland by 6am, Italy by
8.30am and landing back in
England before lunchtime.
As I pull into Milan’s Linate
airport, the final reading on

the car is 3,422 kilometres.
And nobody asked to see my
passport once.
What have I picked up from
my ludicrous sprint across the
region? Chiefly, an allergy to
French and Italian motorways,
and recognition that this
should have been attempted
over a week. But also, that
good things do indeed come in
small packages.

MONACOIAN

A RESIDENT IN THE CITY
WHO WAS BORN IN
ANOTHER COUNTRY

THREE FILMS

THREE JAMES BOND
MOVIES HAVE FEATURED
SCENES SET IN MONACO:
NEVER SAY NEVER AGAIN,
GOLDENEYE AND DR. NO, IN
WHICH SEAN CONNERY FIRST
SAID THE IMMORTAL WORDS:
“BOND. JAMES BOND”

PHOTO: GETTY IMAGES

u fabulous

SLEEPING
WITH THE
ENEMY
AN ARMY OF RESOURCES AND DECADES
OF RESEARCH HAVE BEEN PUT INTO
ACTION TO BATTLE CANCER. YET,
ITS CURE REMAINS A DISTANT HOPE.
AWARD-WINNING WRITER MAX GLASKIN
REPORTS THE GOOD NEWS: NOW THAT
WE KNOW MORE THAN EVER ABOUT THE
DISEASE THERE ARE MORE OF US LIVING
WITH IT THAN DYING FROM IT
72
DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

CANCER

PHOTO: CORBIS

GOING INTO A MAGNETIC RESONANCE
IMAGING (MRI) SCANNER CAN BE
INTIMIDATING — IT'S LOUD IN THERE,
AND YOU MUST LIE VERY STILL.
ENDURING MEDICAL LASERS PROBABLY
DOESN'T HELP EITHER, BUT IT'S A
NECESSARY PART OF DIAGNOSIS AND
TREATMENT FOR MANY CANCERS

73
MARCH 2014

ancer is part of life. It is unwelcome,
unkind, and unpredictable — but it is as
much a part of being alive as any other
physiological condition except that it
can be lethal and how. Its reputation
as an indiscriminate serial killer has
loaded the word with terror, far more
frightening than the name of any
other illness.
Its macabre status is justified. Cancer
is the leading cause of mortality
worldwide, accounting for around 13
per cent of all deaths — that’s 7.6 million
people in a year. As the global population
grows, there will be almost 22.2 million
new cases diagnosed annually by 2030.
Yet, there is an important shift in
the way the disease is regarded. Better
prevention, diagnosis, and cures
are emerging, including some with
spectacular results. The pace of research
is faster than ever, with new drugs and
therapies trialled ever more quickly. But
the question remains “When will there
be a cure for cancer?”
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DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

The answer, unfortunately,
is not straightforward.
The honest but simplistic
response: “never.” The
considered reply: “Never, but
we are getting a lot better at
preventing cancer, detecting
it sooner, and treating it more
effectively so it won't kill as
many people, or as quickly as
it does today.” You might think
this sounds evasive, but let's
get to know what cancer is and
how it develops. Then we'll
understand why the measured
answer is genuinely uplifting.

All cancers begin when the
genetic material of the body’s
basic unit of life, the DNA of
a cell, is damaged or changed
so that it produces mutations
that affect normal cell growth
and division. When this
happens, cells don’t die when
they should and new cells
form when the body doesn’t
need them.
The extra cells may form a
mass of tissue called a tumour,
which may be cancerous.
Cancer cells can travel from
their original site to other

CANCER

PHOTOS: CORBIS (MAIN); GETTY IMAGES

EVEN AS A DIGITAL ARTWORK,
THIS LONE CANCER CELL LOOKS
TERRIFYING, MUCH LESS A MORE
ADVANCED CASE, SUCH AS THIS
MALIGNANT MELANOMA (BELOW),
A FORM OF SKIN CANCER

places in the body, a process
called metastasis. No matter
where they are, a sufficient
number of cancer cells will
disrupt the functions of that
part of the body, upsetting
the delicate balance of the
fantastically complex and
interdependent processes
that keep us alive.
“There are many cells in
the human body dividing all
the time, so the really amazing
thing is that we do not get
cancer more than we do,” says
Dr Daniel G. Tenen, director of

the Cancer Science Institute
of Singapore. Actually, the fact
that we are living longer is one
reason cancer has become
so much more extensive. In
ancient Rome, the average
life expectancy was around
20 to 30 years — but in many
countries it’s now 80 or more.
This gives more time for cells
to mutate and cause cancer.
It’s a part of life; the longer we
live, the bigger part it can play.
“You are not healthy one
day and have cancer the next,”
says Tenen. “I am in my

“IT USED TO
BE SAID THAT
CANCER WAS
200 DIFFERENT
DISEASES.
NOW, THROUGH
GENOMICS, WE
ARE WELL ON
OUR WAY TO
IDENTIFYING
400 DIFFERENT
CANCERS.”
75
MARCH 2014

NOW A DRUG
CAN BE
DESIGNED
TO STARVE
OR DISRUPT
CHEMICAL
SIGNALS TO
MUTATED
CELLS TO
PREVENT THEM
FROM DIVIDING
FURTHER
PROFILING CANCER

He’s not alone in that quest.
Thousands of researchers
globally are on the case,
and they’ve all been aided
by one of the most significant
achievements of science —
the sequencing of the human
genome. Completed in April
2003, it revealed the genetic
make-up of humans.
This knowledge allows
scientists to look at the causes
of cancer in far greater detail.

We’ve known, for instance,
that there are 200 different
types of cell in the body. A
mutation to any one of those
types could lead to cancer.
“It used to be said that
cancer was 200 different
diseases,” says Dr Gordon
McVie, of the Istituto
Europeo di Oncologia (or
the European Institute of
Oncology) in Milan, Italy,
“But now we can see that
there are 10 different kinds
of breast cancer, maybe five
lung cancers, at least two
melanomas (skin cancer), and
perhaps six or more colon
cancers. Actually, through
genomics, now we are well
on our way to identifying 400
different cancers.”
How do they do this? By
comparing the genes of a
healthy person with those
of someone with cancer.
Any differences are then
examined to deduce if they
are mutations that could
be the cause of the disease.
The next step is to identify
how the changes enable the
mutated cell to proliferate
and, crucially, to find a way to
interfere with its progress.
For example, a drug could
be designed to starve the
mutated cell of the fuel it
depends on. Or one could
disrupt chemical signals that
would otherwise trigger the
mutated cell into dividing. Or
it could prevent metastasis
and so restrict the cancer to
its initial site.
The ability to work at the
level of genes and molecules

PHOTOS: GETTY IMAGES (MAIN, GINGER), TAGISHSIMON (STACKED CHIMNEYS)

60s. I feel healthy but I
am sure I have four or five
cancers in me, and they
may or may not develop
into something causing me
symptoms before I die from
some other cause. In that
sense, you could say that the
cure for cancer in older adults
is to die young — but that is
not what anybody wants. I
am a scientist trying to learn
enough about cancer to be
able to help people live longer
and healthier.”

CANCER MILESTONES
The Ongoing Fight

The scientific study of cancer has
gone through setbacks, gaffes,
and victories over the past few
centuries. Here are just some of
the hundreds of cancer milestones
in medical history

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DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

1776 SOOT WART
STUDYING THE HIGH INCIDENCE OF SCROTUM CANCER IN CHIMNEY
SWEEPS, SIR PERCIVALL POTT LINKED EXPOSURE TO SOOT WITH
CANCER, BECOMING THE FIRST TO POSIT AN OCCUPATIONAL AND
ENVIRONMENTAL CAUSE OF CANCER. HE THEORISED THAT CHIMNEY
SWEEPS WOULD SWEAT, CAUSING SOOT TO RUN DOWN THEIR BODIES
AND COLLECT OVER THE SCROTUM. THIS WOULD LEAD TO PAINFUL
SORES THAT WOULD DEVELOP INTO CANCER. THE AILMENT WAS
KNOWN AS CHIMNEY SWEEPS’ CARCINOMA OR SOOT WART

CANCER

CURBING CHEMO'S FALLOUT

CHEMOTHERAPY

The term
chemotherapy refers to the
use of medication (chemicals)
to treat disease, but it has most
often been associated with cancer.
Chemo can be in the form of tablets
or administered intravenously.
Some common side effects of this
are nausea and vomiting, which
half of all patients suffer; and
hair loss which may not affect
one’s physical health but can
be bad for a patient’s
psychological
state.

Chemotherapy involves
pumping cell-killing
drugs into the body. So
it's no wonder healthy
cells can suffer as
much as cancerous
ones. And though you
might know about the
nausea, fatigue, and hair
loss, other side effects
of long-term chemo
might surprise you.
Alternating constipation
and diarrhoea. Anaemia,
a lack of red blood
cells that can lead to
shortness of breath.
Mouth ulcers. Bleeding
gums. Bruised skin.
Short-term memory
loss. Brittle nails. The
list goes on.
As such, chemotherapy
can be the most painful
time in a cancer patient’s
ordeal. While doctors
can and do prescribe
medication to relieve
these side effects, many
patients now turn to
more natural solutions,
in an effort to minimise
their drug intake.

Ginger, for example, has
been used for centuries,
if not millennia, to
relieve nausea or the
urge to vomit. It can be
taken in pill form, or
brewed into tea. Made
into tisanes, fennel and
peppermint are also
said to ease stomach
discomfort. In addition,
some studies have found
support for the idea
that green tea assists
in the prevention and
treatment of cancer.
And sometimes the most
natural solution of all
relies on brainpower. For
those with the discipline
and resolve to practice,
meditation and guided
willpower has become a
popular way to make it
through gruelling chemo
sessions. Alternate
healing practices include
conjuring positive
images whilst listening
to relaxing music. This
has helped many a
patient endure some of
their darkest sessions.

1779 THE FIRST CANCER HOSPITAL

1800S WEAPONS TO THE FIGHT

THE FIRST HOSPITAL DEDICATED PURELY TO
CANCER PATIENTS WAS OPENED IN RIEMS, FRANCE,
IN 1779. IT MARKED A HUGE STEP FORWARD IN
FIGHTING THE DISEASE — EXCEPT THAT AT THE
TIME, IT WAS WIDELY BELIEVED THAT CANCER WAS
CONTAGIOUS. AS SUCH, THE HOSPITAL WAS PLACED
SAFELY OUTSIDE THE CITY LIMITS FOR FEAR OF
SPREADING TO HEALTHY PEOPLE

SCIENTIFIC ONCOLOGY WAS GIVEN A BOOST BY FOUR
INVENTIONS AND DISCOVERIES OF THE 19TH CENTURY:
THE MODERN MICROSCOPE (FOR EXAMINING MORE
CLOSELY THAN EVER BEFORE THE CELL STRUCTURE
OF CANCERS), MODERN ANAESTHETICS (FOR PAIN
RELIEF OF PATIENTS DURING TREATMENT AND
SURGERY), X-RAYS (FOR DIAGNOSING TUMOURS) AND
RADIUM (FOR RADIOTHERAPY TREATMENT)

77
MARCH 2014

DESIGNING
MOLECULES
THAT INHIBIT
OR ERADICATE
CANCEROUS
CELLS IS
ONE OF THE
AMAZING
CONSEQUENCES
OF SEQUENCING
THE HUMAN
GENOME
INDIVIDUAL TREATMENTS

It’s a certainty that genomics
is going to play a major role in
neutralising cancer.
“The ability to read our
own DNA in detail has
accelerated from years to
days, and the cost has fallen
from millions to thousands

of dollars. I predict that one
day you’ll be able to have
your entire genome read in
a day in a pharmacy,” asserts
Dr Laurence Patterson,
director of the Institute of
Cancer Therapeutics in the
United Kingdom. This means
that it could soon be possible
to identify precisely which
damaged genes are causing
the cancer, or may do so in the
future, and so prescribe drugs
to target them specifically.
That should be
great, but Patterson has
reservations about the
potential availability for
individualised chemotherapy.
“Pharmaceutical companies
will invest in developing
new treatments if there are
enough people who need
them. The problem is that
personalised medicine could
reduce the size of the market
for each drug to one person
or a handful of individuals. If
that happens, the companies
couldn't necessarily make
enough money, so they
wouldn't invest in developing
the drug in the first place,”
Patterson explains.
Designing molecules that
inhibit or eradicate cancerous
cells is one of the amazing
consequences of sequencing
the human genome. Another
is being able to identify the
risks of developing cancer
that a person may have
inherited via the genes of
their forebears. Only five to 10
per cent of cancers are linked
to heredity, but people whose

families have suffered can
now be tested to see if they
carry the same faulty genes.
Famously, actress Angelina
Jolie inherited the faulty
gene BRCA1, which led to
the premature deaths of
her mother and her aunt.
So she opted for a double
mastectomy as, she had an
87 per cent risk of developing
breast cancer and a 50 per
cent risk of ovarian cancer.
The surgery reduced the
chance of breast cancer for
Jolie to less than five per cent.

ENTER THE ROBOTS

Surgery isn’t always needed,
and other treatments are
being refined and improved.
This is the case with
radiotherapy, where X-rays
are used to damage the
DNA of the mutated cells
so they die. The problem
has been that the cancer
isn’t the only body region
affected — tissues and organs
nearby may be exposed to the
X-rays. Fortunately, robotics
is now helping.
Before, patients may
have had to undergo more
than 30 treatment sessions
with relatively high doses
of radiation that had some
impact on adjacent tissue and
organs. The robot, though, is
more accurate, so it doesn’t
need to deliver such high
doses and it’s quicker. The
radiation source is fixed
to the arm of a multi-axis
industrial robot. The arm
moves accurately to deliver

PHOTO: CORBIS (MAIN)

is making the most common
forms of treatment appear
as heavy-handed as using a
steamroller to crack a nut.
Traditional chemotherapy,
the use of chemical drugs, can
lead to distressing side effects.
It stops cancer cells growing
but the chemo is generalised,
so it stops the growth of
good cells too. That’s why it’s
common for patients to lose
their hair. But with genomics,
it’s possible to design a drug
whose molecules interfere
only with the mutated cells,
allowing all the good cells
in the rest of the body to
function largely as usual.

DOCTORS DEMONSTRATE
THE USE OF A ROBOTIC
SURGERY MACHINE AT KING
CHULALONGKORN MEMORIAL
HOSPITAL IN BANGKOK. ROBOTIC
SURGERY ALLOWS SURGEONS
TO PENETRATE THE MALE
REPRODUCTIVE ORGANS AND
URINARY TRACT AND CAN BE
USED TO TREAT CONDITIONS
SUCH AS PROSTATE, BLADDER
AND KIDNEY CANCERS

CANCER MILESTONES
1918 PAUL SHEDS THE LIGHT

1943 SMEARING AWAY CASUALTIES

IN 1918, AUSTRALIAN DERMATOLOGIST SIR CHARLES NORMAN
PAUL PUBLISHED THE INFLUENCE OF SUNLIGHT IN THE
PRODUCTION OF CANCER OF THE SKIN, ONE OF THE FIRST
TRACTS TO EXPOSE THE LINK. HIS BOOK CAME OUT JUST IN TIME
FOR THE BIRTH OF THE BRONZING CRAZE OF THE 1920S, WHEN
TANNED SKIN BECAME A STATUS SYMBOL OF THE WESTERN JET
SET. COCO CHANEL HERSELF PURRED IN 1929, “A GIRL SIMPLY
HAS TO BE TANNED”

GEORGE PAPANICOLAOU PIONEERED THE
PAP TEST OR PAP SMEAR, A PROCEDURE
USED TO DETECT CERVICAL CANCERS OR
PRECANCEROUS STATES. IT IS THOUGHT THAT
THE PROCEDURE, STILL IN WIDESPREAD
USE TODAY, HAS HELPED REDUCE CERVICAL
CANCER DEATHS BY 70 PER CENT IN THE
UNITED STATES ALONE

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DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

CANCER

1949 CHEMOTHERAPY’S BIRTH

1964 THE SMOKING GUN

IN THE 1940S, RESEARCHERS NOTED THAT
NITROGEN MUSTARD (ALSO KNOWN AS MUSTARD
GAS), A WEAPON STOCKPILED DURING WORLD
WAR II, KILLED CANCER CELLS BY CHEMICALLY
ALTERING THEIR DNA. BY 1949, THE UNITED STATES
FOOD AND DRUG ADMINISTRATION HAD APPROVED
NITROGEN MUSTARD FOR USE IN CHEMOTHERAPY
AGAINST HODGKIN’S LYMPHOMA

A GERMAN STUDY IN 1939, AND AMERICAN STUDIES IN THE 1950S,
LINKED CIGARETTE SMOKING TO INCREASED RISK OF CANCER (A 1950
BRITISH STUDY CONCLUDED THAT SMOKING WAS “A CAUSE, AND AN
IMPORTANT CAUSE” OF LUNG CANCER). BUT IT WASN’T UNTIL 1964
THAT THE UNITED STATES SURGEON GENERAL RELEASED A REPORT
NOTING: “CIGARETTE SMOKING IS CAUSALLY RELATED TO LUNG
CANCER IN MEN; THE MAGNITUDE OF THE EFFECT OF CIGARETTE
SMOKING FAR OUTWEIGHS ALL OTHER FACTORS”

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MARCH 2014

“IN FIVE OR
TEN YEARS
WE’LL BE
CONTROLLING
ADVANCED
MELANOMA
BUT I HAVE TO
SAY I DON’T
KNOW WHEN
WE’LL BE
ABLE TO HAVE
LUNG CANCER
UNDER
LONG-TERM
CONTROL
FOR MOST
PATIENTS”
Physical surgery to remove
cancers is also advancing.
Instead of a human wielding
the scalpel, the job can be
done by instruments attached
to mechanised arms that are
actuated by electric motors.

They are steadier, and they
don’t get tired. The machine
is operated by a surgeon
seated several metres away
from the patient, using
hand and foot controls and
watching it all on a 3D screen
that allows him or her to see
more detail than with eyes
alone. The equipment is said
to make it easier to complete
delicate procedures, such
as removing a cancerous
prostate gland, without
making mistakes that would
lead to other complications.
However, to perform any
kind of treatment, the cancer
has to be detected in the first
place. “That's another part
of the revolution of the last
few decades,” says McVie,
who has been working with
cancer for 40 years. “Imaging
parts of the body is now
very clever. Scans are very
powerful and potent ways to
find activity that is abnormal.
MRI (magnetic resonance
imaging) and PET (positron
emission tomography)
scans mean we can identify
different molecules within
the body without needing to
do any surgery for biopsies.”

CURE OR CONTROL?

So better detection and better
treatments than ever before
are becoming increasingly
available. Extrapolating from
these recent technological
advances, it seems to make
sense that there should soon
be a cure for cancer. Yet, that’s
not the right way of looking

PHOTOS: GETTY IMAGES (MAIN); CORBIS (MRI MACHINE)

many low doses of X-rays in
quick succession from many
different positions around
the patient, guided by an
automatic vision system and
following a digital model of
the tumour. As few as three
sessions may achieve the aim
of eradicating the cancer.
What’s more, the low doses
mean that healthy tissue
and organs located near the
cancer are exposed to only a
fraction of the X-rays.

CANCER MILESTONES
1970S PLANTING PROSTATE SEEDS

1991 WAVING AWAY NAUSEA

THE FIELD OF BRACHYTHERAPY WAS DEVELOPED,
WHEREBY RADIOACTIVE “SEEDS” ARE IMPLANTED
INTO CANCEROUS PROSTATE GLANDS. THE POWERFUL
PELLETS DELIVER RADIOACTIVITY DIRECTLY INTO THE
TUMOUR, HOPEFULLY LEAVING THE SURROUNDING
AREA UNHARMED. BRACHYTHERAPY IS ALSO USEFUL
AGAINST OTHER CANCERS AND REMAINS A PART OF
SOME TREATMENTS TODAY

A DRUG CALLED ZOFRAN HIT THE MARKET AND QUICKLY
BECAME A BOON FOR HORDES OF PATIENTS UNDERGOING
CHEMOTHERAPY. ONE OF CHEMOTHERAPY’S STRONGEST SIDE
EFFECTS IS VIOLENT NAUSEA. ZOFRAN AND SIMILAR DRUGS
WORK BY NEUTRALISING THE NERVOUS SYSTEM’S TRIGGER FOR
VOMITING. THE DRUGS OFFER CHEMO PATIENTS AN EFFECTIVE
STEP TOWARDS MORE NORMAL LIVING AND REGULAR MEALS,
WHICH HELPS BOOST THE MORALE

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DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

CANCER

NEWER, BETTER
TECHNOLOGY SUCH AS
MAGNETIC RESONANCE
IMAGING (RIGHT) HAS
ALLOWED FOR MORE
SOPHISTICATED MEDICAL
SCANS

at it, says Dr Len Lichtenfeld,
deputy chief medical officer at
the American Cancer Society,
in the United States.
“The focus is on
controlling cancer, less on
cure, just as if cancer is a
chronic disease, such as
diabetes,” he says, “Even
in patients with Hodgkin's
lymphoma (cancer of the
lymph tissue), we can treat it
and it never comes back as a
problem — but we know that
there are still cancer cells in
the body. The condition has
been controlled, not cured,”
he explains.
“Likewise, the recent
success of treating chronic
myelogenous leukaemia

(a white blood cell cancer)
has allowed people to have
lives apparently free of
cancer, yet, we can still find
evidence of the disease,”
continues Lichtenfeld.
“So, is that a ‘cure’? It’s
more like a ‘control’ and,
for some other cancers, in
the foreseeable future, we’ll
be able to control them
similarly,” he says. “Not all
cancers, though. In five or
10 years we’ll be controlling
advanced melanoma, but
I have to say I don't know
when we’ll be able to have
lung cancer under long-term
control for most patients.”
“We've got a saying here
at the American Cancer

2003 A BITE OUT OF OBESITY

2003 MICRO-BATTLE VICTORY

A STUDY FOUND SUPPORT FOR THE IDEA THAT WHAT
WE EAT CAN INCREASE OUR RISK OF CANCER, AND DIET
CAN ALTER GENES. RESEARCHERS FOLLOWED CLOSE
TO A MILLION AMERICANS FOR 16 YEARS AND FOUND
OBESITY COULD ACCOUNT FOR UP TO 20 PER CENT OF
CANCER MORTALITIES IN THE COUNTRY. THEY WENT ON TO
HYPOTHESISE 90,000 CANCER-RELATED DEATHS COULD BE
PREVENTED PER YEAR BY MAINTAINING A HEALTHY WEIGHT

TREATMENT OF CANCER WENT SMALL-SCALE AS AN AMERICAN DOCTOR, BRIAN
DRUKER, REPORTED SUCCESS IN THE TREATMENT OF CHRONIC MYELOID
LEUKAEMIA. HIS COMPOUND, MARKETED AS GLIVEC, BLOCKS THE PROTEIN
THAT SPARKS UNCONTROLLED REPRODUCTION OF WHITE BLOOD CELLS — AND
IT TARGETS ONLY UNHEALTHY CELLS. IN 2003 HIS EFFORTS WON HIM THE 50,000EURO (US$56,700) BRAUNSCHWEIG PRIZE FOR RESEARCH INTO MOLECULAR
CANCER THERAPY. “THE NAME BRIAN DRUKER HAS BECOME SYNONYMOUS
WITH A BREAKTHROUGH IN CANCER THERAPY,” NOTED THE PRIZE-GIVERS

81
MARCH 2014

PHOTO: GETTY IMAGES (MAIN)

RADIOACTIVE SOURCES FOR CANCER
RADIOTHERAPY. THESE PACKETS
CONTAIN SMALL "SEEDS" OF
RADIOACTIVE IODINE, WHICH ARE
USED FOR IRRADIATION OF CANCERS.
THESE ARE TO BE USED TO TREAT
PROSTATE CANCER

CANCER MILESTONES
2010 THE BOOK THAT MULTIPLIED
WHEN ONCOLOGIST SIDDHARTHA MUKHERJEE PUBLISHED THE
EMPEROR OF ALL MALADIES IN 2010, HE PROBABLY DIDN’T KNOW
WHAT A WORLDWIDE SENSATION IT WOULD BECOME. BROAD IN
SCOPE YET MANAGING TO PUT A HANDLE ON MANKIND’S 4,600-YEAROLD RELATIONSHIP WITH THE DISEASE, THE BOOK WON A SLEW OF
ACCOLADES, FROM THE PULITZER TO TIME MAGAZINE’S COMMENDATION
AS ONE OF THE MOST INFLUENTIAL 100 BOOKS IN THE PAST 100 YEARS

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DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

A SMOKING QUOTE

“It remains an astonishing, disturbing fact that in
America — a nation where nearly every new drug
is subjected to rigorous scrutiny as a potential
carcinogen […] one of the most potent and common
carcinogens known to humans can be freely bought
and sold at every corner store for a few dollars”

CANCER

Society: ‘We can win this
fight and make this cancer’s
final century,’” quotes
Lichtenfeld. “Well, the end
of this century is 87 years
away, so it’s not sensible for
me to make bold, short-term
predictions.”

RESEARCH
OVER 40
YEARS HAS
SHOWN THAT
THERE IS NO
MAGIC BULLET,
AND THERE’S
NEVER LIKELY
TO BE.
TEMPERED OPTIMISM

MONSTROUS
CHIMERA

Researchers carried out
genetic analysis of kidney
tumours from four different
people and found that cell
mutations can vary across the
same tumour (“chimera” is used
in biology to describe something
that contains a mixture of
genetically different tissues). The
researchers noted this might
be why drugs that target
specific mutations aren’t
always successful.

2012 AN ARMY OF SURVIVORS
TARGETED RESEARCH, DEVELOPMENTS OF NEW
TECHNIQUES AND A GROWING TREND FOR EARLY
DIAGNOSIS AND HEALTHIER LIVING ARE BEGINNING TO
MAKE A DIFFERENCE. IN 2012, IN THE UNITED STATES
ALONE, THE NUMBER OF CANCER SURVIVORS REACHED
12 MILLION — FOUR TIMES THE NUMBER OF SURVIVORS IN
1971, AND 20 PER CENT HIGHER THAN THE 2001 FIGURE

Every specialist that
Discovery Channel Magazine
has spoken to has admitted
to being excited about the
rapid advances being made in
their field. The survival rate
among people with cancer has
doubled in some countries
since the 1970s, and 50 per
cent are still alive five years
since their treatments began.
A number of cancers that
were never before treatable,
such as melanoma, can now
be controlled in some cases.
“All we need is
time and funding,” says
Dr Paul Workman, head of
therapeutics at the Institute
of Cancer Research in the
United Kingdom. “There is a
road block becoming evident
— drug resistance. Cancer

cells have unstable DNA,
which facilitates the ‘survival
of the nastiest’. When they are
hit by a drug, some [cancer
cells] will change their DNA
to resist it. Like HIV and
tuberculosis, we need to be
giving patients combination
treatments that make it
difficult for the cancer to find
a way around it all.”
Genomics is making that
possible. “In the next five to
10 years we’ll have catalogued
pretty much all of the cancer
genes and how they interact
with each other, and we’ll
develop inhibitors against
the majority of those,”
predicts Workman.
The enormous amount
of research in the last 40
years has shown that there is
no magic bullet, and there's
never likely to be. Instead,
we are on course to having
an arsenal of many different
weapons, each designed to be
used for precise conditions in
specific patients.
Fact remains that we will
still die, even when cancer is
fully controlled, if not cured
while the relentless fight will
continue. And it’s likely that,
as cancer declines in
lethality, other conditions
of old age will increase in
frequency. There are very few
things that are immortal —
cancer cells have had that
rare distinction. But today
they are more vulnerable than
they have ever been. They are
still part of life — but that part
is getting smaller by the day.

1971

2012

2001

2022 PROJECTION

30,00,000 1,20,00,000
96,00,000 1,8,000,000
83
MARCH 2014

FIGHTING
BACK

IT USED TO BE THAT THE WORD "CANCER" WENT, IN HUSHED TONES, WITH
THE WORD "VICTIM". FOR A NEW GENERATION OF SURVIVORS, KEEPING IT AT
BAY AND ADVOCATING EARLY DETECTION IS A MISSION THAT'S BOTH LOUD
AND PROUD. DANIEL SEIFERT SPEAKS WITH ONE GUTSY SURVIVOR

How do you think 20 years from now,
people will look back at our current view
of cancer? Maybe laugh at what a taboo
it still was, and how many people tiptoed
around the topic? Yes, sadly there are
various subjects that we don’t like to talk
about. Death, sex, money, and cancer are
the obvious ones. Some people avoided
me, as they didn’t know what to say.
Loads of funny things happened while
I was undergoing treatment. I was buying
a sofa, and a sales assistant said that if I
purchased it before the end of the month,
I got a five-year guarantee. I was stickthin, pale, had arms wrapped in bandages,
and had lost all my hair. The look on his
face was priceless when I explained I’d
only need it for three months.
This incredibly common disease comes
as a shock once it happens. Were there
aspects that surprised you? Yes, even
with statistics like one in three people
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DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

developing some form of cancer in
their lifetime, it still comes as a shock.
Everyone always thinks it happens to
someone else, or only to old people.
The type of treatment needed and the
duration was my biggest surprise. I just
ignorantly assumed I’d swallow a few pills
and would be allowed to go home. I didn’t
really know what cancer was.
The image of the tumour squeezing
your vocal chord nerves is harrowing —
did that mean you spoke less and less?
Nope, I was very talkative. But the best I
could achieve was a faint whisper. I once
called Directory Enquiries looking for
a telephone number. I remember the
operator asking why I was whispering; it
was easier to say I had a sore throat.
During treatment, doctors put you to
sleep for a week. Why? Sadly, the first
few chemotherapy regimes I was given
hadn’t worked. My tumour was still
growing. Due to its location and size,
removing it by surgery wasn’t an option.
Doctors wanted to try a new type of
chemotherapy, but the side effects were
known to be rather unpleasant. Therefore
I was kept sedated during the week-long
treatment. Each time I’d begin to wake,
they’d simply give me another jab to send
me off to sleep again.
The upside, you say, is that the chemo
“killed your lazy gene”, and gave you
a new outlook on life. Did you start
thinking of a bucket list for when you
got better? Yes, I have loads. I physically
carry a list with me. I don’t want to get
old and have a list of regrets. I’ve ticked
some things off, like running the London
marathon, getting a Guinness World
Record, winning an award for my writing
and having The Cancer Survivors Club
book published. But other items on my
list include: sail the Atlantic, and make

PHOTO: GETTY IMAGES (MAIN)

Over two decades ago, Chris Geiger was
your average happy, healthy go-getter.
Then he was diagnosed with NonHodgkin Lymphoma, and given three
months to live. He had a tumour in his
chest that doctors said was “the size of
a dinner plate”, which was strangling
his lungs and vocal chords. After two
gruelling years of chemotherapy, surgery,
radiotherapy, and a bone marrow
transplant, he was finally in remission.
But as his story ended, Geiger decided
he wanted to do something to help others.
He founded The Cancer Survivors Club,
where people tell their tales of leukaemia,
testicular cancer, and more. On World
Cancer Day in 2011, he penned a column
on the illness, which was published in
400 newspapers worldwide. That earned
him a Guinness World Record for “most
published newspaper article in one day by
the same author”. But Geiger still wanted
to do more.

a TV documentary investigating the
myths and merits of some of the 2,000
alleged cancer cures I’ve found; go on
a dinner date with Keira Knightley,
get the fiction book I wrote while
having treatment published; make a
TV documentary about how I follow
and support people having treatment;
living in Australia; and hope that one day
cancer is just a zodiac sign!
You write about watching cancer
patients who had died in the night being
transported out in makeshift coffins.
It seems like the darker things got, the
tougher you got. I guess you’re right, such
incidents made me more determined
to leave the hospital alive. If I was told I
would be in hospital for three weeks I’d
set myself a target to get out in two weeks.

CANCER

laughing at an incident helped me
enormously. Its not without reason that
laughter is said to be the best medicine.
If you could change one thing about the
way people view cancer, what would
it be? Let me just focus on prevention
for now. I appreciate that in the end,
our mortality rate is 100 per cent. I’m
sorry to break it to you like that, but
we’re all going to die someday. Yet we
can help reduce the number of lives lost
to cancer. See, breast, bowel, lung, and
prostate represent over half of all new
cancers each year. By exercising for just
30 minutes a day, you may reduce some
cancers by as much as 50 per cent. Think
how significant that is: in the UK we
could reduce breast cancer cases by 42
per cent, bowel cancer cases and prostate
cases by 20 per cent, and lung cases by
18 per cent.

SADLY THERE ARE
VARIOUS SUBJECTS
THAT PEOPLE
DON’T LIKE TO TALK
ABOUT. DEATH,
SEX, MONEY AND
CANCER TOP THE
FORBIDDEN LIST

As I mentioned earlier, it’s vital to set
goals. I met people who gave up too soon.
Since The Cancer Survivors Club
has been published, I’ve had people
write to me saying they are going to
start treatment again. Having cancer
treatment is as much about managing
your mind as your body.

TOP: CANCER SURVIVORS
HUG DURING THE SURVIVOR
CELEBRATION CEREMONY
AT THE END OF THE KOMEN
DENVER RACE FOR THE CURE IN
THE UNITED STATES
ABOVE: CHRIS GEIGER HOLDING
AN X-RAY SCAN OF HIS CHEST

It seems like many people still get quite
uncomfortable using comedy against
cancer, despite the fact that many
survivors say it’s their number one
weapon. Let’s face it, being in hospital
and having cancer treatment isn’t
the best of experiences. So if patients
can make that time more tolerable by
cracking the odd joke or having a laugh
at their own expense, why not? I have
experienced dozens of moments when

And early diagnosis can improve your
chances immeasurably, right? Right now
a third of all cancers can be cured through
early diagnosis and treatment. It took
me eight months before I was diagnosed
— it took some of the survivors in this
book many months before a diagnosis
was made. Imagine if we can save a
third of these 7.6 million deaths just by
getting them diagnosed quicker. Finally,
80,000 deaths a year could be prevented
from lifestyle changes, like reducing the
amount of alcohol consumed,
or reducing smoking and sun exposure.
So we can all do something to
dramatically decrease the chances
of being ill — I read some interesting
research recently that said over 169.3
million years of healthy life are lost each
year due to the impact of cancer. I don’t
want them to be my years!
You can read more about Chris
Geiger and his efforts to spread the
stories of cancer survivors at www.
TheCancerSurvivorsClub.com
85
MARCH 2014

THE C WORD
THIS DREADED DISEASE IS ONE OF THE GREATEST FEARS
OF OUR TIMES. BUT KNOWLEDGE, THEY SAY, IS POWER
— SO READ ON FOR A BETTER UNDERSTANDING OF THE
MALADY AND HOW IT AFFECTS THE HUMAN BODY

326.1
326.1
1. Denmark
1. Denmark

Cancer is the leading cause
of death worldwide, accounting for 7.6 million deaths in
2008, roughly 13 per cent of
all deaths for that year

9. Canada
9. Canada

12.7%
12.7%

Breast
Breast
(F)(F)

Lung
Lung

7.8%
7.8%

Stomach
Stomach

306.8
306.8
5. Belgium
5. Belgium

300.2
300.2

7. United
7. United
States
States

4

HUMOURS

10.9%
10.9%

8. Norway
8. Norway

2. Ireland
2. Ireland

#1

CAUSE OF DEATH

299.1
299.1

317
317

296.6
296.6

Hippocrates,
known
as
the “Father of Medicine”,
espoused the belief that humans are composed of four
“humours” of bodily fluids:
blood, phlegm, yellow bile
and black bile. His conviction
that cancer is caused by an
excess of black bile remained

7.1%
7.1%

Prostate
Prostate
(M)
(M)

300.4
300.4
6. France
6. France

295
295

200

10. 10.
Czech
Czech
Republic
Republic

TYPES

There are over 200 different
types of cancer, from acute
lymphoblastic
leukaemia
(cancer of cells in bone marrow) to Wilms’ tumour (form
of kidney cancer)

United
United
Kingdom
Kingdom

9.8%
9.8%

Colorectal
Colorectal
Liver
Liver

Canada
Canada
Stomach
Stomach

FIVE
MOST COMMON
CANCERS

Based on 2008 estimates, the
World Cancer Research Fund
International says the five
most common cancers are
lung, breast, colorectal, stomach and prostate
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DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

GallGall
bladder
bladder
Duodenum
Duodenum

100
THOUSAND

Some cancer cells have the
potential for as many as
100,000 random mutations
per cell

3

Pancreas
Pancreas

MONTHS
Pancreatic cancer is one of
the fastest-killing forms of
the disease, with some studies noting a median survival
rate of just three months after diagnosis

143
DAYS

In 1980, Canadian Terry Fox,
with one leg amputated due
to osteosarcoma, tried to run
the length of his homeland
to raise money for cancer research. He stopped after 143
days and 5,373 kilometres,
suffering severe chest pains.
The Terry Fox Foundation
has since raised over US$500
million for research

BIG PICTURE

HIGHEST CANCER
RATES PER
COUNTRY
IN 2010
(CASES PER
100,000 PEOPLE)
Experts think that the high
figures for these high-income
countries may merely be due
to more effective diagnosis,
or may be partly because
high-income countries have
greater incidences of obesity
and alcohol consumption,
and lower levels of physical
activity — factors that can
contribute to cancer

3

SIX

WAYS CANCER
SPREADS
Locally: Cancer cells grow
into nearby body tissues

TIMES LONGER

Blood circulation: Cells detach and are swept into the
circulatory system

Britons now live nearly six
times longer after being diagnosed with cancer than 40
years ago

20

314.1
314.1

CANCERPROOF YEARS

3. Australia
3. Australia

309.2
309.2

4. New
4. New
Zealand
Zealand

1,601
YEARS

The naked mole rat is a mammal that is immune to cancer.
Once its cells start to multiply too much, the cells shut
down. These animals can live
for over 20 years

The notebooks and materials of
Marie Curie, co-discoverer of
radium and polonium, are still
radioactive, and remain sealed
in lead. Curie died of leukaemia
in 1934, most likely from her
exposure to radiation. The most
common isotope of radium has a
half-life of around 1,600 years

ILLUSTRATION: MARK MCCORMICK

ARMED
ROBBERIES
A British man was recently
convicted of three violent
robberies, but was given a
reduced sentence because he
was found to have a brain tumour, which, the judge said,
meant he suffered “from an
abnormality of mind”

Lymphatic system: Cells detach and circulate in lymph
fluid

2 3
OF CANCERS

Two-thirds of all cancers in
the US could be prevented
simply by not smoking
and maintaining an active,
healthy lifestyle

AS LIKELY
A 2005 study found that
left-handed women are twice
as likely to develop breast
cancer than right-handed
women

10%

LEFT BREAST

120

THOUSANDYEAR-OLD BONE
The oldest evidence of cancer
thus far was discovered in
June 2013, in the bone of a
Neanderthal from 120,000
years ago. It predates previous evidence of tumours by
over 100,000 years

The left breast is five to 10 per
cent more likely to develop
cancer than the right — scientists are not sure why

10%
LEFT SIDE

Melanoma — a type of skin
cancer — is also 10 per cent
more likely to develop in the
left side of the human body
87
MARCH 2014

PHOTO: CORBIS

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DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

THE JEEP

Why
has the iconic
Jeep remained the
chariot of choice for
the die-hard adventure
lover? How does its square
design fit into modern
aerodynamic and aesthetic?
Gearhead Jeremy Torr
takes a look under the
bonnet and rediscovers
this masculine
romance
89
MARCH 2014

o first off, why is it called a
Jeep? Two legends circulate.
First, Popeye’s superpowercapable sidekick of the 1940s
was called Eugene the Jeep —
and lent his name to a vehicle
that could go anywhere, do
anything, and achieve the
impossible. Second, it was
an acronym for the initials
of "general purpose", which
is exactly what the vehicle
was. Take your choice, no
one really knows — either
way, the Jeep has to be one
of the longest-standing and
most recognisable brands
worldwide. And it almost
came about by accident.
Around mid-1940, when
the United States Army
realised that its potential
enemies (the German Army
was swarming over Europe)
had a vehicle known as the
Kübelwagen, it panicked. At
the time, the Kübelwagen
dominated over American

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DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

motor-cycles, bicycles, horses
and small trucks that were
used for light transport on the
battlefield. The result was that
nervous military commanders
sent out an urgent demand for
lightweight, fast and versatile
designs that could outdo the
German vehicle — instructing
135 carmakers to produce a
working design in all of
seven weeks.
Perhaps sensibly, 132
manufacturers decided not
to bother, and never even
applied. The remaining three
— American Bantam Car
Company, Willys-Overland
Motor Company and Ford
Motor Company — were all
keen for different reasons.
Bantam was almost bankrupt,
and was clutching at straws.
Willys had a great engine,
but no decent-selling cars
to put it in. Ford was just
Ford, and had to be in the
game; although the company

TOUGH TENDER
The requirements were a
four-wheel drive with a frontdriven axle, a working speed of
between five and 80 kilometres
per hour, a 190- to 200-centimetre
wheelbase, at least 16 centimetres
of ground clearance, a minimum
capacity of three passengers plus
driver, a 300-kilogram payload, and
an all-up weight of 590 kilograms
(later changed to 980 kilograms).
Plus, the vehicle had to allow
for a .30-calibre machine
gun to be mounted
on it.

THE JEEP

RIDE DOWN
MEMORY LANE
THE QUIRKS THAT GAVE THE JEEP ITS
ICONIC STATUS HAVE LIVED THROUGH
ITS MANY AVATARS OVER THE YEARS

1941–1945
WILLYS MB

When it comes to the Willys MB,
superlatives abound. The granddaddy of
Jeeps. The Jeep that won the war. The
vehicle that the famed New York Museum
of Modern Art reportedly called “one
of the very few genuine expressions of
machine art”. The list goes on

1949–1953
CJ-3A

This post-war beauty was a popular
recreation vehicle, and a revised 1951
model found work on many an American
farm. Armed with a hydraulic lift,
drawbar, heavy springs and rear power
take-off, among other things, it put many
plough horses and tractors out of work

1952–1971

PHOTOS: CORBIS (MAIN AND RIGHT);
2013 CHRYSLER GROUP LLC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED (SIDEBAR)

M-38A1

Built when the Cold War started to heat
up, the M-38A1 saw battle service both
in Korea and Vietnam. And you wouldn’t
want to get in the way of the M-38A1D,
which was equipped with a Davy Crocket
missile launcher that could fire a onekilotonne atomic projectile as far as two
kilometres

ABOVE: AMIDST A CONVOY OF
JEEPS, US TROOPS VENTURE DEEP
INTO SICILY DURING WORLD WAR II
RIGHT: JEEPS WERE FAMOUSLY
TOUGH ON THE BACKSIDE. THIS
POSTER READS, "THESE SOLDIERS
GO UP IN THE AIR TO PROVE THEY
CAN TAKE IT, CAMP HOOD, TEXAS"

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MARCH 2014

AMERICAN INTEREST

Unlike Europe with its
posh, highly engineered cars
that usually sold to aristocracy
and the middle classes,
America’s auto industry was
built on two pillars: simplicity
and toughness, as demanded
by farmers. But the US Army
specifications demanded
something much lighter, faster
and more agile than the norm
at the time. Neither Bantam
nor Willys had the cuttingedge designers required
to come up with a radical
solution, so Willys just fudged
it, by submitting a sample
time and cost estimate, while
Bantam threw themselves on
the generosity of a talented
and patriotic auto designer
named Karl Probst.

“I HAVE DRIVEN
EVERY UNIT
PURCHASED IN
THE LAST 20
YEARS. I CAN
JUDGE THEM
IN 15 MINUTES.
THIS VEHICLE
IS GOING TO BE
ABSOLUTELY
OUTSTANDING”
Commendably, Probst
agreed to work for no pay,
some think just to keep the
United States ahead of the
looming Nazi menace. He set
to work with a clean sheet
and within a couple of days
had come up with an utterly
unique design he called the
BRC, which stood for Bantam
Reconnaissance Car.
The US Army approved the
Bantam design, and awarded
the company the prototype
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DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

contract. Both Probst and
Bantam manager Harold
Christ were ecstatic, because
they knew their design was the
best. What they didn’t know
was that their design would
change the entire automotive
world — or that eventually, it
wouldn’t be theirs.
By September 21, 1940,
the first-ever Jeep had been
laboriously handmade at the
Bantam works, and driven to
an Army proving ground at
the Holabird Quartermaster
Depot, in Baltimore, in the
US state of Maryland. Major
Herbert J. Lawes, then
the chief purchasing and
contracting officer, gave it an
initial punishing ride up steep
hills and through gullies.
He brought it back grinning,
and is quoted as saying, “I
have driven every unit…
purchased in the last 20
years. I can judge them in 15
minutes. This vehicle is going
to be absolutely outstanding;
I believe it will make history!”
He was right. Amongst others,
General George Marshall,
former US Army Chief of Staff,
is reported to have described
the Jeep as, “America's
greatest contribution to
modern warfare.” Not bad
for a cobbled together
panic response to looming
bankruptcy.
Sadly for Bantam and
Probst, the US government
was less generous about
selflessly giving for the benefit
of the nation. Although
Bantam had obviously won the
contract with a great design,
the government awarded the
manufacturing rights to Willys
and Ford, as it had judged them
to have better production
capacity. Bantam complained,
but to no avail. The blueprints
were handed over to Ford and
Willys, and assembly began in
early 1941, at a princely sum of
US$738.74 per vehicle.
This did come with a plus
side however, as the Willys
engine, code-named the

PHOTOS: PHOTO 12 / AFP (MAIN); CORBIS (RIGHT); AGEFOTOSTOCK (FAR RIGHT); 2013 CHRYSLER GROUP LLC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED (SIDEBAR)

told the Army to forget the
deadline, as it was pulling out.
Desperation meantime saw
Willys and Bantam attempt the
deadline — and with that, the
Jeep had germinated.

THE JEEP

RIDE DOWN
MEMORY LANE

1955
CJ-5

Developed as a direct improvement on the
M-38A1, the CJ-5 boasted an increased
wheelbase, more comfortable seats, and
in 1965, a 155-horsepower V6 engine. Not
surprising then that this model had the
longest production of any Jeep, spanning
a whopping 30 years

1967–1969
M715

What’s more useful than a Jeep? A Jeep
crossed with a pick-up truck, of course.
Although its top speed was only 88.5
kilometres per hour, the M715 proved
adaptable. Forestry agents and fish and
game departments picked them up, and
the army modified them to use as an
ambulance

1976–1987
ABOVE: TWO JEEPS WERE USED
IN THE FILMING OF THE 1980
CLASSIC HORROR FILM FRIDAY
THE 13TH, BOTH 1966 CJ-5S
LEFT: WHETHER CARRYING RICE
FARMERS IN ASIA OR TRAVELLERS
ON THE KARAKORUM HIGHWAY,
IN PAKISTAN (RIGHT), THE JEEP
HAS BEEN AROUND THE WORLD
AND BACK AGAIN

CJ-7

The seventh generation of Jeep vehicles
needed something new, so the CJ-7
became the first major change in design
in over two decades. There was a
longer wheelbase, space for automatic
transmission and, for the first time,
optional steel doors. There was also an
optional all-wheel drive system, with a
funky name: Quadra-Trac

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MARCH 2014

CAR VS. WILD
HIGHLIGHTS
NOT THE TOURIST TRAIL
Bill Wu and Gary Humphrey
attempt to take Ruby from San
Felipe to the beach the hard way
— across the harshest desert in
Mexico. Temperatures can soar
to more than 40 degrees and it
gets so hot, Ruby catches fire.
Only Humphrey's quick thinking
saves her from a fiery death.
SKY PLATFORM
Wu, Humphrey and Ruby take
on Mexico's Sierra Juárez
mountains, 1,800 metres above
sea level, following a Native
American foot route to a sacred
rock platform, never reached by
car before. Their way is barred
by a maze of granite boulders
that threaten to topple, wedge or
crush Ruby at every turn.
UNEXPLORED VALLEY
In Baja, Mexico the boys point
Ruby towards a valley so remote
it has no name and has never
marked the presence of a
vehicle. To get there they have
to cross the fast-flowing and
unpredictable Rio Hardy.
CRATERS
Humphrey, Wu and Ruby visit a
massive crater that was used
by NASA to train for the moon
landings. Its central volcanic
peak has never been climbed by
car — with good reason.
WATERFALLS
Wu and Humphrey head towards
a sacred lagoon that has never
seen a car. To get there they must
travel up the winding, dangerous
rivers of the Los Tuxtla jungle,
which local legends say are
protected by spirits.

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DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

THE JEEP

“Go Devil”, was
much stronger than the
Bantam power plant, and no
doubt contributed much to
the Jeep’s eventual
overall success.

PHOTOS: DISCOVERY CHANNEL COMMUNICATIONS (LEFT), LLC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. 2013 CHRYSLER GROUP LLC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED (SIDEBAR)

“IT DOES
EVERYTHING.
IT GOES
EVERYWHERE.
IT’S AS
FAITHFUL AS
A DOG, AS
STRONG AS
A MULE, AND
AS AGILE AS
A GOAT. IT
CARRIES TWICE
WHAT IT WAS
DESIGNED FOR,
AND KEEPS
ON GOING”
The engine’s name was
pretty appropriate. The Go
Devil used a much higher
compression ratio than
normal, at 6.48:1. Instead of
the usual cast iron, it utilised
plated aluminum pistons
to keep weight down and
make them less prone to
heat, scoring and distortion
problems. Precision bearings
replaced scraper-fitted main
bearings, and the crankshaft
used counterweights to
minimise wear-inducing
vibration. Newly designed
valve springs were made of
stronger, lighter special-alloy
steel, and the engine's cooling
system was boosted to allow
it to run at high revs and low
speed when climbing hills. It
produced around 105 footpounds of torque, and almost
60 horsepower; more than
enough to power the vehicle's
lightweight 2,000-pound
(907-kilogram) body.
Ford and Willys happily
cloned the Bantam chassis
and body design, retaining the

distinctive seven-bar grille,
flat bonnet, and wheel-ateach-corner layout.

JEEP AND CHEERFUL

Stories abound of the Jeep’s
ability to take on the most
daunting of tasks and the
biggest bullies, and still come
out with the front grille and
boss-eyed headlights grinning.
Once, outside Manila in the
Philippines, a Jeep pulled
a 52-tonne train of railway
wagons for over 30 kilometres,
though exactly why this was
required is not clear. Jeeps
have been put to work as
ambulances, machine gun
carriers, cable layers, aircraft
tugs and even ploughs.
The Jeep was so versatile
and tough, rumour has it
that one was awarded a
Purple Heart for its bravery.
A Jeep could be wrapped
in a tarpaulin and floated
across a river, packed flat in
the hold of an aircraft (even
a D-Day glider), then driven
out immediately on landing.
Images and photographs of
Jeeps splashing off landing
craft and through rivers
are common. The short
wheelbase, nil overhangs and
wide track meant it could
tackle incredibly bumpy
terrain. It could tow a gun
carriage with ease — and was
surprisingly economical due
to its light weight. As for fixing
it (as Car vs. Wild will again
demonstrate), a hammer, a
spanner and a piece of wire
were usually enough in an
emergency. Everything was
easy to get at and maintain —
and if the doors fell off, well,
that just made it easier for
people to get in and out of.
As World War II journalist
Ernie Pyle is quoted as saying,
“It does everything. It goes
everywhere. It’s as faithful as
a dog, as strong as a mule, and
as agile as a goat. It constantly
carries twice what it was
designed for, and keeps
on going.”

RIDE DOWN
MEMORY LANE

1981–1985

SCRAMBLER CJ-8

Despite being a favourite of former
United States president Ronald Reagan,
who drove his sporty blue Scrambler
around his ranch, this model wasn’t a
huge seller in its day. Now, however, the
roomy Jeep is a collector favourite

1982–1986
CJ-7 LAREDO

With cherry-red colouring and a chrome
grille, it almost seems a shame to sully
the Laredo with mud and grit. Definitely
one of the fanciest models, a Jeep fanatic
once described it as “flashy without being
outrageous”. But, like any Jeep, it could
still handle most terrain thrown at it

1997–2006
WRANGLER TJ

The Wrangler tj represented a new era
for Jeep. Although quite similar to the
CJ-7 in terms of design, it was fitted
with 80 percent newly designed parts.
Its Quadra-Coil suspension, for example,
made for a far smoother ride. But classic
features still remained, such as a folddown windshield (which first appeared in
the 1940s) and removable doors

95
MARCH 2014

THE JEEP

A JEEP LIBERTY ROLLS OFF
THE LINE AT THE TOLEDO
SOUTH ASSEMBLY COMPLEX ON
NOVEMBER 16, 2011, IN THE US
STATE OF OHIO

JEEP
FOREBEARS

PHOTOS: GETTY IMAGES (MAIN); CHARLES CHUA (BOTTOM)

In the early 1900s, car
salesman Otto Zachow
invented a flexible joint that
allowed a car engine to drive all
four wheels while the driver steered
normally. With this, he and a partner
founded the Four Wheel Drive Auto
Company. An order for 50 trucks
followed soon after and by 1917,
nearly 400 FWD trucks were in
use by the British and American
armies. An impressive 18,000
of the vehicles were
eventually produced.

It wasn’t all love though. The
seating in a Jeep was basic;
actually beyond basic. It was
board-like. In fact, the original
Jeep seats were so unforgiving
on the buttocks that anal
piles became known as “Jeep
disease” in soldier slang.
Parking Jeeps on anything
but a flat area was a risk too;
the handbrake was more
for decoration than effect,
and wheel chocks were an
essential accessory.
Jeeps also had a reputation
for springing oil seal leaks.
Unless these were regularly
checked, horrible noises and
grinding to a halt could follow.
The brakes suffered heavily
from corrosion problems,
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DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

especially if used in tough
conditions while the sixvolt battery wasn’t the most
predictable. Worst of all, the
Jeep’s light weight and short
wheelbase sacrificed stability
for agility — meaning rollover
deaths were not uncommon.
Indeed, the amount of
protection if one did roll was
easy to describe: nil.
But these were all part
of the Jeep’s character, and
the machine’s speed and low
profile were used to good
advantage in daring assaults
against Rommel’s tanks and
aircraft in the Western Desert
of Africa, not to mention
countless John Wayne movies.
The Jeep lasted in much the

same format right through
from 1941 to the end of the
Korean War in 1953, and was
still being used in various roles
right up to the start of the Gulf
War, when the Hummer took
over its role with more beef.

CIVVY STREET JEEP

In 1945, the war-to-endall-wars finished. All of a
sudden, the roughly 650,000
Jeeps that had rolled off the
production lines were
redundant. Willys was in a
tough spot: if even a small
percentage of these hit
the secondhand market,
their customer base
would be decimated. The firm
argued against selling the

JEEP TOYS, LIKE THIS TOY
MODEL FROM CAR VS.
WILD, ARE A PERENNIAL
KIDS' FAVOURITE

THE JEEP

“Surfing is a physical
representation of Jeep's
values, and embodies the
spirit of freedom which
characterises each single
model produced by the
American brand. Experiencing
a total sense of communion
with nature and its forces,
challenging the waves and
the wind, with a desire to
push your own limits: it’s
the fascination of surfing
that is also more than a
dynamic sport, as it becomes
a lifestyle. Jeep also shares
with surf enthusiasts the
attitude to live out emotions
fully and in the most authentic
and independent way.” —
extract from new Jeep and
Quicksilver Roxy Pro Series
promotion

‘Legal Tender’
B-52'S

Walk into the
bank, try to pass
that trash.
Teller sees and
says, "Uh-huh,
that's fresh as grass."
See the street pass under
your feet,
In time to buy the latest model
getaway Jeep

‘Sugar Magnolia’
GRATEFUL DEAD

Well, she can
dance a Cajun
rhythm, jump
like a Willys in
four-wheel drive.
She’s a summer love for
spring, fall and winter. She
can make happy any man alive

‘Back Seat’
LL COOL J

I never knew a
four-wheel drive
could be so live,
I'll put your
numbers in the archives.
So take 'em off and put them
things on the mirror, girl,
It's my Jeep and your world
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DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

bags of grass — plus cookpots,
tents and anything that
signified being part of the
Swinging Generation. And
yet, the old benefits of tough,
easy-to-fix and practical
still held true. The Jeep had
moved on from being the
soldier’s sidekick — to the
American Dream Machine.
Between 1946 and 1987,
which is when Jeep was
sold to Chrysler, a steady
stream of ever more
comfortable and larger
aspirational vehicles kept
the company’s coffers filling
— but mainly in the United
States. On the other side
of the Pacific, Toyota had
seen the four-wheel-drive
light and produced a bigger,
more efficient and possibly
even tougher vehicle: the
Land Cruiser. This pretty
much eradicated Jeep’s
export market, and models
like the Cherokee became
known as much for weight
and poor fuel economy as
anything else. Gas guzzlers
were not cool any more. But
even then, the original-style
Jeep was still being made.
After some serious up and
downs in the 1980s and ‘90s,
and a financial bailout or two,
Chrysler, now allied to Italian
company Fiat, is still selling
the direct descendant of the

original Jeep, in the form of
the Jeep Wrangler — which
includes Ruby, one of the
stars of Discovery Channel’s
Car vs. Wild. Ruby still looks
cool, still has the same grille

ON THE CIVVY
STREET IT HAD
THE RIGHT
“JAMES DEAN
ON FOUR
WHEELS” KIND
OF IMAGE. YOU
CAN IMAGINE
THE DRIVER
THINKING, “I’M
NOT KEEPING
TO THE OLD
WAYS. I GO MY
OWN FOURWHEEL-DRIVE
WAY AND
BRING FRESH
THINKING TO
MY LIFE”
and headlight arrangement
— and as the show makes
pretty clear, still goes almost
anywhere. The Wrangler
continues the tradition. After
all, it’s a Jeep.
THE JEEP WRANGLER
UNLIMITED, PICTURED ON
RACKS, READY FOR FINAL
ASSEMBLY AT TOLEDO
SOUTH ASSEMBLY PLANT

PHOTO: 2013 CHRYSLER GROUP LLC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVE

WAVES AND MUSIC

ex-Army vehicles to civilians,
instead recommending that
they be dumped off ships, used
for target practice, blown up
or scrapped. Sadly, that is what
happened, and original World
War II Jeeps are surprisingly
rare and hard to locate.
Willys, their market intact,
began selling a modified,
slightly less austere civilian
Jeep, the CJ-2A, in late 1945.
It came with a corny tagline
of, “Gee wouldn’t it be swell
to take a Jeep to the lake
after the war?” They sold in
thousands. The car not only
appealed to farmers and
practical rural types, but also
to the post-war generation,
which was beginning to
have time, spare money and
different ideas: like heading
up-country with your
girlfriend — alone!
The Jeep was ideal for
this. And even better, it had
the right “James Dean on
four wheels” kind of image.
You can imagine the beatnik
driver thinking, as he slipped
behind the wheel, “I’m not
keeping to the old ways,
no sir. Look at me, I go my
own four-wheel-drive way,
and bring fresh thinking to
my life.” So at weekends,
Jeeps were seen flocking
out of big cities stacked with
surfboards, hang gliders, and

ILLUSTRATION: RAY TOH

BACK FROM

BEAR GRYLLS

WE ALL KNOW THE GLOBAL SURVIVAL PHENOMENON THAT
IS BEAR GRYLLS. BUT DO WE KNOW THE PERSON AND THE
TRIGGERS OF ADRENALIN RUSH FOR HIM AND HIS BAND OF
BROTHERS TO PRODUCE DISCOVERY CHANNEL’S MOST EXTREME
FOOTAGE? WITH A NEW SHOW BEAR GRYLLS: ESCAPE FROM HELL
SET TO LAUNCH, LUKE CLARK SPOKE TO THOSE WHO WORK
CLOSEST WITH GRYLLS AND PEEPED INTO HIS MIND THROUGH
FIRST PERSON ACCOUNTS

M THE BRINK

PHOTOS: DISCOVERY CHANNEL COMMUNICATIONS, LLC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED (MAIN); CORBIS (INSET)

Picture this. You are hanging
from a rope at the edge of the
world knowing that if you mess
up, your next conscious move
will certainly be your last. It’s
like a scene straight out of a
Wilbur Smith novel, except this
blockbuster is somebody’s life,
or what’s left of it.
Bear Grylls recalls a scene
on Mount Everest’s Khumbu
Icefall, “I clutch frantically for
the wall, but it is glassy smooth.
I swing my ice axe at it wildly,
but it doesn’t hold, and my
crampons just screech across
the ice. In desperation, I cling
to the rope above me and look
up. I am 23 years old and about
to die. Again.”

t this stage in his
autobiography, Mud, Sweat,
and Tears, Grylls had already
seen his life punctuated by
the do-or-die Fight Clublike battlegrounds of Brecon
Beacons in Wales, where he
overcame months of extreme
pain and stress-testing, to
emerge with the ultimate
prize: entry into Britain’s
elite Special Forces division,
the SAS. Then, in just a few
pages, he had all but thrown
that career away in the span
of minutes above the sands of
southern Africa — plunging
to the earth and messing up
standard safety protocols,

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DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

in a parachute accident that
fractured his spine in three
places and left him a broken
man, in more ways than one.
Yet, when Grylls takes
a beating, he goes back for
more. And what beatings —
after a late-night read of his
bestselling account, you can
almost feel those bruises,
fractures and lacerations.
After surviving the neardeath parachuting accident,
the adventurer’s response,
upon recovering from the
news that he could no longer
serve in the SAS, was typically
Grylls. It was time to climb
Mount Everest. But of course.

BEAR GRYLLS

So now, as he hangs above
this massive grey crevasse,
with his heart in his mouth
and a thin rope between him
and an early grave, what
thoughts flash through his
young mind? What events
would mould this raw,
accident-prone talent into
the one-man survivalist
brand he is today? And
beyond these TV moments —
whether it’s being buried alive
by an avalanche, stung by
killer bees, or drinking water
from a camel’s carcass — who
exactly is Bear Grylls, and
what’s driven him to hell and
back? We aim to find out.

RIDING THE CUSP

In his early years, Grylls
journeyed through his life
head first and somewhat
haphazardly, often with
what a regular person
might view as a cavalier
disregard for safety. More
accurately, Grylls was playing
with danger; his was a life
where risk and reward sat
in the same deck of cards,
as elements to be seduced,
mastered, and embraced —
part of the fabric of growing
up and becoming a man. Yet
one major obstacle would
serve to define his pathway all
the way to the top.

It is indicative of his outlook
on life that the survivalist
opens a section of his book
with a quote by former British
statesman Benjamin Disraeli:
“There is no education like
adversity.” Certainly, formal
education didn’t promise a
path to greatness — his GCE
A-Level grades (A, C, D, C)
were notable, he admits, only
because “they spelled the
name of a cool rock band”.
Considering that nature had
always provided Grylls with
his own personal classroom,
it was clear that the wilds
would prove his ultimate
finishing school.

103
MARCH 2014

“ADVENTURE
FELT THE MOST
NATURAL THING
IN THE WORLD.
IT WAS WHERE
I CAME ALIVE.
IT IS WHAT
MADE ME FEEL,
FOR THE FIRST
TIME, REALLY
MYSELF”
Dave Pearce has been
Grylls’ right-hand safety man
for the past 15 years, and a
regular on Man vs. Wild. An
SAS veteran of 25 years in
his own right, Pearce is as
well positioned as anyone to
know whether Grylls has lost
any of his love for the wild. “I
think adventure runs through
his blood and always will,”
he tells Discovery Channel
Magazine, on a phone line
from London, England.
“He’s not someone to sit
around and wait for things
to happen. He takes the bull
by the horns, and gets very
excited by the adventures
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DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

and environments that
he’s been in before, or by
certain experiences. And he’s
very open and up for new
experiences, and learning
new things in an adventurous
situation. So yeah, he
definitely still comes alive.”
He cites a recent example.
“Just the other day we
had to do some scenes of
power motoring. It was a bit
touch and go as to whether
the conditions were good
to fly. It was dicey, which
almost fuelled his interest.
Yet, he’s not reckless; he’s
a very sensible, savvy,
careful character. He weighs
everything up.”
It is exactly that mastering
of the cusp between the
possible and the insane that
has become the Bear Grylls
formula for compelling
television. In his capacity,
Pearce is typically in charge
of keeping everyone alive,
from Grylls himself through
to the film crew, who are
often expected to perform
the action scenes themselves
while ensuring that viewers at
home get every great picture.
We asked Pearce to
describe a typical session of
action filming. “Well, Bear
and I will discuss it at great
lengths, mainly whether it’s
feasible. He’s a very capable
character, and he can get
over, across, under and
through things a lot easier
than many people. So it’s sort
of balancing the level of risk,
that fine line between risk
and adventure on one hand,
and being reckless on the
other,” Pearce explains.
A key aspect to the filming
formula is ensuring the best
picture possible, within the
realms of safety — especially
when the shooting is literally
up in the air. “There are some
things we plan in some detail.
Free-falling for instance:
when we do any parachute
jumps and aerial work, there’s
a lot of planning,” says Pearce.

“The actual stunt itself is
often okay, but to capture it
on camera in the way we do —
thanks to the talented camera
operators we’ve had for years
— is a different game. That
requires a bit of planning,
to get these operators in
position to capture what
we’re trying to do.”
Equally important in
wilderness filming is the
ability to plan off the cuff,
adjusting the execution plan
with changes in conditions.
“We might wake up one day
and it’s just hammering it
down with rain and there’s
flash floods everywhere and
a jungle river,” he describes.
“We think, ‘Wow, this is
great, you know, let’s use this.
Let’s show the audience how
tough it can be and how it can
change, and capture that.’ We
do ad lib a lot, very quickly,”
he says. “And that’s where I
come under a bit of pressure
— to make it work and make
sure everybody’s safe.” But
more on that later.

HELL RIDE DOWN

While Grylls has taken
many challenges during his
television career, in terms of
gravity and raw pain there
have been few that compare
to his darkest days. While it
may not have the adrenalinecrazed quality of Man vs.
Wild, the latest Bear Grylls
show has the potential to
take you somewhere even
more powerful — to places
that disaster can bring us to,
and human determination
delivers you from.
Grylls is no stranger to
hellish times, and one of his
hardest began in the summer
of 1996, during a month-long
spell on a game farm in the
northern Transvaal in South
Africa. As executive producer
of Bear Grylls: Escape From
Hell Sarah Davies notes,
that one day in Africa was
an event he would refer to
in the new show.

PHOTO: DISCOVERY CHANNEL COMMUNICATIONS, LLC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

As he says of his early
boyhood encounters with
the outdoors, courtesy of an
upbringing on Britain’s Isle
of Wight, “Adventure felt
the most natural thing in
the world, and it was where
I came alive. It is what made
me feel, for the first time,
really myself,” he writes.
“As I got older, and the
rest of my world got more
complicated and unnatural,
I sought more and more the
identity and wholeness that
adventure gave me.” Yet one
wonders whether today,
after the rigours of his early
years, and a television career
spanning more than 15 years
of full-throttle filming in
some of the world’s harshest
conditions, does he still have
that same appetite?

BEAR GRYLLS

SHOW BY SHOW

A QUICK LOOK AT THE ACTION IN STORE
IN BEAR GRYLLS: ESCAPE FROM HELL
EPISODE 1 Grylls enters the Guatemalan jungle to

relive the experiences of three groups of survivors.
Mexican archaeologist Armando Anaya’s team was
attacked by bandits during an excavation of Mayan
ruins, stripped of belongings, and forced across a
dangerous river. In Malaysia, British microbiologist
John Gillat had set out on a short walk from his hotel
and got lost in the jungle, where he would have to
brave the wilds for the night. When Frenchmen Loic
Pillois and Guilhem Nayral went on an expedition into
the Amazon rainforest, it turned into a 52-day ordeal.
Grylls experiences their challenges and demonstrates
the survival skills they used — from river crossings,
to tarantula hunting, and lighting signal fires.

EPISODE 2 Grylls heads to Canada’s snow-covered,

hostile Pacific Coast mountain range, where he
throws himself into mini avalanches, jumps into
freezing-cold rivers, and leaps from a cliff ledge into
a tree top, retracing the steps of Sébastien Boucher,
Eric LeMarque, and Charles Horton, who found
themselves in the ultimate battle for survival.

EPISODE 3 In Morocco’s searing desert, Grylls
recreates the brute force of a Saharan sandstorm,
scales crumbling desert cliffs, drinks blood from
a snake and his own urine for rehydration, as he
retraces the steps of Mauro Prosperi, Ed Rosenthal,
and Merritt Myers, were all stranded in the desert.
EPISODE 4 Grylls experiences the terrifying climb

that four base jumpers, including Jace Ramsey and
Johnny Strange, were forced to attempt after they
jumped into the Grand Canyon in North Africa and
realised there was no way back out. Then, Grylls
plunges into fierce white water in Italy to relive
the story of Polish explorer Maciej Tarasin, who
lost his canoe, and paddling partner Tomek Jedrys
in a remote river canyon in Colombia. Back in the
scorching desert canyon in North Africa, Grylls
relates to the trauma of Merritt Myers, who went
through hell when he got trapped on a ledge under
a beating sun and with no water.

SEEK
WATER FIRST

“A common myth is
that if you’re lost for any
length of time‚ you’ve got to
find food. That really isn’t true‚
and you can actually survive for
weeks and weeks without it. Your
priorities should be finding shelter
and water‚ especially since in most
places you’ll be dead in three days
without water. Eating food will
also dehydrate you faster‚
so focus on getting water
before food‚” advises
Bears.

EPISODE 5 Grylls introduces three youths who
rescued themselves from mountain ranges and
impenetrable forest. British backpacker Jamie
Neale, who got lost in the mountains for a
staggering 12 days, and had to learn how to make
camp, stay alive, and finally walked out to safety
unaided. Grylls then looks at William Parven's
encounter with a black bear in California and
negotiates a steep waterfall to illustrate the dangers
that the teenager courted when he slipped and fell.
He also demonstrates the skilled techniques of Eagle
Scout Dan Stephens, who fell and knocked himself
out in Quetico Provincial Park, Canada.
EPISODE 6 In this special episode, Grylls examines

the most dramatic, entertaining, and surprising
moments from the series to give viewers a complete
picture of survival.

105
MARCH 2014

“I think that changed him,
and he understood that he
had to dig incredibly deep,”
she says. “I think that was
the hairiest thing in his life,
bar none.”

“I KNEW THAT
I HAD BLOWN
IT. WE GET ONE
SHOT AT LIFE,
AND IN THOSE
AGONISING
MOMENTS I
REALISED I HAD
MESSED THIS UP
BIG-TIME. I HAD
THIS PIT-OFMY-STOMACH
FEAR THAT LIFE
WOULD NEVER
BE THE SAME”
As Grylls writes in his
book, the adventure had
started out idyllically, as some
downtime from soldier work,
and a skydiving adventure
with friends over Zimbabwe
on a clear African evening.
Soon, the time came to jump.
“I looked down, took that
familiar deep breath, then
slid off the step. As the wind
moulded my body into an
arch I could feel it respond to
my movements,” he notes.
“As I dropped a shoulder,
the wind began to spin me,
and the horizon moved before
my eyes. The feeling is known
simply as ‘the freedom of the

sky.’ I could just make out
the small dots of the other
others in free fall below me,
then I lost them in the clouds.
Seconds later I was falling
through the clouds as well.
They felt damp on my face.
How I loved that feeling of
falling through whiteout!”
Yet this freedom would
quickly become his prison.
“Three thousand feet. Time
to pull.’ I reached to my right
hip and gripped the zip cord.
I pulled strongly.” Initially,
as he writes, it responded
as normal. The canopy
opened with a crack that
interrupted the noise of the
209-kilometre-per-hour free
fall. His descent rate slowed
to 40 kilometres per hour.
“Then I looked up and
realised something was
wrong — very wrong. Instead
of a smooth rectangular
shape above me, I had a
very deformed-looking
tangle, which meant the
whole parachute would be a
nightmare to control. I pulled
hard on both steering toggles
to see if that would help me. It
didn’t. I started to panic.”
Things were happening
way too fast, and Grylls was
not following the appropriate
procedure. “I watched the
desert floor becoming closer,
and objects becoming more
distinct. My descent was
fast — far too fast. I’d have
to try and land it like this.
Before I knew it, I was too
low to use my reserve chute.
I was getting close to the
ground now, and was coming

in at speed. I flared the chute
too high and too hard out of
fear. This jerked my body
up horizontally — then I
dropped away and smashed
into the desert floor. My body
bounced like a rag doll.”
“The impact felt as if that
rock-hard chute hard been
driven clean through the
central part of my spine. I
couldn’t stand up; I could
only roll over and moan in
agony into the dusty ground.
“I knew that I had blown it.
We get one shot at life, and in
those agonising moments I
realised I had messed this up
big-time. I had this pit-of-mystomach fear that life would
never be the same again.”
Fortunately, his surgeons
in Great Britain decided
not to operate immediately.
Given that their patient was
young and fit, with serious
dedication to rehabilitation
there was a chance he might
recover naturally. Yet,
strapped into a large metal
brace, all Grylls could think
about was the chance he’d
lost. Whether he recovered
or not, he was sure he no
longer had the body of an SAS
soldier. His self-assessment
was damning, made worse
by the fact that he’d been
trained in exactly what to do
in the event of a parachute
malfunction.

ACTION MAN

For Davies, the new Discovery
Channel show was a chance to
be on set with the adventure
icon, and to observe him

THE BEAR YEARS
EARLY LIFE

OUTDOOR CHILDHOOD

BORN EDWARD MICHAEL GRYLLS IN DONAGHADEE
IN NORTHERN IRELAND'S COUNTY DOWN, THE SON
OF CONSERVATIVE PARTY POLITICIAN SIR MICHAEL
GRYLLS AND SARAH GRYLLS. NICKNAMED 'BEAR'
BY HIS OLDER SISTER, LARA FAWCETT, HE WAS ONE
OF TWO CHILDREN

LIVING IN BEMBRIDGE, ISLE OF WIGHT,
GRYLLS LEARNED SAILING AND
CLIMBING. SENT TO BOARDING SCHOOL
AT ETON COLLEGE, WHICH HE HATED,
HE HELPED SET UP THE SCHOOL'S
FIRST CLIMBING CLUB

NORTHERN IRELAND

1974–1978
106
DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

ISLE OF WIGHT

1978–1988

BEAR GRYLLS

BEAR ESSENTIALS
FROM HIS AUTOBIOGRAPHY MUD, SWEAT, AND
TEARS, GRYLLS REMEMBERS HIS EARLY YEARS
AS A SURVIVOR
SCHOOL BULLIES "I was learning very young that if

I were to survive this place, then I had to find some
coping mechanisms. My way was to behave badly, and
learn to scrap, to avoid bullies wanting to target me.
It was also a way to avoid thinking about home. But
not thinking about home is hard when all you secretly
want is to be at home."

ENTHUSIASM "I’ve always given of myself with great

PHOTOS: DISCOVERY CHANNEL COMMUNICATIONS, LLC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED (MAIN); BEAR GRYLLS VENTURES, BGV (SPECIAL FORCES)

enthusiasm. In fact, my dad always told me that if I
could be the most enthusiastic person I know, then I
would do well. I never forgot that."

SPECIAL FORCES

IF IT AIN'T RAINING "The [drill sergeant] often told us,
'If it ain’t raining, it ain’t training.' And it rains a lot in
the Brecon Beacons. Trust me. (I recently overheard
our middle boy, Marmaduke, tell one of his friends
this SAS mantra. The other child was complaining
that he couldn’t go outside because it was raining.
Marmaduke, age four, put him straight. Priceless.)"
ENDURANCE "Endurance is the route march that has
made the selection famous — it is also a march on
which a soldier had died some years earlier from
fatigue. It is a true leveller — and unifier to all who
pass. The march would take us across the whole
Brecon Beacons mountain range … and then back
again. To drive the magnitude of the task home to us,
we realised that we would need two 1:50,000 map
sheets just to cover the route. Symbolically, it was
also the last test of the mountain phase of selection."
STRESS TESTING "I was half naked with my
camouflage jacket pulled halfway down my back, and
I was huddled over shivering. I must have looked a
mess. I could taste the snot smeared down my face.
For an hour, a psychiatrist debriefed me. He told me
that I had done well and had resisted effectively. I felt
just so relieved."
COLONEL BRIEFS SAS RECRUITS "'But what makes our

work here extraordinary is that everyone here goes
that little bit extra. When everyone else gives up, we
give more. That is what sets us apart.' It is a speech
I have never forgotten. I stood there, my boots worn,
cracked, and muddy, my trousers ripped, and wearing
a sweaty black t-shirt. I felt prouder than I had ever
felt in my life."

PARACHUTE ACCIDENT

ARTISTS RIFLES, 21 SAS

ZIMBABWE

AFTER A TRULY EPIC SELECTION PROCESS, HE
GAINED ENTRANCE INTO THE BRITISH SPECIAL
FORCES. ONE OF HIS TRAINERS, SARGEANT TAFF,
USED TO MEMORABLY THREATEN RECRUITS TO
“RIP THAT FINGER OFF AND BEAT YOU TO DEATH
WITH THE SOGGY END!”

LANDED HORRIFICALLY, AFTER NEITHER
OF TWO PARACHUTES OPENED. WITH
THREE FRACTURED VERTEBRAE, HE
WAS "WITHIN A WHISKER" OF SEVERING
HIS SPINAL CORD. IN HOSPITAL, HE WAS
DUBBED THE "MIRACLE KID"

1993–1996

SUMMER 1996
107
MARCH 2014

and his team in action in
the field. And whether it’s a
result of all the Special Forces
training, the years of TV
experience, or having learned
his lessons the hard way, one
thing today is crystal clear.
When he’s in action mode now,
Grylls is about three things in
particular: teamwork, trust
and process.
Pearce tells DCM that a lot
of the confidence Grylls has
while in the field comes from
having kept essentially the
same core team around him
through his filming career and
feeling safe in the knowledge
that he and his band of
brothers will provide the
critical checks and balances
needed to get them through
the shoots safely — and to act
to plan if and when something
goes wrong.
“It’s a very small crew.
Bear certainly likes to think
of it as like the Special Forces
of TV,” says Pearce. “Bear
leads the charge, and he and
I work things out, and the
guys capture it. They’re fit
and strong, capable and agile,
and used to operating in all
environments.” In this case,
more people would be an
obstacle: “We wouldn’t be
able to achieve what we do
with anything bigger or more
cumbersome.”
There is also the benefit
of having two former SAS
soldiers in the field. So what
exactly did the hallowed SAS
selection process — about
as gruelling and insanely
competitive as it can get —

give a soldier in terms of
training and aptitude? As
Grylls writes, army secrecy
means he cannot disclose
the details of the missions he
performed during his three
years with his squadron. “But
they included some of the
most extraordinary training
that any man can be lucky
enough to receive. I went on
to be trained in demolitions,
air and maritime insertions,
foreign weapons, jungle
survival, trauma medicine,
Arabic, signals, high-speed
and evasive driving, winter
warfare, as well as ‘escape and
evasion’ survival for behind
enemy lines.”
“I went through an even
more in-depth capture
initiation programme as
part of becoming a combatsurvival instructor, which
was much longer and more
intense than the hell we
endured on selection. We
became proficient in covert
night parachuting and
unarmed combat, among
many other skills — and along
the way we had a whole host
of misadventures.” Yet as he
describes, it was among the
most exhilarating times of his
life. “As a young man I was
living my dream. I mean, find
me a young man who isn’t
going to love being trained in
how to blow stuff up, climb
cliffs, skydive at night, and
practice evasive high-speed
driving!”
Having learned early
on how disasters happen
when procedures aren’t

followed, how does Team Bear
Grylls successfully ride this
cusp between high-octane
adventure and carelessness?
For Pearce, the key is to stay
alert, and not get carried away.
“I always say to the crew, let’s
not be complacent. We might
have done a free fall, we might
have done a rappel, we might

“AS A YOUNG
MAN I WAS
LIVING MY
DREAM. FIND
ME A YOUNG
MAN WHO
ISN’T GOING
TO LOVE BEING
TRAINED IN
HOW TO BLOW
STUFF UP,
CLIMB CLIFFS,
SKYDIVE AND
HIGH SPEED
DRIVING”
have done a river crossing a
hundred times, but I’m often
the first to say, ‘Let’s just
stop for a second, let’s just
check everything and make
sure everything’s sorted. Is
everyone completely clear
what’s going on? This is the
way we’re going to do it.’ You
know, we all totally respect
each other for what we do,
and we all communicate
exceedingly well, even in
tough environments. And I
think that’s really important.”

THE BEAR YEARS
MEETS SHARA KNIGHT

MOUNT EVEREST

A SURE BET

TWO MONTHS BEFORE HIS
EVEREST ATTEMPT, GRYLLS
MEETS SHARA KNIGHT. HE LATER
RECALLS, "SHE JUST SEEMED TO
SHINE IN ALL SHE DID." THE TWO
MARRIED IN 2000

AFTER HIS NEAR-DEATH
SCRAPE ON THE KHUMBU
ICEFALL, GRYLLS SUMMITS,
"WITH TEARS STILL POURING
DOWN MY FROZEN CHEEKS"

GRYLLS WAS FIRST SPOTTED
BY DISCOVERY CHANNEL AFTER
BEING IN A WORLDWIDE "SURE
FOR MEN" DEODORANT CAMPAIGN.
ITS TAGLINE: "WHATEVER MAKES
YOU SWEAT"

SUTHERLAND, SCOTLAND

NEPAL

MAY 26, 1998
108
DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

GREAT BRITAIN

2001

BEAR GRYLLS

ACTION
GENERATION

Sarah Davies says
Bear Grylls entered
television when field cameras
were getting lighter. “He was
very much in a generation
when suddenly TV wanted more
experiential footage; they wanted
the viewer to feel like they were
right in the heart of it. Most of
us are never going to do or
experience the things that
Bear does — but you
feel that you are by
watching him."

PHOTOS: DISCOVERY CHANNEL COMMUNICATIONS, LLC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED (MAIN); BEAR GRYLLS VENTURES, BGV (MOUNT EVEREST)

WHAT DOESN’T KILL US

As Davies notes, Escape from
Hell offers die-hard fans a
series of powerful portraits
of real-life survival, narrated
and re-enacted by the
survivalist himself. “What
sets this series apart is that
you see him putting himself in
positions that ordinary people
have got themselves in,” she
says. In taking us there, Grylls
connects with the human
stories too. “You see a more
emotional side, and he talks
about his own experiences in
a way that I haven’t seen him
do before,” she says.
“It’s a special series. It’s a
real survival show, because
every single thing he’s doing,
those guys did. And the
ingenuity of those guys in
some cases is remarkable,”
she describes. “I mean, every
single one of them really
should be dead — but they
all made it out, because they
just wouldn’t give in and they
were very, very clever.”
“What I love about them
is they’re all ages, shapes, and
sizes. They’re not all hero
types — some of them were
just ordinary people who
just got lost, you know,” she
enthuses. And yet, in finding
themselves in dire situations,
each found unknown reserves
of courage and intuition.
“They had to find something
that would get them through.
And for every one of them,
this was a transformational
experience,” says Davies.
Strangely, in some cases,
the subjects seemed as if they

MAN VS. WILD

CHIEF SCOUT

GRYLLS STARS IN SEVEN SERIES OF THE
EMMY-NOMINATED HIT SHOW. IN HIS BOOK,
HE ATTRIBUTES HIS SUCCESS TO HIS "MAGIC
THREE: GOOD FORTUNE, AN AMAZING TEAM,
AND A WILLINGNESS TO RISK IT ALL"

BECOMES THE SCOUT
ASSOCIATION'S YOUNGEST EVER
CHIEF SCOUT, TO 28 MILLION
SCOUTS WORLDWIDE. HE IS
STILL CHIEF SCOUT TODAY

DISCOVERY CHANNEL

2006–2011

were somehow saved by their
near-death experience. In
one example, snowboarder
Eric LeMarque took a wrong
turn after a great powder
run, and became lost in the
Sierra Nevada range, carrying,
according to the Los Angeles
Times, four pieces of Bazooka
bubblegum, an MP3 player,
a mobile phone with a dead
battery, keys to his home and
some matches.
Aside from being lost,
LeMarque was nursing
another affliction — a
dangerous crack cocaine
habit. Says Davies, “he didn’t
care whether he lived or died,
he was doing loads of drugs.
He talks about it on the show
— it was only when he nearly
lost his life that he suddenly
had that moment of clarity
and realised, basically, ‘What
the hell am I doing? Why am I
doing this?’”
“And he managed to give
up crack, literally overnight
— he had it on him in the
mountains, and just poured
it away. Ironically, it was the
little ziplock bag that he had
his crack in that helped save
his life, because he was able to
store water in there,” she says.
Many survivors in the show
went on to discover new
meaning as a result of their
ordeals. Davies was struck by
the way that some were driven
by love for their family. In one
episode, one guy, realising he
is lost and unlikely to survive,
decides he’ll commit suicide.
Yet, he’s determined that
rescuers must eventually find

WORLDWIDE

2009
109
MARCH 2014

THE BEAR YEARS
EXPECT MISTAKES "YOU HAVE TO GIVE YOURSELF
A LARGE MARGIN OF ERROR, AT LEAST IN THE
WILD. YOU’VE GOT TO ANTICIPATE THE WORST, AND
CONSIDER THAT IF YOU OR SOMEONE ELSE GETS
INJURED, YOU NEED TO BE ABLE TO STILL CARRY
OUT YOUR DECISION. TAKE YOUR TIME TO MAKE
THAT DECISION, BECAUSE THE REPERCUSSIONS OF
YOUR CHOICES ARE ONES THAT YOU’LL BE LIVING
WITH FOR A LONG TIME"

110
DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

BLIZZARD "CONCENTRATE ON
MAKING YOURSELF SAFE AND
GETTING OUT OF THE WIND; FIND
SHELTER HOWEVER YOU CAN. IT’S
THE SAME IN A DESERT SANDSTORM.
PEOPLE PUSH ON IN SANDSTORMS
THINKING THEY CAN FIND A WAY OUT
WHEN IN REALITY THEY’RE NEVER
GOING TO BEAT IT"

PHOTOS: DISCOVERY CHANNEL COMMUNICATIONS, LLC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

BEAR GRYLLS

his body — to ensure his wife
can draw his state pension.
“Can you imagine having
that conversation with
yourself in the middle of the
desert after you’ve been lost
for eight days? So he decided
to do it,” says Davies. “And
then, he’s got no water in his
system, so his blood won’t
bleed out. He wakes up in the
morning, and then realises,
‘I’m not going to die, I’m going
to get myself out of this.’
That’s really something, and
Bear was moved by it too.”

“ALL MY
BOTTOMLESS,
CONFIDENCE
WAS GONE. I
HAD NO IDEA
HOW MUCH I
WAS GOING TO
BE ABLE TO DO
PHYSICALLY —
AND SO MUCH
OF MY IDENTITY
WAS IN THE
PHYSICAL”
LOOKING UPWARDS

For many of us, it is only when
we’ve come close to losing it
all that we can see the most
important things with true
clarity. In the show’s desert
episode, Grylls discusses
how he empathises with the
way two of the characters, Ed
and Mauro, kept themselves
going through hunger and
exhaustion by thinking about

ALTITUDE "EVERYTHING IS WORSE AND MORE EXTREME AT
HIGH ALTITUDE; YOU’RE FIGHTING DEHYDRATION, ALTITUDE
SICKNESS, THE COLD, AND THE WIND. AN ACTION THAT’S
TOTALLY STRAIGHTFORWARD TO PERFORM AT SEA LEVEL
CAN BECOME IMPOSSIBLE AT HIGH ALTITUDE. HIGH UP IN
THE MOUNTAINS I’VE SEEN PEOPLE — MYSELF INCLUDED
— REDUCED TO CRAWLING ON THEIR HANDS AND KNEES
ALONG SOMETHING YOU’D JUST RUN UP AT SEA LEVEL"

the things they had to get
back home for. “In Ed’s case,
he decided he wasn’t going to
die because he hadn’t walked
his daughter down the aisle
yet,” says Davies.
Grylls says in the show, he’s
been through despair too. He
knows what it’s like to nearly
die and survive, describing
his own experience of hitting
rock bottom, of lying in
hospital with his back broken
in three places, unsure of
what came next. “His dad
had put a photo of Everest
at the end of his bed,” says
Davies. “And he said to Bear,
‘You have to get better,
because you are going to
climb Everest.”
Reflecting again on that
hospital bed in his book,
Grylls writes that many
people thought he must
have been “so positive” to
recover from his broken
back, enough to take on the
world again. To him, it was
quite the opposite. “It was the
darkest, most horrible time I
can remember. I had lost my
sparkle and spirit, and that
is so much of who I am. And
once you lose that spirit, it is
hard to recover,” he writes.
Uncertain whether he would
even walk properly again, let
alone climb or be a soldier, his
life loomed before him as one
big question mark. “All my
bottomless, young confidence
was gone. I had no idea how
much I was going to be able
to do physically — and that
was so hard. So much of my
identity was in the physical,”

he recalls poignantly.
The team at Headley
Court, his rehabilitation
centre, were tireless,
providing him with goals,
with intense workouts of
up to 10 hours a day that
included stretching, hydrapool sessions, counselling,
physio (“with the pretty
nurses!” he writes), and
movement classes.
Some eight months after
the accident, he was cleared
to leave — but not before he
sneaked out one night, setting
off for a ride on his motorbike,
wearing the cumbersome
back brace, and jumping on
a train homewards. Grylls, it
seemed, was coming back.
But taking on Mount
Everest? For Grylls, this “do
or die” mission was partly his
typical spirit of adventure
rearing its head again. And
curiously, it was also partly
a business decision. In his
determination to be placed
back among the realms of
extraordinary outdoorsmen
again, he figured that if
successful, the exposure of
being the youngest British
climber to summit the
mountain might give him
a springboard from which
to reconstruct his career. It
was a hunch that ultimately
proved correct. Even so,
having cheated death once,
was it not asking for trouble
to roll the dice again so soon,
on a mountain which at that
time was claiming the lives
of one in six climbers that
reached the summit?

WATER "CLEAR, CLEANLOOKING FRESH WATER ISN’T
NECESSARILY SAFE TO DRINK.
YOU SHOULD ALWAYS BOIL
WATER BEFORE YOU DRINK
IT TO MAKE SURE YOU DON’T
GET GIARDIASIS, WHICH CAN
MAKE YOU THROW UP OR GIVE
YOU DIARRHOEA”

111
MARCH 2014

BEHIND THE SCENES
SARAH DAVIES SHARES HER BITE-SIZED
LOCATION EXPERIENCES WITH GRYLLS
HEALTHY TERMITES "He was telling us that termites

have lots of citric acid in them — it’s a form of
vitamin C, I think. That’s why it’s important to eat
them, not because you get any calorific satisfaction,
but they’re good for your body in survival situations."

MOBBED "When we’re around the public, they’re

either looking at him or they’re coming over to
introduce themselves. In Guatemala [in Central
America], where we filmed the jungle episode,
he had thousands of children camping outside
the hotel. He went out to do a circuit, say hello.
Everywhere he went: Bear! Bear! Bear!"

CAMERAS ON BEAR "We put quite a lot of GoPro

cameras on him, so when he’s climbing trees or
jumping down waterfalls, he’s filming a lot of it. He
did this one where it starts to snow, he’s hanging
under the helicopter and saying, ‘Sometimes in
these amazing landscapes, as beautiful as they
are, bad things just happen. It’s how you deal with it
which determines whether you’re a survivor or not.’
That is all we told him to do, was to hold his arm out
and film himself doing it. So he did that, and then
— completely undirected by us — tilted the camera
up so you could see the helicopter. That’s pure
understanding of how to make TV."
REAL SNOWSTORM "We got caught in a snowstorm

in Guatemala that was, frankly, terrifying. There’s
one moment where I’m going: ‘Oh my God, this is
awful.’ And Bear just turns to camera and goes, ‘Oh
God, I love Discovery. Only they’d take us to a real
snowstorm.’ It was brilliant."

MORNING DRINK "We were looking at the rushes of
this pee-drinking thing, where Mauro saves himself
because he remembered you can drink your own
pee — but the important thing is, you’ve got to save
the pee that you wee in the morning, when it’s most
hydrated. Bear had to drink quite a lot, as they were
filming it, completely fine about it."
HEART-STOPPING "When this young banker,
Sébastian, got lost in the mountains, he decided
to leap off a cliff onto a tree, then climb down the
tree. It was the only way he could get down this
cliff. Bear had to do it — he wasn’t nervous, he
was brilliant getting kitted up and doing it. But I
was fairly terrified — and his heart was definitely
pumping after he’d done it."
CAN BEAR FOOT IT IN THE CITY? "I bet you if we

challenged Bear to go, like, two miles down Oxford
Street without being picked up by surveillance
cameras, I’ve got no doubt he could do it. Actually,
maybe we should challenge him; it would be quite
good fun. It could be a new series, Disappears; he
can explain how he does it."

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DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

REAL
LOCATIONS

Davies says of the
locations: "We had three
days with Bear on location
for every episode, and we had
a couple of more days of doing
the drama reconstruction. We
did jungles in Guatemala, we did
deserts in the sub-Saharan desert
in Morocco, we did the snow
and ice episode in Whistler in
Canada, and then we did
canyons in Morocco as
well as mountains
in Italy.

Perhaps not. As he writes,
“Life has taught me to be
very cautious of a man with
a dream, especially a man
who has teetered on the
edge of life. It gives a fire and
recklessness inside that is
hard to quantify.”
While it seems hard to
believe now, Grylls had a
tough time trying to gain
sponsorship, aware that to
the outside world, he was
literally a nobody. “I had no
suit, no track record, and
certainly no promise of any
media coverage. I was, in
effect, taking on Goliath with
a plastic fork,” he writes.
“And I was about to get a
crash course in dealing with
rejection. This is summed
up so well by that great
Churchill quote: ‘Success

is the ability to go from one
failure to another with no loss
of enthusiasm.’ It was time
to get out there with all of my
enthusiasm, and commit to
fail ... until I succeeded.”

BEAR UP CLOSE

Grylls seems almost from
another age — plucked from
a time when old-fashioned
quirks like brotherhood, and
pitting oneself against nature,
were more important to the
big picture than being part
of the in-crowd. This is, after
all, the man who the Scout
Association named their
Chief Scout in 2009.
Today, Grylls might be
considered an outdoors geek.
He admits that as a kid, he
was never particularly hip.
“When I was wet, muddy,

BEAR GRYLLS

that.” And how about fears?
Grylls, oddly enough, is not
great with heights. “I never
saw evidence of this, but he
referenced it in one of the
films, he said, ‘Believe it or
not, and I know you won’t,
I am still slightly nervous
about heights.’ And he means
that he’s okay hanging onto
helicopters and all the rest of
it, but he doesn’t like looking
down when he’s climbing up.
He always says never, ever,
ever look down.”

PHOTO: DISCOVERY CHANNEL COMMUNICATIONS, LLC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

SOUVENIR BUMPS

and cold, I felt like a million
dollars, and when I was
with the lads, with everyone
desperately trying to be ‘cool’,
I felt more awkward and
unsure of myself. I could do
mud, but trying to be cool was
never a success.”
And what of the name?
“Bear” is a nickname he’s
had since he was a baby,
courtesy of his sister Lara.
Friends from school called
him “Monkey” for his love
of climbing buildings and
trees as a kid. “I really
didn’t like my real name of
Edward — it felt so stuffy and
boring. Monkey or Bear was
okay by me — and they have
both stuck into adult life.”
Fortunately for his three
sons Jesse, Marmaduke and
Huckleberry, none of them

can complain of a stuffy name.
Having spent an extended
period of time filming with
Grylls, Davies gained a
greater appreciation of what
motivates him. “He took me
to one side and said, ‘You have
to understand something
about me before we make
the series. My whole world
is about empowering people
to do something remarkable
with their lives,” she recalls.
As such, championing
everyday heroes was a theme
close to Grylls’s heart, she
says. “He really wanted to
get across that sense of, life
is worth living. Sometimes
you do take risks, sometimes
bad things do happen — but
you’ve just got to hold on to
the sheer will to get through
it. And he’s a big believer in

Focus on your feet, not the
drop. It’s what he was telling
himself that day in April 1998
on Everest’s Khumbu Icefall,
when he heard the ice crack
beneath him, and, he writes,
was suddenly “falling down
this lethal black scar in the
glacier that had no visible
bottom.”
Now, hanging from the
rope, all he can do is wonder if
it will hold. “It was lightweight
thin rope that got replaced
every few days, as the ice tore
it from its anchor point.”
Thankfully, after an eternity,
there is a tug on the rope,
and he is pulled to safety.
Later that day, he lies in bed,
considering how for the
second time in recent years,
he knows he should have
died. He describes in his diary
how his elbow is sore where
he’s smashed it against the
crevasse, “and I can feel small
bits of bone floating around
inside a swollen sack of fluid
beneath it, which is slightly
disconcerting.”
The diary entry continues,
“I can’t get to sleep at the
moment — I just keep having
the vision of the crevasse
beneath me — and it’s
terrifying when I close my
eyes. Falling is such a horrible,
helpless feeling. It caused
me the same terror that I felt
during my parachute accident.

I don’t think I have ever felt
so close to being killed as I did
today. Yet I survived — again.”
It is little wonder that two
near-death falling experiences
might give you an aversion
to heights. Yet considering
the feats he takes on in each
series, including leaping out
of planes, it seems like he’s
coping okay.

HAVING
CHEATED DEATH
ONCE, WAS IT
NOT ASKING FOR
TROUBLE TO
ROLL THE DICE
AGAIN SO SOON,
ON A MOUNTAIN
WHICH WAS
CLAIMING THE
LIVES OF ONE
IN SIX CLIMBERS
THAT REACHED
THE SUMMIT?
For survivalist veterans like
Grylls and Pearce though, a
few breaks and knocks are just
a part of the game. “A few new
scars are always a good thing,
you know. I think I wouldn’t
want to get to the end of my
days without some knocks
and twists, and a few scars.
They’re all fond memories,
they’re like pictures for us,
that we can get together and
talk about. Which I suppose
might be more of a blokey
thing,” Pearce admits.
Ultimately, for Pearce,
testing their limits is well
worth the knocks. “It’s like,
yeah great, you know — let’s
get amongst it and tear it up.
Make sure we’re all safe and
fine. But we know it’s probably
going to hurt a little as well.”
Bear Grylls: Escape From Hell
Premieres Every Monday –
Sunday 9 PM, starting 7 Mar.

113
MARCH 2014

BEAR GRYLLS

KEEPING BEAR ALIVE
BEAR GRYLLS REGULARLY RISKS LIFE AND LIMB ON TV, BUT SURELY THERE MUST BE SAFETY MEASURES IN
PLACE? YES, AND YOU CAN THANK DAVE PEARCE AND THE REST OF GRYLLS’ TEAM FOR THAT. LUKE CLARK
SPEAKS TO PEARCE ABOUT HOW HE WORKS TO KEEP GRYLLS AND THE FILM CREW AS SAFE AS POSSIBLE, AND
WHY AT THE END OF THE DAY, A GOOD SHOT IS NOT WORTH LOSING YOUR LIFE OVER

Thanks for joining us. After
a decade and a half of filming
Bear Grylls, what were some
occasions where you’ve
thought, here perhaps we
have gone too far, more than
we should have? Gosh, yeah
I think the sort of people we
are, we probably do push
it a bit. But I think the two
inevitable situations are:
moving water and glaciers.

Like that scene where he
jumped from the glacier onto
a boat? Yeah. The hull of the
boat hit the iceberg and the
ice broke — pretty heartstopping moments. But then,
Bear’s a capable guy, and he
is able to get out of it. Maybe
somebody else would have
struggled, and gone in and
under the boat.
A couple of times in fastflowing water, too. Rapids
in particular have a habit
of changing second by
second. Hanging someone
off a 120-metre cliff — I
wouldn’t say it’s easy, but it’s
controllable. With people in
moving water, there comes
to a point where you have
to let go of the control. I put
measures in place, but there
were a couple of times when
despite being super-careful,
the situation got worrying.
114
DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

The most dynamic elements
are the scariest parts for me.
And it’s not only Bear pulling
the stunts; many times the
cameramen do them too.
We are a very small squad
operating with Bear; we’re
all great friends off-camera;
we party hard together away
from the field. That’s really
important.
The camera operators rely
on Bear and I to be their eyes.
They’re thinking creatively all
the time, and I regard them as
the best in the business. After
some years, I’ve got an eye for
what I think the cameraman
will want out of the shot, so
I kind of have an idea about
where we can put cameras.
Often with Dan, one of our
main camera guys, I’ll be like,
‘Here you can be right in it, in
his face filming, and I’ll have
this rope on you, and another
person beside you, so you
can just totally focus on the
shots.’ Or sometimes there’s
something that worries all
of us. It’s a good thing to
be slightly — like being in a
helicopter at 3,000 metres,
when it’s never gone to that
altitude before. There’s
always that thing where one
of us will say, ‘You know
what? I’m a bit sort of nervous
about this.’ That’s positive:
complacency does kill.
A big theme of Bear Grylls:
Escape From Hell is that while
the outdoors can get us into
these scrapes, it often brings
out the best in us too. Is that
your personal experience as
well? I am also a huge believer
in the outdoors. Having a
passion for something really

does bring you alive. It puts
you in a different place
mentally, gets rid of all the
fluff in life.
You get out there, and
there are absolutely no
mobile phone or wireless
signals. You focus on what’s
really important. Even when
I have been most anxious
outdoors, on a cliff face or a
mountain, there’s a certain
energy to it, and you come
out of it thinking, ‘Wow,
what an amazing experience.’
It fuels you for more. It is
almost like you are a more
real person, when you’ve got
rid of all that fluff.
Filming Man vs. Wild must be
totally different to a film set, in
terms of time pressure. How
tough is that, when you’re in
charge of safety? It’s the same
old story: we either haven’t
got enough money, or enough
time. Our challenges increase
when there is an avalanche
risk, or a glacier is moving.
That’s where it is pretty highoctane. We can still get the
shots, but things have changed
so much we usually need to up
our game. Someone like Bear,
you know, is very sensible,
and totally understands it.
But I treat these challenges
the same as steady walking
down a hillside slope, talking
to camera. At the end of the
day it’s only TV, you know; it’s
not worth losing your life over.
My own mantra is: come back
alive, come back friends, come
back successful — very much
in that order.
Crucial to the show is putting
Bear under a lot of physical
pressure. He eats crazy
things, gets deforming bee

stings, yet delivers pieces to
camera where most people
would be freaking out. Is this
the Special Forces training,
that muscle memory? I think
it’s a lot of practice. He’s a
very skilled presenter these
days, and very gymnastic and
athletic. We both still train
hard: when we’re together
we’ll go for workouts. In the
early days, Bear and I did a
workout in Iceland I think, in
minus-15 conditions, sleeping
outdoors and doing sit-ups on
the ice. Yeah, that’s a spin-off
from the Special Forces days.
You have to be self-motivated
to do things; you don’t wait
for people to tell you to do
that, or to go to the gym.
That’s a huge part of his DNA.
One thing I always
wanted for the show, was
that the action is the action
— and the pieces-to-camera
come before and after the
action. It’s very hard to
deliver anything to camera
during the action. So it’s
about getting that reaction
afterwards, to try and tell
the audience, ‘Wow! This is
what it felt like, this is what
it smelt like — this is what it’s
done to me.’
You mentioned earlier that
a bigger crew can mean a
less agile one. That’s a risk
of success, I imagine. As
the years have gone on,
we’ve sometimes been on
big productions, just by
the nature of the way his
career has gone. And it’s
very clunky, slow-moving,
and doesn’t really work as
effectively as the Man vs.
Wild shows — and Escape
From Hell as well.

BEAR GRYLLS

FORM – IV
Place of
New Delhi
Publication:
Periodicity of its
Publication:
Monthly
Printer’s Name: Ashish Bagga
Nationality:

Indian

Address:

K – 9,
Connaught Circus,
New Delhi – 110 001

Publisher’s
Name:
Nationality:
Address:

Ashish Bagga

Nationality:
Address:

Indian
K – 9,
Connaught Circus,
New Delhi – 110 001

Indian
K – 9,
Connaught Circus,
New Delhi – 110 001
Editor’s Name: Jamal Shaikh

Names and Addresses of individuals
who own the newspaper and partners
or shareholders holding more than
one percent of the total capital:
Owner: M/s. Living Media India
Limited, K – 9, Connaught Circus,
New Delhi – 110 001

PHOTOS: DISCOVERY CHANNEL COMMUNICATIONS, LLC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Shareholders holding more than
one percent of the total capital of the
owner company:

Was your 8,200-metre
climb up Kangchenjunga
your own most difficult
challenge? In terms of
adventure, yeah that was
tough. We were up in
the death zone, without
supplementary oxygen, which
was blooming hard, and
painful. I was climbing with
an amazing mountaineer,
and we got pinned down high
up, in a horrendous storm.
We had to retreat, but the
avalanche threat was so
bad, I really thought it was
curtains for us. We managed
to get through it, and we left
all our kit up there. We were
almost buried alive in our
tent, due to the amount of

116
DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

snow that was coming down,
and couldn’t get our cooker
going. It was pretty tense, and
I really questioned myself
then why I was doing all this,
you know. It felt very selfish
afterwards. So that was very
tough mentally.
I remember a colleague
and great buddy, who was
a bit of a mentor when I
was serving. And we were
talking about this, and he
said, ‘You’ve got to realise
that experience is the sum
total of near misses.’ That’s
always stuck in my mind. If
you go out and tick all these
sort of adventurous things,
and sometimes you tick them
a bit too hard, some are going

to bite you on the backside.
It’s a far bigger thing than we
will ever be, and that’s why
you’ve got to respect it.
I remember the captain of
the All Blacks rugby team
once describing preparing
for a rugby test as like getting
set for a car crash every
weekend. Filming with Bear
must be a little like that for
you guys. Yeah, that's true,
it certainly is and a big thing
at. And yeah, the car crash
can be a couple of dents or it
can be, you know, a lot worse.
Touch wood, you know, we
have been lucky...we’ve not
had any horrific accidents.
Fingers crossed.

1. Mr. Aroon Purie, 6, Palam Marg,
Vasant Vihar, New Delhi – 110057.
2. Mrs. Rekha Purie, 6, Palam Marg,
Vasant Vihar, New Delhi – 110057.
3. Mr. Ankoor Purie, 6, Palam Marg,
Vasant Vihar, New Delhi – 110057.
4. The All India Investment
Corporation Private Limited, K – 9,
Connaught Circus, New Delhi –
110 001
5. World Media Private Limited, K - 9,
Connaught Circus, New Delhi –
110 001
6. IGH Holdings Private Limited,
1stFloor,Industry House, 159
Churchgate Reclamation,
Mumbai- 400020
I, Ashish Bagga, hereby declare that
the particulars given above are true to
the best of my knowledge and belief.

Dt: 01.03.2014

Sd/Ashish Bagga
Signature of
Publisher

WHAT'S ON
THIS MONTH ON DISCOVERY CHANNEL

AFRICA
A journey through five diverse regions
of an amazing continent, AFRICA
will take you seamlessly from the wild
terrain of extraordinary landscapes
to intimate encounters with its
mesmerising creatures. From the
beauty and serenity of the soaring
Atlas Mountains to the Cape of Good
Hope, from the brooding jungles of the
Congo to the raging Atlantic Ocean:
experience unexplored rainforests,
never-before-filmed mountain ranges
and even snow-covered desert.
AIRS EVERY THURSDAY 8 PM, STARTING 6 MAR

118
DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

WHAT'S ON

SEVEN WONDERS
OF THE SOLAR
SYSTEM
Prepare to immerse yourself in an alien world
as if you were standing there yourself. Giant ice
fountains rising over 100km high; an ocean hidden
beneath a frozen crust of ice; storms twice the size
of Earth coloured blood red by a vortex of dust and
gases; immense volcanoes that could rip a planet
apart - this series reveals the true and awesome
beauty of our solar system. Travelling from the
Sun to the far-out reaches of Neptune, the series
has at its heart the latest scientific knowledge
beamed back from the fleet of probes, rovers and
telescopes currently in space, and offers a vivid and
unprecedented tour of the world beyond our planet.
AIRS EVERY THURSDAY 8 PM, STARTING 6 MAR

BEAR GRYLLS ESCAPE FROM HELL
BEAR GRYLLS: ESCAPE FROM HELL aims to bring to life real survival accounts of ordinary people with the world’s best
survivalist experiencing some of the highs and lows that they had to go through. It sees Bear Grylls move on in his survivalist role,
into the role of story teller – where he helps our audience experience, understand and appreciate just how incredible some human
survival stories really are. The stories featured will be some of the world’s most extreme survival stories. Bear’s job is to own these
stories and to bring the human emotion and personal perspective of how these incredible people felt.
AIRS EVERY MONDAY – SUNDAY 9 PM, STARTING 7 MAR

119
MARCH 2014

JUNGLE
GOLD
Four years ago, George Right and
Scott Lomu were real estate highrollers. By the time he was 25 yearsold George was worth a million
dollars, while 33-year-old Scott was
turning over properties for a cool
three million. But George and Scott
were so intent on the next deal they
ignored the warning signs - and lost
everything in the 2008 property
crash. With their houses and families'
futures suddenly on the line, George
and Scott had to come up with an
answer.
AIRS EVERY SATURDAY 10 PM, STARTING 1 MAR

120
DISCOVERY CHANNEL MAGAZINE INDIA

WHAT'S ON

INVISIBLE
WORLDS
The human eye is a remarkable piece of
precision engineering, but all around us
is an astonishing and beautiful world we
cannot see. Wonders which are outside
the visible spectrum, or too fast, too
slow, too small or too remote for our
eyes and brains to interpret, yet which
touch every aspect of life on Earth and
shape it in unseen ways. Now, for the first
time, this hidden world is revealed - in
action. Combining bold ideas with lucid
scientific insights and stunning footage,
the series is packed with surprising facts
as well as phenomena never seen before
on TV. Transported into the heart of
the action, viewers are immersed in a
breathtaking journey of discovery.
AIRS EVERY MONDAY 8 PM, STARTING 3 MAR

121
MARCH 2014

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