Ben & Sok's travels here and there

Was the last line in the last blog that I was starting to settle down? Hmm, all change there then. That didn’t last long.

OK. So things were still all going well with the job, apart from the unreasonable, stressed, highly strung boss. So I was happy enough for now. I had taught one of the chef’s, Ian, from the Zalu hotel how to dive. The Zalu is probably the most luxurious 5 star hotels on the islands of Zanzibar. It was a really fun course as my other student was a Polish…….. Madman. It was like he was on speed 24hours a day. Anyway getting back to the point. Ian became a good friend (aka drinking partner), and not just because he took me up to Zalu for lunch on the private jetty during the diving course. Witch I have to add- I felt like I should have brushed my hair before I went. It was fantastic to be eating food that had more than one flavor in it. Very posh nosh. Ian also offered me dinner any time I wanted to come up.

The next few days were spent in Mangies bar, Bored…….. Neil, my main drinking buddy had gone off to Egypt to complete his PADI Instructor course. I would like to add a Congratulation to him on passing the course. Morgan and I started watching the six nation’s rugby. That was nothing special by the English. But I was generally getting bored of the island. The only really good days were when I had a day off and there was wind so I could go kitesurfing.

Then an old traveling buddy, Yvonne, who I met in Zimbabwe and Mozambique, came to stay with me for a little over a week. It was really good fun to have a new face on the island who I knew I would get on with really well. I really enjoyed her company. We went to stone town to the annual Zanzibar music festival. It was really good music. We arrived just in time to catch the headline act. We met up with a well lubricated Ian, a few of the kitesurfing guys and a few people I knew from a hotel I know. All in all, a really good night. Then Yvonne took me to see the Columbus and the red monkeys that Zanzibar is famous for a couple of days later. She just got me away from Nungwi, and that is exactly what I needed.

Then the next night we went for dinner at ‘The Zalu Hotel’ courtesy of Ian (so glad I met that man). The food was amazing again. Yvonne’s was only with me for a few days more and last night was a bit of a late one. Ian joined us a bit later on and proceeded to force more and more drink down my neck, Honest, it was all Ian’s fault, not mine! Yvonne and I had lots of chats about if I was actually happy with my working conditions (the boss), as she felt I seemed quite the opposite. The next morning it was time for Yvonne to leave. I was sad to see her go. So off I go to work. Get the usual shit from the boss. Come back from the dive and I go to cover the offices we had in the Hilton. So I was sat reading my book, and I fell asleep for a couple of min. Normally this is not a major problem, but this time the general manager’s wife saw me and took a photo of me and sent it to my boss. I got a phone call from her asking me to come back to the dive centre and explain my actions.
I went back with my hands held high. I apologised several times but im not sure they heard any of them over their shouting at me. Eventually, I got fed up of being screamed at like a five year old and I managed to get half a sentence in and I said “Do you want me to leave?’’ To that they screamed “We F*#?ing should make you leave!’’ So I responded with, “Okay, im going to pack my dive equipment up now, I will be in tomorrow to collect my wages, and I will be out of the staff house as soon as I can find somewhere to stay.” I’m not too sure they were expecting that because there was a long pause, and then I started packing.

So that was the end of East Africa Divers for me. I managed to find a place to stay ‘The Zalu Hotel’. RESULT!!!! It was awesome. Ian let me stay in the hotel with him for 4-5 days. Dinner at Zalu most evenings, fishing off the pier, far too much drinking, especially when it comes to ‘Nagronies’ (Ian and I are bad news for each other when drink is involved), midnight food binges in a five star hotel’s kitchen fridge, and a shower that not only works but it has more than one temperature setting. I felt like Cinderella just after she tried on the glass slipper. From rags to riches, and all it cost me was a taxi (about $5) to get myself there. So a big thanks to Ian for putting up with me. I can actually hear my Mum saying “Thank you for looking after my boy Ian” out loud as she reads this.

During my time at Ian’s I decided that I was going to visit my old Russian pal, Victor from Egypt. He had moved on to Malaysia, so after a fifty hour bus, boat, taxi, two planes, a train and a moped journey, I arrived in Kuala Lumpa. I spent a couple of days wondering the streets having a look round. Then an overnight bus and a speedboat across to The Perhentian Islands just about 40k from the Thailand border to where Victor is now living. And that is where I am sat now writing this blog looking out to sea with a good old cup of tea. I met Victor and he told me about a possible job on the island next to the one we were on (they are about 2k from each other), so I jumped on a taxi boat and I went to have a chat with Mikey, the Asian owner. I started work today. I’m not too sure how long I will be here yet, but that has been my life story for the past 20 months. I have got used to living this way and I like it.

Next update will be in a month or so. Hope to hear back from a few of you. Also love to see any of you that want to visit Malaysia.

Missing you all still.

Ben and Sok xxx

I got to Dar es Salaam airport at about 5am. Grabbed my bags and aimed for the boat to Zanzibar. I missed the morning boat by about 5min so I had to wait for the lunchtime boat. On the boat I got chatting with a couple of guys who were going to Nungwi by taxi and I managed to grab a lift. The journey should tale about 1-1.5 hours….. Not this one. The taxi hit a guy on a bike on the way, he got arrested, had to take the guy to the hospital and finally take us to Nungwi. 4 hours…. Nice! I felt sorry for a guy called Neil. He had to wait at the dive centre after hours for me to arrive. I could see he was a tad pissed off. Good start with my new colleague. Then I was told that I start an open water course the next morning. I expected to have a day or two to relax and get myself in to the motion of a new place. Nope….. I still have not managed to do so three months in. Days off are very rare. The boss is hard work. Delene works 365 days a year and gets stressed out the same amount. It makes it hard on the staff as you always feel you need to tiptoe around her.

Apart from that, I love my job. The rest of the staff are really good fun. I have found a really good friend in Neil. The only problem with Neil (apart from the fact he has blonde hair like a sheep stuck in the 70’s, ‘’Starsky n Hutch’’ style) is, he is too clever with words. Every sentence you say, Neil will come back with some kind of pun. For the first week, they were bad, but after almost three months…. You get the picture.

There is a really good community here. Within a week I had met most of the guys I am friends with now. Everyone is really welcoming. Tania was a real help to introduce me to everyone and has been a star of a friend ever since. On my second night in Nungwi I was dressed as a pirate in the local bar (for Halloween). A week or so later I was dressed in 70s gear and I’m sure there were a few other strange nights out too. Tania was even taking me to parties that I wasn’t invited to (or felt very welcome at). But I have to say a big thank you to her for taking me in with open arms and making Nungwi feel like home. Picks are on Facebook.

Our house got broken in to one night so our landlord decided that he would get us a couple of dogs to protect the house. They arrived and they were 2 week old puppies. Great guard dogs. They will be really good at licking a burglar to death. The two of them are very cute. Neil came up with the names ‘Freddy’ for the boy and ‘Mercury’ for the bitch (Freddy Mercury was born on Zanzibar). So now I get up early every morning and walk the pair of them and then straight home from work to walk them again in the evening instead of going straight for a beer. I feel all grown up. But I really enjoy them. They are now about 8 weeks old and the boy is great and the bitch is a bitch at times, but, I love them both.

So Christmas comes around and this year I was a bit home sick. I would have loved to have been at home with the family and my friends. Instead, on Christmas day I was 30 meters under water when a pod of about 50 Dolphins came and to say ‘’Happy Christmas’’ too me. It was an awesome Christmas gift. After we got back, I went for 2 quick beers and went to bed. It was a bit of a boring Christmas to be honest. Nobody really wanted to do much. So next came new year. It was a really funny night. I got invited by a few Turkish guys I know for a bit of food at the beach on the barbeque. I ate like a King that night. The food was amazing. Then, on to the local bar, ‘Mangies’ for lots of overindulgence. I got too drunk. On my way home at about 11am in the morning I got knocked out and mugged. ‘’Welcome to 2012!’’ My dive computer and a little bit of money had gone when I came too. Bastards! So that was the bad start but I have now got the computer back thanks to a good friend Morgan. Morgan noticed that one of the divemasters at his dive centre had a new computer that looked very much like mine. He had brought it from a guy in the village. I gave him a reward and now have my computer back. So all is well.

New year’s day was really nice considering how much of a moody git I was (sorry everyone who had to put up with me). We took the puppies in to the sea for the first time. They really didn’t like that. Then we had another barbeque on the beach with some freshly caught tuna and sailfish. The fish is awesome here. Always so fresh.

Other things I have been up to include Kitesurfing. This is where you attach yourself to a 12m square kite strong enough to take me back to the UK with the right wind. Then strap your feet to a piece of board and let the wind do the rest. Yep, it’s that easy…. Oh apart from the easy bit, that bit is not true. I have now got to the stage where I can stand up on the board for about 30sec and I can turn a little bit. I love it. It is such a thrill to be moving so fast under the power or the wind only. The pros can reach speeds of up to 50 knots (over 93kph). Needless to say, I won’t be trying that one this week. Maybe next week……

And that brings me pretty much up to date. Sorry this blog is not as exciting as the previous ones but I think I am starting to settle down a bit and find my feet again.

It would be great to hear back from you.

Ben and Sok. xx

The plane’s wheels hit the ground in Cairo at about 5am. I was out of the airport in about 30 min. This amazed me. That must have been the fastest I have ever got through an airport. Outside I had all the usual taxi drivers trying to get me in to their cabs and charge me 4-5 times what the journey should have been. So I found a bus that went to town. It took about 45min to get to the centre of Cairo and cost me about £0.10GBP. I found myself a room and went out to explore the deserted streets. Then at 8:15am, absolute chaos hits central Cairo. The streets are grid locked the pavements are grid locked. General madness. I finished the day with several hours walking round the Cairo museum.

The next day I went to the immigration office to arrange my extension to my visa and then straight on to the Pyramids in Giza. I got chatting to a guy on the metro who gave me some great advice on how to view the pyramids by camel, but going in the back entrance so costing about half the price. He actually ended up walking me to the place I could book a cheap tour. The pyramids and the sphinx were nice but the best part of the tour was the guide riding the camel. He was hilarious. He made the big stone triangles in the desert interesting and funny at the same time.

The next day I picked up my passport and jumped on a train to Luxsor. During the train journey I caught a guy trying to pickpocket my phone from me. The rest of the people on the train went mad at him. I thought he was going to be ripped to pieces by them. Luckily the train guard arrived and grabbed him and then threw him off the train at the next stop. So while in Luxor I visited The ‘Luxsor Temple’ and the ‘Valley of the Kings’. I found them both very interesting but not as fun as the pyramids. I returned to Cairo on the overnight train and went in to Cairo for the day and then on to the bus station on my way to Dahab. I got the overnight bus so that I would arrive first thing in the morning. Hmmmmm, I should know by now, busses are a pain in the ass. To be fair, it wasn’t the busses fault. It was around the time when Egypt and Israel were not playing nicely together at their border. So the military police decided to shut a crossroads at 2am for 4 hours. So I arrived at lunchtime. I didn’t even bother going to the house I would be living in. I wanted to get in the water. Within 30min of me being in Dahab I was under the sea making bubbles and playing with the fishes.

For the next two weeks I dived every day but one. Then I started my PADI Instructor training. This was very intense course. The day was normally 8am-5pm daily for 2 weeks and then homework. The one good thing was that it was a great detox for my body. Then the exams. As most of you know they went well and I am now a scuba instructor, but they went without their stress and hiccups. One part of the exam was to simulate teaching a class a lesson on a certain diving subject. My subject was on something I had never been taught and had no idea about and to make things worse. Our dive centre could not find the manual we use to teach the lesson. So, I was stressed because it was the final exams, I was stressed because I needed to teach a subject that I knew nothing about, I was stressed because I had no way of knowing what the correct answer for the subject was. So we finally found the info I needed and about five min before I had to present it to the course director who was assessing me. So I winged it. And by all accounts, ‘I winged it good’ apparently my lesson was very informative and interesting.

So we all passed. For the next couple of months I spent time trying to find as much work as possible. Unfortunately due to the problems Egypt has had in the past year the average tourists are giving Egypt a wide birth this year. So I started to email around the globe to try to find work elsewhere. I had several responses from many different dive centre’s. I had a telephone interview and I decided on an Instructor position in Zanzibar. I wanted to stay in Africa for now. For the first time in 14 months I will have a job…. Hmmm, not too sure I should rush these things. So, here I am. Living in paradise, diving in the Indian Ocean on a daily basis, and, being paid for the pleasure. It’s a hard life.

I hope to hear from some of you soon and I will update my next stage of my journey soon.

Ben

P.s Sok said hi. He is a tad busy sunbathing at the moment, but he misses you all.

First stop was Kabale. I got there at 9:30pm in the pi$$ing rain. A local guy showed me where to go but i had to go to the bank first as i had no cash. I couldn't even afford a boda-boda bike taxi (this would be about 25p) the 2k i had to go. Went to the bank and as i was soaked through already and it was only 1 k to go from the bank i walked. Bad idea. I tripped over a tree root and was on the floor. Uganda is famous for its red soil. I was now the same colour red and very wet all down one side. Got to the hostel and showered in the coldest shower i have had in Africa, but what do i expect for £1.25 a night. Next, I deserved a beer. Went to the hostel bar and met a group of volunteers who were all very drunk already. We finally went to bed at about 4am.

After this i moved on to Bunyonyi lake. Defiantly the most beautiful lake i have seen in Africa. The lake is filled with many small islands. The only way to get around is by canoe. I took a walk up to a hotel on the top of the hill to get the best view if the lake. It was stunning. I was lucky that i got there when i did. 2min after i arrived, the heaviest rain storm i have ever experienced hit. It was a solid wall of water for about an hour. I had lunch and then once the rain had stopped tried to walk back down the hill. The rain had turned the dusty mud to slush. I slid on my arse for half the way down. I felt like a naughty 5 year old getting covered in mud again.

Next i met a Italian couple Noemi and Michele and we moved to Lake Mburo National park. I had decided to go here as i had read that they did morning Hyena walks and i am a big fan of Hyenas. So we get the bus to the local town and then a cab to the park. We managed to get a room for 3 for 30,000ugx (about £2.50 each). That is an amazing price for accommodation inside national park. The next morning we were up at 6:30am for the Hyena walk..... The first thing the guide said to us was ’’We only really see Hyenas at night, very rare to see them at this time’’. I was quite annoyed at this as i had paid $30 park entry fee and $10 for the ‘Hyena walk’. The one thing i came to see. The annoying thing was that i had checked if i was likely to see Hyenas at the front gate and i was told, ‘’yes, it is very likely’’. I understand, it is nature but they lied to me so i paid the entry fee.

So we left for Kampala, the capital of Uganda. I stayed in a different site to my new Italian buddies as they were heading north and i wanted to hang in Kampala for a few days. The camp site was nice. All except one thing, there was a huge private party just behind that had music blaring till 6:30am. It wouldn't have been a problem if we could have joined in but we got thrown out twice for gate-crashing. That is very unlike Africans. They are normally the first to involve you.

The next day i went in to the city to do some shopping and just for a look round. It was dusty, littered, smelly, busy, hot, you got hassle on every street by taxi drivers and guys and girls trying to sell you things and just generally DIRTY!!! I LOVED IT! After Rwanda’s Clean efficient Kigali, Kampala felt like i was back in Africa again. It must be a very religious place because everywhere i walked they were shouting Jesus! Jesus! How are you?!!! towards me..... Or maybe it was because of the long hair and my big bushy beard. That may have had something to do with it. Well its better than the Italian chap i met, Alex, being called Osama bin Laden in Dar es Salaam isn't it? This name seemed to stick with me for the rest of my time in Africa. I got all the bits i needed and went back to the campsite and decided to go to Jinja (the source of the river Nile) the next day.

After falling asleep in about 5sec flat i woke nice and early. I got to Jinja on the bus at about lunchtime. Put the tent up and went to town to grab lunch. Then back to watch the lady's Wimbledon final. Had a few too many beers with some English people from Windsor who are just buying a house about a 3 min walk from my flat in Wokingham, and went to bed. The next day i decided to have a hangover day. I didn't really have a hangover but felt like a lazy day. I spent the day online, watching TV and having a lovely chat online with a very good friend of mine from home.

Next day spent the day wondering round the town and then i went to another campsite about 10k up the river Nile. This place was much better than the last one and a couple of dollars cheaper. I stayed here for a few days. The view over the Nile and the waterfalls. Next i moved back to Kampala. I met a few people who were going out to a Irish bar playing live music. We all ended up in a Reggae club after. I think every person in the club was stoned off there box. We finally got back at about 3am. The Next morning two of us went to see a few of the sights around Kampala, the palace, the tombs of the previous kings, and a few other bits that i didn't want to do with a hangover.

My next destination was to be my last in Uganda before, if you don't know, I flew home to the UK. But just for a month. In fact, by the time i upload this blog i will be home so i hope to see some of you soon. I moved down to Entebbe. Entebbe sits on the equator at the north of lake Victoria. So it is hot, and there are beaches. I slept in a wildlife education centre (a zoo). At night you can hear the lions roaring, Hyena’s laughing and the monkeys screaming. During the day, there were hundred of animals just wondering around or in a pen if they had sharp teeth. I got bitten by a Camel on my back and chased by a Ostrich here. Obviously used the wrong perfume that day. The rest of my time i decided to chill and do pretty much nothing. I sat on one of the many beaches and I found a good bar with sky sports so i could watch the British GP. The next thing i know, it is 3am and im just walking out of a club with a group of Germans and one Spanish guy. The next day i just chilled in the town as i had to get my flight at 4 am so i just stayed up and waited. And then, i left Africa. It was a sad feeling to be coming home but also a happy one as i was soon going to see my family and friends. And im only back for a few weeks before my journey continues back in Africa.

Ben and Sok. xx