I’m awfully sorry…I’m English

I really enjoyed writing while I was travelling, so I decided I would continue with my blog, when I felt inspired to.

It was nice to spend the 2 ½ months in Sydney and on the scenic Central Coast between the trip and our move to the UK. The trip seems like a distant memory already, but when we arrived home we experienced some serious reverse culture shock for a while. It was so good to see everyone though and I really enjoyed my stint working at Cochlear again. I’m all excited about working now!

I’m in sunny England trying to find my feet at the minute. I feel I should start by talking about the weather, as all good Britain’s do. So far the weather has been lovely. The day I arrived I got off the plane in a sweltering 27 degree C heat and I had to wait in the immigration queues for a good hour or so (with no air-con) in front of some really annoyingly whiney Australian’s, complaining about how hot it was, how tired they were and how sick they were, as they breathed and coughed all over me. I really believe I am a weather good luck charm now though. I leave Sydney and it turns into a dust bowl!

It’s the little things I’ve noticed that are different from home. Here are some things I’ve taken note of.

People are ridiculously polite here! Really, really polite! Nick and I were in Stratford-Upon-Avon, having some lunch before an interview Nick had with a company. As I was getting up after eating, an elderly lady with a walking stick walked past my table and apologised to me as she hobbled past, as she was vaguely holding me up for 1/20^th of a second before I could leave my table. This is when I realised that yep, I’m in England.

The second thing that hit me was the flag on the cathedral outside our bedroom window at Nick’s friend’s Ben and Jane house…it was red and white!

I am trying hard to fit in here, asking for a sausage butty instead of a sausage sanga, saying sorry at any and all opportunities. I am getting used to asking where the public conveniences are rather than the public toilets, and calling capsicums, peppers. At times I really need some translation though, Nick asked for me to pass the bainne (pronounced bonya) the other day and I had no idea what he wanted…it was the milk.

I have found it weird buying things too. I bought some fresh eggs the other day for £1, so I handed over £1 and was waiting for my change. It looks like the $2 coin to me. Then I was buying a banana another day for 49p and realised that I get change. I stood there wondering if I should wait or not. Well, I don’t want to look like a tight arse now!

I have been listening in on all the accents. I was waiting in Sheffield the other day for a “bous” (a bus) and heard some great ones. I overheard someone on her mobile phone saying “eez at ome innhe” that means that he was at home already. I have noticed that people here like to add in the word should to sentences too...”I should think so”, or “I should hope so”. Plus they like “to be fair” a lot too. I keep hearing “alright” and I’m not sure how to reply…is that a question?? I think I have already picked up some of the accent though. Nick’s dad called us the other day and when I answered the phone he was about to hang up because he thought he had the wrong number.

Driving has been interesting. When I first drove the Golf, I didn’t know how to put it into reverse. I would have driven it straight into the car parked in front, if Nick hadn’t been in the car to tell me that I need to push down on the gear stick to pop it into reverse. I also keep putting the windscreen wipers on instead of the blinkers and the blinkers on instead of the windscreen wipers. One day we had to park our little green Golf down the road in the village as there was some big flower festival on and parking was limited. The next day when I went back to the car. I wondered why it wouldn’t open and there was different stuff on the inside. After scratching my head I realised the car had transformed into a Peugeot. I’m getting used to the narrow lanes and the different road markings and signs though. I now know, luckily not the hard way, that the road sign that looks like a tuning fork…means your lane is about to end…abruptly! I have to get used to lay-by’s not being where you go to pay off your expensive jacket that you couldn’t quite afford, hard shoulders are places that you drive in at times, not some arthritic body part and that central reservations are not where native American Indians are forced to live. I haven’t recognised any of the road kill yet and found the names of the little caravans serving food on the side of the road very amusing. My favourite was the snack wagon.

After a lot of discussion we have decided to move to Cambridgeshire or nearby. Nick has accepted a job in Cambridge and as I write he is busy looking for houses near Jamie Oliver’s dad’s pub in Saffron Waldon. So it’s onto the next exciting phase.

Last Round of Photos

The trip of a lifetime is all over now. :(
I'm back in OZ trying to apply for a UK visa.
But I have a head full of treasured memories.

For those of you not on facebook, here is a link to the last collection of photos from the trip:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=127400&id=548657385&l=e82df50a35

One Year

We are now back in chilly Chile before we fly home. I´m tucked up under the warm covers as I reflect on the past year and write my last blog. We flew from Bogota the other day and could look down on all the wonderful places we had visited through South America, the Amazon and it´s jungle, we flew over Arequipa and the Colca Canyon region, I could see Lake Titicaca and the salt flats of Bolivia, the volcanoes and the rainbow coloured mountains there, the Atacama Desert and as we landed in Santiago we could see Aconcagua jutting out very clearly against the Andes.


It´s winter now in Santiago, the mountains surrounding the city are now snow capped. The shorts, T-shirts and sandals we wore 3 months ago when we travelled through here have been replaced by beanies, gloves and scarves.


I feel a mix of emotions at the moment. I can´t believe our trip is about to end and at the same time it feels like time has slowed down for the past year. I am excited to see my family and friends, but also sad to finish our travels. I don´t want to forget all the experiences we have had and all that we have witnessed.


We have met so many wonderful and diverse people that have shared their lives with us. From Henry the aspiring truck driver living in Chapata, Zambia, Pauline the pregnant Botswanan woman facing the prospect of being HIV positive, to Ali Barber the local Tatouine doctor working hard to send his kids through med school, Hernan the Chilean painter and partner of an architectural firm in Santiago, the lovely Zimbabwean couple we met in Ecuador Brian and Nina who have struggled to get visas on their around the world trip but haven`t let that deter them, to Faith the retired teacher of the blind and a passionate peace activist who spent 3 months in a US federal prison for acting as a human shield and volunteer for the injured in hospital in the Iraq war, to a Turkish UN worker in Kenya, to crazy Austrian cyclists and Finnish para gliders the list goes on and on. We really have made some great friends.


We have slept in the wilds of Africa all by ourselves with only a fire to protect us, spent one precious hour with the gentle giants of the Congo, played soccer with the local kids in South Africa, we walked hundreds of km`s until my feet couldn`t take it anymore, appreciated and learnt all about the pre-colonial cultures of both continents, laughed with the locals while being squashed on a bus or two, seen countless sunrises and sunsets, seen canyons, rivers, deserts, jungles, mountains, plains, waterfalls, glaciers, islands and volcanoes, crossed oceans and seas. We have visited churches and mosques, ancient ruins, museums, art galleries, souks and medina's, forts and libraries.


I don´t want to forget about the plight of the people in the places we have visited and the environment that is progressively polluted and destroyed in the name of economic growth. I like to be in places that remind me of all of the ugliness that goes on in the world, it´s all too easy to get caught up in the mundane day to day life and forget.


I like the broader perspective travel gives. It rewrites my understanding of history from another perspective. It is so much more than just a collection of things to see and do, that´s ticked of a list somewhere, more than a collection of sights and activities. Travel is interesting for the sights you see, the food you taste, the music you hear, the smells that fill the air, the hands you shake from the people you meet, to the things you learn and the culture you experience. It all adds to an appreciation of our diversity as people, but also our similarities as humans. Although we wear different clothes, eat different food, listen to different music, sleep in different style houses and follow different traditions and beliefs our human needs are no different to our own.


I have spent the last year mostly traveling through the third world, across two of the worlds poorest continents. I have seen it´s sadness and it´s beauty. I have looked at the face of poverty and marvelled at planet earth with all it´s richness. It´s impossible to come back the same person, all that I have witnessed has seeped into my consciousness. I am bound to feel confronted by what I will now witness back in the first world with all it´s materialistic desires and complaints they may seem petty after what I have seen.


During the last year I have lived out of my backpack with only a handful of things and it is all I have needed. The world economic crisis hit and from a place where people make their own homes from mud and grass, grow their own food from their small patches of land, make do with what they have and fix whatever breaks instead of throwing it out and buying a new one, it hardly seemed to matter. I have been to places where the unemployment rate is at 70% and heard other western tourists complain how bad things are at home.

I can only hope I come back more grateful for what I have in life. It has been an unforgettable year that`s for sure.

Colombian Fried Ants and Mud Baths

I sit here typing out another blog, probably my last or second last for this amazing trip, with bits of fried ants stuck between my teeth. Nick and I are in Bucaramanga, Colombia and the fried ants are a local treat, so we had to try it of course. Personally I didn't think they were very tasty, Nick seemed to like them though. We also tried some Lemon ants in The Amazon, they were alive ones. They were supposed to taste like lemon, but I think I ended us grabbing the other ants who like to hang out with the lemon ants, as I didn't get that nice lemon flavour, just a numb sensation on my tongue.

Anyway, so far we have had a great time in Colombia. It has been the highlight for South America for us. The place in stunningly beautiful, the people are super friendly and the travel is much less touristy and real.
We have travelled through Pasto, Popayan, San Augustin, Bogota and Cartagena on the Caribbean Coast so far. San Agustin was an interesting place full of ancient archeology that is linked to Ancient Egypt, Asia and Africa. Interesting stuff!

Here is some exerts from my diary recently.

12-6-09 Volcano Mud Bath

"What a surreal experience today was. We dunked ourselves in the contents of what has to be the worlds smallest volcano. We were suspended from within the mud completely weightless, I think this must be one of the closest feelings to being on the moon....There was a Colombian couple with us from Medellin. All I can say is, when plastic surgery goes bad! I had read about Colombia being the plastic surgery capital of the world, but up until today I had found that hard to believe. Think bad botox and boob job, I really felt for the poor woman. Why do people do that to themselves?!...After a 45 min bake in the volcano mud we exited looking like a swamp monster, covered from head to toe. I noticed one girl getting out of the mud had had a blowout on her bikini bottoms...too much mud weighing them down, luckily the mud covered everything... "

13-6-09 Hop, Skip and a Jump to Mompox

"Back on the road again today and it was another enjoyable day of travelling. We were woken up early by the screaming young school girls staying in our hotel, sometime between 5:30am and 6:00am...we got a taxi to the bus terminal as it was raining in Cartagena this morning. The bus station was miles out of town and it would have taken a long time by bus, so I'm glad we did. A lot of Colombians ride motorcycles and you often see whole families on the same bike on there way to work or school. On this raining morning, we saw one family riding along with their umbrella in a vain attempt to keep themselves dry.

We were directed straight onto a minivan headed for Magangue, a place I can not pronounce on the Rio Medellin, the same river we were near in San Agustin, in the South. There was the expected faffing here of course as we waited a further hour to actually leave the bus station as we waited for other passengers...We drove through lots of green fields that reminded me of parts of Africa near Uganda. Some of the buildings were also reminiscent of African huts built of mud, sticks and grass. We twisted and bumped along the road, the driver was going so fast that half the family sitting in front of us on the bus were throwing up. The granny was sick, then the young boy, emptying the contents of their stomachs into numerous plastic bags when they made it. It was quite a vomit feast for a while there. The mother was busy handing out bags to the gran on her left, then the young boy on her right, all whilst holding her little baby. The husbands job was to collect all the vomit bags and sit with them. We managed to make it with all the contents of our stomachs in tact. Although I found out later that I wasn't helping matters when I gave Nick a running commentary of the little boy and the plastic bag distribution around the bus. Oops! Anyway we got off the bus and the family gave us a cheery goodbye...We were directed to the boat ramp for the next leg of our journey, on a chalupa (a small passenger boat) for a small fee...The street vendors dangled there goods by the side of the boat as we waited again for a full load of passengers...We considered buying some bread, but the guy was charging too much so we declined to prevent embarrassment in front of the locals. At which point they all seemed to take an interest in where we were from. They were all so warm and friendly. I love days of travelling like this. We didn't take long to reach the stop for our final leg of the trip...We opted for a shared collectivo with the 2 friendly young girls we were sitting next to on the boat...As we drove along it all felt a whole lot more laid back and relaxed and I was enjoying the beautiful rural scenery role by. Pigs with their piglets, a small child riding a bike that was so big for her she could hardly reach the pedals, dogs wandering about, farm houses, potholes, motorbikes weaving there way around the potholes. We were stopped 2 times by the police or army, either way it was just a routine check for drugs or weapons. The first one was particularly friendly and when he found out Nick was English he felt the need to share his love of UB40 with us. The 2 young girls in our taxi had no idea what we were talking about as they played their own Latin American music from their mobile phone..."

Today we are leaving Bucaramanga for San Gill. We are slowing making our way back to Bogota. We have less than a week left in Colombia before we fly back to Santiago for a few days, then back home from there. See you all very soon.

Parasites in The Amazon

There are parasites in The Amazon and I don´t just mean the natural sort that are part of the natural ecosystem!

We just got back from a trip to the Ecuadorian jungle yesterday. I still can´t believe I have seen the Amazon. What an amazing natural wonder!

Which makes it sad to discover the mining that goes on here. The worst of the companies is US oil company Texaco that has extracted oil here in the jungle since 1972. Before this time the jungle was almost impenetrable and inhabited only by the various indigenous populations still living in their traditional ways.

I´m sure lured by promise of infrastructure such as roads by Texaco and the need for foreign investment, the Ecuadorian government agreed and the US company has exploited its mineral wealth for decades. The oil company and the Ecuadorian military forced the indigenous populations off their land and cleared huge tracks of jungle to give Texaco safe access to the jungle.

Unfortunately, Texaco had a monopoly for years on mining their oil and being in a third world country, I guess they thought they could get away with cutting costs (saving the company an estimated $300 million) by not following industry standards for oil extraction and production to increase there already obscenely greedy profits. As a result, the company is responsible for one of the worst environmental disasters ever. Oil spills and toxic waste has spilled into the delicate Amazon waterways as has caused all sorts of illnesses including cancer in the locals and has seriously damaged the ecosystem here.

The other sad reality that was very obvious to me while travelling through these towns is that the locals don´t benefit at all, even financially! They are dirt poor. What oil town anywhere else in the world would be considered poor! Just think about how wealthy the oil sheiks of the Middle East are. By all accounts these people should be rich, but the money ends up in the pockets of wealthy western shareholders and corrupt military and government officials.

The maddening thing about all this is that Texaco was bought out by Chevron and they don´t claim any responsibility for the environmental disaster it caused. A class action lawsuit was taken out on Chevron Texaco by a Ecuadorian-American environmentalist lawyer and I believe it is the biggest environmental lawsuit ever. One to watch out for.

Onto something a bit more positive. We did various activities while in the jungle, here is a journal entry from one of the days there.

27-5-09

¨We did another walk through the jungle today this time on terra firma. We headed off after breakfast via the pink dolphins (yes pink dolphins!) again to glimpse them across the surface of the water. Enrique (our guide) was full of knowledge about the jungle. It was so fascinating and I hope I continue to learn about this interesting ecosystem. We learnt about a sap that looks like blood (Like the Australian Red Blood Wood that the Aboriginals use), that is excellent for all manner of things from stomach problems to skin infections. This is so good it´s sold here in pharmacy´s.

The jungle is so full of toxic and venomous substances, highlighted by the beautiful colours of the insects, butterflies and frogs warning their predators of their toxicity. The substances are sometimes used for hunting, like the poisonous dart frog that we got to see. The indigenous tribes use the poison on the skin of these frogs to coat their spears. Some substances have been discovered that put people in a coma like trance, another one puts the person in a hypnotised state. There have actually been cases of people using this to rob or rape people. There are other substances that give the local shamans hallucinations allowing them to connect between the spiritual world and their people.

Everything fights for survival here, trees try all sorts of tricks to reach the precious sunlight and animals have all sorts of defence methods. It´s interesting to know all about their mechanisms for achieving survival. Fungus, for example has an extremely complex system for spreading. Firstly ants get infected from an already infected tree, the ant them becomes compelled to climb to the very top of the tree where it essentially dies, it becomes rock hard and the fungus starts to grown out of it´s body. A bird then will fly along and eat the ant and will spread the fungus after pooing onto some other unsuspecting tree and the process is repeated.

All sorts of trees, plants and animals have symbiotic relationships. There are trees that grow in the lakes and only survive with the help of the plants that grow on it. The plants help protect the tree from dehydrating in the sun and the plants get water from the tree. There are monkeys that live together and help each other out. One finds the food for the others and the others protect them from predators...

...The jungle really is a fascinating place and full of potential unknowns and undiscovered medicines. The big drug companies know this, so there is a big push to drag what knowledge the shamans have about their environment. None of their knowledge is written down and if a shaman dies, thousands of years of knowledge dies with him. However noble it is to document this knowledge, it´s certain that these drug companies act like parasites and use the shamans for their own financial gain and give little in return for that knowledge. Hundreds of current day drugs have already been derived from tropical jungles...

...I found the afternoon activities a little tedious. Fishing just ain't my thing. I did try pirhana fishing for at least 2 minutes, but the excitement level was just too much for me...¨

I have so much more to write about the Amazon, but I´ll save it for another day.

Here´s a quick run down on what else we have been up too since my last blog. We trekked to Machu Picchu via Sultankay, spent time in Cuzco visiting museums and art galleries, we travelled through Nazca and I flew over the Nazca lines (Nick didn´t think he could cope with the twists and turns in the small plane), Lima was interesting there we visited the Spanish Inquisition museum and the National Archeology, Anthropology and History Museum. I really liked Peru and found the people extra friendly there. In Ecuador we have stayed in Quito and spent time in the Galapagos, which was tops...before our trip to the jungle.

Now we are onto Colombia and Venezuela for the last stretch of this trip. Only 4 weeks to go and we´ll be back home. I´m looking forward to catching up with all of you.

Mountain Gods and Devils Miners

We are now in Cuzco about to do a 5 day trek to Machu Picchu via Salkantay. I haven´t been well for the last 2 weeks and Nick just got it too, but after a visit to the doctor and some antibiotics I´m finally feeling better and looking forward to doing a bit more than just sleeping and watching TV in our hostel room.

Since the last blog we have travelled through Bolivia and Peru. It has been very interesting, culturally speaking. Everywhere I look here I see evidence of the old traditions and customs from Inca and Pre-Inca times blended with the traditions and customs from Spanish colonial times.

The bus rides through Bolivia have been much more like African standard. We took a bus from Uyuni to Potosi, and while on the bus I noticed a poor boy sitting opposite us that obviously experiences a bit of motion sickness from time to time. I looked over to see he had vomited into his mothers bag and all over her knitting (while she was sleeping). Somehow I don´t think that jumper will be completed. Luckily it didn´t smell or I would have added to the knitting myself. We drove through some very remote villages in Bolivia. Now the poorest country in South America. At times we would drop passengers off in the middle of nowhere and I would wonder where their house was. It makes me sad to think that not everyone here in those villages will have access to proper health care and education, but they can always get a Coke!

Potosi was an interesting place to visit. It was once the richest city in Latin America, fuelled by the Silver mines for the Spanish Colonialists. The Spaniards would force the native populations as well as some African slaves to mine the silver in the most horrible conditions, working for most of the available 24 hours a day with little sleep and not much to eat. The sad thing is that not much has changed since those times. The big difference is there is no longer any slave labour. We visited one of the mines and the conditions were appalling. It´s not far off Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. It´s hot, dusty and very dangerous. The mountain is like swiss cheese and I was too scared to go too far in. The miners still do much of the digging by hand, with a little help from some dynamite, supplied by the tourists that visit everyday. We bought them some dynamite, soft drink and coca leaves. The don´t actually eat anything while on shift, so they chew on coca leaves to help fight hunger and altitude sickness at 4060m above sea level. Potosi is the highest city in the world. In colonial times the slaves would chew on the coca leaves to help them survive in the conditions of the mine. At one point the Catholic Church banned the use of the leaves saying it prevented their path to Christianity, but when they realised that it affected productivity in the mines they changed their minds. The miners are very superstitious and believe that they must make offerings to Tio (the Devil). They believe that God can´t protect them under the ground and must keep Tio happy by giving offerings of coca leaves and cigarette´s to the statue of the devil in the mines. Children still work in these mines who are too poor to go to school. We were fortunate enough to see the movie Devil´s Miner about one poor boy who worked in the mines to support his family. I highly recommend it. So the next time you buy a silver bracelet girls, I hope you think of the poor miners who dug it up for you.

We also visited Sucre, a beautiful old colonial city. At the time we visited they were busy giving the whole city a fresh coat of paint and a clean up as they were about to celebrate their bicentenary of the fight for Independence. The president Evo Morales (the first indigenous president of Bolivia) and the Prince of Spain would be visiting for the occasion. We kept bumping into Evo while in Bolivia, he was at a parade in Potosi while we were there, then we drove past in a bus while he was about to board his plane back to La Paz, then when we were in La Paz, we stayed in a hostel right near his residence and witnessed another parade which he attended.

We visited the Museum Casa de la Independence in Sucre, where their declaration of Independence was actually signed. We learnt about the struggle for Independence by Simon Bolivar and General Sucre, 2 Venezuelan freedom fighters. Bolivia has had a very tumultuous time in their political history since their Independence. They have had a stack of leaders. Some democratically elected, some dictators. One dictator curiously ended up being democratically voted in years after his dictatorship. One women tried to restore democracy only to be ousted by a relative dictator of hers. One noble leader ensured that everyone could vote and changed the Constitution to include women and the poor.

We also visited an archaeological site just outside of Sucre that had uncovered dinosaur footprints in an old riverbed 68 million years old! You could clearly see them on the mud wall. Unfortunately though the site is eroding very fast, a section of the wall actually collapsed the night before we visited and the scientists don´t expect it to last any longer than 6 more months, unless they get enough money to preserve the site.

We travelled to La Paz, then onto Copacabana on Lake Titicaca where we visited Isla del Sol at Easter time. There were hundreds of South American tourists in this town at Easter.

From here we travelled to Puno on the Peruvian side of Lake Titicaca. We visited the Pre-Inca funeral site of Sillistani where we could see how they used to create tombs for their dead.

We then spent a lot of time in Arequipa while I tried to rest and get over this flu thing I had. While we were there we saw a museum that houses Juanita, a mummy that was discovered on top of a nearby volcano. We learnt a lot about the Inca traditions of sacificing children to their mountain Gods. The Inca´s believed that their God´s were the mountains and volcanoes that surrounded them in the Andes. When the Volcanoes erupted they believed this meant that their God´s were angry and therefore a child needed to be sacrificed to the God´s. Unlike the Mayan Culture, the Inca´s chose their children from elite families and they had to be very beautiful. It was considered an honor to be selected. These children were selected by the religious men of the Incas and were brought up in Cuzco (the Inca Capital) until it was time to die in the mountains. The children were walked to the various mountains over many months until they reached the top where they would hold special ceremonies. By that time they must have been very tired, cold and scared, but they believed they were going to live amongst the God´s. The child was wrapped in some beautiful woven cloth placed in a tomb or pot and the religious men would kill them by a strong whack over the head. They would leave things that they thought the child would need in the afterlife, like coca leaves and pots etc.

We also visited the Santa Catalina Convent in Arequipa. It was like a city within a city with small cells everywhere that the women lived in. Nick liked to call them apartments, but they were more like cells. When this convent was in full swing the women were only allowed to wash 7 times a year and would often wear barded wire underwear!! I don´t understand why? Sometimes to make money they would sell off the odd child slave, as you do. Luckily now-a-days they live off the money generated by tourists.

We also visited Colca Canyon, one of the deepest canyons in the world.

That´s about it for now. I hope everyone is well.

Links to Some South America Photos

We have posted some photos from South America now, for those not on facebook, you can see them on the links below.

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=101758&id=521468297&l=2329a6280b

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=101399&id=548657385&l=a144f6f4ee

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=101258&id=548657385&l=f32200d46a

Cheers

Bec