Love from Ljubljana

I find myself surrounded by dead animals.

I am writing to you from Pension Zaplata in Slovenia.

Pension Zaplata must be the place that vegetarians and animals rights activists who have led unwholesome lives go to when they die. Just about every animal from Slovenia can be found here, stuffed, mounted and proudly displayed, welcoming visitors with cold, dead eyes.

From the birds and deer in the hallway to the imposing Croatian bear that greets you as you enter, this place is a Republican's dream.

At first I thought I didn't mind it too much, but waking up this morning to be confronted by the bare white skull of a deer, antlers still attached, is more than a little nauseating. (Eat them, sure, but don't decorate your house with them).

Still - and I feel a touch of hypocrisy coming on - I did tuck into a hearty meal of deer medallions in cherry sauce earlier, followed later by tender young boar. Perhaps that's why a bull charged me today.

That Bulls Got Balls

Slovenia truly is a beautiful country.

A few hours ago I rented a bicycle and took a ride to a nearby village called Kranj, travelling down little used roads and past green meadows, fast flowing rivers and towering, cloud covered mountains.

After visiting Kranj, I hid my bicycle and made my way into the hills on foot to explore this beautiful landscape further. After a short walk, I came to a wire fence and, mindful of the fact that I was entering private land, I hopped over and began making my way across a field.

I soon ran into a couple of cows, who started giving me the daggers, so I stared back, being sure to give them a wide berth. Don't bother them and they won't bother you Andrew, I thought to myself. With that thought barely finished, there was suddenly a great crashing noise and moments later a huge bull appeared from nowhere and came charging towards me.

I turned and ran, jumping the wire fence, and began making my way down a steep slope, going as fast as my legs would carry me. Inevitably, I slipped and started sliding down the slope, ass first.

With the bull now completely forgotten, my only concern was to stop myself falling. I was grabbing at branches and small trees but I was moving too quickly to get a grip. After sliding about 30 feet, I went - quite literally - crotch first into a small branch.

Looking back, and at the time, it was quite comical. I was sliding so quickly, there was no time to be afraid. The fall wouldn't have killed me, but that little branch saved me from a few cuts and bruises.

Surprisingly, I experienced no pain at all and my crotch came out completely unscathed. I suspect, however, that Emily may now need to wait a little longer for the child that she so desperately wants.

Smiles and Sadness in Semic

Being in Slovenia, and writing this email, brings my life full circle.

This is my second visit to Slovenia; I was here two years ago today, in a small town called Semic, working with paraplegics.

Tomorrow I head to Kranj again, leaving the stuffed animals and my friend the bull behind. I will catch a train to Ljubljana and then head to Semic where I will spend time with the same Slovenian people I first met in 2005.

Being in Semic two years ago was very intense. There was me, a dozen Slovenian paraplegics and a few other international volunteers. We spent nearly all of our time in a house not unlike the Big Brother house. There was no TV, no Internet, just us in the house, talking, eating, playing chess and other games.

On the one hand, it was a great experience. The Slovenians were great people and nice to be with. But I had problems with the other volunteers. There was a man in his late seventies called Howard who was fine. My problems were with a Swiss girl, an Irish girl, an American girl and a French-Polish girl. They were nasty, small minded people, who should have been appearing in an episode of Big Brother rather than volunteering to work in Slovenia.

They spent most of their time gossipping (about me, unfortunately) and were all obsessed with sex.

At one point - and it's embarrassing for me to relate this but I will anyway - I walked into the room to find them engaged in a conversation about how they would refrain from eating a day before having anal sex so they don't open their bowels before doing the deed. This is the type of girl we are talking about here. They said some very nasty and hurtful things about me and ruined my time in Slovenia.

That is part of the reason I am going back, to banish the memory of those awful people.

But more than that, I am going to spend time with the Slovenian people again. Wonderful people like Rok, Stefan, Damjan and Joe Rabbit. Tomorrow I will return to that small village and history will repeat itself as my life comes full circle.

More Smiles and Sadness in Semic

Thursday 20 September 2007

I am writing to you from Semic. Its a little after eleven in the evening on Thursday 20 September 2007. Two years ago, to the very day, to the very minute, I was here, in this house, almost certainly in this room, with the people who are sitting across the table from me right now.

Rok is here, and Joe Rabbit, and Stefan and Damjan and many of the people I met two years ago. Very often, when I visit a place and then go back in an attempt to recapture the past, I am met with disappointment because things always change.

In the time that has passed since I visited Semic in 2005, nothing has changed.

The house is the same. The kitchen, the decor, the beds, the crappy TV, the trolley we used to wheel the food around on. Even the neighbours dog that barked all night long and kept us awake two years ago is still here, still barking.

The church bells still rings. The same clock still ticks. Sitting here, writing this, it is like those two years never passed at all.

I arrived in Semic from Kranj on Tuesday and the past two days have again been filled with smiles and sadness. There have been visits to the pub, games of chess, meals, conversations, laughter and moments of reflection.

Tomorrow the camp ends and I will leave Semic once again. But for now, for this moment, I am back in the place of a thousand memories.

My life truly has come full circle.

From the memory box of a Professional Englishman.

Madness in Mexico City

Ever since I was a boy I've dreamed of visiting the Amazon.

Some kids want to be astronauts. Some want to be firemen. But not me. I wanted to be an Indian, living deep in the Amazonian jungle with some unknown tribe, who would accept me as one of their own and teach me the ways of the forest.

I think a lot of that came from watching a film called The Emerald Forest based on the true story of a boy who was kidnapped by a Brazilian tribe.

It fascinated me then - and still does today - that there are Indians living in the Amazon who have never had contact with the outside world. Unknown tribes, who have lived in the rainforest for eons, and have never seen or spoken to a white man.

When I was twelve, I resolved to save up the money I was earning from my paper round - which was about £2.60 a week - and use it to visit the Amazon.

I guessed that it would take me about six months to save up the necessary airfare. When I arrived in the jungle, I genuinely believed that I would come across a tribe who would 'see the light of the forest in my eyes' and take me in as one of their own.

I planned to spend the rest of my days living blissfully amongst the trees, bathing in clear lakes and flirting with bare breasted young women. Yup, I was a strange kid.

Well twenty-one years later, at the grand old age of 33, I am finally on my way to the Amazon where I will spend the best part of a month living with the Shuar people in Ecuador.

This is the latest part of my travels. I left London Heathrow on Saturday morning and spent five hours in Toronto before boarding a connecting flight to Mexico. My time in Toronto was too short for me to form any impressions of the city, but I will return in late February, on the way back to the UK, which will give me a chance to explore Toronto and give me a taste for Canada.

I arrived in Mexico City at half past eleven in the evening on Saturday night where I was met by my friend Cesar, from my days in York, who remains one of the nicest people I have ever met.

Yesterday I spent a very nice day in his car and his company, exploring the sprawling megalopolis that is Mexico City, one of the biggest, most violent and most diverse cities on the planet.

We visited the ancient city of Teotihuacan, getting lost along the way, which gave me a chance to get a taste for the 'real' Mexico, as we passed through forgotten towns where old men in sombreros stood around, killing time and drinking beer.

We planned to visit a bull fight, but ran into some fajitas on the way, and arrived at the fight as everyone was packing and leaving.

I am not quite sure how I would have reacted to watching a bull fight, but very much regret that we were too late, as I would have liked to have experienced it just the once. I think that killing animals for sport is very cruel, and I may well have been the only person there cheering for the bull, but I would have liked to have watched it once nonetheless.

As we were late for the bullfight, we visited a restaurant instead, where I tucked into some dead cow, so it wasn't all in vain.

In a few hours time I return to Mexico City airport where I board a flight that will take me to Ecuador in South America, where I will stay in the capital, Quito, for four days before heading to meet the Shuar on Thursday. You wonder why I visited Toronto and why I am currently in Mexico if I am visiting the Amazon rainforest. Well, it was simply the cheapest way of doing it.

A round trip ticket from the UK to Ecuador costs around £600, but I was able to find a return flight from the UK to Mexico for £299 (sometimes it pays to spend ten hours searching Google) and flying from Mexico to Ecuador costs just £230, albeit with a dodgy Panama airline, known for losing the occasional plane.

It also gave me the opportunity to meet Cesar again (before he visits me in Belarus in April) and spend a bit of time in Mexico.

I will return to Mexico City for two days in late February, before heading briefly to Toronto and then returning to the UK. I travel to Belgium the following day and visit Belarus a few days after that.

I think that I have learned a very important lesson in the past few months, and my time in the Ukraine has been a big factor in that. What I have learned is that life doesn't have to be about problems or suffering, life can be wonderful too, if only you let it.

True, for some people life can be very difficult, if you are terminally ill for example, and we live in a horrific world, but still, life can be lived to the full, if you don't let the bastards get you down.

With this in mind, I am leaving my hotel in Mexico City shortly and putting my faith in Panama aviation, hoping that I will make it safely to Quito in Ecuador.

Tomorrow I have five hours of Spanish lessons, followed by four on Wednesday, and then on Thursday comes the most difficult part of my journey, when I leave Quito and board a bus that will take me to a province from where I must make my way into the Amazon and to the Arutam Rainforest Reserve where I will meet the Shuar people.

The Shuar were once regarded as the most fiercesome people in the Amazon and were known for shrinking the heads of their enemies. Today they are much nicer though.

I will spend the best part of a month living with the Shuar, helping them farm their food, teaching the kids English, helping the men hunt and learning how to make wooden baskets. I will visit other tribes who live deeper in the rainforest.

I only hope that on Thursday the Indians are expecting me and they don't take one look at this unshaven Englishman, who will at that point speak about three words of Spanish, and say to each other: "We don't understand a word this man's saying. Let's eat him."

Providing that doesn't happen, and providing I make it there and back in one piece, I will write to you again from Ecuador in mid February to let you know how things went. If you don't hear from me again, you can guess that things did not go well.

Until next time, if there is one, take care.

Thanks for reading this.

Take care, Cesar.

From the memory box of a Professional Englishman.

Englishman in New York

Howdy.

This entry comes to you from the world's biggest Internet cafe in Times Square in New York.

What I'm about to write will probably sound a little geeky, but ever since I wrote my first blog entry, I've wanted to write an entry with the subject title 'Englishman in New York.' And now that I've done it, it actually feels quite good! Another ambition achieved! Two to go!

I arrived in the capital of the world on Tuesday after a two hour flight from South Beach in Miami. Miami is the worst place I have ever visited - it must surely be the place that devils go to when they die. A plastic place full of beautiful, awful, rude, plastic people.

I was forced to endure three days in the sunshine state after flying in from the Bahamas. I must have been on coke when I decided to include Miami in my travels. And it's not over yet - I have to spend one more day there before I fly home. Aaaargh!

But enough about Miami. What I want to write about is New York City. It's funny, but the strangest thing has happened. I've realised something, something that I could never have predicted or expected. What I've realised, simply, is that I love New York.

Yes - me! Mr. Anti-American.

This is my first visit and I never expected it to affect me in such a way. I understand now why New York has been the inspiration for so many films and musicals and why so many artists have been able to harness the almost tangible energy that runs through these dimly lit streets. I've never experienced anything like it before.

Within just a few hours of flying into LaGuardia airport I knew that this city was going to have a profound affect on me. I was like a kid in a candy store, running through the streets, marvelling at everything around me.

My tour of New York City began yesterday with a trip to the Empire State Building in Manhattan. My hotel is nearby and so it seemed like a logical place to start. I took the audio tour and learnt a little bit about the history of New York. It also gave me the chance to see the entire city spread out before me and to marvel at the scale and the scope of this vast metropolis.

I liked the view so much that I returned to the Empire State Building and looked upon the city by night. It was a beautiful sight, a million lights stretching out before me, seeming to go on forever.

After visiting the Empire State Building I made my way down Fifth Avenue. As I did so I listened to the song by Sting that was the inspiration for this entry - another ambition achieved! (One to go).

While on Fifth Avenue I did something that every visitor to New York should do - I bought a hot dog. And it was pretty darn good! I haven't travelled in a yellow taxi cab yet, but the night is still young!

After devouring another 2 hot dogs I made my way to the ice skating rink at the Rockefeller Center. I stood there and watched a few dozen people skating and I wanted, more than anything, to join them. Yet I lacked the confidence to do so.

That sounds strange, I know. I can travel halfway across the world, I can swim with sharks, I can go paragliding, I can eat in restaurants alone and yet I can't bring myself to go ice skating alone?

Even with all these thoughts going through my head I still couldn't bring myself to step onto that ice rink. The head said yes but the feet said no. The truth is I'm a shy person, I lack confidence and there are just some things I find it difficult. I guess that ice skating alone is one of them.

So I left the Rockefeller Center behind and made my way to St Patrick's Cathedral, the oldest cathedral in New York. It was okay, though my eyes were drawn to the gigantic American flag hanging from the ceiling. The stars and stripes inside a church? Ugh.

After leaving the cathedral and the flag behind, I made my way to Central Park where I found another ice rink. This time I was determined to let my feet do the talking and before I could doubt the wisdom of my thinking I paid $13 and made my way on to the ice.

And it was all okay. The world didn't melt, Michael Jackson didn't turn black again. Skyscrapers didn't fall. I didn't even get laughed at. And I didn't fall over once!

True, I went went round slower than almost everybody else and I did knock a few kids over, but I didn't fall over once!

It turned out to be one of the most enjoyable times I've had during the past 16 days and it was quite magical, skating in Central Park at night, surrounded by skyscrapers. Quite magical.

And that was my first night in New York City. After stopping by Grand Central Station and New York Public Library, I returned to my hostel and was soon sleeping soundly in the city that never sleeps.

Earlier today I took a short helicopter flight around Manhattan. It was fun, a little scarier than I imagined, almost like floating.

Afterwards I made my way to the site where the World Trade Center stood. It was a sombre moment, standing in the spot where, two and a half years ago, nearly three thousand people lost their lives.

September 11th was a chance for America to change. Unfortunately, under the leadership of George W. Bush, America was transformed that day into something awful.

Monsters created more of a monster. And now, sadly, because of this Government's appalling foreign policy, what happened on September 11th was just a taster of what is to come.

After leaving Ground Zero I took a ramble down Wall Street and soon found that Battery Park and the ferry terminal to Liberty Island were nearby. I couldn't resist going to see the Tall Lady so I paid my ten bucks and headed out to see the french visitor.

And she was kinda small...!

After the Statue of Liberty I made my way here to Times Square - and boy what a sight to behold. Piccadilly Circus eat your heart out! I think that the first time you see Times Square you are either amazed or appalled. Or, like me, both.

Times Square is a mesmerising combination of skyscrapers, advertisements, flashing lights, TV screens, crowds of people and yellow taxi cabs. It's hypnotising, impressive - and probably quite evil!

A few hours ago I was standing in Times Square, wearing my Versace coat and taking photographs with my mobile phone, when a photographer doing a photo shoot started taking photos of me! Really!

A child of capitalism in the capital of capitalism.

And that's just about it for New York City.

I leave this great city behind tomorrow afternoon and board a flight that will take me to Detroit. Hopefully I'll be able to squeeze in a quick visit to the American Museum of Natural History before I leave. I also want to visit the Bronx.

But for this entry, and for this night, this is an Englishman in New York signing off and wishing you well. It's after eleven and I'm miles away from home.

I'll write to you again from Michigan.

Until then, take care.

New York, New York.

From the memory box of a Professional Englishman.

Email from the Edge Part I

Hello.

How are you?

I don't know where this is going...

I'm going to sit here and let the words flow and see what appears on my screen. This could be a very personal entry, so if that's not your thing, go and take a walk and when you return I'll be gone.

I'm sitting in York library - my bum has graced this seat many a time - and I'm writing to you on a warm and sunny afternoon.

Life is a bizarre thing, man.

I often marvel at people who manage to breeze through life, hardly a care in the world, meeting all of the challenges that confront them on a daily basis and accepting and adapting to this crazy little world which human beings have shaped and conquered.

Life for me, and many of us, is not that easy. My heart was broken a few days ago, as it has been broken many times before, and now I am trying to recover the fragments and piece them back together.

I guess it's this that I want to write about today.

I'm aware that my entries sometimes have an air of tragedy to them, and I really try my best not to be self-absorbed, but despair and heartache confront me on quite a regular basis and an outlet is needed for the emotions that often threaten to overwhelm me.

If that outlet is a library, a computer screen, a keyboard and oodles of electronic space, then so be it. I don't know anyone I can talk to about my trials and tribulations, and so that's where you come in.

But before we go into that and before I tell you about Kimberley Dryden - the girl who is the cause of my latest troubles - let me tell you how things have been going in my increasingly bizarre and surreal life since I managed to get away from that damn hospital.

So, I visited London recently. I bought myself a nice Versace coat. It cost the equivalent of almost two thousand dollars. It 's covered in distinctive patches. I think - and hope - it's cool.

While I was in London, I bumped into Michael Portillo. He thought I was stalking him. (Michael Portillo is a high-profile ex-politician). It happened when I was travelling around London by tube. I noticed Michael Portillo standing opposite me. He was immaculately dressed, wearing a suit, with his hair gelled; frozen in perfection.

He was looking at me, because I'm wearing a mad coat covered in patches, and I was looking at him, because he's Michael Portillo.

This went on for a while - him looking at me, me looking at him - in a non-sexual way, you understand - and then the tube pulled into a station and he got off. This was also my stop, and amongst dozens of people, I ended up walking right behind him as he left the train and made his way across the platform.

I unintentionally followed Michael Portillo as he walked and suddenly he became aware that I was just a few feet away from him.

I'm sure that the poor guy thought I was some sort of nut. Maybe it was the fact that I was blasting Sting's Don't Stand So Close To Me through my personal CD Player. (Perhaps Mad About You would have been a better choice).

As soon as he got through the turnstile, he was off, faster than a race horse. He veered to the side, took a right turn, went in the opposite direction of the exit and disappeared.

As for Sting and I, we went on our merry way and thought how funny it was that we'd managed to spook Michael Portillo.

So the moral of this story is that you don't need a degree or wealthy parents to make a difference in politics - all you need is a two thousand dollar Versace coat!

So that was my first bizarre trip to London. My second strange visit to London happened about two weeks ago when I visited my nation's capital with the intention of purchasing a pair of Versace trousers.

I arrived at London Victoria coach station and joined a queue to purchase a ticket for the tube. I noticed that somebody had left a white envelope lying on the counter in front of me. Thinking it was empty, I took a look inside anyway and, to my amazement, I found that it was stuffed with crisp, unused bank notes!

My heart skipped a beat or ten and I looked around. There was a guy behind me but he seemed unaware that the envelope was there.

I contemplated leaving the envelope on the counter but thought that if I did the guy behind me would probably take the money. I considered handing the envelope to the ticket-seller but he was rude and I thought that he might keep it as well.

So I took the envelope and the money. I counted the money on the tube and there was one hundred and forty pounds there. And yes, I did rather guilty about it later, but it did pay for the Versace shirt that I'm wearing right now as I write this blog entry!

So that was my second bizarre trip to London.

There's a lot more to write about it. I want to tell you about my brief visit to Paris last week. I want, too, to tell you the Princess Diana obsessive and possible serial killer that I'm about to share a house with in York. I also would like to share a thought or ten with you about the whole Iraq situation.

And, of course, I want to tell you about Kimberley Dryden. She is the reason that I'm writing this entry and the reason that I'm in York. She's also the reason that my heart is in pieces...

Until next time, thank you for reading my words.

Bye.

From the memory box of a Professional Englishman.

Chasing Dracula in Cluj-Napoca

Hi!

It's me.

When I was a teenager I was a big fan of a TV show about a fictional town in America called Twin Peaks.

It was a strange town, full of weird and wonderful characters like the Log Lady and Agent Cooper and visited by evil spirits that possessed many of the locals. I watched Twin Peaks every week and for a while I was obsessed. But in all the time that I spent watching the show, I never thought that I would end up visiting a town like Twin Peaks...

Welcome to Cluj-Napoca in Transylvania.

I'm exaggerating, of course. Cluj, the second largest city in Romania, is really nothing like Twin Peaks. But it's still a weird and wonderful place.

I have never before set foot in a city with so many flags. They decorate every street here. The mayor is a bit of a right-wing nut and he's taken his love of Romania to the extreme. Even the benches have been painted in the three colours of the Romanian flag. And the traffic cones. The litter bins. The police cars....

Romania, though never a part of the Soviet Union, still looks very Soviet and the cars, buses and monuments here are very similar to those you can find on the streets of Belarus and the Ukraine.

To tell the truth, I don't really like the people, though my opinion of Romania and the Romanian people is changing daily.

Some people have been kind and I've collected many new email addresses. Cluj is a very nice city and I would recommend it. The girls are also very pretty.

But this is not the welcome that I received from the people of Belarus. I've spent the last week thinking about the people I met there. People like Michele, Tanya, Olga and, especially, that wonderful girl I fell in love with...Katja Hrinkevich.

Here in Romania, walking the streets of Cluj in my expensive clothes and with my British accent, I do get the impression that many people look at me like I'm a meal ticket. And many people here have told me that the locals just want to know me for my euros.

So anyway. I mentioned last time that I was coming here to meet some mysterious strangers. Those strangers were a group of international volunteers I had arranged to meet here. We were coming to Transylvania to learn how to make pottery.

Unfortunately, I was a few days late and when I arrived I discovered that the volunteers had decided to abandon the project and go travelling. It seems that there English wasn't so good and they didn't understand the meaning of the word "pottery"! Eh?

This means that I have come to Romania for nothing. Am I pissed? You bet! But still, it has given me the opportunity to meet some new people and to see a place that I would never otherwise have visited.

I've also had some rather unique experiences.

On the train from Budapest to Cluj I met a girl in her twenties who spoke good English. She was travelling to another city in Romania. We spent some hours together and ended up playing a game where we used a pen and bits of paper to ask each other questions.

These soon became questions of a very sexual nature and as the journey continued we both started to get rather excited and rather hot.

Nothing actually happened, because I'm far too shy to have something with a stranger on a train - I prefer to get to know a person much better before doing the shaky-monkey-wild-and-bumpy - but it was an interesting experience nonetheless.

So. What else have I done in the past week? I visited a Chinese restaurant and sampled frogs legs for the first time. (I wanted to try shark and octopus but they were out). I went to an art museum with a girl called Dana and later watched Stuart Little 2 with her.

I met two pleasant girls at a restaurant and enjoyed speaking to them very much. I sampled some of the nicest milk shakes I've ever had in my life. I also went to a nightclub with two people.

During the past days I've come to the conclusion that Romanians are vampires. They really are a night people. Many places - clubs, cafes, shops, bars, supermarkets - are open 24 hours.

I've become addicted to a local chat site and have spent lots of time in Internet cafes. I've been visiting one particular Internet cafe until 6am and each night at around 3am the owner tells me he's going to sleep and I should wake him before I leave. Odd!

It was my plan to visit Brasov to pay my respects to Count Dracula before I left but my money is running low and so I've decided instead to return to Budapest and then to head to Minsk. In fact, I'll be boarding a train for Budapest in just a few hours time.

So, these have been good days in Cluj-Napoca. Not great days, but good days. I'm glad that I finally got the chance to visit Romania - it's been an ambition of mine for a long time. And although I do feel a little disappointed, I will one day return to this country.

And now I have to go. I have people to do and things to see.

I will write to you once again from Budapest.

The adventure continues...

From the memory box of a Professional Englishman.

PS: A big hello and a message of love to my family: My Mum and my sister Emma and my brothers David and Mark. xxxxx

Beating the Beggar in Budapest

Hello!

How are you?

I'm writing to you from Budapest, the capital of Hungary. I arrived here yesterday after a 36-hour coach journey from York.

I'm in Budapest for just a few more hours and then I catch a train to Cluj-Napoca in Romania where I'll be meeting five strangers. I'll spend ten days in Cluj and then head back to Budapest before setting off on 18 September for that country I know so well - Belarus!

I could tell you why I'm meeting four strangers in Cluj-Napoca tomorrow. I could even tell you what I'm doing in Budapest today. But then, of course, I would have to kill you. So, for the time being at least, it will have to remain a closely guarded secret...

What I can tell you is that I love Budapest and I have really missed the people of Eastern Europe. It's funny, but Budapest is very similar in many ways to Minsk in Belarus, with an identical Metro system and lots of beautiful faces and friendly young people.

Last night I stayed in a funny little hostel called the Museum Guest House. It's where I'm writing to you from now. It cost me 2,500 Hungarian forintz to stay here which is about six pounds.

The Museum Guest House has got to be the smallest hostel I've ever seen! It has just a few beds here and there, a couple of settees and some mattresses strewn across the floor. I think that this is the closest that you can come to actually paying to be homeless!

I was treated to an all over body massage this morning! I had to strip down to my underpants in front of a room full of strangers - which was rather interesting - but it was well worth it!

The massage was very nice, very relaxing - and I'm not just saying that because the woman who gave it to me might one day read this entry! The massage set me back 2,100 forintz.

Unfortunately, my all over body massage didn't include the two parts of my body that I wanted massaged most! But never mind. Someone else will do that for me!

On the subject of naked bodies, I awoke in the early hours last night to find that all of the people in my room had decided on the spur of the moment to have an orgy. They were all naked and in various positions, some of which just didn't seem possible.

It was very interesting to watch and - oh. Wait. That didn't happen. It was just a fantasy I had while enjoying my massage. Oh! The fine line between fantasy and reality becomes ever more blurred!

It was lovely to sleep in a bed last night after spending 36 hours curled into a ball and trying to sleep on the seat of a Eurolines coach.

The only thing about sleeping in a dormitory is that it makes indulging in a man's favourite hobby a real problem, especially when you're sleeping on the top of a bunk-bed and the slightest, smallest movement sends vibrations through the whole bed!

Ha ha! Oh, come on! Don't look so shocked! It's perfectly natural and just about everybody does it from time to time. Even YOU!

Soooo. Anyways. Leaving York was sad. After spending eleven months as a resident of York, it was sad for me to leave that magical little city behind.

I've never before lived in a city where I've made so many friends and met so many decent people. True, I did meet some bastards, but the people who became my friends were great. And, as each one left, I met somebody else who became my friend.

So, a big mention to all my York friends:

Urko, Roberto, Cesar, Andrew, David Shakespeare, Dana, a little boy called Jake who I met when he was a patient at York hospital, Chris, Shaun, Eileen and, finally, a huge mention to the sweetest girl I've met in years, Kimberley Dryden!

I only met Kimberley just a few weeks before I left York and yet she quickly became one of the best friends I have ever made. She is wonderful, pretty, sweet, extremely fragile, delicate, sensitive and utterly unaware that she possesses all of these qualities.

I have truly never met anyone that I feel so protective towards. Kimberly is not well and, to be painfully honest, she may not be alive in a few years' time. I have only been away from her for three days and already I am worrying about her.

I will never forget her or any of the friends I made in York. I will always look back upon my days in that city as days of wonder, filled with magic, laughter and romance, where I was able to enjoy the sort of life that I was deprived of in my early youth.

So, it's a sweet goodbye to York. For now...

And it's goodbye from me, too. Romania awaits. I have to buy my ticket for the overnight train that will take me to new cities, new people and new situations. I just hope that I can find somewhere to sleep on the train other than a squeaky bunk-bed!

Thanks for reading this. Take care.

From the memory box of a Professional Englishman.