Tinza’s Tiddley-Bits: {Travel & Leisure}

I was recently notified of an exhibition on LV luggage in Paris. I was immediately taken in by the advert:

{From October 13th to February 27th, the Carnavalet museum in Paris is showcasing the Saga of Louis Vuitton Malletier, gathering together for the first time the iconic trunks and luggage which have embodied the Art of Travel for more than 150 years}

In 1854 Louis Vuitton opened his first store in Paris. I am not a big name brand person, but I do love the idea of trunks and old things...& travel.
Who couldn't love these cool old trunks, whether they have LV on them or not? I love the look of them:

{From decouvertes, featuring info on the LV Exhibition at the Musée Carnavalet, Paris}

They remind me, indeed, of many trunks we had around the house growing up... and no, they were not LV, but they were cool & old nonetheless. My sisters & I used to fill them up with all our dress-up clothes and I remember them all being marked CLARK.

This was because my Dad had acquired them when he immigrated to Canada at age 13. My father was born in Peshawar, what is now Pakistan, but what was then India. They used to travel back to England on the P&O (Peninsula & Orient) liners and they would pack their stuff in such trunks.

{my Dad and his family on a family trip}

{My father (furthest left) and his two brothers with my Grandpa (note the old camera in hand), in India, c. 1950s}

I don't have any photos of our trunks, since they are all in storage, but they were black, and heavy-duty, and cool--warn around the edges from their travel 1/2 way across the world. They looked similar to these:

{From Fullerton Civic Opera}

I think I love the idea of these trunks so much because they bring back memories and in my case, imaginations of a time when travel was much different.
It was much slower, the journey was part of the adventure, and it didn't involve busy, crazy, stressful airports, with line-ups in security, invasive metal-detectors, restrictions on liquids etc.. etc... and though the luggage was more cumbersome, it was so much more fun than the black 'rollies' we use today.
I remember my father telling me stories of how much fun they had on their journey to England on the ships--perhaps this is where his love for the sea began.

{An advertisement placed by Mackinon Mackenzie & Co. in Colombo in the mid 1930's promoting its newest ships the 'Strathaird', Strathnaver' and the slightly older 'Viceroy of India'. From De Fonseka}

{You can purchase prints of P&O posters here}

I was recently in an antique shop on the Sunshine Coast when I came across some old menus from the P&O liners. I have it tucked away in storage, but this one gives you an idea of how they did things differently back then.

{a 1938 menu from the Orwell Diaries}

Check out this cute postcard I found online:

{This was written in 1959 by David Hill}

P&O travel is most likely where we get the word posh from. As the tale goes, 'Posh' derives from 'port out, starboard home' supposedly printed on tickets on P&O passenger vessels that travelled between the UK and India in the days of the Raj.

Another version has it that PO and SH were scrawled on the steamer trunks used on the voyages, by seamen when allocating cabins.
The port (left-hand side) berths were mostly in the shade when travelling out (easterly) and the starboard ones when coming back. So the best and most expensive berths were POSH. The belief was widespread enough in 1968 for it to have been included in the lyrics of the song 'Posh' in the film Chitty Chitty Bang Bang:

O the posh posh traveling life, the traveling life for me
First cabin and captain's table regal company
Pardon the dust of the upper crust - fetch us a cup of tea
Port out, starboard home, posh with a capital P-O-S-H, posh

{Chitty Chitty Bang Bang--always a favourite with the nieces & nephews. Image from Collector's Quest}

So can we recapture that old-fashioned form of travel? Well, I don't think you'll recapture it by going on a modern-day P&O liner, which is now the flashy cruise ship trip...but perhaps we can try to relive it in other ways. Trying to enjoy the journey rather than getting from point A-B... Placing importance on the 'here & now' rather than on the 'what next'...& trying to enjoy every moment of the trip, in a more slow-paced atmosphere. Turn off that computer or that phone, detach yourself from your email and your texts, & sit out & enjoy that glass of prosecco concentrating on savouring that moment & its tastes. & why not carry this cute pink suitcase rather than the black hunky one on wheels?