The back of Bourke on the back of a camel.

My camel, Victoria, had issues. And I had a fairly upset stomach as we met Tiger, our guide over the next couple of days. Without so much as an Introductory Certificate in Dromedary Husbandry, we were astride our beasts and heading out to no-where in particular. It looked barren and dusty, and I couldn't see a 711 in sight.

I felt a treat in my new outfit. Inspired by my cousin's shopping adventures in Pushkar, I had worn out the plastic on a new pair of orange pyjama draw-string trousers, wooden bracelet and long-sleeve blue hippy shirt. Completing the ensemble was a matching blue and orange headscarf to keep out the sand and flies, and which made me look unassumingly handsome and vaguely menacing at the same time.

I felt the image suffered a little when, an hour after setting off, I vomited. That kind of behaviour is best reserved for when you have a recipient into which you can spew, and secondly, it's preferable to engage in this activity at ground level. Although Tiger appeared non-plussed and my other travel companions actually giggled, I find that vomiting over oneself from atop an ambulating eight-foot camel is overrated. With a few flecks in hair and headscarf, the majority of the torrent had flowed down my trousers and the camel's rump. Yeah, laugh it up ...

But it all got better after that. It also got hotter too, until a few hours later we nestled under the shade of a tree, unharnessed the camels and allowed them to roam free and play chasy while Tiger cooked us our first gourmet meal of the safari, aloo gobi and chapati. Needless to say, I ate little, though I was very, very hungry.

On the afternoon of the second day we came to a thatched mud hut, and took much needed respite from the searing rays of the sun. A small sinewy and slightly mental man appeared, a true Rajasthani. With deep wrinkles and a half toothless grin, he was dressed in the white dhoti and koortah with a pretty glam orange turban (which would have looked quite cool with my trousers: I thought quietly about fixing a deal).

As always in India, every thing is possible - except for kindness to animals and adhering to best parctice of OH&S principles - and from the filthiest hessian sack in the history of the world, he withdrew bottles of Pepsi. With tears in my eyes I handed over whatever rupees I could grab, and gulped the manna from heaven. His name is Mr Chapati; I am going to build a shrine to him. And perhaps introduce him to both soap and toothpaste.

The next couple of days involved a lot of riding and eating, and sleeping under the stars. Tiger was quite the desert tenor, and kept us upbeat and semi-conscious with a continuous melody of Rajasthan's latest hits. We passed a handful of Marwari villages, and I profess a deep respect for those who live here under the harshest of conditions. There ain't no way I'll be getting the first homeowner's grant in this neighbourhood.

Tiger also pointed out a number of abandoned villages, their Muslim inhabitants having fled to Pakistan at the time of Partition. The buildings are beginning to crumble, and will not be lived in again since they were abandoned under ominous circumstances. The sand has begun to swallow the dwelling and the temples ... only a few peacocks and goats walk among the ruins.

It was a wonderful trip, great to get off the beaten track, to sleep on the sand dunes and see the entire universe of stars, to have someone else do all the cooking and cleaning.

I $#^@% love India!

I do the Lawrence of Arabia thing

Jaisalmer sits in the Thar desert close to the Pakistan border. It is a small town of about fifty thousand inhabitants, all of whom arrive to greet you as you fall in a dishevelled but glamorous manner out of the bus, and on to boiling tarmac heavily encrusted with cow shit. Welcome.
Indian auto-rickshaw drivers have perfected their trade. They can spot a tired Westerner when they see one, and have only to keep up their incessant and incoherent Hindish babble for a matter of minutes before a) you accede to the hotel of their choice, b) cry, or c) yell gross obscenities and curse their mothers.

Today I chose the latter, and needed a couple of Navy Cuts (my chosen cigarette brand in the subcontinent) and a bottle of Thums Up (a sickeningly sickly and orthographically challenged version of Coke) before I could entertain the idea of communicating with any of these wretched little bastards. [By the way, if anyone is looking for a niche marketing idea, India is crying out for a good tourism and hospitality school. Currently they sit in bottom place in the entire goddamn galaxy for customer service].

One of the kids could see my obvious distress and offered me some opium. In my book, anyone that ridiculous gets my vote, so his autorickshaw was my autorickshaw and we sped to the fort and to his very inappropriately titled guesthouse, 'The Himalayan'. What? I mean, we're in middle of the frickin' desert here. It's flat, it's sandy and it's not going to snow for another 300 million years.

The staff of the guesthouse were, well, puerile. We got along instantly, although my paternal instincts were aroused when the actual amount of opium consumed by them in a twenty-four hour period became known to me. Still, why not? If you're going to live in a place where the mercury hits 50 degrees regulary, it's either gotta be drugs or insanity.

My room was dirt cheap and about the size of a Rubik's cube. Interiors and lighting by someone blind, and a cooling system that made me think seriously about hiring a street kid and a large fan for a couple of days. But that would be wrong and politically incorrect. And have to say, I did like the look of my bathroom, because the idea of showering while I undertook daily ablutions (is there a verb - to ablute?) has forever appealed to my senses of hygiene and humour. And now I was able to indulge.

Jaislamer is constructed entirely from golden sandstone. It is beautiful, and if I were that way inclined, it would bring a tear to my eye. It's a veritable setting for Ali Baba and his 40 thieves. I can really picture myelf hear wearing a silver and red turban and runnning about the place with a big fat sword and dagger, but instead I settled on a banana lassi (curd), and wished I been born into a band of Arab wrong-doers.

Apart from the Maharaja's palace and some more very impressive havelis, a good reason to sojourn in this region of the planet is to take a camel safari. Nick, Leah and I opted for a three day, two night expedition that promised to be a bit of a hoot.

Provided my grumbling stomach settles down ...

A bigger, fatter fort.

The journey north from Pushkar invited a change in scenery. The temperate areas of southern Rajasthan gave way to desert, not dissimilar to the landscapes between Adelaide and Alice Springs, but with a golden colour rather than the red sands of the Australian desert.

I arrived in Jodhpur around lunchtime, and as always was approached by various touts and rickshaw drivers promising me the best hotel and free rides in their clapped-out vehicles. But a couple of groovers stood out; Darpan and Arpan. Looking ulta cool in their tight denim flares, even tighter T-shirts and Dior-inspired sunnies, their perfect but hesitant English persuaded me to head to the Singvi Haveli, the family home for the last five hundred years.

A pleasant place to be for a few days, and from the terrace rose a fort so massive that I knew I was going to like this place. The old city was not much to speak of; the usual mix of twisted and contorted lanes and alleys, defecating cows and bulls, moribund dogs, and people who all look like they could do with a few year's worth of non-Indian homecooking. [I noticed too that I have started to shed the pounds ... my once huge muscular frame has been reduced to the body of a pre-pubescent twelve year old ... Still, as a wise woman once said, you can never be too thin or too rich].

Meherengarh is the reason to visit this town - an appoximate translation, Citadel of the Sun. The fortified walls stand at least a hundred metres above the city, towering over the squalor and grime below and looking every bit like the imposing home of a very important dude.

Construction commenced in 1459 and continued right up until recent times, with each Maharaja adding to a formidably whimsical mass of havelis, towers, temples and the like.

The original site had been the abode of a hermit, who cursed the Maharaja who decided to take the plot for his own, and predicted a continuous lack of water that would stall the growth of the town and its people. The Maharaja, like all good religious persons, consulted a sage who came up with the very sensible idea to bury a volunteer live into the foundations of the fort. Seems to have worked a treat, and as I passed the plaque to the unfortunate victim, I couldn't help but be in awe at such stupidity. It surpasses even the dumbest of things that I have done to date.

Both exterior and interior take the breath away. Intricate lattice work carved in red sandstone, fabulously carved doors and archways, balconies and turrets. And the armoury is spectaular. So much fine workmanship in each piece, for an instrument designed to maim and kill. These guys must've been seriously bloodthirsty. I would love to have been able to go out and play with them on the sportsfield, mashing a few heads with my solid silver jousting sticks. Not sure what you'd pay for 'em though.

The entry price of the ticket included a set of headphones and a funky little contraption that contained recorded information on the fort's highlights. It describes the Maharaja's private rooms as 'the epitomy of European opulence' Nope, only Napoleon's apartment in the Louvre or the very worst of Italian rococco comes anyway near the amount of gaudiness that the designers achieved here. I mean, where in Europe did you ever encounter an enitre ceiling with eave to eave multicoloured Christmas baubles, a ton of gold and Guy Mitchell blue paint? And stained glass windows? And in a bedroom.

A very satisfactory visit. I was now mentally armed with a cornucopia of interior design tips for my next abode in Coogee, and wandered contentedly back to the guesthouse to shove my gob full of spicy Indian fare.

Very excited about the next destination - Jaisalmer. We're talking big fort and big desert here.

The little lake that was.

Pushkar. In Indian terms, a tiny town. A settlement of just over fifteen thousand inhabitants nestled in the hills not far from the bustling city of Ajmer. Pushkar is a holy town - no alcohol, no meat, no eggs. But dope is legal and sanctioned by the government. Funny place, the subcontinent.

The town is centred around a lake, encircled by numerous ghats, the wide concrete steps that take the pilgrim down to the holy waters. Temples are numerous but similar in style, and behind these are the guesthouses and hostels where many travellers come to while away the time.

To be honest, there's not much for the non-Hindu to do in this place. It's a place to chill out, relax, read books and get spiritual, if that's your thing. It's certainly not mine. Missing the daily activity of my Australian lifestyle, I often feel the need to take exercise of some sort - any sort - but India is one of the hardest places to stay fit. Luckily for me, there was a temple at the top of the hill visible from my guesthouse roof top. To be fair, there's always a temple atop any hill in India, but I decided this was exactly the exercise my legs were crying out for.

Armed with water and my new reading material 'India: A wounded civilisation', by V. S. Naipaul, I headed off into the heat and dust and out of town, stopping along the way to chat with the locals and play a spot of cricket with the kids. Everyone here knows Ricky Ponting. I think he must be one of our famous sportmen.

The monsoon is still at least two months away, and the parched countryside is nearing a critical stage of dehydration. Flora and fauna are limp and languid, distressed dogs lay beneath withered trees devoid of foilage. Nothing much is green, except a small patch of irrigated crops to the west of town. But the climb to the top is the exercise I needed; the temple itself is a bit of a disappointment, but after Chittorgarh it's going to take another massive impregnable fort to really impress me.

Aside from that, Pushkar was an ideal place to be on vacation. The locals are very friendly, the town has a laid-back quality, and if it takes your fancy, there is plenty of shopping to be be done. But I got over that in a few days, and was eager to be on my way again to see the sights of this country. Rajasthan is crammed with magnificent forts and citadels, and I'm still yet to visit half of them.

So we're heading north, to Jodhpur.

A fabulous fort.

Le mot du jour: 'Garh' means fort in Hindi. And today we're off to see Chittorgarh, definitely worth a visit. Unlike Chittor, the town that lays in its shadow, certainly worth a miss.

We hopped on an early train from Udaipur and arrived in Chittor around midday. I seized the opportunity to do some physical exercise, and after dumping our gear in the Railway Retiring Rooms, we went in search of bicycles. With an annoyingly overbearing and bellicose auto-rickshaw driver in tow - 'no bicycle, not possible, shop closed' - I strengthened my resolve to rent three bikes and we were soon on our way through the old town and up the steep incline that led to the entrance gate of the fort.

Young people are disappointingly unfit these days. That's all I have to say on the matter.
Arriving at the top first (there is no second place, only fisrt loser), I waited impatiently until the others arrived and then it was off to explore the ruined city that lay within 28 kms of impregnable stone walls - buildings and fanstastic constuctions that make you wonder exactly why it is that a country producing such magnificent architecture then constructs among the world's worst now. Heady stuff. Maybe funding from the Department of Planning had dwindled over the last several hundred years. Just like Health and Education under the Liberals, I guess.

In any case, the crenellated walls of the fort enclose the numerous palaces, temples and towers that were once the pride of this city. Especially enchanting is Padmini's palace, where the gardens have been restored and it's tragic story is worth recounting. It goes like this:
Maharaja is married to beautiful woman. Other man glimpses reflection of Maharaja's wife in lake. Wife now becomes obsession of the Peeping Tom. He's just got to have her. War is declared, victory evident, since the man who wants Padmini has a much stronger armed force that the man who currently owns her. But, just to piss everyone off, the Maharaja has nobly resigned to ride out to certain death before the enemy, and his chick and her mates throw themselves into the flames. Death before dishonour and all that. I like it, it's a tale with class and style and an iota of voyeurism.

We stayed until the fading rays of the sun cast a spookly glow over the orange sandstone, ponds and gardens, got speed wobble on the way down the hill and battled the congested night traffic.

Can't write any more since the hotel employee wants his computer back. Now.

Does anyone stop at a red light in India? The answer is no.

The magical lake that wasn't.

The guidebooks are in agreeance: Udaipur is the most charming and enchanting city in this heavily visited region of the country. But part of that charm is currently missing. Lake Pichola has almost dried up after several years of poor monsoon rains, and the Floating Palace looks more like wedding cake embattled in a contiuous dust storm. However, with a little imagination you can pretend the lake's there, or simply wait for the sun to go down; no-one's any the wiser.
Furthermore the guidebooks will inform you that the opening scences of Octopussy, the fabulously trashy James Bond movie circa 1978, was filmed in this fair town. How's that for kudos?

The real charm of this locale, and the reason people come to visit, is that the area breathes a kind of magic. It's the India you read about as a kid - mythical and seething with intricately decorated palaces, magnificent harems and elaborate havelis. And I delude myself for a while more, close my eyes, and pretend to the emperor, bejewelled and adored by the masses, riding my elephant across the mountains ...

... You can pretend to be the Maharaja leading a force of fearless Rajput warriors out to face the Mughal infidels, riding to a certain death but maintaining your honour. All the while knowing your wife (or wives) will commit self-immolation as the enemy knocks at the gates, throwing herself (or themselves) onto the burning pyre rather than face dishonour and pillage and all that comes with warfare in the late 15th century.

And when you wake up, you can just sit on the roof top of the guesthouse, drink sickeningly sweet tea, and chill.

I did a bit of both.

The place is chokka with palaces. Behind our little family-run hotel sits the foreboding City Palace, a construction undertaken initally by Udai Singh when he was ousted for the last time from Chittorgarh. Successive Rajput maharajas have added to the glamour of the palace, and a walk though it provides insight into the huge amounts of cash, power and labour that these guys had access to. The armoury: a collection of the meanest, deadliest killing utensils ever seen; sword, scimitars, daggers and guns a go-go, though there was one piece that looked suspiciously like an large egg whisk.

We also visited a Bakar-li-Haveli ... it must've been good to be the king. Have to say though, I wouldn't have liked to be a woman in India prior to the Raj. The idea of being stuck in the same building for most of my married life wasn't probably that much fun. Even if the building in question has 138 rooms on two levels set around a leafy courtyard.

Th rest of the town is that typical Indian labyrinth of narrow alleys filled with motorcyles, woman in saris, groups of immature and sexually repressed teenage men taunting you because there's safety in numbers, underfed and never-fed dogs, the ever-sacred cows, and excrement belonging to all of the above. But it is calmer that the India you see on Discovery channel, and certainly more serene that Bombay - we spent loads of time on the roof top balcony of the hotel, philosophising about total crap and for Leah and Nick, a chance to settle into their new world for the next few weeks.

Getting reacquainted, and getting lost.

Today I actually had something I needed to do.

I had to pick Leah and Nick up from the airport at 16h30, but realised this permitted plenty of time to do what the bank required of me; supply an address in Bombay before it would forward a shiny new Mastercard replete with PIN. I decided that the Australian Consulate might be able to help in this instance, and with a scrawled address in my hand, I headed for the public buses.
Numbering on the transport in Mumbai is a little confusing. The front of the vehicle displays the bus number in Marathi, the local lingo, but the numerals are deceptively like those we use. So after one bus took me no-where, I was kindly escorted to a second bus that took me somewhere. Specifically, a depressingly and hideously banal architectural monstrosity which would have been quicker to reach on foot (but where would the fun be in that, I ask you?). Only a building this devoid of personality could house public servants, so I assumed more or less rightly that I was at the correct place.

As the elevator spewed me onto the sixteenth floor, the faded and very shut wooden doors sporting a faded Australian coat of arms and an even more faded and yellowing piece of paper hanging off the entire ensemble informed me thus: the Consulate had moved. Bugger. I descended the staircase on foot with the newer address in hand, back out into the street and boarded another public vehicle. An hour later I was lost again but soon a very kind bunch of men in uniform, holding rifles, was laughing at me - so I thought I'd ask for some assistance. They were of no use whatsoever, but the chai-wallah next to him listened in, and gestured for me to try the next street on the right.

Got there, and after being limpidly searched and laughed at again by the four guards in the Consulate, I was admitted and finally face to face with a full time permanent employee of the Australian government. She was nice and sensible and offered lots of advice about not trusting anyone and keeping my personal belongings safe. You've just gotta love the maternal instinct, or perhaps she privodes this information gratis to every sad, pathetic traveller who can't manage to keep hold of his gear.

Joyce was happy to collect my mail for me. I liked her. And she looked great in a green and gold sari.

Next on the agenda (already four hours had elapsed: meeting my cousin et al from the International airport. Now that I held a vague impression of getting somewhere, it had to be public transport all the way. Caught the 123 to Churchgate station - think depressingly and hideously banal architectural monstrosity, this time without government offices but perhaps a hundred thousand Indians moving in every direction - and to the queue for a ticket to Andheri station.

The concept of a queueing in the subcontinent deserves an entry all of it's own, so I'll skip over the enjoyment of pushing and shoving, and in brief, throwing my rupees at a man who needed to re-dye his hair. Ticket in hand, I slotted in with several hundred passengers in a wagon that, according to the painted sign at one end, was custom built to hold 98 of us. There were a lot more, and many were staring at me. At least no-one was laughing.

Andheri platform was the end of my train journey. The next bus ride would have taken me directly to the airport, but since I boarded a bus on the opposite side of the street, I went in the wrong direction for some time. Spewin'. I managed to board the 308 in the other direction, and chanted a little mantra to Ganesh, Hanuman, Krishna, and the other one wearing the skull necklace with the blackened face - I had but thirty minutes to arrive. The Hindu deities looked down favourably ... and I greeted a couple of rather shellshocked passengers from the Qantas flight a few moments later.

I love the look on the face of a person who arrives in India for the very first time.

This time I was the one laughing. Well, chuckling really.

This is planet Eart (da, da, da, dah, da, da, dah, dah)

Time to say goodbye to Bangkok and head to the intergalactic airport.

I've enjoyed my time in SE Asia but I'm really excited to be heading to another planet. Cathy Pacific flight CX 751 was brief and bearable, aside from the two pashing passengers to my right (very happy to have scored the aisle seat). Actually, I tell a lie, since the woman across the aisle was watching an episode of 'Friends' on her personal TV screen - I hate the series with inexplicable passion. I guess I shouldn't have ogled her TV screen, so I turned the other cheek, forgot about those skeletal actresses who I fantasise torturing, and stared instead at the two next to me, still pashing.

We landed in Mumbai on time. I was very, very excited indeed, but a touch diappointed that the customs official stamping my passport didn't share my enthusiasm for the luggage carousel ten metres ahead.

Excitedly, I zoomed out of the Arrivals terminal, and with a habitual reflex action, scanned the multitudes of names of people and hotels on hastily prepared paper sheets held tightly in a sea of grubby hands. Never sure why I do that, since I've never yet spent time in a hotel posh enough to have an airport pick-up service. Not to worry, I headed to the Pre-paid taxi service, got myself a receipt and a giant Sikh into the bargain, and we ambled off into the night toward downtown Mumbai - in a Hindustani Ambassador at ten miles an hour.

I was grinning, the wide grin of the wildly-stupid-and-never-sure-what's-around-the-corner, but again, like the customs officia, the Sikh failed to pick up on my lust for India. Nevertheless, he did have a lust for the horn, and kept his hand on it the entire way to Coloba, which is about as south as you can drive in this town without ending up in the Arabian sea. He dropped me at the Salvation Army Hostel on a murky street full of people offering me hashisch or 'something special' - oh, wonder what that might be - and I ran excitedly upstairs to grab a dormitory bed.
Threw my gear onto a spare bed in the room, and stayed long enough to meet Kevin, Martin, Gerry, Matt, Vinod and Claude, and then excused myself to race downstairs and out into the street for my first dose of real Indian food in a year.

I breathed in the filth of this fair city's atmosphere (think Bangkok with a larger concentration of bovine excrement), and headed to a Veg-only diner. An hour later I had demolished a tray of aloo mutter, palak paneer, three roti and a sweet lassi, and certainly didn't have room for the 'something special' that was kindly offered innumerable times over the hundred or so metres back to the dorm.

I am unbelievably overjoyed to be back here again, and if my former employer can find me a job in the Mumbai or Bangalore office, I would be very satisfied indeed.

Anyway, gotta get to bed since I'm collecting my baby cousin and her friend fom the airport tomorrow afternoon.

Take one beach, fifty thousand revellers, a bucket, and stir

The Full Moon Party occurs at that time of the month on Koh Pha Ngan and is in all likelihood the largest outdoor event anywhere within a thousand kilometres of here.

Great fun indeed. As the sun goes down and the lunar light brightens the sky, the place fills with foreigners and locals of all shapes and sizes (but mostly wearing ridiculous hippy clothing and sporting cheap wooden jewellery). There is no space left for the beach-dwelling crabs as every spot on the sand is accounted for. More alcohol is consumed over the course of this evening than in one entire hour at any bar in Ireland. More drugs are taken during the course of the night than by Californian Prozac-munchers in a whole month. The music pumps. People behave, because no-one's practising the Friday evening gotta-get-off-my-chops-as-fast-as-I-can methodology and instead all seem relaxed and enjoying the fact they they won't be donning a shirt, tie and hangover the following day. And instead will opt for the ridiculous hippy clothing and cheap wooden jewellery again.

Being a slightly classy event, the aptly-named bucket is the star of the evening.

The Koh Pha Ngan Bucket may not be the most original invention on the planet and one unlikely to have a patent pending, but it is however very clever marketing indeed.

Take one sandpit-sized bucket that you owned as a kid (unless you're from England where there is no sand. Read: pebbles). Add a litre of soft drink, 200 ml of Red Bull concentrate and a bottle of Samsong, Asia's not-so-finest tipple. Or you can spend the extra baht and get JD or other quaffable libation. Stir. Add six straws and sip slowly, savouring the gentle bouquet and hint of strawberries, chocalate and cinnamon [by the way, if you get the chance to see Sideways, you must. Funniest thing to come out of America since Drew Carey].

Anyway, after you and your temporary mates have shared the odd bucket or two, you feel the need to dance. The musical choice is as wide and varied as the new McDonald's menu, but without the Health Choice options. It's Jungle, Drum 'n Bass, Progessive House (the stupidest term in the Queen's tongue) and assorted nefarious tunes to wipe your inhibitions and make you shake ya thang. It's a true belief of mine that people who don't dance are as dull as dishwater. Repressed too. So I dance, 'cos suddenly I'm gorgeous and carefree and loving life more than ever. My hair looks fantastic.

I lose Tayler and my other Spanish temporary mates, the English girls who bummed smokes from me for hours and the Israelis who thought I was one of them. I made several successful escapes from those sirens of Siam, the ladyboys. These creatures are predatory. I saw many a seventeen year-old European dancing far too close to one than he would certainly like to remember the following day, but hey, alcohol is the best tool the freaks and the ugly have for getting into relationships. I've been using it for years ... Couldn't find the interesting lassie from Ipswich who was talked with me about the frescoes in Siena and della Francesco for quite some time, nor the guy from Nice who shared my view that the International Phonetic Alphabet appears biased towards English speakers. I'd talked a lot of crap but had the best night in ages. And I was still standing and able to get home OK this time around.

It's been a great night as I grab a falafel roll (well, how dumb would red curry and rice be at this hour) and tuck myself into bed. Tayler showed up about three hours later when the sun was also making its appearance ... and his innocent face had a slightly more diabolical look to it at this hour. There was a Swedish looking girl standing coyly in the background.

Being a amenable chap, I spent the next couple of hours sitting on the beach again, talking to the revellers who kept me laughing for quite some time until I desperately needed some sleep. I returned to the room and all was silent. The necessity to slumber was overbearing and more important than maintaining good manners. I crept into the room and was really happy that they had left me enough space to curl up on the tiled floor at the foot of the bed ... I slept surprisingly well.

Koh Pha Ngan is a lot of fun if you take it as it is. Look any deeper, and it's a glaring example of Westerners acting in a completely unacceptable manner with no deference to local culture or habits. But these old arguments are as tiresome as a Dannie Minogue recording, and certainly as facile.

I had a great time over the following days, recovered my senses but not my wallet, bid my single-serve friends adieu and realised that after almost three weeks travelling I was starting to adopt the slower pace necessary for my next destination; the subcontinent.

Easily excitable at the best of times, India has me by the short and curlies. There's no place like it and I cannot wait to return. SE Asia is always good, but you only have to head a few more hours west on a plane and you actually disembark onto another planet.

Time for bus-bus-ferry-tuk-tuk-ute ride to return to the capital. Excellent.

Will upload some more photos very soon.

Not the best day of my life. Trouble in paradise.

Damn it.

After struggling through a bus-bus-ferry-tuk-tuk-ute journey to Koh Pha Ngan, an island off the east coast in the south of the country, and hooking up with my new Canadian travel buddy in a bungalow not too far from the shore, it all turned to pear-shaped custard.

Drugged and robbed.

Not good and not even vaguely amusing.

Previously ... Me and Tayler (my new temporary travel mate) arranged the accommodation and then headed off the the main party beach of Haad Rin. Within a few minutes Cookie and Pickle, two very gorgeous English girls (and previous temproary travel mates of Tayler's in Krabi) had joined us and we chatted as you do when you don't have to talk about work because you don't actually have a job any more.

After a while I apparently began to act a little strangely (and you can keep your simplistic sarcastic remarks to yourself thanks), walked off to find the toilet, and returned thirty-six hours later, more than a little disturbed.

I have no desire to postulate the why and wherefore of it all, but I have to say that I remained non compus mentus all that time later. Of course, no wallet, no credit cards, no anything-that-had-been-in-my-wallet at the time was on my person, but I still had all limbs and a operating nervous system, so not too bad really.

I can't really describe fully how I felt emotionally, I think I was a bit frightened. Actually, I was quite paranoid. I don't remember where I woke up, I don't remember how I returned to the bungalow, but I was hugely thankful to the Canadian lad who had held the room in absentia and now looked after me, accompanying me to a make a phone call to the lovely people at Lost and Stolen Cards desk the ANZ bank.

Those of you who know me well will know of my attitude toward the ANZ bank, and perhaps recollect the death threat I offered one staff member some years back in the York St branch. Well, let's put all that in the past. These guys were great and stayed on the phone while I tried to remember my name, address, security codes and colour of my undies. That done, we needed to organise a new card, but today my barely operating neurological thingies had had a full work out and I decided to leave that for another call another time. Perhaps when I got to India where everything would be easier to organise ... The bitch at the phone call centre took full advantage of my catatonic state and charged me an outrageous amount of cash. At that point I no longer cared but silently wished her a very unfulfilled and uneventful life, and then I suddenly needed to sleep.

When my senses returned I became incredibly angry with myself - I brooded and mooched for a whole day (former housemates and family members need no further explanation, and at this point I would still like to say I am much more mature these days). After that I attempted to soothe my battered ego - I mean, just how goddamn stupid am I - and decided that the best thing to do would be to return to the beach and begin Betrand Russell's 'Introduction to Western Philosophy'. But after realising that the Pre-Socratics were in no position to help me, I left Thales, Aximander, Heraticlus and decided that I just need to accept that I am a total wanker, but happy that my parents had not entertained Greek names when I was born.

After so many travels to places around the planet, this was the first time such a thing had happened (apart from that mildy funny botched mugging in Dhaka last year). Only money and credit cards were gone and my colossal ego slightly mutilated, so time to get over it and move on. I hesitated briefly between Chapter 6 'the Atomists' or the dog-eared copy of 'The Da Vinci Code', and settled back in the sun to read the book that everyone else on the planet had already read too, possibly more than once.

Big problem now was, with South East Asia's largest gathering about to happen in less than forty-eight hours' time (the infamous Full Moon Party), how was I going to cope now that I had decided the clue was not to drink anymore?

Problem solved. My temporary travel mates told me I had no choice. I was going to drink.
Full Moon Party, here we come.

Might leave my remaining valuables in a safer place though ...

We are the Chi Chi girls...

Almost the last night in the capital before heading south to catch some much needed rest and relaxation on the islands. I've become quite friendly with the kids working at the guesthouse reception desk, so it was with pleasure that I accepted their proposal to 'make party' later in the evening when they all finished work. Nui, Wo, Bi and assorted others went in search of fun, Thai style, at about mid-night, ending up in a place in the capital far removed from the backpackers and all that comes with us ...

Welcome to the Bangkok Bar, a nightclub containing all requisite elements for (clean) nocturnal fun in South East Asia.

Firstly, use a large space, cram in as much furniture as possible and then do all but turn out the lights. A single candle of 10 lux is sufficent to work your way around all three levels and the free advanced-level obstacle course of chairs, tables and other assorted shapes hiding in near obscurity.

Next, add air conditioning. It must be either completely non-functional (the type prefered by the Thais' Cambodian neighbours) or so functional that the air has the same effect on your genitals as does the water at Coogee Bay in August. Just chill, man.

Introduce at least one tenth of the city's pouplation into the said space. Dress them in clothing that makes you feel like the filthy, sweating backpacker that you are ... your two-year old Rip Curl t-shirt, crusty shorts and cheap sandals are no match for their designer gear, all in black.
Most important of all, the music. All songs will be sung by in semi-literate English by Thai girls and boys, very much in the early style of Bananarama. Remove any bass line. Absent verses will be made up for amply by a repetitive chorus that can induce deep vein thrombosis. Volume will be at a level that removes the need and possibility to talk at all, your ears will leach varying quantities of sanguine fluids and brain material. But for all of this the very friendly Thai kids will attempt converstation. These guys are really nice.

Everyone will dance, everywhere. No stairwell, table, chair, toilet cubicle or telephone box will remain safe from avid, pumping and highly enthusiastic salsa and rhumba machinations (and may I ask, what the Hell was a phone cubicle doing in the that club, and who was the person attempting to make the call).

Everyone smiles here, especially our little troupe after we polish off the second bottle of Samsong (and like the Angkor temples, a full and just description of its effect on your psyche is beyond the writer's powers). Being locals, my companions for the evening know only too well that we Westerners are willing and stupid enough to argue over the smallest amounts of money with a rickshaw driver but then not raise an eyebrow once drunk and paying an exorbitant amount of local currency for a JD & coke. My new mates were so good as to take me to the local Bottle-O and get the stuff at a fraction of the price.

See, it's all about the love.

One of the girls sneaked the grog through the club door and we continued our disco moves. Not sure how she got it in though. Thai girls are so petite and wear very small amounts of black designer clothing. Also, handbags are generally large enough to contain a lipstick, but just as with women in the Western world, they somehow manage to hold the equivalent of a week's grocery for the average Australian share-house. So maybe it wasn't that hard to get the JD back in at all.
No matter, the important thing was that we drank it and I did very bad dance moves until the early hours of the morning. Of course, morning in Bangkok is not the same at home. In this part of the world the big star rises without warning, the rays hit with a compaparable force to a well guided laser from the Millenium Falcon; your bones and muscles melt. And you suddenly feel a little comatose. But as I had already consumed some pork, fish and other kinds of meat balls and drank my own body weight in water before retiring to the prison cell, I felt ready bright and early for a day at the National Gallery and a jog in the park.

Now that I have befreinded a few Thai locals they are quickly re-teaching me the language. My skills had admittedly never progressed further than the obligatory 'How much'? and counting from one to a hundred, but this time around is another story. Each time I sit down in the guesthouse restaurant to continue my travel diary (the one where I write bad words), one of the eager and earnest staff is hot on my tail for a lesson in Thai nasal vowels and tonal consonants. And sometime they teach me obscene words to so that we can all get a cheap giggle.

Five hours later I know how to say my name and express that I need something to drink.
OK ... off south to the islands.

I do the Harrison Ford thing.

The temples of Angkor in the northwest of Cambodia are without a doubt the most impressive sight I have seen to date. However, the road to get there is one of the worst on the planet, and I still have reasonably vivid memories of displaced vertabrae years after visiting the first time ...

I think I was actually still drunk when the bus picked me up at 7 am from my guesthouse in Bangkok. Already on my second litre of water and wishing I had forgone those last three Singha beers, I was first into the aircon minibus and fast asleep by the time we picked up the next and my only other co-traveller. After that we were speeding along the Bangkok highways and out of the city in no time at all, we reached the border crossing in only a few small hours. With eyes still half-closed, I didn't recognise this place, and yet it's only five years since my last visit. Eyes wide open, I realised we were at a different border crossing. Which was fine with me, since Poipet, the most common border post between Thailand and Cambodia, is, in my opinion, a place that needs to be fire-bombed. A complete shithole of a town, whereas this, Duang, looked cosy and almost clean. After dealing with the friendly Thai customs officials, it was just a brief walk across the rickety wooden bridge and voici, Cambodia.

Here the fun started ... my co-traveller, who I will call Katia because I never asked her name over the following three days (well, she never asked for mine either), well Katia, she carried a Hungarian passport and had paid for, but not received, a Cambodian visa, the money now safely in the hands of a Bangkok tour company. She produced a receipt which the customs officials all proceeded to look at, and in turn they moved to a small concrete building a few metres from where we were seated. When the building couldn't contain any more government employees, they called Katia over and proceeded to show her a list of countries sorted into various groups. Hungary was obviously in a more interesting group than most, as each time a custom official pointed to it, there were impressive affirmative noises to be heard and a lot of furrowed brows to be seen.

Eventually Katia was called over ... and I should break here to mention Katia's appearance. This woman was glamourous. Totally. Dressed in a short sky blue skirt, white blouse and semi high-heels, a lot of gold jewellery and even some make-up completed the picture. And she had a diamond on her finger that, if sold, would fund the entire Cambodian Customs and Excise department for numerous years, possibly with a salary increase for all staff and increased operating costs for all divisions. The ring was huge and I was sensing a possible grab for money as Katia went over to face the furrowed brows. I was wrong. Well, sort of.

After giggling like men seeing a woman for the very first time (and in all probability they probably hadn't seen legs like hers in high heels for a while), they attempted to stick a hot sweaty and limp visa into her already damp passort (it was recovered after the tsunami hit Phuket). Customs sorted, we were off.

You know those movies where a foul hot wind blows down the dusty street and tumbleweed moves slowly across the screen, well, this was one of those towns. Feckin' dust! Loaded with my backpack, daypack and bottle of water, I was dripping in my own sweat and already smelt like an Indian bathroom. Katia looked quietly glamorous and her blouse remained white the whole time. How this was done will forever remain a mystery to me, as will how she managed to navigate the street in her white shoes. We were getting plenty of stares, and I was lovin' it. I decided that they would think I was her husband and they would think me a nice guy because I bought her so much gold jewellery.

When I returned to reality, we were seated in a tiled room with a fan at least six metres above our heads. All Cambodian rooms are decorated in wall-to-wall tiles. Keeps the place cooler. As would a goddamn fan if it wasn't so friggin' far away from us. Katia didn't like the fact that I lay down on the cooler floor (obviously she was developing a concern for my personal hygiene), so I took my place on a brightly coloured plastic chair and we sat and waited.

The bus company representative, let's call him Mr Unsmiling, came over to us. With a face like a slapped arse he proceeded to tell Katia she would have to pay US$40 for the visa. Strange .. considering the customs officals had not asked for a cent. After a discussion in broken English that must be repeated around the world a thousand times daily, she handed over the cash and Mr Unsmiling proffered a receipt. He then left the building. Katia was pretty cool about the whole thing, and no wonder, she produced a mobile phone and called her tour company back in Bangkok (and no, this is still not a good reason to own one). They agreed that she should not have paid for the visa ...

Five weary Germans walked though the door and joined us on the less-than-comfortable plastic chairs. They looked buggered. But two and five is seven, enough for a minibus and our wait was nearly over. When Mr Unsmiling returned Katia broke the news. If it is possible for a miserable person to unsmile even more, then this is what happened. I grinned like that twat I can be and waited while Katia called the company, and handed over the phone. We all listened to the argument of which we understood not a word, but she got her cash back. I have a new respect for Hungarian woman, especially glamorous ones having matching mobile phone and high heels.
The ramshackle piece of crap masquerading as a transport vehicle belched out a welcome greeting in pure carbon monoxide and we boarded. My gut instinct told me the air conditioning probably wouldn't be functioning on today's journey. I foolishly took a seat at the back of the bus and we slowly moved out of town and onto a highway that rightly deserves a place among the worst roads in the world. It is beyond description. Thank Christ it was the dry season, so that we could drive through some poor bastard's rice field when the bridges were missing or when we needed to avoid potholes the size of an American woman's butt.

It is hard to describe the sensation your body has when every pore and orifice is invaded by dust and burnt fuel, the temperature is beyond even the upper ranges of a Sydney summer, you receive instant chiropratic manipulations over each bump and you can't find that packet of sugary dry biscuits you packed before leaving Bangkok. At last the sun set and brought some relief - my body was now only sweating a litre and a half each hour.

But trouble lay ahead. As we navigated the 486th bridge since departure, the headlights gave us full view of a car accident. The vehicle had hit one of the bridge pylons and about twenty metres away sat two bodies, partly shielding a third that was prostrate. We stopped the bus and got out. I grabbed my torch and first aid kit and went over to see. The body laying on the ground was that of a forty year old woman; she had a severe laceration on her forehead at least three inches in length. While the men rubbed her stomach in a hopeful gesture of comfort, I felt a pulse in neither neck nor wrist. She was no longer with us but I unable (in all senses) to communicate this to the men. Instead I did my best to clean them up - both needed profssional medical attention but only a few stiches and a good pair of tweezers to remove the shards of broken glass. The companion of our bus driver held the torch for me while I mopped up as much dried blood as possible. Their wounds were reasonably superficial apart from each having one cut; one above his left eye and the other under his chin. From no-where a red flashing light appeared and the paramedics were left to convey the news.

We left the scene and moved silently to the bus. Not much conversation until we arrived in Siem Reap, the closest town to the Angkor temples. All a bit shell-shocked, we were moved out of this state by a young guy who boarded the bus, and, in another story repeated across the planet a thousand times daily, we listened half-heartedly to the we-just-going-to-show-you-good-hotel spiel, which of course works well after travelling sixteen hours in crap conditions. At this point you are desperate and would gladly pay $300 for a straw mattress. But this guy was right and I loved him for it. He took us to a decent place away from the busier part of town, and as I lay my head down on my comfortable matress in my wall-to-wall tiled room with bamboo features, I fell into a coma.

The following morning it was time to discover the temples and to forget that I should really have been making an emergency appointment with an osteopath. And time for negotiations. A bike, a driver, a good price. The pros and cons of bartering have long been the bugbear of my travels. I hate doing it. It is not fun and it is not a game. But this is not India so it is a lot easier. In SE Asia the practice of bargaining for farang is still bearable. In India it makes my buttocks clench involuntarily while I resist the urge to remove one in a billion permanently from the planet. Negotiations completed in a few minutes, I was beaming from ear to ear as we approached the ticket office and I got my three day multipass (well, it looked like one). Super green.

Then it was time for a three day adventure play in the world's most magical site. Wiser, smarter and more cultured people have already written amply about the temples, I have neither the skills nor the desire to sit any longer at this computer. I'll leave you with the photos.
See you back in Bangkok. Shit, I have to cross that border again ...

Breathe in that air...

After the very frustrating dicovery that my very first entry on this site had not saved ... I am now forced to do exactly what I had hoped this site would save me from ... having to rewrite the same stories over and over again. Well, enough of a whinge, after all, I am on the beginning of a fanstastic journey and am very relaxed and loving every minute of it thus far.

So ... going back a few days ... I took a the flight from Sydney to Bangkok, a great occasion to reacquaint myself with fatty airline food and a fantastically friendly middle aged woman named from Brisbane named Beryl who studied numerology and did my numbers for me. I am a number nine, a very giving person and am currently living in a peak year ... looking forward to that. We arrived in the hot and humid capital on time and I collected my luggage a few minutes later. I stepped out into the night and joined the sweating throng of Westerners wanting a taxi (too tired to negotiate with the tuk tuk maniacs) and got dropped off in Khao San Rd after an hour on the ultra-sleek city expressways, this equally loved and loathed centre for budget travellers.

Found myself a characterless prison cell with irritatingly noisy fan, showered, shaved and went out into the early morning in search of spicy food and a cheap beer. Both of which I located within a hundred metres of leaving the guesthouse.

Slumbered until late the next morning, and armed my new digital camera I headed out to rediscover one of the craziest cities of the planet, and at least one of the most vibrant and colourful ones. I made my way on foot, neither the searing heat nor humidity was going to shake my spirits; although I have to admit that after an hour and a half among the incessant traffic breathing in every manner of combustible fuel particle, I decided it was time for food and possibly a tuk tuk ride on the way home. Grabbed the first of many Pad Thai noodles and saw that I was approaching Yaowarat Rd, the centre of Chinatown and one the best food markets in Asia.

Don't know why, but I have a minor fascination with the million varieties of inedible products that are up for sale and human comsumption in this part of the world. And almost all without the aid of refrigeration. A special favourite for me is walking among recently and not-so-recently slaughtered animals and harvested seafood, all the while trying my hardest to recognise the living creature from its hacked version on display, and wondering how much of this stuff actually ends up in my own stomach.

Sea cucumbers are great for pointing and laughing at, as are many other things on sale whose origins are from the sea. These people sell and eat anything, and have little time for polystyrene and clingwrap packaging. Buckets and other plastic recipients line the stalls and are chock full of every imaginable living and dead thing. In turn, I am sometimes pointed and stared at, and for a moment I feel suddenly at one and sympathetic with the sea cucumber. I move on through the claustrophobic laneways and back out into the main street to breathe in the best a thousand two-stroke engines can give. Nice.

I decide to head towards the fetid stench of stagnant water and head home along one of the many canals which probably gave a certain charm to this city a hundred years ago, but today provide little other than fertile breeding grounds for mosquitoes and a continuous moving display of untreated effluent. It was then I discovered the pig. High up on its pedestal, as I approached the Ministry of Defence I came across the guilded swine wrapped in pearls and tulle ... Apparently dedicated to the current queen, the fat sow was surrounded by offerings and burning insense. My best laugh for the day.

I headed home for more Pad Thai and a change of clothes, and, since it was Friday evening, out for a few beers. A hundred metres from the guesthouse I discovered Gilligans, no doubt a den of thoroughly pissed Westerners, but more enticing than the tuk tuk driver who was offering me a vision of young Thai women doing things to each other that my writing skills would be hard pushed to describe. I thanked the tuk tuk driver for his invitation, and instead opted for the bar. Once inside ... it felt like being in one of those bars you see in movies set in the mid-west of the United States. Pointless neon lights strewn about the place with wooden panels and advertisements for Jack Daniels and various local drops, I took my rightful place as a single male traveller at a stool at the bar.

Was soon chatting with a couple of Aussies and a Frenchie who would quite possibly later increase the total daily sales of the tuk tuk driver, and decided that for better or worse I was going to have a filthy hangover the following morning ... perfect when you have a sixteen hour ride ahead of you into Cambodia. I drank my own body weight in water before falling into a mosquito-ravaged sleep, and awoke feeling 87 years old a few hours later, with enough time for a quick breakfast before boarding the minibus, destination Siem Reap.

I am goddamn lovin' it here.