Dave Reports, UK/Spain/Ireland, July & October, 2000
>Subject: THE DAVE REPORT, JULY 2000
>Date: Sat, 22 Jul 2000 17:41:58 EST
>
>Hola Amigos!!!
>
>Top of the Mornin' to ya all, to be sure, to be sure, to
>be...whatever
>
>How IS everyone?
>
>Apologies for not being in contact with many of you lately (except
>of course for all those crappy forwards I've recently shucked on to
>you).
>
>The Dave Report has been lacking a bit lately - since the pie fight
>record I think. Basically that's because there hasn't really been
>that much to report, except of course for the groundbreaking news
>that I've finally done a bit of travelling again and left the shores
>of England - not just once, but TWICE!!!
>
>My first trip - 5 glorious days over Easter - was to the coast of
>Spain with my dear friend Brit. My first European Vacation was
>purely divine, a moy bueno fiesta. We stayed in Valencia on the east
>coast, just the best place to experience that cool Mediterranean
>breeze (I loved saying that!). We made the most of the beaches and
>the real, genuine 33 degree sunshine and our skins actually got that
>distant memory back of how to tan (or burn, as Brit did on our first
>day, when we didn't take the sun cream - yeah, my fault, and she
>never let me forget it).
>
>We took a few day trips from the city to various beaches, which
>weren't the Australian ultimate, but were a hell of a leap up from
>the English variety. The surf was non-existent and the water was too
>cool back in April to swim in comfortably - except for one
>invigorating dip I took, and one involuntary dunking Brit took (with
>my gallant assistance).
>
>Otherwise Spain was an awesome, incredible culture shock. Dealing
>with the language was a (usually refreshing) challenge. We knew
>maybe three words of Spanish when we arrived and maybe ten when we
>left five days later (slow learners). But our saviour with regards
>to language (not to mention providing a charming, calming centre to
>the our bickering married couple dynamic) came in the form of Anna,
>a lovely Canadian girl we met at the airport and refused to let go
>of for a few days because of her prior experience with the language
>and the country. Anna was incredibly patient as she tried to teach
>us the basics when it came to ordering food or getting around town.
>It was just a shame she wasn't with us when we arrived at our hotel
>the first night at 3am to be "greeted" at the door by this sweaty,
>surly Godfather type who seemed to be grunting in Spanish that
>(despite my hours of pre-booking attempts by phone from London
>"Hola! Habla Ingles?") there was no reservation for us and no spare
>rooms. Luckily there was a scary-looking homeless guy sitting
>outside the hotel willing to translate the good news for us!!! But
>that was fun! Totally surreal, but fun.
>
>We also could have used Anna's legendary lingo on our first day when
>we tried to order a Spanish meal - we sat in a beachfront cafe
>flapping the photocopied pages of the Lonely Planet around trying to
>use them to translate what the waitress and the menu were
>saying...we thought we'd ordered seafood, and we were proved
>right...but nothing could have prepared us for the huge plates piled
>high with dozens of little fishies - fried whole - we had to bravely
>munch down on the heads, the tails, the bones...mm-mmm...and not
>just fish, we got baby eels as well, I even scored a bonus fried
>yabbie.
>
>Apart from this, the food was OK, always interesting - especially
>the local dish Paella - it wasn't always fresh but these huge pans
>of scrummy saffron-flavoured rice with meat or seafood toppings were
>always eagerly scoffed. Much better than the food was the sangria,
>which always went down easy, whether we were sitting in a beach
>front restaurante with a superb Mediterranean view, or seemingly the
>only tourists in a cosy little courtyard cafe within a tiny old
>Spanish town, waiting for the Good Friday procession to start.
>
>Actually this latter place was the setting for a sangria-fueled
>incident where Brit got some revenge on behalf of all you female
>friends of mine who have had to endure me saying chivalrously in the
>past "do you want my shirt?" in a half-serious, half-mocking,
>all-stupid way whenever you've mentioned that you are feeling
>chilly.
>Anyway Brit finally called my bluff in the little town of Sagunto
>which is why I found myself strolling nonchalantly down the main
>street of town - which was packed with every Spaniard from the area
>awaiting the years biggest religious parade - and instead of my
>shirt, I'm just wearing (Adonis-like) a wrap around towel - and I'm
>trying to ignore not only the multitude of double takes from the
>poor townspeople ranging from shocked, curious, indignant,
>disbelieving, repulsed, amused, aroused (?),...not only that, but I
>had to contend with the constant stream of bladder-busting,
>tear-streaming laughter emanating from sweet Brit as she enjoyed the
>whole region's reaction to my own impromptu parade.
>
>The fact that I wasn't lynched on that solemn religious evening says
>a lot for the Spanish people. Generally we found them happy,
>laid-back, open, accommodating - basically everything the English
>are not. At times it felt like home. But at others - totally
>different. We reveled in lots of stuff - like just walking - lots of
>walking, and exploring Valencia and all it's lovely old plazas and
>gothic churches and busy markets and narrow little alleyways with
>motor scooters zooming between the crumbling buildings. Or checking
>out the remains of a Moorish castle on a hillside above Sagunto, a
>town that hadn't seemed to change much in a millennium, with a
>parade (the real parade, not mine) where the young men of the town
>from little boys up to big boys dressed up in complete black leather
>orthodox outfits that where basically photo negative versions of the
>Ku-Klux-Klan getup and walked along with one hand holding flaming
>torches and the other throwing lollies to the kids in the crowd (or
>to cute tourist girls who batted their long eyelashes) as a way of
>seeking penance for the sins of the past year. Or else stuff like
>plucking genuine Valencia oranges from a grove on the size of the
>highway enroute to the beach. Or just sitting on a train watching a
>glorious pink sunset over the green orchards and farmers villas and
>barren hillsides with little fortresses and churches and townships
>nestled underneath...sigh... yeah...I DID love Spain.
>
>But my most recent trip, a few weeks ago, was different in many
>ways. For starters, I traveled northwest from London, not southeast.
>I left the shores of England again to be confronted with the amazing
>scenery and history and people and diversity of the Emerald Isle.
>I'm talking about Ireland. Land of leprechauns and Guinness and
>shamrocks and sheep and scary sectarianism. And it was fab.
>Marrrrrrvellous!
>
>I gate-crashed a 6-day organised tour around the top half of the
>island which my beautiful friend Christine (just arrived from
>BrisVegas) had already arranged to take with her mate Sarah. My
>addition to the tour group of 16 upped the ratio of boys to girls to
>1 guy per 4 girls. Maybe I would have had MORE fun if everyone on
>the tour HADN'T assumed that Christine and I were on our honeymoon!
>
>Unlike Spain, which involved a ratio of relaxing to sightseeing of
>about 50:50, Ireland had no chilling-out time whatsoever - it was a
>non-stop bombardment of beautiful countryside and coastline and
>history and Guinness and culture and laughter. Which was good,
>because, after six days of exhausting but exhilarating experiences,
>I felt like I'd absorbed and learned and loved so much from Ireland,
>yet I still felt like I'd barely scratched the surface. This
>country - well, this ISLAND I should say, cause we visited both the
>Republic (Eire) and Northern Ireland - is so rich in culture and
>history and beauty.
>
>Our little 20-seater tour bus drove through some truly spectacular
>country - alongside the edge of sheer steep cliffs or past little
>coves and sandy beaches on the northeast Antrim coast, through
>squelchy peat bogs or the rugged wild mountains and beautiful
>untouched loughs (lakes) in the northeast Connemara region, and
>EVERYWHERE rolling green fields and farms dotted with little white
>puffs of walking wool. Not to mention trips through dozens of little
>Irish blink-and-you'll-miss-it towns each seemingly with a pub
>always named "Murphy's Bar".
>
>Speaking of pubs...hmm...when in Ireland... Maybe that's why the
>tour was so exhausting! But our excess Guinness consumption was for
>purely cultural research purposes, you see. We spent our Irish
>evenings in a blurry succession of Irish pubs, experiencing a
>variety of decor and charm and characters and weird accents and
>language and live music. A "musical pub crawl" around Dublin's
>finest establishments ended with me pretty much crawling back to the
>hostel in exhaustion. And I was exhausted BEFORE we when out on the
>last night of the tour in Galway, so my attempt at dancing the Irish
>gig when Christine dragged me up in front on the band was pretty
>pathetic. In Westport we entered a pub which was more like the
>publican's living room - you had to ring the bell to get him to
>appear to serve you - and we could almost hear him flush the toilet
>or turn off the TV up the hall. Best part about that place was the
>huge German Shepard dog helping to serve behind the bar. No kidding.
>
>Maybe the most memorable bar was in Belfast - I say "bar", but this
>was more like a bomb shelter - high, barred windows and a front door
>with a cage around the front you had to trap yourself in while the
>management decided if you were going to set of a bomb or not. Yeah,
>that place was pretty scary and I'm not just talking about all the
>tacky Elvis portraits on the walls. And this was PRIOR to us hearing
>that a few years ago someone had had walked into that VERY bar with
>an automatic rifle and gunned down half a dozen patrons.
>
>But hey, that was Belfast. On arrival our tour guide pointed out the
>melted warehouse windows and charred pavement where a couple of tour
>buses from OUR tour company have been fire-bombed a few weeks
>before. The streets were either completely deserted or patrolled by
>police cars that looked more like tanks. Gates and walls and barbed
>wire and warnings were profuse. At times Belfast appeared to be a
>quite normal city, you understand, but I've never been anyway before
>in the world where two different sections of society are living side
>by side, yet are so blatant and confrontational in their
>non-acceptance of the other. We took an incredibly eye-opening black
>cab tour through the most intensely sectarian sides of town - both
>the catholic and protestant - viewing dozens of hardcore murals
>depicting past violence and present beliefs and threats. Some
>members of our tour group even met and were photographed with IRA
>leader Gerry Adams when we visited Sinn Fein headquarters. Our cab
>driver George shared just a tiny portion of this regions turbulent
>history - the many deaths of innocents or revolutionaries or
>defenders - we visited cemeteries and pubs and playgrounds which had
>all been decimated by "The Troubles". The most moving moment of all
>was when Christine asked George if he thought the peace process
>would be ultimately successful - and he just started at her intently
>for a minute before replying: "you've gotta understand something. I
>grew up here..." before sharing some of his turbulent family
>history. George's mum is catholic. His dad is protestant. He hasn't
>seen some members of his family for many years. You could feel the
>hope in George for peace in his country, yet you could also feel the
>pain and regret and anger and despair from the past generations and
>horrors entwined in everything that George - and all the people of
>Northern Ireland - had become. We left Belfast with lumps in our
>throats and lots of confusion and frustration swirling around in our
>minds.
>
>But my memories from much of the rest of the island were less
>heartrending and more heartwarming. Like up on the far northeast
>coast when we crossed a precipitously swaying rope bridge connecting
>the windy and beautiful coastal cliffs to a little fishing island -
>awesome fun, especially when I pretended to be Indiana Jones and
>jumped around and shared the living Irish shite out of dear Sarah.
>Or a day or two later when we picnicked among purple flowers and
>curious cows on the northwest coast before wandering up to peer over
>the nausea inducing edge of the staggeringly steeply precipitous
>cliffs around Downpatrick Head. Or the enjoyment our tour guide Des
>took in either speaking utter barney or sharing his intimate
>knowledge of every little morsel of Irish history or legend - like
>the Battle of the Boyne, or the story of Cuchulain killing the dog
>or of the Giant leaving his shoe behind when he ran across the
>causeway. Or our visit to Croagh Patrick, a huge holy mountain
>dedicated to Saint Patrick - where a few looney Irishmen make their
>annual pilgrimage every year by climbing across the sharp stones and
>jagged boulders all the way to the summit in their BARE FEET.
>Actually, make that now - a few looney Irishmen plus one nutcase of
>a tall Australian traveller. Yeah, I'm stupid, it's official now. I
>don't know if the usual procedure worked with me and all my sins
>were absolved during my long, painful, clumsy stagger up to the
>peak, but the epic foot massage I scored from Christine later made
>it worth it. Maybe...
>
>Doesn't matter. The whole trip was well worth it. The images of
>rusty old bicycles leaned against the front of tiny, brightly
>painted pubs. The contrast of white sheep against fields the colour
>of which made me think I'd never seen green up till then. Sharing a
>Guinness and a chat with old friends and new...that was Ireland.
>
>Otherwise...on the non-travel front, not much else to report.
>
>Limited funds and time mean my travels till October will be confined
>to one or two short trips to the continent. Paris coming up in a few
>weeks. Most romantic city on earth, apparently. Any takers?
>
>But I managed recently to get away for a few days and actually see
>some of the country I've been living in for seven months, and
>finally appreciate the fact that England is NOT London. My
>high-flying and low-farting old buddy Mark very generously took me
>on a quick road trip of the west country: we tried to emulate Chevy
>Chase's domino manuverve at Stonehenge but couldn't get the car
>close enough, I had a bath in Bath (don't panic, we HAVE photos),
>and we tried to find Will Shakespeare among all the American
>tourists in the little town of Stratford-on-Avon (he's dead,
>apparently). A couple of other weekends in the English countryside
>have featured some awesome visits to one of the coolest things they
>have over here in England: castles!!! Gotta tell ya I like best of
>all the ruined ones I can run around in playing Robin Hood or King
>Arthur, but Windsor Castle (where Queen Liz spends her weekends -
>and does all the kid's washing for the week I guess) was the most
>opulent and extravagant holiday home you could ever hope to chill
>out in. ONE dinner table - just ONE - that I think seated more
>people than the entire Keg Restaurant. Now THAT's a birthday party.
>Plus an armory/weapons room filled with hundreds of antique swords
>and pistols - I suppose for when Liz gets grumpy at Phil and wants
>to keep him on his toes.
>
>Further adventures over the last few months have been confined to
>lovely Londontown. Coupla freebie entries to international acts:
>Mark scored tickets to the theatre - the famous Palladium - so we
>could get to know "The King and I", and he then blew all the
>simmering sexual tension between the lead duo away by blabbing in
>the interval that there was no shagging, no KISSING even, and that
>Jason Scott Lee (the King) DIES at the end!!! (sorry if you didn't
>know). And a few months ago my flatmate AJ sneaked a few of us down
>some dingy back alleyways and into the venue he was working that
>night - we sneaked around in the bowels of this building with more
>stealth than Tom Cruise in Mission Impossible - ducking down narrow
>tunnels past management areas, dashing up never-ending stairways,
>until finally we found ourselves in the midst of a vast concert hall
>going absolutely crazy to the performance of...Ricky Martin!!! OK,
>we never would have PAID to see him, but we were really livin'
>lavita loca that night, and I shook my sexy booty all the way home -
>Ricky's energy and pizzazz was contagious. Or maybe I was inspired
>more by the audience - 80% female.
>I must still have some of that energy bouncing around in my pelvic
>region cause I've signed up for a salsa class this week!!! Pity my
>poor partner. Apart from that, looking forward in London holds the
>usual promise: I'm supposed to be checking out the Rosetta Stone and
>King Tut at the British Museum on the weekend. Other cultural
>excursions over the last few months have included trips to the
>National Gallery and to the slightly more contemporary (but no less
>inspiring) mega Star Wars exhibit at the Barbican museum.
>
>Speaking of inspiring, the weather is London has been at an all time
>peak of perfection this past week - cloudless warm days and endless
>evenings where the sun just seems to hang around for a few extra
>hours before dragging the last remnants of light out of the clear
>sky at around 11pm. In the immortal words of John Travolta
>"OHHH!!!...those suuummmmmmmmer nniiiiiiighttttsss!!!". Tell me
>more.
>
>I visited the hallowed grounds of Wimbledon on a couple of those
>summer nights this year. A exciting version of one of those trips is
>that Christine and I ended up sitting in the front row of Centre
>Court during the Woodies semi-final - and appearing on TV!!!
>Elaboration however ain't so glamorous: we snuck into Centre Court
>after a couple of English toffs passed us their £44(!!) golden
>tickets, but they only did so cause the aforementioned semi-final
>was delayed due to rain - Chris and I sat under my jacket and
>pretended that watching the rain covers go up was as exciting as
>championship tennis. Maybe next year we'll return to see Rafter
>win. The electric atmosphere this year (including even the bouts of
>rain, the five hour queuing, the girly shopping) was well worth our
>little look see around the centre of world tennis, especially when
>(on another, non-rainy visit) Brit and I sat so close to the action
>that Andrew Ille almost ended up in her lap after diving crosscourt,
>or so close that Thomas Enquist could see the drool dripping off her
>chin (or maybe that was the residue from the strawberries and
>cream...)
>
>It's glorious evenings like that in London that make work in the
>bookstore so difficult to take. Sure, it's easier to take when
>you're serving Oscar winners like Angelina Jolie (actually I really
>just served her LIPS, cause I was so starstruck by them I couldn't
>notice anything beyond them). But as I said, the late summer sunsets
>mean lots of lovely strolls in Hyde Park - several times I've had to
>pinch myself as I wander down the Serpentine or past Peter Pan in
>Kensington Gardens - I've just looked around and gone: you know
>something - I LIVE here. I live in London. Wow...
>
>But I gotta say it IS exhausting over here - shouldering through the
>crowds on Oxford St, the constant cattle call of the tube, hacking
>up huge smog-induced globules of black snot (sorry about that one).
>Just the general pace of life, so much to do, so little time to do
>it...
>And never being alone. Can't remember the last time I was alone.
>Can't remember the last time in London I could have a quiet chat to
>a friend without more welcome friends bursting in. It's a fun place,
>a wonderful place but it's kinda claustrophobic, kinda intense.
>Sometimes.
>
>And my wonderful and fun household continues to be a little
>microcosm of London. "We live like kings" at 50 Leigh Gardens - we
>are fond of saying that - but I doubt many kings could keep up with
>the blur of parties and BBQ's and good news and shared meals and
>dancing and bills and shopping trips and visiting pussy cats and
>queues for the bathroom and girls wearing coconut-bras (straight
>outta Gilligan's Island) and hugs and kisses hello and goodbye.
>Yeah, a king should be so lucky.
>The guest book is currently bulging at our home/hotel - we've
>graciously and happily accommodated (on a temporary to
>semi-permanent sliding scale system) a variety of quests and
>dossers, including friends from all around the world, brothers,
>sisters, and mothers (our first Mum - woohoo!). And of course not to
>forget the ever-present visitor defined as
>"who-do-they-know-again?". I don't think the maximum number of
>people actually living in the house has ever exceeded ten, but after
>the biggest, craziest party our house has ever been blessed with, I
>tried to work out how many people crashed over and were asleep at
>once. AJ and I woke up to six snorers just in our room, but I think
>the total scattered through the house was around 22. Whoever said
>eight is enough? The more the merrier, we always say.
>
>But restful, it ain't. I WILL however, be escaping from the joyous
>craziness and hectic pace of my wonderful home and this fantastic
>city when I runaway for a few months at the end of this year.
>Runaway where? Well, brace yourself Brisbanites, cause...I'm coming
>home!!!!
>
>Yep, all you guys back home better prepare to either give me some
>big hugs or runaway yourselves, cause after two cold, almost-white
>Christmases over here, I'm returning to sunny Queensland this year
>for a month or two to see if everyone still remembers me. But
>BrisVegas residents, you have my buddy Brit to thank (or abuse?) for
>inspiring me to join her enroute home at the end of the year - I
>mean, I KNEW two and a half years was too long to go without seeing
>Mum - Brit just lit the fire that got me to commit to the "big trip
>home". We plan to spend seven weeks travelling through India and
>South-East Asia enroute to Brissy - very exciting territory, very
>different from anywhere we've travelled before, kinda scary I must
>say, but thankfully I'll have Brit to protect me. Don't know yet
>who's gonna protect HER from me though.
>
>Anyway, that's my last bit of big news. Home for Chrissy!!!! I'm
>sure my month or two home will zoom by as fast as life is in London
>now, so anyone still crazy enough to wanna see me better start
>making reservations now, cause I've booked MYSELF into a huge chunk
>of time with my Mum, not to mention a huge chunk of time lying on a
>beach, trying to remember what R & R stands for...
>
>Till then, well I guess I'll see most of you before the next epic
>Dave Report.
>
>Please keep me updated with all your own news (preferably more
>regularly and concisely than I seem to be capable of). I promise
>I'll respond to all of you that have e-mailed me very soon.
>
>stay in touch and stay yourselves
>
>adios, for now
>
>Davey
>
>xxx
Subject: DAVE OFFLINE & IN ASIA
Date: Wed, 18 Oct 2000 04:49:44 EST
Hello to all my dearest family and friends!!!
I'm happy to say I've got good news for you all - no more e-mail contact from me - no more crappy forwards or bothersome Dave reports - at least for a couple of months anyway.
Because, in a few days, as of Saturday 21st October, I'm hitting the road, and I pretty much won't be slowing down for TWO WHOLE months!!!!, til I arrive back home in sunny BrisVegas for the commencement of the festive season in December.
So, you're all off the internet hook for awhile. However, that said, PLEASE remember that I'll be desperate to hear from those lucky few of you whose paths might be converging with mine over the next couple of months (you know who you are, Kat, Sonia, Karen and Dave, Hel), so stay in touch guys, it would be great to see your familiar friendly faces in those strange lands.
But before we look ahead to the next two exciting months, a quick review of the last couple:
-Taken a few short journeys around southern England lately. Like down to tacky, fun Brighton: kinda an adult, low-rent cross between Disneyland and Surfers. Or up to the Midlands and the colossal Lincoln Cathedral, which was the tallest building in the world for three centuries and now has the even greater honour of playing background to Gwyneth Paltrow's next movie (I missed the shooting unfortunately). Or our long weekend car convoy trip through Devon and Cornwall to the southwestern tip of this fine country, imaginatively named "Lands' End", featuring spectacular coastlines, cliffs and cows and tiny towns hanging off cliff edges, magnificent castles on islands offshore, narrow roads through Devon, wild horses and deer on the windswept moors, and a huge chalk figure fertility guy scratched into the cliffside with an impressive forty foot club and a weapon of his own not much smaller (which would have been kinda intimidating to AJ and myself if we hadn't been enjoying the road trip with seven lovely ladies and a guy called Peanut)
-As for lovely London, it's much the same, getting colder by the second, glad I'm outta here before the puffy jacket comes outta mothballs. Done winter twice here, over it.
-Bye-bye to the bookstore in two days - how will all those books manage without me??? Maybe they'll finally discover that I don't know the alphabet that well after all!!!
-Sob, sob as I leave my luxurious London home, Leigh Gardens, and all the strangers that have miraculously appeared to take my place over the last few weeks. I'm sure AJ will miss the light constantly going on when I arrive home in the middle of the night and the yodels of distress that emanate from my side of the room throughout the night in response to his banshee-like snorefests. Ahh, the memories...
-Yeah, of course I'll miss my home here in London. I'll miss Max the coolest cat in the world, the pooper-scooper parties, the drunken Belinda Carlisle sing along concerts, the eighties retro Dance club nights, Christine dressing up in crazee costumes when no-one else does, Liz escorting me to Art shows previews at the Royal Academy where we stand there pretending we know what the hell a black sun on yellow background means, lovely friends taking me out for Sushi in Soho when I have 58 pence in my bank account, AJ proposing to some babe in a Covent Garden bar when he finds out she's rich (and her accepting!!!), taking a sickee and escaping the insanity of London's shopping streets to stroll through the peaceful grandeur of the incredible British Museum with a special friend, inventorising every single article of Brit's clothing (and that's a LOT!) prior to shipping our stuff home (no comment on which clothes I tried on), spending decades on the phone to travel agents, embassies, insurance agents, shipping companies, non-English speaking hostels...etc, etc, etc,...
Well, I think, finally, everything is under control. Aww, who am I kidding - I leave in three days and I'm two visas short, mega-££££ in debt, several tonnes too high on my packing requirements, plus I only have 60 rolls of film to get me through two months!!! No problemo!!!
Anyway, I'm sure all the pre-departure panic will evaporate as soon as that plan leaves Heathrow on Saturday AM, to be replaced of course, by an altogether NEW sort of panic, that of the virgin traveller in strange lands. A holiday, it ain't gonna be. An adventure, I'm sure it will. My stomach would be fluttering with anticipation if that gang of butterflies hadn't come and stolen it. Excitement is reigning like some power mad dictator inside me at present. Our journey awaits....
Sorry, I'm rambling: here's the itinerary
Thursday 19th October: last day at work, do as little as possible (same as past year basically, but on last day don't worry about PRETENDING). Out for work drinks with bookish boozing colleagues till dawn.
Friday 20th October: stagger home, wake AJ up with light switch, collapse. Friday evening - wake up, panic, over pack bag randomly and without plan, try to arrange visas at last minute, panic, find somewhere to store stuff leaving behind, post stuff home, panic, have a small soiree at my London home for last time with many of my wonderful friends (this means YOU!), stagger into bed for an hour, arise at 4am, panic, wake AJ up one last time with the light switch thing, panic, give my backpack one last futile packing attempt, and leave....
Saturday 21st October for next ten days: MOROCCO!!!! North Africa that is, for the geographically-challenged among you. Casablanca, Marrakech, Fez, marketplaces, camel rides, gorgeous gorges, the Sahara desert, and lots of shopping in the guise of cultural diversity for the girls...
November 1st: return to London for a few hours, attempt to collect remaining visas, panic, try to repack bag for Asia, and leave, properly this time...
November 2nd-5th: DUBAI, in the United Arab Emirates: oil fields, tea- towels on heads, wadi-bashing, oasis in the desert, more camels, and the biggest Wet-n-Wild water park in the world...
November 5th-19th: INDIA - Calcutta, Varanassi, Agra, Rahjastan, Pradesh. Wow! I'm spinning out just thinking about it, and I'm not even there yet. A whole other world apparently - cultural overload. Not to mention the colonial forts, the elephant rides, the tiger sanctuaries, the sacred pilgrimages, the Delhi-belly, the Buddhist retreats, the people, the people, the people... All this in two weeks!!!
November 19th-December 13th: SOUTH EAST ASIA - Singapore, then through Malaysia and Thailand and outta Bangkok. Three weeks to check out the most beautiful beaches, most relaxed parties, most holy temples, most stunning scenery, most inexpensive accommodation, most exquisite food, the most different stuff to our usual humdrum existence that we can find. Bliss...
Dec 13th-Dec 18th: BRUNEI (as for Dubai, only if the visa comes through!!! But you'd think that the richest guy in the world could be a little generous with me though). More beaches, more rainforest (this time with orangutans!!!), sultan's palaces, floating cities...
Dec 19: HOME
The rest is up to you. That is, all my buddies back home in BrisVegas.
You've got me for about seven weeks, which for many of you is probably about eight weeks too much. But don't panic (I'LL be doing all that enroute home), I'm sure we'll be able to squeeze all the reunions into the miniscule moments that I'm back home for. I look forward to catching up with everyone, and will endeavour to get in touch will you all minutes after touching down, except of course when I'm not spending Chirstmas reminding my Mum of who I am and relaxing on the beach. (Yeah, MORE beach stuff - well YOU try spending two-and-a-half years in the northern hemisphere!).
So to everyone who reads this, thanks again for being such great e-mail buddies, but remember I'm gonna be pretty slack for the next few months, I won't be checking or replying or as annoying as usual. And this might seem ironic coming from me, but...no forwards please! They totally overload my account within days usually, and if I don't check for a few weeks it means the server could delete lots of important stuff (like all those love letters being composed as I type).
So good luck everyone on whatever exciting ventures you might be taking over the next few months, I hope to hear about them all soon,
take care and stay well my friends, I'll be thinking of you all somewhere in Asia, I promise!!!
Dave
>Date: Sat, 22 Jul 2000 17:41:58 EST
>
>Hola Amigos!!!
>
>Top of the Mornin' to ya all, to be sure, to be sure, to
>be...whatever
>
>How IS everyone?
>
>Apologies for not being in contact with many of you lately (except
>of course for all those crappy forwards I've recently shucked on to
>you).
>
>The Dave Report has been lacking a bit lately - since the pie fight
>record I think. Basically that's because there hasn't really been
>that much to report, except of course for the groundbreaking news
>that I've finally done a bit of travelling again and left the shores
>of England - not just once, but TWICE!!!
>
>My first trip - 5 glorious days over Easter - was to the coast of
>Spain with my dear friend Brit. My first European Vacation was
>purely divine, a moy bueno fiesta. We stayed in Valencia on the east
>coast, just the best place to experience that cool Mediterranean
>breeze (I loved saying that!). We made the most of the beaches and
>the real, genuine 33 degree sunshine and our skins actually got that
>distant memory back of how to tan (or burn, as Brit did on our first
>day, when we didn't take the sun cream - yeah, my fault, and she
>never let me forget it).
>
>We took a few day trips from the city to various beaches, which
>weren't the Australian ultimate, but were a hell of a leap up from
>the English variety. The surf was non-existent and the water was too
>cool back in April to swim in comfortably - except for one
>invigorating dip I took, and one involuntary dunking Brit took (with
>my gallant assistance).
>
>Otherwise Spain was an awesome, incredible culture shock. Dealing
>with the language was a (usually refreshing) challenge. We knew
>maybe three words of Spanish when we arrived and maybe ten when we
>left five days later (slow learners). But our saviour with regards
>to language (not to mention providing a charming, calming centre to
>the our bickering married couple dynamic) came in the form of Anna,
>a lovely Canadian girl we met at the airport and refused to let go
>of for a few days because of her prior experience with the language
>and the country. Anna was incredibly patient as she tried to teach
>us the basics when it came to ordering food or getting around town.
>It was just a shame she wasn't with us when we arrived at our hotel
>the first night at 3am to be "greeted" at the door by this sweaty,
>surly Godfather type who seemed to be grunting in Spanish that
>(despite my hours of pre-booking attempts by phone from London
>"Hola! Habla Ingles?") there was no reservation for us and no spare
>rooms. Luckily there was a scary-looking homeless guy sitting
>outside the hotel willing to translate the good news for us!!! But
>that was fun! Totally surreal, but fun.
>
>We also could have used Anna's legendary lingo on our first day when
>we tried to order a Spanish meal - we sat in a beachfront cafe
>flapping the photocopied pages of the Lonely Planet around trying to
>use them to translate what the waitress and the menu were
>saying...we thought we'd ordered seafood, and we were proved
>right...but nothing could have prepared us for the huge plates piled
>high with dozens of little fishies - fried whole - we had to bravely
>munch down on the heads, the tails, the bones...mm-mmm...and not
>just fish, we got baby eels as well, I even scored a bonus fried
>yabbie.
>
>Apart from this, the food was OK, always interesting - especially
>the local dish Paella - it wasn't always fresh but these huge pans
>of scrummy saffron-flavoured rice with meat or seafood toppings were
>always eagerly scoffed. Much better than the food was the sangria,
>which always went down easy, whether we were sitting in a beach
>front restaurante with a superb Mediterranean view, or seemingly the
>only tourists in a cosy little courtyard cafe within a tiny old
>Spanish town, waiting for the Good Friday procession to start.
>
>Actually this latter place was the setting for a sangria-fueled
>incident where Brit got some revenge on behalf of all you female
>friends of mine who have had to endure me saying chivalrously in the
>past "do you want my shirt?" in a half-serious, half-mocking,
>all-stupid way whenever you've mentioned that you are feeling
>chilly.
>Anyway Brit finally called my bluff in the little town of Sagunto
>which is why I found myself strolling nonchalantly down the main
>street of town - which was packed with every Spaniard from the area
>awaiting the years biggest religious parade - and instead of my
>shirt, I'm just wearing (Adonis-like) a wrap around towel - and I'm
>trying to ignore not only the multitude of double takes from the
>poor townspeople ranging from shocked, curious, indignant,
>disbelieving, repulsed, amused, aroused (?),...not only that, but I
>had to contend with the constant stream of bladder-busting,
>tear-streaming laughter emanating from sweet Brit as she enjoyed the
>whole region's reaction to my own impromptu parade.
>
>The fact that I wasn't lynched on that solemn religious evening says
>a lot for the Spanish people. Generally we found them happy,
>laid-back, open, accommodating - basically everything the English
>are not. At times it felt like home. But at others - totally
>different. We reveled in lots of stuff - like just walking - lots of
>walking, and exploring Valencia and all it's lovely old plazas and
>gothic churches and busy markets and narrow little alleyways with
>motor scooters zooming between the crumbling buildings. Or checking
>out the remains of a Moorish castle on a hillside above Sagunto, a
>town that hadn't seemed to change much in a millennium, with a
>parade (the real parade, not mine) where the young men of the town
>from little boys up to big boys dressed up in complete black leather
>orthodox outfits that where basically photo negative versions of the
>Ku-Klux-Klan getup and walked along with one hand holding flaming
>torches and the other throwing lollies to the kids in the crowd (or
>to cute tourist girls who batted their long eyelashes) as a way of
>seeking penance for the sins of the past year. Or else stuff like
>plucking genuine Valencia oranges from a grove on the size of the
>highway enroute to the beach. Or just sitting on a train watching a
>glorious pink sunset over the green orchards and farmers villas and
>barren hillsides with little fortresses and churches and townships
>nestled underneath...sigh... yeah...I DID love Spain.
>
>But my most recent trip, a few weeks ago, was different in many
>ways. For starters, I traveled northwest from London, not southeast.
>I left the shores of England again to be confronted with the amazing
>scenery and history and people and diversity of the Emerald Isle.
>I'm talking about Ireland. Land of leprechauns and Guinness and
>shamrocks and sheep and scary sectarianism. And it was fab.
>Marrrrrrvellous!
>
>I gate-crashed a 6-day organised tour around the top half of the
>island which my beautiful friend Christine (just arrived from
>BrisVegas) had already arranged to take with her mate Sarah. My
>addition to the tour group of 16 upped the ratio of boys to girls to
>1 guy per 4 girls. Maybe I would have had MORE fun if everyone on
>the tour HADN'T assumed that Christine and I were on our honeymoon!
>
>Unlike Spain, which involved a ratio of relaxing to sightseeing of
>about 50:50, Ireland had no chilling-out time whatsoever - it was a
>non-stop bombardment of beautiful countryside and coastline and
>history and Guinness and culture and laughter. Which was good,
>because, after six days of exhausting but exhilarating experiences,
>I felt like I'd absorbed and learned and loved so much from Ireland,
>yet I still felt like I'd barely scratched the surface. This
>country - well, this ISLAND I should say, cause we visited both the
>Republic (Eire) and Northern Ireland - is so rich in culture and
>history and beauty.
>
>Our little 20-seater tour bus drove through some truly spectacular
>country - alongside the edge of sheer steep cliffs or past little
>coves and sandy beaches on the northeast Antrim coast, through
>squelchy peat bogs or the rugged wild mountains and beautiful
>untouched loughs (lakes) in the northeast Connemara region, and
>EVERYWHERE rolling green fields and farms dotted with little white
>puffs of walking wool. Not to mention trips through dozens of little
>Irish blink-and-you'll-miss-it towns each seemingly with a pub
>always named "Murphy's Bar".
>
>Speaking of pubs...hmm...when in Ireland... Maybe that's why the
>tour was so exhausting! But our excess Guinness consumption was for
>purely cultural research purposes, you see. We spent our Irish
>evenings in a blurry succession of Irish pubs, experiencing a
>variety of decor and charm and characters and weird accents and
>language and live music. A "musical pub crawl" around Dublin's
>finest establishments ended with me pretty much crawling back to the
>hostel in exhaustion. And I was exhausted BEFORE we when out on the
>last night of the tour in Galway, so my attempt at dancing the Irish
>gig when Christine dragged me up in front on the band was pretty
>pathetic. In Westport we entered a pub which was more like the
>publican's living room - you had to ring the bell to get him to
>appear to serve you - and we could almost hear him flush the toilet
>or turn off the TV up the hall. Best part about that place was the
>huge German Shepard dog helping to serve behind the bar. No kidding.
>
>Maybe the most memorable bar was in Belfast - I say "bar", but this
>was more like a bomb shelter - high, barred windows and a front door
>with a cage around the front you had to trap yourself in while the
>management decided if you were going to set of a bomb or not. Yeah,
>that place was pretty scary and I'm not just talking about all the
>tacky Elvis portraits on the walls. And this was PRIOR to us hearing
>that a few years ago someone had had walked into that VERY bar with
>an automatic rifle and gunned down half a dozen patrons.
>
>But hey, that was Belfast. On arrival our tour guide pointed out the
>melted warehouse windows and charred pavement where a couple of tour
>buses from OUR tour company have been fire-bombed a few weeks
>before. The streets were either completely deserted or patrolled by
>police cars that looked more like tanks. Gates and walls and barbed
>wire and warnings were profuse. At times Belfast appeared to be a
>quite normal city, you understand, but I've never been anyway before
>in the world where two different sections of society are living side
>by side, yet are so blatant and confrontational in their
>non-acceptance of the other. We took an incredibly eye-opening black
>cab tour through the most intensely sectarian sides of town - both
>the catholic and protestant - viewing dozens of hardcore murals
>depicting past violence and present beliefs and threats. Some
>members of our tour group even met and were photographed with IRA
>leader Gerry Adams when we visited Sinn Fein headquarters. Our cab
>driver George shared just a tiny portion of this regions turbulent
>history - the many deaths of innocents or revolutionaries or
>defenders - we visited cemeteries and pubs and playgrounds which had
>all been decimated by "The Troubles". The most moving moment of all
>was when Christine asked George if he thought the peace process
>would be ultimately successful - and he just started at her intently
>for a minute before replying: "you've gotta understand something. I
>grew up here..." before sharing some of his turbulent family
>history. George's mum is catholic. His dad is protestant. He hasn't
>seen some members of his family for many years. You could feel the
>hope in George for peace in his country, yet you could also feel the
>pain and regret and anger and despair from the past generations and
>horrors entwined in everything that George - and all the people of
>Northern Ireland - had become. We left Belfast with lumps in our
>throats and lots of confusion and frustration swirling around in our
>minds.
>
>But my memories from much of the rest of the island were less
>heartrending and more heartwarming. Like up on the far northeast
>coast when we crossed a precipitously swaying rope bridge connecting
>the windy and beautiful coastal cliffs to a little fishing island -
>awesome fun, especially when I pretended to be Indiana Jones and
>jumped around and shared the living Irish shite out of dear Sarah.
>Or a day or two later when we picnicked among purple flowers and
>curious cows on the northwest coast before wandering up to peer over
>the nausea inducing edge of the staggeringly steeply precipitous
>cliffs around Downpatrick Head. Or the enjoyment our tour guide Des
>took in either speaking utter barney or sharing his intimate
>knowledge of every little morsel of Irish history or legend - like
>the Battle of the Boyne, or the story of Cuchulain killing the dog
>or of the Giant leaving his shoe behind when he ran across the
>causeway. Or our visit to Croagh Patrick, a huge holy mountain
>dedicated to Saint Patrick - where a few looney Irishmen make their
>annual pilgrimage every year by climbing across the sharp stones and
>jagged boulders all the way to the summit in their BARE FEET.
>Actually, make that now - a few looney Irishmen plus one nutcase of
>a tall Australian traveller. Yeah, I'm stupid, it's official now. I
>don't know if the usual procedure worked with me and all my sins
>were absolved during my long, painful, clumsy stagger up to the
>peak, but the epic foot massage I scored from Christine later made
>it worth it. Maybe...
>
>Doesn't matter. The whole trip was well worth it. The images of
>rusty old bicycles leaned against the front of tiny, brightly
>painted pubs. The contrast of white sheep against fields the colour
>of which made me think I'd never seen green up till then. Sharing a
>Guinness and a chat with old friends and new...that was Ireland.
>
>Otherwise...on the non-travel front, not much else to report.
>
>Limited funds and time mean my travels till October will be confined
>to one or two short trips to the continent. Paris coming up in a few
>weeks. Most romantic city on earth, apparently. Any takers?
>
>But I managed recently to get away for a few days and actually see
>some of the country I've been living in for seven months, and
>finally appreciate the fact that England is NOT London. My
>high-flying and low-farting old buddy Mark very generously took me
>on a quick road trip of the west country: we tried to emulate Chevy
>Chase's domino manuverve at Stonehenge but couldn't get the car
>close enough, I had a bath in Bath (don't panic, we HAVE photos),
>and we tried to find Will Shakespeare among all the American
>tourists in the little town of Stratford-on-Avon (he's dead,
>apparently). A couple of other weekends in the English countryside
>have featured some awesome visits to one of the coolest things they
>have over here in England: castles!!! Gotta tell ya I like best of
>all the ruined ones I can run around in playing Robin Hood or King
>Arthur, but Windsor Castle (where Queen Liz spends her weekends -
>and does all the kid's washing for the week I guess) was the most
>opulent and extravagant holiday home you could ever hope to chill
>out in. ONE dinner table - just ONE - that I think seated more
>people than the entire Keg Restaurant. Now THAT's a birthday party.
>Plus an armory/weapons room filled with hundreds of antique swords
>and pistols - I suppose for when Liz gets grumpy at Phil and wants
>to keep him on his toes.
>
>Further adventures over the last few months have been confined to
>lovely Londontown. Coupla freebie entries to international acts:
>Mark scored tickets to the theatre - the famous Palladium - so we
>could get to know "The King and I", and he then blew all the
>simmering sexual tension between the lead duo away by blabbing in
>the interval that there was no shagging, no KISSING even, and that
>Jason Scott Lee (the King) DIES at the end!!! (sorry if you didn't
>know). And a few months ago my flatmate AJ sneaked a few of us down
>some dingy back alleyways and into the venue he was working that
>night - we sneaked around in the bowels of this building with more
>stealth than Tom Cruise in Mission Impossible - ducking down narrow
>tunnels past management areas, dashing up never-ending stairways,
>until finally we found ourselves in the midst of a vast concert hall
>going absolutely crazy to the performance of...Ricky Martin!!! OK,
>we never would have PAID to see him, but we were really livin'
>lavita loca that night, and I shook my sexy booty all the way home -
>Ricky's energy and pizzazz was contagious. Or maybe I was inspired
>more by the audience - 80% female.
>I must still have some of that energy bouncing around in my pelvic
>region cause I've signed up for a salsa class this week!!! Pity my
>poor partner. Apart from that, looking forward in London holds the
>usual promise: I'm supposed to be checking out the Rosetta Stone and
>King Tut at the British Museum on the weekend. Other cultural
>excursions over the last few months have included trips to the
>National Gallery and to the slightly more contemporary (but no less
>inspiring) mega Star Wars exhibit at the Barbican museum.
>
>Speaking of inspiring, the weather is London has been at an all time
>peak of perfection this past week - cloudless warm days and endless
>evenings where the sun just seems to hang around for a few extra
>hours before dragging the last remnants of light out of the clear
>sky at around 11pm. In the immortal words of John Travolta
>"OHHH!!!...those suuummmmmmmmer nniiiiiiighttttsss!!!". Tell me
>more.
>
>I visited the hallowed grounds of Wimbledon on a couple of those
>summer nights this year. A exciting version of one of those trips is
>that Christine and I ended up sitting in the front row of Centre
>Court during the Woodies semi-final - and appearing on TV!!!
>Elaboration however ain't so glamorous: we snuck into Centre Court
>after a couple of English toffs passed us their £44(!!) golden
>tickets, but they only did so cause the aforementioned semi-final
>was delayed due to rain - Chris and I sat under my jacket and
>pretended that watching the rain covers go up was as exciting as
>championship tennis. Maybe next year we'll return to see Rafter
>win. The electric atmosphere this year (including even the bouts of
>rain, the five hour queuing, the girly shopping) was well worth our
>little look see around the centre of world tennis, especially when
>(on another, non-rainy visit) Brit and I sat so close to the action
>that Andrew Ille almost ended up in her lap after diving crosscourt,
>or so close that Thomas Enquist could see the drool dripping off her
>chin (or maybe that was the residue from the strawberries and
>cream...)
>
>It's glorious evenings like that in London that make work in the
>bookstore so difficult to take. Sure, it's easier to take when
>you're serving Oscar winners like Angelina Jolie (actually I really
>just served her LIPS, cause I was so starstruck by them I couldn't
>notice anything beyond them). But as I said, the late summer sunsets
>mean lots of lovely strolls in Hyde Park - several times I've had to
>pinch myself as I wander down the Serpentine or past Peter Pan in
>Kensington Gardens - I've just looked around and gone: you know
>something - I LIVE here. I live in London. Wow...
>
>But I gotta say it IS exhausting over here - shouldering through the
>crowds on Oxford St, the constant cattle call of the tube, hacking
>up huge smog-induced globules of black snot (sorry about that one).
>Just the general pace of life, so much to do, so little time to do
>it...
>And never being alone. Can't remember the last time I was alone.
>Can't remember the last time in London I could have a quiet chat to
>a friend without more welcome friends bursting in. It's a fun place,
>a wonderful place but it's kinda claustrophobic, kinda intense.
>Sometimes.
>
>And my wonderful and fun household continues to be a little
>microcosm of London. "We live like kings" at 50 Leigh Gardens - we
>are fond of saying that - but I doubt many kings could keep up with
>the blur of parties and BBQ's and good news and shared meals and
>dancing and bills and shopping trips and visiting pussy cats and
>queues for the bathroom and girls wearing coconut-bras (straight
>outta Gilligan's Island) and hugs and kisses hello and goodbye.
>Yeah, a king should be so lucky.
>The guest book is currently bulging at our home/hotel - we've
>graciously and happily accommodated (on a temporary to
>semi-permanent sliding scale system) a variety of quests and
>dossers, including friends from all around the world, brothers,
>sisters, and mothers (our first Mum - woohoo!). And of course not to
>forget the ever-present visitor defined as
>"who-do-they-know-again?". I don't think the maximum number of
>people actually living in the house has ever exceeded ten, but after
>the biggest, craziest party our house has ever been blessed with, I
>tried to work out how many people crashed over and were asleep at
>once. AJ and I woke up to six snorers just in our room, but I think
>the total scattered through the house was around 22. Whoever said
>eight is enough? The more the merrier, we always say.
>
>But restful, it ain't. I WILL however, be escaping from the joyous
>craziness and hectic pace of my wonderful home and this fantastic
>city when I runaway for a few months at the end of this year.
>Runaway where? Well, brace yourself Brisbanites, cause...I'm coming
>home!!!!
>
>Yep, all you guys back home better prepare to either give me some
>big hugs or runaway yourselves, cause after two cold, almost-white
>Christmases over here, I'm returning to sunny Queensland this year
>for a month or two to see if everyone still remembers me. But
>BrisVegas residents, you have my buddy Brit to thank (or abuse?) for
>inspiring me to join her enroute home at the end of the year - I
>mean, I KNEW two and a half years was too long to go without seeing
>Mum - Brit just lit the fire that got me to commit to the "big trip
>home". We plan to spend seven weeks travelling through India and
>South-East Asia enroute to Brissy - very exciting territory, very
>different from anywhere we've travelled before, kinda scary I must
>say, but thankfully I'll have Brit to protect me. Don't know yet
>who's gonna protect HER from me though.
>
>Anyway, that's my last bit of big news. Home for Chrissy!!!! I'm
>sure my month or two home will zoom by as fast as life is in London
>now, so anyone still crazy enough to wanna see me better start
>making reservations now, cause I've booked MYSELF into a huge chunk
>of time with my Mum, not to mention a huge chunk of time lying on a
>beach, trying to remember what R & R stands for...
>
>Till then, well I guess I'll see most of you before the next epic
>Dave Report.
>
>Please keep me updated with all your own news (preferably more
>regularly and concisely than I seem to be capable of). I promise
>I'll respond to all of you that have e-mailed me very soon.
>
>stay in touch and stay yourselves
>
>adios, for now
>
>Davey
>
>xxx
Subject: DAVE OFFLINE & IN ASIA
Date: Wed, 18 Oct 2000 04:49:44 EST
Hello to all my dearest family and friends!!!
I'm happy to say I've got good news for you all - no more e-mail contact from me - no more crappy forwards or bothersome Dave reports - at least for a couple of months anyway.
Because, in a few days, as of Saturday 21st October, I'm hitting the road, and I pretty much won't be slowing down for TWO WHOLE months!!!!, til I arrive back home in sunny BrisVegas for the commencement of the festive season in December.
So, you're all off the internet hook for awhile. However, that said, PLEASE remember that I'll be desperate to hear from those lucky few of you whose paths might be converging with mine over the next couple of months (you know who you are, Kat, Sonia, Karen and Dave, Hel), so stay in touch guys, it would be great to see your familiar friendly faces in those strange lands.
But before we look ahead to the next two exciting months, a quick review of the last couple:
-Taken a few short journeys around southern England lately. Like down to tacky, fun Brighton: kinda an adult, low-rent cross between Disneyland and Surfers. Or up to the Midlands and the colossal Lincoln Cathedral, which was the tallest building in the world for three centuries and now has the even greater honour of playing background to Gwyneth Paltrow's next movie (I missed the shooting unfortunately). Or our long weekend car convoy trip through Devon and Cornwall to the southwestern tip of this fine country, imaginatively named "Lands' End", featuring spectacular coastlines, cliffs and cows and tiny towns hanging off cliff edges, magnificent castles on islands offshore, narrow roads through Devon, wild horses and deer on the windswept moors, and a huge chalk figure fertility guy scratched into the cliffside with an impressive forty foot club and a weapon of his own not much smaller (which would have been kinda intimidating to AJ and myself if we hadn't been enjoying the road trip with seven lovely ladies and a guy called Peanut)
-As for lovely London, it's much the same, getting colder by the second, glad I'm outta here before the puffy jacket comes outta mothballs. Done winter twice here, over it.
-Bye-bye to the bookstore in two days - how will all those books manage without me??? Maybe they'll finally discover that I don't know the alphabet that well after all!!!
-Sob, sob as I leave my luxurious London home, Leigh Gardens, and all the strangers that have miraculously appeared to take my place over the last few weeks. I'm sure AJ will miss the light constantly going on when I arrive home in the middle of the night and the yodels of distress that emanate from my side of the room throughout the night in response to his banshee-like snorefests. Ahh, the memories...
-Yeah, of course I'll miss my home here in London. I'll miss Max the coolest cat in the world, the pooper-scooper parties, the drunken Belinda Carlisle sing along concerts, the eighties retro Dance club nights, Christine dressing up in crazee costumes when no-one else does, Liz escorting me to Art shows previews at the Royal Academy where we stand there pretending we know what the hell a black sun on yellow background means, lovely friends taking me out for Sushi in Soho when I have 58 pence in my bank account, AJ proposing to some babe in a Covent Garden bar when he finds out she's rich (and her accepting!!!), taking a sickee and escaping the insanity of London's shopping streets to stroll through the peaceful grandeur of the incredible British Museum with a special friend, inventorising every single article of Brit's clothing (and that's a LOT!) prior to shipping our stuff home (no comment on which clothes I tried on), spending decades on the phone to travel agents, embassies, insurance agents, shipping companies, non-English speaking hostels...etc, etc, etc,...
Well, I think, finally, everything is under control. Aww, who am I kidding - I leave in three days and I'm two visas short, mega-££££ in debt, several tonnes too high on my packing requirements, plus I only have 60 rolls of film to get me through two months!!! No problemo!!!
Anyway, I'm sure all the pre-departure panic will evaporate as soon as that plan leaves Heathrow on Saturday AM, to be replaced of course, by an altogether NEW sort of panic, that of the virgin traveller in strange lands. A holiday, it ain't gonna be. An adventure, I'm sure it will. My stomach would be fluttering with anticipation if that gang of butterflies hadn't come and stolen it. Excitement is reigning like some power mad dictator inside me at present. Our journey awaits....
Sorry, I'm rambling: here's the itinerary
Thursday 19th October: last day at work, do as little as possible (same as past year basically, but on last day don't worry about PRETENDING). Out for work drinks with bookish boozing colleagues till dawn.
Friday 20th October: stagger home, wake AJ up with light switch, collapse. Friday evening - wake up, panic, over pack bag randomly and without plan, try to arrange visas at last minute, panic, find somewhere to store stuff leaving behind, post stuff home, panic, have a small soiree at my London home for last time with many of my wonderful friends (this means YOU!), stagger into bed for an hour, arise at 4am, panic, wake AJ up one last time with the light switch thing, panic, give my backpack one last futile packing attempt, and leave....
Saturday 21st October for next ten days: MOROCCO!!!! North Africa that is, for the geographically-challenged among you. Casablanca, Marrakech, Fez, marketplaces, camel rides, gorgeous gorges, the Sahara desert, and lots of shopping in the guise of cultural diversity for the girls...
November 1st: return to London for a few hours, attempt to collect remaining visas, panic, try to repack bag for Asia, and leave, properly this time...
November 2nd-5th: DUBAI, in the United Arab Emirates: oil fields, tea- towels on heads, wadi-bashing, oasis in the desert, more camels, and the biggest Wet-n-Wild water park in the world...
November 5th-19th: INDIA - Calcutta, Varanassi, Agra, Rahjastan, Pradesh. Wow! I'm spinning out just thinking about it, and I'm not even there yet. A whole other world apparently - cultural overload. Not to mention the colonial forts, the elephant rides, the tiger sanctuaries, the sacred pilgrimages, the Delhi-belly, the Buddhist retreats, the people, the people, the people... All this in two weeks!!!
November 19th-December 13th: SOUTH EAST ASIA - Singapore, then through Malaysia and Thailand and outta Bangkok. Three weeks to check out the most beautiful beaches, most relaxed parties, most holy temples, most stunning scenery, most inexpensive accommodation, most exquisite food, the most different stuff to our usual humdrum existence that we can find. Bliss...
Dec 13th-Dec 18th: BRUNEI (as for Dubai, only if the visa comes through!!! But you'd think that the richest guy in the world could be a little generous with me though). More beaches, more rainforest (this time with orangutans!!!), sultan's palaces, floating cities...
Dec 19: HOME
The rest is up to you. That is, all my buddies back home in BrisVegas.
You've got me for about seven weeks, which for many of you is probably about eight weeks too much. But don't panic (I'LL be doing all that enroute home), I'm sure we'll be able to squeeze all the reunions into the miniscule moments that I'm back home for. I look forward to catching up with everyone, and will endeavour to get in touch will you all minutes after touching down, except of course when I'm not spending Chirstmas reminding my Mum of who I am and relaxing on the beach. (Yeah, MORE beach stuff - well YOU try spending two-and-a-half years in the northern hemisphere!).
So to everyone who reads this, thanks again for being such great e-mail buddies, but remember I'm gonna be pretty slack for the next few months, I won't be checking or replying or as annoying as usual. And this might seem ironic coming from me, but...no forwards please! They totally overload my account within days usually, and if I don't check for a few weeks it means the server could delete lots of important stuff (like all those love letters being composed as I type).
So good luck everyone on whatever exciting ventures you might be taking over the next few months, I hope to hear about them all soon,
take care and stay well my friends, I'll be thinking of you all somewhere in Asia, I promise!!!
Dave
posted by The Dave Reports @ 9:50 am
