We bought the plane tickets yesterday. We fly to Delhi, India, via Moscow, on 1st August, 2013. We will travel overland from Delhi, to Varanasi, to Calcutta. Then we will take a boat to the Andaman islands. We will stay on the Andaman islands for around 5 weeks, before making our way back to Delhi overland for our flights home. There was something really nice about buying tickets to someplace hot, while looking at the snow comming down outside the travel agents window. See the top of my profile page, for a counter showing how many days before the trip. - http://www.travelblog.org/Bloggers/Mell/ To be researched: Is it worth buying the train tickets for overland in India, online? Would it cost more than buying them at the train stations in India? If anyone has information about this, ... read more

My boyfriend, who was infuriated by accounts of facebooks 'war on women', detailed in my blog , has decided to give netizens the Christmas gift of joining an internet feminist group called 'Metalheads supporting Feminism'. If you love women, like 'Metalheads supporting Feminism'.http://www.facebook.com/MetalheadsSupportingFeminism?fref=ts According to facebook, rape jokes are controversial humour. According to facebook reporting rape jokes, is also controversial humour. Check out one of the most recent incident of facebooks 'war on women'.http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=434903679891755&set=a.247135242001934.50049.246744282041030&type=1&theater We suggest that facebook make two new categories, to replace 'controversial humour'. One for rape jokes, which would be called 'hate' and another for reporting rape jokes, ... read more

Cyber bullies are attacking feminists facebook groups. What they do is report the sites as religion or gender haters. This is NOT true, as the groups are secular, and they support womens rights with no hate speech about either gender. When the cyber bullies report the pages, the accounts of the admins of the pages are suspended. Check out the following 2 pages for yourself, to see that they don't promote hate speech.'The uprising of women in the Arab world(community)' and 'true Lebanese feminist'. Then, sign the following petition to ask facebook to stop suspending the accounts of 'The uprising of women in the Arab world(community)' admins.http://www.facebook.com/events/304290906351114/... read more

Fans may know that the original band are playing and even touring again. Despite that all but one of the original band members has not died, left, other, they are in fact the original 'Thin Lizzy' band. Have you seen' Thin Lizzy' play live or do you intend to? If so, ... read more

Mel There are even some guys in the building accross from the hostel dorm I am staying in, who keep a constant vigil at their window to watch the activities in our room. I didn't notice them, until one of the other women in my dorm pointed them out. She said, the first thing she does when she comes into the room is close the curtains. When one lives in Germany for a while, one tends to forget that watching out for things like this is necessary. I have been very careful with money. So much so, that I feel like I am 19 again, when I was unskilled and low waged. But, I am still having a good time, and the added bonus is there is a good chance we will have enough for your ... read more

Mel I met an Irish couple here at the hostel. The guy is here to have a root canal. He says it costs 300 Euros, so quite a price difference between here and germany. One could have a nice holiday, with a root canal thrown in for the 1500 Euros the root canals cost in Germany. Might be worth considering. Only thing that would be hugely inconvenient is what would you do about the tooth ache while waiting to get to Turkey. Dirk Jan I suppose in situations where one doesn't need help immediately, it would be an option. Mel I walked to the Marmara seafront today. It was way too cold to hang about there, so I headed in the direction of the Blue Mosque. Conversations with various Turkish men along the way, all initiated ... read more

Mel I've arrived already! I was just settling into the long flight I normally expect when leaving western culture. But, then hours before my subconsious expected to get there, the plane was flying over the Bosphorus, low enough for me to see it is teaming with fish, and with seagulls hovering above it waiting for an opportunity to catch one. As the plane landed, there was a mosque a few hundred meters to the right. An exotic culture, and not a dot of jet lag. It is rainy but not as cold as Germany. Got on the subway and passed many mosques on the way from the airport, and no doubt I will be hearing them at 4AM from all directions. I got out of the tram in the old part of the city where I ... read more

Dirk Jan Re: In Bangkok Well, got this far. Staying at the green guest house. Went to the place you recommended for bus tickets. They only had 400 Baht big busses that go tomorrow at 18:00, so I'd be in Chumphon at 4 in the morning. They had never heard of busses that go in the day, they said. I'll walk around some more to see if I can find one that goes in the day. I'm not all that impressed with the KS Road, I have to say. Teeming with European/American kiddies and touts and little in between. Guess you're gonna show me the good places once we go here together :) See you soon. Mel So, are you in Chumpon, yet? You can always take a night bus to Hat Yai and stay ... read more

Mel We will be leaving here on the 27th. People keep telling me, we should stay for the end of Ramadan party, and telling me about the great homemade fireworks they are making from bamboo canes. Homemade fireworks! Sound safe dont they!? I think, it is a good thing we are putting some distance between us and them. Dirk Jan I guess the 'thanks to that too short fuse I now finally have a dog' (a blind guiding dog...) -campaign didn't make it over there yet... Mel and, a lot of other campagnes didn't make it to here either, or did make it and were dismissed by the 'them against us and everything said by any organisation in any western country is bad' folk. Soon, I will be getting emails from you, from ... read more