Back in the land of Scotch Eggs and Cider

When I left England back on January 18th I was worried about my flight being cancelled due to the thick snowfall carpeting Heathrow. On my return I walked into the choking heat of the glass-walled hall of terminal 5. The car ride back was fogged with sleep deprivation and lazy heat. 

At home, I was happy to find an Easter egg waiting for me in my bedroom. My cat sulked at me and mum talked to me about badminton. I had fun giving Pete his ridiculous souviners; a New Zealand all-blacks stubby holder complete with muscly arms, a kangaroo jumpsuit from Australia, a capsule machine Rambo figurine from Japan. Dad was chuffed with his Australian leather sun-hat. 

The garden at home was in its usual overgrown state; the apple tree had another plant growing in it and the honeysuckle had eaten the stone wall to one side. The lawn hid sleeping neighbours' cats and dangerously camouflaged cat poos. 

Reverse culture shock. Experience, metamorphose and then get dumped smack bang back into an unchanging constant. Back into stasis. Back to my family home with its garden of cats and the predictably unpredictable English summertime.

It's very arrogant to say nothing has changed for anyone else; my friend Rimli had a baby. Pete left his job and went freelance. Perry had one of his best teaching years. Frances moved house. Mum started snooker lessons. Dad lost a stone. Lots of things have changed for lots of people. The thing that is eating away at my brain is this:

I haven't really changed!

Now a week has passed. I'm living in Pete's house. Unemployed. The same weight as when I left. I'm back on six cups of tea a day. I'm back eating toast and fajitas. Cheese and tomato swirlies from Tesco. I feel like I never went away at all.

With my big trip the winding down set in early. The last four weeks snowballed into the finale. I started to buy things, heavy things. I lost my faithful pair of moldy converse shoes. I started to resign myself to the going home. It was already over in my head, I was counting the days. Pete was waiting for me, and I was waiting for Pete. I was forgetting the present.

I've spent the morning looking through my photos from Peru. It feels further away than last year, but I remember the returning travel high. It's where I seriously caught the travel bug. I realised I could go and do what I wanted- I realised I was an adult. I look at pictures of beautiful ancient valleys where condors fly. At low lying clouds and llamas trotting through crumbling ruins.

It brings me back to what I've seen. What and where and who and when I've seen all over the place. Tropical rainforests, skyscraper cities, mountain rivers, lightning storms, suicidal tuk tuk drivers, saffron-clad pilgrims, turrets of multi-coloured spices and medieval streets; the smells of Phad Thai, chillis, coconuts, tumeric, fresh paddies, the mellow-sour of the ocean, human detritus. The sounds of buzzing insects, a crowd of water-fighters and distant base, the tunes of tubes and the ear-splitting bugle of traffic horns. The quietness of wind atop a mountain.

I need to grip on to the inspiration and the memories. I need to re-read this blog and keep it alive. I need to keep moving forward- keep finding and embracing change and enjoying the smells, sights and sounds of the new and exciting world of... the World!

The Bath House

There are plenty of teeny bath houses in Kiyomizu where I'm staying in Kyoto, but I've chosen Funaoka Onsen because of the fact it has a rotemburo (outdoor bath) and the fact that it comes highly recommended in Lonely Planet. I'm hoping that the latter might mean that they are a bit more sympathetic to confused tourists. The place is a bugger to find- half an hour on the bus to the middle of no-where (the bus driver is really helpful and shows me where to get off) and then I use my best Japanese to ask for directions. A very nice old man with a liquor shop points it out to me and says "Look for the big rock outside."

It looms into view- a bit more grand than the Gion bathhouses  which are identifiable by curtains outside with the hirigana "yu" (bath) printed on them. The front boundary is made up of giant boulders and there's a very traditional Japanese looking facade, dimly lit with paper lanterns and a flourescent sign that contains a cartoon drawing of Hokusai's great wave. Inside, I remove my shoes as a smiley elderly women chants "Irashaimase," and without prompting gives me the price in English and points out the ladies entrance. The Japanese are unmatched in helpfullness.

Emma forewarned me about the bath house: "Everyone will stare at your boobs because - you have boobs. Oh, and the bushes! Japanese women take absolutely no notice of their downstairs." I walk into the ladies' changing room and am confronted immediately by naked bodies. Lots of ladies drying their backs with rolled up towels, rolling out their stockings and gossiping . A middle-aged lady stands talking to her friend in a 'power stance' - hands on hips and full on scraggly bush to greet me. I bashfully tip toe over to a locker and try not to stare.

I know how the bath house works and that everyone will be naked- It's the point in trying it out- but I can't help the fact that I feel really awkward. Undressing is the worst part- I feel like everyone's eyes are on me (even though the ladies are actually pretty nochalant) and I sheepishly cower by my locker to hide my clothes in it.

When I'm undressed I demurely wander over to the sinks. There's an ante-room to the actual bath house beyond. It has a long sink with a stack of plastic washing-up bowls at one end. No idea what it's for so I continue onwards. Inside there are a couple of blue-tiled shallow baths to the left, with some attached small bubbling pools. To the right are the shower rows: in the public bath you must wash yourself before bathing. I pull up a tiny plastic stall and start to lather myself in soap and shampoo.

Each 'washing place' has a stall, a mirror, hot and cold push taps and a shower head. There's a young slender woman behind me soaping her hair as her two kids run around her causing havoc, and an old lady next me getting on with soaping her undercarriage. 

It feels very normal very quickly. There are women here of every age and I feel that no-one is judging anyone else. There's a fantastic freedom in the nakedness. And there are lots of boobs too- I thought Japanese women didn't have any- but there are enough impressive ones here that I don't feel like some anime mutant sporting beach balls. When I'm done washing I move into the main bath. It's really quite hot and I lean against the edge in case my blood pressure does a number on me. I can see some little kids looking at me sideways. One of them is only about 3 and keeps walking over to stare. I am definitely the odd one out- but none of the adults seem particularly bothered; I imagine tourists are quite common here. I am really worried about etiquette in the bath house, but the old ladies are very kind and tell me what to do if I look confused (such as, one should shower post-sauna) which puts me greatly at ease.

I give all the baths a go; there are a few electric baths, a sauna, a freezing plunge pool and a really hot bath that is too hot for me (there's a hardcore old lady standing in it and I've no idea how she hasn't melted) and when I'm done with these I strut confidently to the outdoor bath, the rotemburo. There's a bucktoothed lady with steamed-up glasses sitting under the tap (enjoying it a bit too much) and a women with a young child in the other end. The child pounds and plays with her mother's breasts and she isn't bothered. The other staring-kid opens the door after me and then runs away, returning with her mother five minutes later. I settle into the water and close my eyes. The rotemburo is uniquely pleasant. Sitting outside of it in the open air after a steam is really refreshing and by this stage I am completely at ease with exposing my body to everyone else.

I don't last very long in the steaming tub. After cooling off outside it I walk back through to the main area (the lady with glasses is now enjoying the electric bubble bath a bit too much) stick my feet in the plunge pool and leave to get dressed.

In the changing room the little girls are running around playing tag, and Dad placates them from the men's changing room next door (the two rooms are joined at the ceiling). I think that it's nice that the whole family come here to enjoy bathtime.

I leave feeling cleansed and refreshed but mostly struck with how charming the experience is. How nice it is to be so used to one another's bodies, to not be judged and not feel ashamed and to be equalised. To go bathing naked with mum and grandma and your little nieces, with dad a partition away and that be totally normal and pleasant. I have gotten naked with the Japanese and thoroughly enjoyed it.

Oh and when I'm rich and famous- we're definitely getting an outdoor bath.

The Best Shop in Shinjuku

I've got a pretty selective memory. I'm crap with birthdays. No Grandma, I can't remember when D-day is and telephone numbers? Forget it!

I wasn't even confident that the shop was in Shinjuku. It could have been in Ginza which is probably better known for shops. But I remembered Shinjuku when I walked out of the train station. I remembered walking down the hill with the tower of department stores on my right (now the biggest UniQlo I have ever seen) and the sushi places under the railway bridge. I remember the wide crossing across the mental road.

I remember it being stupid-busy, like now, and also stinking hot. Advertisers hand out promotional 'uchiha' fans - I get one with a green gorilla on it and gratefully waft myself with it. After a brief accidental detour in which I pass a lot of ramen and tonkatsu shops and buy a few mystery-flavour riceballs to tie me over, I wind up on the street I want. I remember it isn't this street, but another street round the back of this one somewhere.

I try my luck round a few corners. I can see the limits of the street which means that there is at least a perimeter where this shop exists. Go me for being logical.

I decide that I've been walking around in the heat a little too long and must rejuvinate with an ice coffee. I duck into a busy basement shop full of cigarette smoke and hurridly slurp one down. When I emerge, the glare of the sun illuminates the sign of the building opposite. I'm standing outside it! - damn my blind air conditioning and beverage lust!

I dance around all the displays like a gleeful child. I look at the beautiful postcards and Japanese print style letter kits; the moomin-themed stationary, the animal-shaped corrector pens, the multi-coloured folders, the rubber stamps, the patterned sellotapes, the origami sheets, the character notebooks and the millions and millions of different pens.

Sekaido has 7 floors of stationary. Every type of stationary you can imagine. And
I am a celebrated stationary perv!

After my gleeful dance of the first floor I prance up to the second, which sells all the manga supplies and I have a small neopiko pen and screentone binge (these things tend to be hideously expensive or hard to find back home). There's some serious kit up here which makes me think seriously about drawing manga again.

After a good hour of dancing up and down the escalators in a cloud of excited manga sparkles, I have to backtrack and pay for my postcards that I've accidently robbed from downstairs. As with most department stores in Japan you must pay for your purchases on each floor before progressing to the next.

As I walk back into the disgusting heat with my nicely wrapped purchases I feel a great sense of achievement. I, alone and unaided by persons or smartphones, being of shockingly bad memory and sense of direction have found a shop that I went to once, four years ago, in the middle of Japan.

And it was still as awesome as I remembered.

Crawling Queenstown

I managed to lose absolutely everyone before the start of the pub crawl. Apparently they've been thrown out of Nomads Hostel for drinking in the rooms and must have taken residence in a nearby pub.

I show up at Bar Cowboy dressed as a hipster golfer in preparation for 'pub golf' -  I say hipster golfer because the best I can do out of my backpack in knee high stripy socks, baggy pants, a shirt and a cardigan.
I rock up to the bar alone and order a rum and coke. I start chatting to Liam, an Aussie guy in Queenstown for a skiing holiday, who obviously hasn't noticed that I'm dressed like a complete goon, and within 10 minutes a group of raving drunk mental Kiwi experience patrons tumble through the door cheering and chanting. The barman shakes his head.

After they top up with a few litres of beer the group stampedes into the bar next door and I'm pleased to see my good chums Amy and Jenny having an up until that point quiet beer. We've also found Hamish, Jonas, Michael and Thibaud. Within ten minutes a hearty cheer signals that it's time for the next pub, and the group piles out of the door with golf clubs raised.

Amy has just bought a pint and refuses to down it in order to follow. I've also just bought a glass of rather nice Mount Gay and am in no hurry to see it off. Like a cartoon we see the group stampede in and out of Bar Up (we later learned that this was due to $10 pints being offered) and manage to skip a pub before entering the Boiler room.

As the night progresses my brain becomes more rum clouded. I remember declaring to Hamish (a wee bairn of 19) with my glass of rum raised that this night shall be his University preparation in drinking. I remember screeching 'Wonderwall' at a most likely quite talented live act. Hamish got us thrown out of the -5 ice bar for nicking a shot and then a bunch of us lost the main group. Jenny, Amy, Hamish and I followed a debris trail of broken golf paraphernalia in order to find everyone, to no avail. At some point Amy wisely ducked out and I ended up dancing on a table in a different club to music that I usually despise with a passion.

I woke up for my morning bus to Christchurch still drunk and managed a hilarious slurred Skypecall to Pete.

The dramatic mountains and beautiful lake surrounding Queenstown were sadly lost on me as I tried to avert my bloodshot eyes from the daylight.

The Kiwi Experience

It's green, it's fresh, it's got dramatic mountains and rolling hills. It's got a million acres of sky. It's got geysers and hot pools and volcanoes and waterfalls and crashing rapids. It's got fantastic sunsets.

It's got chocolate marshmallow fish.

I am completely in love with New Zealand. I love the fact that it's beautiful and eco-conscious. The indigenous culture is a source of national pride. They love bakeries and ice-cream. You can buy Cadbury's chocolate WITH TOASTED COCONUT IN IT!

I've joined the 'Kiwi Experience', known to some as the Big Green F*ck Bus or the Big Green Slut Bus, but known to us simply as 'The Bus.' We know that our beardy bus driver's name is Ben, but he introduces himself as something different every day (today it's 'Erasmus'). And he likes to show us unusual tourist sights such as giant vegetables and tell us interesting place-name facts ("Greymouth is popularly known as 'Grey-hole"). He goes out of his way to take us to various bakeries for pies. He hates Jafas.

There's lots to do in New Zealand too, if adventure sports are your thing. I've been doing some cave-tubing, white water rafting, glacier climbing, jumping off of high objects. Next time I come I'm going to go kayaking and horse-trekking- why not eh?

And oh yes, there will be a next time.

Throw Yourself in Head First

"How are you feeling today?"

"Alright."

It's freezing up on the Karawau bridge. I thought I would forget about that. The jump team bind my legs tightly with a bath towel and a strap. The wind is whistling around the canyon, no sign of the sun today. The instructor can see the blank stare of my eyes watching his hands.

"When did you decide to do this then?"

"About a week ago.... because I'm a f*cking idiot."

The instructor snickers. He helps me up and quickly shuffles me towards the edge. Look at some cameras for photos. Give a nervous thumbs up. Then as casually as saying "Nice weather today eh?" he says "Nice big jump then."

It's an order, not a request. And this is the moment. I've been having dreams about the falling sensation, but not about the ledge. The ledge is the worst bit of the bungy. Your brain says something like this:

"no no- we're not doing this today. Humans do not throw themselves from high cliffs. Lemmings throw themselves from high cliffs. Throwing yourself from a cliff should win you a Darwin award. I forbid you. See how your stomach has that squirty feeling? Yes Baldrick, that's fear."

Well brain- this is a bridge, not a cliff. I'm attached with a proven 2 inch thick latex cord. There are a lot of people watching. I'm proving something to myself! The best way to get it over with is to jump.

Jump!

And actually, I don't really remember that first jump. I know I tried to make it a big one. I let out an involuntary manly growl. I don't remember the canyon whooshing past, or how close to the water I was. I have a brief memory of my stomach jolting at the very beginning, and then my brain has blotted out the rest of the fall for its own reasons.

A few scary secondary bounces as the tension releases from the cord and then I'm rescued from the rope by two men in a rubber dingy with a stick. It's over within 2 minutes. When we reach the shore I'm asked to stand up and take off the harness from around my legs, but they're all jiggly. Walking up the stairs is a jiggly battle.

I stop halfway up the path to watch my bus buddies Christina and Laur do their jumps (Laur lets out by far the best scream of the day so far). I can feel the adrenaline high dissolving into my bloodstream. I start to feel really cold.

And then I realise the fear is over - I'm hungry!

Beautiful Places

From the lookout on Whitehaven Beach you can see the shadows of stingrays lying in the gentle turquoise waters of the estuary. The shallow sand flats spread across the bay in white, surf-ringed circles, and the vibrant aquamarine of the shallow water stretches across to the distance like a glimmering bedsheet. The beach is fringed by low cliffs and a lush rainforest whose mangroves sneak their roots onto the edges of the sand.

The sand feels like flour under your toes. The sun occasionally pokes out from behind dramatic clouds to warm you and there's a gentle breeze on the air, slightly chilly.

I walk along the tide-line and notice a collection of yellow leaves punctuating the shore. This place is stunning, and nothing to do here but dip your feet into the water and enjoy the very fact that such a place exists.

Australia

For anyone travelling to Australia, let this be known: it's bloody expensive. I stared longingly at the processed white supermarket bread. $4, which is just under 3 pounds, and way over budget for someone living the backpacker life. I looked hopefully at the chocolate, but a mars bar cost an extravagant $2.50... and it wasn't even be a big one.

I spent four days in Sydney sitting on my arse doing pretty much nothing. The three days of planes had worn away at my enthusiasm, as had the bollock-freezing Australian winter. On the first day I grossly underestimated the cold, tramping around town in a t-shirt and cruisy cut-offs and regretting my decision on the arrival of a cold breeze and light tropical shower. Luckily a kind girl in my dorm bequeathed me an enourmous grey knitted jumper that her luggage allowance would not allow and I invested in some $30 skinny jeans to keep the cold off of my tropic-conditioned knees.

I wasn't having a great time in the hostel. A large group of the Englishman's natural enemy; the French, was routinely occupying the cluster of dinner tables in the courtyard, and I was starting to get fed up of the hostel staff trying to get in my pants.

As a now more seasoned traveler, I recognised that I had come down with a chronic case of 'the lazies' and needed to take action or risk becoming a part of the hostel furniture.

Dodging pissed backpackers and the occasional prostitute on Victoria Street I marched into Wicked Travel King's Cross and grilled the lazy agent as to the main East Coast sights, which include some very expensive trips to Cape Tribulation, the Whitsundays and Fraser Island. I fought the brief handing-over-cash heart attack and brandished my well-worn Mastercard for a $1000 workout, ensuring that my next two weeks would be action packed with fantastic un-lazy experiences.

Realising that with my tours and extra internal flights I'd pretty much spent twice my Australia budget already (about half of what I'd spent in my 3 months in Asia) I popped into the local Coles to stock up on 60c instant noodles, the staple sustenance for the poverty-stricken backpacker.

In Transit

Delhi pisses me off again within 5 minutes of being there. After arriving from Mumbai at the domestic terminal I have to haggle with cab drivers who want ridiculous prices for a 5km cab ride. I know how much it should cost, and so do they, but they also know I'm at their mercy.

In the end, I have to pay 300 rupees for the fifteen minute journey, and the smug little shit driving me tells me "It's fixed price" to which I reply "No it isn't you thieving bastard," as the costing is clearly displayed on a placard in the back of his cab.

I've just done an overnight bus, and 7 hours in the Mumbai terminal. I am tired and pissed off.

I plan to have an easy evening in, plan my trip to Australia, order some room service and grab a good night's sleep. I'm hopeful when I walk up to the desk "Ah yes, Miss, breakfast is included in the rate and we will organise your transfer to the airport in the morning, which is of course complimentary. If you need anything just dial 9." Aaaah... yes! The room's nice too - clean and crisp - I'm feeling very good about this.

But the chinks in the armour start showing immediately. I can't get the wi-fi to work, which is a considerable thwart to my plans. I can find all my favourite channels on the TV- but none of them work (even when I resort to News or cartoons - nothing). The only thing I can watch is Hindi news or 70s Bollywood. The hotel is surrounded by nothing of interest -  I chose it for the purpose of it being close to the airport and a free transfer. I try not to boil over- maybe I'm just hungry. I decide to order room service:

"Hi, this is room 209 -  can I have a menu card please."
"What?"
"Yes, um, I want to order room service but there's no menu up here.."
"Menu"
"Yes."
"We have restaurant downstairs."
"Yes I know that, but I want room service."
"Oh, menu card is on the table."
"No, it isn't. That's why I'm calling."
"Ah.. Menu?"
"Yes"
"... there is restaurant downstairs."
"Right. Okay. Never mind."

I march downstairs fuming in my cat-print pajamas and snatch a menu from the desk. I order a grilled veg sandwich and a mango juice. An hour later I am served the dampest sandwich I have ever seen and a mango shake so thick I think they've made it with cement. The porter hovers around awkwardly after delivering it. I am not amused by his tip fishing after the crappy service and say "yes?" to which he replies "Shake. You must pay now. We don't have so we go across the road." I avoid pointing out that this order is wrong anyway and fish around in my purse.

"If you don't have it you should say so on the phone."
"Why?"
"Do you have change of a 500?"
"You don't have small money?"
"No. This is why you should tell people what's going on."

He then leaves without any money.

Resisting the urge to throw the bedside lamp at his head, I grab my tablet to vent at Pete - Wi-fi still not working. I check it at regular intervals throughout the night, and eventually give up at 11.30pm. My stress causes me to have punctured sleep and all my problems reel through my head; I have nowhere booked to stay in Bangkok. I told Pete I would call. I need to plan out Australia.

After the 4 hour flight from Delhi, Bangkok greets me like an old friend. I am instantly cheered by the bright lights, the bright pink taxis and the lack of honking.

But again my plans are thwarted. I know that the cab to town costs about 450 baht. There's a train, but it's miles away from where I want to be. I search around desperately for someone to split it with. There are two French guys standing near the stand.

"Hi! Are you guys going to Khao San."
"Sorry What?"
"Where are you staying? Is it near Khao San. Did you want to share a taxi?" I gesture to it.
"Ah yes -  you can get taxi here - it's a very good taxi."
"Yes I know but- where are you staying?"

Their blank faces are a sign for me to give up.

When I'm finally there, I can enjoy all my old haunts. Eat some water spinach on Rambuttri road, use the internet Cafe on the corner for 10 baht, shop for Souviners on Khao San. The tiredness is still lingering, but at least I don't feel the urge to murder anyone anymore.

I have a good nights sleep -  but the tiredness is still lingering beyond check-out time, and by the time the shuttle bus arrives all I want is to be asleep on the plane.

When I get to the airport, I'm right on time. I'm happy in the fact I'm getting a big flight out of the way, happy to be in Bangkok's fabulous shiny airport.

"Thank you Madam. Here is your boarding pass. Just to let you know the flight is currently delayed by 2 hours."

"..."

There are no words.

The Smells of Jaipur

Walking down a street in Jaipur smells like this:

Outside the hotel there's a sickly sweet raw-meat smell from poultry shops that makes me choke. There are also huge open bins that smack you in the face with the sour smell of rubbish; it reminds me of how the grounds smell at the Reading festival after a few days.

Along the shopping arcade there is the earthy smell of turmeric, the fruity tang of dried chillis. Peppery sour smells from a pickle shop, the acrid smell of urine from a public urinal. From the sweet shops I get a seductive waft of sugared batter.

Round the corner is the wonderful smell of fried bread from a row of street vendors, and then a waft of jasmine from men making religious flower garlands.

Everything is lightly dusted in the smell of earth from the road.

Delhi Mental

Me and Pete knew we were in trouble in Delhi from the moment we stepped off of the plane.

A well meaning person decided to pull all the bags and cling-wrapped boxes from the luggage belt and place them in a line in front of it, making it impossible to reach the remaining bags. As I tried to establish a space in one of the gaps, people just pushed in front.

Our hotel driver was waiting for us, and managed to scam us out of an extortionate parking fee. The drive to our hotel gave us our first taste of the Indian traffic; 6 lanes of traffic battling on a road meant for two, with cows getting right of way and everyone's hands constantly on their horns. The traffic consists of cars, auto-rickshaws, cycle rickshaws, people, ox-drawn carts and stray dogs.

At our hotel, the staff were a bit strange, with their understanding of English coming and going; our details were written down in an enormous ledger. A porter showed us to our room before turning on every switch (about 20 in total), the TV and demonstrating how to work the air-conditioning unit. All in all this took about fifteen awkward minutes before Pete placed a hand on the man's back and said in a Stephen Fry-like  fashion "Yes. That'll be all"  causing me to giggle uncontrollably until the porter had left.

The room was beautiful and looked luxurious, but nothing worked in it. The plugs were all blown up or hanging out, and in the shower the hot and cold taps were the wrong way round.

Walking around the main bazaar in Paharganj, we got stared at... a lot. Some little kids waved hello to us. The housing consisted of very old venetian looking apartments, with laundry hanging between them out of the windows. Women sat on the street chewing. There's rubbish everywhere you look. Plastic is truly the scourge of India.

We learnt how to spot the touts in Connaught place by their odd behaviour. People who suddenly turn direction when we walk by, people who stop and loiter until we reach them. People who just want to chat and helpfully point out the travel agencies for you (where they will get commission).

After our first day we are physically and emotionally exhausted. Welcome to India!

Mumbai Munchies

The old town of Mumbai reminds me of Bloomsbury. It's chock full of grand, gothic brick buildings and crumbling colonial mansions with wrought-iron balconies. As I walk through the leafy avenues, watching crows breakfast on stinking rubbish bins and shouting 'bollocks!' as I trip over uneven paving stones in the sweltering humidity, I come to the conclusion that I am done with India.

It might be because I am now travelling through it Pete-free and am having to stare down groups of leery men on my own; though I am finding Mumbai is generally much more chilled out than mental, medieval Delhi. It's more likely because India is a uniquely frustrating country, and I have reached the pinnacle of my frustration. Nothing works. Everything is bodged or falling down. The bureaucracy of simple tasks is crippling. People try and swindle you -  a lot.

But I'm not signing it off forever; there are still some awesome things about it.

For me, predictably, it's mostly about the food. On the street next to my hotel there are two men with a tiny cart whipping up savory pancakes, curry and vegetable Bahjis every morning. It must be good as there's always a crowd of around 20 men, seduced by the warm smell of garam masala, who stop for a quick breakfast before work. Carts like this are everywhere in India churning out wholesome meals for less than 50p.

In Rajasthan we feasted on pooris (fried flatbreads), parathas (buttered flatbreads) and chickpea curry, in Uttar Pradesh we had fresh rotis, samosas and some fantastic Thalis. West Bengal had the bengali egg-rolls and some fabulous noodles and dumplings courtesy of the influence from Tibet. I've been scoffing bright orange Jalebis everywhere (that is, Jale-bingeing) and making myself sick on burfis and luddus.

I'm now on the gateway to Southern India, so now it's all about the dosas (savoury pancakes) and idlis (steamed rice cake). I had some idli for breakfast and they were fantastic. I then had a battata vada (potato pakora) roll for lunch, followed by a raspberry frozen yogurt and an iced coffee (yes a coffee) at one of Mumbais slick, super air-conditioned snack chains.

I'm glad I can eat veggie easily and all the time; a walk past a miserable stinking poultry shop reminds me that chickens don't have a fantastic time here.

I'm off to Goa for 3 days of R&R before heading off on a convoluted route to Australia. I'm hoping for some awesome fish and coconuts to make the most of the time I have left in this culinary paradise, before entering a land of organised traffic, sexual liberation and even paving stones.

The Tea Hustler

The 5 Second Tea Lady's tasting room is filled with pink and green polyester rose pillows and various stuffed animals wearing baseball caps and sunglasses. On the lacy white tablecloth in front of us she lays out six small bowls of different tea leaves.

"Hold part in your hand like this and blow. Strong. Four or five times. Then smell. Put them in order best first -  very easy to tell the quality."

The room is in a tiny building in the middle of the Happy Valley tea plantation, next to the factory. It's a small, steep plantation just below Darjeeling town and exports most of its tea to Harrods, London. It's apparently the highest altitude tea plantation in Darjeeling.

After ten minutes of us involuntarily ingesting tea leaves nasally, the lady beckons us over to her stove to show us the process of brwing the famous 5 second tea. She throws the leaves into boiling water and immediately strains the liquid through a holey, blackened filter into another pan. It produces a surprisingly vibrant golden tea. Banishing us back to the lounge she follows is out with a tray carrying two teacups and a tall teapot and pours us a cup of what we are assured is finest first flush Darjeeling orange flower pekoe.

I hold the cup to my nose and let the steam warm my upper lip. The tea has a slightly sweet smell and a rich golden colour. It's a light black tea - bitter and refreshing without the smoky flavour of the Assam tea used in most of the blends back home.

The 5 second tea lady displays a tea leaf to us and explains which ones are picked. "Only tippy, two and three leaf." She also shows us a tea flower, and shows us the difference in quality between first flush (first pick) and second flush tea. Then she slaps her thighs, her eyes twinkle, and she gets down to business.

"So -  You want to buy some tea?"

I can tell Pete's been tempted since we walked in; lured by the glamour of the kitsch decor and the subtler Darjeeling taste. He goes for the white tea - it's the least processed and therefore the most expensive; we pay 600 rupees for 100 grams.

The lady explains to us that the workers on the plantation are given tea but aren't allowed to sell it. She claims to be making extra money for the workers. She makes a grand show of packaging it in front of us, weighing the tea out with a set of ancient iron hand scales and strapping a tea leaf and flower to the package. We give her a thousand rupee note and she stashes it in one of her rose cushions, digging around in it for change.

"In the factory don't tell them I sold you tea -  tell them you bought it in town. We are not allowed to sell." We assure her that we are secret safe, sign her guestbook and head down to the factory for a factory tour.

The guide shows us through the production processes; withering, rolling, drying and grading, explaining how these processes differ for the different varieties. He asks us if we bought any tea from the lady further up the hill.

The bottom line is that it's all total bollocks; apparently there is no such thing as 5 second tea -  the workers aren't given tea from the estate - it comes from a different estate further along the mountain. The lady is a tea hustler, selling lower quality teas to idiot tourists for extortionate amounts of money.

Who do we believe? Have we been tea hustled? I choose to believe that we have bought nothing but the highest grade first flush white flower orange pekoe, sold in Harrods, London, also for extortionate amounts of money to idiot tourists!

The Flight of Bats

I'm sitting on a wall in front of a Cambodian graveyard. The graves are mounds covered sparingly with coloured paper streamers. A little girl comes and sits next to me, which makes me nervous as children in close proximity usually results in a request for money.

It's nearly sunset, the clouds are closing in. The little girl chats to me about where she lives. She sings songs to me and stops every ten minutes to say 'you're really beautiful...' I ask her if she likes animals.

"Yes. I like animals.'
"Do you like the bats?"

She nods her head and we both look towards the jagged gash in the mountainside. We can hear thousands of them chirping inside waiting to burst out into the sky.

I keep thinking that it will be like an enormous cannon ball, and the bats will explode into the sky as one evil-looking shape- but in fact they emerge slowly- just a few at first and then a steady stream emerges, getting thicker and thicker as though a dam has been released.

My driver shuffles up and tells me there's another place we can see the bats from. I say my goodbyes to my little friend (who presents me with an origami pigeon as a gift) and then zoom off to a nearby field.

From here it's more dramatic- I can see the black miasma snaking into the distance over the rice paddy - off to do its evil bidding.

I stand there for a long time until the driver starts looking awkwardly at the road as the night creeps slowly in.

Beautiful Decay

After my tuk tuk tour around Angkor, I decided to bike there the next day.

The temple complex is only 8km out of Siem Reap and you can hire a bike fore $1. It seems like a great idea until the 38degree heat starts to pick up and you realise that there's next to no shade. No matter; I'm armed with 5 litres of water and some suncream so thick it's like smearing mayonnaise onto your skin.

The temple I really want to see is Ta Prohm, known informally as the 'Tomb-raider" temple after the movie that was shot there. It's a ruin choked by enourmous mangrove trees, the roots strangling the efforts of man as though the forest got annoyed at the intrusion and decided to eat it.

As I walk up the entranceway I get excited as I see my first mangrove; it's about 25 metres high and stuck in the middle of the flagstone courtyard, feeling it's spindly roots between the gaps in the stones. I get momentarily mobbed by tiny Khmer children trying to sell me magnets and postcards for a dollar. There's some restoration work going on in the centre of the complex, the scaffolding shielded by bright green nets. This work is being partly funded by the Indian government.

As with many places on the Asia tourist trail, my experience at the temples of Angkor is blighted by Chinese tourists. At the daily alms-giving to the monks in Luang Prubang, busloads of them turned up to shamelessly crowd round and photograph the monks from two feet away, reducing this traditional ceremony to a fairground spectacle.

In Ta Prohm temple they crowd around any possible photo-spot, flashing V signs and silly poses in complete  ignorance of anyone trying to view the temples, trees, or waiting to grab a photo themselves. Every corner I turn there is a great horde of them crowding a particular spot; I end up having to take a roundabout route to dodge them and escape. There's no reverence in their visit or respect to their actions. It's all just a big hilarious spectacle to be photographed.

I cycle irritably to the next sight on my hitlist- Bayon. This turns out to be my favourite of the Angkor temples, and it's the only one where I am really impressed with my surroundings. Bayon is a nice mix of ruined and complete; enourmous grey faces smile enigmatically from the towers and resident bats chirp from the spires. Climbing the numerous stairs to reach the main part of the complex gives it an air of drama, and I'm happy to see some working Buddhist shrines wafting sandalwood incense from some of the corners.

Angkor Wat is famous for its completeness (despite some very obvious dodgy cement-work), and you can fully appreciate this after seeing the other ruined temples. However in terms of raw beauty, what it is missing is that stamp of nature; the green tinges of moss, the spindly decoration of trees and the pockets of intruding light that truly highlight the beauty of stone. Also the desertedness that can return the sense of reverance and dignity to what is viewed by some as merely a photo-op.

Sunrise at Angkor

I arrive at Angkor Wat at five in the morning in blackness, amongst a convoy of lighted tuk-tuks. 

''Okay. We here. I wait for you outside when you finish.''

I wave my driver goodbye and walk along the uneven flagstone causeway. I can just make out the pointy towers of Asia's centrepiece looming in the darkness ahead.

I follow a steady line of tourists through the gatehouse; thankfully some of them are carrying torches to light the oppressive passageways. There is a real adventure element to following the dim lights through the dark caverns of ancient stone construction. Carvings of dancing "Apsara" grin dimly from the walls as we tread carefully along ancient stones.

The morning light is creeping in as I reach the other side of the gatehouse. I can see the three iconic Angkor columns against a background of murky blue. Tourists crowd the lawn on the left side of the causeway, by one of the great square ponds. I suspect this is the best place to grab that much coveted perfect photo. 

As the sun rises I am once again confronted with the classic 'world monument anti-climax' that hit me at Machu Picchu. I think the reason is this: films spread the lie that every sunrise involves a spectacular lion king style orb of yellow rising majestically against a background of shocking red. Your spectacular world monument of choice will be silhouetted against this masterpiece of nature and you will live smug and satisfied that you have experienced something truely unique and amazing that you will never forget.

At Angkor Wat, the sky makes a slow transition from murky blue to shocking pink. While this is not on a par with the lion king, the temple silhouetted against this pink results in a beautiful photograph, and I admit that the sky was ethereally beautiful.

I wait eagerly for enough light to filter through to explore the inner recesses of the temple. For me it's much more about nerdy exploration than magical experience, and I can tell these temples will not disappoint.

Welcome to Cambodia

Rubbish. Everywhere. Plastic bags, bottles, paper plates, straws; all strewn at the side of the road for miles and miles and miles. This is the first thing I notice about Cambodia.

As the bus lurches out of the immigration checkpoint I can see the ruins of half-finished casinos; a border frontier development project that never took off. The bus pulls into a service station for a lunch stop. Immediately, young children and old women crowd the doorway with begging bowls (the same plastic bowls used to flush simple squat toilets). There's obviously an agreement that these people cannot enter under the tarpaulin roof of the canteen; as we sit down to eat they linger at the threshold watching for movement.

As the bus continues to Phnom Penh I watch long stretches of arid fields dotted with a few skinny cows, lakes clogged with weed-like lilies. The houses are on stilts - I am guessing that this flat land is prone to wet-season flooding.

The social disparity in Cambodia is obvious; there's something very suspicious about the Cambodian People's Party, whose sign is always the accompaniment to a gloriously lavish out-of-place mansion.

The bus parks up onto a ferry to take us across a lake to the capital. I get a good look at the people surrounding the gaps between the cars. In Cambodia they don't wear pointy hats like the Vietnamese; the national hat here is a wide-brimmed straw planter's hat. I can see a lady in one of these hats carrying a large platter of deep-fried beetles. A young man points at a few and she cheerfully scoops a heap of them into a plastic bag.

The other main thing that you notice is the smiling. The people here, even the begging children, are the most smiley people I've met so far in Asia.

Understanding Anger

I have no photographs from the war remnants museum in Ho Chi Minh City.

I met Mif in the shade of the foyer, the backs of my knees dripping from 36 degree heat. I had taken a wrong turn out of one of Saigon's many leafy parks and walked the scenic route through blistering concrete to the museum. The enourmous US helicopters and tanks displayed in the courtyard provide a dramatic entrance to a museum which actually largely consists of photographs.
 
Of course, with the former name of the museum being 'The Museum of American War Crimes" you expect that you may have to take the exhibitions with a pinch of salt,  however the museum steers away from propagandaist explanations, preferring instead to use photographic evidence.

In the first gallery that Mif and I enter, the first image I am confronted with shows a ditch full of murdered villagers, mostly women and elderly people, their bodies contorted and bloody. Then an image of two little boys shot dead in a road, the eldest no more than 8 and shielding the younger. Then a large stone well displayed in one corner. The plate reads that a villager's family were discovered hiding in it, shot, and disembowelled. A chilling photograph shows a GI setting fire to the roof of a wooden house. Three GIs grin next to pictures of dead Vietnamese on the floor. Mif has to walk out to catch her breath.

As we slowly shuffle through the galleries, another displaying the evidence of debilitating birth defects as a result of contamination with agent orange, I begin to understand some of the anger held up in this country.

As evidenced by the photographs, and understood by the Vietnamese, the country's landscape was completely burned, contaminated and permanently scarred by the use of illeagal chemical warfare. It seems that the US used the country as a testing ground for a new generation of vile chemical weapons, the liability for which it has not accepted.

A gallery on the second floor entitled 'Requiem' is relieving in that it does not continuously point the finger of blame. Its focus is on photojournalists, non-combatants, who documented the war on both sides. Many of them died in the field. The image that haunts me here is that of Dickey Chapelle (American photojournalist) being given the last rites as she lies dying on the ground. Larry Burrows (who himself later died in a helicopter crash) documents an American GI crying after a tour in the storeroom. . Again there are murdered civilians, terrified civilians. A lady wading through a river carrying a British stamped supply crate reminds me that my own country is not exempt from the conflict.

After a couple of hours we leave the museum emotionally drained, and agree that a stiff drink is required. Seeing this museum makes a lot of Vietnam make sense. The older generation have worked incredibly hard to get their country where it is. The cosmopolitan, friendly and affluent city of Saigon does not seem like a place that has horrific suffering lurking in its living memory. The North seemed unfriendly to me, but if people there are still pissed off at the rest of the world, I totally get it.

Our tourist restaurants (that Vietnamese can't afford to eat in) are irritating. Our insistence on people speaking our language is irritating. Our tourist-only beach resorts and binge drinking are irritating. Tourists it seems, never step lightly on the world; some people in Vietnam would rather that foreigners don't stick their noses into their business.

On the way back to my hostel I am approached by some university students in the park. They say that they are practising English and I indulge them for a while. They are apparently studying tourism. After chatting about Vietnam and England for a while, I say my goodbyes and they present me with a small woven scarf as a gift. It's my final image of Saigon.

Return to the Hostel

I spent the morning looking for all the stuff I'd lost in the Than Thoc Hotel. When I asked the receptionist if she'd seen a rolled up sleeping bag (with the aid of Van De Graf's ingenius 'point it' picture book) she looked at the picture, looked at me, and stated "no."

This was highly irritating considering there are about twelve other porters and receptionists that she couldn't be bothered to ask, she didn't look anywhere behind the desk and to top it off she couldn't even muster the strength to be polite. After asking said twelve other staff members I eventually retrieved my sleeping bag, but didn't find the earring I'd dropped, as this question was too answered with a blank "No."

Sod this shit. The tour is over and so is my stay in this hovel of incompetant morons. I hoik up my backpack, say my teary goodbyes to the group and march off to my new $5 hostel down the road.

At first I can't find it, as it's tucked behind a weird side alley behind a travel agency, but a strategically placed lady on the road points it out to me. My My Arthouse looks very basic, but the two staff members sitting at the communal table give me a hearty welcome. In a timespan of 5 minutes the gay concierge has taken my passport details, given me my key, marked out the major sights of Saigon on a map and given me prices and timings for the bus to Cambodia. He then minces off to stash my passport in the safe.

I'm enjoying the return to the hostel after two weeks. The staff act without the snobbery and pretention of hotels. The rooms are basic, but are combatted with cleanliness. You can get a breakfast, minus the silverware, glass bowls and inflated price tag.

Our tour's Saigon hotel involved a sighting of the biggest cockroach I've ever seen. It provided an expensive breakfast of rotting fruit and cheap bread. The 'secure luggage room' consisted of a net placed over our bags in the reception area.

I've enjoyed the tour- mostly for the group rather than the regimented structure -  but now I'm looking forward to the renewed freedom to make my own bad hotel choices, rather than have to suffer them at the hands of Intrepid Travel.

Parks

In an unheard of show of efficiency, our overnight train to Saigon arrived an hour early.

In an indescribable show of crap organisation, we were not allowed to check into our hotel.

At 5.30am, Viet marched us bleary-eyed through the streets of Saigon. At this time in the morning the heat is already crushing, and I drag my feet in heavy steps along the pavement. Viet wheels us into the park; and it's heaving.

Dance music pumps out of distant boom boxes, and we can see clustered groups of people in sportswear on the lawns between the flowerbeds and in the bandstands. We have to move round some men setting up a badminton court in the pathway. People are waiting patiently for a go on the outdoor gym equipment, including chin bars and exercise bikes. We group under the shade of some trees to watch a women-only exercise group doing frantic chest pumps.In the distance some elderly people are doing Tai Chi.

Viet jumps opposite the group; for one crazy second I think that he is going to start taking the class, but he simply performs his usual suite of bizarre (though impressive) ninja stretches. He invites us to join in the exercise, but I think that he can read the collective sleep-deprived faces that say 'Sod. That. Shit.' He says he'll meet up with us later. We wander around the unselfconscious exercisers for a while, then pile into a Starbucks coffee for some calories and some glorious air-conditioning.