I think I jinxed myself

Pai, northern Thailand...today
Why did I have to give yesterday's post that title? Wasn't it just an invitation to The Gods to give me a karate chop in the head? Yes, yes it was. And they did. And a punch in the throat to boot. I have lost my passport & wallet not to mention flight tickets, camera, UK SIM card and a host of other important bobbins that were in the Do Not Lose Under Pain of Death bag. It was my fault, I just left the bag in a bar and went off to bed. Numb-nutz! Needless to say I have not been my number one friend today.

To add insult to injury, someone also walked off with (literally) my flip flops from outside the Internet cafe earlier. ARRRGGGHHH. Barefoot and credential-less. Grrreat.

So I have some serious unravelling of the terrific mess I've got myself in. Here's a pic to remind me what I'm missing other than the complete left side of my brain.

My life's lowest point to date...?

OK, it has really sunk to a nadir when I am not only reading but publicising other folk's blogs, especially when on a world trip with the wonders of different cultures surrounding me, but sometimes, just sometimes you strike a gem. And that's what you need. Like that roast dinner fix when you've eaten nothing but rice for three months.

If you do nothing else this week read this: Whoopee

Disclaimer: Be warned, it is filthy but it is very very funny. Don't click if easily offended (no pics, just text). And it is funny.

The day I met my tailor (Hello Tailor!)

Singapore - 16-18 Mar, 2007

So, was I ready for the culture shock of leaving behind the western trappings and English language of the past five months and immersing myself in Asia? Oh yeah! The moment I got out of the airport (well, OK, off the spotless and efficient MRT rail system) it all felt so different and so much more exciting. Don't get me wrong, Singapore will go head-to-head with nearly any western city in terms of buildings, transport network, shops, (property prices!)...pretty much anything, in fact I'd say it would get them in a very strong half-Nelson and perhaps give them a Dutch rub. But it is unmistakeably Asian: the people, the food, the smells, the bustle...albeit the shallow end of Asia, which was a good introduction for the likes of me.

One funny incident on my second day: whilst walking around Singapore's China Town this large Indian guy, well over 6ft with teeth like old gravestones and wearing what could be described as the outcasts from P.T.Barnham's wardrobe, stood directly in my path. He announced in a booming voice:

'Welcome to Singapore. I AM YOUR TAILOR!'

I couldn't help laughing out loud, hopefully not in an offensive way. Perhaps what I should have said was: 'I was wondering where you've been, you're 36 years behind schedule with my thornproof tweed two piece' ...but I don't think that fast and it could have been difficult to explain. In fact probably has you confused, right?

As usual, here are some snaps:

My guest house in a street in Little India.

See what I mean, quite Indian...as opposed to China Town or the Malay quarter (or maybe it's a third).

More proof of the area's ethnicity, if it were needed.

Here I have juxtaposed the old colonial Singapore with the modern high rise version of the city. I am now going to get into a scratchy black polo neck and Lafont eyeglasses and juxtapose a bullet with my head.

I think you can see where this is going.

And there we have it, the Singapore Sling at The Raffles Hotel. Cliched, yes, but it's gotta be done.

Shared my trip to Raffles with a couple from my guesthouse - Anthony & Jeannot (check out a very similar shot of them on their Blog) from Richmond but taking a break before moving back to their home town of Glasgow (what is it with me and my affinity to Glaswegians?). Anthony had me in stitches - he's an actor & children's entertainer (Mr Boo) and was recounting a Harry Potter party for the 8 year old son of someone in a big house in Richmond, for legal reasons let's call her Ms H. As you'd imagine with a bunch of spoilt 8/9 yr olds it took a while to win them over. And then the father turns up (we shall call him Mr J) in full pirate outfit and starts waving a steel bladed machete around as his cutlass. Anthony, envisaging some heinous disaster that will land him in prison, suggests it's not a good idea and Ms H comes into the room and there ensues a domestic between her and Mr J with Anthony chipping in every now and again with 'I think I'm with Ms H on this one, Mr J' and 'Perhaps you and your son can play with the dangerous implement after the show and once I've left!'

Peace resumes and the show goes on with Mr J in pirate outfit lounging on a couch at the back of the room and barracking the magic show with 'Rubbish!' 'I saw you put it up your sleeve!' etc etc much to the stifled annoyance of Anthony. He quietens down and there's a game involving the kids holding a sheet and bouncing a rubber chicken on it trying to avoid being hit by the chicken (sounds just a little surreal). Anthony in his wizard outfit is accompanying proceedings by prancing about playing the Benny Hill theme tune on a kazoo. Mr J pipes up 'That's Benny Hill, right? Cool!' and proceeds to start jumping around too, clapping, singing and jamming along. Anthony wished he had a camera at that point to capture on film what even the most hallucinogenic drugs Mr J ALLEGEDLY took in his youth could not have recreated!!! As you can imagine, after a few cocktails and this story, I was weeping tears of laughter.

Decided one afternoon to go for a nice stroll and this is where I ended up. Nice.

I found this surreal plant pot in the street I was staying both fascinating and scary.

And that's Singapore.

Air travel & I mix like the devil & cream cheese

Sydeny - Singapore - 16 - 18 Mar, 2007
Leaving Australia proved to be a little bit trickier than it should have been. I had a funny feeling deep down in my boots that it would be. You see, I'd changed my Star Alliance (round the world) ticket so I could stay another couple of months in Oz. For reasons I won't go into for fear of raising my blood pressure and developing a nervous tick, to do this I had to ring up some United Airlines call centre in...I don't know...Ohio? The guy at the end of the phone had a very weak-thumbed grasp on what I wanted and it took a long time to walk/talk him through the changes to my Sydney - Singapore flight and subsequent changes to my Bangkok - Hong Kong and Beijing - London flight dates. I received an email confirmation of the changes from one Brad Marshall (Dipl. in Feckwittery), and that was all. As I said, I suspected some trouble, and I got it.

At check in I was told there was no record of me on the Singapore Airlines flight to Singapore. What they had got a record of was that all my subsequent flights after arriving in Australia had been cancelled from the system. Grrreat. I showed them my email from Brad Marshall, but funnily enough it didn't seem to hold water, in fact I'd say it was terrifically porous.

I think more to get me out of the check-in staff's hair, I was sent to the bowels of Sydney Airport to some ticketing office. It wasn't clear to me quite why, but I had little option. My flight was leaving in an hour and a half and I had not even a day left on my visa.

After another half an hour of explaining again (to two different folk) I managed to get hold of someone who seemed to understand my predicament and whether they unravelled Brad Marshall's Gordian knot or simply re-issued my tickets for the ongoing legs out of pity, I don't know, but I made the plane.

Singapore Airlines - fab airline indeed. Watched three films back-to-back including The History Boys based on the play by Alan Bennett. Strange that I was flying at 35,000ft somewhere over Australia or Indonesia and watching a film by the odd, tweedy, bespectacled, bookish fellow I would see buying ready meals in Camden Marks & Sparks a few months ago.

Tunes to watch Oz by

As an aside, here's a musical backdrop to Australia: artists and tunes that I heard along the way, that struck a cord with me or got my foot a-tapping. When I hear them again, I'll think of big red deserts, impossibly tall trees, shark infested water (or at least my obsession with the myth), fine wines, cool southern cities and ridiculously sticky nothern towns, bus journeys that go on for ever and the friends I met and made.

Bare Naked Ladies
Blue River - Kill Some Time
Brand Nubian - Slow Down
Carrie Clark
Eels - Blinking Lights
Golden Horse - Riverhead
Jeb Lloyd
Mazzy Star
Putumayo Presents Series
Reg Mombassa
The Mountain Goats
The Shins
The View - Hats off to the buskers

Australia - let's put this sucker to bed!

Brisbane & Sydney, Australia - Mar 10-16, 2007

I know this sounds odd when you've been somewhere for three months, but I kinda ran out of time in Oz. Don't know where it all went. Maybe I had a hole in my timepiece and it was leaking out or I dropped three weeks down the gutter somewhere, but run out it did. So in a move that bucks the trend regards travel in Australia much as a pink fluffy thong and a pair of white cowboy boots bucks the trend in City attire (other than in the more unsavoury nocturnal establishments closer to Bethnal Green), I didn't really bother with the east coast. Can't say I missed it, then again, I don't know what I'm missing.

Flew straight from Darwin to Brisbane to see an old work colleague Richard Dougall (aka Dicki D) and then after one night I jetted off for five days in Sydney. Other than it was jolly chipper seeing Richard again and the fact I got my first sushi fix in over a month, I don't have much to say about Brisbane really. There was a nice t-shirt shop I didn't buy any t-shirts in. Here's a snap:

See what I mean?

Sydney on the other hand was a different spouted vessel of scaly gilled creatures. I did rather like the place and after merely two days I had sushi coming out of my ears. I think I might have got the wrong end of the (chop) stick with regards to eating sushi. Enough about sushi. Also, it was a bit like I had been there before as I seemed to have a ready made social life: I met up with V after a lot (and I mean A LOT) of to-ing and fro-ing (par for the cause with V), also Hilary from the Easyrider bus up the west coast and I bumped into another Easyrider, Vera, in the street or rather she bumped into me. After recognising me she chased me down the road shouting out my name! I had to stop and chat in the end as I ran out of puff trying to escape, as one generally does when one is being persued by a 23 year old Russian stunner, hair all a-swinging like a Timotei advert! (AS IF!) Oh yeah, and also I met up with a guy Alex whom I had met in Auckland & Taupo in New Zealand. So you see, there was a little social cluster to keep me busy along with the opera house (viewing rather than performing), my final (yawn) innoculations, a trip to the Blue Mountains, stroking a kuala bear, a boat trip down the river and loading up on wine (OK, goon) before the vino desert of SE Asia.

As most folk do, especially those that aren't scared of a city bigger than Wigan, I liked Sydney. It was buzzing, the people seemed friendly for a big city, the weather was delightful, the food was good (other food, not just sushi I mean), it's picturesque...but I still wouldn't live there even if you offered me a mint humbug. Don't know why. I think I was done with Australia in my head and wanted to try something new. Don't get me wrong, Australia is a beazer place and I found it fab to visit, the people really charming (give or take the odd meat-head), the scenery stunning...la...la...la but I just felt I couldn't live there unlike how I felt about New Zealand (OK, maybe Perth...or Melbourne). Perhaps I was seeing it with jaded eyes to a degree, too used to the western way of life and pining for some culture shock. Regardless, I was ready to leave. Here's some farewell snaps, most of a cliched nature:

Cliche

Cliche squared

I was trying to get a nice picture of the sunset and this Italian guy with a massive hooter lay down right in front of me as I tripped the shutter. Would you believe it? No.

Kuala. Give it a stroke and tick your list!

Actually, this was quite cool but a bit sad. A Tasmanian Devil (the cool bit), just running round and round his enclosure in this wildlife park (the sad bit). The keeper said that's what they do but me thinks that's what they do when they are penned in captivity and not left to roam free. Still, he seemed to be fulfilling his Loony Tunes obligations. (Oh dear.)

Blue Mountains

The Three Sisters or something like that.

So farewell Australia. Maybe I'll return and kiss your east cheek before this trip is over. Laters!

And in honour of Shave...

I have given the old BligBlagBlog a wee bit of a face lift. I know, I know, time could be better employed in actually getting it up-to-date but I couldn't resist.

So as you can see it is now in the Shave colourway, that also happens to be my favourite colour combo - brown and orange. What's more, the eagle eyed (and maybe even those with gripping hands) amongst you might spot that there's been a wee rejig going on to your right. No, not out of the window numb-nutz, I mean on the side bar. It's been slightly re-ordered to make a little more sense (yeah right!) and also I've added a section dedicated to folk I've met on my wanderings or at least those with a web presence (and that I deemed worthy of adding!).

I am mighty chuffed with the results I have to say. Gonna treat myself to a Paddle Pop as Tangly Twisters are known in Thailand or maybe that's the generic Thai name for an ice lolly? Who knows? Who really cares? I'm gonna get me one!

(One slightly annoying thing is I seem to have lost the font size I was so happy with before: it's either too big or too small, no Goldilocks - just right. Ah well.)

Darwinian Man

Darwin, Western Australia - Mar 4-8, 2007

To be honest, I found Darwin a tad disappointing. It's a city which in Aussie terms means it's the size of Market Harborough, but that's not the reason.

1. The outdoor cinema that I was so looking forward to after my previous experiences in Western Australia was closed for The Wet (i.e. the wet season...is that really what The Wet stands for?...yes, yes it is).


2. My withdrawal symptoms from sushi were far from being alleviated. There was one sushi joint in town...sorry...city and like the cinema it was closed altho' probably not for The Wet, it was just closed.


3. The backpackers hostel I checked into was decidedly rough around the edges (I shan't mention the name...as I can't remember it). It would have been tolerable but for the gang of Aussie meat-heads that sat around all day in the corrugated roofed, car-port like cooking area (see what I mean about a bit rough) drinking beer, smoking weed, playing Playstation, and waiting for work to start, which was always 'next week'. Generally a bit intimidating. Oddly enough the TV they tended to watch was predominantly gardening shows. I presume they were looking for tip on how to grow their own. "Darwinian man, though well-behaved, at best is only a monkey shaved." - W. S. Gilbert

However, every cloud has a silver lining and Darwin's côté positif was that I met Leo, another Brit post-30 year old wayfarer altho' he looked younger than the average GAPer. I suspect there's a painting in his attic in Lincoln ageing on his behalf. We mooched around, drank coffee, blagged our way onto the roof terrace of the Backpackers Hilton (where we should have checked in instead of our flea pit) and swam in the pool, strolled out to the pier, took sundowners at the Ski Club (more water skiing I suspect than Alpine...or indeed yogurt orientated). Leo also 'entertained' me with day long discussions (altho' I rarely said a word) on what price plan for his Aussie mobile he should opt for. I had to ration any mention of this fascinating topic for fear of developing a permanently glazed look.

Here's Leo the Lion, strutting his stuff in the jungle of a very dodgy bar. It almost looks like he's sporting a tash...or an affectation as Leo called any form of facial hair, particularly that solo tuft below the bottom lip.

The night progressed and Leo introduces his right cheek to a German girl's left. Nice move. I think you can see where this is going.

Ahhh, sweeeeeet. The funny thing was about 10 mins prior to this the lass, let's call her Helga, asked me if Leo was gay. It's a novel approach to gaining the affections of a lady, but it seemed to work for Leo on this night.

And here's a couple of snaps from around Darwin that show you nothing of what it's like but they simply amused me for reasons that I think need no further explanation here.