Gallimaufry

Earlier this month the BBC aired a show called Sex Trafficking in Cambodia: Stacey Dooley Investigates – an informative title, as the show was about sex trafficking in Cambodia, hosted by Stacey Dooley.

Nope, I’d never heard of her either. I deduced that she must be a brilliant undercover reporter – so brilliant that nobody ever knew she existed until now. My deduction was wrong. She’s a 23 year old from Luton with a very thick accent (in both senses of the word. But I don’t have accent prejudice. Being the main ethnic minority at SOAS – a northerner - I’ve often been accused of sounding stupid.)

In fact, it turned out that I had come across her before. She’d summed up her life philosophy in a show called Blood, Sweat and T-Shirts: ‘I love love love love fashion. I just love hanging out at the shops and buying the world.’ In the show, Stacey, along with 5 other Brits with similar theories of existence, was sent to India where she was shown how her stupid view on life was funded by child labour and human rights abuses.

Apparently, that was Stacey’s rite of passage - she’s now been transformed into a 21st century Mother Theresa. Minus the Catholicism. And accusations of evangelism. And, it seems, any knowledge of the world or how it works.

So, Mother Stacey is sent to Cambodia to be the saviour of child sex trafficking. She quickly gives us her first impressions: ‘It’s a lot more glam, a lot more current than I thought it would be. I thought I was gonna kinda rock up in a (sic) old school village.’ Cambodia has stuff that we have too! Bricks! Vehicles! Beer! Like us! Who’d have thought it?!?! Oh, shut up, Stacey’s mind, and stop using those uncouth exclamation marks.

The show continues in this vein, with Stacey simultaneously oversimplifying the issues and patronising Cambodia’s people. Her reaction to a Khmer-run organisation, which puts girls in education so they don’t become prostitutes, is ‘Awww, that’s good.’ How cute, the locals are organising something themselves.

Whenever somebody is speaking Khmer, Stacey pretends to listen and understand. That in itself isn’t bad; all reporters do the same, but most manage to do it with a certain elegance. Stacey, on the other hand, nods her head and adopts a wide-eyed, gormless expression. Her thoughts must be: ‘What a very silly language they’re speaking. What’s wrong with English?’

The worst part, though, is when she informs us that, ‘the Prime Minister has told all the police and all the big dudes at the top, “No, stop using the brothels, stop using the girls, stop exploiting the underage sex workers, just pack it in.”’ With this statement, Stacey seems to be implying that Hun Sen, the Prime Minister, is a good man. She fails to mention that he is ex-Khmer Rouge and was somewhat instrumental in screwing up the country and ruining people’s lives in the first place. If he hadn’t been smart enough to join the current government, he’d very likely be facing trial at the moment.

So, if you’re a fresher desperate to get to grips with the concept of Orientalism, make it easy for yourself – don’t read Said, watch Stacey.

We didn’t find the midgets. Margaux had to go home for a few days, from Kunming, so I went to a place called Dali by myself. On the bus there I met an American guy, and we agreed to share a taxi to the guesthouse I’d booked - ‘The Dali Hump’, advertised with the slogan, ‘A place to be creative’. As it turned out, creativity wasn’t abundant. There were a few half finished drawings on the walls, and, in the bar, a badly made guitar, a drum kit with old and tired skins, and a terrible amp. But, apart from lacking the main thing that it’s supposed to be based on, the guesthouse was amazing, and is definitely the best place I’ve stayed.

The American, on the other hand, isn’t the best person I’ve stayed with. On the first evening, we had a few beers. Well, he had half of one. And the next day he had a terrible hangover, all day, and halfway into the day after. He was also about as creative as the Dali Hump itself - claiming to have been playing guitar for five years, but, upon being asked to play something, responding, ‘oh no, I don’t know any songs, I just strum around.’ I would have thought that, after five years of just strumming around, it was time for him to learn something proper - for example, a song. During general conversation, this American man also forgot half of the words he was trying to use, so every 2 or 3 minutes, there was always an awkward pause as he said, ‘oh, umm, erm, what’s the word.. god damn, ermmmm, ummm, oh yeah - career’ (replace ‘career’ with any other common polysyllabic word). Furthermore, halfway through games he wasn’t involved in, he was constantly trying to change the rules. So, for example, when a Swiss guy and another (normal) American guy were playing snooker, he walks up and chips in,

‘So, guys, how about we double the score of this pink ball and this black ball, just to make the game more open and exciting?’ You could see the other two, who were actually playing, exchange a glance with each other, which meant ‘Errr, no, let’s not do that, because that’s not the rules of the game. Also, why are you getting involved anyway, you’re not playing?’ It was quite a complex and subtle message to convey with one quick glance, but they managed it. They didn’t, however, manage to verbalise their thoughts.

‘So, that makes this ball, what, 14?’ The American went on, and started rearranging the scoreboard accordingly.

However, although it might not seem like it, this American was very quiet and soft spoken - all of the above speech was done with his calm, quiet, breathy and lilting voice. The kind of voice that makes me want to punch people who have it in the face, grab them by the collar, pull their (now bloodied) face up to mine, and shout ‘WHY CAN’T YOU PRONOUNCE YOUR WORDS PROPERLY?’ at them. The one time that his voice didn’t make me want to take the above action was when, one morning, a grouchy and angry Israeli (she was basically a personification of the IDF) tried to shout at us for talking in our dorm at 11am, because she was trying to sleep. The American shouted back. That made me happy. Well, I say he shouted - it was more like airy speech, but slightly louder than when he usually airily forgets common words.

Ok, enough about the American man, more about me: I was very pleased with myself, because while in Dali I actually did some exercise. Actual, real exercise; for the first time in a long time. I spent 3 hours clambering around some mountains in a national park by myself (upon reading the Lonely Planet later, I discovered that it said ‘do not go here by yourself, as there have been multiple reports of serious accidents and muggings of solo travellers’), and also went on a bike ride to a freshwater lake, and swam in the lake. The bike ride and swim expedition was led by a bald fat Canadian, who managed the guesthouse. He was weird too. Basically, he’s been in China for 18 years. He originally came here to study (‘oh, did you study for a Chinese degree?’, ‘No. Sand sculpture.’) Since then, he hasn’t carved any sort of career path, but has just taken odd jobs here and there. Until, 3 months ago, he found himself managing the Dali Hump. For 2,000RMB a month. That’s 200 pounds he earns. A month. For a full time job. Oh, but occasionally he goes to a sand sculpture festival somewhere in China, where they pay 1,000RMB (100 pounds) to make sand sculptures for a week (‘But it’s a great deal, because on top of that you also get transport and accommodation.’ Brilliant.)

As well as the fact that this Canadian man had effectively spent his whole adult life scrabbling around for loose change, or doing visa runs to Hong Kong (I forgot to mention that he’s spent the past 18 years here on 2 month tourist visas), or having on-off Chinese girlfriends (the last one was for 2 months, 3 years ago) he was also desperate to prove himself to us, largely with unceasing, and oft repeated, mediocre (at best) jokes. For example, every time he walked past this Scottish woman who was staying at the guesthouse, he’d look at whatever she was holding - beer, fags, bacon - and say ‘hey, do you want to deep fry that! hahahahahahahahahahahaha. Just take it, bread it…’ - pause for effect; comedy is, after all, about timing - ‘… and fry it! hahahahahahahahahaha’ His laughter abruptly ceased as he desperately looked at us, wide eyed, waiting for our forced smiles to turn into even more forced laughs.

One day he made the joke when the Scottish woman was eating battered fish. It didn’t work. He stopped making the joke after that.

There were many more weird people at the guesthouse who I haven’t written about (such as a Dutch guy who works for the military police at Eindhoven airport, loves chasing immigrants on his motorbike, and supports Geert Wilders, the Dutch equivalent of Nick Griffin), but the counterweight to all these people was Chun Li, the best receptionist in China, and the person who pacified my dislike of the Chinese. She was bubbly and witty and always had a smile on her face (except when she had to do a 48 hour shift with no breaks).

On one particularly quiet evening, when we didn’t have to listen to the Canadian crack repetitive ‘jokes’, or listen to the American breathe-talk, me and a couple of other normal people asked Chun Li to translate a Chinese booklet, multiple copies of which had been lying around the guesthouse. It turned out to be a fundamentalist, evangelical Christian booklet. And a rather simplistic one at that. The first page read,

‘Question: Where does the universe come from? Answer: The universe, and everything in it, comes from God.’ I’m glad that’s cleared up then. Further in the booklet, the discussion (read: complex philosophical questions accompanied by oversimplistic and unproven sledgehammer assertions) turned to sin. One page asked,

‘Question: What is an example of sin?’ Multiple examples were given, including murder, fighting, and watching porn, all with drawings to demonstrate what someone doing the sin might look like. One example of sin, abortion, was accompanied by a picture of a bloody new born premature baby being thrown into a bin. I don’t think these Chinese christians really understand how abortion works.

One evening, an old wrinkly American man appeared in the Dali Hump, accompanied by a very attractive young Italian. It turned out that he was a Dali-based palm reader, and somewhat of a local celebrity.

‘He’ll read your palm for free, if you want,’ the weird Canadian explained, ‘but you have to ask “Will you read my palm?”, because if you ask “Can you read my palm?”, he gets angry.’

Even though we now knew which lexicon to use in order to stop hand man getting angry with us, I, having gained the knowledge, at quite an early age, that palm reading is a complete load of bollocks, decided against asking him to read my palm. Chun Li, however, was apparently not possessed with that knowledge, so did get her palm read. Here are selected excerpts from her session with hand man:

Excerpt 1:

Hand Man: So, this line says that your parents argued a lot in front of you when you were young.
Chun Li: Yes, they got divorced.
Hand Man: Yeah, and they used to fight in front of you.
Chun Li: No not really.
Hand Man: Yes they did, they used to scream and shout at each other when you were in the same room.
Chun Li: No, I don’t think so.
Hand Man: Oh… oh wait, this line here, I didn’t see it before, but this line shows that they did used to fight in front of you, but you just didn’t realise.
Chun Li: (looking impressed) Oh, ok, yeah.

Excerpt 2:

Hand Man: I can see that you’re very ambidextrous aren’t you?
Chun Li: No, I’m right handed. Very right handed. Not ambidextrous at all.
Hand Man: Oh. Well, your hands say that you should be.

Excerpt 3:

Hand Man: This line shows that you’re very good with animals. You should work with animals.
Chun Li: Yes, I like animals.
Hand Man: Yes, you’d be good at working with any animals.
Chun Li: (Looking shocked and scared, and bringing her hand up to her mouth) No, not spider not spider not spider! Please not spider! Spider is the only animal I don’t like. Not spider!

I took the bus back to Kunming a couple of days later, to meet up with Margaux again, and to try and find the midgets again. My bus left at 1:30pm. Usually, they said, the journey should take about 5 hours. However, they were working on the road, so the journey would be closer to 7 hours. We were planning, therefore, to arrive in Kunming at around 8:30 in the evening.

At 9am the following morning, my bus rolled into Kunming. Margaux’s flight arrived from Amsterdam at midday, so I’d been planning to have a relaxed evening, lots of sleep, and then a lazy breakfast before going to meet her at the airport. As it happened, I had time to check into our hostel, have a quick shower and no sleep, before leaving for the airport. Nonetheless, we successfully reunited, and ventured back out into Kunming to look for midgets again. We didn’t find the midgets. After a day, we gave up and hopped on a train to Yangshou, details of which will come in the next update, in a couple of days time.

So, we were only in Urumqi， Northwest China， for a night (mainly to eat Pizza cooked by expats, and KFC; there was no McDonalds), as a connecting point before going on to Kashgar, which is full of an oppressed Muslim minority (the Uighurs), of Cental Asian ethnicity. I‘m not allowed to write anymore about this blatant violation of basic human rights，because apparently the Chinese government might find me and lock me up/beat me up， and Margaux’s a bit scared。In some ways it‘s a relief that I can’t write about it， as I‘ve spent too long fucking about on the internet，and only just started this blog as my internet time’s running out。But anyway，this Kashgar place，being full of minority Central Asian ethnicity Muslims and veiled women （who， interestingly，are doubly oppressed - oppressed by the Chinese for not being Chinese，and oppressed by the Muslims for not being male），was more like Central Asia than China， which was wicked， because the Chinese， who I don‘t like，were starting to annoy me。

We spent a few days in Kashgar doing lots of Muslim-based and Uighur-based things，such as going to a Mosque where an angry man threw a scarf on Margaux because her elbows weren’t covered。The best thing，however， was the Uighur night market，where you could get some wicked food - Watermelon by the slice，rice and dates covered in syrup， and fried dough balls filled with nuts，raisins，and sugar。I think you all get the general gist of a market；a thing where people who want to make money have a stall and sell stuff，and people who want to spend money buy the stuff。One man didn’t seem to get the idea - he wanted to make money，but had not stall。 Instead，he‘d put his baby on a rug on the floor，turned the baby over，and pulled its pants down to reveal an Elephant man-esque bum。Then he was charging people to look at，and possibly have photos with， the bum child。We stuck to the food。

After our few days in Kashgar， we went back to Urumqi， as we had a flight to Kunming （Southwest China）。On the 30 hour train ride， I was having a nap， when Margaux noticed a German man struggling to work， and understand， his instant noodles。 Now these noodles are simpler than pot noodles， the instructions to work them being：

1。Open packet。
2。Pour in hot water。
3。Wait。
4。Eat （with the fork provided）。

At some point in the above process，the German man had got stuck （and I thought Germans were good at following precise instructions）。So Margaux decided to help him， out of compassion。 He was asking her questions like，

‘How do I get into them？’（take the top off）
‘Do you have a fork I can borrow？’（there‘s a fork inside）
‘Do I add hot water or cold water？’（I‘ll let you， the reader，try and work that one out。Little puzzle for you。But bear in mind that it’s a hot snack。）

The German seemed to take Margaux‘s help and pity as a sign that he could attach himself to us。 He made me find and read out sentences from the Lonely Planet which had complex grammatical constructions， to see if he could understand them。After he got bored of that game， he took our Lonely Planet 。 After about 5 hours， we asked for it back。An hour later，he took it again。In the end，we got it back and held onto it。

When we arrived at Urumqi train station， we got off the train， and were about to start walking towards the exit， when we heard a German man’s hand tap us。 We turned round to find him smiling， excited by his new friends （us）。

‘So， what hostel are we going to？’

We ended up checking into the same dorm room together。

‘So， what shall we do now？Shall we shower？’

We felt a bit wary about being asked to shower by a blond-haired German， but did as instructed。

‘So， shall we go and eat？’

We did。The German guy filled up the 40 minutes we spent waiting for our food to come with an overly-long drawn out anecdote about how， 3 days previously，some suncream had melted into his eye from his forehead。 When the food came，the conversation completely dried up （Margaux：well clearly， if the conversation ends as soon as you start eating， it can’t have been a very fucking good conversation）。After eating， we went back to the hostel，where the German man fell asleep。 We took this as our opportunity to sneak out。

He tracked us down an hour later。

‘So， what are we doing tonight？’（Erm， well we‘re going to have sex， I don’t know about you）。

The next morning， we escaped to another hostel。

。。。And met Shezam 2。We call her Shezam 2 because， in my parents house，there used to be a really annoying lodger called Shezam （who was British，but my Mum， ever desperate to be PC，always referred to her as a ‘British Asian’）。Shezam 2 looked just like Shezam Original，but，we thought， not as annoying。 Until we went to a night market with her，where she made Margaux translate to Chinese the most mind-numbing and pointless conversations ever （‘What do you do？Do you enjoy it？Where are you from？I‘m from Calcutta， have you heard of it？I live in New York now， have you been？’）。When she wasn’t doing this， she was treating us to an endless verbal barrage against the Han Chinese - so much that Margaux found herself almost defending Mao，the Cultural Revolution， the Great Leap Forward，and the oppressive occupation of Tibet。 Luckily，before Margaux had chance to become employed as China‘s Mark Regev， the next morning we flew to Kunming，in Yunnan province，and near to Indochina。

Which is where we are now。We came here go to the thing I‘ve been most looking forward to about the entire trip - the Kingdom of the Little People。Let me tell you the story about the Kingdom of the Little People。

Once upon a time （around 2007）， there was a Chinese entrepreneur。 This man was very wealthy， and had numerous successful business projects。 But， being a nice big generous capitalist （although we all know that a ‘generous capitalist’ is perhap‘s the world’s biggest and most successful oxymoron）， he decided that， on his next business venture，he wanted to do something to benefit the community。

NB - Margaux thinks she is a generous capitalist。 She‘s sitting next to me and just protested that she gave 1 yuan （10p）to a little midget family today。 Our Chinese businessman also took pity on disabled people， and especially， just like Margaux， on midgets。He saw that there wasn’t much available for them - education， healthcare， midget rights， or employment opportunities。 The businessman thought he could something about this last one。 He wanted a business venture that would give midgets regular employment， and a regular wage。 What a nice man。

And so was born ‘The Kingdom of the Little People’ - a place， located in a butterfly park，where midgets are dressed in fairytale costumes and performances for paying normal-sized people。 One of the performances is a slapstick Swan Lake。 Naturally， we decided that we had to go there。

We asked at our guesthouse how to get there - it‘s about 40km from Kunming - and the receptionists turned to each other，and one said to the other， in Chinese，‘I can’t be bothered explaining to them。 It‘s too tiring。 Let’s just tell them to take a taxi’， to which Margaux responded， in Chinese， ‘No thanks， we’d rather take the bus。’The receptionist who‘d complained went bright red and scuttled off。 The other one scribbled down some directions for us on a scrap piece of paper。

Trying to follow these directions today， we spent 2 hours getting lost and in the middle of nowhere。 We’ll ask again for better directions， and try again tomorrow。

Thanks for reading xxx

We arrived in Beijing, and immediately went to book a train out. Not because we didn’t like Beijing - it was mega - but because apparently that’s what you’re meant to do around here. After an hour or so of queue switching and searching and pushing and being pushed, and finding that Beijing train people don’t take kindly to Chinese being spoken with a foreign accent, we gave up on Margaux’s Chinese and went to a travel agent. 2 minutes later, we had our tickets.

Our first couple of days in Beijing (we’re going back there at the end) were nice, but uncomfortable, as they were accompanied by massive amounts of chaffing.

When we got on the train - which was to Xi’an - we could give our chaffy legs a rest and do some puzzles instead. I was doing Sudoku, and Margaux was doing some Dutch wordsearches. After a couple of minutes of my Sudoku (which was level 1, the easiest level of the book), I discovered that the guy next to me in the train was staring very intently at it. When he’d seen that I’d seen him, he took that as a sign that the was allowed to jump in and help; he wasn’t. After listening to him point out various numbers (well, watching, as he couldn’t speak English so was just tapping me then holding up the appropriate number of fingers), I finished my Sudoku, then decided to try and get him back by giving him a level 4 to tackle. He couldn’t do it; my pride - 1, Chinese people - nil.

After giving up on Sudoku, he then tried to help Margaux with her Dutch wordsearch. He couldn’t do that one. 2 - nil.

We mainly went to Xi’an to see all these stone warrior people, which apparently are the biggest and most impressive archeological find of the 20th century. They were alright, but I think the above description is a little bit hyperbolic. There was a video thing about it that was just like a boring 1950s BBC documentary, with incredibly hammy emperor and warrior acting and a monotonal narrator with an RP accent. Except he gave away that he wasn’t actually British with weird vowel pronunciation of occasional words. Oh, and the non-talking bits were a bit too overlong, and the music too dramatic, to be a 1950s BBC documentary.

Now we’ve left Xi’an, and are in Dunhuang. It’s incredible (although not in a sense that means ‘brilliant’) in 2 ways; firstly the main roads are incredibly clean, pleasant to walk along, and give the impression of a very very developed city. Until you get off the main roads, and discover the shit attempts at infrastructure that they try to hide from view. Secondly, it’s incredible as there’s nothing to do. Apart from some sand dunes, which are on the edge of Gobi desert. They cost 12 quid to get into, partly because there’s also a lake in between the dunes. This lake in the middle of a desert is, apparently, amazing. Lonely Planet calls it ‘a miraculous pond’, while the entrance to the desert-lake (where you pay 12 quid) declares it to be ‘a precious national legacy fashioned by the hand of God as a pleasant holiday resort’. In reality, it’s more like a big, murky, anti-climactical puddle. Oh, and the capitalists have jumped on this natural site, and apart from charging 12 quid to see it, have filled it with paved paths, gardens, touts, camel rides (in the style of Scarborough donkey rides), dune buggies, dune surfing, a restaurant next to the natural lake, and a man-made lake to go next to the natural lake. Lonely Planet warned us of this, saying that the site has become a ‘no-holds-barred tourist playpen’. That would have been wicked. Unfortunately, there were many holds barred, and instead of a mega desert theme park it was a desert full of tacky tourist bumpf.

We’re leaving Dunhuang tomorrow, for Urumqi. Now Margaux will write her take on events, below:

—————

Hello :)

As Joe has written above, we are now in Dunhuang and going to Urumuqi tomorrow. We’re really looking forward to this because Dunhuang is bloody hot and it’s boring if you’re not into caves. One of the caves is a World Heritage Site, but since I’ve already been, and Joe’s not too interested, we won’t go again. The other one we are going to visit tomorrow. The night market here is nice too, restaurants have hilarious names though. We will go back tonight to get some food around there.

Basically, the train ride here was an adventure in itself. Firstly, we were stared at intently by what we thought to be a nice grandpa for about 5 hours. This grandpa ended up sleeping in the bunk directly opposite me, and at a certain point he even stared at me for the duration of me reading an entire magazine. On this man’s bunk, was the bag of the man bunking below me. However, at 4 am I was awakened by police men shining torches into my eyes and searching my bed, only to discover I was a foreigner and hastily pretending like he hadn’t actually just pulled my sheets up to search for something. He asked me if the boy snoring above me was with me, and didn’t search his bed because I said yes. Eventually I started realizing that the ‘sweet grandpa’ had gotten off (with wife and granddaughter) about an hour ago in some village, taking with him this man’s bag. Basically, the police searched for another hour and I spent the rest of the night sleeping on top of my bag.

The next morning, this same police officer came to see us and asked for our passports. He went on to copy down our names and nationality, but was only able to after I pointed out which were our names. He was basically pretty much writing “s’-Hertogenbosch (my place of birth) Margaux Louise Margarethe” as my name, and was attempting “Buckley Sheffield” as Joe’s name. All of the above was written in a pink, glittery, Hello Kitty notebook. Sort of makes you doubt whether this is all for official use.

Xi’an was really nice, and the terra cotta warriors are spectacular (but maybe that’s just because I want to be an archeologist). There’s still so many buried into the ground, maybe one day I’ll help them dig them up! Walking around the Muslim Quarter was also fun, as we got Joe a Mao wallet, and some postcards.

That’s all for now, we will write again after our Urumuqi and Kashgar adventures (if we get another magic computer that wil allow us to get to Facebook/Tumblr).

Right, I’m off to China soon - I’ve got a bus to London at 2:40 in the morning. That gives me 40 minutes to write something witty before I leave. Pressure.

Unfortunately, I’m a bit buzzing from multiple coffees at the moment, which I’m using to keep myself awake. Thus, I can’t really think of any blog post with a sort of linear development, with a well-crafted beginning, middle, and end. So this will just be multiple one or two line musings. How postmodern;

- I think I’ve got a new mancrush on Mark Radcliffe. Just watching how cute he was while presenting Glastonbury made me enchanted by him. Here are other people that I have Mancrushes on - James McAvoy and Taylor Mac. And if I’m going for an older man, Ken Clarke. Even though I’m a socialist. Although I imagine him more as a sort of Grandfather figure. Ooo, incest.

- I went to Somerset for the first time a couple of weeks ago. I still can’t get my head round this countryside thing. It seems to be infinite swathes of fields, occasionally peppered with sparse collections of houses. Although I did get to hold a duckling, which was nice :). It was like when I held a chick, but with a different head. I don’t think he liked me much though, the duckling, because he tried to fly away. Luckily for me, its wings hadn’t developed fully. I suppose an appropriate comparison would be an innocent baby trying to run away from abusive parents, but the baby can’t because its legs haven’t developed fully. In that scenario, I’m the abusive parent.

Ok, that was a short and sweet post, with only two musings in it. But I have to leave soon and I’m still naked. I’ll be updating this blog from China, though; with help from my lovely girlfriend, who I’m travelling with. I’ll also be trying to avoid eating Duck’s beak/Chicken’s feet/Any part of an animal that isn’t meat.

A friend, who likes this blog, was disappointed that he hasn’t yet been mentioned in it. However, he had a think and eventually came up with an ingenious solution; ask me to take the piss out of him on here. He ran up to me, and, jumping up and down, excitedly squealed,

‘Rib me! Rib me! Can you rib me on your blog please?’

‘Erm, Ok’, I replied, mildly bemused by his boundless enthusiasm.

‘Yay!’, and he bounded off.

Later on though, it transpired that his enthusiasm wasn’t boundless, and he applied some boundaries to the ribbing of him I was allowed to do. I wasn’t allowed to just write ‘this guy’s a cunt’; the ribbing had to be related to something. I wasn’t allowed to be ‘really mean’. And, most irritatingly, I wasn’t allowed to rib him about anything that he had previously been ribbed about. That last one cut out a lot of great potential ribbing material, including;

1) His attempts to pull. One attempted chat up line was, ‘Do you like penguins?’ There wasn’t a punchline to it, he asked it as a genuine question. The best one, however, went as follows:

Girl: Where are you from?

Him: Brighton

- He’s not from Brighton, but thought it sounded cool

Girl: Me too! Whereabouts?

- Instead of just giving up the act of being a Brightonian, he thought he could pull it off, so thought of the only road he knew in Brighton.

Him: X Road.

Girl: No way! I’m from X Road! What number do you live at?

- At this point he realised that his acting isn’t that good, so came clean.

Him: Oh. Erm. I’m not really from Brighton.

Girl: Oh. You shouldn’t lie about where you’re from.

That was the end of that relationship.

2) His sort of general physical awkwardness and Charlie Chaplin-esque walk.

3) When he had a really bad trip on ketamine last Thursday, which, according to one observer, ‘was the funniest thing [he’s] ever seen’.

I could easily expand upon any of those, but I’m not allowed to within the parameters I’ve been set. So I’ll just write a short note on how desperately attention-seeking and bigheaded he must be for asking to be written about. Most people either earn that right, if I respect them, or are retarded enough to have it thrust upon them, if I don’t respect them. Nobody, however, asks to be written about. Apart from this self-absorbed, self-obsessed, self-loving man(/boy) who considers himself and his personality to be vastly superior to anyone else, and is desperate to be the centre of everything and raise his own profile.

Well, he got his way.

What do you do if you see a rare bird in rural England? Run.

Too soon?

So, I’ve just got back from a few days in Cornwall with my family. We’ve been going to the same place for a week every May for the past 20 years. 20 years. This year, I dipped my toe into the possibility that they might want to perhaps spread their wings a bit for next year’s May holiday. My sister screamed, as if I’d torn a ligament in the very fabric of her soul;

‘NO!’ - I know I hate exclamation marks, but this time, it’s a simple, if over-clumsy and cumbersome, way of portraying how piercing the ‘no’ was - ‘We can’t do that. It’s tradition to come here.’

I pointed out that Satī - a Hindu woman chucking herself onto her husband’s funeral pyre - is also a tradition for some South Asian Hindu women, but we don’t hear anyone shrieking when someone suggests stopping that. Apart from the currently burning women, they’re probably shrieking. Apparently I’d missed the point.

The reason I suggested that maybe we stop going to these cottages, apart from the fact we’ve been to the same little Hamlet (Mawgan Porth, in case you’re interested. You won’t be) every year for 20 years, is that I’ve decided that Cornwall really is the arse end of Britain. Here’s a few reasons why, handily broken down into bite-sized chunks:

1) Bit of background first; we stay in a cottage in a group of cottages. We stayed in the same cottage for many years, but recently started staying in a different one. The owners of the cottage we used to rent decided to renovate it a bit, primarily by adding a second floor. They took the roof off. The walls fell down. There were no foundations. Therefore, my first reason is infrastructure. Or lack of. I bet bloody Mogadishu has better infrastructure than Cornwall.

2) Internet. Or again, lack of. Apparently, Cornwall only got internet in 1999, the same time as Bhutan. While the rest of the world was wondering what amazing new developments the 21st century would bring (turns out, international terrorism), Cornwall was excitedly carting round Commodore 64s, making use of another recent discovery, something called the ‘wheel’. If this rumour isn’t true, it certainly seems it. I saw very few internet cafes. All had slow connections, and treated this thing as a treasured item, charging about 4 quid an hour. You can get it for a quid in London.

3) Mobile Phone signals. Or, again, lack of. Actually, come to think of it, all my qualms about Cornwall are based on the fact that they don’t have normal, simple things - buildings with foundations, the internet, bus stops (you just ding the bell and the driver jolts to a halt no matter where he is) - that the rest of the world does. A good mobile phone signal is another one. I never got more than two bars of reception, even when I stood on chairs, stuck my arm up and waved the phone about. Which is what you’re meant to do to get better reception. Sigh.

There’s more, but I’ll wrap it up here, because I’m naked, having just got out the shower, and am meeting somebody at half 12. It’s 1.

So, Frank Turner did a free gig at The Flowerpot last night, which was nice of him. He did it with only 3 and a half hours as well, which was even nicer. And, in his words, he ‘did this gig for free beer’.

That comment was fine, and I don’t doubt accurate, and the songs were mega, as usual. But his banter between songs started to grate. Most of it was drink related:

‘So, I was touring in America recently, with these people who can drink Jamieson like it’s water. And I thought I was hardcore but they were really something. Toughened me up though.’

‘So I’m going to play a few more songs then I’ll fuck off and I can get on with the business of getting drunk, which is why I’m here.’

No, that’s not why he was there. He was there to play songs. Which he did. But it was a bit disrespectful and immature to declare that the main reason he was there was to get wasted.

On a wider, moral philosophical point, why do people show off about getting drunk? Yesterday morning, before Frank Turner started banging on about how cool he was for drinking, my girlfriend got this text from one of our friends:

‘OMG OMG I am SO hungover it’s ridiculous. I’ve only just woken up! I can’t even get out of bed! I blame you! How are you feeling?’

Ok;

1. This was around midday. Late to get up for a full time professional who works 9 to 5, but not particularly late for a student. Waking up at midday isn’t unusually late; in fact, it’s a perfectly average time.

2. Why did she blame my girlfriend? Any drinks that our friend had were her own conscious decision. We didn’t slip rohypnol in her drink then pour vodka down her throat. Even if we had done that, she probably wouldn’t have been able to swallow the vodka due to the rohypnol effects.

3. My girlfriend was fine; she’d only had 2 pints the night before. Upon pointing this fact out to our friend, she got this text response:

‘Oh right, I had jagerbombs and tequila shots as well, oooooops.’

Why ‘oooooops’? It was her decision to have the other drinks. And, furthermore, anybody could have decided to have them. She, on the other hand, seemed to be trying to wear her jagerbombs as medals of honour. For no reason except to show off about nothing. Anybody can get drunk and have a hangover. Which is fine - I like drinking - but you’re not big, clever or special for doing it. AT ALL. Grow up.

Frank Turner did make one useful comment though;

‘I’ve just got back from 2 weeks touring in China, and it’s great to finally be somewhere where you can be sure the food won’t have fucking chicken’s feet in it.’

I’m going to China at the end of next month, so took note.

PS. I just finished writing this, then went on Facebook. This status, not from the texting friend, came up in my newsfeed;

‘… would really love a can of fizzy but is too hungover to get out of bed :(‘

I checked her previous statuses;

‘… was such a hot tranny mess last night :S’

‘… loves getting drunk for no reason :D’

Oh good God.

After a better than expected Hinduism exam today (or yesterday), in which I wrote extensively on varnasramadharma - not because it was relevant, because the word sounds ridiculous - I came back home to revise for my next exam and promptly started procrastinating. Effectively, apparently, as I haven’t got round to writing this blog entry until now.

Some of my procrastinating was actually productive, though; I decided to read about how to live with Tories (which also links to a witty article on why we might want to actually embrace our new government), partly because of the new state of our state, and partly because my girlfriend’s a tory, so I wanted some relationship tips.

Upon discovering that I’d done this, she wasn’t happy, but in her retort inadvertently revealed an inconvenient truth that we’d do well to remember:

“I am not a tory. There are other capitalist parties you know.”

I was going to expand on this further, but I also received some advice from my girlfriend’s sister this evening.

“Your politics posts are really boring.”

So I’ll end it here.

So, Cameron’s PM. In case you missed the news, that was it.

While most normal people cried themselves to sleep, or just cut the suffering short and killed themselves, a Tory friend of mine skipped around, skipped his dinner (which was going to be at an Indian restaurant, but fuck the browns), and skipped to Downing Street. He declared that the Tories don’t want to fuck the poor, but that they have ‘an intellectual disagreement’ about how best to help them. Maybe, but in that case it’s a disagreement about which the Tories are wrong.

At the news of Brown’s resignation, and therefore the news that Cameron would be PM, I sent a text to my newly politicised Lib Dem friend, who was busy procrastinating over Islam revision. He hurriedly switched on the news, got confused, and sent a text back, ‘It says that Brown’s only suggested Cameron as PM?’. I tried explaining to him that this was merely an outdated formal procedure, and pointed out that if he didn’t have to, it’s highly unlikely that Brown would have suggested his greatest arch rival since Blair as the next PM. If the next PM was based on who the current PM suggests, Brown would have been much more likely to suggest Brown. I also argued that, even though Cameron’s a twat, in the long run it’s probably quite good that the leader of our country is decided by this democracy malarky, rather than, say, the Queen weighing up whoever the PM suggests, and then deciding yes or no.

At this point, Brown was going into the palace to formally resign. My friend’s reaction?

No, nothing’s been decided yet, anything could happen. Let me know if some actual news occurs. I’m going for some Thai food.