A hint of amnesia

It is said that as you get older and dementia sets in, you remember faraway distant events of the past, but struggle to conjure up what happened recently. Far be it of me to suggest Michael Palin is succumbing to a condition linked to old age, but his "Around the World in Twenty Years," seemed to sum up the symtpoms of such a condition succinctly.
Although referring to a rather snazzy portable computer to give us a flavour of what happened 20 years ago, Michael Palin serenely careered around the Middle East and the west coast of India, in his affable style, as if the world hadn't changed much in two decades. When it came to Bombay, however, with November's terrorist attack probably fresh in anyone with an interest in the wider world, I expected at least a postscript commentary on the slaughter. After all, what did Palin visit? First of all, the Taj Hotel, iconic with its smoudlering interior last November, plus Cafe Leopold which was turned into a bloodbath and even the train station concourse where dozens were gunned down. As Palin strode the halls of the Taj hotel, I couldn't help but see Indian commandos advancing as they reeled off more automatic fire, amidst smoke and flames. As Palin chatted to a Bollywood producer in Cafe Leopold, the red blotches on the floor and upturned tables were pertinent in my imagination. The concourse I saw a terrfied charging mass, rather than the organised chaos of everyday life. But none of this was mentioned.
Maybe the producers felt even to refer to it in passing would sully the sunny disposition of the programme or they didn't have time within the show to add it in, but that made the programme frankly bizarre, as if existing in a parallel universe, with Palin the perennial traveller looking rather ill-informed, with not so much as a voiceover intoning over his perambulation. Post-production had a month to come up with something, but slipped in failing to do so, seemingly as tired as Palin looks these days. The travelogue was shown after Christmas, but it's been on my mind for a while and I'd like to get it off. The BBC has got a lot of stick, much of it undeserved from people who will not be happy until they are dancing on the grave of all publicly-funded bodies, but here the BBC deserves some criticism for this oversight.