We've bumbled full circle

We're all back again. We've caught up with most people we haven't seen for almost a year by now and are at the stage of trying to find a job & a place to live.

It all feels so normal but at the same time is weird.

I think I'm bumbling more now than I was when I was going around the world.

DCNY

All right, so Washington and new york. (this is written through a haze of jetlag, so god only knows how it's going to turn out)

So it was hot in washington, and I went to museums, and hung out with a guy from Indiana and a girl from Switzerland. (the guy has since emailed me saying wouldn't it be cool if we all got matching t-shirts to remind us of our cool time in DC...wouldn't it be cool though?) Also, the guy who owned the hostel was a fire engine enthusiast. he kept one out the back. Odd.

Anyway, we saw museums, and Arlington Cememtery, and various large marble buildings of political import.

Then flew on to New York. Fun fact about America - they think i am a terrorist. Seriously, honest to god a terrorist. Every time I flew, i got the SSSS rating. which means 'Seriously Suspicious So and So'. I think. Anyway, The result was that each time i went near an airport i had people shouting orders at me, swabbing my extremities for explosives and mostly just getting more and more worked up at my inability to follow their orders. (as I've mentioned, I'm kinda...well...disorganised sometimes)

So, eventually touched down in New York. It's like walking into a film, looking at all the places I've seen on television. It was odd.( Although I didn't get to go on a date with any of the women from Sex in the City - thought that was something that just happened as soon as you get onto manhattan island, live and learn, i s'pose) I did, however see the sights, and walk around like ahomeless person. (spent the last few weeks growing a big nasty travelling beard)

Following new york, I did get on the plane at JFK, spent an hour taxiing around, and 6 hours later, touched down in Dublin, bringing the trip to an end.

probably some editorialising tomorrow. And that'll be it.

i'm a bit sad though.

Last stop...

New York City.
It's hot.
I'm home on Saturday.

I'll put up a proper post before then.

LA.

(I had a whole post devoted to steak, and argentina, but i'll put that up later)

So, I stayed in a hostel on Hollywood Boulevard. With 2 roomates. one's a dwarf who does impressions of Chucky (from Childsplay) for money outside Mann's Chinese Theatre, The other was - let me get this right - a poet, who was also a knight Templar. Who was trying to revive the tradition of knight poets. He was in LA to try and get a job with a breakfast radio show writing limericks. Or as a Male model.

These were only two of the people i lived with. Others included:
-The jingle writer, who sang about everything, all the time. 'maa-kin' a sandwiiiich...gonna put some peanut buttter iiiiin....'
-The would be soap star. Who lectured me on the importance of coke as part of a hollywood career. And on the danger of kissing girls who turn out to be guys.
-The guy who goes around pointing out celebrity resemblences. (i look like no-one, sorry dude)

So i went for a walk on hollywood Boulevard, saw all the adult shops, exotic shoe shops, exotic adult shops, tattoo shops, exotic tattoo shops, shoe tattoo shops, and any combination of the above.

And I decided, since I was there, I might as well have a bit of a wander out to see other parts of LA. So i did.

Long Beach - Gone in 60 seconds was filmed here.
Universal City - i couldn't afford the theme park, but i wandered along the shopping streets
Reseda - 'It's a long way, living in reseda...'
and
of course,
because I am the wisest man ever to have walked the face of the earth...

i went for a stroll in compton. (as in 'the hood' from 'boys in the hood' and 'compton' from 'Straight outta Compton' and...well, you get the idea, it's the hood)
(where stroll = getting off the train, wandering across teh road, saying wow, this place is kinda crap, and getting back on the next train)

Anyway, at the moment I'm in D.C. It's hot, but i don't care, i saw the capitol building over the top of some trees and thought I was in the west wing for a bit. awesome.

Travelling, all glamour, all the time

All right. I'm a terrible traveller. You probably know this. I enjoy it, having a blast, but seriously, i'm very disorganised, prone to worry and have a short fuse when i'm really tired.
Some examples:
I had a complete meltdown in a chinese bank. (where complete meltdown includes, but is not limited to: incoherent swearing, clown like gesticulating, arguments that rely on the 'Just...Fucking...Because!' principle, and confusing of foreigners with half remembered junior cert language classes. -today i went around going 'i eat the bank?')
And a Danish train station.
And Hong Kong Airport
And Santiago Airport (Twice)
Various small ports in south east asia
Overnight buses make me suicidal (or homocidal, depending on whether or not you're all up in my face trying to get me to stay in your guesthouse)

So, this last few days, i've had a particularly complex bit of travelling to do. On my own. Rio- Santiago- Buenos Aires. With no Spanish or portuguese, a shortage of local currency (guaranteed to make me kick inanimate objects) 3 hours sleep a night, and lots of complicated and hitherto unknown (due to my aversion to guidebooks) airport taxes. Also, the fact that i've just apparently smuggled a mobile phone into Argentina. Anyway, I'm dead proud of myself. I didn't break down, didn't freak out (even when it looked like we were going to land in the middle of the Andes again)

I even managed to include an interlude of drinking whiskey with Chilean political activists, very inflamed about nationalisation. I think. They were speaking spanish. They may not have been activists, may in fact have been Zookeepers. My knowledge of spanish isn't great.

Anyway, I'm in Buenos Aires, alive and well.

Also, remember back in last August, I wrote this:
In my head, I'm playing the blues on a beach at sunset to a crowd of smiling brazilian girls. The waves lap in. There was a barbecue earlier, and we had freshly caught fish. I've a cold bottle of beer beside me, the moisture on the side slowly dripping down onto the sand.

That Happened! Not at the beach, but close enough!

Thursday night in Rio

It's about half ten, we've spent the day wandering around Ipanema, came home, watched some tv, read for a while, had some dinner, drank a glass of wine with a nice English couple. He works in advertising, she had a dream she was going out with Michelle McManus.

Laura and Sinead wanted to go to a Samba nightclub, so around half an hour ago, they had their showers, got changed, got a group of backpackers together and headed off. I decided to get an early night and give my wallet a rest.
But i still fancied a walk, it was a nice evening, so i walked the two blocks to the garage to get some chewing gum. And maybe a can of Coke.
Between the hostel and the garage, there's a roadblock. Police cars block the road, and plainclothes officers dressed in jeans and t-shirts stand around, M-16s cradled in their hands.

I move along past them, on the path. They nod at me, I'm a tourist, one of them smiles. I get to the garage, buy the chewing gum, decide against the Coke, it's late, I could probably do without the caffeine and the sugar.

On the way out, a Taxi passes me. You have to understand just how crazy fast the taxi drivers go here. They run red lights, regularly hit 140kph. This guy's not going especially fast.

I stroll up to the roadblock unwrapping my gum. There's shouting, the Taxi has tried to run the roadblock. The policemen are pointing their guns in the driver's window, screaming in Portugese, the blue lights flashing off their guns. I don't know whether to walk on through the roadblock, or stay where i am.

They open the door, the driver gets out, his hands up. Two machine guns aimed at his chest. The guy who smiled at me now screaming orders at him. One of the policemen reaches in and pops open the boot. I follow the small crowd and walk on, unsure of gawker etiquette here. As I reach the corner, i look back. The driver is on the ground, one of the cops is emptying the boot, the other has his rifle trained on whatever might be in there.

I get home, rabbitting about what I've just seen.

'Oh, that's normal around here'

Palmy & Chile in Chilly. Also, Rio!

Anyway, we spent the last week in sunny -read rainy- Palmerston North, with Kev & Eimear. Great time, great to meet up with them, see how they're, between them running the town. So in between hanging out in Palmy, we took a trip around the North island of New Zealand. Saw lake Taupo, a giant boiling lake at Rotorua (seriously, thermally heated boiling lake in the middle of the forest. it was like something out of Jurassic park)

And - i got the flu. There is nothing more miserable than being sick when you're travelling. Well - maybe not nothing, in fact i'd say there's quite a few things. Genocide comes to mind. fine, i'll rephrase that. The absolute worst time to get the flu is when you're travelling. Y'know when you're antisocial, and all you want is telly and food and sleep and warmth? Yeah...Anyway, thanks again to kev and Eimear for putting up with me in my wojus state. I owe you both more pints than any two people should ever drink.

So, post new zealand, we rolled on into Chile. Where it was...Chilly! (i rule, honestly - good Jokes? come to Andy) Santiago, to be precise, where we suffered from jetlag, spending whole days in bed, and whole nights wondering why we couldn't sleep. Fun times. However, despite all the films - well, one - about jetlag, i still haven't had an odd non-relationship with Scarlett Johannsen. I'm holding out hope for when i hit LA.

Santiago's quite nice in an odd, nondescript way. full of shops...and underground trains...and...uh...y'know...city-like stuff.

3 days of odd Chilean food, drinks with an incontinent politics professor and his wife and a scary night out that ended in a dodgy back alley odd smelling reggae club in Santiago (at which point i called chicken and went home) And we hopped a flight to Rio.

The Most Turbulent Flight Ever. The woman next to me grabbed my arm so hard there's still little white half-moons where her nails dug into me. I was all excited because it hought we were over the Amazon, and we could crash, and have strange adventures in the jungle, where no-one's sure what's real and what's not, and it all could be part of some fat guy's mental illness, or possibly some sort of purgatory, and then Kate and i would have a stormy relationship...ok, sue me, i watch too much lost. Anyway, looked at a map today, we were nowhere near the Amazon so scratch that. But we did fly over the Andes. During which time, i sized up my flying companions and tried to work out who'd be the tastiest. (watch Alive)

Point is, arrived safely in Rio, home to the Copacabana, Ipanema beach and more song puns than any one city should have. Also, apparently, more gun-crime. In fact, it's a wonder i'm still alive, the amount of gun-crime they talk about. GUNCRIME!
you get the point. (also, heard gunshots earlier on tonight) (Mam, don't read that last sentence)

as I write, Laura, sinead and Sam are knocking around the hostel, we're talking about going out to a samba show later, and earlier today we went up to visit that big scary jesus on the rock that overlooks the city.


More soon with less delay.