a ferry to sudan

on a ferry to sudan. sleeping on deck. under the night sky. and a million brilliant stars. shining so bright. how awesome is the earth. the universe. the you. the me. the everything.

listen to me in the truth of your soul. listen to me in the feelings of your heart. listen to me in the quiet of your mind.

hear me everywhere. whenever you have a question, simply know that i have answered it already. then open your eyes to your world. my response could be in an article already published. in the sermon already written and about to be delivered. in the movie now being made. in the song just yesterday composed. in the words about to be said by a loved one. in the heart of a new friend about to be made.

my truth is the whisper of the wind, the babble of the brook, the crack of the thunder, the tap of the rain. it is the feel of the earth, the fragrance of the lily, the warmth of the sun, the pull of the moon.

my truth - and your surest help in time of need - is as awesome as the night sky, and simply, incontrovertibly, trustful as a baby's gurgle. it is as loud as a pounding heartbeat - and as quiet as a breath taken in unity with me.

i will not leave you, i cannot leave you, for you are my creation and my product, my daughter and my son, my purpose and my self.

call on me, therefore, wherever and whenever you are separate from the peace that i am. i will be there. with truth. and light. and love.

power of the dice

not much news here folks. mainly because we haven't been able to drink. seriously this place is not funny anymore. no booze at all. anywhere. crazy. we were told we could buy beer at the expensive, exclusive hotels. the hilton, the sheraton, etc. but all they serve is amstel zero. or grolsch extra light. or non-alcoholic bud. where's the fun in that? it's just not cricket.

we've spent much of the past 4 days in transit. ferry from aswan in egypt to wadi halfa in sudan took 2 days. and then the train from wadi halfa to khartoum took another 2 days. ferry was good. slept under the stars. read books. drank whiskey. train was bad. no lights. no aircon. no fan. loads of dust. the dustiest train in the whole world ever. felt like i swallowed a whole sandpit. we celebrated miguel's bday on the train. with a non-alcoholic beer. it sure was swell. we were feeling super sorry for ourselves on the last day. got off the train and didn't look back. super grumpy.

wadi halfa on the border was a friendly relaxed place in the middle of the desert. we had some good food there. lamb. and potato's. and beans. and some good coffee. had a kick around with the locals in abu hamed using the inflatable world on route to khartoum... where we are at the mo. camping on the side of the blue nile. centre of town reminds me of warrick triangle. it's a jungle here man!!! sudanese folks sure are friendly though. big smiles. white teeth. a walking talking toothpaste advert. it's cool.

so what of the team. you'll be happy to know that the tach's survived the travelling. they needed a bit of grooming this morning... but they escaped unscathed and are now stronger and thicker than at any time in recent living memory. we have our weekly shithead compo this evening. the loser is kitty-master for the week. big responsibility. so as you can imagine the stakes are high. and emotions get a little frayed. especially as we have no booze.

oh ja... jon "i was born on a backgammon board" frankish was born on a backgammon board. apparently. he has super human backgammon power. the power of the dice. it's unfair.

if you're going to san francisco
you should wear
some flowers in your hair

salem egypt

we went fishing today. it was almost as successful as the rest of the tour. we caught nothing. not even a bite. five hours man. thank god we had the beer to keep us company. booze has been hard to come by lately. what with ramadam going on. we chose the worst time in the whole world ever to visit an islamic country. nobody sells beer. and black-market prices have gone through the roof. but we were desperate. there's only so much shithead and backgammon a man with a tach and a cowboy hat can play in his hotel room without getting restless.

and restless we got. it sure was nasty. using binocs to spy on the old flabby mommies with peach coloured bikinis suning themselves on the cruise boat outside our hotel window. we were desperate man. playing hotel volleyball with an inflatable earth. wrestling in the roof-top puddle. reading the bible. it was horrible. state of emergency. code red.

sudan tomo promises to be just as challenging. 40 lashes for anyone caught with booze. and that is in times outside of ramadam. goddamn fanatics. these people are nuts. i now feel like christ must have felt walking through the world: a psychiatrist in a ward full of insane freaks. how can you give up alcohol for a month. it's just not normal. not natural. and it's miguel's bday on the 26th. a bday without booze. it's just not on.

so as you can imagine. moral has been low. not rock-bottom. but low. it's hard to keep team morale up without booze. there's nothing to laugh and snigger about. thankfully we have the tach's to hold on to during these tough times. something to remind us that god does indeed work in mysterious ways. and that somewhow, anyhow, things will turn out okay.

the raging tach

i do have a tach goddammit!!! it's there - stretched out like a dead rat on my top lip. thick and furry. with a rank damp smell. and bits of old food attached. how can you possibly not see it??? i admit it may not be as stand-out as miguel's or frank's... but it defo is there... it just needs a few more days of love and careful nurturing in order to realise it's true potential. and then the girls are gonna love me man. no female can turn down a man with a thick tach... and the feeling it gives her when moved lightly down the inside of her thigh. it is the sign of a virile young male. strong genes. ready to mate.

the easy life

check out miguel's blog for an alternative (and better) view of our african bumblings...

the easy life

the big blue

dahab sure has changed in the year and a bit i've been away. the strip has expanded both ways (north past the light house and south past the big blue diving centre). roads have been turned into pedestrian walkways. flashy new hotels have sprung up. miss 2007 miss belgium contestants roam the streets. honestly. why would i lie about something as serious as this? jimmy the switch got married. to an egyptian lady. although he still has his western girls on the side. apparently. mustafa cruised off to australia. with an australian girl. alex has a new english girlfriend. as well as the french one he's always had. jeff snuck off in the night leaving a bill of 12,000 egyptians. ibrahim bought a house. price of property is now 1,000 egyptians / sq meter. we were gonna buy at 450. dammit.

there are some things that haven't changed of course: there are still a whole lot of mohammeds all over the show. we call them mo for short. it's just easier that way. mango lassies are still the bomb. banana pancakes are still the way to go for breakfast.

went out for a few beers last night. just to cure the boredom. bad news. awoke this morning with a raging thumper. i had to get to the dive center at 8am. frank and miguel were only due at 10am. so i woke them anyway. but they went back to sleep. bastards.

dive was great though. el bells, the big blue. awesome awesome spot. one sort of has to dive through this chute and one pops out at 28m. one turns around and all one sees is a massive face of rock and coral. one looks up and it's blue. no top. one looks down and it's blue. no bottom. one looks to the left and it's blue. err... no left. one looks to the right and one's fellow divers are dwarfed by the sheer size of the rock face. sure does help one to reassess things. like why one sooo badly wants to grow a thick tach. or why ginger things are inherently attracted to one named frank. or why one and friends were sitting at supper tonight and discussing the purchase of viagra pills in order to pop them for breakfast tomorrow morning before putting on wetsuits and going to dive. hmmm... the beauty of the big blue.

we sure did bang on about god and the mystery of the universe last night. not good. oh yeah... and i'm reading the koran. interesting book. although probably not my scene.

god, i feel like hell tonight
tears of rage i cannot fight
i’d be the last to help you understand
are you strong enough to be my man?

all systems go...

just got my sudanese visa. wooohooo. quality. was worried i wouldn't be able to get it due to my connections with israel. no... not my big nose. but rather the fact that i had been there recently. this means that we will be able to complete the cairo to cape town tour by land. the romantic way. no flights.

just have to wait for miguel's credit card to arrive in cairo. should take about a week. a learning - one of your first checkpoints when travelling to a dodgy foreign country should be to ensure that the expiry date on your credit card isn't 8 months old. so off to dahab this afternoon to do some diving. which will be good. and bring back some memories. mango lassies and banana pancakes. the canyon and the big blue. jimmy the switch.

otherwise travel has been uneventful. stayed at bianca's hostel for the night in eilat. she treated me like a son-in-law (after having tried to set me up with her daughter in tel aviv). she cooked me dinner and breakfast. and made me coffee and vitamen drinks. and let me sleep in the double bed. it sure was great.

at the border i met some politically active irish dude who had been working for a non-violent palestinian organisation in hebron in the west bank. he had been detained by israeli border control for 4 hours. a japanese dude who he met on the bus to the border was also detained. just cos they were talking. unlucky. told me a story about a girl he worked with who went through the border and was detained: she suddenly heard an explosion and asked what it was - the border police and performed a controlled explosion on her backpack. clothes, toiletries, shoes, books, laptop, everything up in smoke. was a good laugh.

frank never fails to impress. got to the hostel in cairo. the dude let me into the room and was chilling out waiting for the guys to come back. suddenly the door burst open and in marches frank dressed in a long white arab gown down to his ankles, leather jesus sandles, sporting a shaved head and a wispy ginger beard, munching dates with one hand and waving the koran around in the other. quality. had a good chuckle to myself.

the holyland

you can see straight away why god made israel his chosen land. hot girls. warm sun. cool sea. and cold beers. paradise. heaven. what more could you ask for? one of the hot girls perhaps... but right now i'm happy just looking.

graeme and talia's wedding was great. one of those mtv "my super sweet 16" efforts with live bands and dancers and performers and tv cameras and paparazzi and great food and loads of free booze (quality booze). it was by far the most lavish affair i've ever been to. and the jewish folk sure do know how to party. graeme was buggered after his 17th dance in a row. we could tell. he was panting. heavily.

we managed to get pretty drunk on chivas regal. as per usual we ended up throwing grapes around the dance floor. pink target was semi-comatose in his socks swigging red wine out of the bottle. stuart was eyeing out one of the barladies. howard was banging one of the barladies. fred was moving in on the mothers (but getting nowhere with the gran). spanky was rolling on the floor in the lobby. graeme was panting. heavily.

otherewise the holyland has been good to us. and a little weird. jerusalem was weird. super weird. super orthodox. jewish and christian and muslim. lots of ritual. and kissing stones. and chanting. and dark clothing. and curly-fry sideburns. and bobbing and weaving. and nothing is historically true. nobody knows where anything happened. but they'll sell you the tour.

galilee was good. we rafted in the jordan river. and then took to skimming stones. and when we got bored we played stingers with grapes. nice.

the dead sea was salty. one learning: don't try to urinate in the dead sea. it stings. super badly. i know this because i slipped up. twice. and paid the price. twice. it wasn't pleasant. sunrise at masada is pleasant though. as are the sweet water springs just up the road.

eilat is great. the diving is average. but the dead sea diving is "one of the best spots in the world". we found a cool hostel (which doubles as a dog farm) and met a che guevara lookalike dude named yeti. random. but there are no coincidences in life.

tel aviv is the bomb. super party town. super sexy girls. super nice beaches. but also super expensive.

israel teaches you that (in all probability) jesus sure was a cool guy. he probably had designer stubble and a great six-pack. he wore his baggies low and didn't take shit from no-one. he liked falafel and enjoyed the occassional beer or twelve. he was a great party entertainer and would often turn water into wine should there be a lack of alcohol - as such he was very popular and had a super active social circle. we can also deduce from our israel learnings that mary was a super-babe.

christ you know it ain't easy
you know how hard it can be
the way things are going
they're gonna crucify me

off to egypt tomo. having issues with the sudan visa.