How to make Christmas abroad more fun.

This will be my first Christmas away from home. Andrew's too. As much as seeing how another country and culture celebrates the season can be fun and enlightening, I'm a sucker for tradition. I need the trees, I need the snow, I need the terrible TV commercials and I need 'Jingle Bells' playing over the loudspeaker of every store that I walk into in order for it to feel like Christmas. I need my North American capitalism!!
So how do you 'feel' Christmas when in another country? How do you get that sensation that comes from wrapping up in a large blanket, sitting by the fire with a cup of hot cocoa staring at a beautifully decorated tree while Boney M's 'Feliz Navidad' plays softly in the background? Is it possible? In South America? In Russia....Italy? Absolutely! Just pour yourself another mug of hot chocolate, crank the Boney M and let me show you how to take some Christmas traditions from home and enjoy them abroad. AND enjoy them on a travellers budget! (Nothing!!)

The Christmas Tree

Ah yes, the tree. "How lovely are your branches!" Normally I think you would agree that bringing a dead tree into the house and covering it with light bulbs is a pretty stupid idea. But it's Christmas!! Which means 'Who cares!?!' We all get a little crazy during the holidays (I blame the gingerbread men.....but that's a different story). So, how do you capture and decorate and decorate the perfect Tannenbaum when there are none in the country you are visiting? You have a couple of options:

1. Decorate a palm tree.
Easier said than done. You've got 15 feet of trunk and a bush of leaves at the top. Not so simple for decorating. So, make a holiday game out of it! See who can climb the highest (without a ladder) to nail their ornament into the trunk. If you get the star to the top: you win! There are negative points awarded for every coconut that falls.
This of course is never ideal because no matter how much you pretend, there is nothing festive about a palm tree. But look at the bright side: think about how many presents you can fit under it!!

2. 'Borrow' a tree.
Most places of business around the world like to set up one of those fake-but-beautiful 'traditional' fir trees to make their business appear more festive. This gives their customers that gooey Christmas feeling so they will buy more stuff. You however, are after the only thing in the store that is NOT for sale. The tree. Here's the plan, pick a business that is easy to spend a lot of time in (bookstores, clothing stores etc.). Send your travelling partner in to engage the staff by complaining, trying on clothes....anything that keeps the staff from noticing you creeping through the back door and hauling the Christmas tree to your getaway wagon (that you 'borrowed' from a little boy carrying home firewood). Ah yes, nothing says 'Christmas' like green fir, a star on top and $25 gift certificates for lingerie hanging from the branches.

Eggnog

Christmas can not be spent without this holiday drink. It's like Batman without Robin, it's like bread without butter, it's like wine without cheese, soda without cracker, glue without stick!!!!!
It's sacrilegious.
But, it happens around the world.

Pagans.

Your Options:
-Fly home. Hmmmmmm... expensive.....
-Forgo eggnog this year........

Haahahahahahahahahahahahaheeheeheeheeheeheehee!!!!!!....*sniff* oh boy. Good one.

-Cry.
-Substitute goats milk and raw eggs for the Christmas goodness.........*gag* ;-P
-Ha!! Make your own!!!! It's genius!! GENIUS!!!!

So...................................How does one make their own eggnog?

I got the 'egg' part.....but what the heck is 'nog?' Hold on a sec while I consult Wikipedia......

..............................................................*on hold music*..................................................

Ah! Nog, an old European slang word for rum! So, this is best done in Europe! Now, mix your eggs with your rum, beat until frothy and enjoy the festivities!

Note: The more you have, the more festive things get! Woohoo!

Snow

Bing Crosby would be ashamed if you didn't at least attempt to spend your time abroad with a 'White Christmas!' But, as reality has it, most of the world does NOT get snow for the holidays... So here is how you beat the heat and get back on Crosby's good side.
First, find the thermostat in your hostel or hotel room and crank it way down. Below zero. Next, grab two buckets and a spoon. Head to the local supermarket. Find the frozen food section, and when nobody is looking, start scraping the ice on the sides of the freezer with the spoon. Fill the buckets. RUN back to the hostel. (If you are not quick during this step, you will end up with two buckets of water. If you try to go back to the supermarket, the police will have made it there by then).
Spread the ice shavings onto the floor of the hostel and voila! A winter wonderland!

Note: Snow angels are not recommended as they tend to shorten the lifespan of your snow... breathing should be kept to a minimum too.

Now, for the snowman, make sure you picked up a bag of marshmallows while you were at the supermarket. Big ones. Hopefully your hostel has a microwave. If so, place a marshmallow in the microwave for 1:30. This is the bottom ball of the snowman. Place another marshmallow in for 1:00. This is the middle of the snowman, and one more goes in the microwave for 30 seconds. This is the head. Maybe give him a graham cracker hat....... and chocolate chip eyes and nose.......
Mmmmmmmmm......Frosty the Smoreman.

Fruitcake

This is a tradition best left at home. Do not contaminate other countries with it. Besides, I don't think they'll let you onto the plane with that mysterious substance.....

Caroling

What better way to spread Christmas cheer than singing in the streets? Who cares if the country doesn't speak English! Jingle Bells is universal. Everybody hates it.
Just grab your travel partner for a little back-up beat-box and sing your heart out in the main square! Don't forget to lay your cap our on the ground for coins. You are after all singing for Christmas supper.

Note: I hope you're cool with a McChristmas dinner....

Reindeer Games

Believe it or not, reindeer are a pretty North American tradition. So, in other countries that DON'T know about them, it's fun to try and convince the locals that Dasher, Dancer, Prancer and Vixen, Comet and Cupid, Donner and Blitzen are Christmas gods where we come from. They fly around on Christmas eve from rooftop to rooftop pooping in the chimneys of the naughty kids. Rudolph (who is kinda like Zeus), shoots lightning from his red nose (that he got from too much holiday 'festivities').
Or, if you are travelling in northern Scandinavia, Russia or Norway where these animals actually live, you can play REAL reindeer games. All you need is a rifle and a few wild reindeers.

"Dude, Dude!! I just snagged Blitzen!"

After this season the song goes: "You know Dasher and Prancer and Comet and Donner."

Soon there won't be much left of the song.

Lights

What is Christmas without all the pretty lights? Unfortunately, many lights cost a big penny, so here's how to do it traveller style!
Head to the nearest dumpster and fish through the banana peels, diapers and leftovers to pull out wine and beer bottles (red and green would be best....keep things festive!)! Get about 12 of these. Now luckily firecrackers are cheap in most places around the world. As well as accessible. Get about 12 of these. Tie the wick of each firecracker to a long length of string, spacing each about two feet apart. Place each firecracker into a bottle and line the string of them in front of your house/hostel/hotel. Light the end of the big piece of string and enjoy the show!

Note: This may not last as long as your lights back home, but you'll have the coolest lights on the block!!

Mistletoe

What better way to break a language barrier than a little mistletoe! Grab a missile, grab a toe and see who will kiss you!

Note: Make sure you know what "Stop it you creepy moron" sounds like in the local dialect.

Stockings

Ah yes, the treasure chest for Santa to leave your booty! This could be as easy as using your own sock, but if you've been travelling, those probably smell like week-old mongolian roadkill.... Santa will NOT fill those, even if you leave him a BAG of cookies.
So luckily, the dryer is more of a North American device and most people around the world leave their laundry out to dry on the line.
If you are travelling in Japan, try to find a sumo wrestlers house, they have to have HUGE socks....
If all else fails, or there are no socks to be found, just hang your sleeping bag by the fireplace.

Watching Christmas Classics

The season can not go by without watching your holiday favorites be it 'Home Alone,' 'The Grinch Who Stole Christmas,' or 'Wonderful Life.'
Fortunately, I've found out that James Stewart speaks English, French, Spanish and Italian. He just moves his mouth funny when he does. I can bet the line "I'll lasso the moon for you Mary" sounds even more romantic in Italian...

"Io lasso di volontà la luna per voi Mary"

Whoa, I'm a dude and that just made ME melt.....

Note: Disregardhow un-manly that last comment was....

So here's the deal, find your local 'has everything' store. They usually have Christmas movies playing on the TVs for sale. Drag a sofa from the furniture department to the electronics department and enjoy the movie! Insist that you have to really 'test' the merchandise before buying.

Well, there you have it! The keys to a successful Christmas in another country. Tradition knows no borders! So, raise your glass high and toast the coming of the Savior into the world!
To everyone back home, we miss you terribly and wish we could show up under your tree this year.... but, if this made you smile in any way, accept that as a hug from us! Enjoy the season! Enjoy the eggnog! Cheers! "God bless us, everyone!"
Keep Smiling!
Feliz Navidad!
Anthony

A Brief Interlude...

Rio de Janeiro
Lisbon (Portugal)
Fatima
Madrid (Spain)
Pamplona
Lourdes (France)
Paris
Rome
Naples

It rained the first day we were in Pamplona, but the winter sun was clear and bright as we waited for the bus the next morning. The bus stop was at the end of a wide street leading into the oldest part of the city, and a short walk from the bull ring. The air was cold, and it smelled of things legendary...

We got off the bus at the foot of the moutain we had picked the day before. Standing on top of the "Ciudadela," a fortress used to defend the city when the border situation with France was still tenuous, we had tried to find a suitable climb. Most of the view had been obstructed by the mist and by the much taller newer buildings that populate the city today... but in the northwest, marked by a rainbow, loomed an enormous tree-covered hill.
"That one," I had pointed. Anthony nodded, and tucked his arms around his sides.
"Let's get out of the rain."

We set out the next day to meet our goal. Once off the bus, we made our way up an asphalt path until we found the train tracks. There was a sign that told us not to cross, but fortunately we don't speak spanish.
Across the tracks, the asphalt continued up to the trail head, and then off into a quiet Suburban neighborhood. Up at the top of the hill, there were some cell phone towers, and a bald spot that I thought would give us a good view. Off of the asphalt, the wide trail head branched off into a wild network of trails all across the mountainside. We set out without knowing where to go (as we usually do), except that upward was obviously the way to get to the top.

The trail was still damp from rain, but the trek wasn't hard. The ground was soft, covered with small corrugated leaves - a nice change from cobblestones. There were evergreens, and tall thin beeches naked for the winter. The trees were thick, but the cover would break periodically. In these places, the faded greens and browns of the forest floor would be met with piercing winter sunshine, and equally fierce northern wind. Through these bare patches, we could see cultivated land, small hamlets and farming communities, and far off in the distance the snow-capped Pyrenees.

We climbed steadily for well over an hour, meeting nothing but the whistling of wind and another faint dull sound that I had trouble recognizing.
"Do you think those are cow bells?"
Something mooed.
"Yup."
The only signs of people using the trail were a set of stone picnic tables, and a set of tracks from someone who was climbing ahead of us. We came upon a service road (up to the phone towers), and saw an older gentleman who was making the same trek as us. He seemed distracted by the cows, so we took the chance to pass him.

As we neared the summit, the clay and mud of the path gave way to rock, and the climb got steeper. Out of breath, we made it to the top and were startled by.... well, first we were startled by the old man, who had a car and had taken it to the top. Next, however, we were startled by an enormous fort that was occupying the entire 'bald spot' that we'd seen from the bottom.
We moved toward it. An enormous gate closed the entrance; above the gate was a sign that read "Fuerza de Alfonso XII." Sadly, we didn't know who Alfonso XII was - but we weren't going to pass up the oportunity to explore his legacy.

The fort was built right into the mountain, adding its moats and turrets to its already formidable natural defences. We climbed up the side of the hill around the side of the main gate.
"Mmm. The moat goes all the way around, I think."
"That's gonna make it hard to get in..."
Anthony rolled his eyes.

Not to be daunted, we set out in search of an entry point. Finally we found a point where a steep set of stairs led down into the moat, and gave us access to a passagway used previously by many shepherds (from all the sheep poo) and artists (from all the graffiti). Following in the footsteps of such noble predecessors, we made a thorough exploration of the castle - from the northern lookout posts and battlements, to the underground where arrow slits opened out onto the moat - from the prickly underbrush outside and the prison cells inside, to the long tiled halls where old Alfonso probably spent his time. The place was a miniature city, with space for hundreds of people to live (and live well), courtyards and balconies contrasted by towers from which one could see anyone coming for miles - and provided us with a fantastic vista of Pamplona.

Finishing with the exploration, we declared the excursion a success. We exited the way we came in (which turned out to be the only viable way), and went to eat lunch on a bench in front of the fort. The sun came out and warmed our wind-bitten hands. We opened a bottle of cheap wine with a corkscrew bought specifically for the occasion, and toasted while we ate delicious sandwiches, laughing and talking and passing the bottle back and forth.

We drank a bottle of wine on top of a hill in Spain - in front of a fort, which makes it even cooler. We toasted Quinn, and his family, and Scott, and his upcoming marriage and his family; and there was enough wine there for a rather large number of combinations along those themes.

So, while it may not be liturgically accurate to say this for another week, the story is told, so I'll say it now: Merry Christmas, Quinn. Fond thoughts and regards, my friend. Tell Scott that we had him there too.

"Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night."

Andrew

Cows Vs. Humans.

Salta (Argentina)
Puerto Iguazu
Foz do Iguassu (Brazil)
Sao Paulo
Rio De Janeiro


Hooray!! Anthony can type with both hands again! (He can also tie his shoes and wipe his bum all by himself!) By ´Anthony´ I mean me... I am sorry to say that I am getting better and you once again have to put up with my perception of this trip...(I apologize to all the intelligent people out there...) Anyways, on with the blog...

*ahem*

I never thought paradise existed in this life.
Imagine a place where the sun shines on cobble-stone streets that are lined with palm trees...
Imagine a place where wine flows like water...
Imagine a place where the best steak you have ever tasted is the cheapest thing on the menu...
Imagine a place where buses and bikes stay ON the road...
Imagine a place where the local ice cream store sells 1/2 kilo tubs of your favorite flavour for $2.87...

This is Argentina.

This is also my retirement plan...

I biblical times there was a journey through the desert to get to the ´land of milk and honey.´ Now if you give the Israelites more modern lingo (and diet), you´ve got the ´land of wine and steak.´
We´re on the same page now eh?
I´m almost convinced there may be a geographical translation error and that this is probably where the Israelites really ended up. Moses actually parted the Atlantic Ocean...
The Egyptians stopped at the shore and saw them 1,457km away (approximately where the Titanic would sink some thousands of years later) and said: "Ha! Forget that! Let´s go back to Egypt and wear funny hats, do cool dances and dress up our cats."
I guess all those details will be in next years "New American-revised-translated-King Tut-re-revised-illustrated-deciphered-and-ultra-interpreted Teen Bible..."

There we were in Argentina. We totally had to try this legendary steak... We went out with about six friend to a nice restaurant (the kind that serves bread free of cost... You know a place has class if it comes with free baguettes... If I ever own a restaurant you will get entire castles of bread with baguette pillars that you get to play and jump around in. Then you eat your way back to your table...
which is also made of bread...
THAT´S class.)
We had waiters in bow ties, free champagne and instrumental music playing softly... I wore shorts and a stained T-shirt. I even went the extra mile and wore my ball cap to match my underwear.
The evening then proceeded as follows:
Small talk, small talk, small talk, wine, small talk, beer, small talk, small talk, bread...

Then the heavens must have opened up and the music turned to trumpet fanfare as the waiters brought forth the most amazing piece of meat I think I have ever beheld...
They proceeded to lay the fatted calf in front of me...
My mother would be proud.
As would the chunky kid I went to elementary school with who used to fit 6 Oreo cookies into his mouth at once...
Actually, I´m not too sure this wasn´t him on my plate...

This was the biggest piece of dead cow I have ever seen-no, scratch that, ´cow´ isn´t manly enough of a word to describe the smorgasbord that lay before me... I had a full-out massive, macho, meat-eating, spitting, scratching, weight-lifting, Aye-Carramba BULL on my plate! I felt like one of those bull fighters in Spain waving the red cape...

NOTE: The red cape was actually my tongue hanging out of my mouth...drooling in my champagne...

At this point I discovered another drawback to Bolivian bus crashes. (If you are clueless about bus crashes and broken shoulders check out thenutztravel.blogspot.com)
While in my cast I had been making a list of things that are hard to do with only one arm:

1. Tie shoes.
2. Peel Oranges.
3. Spread butter.
and
4... Cut Steak...!

Imagine a paralytic getting roller-skates for Christmas... I almost cried.

Fortunately there was a Swedish girl who came with us six and was sitting beside me and pitied the poor gimp and helped out. (She should get a medal or something, just because cutting a piece of meat like that should take more than a fork and knife....
I´m thinking along the lines of chainsaw...)

She also had absolutely gorgeous hands....

The rest of her might have been lovely as well, but I only remember the hands... that were cutting up that delectable chunk of bovine on my plate...

They must breed cows like crazy down here because I´m sure they had to take out an entire herd to feed our table...

Incredible steak. Perfect steak. Perfect wine. Perfect bread... The whole meal cost me a whopping $11.13...
That´s about how much a glass of water costs at ´The Keg´ back home...

I might just move down here and be a cow farmer... Or a waiter in a bread castle...

The rest of Argentina was beautiful, it had a very European feel to it. We had our camera fixed in Salta (It broke at the Salt Flats in Bolivia), said goodbye to some friends heading to other places and made our way to the next check mark on OUR list. Iguassu Falls.... 36 KM of waterfalls....
Man, standing among them made me have to pee..
One of those pees that comes out of nowhere but hits you like a bowling ball in the bladder...

We found ourselves walking on a path to a certain set of falls on which a sign was posted:

"Natural habitat, beware of dangerous animals. Keep children in view."

I didn´t take my eyes off Andrew.

As if not enough has happened already, the stupid part of me wanted to see a jaguar.
I don´t know what I would have done if one showed up considering my right arm is useless...
I imagined myself running (picture Forrest Gump to get an idea of how a handicapped person runs...)as fast as I could with the Jaguar trotting along behind me... smelling sweat and smiling...
Then he easily takes me down and eats my LEFT arm...

I quickened my pace to the falls.

They were a thing of beauty. Once again words will always fall short if one tries to capture the feeling of standing there with a panoramic view of so many waterfalls, the roar of the water, the mist in your face, the glow of the rainbows, the pee running down your leg...

From the falls we stopped in Sao Paulo to meet/stay with the family of one of Andrews friends. What amazing people! They put up with our non-existent Portuguese, made us home-cooked meals, gave us room to sleep AND gave us a tour of the city! Which included one of the best sandwiches I´ve ever eaten.... Take your favorite sandwich meat, buy about $15 worth of it for one sandwich, heat it up on the grill, melt cheese over it, stack it on a bun and enjoy the ecstasy. It was kinda like Arbys... but the one in the picture, not the one you actually get...

A few pictures and goodbyes later and we were off to Rio De Janeiro! We were hoping to get a little R&R on the Copacobana and Impanema beaches before heading off to Europe, but events and shady people prevented that...that´s later in the story, sit still.
Patience young Jedi.

The first day we walked along the Copacobana beach to get a feel for it. The problem with a beach in a city that size is that everybody, of all different sizes and shapes decides to show a little skin...
I think that day every man over 80 in the city whose body hadn´t seen the light of day since it came out of the womb thought: "Hey! WHY not today?!"
"I didn´t buy that speedo 53 years ago for nuthin!"

So we left the beach.

In the afternoon we headed up to the ´Christ Redeemer´ statue. You know that huge monument of Jesus that you see in the movies, where they do this huge panoramic wrap-around shot? That´s the one. Recently named one of the seven wonders of the world.
The day we visited was also International Campaign Against AIDS day (Dec 1st) and there was a big ceremony up at the statue with speakers, music, signs, and all of it...in Portuguese. We even walked on some red carpet... in shorts and a stained T-shirt. (It didn´t quite merit my ball-cap status though...) We were also handed out stickers, ribbons, programs and....condoms.
Of all the places in the world where I thought I MIGHT be handed a condom, the worlds largest statue of Jesus wasn´t the first one that came to mind...

The next day was Pizza Sunday (an idea we brilliantly came up with in Peru where Sundays we do nothing(I think someone smarter than us came up with that before us...). In the evening we just eat pizza and drink wine. This way at the end of the trip we will know where to send you for the worlds greatest piece of pizza and glass of wine! Cheers!) This Sunday we got to enjoy our pizza on the Copacobana boardwalk beside the beach and watch the sunset.

This is why I travel.

After supper we decided to dip our feet into the Atlantic to make our ´coast to coast´ experience official...

After about five minutes on the beach we were approached by two guys with knives who started asking for money (undoubtedly the only word they knew in English...) We didn't really have any on us. But they saw my camera slung around my shoulder. They had me on the ground in seconds (they've obviously done this before...) and were grabbing at the camera. My glasses came off and I couldn't see, they started kicking me and poking me with the knives. I started yelling and they covered my mouth. I had trouble fighting at all with my broken arm. I held on to the camera pretty tight, but they kept tugging and the strap snapped. There was a scramble in the sand for it, but I was in pain, and couldn't see.

So they took off with it.

*sigh*

I hope they like my pictures. I´m sorry that we will be missing a few on Facebook from a chunk of our journey. A friend promised to send me some of Iguassu, so I will post those.
So, we spent our R&R day nursing wounds, getting over the surprise (and disgust) at the human race, and shopping for a new camera.

Sing:
"We were mugged down at the Copa, Copacabana!"

Friggen Manilow.

Never really liked that song anyways.

AND I have no girl from Impanema to report either.

Lesson of the day: Life is not like a song.

(Not really like a movie either, otherwise I would have pulled a Jackie Chan on those muggers.)

All in all, we are alive and the adventure continues. We are in Spain. Saying that somehow fixes everything for me... But THAT, my friends, is for another day...
Keep Smiling!
Anthony

Portuguese lesson for the day:
"Sei Kung-Fu, e se você não me der a minha câmera atrás serei conseguido usá-lo!"

"I know Kung-Fu, and if you don´t give me my camera back I´ll be forced to use it!"

Cuzco
Puno
Copacabana (Bolivia)
La Paz
Uyuni
Salta (Argentina)

Bienvenidos todos a Argentina!

It´s only been just under two weeks since our last post, but it seems like much longer. The extremes to which our trip has gone have passed even what we might exaggerate, and so Andrew, the less imaginative and slightly more level-headed brother, is back at the keyboard. Gather ´round, and I´ll tell you a story...

We´ve added some more people to our family since our last note. After visiting Machu Picchu, Anthony and Jeremy went ahead to Lake Titicaca (the highest navigable lake in the world- we were wondering what this was supposed to mean, but it sure sounds good). I hung back in Cuzco to check out a fantastic ongoing project called Aldea Yanapay (look it up yourselves, and you´ll probably understand why I was interested: www.aldeayanapay.org ), then went to catch up with them. While I was catching up, I met Mario, another volunteer from the Pisco project, and his friend Olof (from Sweden), and invited them to join us.

Together, the five of us visited the reed islands of ´Los Uros,´an indigenous tribe that actually faded out in the 60s and 70s, and was replaced by tourist shops and even a telephone on the water. For what it was, it was pretty cool.
After the islands, we set out for Copacabana, another tourist town on the Bolivian side of Lake Titicaca, to see the Isla del Sol, the legendary birthplace of the Inca; crossing the border, we met up with a Finnish girl named Carolina, and on our way to the island we met an Irish gentleman named Robin; both of them joined us as well.

Seven people. Seven is a lucky number, is it not? I suppose, now that it´s all said and done, we have been lucky. Blessed is perhaps a better word, but however you call it, we´re all very good friends now, and happy to have made it out of this adventure alive...

After Copacabana, we travelled into La Paz, the capital of Bolivia - we arrived between ten and eleven at night, and the city was alive! The city lights were spread like stars or flowers through the valley and up the sides of the mountains. As we drove through we could see vendors selling everything from baby shoes to street meat; mothers, fathers, and children pushing their way down the sidewalk; and young couples everywhere, finding ´privacy´ on park benches and in small awnings.

We were hugely excited to try the street meat that night (it comes highly recommended), and just as excited to check out the market the next day; there hadn´t been any bank machines in Copacabana, and we had to squeak by on the cash we exchanged at the border. I was so excited about this, in fact, that I left by bank card in the machine that I ended up using.

Ouch.

But don´t worry! There are ways around that, and there´s more to see and do!

Despite the better judgement we should have had after the bike ride down to Machu Picchu, on Tuesday night five of us (Me, Anthony, Olof, Robin, and Jeremy) decided that on Wednesday we would ride down (and I quote) "The World´s Most Dangerous Road." How bad could it be? If this was anything like the reed islands, it´d just be another hyped-up tourist trap...

We should have realized it was otherwise when we heard that eight people had died making this bike trip, but perversely that somehow made us more excited. There were a couple other chances for the penny to drop when we set out that morning (for example, the simple sight of the cliffs we would be riding along - or when I started to vomit at the top because of the altitude - or when my contact lense dried out and stuck to the back of my sunglasses just as a jeep blew past me on a curve and narrowly avoided being destroyed by an oncoming truck), but it didn´t actually occur to us how dangerous this activity was until one girl in our group rode off a cliff.

None of us saw it, but all heard her scream. The first few seconds were filled with unbelief and cursing; then we ran back to where she had fallen. She had been passing another member of our group on the gravel road, and wasn´t able to slow down enough for the curve. We stood and stared at where she lay about a hundred yards (a football field) down the side of the mountain. The first thing we realized was that she was alive - she was crying out and asking for help. The second thing was that she couldn´t move on her own.

There were no easy ways down, and no way to call for an ambulance. Most of us spent our time watching stupidly while the driver of our group´s van climbed down to see what he could do. Another group came was passing by that time, and loaned us a harness and a rope long enough to get her up if she climbed a little higher. The girl and the driver determined that she was able to walk with help, so together they managed to get to the harness.

We were happy to be able to help hoist her up, and send her ahead of us to a hospital. She ended up being fine: a bump on the head, a few cracked ribs and possibly a broken ankle last we heard. But it was a rude realization for the rest of us. If she had rode off at any other part of the road, she probably would have died - the place where she had fallen was a shallower incline than the 90 degree cliffs along most of the way, and it actually ended in a sort of valley 100 yards down, whereas most of the cliffs dropped much further. Suddenly, all the crosses and plaques that marked the places where people had died took on new meaning. We rode more carefully on the way down, and spent a good chunk of the ride back to La Paz in silence.

Life is a beautiful thing. We have an unexpected and exciting chance to experience the unexpected, to climb hills and mountains, to taste the sweetness of an orange past the bitterness of the peel... but best of all, we are able to laugh and tell stories and share all of these things with the people around us. I´ve spoken with many of you at great length, and if we´ve been fortunate enough to talk about things like life and people, you know that this kind of grandiose sentiment makes its way in and out of what I believe - I bring it up now because the story continues, and life is a good context for it.

Take a break. Get some hot chocolate if its cold outside. I´m not finished yet.

After our biking fiasco, the same five of us decided to get out of La Paz and move on to the Salt Flats - a much more tame tourist attraction...
Then our bus crashed.

I was still feeling ill when we set out on the bus at 7:30 pm local time, on Thursday the 15th. I had to make a trip to the bathroom before we left, and ended up having to run to catch the bus while Anthony stalled the driver... which seems ironic, now that I think of it. I fell asleep almost immediately, so I don´t remember much before the crash, but I´ve been told that because of traffic, it took us over two hours to get out of La Paz. That may have put the driver in a hurry, I don´t know. I do know that it was raining and storming badly; lighting struck right beside the bus at one point. Whatever the cause of the crash, we apparently swerved twice, then the bus did a 180 degree turn on the highway, and flipped onto its side in the ditch.

I woke up to swerving screaming chaos. I couldn´t tell which way was up, or who I was touching. Things moved so fast , and I tried to keep up. There was a woman with her head caught between two seats, and a man standing on top of her. He was in shock. A girl named Nina and I pushed and coaxed and yelled at him in bad spanish to get off of the woman and sit on the roof, which was at a 45 degree angle to what seemed to be the ground. I tried to open the roof hatch to get people out, but it was apparently only for ventilation. Anthony told me he was going to pass out, his shoulder hurt. Nina and I talked to him and got him out with the help of the military who had arrived by that time. We tried to help the lady who had her head stuck, but we weren´t able to - soon the military guys took over anyways.

Outside the bus, we managed to get all of our team and all of our stuff together. Ambulances came and took the most badly injured to the hospital. Olof and Robin were in a lot of pain, so we got them onto the second set of ambulances, which came an hour or so later. The rest of us (including me, Anthony, and Jeremy) waited another hour and a half until some big-hearted locals stopped by to pick us up and take us back to La Paz. Fortunately, we were only about a half-hour´s drive away.

In the hospital overnight, and during the next day, the story unfolded itself slowly. Nobody had died in the crash, thank God, and the most serious injuries were broken bones - no serious head or back trauma or other debilitating injuries. Of the five of us, Anthony has a crack in his collarbone, Olof has some stitches in his ear, and Robin, Jeremy and I have nothing but a few bumps and bruises. The doctors thought for a moment that Anthony might need to get surgery to put some bones back in place (which would have sent us home), but they realized quickly that they had switched his x-rays with someone else´s. Whew.

I remember wondering with Anthony whether the things that kept happening were some kind of sign to go home. We´ve had a peaceful trip for the most part, and then in a short time Anthony´s I-Pod was stolen, I lost my bank card and became very ill, a girl in our group rode off a cliff, and in the confusion I almost lost my glasses (they were in the van that took her to the hospital). After the bus accident, though, this wondering has settled into a kind of stubborn determination to continue... even with Anthony in a sling. ...that´s life, after all.

That being said, while we were in Uyuni to see the world´s largest salt desert, our camera stopped working. Then the news informed us that in La Paz, thousands of Bolivians were marching toward the Senate to overthrow it, and it was predicted that the President would be next...
We hopped the next train out of the country.

Twenty-four hours later, we found ourselves here, in Salta. Argentina is a very "european" country, and so its been a good place to sit and actually relax....

This afternoon, deciding that we needed a break, Anthony and I consoled ourselves by going to get our beards shaved and eating a half-kilogram of ice cream...
Anthony needed the calcium. And just imagine how cute all the Argentinian girls must have thought it was to see me feeding my gimpy brother...

That is the story so far; we´re all in one piece, though still a bit shaken, and wary of night buses. I don´t think we´ll be exaggerating about near-death experiences anymore, having been close to the real thing. But please don´t stop reading- I assure you, that the adventure will continue, and that we´ll keep ourselves alive to tell the story.

God bless. You´re in our prayers- please keep us in yours. It´s kept us safe so far.

Liquid Gold and Ancient Temples

Pisco
Huacachina (Ica)
Cuzco

Personally I do not enjoy carbonated beverages. However, surprisingly here in Peru, I have found a small exception whose very name calls forth trumpet fanfare and a chorus from heaven.
**Cue heavenly choir**

--INCA KOLA--

DaDa!! This yellow beverage with a blue label, to my experience, has hooked everyone who has tried it by both refreshing and delighting its consumers without that rusty-nail feeling that most colas leave on your teeth.
Imagine liquid bubble gum with a hint of cream soda tantalizing your taste buds while the light bubbles that dance around your mouth are less like a soda and more like a champagne feeling...
*sigh*
I think I´m in love.
Also, if this drink comes from the Incas, an intelectually advanced race, I figure it´s got to be even good for you. Maybe it has long-lost medicinal purposes. A cure for everything from leprosy to diahrrea...
I was sure to have regular, healthy doses. You know, keep up my Vitamin P.
I think that Machu Picchu, the hidden city of the Incas is actually also El Dorado, the lost city of gold where they had a fountain of Inca Kola in the Main Square that cascaded liquid gold into the streets...(or maybe thats just heaven....have to wait and see.)

I don´t think that any trip to Peru can be complete without visiting that ancient city, so, like good tourists, after we finished volunteering, we picked up a friend (Jeremy, he´s from America-but we like him anyways. He´ll probably be travelling with us until Rio de Janeiro) and started a five day, four night trek to Machu Picchu, the lost city of the Incas-nestled high on top of the Andes. (Machu Picchu actually means "Old Mountain." Okay, you owe me a drink for helping you win that round of Trivial Pursuit...)
The first day we were on horses (riding horses searching for a lost city-trust me, the Indiana Jones theme song was stuck in my head ALL day...).
I remember reading somewhere that bovine flatulence was a leading cause of ozone depletion and global warming, but I think the horses we were given put those numbers to shame. These had to be some of the gassiest animals on the planet. I bet 12 more people in the world have skin cancer because of our four-hour climb in the Andes. Sometimes the trail was pretty narrow and we had to ride single file... There was a pretty fierce battle for who got to ride in the front.

The second day I think the scariest thing that has happened on this trip so far took place. We had to take a bus high up to a point where we would get mountain bikes to continue the trek. The road up was like one of those you´ve probably heard about may be named "Dead Mans Pass" or "Super-High Cliff Of Death" where they collect all the cars at the bottom for spare parts. On the right side of the bus you have the side of the mountain, and on the left you have 2,978 feet straight down.
No guard rail either.
This is where it gets fun.
Our bus had to stop up there because they just had a landslide and a layer of rock was covering the road. Since there is no handy side-street to cut down, we got to experience ´extreme four-wheel busing.´ I didn´t know this was part of the tour package.
As the bus crawled over the rocks the whole vehicle started rocking back and forth, back and forth, side to side. I flashed back to images of my childhood where I used to throw toy cars down the stairs. I also wished I had never seen the movie ´Speed´, because I started to picture what it would be like without a happy ending.
I think I actually kissed the ground when I stepped off that bus.
The rest of the day went pretty well. Mountain biking in the Andes was sort of a dream come true. I don´t think words can do justice to the feeling you get flying down a mountain with the wind in your face and the Andes 360 degrees around you.
The next day was equally if not more beautiful as we started two days of hiking on an ancient trail built by the Incas. I´ve never really lost my breath due to nature before (maybe it was just the hiking), but this was incredible. The mountains, the rivers, the jungle, my pictures will never do it justice.
Honestly, it was almost as good as HD.
Apparently the Incas had messengers (Chaskis) that would run along this trail and, through a series of them, could get a message across the country in 2-3 days.
That´s if you ExpressPost it.
Or, if the king in Cuzco wanted a fish, out go the messengers to Arequipa, a coastal town (about 800km away) and the king could have a fresh fish from the ocean back for suppertime. Crazy. The Dominos Pizza delivery guys will never be fast enough for me again.
I hope the Chaskis got a tip...
The trail was like a mini version of Deadmans Pass, wall to your right, death to your left. So as I hiked holding firm to the wall, I was thinking about Inca human sacrifice rituals and I tried to imagine a Chaski bolting down this trail full speed, barefoot, and what might be going through his head...

"Don´t drop the fish, don´t drop the fish, don´t drop the fish...
Man, I could really go for some sushi right now....
I wish Nike was around... I could make a killing in a sponsorship deal....
Air-Chaski."

Actually, I guess running along a cliff, the last thing you want to catch is air...

The morning of Machu Picchu we rose at 4:00am to hike up the mountain and catch the sunrise over the city. When I woke up, I had so many bug bites (noceeums) on my ankles that they had swollen up and were quite painful. I know a couple people reading this that will shake their heads when I say that I did the hike anyways. Probably close to 10,000 steps up on swollen ankles.
Nike deal that Mr. Chaski.

The ancient city itself was a pretty nice pile of rocks. Incredible stone architecture that was mostly intact as it remained undiscovered when the Spanish came in the 1500´s and almost wiped out the Incas. Machu Picchu was abandoned shortly after the conquest anyways; but no one is quite certain of the reason...
I bet they just ran out of Inca Kola...

After returning to Cuzco in the evening by train, we celebrated Jeremy´s birthday with some killer lasagna and a few drinks at an Irish Pub...-in Peru... What? We´re not giong to Ireland on this trip.... That´s on the next one.
Some Irish lads at the pub taught us a second verse to ´Happy Birthday:´

"Oh, he´s a good boy through and through
But he´s an alchie so they say,
He tried to go to heaven but he went the other way, he went
Down, down, down, down, down, down..."

(You continue chanting as the birthday boy downs whatever drink they have in front of them.)
Cheers!
Keep Smiling!
Anthony

Spanish lesson for the day:
"¡Salud! Desear vida, la salud, la felicidad, y pueden parada del alcohol usted de sentir sus sensaciones"
"Cheers! To long life, health, happiness, and may alcohol stop you from feeling your feelings!"
(This was my toast to Jeremy-he was pretty upset after losing his cell phone an hour prior....just trying to help! ;-)

The Richter Scale.

Pisco

When you travel with someone, alot of times the ideas they will bounce off of you are similar to: "Hey let´s go check out that beach" or "let´s try this type of food..." You know, kind of a mutal idea of "lets be safe and not die."

I´m travelling with Andrew.

"Hey Anthony, Pisco in Peru just had this massive, destructive, killer earthquake. Wanna go there for a month?"

As much as I love an adrenaline rush, gettig engulfed by the earth itself and tumbling into the pits of hell isn´t really the thrill I had in mind.

We found out about HODR (Hands On Disaster Relief) at a hostel in Lima and since we were looking for a volunteer opportunity anyways, this falling into our lap was perfect. Minus that whole abyss due to aftershocks thing...

They don´t really ease your worries when you show up either. The first thing you do is sign a page-long, point 8 size "release form."
Excerpt:

"...these and other hazards and dangers may result in injuries to the participant, which includes without limitation, falling, being struck, dismembered or crushed, colliding with objects or people, experiencing vehicle collisions, being injured or sickened by machinery, pbjects, animals, water, mold or people (collectively "injury")

At least they´re looking out for us.

My first day on the job, I went from pauper to prince rather quickly. I spent the morning cleaning rubble from on families living room and in the afternoon went with a group of volunteers to a building now acting as a school where the kids had a bit of a sports rally going on. The kids hated the idea of our original Q&A purpose and quickly had the volunteers pitted against each other in some brutally competitive rounds of musical chairs and wheel-barrow races.
Chock one up for Canada. I am now the officially crowned musical chair king of Peru.
My prize was a juice box. Orange juice. Down here, that´s kind of like giving me a gold bar.
Even now, if I´m working on a job site and some kids walk by, they call me by name.... "Hola Anthony!!"

Told you I was royalty.

Since that day my routine has been pretty consistant: Wake, breakfast, sledgehammer, shovel, sledgehammer, shovel, sledgehammer, shovel, sledgehammer, shovel, lunch, sledgehammer, shovel, sledgehammer, shovel, sledgehammer, shovel,wheel-barrow, shower, supper, meeting, free-time, bed.
I do however think that it is every boys dream to wake up in the morning, be shown a house and then have someone hand you a sledgehammer and say "have fun!"
No therapy can beat this. I´m sure that if I ever had any grudges against anyone before, it´s all been taken out on the walls right here. This is what inner peace feels like.
I think I might start my own therapy/demolition business. Marriage counseling 101.

Being here a month though has gotten me into the habit of taking a hammer to the ruins of any house I see... I think it might be a bad idea to make the ancient ruins of Macchu Picchu our next stop...
I´ll be the stupid tourist taking a wheel-barrow full of Picchu back down the Inca Trail.
I´ll also be the stupid tourist in a Peruvian jail trying to convince them that the sacred temple was only sacred hundreds of years ago...

We saw a bit of a change in schedule the other day when a news crew from Lima stopped us on the job site to interview a few volunteers. I was on Peruvian television.
Told you I was royalty.
Unfortuanetly we don´t have T.V. here... It would have been really cool to see myslef dubbed over in Spanish.

A few pepole at home were worried about us marching into earthquake territory, but on the first day you get here, they give you a safety talk on what do do if there is an "event" (They use the word "event" because "eathquake" is like a bad word here... even in english). They show you the quickest exits and extra ones just in case the doorways are clogged by people not moving fast enough.
On our second night here, we had a small "event" at about 2:45 AM
I went from asleep to a full-out run in a time that would have put most sports cars to shame.
0-60 in 0.000375 seconds.
It could have been a guy snoring too loudly in the bunk below me and I wouldn´t have known until I was safely down the street crouching in the fetal position.

Just a sidenote: I´d be cool with the ground never moving again.

HODR also works in conjunction with UNICEF on another project that provides "Ludotheca" tents in the refugee camps. This is basically a safe place for kids in the camp to play and HODR volunteers are encouraged to take a day off from the toil of rubble removal every now and then and play with the kids.
I tried this out. I´m sure that it would have even been a nice change if these children hadn´t been raised by Satan himself. I think I have more bruises cuts and muscle pains from my day at Ludotheca than I do from a week of rubble.
How do you say "Don´t kick me there" in Spanish?

Serious though, our time here has been phenominal. It´s an incredible experience to help people who have lost everything. The look in their eyes as you leave the job-site is something you´ll never forget. Most of them are even in amazing spirits and like to joke around like me, but we do so carefully, trying only to raise the spirits in the midst of tragedy.
The earthquake was serious, many lost their lives, and we are the lucky ones given the privilige to help those who have lost so much. We´ve met amazing people from all over the world, joining together to rebuild this community. Friendships that will probably last forever. Before now I´ve never really known what it feels like to help someone who can´t pay you back... I don´t ever really want to stop feeling this way.

Please keep the families, community and volunteers in your prayers. Also, check out aidgle.com. It´s the exact same search engine as Google, but for the next month every search that is done through there gives HODR a donantion! Zing! I know! I even search for hotmail and facebook through it. www.aidgle.com Spread the word!
Keep Smiling!
Anthony

Spanish lesson for today: "Mi casa es su casa" - "My house is your house."

Iquitos
Lima
Pisco

GAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHH! -

Thank you. I needed a minute to catch my breath. Yesterday, we arrived in Pisco. Pisco is a city in the Ica region of Peru... Ica being the region that was rocked by a massive earthquake on August 15th. The town is a shambles, as one might imagine, with rubble and the teetering remains of walls and buildings all around, and the streets lined with chunks of rock and thatch that families have cleared out of what used to be their homes. But a couple months after the initial devastation, people are doing as they do, and rebuilding their lives.

Anthony and I are here with a very motley group of volunteers, many or even most of them backpackers like us, who are offering some time out of their trip to help with the clean up, both of houses and of lives. It´s great. I was absolutely coated in adobe dust today. Head to toe. I´ve worked in some dusty places (Gerard knows), but the dust got into places I´ve never found it before. Like my ears. I scratch them and my finger turns black.

Anyways, all of you are missing some information, and we´ve only been here a day, so I´m going to skip backwards a bit, and tell you what happened after our jungle adventure.

Skip, skip, ski- THUD!

Ungh.





After we escaped from the jungle (I think that´s a fair statement - the little jalopy that carted us most of the way out navigated some dirt roads I´d be scared to try with four wheel drive), we were rushed (in the whirlwind way we´re now familiar with) to a boat bound for the Brazil/Peru/Columbia border - a city called Tabatinga. Our jungle tour included the fare for this boat, as well as (fanfare!) new hammocks!

Now, I think that we need to print a retraction for one of our previous blog entries, or at least an apology. We wrote earlier that the hammocks in Belize were terrible, and we slept terribly in them. Well, they were, and we did. That´s not what I´m sorry about. The mistake we made was in generalizing that experience to all hammocks, everywhere, including (regrettably) Brazilian hammocks. This, my friends, was a great and terrible oversight. We spent the better part of a week on this boat, sleeping each night in a hammock, and it was fantastic. So fantastic, that often we spent the better part of our days in the hammock as well.

The boat trip, as with many of the good things that providence has dropped into our laps on this trip, was a very well-timed change of pace from the hectic daily zooming from place to place. A chance to watch the sun rise and set every day; to watch pink dolphins coming up for air, and a host of little fish jumping in the wake of the boat; to see houses and villages, and how the inhabitants depend so much on the river for their daily life...

This part of the trip was less fraught with the gut-twisting ironies and narrow successes that we´ve experienced so far; but we were on the boat with the same people for several days, and the characters we encountered were even better.

Within a day, the girls in the hammocks across from us developed a crush on Anthony. They first expressed their feelings by trying to get me (through a series of gestures) to set him up with one of them. Then, they began learning some english phrases to match the little portugese we were learning. Finally, as they were leaving on the third or fourth day (they got off earlier than we did), they approached him and confessed their love for him. I thought it was hilarious. He didn´t.

There was also a young man on his way to a new school where he was going to learn english. Keen to begin his studies, he tried to get us to teach him a bit while we were en route... easier said than done, though, because although his portugese was fantastic, ours was non-existent, and his spanish was worse than ours. Nevertheless, over two language barriers and with a whole lot of embarrassed silences and laughing, we made good friends with him.

There was a young woman from France, who was in fact just finishing her own world tour - in the opposite direction. She endured our rusty french, and gave us some tips about what to do and how to manage in some of the countries we´ll be going through eventually. That, and she was the one who discovered they had fruit salad in the kiosk on the top deck of the boat - it was heavenly after a world of pasta, rice, beans, and meat, pasta, rice, beans, and meat - every day.

Another, perhaps one of the most helpful people we´ve met so far, was a man enlisted in the Brazilian military named Misael (Meeshac in English). He spoke little english, but his spanish was excellent, and he seemed to really enjoy the challenge of teaching us. Between our conversations with him and with his other acquaintances on the boat, we learned more useful spanish and portugese than we could gain from weeks of reading our phrasebooks and checking things on the internet.

There were many other enjoyable personalities, but I´ll skip most of them to tell you about this one; about four days in, a fourteen-year-old girl joined us as a passenger on the both, and enjoyed the novelty of meeting someone who didn´t speak portugese at all. She was talking to Anthony, who was telling her (as best he could) about our country and our family. Anthony pulled out a picture of our family to help explain, and when he did she was suddenly and absolutely smitten with love for... Jefferey. Jeffery Hoffman, there is a fourteen year old girl in Brazil who thinks you are the most beautiful human being on the planet.

Hmm. The Hoffman charm transcends race and distance, I guess.

The ride was great, but by the fifth day, we were itching to get off the boat and re-enter the impossible rush of our travels - and voila! Here we are! A brief stop in Iquitos to catch mass and a pizza (it eases the homesickness - and it´s not rice and beans), and we flew into Lima. In Lima, providence once again spoon-fed us our next step in the form of a note from two previous volunteers that recommended this particular organization to us, just as we were wondering how to get involved in the relief work here. Breakfast and a bus ride later, we signed our lives away, and will be helping out here for a couple of weeks.

So, my friends, peace and love until we meet again!

Oh, and somewhere in Manaus or on the boat, Anthony got fleas. I found that funny.

And for those who have been asking, the spiky fruit that we ate is called a Lichi fruit. You don{t eat the spikes - they´re part of a shell that you take off to expose the soft white deliciousness inside. If you ever have the chance, try one.

Andrew

"Jungle"-Native for:´Never Get Out Alive´

Panama City
Manaus (Brazil)
Tabachinga
Santa Rosa(Peru)
Iquitos

You know how they say that what you spend years building, someone could tear down overnight? One month in Central America cramming Spanish-learning everything from pineapple (Piña), to bathroom (Baños). Everything was fine when we boarded the plane in Panama City, but when we landed in Manaus, Brazil, I´m sure I looked like a pig heading to the bacon-making-place when someone tried to speak to me in Portuguese. This language of course, is relatively similar to Spanish, but only enough to mock us.

Crazy jugle-talk or not, Brazil is a pretty sweet place. Through a flurry of hand-gestures, animal-like sounds and flashing a bit of the local currency, we landed a three day/two night tour of the Amazon river/jungle.

Day 1: Pirhana fishing.

I have to start this by saying that I caught the first one. I named him Bartholemew. Now, for the record, fish should not have teeth. Somewhere, somehow there was a major wrench thrown into the circle of life.
I had never thought that fishing could ever be considered dangerous. Hunting a Tyrannosaurus Rex with a BB gun maybe......but fishing?!
I took everything I thought I would need to make sure I was the one being fed tonight... Two lifejackets, longsleeve shirt and pants, my fishing rod, and a shotgun... I also put on extra mosquito repellant, just so there was no chance of me tasting good.
I don´t think I would mind being Filet-Antonio so much if it wasn´t for the after-death conversations people would have...

"He was killed by a fish!?"

"We´ve never had problems with our goldfish before..."

It has to be the least manly way to go. I can hear the snickers at the eulogy already... I bet they´d have fish at the after-funeral reception too...

I think the entire Amazon must have heard me singing "Hakuna Matata" when Bartholemew showed up on my plate for supper.

Day 1 evening: Alligator Hunting

You´d think that one near-death-by-animal experience would suffice for one day eh? Not in the Amazon. They like to keep things interesting. (I´m guessing it is due to a serious lack of things like CBC, or X-box to keep them occupied.)
Our guide said we had to wait until after dark to go because alligators only come out at night.
I instisted that Canadians stay in and watch TV after dark to avoid being eaten by creatures that only come out at night.
Complaining only ended up making me look like a baby when we actually caught an alligator.... It was less like a volkswagon-eating, prehistoric beast and more like an oversized gecko... Still, saying I´ve been alligator hunting HAS to be a pretty sweet pick-up line.

Day 2: Jungle Trek and Swimming.

Swimming in the Amazon?! Why don´t I just lather myself in BBQ sauce and ring the dinner bell?
Is this just to finish you off in case you survived the panthers and anacondas during the jungle trek?
I remember seeing a picture in the tourguides office of the largest fish ever caught in the Amazon. It was about 11 feet long and I´m sure could swallow an Anthony-sized boy in one gulp no problemo.
So, flesh eating fish, gators and Moby Dick were the three strikes I needed to keep me on dry-land.
...and as if I needed a fourth, the next day we visited a native dwelling and saw a man fishing in his boat. Our guide asked if he had caught anything yet and the man said, "Cravadora."

In english: Death.

It actually means ´stingray´, and as our boat pulled up to his for a closer look, I had two words running through my head:

Steve Irwin.

If the croc-hunter himself didn´t stand a chance against one of those bad-boys, what stupid Canadian in his right mind would want to be in the same boat as one? Send a rabid beaver my way and I MIGHT be able to do something. Stingrays are out of my league. I contemplated jumping into the water and swimming to shore... good thing I thought that one through before putting it into action.
I was pretty impressed to watch the native fellow slice off the poisonous tail and continue to chop up the ray.... Apparently roasted-ray is pretty tasty. I´ll take their word for it.

We met three Irish lads who joined us on our three-day expedition, who had learned one South-American word that summarized the entire pupose of their three-week Brazilian tour.

Chicas.

Spanish for ´girls.´ Needless to say, they spent their time at the native dwelling looking for some Amazon babe.*
(An Amazon babe might be a long dark-haired, cinnamon skinned girl with a long skirt and a flower in her hair... but for some reason when I just wrote that I pictured a butch she-man in a leopard-skin skirt weilding a machete and swinging from vines... not exactly the Lucky Charm eating, Guiness drinking type I´d imagine)

*Jungle STD not included in package price.

I imagine there must have been some kind of contract we should have signed... where the fine print says:

Amazon Tour Company is not responsible for death or loss of limbs during this trek. Nor can it be held accountable for any loss due to alligator attack, anacondas, pìrhanas, jaguars, malaria, bad food, sunburn, drowning, lightning, tarantulas, native cannibals, stingrays, dolphins-(hey, you never know), poison darts, hang-nails, bugs, yelllow fever, fruit or other tourists. (Especially Hungarians....)

If they didn´t have anything like that, I´m sure they would have been sued by every dumb American who was bitten by a mosquito.

Portuguese lesson for the day:

"Eu nao entendo" - "I have no flippen clue what you just said to me."

More pictures coming!
Cheers from Peru!
Keep Smiling!
Anthony

Beautiful lava and dead fish.

Omoa(Honduras)
Trujillo
Tegucigalpa
Managua(Nicaragua)
San Jose (Costa Rica)
Panama city (Panama0

Soy Antonio.

Remember that waterfall I told you Andrew and I were going to bike out to after I posted my last entry?

I don't think it exists.

Or if it does I'm not sure it accurately measures up to the definition of a waterfall.
It's also apparently very dangerous to go there...(we read the warning sign AFTER we got back...)

WARNING: Backpackers are not to go to the waterfall. In April 2007 two hikers were robbed at gunpoint and chopped into little bits with a machete. Then they were fed to the fish.

(OK, I made the last part up....but the rest is true.) Apparently the guy who posted the warning is the same guys who gave us directions TO the waterfall......
He must not like Canadians.
He probably dated one once.......and she left him for some Russian hockey player. I guess having the blood of a couple Canadian backpackers on his hands is pretty good restitution.
Or maybe he IS the robber. He was just setting us up.
Man, we showed him.
We got lost.
A wrong turn took us to the city dump. Whatever was flowing here-I'm not exactly sure it was water....
We did retrace our steps and find the waterfall, but when I picture 'waterfall,' I see a beautiful blue shoot of crystal clear water cascading down the rocks into an aqua blue pool surrounded by lush green jungle. Something that yells "bathe in me!!"
I guess we should have looked up 'waterfall' in the Honduran dictionary.
We found, more or less, a stream dribbling over a few rocks about the height of my knees into a puddle that smelt like fish. (This might have had something to do with the dump next door, I'm not entirely sure.)
Well, I bathed my shins quite thoroughly.

Waterfall or not, Omoa has been one of my favorite places so far.

Now, I gotta tell you, as an Albertan born and bred, I grew up with milk in four-liter plastic jugs. Easy and efficient.
Then I moved to Ontario where they sell their milk in plastic bags... who on Gods green earth ever thought that this would be a good idea?
You have to cut the corner of the bag to pour it; and heaven-forbid you cut it too big or too small and end up with not enough or too much milk pouring through at once into your cereal. Half of it usually ends up on the counter too.

In Honduras they sell water in plastic bags.

Let's make one of life's essentials as difficult and frustrating as possible...
I poured my bag into a bottle. Me smar-tee Kanadian.

A couple days travel landed us in Nicaragua where we visited an active volcano. Volcan Masaya.
It's quite the experience to hike to the top of a smoking crater. It's also pretty fun to throw rocks into the opening to see what will happen.....
Nothing did.
C'mon, what is an adventure without a near-death experience?
Bolting down a volcano with liquid boiling magma hot in pursuit would have been a pretty cool way to start the day. (And maybe end it too....depending on how it went...)
Actually I read that the natives back in the 1200's used to worship a goddess that apparently came out of the crater to give them guidance. (We now know this phenomena as smoke.)
They would also sacrifice women and children to the smoke goddess for favors...
Could you imagine? The villagers all lined up along the craters edge...
"Oh great goddess of fire and smoke, accept this humble sacrifice of my mother-in-law..."

Push.

"...and my annoying little sister....."

Push.

I'm wondering if we really have progressed as a society. Things were much simpler back then.... You do something wrong........push.
None of this court system, probation garbage.

Today we went to the Panama Canal. Picture the Peterborough lift locks on steroids.
Exactly. Check mark for the life-list.

Spanish Lesson for the day:
"Hola hermosa, puedo comparie una bebida?" - "Hey beautiful, can I buy you a drink?"

(I don't ever plan on using this one, but it is in the need-to-know list of Spanish phrases for tourists...)
Keep Smiling!
Cheers from Panama!!
Anthony

The Same but Different

Omoa
Trujillo
Tegucigalpa
Managua

Hello everyone. Once again, I, the elder and slightly more cynical brother, am happy to chronicle how our trip has been going. Today, we made a side trip out to a place called Masaya (about half an hour from Managua, the capital of Nicacaragua) to see a volcano, and I was scalded by the billowing sulfuric fumes. Either that, or I got a sunburn. Some things about this trip aren´t much different from home...

Seriously, though. You might think that since we´re far away, things must be WAY different than they are in Canada. And a lot of things are. I was amazed at how different the people are, the language is, the methods of selling are (Masayamasayamasayamasayamasayaaaa! It´s never hard to find the bus you want, because everyone wants you on their bus), and many other things. But other things are disappointingly similar....

For example: in most of the larger centres, there´s at least a McDonalds. Pizza Hut has made a good show out here too, and in Tegucigalpa especially we saw several Dunkin´Donuts. Not to mention the ubiquitous Coca-Cola and Pepsi advertisements. They´re everywhere, including the small towns, and even random stores that are in the middle of nowhere. Tegucigalpa was actually a good example of that, too - there´s an enormous "Coca-cola" written on the hilll, Hollywood-style, only just lower than the large statue of Jesus that looks over the city.

Yes, the children of free trade and capitalism have charged in and made themselves at home in most places. It seems like much of Central America wants to be like the USA. There was even a Wal-Mart in Cancun. I was really worried about that when we saw it, but that´s the only one we´ve seen so far, fortunately. If they ever built a Wal-Mart in a place like Omoa, I think I´d have to retire from being human. Maybe I could be a lizard instead.

That being said, outside the major centres things are in fact very different from home. While in Honduras, we made a side trip out to Trujillo. There wasn´t much to draw us out there as tourists, but I think it´s been our best stop so far. The town itself is beautiful, but we didn´t actually come to see Trujillo at all. The reason we were out there was actually a very bumpy cab ride out of town, and a very wet walk back.

Let me explain. Before the idea of this trip was ever conceived, I spent a short while with a social justice club at the University of Alberta called Ignite. One of the activities we did as a group was to cook hamburgers and raise some money for a family in Honduras that needed a new roof. The president of Ignite at the time, Kara Elias, had volunteered at an orphanage close to Trujillo, and had come to know a woman named Maria Diaz while she was there. Once Kara had come back to Canada, she and Maria exchanged letters, and Maria mentioned that her roof was leaking... so, Kara and Ignite arranged to ´Raise the Roof,´and managed to raise enough money for Maria and her husband, Cristobal, to actually build a new house!

So, while this trip was still in the planning stages, I realized that we´d be passing through Honduras, and I asked Kara to put us in touch with Maria and Cristobal. She did, and we corresponded and arranged to meet.

The cab dropped us off at the orphanage, and we were brought to the house by a young woman who worked there. Maria and Cristobal were very happy to see us, and we managed (with our very sad and broken Spanish) a conversation. Amid some sharing of pictures and some good laughs, this is what we managed to find out: currently, family is living on a small acreage not too far from Trujillo. There are ten in the family all together: Maria and Cristobal, and their eight kids, the oldest of which is seventeen, and the youngest going on five. On the property, there´s a few chickens and turkeys, and some pigs - Anthony was excited to see them :). It was all indeed very different from home. Cristobal told us that the new house isn´t finished yet, because they´re waiting on a bit of material. But he knows it is going to be down close to the beach, so that they can go catch some fish, to supplment the rest of the food they have.

Sadly, our short supply of language meant we didn´t exchange much more in the way of words, but there was nevertheless a lot of warmth shared. As we left the first day, first they offered to let us use their phone to call home (we had explained to them that it was our dad´s birthday that day, and they wanted to help us offer felicidades)... when we declined (it was much too kind) they invited us for lunch the next day instead. We accepted :)

Pollo Frito! When we showed up, we sat and chatted with Cristobal in the shade as Maria finished up, and then Voila! A meal for a pair of kings! After we ate, we had a chance to speakon the phone with Maria´s brother, who lives in the west and speaks english - he told us that Maria was so grateful, she wanted to repay the whole Ignite group somehow, but wasn´t sure how to do it... so she decided the least she could do was cook for my brother and I.

It was the best meal I´ve ever eaten, in the warmest company I´ve ever shared. I still feel small in the face of their gratitude, which is toward the whole group. They welcomed us, though we invited ourselves; they endured our bad spanish and poor conversation; and Maria prepared a meal for us, the cost of which can´t be counted...

...I wish I could express it adequately for those of you who were a part of the fundraiser. I didn´t realize how much our simple flipping of burgers would mean for them.

Maria and Cristobal are very happy. And very thankful. They will soon have a new house.

Sorry to the rest of you Ignite members, though. Anthony got your share of the chicken.

Peace and love be with you all.

Andrew

Buses fly - In hurricanes.....

Cancun
Chetumal
Belize City

This is Anthony again.

Money is a funny thing here. It´s amazing what a difference a little amount can make.

When taking the bus from Chetumal, Mexico to Belize City, Belize you can pay $100 pesos (roughly equivalent to $10 American) for the Mexican Greyhound (ADO). You´ve got nice padded seats, an en-route movie, air conditioning and a pee-pot in the back. Now, for $90 pesos (roughly $9 American) you can take the ´economy´ bus.
We call it a school bus. A regular old cheesewagon. No AC, no movie, no pee-pot, and the one dollar downgrade even takes away your seatbelts.

So, we took the cheesewagon.

If not for the simple reason that it FEELS like you´re travelling. It also feels like you might die. Maybe that´s where the excitement comes from. Pure adrenaline.

I mean, in movies its always the school bus that blows up. I´ve never seen a Greyhound go up in smoke.......That one dollar can be precious.

It´s also the school bus in the movies that the 6-foot 300-pounds-of-muscle guy comes on board with an uzi and demands your passport, money and any gum that you might be carrying. (I only assume the gum part because their teeth are always so white....maybe it´s just a Hollywood oversight...)
I figured that if this was going to happen, it would happen at the Mexican/Belize border.
So when we pulled into customs, that´s when I started telling Andrew how much I cared about him.

Oh, by the way, when we got on the bus and the guy came around to collect payment, we both gave him $100 pesos and got no change. So we payed for an ADO anyways. ....He must have thought it was a tip. Or he knows we´re about to die and it doesn´t matter anyways.

Customs was actually a piece of cake, and I didn´t even see one uzi. Is it wrong that I´m almost disappointed?

---Random thought change---

Have you ever wanted waterfront property? Maybe a beachside cottage...? Every time I go to the beach I would think "Why can´t I live here? This is home..."

I am now living inland for the rest of my life.

As you may have heard on the news, a hurricane recently tore through parts of Belize... It´s like putting a city in the blender with a beach, hitting ´pulse´ a couple of times and voila! Blendo-Belizo Milkshake!
Living inland gives you the peace of mind that a telephone pole won´t come crashing into your living room when it starts to rain. Or that 500mph winds won´t carry your car up and crash it into the 7-11 eight blocks up the road. (Yes, for the record, they DO have 7-11 here...but no slurpees. In my opinion, what´s the point? A 7-11 without slurpees is like a pizze with no crust. All you have is a mess of sauce and toppings. Crust makes pizza PIZZA.)

So, no ocean-front property for me.
Lake front might even be pushing it. I just don´t know right now.

Belize City
Dangriga
Punta Gorda (Belize)
Puerto Barrios (Guatemala)
Omoa (Honduras)

We found a hostel in Dangriga that had hammocks for beds. I was pretty excited about that.
Until I tried sleeping in one.

Relaxing in a hammock - Perfect.
Sleeping in one - Not so perfect.

I think I was finally dozing off when a couple in the cabin a few down from us started making babies.
Loud babies.

Welcome to Belize.

Population: Growing.

Then it started to rain. I now know that rain on a metal roof if quite loud.

The good news is that we bused to Punta Gorda in the morning and took a boat across the Gulfo de Honduras, went through Guatamala into Honduras where we found a little oasis of a town called Omoa.
Beachside fishing town. Simply gorgeous.
Freshest meat I ever had too.
You´re stepping over live chickens on your way down the street. We had fried chicken at a restaurant.
I´ll let you do the math.

Spanish lesson for the day:

´Tengo hambre´ - ´I´m Hungry´

This has saved me from learning:
"Excuse me good sir, I´m from the cold land of Canada and have not had a scrap of food all day. Would you mind pointing me in the direction of a supermarket, a restaurant or any other means of nutrition please and thank you?´

Well, Andrew and I are biking out to a waterfall this afternoon. We love hearing from you! Leave comments or e-mail us! We miss you all! More pictures coming soon!
Keep Smiling!!
Anthony

Snake Nest (Cancun)

Toronto
Miami
Cancun
Chichen-Itza

This is Anthony.

So, apparently there is a world outside of that Canada place.
It´s really cool cause all you have to do is walk into this big metal cylinder, endure no leg room and miniscule bags of peanuts and BAM!!! you exit the cylinder to find palm trees, short people and no english.

I didn´t think this no english thing would be a problem until we arrived in Cancun and went to collect our luggage. For the record, Murphy wasn´t invited on this trip but decided to show up anyways. As we watched the bags go by on the carousel we spotted Andrews sleeping bag........ just the bag............no longer attached to the backpack.

Perfect.

We shared a laugh when his bag soon followed and continued to wait for mine.

And wait.



And wait.....







And wait..............................








Perfect.




Apparently the people in Miami thought my bag was so pretty they decided to keep it for awhile.
I guess this trip might be tougher than I thought. No english AND no deoderant.

I like to think of this as the perfect opportunity to begin trying to communicate something to someone who just stares at you like you´ve got a booger the size of Australia hanging from your nose but doesn´t have the nerve to tell you.
I expect this to happen often.

OK, bag sent to my hotel when it arrives in the morning? Comprede? Si.

After going through customs we went through a door that led us to what felt like a huge Mexican game of tennis... In this game Andrew and I were that little fuzzy ball that goes cluelessly back and forth...
All I know about tennis is that there are two people, some kind of controlled mayhem, and an end result.
We started at the door, ended at a hotel. I don´t know how.

No hablos espanol....

There were tour guides shouting at us-signalling-taxi drivers-maps-´buy this!´-no-this is cheaper-hola muchachos-dark outside-get in-stop-Espanol?-Centro-What´s a hostel?....

We were almost pushed into a cab with no idea where it was going and no address for a destination.
No english, no direction, no idea.

Perfect.

After the ride through language barriers and a foreign city we ended up at a decent (and cheap (and yes mom, it was safe)) hotel.
We flopped down on the beds and decided that planning from now on would probably save our lives.
Spanish might help too....

The next day went much smoother, we ate three whole meals and are still alive, I got my backpack, we found the beach, swam in the Carribbean and built a sand Chichen-Itza castle. We also found a hostel that gives you a free beer with your registration.....things are looking up.

Way up. Today we made it to Chichen-Itza, recently named one of the seven man-made wonders of the world. I used to think it was just a huge hunk of rock some ancient dudes put together. Then I learnt how much smarter than me they were. After learning of the complexities and details in the design, their own calender, the acoustics, even their sports.... made me want to be Mayan (ancient dudes).
Check it out. Honestly.
We then went to cool off in a lagoon with small waterfalls and a 10-foot hign jumping platform.
bragbragbragbragbragbragbragbrag-shut-up Anthony.
Spanish lesson for the day:
´Losiento, soy de Canada.´ -----´Sorry, I´m from Canada.´

Works perfectly.
Cheers!
Keep Smiling!
Anthony

PS. Pictures coming soon hopefully, this computer is beign tricky....it IS Mexican you know....

We leave tomorrow afternoon and typical of us, we're not ready. Anthony's malaria pills will only be ready to pick up tomorrow morning (because he only asked for them an hour ago, and he only got the prescription at noon), his travel insurance isn't bought yet, and he hasn't even packed... actually come to think of it, I'm in the very unusual position of watching him scurry around frantically, while I post a blog entry and write an e-mail or two. Wierd.

Anyways, everything looks good for us to leave for Cancun tomorrow morning, barring the sudden onset of traveller's cancer in my brother, or some tropical storm making landfall on the Yucatan (what are we naming them now? Gerry? Harrison? All of those names seem so inadequate for a death-dealing city-destroying storm. The next one should be called Grendel the bone-crusher, or Hellboy or something. Regardless of what they call it, though, it'd be an apt beginning for our trip...). Whose idea was it to travel through Central America during hurricane season, anyways?

One of the important things we did get done yesterday was to make a list of things that we're going to miss from Canada. We figure we'll get a good laugh out of it at the end of the trip, when we find out that the the thing we missed the most was the laser pointer we left behind (sorry Colleen - but you'll be happy to know I've already found a use for the hair ties :) ).

Things that we're going to miss:
Friends and family (sob!)
Oreo cookies
English
Fall and Spring (Andrew will miss winter)
Line-ups (we're so polite)
BC Fruit stands
Evergreen trees
Reliable electricity
Drinkable tap water
Thanksgiving

Things that we're not going to miss at all:
Bad pop songs (blah emo)
Souped-up Alberta trucks
Prime Minister Stephen Harper... actually, all of Parliament
Hockey season (sorry)
Toothpicks
Iced Cappucinos (well, Andrew won't miss them. Anthony will cry at night)

Anyways, also typical of us is the fact that we're taking a break in the midst of our preparations to go rock climbing this afternoon, and to get haircuts so we're all swank and cool when we head out. There'll be pictures on this site as soon as we have our brand new camera in the same place as the computer we're using to make updates (surprise surprise, when planning to make this entry, we forgot the camera at home...).

So, keep reading, and I assure you, the next one will be more entertaining than the last.

Peace be with you all!

Andrew

...and They're Off!! - In a month. Or so.

Knee deep in planning, I've decided to procrastinate. Amid settling the funding, contacting potential volunteer locations, finding out which immunizations I'm going to need and gathering supplies, I decided that now was also the best time to begin blogging. And so, my valued and faithful followers, welcome to the documented beginning of our trip around the world!

There are a number of things that remain to be done, but not many of them are particularly interesting, unless you're planning a trip of your own - which, of course, I'm going to assume everyone is. Right now, the list looks something like this:

1) GAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!

2)UNGHANNG!

3)*gasp gasp wheeze pant*

4)BWRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAR!!!!

...needless to say, this thing is taking a lot of energy to throw together. I'm beginning to realize slowly that a trip around the world takes a bit more planning than a road trip to Edmonton. And given that my roadtrips to Edmonton (all one of them) were never very well planned (right, Bob?), this is a big step for me.
Hence, I am procrastinating.

This is the itinerary as it stands now:

• Toronto to Cacun
• (Mexico)
• Chichen-Itza
• (Belize)
• (Honduras)
• Trujillo
• (Nicaragua)
• Rio Coco
• (Costa Rica)
• (Panama)
• Panama Canal
• Peru
• Volunteer
• Bolivia
• Cochabamba
• Brazil
• Iguacu Falls
• Amazon

• Portugal
• Fatima
• (Spain)
• (France)
• Lourdes
• (Italy)
• Pisa
• Vatican City
• Blue Grotto
• (Austria)
• Hungary or Czech Republic - Poland
• Ukraine
• Volunteer
• (Romania)
• (Bulgaria)
• (Greece)
• (Turkey)
• (Syria)
• (Israel)

• Egypt
• Morocco
• Casablanca
• Mauritania
• Senegal
• Guinea
• Côte d’Ivoire
• Ghana
• Togo
• Volunteer
• (Benin)
• (Nigeria)
• (Cameroon)
• (Central African Republic)
• (Democratic Republic of Congo)
• Congo River
• (Burundi)
• Bujumbura
• (Tanzania)
• Mount Kilimanjaro
• (Zambia)
• Victoria Falls
• (Zimbabwe)
• (South Africa)
• (Namibia)
• (South Africa)
• Fly to India

• India
• Volunteer
• Nepal
• Volunteer
• (China)
• Great wall
• (Japan)
• Mount Fuji
• Buddha
• Laos
• Thailand
• Malaysia
• (Philippines)
• (Indonesia)

• Australia
• Hawaii
• Home

---------------------------------------------------------------------

Small potatoes, right? The only change we may make at this point is the visit to the Rio Coco in Nicaragua. Apparently in Northeastern Nicaragua and Southeastern Honduras there are some fields of unmarked landmines... and as cool as it might be to tell the story of crossing a field of landmines, there are few enough people who live to tell such a story that we're not as keen to do it as before...

And so, the game continues. I'll be sure to give you all the ugly details as we slog through the plans, and maybe even give an antecedent story about our trip out with Club Pat in B.C.
It depends on how badly I need to procrastinate later.

Peace! - Andrew