If Karl Pilkington didn't exist, I'd probably have to invent him... then any time anyone ever calls me a "miserable northern bastard", I can refer them to Karl. Compared to him, I'm a children's TV presenter.
Karl isn't a great writer, he'd probably be the first to tell you that. Yet the diaries he kept while filming the first series of An Idiot Abroad make for amusing and, at times, enlightening reading. Unlike many other travel writers, he's not afraid to tell you about the grotty parts of the world's most famous destinations. In fact, most of the time, that's all he tells you about. He's like a more cynical, far less erudite Bill Bryson.
Every time I hear about Israel on the news it's normally something bad. It's never a story about a man who's grown the world's biggest melon, is it? Its problems are normally related to religion and seeing as I'm not into religion in the slightest, I don't understand the situation in Israel and if it's too complicated to learn overnight, I'd rather leave it. It's the same reason I've never bothered learning chess.
Karl Pilkington: travelling the world with a frown, so you don't have to bother.
