i am considerably agitated.

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i just saw my first cockroach! wow! anyway, i´ve got lots to update, so i best get started.

i bought another watch, so after having no watch for a long time, now i have two. good work john, good work. the flight was loooooooong, but i did get a pretty awesome view of the moon on the flight from london to madrid. that was cool, i took a photo, but its pretty bad. i also bought a new book at the airport, which is all about the planets and the solar system, so i suppose i shall continue to be as exciting as ever when i return. made the connection to caracas, got on that plane, and felt my heart sink when the pilot said it would take 8 hours. 8 hours! 8?! EIGHT! thats a long time to be spent sat in a chair next to a spanish woman that snores. there were 2 films shown in those 8 long hours, the new indiana jones (which looked absolutely awful) and kung fu panda (which looked glorious). we flew over a portuguese island, which looked absolutely incredible, i cant remember the name off hand but i´m sure it will come back to me at some point. i´ve just realised i am skipping over things, i blame that on the heat and the fact that this is a spanish keyboard and i am confused. anyway, the plane landed, and i saw the one word that scares me, as a welshman, more than any other. IMMIGRATION.

OH MY GOD.

images of brooke mcguire went through my head, i could imagine myself sat in a dark room surrounded by soldiers. at least brooke was held by people that spoke english. i could die here! but then, my fears were saved by the fact that venezuela is obviously very lax in its immigration control, so i went straight through. nice and safe! then came the obligatory wait for baggage (EURGH). then customs. then more worrying. i worry a lot you see, thats why i´m here. i´ve also just realised i´m on my 3rd paragraph and i´m still at the airport. not good! anyway, went through customs and a man approached me asking about money and whatnot, i needed money you see. so he took me into a dark alley and i did what i had to do. ok, thats not true. lonely planet recommends changing money with someone you trust, and i dont understand because you cant just trust someone off hand. so i figured, the first man who approaches me about changing money who has a moustache, he will be the one. so i changed $150 into bolivars with this moustachioued man, and started the long arduous task of finding sandra, my couchsurfing rescuer.

just a comment about sandra, i was supposed to be staying with a guy called jean, but he didnt reply to my emails for a while, so i figured he had abandoned me. so the night before i left, i put out a few desperate couchsurfing messages, and was met by loads of replies! people are ace! so sandra won through, and i was super happy to be staying somewhere. although i didnt reckon on my phone not working, so therefore being unable to ring her. i rang her from the airport and we sorted out meeting at parque central, but we forget to make clear where. so i get to parque central, and proceed to panic. not good. i walked around hoping that she would just turn up, but thats not going to happen is it. so i asked people if they spoke english. no one did. panic built! then, at about the 20th person i asked, a woman said she didnt, but she was going to help me anyway! woo! so she helped me a phone card, and left me by the phones, ready to call sandra the saviour.

none of the phones worked. gah! so again, im panicking. for some reason, i thought i´d ask a security guard if he knew why the phones werent working. this man was a legend! he just shook his head, and gave me his phone! madness! so yes, my life was saved by a venezuelan security guard. how awesome is that! finally met sandra and her good friend cesar and his girlfriend, had a couple of beers and headed home. on the way home we had to pick up sandra´s daughter, arianna, who is probably the cutest person in the history of the world. got home, met sandras dad, francisco (who you will hear more of later), and went to sleep, nice and safe.

sorry this is long, but its 3 days worth, so stop whinging.

it was arianna´s first day at school on thursday, and she has a long way to travel, so we were up at 5am! madness! after the longness of wednesday i slept well, and i had a nap after they left anyway, so its ok. so it was me and francisco all day, and it turns out he is a tourist guide! how lucky is that! so francisco directed me to the centre of caracas, and proceeded to give me a constant amazing history lesson and simon bolivar, who may i add, looks a little bit like me! ok, he´s just skinny, short and had a moustache, but thats close enough for me! saw lots of bolivar related history, and sat in plaza bolivar for a bit. they have black squirrels here! black as the night! how mad is that! so yeah, i was very excited at seeing this black squirrel. after all this, me and francisco went for a couple of beers, and had a good chat. it turns out he tried learning russian as well when he was my age! he´s 74 on monday mind, but he´s got loads of stories, speaks amazing english and is generally awesome. he keeps saying ´oh shit´when he´s surprised at something, it never ceases to make me chuckle. he doesnt seem like he is 74 at all, something that he puts down to his constant positive attitude, and the man might have a point. i certainly hope i am like that when i´m 74. met up with sandra and arianna, went home, and had tea. pork chops and veg! it smelt AMAZING. absolutely amazing. and it was lovely, i ate it all (i promise), it was lovely. me and sandra went shopping for tonights festivities, which involved buying a bottle of tequila that was 100bolivars, the equivalent of about 23pounds! madness! but i promised them flavoured tequila you see. no matter where in the world i am, i just cant escape cava. i want to be free! we are drinking them now, we made peach tequila, its awful. i am about to have my 4th one, and i feel bad already. its only 7.26pm here as well. the night is young. it rained both of these days by the way. slept brilliantly again! i like this! i feel very comfortable here, i havent worried about anything at all.

had a really good time today as well, had a cold shower to wake up this morning, another 5am start you see. got on the most awesomely run down bus imaginable and headed to the metro station. buses here are great, they are all falling apart, they have the same price wherever you are going, and you pay as you are getting off. i love it! oh, and any bad words i said against the london underground i take back. the caracas underground is intense. mad intense. oh, the traffic as well, good lord. so many beeping horns as well. its such a busy place, mad chaotic. anyway, i had another day with francisco, and we decided we were going to head to teleferico, which is the place of the big cable car to the top of a mountain, which has amazing views of the city. so good! its a massive place i tells ya, massive. anyway, got to the top, walked around a bit, and then francisco put forward the idea of going to the village that was in the mountains behind the city. so got in a jeep and went! it was such a beautiful place! its called galipan, its so old skool latin america, it was great. it did make me laugh uncontrollably though, because there was this massively old fashioned village, lots of horses around, loads of jam in the windows, kids playing in the street, and then all of a sudden, i saw it. stuck to one of the walls, was the actual last thing i expected to see there.

a poster for the fantastic four.

venezuela is insane.

ps: the title of this entry is the punchline to a joke francisco told me about elvis presley. SO FUNNY.

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