Brutal Bureaucracy

Throughout my travels I have stumbled across monumental bureaucracy. Usually it doesn't affect me too much, what do I mind if they have to fill in and stamp three bus tickets three times for our 30 minute journey? And if it avoids corruption then I guess it's a good thing. But occasionally it frustrates one to screaming point. This might end up being a very long boring story.

So in Oaxaca I posted three things, two large envelopes at 300g each and a wooden armadillo for my dad, which I packed in a box, wrote his name address on and took to the post office. The only trouble I had was with the cost, a total of about £30, over double the total cost of the presents I was sending (the usual ratio), and since they only had small value stamps I had to cover half of each parcel and letter with stamps and my saliva. Now we get to Puebla, a couple of hours away from Oaxaca, I have two boxes to send. It was difficult enough packing them, it made me realise how helpful everyone had been in Oaxaca. So I get to the post office and the guy tells me the boxes need to be wrapped in manila and tied up with string. WTF? So I go across the road to the papelaria for the third time and ask the moody old woman who wouldn't give me any boxes, and ignored me so much the second time that I nearly walked out without paying for the two sheets of paper, but she tells me that I need to get the post office to check them before wrapping them, I try to explain that they just sent me over, but she wouldn't have it so I return to the post office, they send me straight out again, I guess because I practically packed the parcels in front of them and they didn't see any hint of drugs or arms. So the moody old woman wraps my parcels and asks me to address them. After I've addressed the first one she tells me that I need to put my return address on it. Now I haven't left enough space and I can't really see the point, it's not like I have an address in Mexico, and if they can't find one address in Steyning how are they going to find mine? So I tell her that the address is my address. She huffs and puffs. Eventually she finishes both packages and I return to the post office. The guy is finally satisfied and weighs up the two parcels at 400g and 800g, which for some reason only costs £10, less than the presents cost!

So if you do get something from me, be very grateful, and if you don't then it's either been eaten up by customs, or I just lost the will to live before I finished posting it.

Odds And Ends

Well Maddy got off ok, and has arrived safely home. I'm glad to say that in the last few days in Mexico she really managed to begin living the Mexican life, with such choice quotes as:

"Is that a cockroach, or is there an elephant stuck to the ceiling?"

"Jamie that man just full-on groped my arse."

Of course I went looking for said man, to show him how western democratic justice works, but unfortunately he'd managed to escape me after I wondered slowly in the wrong direction, shaking with fear at the thought of finding him.

If you've been checking my photos recently you may have noticed that a strange Machu Picchu-like structure has cropped up in the middle on Mexico City. Well actually no it hasn't, I just uploaded Diego's photos from the Inca Trail. So that's that mystery solved, now we just have to work out how they got all those stones up there and so perfectly shaped without the use of wheels, metal tools or animals.

A blast from the past of a different jungle trip came in the following form from a fellow Lost City trekker:

i find myself in a weird mood in this current circumstances, kind of summering up my trip and looking back at things in a nostalgic manner; from meeting up with jamie kitson i can say i learnt this short, yet very true line that i found myself thinking about over and over again - "if it`s worth doing, than it`s worth doing well".

It's odd what you leave people with, I don't even remember saying it to him, mostly I asked him what the army was like and tried to keep off the subject of politics. He's Israeli.

Something I meant to mention about Colombia and all of America in general is this road system. The block system. It might be logical and easy to navigate, but it isn't half boring! Colombia though, decided that it wasn't boring enough and numbered the roads. Calling the north-south roads "Races" for some reason. But then Bogota decided that this was too boring and decided to renumber a whole sector meaning that lots of buildings now have two addresses on them, one crossed out in red.

UPDATE - So the phrase "if it's worth doing, it's worth doing well" was being applied to drinking, most of the guys were drinking warm rum with warm coke, and I couldn't stand it, I went out and bought a giant bag of ice and a giant bag of limes. If it's worth drinking, it's worth drinking well. And I hope I didn't cause any offence with the Israeli comment, I've liked every Israeli I've ever met.

Food And Drink. Minus The Drink.

Maddy and I went to an Italian restaurant last night. It reminded me how irritating Italians can be on the subject of food. They seem to think that they're God's gift to the human palate. Well no! You're not! Italian food is boring! The first mouthful may be the most delicious thing you've ever tasted in your life, but then every other mouthful is exactly the same. I want some variety here people! And if you try to explain this to them they smile at you in this condescending way and say "But darling, you've never had proper Italian food." That's right, I've never been anywhere near Italy. No wait. I have. Twice. And you know what? I can't even remember the food! That's how good it was. (Actually I do remember the pizza that was like a biscuit with some cheese on top. Great!) And the other thing they say to you is "But darling, you're English, you wouldn't know good food if it bit you on the tongue." That's right, you lived in Britain for twenty years and you never even found an Italian or Indian that you liked? "But darling, that's not British cooking." Right, every single dinner you ate in that twenty years was cooked by a foreign chef. And those aren't national dishes you're eating, those are British variations on a theme. My mum cooks great lasagna and spaghetti bolognese (fuck off Adam:), but the only thing that's even vaguely Italian is the pasta, and where was that produced? Italy?

So the good news is that after eating the whole bread basket and my so-so cannelloni I have decided that I have finally got my hunger back after a bit of a nasty illness. My previous worse ever illness was in Laos, when I awoke at 3am with a sudden onset of Explosive Bowel Syndrome and fell unconscious against the wash bowl (see Mum, I've learnt that one!) on my first visit to the loo. But it got better after that, and only lasted about 12 hours. Statistically this last bout was 2-4 times worse. By Thursday night I was visiting the toilet frequently and after exiting the toilet to wash my hands on one such venture I suddenly felt very weak and giddy and awoke to find myself unconscious on the floor of the shower room. I then had to sit down half way up the short flight of stairs and then collapsed again once in our room, and had to crawl into bed. Maddy asked me why I didn't wake her, I'd thought about asking her to pass the bin in case I was sick, but what else could she have done.

So today it was Maddy's turn, she started feeling a bit bad after her spaghetti bolognese (yes Adam, with meat). I only realised how bad she looked today after I'd marched her to the bus stop and we were already on our bus to Taxco. I said that we could stay in Cuernavaca, but stoic as ever she said she'd see how she felt after she'd eaten. She ate, and ate a little more at my prodding, about half a slice of toast in all, and then was sick all over her feet once we left the restaurant. we could make out little pieces of spaghetti. I knew it, not just boring but poisoned too! Maybe they heard me. Anyway, we came right back to Cuernavaca.

Food And Drink. Minus The Food.

Wondering why we were still drinking Coronas which we could be drinking anywhere in the world I decided that since we were in the state of Michoacan I'd order a Michelada, which turned out to be a Bloody Mary made with beer (Corona) and of course limes and chilies and had salt around the rim. I am now addicted to the stuff!

Maddy and I arrived at Mazunte on the Oaxaca coast last night, we checked in to our room over looking the beach while it was dark and were rewarded with a beautiful, paradyllic some might say, view when we awoke this morning.

No, we didn't feel any hint of the earthquake.

Expectations

I wasn't expecting Mexico to be so calm and tranquil. Don't get me wrong, there's been plenty of craziness, not least in Jerez, where they seem to think that mixing horses, fireworks and alcohol (for both the horses and the people on the horses, and the bystanders of course) makes for a jolly good time. Actually I have to agree with them on that one :) And then there was the march of silence (I think) which was silent apart from a drum beat and very occasional trumpet calls, and consisted of an incredibly long march of people mostly dressed in KKK-like robes carrying Jesuses in various conditions of pain and distress, enclosed by the longest rope in the world. But over all Mexico seems a pretty relaxed place, especially Guadalajara, a place which I cannot pronounce if I am reading its name. I've also been quite surprised at the openly gay community here, I think even in Brighton you don't get the openly affectionate gay scene that you get here, but then I guess if your straight scene is open enough to have people groping each other in parks all over the place then it only follows.

When Maddy arrived she said three things, that I am thin (I've always been thin!), that I am brown (I've never been brown!) and that everyone at home thinks that I am having so much fun that I will never come home, well fear not, I am actually quite looking forward to it, but not quite enough to move my flight :)

Another thing that Maddy said was "I fancy cooking tonight." I was flabbergasted, well, surprised. I've been loving the food here, it's so good and so different. The food's been good everywhere really, but here it's really different from European food, goat stew for breakfast with tortillas and limes, sheep cooked in cactus leaves in a hole in the ground with tortillas and limes for lunch and then... actually we've mostly been having a very large late lunch and not much else. With tortillas and limes. In the UK I've often thought what a genius combination beer and limes is, but it's just a default really, everything comes with limes, and chili, and you can get your beer with chili too, it's just way too salty for me. Anyway, the point is I found myself wracking my brains trying to remember how Johanna did her blue cheese sauce this evening, after Maddy's spag-bol (though Adam always swears you can't call it spag-bol if there's no meat in it) last night. I can't usually be bothered to cook in hostels, it's too frustrating and you usually don't really save much money. And so it was. Our bill came to 200 pesos when two can eat well on 150 pesos, though as Maddy pointed out, that doesn't include chocolate, which after the steak was the second most expensive item on the receipt. Honestly, we come to the land of chocolate and she buys Cadbury's!

Again, you might like to have a look at Maddy's photos so that you can get a load of my ugly mug/beautiful face.

Talking of photos, this was recently brought to my attention :)

Go To Colombia

Forget everything you think you know and go to Colombia. It's the most fantastic place. I think it's the only place I'd really like to revisit (apart from Huacachina of course) and the only place I really regretted having to leave. Though that's unfair to Argentina as I spent four months there and am going back, so I don't have to wish for it. Anyway, back to Colombia... Probably the friendliest place I've been, the most paradyllic, the most varied. Though that's unfair to Ecuador, which I hear is also very varied, but I didn't exactly make the most of it, staying for just a week. Back to Colombia... The land of fruits... and... and... the classic jam and cheese combo! What else was there Sonia? Oh just go!

I think I am beginning to understand how parents feel, well I don't think "understand" is the right word, as I have all these irrational fears, starting with a very anxious two and a half hour wait at the airport (I knew her plane had been delayed) and continuing when she didn't eat any dinner, little breakfast and then left virtually all her lunch (very unusual for a Kitson/Johnstone/Bowers) so I was very relieved when she ate all her dinner and said she might have a 3rd pancake for breakfast and reported solid pooing afterwards. I managed to allow her to make her own mistake of not putting on enough sun cream despite the clouds (Sarah, I did advise her, but she insisted she'd be ok. She has very pink, slightly painful arms today).

Her pictures are here.

Heaven Is Hell

Jamie, I know you are going to get cross with me but please write as I am getting a bit concerned having not heard from you for several days.
Worried of Steyning

I told her I was going to the beach, but I guess maybe I didn't explain that you have to get on the bus for an hour and then walk for three hours to get there so it's not really worth it for just an afternoon. In fact I stayed there two nights rather than the one I had been planning, and no, I didn't find a satellite. Or a dish.

So I am sorry if I haven't been replying to your emails (hello Johanna, Jordi, Martin, Rob, etc), but after the six days in the jungle I had about an hour on the internet and then I went to the beach.

Paradyllic may not be a word, but if it was I think it would sum up Tayrona National Park perfectly. I'm not sure what else I can say about it, the jungle reaches the sand, coconut trees abound, the coast is the Caribbean so the sea is warm and blue and swarming with pretty little fishes, I went snorkeling properly for the first time in my life. And because it's so difficult to get to it isn't even that touristy.

Having said how difficult it is to be down here, and even more so in the park, I managed to find a way, I read the last quarter or so of Catch-22. An amazing book. Read it!

Entering the park was an interesting experience. I was with a friend who will remain anonymous (for reasons which will become clear). Beforehand we went to buy some supplies, including a bottle of rum and some Pepsi. Unknown to us alcohol is not allowed into the park, despite the fact that you can buy it once you're there. So we didn't go to any lengths to hide our bottle of rum, and I think that's what might have made up the policeman's mind to search us, after standing by for a few minutes while we waited for a non-existent bus. Walking into his office it slowly dawned on me what was going on, and I wondered, slightly panicked, if said friend had his weed and cocaine on him. The policeman began by asking us if we had any cannabis, my friend rather longwindedly explained that he'd given up smoking 2 months ago. The policeman chose my friend's bag first, it occurred to me afterwards that I should have put my bag forward first, but my mind is not so quick in these situations. I was standing, watching, my arms crossed, interested to see what would appear from the bag. My friend strolled nonchalantly around the office, occasionally peering out, probably watching for some interesting species of bird (he's a birdwatcher, and that's why he's remaining anonymous). Eventually a bag of weed appeared from the bag, followed shortly by a pipe and some cocaine. This is where I began to relax, it wasn't a game of chance any more, Schrödinger's cat was dead. The policeman asked if there was any more, my friend replied in the negative. The policeman went on to find another bag of weed. No, it wasn't planted. Then the policeman turned to my bag. He wasn't interested in my Valium, but did have a quick sniff of my powdered milk, I didn't make any jokes about being English. What happened next is a bit of a mystery, along with the policeman there was a park ranger in attendance, who for some reason seemed to wield more power than the policeman, and they both started to ask us if we still wanted to enter the park. I thought that I must be misunderstanding the simple sentence, then pictured the police waiting for us as we exited the park. But no, they confiscated the stuff (insisting that we come back for the rum, despite my protestations that they keep it), made my friend sign a statement, the point of which seems to be that he won't do the same thing again, and we were free to go, they didn't even want a bribe. Another funny thing, throughout our ordeal the policeman was sweating, more and more, towards the end it was dripping off his face, as if it were he that had just been found with several illicit substances in Colombia.

btw, I found out how you distinguish between a policeman and an army man, quite simple and obvious really, policemen wear plain green uniforms while army men wear camouflage.

The last thing that my friend said to me as I left the park was some advice on getting the bus from Santa Marta to Cartagena: "If someone comes out to meet you and tells you that the bus is leaving now, don't take it, it will do the four hour journey in six and won't be direct. Get a bus from a reputable firm such as Expresso Brazilia." Now, I heard what he said. I listened. I understood. But the guy swore it would only be four hours, and that it was direct. We reached the half way point in two hours, and I was thinking, phew, this will be ok. How wrong I was. After another few minutes the bus stopped and the conductor got out to have a fist fight with a man with some large boxes. I guess he just didn't like the size of them. The police came and decided that the size wasn't so bad. We continued. We stopped. The conductor explained that the bus couldn't continue for another hour, but there was one across the street that we wouldn't have to pay for that was leaving immediately. We crossed the street. We didn't have to pay. It left immediately. Turned a couple of corners and stopped. For an hour. Several Expresso Brazilia buses passed is. We got going. This bus did 0-60 in... no it didn't even do 60 kph. We got stopped by the police. Twice. Several more Expresso Brazilia buses passed us. Total travel time: about six hours.

I do like travelling alone, but occasionally I do wish for some female company, of the more-than-just-friends variety. Cartagena is a beautiful beautiful city. One of the most romantic cities I think I have visited. I ate dinner the first night I was there in this beautiful square, surrounded by colonial buildings, the Caribbean night air so warm, alone, but not unhappy :)

Another point of view of our trip to Villa De Leyva, including some pictures of me! is here.

Lost City 1 - Machu Picchu 0

If I had to chose between Machu Picchu and Ciudad Perdida I would chose Ciudad Perdida. Machu Picchu is like an outdoor museum, with a fine green carpet. And there's no mystery to it, you can go up the first hill and see it all, and it's so perfect! Like a model. Just like the photos. Just like all the photos! And by 11:00 there's so many people there, the world and his dog, his middle aged fat American neighbour and all 60 of his French school children are there. Ciudad Perdida on the other hand is mysterious, you can never see it all, and you can never work out how big it is. And there's no one else there, just you and the 10 or so guys you've just spend three days getting there with. Not that the three days getting there were well spent, the six days of short walks could have been reduced easily to 5 days trekking, or even four days without a stay at the city. Which is another thing, you get to sleep there, which doesn't sound like much, but it really added to the whole trip.

A friend of mine in Valparaiso declared that he was depressed one day, and continued "what kind of fucking bastard gets depressed while he's spending a few months on the coast of Chile?" I felt a bit down after getting back today, I had that feeling like when you get back from holiday and think, oh, so this is real life. I know that's ridiculous, but anyway, after having a shower and stepping out the door into the warmth and sun to go to our local drug dealer/brothel for a milk shake (this guy does everything!:) I realised how difficult it is to stay down for even a minute here.

I had a couple of enquiries about subscribing to this blog (no really). You have to use a 3rd party rss to email service. I chose one arbitrarily and have added a link to the left.

It Ain't Half Hot Mum

I am on the Caribbean coast. It's hot. I am going to the jungle for 6 days to trek to The Lost City. Yes, very Indiana Jones. So far every time I have said I will be away I have managed to find a computer somewhere. So knowing my luck I will bump into a villager with a satellite or something :) Chau for now.

Of course a satellite would be of no use, I meant a dish.

Exodus

I think this is going to take a bit of explaining, but let me first say that I have nothing against hippy Porteños per se, there's just so damn many of them.

Every year, around January time, the time of the summer holidays in Argentina, an exodus occurs. From Buenos Aires hordes of hippy Porteños stream from their homelands further north, for... actually I don't know what for, but that's what they do. It's probably a spiritual thing, man. Of course the further north you come, away from their natural habitat, the thinner their numbers become. At Humauaca, one of the northern most towns in Argentina, you could have given a blind man a bullet and he could not have failed to kill at least three, and maim several others. Heading up through Bolivia there were still a disappointing amount, the streets of Copacabana were lined with them and their hand made wares and Dan was attacked mercilessly by one in a bar in Cochabamba, and was forced to part with a far wad of his money for two worthless (and very badly colour coordinated) bracelets after some merciless flirting. By the time I met Dan again in Ecuador we thought we had lost them, but in an Italian restaurant in Cuenca a three piece turned up, in suspiciously short trousers, our Porteño radars started pinging, and sure enough, they were from Beunos Aires.

Porteños can be spotted easily enough by their Inca/Israeli/Porteño trousers (notice I use the American "pants" in the video) which are baggy, striped and always too short, at least one in a group will always have a guitar, usually in an Inca case, if it's out of the case it is usually playing Redemption Song, a couple in the group will usually be juggling, badly and most of the group will have at least one dread lock, often with some sort of thread and bead attachment.

Anyway, the point is that I tracked down some of these hippy Porteños as shockingly far north as Colombia, see my videos, Porteño Hunter, Part I and Part II. Their call is very quiet, perhaps to avoid attracting predators, so you'll have to turn your sound right up.

I spoke too soon about the insurance, they are saying that I am under insured. The truth is that their suppliers are ripping them off, and I have not hesitated in telling them so. You could actually buy all the equipment for £200 less than I insured it for, money that would be the insurance company's saving.

I am off today to the holiday home of some Colombians that I met in Valparaiso so again, don't worry if I'm late in responding to emails, I haven't been captured by guerrillas. Maybe.