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Ouaga - Tom Griffith

Tom Griffith Travel happens when I can fit it in, nowadays, but it will always be my favourite hobby. Here's my list of the best bits so far, in thirteen years of hopping around the world:

Asia Angkor Wat (Cambodia) Taj Mahal and Varanasi (India) Annapurna Range and Kathmandu (Nepal) Bagan (Burma) Koh Phiphi (Thailand) Great Wall, Terracotta Warriors and the Forbidden City (China) Peshawar and the Chitral-Gilgit road (Pakistan) Istanbul and Butterfly Valley (Turkey) Luang Prabang (Laos)
Americas Teotihuacan and Mexico City (Mexico) Lake Atitlan and Tikal (Guatemala) Roatan (Honduras) Cartegena and Tayrona (Colombia) Macchu Picchu, Nazca and Cusco (Peru) Los Angeles (USA) Salar de Uyuni, Rurrenabaque and La Paz (Bolivia) Buenos Aires (Argentina)
Africa Pyramids of Giza, Luxor and Cairo (Egypt) Chefchaouen, Essaouira and Fes (Morocco) Iron ore train and Chinguetti (Mauritania) Saint Louis (Senegal) Dogon Country and Djenne mosque (Mali) Masai Mara (Kenya) Butre Beach (Ghana) Zanzibar, Ngorongoro Crater and the Serengeti (Tanzania) Lake Malawi (Malawi) Cape Town and the Wild Coast (South Africa)
Europe Paris (France) Prague (Czech Republic) Berlin (Germany) Pompeii (Italy) Liverpool (UK)


Where I've been, where I am, and where I'm going

Svalbard Spain United States of America Antarctica South Georgia Falkland Islands Bolivia Peru Ecuador Colombia Venezuela Guyana Suriname French Guiana Brazil Paraguay Uruguay Argentina Chile Greenland Canada United States of America United States of America Israel Jordan Cyprus Qatar United Arab Emirates Oman Yemen Saudia Arabia Iraq Afghanistan Turkmenistan Iran Syria Singapore China Mongolia Papua New Guinea Brunei Indonesia Malaysia Malaysia Tiawan Philippines Vietnam Cambodia Laos Thailand Burma Bangladesh Sri Lanka India Bhutan Nepal Pakistan Afghanistan Turkmenistan Tajikistan Kyrgyzstan Uzbekistan Japan North Korea South Korea Russia Kazakhstan Russia Montenegro Portugal Azerbaijan Armenia Georgia Ukraine Moldova Belarus Romania Bulgaria Macedonia Serbia Bosonia & Herzegovina Turkey Greece Albania Croatia Hungary Slovakia Slovenia Malta Spain Portugal Spain France Italy Italy Austria Switzerland Belgium France Ireland United Kingdom Norway Sweden Finland Estonia Latvia Lithuania Russia Poland Czech Republic Germany Denmark The Netherlands Iceland El Salvador Guatemala Panama Costa Rica Nicaragua Honduras Belize Mexico Trinidad & Tobago Puerto Rico Dominican Republic Haiti Jamaica The Bahamas Cuba Vanuatu Australia Solomon Islands Fiji New Caledonia New Zealand Eritrea Ethiopia Djibouti Somalia Kenya Uganda Tanzania Rwanda Burundi Madagascar Namibia Botswana South Africa Lesotho Swaziland Zimbabwe Mozambique Malawi Zambia Angola Democratic Repbulic of Congo Republic of Congo Gabon Equatorial Guinea Central African Republic Cameroon Nigeria Togo Ghana Burkina Fassu Cote d'Ivoire Liberia Sierra Leone Guinea Guinea Bissau The Gambia Senegal Mali Mauritania Niger Western Sahara Sudan Chad Egypt Libya Tunisia Morocco Algeria
Map Legend: 23%, 62 of 263 Territories
 Where to next 
 Where I am now 
 Where I've been 


AfghanistanArgentinaAustraliaBelgiumBoliviaBruneiCambodiaChinaChileColombiaCosta RicaCape VerdeEcuadorEgyptIrelandEthiopiaCzech RepublicFranceGhanaGermanyGuatemalaHondurasIndonesiaIndiaIranItalyKenyaLaosLesothoLuxembourgMalawiMaliMonacoMoroccoMauritaniaMexicoMalaysiaMozambiqueNetherlandsNepalNicaraguaPeruPakistanPanamaPhilippinesRwandaSouth AfricaSenegalSpainSwedenSwitzerlandThailandTogoTunisiaTurkeyTanzaniaUgandaUnited KingdomUnited StatesBurkina FasoWestern SaharaSwaziland

Where I've been, where I am, and where I'm going...


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Joined on: February 7th 2007
Last Login: January 30th 2010

Blog Entries: 53
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Recommended by 9, Recommends 5
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Blogs & Travel Journals

by Ouaga, order by Date newest first.

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By Ouaga
January 21st 2010
Celebrating With Grover Asia » India » Kerala
Alright, I suppose I will start with the big news first - me and my girlfriend, Susan, got engaged in Kerala a few days ago. Yep, after ten years of dilly-dallying, I finally popped the question. I won't go into the intricacies, but it happened at sunset on one of the cantilevered Chinese fishing nets on the harbour at Fort Cochin. The celebrations began with chai, and ended with some surprisingly drinkable Indian wine, grown in Karanataka and called Grover. And yes, we're both incredibly happy... Anyway, this is a travel blog, so I will return to matters travel-related. Two weeks [View Full Entry]

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1374 Words | 2 Comment(s) | 17 Photo(s) | 0 Video(s)
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Nilgiri Tahr
Tea Fields
Carom and Kingfisher

Before I arrived back in India for the first time in eight years, I was a little apprehensive about just how much this supposedly timeless country might have changed. I mean, the place has been charging into the modern age like a sacred bull in a tiffin shop for a decade or two now, and I wasn't entirely sure if I would find India to be a transformed nation, one of glittering shopping malls, orderly traffic, efficient service, and well-to-do locals. I needn't have fretted - India is, indeed, timeless, and though the modern world has made a smallish dent in [View Full Entry]

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1691 Words | 2 Comment(s) | 13 Photo(s) | 0 Video(s)
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Happy New Year
Pondicherry Sadhu
Rock Fort Temple Pilgrimage

By Ouaga
January 25th 2009
...It'll Always Be Burma To Me! Asia » Burma » Yangon
Myanmar is not, as Cosmo Kramer mistakenly asserts, an American discount pharmacy. It is, of course, the country which is always referred to (parenthetically) as (Burma). It's coming on twenty years now since the military junta changed the name, so why does the world persist in sticking to the old label? This 'Myanmar or Burma' question continued to tax me throughout my fifteen days in the country. Because even the Lonely Planet refers to it as Myanmar (Burma), I resorted to the internet to track down the correct usage. It seems the Burmese generals changed the name for two main reasons: [View Full Entry]

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Thanaka
Padaung Woman
Standing Buddha

Despite four years of startlingly bad luck - tsunamis, earthquakes, military coups, government corruption, nightclub fires, and the recent shutdown of the brand-spanking new airport by pro-democracy protestors - Thailand's tourist industry seems to be able to bounce right back. When we arrived in Bangkok just a couple of weeks after the latest setback - the closure of the main international hub into the country - you wouldn't have guessed that anything untoward had occurred. The main tourist drag, Khao San Road, was as happening and pumping as ever, even at midnight - in fact, that is when it is probably [View Full Entry]

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Tom's Feet
Jungle
Singha Loo

Those who have been reading my blog are probably aware of my love of meaningless lists, and my trip wouldn't be complete without just a few more. So, here, in no particular order, are all of my Top Fives (and some Bottom Fives), to give you an idea of what I loved - and hated - about Africa. First, I'll do a ranking of the 18 countries I visited (I did pop into Lesotho as well, but didn't see enough to pass judgment on the place). Trust me, I did a lot of thinking about this, and took into account such [View Full Entry]

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1664 Words | 7 Comment(s) | 22 Photo(s) | 0 Video(s)
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Fishing boats
Beach soccer and slave forts
Fetishes

Africa has obsessed me since I was a kid. My dream as an 8-year old was to come to Africa, and kiss a wild hippo. Yes, weird, I know. Perhaps I shouldn't have revealed that little nugget of information. Nevertheless, the history, the mystery, and the tragedy of this immense land has attracted me for years. Finally, around ten months ago, I had the funds, the air ticket, and the time to launch my own exploration of at least part of this gigantic enigma. My aim was to challenge my own prejudices, and discover whether the stereotypes presented to us in [View Full Entry]

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Saharan house
Helwan
Pure Luxor-y

What better place could there be for ending an African trip than the Mother City itself, Cape Town? This city has it all - a spectacular location, cool bars, fine dining, great shopping, (relatively sharkless) beaches, mountains, wilderness, a developed infrastructure, a (mostly) friendly vibe, and plenty to keep you occupied. It has to be the most beautiful city I've seen anywhere on the continent, and it has certainly been the most westernised, the most developed, and the most wealthy. You could be forgiven for forgetting that Cape Town is actually part of Africa at all, as the city has gone [View Full Entry]

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Cute guys
Mother City
Cape Point

I just cannot get my head around this Rainbow Nation they call South Africa. It is perhaps the strangest country I have ever visited. In fact, it is more like many countries, all overlapping and sharing the same geographical space, yet interacting very little. Sometimes it feels like Australia, sometimes it feels like the US, sometimes it feels like Britain, and sometimes it feels like, well, an African country. There are plush shopping malls full of affluent white shoppers, and barred-up corner stores selling mealie maize to queues of poor Africans. There are super-smooth highways carrying along the wealthy locals in [View Full Entry]

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| 922 Views | [diary=224850]

Washing line
Wartie and daughter
Sotho boys

The average life expectancy for a Swazi is now 32 years old. Swaziland is a stable, affluent, and peaceful nation. So why are people dying at my age? Because of AIDS. Swaziland now has the highest infection rate in the world - a shocking 40+ percent. Why that is, I'm not quite sure, but it probably has something to do with the size and location of this tiny country. Sandwiched between Mozambique and South Africa, Swazi is about a quarter the size of Tasmania, and is home to a million people. Travellers and truck drivers pass through on their way to [View Full Entry]

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On yer bike
Poaching victim
Nyala

By Ouaga
November 26th 2007
Travels with Bandito Africa » Mozambique » Southern » Maputo
Let me begin with a word of warning - never, ever, have anything to do with the Mozambican police if at all possible. They are bent, corrupt, rude, xenophobic, and vindictive - and that's just the nice ones. They are, without a doubt, the worst officials I have had anything to do with in the whole of Africa: most of the continent's border guards and cops have been surprisingly friendly and not bribe-hungry in the least. Then we got to Chimoio, in central Mozambique. Avoid this city like the plague. It sucks arse. It is a shitty place. It has no [View Full Entry]

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Frelimo sign
The hat guy
Catedral do Inhambane



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