Discovering the world on $20 per day ......................




Post 262: A Productive Christmas


I can’t believe that Christmas is over already, where did it go? I’ve eaten more than I planned and drank more than is probably good for me, but I’ve also got an awful lot of work done. When the phone doesn’t ring and nobody is pulling your chain for a few days, it’s quite surprising how much you can actually get done.
In the past few weeks, I’ve been spending a lot of time arranging the upcoming tour of SE Asia. I had planned to start out in January, but it now looks as if it will get pushed back until the middle of February. It means that I’ll miss the Horizons Unlimited meeting in Chang Mai, but I’m sure that they’ll still manage to drink the City dry without me. Last week I thought that I’d bought a Minsk in Hanoi, but sadly the deal slipped through my fingers when the vendor insisted that I also purchase his knackered Honda Wave. I really hadn’t seen that one coming, but I’ve got to start putting my brain into ‘Asia Mode’. At the moment I don’t have a bike, an air ticket or a departure date, but I do have a map and a passport.
Unfortunately, I still haven’t finished writing the book. That’s actually a lie. I’ve finished writing it five or six times, but every time I finish it, I change something and it just seems to knock another chapter out of kilter. However, over the past week, I’ve changed the ‘Ashes to Boonville’ Blog and added photographs to all of the existing chapters. I’ve also added another five chapters which takes the journey up to Turkey. The published chapters are abridged and I’ve bypassed around half of the countries, but hopefully it still makes sense. Before I head out to Vietnam, I’ll hopefully have that Blog completed and the book will be with the publishers.
I’m giving another ‘Talk’ on January 10th down at Rake in West Sussex. It’s at the invitation of the BMW Riders Club and I just hope that they know what they’re letting themselves in for. It’s safe to say that while I’m not a particular fan of ‘Triumph’, my comments about BMW GS’s are generally unprintable. Of course, they’ll understand that’s just a simple case of jealousy and I should at least escape with my life. However, if this Blog goes suspiciously quiet after January 10th, then you’ll know the reason why.

Post 261: Winter Wonderland


Great Britain has been caught-out by unexpected Winter snow and according to the BBC, the nation has ground to an embarrassing halt. The usual crowd of high-volume idiots are already calling it a ’ National Disgrace’, but the majority of us pragmatists are just enjoying the slightly slower pace of life that snow inevitably brings with it. On the BBC News, they interviewed a young lad as he played with his mates in the snow. “I went to school this morning and there was a sign outside saying - ‘SORRY SCHOOL CLOSED‘ - but we‘re not SORRY“. Maybe they should make that young lad Director General of the BBC before society has a chance to beat the fun out of him.

I then got an unexpected call from a distant colleague who was trying to write a short piece for one of the slightly less independent bike magazines. After a few minutes of conversation, I gathered that he wasn’t really writing an article, but rather that he wanted me to write it while he went outside to put the finishing touches to the Office Snowman. I can’t blame him for trying, but as he was getting paid and I wasn’t, I decided to be as honest as possible.

He was trying to put together a short page filler about riding in the snow but was struggling to find any riders who were able or willing to contribute. The piece was to be directed as novice riders and should give them practical advice about coping with the dangers of riding road bikes in the snow. No doubt keen to join his snowman building colleagues outside in the office car park, he asked me to email my thoughts and then he was gone. Fair enough.

“When attempting to ride a road bike in the snow, there is only one important rule to remember. That rule is the rule of Give and Take. Give the bike a rest, Take the bus“. It’s not exactly what he wanted, but if he didn’t want my advice then he shouldn’t have bloody well asked for it. He’d struggled to find any experienced road riders who could advise him on the best techniques for riding in snow, and that wasn’t really surprising. Experienced riders adopt the rule of Give and Take, because when riding in snow there is only one certainty. You will inevitably fall off and no matter how experienced a rider you are, the density of the objects that you hit will simply depend on your luck.

www.justgiving.com/geoffgthomas

Post 260: Christmas is coming .....


Yes, Christmas is coming. Not the ‘Festive Season’ and certainly not the ‘Holidays’, just good old fashioned Christmas. I’m not a Christian but I really don’t get upset if anybody wishes me a ‘Happy Christmas‘. Nor for that matter would any of the Muslims, Jews, Sikhs or Buddhists that I know. If I wish Muslim friends ‘eid mubarak’, even though I’m not Muslim myself, they don’t get bent out of shape about it and the same would be true if I sent them a Christmas card with a Christian prayer inside of it. In fact, they’d probably be chuffed to bits that I was taking the time to include them. It seems that the only people who take offence at the mention of Christmas, are Christian’s who have somehow advanced into bureaucratic positions that are far higher than their IQ’s should allow. They seem to perceive that ‘Christmas’ is offences to other religions and instead of inviting everybody to join in the celebrations, they try to sweep it under the carpet and end up hacking everybody off. So, if somebody wishes you ’Happy Holidays’ or sends you a politically correct corporate card, then please return it to sender and tell them to get a life.

Talking of perception - sort of - I recently changed my Facebook picture for Children in Need. I normally use a photograph of my face in my normal crash helmet, but I changed the helmet to yellow and had a spotted bandana running diagonally across it. An email asked me if I’d used special paint that wouldn’t affect the integrity of the helmet and if I’d used special one-way coloured film for the bandana? The answer is almost ’Yes’. The special paint that I used was eco-friendly MS Paintbrush and no helmets were harmed in the making of that photograph.

Anyway, I’ve done all of my Christmas shopping, one present for Hannah and a donation to charity that’s equal to all of the other crappy presents that I would probably have bought for everybody else if I‘d had the time. It’s an easy solution, nobody ever asks for a receipt and hopefully everybody feels a little bit better because of it.

Happy Christmas

www.justgiving.com/geoffgthomas

Post 259: It's a mad world .. so buy your new bike now





The world has lost the remainder of it’s marbles and everything has been turned on it‘s head. We have a new President of Europe, Mr Herman Van Rompuy. Apparently he’s the Prime Minister of Belgium but until now, I and millions of other Europeans had never heard of him. In a game of political ‘Top Trumps‘, Van Rompuy would probably be the one crappy card that nobody wants but like it or not, we’ve all got him now. Personally I don’t really mind because his name alone will make comedy shows more interesting and if the alternative was Tony Blair, then it’s got to be much better news than it might have been. Every comedy character worthy of the sketch writers ink deserves a suitable sidekick and Herman Van Rompuy has been given Lady Cathy Ashton as his Foreign Minister. Yes, I’ve never heard of her either. Apparently a late runner for the post of EU Foreign Minister was our very own Lord Peter Mandelson, he of Hartlepool and Foy, First Secretary of State, Lord President of the Council, Secretary of State for Business Innovation & Skills, Prince of Darkness and sometime lapdog to Saif al-Islam Gaddafi. We should therefore count our blessings that Lady Ashton was shoe-horned into the post because without Lord Mandelson’s selfless efforts here at home, who knows where we might have been. New Labour love league tables and ever since Gordon jumped into the metaphorical bed with Peter, we’ve rocketed to the top of all of them. Highest debt per capita #1. Highest debt as a percentage of GDP #1. Longest recession of any major economy #1. For a British performance in Europe they’re mighty impressive results in all categories, especially when you consider that we didn‘t even go to a penalty shoot-out in any of them.

In a plan to make us Brit’s feel a little better about our own fiscal furrow, Dubai World this week announced that is was delaying repayments on £36 billion of debt for a period of six months. On the face of it, a seemingly oil-rich Emirate suffering along with the rest of us shouldn’t really be any great cause for concern, but it is. Dubai is not oil-rich and the debt of Government owned Dubai World is really Sovereign Debt and not Corporate Debt. International money markets instantly lost confidence in Dubai’s ability to service it’s debts on a long term basis and a vast quantity of manure hit the Emirates air conditioning unit. Thankfully, it seems that it’s oil-rich neighbour Abu Dhabi has stepped up to the plate and quite possibly saved Dubai’s artificial bacon. The measure of Dubai’s fiscal fall from grace is quite staggering and it’s credit worthiness has dropped to below that of Iceland when it teetered on the brink of bankruptcy. You’re probably still not shedding any tears, but if you consider that Dubai’s debt is a mere innocent kiss in comparison to the full blown orgy of Britain’s Sovereign debt, then there may indeed be trouble ahead for Blighty. By the time of the general election in 2010, Britain’s ‘official debt’ will exceed one trillion pounds, that’s one thousand thousand million pounds - £1,000,000,000,000.00. If the Government were honest with us and added in the hidden liabilities, then that figure can easily be doubled and I have no idea if that includes the billions of pounds that were printed during the process of quantitative easing. Assuming that as a Nation we don’t borrow any more money, and it’s unlikely that anybody has any left to lend us, then for every individual UK tax payer, the Government will be carrying approximately £35,000.00 of debt. If as in the case of Iceland and Dubai, the international money markets lose confidence in Britain’s willingness to reduce this unsustainable level of debt, then the interest that we pay will dramatically increase and the value of Stirling will crash like the proverbial lead balloon. Despite what our smiley politicians might tell us today, come June of 2010, they’ll look more closely at the books, blame somebody else for the fiscal failure and kick each and every one of us sharply in the nuts. It’s going to hurt and nobody will be immune from the fallout.

The good news is that if structured in our favour, a fall in the value of Stirling could effectively decrease the level of our debts, but the bad news is that this will lead to stagflation. A stagnant economy with hyper-inflation along a very long tunnel with precious little light at the end of it. So, if you’re going to buy a new bike, then I’d advise that you do it now. If Stirling crashes and the real price of imported goods rockets, then next year you won’t be able to afford it and your existing bike might not be exciting enough to take your mind away from the economic doom and gloom. While you’re buying your new bike, I’d also think about hanging onto your existing one. The dealer will probably only offer you a token of what it’s worth, but if the economy does take a further tumble in 2010, then the value of clean and desirable previously enjoyed models should be an awful lot stronger than they are now. I might be wrong, and I hope that I am, but if anybody needs an extra excuse to buy a new bike, then I'm happy to help.

www.justgiving.com/geoffgthomas

Post 258: KTM Adventure 990


A bike with this many faults should leave me with an overwhelming feeling of disappointment, but it doesn't. This is the KTM 990 Adventure and the first thing that you'll notice is just how fast it likes to travel. The second thing that you'll probably notice is the fact that the brakes are really quite rubbish. Saying that they're 'Quite Rubbish' is actually being kind, but I get into trouble for writing words like 'Shit' and 'Crap'.
A fast bike with rubbish brakes should be enough to make any sensible rider walk away, but before I get onto the finer points of the KTM 990 Adventure, here are a few more flies for the automotive ointment. The headlight is poor, the throttle and fuel mapping sucks, the seat is apparently hewn from solid granite and the foot of the side stand sinks straight into anything that's slightly less stable than cold tarmac. On the face of it, that sounds like more flies than ointment, but when the ointment is pure snake oil, it becomes very easy to ignore the flies.
To be honest, I can't really say 'Why' the KTM 990 Adventure is so good, it just is. The engine is overflowing with grunt and the standard exhaust system sounds like James Earl Jones gargling with treacle. On fast 'A' roads the front and rear WP suspension makes you feel like you're riding a focused sportsbike, but jump onto the rough stuff and the same bike suddenly feels like a full-on enduro. I have no idea how KTM have achieved this amazing cross-over, but I'm ever so thankful that they have. A bike that can be so good on both 'A' roads and 'No' roads, should absolutely stink on the motorways, but yet again it doesn't. The seemingly tiny screen deflects the wind away from everywhere but your shoulders and the seat that I criticised earlier, is actually quite accommodating on long hauls. If it was legal in this country, then all day three-figure cruising speeds on the KTM would be an absolute joy. On smooth paved roads it lacks the refinement of BMW's 1200 GS Adventure, but in place of that refinement KTM have given it a beautiful sprinkling of fun-dust. As a bike, the KTM insists that you become actively involved in every process while the BMW seems to delegate many of those functions to it's on-board butler. Simon 'The Locksmith' French, was kind enough to join me on his shiny new BMW 1200 GS Adventure for an afternoon of fun around Finchingfield in Essex. It was an opportunity for us to ride both 'Adventures' together and of course, there were two apposing verdicts. Neither bike was 'Better', but they are just so totally different. Personally I'd go for the fun-factor every time, but then I still haven't really grown up. The BMW is a proper bike for adults, but the KTM just keeps reminding me why I love bikes.
I'll stop there before I run out of things to write in the magazine. However, given the choice between my Triumph Tiger and the KTM to ride around the world, the experience would have been far richer and much more fun aboard the KTM.

Post 257: Romania? ... Thank you very much


I was reading through issue 143 of The Riders Digest and on page 85, came across something quite unusual. It was a full page advertisement for an accident claims management company that specialises in claims resulting from motorcycle accidents. Nothing really unusual about that you might think, and you'd be absolutely right, but this one was slightly different. The photograph used in the advertisement showed a biker entering a bend aboard a BMW K1300R along with the question .... 'HAD A MOTORBIKE ACCIDENT?'

The photograph was actually one taken of 'Me', and thankfully my answer to the question was 'No'. Ironically when it comes to motorbikes my only notable talent is for not crashing, but once I'd discovered the reason for my photograph appearing in the advertisement, I really wasn't bothered. It hadn't been used as an example of an accident waiting to happen, it was just a 'Stock Photograph' that the publisher had used in order to meet a fast approaching print deadline. I went about my life and thought nothing more about it until I received an email from TRD. Would I like to go on a two-week tour of Romania? After quickly establishing what the cost of such an adventure would be, which was thankfully nothing, I could only agree.

So in June 2010, I'll be riding around Transylvania for a couple of weeks on a BMW 650GS as a guest of the Romanian Tourist Authority. Aside form the obvious, I really don't know very much about Romania and so I'll need to do a little reading on the Internet. It's a hard old life.

Post 256: Welcome to my World


Last week I posted a message on Facebook and the conversation somehow turned to one about dyslexia. Trying to describe dyslexia to a person who isn’t dyslexic, is probably like trying to describe a rainbow to somebody who’s colour blind. Dyslexia comes in many shapes and sizes and I guess that many people, including myself when I was first diagnosed, think that dyslexia is nothing more than a posh excuse for crap spelling and general idleness. In some cases that’s possibly true, but as far as my own dyslexia’s concerned, I’ll try to explain it here.
Kemerovo ..... 324
Irkutsk .......... 1820
Chita ............ 2933
From this photograph, unless you happen to be familiar with the Cyrillic Alphabet, then you probably wouldn’t recognise the place names. I know what the Cyrillic words say, not because I’ve learned that particular alphabet, but because I’ve memorised the pattern of each word and related those patterns to a corresponding sound in my head. However, you could reverse any one of the individual letters in any of those names, and I probably wouldn’t notice the change. I’d still see the word in exactly the same form and wrongly recognise them as still being correct. It’s a little like when a child first leans to write and ’b’ & ’d’ or ’p’ and ’q’ or even ’6’ and ’9’ become confused. The good news is that over time 90% of kid’s will learn to use each one correctly, but 10% of us never do. Weclome to the world of dyslexia.
That’s a perfect accidental example. My spelling of the word ’Welcome’ above is incorrect and I only know that because as I finished typing it, a helpful red line appeared directly below it. When I read the word back in my mind, it looks to be correct and I can‘t really see what I‘ve done wrong. I honestly do know how to spell the word ’Welcome’, but clearly I’ve written it incorrectly. Whatever dyslexia is, it can’t be cured but you can at least learn how to identify and cure the mistakes.
Quickly look at the number that I’ve written below, and then ’say’ the number out loud as if it were a lottery jackpot in terms of pounds and pence:
£1400470003
Without the help of numeric punctuation , and . I guess that it’s not that easy to hit the correct answer on the first attempt. Any dyslexics that are reading this will probably have to physically transfer the numbers onto paper, add the punctuation marks and then work backwards to find the answer. There’s nothing wrong with our eyesight, but we seem to interpret visual information differently to normal readers. The answer is fourteen million, four thousand seven hundred pounds, and three pence, which when written as £14,004,700.03 is quite easy to recognise. As a dyslexic, I interpret ’words’ with the same difficulty that you might interpret the ’£1400470003’ without the punctuation. Eventually we’ll all reach the correct solution, but it just takes us dyslexics a little bit longer to get there.

www.justigiving.com/geoffgthomas

Post 255: The Strangest Things


Earlier this week, I popped into Millers Tea Hut in Epping Forest. It was a nice bright day but there were far more cars than motorbikes in the parking bays. I was sitting on a bench chewing the fat with John Newman, publisher of The Riders Digest, and wondering if frothy coffee was indeed the hottest substance known to man. People were coming and going and an aging Honda CB250 caught my eye. For it's age, it looked to be in quite good condition and the rider and pillion sat admiring it for several minutes. A young couple whispering sweet nothings perhaps?
Sweet nothings? Possibly not. Conversation over, the rider leapt into action. From one pocket he produced a tin of Hammerite Smooth Black, and from another a 2" paint brush. No cleaning, no rubbing down. Before my eyes the little Honda turned from original Honda Aqua Marine to Hammerite Smooth Black.
The riders name was Andy Peckham. I wanted to ask him why he was painting the little Honda, and especially why he'd decided to do it in the Millers Tea Room car park. But I didn't ask him, I just took his photograph and wrote down his name. Some mysteries are much nicer when they remain as such. Mysteries.

Post 254: Testing Times


The court of popular opinion has spoken and the motorcycle media has condemned the new Driving Standards Agency Bike Test. It’s dangerous, it’s unrealistic and candidates are putting their lives at great risk when attempting to pass. Novice riders are being asked to perform a fast swerving manoeuvre before bringing their motorcycle to a controlled stop. Students are being asked to carry out this manoeuvre, and an emergency stop, even in damp and wet conditions. These elements of the new Module 1 Bike Test have already resulted in serious injury to several unfortunate candidates. Wow, the DSA are needlessly murdering innocent novice bikers?

I’m lucky, I’m old and I took my Bike Test back in 1979 when it was easy. Twice around the block without falling off, four correct answers to five simple questions and in recognition of this amazing personal achievement, I received a certificate that would allow me to legally ride any bike that I could buy, steal or borrow. That intensive five minutes spent in the company of a driving examiner and his clipboard was not a ‘Test’ of my competency on two-wheels but merely an ‘Administrative Inconvenience’. If my wallet had been as thick as my truancy report, then I’d probably have bought myself a Kawasaki Z1000 and more than likely killed myself within weeks. Thankfully I was skint, I bought a clapped-out Jawa 350 Twin and lived to tell the tale.

The Driving Standards Agency (DSA) invited me to Wolverhampton for the opening of their latest Multi Purpose Test Centre (MPTC). It’s really little more than a single storey office building with a large enclosed car park that’s been liberally dotted with coloured traffic cones. Not a lot to see or photograph, but after convincing them that I wouldn’t sue them if I crashed, I was allowed out to complete Module 1 of the new Bike Test with my Hi-Viz examiner, Dave Sims.

After a brief briefing, I was ready to go. The first task is to manoeuvre the bike around an imaginary parking space without dropping it or hitting any of the cones. The Tiger’s a little taller and heavier than your average scooter, but so far so good. Then, it’s a slow slalom between evenly spaced cones before completing two full ‘figure-of-eights’ without dabbing your feet. A tad more difficult than pushing your bike between imaginary parked cars, but I never once felt in any great peril. Next is a swifter ride around a sweeping bend before passing through a timing-gate at 50 kph (32 mph). After the timing-gate, you then flick right and left before bringing the bike to a controlled halt between a set of four cones. Oh, the infamous ‘Swerve Manoeuvre’! To this point, I’d only been nervous at the thought of failing the test and looking like a total dick but at this point, a new set of nerves kicked in. Because of the tales that I’d read in Motor Cycle News (MCN), I was looking for dangers that simply didn’t exist, worrying for absolutely no reason at all. Ride around the bend accelerating to 32 mph, a gentle flick right, a gentle flick left, roll off the throttle and gently bring the bike to rest in the appropriate place. Faster than the ‘Slalom’ and ‘Figure-of-Eight’, but really no great shakes. Wet or dry, this manoeuvre registers a big fat ‘Zero’ on the danger scale. Having survived the 'Swerve Test', you then execture a 'U-Turn' between two painted lines. The distance between the 'Lines' represents the width of a Street, not the widest Street, but on anything shorter than a Pro-Fuel Drag-Bike, you should get around without dabbing. Then, follow the clipboard at walking pace for a few metres. Dave Sims isn’t the fastest walker in the world, but it’s still faster than a lot of the filtering that you’ll do in London. Finally, it’s the emergency stop. It’s hardly an ‘Emergency', your examiner has just told you that it’s going to happen. Again, accelerate and pass through the timing-gate at 32mph and as the Examiner raises his arm, stop in a controlled manner before hitting him, which I assume would be a ‘Fail’. The Examiner wont raise his arm until your bike is straight and upright. Use the front and back brakes, don't worry about locking the rear or not stopping in time, because you will. It's not difficult, so don't worry about it.

That’s it, the Module 1 Bike Test in a nutshell. Candidates will probably be nervous and I can imagine that a couple of riders from the thousands of candidates might drop their bikes while performing an Emergency Stop. But, if you don’t know how to stop a bike properly, in the wet or the dry, then it’s far better to identify this fact in the comparative safety of a closed car park. The open road is far less forgiving. The roll-out and implementation of the Module 1 Bike Test leaves an awful lot to be desired, but the test itself is fine. Anything ‘Less’, simply wouldn’t be a ‘Test’, and surely that’s the point. So, when MCN declare that the end of the world is near, then ask for a second opinon, because it seldom is.

www.justgiving.com/geoffgthomas

Post 253: Slight Change of Plan

Oops! It should have been the Aprilia Shiver followed by the Mana, but that couldn't happen. KTM came to rescue but unfortunately, there are some problems getting hold of the one and only Press-Bike and so that's been delayed slightly. Another bike became available, but once again there is another slight insurance issue. Thankfully this time, it's somebody else's insurance policy that's failed to pass muster and I'm having to pick-up the reins. Result, thank you very much.

Sadly, or fortunately depending on how you look at it, things have gotten a little bit hectic and so no 'Blog Post' this week. Next week, there'll be much more to report. In the meantime, I've uploaded another abridged chapter to the Book Blog. Entering Europe now and things are becoming weirdly foreign. That's not a criticism, just a statement of fact ... you'll see.

Got to dash .... see you next week.

Post 252: Shiverless


The Aprilia Shiver 750GT is a beautiful looking bike. 95bhp on a fly-by-wire throttle and weighing little more than a Suzuki SV650, deep joy. The 850 Aprilia Mana, slightly less power than the Shiver but running through an automatic gearbox -CVT- Continuously Variable Transmission to be precise. I've never ridden a bike with an automatic gearbox, at least not one where my feet sit somewhere behind my arse. I was really looking forward to the whole experience. Perhaps I'd even become a convert? Unfortunately, I never got to find out if the Aprilia's beauty ran any deeper than their shiny paintwork. The week ahead was all nicely mapped out, the lovely Aprilia's awaited my attention in Peterborough and the Met Office were even promising me some decent weather. But, there was a problem. Aprilia's PR Company didn't like the cut of my insurance policy. That news came as something of a surprise, Harley, KTM, Honda, Ducati, Triumph and BMW all seem to think that the policy's just fine. Apparently Aprilia didn't like the clause in policy that excludes 'Racing'. 'Racing?' Me? I think they confuse me with others. Anyway, it's too late in the day to make alternative arrangements and there's no use in crying over lost V-Twins.

With my riding juices rising in anticipation of the Italians, there was nothing left to do but to ride the Tiger. And ride it I did. With the new front tyre, it's a totally different beast. It's fun again, it makes me smile. For no other reason than the fact that the road took me there, I ended up riding in London. A busman's holiday if ever there was. Nothing of any great consequence happened, I just rode and enjoyed. I like riding the Tiger but there's nothing quite like the experience that you have when riding a brand new bike, especially when somebody else is paying for any of your indiscretions. Thankfully, my Aprilia disappointment was short lived. They've lined up something even more appealing for me to ride. It's a bike that I've salivated over for quite some time and it's a bike that's certainly worthy of my drool. Hopefully this time my insurance policy will pass muster. It's got to happen soon. I feel like my Birthday's just been cancelled but they've given my an extra Christmas in way of compensation. Bring it on, I'm ready.

Post 251: The Next Chapters


Resting Actors and Movie Stars make it look so bloody difficult. Maybe that's just a "Hollywood" thing. Raising kids, paying a mortgage and working a job that you don't particularly enjoy, that's the really difficult stuff. By comparison, buggering-off on a motorbike is really quite easy. Pack your tent, kiss your loved ones, grab your passport, twist the throttle and go. It's simple, so lets not pretend that it's any more complicated than it really is. You probably don't need a specialist security instructor or SAS survival training before you depart. But, if it's a condition of your multi-million pound life insurance policy and somebody else is paying for it, then why not? It looks like a real giggle, so go for it. If you're very unlucky and somebody does point a gun at you, then I seriously doubt that a couple of hours spent with a pixel-faced man is going to be of any real help to you. When you're travelling, the guns only come out after dark, and after dark you're generally quite pissed. You probably wont remember what you've been advised to do. Besides, just how much training do you need to run away quickly, with or without overflowing underpants?

Riding around the world was a blast and writing the book was fun, but finding a publisher willing to take a risk with the book has been neither. I'd swear that the many rejection letters were all written by the same person. He "enjoyed" the words but had "no love for the subject", it wasn't "a work of commercial significance". Sure, we're in the middle of a deep recession, but I can't help thinking that perhaps he was just being polite. He suggested that I "develop the dangers", "raise the tension" and expand the "conflicts". All sound commercial advice I'm sure, but what happened happened, and what didn't didn't. "Chapter 29 .... the bloody Tiger refuses to start. That's not good, but the other news is even less agreeable. I've just been eaten by a gang of giant sea monkey's". No, it doesn't really work does it? The truth is, we didn't get shot or catch any wonderful tropical diseases. To the best of my knowledge, we weren't eaten or attacked by any wild animals and ignoring the possibility solo performances, there was certainly no sex. We left London in reasonable health and returned a few months later weighing slightly less, but in roughly the same condition. There was no serious crashing, the rivers that we forded were never raging and the Triumph Tigers were boringly reliable. Despite our best efforts, the bikes simply refused to break. No drama. "Plane lands safely at Heathrow".

So, my dreams of writing a best seller and buying the house next door to J. K. Rowling have been cruelly dashed. I didn't expect to make a fortune, large or small. I've seen the crowded shelves in Waterstones, the competition is fierce. Without exception, every book on every shelf seems to be written by a person who can actually spell, quite amazing. So, massive book sales aren't going to help me to make the money that I foolishly promised to raise for St Teresa's Hospice. I'll eventually reach the target, but I'll just have to do it slightly differently, or perhaps "By Any Means". Anyway, I've decided to publish and possibly be dammed, but unfortunately, the publisher will be me. Self-publishing, it's not the cheapest option. But, if I can sell one book a week, every week until my grandchildren have become grandparents, then I'll break into profit. Ha, that'll prove the doubting publishers wrong. Thankfully, just like the journey itself, I'm receiving an awful lot of help with the process - you know who you are, Thank You. It'll take a few weeks, which probably means a few months, but eventually there'll be a book, "Ashes to Boonville". It'll have words and pages and photographs and everything, just like a real book. In the meantime, I'm writing extracts from the various chapters onto my mirror Blog listed below. Maybe, just maybe, a few people might read it. Maybe, just maybe, they'll be inspired enough by the story to ignore the fun-sponges and set out on their own adventures. I hope so, because they wont regret it.

Anyway, I've got to go, I'm very busy. Busy in a relaxing sort of way. I've got a date with a couple of sexy Italian sisters, the "V" twins, they look quite hot. I'll be riding them for two weeks, but only one at a time, I'm not a gymnast. Also, I've bought a notebook in which to plan the next adventure. It's actually already planned, I just haven't written it down yet, but it shouldn't take me too long, it's a very small notebook.

www.poorcirculationbook.blogspot.com

www.justgiving.com/geoffgthomas

Post 250: Dosvedanya Comrade Scorpion


Volgograd was a lifetime ago. A plea for help. A hastily scribbled note and a copy of The Rider’s Digest. Roman and Slava had raced to our rescue. Under their protective wings in an amazing city of plenty, we were wined, dined and lavishly entertained. With Roman’s help, we tracked down new tyres in Moscow. Metzler Tourance’s for the rear and Pirelli Scorpion’s for the front. Not ideal, but infinitely preferable to riding on canvas. Six days later, with tyres replaced and personal batteries recharged, we pulled out of the “BikeCity34” workshops and onto the wide and perfectly paved Strasse. The compass pointed East towards Saratov but the Tiger‘s were reluctant to follow. Around the first corner and safely out of sight, we pulled to the side of the road. Something was wrong. Tyre pressures too low? Steering bearings too tight? We checked and adjusted everything possible but both bikes had adopted new and dangerous personalities that we just couldn‘t seem to cure. The once reliable and precise steering of the Tiger was gone. The new tyres weren’t working as new tyres should. Individually they were probably fine tyres, but as a mismatched pair they were certainly an experience. At any speed below 40 mph, the handlebars oscillated violently and the bike gave a constant feeling of “falling over“. The front wheel just refused to steer. Where once a gentle nudge would tip the Tiger into any corner, every turn now required a threatening memo giving notice of your intention. It wasn’t a pleasant experience but I was confident that miles and wear would eventually solve the problem.

The mounting miles did little to improve the steering and the silky smooth roads of North America only highlighted the problems. In New York, 18,000 miles after the tyres had been fitted, I replaced the now threadbare Metzler Tourance. I couldn’t bring myself to replace the offending front tyre. In 18,000 miles the Scorpion had used less than half of it’s tread, the bloody thing just refused to die. Sadly, there was no improvement with the new rear. Granted, an undersized Pirelli Diablo Corsa wasn’t the ideal partner for the part worn Scorpion on the front, but it was all that I could find and came at an amazingly low price. Beggars don‘t make good choosers.

Back in Blighty and with only 3,000 miles under it’s belt, the new Diablo Corsa was already beginning to show-off it‘s canvas undergarments. The lovely people at Jack Lilley Triumph in Ashford Common replaced the rear tyre with a previously enjoyed, but free and lovely, Bridgestone Trail Wing. For another 3,000 miles through the summer, I wobbled on with the 24,000 mile Pirelli Scorpion before finally screaming “enough” . I now hated riding the bike, it was always awkward, like walking in flippers or dancing in clown shoes. Calling time on my frustration, this morning I headed down to Essential Rubber in London N1. The Pirelli Scorpion was removed and a new Michelin Anakee was fitted. For the very first time I‘d changed a tyre long before it was legally necessary. I rode out of Essential Rubber wearing a giant smile. The transformation was instant and amazing, riding the Tiger was once again an absolute pleasure. If only I hadn’t been such an arsehole, I could have changed the offending tyre in the Spring and enjoyed a Summer of motorcycling fun. 24,000 miles is a damn fine innings for a tyre, but I wasn’t sorry to see the back of it. Lesson learned.

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Post 249: Donald Masters RIP


This post is an insight into the lengths that many bikers will go to in order to help fellow riders, sometimes friends but more often than not, total strangers. I first picked up this story from a concerned American friend on the 9th of September.
Donald Masters disappeared on the 31st of August while riding his Honda Goldwing in the Rocky Mountains between the borders of Montana and Idaho, somewhere to the north-east of Yellowstone National Park. Donald was a veteran two-wheeled traveller and a regular contributor to Honda Goldwing and Honda ST (Honda Pan European) Internet forums. The alarm was raised when Donald failed to arrive at his destination in Denver Colorado on or around the 9th of September. At first, it seems that local Government Services paid little attention to requests for help, passing responsibility to other Services or to other Localities. It probably seemed to Donald's family that nobody was interested in his disappearance.
Joe Norris, aka 'Mellow' from the US Honda ST Internet forum, a fellow rider but a man who had never met Donald, then posted a message on the forums bulletin board. Word quickly spread, information was gathered and riders were mobilised. Cell phone data was retrieved, surveillance video from traffic cameras was viewed and credit card usage was analysed. Within days, riders were out riding every possible route that Donald could have taken, searching for anything that might possibly help. The town of Dillon Montana became the centre of unofficial operations, riders from across the North East States joined in the search and bikers from further afield paid for their accommodation, food and even helicopters to assist them in the search. The search area was vast, approximately the size of Wales, cell phone coverage was limited and communications difficult. Roads were ridden North and South, East and West, then retraced by other riders. Every motel, gas station, convenience store and camping ground within a seventy-five mile radius of Dillon was checked, ''Missing'' posters handed out and clues to Donald's movements sought. On the weekend of 19th and 20th September 2009, more than a hundred riders were directly involved in the physical search for Donald Masters while many more worked telephones and fax machines from their homes. The majority of these fine people had never met Donald, but each gave their time in support of a missing biker and his family.
Sadly, on 19th September on ''I-93'' just South of North Fork Idaho, Donald Masters was found. His Honda Goldwing had left the road on a bend and come to rest in a ditch shielded by dense undergrowth. Donald Masters had been travelling from Montana to see his newly born grandchild in Denver Colorado. Exactly what happened to Donald Masters may never be known, but as a biker, it's comforting to know that while to the outtside world many of us can appear to be strange, we're never really strangers. My thoughts are with Donald's family, my respect with those who helped his family in their search.

Post 248: Essex Air Ambulance Motorcycle Run


Sunday 13th September 2009, was the 10th anniversary of the Essex Air Ambulance Motorcycle Run. 5,000 bikes gathered at Ford's Dunton Technical Centre before heading off in convoy towards Harwich. Stunt maestro Craig Jones entertained the crowds with wheelies and burnouts that were almost as long as the queues for burgers and coffee. He wasn't the Star of the Show, that place was reserved for the Air Ambulance and its crew. However, life being what it is, the helicopter was called into action and left the event early .... no apology necessary.
The organisation was slick, the segregated car parks were emptied with military precision and 5,000 bikes departed for Harwich without incident. Seeing so many bikes on the road at the same time is an amazing sight, unless of course you just happened to be a car driver waiting to join the same carriageway. All along the route, turn-outs and bridges were filled with waving well wishers. To be riding a motorbike in Great Britain and be 'accepted' by the general public, is a great feeling, especially for a Despatch Rider. Riders and passengers waved back at the crowds and everybody behaved themselves, everybody on a bike that is. Unfortunately, the young spotted dicks in their big noise Vauxhall Corsa's still tried to provoke violence along the A12. But thankfully, none of the riders reacted and the 'Corsa-Boys' survived to annoy us all tomorrow. The day, sponsored by Equity Red Star and Cannon BMW of Braintree, raised more than £40,000 for a service that an increasing number of people, especially bikers, owe their lives to.
Wandering amongst the 5,000 bikes in the car park, I was amazed at the wide range of metal and plastic on display - Scooters, Harley's, Trikes, Classic British, Modern Japanese and Exotic Italian. There were no stars, people or bikes, everybody was equal. It was Animal Farm for powered two wheelers and bragging rights were taking a rest day. In the far corner of car park #3, I spotted a group of immaculate and original Kawasaki KH triples; 350, 500 and 750 versions, a trio of widow-makers. When I was a teenager, my favourite bike was my Kawasaki KH250. I helped to make Sheik Yamani a very wealthy man and kept Darlington's Bob Fortune Kawasaki Centre in business, Kawasaki two-stroke ownership was never cheap, but it was always eventful. It was a bike that made every journey feel like an adventure into the unknown, and often into the nearest hedgerow, but it was the bike that intorudced me to the spirit of biking. It's difficult to form a bond with a bike that you start with a 'Button', but when you kick it into life with your foot, it's a whole different story, you connect. I never had the balls or the finances to graduate to the 250's larger brothers ............. but like the beautiful KH500 above, I've lived to tell the tale.

Post 247: Financial Meltdown ... Happy Anniversary



For those uninterested or unaffected by the current economic conditions, then this is an ideal time to go browsing elsewhere. I’ll return to biking matters in the next post, but to celebrate the first anniversary of Financial Armageddon, the following is my layman’s take on the why’s and how’s of last years financial meltdown.

One year ago this week, I was riding happily across America with a fistful of dollars and not a care in the world. Tents and motorbikes are not the most media friendly environments, but despite being divorced from economic reality, it was impossible to overlook the simultaneous collapse of the world’s banking system. Gas stations were the ideal place to freely read the front pages of newspapers like ‘USA Today’ and the road was the ideal place from which to observe the economic effects on everyday people. Possessions in front yards were labelled with handwritten ’For Sale’ signs and ’U-Haul’ trailers were carrying the possessions of the displaced in every possible direction. The population of Middle-America was selling-up and moving-on. The world had changed overnight, Wall Street had collapsed and Main Street was ’For Sale’.

Collateralized Debt Obligations (CDO‘s), Credit Default Swaps (CDS’s), Asset Backed Securities (ABS’s), Contracts For Difference (CFD‘s). For most people, these terms might as well be from an alien based language and that’s exactly why the Banker’s developed them. Such terms are designed to impress us into a false sense of security and to prevent us from asking questions that we fear might leave us looking stupid. Complex financial instruments are not a new concept, they’ve been in use since the 11th century, so why did it all go so horribly pear-shaped in 2007? The answer is basically ‘Greed’ and below is my layman’s explanation of why things went so horribly wrong.

Building Societies were great institutions. If you had excess cash, you invested it into a savings account and the Building Society paid you a regular rate of interest. In order to afford the interest that they paid on the savings, the Building Society lent out those savings to people who wanted to buy, and more importantly could afford to buy, a home. The interest charged on the ’Mortgage’ was 8% and the interest paid on the ’Savings’ was 3%. The Building Society enjoyed a margin of perhaps 5% that would cover it's operating costs. If the new homeowner stopped making the monthly loan repayments, then the Building Society would recoup their losses by repossessing the house and selling it back into the market. Each Building Society shouldered the risk of every loan that it made. To reduce this risk to an absolute minimum, the Building Society vetted the mortgage applicants and only loaned money to those people that they deemed to be financially worthy and had a healthy initial deposit. The ’Mortgagee’s’ got their homes, the ‘Savers’ got their interest payments and the Building Society ’Members’ shared in the organisations success. It all worked remarkably well, but each Building Society was limited to lending out in mortgages no more than they received in savings. The management of Building Societies began to change and governments encouraged the development of home ownership, the Retail Banks became more aggressive in the residential mortgage markets and the Building Societies looked on in envy. A Building Society’s capital came from the savings deposited by it’s members, but a Retail Bank was owned by shareholders and could borrow additional capital on the open market. Retail Banks had a seemingly unfair advantage and the answer was quite simple ……. Building Societies would become Retail Banks.


We all got our Halifax and Abbey National Shares, the names on the High Street began to change, our regional Building Society became a Retail Bank, the Retail Bank was then swallowed up by an International Retail Bank and the International Retail Bank bought a sexy little Investment Bank with a nice address in London EC3. These new megalithic Financial Institutions had cheap money thrown at them from every direction, annual profits rose and the decimal points moved to the right on the rocket scientists bonus cheques. House prices were rising. Regan, Clinton, Bush, Thatcher and Blair all encouraged the concept and reality of home ownership. New money flooded into the housing market, mortgages once only available to Mr Prime were now being made available to his less reliable half-brother, Mr Sub-Prime. The profit margins were good, Mr Sub-Prime was less worthy than his half-brother and therefore paid a higher rate of interest. He kept up his repayments, why wouldn’t he? His house was rising in value every year. If financially things became a little difficult for him then it wasn‘t really a major drama because a no-questions asked re-mortgage was never more than a mouse-click away. Everything in the financial garden was flourishing and everybody was much more financially aware than the generation before, ’Risk’ was no longer an important factor.

The Rocket Scientists at Investment Banks such as Lehman Brothers, had rediscovered the CDO, the Consolidated Debt Obligation. For the Retail Bank this was a way of reducing the risk involved with homeowners defaulting on their mortgage repayments and for the Investment Bank, often part of the same institution, it was just an amazing way to sell the same profitable product several times over. A CDO is basically a box-file, a container for documents, in this case those documents are Mortgages. Into that container, a bank will put a selection of it’s own mortgages, otherwise known as ’Debt Obligations’, and attach a value to the box, a selling price. Human and corporate nature being what it is, the Retail Bank will hide a few of it’s Mr Sub-Prime Mortgages in with it’s gold-plated Mr Prime versions, thus off-loading some of it‘s more dangerous loans. The Investment Bank buy’s a van full of boxes from various Retail Banks, shuffles the documents into larger boxes, attaches a new selling price to each new box and finds a willing buyer. It works well, each sale generates a small profit and each container can be rearranged and sold again and again. Each subsequent box becomes so big and so diverse in quality, that it becomes impossible to assess the true value of it’s contents. These boxes are on a merry-go-round, Banks are re-purchasing bad mortgages that they’d off-loaded weeks earlier, but now at a slightly inflated price. Finally, somebody asks the sixty-four billion dollar question - ’’why is this box full of crap?’’

The answer to that sixty-four billion dollar question is CDS, the Credit Default Swap. It’s not really an answer to the sensible question, it’s more of an escape mechanism that deems a meaningful answer unnecessary. The fact is that the there is no real ‘answer’, nobody can really understand what the hell is in each box. The boxes of mortgages are now so far removed from the original lenders that even the Bank’s Rocket Scientists can‘t calculate an accurate value for it‘s contents. The reaction of the Bankers is to bury their heads in the communal caviar, continue turning the profits on the CDO’s and to introduce an additional means of making new profits; the CDS.

It’s almost perfect. When the Bank sells CDO, a box of assorted mortgages, it now sells an insurance policy that sits happily alongside it, a Credit Default Swap. The Bank charges an additional premium for the CDS, and if the underlying mortgage asset turns sour, then they compensate the buyer accordingly. At the same time, when the Bank buys a box of assorted mortgages, it buys a Credit Default Swap as part of the same deal. The risk is spread again, everyone is protected and more profits are being made. Suddenly, the world’s largest insurance group AIG, pricks up it’s ears and wonders why it’s missing out on what they deem to be ’Insurance’ business. The Investment Banks are more than happy to let AIG in on the action. I can just imagine an AIG underwriter looking into a billion dollar box of assorted mortgages that’s passed twenty times through various institutions and wondering 'WTF?' Long story short, AIG seem to accept the ’Retail Price’ stamped on each box, they collect the premium for providing the CDS and announce record annual profits on the back of this entirely new business. By the end of 2007, the global trade in CDS’s exceeded $60,000,000,000,000.00, that’s sixty trillion dollars.

Historically, a Building Society could lend no more money than it held in savings. Their profit was limited by the amount of money that they had available to them. By the end of 2007, many Investment Banks were leveraged to a factor of forty. This means that they had borrowed amounts equal to around forty times their actual value, forty times more than they were worth. To put that into context, it’s equivalent to a person earning two thousand pounds a month taking on a mortgage of one million pounds, it’s financial suicide. Adding to this leverage problem, the loans taken on by these Banks were in nature, short-term, but these loans were used to purchase mortgages, which are long-term. The situation was beyond precarious, the entire worlds financial stability rested on the value of our houses.

Much of governmental economic thinking revolves around controlling the rate of inflation. The rate of inflation is determined indirectly by the supply of money, and the supply of money is determined in part by interest rates. As higher inflation became a possibility, Interest rates began to rise which meant that monthly loan and mortgage repayments increased. Added to this problem, many of the Mr Sub-Prime mortgages were falling from their ‘Introductory Discounted Rates’ and homeowners were confronted with a double whammy. The housing market slowed and homeowners began to default on their monthly repayments. Houses were repossessed, new buyers stopped entering the market and prices fell further. A vicious circle had begun. The Banks also had massively increased repayments on their own debts which added pressure to their already overstretched cash holdings. They were no longer able to loan money to other institutions, the financial squeeze was coming from all sides. Northern Rock were the first to break cover. The short-term loans that they’d used to provide long-term mortgages for their customers were not being renewed, they quickly ran out of money. Northern Rock approached the Bank of England and the first run on a British Bank in living memory began. To the public, the failure of Northern Rock was reported as a blip, the result of a flawed business model, an individual case of gross mismanagement. The rest is history; Fannie Mac & Freddie Mae, Bear Sterns, Bradford & Bingley. Lehman Brothers bankrupt, Lloyds saving HBoS and RBS falling into government hands.

The Banks got greedy and the greed was rewarded with the payment of stellar salaries and bonuses. Smoke and mirrors were used to disguise the true value of their business transactions. Profits and bonuses were annual calculations but the mortgages upon which those profits were based were not. Governments were happy with the application of soft-touch regulation for financial institutions while they spent the enormous tax income on popular vote winning projects. Nobody emerges from this global fiasco looking good, but some will emerge looking wealthy. Unfortunately, those are the same people who’s actions created this whole mess in the first place. Governments and Customers don’t design and sell complex financial instruments …. That’s all down to the Bankers.

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Post 246: Summer Holiday, Krabi Southern Thailand



Krabi, deep in the south of Thailand. Rainy season but thankfully for us non-farming off-peak tourists, very little rain. White sandy beaches, warm seas, endless sunshine and ice cold beer. Long tail boats to islands, deserted beaches, peace and tranquility. Krabi is like Phuket of 25 years ago or Kho Samui some 20 years ago. It's not 'unspoilt', but it's at a stage of development that unlike Phuket and Kho Samui, still represents a good compromise between tranquility and entertainment. Unbelievable beaches that you see featured in magazines and movies, will either be in the expensive Seychelles or here in good value Thailand. Sand, white and pure against a sea so blue that you can't help but feel has been freshly painted in anticipation of your arrival. It's August, the low end of the low-season and everything is cheap. At the Ao Nang Beach Resort Hotel, we have adjoining mini suites overlooking the beach, rooms that cost a large fortune during the peak periods are ours for just £10 per night.
From the beautiful Ao Nang beach, a few pounds takes us to the nearby islands on a long tail taxi boat. Poda and Chicken Islands are a few minutes away, Kho Phi Phi Don and Kho Phi Phi Lei are a little further and slightly more expensive. Sadly, Kho Phi Phi Don, featured in 'The Man with the Golden Gun', and Kho Phi Phi Lei, featured in 'The Beach', have risen in popularity and unless you arrive really early in the morning, you'll be sharing your small piece of tranquility with a million other tourists and a flotila of taxi-boats, even in the low season.
For the first time in my life, I paddled a sea kayak. An unsinkable boat designed for two people. The purveyor of these craft turned out to be from Isaan. Everywhere that we go Tassaneeya seems to meet somebody that she knows and advantageous deals are constantly being negotiated. The craft was suddenly suitable for three people, but it seemed that I had the only paddle that ever got wet. It was hard work paddling against the current, but entering the mangrove swamps where macaque monkeys jumped down onto the kayak and hitched short rides made it well worth the effort. We didn't encounter any crocodiles but paddling on still waters beneath high canyon walls was quite an experience.
Later in the day, we visit an elephant sanctuary where once again, Tassaneeya strikes up a conversation in the language of her village. Within minutes, the three of us are aboard an elephant called 'Chang Bung-Shwee' (Mr Helpful Elephant). I struggle with the whole concept of animals being kept in captivity and had it not been for Hannah, I would never have done this. Reluctantly I'd agreed to take a trek through the forests and with hindsight, I'm pleased that I did. We wandered the forests for an hour, taking it in turns to ride the elephant, sitting on it's shoulders and steering with small strokes on it's ears. Meanwhile, the Isaan mahout's walk around us and a constant stream of jokes flow, mostly at my expense. It was actually great fun, Hannah's highlight of the entire holiday. Chang Bung-Shwee didn't seem to notice that we were there, he simply wandered where he wanted, drank half a stream, ate any leaf that took his fancy, pee'd a small reservoir and poo'd a whole mountain of crap. I'm not sure that I'd ride another elephant, but at least these elephants have escaped the trauma's of wandering the streets of Bangkok for the entertainment of other tourists. All in all it was a really good day.
I'll definately return to Krabi in the future, if not for the beauty of it's beaches, then simply for the magnificence of its sunsets.

Post 245: Summer Holiday, Back to Bangkok


After four days in Isaan, Bangkok slaps your face and steals any remnants of tranquility that you'd managed to find in the provinces. It's a different world, a different country, a different culture. We've fallen lucky. I've found a shiny new boutique hotel just off the Kao San Road that's batting well above it's introductory room rate. All the mod cons, three tourist stars and not one of them borrowed or faked. It's a short walk from the 'SleepWith Inn' to Wat Phra Kaeo (The Temple of the Emerald Buddha) and Phra Borom Maha Ratcha Wang (The Grand Palace), but as it's Hannah's first visit to Bangkok, that means taking a tuk-tuk. Tuk-tuks used to be the main means of transport for those who couldn't afford taxi's, but now they're strictly for the tourist and priced accordingly.

The roads are congested, busy even for Bangkok. Within minutes the reason becomes clear. We're surrounded by thousands of protesters. 'Red Shirts', supporters of ex-prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra. A man in exile, a man accused of massive corruption, of electoral fraud and of buying votes by giving away a million free cows to the farmers in the north. Tens of thousands of people form an ocean of red in Sanam Luang, a huge parade ground just to the north of the Grand Palace. Organisers use microphones to whip the crowds into a political frenzy. I have no idea what they're chanting but they seem more than enthusiastic about their cause. It's not intimidating, but it becomes quite claustrophobic as they spill out onto the streets. They stop the traffic and surround our tuk-tuk. It's good spirited, they pose for photographs and wave at Hannah who seems to take it all in her stride. There are no masks to cover their faces and the only visible weapons are banners and long strings of jasmine and orchids worn around their wrists and necks. Then without warning, everything stops, not a single person moves and a comfortable silence falls across the entire area. The sound of Thai music replaces the protesters chanting, the Thai national anthem begins to play. At 8am and 6pm every day, all outdoor spaces across the length and breadth of Thailand are filled with the sound of the national anthem. Everybody stops, everybody stands still and everybody listens. Thaksin Shinawatra might be popular here, but the King is in a whole different league.

We avoid the smiling touts who surround the main entrance from dawn till dusk. They inform unsuspecting tourists that the complex will be closed for two hours, two hours in which they'll escort them to various tourist shops, fashion boutiques and gem stores. In exchange for escorting tourists to these establishments, the tout will receive a healthy introducers fee before returning them to the always open Grand Palace. Nobody seems to stop it, many seem to fall for it and it's the one thing in Thailand that is guaranteed to test my saint-like patience. Thankfully today the touts didn't ask, probably because Tassaneeya was with us, but many other tourists seemed to be falling for their no doubt convincing charms.

Once inside the grounds of the Grand Palace, tranquility is restored. A hundred well armed Thai soldiers march past us at the double and block the entrance against the protesters. Good timing, one minute later and we too would have been denied access. Hannah and Tassaneeya are shocked, not by the demonstration or by the appearance of our well armed guards, but by the fact that they have to rent sarongs in order to cover their lower legs. As we'd left the hotel an hour earlier, the girls had laughed at me for wearing jeans on such a hot and humid day. But I'd known the 'Rules' and no matter what they're called here in Bangkok, I really don't do skirts of any description. Appropriately attired, we reach the turnstile and Hannah is shocked again, ''Foreigners 400 Baht, Thai's Free''. Discrimination she cries.

Dating back to the late eighteenth century, The Grand Palace complex with it's tall golden tower is probably Bangkok's most famous landmark. A complex of richly decorated palaces, rooms and temples that has developed and grown over the centuries. It's a rappers utopia, blingtastic in every sense. Everywhere that you look there is gold, gold and more gold. In the centre of the main temple stands the Emerald Buddha, a statue made entirely from Jade, hence the name, 'Emerald'. The Siamese once covered entirely in gold in order to make it appear worthless to invading forces. I've no idea if the Khmer or Burmese invaders ever reached this far south, but if they did, then the gold diversion had clearly worked because the Emerald Buddha is still here. Of all of the temples that I've visited here in SE Asia, this is my least favourite. It's undoubtedly beautiful but with each additional visit, I get an increasing sense of 'Disney Land'. I prefer the ancient ruins of Ayutthaya or the faded magnificence of Wat Po. But this is for Hannah and no visit to Bangkok is complete without a tour of Wat Pra Kaew and The Grand Palace.

After several hours of wandering, the girls return their temporary sarongs and we escape the tourists and pack sardine-like onto a water taxi along the Chao Phraya River. From the river, you see a side of Bangkok that's invisible from the street. The only open spaces are the perfectly manicured lawns of the luxurious hotels bordering the river; the Mandarin Oriental, the Shangri La. Between them and hidden behind high white walls, are shanty homes that cling to the banks supported by wooden stilts that sink down into the depths of the river. Rows and rows of clothes hang drying on makeshift washing lines and every ramshackle home represents a platform upon which another can be built. No planning permission, no permits, illegal living awaiting the inevitable fall of the developers axe.

We leave the still overcrowded commuter boat at Thaksin Bridge and take the BTS (Sky Train) to Nana Station. I love Thai food and will happily sit all day long at a street stall and eat until way beyond capacity. But this is a holiday and Hannah needs a reintroduction to menus and crockery. It's not the cheappest, but I take the girls to my favourite restaurant. It's unusual and the name sounds strange, but the food is quite possibly the best that I have ever tasted. 'Cabbages & Condoms' is located a few hundred metres along Sukhumvit Soi 12, but it's well worth the walk. The restaurant supports Thailand's Population and Community Development Association, a non-profit organisation founded by a former Thai Health Minister. It promotes safe and responsible sex in a fun, and I guess, practical way. All around the beautiful outdoor dining area, light shades, art work and statues are made from condoms and as the delicious meal comes to an end, instead of the usual after dinner mint, each diner receives a condom. It's difficult to explain this unusual place, you really have to go there, but for the food alone, it's well worth the journey. Hannah and Tassaneeya loved it. After the meal, production of a receipt at the adjoining clinic entitles the presenter to a free vasectomy .... an offer that I politely declined.

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Post 244: Summer Holiday, The Village Temple


As Buddhist's, Thai's believe strongly in the process of making merit. The belief is that the actions taken in this life, will determine their position and happiness in the next. The three basic ways of making merit are to pray, to maintain the Buddhist commandments and to give alms. In a modern and lets face it, seemingly sinful city like Bangkok, this process can often feel at odds with what's happening in the current life. Even in the bars of Bangkok's notorious 'Entertainment Districts', every venue will have a small shrine where prayers are offered and food is given to the spirits of their ancestors. On Bangkok's streets, every morning between 6am and 7am, thousands of monks will walk in their saffron robes towards their various temples. While the tourist sleeps, Thai's will flock onto the streets and place food into the monk's bowls. They add freshly prepared rice, fish, vegetables and fruit to the monk's bowl and place candles, joss sticks and flowers into the monks shoulder bag. Then, they will bow their heads and receive a short blessing from the monk. As the monk performs the blessing, they will often pour water between them signifying that the merit that they receive is to be shared amongst the donors entire family. Most tourists probably miss this daily act, but to understand it, you have to leave Bangkok and travel to the more rural areas, places that are yet to be affected by the cultural pollution that has infected the towns and cities of Thailand.
In Bangkok, or in any other major town in Thailand, you'll see many young and middle-aged people. However, you'll seldom see a Thai of any great age. Thai's are historically village dwellers and the villages are the homes of individual extended families. The cities are for the young with careers, places for making money to provide for the extended family back home. Life will usually begin and end in a small village, often a village without a name. The city or town is for the middle part of life, a means to an end but never a place that a Thai will really consider to be 'home'. Home is a rural place, a place where the family can trace it's ancestors back to the times of deforestation, a time when the travellers levelled the land and began irrigating and planting their rice. The buildings are new, the traditions are ancient and the contrast between the two can seem irrational to the European eye. It is only out in the villages where everything begins to make sense.
We kick off our shoes and follow Tassaneeya up the burning marble steps into the coolness of the dark Village Temple. Thirty elders of Tassaneeya's family, mostly the womenfolk, sit around the floor on uniformly sized straw mats, mats upon which they'll pray, eat and sleep for a period of 24-hours. They're all dressed in exactly the same white robes, they share the same facial features and chatter together in chirpy Isaan Thai. It's a language derived from Thai and Lao, a language that I struggle to understand. Amongst the thirty sisters and cousins, I eventually pick out Tassaneeya's Grandma. She looks at me and cracks into the most beautiful and toothy gleaming smile. Three monks with shaven heads wearing less than pristine saffron robes, sit cross-legged on a small dais and quietly meditate. To the side of the dais stands a small and temporary internal room that wasn't there on my previous visits. It has walls of golden silk fabric that flow and shimmer beneath the cooling breeze from the whirring ceiling fans above us. In front of the curtains is a low altar covered with flowers, burning candles and strongly scented smouldering joss sticks. The chattering has stopped, all attention is now on us, or more particularly, on Hannah. As whispers turn to giggles, I pick out several often repeated words; 'sow, farang, narak', girl, European, lovely, Hannah is the subject of all conversation. The eldest monk gestures for us to come forward. We kneel in a line before the monks and offer the goods that we have brought for them. UHT milk, paper tissues and fresh fruit. They smile and together nod their approval. We knew that the monks would approve of our offerings because they operate something of an informal 'wedding list' system, we'd brought only the things that remained outstanding. The ritual of making merit might be ancient, but it's also totally practical. You give only what is needed at the time, nothing is wasted. The people take care of the monks and when the people become, for whatever reason, incapable of taking care of themselves, they can join the Temple as monks. A perfect system of welfare. We light candles and joss sticks on the altar in front of the curtained room before returning our attention to the three monks. They provided their blessing and smilingly indicate to Hannah that she should turn around. Forewarned by a fatherly whisper, Hannah turns around slowly and with hands clasped tightly together, head bowed, she speaks quietly, 'sarwasdee ka'. To the European eye and in perfect unison, thirty identical septuagenarian women return the smiling gesture and say aloud, 'sarwasdee ka'.
You had to be there, it was a moment in life that is unlikely to be repeated. In a slightly scary movie, this would have been a 'one-take' scene, perfect, surreal and so bloody funny. Everybody was laughing, excited that they'd met another European, a girl, and a girl who spoke some Thai. We leave the temple and wander outside in the Temple gardens. We're still laughing, Hannah asks me what 'the thing' behind the curtains was? There was no point in trying to hide it from her, the whole point of traveling in this way is to discover. I told her what was behind the curtain and surrounded by strongly scented joss sticks ...... but unfortunately we wont be here for the Senior Monks final funeral on Monday.

Post 243: Summer Holiday, Leaving London


Heathrow hotels charge upwards of £60 per night. That's equivalent to staying five or six nights at hotels in Thailand. No contest. An uncomfortable night on the free but inadequate benches of Terminal 3. Cold metal, multiple armrests, too little comfort, zero sleep. The Etihad tickets had been amazingly cheap. I assumed this meant that the planes would be empty. Boarding at 8am for the 7-hour flight, no spare seats, no room to sleep. Muslims returning to Abu Dhabi for the holy month of Ramadan. Two hours in transit at Abu Dhabi's new airport before boarding the 6-hour onwards flight to Bangkok. Again, no spare seats, no room to sleep. Muslims escaping Abu Dhabi for the holy month of Ramadan.
Bangkok; hot, humid and wonderfully vulgar. Hannah's first visit to South-East Asia, a culture shock of some magnitude. All personal space is abandoned at Suvarnabhuni Airport, a taxi to Sukhumvit Road, kind offers of golf, massages, tailored suits and precious gems all politely declined. The Guest House, £12 for two rooms. Fifth floor, no lift. Hannah gets a room with balcony and a wonderful view over Bangkok. Next door, I get the buildings two giant watertanks and the promise of a reasonably priced night of sleeplessness. The prospect of a 7-hour bus journey to Khon Kaen is unpopular. I revisit the purveyor of forged air tickets on Sukhumvit Soi 4. It's closed. Wednesday 12th of August, the beginning of the grouse season in Britain, the Queen's birthday in Thailand. A public holiday.
North of Bangkok, we arrive in Khon Kaen. The vast and inexpensive hotel, always empty, always welcoming. A conference for H1N1, the threat from the swine flu pandemic has followed us into Asia. The hotel is full, all hotels in Khon Kaen are full, bad timing, poor planning. I consider the prospect of sleeping at 'The Village'. No great problem for me but a hardship too far for a teenage town dweller with an addiction to all things electrical. I smile and I beg, they find us two rooms. The first proper nights sleep, pressed cotton sheets and cool air conditioning. Hannah will need it, and so will I.
The huge silver pick-up truck bumps across unpaved roads that weave between flooded paddy fields surrounded by lush green trees. It's growing season in Thailand. Entire families work as teams in the fields. Bent double for hours on end beneath wide brimmed hats and a blazing sun, not an inch of flesh exposed. The rice is planted by hand. it grows lush and thick before before transplanted into flooded fields where it flourishes until harvest. These are hardy people, Isaan people. Their long eared, long faced cows are more sensible. They shelter beneath the broad leaves of the banana trees as they watch their masters toil. Eventually, we arrive in the second village, the home of Tassaneeya's family, a village still without a name. As Hannah climbs out of the truck, a small crowd of children gathers. The adults, more reserved than their offspring, stand back and observe us from a distance. I was not the first European that the villagers had seen, but for most of them, I was the first that they had met. Now Hannah was something completely different, a giant European girl, a first for everybody. I could hear the chatter of the adults in the background and the giggling of the children closer to us. They wanted to reach out and touch Hannah, perhaps to see if she was real. It was quite surreal, possibly a once in a lifetime experience for her.
The village seemed to be quieter than usual, none of the older generation were outside to greet us. A fast exchange in too fast Thai. Tassaneeya then explains their absence. The village elders are 'making merit' at the Temple. They will be spending the night there, paying their respects to Tassaneeya's Grandfather and the senior monk who both recently passed away. We too should go to the Temple, and we did. But, I'll try to convince Hannah to describe exactly what happened next.

Post 242: Holiday Season


When it comes to English weather, you can only have so much fun before you finally admit defeat and throw in the beach towel. But escaping these shores in the summer is expensive. Whenever the schools are in recess, the cost of flights increases and the price of sunshine moves further beyond your budget. For me, the answer is to head for the rain and to hope for the best. It's 'Low Season' in Thailand and I managed to book flights for myself and Hannah when they were still relatively cheap. It will be Hannah's first taste of travelling. Nothing extreme, apart from the limited budget. Hopefully a temporary separation from hair straighteners and meals that don't need to be unwrapped will prove less traumatic than she currently fears. We'll be roughing it for a night in Heathrow Airport before flying via Abu Dhabi to Bangkok. We'll spend a couple of days in and around 'The Village'' close to Khon Kaen and then back to Bangkok for some therapeutic shopping that should help to reduce any teenage trauma. From there, it's down to a beach hut in Krabi for a few days before returning home via every landing strip in the Middle East. Hopefully, Blighty will still be here when we return at the end of August.
Meanwhile, I think it's fair to say that 2009 hasn't been Gordon Brown's finest year. I suspect that for him the summer recess couldn't have arrived soon enough. For the first few weeks of his family vacation, Mr Brown is spending time with his family in the Lake District and by avoiding flying, he'll be helping to save the planet. Then, he'll return to Kirkcaldy where he'll be undertaking voluntary work and thus helping to save his reputation. To prevent this altruistic act from looking like any another calculated publicity stunt, the Downing Street press office has quietly announced that this volunteering should not be a matter for media attention. Shoot me.
Back in Westminster, Deputy Leader Harriet Harman had moved loudly into Number 10. It's interesting that she's chosen this particular time to announce that 'Men' are to blame for the current financial crisis. She's probably quite correct in her assumption that men are to be blamed, but as she makes her feet comfortable beneath Downing Street's shagpile, I wonder if she'll be brave enough to name the 'Men' she's referring to? Harriet is undeniably ambitious, but Gordon needn't worry too much about her current bout of sniping. Next week she''ll be gone and replaced by his trusty sidekick, Peter Mandelson. In turn, Mandelson will later be replaced by Jack Straw who'll keep things ticking along until Gordon returns to the helm at the end of the summer recess. Hold on. I know that Alan Sugar's been drafted in to support Gordon's Cabinet, but this is beginning to sound like a very scary episode of the apprentice. The contestants may be quite familiar to us, but I think we can guess who Peter Mandelson is hoping will get ''Fired'' and ''Hired''.
When Lord Mandelson of Foy in the county of Herefordshire and Hartlepool in the county of Durham, First Secretary of State, Secretary of State for Business Innovation and Skills and Lord President of the Council moves into Downing Street next week, I suspect that included within his personal baggage there will be a tape measure. Mandelson may lack many things, but like Harriet Harman, ambition isn't one of them. It seems that having saved Gordon Brown's arse, Mandelson has been given the freedom of Westminster and is using it to advantage. His own advantage of course. Gordon Brown must surely have enough vision to see that those around him are planning their own advancement based upon his demise.
Lord Mandelson hasn't employed any subtlety in his efforts to undermine the Prime Minister. He doesn't need to be subtle, Brown is a fighter on the ropes, punch drunk, upright but unconscious and clinging to every possible glimmer of hope. Mandelson privately devised, and then publicly destroyed, the obviously flawed message of 'Tory Cuts'' verses ''Labour Investment''. He volunteered Brown for a ''Presidential Debate'' that he can never win and that he'd already declined. I can only guess that it was the Lord of Darkness himself who advised Gordon Brown to continue the Government's stupid and immoral challenge to the levels of compensation paid to service men and women injured in the line of duty. I'm no fan of Brown, nor a supporter of Cameron and Clegg, but they're all infinitely preferable to the twice disgraced and unelected hubris horror that is Lord Peter Mandelson.
Perhaps I'm being paranoid, but my theory is this: Mandelson plans the complete the public destruction of Gordon Brown and thus ensures that Cameron's Conservatives win the 2010 General Election. A task that with Brown's assistance, he seems to have already achieved. Prior to the election, Mandelson will relinquish his many titles and stand as a Labour MP in the safest possible seat. Following a humiliating election defeat, Mandelson will run, with Harriet Harmen as his Deputy, and gain the leadership of the Labour Party. The Tories will inherit an economy where for many years to come the only thing in the black will be Alistair Darling's eyebrows. They'll have to increase taxes and drastically reduce Government spending. Within five years of necessary but unpalatable economic pain, we'll grow bored with the austerity and vote New New Labour back into power. Peter Mandelson, First Lord of the Treasury, Prime Minister ...... mission accomplished.