...don't know when I'll be back again. Ok, so the last part's not true - I do know (roughly) when I'll be back again. And unlike the John Denver song, my bags aren't packed, I'm not ready to go and there's no taxi outside the door just yet. But I am getting myself prepared. I now have a Syrian visa, a prescription for some hallucinogenic anti-malarials, and a couple of kilos worth of Lonely Planets and other assorted travel literature by authors ranging all the way from Theroux to, er, Thesiger.
Last week I braved the full horror of the NHS in east London to obtain some vaccinations. A rotund African nurse (who worryingly mistook "the Middle East" for "Malaysia") briefed me on travel health issues: "don't drink the water, take lots of Immodium, use mosquito spray. And if you're going to 'make friends' while you're away, take some condoms with you." There then followed some fierce invective about the woeful inadequacies of Sudanese contraceptives. I'm not quite sure how she imagined I was going to pick up any nubile Nubian ladies - Sudan's not exactly renowned for its nightlife, what with Sharia Law and all, but thinking about it, perhaps she was referring to goats rather than girls. (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/6619983.stm)
After the lectures about covering my prick with African ladies (ovine or otherwise) it was time for this particular African lady to uncover her prick and administer a couple of shots of her own, which she did with a flourish. I'd never heard an audible squirting sound from a syringe before, but I can assure you it's a fairly disconcerting experience. As, I'm sure you'll agree, is what happened next. Onto a different nurse, this time for a blood test to check my immunity to Hepatitis B. At first I thought there'd been some mistake - instead of a nurse, I was confronted by a grotesque caricature of a woman - huge, deformed, clearly insane, and most definitely local. That's right. It was Tubbs from the League of Gentlemen.(http://www.lunacynet.com/league/char_tubbs.html#tubbs) Worse, if it could get any worse, coupled with the Royston Vasey appearance and speech patterns, it had the accent of an extra from East Enders. "This is a local doctors for local people...innit?" I fled as quickly as possible, leaving a substantial amount of blood in a jar behind me, typhoid and tetanus now coursing worryingly through my veins instead.
But enough skirting around the issue, onto the main topic at hand. In case you didn't already know (the clue is in the title) I'll shortly be embarking on a seven month trip to the US, South America and the Middle East. The plan is roughly as follows.
After ten days RnR in the Florida Keys I'll embark on a month long intensive Spanish course in Bogota, before flying to the far south of Colombia for a few days exploring the remote rainforest reserves of the Rio Yavari on the border between Peru and Brazil. From there I'll take a boat 1600km down the River Amazon to Brazil's jungle capital Manaus, before turning north and dodging poison darts while crossing the vast and remote Yanomami Indigenous Reserve into southern Venezuela. Here I'll take in Roraima and the Gran Sabana (inspiration for Arthur Conan Doyle's "Lost World"), Angel Falls, and the Orinoco Delta, eventually flying home from Caracas.
After a brief stopover back in UK for a friend's wedding, I'll fly to Istanbul, from where I have a shade under four months to make the 5000km overland trip south to Khartoum. I'll sojourn along Turkey's Aegean coast and cross Cappadocia's moonscapes into Syria, pausing for five weeks to learn Arabic at the University of Damascus. Political situation, border guards, and budget permitting, I'll move on to Lebanon, before following the Lawrence Highway through Jordan and into Egypt. After crossing Lake Nasser I'll take the scenic route, following the Nile through the scattered villages and vast deserts of northern Sudan to Khartoum, before finishing with a week of diving the pristine Red Sea reefs off Suakin and Port Sudan. I'll fly home, via the Emirate of Sharjah and Istanbul (again), sometime in mid-December.
All being well, I'll then take my passport, by now bearing the stamps of various members of Dubya's "Axis of Evil" and other states not exactly high on the White House Christmas card list, to the US for what the locals call "The Holidays". Of course, the alternative ending sees me donning an orange jumpsuit and taking a one way flight to the all-inclusive resort at Guantanamo, but I'm hopeful the US Immigration and Naturalisation Service will be understanding about Syria and Sudan as holiday destinations. Er, won't they?
Whatever, it should be an adventure. Stay tuned!
Last week I braved the full horror of the NHS in east London to obtain some vaccinations. A rotund African nurse (who worryingly mistook "the Middle East" for "Malaysia") briefed me on travel health issues: "don't drink the water, take lots of Immodium, use mosquito spray. And if you're going to 'make friends' while you're away, take some condoms with you." There then followed some fierce invective about the woeful inadequacies of Sudanese contraceptives. I'm not quite sure how she imagined I was going to pick up any nubile Nubian ladies - Sudan's not exactly renowned for its nightlife, what with Sharia Law and all, but thinking about it, perhaps she was referring to goats rather than girls. (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/6619983.stm)
After the lectures about covering my prick with African ladies (ovine or otherwise) it was time for this particular African lady to uncover her prick and administer a couple of shots of her own, which she did with a flourish. I'd never heard an audible squirting sound from a syringe before, but I can assure you it's a fairly disconcerting experience. As, I'm sure you'll agree, is what happened next. Onto a different nurse, this time for a blood test to check my immunity to Hepatitis B. At first I thought there'd been some mistake - instead of a nurse, I was confronted by a grotesque caricature of a woman - huge, deformed, clearly insane, and most definitely local. That's right. It was Tubbs from the League of Gentlemen.(http://www.lunacynet.com/league/char_tubbs.html#tubbs) Worse, if it could get any worse, coupled with the Royston Vasey appearance and speech patterns, it had the accent of an extra from East Enders. "This is a local doctors for local people...innit?" I fled as quickly as possible, leaving a substantial amount of blood in a jar behind me, typhoid and tetanus now coursing worryingly through my veins instead.
But enough skirting around the issue, onto the main topic at hand. In case you didn't already know (the clue is in the title) I'll shortly be embarking on a seven month trip to the US, South America and the Middle East. The plan is roughly as follows.
After ten days RnR in the Florida Keys I'll embark on a month long intensive Spanish course in Bogota, before flying to the far south of Colombia for a few days exploring the remote rainforest reserves of the Rio Yavari on the border between Peru and Brazil. From there I'll take a boat 1600km down the River Amazon to Brazil's jungle capital Manaus, before turning north and dodging poison darts while crossing the vast and remote Yanomami Indigenous Reserve into southern Venezuela. Here I'll take in Roraima and the Gran Sabana (inspiration for Arthur Conan Doyle's "Lost World"), Angel Falls, and the Orinoco Delta, eventually flying home from Caracas.
After a brief stopover back in UK for a friend's wedding, I'll fly to Istanbul, from where I have a shade under four months to make the 5000km overland trip south to Khartoum. I'll sojourn along Turkey's Aegean coast and cross Cappadocia's moonscapes into Syria, pausing for five weeks to learn Arabic at the University of Damascus. Political situation, border guards, and budget permitting, I'll move on to Lebanon, before following the Lawrence Highway through Jordan and into Egypt. After crossing Lake Nasser I'll take the scenic route, following the Nile through the scattered villages and vast deserts of northern Sudan to Khartoum, before finishing with a week of diving the pristine Red Sea reefs off Suakin and Port Sudan. I'll fly home, via the Emirate of Sharjah and Istanbul (again), sometime in mid-December.
All being well, I'll then take my passport, by now bearing the stamps of various members of Dubya's "Axis of Evil" and other states not exactly high on the White House Christmas card list, to the US for what the locals call "The Holidays". Of course, the alternative ending sees me donning an orange jumpsuit and taking a one way flight to the all-inclusive resort at Guantanamo, but I'm hopeful the US Immigration and Naturalisation Service will be understanding about Syria and Sudan as holiday destinations. Er, won't they?
Whatever, it should be an adventure. Stay tuned!
