Digging up a bit of home.

Every month at Vientiane International School, the staff social club has a Sundowner event which is organised by the staff from a different designated country each month. This essentially means sitting around drinking Beerlao with the odd splash of wine, and a few nibbles. February was New Zealand's turn and for some crazy reason I suggested it would be a great idea to have a hangi.
Having not actually put a hangi down before by myself, and with not a lot of others around with a huge amount of experience I began to think it may have been a mistake to have ever mentioned it. The excitement of some of the other staff at the mere mention of it however meant that really......I was going to have to make a go of it and just hope for the best.
The logistics of such an undertaking were complicated by the fact that good hangi stones were always going to be hard to find in Lao PDR. With a few enquiries put into place we set off for Darwin for a brief Xmas trip. Apparently the trip was to catch up with family and friends. This, of course, was just a ruse. The real reason for the trip was to collect hessian oyster sacks from the Mr Barra fish shop and to source some muslin cloth from Spotlight and an old clean sheet from an Op shop. Mission accomplished, we made our way back to Laos to be met with a delivery from one of the many mining companies operating in Laos. A wooden crate filled with 80 or 90kg of spent excavator teeth.....You bloody rippa.
With things falling in place and the date quickly approaching I figured I ought to find a basket somewhere. Eventually I just went off to one of the many little 'hardware' shops dotted around the town and purchased 20m of steel rod and carried it back to VIS on my motor-bike, (adventure-plus trying not to swipe anybody on the way), drew up some basic plans and gave it all to one of the amazingly helpful Lao school guards who promptly whipped it into a perfect hangi basket.

Then of course we needed wood. Went to the 'Old Chinatown' part of town where there are piles of wood lining the roads waiting to be sold. Unfortunately, being only a week before Chinese NewYear, it was all more expensive than usual. (Not quite sure what the wood is especially useful for at Chinese NewYear but anyway....that's what the first 'wood-lady' told us) This meant that I had to fork out a massive $8 for the wood we needed. Never mind..... the goal was getting closer.
A couple of quick trips to the 103 markets to stock up on spuds, pumpkin, onions, kumara, (not quite but pretty close), and a bit of cabbage and we were almost done. The day before the event I dug the pit which involved breaking the shovel handle twice in the clay. Fortunately the cost of a shovel is $4 so what can you expect? Then I scooted off to the Japanese cold storage just up the road from home and bought 3 chickens and a couple of small legs of pork. Meanwhile another Kiwi from school had snuck over the border to Thailand and returned with a beautiful leg of NZ lamb that was cheaper than it would have cost at home......go figure. The fire was stacked and lit, veges peeled, basket packed, in the ground, a couple of prayers sent up and the wait began.

As anyone who's ever been involved with a hangi before well knows, (especially with new steels and wood), the anxiety over whether or not it's actually cooked can drive you to madness. Perhaps this is why drinking has always been a co-existing event with a hangi. 4 hours of agony later and my reputation as a Kiwi was well and truly on the line. There were a bunch of people with drinks in hand and only a couple of packets of chips to keep them dry. The piles of empty waiting plates were just making the whole thing worse. I tried to sneak around the back of the new Arts building, (where I had hidden the whole event away from prying eyes), with just a couple of helpers to dig it up and see if we needed to make a mad dash up the road for a load of Khouvieng Fried Chicken. But there must have been a sense of things going on and suddenly there was a small group of spectators gathering around to witness the potential weeping and sobbing of a grown man. With a silver fern on my sleeve and a GoPro camera on my head, we launched into the unveiling.
As soon as that wonderfully nostalgic smell came wafting from the freshly uncovered pit my pride took a big breath and stood up to be counted. We bravely marched the basket straight into the outdoor cafeteria where everyone was waiting and unwrapped the sweet flavour of success. Everything unpacked onto the tables and it was very swiftly mauled by the pack of curious onlookers. The meat, (Lao certainly love their pork) was disappearing as quickly as I could cut it up. Fortunately Kim, (secondary principal), grabbed a plate and stacked it with goodies so that there would be some left for me at the end of it all. Thanks Kim. Otherwise I pretty much would've missed out. (note to self....must pick more) In the end it was a tremendous success and everyone seemed to be mightily impressed. Even had enough veges left over for the traditional hangi fry-up for breakfast on Saturday morning......Oh yeah!

I'm not sure how many times a hangi has been cooked in Laos, but now I know that it's at least once.
Big thanks to Mr Toh for making a fantastic basket, Nick and Pani for their help stacking the fire and joining me on vege peeling duty, Claire and Chris for a beautiful leg of lamb, Lara for providing two bags of great stuffing that got absolutely moolahed in the first minute of eating, Greg Smith for hunting down the steels, and all the rest of the crew for organising plates, bread and beer. It was a lot of stinking hot work...... and I sure can't wait to do it all again.

There and Back Again

Such a strange feeling. Having a holiday in Darwin, and then returning home to Laos. It is still exciting and feeling like an adventure, but at the same time....this is our home now and anywhere else is.....well.....somewhere else.
Being on a Northern Hemisphere, (is that actually a place that needs capitalization?), school timetable, our Christmas break is quite a short one when compared to the luxurious 6 weeks we are used to. 3 weeks just doesn't seem to say enough about itself to make it worth while. Nevertheless, the break was a welcome one and we didn't want to waste any of it. We flew to Darwin where we were met, (at 2am), by the patron saint of midnight taxis Norah Lewis. We were then dropped, (minus mine and Luther's luggage which had gone on a small holiday elsewhere for 4 days), at our home for the next 2 and a bit weeks in Moil at the house of wonderful Ramsays. Such a beautiful home, we were so lucky to be able look after it whilst they were on their own holiday in Melbourne, and the lovely pool was certainly well utilized. Merrilee's mum Bon arrived on Christmas eve and we spent Christmas day together as a small little family.
The obligatory catching up with friends took up most of our time in Darwin which was of course a wonderful time. As always in these situations there were some friends who we just didn't manage to see in our short stay which is sad, but on the whole we had a wonderful time with old friends.
With only a few days before the school term was about to start, we began our journey home to Laos. Our first leg was to Singapore. We arrived at our hotel on Sentosa late in the evening, found a noodle place for some late dinner and hit the sack ready for the next two days of adventure. The boys were about to turn 13, (OMG), and this little two day side trip to Singapore was essentially their birthday present. After a slightly late start in the morning, (what's a holiday without a sleep in?), we headed off to Universal Studios Singapore.
Neither Merrilee nor I have ever been the type who enjoys the crass commercialism of such overblown, Hollywood-worshipping money-grabbing ventures. The prospect of spending the next 7 hours locked in the belly of such a beast was not a pretty one, but we thought......"No....we'll swallow our sense of pride, taste and decency for the benefit of the boys"
That place is absolutely freakin' AMAZING!!
Sure, there were plenty of opportunities to waste even your more easily earnt pennies on tacky shirts, caps, drink bottles, and coffee mugs, but the effort gone in to this place was unbelievable. Castles, Egyptian tombs, theatres, a whole section of New York reconstructed, and a good part of a full sized ocean container-ship jutting onto the land for the Madagascar ride. Every area had it's own theme and was full of things either to look at or to do. 

Scattered in amongst it all were a bevy of characters doing their walk-around-and-get-their-photo-taken-with-the-public thing, but they seemed to enjoy themselves and were either very pleasant or extremely unpleasant.... as each character required. With neither Merrilee or I being joyride junkies and Zachary never being on any rides, it looked like we would have to sit and watch Luther for the day. The first ride we stopped at was a small Dragon roller coaster in Duloc. (Lord Farquhar from Shrek for those without kids) REALLY not wanting to go on the ride but also wanting to get the ball rolling I volunteered to take Luther on so he wouldn't be by himself. The ride was mercifully short and actually kind of fun....although I spent every moment thinking it may be my last. Luther thought it was the bees knees and was wrapped when we climbed off and told his brother all about it. Whether it was a fear of being left out or my claims that it wasn't actually THAT bad, (or probably a bit of both), Zachary decided he was going to give it a go. Knowing how frightened he was at these sort of things I was so proud of him for taking the leap and just giving it a go. How ever it was going to turn out I was a proud dad. As it turned out, he loved it and just wanted to go and do it again. This set the tone for our day. There wasn't much by the end of the day that we hadn't done. Zachary kept wanting to go back and ride the Mummy roller coaster which being inside a tomb spent a good deal of the time pitch black with ghosts and monsters jumping up at you while you were thrown left, right, up, down and at one stage backwards at a frightening rate of knots. The other massive favourite was the Transformers ride. WOW. This is a must see at the park, unless you are claustrophobic, get dizzy, or don't like heights. The crazy thing is that it doesn't actually move very much at all. You put on your 3D glasses and climb aboard and are basically just moved though something like 8 different giant screens. But the combination of the imagery, the judicious use of fans, heaters, spray and a little bit of movement has you believing you are speeding through a city, narrowly dodging missiles and at one point falling head first of the top of a skyscraper. We rode it 4 times and I still couldn't convince myself that we weren't actually about to die. Really really fun. 

Other events for the day: Madagascar - just like an old school Disney ride; Jurassic Park water ride and canopy coaster; Monster Rock - all singing and dancing stage performance; Shrek 4D theatre - get sneezed on by Donkey and then when a huge mob of spiders drops from the screen something brushes up against your ankles etc; dancing with the Rockafellas breakdancing crew on a NY street corner, (may have embarrassed my children somewhat, but if I'm gonna get picked out of the crowd then I'm gonna give it a damn good go. I think the old school back-spin might have put the icing on the embarrassment cake); the Waterworld live show with boats, jet skis, gunfire, fight choreo, explosions and lots of falling into the water from high places where we got completely soaked; Hurricane Studio - a replica of a NY dock that gets hit by a hurricane with more explosions, things falling from everywhere, water catching on fire and a ship bursting through the wall nearly mowing us all down. The only things left that we gazed at with confused emotions were the twin Battlestar Galactica roller coasters. There was no way we were going to put ourselves on those frightening looking things, but at the same time we didn't want to not do it. In the end Luther and I took the bull by the horns and dived in whilst there was no waiting time. (Nothing brings on a change of heart like waiting in line for something you're not really sure you want to do) We decided to tackle the red Human coaster, as although it was the faster of the two, it at least had you sitting on something rather than having your legs dangling into nowhere which was what the blue Cylon coaster had going on. One of the most terrifying things was the start. There was, as usual, a reasonably steep incline that, one would have thought, the coaster had to crawl it's way up before casually falling over the the edge into the throes of gravity. But no. The coaster gently began the climb before suddenly accelerating with face-pulling momentum up the slope, hurling you over the precipice into G-force oblivion. With my stomach lagging some metres behind and my bravado still trembling at the entrance all I could do was scream and laugh in the face of certain death. Meanwhile Luther was squeezing finger-shaped grooves into the steel frames of the seating while Zachary stood comfortably beneath it all laughing quietly at the commotion above. On completion of the ride, after checking all vital signs and pretending there was something that I had tripped on to cover the fact that my legs weren't quite ready to walk again, I surmised that our first ride on a full blown, ridgy-didge, trouser-scaring roller coaster perhaps should not have been in the very front row. Having said that, we casually wobbled our way out through the exit and straight into the entrance to the blue Cylon coaster. There was nothing that was going to stop us now. We thought the Human coaster was horrendously frightening...but then the Cylon coaster was something again. The most memorably forgettable moment, (because some thing are best forgotten....if you can), was doing an outside loop with legs flailing only to be heading straight for a giant groove cut into the ground so that you are below ground level. All very good except they fill the space with a dense mist so that it just looks like the surrounding concrete. I'm quite sure that someone at some stage has wet themselves as the impending slam into the solid 'concrete' approaches. Again, Zachary stood below shaking his head at our foolishness, but we had done it. And given another visit, I think Zachary will be right there with us next time as although we were frightened out of our wits, he could still see that there was something inside us that was absolutely buzzing. In the last 45 min before closing almost everyone had left so Zachary, Luther and I dashed around the park catching last minute rides on everything we could, (no waiting time on anything) before we headed out and back to the hotel for dinner and a much needed sleep. The following day we headed to the Maritime museum which was very interesting. Watched a kind of cinescope presentation that ended in the sinking of a ship we were 'on'. When the doors opened again, we had indeed sunk below and were now in the South East Asia Aquarium. With glass domes and tunnels everywhere and the large tank with 30+ metres of glass wall it was pretty impressive. When we finished there, Merrilee wandered across the boardwalk to look at some shops whilst the boys made their way around the corner to the Adventure Cove Waterpark. Slides, jumps, tunnels, a wave pool and probably the best attraction, a salt-water pool that you could snorkel in that was filled with 20,000 brightly coloured tropical reef fish. We spent the rest of the day splashing around before tiredness finally grabbed us and we made our way back to the hotel.

The following morning we flew into Bangkok for what turned out to be a 6 hour wait at the airport before finally arriving back to our comfy home in Vientiane, ready for another semester of school for the whole family.

The song on this video was one I recorded with some of my year 10 students. They wrote the music and lyrics and I played the instruments and put it together for them.

School's Out and About

37 grade 10 students and 4 staff loaded luggage and then boarded the bus in Vientiane on Monday morning ready for a week of travelling, study and fun on Vientiane International School's yearly SALSA trip. (Secondary Action Learning Service Adventure)
The bus ride took us north where after a couple of hours we stopped at a bridge and all piled out. Making our way down to the river bank we were met by our 11 guides for the first part of our adventure. We were all kitted out with life-jackets and helmets, selected our paddles and in a very large circle on the bank of the Nam Lik we learnt the basics of kayaking. Dry land practice over, it was time to pair up and hit the water.

The journey down stream was superbly pleasant with wonderful rock formations, overhanging jungle trees and just the right amount of small rapids every now and then to make it exciting. Most students, and one pair of staff, ended up with an upturned craft at some stage of the journey which resulted in much laughter and joking during the long river trip.

Eventually we stopped at a magnificent bank of rocks where lunch was awaiting us. With clothes slowly beginning to dry, it was time do don a climbing harness and embark on a short walk up the hill through the jungle. It then became evident that our method of returning to the river was to be quite spectacular. Our harnesses were attached to a wire cable stretching its way through the trees and one by one we whizzed through the canopy making our way from tree-top to tree-top. As we finally approached the river again it was one final walk across a suspended bridge before being lowered to the rocks below at an alarming rate via an abseiling free-fall.

 

Everyone enjoyed the experience immensely, including the students who, at the beginning, were perhaps a little apprehensive. Then we were back into the kayaks for another 2 hours of paddling downstream where the bus was waiting to meet us. We then made our way to our first night’s accommodation on the western bank of the “Lao Sea”. This is a reservoir created by the hydroelectric dam on the Nam Ngum river which was to be our first stop on the following day. After a great and well deserved night’s sleep, those lucky enough to wake early watched the sun rise above the mountains. (Something we certainly don’t get to see here in Vientiane.)

Our day began with a visit to the dam where the history and working mechanics of the dam were explained as we toured the main control room as well as the dam wall. We then began what was to be a very long and slow boat ride across the reservoir, stopping at a village along the way where students made their way amongst the villagers and spoke to them about the dam and whether it had had any impact upon their lives. We also stopped briefly to observe the underwater logging operation where divers descend to the bottom and mark underwater trees with plastic coke botles on a string that float to the surface. The work boat then makes it's way over where they have some kind of apparatus for cutting the timber underwater and then floating it to the surface where they dry it on pontoons. A very long process but I guess it's not damaging any native forest. Apparently there is an underwater village not far from where they operate with a whole village temple that you can dive on if you're keen. Back on board the boat, the students managed to find many ways of wiling the hours away. (Playing cards, word games, tunes on the ukulele, dangling your feet in the cool water or even just putting your head down and having a quick nap.) Upon reaching the Eastern shore we were loaded into tuk-tuks and trucked to our next two nights’ accommodation. The luxury of the previous night spent in the lodge on the banks of the “Lao Sea” suddenly seemed so far away, but still…..all we had to do was sleep there.

The following day we split into two groups, one visiting the Phu Bia copper/gold mine and the other visiting local villages to discuss the possible impacts of the mine on village life. The first village we stopped at was a glorious Hmong village, (Ban Nam Cha), on the banks of a small river.

With only 43 families it was reasonably small and yet had a large, 3 roomed school full of children beaming with a mixture of excitement and trepidation at the crazy bunch of Falangs that had just entered their village. Our students wandered amongst the locals and spoke with as many people as they could before we moved on to another village closer to our home base.
This village appeared to be the Lao version of Texas with every second man wandering around with a home-made rifle slung over his shoulder.

With a strange looking badger type creature hanging by the neck on the side of the road and every small roadside stall having a healthy supply of ammunition this was indeed an interesting village. We spoke to one man briefly who casually wandered through a schoolyard with rifle over shoulder on his way to the river to try and shoot a buffalo. Goodness knows how he intended to bring it up from the river.

On our journey back to home base we stopped at a small brook for lunch before continuing on. Having arrived home a little earlier than anticipated we took the opportunity to make a small visit to a local waterfall. Some of the students braved the dodgy walkways and bridges up to both sets of falls and even dipped into the icy cold waters.

The following day the groups swapped activities so our group headed further North to Phu Bia mine. After a safety induction we were bussed to a ridge above the open cut mine just in time to catch the daily blasting. The sound and shockwaves from the blast were unbelievably impressive. It was as if they had opened several big cans of thunder all at once. We then checked out the tailings dam and the simulator for the oversized tip trucks before making our way back to base camp.

We then quickly loaded the bus and headed on to the last section of our adventure, Tadleuk Falls. Arriving just on dusk, the tents we were to sleep in were already set up so we settled in, had a quick dinner and then busied ourselves with campfire activities before calling it a night. Songs were sung, marshmallows were toasted and we called it a night under a magnificent starry night. The following morning we had a dip in the waters and explored the waterfall before dismantling our tents, packing up sleeping bags and boarding the bus for our trip back to Vientiane.

The students managed to keep their sense of humour and adventure intact throughout the trip which was a great achievement through some long and hot days. Overall it was a memorable and enjoyable adventure as well as a great opportunity to get to know more of the year 10 students.

ps... it must be fun being an linesman in this country...... at least they wear their safety thongs.

 

Germany - part 4 : Das Letze Kapital

We headed from Bremen south on the train to Koln where Merrilee had booked a hotel online close to the train station. When we booked in and opened the window to our room, we discovered a magnificent view of the Koln cathedral. What an amazing piece of architecture. Just its pure size is unbelievably impressive. To marvel at such an awesome construction and to ponder on just how it was possibly made without the benefits of modern mechanical methods is astounding. I have never been all that interested in architecture in the past, I guess I haven't had a lot of opportunity to experience a lot of architecture of any consequence before, so I was somewhat surprised when we actually entered the cathedral on the Sunday morning to find myself completely overcome by its majesty. Compounding the situation was the knowledge that my mother never had the chance to see something as wonderful as I was currently marveling at through teary eyes. I know she would have loved it immensely.

Our stay in Koln was very brief, just the one night, but wonderful as well. Wandering the streets, eating the obligatory pretzels and ice-creams, marveling at the variety of characters, (it seemed somehow different to Berlin, some kind of Italian cosmopolitan or something), was as entertaining as anything. We managed to fit in a visit to the Museum Ludwig to check out a fantastic range of mostly modern art which was fascinating not only to see but also to observe others and listen and watch their reactions to many of the exhibits. ("What a load of crap....I could've made that!!", which of course, they didn't........and it's a pretty sure bet they wouldn't have thought of it in the first place, you'd need a brain for that! Not quite sure just why those guys were in there to be honest)
We went to a fairly run of the mill steakhouse in the hope of a decent piece of meat, (not an easy or inexpensive thing to come by in Laos), and were not disappointed. It had been a while since having a nice steak, cooked to perfection, so that actually ended up being something of a highlight also. But it was time to move on, so we left Koln and boarded the train once more, heading for Worms.

Worms is not too far from Frankfurt and, like most of the places in Germany I had seen via train windows, it had its fair share of impressive graffiti along the train line walls. I am not particularly partial to the average wall scribblings of half-witted layabouts who even on their best days are hard pressed when it comes to spelling even the simplest of curse words. But I have to admit, the plethora of 'old-school' style tags adorning almost every concrete wall partition on the train lines was, to me, a bit of a visual treat.

In Worms we stayed with Franzi and her father Thomas. Franzi also spent some time with us in Australia whilst she attended school in Darwin for a few months so it was wonderful to spend some more time with her again. We spent two nights in Worms, having a great explore of the cathedral there that, whilst not as large and impressive as the one in Koln, was just delightful. We also spent a day shopping in Mannheim where we finally managed to find another skateboard store to buy a longboard for Luther. (I had already bought one for myself in Berlin.)
Before we knew it it was time to return to home base in Meisenheim to spend our last few days with Mutti and Papa. We did one day trip to the Technical Museum in Speyer. Some wonderful old vehicles and some great old boats, submarines and even a couple of old aircraft on giant stands that you could climb into via a large staircase, walk around inside, (on such a raked angle it made it difficult to stay standing), climb right out onto the wing, (which was a bit frightening when we decided to see how much we could make it wobble by all jumping at the same time; quite a lot as it turned out), then make your way out and down to the ground on a great big stainless steel tube slide. Great fun.
We then had our final trip to...... where we boarded a boat and spent the afternoon on the Rhine. I had no idea just how many castles there were in this area. Unbelievable. Some in better shape than others, but fascinating none the less.

We spent our last day in sleepy Meisenheim, just relaxing, walking through the forest, strolling, (or skateboarding for the boys), to the next village for yet more ice cream, and just wiling the hours away happily enjoying the company and the odd board game.
Of course, all good things apparently have to come to an end, so eventually we made our way with Mutti and Papa to the airport in Frankfurt. Farewells were made, promises put in place, tears wiped away and we were headed back to our home away from home.

Final observations:

Things I didn't like about Germany.

-Smoking. I find it hard to believe in this day and age that so many people in this country are fooled by this ridiculous activity. Spending most of my life in a country that has, over the years, actively discouraged people from taking up this vile practice and just recently won a world first case enforcing plain packaging, it is so disheartening to be in a country that seems to encourage the staggering number of people, (especially youth), to engage in such an archaic form of self destruction. The fact that it is accepted as being the norm is just plain outdated. Most of the rest of the developed world has moved on. We found it difficult to find places where you could just have an enjoyable meal without poisonous clouds invading your senses. Is this just Germany or is it basically all of Europe? Either way.....yuck.

-Dogs. Anyone who knows me knows that I'm not keen on dogs in ANY country, but seriously...... being allowed to bring your dog into a restaurant where I'm trying to eat a meal. I think not. Most developed countries have health regulations that forbid this......for good reason. The only time a dog should be anywhere where near the dinner table is if you are eating it!

Things I did like about Germany.

-Food. This is not hard... I like food anywhere.. But here it was fresh and actually quite cheap. Highlights.....Cheeses, pretzels and fresh raspberries.
-Beer
-Transport. The roads in Germany are mostly pretty damn good. There seems to be an autobahn near enough to anywhere to be able to jump aboard and speed off to wherever. (Assuming there a no burning cars in your way) the bits of road that aren't so flash are usually the cobbled bits through the villages which have their own magnificent charm. The train system is also pretty damn awesome. Not cheap.....but definitely awesome.
-Castles. What's not to love about castles?
-Beer
-Windmill thingies. I don't know what you actually call these things, but the fact that they are dotted all over the horizon, (or in some places so thick it's like an eerie invasion scene from war of the worlds), suggests that this area of the world, at least, is doing something right about alternative energy. Add that to the various solar farms we travelled past and it makes the whingers about a carbon tax just seem even that little bit more ignorant as to what is going on in our world.
-Architecture. From the largest of cities to the smallest of villages. Sometimes it's a magnificent cathedral and sometimes it's just a single brick in a wall but there is always something to marvel at.
-Did I mention beer?

Will we go back to Germany? Definitely.
Will it be soon? Most likely.
Would I like to live there? Absolutely.
Will that happen? Who knows?....but not ruling it out that's for sure.

Germany - part 3 : "It's the Arctic Ocean...with a different name."

After a great week in Berlin, Mutti and Papa made their way, via train, back to sleepy Meisenheim. Heiko took the reins as pilot of the great holiday machine with Merrilee, Zachary, Luther, myself and Jorris as willing passengers. We were headed to Elmshorn, north of Hamburg, and then further on to the North Sea. Fortunately, there were no major disruptions on the autobahn and we got to Elmshorn in good time. Our purpose was to visit Heiko's sister Kirstin, (Merrilee's 'host' sister), and spend a couple of days with her and her beautiful daughters Siri and Ira. (Siri came to Australia as an exchange student last year and stayed with us in Darwin for a couple of months) A wonderful, comfortable little home greeted us on our arrival and our stay with Kirstin and the girls was truly delightful. We even had a barbecue in the back yard and then hauled the ping pong table out to the side yard where many laughs were heartily enjoyed. One of my enduring memories is of the shower. Two heads, the main one glowing with blue LED lights when you turned the water on and stereo speakers directly above. Now THAT'S the way to get clean.
Whilst we were in Elmshorn, we took a day trip on the train to Hamburg. It was a cool and drizzly Sunday, but our spirits were high and we enjoyed the day. After having a Berliner in Berlin I also thought it prudent to indulge in a hamburger in Hamburg.

Of course, I then began to worry what I might need to eat in another week or so's time when we were due to visit Worms. But I figured I'd cross that bridge when it arrived.
Being a cold, wet Sunday, we did what hundreds of other Hamburgers, (??, Hamburgians... Hamburgolians... Hamburglars..... whatever?), decided to do. We visited the Miniatur Wunderland of model trains. We entered the building and climbed the sopping stairs surrounded on all sides by dripping umbrellas connected to other Wunderland Sunday revellers. Bought our tickets and waited for the 2 hours it would take before we would be able to enter. Sure is a popular spot on a wet weekend. After wandering around the centuries old docks our time finally arrived and we made our way in toward the waiting train sets. What greeted us was quite remarkable. Then as we made our way further in and up to the next level it was beyond astounding. When one thinks of train sets, something on this scale never enters your reckoning. At current standings, they have 930 trains with 14 000 wagons spread over 1300 square metres of floor space, 13 km of track together with 215 000 hand made figurines. They have workers there full time to operate the 46 computers that run it all.

There were areas that were designed on the Swiss Alps, the Grand Canyon, Las Vegas, Austria, Scandinavia it just goes on and on. There was even an airport where trains would arrive, fire and safety vehicles would drive out to the runways and back, and the planes actually took off and disappeared though the painted clouds on the wall. There was smoke billowing from castles and tunnels that caught on "fire" requiring miniature fire brigade vehicles to attend, tiny amusement parks with fully operational roller coasters, ferris wheels and other rides, a rock concert attended by throngs of fans holding lighters into the air, and all the while, trains would whizz by over bridges, through tunnels and even at one spot, underneath the very floor that you stood on whilst every few minutes, the lighting above it all would gently change from day to night and all of the 335 000 lights on the trains, cars, buildings, planes, boats and streets would transform the entire set to a magical night scene before gently returning to day and beginning the cycle once more. It was, rather astoundingly, absolutely breathtaking.

Half the fun, if you spent long enough looking carefully, was discovering the stories that were going on in the surrounding towns and mountains. They really were quite fascinating and often rather amusing or even slightly risqué. You could find fairy tale characters, nudists, base jumpers, hippies, cowboys, lost boyscouts, and the odd fellow being pursued in the forest by velociraptors. I even came across a crime scene with police divers finding a dead body in a small brook. It believe it would likely take months or even years to uncover every wonderful little story. It truly was a Wunderland.

Before making our way home we had what seemed to have become the obligatory stop for ice-cream. (I do believe that with all the pretzels, sausages, beer and ice-cream I may have possibly added a few pounds to my already aging frame.) After two wonderful days we said our goodbyes to Kirstin and headed for the North Sea.

Heading north west we decided to get off the autobahn and take a few back roads for a change of scenery. Wending our way through the northern tip of the Netherlands was delightfully refreshing. The long thin roads leading through endless fields of crops and passing tiny farm houses seemed quaint after the hustle and bustle of the city. Eventually, after one or two moments of backtracking, we arrived in Eemshaven and prepared to board the ferry to the German isle of Borkum.
Borkum is the largest of the East Fresian islands in the North Sea. It is oddly shaped and surrounded by very shallow waters which means there is only one way to approach it in a large vessel. The channel markers show a very narrow path with bare sandbars on either side. I would hate to be doing the hour long trip then entering that tiny entrance in a rough sea. My hopes of a quick dip in the North Sea were slightly put on hold when I discovered one of the sand banks was home to a resident pack of lounging seals. Perhaps it was going to be colder than I had even imagined. We set ourselves up at the local camping ground and walked to the main beach/town area. Perhaps it was the fact that it was overcast with a chance of rain, or maybe that it was very early in the summer yet. But the deserted beach covered in lonely huts, (all facing away from the sea view and instead toward the township promenade), was a striking but somewhat depressing image.

Of course, the other thing that I had neglected to take into account was the summer time. It was almost 10:00 pm when the above photo was taken, so there was good reason for the lack of life on the beach. It didn't get dark in Borkum until 11:30 pm and the sky would be light in the morning at 4:30. (Summer time like that would be awesome back home. You could still fit in 5 hours of surfing after work!) I can imagine though, that in the height of a summer's day this quite pretty little beach would be literally crawling with happy families. We made our way back to the camping ground and settled in for the night.
Every morning Merrilee would walk into the township to buy bread rolls and pretzels for breakfast. Sometimes one or more of us would join her on this pleasant outing and we would often take a different route just to discover more of this interesting little island. The weather whilst we were there was not the greatest. Mostly it was overcast and windy with a few drizzly bits and the odd downpour accompanied by a fairly impressive thunderstorm. This made it all the more funny when, hiding in our tent from the early rain, the campground speakers would erupt with morning greetings and a rousing rendition of a hilarious song about Borkum that loudly proclaimed "auf dort gibt's Sonnenschein" (...there, there is sunshine...) Still, it was of no matter to us. We had a very enjoyable time. There were enough dry spells to get out and about and do some exploring. I wandered to the beach directly over the hill from the camp one evening and decided to walk to the sea. I thought the tide went out a long way in Darwin but this was ridiculous. It took almost 20 minutes from when I reached the beach to make it to the water.
We had one day that was sunny with blue skies, so we hired bikes and did some longer range exploring.

There are bike and walking tracks all over the island and we covered some serious miles. Some of the tracks through the marshes and dunes were more walking tracks really which made for a few stacks between us, but that was all part of the fun. We stopped at an area where the sea reaches much closer to the land and finally managed a swim in the North Sea. Not exactly crystal clear tropical water, but certainly nowhere near as cold as expected, so that mission was accomplished and thankfully without the loss of the family jewels.

Borkum is a very quiet and friendly island that has been a popular summer holiday destination for German families for many years. (When we finally returned to Meisenheim, Papa showed us photos of him in Borkum when he's was 4.) I imagine returning here someday, it really was quite lovely.
One of the main reasons to come to Borkum was so that Heiko could take Jorris kitesurfing. Unfortunately the school was booked out for the first two days and then there wasn't enough wind so Jorris was pretty disappointed that he had missed out on the opportunity. One of the strange things about Borkum however is that it has a Flo-Rider, so this would have to be a replacement. A Flo-rider is basically a man made standing wave where a few inches of water gushes up a slope at a great rate of knots enabling the rider to essentially 'surf' upon it.

They were planning to take the centre divider out the following day which meant we could have ridden it on stand-up boards but because we were leaving the next day we had to make do with the body/knee option. (This was probably a good idea in the end given how difficult it was to get used to.) We all still had a whale of a time and were blessed with many spills and much boisterous amusement.
We caught the ferry back to Eemshaven and drove to Bremen where we said a sad farewell to Heiko and Jorris and boarded a train to head on to the next part of our journey.

This is one beer I didn't expect to be sampling in Germany.

Germany - part 2 : "I am a jam donut"

Our home base for Germanic adventure was to be Meisenheim. A typical small country village about 1.5 hours drive from Frankfurt with a beautiful little cathedral, a hand full of stores on cobbled streets and the river Glan running peacefully through it. Our hosts were Wolfgang and Gisela Doerr, Merrilee's host parents as an exchange student in 1980, so really, they were just Mutti and Papa. We arrived at their house and out came the Kaesecuchen, Mutti's well renowned baked cheese cake.

After a day of resting from the travel and enjoying the peace and quiet of Meisenheim, (also letting the many slices of kaesecuchen settle), Mutti was adamant that we see as much as we could whilst we were there. So our first day trip in Germany was put in motion and we were off to Burg Eltz. This was the first of dozens of castles we were to see on this trip, and my God, it was certainly the most spectacular. Walking down a steep road toward the valley where the castle is perched on a rocky outcrop on the bend of a small river, the first glimpse was jaw dropping. Looking like something straight out of a Disney feature, (it is apparently the best preserved of all the German castles), one expected knights, damsels and ogres to be prancing around the surrounding hills. Inside the castle itself was a veritable maze of stairwells and passages leading from room to room and floor to floor. There were remnants of old treasures, furniture, tapestries, armoury, (there are even some arrows from enemy crossbows fired against the castle centuries ago), and some of the most amazing little window nooks that would be beyond heaven to curl up in and read fairy tales.

The main reason for our German holiday was to attend Merrilee's (host) brother Heiko's 50th birthday. So with only a couple of days in Meisenheim we set off for Berlin.
Traveling in Mutti and Papa's campervan was a bit of an adventure in itself. The ability to sit at a table and play cards on a very long journey was indeed a welcome bonus. Once on the Autobahn it was fairly easy traveling.......until it wasn't! Apparently a car, somewhere ahead, had burst into flames on the side of the road. This may not have been such a problem except that the Germans do some strange things. One of these things is to block off half of the lanes on the Autobahn, apparently in order to prolong the life of the road surface!!!!????? (Perhaps there was no mention in the meeting that decided on this peculiar measure of the distinct possibility that prolonging the life of half of the road was possibly going to shorten the life of the other half) Because of this wonderful beaurocratic decision, there was no room for traffic to pass the aforementioned roadside fireball. Eventually the slowing traffic came to a full halt. And this is where we stayed for the next two hours. The offending barbequed bomb was about 6 or 7 km in front of where we were stopped so I would hazard a guess that after 2 hours, the eventual line of stopped traffic gathering behind us must have continued for at least another 20 km if not more. People talked, played cards, listened to music, played soccer, wandered into the bushes, (mostly they were probably not looking for berries.....some particular bushy areas were obviously more popular than others judging by the slowly gathering smell), but mostly they just walked around trying to relieve the boredom.

Finally the traffic began to move and people ran everywhere in a desperate bid to get back to their vehicles that they had long forgotten that they actually owned. Our drive to Berlin had stretched out and had eventually taken 12 hours, but we were there.
Everyone in our circle of German family and friends knew that we were coming to Germany, except Heiko. Our first stop in Berlin was at a pub where everyone had gathered for drinks on the night before his birthday. The meeting of Merrilee and Heiko was just perfect. He was genuinely shocked to see us and just absolutely thrilled to bits. We had a few drinks, something to eat, I finally got to meet Heiko's 16 year old son Jorris who was named after me, and our Berlin chapter had begun.
By the time we left the pub and made our way to the hotel it was almost midnight.....so they wouldn't let us in!!! A quick re-adjustment of plans and we found a hostel down the road that would take us for the night and we hauled in for a much needed sleep.
Our stay in Berlin was excellent. So many things to see, both wonderfully uplifting and frighteningly sobering, occasionally at the same time. With such a dramatic recent history it is certainly a city for contemplation.
The architecture in Berlin was something to behold. From modern constructions like the Sony Centre with its extravagant sails to the majestic old buildings that have seen so much change in this magnificent city. To see buildings that I remember from old paintings in Art History classes was pretty special. Napoleon visiting Berlin in front of the Brandenburg Gates....and there were the very same gates, although the day we were there a different tyrant was in town.

Other notable things from our Berlin stay were going to a massive slot car track and mucking around on that for an hour.

And of course visiting the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe. A magical installment that I could have happily wandered through for hours, and then the harrowing museum built underneath it. I must remember to take some tissues next time.

One of the stranger things we did in Berlin was to have a game of mini golf. Not normally all that strange, but here in Germany they of course do things just a bit differently. There is no attempt, in any shape or form, to replicate, (as we do in Australia and New Zealand), the colour, look or feel of actual grass. Each hole's surface appeared to have been lovingly and carefully created with the use of that most famous of putting surfaces....... asbestos. To strike the ball, (yes...it is the size of a golf ball but that is where the similarity ends....still not sure what they were actually made of), the competitor was expressly forbidden to stand on the putting surface and therefore forced to stand on the ground below the playing surface, reaching across to the designated starting point. (Perhaps if they let you stand on it you would be entitled to sue them for getting cancer in later life?) The regular corners, mounds, twists and turns we're all there....it just felt a bit odd. A quick look into the club room, (I kid you not), revealed a wall full of trophies and pennants celebrating their success at various championships. There were people there with their own custom designed rubber-faced putters and fancy cases full of balls of varying weight, size, colour and density ready for the challenge that each hole presented. Mutti sat down and chatted to one of them and it turned out that he was qualified for the European tour of asbestos putting competitions. What next? As much fun as it is.... I thought ten-pin bowling was nerdy. Anyway, after the parties, dinners, pretzels, sightseeing, slot cars, museums, shopping, mini-golf and of course many different beers, our time in Berlin was over, and the next part in our adventure would take us north towards Hamburg.

It would seem that it is not only Asia that has some funny things on display.

Germany - part 1 : Planes, Trains and Tuk-tuk-mobiles

We have just returned from almost 4 weeks in Germany. What a fantastic experience. Meeting new family and friends, seeing amazing sights, eating a lot of food and of course drinking plenty of beer.

Our adventure began with a breezy tuk-tuk ride to the train station in Tha Nalaeng, (just out of Vientiane). This was followed by our first of many train journeys. The trip from Tha Nalaeng, across the Mekong River to Nong Khai in Thailand is, by its very geographical nature, a short one. The train was an old one. It was relatively short, only a handful of carriages with plenty of natural air and light due to its lack of windows. Board the train and take a seat....there were plenty, this is not what you would call a busy line. Then the driver started the engine. The rhythmic chugging of a large diesel engine vibrating through the seat of one's pants can be either embarrassingly uncomfortable or titillatingly amusing, (I think it depends on one's age), but it was nothing compared to what was about to happen. For some reason the gentle chugging turned into an outrageous roar. Either the driver was the railway equivalent of a bogan rev-head trying to impress the railway slappers, (sleepers?), or he thought he were piloting an old DC-10 and we were about to fly across the river. Either way, the peaceful beginning to our journey was well and truly over and the ear-piercing scream of the engine continued on for what must have been 5 minutes but felt like a painful eternity before the driver was satisfied that either all the girls were impressed or he finally realised that we didn't actually have any wings. The important thing was that the torture was over and with our hands now available for something other than ear-blocking, we were on our way. The track itself runs directly through the middle of the Friendship Bridge which means that there is only room on the bridge for the train and not much else, therefore all other traffic must wait at either end until the train has passed. Uninterrupted views of the Mekong river to the East and the West and plenty of time to take them in on our slow, chugging caboose was a pleasant relief from the previous onslaught. By the time we had cleared immigration on the other side it was time to board our next train. Nong Khai to Bangkok sleeper, first class.

OK, it said first class on the ticket, and it was certainly a large step up from the second and cattle classes that I wandered through during the trip, but first class on the Orient Express it was not. It was private, it was reasonably comfortable and reasonably clean, the beds were spacious and it was air conditioned. Thats all we needed. There was also an hilarious Thai woman moving from cabin to cabin trying to sell meals and drinks from the restaurant car. It wasn't hard to decipher that she was working on commission with her constant compliments as to how young and good looking we were. But even with her constant and random exclamations of "Happy happy happy!", we respectfully declined her offer. We had heard it was cheaper to go and eat in the restaurant car in person. Upon walking through what seemed like an endless chain of crowded carriages to check out the aforementioned eating facility which turned out to be tiny, with no air conditioning, and full of people smoking we respectfully went searching for Miss Happy-Happy. A quick delivered meal and a couple of beers and it was time to bed down.

The regular clak-a-dak of wheels on track is known to be hypnotically relaxing and sleep-inducing. Apparently that doesn't work so well for us. The night that was supposed to fly by whilst we slept turned instead into one with no apparent end. The 12 hour sleepless journey to Bangkok then unfortunately turned into 15 hours due to an accident on the track somewhere ahead. The few spare hours we had counted on at the airport before our flight to Frankfurt quickly disappeared. A swift taxi ride from the train station to the airport was to be our saviour....until the entire freeway was diverted to side streets whilst rows and rows of police and fire vehicles filed on. The previous few hours of telling myself over and over "We will make it on time we will make it on time." we're getting harder and harder to believe. Thankfully, with a little bit of driving into the oncoming traffic, (sometimes ya just gotta love taxi drivers), we did make it on time and the wait at the airport was significantly shorter than originally anticipated. Luggage was loaded, boarding passes acquired, seatbelts fastened, tray-tables in the upright position and we were on our way.

The 10 hour flight with Thai Airlines was a pleasant one. What time wasn't indulged in the many movies one could choose from was spent trying to work out where we were. With mostly clear skies we saw mountains, towns, snow covered hills, jungles and deserts passing quietly beneath us. The only place we could pick with any real confidence was the Caspian sea, but then, on a journey that only passes one piece of water that was not too difficult. After some 36 hours with no sleep, 5 movies and a bit of window gazing later, the German landscape was beckoning. The fields of crops stretching to the distant horizon, the countless villages sometimes no more than one or two fields apart and the Auto-Bahn wending its way through it all. Frankfurt at last. We were met at the airport by our extended German family, within minutes the first beer was bought, and our German adventure had begun.