Sport and the Scoundrel Saint Patrick's Day, 2007. Memories? A sickening last minute heart-breaking try by France against Scotland in Paris to deny the Irish a first rugby Grand Slam in over fifty years. On the same day the Irish cricket team was sending Pakistan out of the Cricket World Cup in the West Indies. At the same time my old alma mater, Saint Macartan's, Monaghan, was gearing up for a McGrory Cup Final with a chance to take a senior title for the first time in over a half a century. They went on to lose in injury time [View Full Entry]

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After all the romantic views of the Angkor temples, I decided to have time on my own in Bangkok and do the things a girl loves most - shopping and massage! Last year I was at the Wat Po Thai massage school for the General massage course which works on the whole body. This time I went back specifically to learn the Foot massage technique. This course is also 5 days at the famous Wat Pho massage school. It's a great way to meet people and learn a new skill. There was a group of around 20 in our class - [View Full Entry]

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I think I'll just to stick to the pictures of our short 10 day trip to Cambodia this time which for Sof and I took in Phnom Penh and Siem Reap (Angkor Wat). When Sofie headed off to Bangkok to do her massage course I went deeper into the Heart of Darkness by taking the slow boat to Battambang but the photo evidence on this trip is limited. I came back to PP and then HCMC and the whole journey seemed some kind of beautiful dream carved out of variously hued stone, faces staring out of the early morning mists, monks [View Full Entry]

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Just back from a lovely weekend in the beach resort of Nha Trang. We just missed the tail-end of the Typhoon Durian which cost many lives in the Philipines. Even a couple of days before the storm was due, waves were battering the coast. Spectacular waves stopped us having too much water fun. It's hard to gauge but I suppose the waves would have been 3 or 4 metres high. Our friend, Chris, has the friction burns to prove it! Anyway, how refreshing it is to get out of Saigon again. So easy too. A Friday night train at 11pm and [View Full Entry]

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Guess who’s back? We have been meaning to blog Saigon for ages. We are living here now and people are curious about our lives in Vietnam. We have plenty of photos below from the city, our schools, our flat, our friends and various other stuff too. There are also a couple of short videos just to the left of this text (if you take the time to download them). They will give you some more insight into where we are living right now and how things are for us.. So.. George W, Angelina & Brad have all been and gone. It [View Full Entry]

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Hi everybody! Warren at the healm once again. You may remember me from such blogs as 1000 Things To Do with Stuff and Where Did I Leave My Dong? After I had parted from the missus, we made our way from Hoi An and entered Laos via Hue and across the border at Lao Bao. from there it was to Savanakhet on the Thai border. And just in the nick of time as it had pretty much rained for 48 hours straight and the flood waters of Central Vietnam were rising. I only heard about the crazy typhoon that hit Central [View Full Entry]

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A Hoi An Wedding Ceremony Seeing as we were having a ‘home-made’ wedding with ingredients from Scotland, Ireland, Vietnam and Pakistan thrown in, we thought we would let you know what was happening on the day. Since we did not have a priest or registrar marrying us, the beach ceremony in the afternoon gave our friends and family a chance to be involved - we like to think that our family and friends were the ones marrying us! Here is how the days progressed... The Sequence of Events Wednesday Morning *After a lovel [View Full Entry]

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After 7 months of being in Warren's pocket, it was time to be a brave girl and finally head out to do my own thing, and what better than meeting my favourite sister Huma in Beijing?! The last time I was in Beijing was 10 years ago and I was really looking forward to experiencing all the recent changes and seeing the city prepare to wow the world at the 2008 Olympics. On arrival at Beijing airport, the first excitement was seeing a young chap caught by the police for shoplifting a bottle of CocaCola - a true post-communist statement. Arriving [View Full Entry]

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Hi again everybody. Sofie and I are about to go our separate ways. She has a visa for the People's Republic of China and I for Vietnam. We've tried to reconcile ourselves to travelling separately on our journey but since we'll meet again in Saigon in a month or so it's really not so long at all. So to Bangkok. Every time I visit the city I am more and more suprprised. Sure it's a big noisy Asian Megacity but it has it's charms. We spent a fair bit of time being choked by traffic fumes but taking the river ferries [View Full Entry]

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Tribal Tour (Note: There are two pages of photographs so check out page two or even better use the slide-show tool) From Puri we embarked on a six day Tribal Tour booked through the excellent Adventure Odyssey (thanks to Chinya, Deepak and Jaisan!!) and had a fantastic insight into the adivasi cultures of West and South Orissa where over seventy indigenous peoples are recognised - each with different language, clothing, living arrangements and customs. The highlight of the trip was Day Three when we met the Bonda tribe on their way to market. The Bonda today number ju [View Full Entry]

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