Read the english at the top of the sign: Dong Da Hospital for Anus and Intestine Disease Beijing.

Now, you tell me. Why on earth could this guy be giving us the thumbs up?

Happiness is always a by-product. It is probably a matter of temperament, and for anything I know it may be glandular. But it is not something that can be demanded from life, and if you are not happy you had better stop worrying about it and see what treasures you can pluck from your own brand of unhappiness.

Umayyad mosque, Damascus 

Souk, Damascus 

Nightview of Damascus 

Old City, Jerusalem 

Istanbul 

Kas, Turkey 

Sunset on Turkish coast 

Desert camp in Wadi Rum 

Dialogue with the Unconscious

A: Okay, good. The Camino de Santiago in Spain. My amazing endeavour, my proof to myself. My life changing experience that changed my life, well, maybe, around the edges. I know, inside, that I’ve changed. Yeah, at the core. I’ve changed. So. What’s my angle. I need an angle. Start with that Jesus line, man I guess I’ll need some research about the history of Santiago. Was it St John or St James? St James I think. The Lonely Planet will probably tell me. Where is it?

U: It’s probably in the living room on the shelf.

A: Anyway, I can find the facts out later. I’ll do the planning now. One post for each day? But I didn’t take notes each day. I guess a lot of those middle days blended after a while, but that doesn’t matter. I’ll still remember funny things about the town names, those stupid songs I entertained myself with over those many, many hours of hiking. And I won’t decide my content too much at the start, I’ll talk about the hike as much as I want, or it could be an internal journey through my blisters and pain and sleeping if I want that as well.

U: Hey, that sun is warm on our back

A: Okay, so I should write something now. Write something, to get started then I’ll be on a roll and I can go back to the planning.

U: The sun is fantastic. London isn’t that cold all the time.

A: Um… it was a dark and stormy night. No. Where do I start? In Berlin, when I took my first step out of that coffee shop with my backpack so light and that beautiful morning and the hangover?

U: The park would be really nice this afternoon.

A: Or, um, when I landed in Spain? My layover in Mallorca? My usual line about flying from Berlin to Madrid one-way: how euro is THAT!?

U: (yawn)

A: No real stories from Madrid. I was excited that I turned up so late in Leon without any real idea of where I could stay. But hard to write about that without big noting myself, and it wasn’t that impressive after all. A town of 200,000 people that’s a major train stop? And I managed to find a hotel all by myself?! Boring. It sure would sound impressive to everyone who’s never left Australia, but it’s not.

U: Hey, maybe we need a coffee

A: … Hey, maybe I need a coffee. No… I drink too much during the week why can’t I cut back on the weekend? No, I won’t have a coffee. I’ll just write. I’ll push through and write.

U: The café in the park serves espresso.

A: Okay, my first sentence will be “It’s hard to explain wh-

U: And it’s only like one pound fifty

A: How about “The story starts around 1100AD, when St Jam-

U: We could go and sit in the park for a while, have a little sleep then get a coffee

A: How about “The story starts around AD 60, when St James, one of Jesus’s inner crew, was martyred near Bethlehem.”

U: … So many facts, none of them checked.

A: It’d be good to know how he died, that’d be a good detail. Anyway “It comes as a surprise to the modern observer”, no “modern savant”

U: You really should know what that word means before you use it

A: Okay, start again: “Given the lucrative trade in holy remains that emerged in the middle ages,”

U: Oh god. He’s started a sentence with the word ‘given’

A: “it comes as a surprise to the modern observer that his mortal remains were found, over a millennium later, in rural Spain. Near the end of the earth”

U: You’ve been writing for work too much. You don’t even know what you’re doing.

A: Oh come ON. That sucks! I’m using all the bullshit shortcuts I can get away with at work!

U: sigh

A: What am I doing? What’s up today? I should be writing! I don’t want to be looking out the window, I want to be writing! Why aren’t I writing?!

U: I’ve ‘given’ you a lot of better things to be doing that’s why.

A: I can’t think of anything better to do! I should be writing!

U: okay then.

Sound of unconscious getting up, closing door. Then footsteps getting closer. Door to flat opens, in walks Unconscious.

A: What? What are you doing here? I don’t see why you’ve got to come barging in disturbing me.

U: Yeah, whatever. You’re the one wasting our time.

A: I’m trying to achieve something. Trying to write something so I have something to show for my day.

U: Um, okay. Sure. ‘Achieve’ something if you want, but don’t expect me not to come up with a million other better things to do.

A: Like what? The Camino was excellent, don’t try to say you didn’t like it.

U: It was okay, I guess

A: And I just want to write about it? I don’t write enough about these things so can you give me a little something? Maybe stop distracting me for a second?

U: I’m not trying to sabotage you or anything, I just think we’d be having a better time doing something else.

A: Like what?

U: Hello? Have you not been paying attention? Lying in the sun outside? While we still have some? Maybe close our eyes and see if you can relax long enough to get some sleep? Maybe get something to each beforehand, one of those burgers maybe.

A: Why do you talk like an American teenager?

U: I don’t know, maybe all those sitcoms you watched? Anyway, this is what I want to do: get some food, walk to the park, lie down in the sun and go to sleep if you can shut up for five minutes. THEN have a coffee.

A: Then we can do some writing?

U: Eh, whatever. Everyone will probably be at the pub by then.

A: Yeah, sure they will be. And you’ll make us go along again, like you always do.

U: You know, you used to be more fun. You’ve gotten totally precious since you went travelling.

A: Don’t try to distract me from my point. I want to do some writing this weekend. When’s it going to happen.

U: We’re missing the best part of the sun you know.

A: No, screw it. I’m going to have a cup of tea – tea! – and write something. THEN maybe go to the pub tonight.

U: Well, if the tea will get rid of this headache maybe you’ll be less crabby. Just not that green crap. Proper breakfast tea in that pint glass again.

A: Okay, okay. (goes to make tea)

U: (Calling from living room) you know what would be better than lying in the sun?

A: What? I can’t hear you.

U: YOU KNOW WHAT WOULD BE BETTER THAN LYING IN THE SUN?

A: What?

U: GETTING A BLOW JOB WHILE LYING IN THE SUN.

A: You’re offensive.

U: (Walking to kitchen) ha ha haa GO ON, ADMIT IT. YOU’D LOVE a blow job.

A: What’s your point?

U: Umm… My point is… HOW GOOD would a blow job be right now?

A: What… How… How does this help us?

U: I’m suggesting things to do that would be like a million times better than your self-important writing.

A: You don’t think its self-important. You love success as much as I do.

U: Are you kidding? You don’t even like success! It makes you uncomfortable! I’m the one that loves it. But I don’t want success right now. I want a blow job.

A: (sighs)

U: Don’t sigh at me like that.

Things one can buy in the British Post Office Shop that, arguably, have preciously little to do with the commonly-understood provision of postal services

1. Cordless drill
2. Personal stereo
3. Map of Tenerife
4. Zapf mini world doll (£0.99)
5. Travel Insurance
6. Lexmark bubble jet printer
7. Children's one-size-fits-all poncho (£1.99)
8. A "4 Films on 1 DVD" DVD (£1.99). Titles include "Horror" (Boogeyman 1&2, Halloween 4&5) and "American Heros" (Operation Delta Force 1-4)
9. A wide selection of CDs, including "The Best of the Tremoloes featuring Brian Poole" (£1.99)

In a concession to tradition, postage stamps are also available

From the Harder archives, the full story of this picture.

I'm a little to excited to think straight, so I'll just take it from the top. I'm in Interlaken, Switzerland, where there is a mountain called "Harder". I feel like I've finally come home - this is where my people are, where the ley lines here are vibrating on just the right kind of sarcasm. Also, I don't have to spell my surname for anyone. Pretty cool.

Now. You can hike up Mt Harder, but if you don't feel like the exercise you can always take a small train up there. The train's name? HarderBahn. That's basically German for the HarderTrain. Can you believe it? What a lucky, lucky camper I am.

Some clever Harders all those years ago not only discovered this mountain (actually not a mean feat because there are heaps in the area), but also decided, entrepreneurial-like, to build this cool train line up there! I am, I feel quite confident, directly descended from these clever Swiss.

So, to celebrate this kind of family/infrastructure reunion, I waltzed up the the HarderBahn yesterday (Waz - gauge looks right to put on the you-know-what-stock), pushed the driver out (his name was like, Hans Schnitzel -- obviously an imposter not worthy of driving the HarderBahn), and took the baby for a spin straight up the mountain. Not much cant to speak of, but some fairly solid gradient. Wreaked havoc with my braking profile, I can tell you. Nice corners, and some fairly hair-raising drops coming straight out of the tunnels. The Japanese tourists on the HarderBahn certainly appreciated my aggressive driving technique -- got them up there in a quarter of the timetabled journey time with the loss of only two arms that were totally carelessly put out of the windows to try to knock out the electrical wires from above us. I feel confident that the punters, sorry, passengers, will recover fully given the fine Swiss medical service. Hope they have travel insurance. Good time had by all.

Can't say the Swiss Army had the same attitude, though. (You should see the knives that they really give to the military! wow!) But, on the bright side, my holding pen has decent internet access, the Swiss court system is known for its thoroughness (as soon as I can find a family tree I will be able to submit it to evidence), and finally I can be fairly certain the Geneva convention will apply to my short stay in the Swiss penal system.

Tsunami
My sister and I were safe up north when the tsunami hit. We felt the earthquake shaking our beds gently, but we were in no danger. A lot of people I spoke to in Chiang Mai didn't even notice it, and if the earthquake didn't leave our lampshades swinging we probably wouldn't have believed it really happened.

But not four days before the tsunami hit Thailand, I was camping on a beach on an island not far from Phi Phi, dreaming about killing all the cicadas within earshot. That island must have been devestated - it was mostly flat and the only concrete structure was the toilet block. Even the resort island we stayed on after that would have been hit very hard - I've seen photos of much stronger buildings on Phuket now in rubble. I have no doubt that not only the tourist resorts but also the fishing villages and communities I saw would have been wiped out.

I feel pretty lucky, to say the least. But it's strange. When you nearly walk in front of a bus, you know that you were in real danger - 20 tons of metal swoosh by, my heart races and I panic a little - they all prove it. But I would never have known about the tsunami if not for BBC News that day. Even now when I think about the islands I saw I find it hard to imagine what they'd be like now. I went snorkelling there, I read a book about co-incidences, I played cards. That island was hit by thousands and thousands of litres of water, three days after I left it? I came that close?

Boats, monkeys, tubes
After bobbing in the lakehouses for two days, we left on lengthily boats, the kind you see in movies about the Vietnam war, expect rather than powering them by paddles or perhaps being propelled sheerly by the navigator meditating on the concept of movement, modern Thais have added what must be a diesel tractor engine to the back, its spluttering coughing engine primarily producing metres of black smoke and a lot of noise pollution, as well the byproduct of just enough kinetic energy to rotate the tiny propeller and move us forward in the water.

After the longtail boat and a truck ride of a couple of hours (I managed to snag a ride in the airconditioned cabin, while everyone else sat on two planks in the back) we arrived right on the other side of the national park, at Art's Bungalows. Art's was a very peaceful location, in front of another big lump of limestone mountain, with the river flowing meekly past. In the evenings a little band of monkeys would venture out to play, scratch themselves, swim into the water to catch bread thrown by the German kids, and randomly engage in not-entirely-consensual rumpy-pumpy.

The day after we arrived, we went tubing down the river. Because it was dry season, the river lacked about a foot of water that would've protected my derriere from the bumps of rocks as we moved gently downstream. I felt a sense of true peace descend on me as I bobbed downstream, my head resting back on the tube to look back to see the trees and bushes meeting the curves to the river, hearing only the swish and tumble of the water. Then I looked back up to see our Thai river guide winning a place in my heart forever by handing me a new bottle of Singha. It was one of the moments that I travel for.

Cicadas
About a week later we were camping on the island of Koh Rok. I was hoping for a similar sense of peace and total relaxation to descend on me, but my frame of mind was disturbed slightly by the oppressive and continuous whine of cicadas, pitched at the perfect tone to eventually but inevitably lead to human madness. I filled in more than an hour or two daydreaming about the perfect way to commit genocide to my little insect friends, and I'd like to share the results with you.

1 - The preferred option - through the employment of previously-untapped superpowers, to snap my fingers and have every cicada on the island fall from every tree, inert and lifeless, its brittle wings to torment me no more.

Some details need to be considered in the implementation of this strategy. First - how to unleash said superpowers. Second - need to ensure that cicadas don't hold a niche in the Koh Rok environment that prevents the rise in vast numbers of an even louder and more sanity-challenging insect. Would hate to see my carefully developed superpowers applied only to find cicadas are only natural predators of an even more annoying insect - perhaps crickets whose mating call is The Best of John Denver, and which know how to use the island's PA system. (Note to self - check that PA system is cricket-proof as first step).

2 - Choose one cicada (the one who burrowed into my shirt last night over dinner and stayed there unknown to me for several hours seems as good a candidate as any) and infect it with insect plague, which quickly spreads across the entire population. The virus lies inert until the cicada begins rubbing its wings together when - phfoot - the insect spontaneously explodes and all that remains is a gentle falling mist of insect goo.

3- Publish nasty, spiteful review of the cicada singing in the Koh Rok Times. Wait for sensitive cicada artistic temperament to take offence and watch as cicadas leave island in huff.

4 - Ring friend on mobile phone, casually mention that we have come across a militant branch of communist Al-Qaeda reading the New Yorker. Retreat to water as Donald Rumsfeld personally drops enough Agent Orange and laser-guided missiles to level island, including cicadas. Emerge from water and enjoy the serenity.

This option has bonus of not needing to carry out potentially long and certainly boring evaluation of islands ecosystem - no chance of more annoying insect rising to dominance when the whole place will be annihilated!

Khao Sok National Park
After Bangkok we went to floating rafthouses on the dammed lake in Khao Sok national park. We rode a long-tail boat, past limestone mountains erupting out of the water, their cliffs towering what seemed to be hundreds of metres above the water. The jungle wrapped itself around the cliffs unevenly, a mess of trees and vines. Sometimes the jungle covered the rock evenly all the way to the edge of the water, sometimes it left the rock bar and empty. Seven years ago they lowered the level of the dam about five metres, leaving a pale strip of rock at the base of most cliffs, where the jungle stopped neatly. To me, this looked precisely like a choc-top from the Astor in Melbourne, where the chocolate coating stops just short of the cone, revealing a neat line of white ice-cream.

After about an hour, the boat arrived at our accomodation - the Plern Prai rafthouses. They look like sturdy set of huts as we approached over the water, so it was only once I was on them that I realised that the huts actually float on the water, supported by sunken logs and the remains of acres of bamboo forests. One minute they look so sturdy and dependable, the next it looks like a strong wave would send the rafts off in separate directions. Most of the time, though the huts and the bamboo walkway that connects them shifts to accomodate my weight confidently - it was only the long and decidedly dodgy section that connected the huts to the toilet block on the mainland that where I tread carefully.

The place was so peaceful all day, but especially so in the soft light of the mornings when the noises of the forests carried across from the lake. After jumping straight off the walkway into the lake, I could hear amazing bird calls echoingfrom the mountains, or locusts or crickets twittering from nearby. Occasionally a gibbon called out in their sing-song chant, which one of the Thai guys here assured me was a mating call. I spent a few minutes just listening to the noises of the lake around me - the chatter of the staff working, the creaking of the bamboo walkways as they shift to a new position, the heavy roar of a long-tail boat ferrying people in or out, then a few moments later the gentle lapping sound of its wake against our huts.

Jetlag

I hadn't slept enough, nowhere near enough. And those three glasses of red wine had caused headaches well out of proportion with the amount of alcohol they contained, but that was probably because the tiny portion of roast pork in my dinner wouldn't have satisfied a sparrow. And once I had woken up I had to sit for hours on a bus as it stop-started through smoggy crowded streets, then trudge through hundreds or thousands of people shuffling slowly in front of me.

I eventually found my room, and after a few hours of sleep my foul mood lifted long enough for me to realise... hold on a minute... that I wasn't hungover, I was jetlagged! And this wasn't London, it was Bangkok. That was the 414, it was the airport shuttle!!

It all suddenly made sense.

And so here I am no, trying to face breakfast when all my body wants to be doing is what all sane Londoners are doing at the moment - making the always-unwise decision to have a third martini!

Of course, there are thousands of differences between Bangkok and London. You can get good coffee here, for a start. The service in cafes is pretty bad in both places sure, but when you pester waiters in London you just get attitude, but here them seem a little panic-stricken that the foreigner has come up with yet another request! What, a spoon now? their expression seems to say. Hold on, I'll see what I can do. Also, when you're buying illegal copies of DVDs at street markets over here, they're willing to take orders of movies from you, then deliver them to you piping hot from the DVD burner in a couple of hours.

And in London to brown your undergarments as a twenty-tonne bus heads straight towards you, you have to get on your bike. Here, the experience is available on a tuk-tuk, allowing you to mentally draft your will as exhaust fumes blow gently through your hair.

Another thing - they have a huge "Democracy Monument" here. It commemorates the move to a consituitional monarchy in the 30s, and was the scene of massive riots and the deadly put-down by the army in the 70s. It's quite a sight, two massive pillars arcing towards the sky in the middle of a massive roundabout. The effect is qutie beautiful and poignant. One thing. There's a McDonald's overlooking it. Who said global corporations don't have a sense of humour?

Felucca
After the train ride south to Aswan, we caught some more ancient Pharonic sites (I will write about them soon enough, perhaps). We started travelling north again, back up the Nile. From Aswan, we took a cruise on the Nile on a felucca, a very simple small yacht. There was a variable crew of two or three, and around eight of us punters.

I felt the last part of London leave me as we gently tacked north up the Nile, against the breeze but with the current. For three days, we gently rocked from side to side, looking absently downstream until we turned and upstream came into view. The Nile is an amazing deep blue and gentle, only disturbed by enormous and revolting floating hotels plowing straight ahead, while we nimbly skipped out of their path. On each bank of the Nile there was a thin strip of lush green, full of palms and grass, which quickly gave way to barren bone-coloured mountains and plains of the desert. The sky above this was pale too; dust from the desert stayed high like smog. The sunsets we saw on the felucca were white, not yellow. Somehow the desert dust bleached the sun from its canary brightness to a dull sheen. It looked like the moon was rising, not a sunset.

The on-sell
I went into a pharmacy in Egypt to buy some sunscreen and ear drops, and after dealing with my rather hum-drum request, the guy pointed at the counter and said "Do you want anything else?" I looked down, and saw a small advertisement for Viagra.

"Come on," I laughed. "That's just for old men!"
"Okay," he said, and went to the back of the shop to get a carry bag.
The cogs of my brain turned while he was away.
"What, is no prescription necessary?"
"No, no, not in Egypt," he replied, quietly amused.
"How much?" I asked, strictly out of anthropological curiosity.
"Well. Egyptian equivalent, only 35 egyptian pounds" he said, tapping the number out an a calculator for reinforcement. "American brands, maybe 45 pounds. Viagra is 55."
That meant the genuine article was about 5 british pounds. Which is only slightly more than a day pass on the tube.
"If you buy a big amount, I can give you discount."
"Do you get many sales?"
"Yes. A russian man yesterday bought 20 tablets. I sold to him earlier this year as well. You are young, yes, but maybe you have a friend? A father? An uncle?" The man had sold these things before.

I have to admit that by now, my curiousity was, erm, piqued. What red-blooded man, even if it doesn't have a problem in that departement, isn't at least passingly interested in the effects? And my own, strictly hypothetical, curiosity aside, these things would have a certain market value in London. Get a nice discount from this guy and then offload them for what, 5 or 10 quid a pop? Just hang out in pubs in the daytime and offer them to the old guys that look like they could use a hand. Like a community service. I'd be a pharmaceutical Robin Hood. And that's not even thinking about the burgeoning metrosexual market -- one you've had a manicure, you'll try anything surely.

So, any takers? Your discretion is guaranteed -- all credit card orders will be charged from "harder.com"

Now you know
At the 4th International Penguin Conference in Chile in September 2000, it was finally agreed by penguin researchers that they would refer to a group of penguins on the land as a "waddle", and a group in the water as a "raft".

Meeting Egyptians is easy
At the end of my first day in Cairo, we found a tea house in a small tree-lined street. We stumbled across our desire for some tea and a sheesha pipe, and our host was happy to oblige. Seeing the late afternoon sun turn the leaves on the tree translucent, sitting around with old mates I hadn't seen in two years, I got my first feeling feeling of perfect satisfaction on this trip: Well, if this isn't nice, what is?

By the third tea I felt the need to share this satisfaction with our gracious host, so I looked up my first word in Arabic in my phrase book -- thank you. When he came to stoke up our sheesha, and I inadvertantly ordered another (oh well) sheesha, I broke it out: "Shukran", I said, beaming ear to ear. He was quite surprised by my obviously novel grasp of his language. He chuckled to himself and said that I was welcome, I assume. He went to serve the next table, and, still slightly bamboozled by the experience of me brekaing out some Arabic, he spoke to the guy and pointed back at us, spouting off a bit of Arabic. We agreed that he said "Those crazy foreigners over there just said Thank You to me!" The other patron seemed to agree that it was quite noteworthy.

Just later, two kids walked by trying to sell telephones to people, can I repeat, trying to sell telephones to passersby on the street. They came up to us and started advertising their wares to us in what, even to my untrained ears, was clearly kid-speak gobbledegook. They blabbered at us for a while, we smiled, they smiled, they offered their telephones to us one more time just in case we did want to buy one, then they were off.

Train to Aswan
After stumbling around, enjoying ourselves despite Cairo, we got on the overnight train south along the nile to Aswan. Despite our budding awareness of how 'without personality' Egypt is, we had high hopes for an opulent experience on the train. The price alone -- US$50 per person -- is a shirt-load of money in Egypt. My sources tell me that you can organise military coups for only a little more. As well, the posters advertising the service gave us misty-eyed visions of mahogany panelled cabins and deep red curtains, our beds being turned down at night while we ate roasted pheasant next to Hercule Poirot, then a discreet knock on a secret panel revealing a small yet servicable harem. You know, how it used to be in the olden days.

Instead, we had a squeaky couchette with seriously over-microwaved food. I got the short straw and shared with Cam, who had at that time been vomiting for several hours and was eyeing the distance between his pillow and the sink. I decided to make the most of it and gamely ordered an Egyptian red wine with a very nice label. It was pretty brutal, perhaps it'd been mixed with paint thinner, but just like the train it got the job done.

Cairo
A polite thing to say about Cairo is that it "lacks personality." Your faithful correspondant, always one to jump at the chance to call a spade a bloody shovel, has some other choice words, including "ugly" and "relentlessly ugly" and "completely without any aspect that could not be described as 'ugly'".

There are certain things worth reporting, however. Saw an advertisement for Cairo's bid to host the 2010 World Cup: "Trust us... and we'll deliver the best World Cup in history!" to various photos of sphynx, pyramids and famous footballers.

Now, the first rule of travel is never trust anyone, especially not yourself. But the second rule of travel must be, never trust an Egyptian who says "trust me" and then tries to sell you something like a boat ride or a tour or a million-dollar world class sporting event. You can haggle on the price all you like but whatever you buy will fall apart the second you walk out of view.

Crammed in the back of a Hyundai, my hotel's tour guide holds forth."To drive in Cairo, you need two things. First, a strong heart," he says as two trucks ahead of us, one in the lane each side of us, begin gently moving towards each other. "Second, to close your eyes," he concludes, pressing the acclerator.

Walking to a restaurant one night, Cam, Fuss and I are helplessly consulting another fine Lonely Planet map when an Egyptian man walks over to offer us help. After pointing us in the right direction, he starts talking to us. Where are we staying? Where are we going? Where are we from? When we answer "Australia", that gets him very excited.
"Morrymedran!" he cries.
"What?"
"Morrymedran!"
"I'm sorry?" I say, completely at a loss about what he is talking about. Melbourne? Marybinong?
"Morrymedran!"
A cog turns in Cam's head and he reluctantly proposes "Molly Meldrum??"
"Yes! Morrymedrran! He is a friend of mine! He stayed with my family for a week in the 70s!"
Now, you hear a lot of tall tales from locals when you travel. But this had to be true. Molly must've stayed with this guy for a week in the seventies. No-one would lie about that..

On inauspicious starts
Have started three months of vagrancy moving between continents, hotels and bars. The first leg, my journey to Granada in southern Spain was a long, nightmarish testing ground of endurance and self-flagellation. I missed my flight to Seville due to a number of reasons, which I immediately afterwards categorised as completely manageable except apparently for my own deeply ingrained idiocy.

A saving grace was that because I chose a proper airline, the 'I've missed my flight' lady was actually very helpful, trying to get me anywhere in the south of Spain that she could. Was Alicante any good? Or Gibralter? Or how about Northern Algeria then an 18 hour ferry?

In the end I got a later flight to Malaga which left me just enough time to get really stuck into myself about how hopeless I am. I´m unsure how many flights one is allowed to miss before one is expected to know better, but I suspect that my current tally of three missed flights in the last two years falls significantly short of world´s best practice. Sure, only one of those flights (today´s) was entirely due to my own negligance, but halfway through the second pint and the third cigarette, that was hardly the point! The point at the time, as far as I can recall, was that I was a stupid bloody idiot who shouldn´t be left alone to do anything by himself ever! Ever!

But that was in London. Now I´m in a foreign country with beautiful weather and beautiful people who have rather strange haircuts. And even better, I get to play around with my very rudimentary yet ceaselessly enthusiastic phrasebook Spanish. I love ordering a beer and a coke in stuttering ungrammatical Spanish, then seeing that certain look of incomprehension and confusion when the bartender realises that I am in fact speaking their language, and they are therefore expected to understand me. It only gets better when I resolutely do not understand their follow-up questions, and am reduced to looking friendly yet simple. You know, it really does work.