San Cristobal de las Casas and Oaxaca City

I really liked San Cristobal. The centre is very lovely to walk because they've closed some streets to vehicular traffic, so it's easy to stroll down the Main Street (complete with buntings in Mexican flag colours overhead) and look in the little shops and cafés. At the very end of the pedestrian street is a cute yellow and white church on a hill. Another amazing church is a few blocks away, surrounded by a local craft market (which I spent a little toooo long at). There's also the main square (zócalo) with, you guessed it, another church. It makes such a difference when a city is easy to stroll around. I remember being "over" Hanoi very quickly (years ago) because the part I was staying in had very heavy scooter traffic, and the sidewalks were completely clogged with parked scooters, so you really had no where to walk without getting hit. 

I stayed in a lovely cosy little hostel with sunny courtyards (complete with hummingbirds) and fantastically hot showers. It gets really cold in San Cristobal. It's kind of like a Biloela winter in that you need to really rug up at night (I had 3 thick woollen blankets on my bed) but then when the sun is out during the day you have to peel off all the layers back down to a tshirt and shorts (unless you're in the shade - where it's a bit nipply).

I only stayed one night as time is running out but could easily have stayed for several! 

Next was Oaxaca City. It was an overnight bus from SC that began with a man in a uniform that said "privado seguridad" (private security) taking a video of the faces of everyone sitting on the departing bus. So there's a video of me scowling in confusion as to why I'm being videoed floating around Mexico somewhere. Then we were woken at around 4am and had to get off the bus for a security checkpoint, which involved them selecting a few random bags to unzip and look at. Completely pointless. Then at 5:30am a guy in a spiffy all red uniform came through the bus to look at us, check the toilets, then get off the bus. I'm not sure what this was supposed to achieve. I guess none of us looked like villains. 

Oaxaca is another cute city, I preferred San Cristobal though. More old churches, more markets, more old buildings. I found that Oaxaca was a bit bigger and had more big, expensive restaurants, shops etc and less of the small cute ones that San Cristobal had. So San Cristobal wins. I spent my last morning there looking around for 'milagro' which are little metal charms that are traditionally used for asking for blessings. Eg. If you had a sore/broken arm you would go and buy a little metal arm milagro and pray for your healing. Then, when your arm got better you would go to a cathedral and leave it there as an offering of thanks. In craft shops I've seen big crosses or hearts covered in these milagro charms and I really like them but they're super expensive, so I've bought a tonne of the charms and I'm going to make some myself when I'm home!! 

Next instalment: Mexico City. 

Merida, Tulum y Palenque

The hostel I stayed at in Merida was amazing. I walked the couple of kilometres there with my pack because I'm stubborn and knew the taxi drivers were trying to overcharge me. It meant that I got my bearings and understood the layout of the city quite quickly though. The hostel had a resort style swimming pool with hammocks, free yoga, cooking classes and traditional live guitar music at night.. And a lot of cool people! 

Met a couple of guys from San Diego traveling together and went with them to the ruins at Uxmal. I found them more exciting than Chichen Itza because you're still allowed to climb some of the pyramids. A lot of "maintenance" had been done on the site which meant a lot of very obvious concrete work which I thought was a bit of a shame/eyesore. Could have been more subtle/sensitive. One of my favourite parts of the grounds was a part they hadn't fully excavated that was left to the jungle.. Made you feel like you were discovering something. There were hundreds of iguanas living on the grounds which were both entertaining to watch and scary when you almost stepped on them. 

We had to wait on the side of the road to be picked up by the bus on the way through. Luckily there was also a Chocolate Museum right there. There were a lot of strange flavours including corn chip. I bought a brick of chocolate for the 3 of us to share (it was gone before the bus arrived).

The next day I went on a tour to Celestun to see flamingos! I had no idea that their pink feathers are caused by the shrimp they eat! We took a boat out on the river amongst the flocks. You could clearly see the different large groups, apparently these are large families that stick together. Sometimes teenage flamingos go off and start their own new group. I imagined them off sneaking alcohol and smoking. 

The day after I left for Tulum. I easily could have stayed for days more in Merida but I'm running out of time. I met the San Diego boys on the bus to Tulum, they'd spent the night in Valladolid to check out Chichen Itza. The three of us stayed in a cabaña across the road from the beach in Tulum, in a hippie sort of bamboo place. We had our own cenote in our backyard and free kayaks to use. I became the chef whilst the other two became cleaner and chauffeur. 

We spent 3 days in Tulum exploring cenotes, ruins and beaches. The taxi drivers are backed by the gangsters and charge ridiculous amounts of money to get between the town and beach (about 150 pesos/$14 AUD). The colectivos only cost 20 pesos but have been intimidated into not picking to white people so that we are forced into paying the ridiculous taxi prices. Well, we weren't having a bar of that so we rented a car. Per day it cost just over the equivalent of a trip to town and back... And then we split that between the 3 of us. And just to spite the taxi drivers we picked up as many white hitchikers as we could. 

Everything around Tulum is so beautiful. The turquoise waters of the cenotes is crystal clear. I spent a lot of time snorkelling around exploring the underwater caves and swimming with the fish. They're all so deep too, usually 5-8m and then there's the underground caves. Many people scuba dive and swim around the cave systems. I remember seeing a documentary at home about scuba divers mapping out the cenotes all connected by these underwater caves that eventually lead to the ocean. 

Eventually we had to part ways - the boys have gone road tripping small seaside towns towards Belize and I've gone to Palenque to see the ruins. I'll see them again in San Diego before I fly home though!

I stayed just outside the ruin entry at a commune of sorts called El Panchan. There's 3 or 4 hostels and a couple of restaurants set amongst jungle, walking distance to the ruins. I spent a day exploring the Palenque ruins and they're my favourite that I've seen on this trip, almost rivalling Angkor in Cambodia for all time favourite. They feel very "tomb raider" because they're so hemmed in by jungle, a lot of which you have to walk through to reach the different parts of the ruins. Like Uxmal, you can still climb through/on a lot of the site. Only about 10% of Palenque is actually restored, the rest of the enormous site is still covered by jungle. It was beautiful exploring the moss covered ruins in the dappled light that sneaks through the jungle canopy, and there's a stream with waterfalls running through the site. Really really gorgeous. 

I have to add that in El Panchan there was a restaurant called Don Muchos and they make their own pasta. I had 4 cheese tagliatelli and it was so damn delicious. Also it came with a side salad so I'm totally healthy. I really really miss fresh salad and vegies (ones that aren't fried). 

I'm in San Cristobal de la Casas now and it is also a beautiful town! I want more time! 

Cancún and Valladolid

So Cancún kinda sucks. It kinda felt like just a piece of the USA transported down South. There's not much to do other than go to the beach (most of which has been claimed by big resorts) or pay $80USD to go out to big tacky night clubs. Just wasn't feeling it to be honest. 

"Come play beer pong" 

 

That's how I was feeling. 

Buuuuuut now I'm in a town called Valladolid which is really cute with a bunch of pastel coloured colonial buildings and it actually feels like I'm in Mexico and I like it here. 

Caught my first Mexican bus here. Was pretty easy. Opted to walk to the hostel from the bus station here rather than spend money on a taxi. It was midday and I had my increasingly heavy pack on but since the streets are numbered (ie calle 37, calle 38 etc) I figured it'd be easy to find the hostel and close by. No. Not easy. I started at Calle 41.. Had to get to Calle 38. Easy, 3 blocks! No. Next block was Calle 39... Okay... Then Calle 37... Huh?? Ok.. I know it's on Calle 38 between Calle 43 and Calle 45... Maybe I'll find 43 and 45 and then Calle 38 will magically appear. No. Walked around in circles. Between 37 and 39 I stopped and asked a guy in my budding Spanish, "where is Calle 38?!?"

 "Calle 38??" he says, "I don't know... Calle 38.. *confused face*... Hey dude.. Where's Calle 38??"

"Ummm. Just keep going that way"

"That way? straight?"

"yep. That way" ***

***loose translation 

Well no, it was not that way. I didn't believe that Calle 38 came after Calle 37 and 39 so I just jumped in a taxi (more than half an hour after I first started walking). Turns out that all the odd streets run one way, and all the even streets run the other way. But could I figure that out? No sir. 

My hostel here is rather cute. I'm sitting in a rocking chair on my front porch writing this. 

Today another girl from the hostel (Megan) and I went to Chichen Itza. Except instead of having to catch a bus, we caught a lift with two Mexican guys staying at our hostel that had rented a car. Winner. They didn't give off any rapey vibes so I figured it'd be fine. We got there just as it opened and before the hoards of tour buses arrived. Walked around all the ruins. Was pretty cool. Then we drove to another cenote for a swim and then drove home. This is sounding really brief but I'm not sure what else to write other than it was a fun day!

Off to Merida tomorrow, the biggest city in the Yucatan. 

Panama City

I spent I think 6 nights in Panama City doing a whole lot of not much and it was lovely. 

A lot of us from the boat trip were all staying at the same hostel so I had a pretty big posse for a few days. 

Did the mandatory trip to the Panama Canal and stood and watched for an eternity as a freight ship and a cruise liner both slooooowly made their way down the miraflores locks. It costs like 150-300k for a boat to pass through the Panama Canal! Because the canal was built all the way across Panama through mountains etc... Boats need to be raised and then lowered back down to sea level and the series of locks is where this occurs. Took me a while (and watching it) to get my head around it. 

Also discovered the amazing existence of ceviche which is raw seafood cured in like juice with onion. I went to the fish market 3 times to eat it. It only costs $2.25 and comes in a styrofoam cup with crackers on the side. I'm craving some now. So fresh and delicious. 

I also spent an afternoon walking around the old town. Interesting the old town is always the nicest part of the city to stroll around - because they were built for pedestrians rather than cars. Something I think we need to consider.

The rest of the time I relaxed, napped and watched movies! Was a really good break! Cancun now. X

San Blas Islands

We left early in the morning from Cartagena on the organised transport to our departure point in Sapzurro. First step was a long ass van ride to Turbo, split into 2 stages. Luckily the vans weren't crowded and it was actually quite a pleasant drive through rural areas of Colombia. 

We stayed the night in Turbo, which is basically a hole. Grabbed some supplies for the trip, stayed in a shifty hostel. Woke up and found the room had flooded somehow and my only pair of shorts were dripping wet and the rest of my luggage partially wet. So this is how I ended up wearing a ridiculous maxi dress tied up around my knees on the long boat ride to Capurgana. 

We waited at the dock and wrapped out belongings in garbage bags before finally getting to board our fast boat. The boat ride was insanely rough like a roller coaster as we jumped and smacked down over 8ft swells. I enjoyed probably 80% of the trip, yelling and laughing. Others didn't enjoy it so much. 

Almost 4h later we got off the boat at Capurgana where we were to meet the rest of our group for the next 4 days. We also met our group leader Tess and helpers Chantal and Bas. Lunch, chatting, etc. Had to stamp out of Colombia at the immigration office there so was technically nowhere overnight. 

THEN we caught another boat 10min to Sapzurro where we were to stay the night. As we were getting all the luggage out of the boat, an Aussie guy in the group hopped back in to pass the luggage out. He had just climbed in and had his hand resting on the side of the boat when it bumped back into the dock, completely squishing and pulverising his pinky finger. I saw bone. And blood. Lots of blood. They quickly evacuated him back to Capurgana, as there's slightly more chance of medical help there then in Sapzurro. Luckily and coincidentally there was a Western doctor couple staying there and they were able to give him some good drugs and put the finger back onto the (broken) bone and wrap it up... But he then had to take the 3-4h boat back to Turbo that night for surgery. Booooo. 

Meanwhile a few of us took a stroll over to Panama. I amused myself by jumping between the two countries and then sitting on the statue that demarcates the borderline, therefore technically sitting betweeeeeen the two countries. I felt invincible but realistically I'm sure the dudes with big guns there could still shoot my ass. 

Dinner was a whole baked fish. Yum. I somehow managed to score a double bed and slept spread eagle. 

The next morning was the official start to the trip through the Islands. Half the day was spent going through Panama immigration (had to pull all out bags out of their waterproof wrappings so they could get the sniffer dog to go through them all... Ironically the sniffer dogs never went near us, nor were we even patted down) and then boating to our first island for lunch. On the way we passed the area where Scotland attempted and failed to colonise part of the Darien in the late 17th century which lead to Scotland almost bankrupting itself. I'd never heard of this before and have done a bit of residing on it since - very interesting. The area is still uninhabited except for probably a bunch of druglords and you can apparently still find a bunch of ruins from the first attempts at Scottish settlement. If I were rich, I'd hire a bunch of body guards and go find them all. 

We stayed in a Kuna village on one of the Islands that night and learnt a lot about Kuna culture. Here's some kuna facts for you. The Kuna people originated in what is now Colombia but were pushed up into the Darien by the conquistadors. Then they moved out to the Islands. They removed most of the mangroves and planted palm trees. This is where they earn most their income. Every coconut in the San Blas belongs to someone. There's even a system in place where they can get monetary loans from Colombia and pay them back in coconuts. There are 362 Islands and I think 42 Kuna village. They are completely self governed after they fought for their independence in 1925. Panama started imposing taxes and laws and restrictions on them so they waited until the night of Panama's Independence Day when everyone was drunk and ran in and massacred a bunch of people. And no one has messed with the Kuna since. Each island has their own chief called a 'silas', elected democratically, and then a 'congresso' of advisors. The chief is responsible for learning all the history I the kuna and transmitting this information to the people via song. The marriage ritual is particularly interesting, part of which involves the husband and wife being swung around naked in a hammock. Girls are also very much revered as bearers of life, and there are big celebrations when a girl turns 5 and when a girl starts menstruating, which involve the whole island getting drunk on a liquor they make themselves. Final fun fact, they consider albinos "children of the moon" and when there's a lunar eclipse all the albinos go outdoors and shoot arrows at the dragon covering the moon, while everyone else must stay indoors. Because of this special position they have in Kuna society, vs being shunned like a lot of the rest of the world, the San Blas actually has the third highest albino population in the world, supposedly. 

On the second day we went and played on "No Name Jungle Island" which is it's legitimate name. Lots of snorkelling and frolicking. Then we stayed in another Kuna village that night. Went for a walk from one side of the island to the other. There was a family with a weird sort of mini zoo set up on their patio with some love birds, and iguana, a turtle, a mini monkey and a HONEY BADGER. I don't know for sure that it was a honey badger but I think it was and so I'm going to say it was. Saw some traditional dancing, an albino, had kids jump all over me, found a church some missionaries built a long time ago, and watched a pack of young guys jog around the island doing military chants. A very interesting stroll. I was also carrying around a tiny 5 week old orphan kitten named Jessica who I decided to make my baby for the night. Saaaa cute. 

The next day we boated to an island that we would stay on for the whole day and night. Quite a bit smaller, only one kuna family living on it, and surrounding by reef and turquoise water. On the way though we did get into a boat crash. How does this happen when you have an entire ocean around you? Beats me. We saw another fast boat on a direct collision course with us for about half a minute, and we were all sitting there thinking it must have been a joke because no one was doing anything about it. Until the lat few seconds when it became clear yet were about to T-bone us. They turned their boat at the last second and we clashed side on, luckily no one had their fingers outside the boat this time. It was funny seeing everyone's reactions, diving for the water, crouching down and covering themselves etc. I just remember watching the boat coming, thinking "yep this boat is a wreck and we'll be in the water shortly" and watching the terrified faces of the kuna women on the other boat as they clutched their children close. Luckily there was miraculously no damage in the end but we were all pretty shaken and thinking.. wtf just happened. I think the two drivers both kept second guessing each other, thinking the other would turn. And the other driver was probably drunk. It took about 5min for my adrenaline to properly kick in but I was flying after that. WE'RE ALIVE BITCHES WOOOOOOO!!! 

But then we got to our paradise island. We all did the usual island stuff but some of the guys organised a Survivor style island Olympics as well which was very fun and got everyone involved, and slightly intoxicated. Seafood dinner, so much lobster we couldn't even eat it all. Bonfire, roasted marshmallows, ukulele singalongs, skinny dipping with PHOSPHORESCENCE in the water!! Have you ever seen phosphorescence? It's the most beautiful thing. This was the second time I've seen it and I think I stayed in the ocean about an hour just splashing around to see it light up like underwater stars. 

 

Leisurely morning, pack up, went to our smallest and last island for the trip. Was like a postcard. This little bit of land, full of palm trees, white sand and surrounded by crystal clear water. It even had palm trees leaning out over the water like you see in resort brochures. More snorkelling. Tonnes of giant starfish and I even saw two stingrays. The water is so salty that it takes zero effort to float, making snorkelling super easy. At one point I was floating in the midst of a school of thousands of tiny colourful fish. 

It really was such an amazing adventure and I will never ever forget my days in paradise. Panama post coming soon x

Colombia - the very delayed post

Colombia was amazing. And one epic party. Don't get me wrong - I still got stuff done. But wow. 

Medellín was a really interesting city. The taxi drive from the airport is pretty epic. I arrived at night and it's an hour long trip, at about 15-20min in you go over a ridge and all of a sudden you can see all the lights of the city below. My taxi guy thought he was a rally car driver and was doing triple the speed limit weaving and winding down the mountain range. 

I stayed in the beautiful leafy backpacker area of Poblado in a great hostel called Happy Buddha. Despite its reputation as being a party hostel, the facilities were pretty schmick. My dorm had its own bathroom attached with 2 showers, toilet and double basin. Considering there was only 8 of us at full capacity, that's a pretty good person to shower ratio. 

Met a bunch of really cool people, lots of Aussies too. At one stage there were 5 of us there who realised we all lived within a 3km radius of each other back home. Needless to say there will be a reunion. 

Met up with Jen from work back home and her fiancé (who's from Medellín but lives in Melbourne and his also an architect) for lunch and Eduardo took me to meet his previous coworkers at his old firm, Opus. A few days later I went back and met with them again and spent time there having the history and development of the city and the slums explained to me and asking questions. Was very worthwhile. 

Medellín has built a number of projects to try and improve life in the slums. One of those projects is a series of "parque bibliotecas" (park libraries) in the slums or low income areas. They provide a place to access computers, books and free learning workshops, but are also located on large sites with gardens, playgrounds, basketball courts etc. I visited 3 of these parque bibliotecas over a couple days, each designed by a different architect.

Medellín has also built 2 "metro cables" which are cable cars up to the top of the steep slums that are linked in with the metro train infrastructure. One of them is a very popular tourist activity because you get to fly over the slum but can also pay to get to a park right up the top of the mountain. One of the parque bibliotecas is mid way up so I got off and strolled around and over to the library. The Main Street was so busy and noisy, very full of life. The library itself was closed for repairs (it was sponsored by the Spanish royal family who had a set date to come and "open" the library so the end of the initial construction was very rushed and therefore shoddy) but was a good experience just seeing where it's located. It has quite a presence up on the mountain, and a very grand scale compared to the surrounding self built houses. 

The other metrocable and library were located in Communa 13 which is apparently somewhere you just can't go as a tourist. Well I wasn't so convinced so I went anyway. A very tall american friend I met at the hostel decided to come with me to take a look, not really knowing where I was taking him. I think the look on his face when he realised where we were ("hang on... Are we in Communa 13?!? Everyone has told me I can't go here!) was the funniest part of the day. We rode the metro cable up to the top and back, at the top they're building big "social housing" apartment blocks where they've rehoused some of the city's slum residents. Esteban at OPUS was explaining the various problems this creates. Considering Medellín's very violent history, a lot of people from different areas in the city don't trust each other and are afraid of getting attacked still, even though this is mostly just imagined and no longer the reality. 

Next I flew to Cartagena where I met with a couple of the guys I'd met in Medellín, and also Amanda who I met in Rio. I stayed in the old city which is full of brightly coloured Spanish colonial houses. More partying ensued. 

The rest of Rio + a bit of Bogota

Rio. Wow. I love it so much.

Let's see... what did I do my last week...

Well I went hangliding! Turns out it was exactly a year from when I went paragliding in Nepal. I had a driver, Miguel, pick me up at 7:30am and drive me to the beach landing site. There I met the instructor/guy responsible for my life, Renato. He was really lovely and professional and spoke great English. We did the paperwork and then drove up the mountain to the launch site. Seeing the ramp we had to run off was a little daunting. It doesn't feel like just attaching yourself to a 40kg kite would allow you to fly. We practised the 'running together off the ramp' part a few times and then waited for the wind to be at optimal take-off conditions. I have to say that after failing the first attempt at take-off when I went paragliding a year ago, I was a bit nervous that the same would happen this time. "Don't worry," says Renalto, "That doesn't happen with hangliding, you have to take off the first time or crash." I think this was supposed to reassure me. 

Well, we didn't crash and it was a lot of fun. I prefer it to paragliding because you lie down and feel like a bird.

For NYE in Rio everyone wears all white outfits and coloured underwear depending on what you wish for in the new year (pink for love, yellow for money etc), so I had some shopping to do. It wasn't hard since every store was purposefully displaying all their white clothing together. 

On New Years Eve Eve (the 30th) I went out for "one beer", a quiet night with a few friends. Ended up seeing the sunrise (most beautiful sunrise I have ever seen). Have you been skinny dipping in Ipanema? I have. 

On actual New Years Eve I (understandably) woke up late, got ready, and went out again. A few friends I´d met at a hostel had a friend living in a block from the beach in Copacabana who had booked the rooftop area (with BBQ and pool) for a NYE party complete with DJ and great view of the fireworks. Needless to say I tagged along. It was good to have a place to base ourselves for the night, considering that more than 2 million people flock to Copacabana beach to party. It gets very very crowded, especially near the main stage. We saw in the New Year with champagne and then went down to the beach to samba samba. 

The next night was my last night in Rio :( I went back to the Vidigal favela for a BBQ and some drinks and said goodbye to some friends. Didn´t want to leave :(

The next day I flew to Bogota. Business class. Because I can. And because it was on my bucket list. I checked in and the airport nice and early and went and sat in the VIP lounge. It´s a shame that at 10am after 3 consecutive nights of partying I didn´t feel like drinking because man they had a lot of free booze. I ate my fill of free food and then went to the gate. I liked being one of those business class people that skip the inevitable massive line up to get on the plane a little too much I think. Hehe. I really could get used to business class service. Our dedicated flight attendant came and introduced himself, asked what I would like to drink and at which point during the flight (champagne, please) and gave me my menu options. They even laid out a table cloth on the tray table. Three course meal plus snacks. The entree was salmon, main was chicken and potatoes and dessert was a big delicious scoop of icecream with my choice of toppings (caramel and almonds, thankyou). It was super awesome.

I´m in Bogota now. I was understandably exhausted when I got here and have spent a lot of time catching up on sleep. Have done some walking around and sight seeing. I went to the Botero gallery yesterday, where they even have works by Picasso, Miro etc. I really love Botero´s work. Had some beers at a very bohemian bar owned by an old crazy, drunk poet. Loved it there. Going back on Monday when they host local poets reading their work (not that I´ll understand it but I´m sure it´ll be beautiful all the same). Off to explore a market now.

Ipanema + Copacabana

Ok so I haven't posted in a while... Let's see how I go at remembering the last almost week now. 

The night I was writing my last post got even stranger. I performed open ear surgery on the French guy in my dorm.. Had to remove a piece of cotton wool that he'd wedged deep into his ear whilst on drugs before he left France. So that was gross. Then I went and joined the party. 

During the party the power went off. It came on and off a couple of times, which was pretty cool to watch from the top of the favela. But then half the favela's power came back on and ours didn't. It's not great when there's no power in a favela because people take advantage of the dark (we heard at least one gunshot). There's no street lights even so it makes things unsafe. People on the street nearby came into the bar and waited it out.

Spent a couple days walking round the favela taking pictures, documenting/drawing things.  You know.. Architect stuff. 

Then I moved to Ipanema! Was so great to be able to just pop in and out of the hostel and walk around the beach rather than having to trek down out of the favela! Made lots of friends. 

Christmas eve we walked to the lagoon to see the tallest Christmas tree in the world (85m) light up. Pretty cool. Then we partied. Christmas morning I went and lay on Ipanema beach in my newly acquired Brazilian bikini. Got sunburnt. Lunch we ate at Kilograma. I won the competition of who ate the most. Not sure that's something to be proud of... It's not Christmas if you haven't eaten so much you need to nap. 

So nap I did. But first I checked into a nice hotel in Copacabana. Took a swim in the rooftop pool (post nap and digestion) to help cool my sunburn. Ordered room service. Watched TV. Sat around naked because I've been living in hostels for weeks and that's generally frowned upon. Slept diagonally across the queen sized bed. Ate from the minibar. Christmas well spent. 

Boxing Day I moved into my last Rio residence.. An apartment in Leme (edge of Copacabana) on a quiet street just a block from the beach. It's an airbnb room so I have two Brazilian housemates, Ursula and Roberta. And there's a 24h doorman to let you in the lobby which I find very novel. 

Ursula and I escaped the heat on Boxing Day and hung out at the mall. She's gone to Chile now so her mum is staying here. She speaks some English and she's really cute. I'm making her my Brazilian mum. She keeps feeding me. Awesome.  

Tonight I went to sugarloaf mountain which is one of *the* touristy things to do along with going to Christ the Redeemer. It was a pain in the ass. Queue after queue after queue. The view was great but I couldn't really tell since there were too many people to really be able to stand and appreciate it. I saw a lot of selfie sticks. 

6 nights left in Rio. 

A xx

#favelalyf

Today has been strange. 

Didn't sleep much due to lack of glass on my window (read: lots of noisel and mosquitoes) and my new French dorm buddy getting home in the early hours and turning off the fan (apparently 30 degrees qualifies as "cool weather") I decided to get up and head to the beach. And for breakfast. Because no breakfast = not an Amiee you want to see. 

I went to a place called Gringo Cafe. It's in Ipanema. I ate bacon and eggs and fruit smoothie. I'm not sorry. 

On my walk down to the bottom of the favela I saw a guy carrying a new door... uphill... by himself (no shirt.. Reow), a Santa in a blue Santa suit on the back of a motorbike, followed by someone in a lion suit on another motorbike. 

Seems like there's actually garbage collection here. The process seems to be... Everyone dumps their rubbish in big piles... Then a garbage truck comes and collects. I'm pretty impressed considering the nature of the neighbourhood. And the garbage man waved to me. 

I went to the beach. It was so damn hot I couldn't even deal. 38 and no breeze. I am not tropical. I am not a toucan. I don't even know how I dealt when I lived in Biloela for 18yrs and 38 was a standard daily summer temperature. I couldn't swim because I had my phone with me and you can't leave your damn bag or it'll get damn stolen. So I Iay on a towel and oozed perspiration. Correction, I lay on a sarong because I left my damn towel in Chile. I think I was the most clothed and probably just about the whitest girl in Ipanema. Two beach vendor guys spoke at me.. In Portuguese.. Which I don't understand. I can only assume they were something along the lines of "girl you WHITE" "why you wear such big grandma bathers?".

I was supposed to meet Pablo at 1 but instead it turns out we both waited for each other for about an hour at different beach kiosks about 100m away. On the upside, I drank the coldest most delicious coconut of my life. 

After giving up on Pablo and withering in the heat I found a shopping mall to sit in and absorb air conditioning and steal wifi. I promptly forgot to find and buy the things I require (a towel and ear plugs) and instead ate gelato. These fancy shopping malls have concierge desks which are particularly helpful because they speak English and are paid to be polite and helpful so you can ask them anything about Rio in general. I managed to get directions to a grocery store. 

I went a little grocery happy. I ended up inadvertently spending my taxi fare back to the favela. So I had arms full of shopping bags and no money. Good work Amiee. Real smart. Luckily I am actually quite smart because I managed to find a bus that went by the favela. The streets of the favela are so steep and winding (and long) that they self organised this fantastic system of moto-taxis and Kombi mini buses that ferry people up and down the favela for 2.5BR. Unfortunately I seemed to arrive at peak period and had to wait for about half an hour in a queue while my butter slowly melted through the rest of my groceries (why do I need butter? Umm for mashed potato duh). White knuckled it up the favela, willing the helmet not to fly off, holding my groceries with one hand and the back of the moto with the other. You get right of way as a moto on the way up because if you don't keep up a certain amount of speed you fall. 

I decided to shower off the sweat of the day. The shower is so god damn filthy. Anyone that knows me knows I'm not precious... But FFS the thing is slimey and brown like it's not been cleaned in months. And I lost my thongs in Chile. Must really add that to the shopping list. 

Then I cooked dinner and promptly poured boiling water on my hand. So that's fun. There's no hot water for washing dishes, and the detergent is empty an has been refilled with water.. And even the pseudo detergent water is almost empty. Makes me wonder what I've now contracted by eating with the dishes. 

So I decided to make myself a drink (litre of vodka - $9AUD) and watch the sunset over Ipanema (the view really is outrageously sublime ... Sublime is really underused as a word). There's a party going on at the hostel bar with about 100 people.. I can't check it out right now though because I've been put in charge of watching over a sleeping baby. From what I can gather the mother is a friend of one of the hostel workers? She doesn't speak any English but she managed to communicate through gestures that I please watch her sleeping baby.. But I don't have to sit near it.. Just listen out for its cries. Oh look! Fireworks over Rio! Beautiful!! 

So the mother of the baby might be more than just friends of the hostel worker... I thought he was showing her the empty private room next to my dorm so she could put the sleeping baby in there rather on the hostel couch... But now they're in there with the door closed.. Alone. It seems I'm babysitting while they're banging. Guess I'll just wait til they're done before I check out this party....

Oh look there she is now. I'm gonna bail while I have a chance. 

Peace out. 

I live in a favela now

 

And it's pretty cool. 

It was a right bastard getting up here in the taxi. The hostel is right at the top of the favela and there's only one vehicle entry point. A couple of times there were some trucks coming down so a chain of cars had to reverse back to let them through. 

This place is definitely budget... eg. There's mould on my mattress and pillow.. But the view is amazing!

I was just chatting to the owner at the bar. An Austrian guy. This was his house and then eventually grew into a hostel over the last 6 years. It was interesting talking to him about favela politics. He bought this house but no one that lives here owns the land, and he had to ask the drug lord if he could start a hostel. That drug lord died in a shoot out on NYE 2011. Once, "hostel guy" (can't remember his name) was summoned to speak to the drug lord because word was that he was selling drugs to the hostel guests; "be there at 6 or we will kill you". Everything was chill in the end... Just a misunderstanding...

Since word of the popularity of the parties at this hostel got out, 2 other imitation bar/hostels have popped up.. One literally on top of this one and one directly across the street. The one across the street is having a big party tonight... And because of the reputation of the parties here.. They charge a fortune for entry. Like.. A FORTUNE. It's insane. 120BR for girls and 150BR for guys. That's $55-$70AUD just for entry, no drinks included... And at the top of a favela where the average monthly income  is around $220AUD. It seems.. kinda unethical. And bullshit. 

Just ate some sort of delicious thing from the tiny hole in the wall restaurant next door. It's kind of reminiscent of a tortilla but made of tapioca... Fried... With a variety of different things and then folded over like a giant soft taco. I had salami, cheese, tomato and onion. Delish.

Tomorrow I'll wander around the favela and maybe down to Ipanema to meet Pablo. 

Amiee x

First days in Rio

Tuesday:
I walked down the winding cobblestone Santa Teresa streets to Central to meet an architect contact, Pablo Souto. We ate brunch at Confeitaria Colombo, an amazing cafe, bar and restaurant that was established in 1894! It is such a beautiful place and incredible that it's still completely intact and operating. We ate a lot of pastries. I ordered a 'Colombo Cappuccino' which turned out to be espresso, chocolate, topped with a large portion of Chantilly cream, sprinkled with cinnamon. Not quite what I was expecting and super sweet but... wow. We spent about 3h there talking architecture. Afterwards we visited a unique cafe that Pablo had built the furniture for; Curto Cafe. They started in a tiny nook in the shopping centre about 1.5mx1.5m and had the concept of not setting prices for the coffee but they have a chart showing their expenses on the wall and people pay what they wish. It became so popular that the shopping centre management gave them a bigger area to set up in. When we went there it was crazy busy with people standing everywhere. The barista would just call out - "how many for latte??" and people would raise their hands, and he would make those 8 lattes. And then he'd move onto the next type. Profits, expenses, number of quantities of coffees made were all charted on the wall and there was a table in the centre with a bowl where you put money.
We visited the Sao Sebastiao cathedral which looks really strange from the outside but is really amazing inside.
Afterwards we walked to a street where there's a lot of antique furniture shops. Have decided to buy an old colonial house and stay here. Jks. But seriously.

Wednesday:
I went walking around Central with my French brothers. We visited a lot of churches and libraries. A lot. My favourite was the Real Portugues Gabinete de Leitura. It contained old Portuguese books about 500 years old. In the evening we bought some Caracha and made Caipirinhas. The boys even cooked dinner. Then we went out to a candelit local bar with live acoustic music, which was very beautiful. We eventually had to leave when they closed around 230am!

Thursday:
Had a bit of a lazy day. My French brothers left :( But in the late afternoon I visited the Cristo Redentor! It was quite expensive to visit. I took the tram up to the peak through the rainforest. The sun was starting to set behind the statue when I got there. I actually think the statue is more impressive from a distance looming over the City rather than up close where you can't really comprehend the scale, and have to crane your neck to see it all. The view was amazing though. But of course, lots of people around taking photos. No where near as busy as earlier during the day though; I was on the last tram up for the day.

Friday:
I've eaten breakfast and written this blog... should probably go out for a walk!

Amiee x

I go to Rio

Just arrived in Rio. My taxi driver took me the scenic route from the airport and wanted me to teach him Aussie slang. Great guy. He´s the way I found out the siege in Martin Place was over and he gave me his iPad so I could read about it while he drove.
I´m staying in Santa Teresa for 5 nights at Sante Hostel. There´s only 3 other people staying here at the moment - some French guys. It´s a good thing they seem lovely and don´t give off a rapey vibe because we´ve got the whole place to ourselves - staff only stay til about 3pm apparently.
I walked to the grocery store and realised I don´t speak a word of Portuguese and my Spanish is dodgy. Guess I´ll be learning very quickly.
Tchau xx

Back in Santiago

After a bit of a crazy night out with people from my hostel and a few too many pisco sours I made my way back to Santiago for my last 3 nights in Chile. 

First thing I did when I got back was go and crash the Elemental office - it was Friday afternoon aka the last working day before I left Chile and I was hoping to be able to interview one of the architects about their projects I'd visited and informal housing in general. The office is on the 25th floor of a building about 15min from my hostel in Barrio Bellavista. I hadnt really expected there to be security but I got past them with no worries. The 25th floor has an office with a glass door and the names of businesses to the left, and then a timer door that looks like a fire escape with no name or description of any kind. Go through the nondescript timber door to find Elemental. 

The receptionist spoke enough English to understand what I wanted a was very accommodating; ushering me to sit in the board room while she fetched me someone to talk to. That someone was Cristián Martínez: Architect, Chief Project Coordinator. I recorded an interview with him for about 15min with some questions I'd prepared earlier. No one from the office had visited the Antofogasta project since its completion so he asked me to email him some of my photos. Go team Amiee. 

I visited another of Pablo Neruda's houses which was just around the corner from where I was staying. He built this one for his secret mistress who later became his wife until his death. The steel grates on the windows have a logo with their initials entwined together. It  was great but not as spectacular as his Valparaiso residence. More Pablo Neruda quirky facts: he would always write in green ink, he would buy playing cards in every place he traveled, as a joke for his guests the salt and pepper shakers were labeled with 'morphine' and 'marijuana', and there is a secret passage with a spiral staircase next to his dining room, meaning that Pablo would often appear through a cupboard, surprising his guests.

The rest of my time I spent wandering around and in artisan markets. I also met with Matias, a Venezualan architect friend of one of my lecturers who lives in Santiago with his Chilean wife and children and had some interesting conversation about architecture. 

Anyway, off to Brazil now!

Amiee x

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¡Valparaiso!

I arrived in Valparaiso 37h after leaving Iquique and boy am I sick of buses. I don't want to see another ham and cheese sandwich in a very long time. They hand them out for lunch and dinner on the bus. White bread, in a plastic packet. Always ham and cheese. I've eaten so many that by the end of the bus ride I was opting for hunger over another sandwich.  

I've also developed a new strategy for getting by on buses: I become the "sweet girl" meaning I feed people around me sweets (in this case, chocolate eclairs). This transforms me from that annoying white chick who speaks terrible Spanish to that nice chick who gave me a sweet who I'm going to look out for and make sure she gets off at the right stop and her bag doesn't get stolen. 

Valparaiso is beeeeeeeautiful. I'm so glad I have a few nights here. It's hilly and by the ocean and full of colourfully painted houses and street art 

Yesterday, after I took a long hot shower to rid myself of 2 nights on a bus, I spent the afternoon strolling around the streets. I'm staying in the older part of the city up on a hill which has been UNESCO listed. The street my hostel is on is foot traffic only and cobblestoned. 

I also walked up to the only public park in the city which is in the giant walled grounds of the old prison. 

This morning I hiked up to visit the house of the poet, Pablo Neruda. Truly spectacular. He was a keen collector and an eccentric. His house was wonderful and looked over all of Valparaiso. All manner of things existed in his house; a stuffed exotic bird from Venezuala, a wooden carousel horse from Spain, antique maps, old oil paintings, prints from China. He believed water tasted better from green or red glasses, enjoyed whiskey and red wine, and never ate alone; he entertained friends for both lunch and dinner. Here is his dining table, with green water glasses and big ceramic cow punch bowl:

And here is his bedroom:

I'd have 10,000 more photos but you weren't allowed to take photos inside. So these are my secret squirrel "while the guard isn't watching" snaps. 

Here I am outside the house where you're allowed to take photographs:

I toured the house with a Canadian girl I met whilst I was sitting outside a church eating some of the 2kg of cherries I bought for $2AUD. I thought we were quite the pair; she was visiting the house because she studied literature and liked the work of Neruda; I'd never heard of Neruda before but was visiting the architecture. 

I am becoming somewhat addicted to empañadas. I would describe them as pie calzones... Pie pastry but folded over like a calzone and filled traditionally with a mince or cheese. There's the best empañada shop way too close to my hostel for my own good and they have over 60 different flavour combinations!!!!!!! Yestetday I had chicken cheese and capsicum, today I had beef mince, onion, tomato and cheese. They're about $2 and they rock my world. 

Tonight I shall drink red wine and read some Neruda.   

Amiee x

A brief stop in Antofogasta

Well.. That was fun. 

Maybe I'm crazy but I wanted to get a trifecta of Elemental housing projects and Antofogasta was sort of on the way back down South from Iquique. By all accounts it's not really a great touristic town and "a bit of a shithole", even though it's Chile's wealthiest town due to a mine and port. 

I arrived here on the bus at 05:30 and booked a ticket back down to Santiago leaving at 13:00. I figure that's plenty of time to go photograph a housing project and get back to the terminal. I had to wait around for about 90min in the terminal before it got light outside. 

I should probably have mentioned in the last post how lucky I was to actually find Quinta Monroy. I had the street address and was sitting at the hostel cafe looking for it on a map. I happened to mention it to the barista, who luckily spoke very good English because she told me tht they had actually changed the name of that street! Surprisingly she knew the project and drew the location on my map. An easy 15min walk away! 

Anyway, I realised yesterday that I didn't have an address for this housing project in Antofogasta, just a street name (it is a very long street), so I had to spend a while zooming around on Google Street View to find an approximate street address. 

At about 7am I checked my bag in the bus terminal 'custodia' and went and caught a $10 taxi out to the housing project. I think the taxi driver thought I was a bit loco. He wanted to drop me off at a particular house and I kept saying "acqui, acqui... Muy bien" (here, here... Very good). He eventually just let me out and then watched as I started photographing the complex before slowly and hesitantly driving off. 

I decided I would walk back to the bus terminal despite having only a vague idea of direction since I had hours to kill before my bus. 

Nothing like an early morning stroll through a bit of a slum. 

Well.. It was quite a long walk. I had to keep stopping and (poorly) asking for directions. At one stage el hombre told me it was only tres blocks away (woo!) but I got there and realise he'd directed me to a ticket office of the bus company, not the terminal (boo). I figured the woman at the counter would know where the bus terminal was, but she just kept telling me "lejos, lejos" and I'm like "¿asi?" (this way?) and she just keeps telling me "lejos!". Mmhmmm ok.... Whatever that means. I typed it into the eng/esp dictionary app on my phone.. It translates to "far away". Yeah, helpful. Thanks biatch.  

Well I had already made up my mind that I was going to walk, so I kept on walking! Here's a photo I took at one point looking back at where I'd come from - you can see the housing project teeny tiny in the distance:

I stopped again at the Shell service station for directions, then again a few blocks later. A kid on a motorbike was calling out to me, I roll my eyes. I stop to pat the most adorable Labrador puppy and the kid on the motorbike has pulled up behind me... I realise he's the guy from the service station that gave me directions.. And he wants to give me a ride to the bus terminal! FUN! Dw mum and dad.. He had a spare helmet...

Actually it's funny, a lot of men driving past will wolf whistle or make kiss noises at you, but the two times now that I thought someone was being really irritating/creepy (like the guy on the motorbike just now) they've actually been trying to help me. The day before yesterday in Iquique a man slowed down next to me in his car and was gesturing behind him. I thought he was being a creeper and telling me to get in his backseat so I gave him the "piss off" glare and head shake combo... Only to realise a minute later that I'd been walking down the street with my backpack open (noob.) and he was tryin to tell me! Oops. 

Anyway, the kid on a motorbike gave me a ride the last couple of km to the bus terminal and dropped me off out the front. Only about 4h til my next overnight bus....

Amiee x

Update: I have now eaten a hotdog for for breakfast. Also, it costs almost a dollar to use the bathroom here so I'm holding out until my bladder is about to burst. 2.5h until the next bus...

Santiago & Iquique

I had some serious jet lag to deal with in Santiago.. Just wanted to sleep all day and then was awake half the night. 

Spent a day walking around Central Santiago. Walked to the Universidad Catolica de Chile and then spent a lot of time in a great little artisan market. My Spanish is just enough to get by; I know enough words to get my basic point across. And Spanish/English have enough similarities that I can generally get the gist of what people are saying to me. 

I caught a 24h bus up North to Iquique to see a housing project: Quinta Monroy by Elemental Chile. The bus was actually very comfortable (would want to be for the price I paid). I went for the "Salon Cama" seat which is the 2nd best. It's like a reclining arm chair with foot rest. Very cushy. There was a bathroom on board (very convenient) and they gave out snack like in a plane. I slept a lot. I think Chile has overtaken Vietnam as m favourite overnight bus experience. 

I've been staying at a great hostel and made a tonne of friends here. And there's a fantastic little cafe attached that makes palatable coffee and delicious fresh OJ. We're just around the corner from the beach, which is quite lovely and a great place to hang out. We all had a bit of a party last night, so I'm tired today and I feel like this post is a bit uninspired by figured I haven't posted anything in a while. 

I've visited Quinta Monroy twice now. I was a bit apprehensive of how the residents would feel about my poking around taking photos but the people I did encounter were welcoming. I've just got back from recording some interviews with 3 different residents about their homes and their experiences living there (with the help of a friend from the hostel who speaks good Spanish). We were invited into a couple of the homes and it was really interesting to see how people had customised the spaces to their needs. 

Later tonight I catch an overnight bus to Antifogasta to visit a similar housing project.. But apparently it's quite a dull town so I'll just go and do what I need to do and then catch another overnight bus to the very picturesque seaside town of Valparaiso. So 2 consecutive nights on a bus... At least I'll save on accommodation....... 

Amiee x

Jugo de manzana por favor!

¡Hola from Santiago!

This post is part of my "stay awake until dark" strategy. Must not sleep too early to avoid days of jet lag. Have to confess to a big nap though which was supposed to be a little nap but sleeping Amiee decided to turn off her alarm. 

The 15h journey from Sydney - Auckland - Santiago actually went super quick, partially due to an amazing 6h sleep brought to you by every travellers' best friend, benzodiazepine. I had the window seat next to a lovely Argentinean gentleman who lives in Melbourne and builds houses in Lakes Entrance, VIC. 

I've realised that in comparison to traveling in Asia or India... It's a lot harder to tell who is a foreigner and who is a local here. The flight attendants couldn't pick it either (until I opened my mouth...) because they all started speaking to me in Spanish. I was pretty excited to understand what they asked (not that hard to guess when they're wheeling a drinks trolley...) and to answer in Spanish "jugo de manzana por favor" (apple juice please". In case you were wondering, apparently my pronunciation was "muy bien" (inner Amiee was prancing around - pretty chuffed with herself). 

I'm staying in a Colonial mansion. No biggie. It's just super cool  I LOVE COLONIAL ARCHITECTURE IN FOREIGN COUNTRIES!! It's called La Casa Roja in Barrio Brasil, Santiago. I chose it partially because it has a pool and partially because I love saying "roja". The roll of the R and the "ha" (ja) is just so yummy. Go on - try it at home. Fun, right? RrrrrroHA. Muy bien. 

Check it out:

I would have made some different decorating choices but I still love it. 

I just had my first meal in Chile at a place suggested to me by one of the hostel staff. He told me he wasn't sure if I would like it... I thought he was suggesting I wouldn't like it because it was traditional cuisine or something so I had to go try it. 

Nope. Not traditional Chilean cuisine. My first meal was at "Cafeteria Bam Bam". A burger joint. 

Holy guacomole!

After dinner I stopped by the Shell service station to buy M&Ms. I'm classy like that. Hey, it's jet lag day... Don't judge. I was able to use my minimal Spanish to tell him I wanted the "negro" packet, not the "amarillo" one (peanut m&ms suck). 

I'm really going to hit the Spanish study hard over the next few days. Es necessito. I'm currently just stumbling through transactions but would like to sound a little less stupid.

Ok that's all I've got to tell. Gonna sit in this mansion and eat my m&ms til it's dark and es acceptablè a duermo. 

A xx

19 days in Itahari

My 2014 so far has been spent living in a tent, no technology, hole for a toilet, occasional camping showers, project work and a trek into the Himalayan foothills.

We've been living within the Maiti Nepal Itahari rehabilitation house compound in tents. There's 8 of us, project leader Wendy, the group nurse Jess (who we renamed 'Nurse Jackie' for the entire trip - apparently it's a tv show), 2 Nepalese architecture students, Krishna and Min, and then our guide, Sandesh, our porter, Raj, and our cook, Maila.
We renamed Sandesh 'Sundance' and he's seriously one of the most loveable people I've ever met. Sometimes we sing "you are my sunshine" together. He's constantly smiling. Raj is crazy and likes to occasionally shout or sing things really loudly. He calls me "Saltini" which apparently means "good friend" in Nepali. Maila is quiet but just an amazing guy. He had a kind face and he makes the most amazing food. He even managed to make us pizza.. On a GAS CAMPING STOVE. The mind boggles. These guys usually work taking people up proper mountains.. Sundance has been most of the way up Everest (before his clients got too sick and had to head down) so by working for Aussie Action Abroad they manage to get a month of employment they wouldn't normally get since it's currently Nepalese Winter (not so great for climbing Everest - which takes about 90 days in case you were curious).

It's been a tent city - 2 to a tent except for nurse Jackie, Wendy and Sandesh who get their own tents, a toilet tent, a shower tent, a kitchen tent and a dining tent. Raj even erected a big flagpole in the middle of the grounds with an Australian and a Nepali flag. We've been really lucky to be located in the Terai.. It's sort of like a Biloela Winter - down jackets in the night/early morning and tshirts during the day. Mornings generally began with Ricki and I bursting into song in our tent. I think the others got used to it eventually.



The project work went well. The first few days were the hardest with the full interior demolition of the bathroom, which involved a lot of chiseling, sledge hammering (massively fun) and carrying of piles and piles of bricks and chunks of concrete. All without a single power tool. There was something like 3 or 4 layers of flooring to get through because of the way they build it here. No waterproof layer.. Just dirt, then big rocks as foundation then chunks of brick then concrete then the flooring.

It was really interesting building 'Nepali style'.. There's too many funny stories to even begin to tell them all on here. The tradies each had assistants.. And then there also seemed to be a bunch of 'watchers' as well. You never really know what you're getting with tradies. We thought we'd hired a plumber.. only to have the guy tell us half way through he'd have to call the plumber for part of the job.. "uhh.. aren't YOU the plumber??!". My favourite tradie was the tiler (who turned out to actually be the plasterer/demolition guy) who was named Shiri (which kind of sounds like 'Shitty' when pronounced correctly, so we called him Tiler for most of the project until the real tiler guy came.. That guy was an ass). A few of us bumped into him at the village corner store one afternoon (on the routine chocolate run) and he invited us into his home across the road for a drink. He had Mongolian heritage and gave us a home brew beer made on rice. Beer, cigarettes and wrestling on the TV.. I really managed to make it into the 'boys club'. In Nepali culture it's considered bad to not have 2 of anything on offer so we had 2 drinks, the second one we had to scull or miss dinner back at the compound so we strolled home feeling a little merry... Sundance and I almost managing to make it off with a parked rickshaw on the way.

It's really unusual to the Nepali tradies for women to be doing construction work so for the first few days there seemed to be an overcrowding of Nepali guys just watching us work. We had some issues with chauvinism/having tools constantly taken from us/not being listened to.. But we just had to take a deep breath and remember it's just their culture and they're not used to women being involved in this sort of work. Eventually tools were taken from us less and there seemed to be somewhat less sniggering. Shiri was always good, he taught me how to demolish a wall the proper way. The tiler guy was an ass though. It's ok.. We ended up literally making him work around the clock to get the project done.

Altogether we repainted the 2 dorms complete with murals (a giant map of the world and the other room had a solar system), repaired their timber beds, demolished and installed an entirely new bathroom, painted the dining room, and built new paved footpaths and a clothesline.



No one really got sick on the trip which was lucky (and made nurse jackie's life easier). One day I got sick with a cold which then rapidly developed into a sickness I've named 'Darth Vader Syndrome' (or DVS in shorthand). Symptoms include creepy wheezing sounds and a small struggle breathing. Nurse Jackie thinks I have asthma. Asthma Schmasthma I say.

Ricki turned 21 on the 11th so we had a day off to celebrate. We took a minibus to the other Maiti home near the India border where girls are initially taken when intercepted at the border before they're reunited with family or taken to the Itahari home to learn skills like sewing etc. A real issue these girls have is that in Nepali culture, if a girl spends a single night away from her family without permission, her reputation is forever ruined and she's shunned. So even though these girls have been tricked or taken against their will, returning to their community is often difficult or not possible.

We then went to the actual border to see how Maiti works spotting girls that may be getting trafficked and had a tour of the police station. They really have their work cut out for them since it's an open border, meaning if you look Indian or Nepalese you can basically just stroll on through. It's actually just a street with an arch over it where the border line is.

When we got back to camp Wendy had managed to paper mâché a piñata and the dining tent was filled with balloons and a happy birthday banner. There was also pass the parcel after dinner. And cake. CAKE! Maila made a CAKE with RICE FLOUR on a CAMPING STOVE! I swear there's nothing that man can't do with a camping stove.

Trekking was pretty damn amazing. We drove to a little town called Hile to begin with massive bags of snacks packed. Unlike the trek I did in Burma we had to carry a full pack with sleeping bag and our down jackets, thermals, etc. By the end of the first day I had actually developed lumps on my collarbone where the weight of the pack sits. The next day I figured I needed to tighten the hip belt so it wasn't as bad. We had some truly spectacularly incredible views. Where we stayed after the first trek day provided one of the top ten sunsets of my life. The accommodation was truly local; Ricki and I had what I named the "honeymoon suite" which was literally a corrugated iron shed tacked on the back of a family home, complete with water tank, clothes line and window to the toilet. Nurse Jackie and Wendy had the penthouse suite upstairs, also made of corrugated iron. They had pigeons for companions and I kid you not the floor of their room was literally covered with corn. On the cob. Like actually covered. No walking space. The family had stored their Winter corn supply up there... But they bagged it up not too long after our arrival.

We also discovered a new local beverage called tongwa (pronounced kinda like 'tongba') which is fermented millet in hot water, served in a small wooden barrel with a brass or wooden straw. The magical thing is that when you hit the bottom, you just top it up with hot water. It's actually like magic.. It never ends!

The second day of the trek we ascended higher into the mountains and at one stage all the ground was frosted and the leaves crystallised with ice. It looked really mystical.

The third day we trekked half the day and then caught the bus back to Itahari. We made it home on dusk to be greeted by all the village children.

We've made lots of local friends. The Maiti compound is just outside of Itahari in a farmland village and all the local children like to peer over the fence and yell "sister sister!". They're also really good at picking up and mimicking things we say or do. When we were playing piñata if someone missed we'd yell "one more go!" and soon the kids were yelling it for us over the fence. We gave them all the piñata candy because they were so cute. We also played several games of soccer with them sometimes in the afternoon. The first couple of games were played on a semi-ploughed field which made it extra challenging on top of being completely outmatched in terms of skill. We narrowly avoided several rolled ankles. The last 2 games we played on a more level field amongst some tethered cows and a lot of dung.






The architecture around the village was seriously fantastic. A series of isolated fantastical mansions painted in all sorts of colours and covered in ornamentation. Multistories with towers and roof terraces with hanging colourful washing. It's really something else. I think it's really cool that they just build these fancy things and paint them whatever colour they want. No need to be modern or stylish just do what you want. This one was my favourite:



On our last day the girls that live in the dorms came back and we all ate together. They loved the improvements and made us beaded rings. Then there was a ceremony thanking us for our work which was really lovely. They presented us with traditional scarfs and posies of flowers, put a tikka on our foreheads and fed us traditional sweets. All the colour made for some great photos.



The bus ride back to Kathmandu was interesting. On the way to Itahari we'd taken a shortcut o some pretty hairy roads they were still building and down actually running riverbeds to make the journey quicker. This time Wendy decided we should take the safer roads which basically involved circling the Kathmandu valley to enter from the main highway route. 15h later....
We left Itahari at 6:30 in the morning. They blasted that Icona Pop song "I don't care" as soon as we set out. Followed by Nickelback, followed by Guns n roses, followed by System of a Down, followed by Green Day. We heard this same playlist (the only songs they had in English) three times during the trip.

We finally made it onto the national highway. A few minutes later: "traffic jam... 2 hours waiting". We crawled along. They put some slow Nepali music on. "Sentimentals!! I don't like!" yells Raj (Raj pronounces a lot of English words with an added 's'.. My favourite being every night when he brings the soup into the dining tent and announces "chicken soups"). So Icona Pop went back on and Raj started dancing down the aisle. That man can really move. I went to sleep for the rest of the traffic jam until we made it to Bhaktapur.

I'll write about Bhaktapur later... For now I'm off to enjoy my last night in the country!

Have been with my Aussie Action Abroad/Architects Without Frontiers group for the last few days in Kathmandu - in a much fancier hotel than I'm used to whilst backpacking.

Have been doing inductions, language lessons and some sight seeing. Last night we had dinner at Nepali Chulo (where I went last week with Barga and Candy) with the entire group of 70+ of us plus 20+ Nepali students. I was sitting with the Australian Ambassador and his wife as well as getting to meet Anuradha Koirala, the founder of Maiti Nepal, which was so amazing to actually meet such an inspirational woman.

I can't remember if I've already written about what we're doing for the next few weeks but I'll do it again now anyway. Tomorrow we travel 12ish hours to Maiti Nepal's Itahari facility. Maiti rescues trafficked children and women from brothels in India and provides healthcare, shelter, training, support... Whatever they need. Last year they rescued 3600 women and children. Unfortunately around 30% have been infected with HIV, not to mention the torture (burns, acid burns, beating, starvation, cuts, forced abortions), and the usual 5-50 clients per day that are forced upon them. Anuradha started Maiti Nepal over 20 years ago and I'm yet to think of a more worthy cause to support. I've said it before but, watch the documentary "The Day My God Died" if you can handle it. It's all about Maiti and Anuradha.

The Itahari facility where we'll be stationed is a training centre for girls that have been rescued at the border before they're sold into a brothel. Maiti has staff at the border trained to recognise girls that may be getting trafficked (usually the staff members are women who were once trafficked themselves) and intervene and rescue the girls before they cross the border to India. We'll get to go and observe this as well.

We're gutting and rebuilding the amenities block at Maiti Itahari and painting (possibly a mural) the girls dormitories. That will be for just under 2 weeks, then we'll do a 4 day trek and then head back to Bhaktapur and Kathmandu just in time for me to fly home. Complete technological blackout until the 20th.

Today we visited the Maiti Kathmandu headquarters and I was completely overwhelmed. We ate lunch and had a lecture on the work they do and what they're fighting against followed by a tour of the facility. There are about 200 children there and they were just so precious and adorable and so excited to see us. As the guests of honour there were some dance performances by some of the children. When the younger girls got up to do a very groovy dance called "dance for life" which had music set to it about beating HIV/aids etc, all 200 children ended up standing and joining in the dance. They were all so happy and dancing all around us and I was just blown away.

Afterwards we visited the Pashupatinath Hindu temple where they hold their cremation ceremonies on the ghats. It's a bit like a mini version of Varanasi. There's also the oldest hospice in Kathmandu there (about 100yr old) where people can go and live the end of their days right next to where they'll be cremated. I saw a woman being carried into the building on a stretcher and just found it really morbid and wrong in some way... Like it's great that they have such a facility but watching it, it kind of felt like "there you go, we'll just stick you in here til you die and then there's not far to take you to be burnt". One of the other groups here will be doing construction/repair work on the roof of the hospice over the next couple weeks as the whole thing is leaking onto everyone dying there.


There were a couple of people being cremated when we arrived and we saw another two bodies being prepared while we were there. The first part of the cremation requires the head and the feet to be washed with the river water. At one point a body was brought over to the ghats on a stretcher. It was wrapped in a floral bed sheet and wearing a khaki green beanie. They were waiting there for a while and I was wondering what the hold up was; it seemed so strange for the body to just be there and everyone casually standing around and people going about their business nearby. Then another body was brought over on a stretcher, except this one was wrapped in saffron fabric and covered in flower petals. Turns out the first body had to wait for the more well dressed body to be washed first. It just seemed so wrong to me that there was still a hierarchy in death; that somehow even some dead bodies are more important than others.








Our group went out to dinner at a woodfired pizza place tonight. Last western food/food not prepared on a camp stove for 3 weeks. So full. Will I ever get sick of goats cheese salad? Doubtful. We went and did a stock up of snacks for the trek/general snacking.. You really can get anything here. I managed to find a big bag of Cadbury's chocolate eclairs (my childhood favourite because grandad would have them in the glovebox of his car when they came to visit) which made me very happy and there may or may not be a bottle of 75 proof Nepalese spiced rum in my bag for probably the coldest New Years celebrations of my life thus far.


We'll be in tents for the next 3 weeks so I'll come back to an Australia with a renewed appreciation for walls and a bed. I just took the longest and hottest shower I could manage.. "The Last Shower". Won't be that many happening over the next couple weeks considering we're gutting the bathroom there, so it's just a camping shower (that we'll have to boil water for first). Anyway.. Have to be up at 4:30am to pack, eat breakfast and get on the bus. We've got to try and beat traffic out of Kathmandu otherwise it'll add on 2-4h to our trip.

So.. This will be the last blog until probably at least the 20th! Happy New Year everyone. Lots of love xx

P.S kiss my ass 2013!!!

Location:Expedition beginnings