Been sicking on trains (China blog)

Finally found fame at last, and for once it was'nt for being an infamously slow barman.. Unless that Facebook group gathered momentum whilst I was unable to observe Facebook in China (yeah I'm still 'bitter' about the claim..get the semantic. And you get me. Just not a drink in good time..). Or Annika is higher up in the Danish royal family than first anticipated. Many tourist trips or places come with an extra bonus for the locals; us white people. WTF? OMG. Etc. At first the photos they snapped of us were perfidiously took, we'd look-up and see a laughably badly hidden camera clicking our way. This laid the foundations for a full-on brazen attack, after one person would ask to literally pose for a photo with us, the floodgates would open, people even queuing up to be pictured with us. I felt like Mickey Mouse. Or at least they were taking it (other than the photo..*remember to think of better 'joke' to edit in by the time I finish this...*). All these ostentatious photos were took whilst ignoring the scenery outside (which we'd all paid about 20 pounds to enjoy). One aficonado’s implor of 'Kiss kiss' to me and Annika was the pinnacle/lowlight. Twas softcore porn for them (as the Great FireWall of China has banned all that kind of online entertainment), and obvious Scandanavian porn ignorance still rearing its beautiful head (don't get the semantics this time please). Crunchy Nut is just Frosties for wankers.

Not content with being amazed with the sheer brilliance of the colour of my skin, the Chinese also lap-up our 'humour'. I could have a job out here (best place for me as my jokes have got old-hat back-home, fuelling paranoia of why Annika conveniently had to curtail her trip by a few weeks..'but just one more 'Im no David Beckham, honest..' please'..). One time in response to being asked why I didn't pick a hostel over the road instead by a receptionist, I asked the inspired/insipid, 'Why? Is this hostel better?', delirious bellylaughs were bizarrely beamed out by her, and the ensuing, 'no, seriously?' nearly killed her. Secondary paranoia wave of maybe I'm not as (un)funny as I think, it's just my stuttererer , as anything freaky, i.e. white skin, blue eyes etc, (but apparently not watching people have a number two in the toilet) (sane sane) is lapped-up. Though if you've got it, flaunt it, if you haven't, develop a personality instead (a Chinese student guidebook we saw literally said this in worryingly unabridged terms).

Now to the running (scared..[if anyone knows me]) rollercoaster theme; the being a lazier-than-a-Big-Brother contestant has it's downsides. The fame threatened to get out of hand when I was making full use of the 'facilities' at a public toilet (read: hole in the floor) and people still stared at me (though thankfully no photos). The cubicles have no doors or walls (neither do the social conventions), all is there to enjoy, savour, and devour. Maybe they thought I was Scandanavian too. And because 'we all look the same,' clearly they thought I was a famous method actor. Same fear/wish re-lived when a couple wanted a photo of me with my top-off. This was probably the time the 'I'm not David Beckham, really' line probably hit home to the punters.

The upz n downz are inherent in other factorz (yeah i'll stop that already), for instance climbing Haungshan mountain entailled braving horrific downpoours and ensuing mist which equated to few vantage points by erm taken advantage of. But occasional (and bemusingly..as no scientific [well GCSE scientific] could reasonably explain) and sporadic glimpses of scrumptious sights sourced by scaling sumptious sibilant erm steps were apparent. Same highs and lows concept applied to the following 40 hour train ride, which no sibilance could do justice. Feeling rotten and living up to my sickboy nametag, as well as lambasting the ethnocentric pharmacist for only giving me Chinese herbal medicine to make me better, I sat on my bed eagerly awaiting a 40 hour coma. Lo and behold a semi-fluent in English Chinese man sat on the next bed, which was the first time in the whole 6 weeks of being here, usually they can't speak the Queens, in which case we could have done the usual A/S/L formalites, as well as 'I smell good/taste good' semi-jokes (I only learned the Mandarin essentials of course), before my entire Mandarin repertoire comes to a convenient close, and we can go to sleep. A semi-fluenter is a minefield for the sick and tired, as not knowing when to nod/laugh/cry etc as it's hard to work-out what they're actually saying, which is another abhorrent reason, especially when I was trying to the classick [sic] schoolboy trick of the micro-sleep by putting hands over eyes and pretending to concentrate. This chap was extremely hard to understand, and launched straight into a Chinese history lesson. I've seldom felt so ill, though I've seldom felt well, so make of that what you (w)e/i-ll.

Waiting for a cue to repeat he randomly wanted me to repeat in Mandarin, for some reason, I started to hate him. I'd normally be grateful of the history lesson (or would I? gulp), I couldn't help but constantly think, 'When will this be over? Will I ever be allowed to leave?', thoughts which are actually frighteningly concurrent with both my frequently recurring nightmares of having to go back to university, and missing my plane home: so I'd have to stop here and learn till it/vomit comes out my ears. As he was rounding off (well at least getting to the Tang Dynasty..indicative of China's history, size, and boredom threshold), a train worker on his break sat down inches in front of me, intense, bewildered, eye contact. I had to laugh, only because my teacher carried on like all was normal. All was normal for China. Then my emperor had a snooze, only for his substitute/supply teacher to start up. I was completely aching all over by this point. He actually could talk forever about the phases of the moon (soulmate to the spinster immortalised in Bright Eyes' Classic Cars song) in a piercing, tone-inflected, disjointed English accent, and bemoaned how the male Valentine day should be celebrated on 7th July due to the lunar readings. He was relentless. He'd precede to ask me if I understood at intermittent intervals, I'd have to nod yes regardless, and pray he wouldn't ask which bit..

Now, the 'good thing', after Moonman went back to work/his planet, and Dozo was being implicit/eponymous, I caught sight of an elderly Chinese couple sat adjacent to a window; ambient yet stirring music akin to Sigur Ros (ambient music/Scandanavian ignorance still in tact..anything ambient is seemingly similar to Sigur Ros) soundtracking the moment from the train PA, they sat with beautiful scenery lazily sauntering past, whilst peeling and eating bananas in poetic/perfect harmony with the music and eachother. All complete with the odd knowing glance at one another, uttering a few nothings, and being all round content in the majesty of the blissful mise-en-scene, innate with sweet succinct confidence. Plus a whole host of other effeminate cliches, and musings. I thought of the ending of On The Road. The bag scene from American Beauty. Laughed. And lulled into a cathartic slumber.

The eye of the storm apparently, this scene was just an interlude, a visual test-card. As I awoke for a toilet call, feeling horrific again, Moonman spotted me, he'd transcribed a traditional Chinese poem for me, and preceded to make me learn it off-by-heart. Mandarin is nigh on impenetrable for native English speakers, never mind someone with swollen throat glands.. a Chinese Humour Torture instrument. Well we did have 30 more hours to die/kill.. As he finally went back to work, his tag-partner woke-up again, and continued where he had left off. 4am in the morning..nice. For posterity's sake, the poem was;

>Before my bed, there is bright moonlight,
(Chuang qian ming yue guang)

>So that it seems life frost on the ground,
(Yi si di shang shiang)

>Lifting my head, I watch the bright moon,
(Ou tou vang ming yue)

>Lowering my head, I dream that I'm home.
(Di tou si gu xiang).


I personally think a 'Now leave me alone' could've been a nice ad-lib finish. He woke me again at 6am to teach me another poem. Maybe it's part of the Chinese medicine treatment.

More flying like paper, and getting high like planes in Beijing. Where a common scam is for apparent 'strangers' to befriend you, take you to their teahouse, seemingly show share some cups of tea with you, then charge you hundreds of pounds for it. Number one (yes there's more than one time when I naively got scammed. Well guessed) was quite nice actually, had a good chat, then decided to have a drink. We only survived by our Englishness, 'we'll have a beer'. So got away with a 30 juan fine. Number two, another nice chat, though I picked up on it as we walked in don't worry, I was hysterically laughing. I couldn't help it. FNG. I said we should go somewhere cheaper as it looks expensive, 'oh no I want rest, I'm sat down now', she played me, knew how to make me laugh with such horrendously bad lies. I had some story concocted that I went to somewhere else before which was half the price and that we should go there, she called me a liar (I’d caught wandering-bad-liar-syndrome), it escalated dramatically. I loved it. I want to do it again. I feel like kerb-crawling Hugh Grant style looking to pick-up some scam artists for the kicks. Which one of us would be the scam artist? Talking about kerb-crawling, I got this email from a middle-aged American, who got married a week ago in Bangkok, the marriage lasted a few days before the woman eloped with all the money. He said he was paying for sins he committed in a previous life. Winner. /loser.


> From: steve petersen

> one place you might can get your
> hands on one of these honies is "english corner" they
> do corner you--but just to make a lady friend it is at 8 pm
> at green lake across from green lake hotel. get
> a map--is on all the maps--green lake that is---- you
> will see people on the sidewalk interrogating westerners and
> fat guys like me that have lost thier looks . mostly
> young girls from the university--so you make the
> assesment. that is tonight--but every thirday night at
> 8. sp--ps would like to hear about other place
> you have been. if you have time-- if not like i said
> hope you have a good time here in kunming.


I just hope he knows the price of tea.



So what is the meaning behind all this? Be bi-polar? Have the old people train clip as the alternative ending to Burn After Reading? 'Is this ending better?' No, seriously?

Bye

xx kiss kiss

MP on Gangs (Brazil blog)

Rio de Janeiro (very belated, and uninteresting to anyone ive had chance to message..or just uninteresting maybe).

Sampled the quintessentially cliched Rio life - samba, guns, and saline..

Went to a samba school, basically a carnaval warm-up, thousands of people samba smashing it in the street. Also bodyboarded (surfing for us gay icons), street partied it, and an all-night rave in a favella/slum. Amazing/worrying how quick i became desensitised to guns. Im no expert on guns (i dont even know the size of my car engine, or how to scramble eggs untill last month), so they were all dancing with 6ft guns like us nobheads dance with wannabe phallic ropelights . We were the only gringoes, and the only ones unarmed. Was only the second time the hostel had been to the rave, and the last. One lad from our hostel exercised the cardinal sin (like a snogging prostitute, apparently) - took a photo. He was set upon with all manner of guns (big ones, err medium ones, scary ones etc), had him down on the floor with them pointed etc. Note - going off my mate Troy's innate wikipedia, these favelas in Rio are amongst the highest in the world for murder rates (unique selling point i guess, worked on me). Threatened to get nasty for all us gringoes (about 7 of us), then a minibus appeared, either to round us up and take us up the hill for a bonding session of torture, or to get us the hell out, we gambled..As we stepped in the minibus tonnes of fireworks were set-off, I didn't see them at first, thought we were being shot at with err scary guns..Later learnt that this means theres people in the favella who aren't welcome, so probably wouldn't of surprised me if my initial hunch was right..

A local had previously capitalised on our drunk/Yesman state to get us to agree to a tour of the favella the next day (we'd previously said no when sober, i hadn't wanted to be voyeur, then i remembered i'd been to Bosnia..). Anyhow he didn't show up to take us, got told that its now too dangerous for outsiders to enter, theyd of 'killed us' (not sure what the English translation is). The sheer cheek to go back the next day..Must dry behind ears.

Ended the weekend in style - on a drip in hospital. Rehab. We checked into plush hotel for 2 nights to complete the rehab. I'd of felt so cool if was back in college/thinking i was Pete Libertine again, alas I just lament having to endure some awful Adam Sandler film and paying twice my budget for a room with aircon and saline on tap. Help me get ma boots on.

Then onto Ilha Grande, a beautiful exotic island, camped in the rainforest, played cards in hammocks by candlelight etc. i was a general cock basically, or just your average Gap Year-er. Shamelessly overdid the ´holas' to the man on snake watch duty, im not as toughened up from the favella or the saline as i´d of liked.

Welcome to the Third World, we've got fun and games (Bolivia blog)

Arrived at the Bolivian border, all of 3 people (us who don't watch the news, in homage to Jeremy from Peep Show) in one queue trying to get into the country, all of the country trying to get out in the other. Pondered why was this..Within half an hour all was clear - civil war and worryingly authentic white-knuckle ride bus journeys.

The very first bus we got on, within about half an hour, came crashing into a deep mud ditch off the side of the road. Completely lodged in a 35 degree angle. Not having sank in (both the situation and luckily the bus..har de har), I presumed it must have been a side effect of my malaria medication ('seeing and hearing things that arent really there, sense of persecution, suicidal thoughts, webbed feet etc), combined with the local next to me who seemed rather non-plussed and laissez-faire about the whole thing, then suddenly eschewed any thoughts of looking cool and shrieked when the bus began sinking into the mud (ive been there many times, there no smokescreen for gayness), then thoughts that it could go completely horizontal. This was the catalyst for abit of much belated panic, despite my American vacationer-esque impression (or doublebluff) question to my mate Mike of 'Is it too soon/sick to get a photo yet?'. Was akin to the last scene in The Italian Job, noboby move, nobody get hurt, nobody get sunk. No safety hammers to smash the windows either, a New Labour nightmare. Now I get you Tony. All is forgiven.

Managed to scramble out. Then we spent hours tugging on a rope with the locals to get it out, interspersed with hiding in a mudhut (oh to be a wiganer prepared me well for this..WAFC fans only joke. got to have your niche..) to escape the tennis ball sized hailstone. The remaining journey was a torrid affair. Imagine a boat in a rough storm, swaying from side to side. It nearly toppled over at least another 3 times. Not good for us with an Alton Towers phobia. Though many people (the ones who chase storms) would probably pay to experience this at Disneyworld, as Scott said, the crew made it look (disturbingly) realistic..

Rode on to find a bus in front of us had fallen off a bridge into a river..Now in La Paz, saw a sign saying some firms have stopped selling bus tickets for the routes weve done as its too dangerous..pah