Posted in The Odd Awkward Muttering, Travel Blog on October 26, 2007 | No Comments »
I was offered a Eurostar ticket to get to Paris a night early. A friend of a friend of a friend couldn’t go and was happy to off load it. It wasn’t in my name, of course, but I was assured this wasn’t a problem.
Now, I’d like to point out that I originally said [...]
Posted in Travel Blog on August 6, 2006 | No Comments »
From Dubai to Bangkok, there are so many varying systems of ettiquette in place that there are countless ways of offending the locals. Although the Japanese are known to be accomodating when it comes to the errors of unenlightened “gei-jin” (tourists), the list of dos and don’ts here is considerably more quirky and baffling.
On the [...]
Posted in Travel Blog on July 31, 2006 | No Comments »
This is the strangest land I’ve ever experienced. I know I should be feeling like the rope in a tug-of-war between all that’s irresistibly magic and the disturbingly wrong about the place, but somehow…there’s no contest. It has won me over in ways I can’t quite explain.
Posted in Travel Blog on July 27, 2006 | No Comments »
You’d want to keep your wits about ye in this place, I tell ye…
My first proper day in Cambodia began by befriending a crazed, slurring tuk-tuk driver named Vinnie. Once again, I was being assured of a deep love for the Irish people, and after calling his bluff by testing his opinions on other nations, [...]
Posted in Travel Blog on July 21, 2006 | No Comments »
From now on, I’m going to dress as a ninja. It’s the only way forward. One of those smog masks and some form of crazy hat should do for a start. More on that later…
Ho Chi Minh City (formerly Saigon) has eight million people, three million motorbikes, and one thousand streets. It tends to get [...]
Posted in Travel Blog on July 7, 2006 | No Comments »
If anything was going to fast-track the settling in process, renting a bike and heading out on Ayutthaya’s chaotic, signless city streets was definitely going to do it, in the extreme, worse-case scenario survival sense, of course. The guidebook said it was the best way to explore the city, but holy Jesus, that was definitely [...]
Posted in Travel Blog on June 8, 2006 | No Comments »
Getting nervous, I placed my feet in a more feminine stance, facing inwards to each other and up on their tippy-toes, just so it would look legit when they inevitably started looking under the door. Time went on, handles were shook vigorously, and I even ended up putting on a ridiculous woman’s voice just to sustain the facade.
Posted in Travel Blog on May 28, 2006 | No Comments »
So this is where I start running through the airport, arms flailing, shouting wildly, literally looking out the windows to see where there’s an Air Baltic plane reversing away from the terminal. Somehow, I found it - but there was no one there. Why would those fuckers sell me a ticket for a flight I couldn’t possibly get to in time?
Posted in Travel Blog on May 26, 2006 | No Comments »
While I was vaguely aware of the big-bang theory (loud bangs and hangovers not being a good combination), at some point I obviously thought that the adrenaline rush of being granted access to high-powered firearms would surely relieve me of any grogginess.
Posted in Travel Blog on March 3, 2005 | No Comments »
At some point on Sunday morning I realized that my email home could well sound like an investigative journalism piece on the life and times of Andrew Dicker - he’s been keeping me on my toes over here. It began with a phone call from the airport: he requested that I meet him in [...]
Posted in Travel Blog on January 18, 2003 | No Comments »
Ahh…Holidays.
Well, after being boarded up in our rooms for the best part of a day and a half, delirious with sunstroke and heat exhaustion (believe me, it was that bad), I realised that spending the first few days of your trip shut away from the world, thinking that you’re going to die, does not exactly [...]
