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Hello,
The curtain is coming down on this little show now. After 334 days, 4 continents, 13 countries, 36 passport stamps, 20 flights, 11 over night bus journeys, at least 21 different forms of transport, 140 different "beds" to sleep for the night and two fillings...it is at an end. No more nauseating and long e-mails after this one. I will be back in the mother country by breakfast tomorrow.
I'd like to raise my hand boldly with a not inconsiderable superior manner and ask who thought that I would not lose my passport or anything valuable or get mugged or lose my kidneys? Ye doubters I scorn thee thus. Last year I lost my credit card three times...not this, oh no!
That said I have had made my last few days memorable with a new bout of Tonsillitis. And the world's favourite airline added a little touch of farce by secretly deleting my ticket home.
In the spirit of the last paragraph I thought it wise to fore worn anyone of such a daft and highly dull enterprise as travelling, especially if you've just handed in your notice to do so. Personally speaking I've had a miserable year. So here is my A to Z of a rubbishy year. (you can see I got a bit carried way and have had to give up!)
Have fun.
A- Abuse of your body: The count this year...Two fillings, two bouts Tonsillitis, four food poisonings, altitude sickness, flu, an infected finger (!), Diarrhoea, mossies and bed begs. I have never been so ill.
B - Bed Bugs: If I ever, ever (and make that one more) ever see these little bar stewards again I promise you here and now I will pour liquid mercury over them. Now I've never seen them, that's half the problem, but I can assure you they are THE single worst thing about travelling. Exactly how excruciating, frustrating and infuriating they are is say comparable to be chained to your chair and forced to listen to an endless repeat play of James Blunt...and then add Keane.
C - Cockraoches: Unlike bed bugs they are only threaten to do you a mischief. Nab 'em, grab 'em, splat the cockroach now. Instructions...take your shoe...watch the blighter scurry...focus....stay clam...breath in...hit...hit again...and hit again (remember these feinds can actually survive a nuclear winter - no really). Under no circumstances let them under your bed where such items as your shoes and wash bag may lay. I rather wish in retrospect I'd not passed up the opportunity to eat them deep fried.
D - Dust: There was a time when I thought I might never see a lush green field or green tree again. Dust in your shoes, in your clothes, in your food and in the lines of the palms of your hands. It's enough to make you rant.
E - End of dignity: It's not cross dressing wearing second hand Peruvian dresses or stuffing paper cups down your front. Nope, I lost my self dignity 12,00ft up in the Andean desert during a long long four day off road and very bumpy jeep expedition. What do you do when diarrhoea strikes in these circumstances? Take every available break to find a rock on the "road side" that slightly obscures the barren landscape, rip some pages out from the back of a book and make sure you are comfortable that the slope of the land and the wind will work in your favour.
G - Guinea Pig: Try it some time. When was the last time your dinner looked up at you and said "throw me a frigging hamster wheel here"? Also, it doesn't taste like chicken either.
H - Hygine: I'd just like to say that after 334 days I have never stooped to turning my pants inside out. But generally...
K - the King of Thailand: What a man, lets hand it to this guy. He holds out hope for all wanna be demagogues everywhere. This man can do everything better than anyone else in Thailand...the best photographer, the best dresser and recently also dabbled his hand back in his favourite life long past time - heading up military coups.
L - Legend: My brushes with fame have been surprisingly small this year. Consider that second on the list is being told that Hulk Hogan was in the Wendy's fast food restaurant in an airport departure lounge but that I couldn't see him because he'd ordered a privacy booth (no one else was in the restaurant). However I did meet a legend...Mr Steffan Dennis of Paul Robinson fame. A very funny moment, trust me, I was drunk.
M - Meeting new people: "Hey, I come from Wokingham and when I'm in Reading I like to go to the Ice Bar and Bar Med". Oh.
N - Nowhere ville: Or rather, nasty little holes of towns. There are plenty of them out there. Squalid, grey, scrambling little places where every inch of happiness and character has been surgically drained away. Surfers Paradise in Australia, Puerto Montt in Chile, Puno in Peru and Walsall. In this place called Puno they had a boating lake with paddle boats and in the centre was a fountain that sprayed the water of the lake 30 feet in to the air. At the edge of lake a man was having a pee. It says it all really.
P - Planning: And the importance of it. As in don't schedule a flight in to Lima at midnight. A city of nine million of which you don't speak the language (in a new continent). Especially when it's one of the most dangerous cities on earth and the bus driver doesn't know where to take you and isn't wearing his (necessary) glasses. And there's a curfew. Brown trouser time boys and girls.
S - Stray dogs: There are some parts of the world where it is either sacred or an art to terrorise sheepish little western folk by popularising the streets with as many mangy, growling, salivating mongrels as possible. I will never look at the Disney film "The lady and the tramp" the same again.
T - Try something new: Yep, always try something new. I tried Bananas. Still hate 'em. My horizons are comfortably narrow enough on that one thanks. Also, I tried a sweetcorn flavoured ice cream. Nope, doesn't work either.
U - Unplanned expenditure: As in getting in 25p tuk-tuk ride and ending up buying a tailor made suit from Bangkok. Did I not mention that before? It's Armani apparently, no really. No excessive or sharp waving and stretching etc in my next job interview then.
W - World Music: Music that holds the world in union essentially consists of Reggae, Jack Johnson and Counting Crows' Mr Jones. One of which you can never really hate but you wish you'd hear less of, one of which you can and one of which is the song of the millennium. Possibly.
V - Very cold: As in -25c. As in scraping the ice off the inside window of your bus at 4am. As in your hands being scalded it's so cold, as in showering in the latter.
X - X-rated: Lady boys. It's good to be able to tell them apart. I refer you to the following exchange between me, Mark and a young "host lady" in a Bangkok bar of questionable repute..."which ones are are which do you think mate?". "Well, I think I've got it sussed now, see that one there is...". Mark received an iron grip on his shoulder form a young lady... "You want another drink?". "Er no, not really...". "Listen, you buy drink. This is all lady boys...you no like, you leave ok?". Ah ha.
Y - as in "You know what I'd really like right now?": Perhaps my favourite private joke phrase of the year. It is used in sarcastic circumstances. As in "You know what I'd like right now mate?". "What's that then?". "I'd like when we get off this bus in a minute for a crowd of grubby, sweating and jostling middle aged men to assault us with pictures and offers for their flee pit riven, cockroach infested, cold shower equipped (possibly with smell of the sewers coming up through it) dives for us to randomly chose where we rest our hung over heads". "Yeah, I'd like that too."
Cheers for putting up with and maybe even reading all these e-mails. It's been fun. Please humour me when I get back. I really don't know of anything else to talk about. I'm institutionalised.
Bye,
Paul.
SMOKE ME A KIPPER, I'LL BE BACK FOR BREAKFAST
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