Keep Calm and Carry Sheets

Because I disallowed photographic evidence of my disfigurement during those two weeks in the UK, let me describe it to you.

One morning I woke up with my left eye and crusted and puffed shut while buttery mucus oozed from the corner.

My lower lip was swollen like my feet, and all along my face, neck, hands, arms, toes, feet and legs were trails of red, angry bulbs of itchiness that made me want to commit epidermal suicide. All the scratching infected my eye and I wept tears of English goo. Even my mucous membrane hurt.

This, amigos, is what my body did when I had a bed bug slumber party. Rather, I slumbered while bloodsucking parasites partied.

It was the very end of my year off and dude, I stayed in some shitty hostels around the world. There were warnings of a bed bug infestation in OZ, crawly creepy bitey things in Thai bungalows, mice in Malaysia and even a tarantula chillaxing overnight on my backpack in Ecuador.


But nothing turned me into the elephant woman like one night in Brighton.

It was my own fault. I hadn't booked a room and when I arrived, all the good places were full. An hour of walking around with my pack in the dark made me desperate and that's when I saw the Holy Grail of Holy Shit: The Churchill Inn Hostel.

'VACANCY.'

Two middle-aged ladies with graveled, Marge Simpson-style sonorousness sat in the stale foyer chain smoking with a bottle of whiskey and a re-run of East Enders. One tossed me the key without looking me in the eye, nor removing the cigarette from the corner of her mouth, though her velveteen tank top was covered in silvery ash and bits of spotted dick.

I trudged up the green shag to the second floor, blissfully unaware of my impending nocturnal blood draw. The room was nothing fancy: peeling paint, a shower with no curtain, a sink coming off its hinges, and a carpet that hadn't seen a vacuum since 1975. The strong, sanitary perfume of Lux hand soap loitered in the air like the rosy smog of grandma's house. Pink medallions of the stuff were scattered along the sink.

At least it smelled clean. Even if I was sleeping in a Fight Club factory.

Hey, you know? I've stayed in much worse.

'I'll take it.'

'You will?'

In hindsight, I should have given her incredulity more weight.

'Um... Yeah!'

'Suit yourself, sweetheart. That'll be 40 pounds. Cash only, of course.'

To be honest, I had a good night's sleep at the Churchill Hostel. I also had little red marks on my forehead and chest the next morning.

They weren't itchy. Just some random dots. Over the next few days I stayed with friends in Brighton, toured with locals in Liverpool and took a long train ride to one of my favorite magical places on earth: Scotland.

I noticed some new red dots on my hands and feet and wondered - like the idiot I am - where they came from.

'Hmm, I wonder where these came from?'

I went to sleep my first night in Edinburgh and woke up looking like Woogie. Cue the weeping goo.

'Yeah, it's the time of year for bed bugs,' the chemist told me. 'It takes about seven days for skin to react. Looks like your reaction is a bit violent, eh lassie?'

He prescribed Benadryl and some pasty pink sludge to smear over the bites. It looked like half my body was covered in dried strawberry yogurt, topped with a black eye. I've never felt sexier.

'How will I ever marry Prince Harry looking like this?!' I cried to Dr. Robbie, hard at work at the STI clinic in London. A professional appraiser of all conditions weird, he was begging for photos of my epidermic meltdown.

'Darling, did the sign on the door actually read YOUTH HOSTEL?'

'Well, no. It did say HOSTEL, so I figured it was just a crappy one.'

'Indeed... Jules, I should have warned you. HOSTEL in the UK also means halfway house. You likely spent the night with drug addicts and prostitutes. If you don't feel better by tomorrow, go to an NHS clinic - god knows what else you've caught.'

Ew.

The next morning I walked into a clinic of one of the most venerated, sought-after, free public healthcare systems in the world and was promptly kicked out for not having an appointment.

'We could see you next month. Or you can go to the private clinic in town, lassie, but it'll cost you.'

I guess you get what you pay for. $250 and 20 minutes later, I had heavy drugs and strict instructions to wash all my things, including my backpack. But it was too late.

I called my friend in Brighton to relay the saga:

'Marty slept in the guest bed after you, and it is so odd... He has these terribly itchy red spots...'

The Ping Pong Show

There were just so many questions.

Like, if lungs are fundamentally necessary to smoke cigarettes, was the upside down naked lady technically 'smoking' that Marlboro Light with her reproductive organ?

Should she be worried about cervical cancer?

And how did she propel those glow-in-the dark ping pong balls so far across the room that one nearly hit my travel mate, a girl I call the Brazilian Princess, on the forehead before she absently batted it away?

'I need to go wash my hands now,' she said, leaving me alone to marvel at the skill required to shoot darts from the confines of one's vaginal cavity. What accuracy!

'The Pussy Show' is indeed disgusting and degrading. And it is also as ubiquitous in Bangkok as fried noodles and corrupt pink cab drivers, with more giggling.

We were in the Thai capitol for 9 days waiting on our visas to Burma to be approved. It was Thai New Year time – Happy 2554! Thais celebrate with a three-day water festival that involves squirt gun fights with local kids and everyone else on the streets, including the good-natured cops.

By the third day, we were looking for something a little less wholesome to do.

We found it.

The Brazilian and I covertly shopped around Patpong, the red light/fake watch district, looking for a show. It was around 8 p.m. when we started getting approached by greeters who presented laminated menus of that night’s special.

Most of the ‘specials’ were the same – darts, horn instruments, painting.

‘Maybe we should just have a look inside and see what looks, you know, the least disturbing,’ Princess suggested.

The Super Pussy had a nice neon sign, but the girls had that depressing 'I've-just-been-trafficked-in-from-Laos' vibe going on, so we left.

Queen's was empty, apart from an old white guy chatting up a chubby go-go dancer in the corner. What really killed it was AC/DC. 'Thunderstruck' is mood music for monster truck shows, not housing goldfish in your reproductive organs.

Finally, on our third try I was sold - the DJ was jamming some Snoop Dogg and the vaginal gymnasts were chirpy and smiling, not all strung out on heroin or oppressed by their station in life.

What a breath of fresh air!

We were the only patrons until a curious couple came in, followed by Creepy Indian Guy, who was alone and not nearly as enthusiastic about the novelty of it all as the rest of us. He didn't even applaud when she squirted a whole hot dog OR played taps on the kazoo. I guess there's no accounting for some people's taste...

We wondered if the girls would come up with something for the New Year festival, but I guess opening a bottle of soda water with your pelvis is anatomically easier than pulling the trigger on squirt gun. Go figure.

The fun ended when the mamasans realized we were giggling more than spending and called the Brazilian over for the bill.

'Three thousand baht each?'

The equivalent of $100, I'm not saying the performance wasn't worth that much - anyone who can write a love letter with a Sharpie in your privates deserves some serious cash - but we didn't have it.

So we went for the door, which was promptly blocked by three Thai mob bosses, all women, all built like linebackers, all effectively annoyed. The negotiations started and in less than 60 seconds, the price dropped to $7, a real bargain in my view. And like that, we'd been kicked out of Club NoPhoto.

Lots of Thais I met are pretty ashamed of this style of Bangkok entertainment, including our cab driver that night who offered to drive us straight to the temple to cleanse our sins.

But be encouraged, people of Thailand! A 4' picture of the king hung over the stage, just above the Vaseline-lined ping pong balls.

If that's not patriotism, I don't know what is.

Dia de los Snort-os

I knew it was going to be a weird day when the man took my student ID card to cut lines of cocaine for our tour group. For weeks the backpacker circuit had been abuzz with story of the San Pedro Prison in La Paz, a special place for murderers, rapists and pedophiles. Also, a a place you could take drugs with said lovely people. Lots of people were reading the book, ´Marching Powder´, an account of an English inmate who started offering tours of the inside.

The inside was still a mystery. I hadn´t actually met anyone who had been inside. But whenever I talked to someone about San Pedro, we spoke in serious italics. For emphasis.

Generally, I tend to avoid prisons, which I have always found to be wise. I don´t like violence, drugs or orange jumpsuits, and on TV, that´s all prison´s about.

But, it was Day of the Dead. And I had convinced some burly-looking guys from the north of England to come with me. Israelis would have been preferable, but they were too cheap to do it. You have to pay 400 Bolivianos to get in - roughly $50 - plus bribes once you´re on the inside to stay safe. But the pound is strong, and so it was - two electrical engineers from York, and yours truly.

San Pedro is capitalism at its most glossy-eyed. Every prisoner must pay for his own cell (who they pay was never clear), which has created an entire community of strung-out venture captalists. Restaurants, laundry, artisans and drugs or alcohol are all available for a very unfair price. Those who speak foreign languages can make more as tour guides, and those good at beating people up make the best bodyguards. My group got Felipe and Jose for both jobs, respectively.

Felipe is 47, has a tan like George Hamilton and a rasp like Phyllis Diller. A Portuguese national, Felipe was arrested 36 months ago for drug smuggling. He pled guilty at trial and has yet to receive his sentence.

He seemed bitter.

But at least he dressed up for the occasion. His black blazer was just slightly tattered at the elbows and his white button-down was gray, though neatly tucked into his jeans which were held up by a rope. I wondered where he got the rope...

Felipe is a master of languages and almost blew my cover off the bat. We were standing over a pool with a giant painted Beluga whale smiling up at us from below. They used to find corpses floating in the pool every morning not long ago.

´Blah blah blah´, he said to me in French.

´Pardon?´

´Didn´t you say you are from Canada? I thought every Canadian spoke French.´

Shit. I did lie. The York boys told me to because the prisoners here blame Bolivia´s poverty on the United States. Listen, I know we´re bad and stuff, but do I really have to take responsibility for Jose´s armed robbery?

I knew tombe-pas-de-bourrée-glissade-assemblé wasn´t going to help here. The extent of my French is ballet vocabulary. I mean, I doubted Felipe, a self-proclaimed con-man, had ever taken a ballet class, but when you´re on the inside, you can´t make such assumptions.

´Actually, in Vancouver we really don´t speak French. Just English. It´s a western province thing.´ Bright Canadian smile.

I mean, what´s a little white lie among pedophiles anyway?

For two hours, Felipe showed us around, in English. There are 7 main ´neighborhoods' in the prison, all with increasingly better cells or cleaner-looking particleboard. The prison is a hodgepodge, with cells atop each other, and an extremely rickety-looking web of staircases that lead you through atriums, concrete soccer grounds, lots of mini cocaine or chocolate shops or the laundry blocks.

The prisoners get stuff to sell to each other because their wives or girlfriends bring it in. Actually, if you´re married, you can live with your sweetheart in his cell in prison. It´s so romantic that lots of women do. And so do their children. In Bolivia, just because you´re locked up doesn´t mean you lose the right to see your family. The kids are released for school every day, and come back by 5 p.m. for dinner or church.

Prisoners can sell and take drugs because the police don´t go into San Pedro, preferring to let the inmates police themselves. And they do.

Dudes in black shirts with batons are the official security team. They enforce a 3-strikes rule. If you tattle, you get a beating. If you do it again, you are beaten until you bleed. And a third time gets you all that, plus extended time between the walls, where a lot of people are found dead.

We don´t tour between the walls, thank god.

According to Felipe, if you murder someone in prison in Bolivia, you only get 2 years added onto your sentence. He grimaced. There was that elusive word: sentence. Poor Felipe...

He took us into the kitchen where the prison mush is cooked. Bolivia will pay for water, electricity, tea and bread. The rest is up to the prisoners. The day we visited, it looked like they were cooking killer stew. Five teenage boys were peeling potatoes in the corner with 6-inch knives I was praying were dull.

Avoiding actual eye contact, I could see the peeling had become provocative, as you might imagine it would when you´re a 19-year-old convict.

´Íf you can afford it, it´s great to take a shower here because it´s hot water. I take a shower once a week in the sauna room...´

Felipe´s hygiene was fascinating, but the killer spud peeling gallery was getting raucous. I´m glad my Spanish sucks, because the words coming out of their mouths just sounded foul, and I needed no translation. I grabbed on to a York engineer for dear life, Felipe took the hint, and we went to another, equally uncomfortable area with no visible knives. That smelled.

I wasn´t sure if the aroma of boiled vegetables, mold and nervous sweat was making me ill, or the fact I was in a prison on my own will. Prisons on TV actually look like they smell pretty clean, because prisoners are always assigned to mop and things. But San Pedro is not like TV prisons. TV prisons don´t have little girls hugging you for dear life, and the whole time I kept thinking ´Glad I left my wallet at home´, not ´Geez I hope this little girl isn´t ruined for life.´

I am a terrible person. I mean, she´s already got 10 years of therapy ahead of her...

Also, TV prisons don´t have cocaine labs where you can sample the local product, purported to be the finest in Bolivia. Don´t worry mom, I don´t take drugs, and if I did, it wouldn´t be in an effing prison. But I did proffer my ID card - not my Duck ID, of course! - because one has to appease the drug boss when you´re on the inside.

Pablo, another tour guide, told me San Pedro really isn´t a bad place to live.

´Before I was deported, I did 3 years in SoCal, and it was always the Mexicans vs. the Blacks vs. the Russians... shit man, here´s it´s different. Everybody mixes - Bolivians, the foreign dudes, the drug dealers, the hard murderers. And nobody has to wear that ugly-ass orange bullshit. Fuck, man.´

Fuck, man, indeed.

FARC and Circumstance

Second-hand danger stories are always annoying.

Firstly, danger is an overused term. Stranger danger. Austin Danger Powers. Highway to the Danger Zone. So when I heard stuff like kidnappings, armed robberies and other scary death-related stuff goes on in Colombia, I thought - wow, this could be unpleasant. But gee, there's a place that could use some positive press. And off I went.

And the funny part was, as soon as I arrived in Popayan in southern Colombia, I started meeting people who were actually held at knife-point - they, themselves - and taken for the equivalent of $15 by 10-year-old children in Bogota.

And when my two friends finally met up with me in Cali - 3 hours later than planned - it was even funnier to hear them talk about how their bus had been roadblocked by FARC, Colombia's most charming terrorist organization. And when I say funny, I mean in that uncomfortable way that makes you want to clutch your wallet and suck your thumb. Not that I did that...

They told me, first-hand, how they stood single-file while a soldier explained the FARC had nothing to do with the assassination of their leader the day beforehand, and how they were really a peaceful group - difficult to buy when an automatic weapon is aimed at your torso. Doubly difficult when you can see soldiers hiding in the jungle on your narrow stretch of road, rifles ready to cover their compadres should anything turn ugly... Also, their uniforms cost a lot of money. Oh yeah, and all the strife in Colombia, including that leader's death, is the fault of the Americans.

Well, I guess we do have a bad reputation for covert assassinations in this part of the world...

They let them go after 30 minutes of complaining. The FARC could really use a community newspaper or something less, um, scary to inform the masses of their statements of peace. There's a group that could use a PR professional. UO Journalism School, are you reading?

All this wasn't helping my quest to create my own non-danger Colombia story. All FARC and no fun makes Colombia a dull drug lord. So after arriving in Cali, the salsa capital of the world, I decided to make the most of my Mexican salsa lessons and dance for an entire weekend. Employing my best judgment, I decided to first hop on the CHIVA Party Bus with some hostel mates.

For those who don't know, the CHIVA Party Bus is an old schoolbus pimped out in disco lights, a great stereo system and no windows or doors so that innocent pedestrians may also enjoy said strobe lights and overly-loud reggaeton against their will. It is, undoubtedly, the most obvious way on earth to announce I AM A TOURIST, PLEASE ROB ME.

The Party Bus leads you all over town, subjecting all walks of Cali life to our noisome menagerie of shot-swilling foreigners and a fair number of Colombian women, drop-dead gorgeous with their stilettos and silicon out for the night. My favorite was a lady in a red bedazzled tube top and bionic breasts. We called her Boobs. She was extremely friendly and didn't speak a lick of English to her extremely appreciative American novio. I was concerned for her health given the air tightness of her jeans, but 'yeast infection' doesn't translate like you might think it would.

Anyway, everything was going well - we boogied past the posh neighborhoods, then the red light district, and Boobs waved to the skinny and starving homeless people sleeping by the library. I started to wonder just what part of town we could possibly offend next. That's when we arrived at a red light and a huge group of high schoolers were drinking en masse right behind us. Obviously, the Party Bus is way more fun than drinking on the street with your teenage friends. Duh! We had Boobs! So a couple of them hung off the side and danced along with us.

And at that point, all was right with the world. Smiles were smiled. Drinks were drunk. Lovely, young Colombians were enjoying our evening out as much as we were.

But the bus driver was vexed with all this merriment from people who hadn't paid, and lurched the bus forward, knocking some of the boys to the hard concrete below.

Well, nobody likes to be knocked off the Party Bus by a grouchy driver, do they? I mean, I wouldn't.

The DJ cut the music and the boys, mad, started smacking the electric green siding with their fists and yelling things in Spanish that were, frankly, fowl. And it was around this time I thought again, wow, this could be unpleasant.

The boys were scrambling to get into the windowless/doorless bus with agility when the light turned green and we took off, popping onto a viaduct to another classy part of town. Only a few glass beer bottles actually hit us, and even Boobs' botoxed eyebrows seemed to have moved slightly to express pain or concern. I think she was really scared, but no one could tell.

Alas, this could have happened anywhere in the world. And there is no point in running around being scared of the danger that happened to others. Or even the almost-danger that is likely to befall the ridiculous Party Bus on its next round of the city.

I would like to give Colombia props for the following cool things:

* Lush green countryside with deep valleys and pointy, jungly mountains
* Excellent coffee, thanks Juan Valdez
* Fabulous graffiti art
* Men with rhythm on the dance floor (though not even remotely as good-looking as the women - or Ecuadoreans! - they do have pizazz)
* Cowbells in the salsa bars
* Excellent and varied fried food
* Very flirty and helpful police officers
* Super yummy local drink - hot chocolate with melted cheese (mixed) and a fried piece of cornbread

Next stop: Cartagena on the Caribbean coast!

Lewd and lascivious - thanks, Spain

After nearly a week in Spain I have several tales to tell fine art, street hustlers and public masturbation.

I spent four full days in Barcelona after a tumultuous train ride from Nice (which is another story altogether, involving a Frenchman on speed). My first day in Barcelona I devoted to Gaudi, zipping around the Sagrada Familia -- the church that has been under construction for nearly 100 years, don´t have to cover up your shoulders to go in there, haha -- and poking around Parc Guell, both equally awe-inspiring works if architecture and art. I am officially a Gaudi fan, so it was a good thing I went to Barcelona because he´s everywhere.

The next day I did Picasso, visiting the museum and being somewhat impressed by his transformation from a classically trained painter during his teenage years to a complete nut by the end of his days. That was the fine art portion of this posting.

I took a third day to pop around Las Ramblas, the main market street that has a lot of FBC (that´s Barcelona futbol for you ¨football¨ fans) jersey shops adjacent to Cartier and Louis Vuitton. An interesting mix.

Las Ramblas has the best street performers I´ve ever seen. I think I´ve found a new calling in life because the job is simple: dress up like your favorite historical character, don´t move and people give you money. Jesus and Mary were particular favorites of mine, as well as a man painted white, sitting on a toilet reading the paper. Give him 50 cents and he mimicks constipation. Genius.

The people in Barcelona are smart -- they know stupid tourists are easy to rip off. There was a street game that always started as randomly as it ended involving three boxes and a little ball. You are supposed to find the ball, the catch is you have to pay 50 Euro each time to do so. Sometimes you win; often you lose because the other people playing with you are not in fact tourists, they are in on the scam. It looks like they´re winning all the time, and to the average joe, that means you could win too. I watched a poor Polish guy get suckered out of 150 Euros this way.

All in all, I really enjoyed Barcelona and met some very nice Australians to scout out the city with. The shopping there has so far been the best I´ve found, the mom and pop stores are unique and cheap, lots of jewelry and tapestries.

I must note that the Barcelonans are pioneering the fight to bring back the 80s. I´m calling it the Mullet Movement, because men and women alike, clad in striped 3-inch headbands and one-shoulder sweatshirts paired with stretch pants were walking around everywhere in Barcelona. Without realizing how horrible they look. I was thoroughly disgusted to see this trend, which should be quarantined in Sweden, infiltrating the rest of the world.

From Barcelona, I decided to travel to Madrid. But sometimes the journey is more important than the destination...

I hopped on a train thinking with my Eurail pass, I wouldn´t need a reservation.

Wrong.

I was quickly kicked off the train and told to make a reservation for the next one, which was coming in an hour. Fair enough, said I, but the next trains were booked solid until 11.30 at night. I would have to take an overnight train to Madrid and waste about 10 hours in a city called Tarragona, also on the Mediterranean coast.

Being the resourceful girl that I am, I decided to spend the day on the beach doing some ¨tan maintenance¨ after it dared to rain in Spain during my stint in Barcelona. After about an hour of basking near the rocks on an otherwise sandy beach, a huge wave came and threatened to draw my unsuspecting purse, clothes and lunch into the warm Mediterranean water, never to be seen again.

Being agile as usual, haha, I managed to catch all of my things but not before they were sopping wet with saltwater and sand. During the whole process, I managed to smash my knee into a rock and was gushing blood (I apologize if this is too graphic, but it gets worse). Disgusted with the day´s events thus far, I managed to collect my things and lay them out to dry. My camera doesn´t work anymore, my railpass and passport were soggy and my poor journal was dripping.

Well if that was the worst that could happen, I would be okay, right? God, who has a really sick sense of humor by the way, heard me say that to myself and decided to teach me a lesson.

Not more than five minutes later, I was nursing my knee and a dodgy man in a speedo emerged from his tent from down the beach and plopped down ten feet away from me. Being the sweet, innocent flower of a girl you all know and love, I wasn´t sure WHAT he was doing. At first I thought he was massaging his inner thigh with his fist; upon further inspection, I realized he was massaging a very different muscle. Definitely NOT something Don Juan would do.

Completely fed up with the whole day, I glared at the nasty old man, grabbed my wet stuff and headed for the hills. People were staring at me all day thinking I was a vagabond but I didn´t care. If they dared look me in the eye, they pretty much got my best ¨look of death.¨ I was in no mood to be friendly.

Finally I arrived in Madrid this morning and found a very lovely hostel to stay in. Madrid is lovely, the people here have been very nice so far and I have spent the day looking around the Sunday flea market and getting lost in the Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, which has a Degas from his ballet sequence (whoopee!!!).

Tomorrow I will take a day-trip to Toledo and Tuesday I am heading up to Burgos to stay with a relative of a friend. Am looking forward to eating a home-cooked meal and being surrounded by actual Spaniards -- not more tourists.