Yes, it's a corny title, but when am I ever going to get another chance to use it? It's time to travel. Where have you been for the last two years? Rhetorical question. Hell, where have I been for the last two years? Well, I've been stuck at home, saving the readies for my next trip. Oh, and getting a new knee. I've kept myself busy for the last eight months doing stuff like, ooh, trying to bend my leg, learning to walk again, cursing the medical profession, you know, that kind of thing. Let's just say I had a below average experience. Thanks to all those who encouraged and assisted me, I'm most grateful. If nothing else, I've had plenty of time to plan my next trip, and the one after that as well.
Groucho Marx once said "When the guy driving the elevator tells you it's time to buy, then its time to sell", or words to that effect. He was talking about stock market advice, but what I take from that is this. When you like to get off the beaten track, like I do, and you overhear some pimply adolescent in the checkout line telling somebody else about his killer trip to Phuket, or hear about some bogans getting married in Bali, you start to think what else is left? Fortunately, there are still a few places that haven't been ruined by the common herd. Yet. But that doesn't mean I'm going to pull a sled across Antarctica. (I was going to, but the knee job sunk that idea.) I'm not going to Burundi or Togo in the foreseeable future either. No, I'm going to Burma, also known to the ruling clique as Myanmar.
Its one of the few Asian countries I haven't been to. When Chris Phillips and I did the big trip to England in 2008, you could not get into Burma with a motorcycle. Period. End of story. Simply not possible. And China made bringing your own bike into the country so difficult as to be virtually impossible as well. So we searched for alternatives, and at the time, the most popular one was to crate your bike and have it flown about 35,000 feet above Burma, from Bangkok to Kathmandu. But things change, and now both Burma and China are more accessible, but not without a giant dose of ingrained bureaucracy, I suspect. So to some extent, its unfinished business for me. Burma now, China and Tibet in 2019. That's the plan. (Yes, I know China reckons Tibet is part of China. Ask the Dalhi Llama what he thinks.)
As I'm a bit of a history buff, Burma does hold some attraction. The first thing I ever heard about Burma was finding out that the Secretary General of the UN when I was a kid was a Burmese guy named U Thant. I remember being impressed that someone had just a single letter of the alphabet for a first name. Very efficient. And it was easier to pronounce and kinder to the senses than the name of his predecessor, Dag Hammarskjold. Then of course, there was Lord Mountbatten of Burma, a fancy handle if ever I heard one. I think he told the Burmese "Its all yours, but the flag is ours, so I'm taking it with me. Sorry about the mess" after Britain granted independence to Burma after WW2.
Burma, an ancient peaceful Buddhist country, but one which was constantly at war with Thailand for yonks. A former British colony, invaded by the Japanese during WW2, who attempted to build a railway from Thailand to India brutally using mostly Australian, British and some American and other POW's who died in their thousands. The extremely hard fought recapture in diabolical conditions by the Allies, the behind enemy lines exploits of the legendary Chindits led by Brigadier Orde Wingate (an oriental Major David Stirling, founder of the SAS, if you will), then eventually independence from Britain, only to fall victim to the military junta which booted out the King and which has run the country since. The infamous house arrest of Nobel Laureate Aung Sang Suu Kyi, then finally her release and election to office, followed by vast silence, mostly from her. Then a whole lot of bad publicity due to persecution of various ethnic minorities, (eg Karen, Rohinga, Shan and Chin, to name but a few.) Some more recent than others. Evidently enough for a UN indictment of the military junta for crimes against humanity. Then more silence. Its a mixed bag really. Anything could happen. I could actually be safer in Yemen, but I bought the tickets for this trip months ago.
Of course, there has also been the obligatory plane crash just before I decide to fly out of the country. Last time it was Malaysian Airlines, this time Lion Air. Tragic and unnerving as it is, I hope it has got all the pilots focussed. Just to add a bit of excitement to my preparations, last night my fridge decided to die. I lost everything in the freezer, and a lot of stuff in the remainder. So at 9am this morning, I was waiting for Harvey Norman to open, raced in and delivered the ultimatum to the first sales guy I saw. I need a new fridge, delivered today, or its no deal. They delivered, so good on 'em. Mind you, I had to wait quite a while for the fridge to get down to operating temperature to accommodate the little useable food I still had left. In the meantime, I raced out and got some ice so I could chill the most critical foodstuffs, ie the beer. And some incidentals like milk, margarine, cheese etc. Sofar, no gastro, so I'll take it. My wheelie bin is going to stink something toxic by the next bin collection. A little toxic waste never hurt anyone. It will probably smell like most Asian countries, so its kinda completing the circle. Yin, yang, karma or whatever. Then, later today, the usual tantrum from my laptop during the travel shakedown. Adding every update ever issued since Bill Gates was in short pants. It ain't easy folks.
So I leave Friday morning, Adelaide to Hong Kong, a quick change of planes to Yangon (that's Rangoon to anybody over 50), arriving about midnight local time. That gives me a whole day to pack, and for once, I don't have to fit all the stuff on a bike, so its a bit of a luxury having all that space. Space that will rapidly be used up by travel medicine, (to treat everything from rabies to St Vitus Dance), chargers and leads for myriad gizmos, and of course, my trusty and very well traveled coffee plunger, immersion heater and this time a half kilo of vacuum packed Lavazza. Hope they don't think I'm smuggling something to throw the sniffer dogs off. Kaz also gave me a box of Robert Timms coffee bags as a backup. Well, you can't be too careful where coffee is involved, can you?
Hasta Luego, readers.
Groucho Marx once said "When the guy driving the elevator tells you it's time to buy, then its time to sell", or words to that effect. He was talking about stock market advice, but what I take from that is this. When you like to get off the beaten track, like I do, and you overhear some pimply adolescent in the checkout line telling somebody else about his killer trip to Phuket, or hear about some bogans getting married in Bali, you start to think what else is left? Fortunately, there are still a few places that haven't been ruined by the common herd. Yet. But that doesn't mean I'm going to pull a sled across Antarctica. (I was going to, but the knee job sunk that idea.) I'm not going to Burundi or Togo in the foreseeable future either. No, I'm going to Burma, also known to the ruling clique as Myanmar.
Its one of the few Asian countries I haven't been to. When Chris Phillips and I did the big trip to England in 2008, you could not get into Burma with a motorcycle. Period. End of story. Simply not possible. And China made bringing your own bike into the country so difficult as to be virtually impossible as well. So we searched for alternatives, and at the time, the most popular one was to crate your bike and have it flown about 35,000 feet above Burma, from Bangkok to Kathmandu. But things change, and now both Burma and China are more accessible, but not without a giant dose of ingrained bureaucracy, I suspect. So to some extent, its unfinished business for me. Burma now, China and Tibet in 2019. That's the plan. (Yes, I know China reckons Tibet is part of China. Ask the Dalhi Llama what he thinks.)
As I'm a bit of a history buff, Burma does hold some attraction. The first thing I ever heard about Burma was finding out that the Secretary General of the UN when I was a kid was a Burmese guy named U Thant. I remember being impressed that someone had just a single letter of the alphabet for a first name. Very efficient. And it was easier to pronounce and kinder to the senses than the name of his predecessor, Dag Hammarskjold. Then of course, there was Lord Mountbatten of Burma, a fancy handle if ever I heard one. I think he told the Burmese "Its all yours, but the flag is ours, so I'm taking it with me. Sorry about the mess" after Britain granted independence to Burma after WW2.
Burma, an ancient peaceful Buddhist country, but one which was constantly at war with Thailand for yonks. A former British colony, invaded by the Japanese during WW2, who attempted to build a railway from Thailand to India brutally using mostly Australian, British and some American and other POW's who died in their thousands. The extremely hard fought recapture in diabolical conditions by the Allies, the behind enemy lines exploits of the legendary Chindits led by Brigadier Orde Wingate (an oriental Major David Stirling, founder of the SAS, if you will), then eventually independence from Britain, only to fall victim to the military junta which booted out the King and which has run the country since. The infamous house arrest of Nobel Laureate Aung Sang Suu Kyi, then finally her release and election to office, followed by vast silence, mostly from her. Then a whole lot of bad publicity due to persecution of various ethnic minorities, (eg Karen, Rohinga, Shan and Chin, to name but a few.) Some more recent than others. Evidently enough for a UN indictment of the military junta for crimes against humanity. Then more silence. Its a mixed bag really. Anything could happen. I could actually be safer in Yemen, but I bought the tickets for this trip months ago.
Of course, there has also been the obligatory plane crash just before I decide to fly out of the country. Last time it was Malaysian Airlines, this time Lion Air. Tragic and unnerving as it is, I hope it has got all the pilots focussed. Just to add a bit of excitement to my preparations, last night my fridge decided to die. I lost everything in the freezer, and a lot of stuff in the remainder. So at 9am this morning, I was waiting for Harvey Norman to open, raced in and delivered the ultimatum to the first sales guy I saw. I need a new fridge, delivered today, or its no deal. They delivered, so good on 'em. Mind you, I had to wait quite a while for the fridge to get down to operating temperature to accommodate the little useable food I still had left. In the meantime, I raced out and got some ice so I could chill the most critical foodstuffs, ie the beer. And some incidentals like milk, margarine, cheese etc. Sofar, no gastro, so I'll take it. My wheelie bin is going to stink something toxic by the next bin collection. A little toxic waste never hurt anyone. It will probably smell like most Asian countries, so its kinda completing the circle. Yin, yang, karma or whatever. Then, later today, the usual tantrum from my laptop during the travel shakedown. Adding every update ever issued since Bill Gates was in short pants. It ain't easy folks.
So I leave Friday morning, Adelaide to Hong Kong, a quick change of planes to Yangon (that's Rangoon to anybody over 50), arriving about midnight local time. That gives me a whole day to pack, and for once, I don't have to fit all the stuff on a bike, so its a bit of a luxury having all that space. Space that will rapidly be used up by travel medicine, (to treat everything from rabies to St Vitus Dance), chargers and leads for myriad gizmos, and of course, my trusty and very well traveled coffee plunger, immersion heater and this time a half kilo of vacuum packed Lavazza. Hope they don't think I'm smuggling something to throw the sniffer dogs off. Kaz also gave me a box of Robert Timms coffee bags as a backup. Well, you can't be too careful where coffee is involved, can you?
Hasta Luego, readers.
