Having just returned from seeing Ho Chi Minh, in the flesh literally, I thought I’d share with you this incredible piece of propaganda:

The Mausoleum of President Ho Chi Minh is an architectural work of great political and ideological significance, expressing the profound feelings of the entire Vietnamese people towards the Late President who is endearingly called Uncle Ho. In this place the Vietnamese, generation after generation, have arrived to pay homage and show gratitude to President Ho Chi Minh and express thier determination to follow the revolutionary path He had charted to build a peaceful, united, democratic and prosperous Vietnam.

It’s written in the best English I’ve seen in Vietnam.

While we’re on ‘Uncle Ho’, was he a benevolent dictator? To my knowledge (and this is based largely on what I’m learning in Vietnam), there were no Railway Purges, Gulags, Cultural Revolutions or other acts of genocide and the likes. There was some land distribution that pissed a couple of people off but otherwise it was just everyone else committing atrocities on the Vietnamese (the Chinese over thousands of years and more recently the Cambodians and Americans).

Can anyone tell me of human rights violations committed by Ho? He even seemed quite tolerant of religion.

The moment you’ve all been waiting for:

A Belated Update: I meant to comment on this earlier but failed to so I thought I would come back to this post to do so – for the sake of the web and those that may do a search when looking into their trip around Egypt.

Towards the end of our trip we met up with a tour guide, Naga Gabrail and I guess I just want to warn people against using him as a tour guide as he left me furious.

We found that “Gabrail” would basically say anything to get you to come on the tour with him. We initially contacted him to see about spending a night or two in the desert. It bacame apparent rather quickly that we simply didn’t have time to do this and had decided against us.

He then started calling us a couple of times a day with new itinerary options until we eventually capitulated. However to do this we had to drive from the White Desert, near Daklha, to Dahab in a day – basically from the South-West corner of Egypt to the North-East corner. This being possible was pivotal to us being able to go to the desert with him. The next day we started driving at about 8 in the morning and didn’t arrive in Dahab until after 5 am the next morning. He had told us that we would be in Dahab by dinner time. If we had known that there was a 21 hr drive in the back of a trooper we would not have done it. 5 people in the back of one of those for an hour is uncomfortable – let alone 21 hrs.

This left us feeling totally ripped of (we didn’t think the price was all that cheap in the first place) and exhausted which affected our time in Dahab as well.

In short he left a very bad taste in our mouth.

… oh yeah, and he “propositioned” my 60 year old mother so he is quite sleazy as well!

Well, i’m in Egypt now, Cairo to be exact. This place is insane.

Went to the Pyramids yesterday – I wanted to post a few pics but this computer won’t let me.

So I guess I just wanted to say hi to all and note that in my extreme disorganisation I failed to take anyone’s email address, phone number or address with me. So don’t expect an email or postcard unless you email me your self with your details.

I’m also very sorry to those I didn’t get a chance to say good bye too. Nothing personal I promise.

And finally to A(S/M), if you happen across this post, please give my love and birthday wishes to that amazing child of yours.

We can fly like birds over this diseased planet but when will be land?

Random Graffiti I saw in Bristol

Well I’m back and so ends the “travel blog” part of my trip.

Yep, it’s a little strange to be back and a little too easy just to settle back into my life, only to discover that I’m unemployed and probably should get around to doing something with my life. Naturally, I’ve lots of ideas about what to do with my life but I’m not going to write about them hear because we all know that many of them might not come to fruition.

So what I thought I’d do here is just write a couple of lists of things that relate to my travels, then move on to the next phase of this blog, never to speak of my travels again.

So first up has to be a list of the places I went to by city:
Singapore
Rome
Florence
Venice
Vienna
Prague
Krakow
Berlin
Dresden
Nuremberg
Berlin
Hamburg
Berlin
Amsterdam
London
Liverpool
York
Edinburgh
Glasgow
Belfast
Dublin
Kilkenny (day trip)
Bristol
Cardiff (day trip)
Poole
Milton Keynes
London
Cambridge (day trip)
Little Gidding
London
Paris
Lille
Bouge
Paris
Bayeax
Mont Saint Michel
Paris
Bordeaux
Barcelona
Valencia
Granada
Tanger
Chefchouen
Marakesh
Seville
Madrid
London
Bangkok
Pattaya
Bangkok
…and Melbourne

Highlights included:
Florence and Rome
Berlin
Edinburgh (the Fringe Festival was on)
Barcelona
Chefchouen

Naturally I took about 30 gig of music away with me but the following songs were on high rotation:
Edge of the World – Faith No More
I’m Lonely – The White Stripes
Back in Black – ACDC
Slam – Pendulum
You Fucked Up – Ween
Que Onda Guero – Beck
Man in the Garage – Cold Cut (in fact the entire Sound Mirrors album)
Dirty Harry – Gorillaz
Snap Shot – Roni Size

I also sat on trains for days on end which is highly conducive to getting a few books read so the following books were consumed during my travels:
Hard Times – Charles Dickens (Mum has been at me my whole life to read a Dickens – it was ok but I don’t think I’ll be reading dickens again
Multitude: War and Democracy in the Age of Empire – Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri
Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance – Robert M. Pirsig
Down and Out in Paris and London – George Orwell (what can I say, I was in London)
Illywhacker – Peter Carey
Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail ’72 – Hunter S Thompson
The Corporation – Joel Bakan
Animal Farm – George Orwell
An Ordinary Persons Guide to Empire – Arundhati Roy
A book about Che Guevara and the Cuban Revolution that wasn’t particularly interesting but fill a few gaps in my knowledge of Che which was nice
On Democracy – Robert A. Dahl
Tell Me No Lies – Edited by John Pilger
High Fidelity – Nick Hornsby (left me feeling that John Cusack’s role in the film should have been played by Dilan Moran)
Notes from the Underground – Dostoevsky
The Odyssey – Homer (although I haven’t finished that one yet)

Normal progaming will now resume, although I might pop a few more photos up on the blog when I finally go through them all.

I will also probably update the look and feel of this blog shortly and, all going to plan, I’ll have another person writing on the blog soon enough… I just have to convince him it is a good idea.

Some photos for you all:

The indulgences of Mary Antonette (I realise this is probably not how you spell it):

Under Paris lies a deep dark secret:

…and finally the amazing Mont-Saint-Michel

• Beer has wheat in it right? So can people with celiacs drink beer. This disorder could be more serious than I had initially thought.
• Travelators: I’ve got a plan but I just need a renewable energy supply.
• Warm beer isn’t as horrible as it sounds.
• It takes 22 years of military service, certain honours and to rise to the rank of Sergeant Major to become a Yeoman Warders (or Beefeater) and all you do is take people on guided tours of the Tower of London. Hardly seems worth it really.
• The Beatles first played at the Cavern Club. The thing is that there are two Cavern Club’s and they are litterally across the road (or small lane way as the case my be) from each other. Who do they think they a fooling?
• Despite the current situation in Israel, walled cities are very cool.

Today is the falf way point of my trip, shed a tear for me my friends, it feels like I’ll be home tomorrow.

I was asked to post a couple of social photos so here goes:

Chris who took wonderful care of me in Rome (enjoying a Pizza and the World Cup):

Mimmo on a boat in Venice:

My Finnish mate in Prague (Meeko) who I met in Vienna:

On a roof top in Berlin:

After a night on the town with Tilman in Hamberg:

Mr and Mrs Sharp in London:

…and just in case you were wondering I’m currently in London with Mr and Mrs Sharp.