A ramble at the end of a year of travelling

Its Xmas eve and after 356 days of traveling, around 14 countries and almost 18,000 quid spent, I find myself in Fort Cochin, Kerala, South India, with just 2 days to go before going home.

In 11 months of traveling with Fayette, I learned (amongst other things) how to ride a motorcycle, scuba dive, speak a little Vietnamese/Japanese/Mandarin, farm rice and take decent photographs. I rediscovered reading (1 book a week), hiked for 22 days at altitude in Nepal, fell in love with Japan, reestablished my love for Hong Kong and China, lost a few kilos and earned myself a nice tan.

I was introduced to the misery of bed bug bites, was bitten all over by mosquitoes, was annoyed constantly by travelers who spoke about money all the time and was saddened by the corrupting nature of tourism (of which I have been part of the problem).

I also experienced first hand just how dirty the world is. Its clear to me now that not only should we enforce radical changes to our luxurious lifestyles (traveling for a year is outrageous), but also bankroll lower and middle income countries, helping introduce existing, sustainable low tech solutions. Hi-tech improvements we make at home are irrelevant in poor countries and their benefit will be swamped by the rampant pollution and destruction of biodiversity being made abroad.

Japan was without doubt my favourite country. I appreciated the cleanliness, the extensive and rapid trains. I adored the food. The capsule hotels were awesome and the traditional Ryokans a dream. I visited the public baths (sentos) frequently and I relaxed into the mindset of a country with essentially no crime. People there lived to ripe old ages and were active, riding the tube, exercising in the park, hiking up Fuji! Not to mention how stunning the country was, from the sprawl of mighty Tokyo, the greenery and temples of Kyoto and the vistas of the Japanese Alps. Having spent 2 months there, I want to live in Japan someday.

A close second was Nepal. Hiking there for 3 weeks was wonderful and something I will do again in the near future. More challenging treks await and I now know I can hike at high altitude, without porter and cover good distances for several days. I also know I suffer from the cold more than most (I lack fat) so will return with a proper four season sleeping bag and decent down jacket.

The longest time in any country was India, which truly is "A land of contrasts" (groan). Its beautiful, culturally diverse, has great food, is cheap and proper hot. However, at the same time I found it filthy, socially ugly (no sexual equality with huge class differences) and full of have-a-go scammers. Its logistically very easy to travel in India, but at the same time exhausting mentally and physically.

This is touching on why people are said to either "Love or Hate India". Well that to me is nonsense. I both love and hate India, just as I love and hate marmite (contrary to the advert's claims). Its great on toast (and banana) but I wouldn't eat it with pesto pasta. India may be politically one country (just about) but its immense, and other than spending the same currency, drinking chai and reading the same newspaper, two places can be utter dissimilar.

This was manifested by an encounter with an Indian from Delhi taking a break in the South. He spoke Hindi, but the locals spoke Tamil and Malayam, so he got by with English; speaking a foreign language in his own country to talk to fellow Indians.

Anyway, I ramble. Here are my top ten highlights for the year, roughly in chronological order...

1) Taking a 12 day Thai massage course in a small hill tribe village in Northern Thailand. Living in very basic conditions, surrounded by pigs and eating sticky rice with stewed pumpkin and papaya every morning.

2) Reading books by Richard Dawkins (The God Delusion and The Selfish Gene) which strengthened my atheistic resolve and completely redefined my understanding of evolution.

3) Scuba diving in Thailand, Vietnam and Malaysia. I hope to have many more dives in the future.

4) Traveling in South West China by local bus, and living in\walking around small, lightly touristed, rural towns.

5) Taking long distance trains in China and India and a long distance ferry from Shanghai (China) to Osaka (Japan), then Osaka to Busan (South Korea). Whats the rush?

6) Working on rice farms in Japan, riding the bullet train at 270kmh and hiking in the Japanese Alps.

7) The food! Red and green curries (Thailand), Noodle soups (Laos), Luc Lac beef (Vietnam), stir fried vegetables (China), roti canai (Malaysia), bibimbap (South Korea), sushi and katsu curry (Japan), massive veg curries (Sri Lanka) , dosas and thalis (India).

8) Traveling for a month by myself in India and Sri Lanka. Though not something I would recommend to lone female travelers.

9) Hiking the Annapurna Circuit and Base Camp in Nepal with Fayette, Meg and Liam.

10) Briefly exploring the south of India (Kerala state) with Meg.

So now I'm returning to the UK, unemployed, broke and single. But then the former two I expected and the later is for the best. I may stay in the UK, I may leave in 6 months (things are uncertain) but for the time being I'm glad to be coming home. I'm fed up with eating out 3 times a day, having to bargain for everything, living out of a bag and moving every few days.

Maida Vale beckons, as does a bitter in a pint glass and jogging along the Grand Union Canal.

Peter's Solo Travels to Sri Lanka

SL Photo Album
Back in India after eleven days in Sri Lanka (SL), I write this stretched out on the bunk of a train heading north into the mountains towards Tibet. Its hot outside, in fact the glass of the window is too warm to touch. Herds of camel, sheep and goat pass by followed by their keepers, and under the harsh sun, people work harvesting crops of millet and cotton.

My reasons for visiting SL were tenuous. In January we were taught by a SL yoga instructor who seeded the idea, but really I just wanted to go somewhere that Fayette “anywhere you've been I've been too” Fox hadn't! It wasn't exactly nearby. 2500km by train over two days, staying in the cities of Ahemdabad, Mumbai (formerly Bombay) and Chennai (formerly Madras) and a short flight of 600km.

Ahemdabad
Once a year in mid-January, everyone in town shuts up shop to fly and fight kites from their roof tops. Apparently this is quite a spectacle. Unfortunately for me it was September and instead I visited a tired and musty kite museum, while it flooded outside with torrential rain. People didn't use umbrellas and walked around the market, shin deep in murky water.

My lasting image was a man foraging through river trash a few meters from a dead cow, being picked at by crows.

Mumbai
“The most atrocious city of either hemisphere” - Aldus Huxley

The setting for the phenomenal books A Fine Balance and Shantaram, set in the 70s and 80s respectively. Things have improved, though a few people said it had lost character. I loved the 50 year old Ambassador taxis, was horrified by a family of five living on a sheet of cardboard between parked cars alongside a chaotic main road, strolled along the coastline up to Chowpatty beach and did a non-profit slum tour of Dharavi, witnessing first hand where half of Mumbai’s people live and work (thriving industry and cramped often foul living conditions).

Chennai
“An absolute shit-hole with superb food” - Peter Merrett

Not a sophisticated comment, but factually accurate. Of the tens of million of tones of solid waste generated a day, only 27% is collected and disposed of by the government (comparing unfavourably to Delhi and Mumbai which both exceed 80%. Wow!). The rivers were black and could be smelt from 100 feet and the Piss Wall* was ever present.

Meanwhile, the food and coffee was some of the best (and cheapest) I've had in India!

Needing repairs to my bag, I approached a cobbler on the street. He gladly undertook the work whilst singing the praises of his daughter who was about to graduate. She was fluent in written and spoken English and was hoping to get a job in a call centre. He called her over and we chatted. He then excitedly requested that she read my book out loud (Catch22) which she did flawlessly. When he'd finished repairing my bag, he refused to take payment. I finally forced 10 Rupees on him which he gave straight to his daughter who smiled and ran off to the nearby corner shop.

Sri Lanka
So onto to SL, home of (among others) fantastic food, tea plantations, an ancient and charming (though slow and overcrowded) train network, fantastic beaches and a repressive war in the North with daily threat of terror attacks in the South.

Soldiers were everywhere throughout the country and security blocks dominated roads leading to and within Colombo. Bus journeys were broken every 20 minutes by checkpoints, during which all men had to get off and line up for ID inspection while armed soldiers (sometimes teenagers) came onboard to question the women and search though all luggage.

The British ruled in SL (then Ceylon) until 1948. Since the 1970s ethnic tensions between Tamil Hindus in the North\East and the governing Sinhalese have escalated, as the Tamil’s desire for independence and autonomy was ignored. Norwegian brokered peace talks from 2001 brought some stability, but in January these broke down and now there is almost daily shelling of suspected LTTE hideouts (Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam) in the North with many unreported civilian causalities and 160,000 Tamil refugees. In addition to the violence, the SL government is now described as the "world's worst perpetrators of enforced disappearances", hundreds of people (mostly Tamils) vanishing since 2006.

It was disconcerting knowing this was going on, despite little visibility in the news. Brief TV reports showed no pictures, just a voice recording and static picture of the heroic troops on parade. People didn't show any sign of frustration with security checks, indeed our taxi driver one day waxed lyrical about the charming and charismatic president who he “loved”.

My time in SL didn't allow for an excursion into the natural parks. Instead I split my time between Kandy (the cultural capital), the hill country (tea plantations) and beaches of the south west coast, touring on and off with a young Polish couple (Joanna and Wojtek). We all loved SL but had very different baselines for comparison. Having just spent 10 days in the Maldives at a phenomenal coral island resort, SL for them was crowded, polluted and chaotic. For me, having spent the last six weeks in India, the comparison was quite the opposite. SL was a veritable holiday.

There were lavatories at the train station, rather than pools of shit on the platform and tracks. Other than in the capital Colombo, I saw no slums, only a handful of homeless and the streets were remarkable clean. The traffic was comparatively serene, fewer animals roamed the streets and the dogs wagged their tails excitedly as you approached (to my dismal, dogs in India are covered in wounds, aloof by day and aggressive at night.

We were accepted by the locals and not continually interrupted by the questions "Where from? What name?". They spoke sophisticated English in an accent I could understand and there were women working in public! (shop keepers, soldiers, police), a real surprise after the inequalities of India.

Three days at the end relaxing on the beach, jogging in the morning, reading and snorkeling by day with evening cocktails was a superb conclusion.

Yes it was more expensive, the coffee rubbish and newspapers little more than neatly folded trash, but it was a good value, friendly experience. Softer on the senses than India, but still lively and tropical. If you can ignore the human rights violations and repression in the North, then I’d highly recommend visiting.

Peter – Back in India, Oct 2008

* Piss Wall – If it’s a wall and it’s in India, then there's a man pissing on it.

Onsen

One perk of being in an earthquake prone country are the hot springs. There are thousands of these onsen in Japan and as a result hot public baths (sento) are part of the culture. Towns throughout Japan are littered with them and we've frequented them regularly. The etiquette is important but fairly simple and here is how it plays out.

Walk in from the street feeling sweaty and grimy. Remove your shoes, place in rack and don a pair of slippers. They'll be too small for you if you are a western man.

Purchase a voucher from the vending machine and present to the attendant. If you have no towel, you can buy a “nothing in hand” ticket, which gets you a towel, preloaded toothbrush, razor and soap.

Experience suggests now is the time to buy a cold drink, since you are about to sweat a lot and with all the temperature variations coming up, dehydration and dizziness are likely.

Girls go through the door with the red curtain, guys, blue. From here on, I tell the men's version, but I'm told the story though the red curtain is pretty much the same.

You're in the changing room and probably surrounded by five Japanese men in various stages of undress. At least one is watching telly naked, cooling down from his bath and hasn't noticed you. Some of the others briefly stare your way, surprised to see a westerner and wondering if you know the deal. You do. So no worries.

Clothes, bag, wallet, everything goes in a basket. Sometimes there are lockers, other times just a shelf. It really doesn't matter, since this is Japan and your stuff is safer here than in your house at home. Towel in hand, you go through the steamed up sliding doors into the bathing area.

The layout is a bit like the spa area of your gym. Large hot bath, sauna, cold bath, water fossett and jacuzzi. In addition there are a number of sit down showers and if you're lucky, a small bath outside (Rotenburo).

The towel that accompanies you serves a variety of roles, from covering your bits (kind of), to washing and putting over your head to cool you down.

Starting with a shower and washing thoroughly, you take your time, since the main baths are for relaxing in once clean.

Now into the big bath. The water is naturally hot (45+) and often steeped in minerals making it brown and feel soapy. There are ledges on the side of the bath so you can sit with just feet in or pretty much fully submerged. Stretching is OK, walking around with a towel on your head looks a bit funny to me but is also fine, but just sitting is best, releasing the odd sigh of relaxation.

Right, time for a sauna. It's hot (up to 100) so it might be quick. Sitting on thick towels or a foam mat are recommended.

The next five minutes will be quite familiar, except for the interruption half-way through by the fully dressed and apologetic woman who has come in to change the towels. Female staff wandering around the men's area is pretty normal. Perhaps a perk of the job, but probably not. Clientele tend to be middle-aged to senior, the rest are at work (at least when we are there).

From sauna to ice cold bath. Straight in, fully submerged then sit there with a cold wet towel on your head. Last time, as I sat shivering a man in the changing room lay down in a massage chair looking through the window. All I could see was his contorting face and one vibrating nipple. Couldn't help but laugh out loud and moved on.

If they have one, its time for an outdoor bath. This is where people lounge around and chat. Last night we went to an onsen on the top of a hill and the view of the city below us was fantastic.

If there's no outdoor option, just take another bath, but watch out for the electric seat. This has a large Japanese warning beside it, which you probably won't notice. As you swing into the seat, however, your body will convulse and it will feel

like you just slipped a disk as the electric potential applied across the ion filled water resets your autonomic nervous system. I guarantee this is not fun if you are not expecting it and only really serves to amuse the regulars.

Quick cold shower to cool down (otherwise you will sweat in your dry clothes) then you're back to the changing rooms. The guy watching telly naked is probably still there and your stuff is where you left it.

Back outside, time for another drink from the vending machine or a complimentary tea and then rest up in the tatami mat room before moving on.

You may be back tomorrow.

- Peter (Azuminoshi, Japan - 16 July)

Overweight in China (Apparently)

Overly attentive shop attendants. I can't stand them. But with so many shops and indeed so many people working in each, you can't blame them, it must be pretty boring much of the time.

No sooner do you enter, there's one by your side watching every move you make, pointing out clothes you don't want. It often scares me away. I don't really enjoy clothes shopping so the hard sell in a language I don't know is often too much to bare.

But needs must so today I found myself in another swanky clothes store in Guiyang trying to buy some pants (that's boxer shorts to all those who call traffic cones, pylons). My stealth tactics, which sometimes buy me a few minutes unnoticed, were in this case ineffectual. Before I knew it, not one but three shop girls were “helping out”, showing me different styles and having a great time discussing something among themselves.

I get the impression this place doesn't see many westerners, since looking up I see there's another group of assistants peering at me from across the room.

Right, so I'm a 34” waist so that's a medium. Easy, I'll be out of here in two minutes.

They hold up a box.

“No no they're XL, that's too big for me,” I protest in vain. They have no idea what I'm saying, but seem quite insistent.

Having managed to communicate 34 (“san shur sur”) I'm immediately upgraded to XXL.

“Really? XXL! You sure?”

Nods all round, and then another round of giggling. Oh well, who I am I to complain. Besides it costs Y20 ($3) and then its over.

They were right by the way. Perfect fit.

-Peter (Guiyang, China, June 2008)

P.S. The pants pictured we actually saw in a supermaket (that was the spelling) in Rongjiang a few weeks ago.

The Durian Den

Some of you may be familiar with the British comedy “The League of Gentleman” which tells the story of a small rural town advertised with the sign “Welcome to Royston Vasey. You'll never leave”. The show follows the day to day lives of the locals, the outsiders prevented from leaving (or killed) and an addiction to human flesh sold by the town butcher.

This leads me to discuss our stay in the town of Tulok Bahang on the Malaysian island of Penang. Arriving by ferry in Georgetown we spent a few nights before crossing to the east to hike in the coastal primary jungle. Consulting the guidebook we decided to check out Miss Loh's.

The guesthouse was located outside the town centre in a residential area, with neighbouring mosque and high school. Set well back from the road with no signs, it was difficult to find and the greeting by the dogs was not welcoming. Consisting of several wooden buildings divided into a number of rooms, it had seen better days. There was a large communal kitchen with plastic plates dotted with dried gecko poo, a lounge occupied mostly by dogs with ticks, shared bathrooms with green algae round the edges, and loads of unused stacked garden furniture.

After 120 days on the move, however, we're through with hunting down the best place on day one, so despite this we decided to give it a try.

It seemed Miss Loh's was a place where you came to disappear. She asked for no passport ID, and charged only a few dollars a night for her regulars. There was no onsite staff and she herself only visited for an hour a day, leaving the guests undisturbed.

All were long term residents, up to 18 years. Some stayed permanently, others wandered through Asia but always came back. They were men ranging from their 30s to 60s, all but one was a westerner and each of these were recluses who initiated no conversation other than phatic grunts and when asked, had sometimes interesting but usually semi-cohesive life stories.

One British guy talked about using fake passports so he still received his benefits and could stay in Malaysia beyond his visa expiry. At almost fifty, he hated the UK government (that supported him) and was traveling with his four-year-old daughter, the product of a failed marriage with a young Indonesian woman. Once his wife's residency was complete she had rejected them both.

Or so he claimed. As Miss Loh said, whilst chuckling (as she did frequently)...

“There's something not quite right in his head”

He talked about having to take responsibility for his mistakes and look after the girl the best he could, then out of the blue told me to be careful when buying drugs...

“See I've been doing it for years. Know what I'm doing and always looking out for myself, so I won't get caught. In fact I've got a load stashed in the ceiling around the light socket in a another room in town. If they ever do try and get me, I'll just go to America. I've got friends in Chicago and can just disappear”.

In my mind risking life imprisonment or death for using drugs in Malaysia is not exactly taking your role as sole parent seriously.

In addition to their sketchy backgrounds, the men shared another thing in common. They hung around during the day with nothing to do, lazying in the heat and eating durian. You see, much of the land owned by Miss Loh was uncleared forest and populated by durian trees. The hour each evening when she visited she'd sell fruit by the side of the road and many locals stopped by to collect some.

In fact everyone we met in town knew Miss Loh and the durian she sold. She was generous too, selling it by item rather than by weight and cheaply (there are just three or four foul tasting seeds inside each fruit, which weigh at least a few kilos).

To her guests she gave durian freely, though like the butcher in “The League of Gentlemen” and his addicted customers, there was never enough. One German called Peter bought an additional supply which he kept by the toilet next to his sandals (making for an extra potent smell). He gorged himself in the afternoon and walked around with green jelly drips at the corners of his mouth.

This guy in particular had been there too long. His hatred of the local kids playing on their scooters was disturbing and he cursed at the barking dogs. He seemed tired of life, spending one afternoon (post durian feast for one) playing solitaire on his mobile phone. Don't get me wrong, solitaire is a great game (Mum taught me with real cards long before Microsoft popularised it) but it is not my idea of retirement material.

Having tried our first durian we went out for dinner only to be stopped by Miss Loh and the Malay guest Kenny, who both offered us more.

Kenny: “Not many people like it at first, then it grows on you and before you know it you're addicted to the stuff”

Miss Loh: “Are you staying long?”

Fayette: 'We think one more day”

Miss Loh: “Stay as long as you want dear. [Chuckle] You sure you don't want anymore? I'll leave one out on the table for you in case.”

Poor Kenny. The one non-westerner, apparently with a flat in New York, he'd come to the guesthouse to escape “the cruel world” and get some down time from the corruption he dealt with daily whilst running his orphanage in Cambodia. Having learnt a bit of meditation in Thailand he now wanted to practice in peace and quiet. Of all the guests, this is the one I believed the most. Our knowledge of Cambodia was fresh and seemed to fit. He joked with us about marking our eggs so others wouldn't take them and told us about his mistake in offering assistance to Miss Loh.

Kenny was now the unpaid caretaker, yet still had a higher rent than some of the long timers. Things had also just taken a turn for the worse. Local kids were coming each night to the durian field to poach fruit and now Kenny was paying for a room, but living in a iron shack at the edge of the field, waking up five times a night to scare them away with his knife.

Kenny: “When it's windy and rainy you have to move your stuff around inside to stay dry, but it's quiet and I get to practice my meditation. When I'm not chasing away the thieves that is.”

Intending to stay only one night, we tasted durian and stayed for five. Fortunately we had plans to meet with Ez and Sarah in the Perinthians so had cause to leave. However, even as we left we were talking about returning.

Peter: “I'm sad to be leaving. You know that durian doesn't smell so bad after all.”

Fayette: “I could definitely work on my book here. Nice and quiet and cheap! I wonder what sort of deal Miss Loh would give us on the room.”

Peter: “I'll ask when I see her.“

Fortunately I didn't.

-Peter (Malaysia - May 2008)

Child health care in Cambodia

Before the rise of the Khmer Rouge (KR) in 1975 there were ~950 doctors in Cambodia, afterwards just 53. Now in Cambodia there are a group of five hospitals (Kantha Bopha in Phnom Penh and Jayavarmann in Siem Reap) which with the support of the King were set up by a couple of Swiss doctors, starting 1991. These hospitals provide 100% free health-care for mothers and children, treating disease and ensuring TB and HIV infections are not passed on during childbirth. Though founded with western staff, after years of training they are now staffed by 2060 Cambodian doctors and nurses, with just two Swiss remaining.

One of these men, Dr Beat Richner worked in Cambodia before the KR and came back on the explicit request of the King to become hospital director. Each week he holds a fund raising concert in Siem Reap during which he plays the Cello and talks about the the catastrophe of child health in Cambodia. Last week we went and this is what we learned.

During the KR regime there was the biggest explosion of TB in the 20th century, leaving 65% of the population infected. The infection is carried for as long as it remains untreated and is also passed to babies during birth. Lying dormant in the stomach it weakens the immune system and exacerbates subsequent infections by Japenese Encephalitis (JE), Malaria, Meningitis and particularly Dengue Fever (DF). In the case of DF, there are annual outbreaks in Cambodia and once a child is infected five times it leads to severe bleeding, requiring transfusions to save their life. Each day several children are admitted to these hospitals in shock fom DF. At the height of an outbreak in 2003, 150 a day, or 1 every 10 minutes arrived in Phnom Penh alone. Treatments can require up to 14 pints of blood, oxygen to prevent brain and kidney damage and expensive drugs.

The hospitals statistics are amazing. In the last 15 years they have treated 7.5 million children, with 75,000 hospitalised each year, and 40,000 would die were it not for the treatment administered. Annual costs are around $24m of which 90% comes from private donations (mostly Swiss) with another 5% each from the Swiss and Cambodian governments. Half this money is spent on importing drugs, since 80% of medicines are fake in Cambodia and 20% of these are toxic! Another $2m is spent on obtaining and administering safe blood, that has to be screened to protect against the 7.5% HIV and 25% Hepatitis B national infection levels. Finally $6m pays the staff, wages of $200-300 a month for nurses and $600-$700 a month for doctors.

Compared to the average national of $20 a month these wages are sufficient to eradicate corruption, systemic in Cambodian society. Dr Richner claims that his hospitals are the only corruption free infrastructure in the country (excluding some NGOs such as the Angkor Hospital for Children, which also operates in Siem Reap but are much smaller outfits).

Despite all this work Dr Beat Richner is criticised by the WHO and Save the Children who claim that the standard of care offered is inconsistent with the economic status of the country. For instance...

Despite the necessity for CAT scanners to diagnose possible brain damage caused by TB inflamed JE, the WHO claim they are excessive.

Were donated blood not screened first, then they would stand to infect 1 in 12 of their patients with HIV and 1 in 4 with Hepatitis B. The blood lab they have built is of western standard but again deemed overkill for a 3rd world country.

Meningitis treatments with modern drugs are 20x more expensive than the WHO endorsed Chloramphenicol treatment, but the later has been banned in the west due to life threatening side effects.

Dr Richner claims that the unique situation of the Cambodians demand this care. The TB infected children are particularly susceptible to DF and despite reporting the address of each infection to the government, nothing is done to stem the outbreaks (as in other countries of the region). He claims Cambodian lives are simply not valued enough. In 2003 there were 24,000 cases of DF in Cambodia and no international aid given or press coverage received. The same year one case of bird flu in the north resulted in 100s of WHO officials arriving in under 24 hours and international network wide coverage.

Whilst DF was of threat to the Cambodians only, bird flu threatened westerners too, so was dealt with no expense spared.

Indeed the consultants officials who regularly visit his hospitals and advise him to follow the cheaper WHO line of treatment for 3rd world countries, stay next door at the Sofitel hotel, at a cost of $320 a night. The cost of the average five night admittance and treatment for a child at his hospitals is just $170!

After all, the situation of Cambodian health is one of our creation. The KR only came to power because of the secret bombing campaign of the US during the Vietnam war. Cambodia was decimated with a loss of 600,000 lives (although at the time it was claimed that the US were helping the Cambodians) and the subsequent civil war was inevitable. Dr Beat Richner claims it is therefore a moral obligation to help out and do so in a manner which values Cambodian life. Ignoring the situation, or offering lesser care, amounts to a “passive genocide”.

We were very impressed with his work and saddened by his story. To find out more (or even donate as we did) you can do so here...

http://www.beat-richner.ch/

If you want to donate blood (like us) you'll need to book yourself a flight to Siem Reap (don't spend too long at the temples of Angkor Wat!).

- Peter (Cambodia - April 08)

Hanoi Traffic

Hanoi in many respects is little different from any other large Asian city. A population of several million, countless markets, continuous roadside street food/small time vendors and roads seething with traffic. Some expat residents suggested to us that the roads were unusually dangerous, the worst in the world, with scores of deaths every day. Indeed this is almost true. Fatalities per year in 2004 were 8.3 persons per 10,000 registered vehicles, comparing unfavourably to the West (1-2 per 10,000) but rather well to China (25-30 per 10,000).

After a few xe om (motor bike taxis which translates as bike hug) you see why. The roads are busting with traffic (almost exclusively Honda scooters) moving at break neck speed. London cars chug along at 10mph if you’re lucky. But hop on a xe om (even in rush hour) in Hanoi and you break for your destination at 40+.

Sure, compared to India the roads are probably orderly (we'll see in September), but the odd scooter trying to beat the flow jumping through red lights and heading down the wrong side of the road towards a turning, with 200 others bearing down on them, is just the beginning of where the order breaks down. Cyclos (very slow 3 wheel passenger bikes) and the odd oversized 4WDs are like blood clots and with bikes\scooters as their only real transport option, people carry everything with them. A stack of dead dead pigs on the back or a 5 foot orange tree is not an uncommon site. The yellow Lambo (a real rarity) seen one night, also proved a potential lethal distraction to the young male taxi drivers circling lake Khiem.

Everyone it seems has a scooter with customised seat covering, and if you've a little extra money you have a restored Honda classic or Piaggio Vespa. Its therefore no surprise that the pedestrian is a secondary concern. The extent of this marginalisation is represented by the side walk being no more than a continuous bike parking lot (broken only by vendors and shop fronts) rendered them impassible and forcing everyone onto the afore mentioned urban highway, complete with speeding orange trees and bikes with more pork momentum than driver and machine.

So walking along some of the narrower streets can be incredibly challenging and for me was often complemented by a bump, push, shout and startled retreat. However, what truly surprised me was the almost triviality of actually crossing to the other side. There were plenty of city chickens in Hanoi, wandering around doing their thing, and I'm sure they crossed the road for whatever reason, but no road kill. Even Plus sized American tourists were observed to have made it to the other side in one (big) piece. The trick is to just look up at the oncoming onslaught and like stepping into the ocean complete with scuba gear, head in with determination, at a steady speed and glare at any one who doesn't immediately change course to pass around you.

To really prove to you that this works, Fayette and I saw a blind man cross straight through the middle of a 5 way junction (we were two floors up in a cafe a few hundred feet away and unable to help). He clearly had no idea where he was going, since he stopped two thirds of the way over and came back to where he started, but nevertheless during that time several hundred families on scooters, honking taxis, and a few thousand oranges flashed past him and his cane on all sides.

- Peter (Nha Trang, Vietnam - March 08)

Laos and Angry Westerners

Our entry into Laos was by crossing the Mekong river between Chang Khong (Thailand) and Huay Xai (Laos). Visa costs were different by nation with Canada paying the most and the Middle East the least. A couple of Israelis we met joked it was about the only advantage (only they would know). We can only guess what the Canadians have done to annoy Laos.

We travelled by slow boat to Luang Prabang stopping overnight in Pak Beng. On arrival (after sunset) we were descended upon by kids who grabbed our bags from the boat and tried to run them up the hill for a fast Kip (Buck). Watching all the Westerners using the light of their cameras\phones in the dark, trying to spot their packs then getting stressed and piling back on the boat tipping it precariously to one side, was a highlight of the day.

Apparently rather predictably we headed to the Indian restaurant only to find it full and a rather unhappy neighbor Mr Sivali (manager of the Laos restaurant next door) who dejectedly remarked... "Why does no one want to eat Laos food? Many people in Laos very unhappy about this!". Unable to provide an adequate answer we headed inside for one of many good Laos meals and also an opportunity to flex my IT skills by fixing his camera phone (he'd exhausted the memory on dirty videos making the average young Laos male not that different).

Sadly the angry/stressed Westerner theme continued. A five minute wait for a group of sleepy Australians before departing on a boat to Luang Prabang resulted in abuse from Americans and Canadians ("Who the f**k do you think you are?"). Indeed a few days later we too were the subject of some European abuse, arriving back at a tour bus on time, but after the rest. Holiday (definition) = Leisure time away from work devoted to rest or pleasure. To me this does not encompass verbal abuse of complete strangers because you've been delayed a few minutes. It makes us westerners look very stupid.

The ride down to Luang Prabang (LP) ranks highly in the list so far. Rolling hills, dense greenery and the odd goat or elephant working in the field all resulting in a very easy and therefore short game of eye spy. We would spend an entire week in LP the town whose tag-line is "stay another day". Well it worked on me, though the last day was due to dodgy food rather than choice. Town life was good value being $6 a night for decent accommodation and only $8 for an Indian meal for two with beer that would cost $60 on Brick Lane.

Wanting to see more of Laos and working towards Vietnam we headed North. After a short ride in a minibus coated in Laotian vomit (they get very motion sick) and a dead dog (the driver was in a rush) we arrived in Nong Khiaw. This was the beginning of a fun but very cold few days. At 1K feet and clouded over, the temperature took a huge turn for the worse. Two days prior I had been cycling in 32 degree heat, now we were at less than 10 with only summer clothes. Coal heaters under restaurant tables and the odd fire were our only heat source, bamboo huts offering little insulation.

Despite this we saw fit to go net fishing (wading around in the river stringing nets along the bank and whacking the water with sticks) to catch tiny fish and crabs which Fay then helped cook back at the guest house. Doher (our fishing guide) was more than happy to take us, but was the subject of much amusement by the other villagers as we headed out and returned shivering. The fire back at the guest house was a treat and my clothes steamed dry whilst the dog MeMe's whiskers shriveled in the heat.

Deciding to push on to Vietnam (better weather) we took the Sawngthaeu (picture) east thinking it could only get better. We now know better. Two days of trundling through mountain roads at 3.5K feet in a freezing mist on the back of an open truck wearing only summer clothes (albeit ALL of them) was a real test for the westerners aboard, though apparently only a mild annoyance for the locals, who endured the same in just one layer, no hats no socks and sandals!

Arriving in Sam Neua took us to 4K feet and after a brief glimpse of sun we spent another freezing night in a country which doesn't seem to acknowledge the cold. What a town though, with an amazing market (see album 3). Finally we made our break for Vietnam, 12 hours in a proper bus arriving in Thanh Hoa, a few hundred km south of Hanoi. Amazingly as we passed through immigration and got stamped into Vietnam, the sun came out and the thermals and multiple layers came off. The really cold snap was over, though while we remain in the north, the temperatures remain only a shade above London.

Oh and one important travel tip for you... Before adding spare blankets to the bed, check them for ants nests (of course). If you don't you might end up covered and with a bed full of ants and eggs and would have to spend over an hour salvaging sheets before going to sleep. Now wouldn't that be fun!

- Peter (Hanoi, Vietnam - Feb 08)