Soph's latest avoidance of real life

So as I promised here is an update of the last days in South India. As i write, it is my last day here in Mumbai, and to be honest it got off to a great start! I've been excited by this all day so i feel it is appropriate to share what was possibly my best breakfast i have had in South India - spring massala dosa (spicy veg and potatoes in a crepe like pancake), a mango lassi (essentially a yogurt drink but they advertise it as fermented milk which is not quite as appealing) and chai. woop! Followed later by kulfi - similar to ice cream with fruits and nuts mixed in, absolutely amazing! Whilst we are here i might as well share another story of my day. Using a public toilet in India is often a regrettable choice but when nature calls...This time, i step in to find about an inch of soapy water on the floor and a motly collection of women sitting on the floor. The majority are washing their clothes in this soapy water, others are completely naked, sitting on the floor washing their bodies completely oblivious to their surroundings. Bemused, I ask if there is actually a toilet I could use and a naked lady grins and points to a shower cubicle.
So i wade over.....

Whilst on the topic i may as well share some more unsightly indian behaviour. Streets stink of urine, largely because the public toilets are so gross the street is probably a better alternative. There is poo in the road, both in metropolis's like mumbai and rural towns. The women - incidentally never the men - burp or fart in your face mid-conversation with not even a blink. One example, we were waiting for a train at a train station (strange that!) and a mother walks her kid over to the train tracks, where he squats and does a massive poo. His younger sister copies him. Then walking back he scratches his bum, scratches his face, and then sucks his fingers. yum.

New Favourite Game
As you walk the streets of India you constantly come across bodies of cats, dogs and people lying strewn across the street. Most look like they are dead. Or not real. It is sometimes hard to tell if the people are sleeping or actually dead. For example, its the middle of the day, you are walking down the street and there is a body lying across the pavement. Not by the side but across it. People walk around it. Now you either have to be really tired or dead to stay there. Another one. In the queue at the ticket office and there is body lying on the floor directly below the ticket booth. Who chooses to sleep there?! And who can stay asleep during the day with hundreds of people crowding around trying to buy a ticket?? So if you haven't guessed it by now, the game is crudely called; dead or sleeping? Well it keeps us amused in the long train station waits...

Surreal moment
The train journey from Varkala, Kerala into Tamil Nadu was absolutely breathtaking. This is why i love travelling by train, you see some amazing views. (Well i also like the fact that when you are squashed between families as we often seem to be, I seem to inadvertently provoke a 'food-off', whereby they compete to get me to taste their home-cooked food brought onto the train - im definitely not complaining!) The south especially has some stunning scenery and is very different from the north. This particular view was made even better by the group of lads sitting nearby, who had a liking for Backstreet Boys. So much so that they 'knew all their stuff', which was demonstrated by some truly awful but enthusiastic singing! I never thought I would ever see men in their twenties un-ashamedly belting out Backstreet Boys tunes! It seems that Backstreet Boys are huge in India!

Best Purchase
Do you remember as a kid you used to get those juice cartons in your lunch box? Well India has the adult version - Rum in a carton! The only thing missing is a straw....

Dharavi slum, Mumbai
Its quite a contentious issue amongst travellers' whether to visit Asia's biggest slum or not. Some say you shouldn't see how people live as a tourist attraction. But isn't that what we all do when we travel around the world? And the way to respect someones lifestyle is to understand it, and to do that, you have to see it.
Anyway, we opted to visit through a company that puts money into a school and education centre located in the slum. and anyway we were not allowed to take photos inside the slum. Im really glad we did go, because it was an eye opener and not really what I imagined at all. I don't think slum is the right word at all, because the majority of its habitants live better lives than those not in the slum.

We started with a look at the plastic recycling process. This was a surprise in itself because india is not renown for its plastic recycling, as litter is strewn everywhere. (a real gripe of mine is the rubbish that people throw out of the train windows, but thats another story. Although people are very good at re-using items and keeping them in use for as long as possible). People who arrive in Mumbai cant afford anywhere to live, so they go to the slums and work for a few years. We saw a typical room, which would cost 2,500 rupees a month. To put into context, those working in the plastic process would earn about 150 rupees for working 8-10 hours a day (just over 2 quid). Ah man the fumes from that place were toxic, I couldn't stand there for more than a few minutes and they were working all day with no protection at all. The women making poppadoms would earn 28 rupees for 1 kg and would produce 5-6kg per day. We saw the leather making process, and the sight of the day has to be the men working away at the sewing machines with cowprint material draped over their shoulders!

Many people have never left the slum, cos it has established a community feel, and they can get everything they need - clothes, food, medicine, schools...We were told that some people like living their so much that even though they can afford to live elsewhere, they choose to stay. There are definitely some very poor people in the slum, and in areas the conditions are horrible - like the rubbish tip outside the communal toilets on which the kids would poo on and then run around playing with the rubbish as toys. There are also some nicer, richer areas where the inhabitants have bigger houses and air conditioning. It is in fact like a town within a city. The community feel and productivity was everywhere - there were Muslims making Hindu shrines, women painting pots, children learning English, bakers baking pastries - which we got to try and were amazing! There was a main street where you could buy goods and then little alleyways off it which were more akin to what i had imagined. These were stuffy, muddy, narrow dark passageways leading past doorways with women sleeping or chatting, children laughing and playing, and the smell of chai a constant.

As we have often found, children are more willing to come up and say hi and shake hands. One girl held out her hand for Kate to shake it. Walking behind them, I saw the girl turn back to the shop, hold the palm of her hand to her face, inhale deeply and beam with pleasure at whom i took to be her father!

What we liked most about the slum was that it was the only place where vendors didnt harass you to buy their goods. We were left in peace to wander around and soak it all in. It was a visit that I would definitely recommend.

Mahalazmi Dhobi Ghat
Mumbai's oldest and biggest washing 'enterprise'! Interestingly it was the men washing the clothes - perhaps because they earned a wage from it! We also saw an advertisement for 'Tide' washing powder being filmed in the ghat.

So there you have it! There is tonnes more i could write about but i don't want to bore you! Im impressed that you are actually even reading this! So the journey around South India has been an unforgettable one. I was worried that having visited the North 2 years ago it wouldn't be as good, but i found that you just can't compare the two. The South and the North are in a way like 2 different countries. So today I head to the airport and fly to Uganda for the last stage of the adventure, meeting up with Maz, Chel and Big Fred. I have no real idea what to expect, it will be totally different from South America and India - very excited!! woop!

Its been a whirlwind tour of South India, some places were amazing and we would have liked to stay longer, others weren't so great and we were happy to leave, and some didn't even want us to stay and we left after a couple of hours! For those who have been to the North, the South for me, was very different. For one there appears to be less poverty - at least visually - the scenery is stunning, the food is different.....

Wayanad animal sanctuary

In Kerala there are loads of sanctuaries and reserves all proclaiming to host an array of animals. From what we read and had heard though, they all seemed rather touristy - indian tourists rather than western - and as Indian tourists in our experience are often in big, noisy groups, this will greatly reduce our chances of actually seeing any wildlife. So we opted for Tholpetty, in the North of Kerala for a chance to see some Indian Elephants. No wonder not many tourists go, it took a number of buses and a couple of days to get there, but get there we did! We arose early to get to the sanctuary entrance for 7am, where we managed to squeeze in with 2 Americans in their hired jeep. driving around the sanctuary we were bitterly disappointed, only seeing deer and bison. Returning back to the town however, we saw an Indian Elephant and her 2 children in bushes off the road...they were so close it was amazing! We stayed and watched them for a while, until a minibus driving about 20 Indian tourists came blaring down the road and scared the elephants away with their loud music and shouting....We waited for them to pass, and continued, happy to have actually seen some elephants and so close! Five minutes later and we came across another Elephant! This time he was a big male, with huge tusks. However, it was not long before he became scared and lumbered off. It was amazing though! Quite ironic that the elephants were not actually seen inside the animal sanctuary, but to be fair, if i was an elephant I wouldn't spend my time inside a sanctuary with noisy tourists gawping at me.....

You can travel around India very cheaply if you want to. It is about 80 rupees to one English pound.
80 rupees can buy you either....

• 80 chocolate eclairs

• breakfast (or dinner) for 2

• a fake original Indian cricket shirt

• 4 hour train journey

• a rum and coke (in Kerala)

• a bottle of rum and a coke (in Goa)

• 2 whisky (Blenders Pride) and cokes (in Hubli, Karnataka)

• 2 toilet rolls

• charter a ferry (and have change....)

• 6.5 minutes of moving advertisement time

• 16 train station samosas

• 16 cups of chai

• 2 snickers bars

• watch a magic show (and have change...)

• a Punjabi thali and a chai

• have a rickshaw driver wait for you for 4 hours

• 80 boxes of matches

So as you can see, the humble pound can get you far...What can you buy in England? a newspaper?

Snippets of conversations and bizarre situations...

On a boat during the backwaters trip
Eccentric Indian Lady: What's your name?
Irish tourist: Gronya
Indian Lady: Is that with an O, an E, and an A??

The tour guide on the same trip
Tour Guide: What's the most expensive spice?
Group: Saffron
Tour guide: What's the 2nd most expensive?
Group shouts out a number of spices but none are correct
Tour Guide (shouts as loud as he can):1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10.....ICE CREAM!!
There are a lot of blank faces as the group struggles to comprehend what's going on.
Tour Guide (with a smug grin): Vanilla!

The train journey to Varkala
Waiting for the train, an Indian man working as a yoga teacher and sporting a dhoti, a shirt, a woolly hat and ski sunglasses, strikes up a conversation with me. It is the standard conversation, where are you from, why are you here etc and is nothing memorable apart from his astounding dress sense.

Later, on the train he sees me and plonks himself next to me. One look in his eyes and I could see he was pretty gone and judging by the conversation I was proved right. Below is a snippet of part of the conversation...

Yoga Man: Do you know cashews?
Me: As in the nut? Yep.
YM: They're like a nut. Cashews.
Me: Yep.
YM: They're about this big - indicates with his finger. And some are bigger - he demonstrates again
Me: Yeah I know
YM: Do you like cashews?
Me: Yep
YM: I have something that is like a cashew
Me: Oh yeh? What is it?
YM: Yeah...it rhymes
Me: Rhymes with cashew nut?
YM: Yeah... I have hash...It rhymes with cash
Me: Erm...ok
YM: Would you like some?
Me: No thanks
YM (looking genuinely devastated): But....it rhymes with cash...ew nut.

It seems that everyday we have bizarre conversations of this ilk, most of the time the conversations just seem to go around in circles..If you are in a good mood its funny, if not is very frustrating! There are a few more gems I will put in the next blog. Plan is to finish the India blogs before I fly to Uganda (7th feb) so there should be an epic in the next few days!!

why hello there! so when i last left i was diving in goa....well i missed one little event that happened in goa...

The haircut

So haircuts abroad are turning out to be almost as bad as the bus journeys....We both went to get haircuts and Kate went first. All was fine. Then it was my turn. Because Kate has short hair and mine is much longer, when he asked what i wanted we joked that I wanted to look like Kate. We laughed. He laughed. Then, sitting in the chair, I said I just wanted a little off, a trim. I even showed him how much with my fingers. The scissors came out and he proceeded, in lightening fashion, to lop a great chunk out of the side of my head. Before I could stop him he had gone past the ear....
Crying for him to stop, he looked confused. It was a joke we cried. You laughed. We laughed. A joke! Apparently he doesn't understand the british sense of humour. So i was left with one side of my head normal, the other...well from the front of my right side to past my ear the hair length is maybe 15cm long...Its bad. so very bad!
And the biggest joke of all...I was waiting until we left Mexico and arrived in India to get my haircut so that it would be easier to communicate!

From buses to trains...
To travel on an Indian train is an experience like no other. You have to be ready for anything that may come your way. Anything.
so I am at the train station one evening waiting for a train that gets in at 1.30am (kate left early as i was diving so we were meeting on this train). Anyways, i spot a ladies waiting room and decide this is as good a place as any for a short nap.

I soon catch the eye of a middle aged lady who plonks herself down next to me, asking if i speak Hindi, which sadly, i don't. I soon discover she doesn't really speak English either, as every question I ask she responds with 'yes' or a mumble...and then a huge grin. She wanders off back to her seat. I close my eyes. I open them to find 3 kids standing in front of me, no communication, just a hand held out demanding money. I dont like to give out money, only food if i have it, which i didnt. So i shrug, say sorry i dont have anything and close my eyes, thinking they will move on to the next person. I open them again a few minutes later - no lie, they had multiplied! There were now about 8 kids all staring at me with the same expressionless look on their faces and an outstretched hand. I blink. Not sure what to do next I look around. The entire waiting room have their eyes on me, suppressing giggles, waiting to see what i do next. My new friend comes to the rescue. She approaches the kids and says something like "she's english, speak english to her and she will give you something." Bollocks will i! anyway they cant speak english and are shooed away by the dragon, the keeper of the ladies room who instills fear on every male that dares to venture near the invisible line that separates the ladies waiting room to the rest of the station.

I attempt to sleep again. Then i hear a noise which sounds strangely like a snake. I open my eyes to find my new best friend poking me with bread wrapped in newspaper, motioning for me to eat it. I accept and eat in the hope i would then be left alone....

South Indian quirks

1. A hotel is not actually a hotel. Arriving in Calicut, we see a place called 'new hotel'. it looked like a restaurant downstairs and the rooms we presumed were upstairs. We walk in and ask if there are any rooms. There are. We are motioned to go upstairs. Upstairs a young man approaches, points to the bathroom and says "wash hands". Bit odd we think, i mean we have just come off a train but surely we dont need to wash hands before we look at the room? anyway we oblige and dutifully wash our hands. We are told to sit down at a table and given a menu. "oh no, we dont want to eat, maybe later but now we just want a room". "we dont have rooms, we are a hotel". right....

1. Its nice to know sexism is still prevalant...When we eventually find a room we decide to head to the hotel bar for a much needed drink. We walk into a darkened room full of men. It goes quiet. A waiter approaches us and quietly says, "i think you two will find it 'nicer' upstairs in the restaurant" right..... got the message!

1. 2 month old babies on trains with their eyebrows pencilled in...

1. the sight of grown men sitting on a train, all sucking greedily on a straw drinking sachets of milk like its milk time at school! all they needed was a cookie.....

1. the many conversations with Indians who are convinced they are speaking English but are in fact talking some hybrid mumble of their local dialect and erm...im not sure what! there is only so much nod and smile, grimace and shake you can do on a 10 hour train journey!

so i apologise, its been a while since the last update, but here goes....

so we spent xmas in Mexico City with Talis' family - a great and unforgettable experience!

Bullfighting
No trip to Mexico is complete without a trip to the sunday afternoon bullfight in the worlds largest bullfighting arena! We splurged and got tickets close to the action, meaning we were surrounded by Mexican toffs - think cigars, cowboy hat, infact an entire cowboy outfit on some! So its a regular occasion for some mexicans, they get really into the action, properly lamenting the matador if he doesn't perform.
So it goes like this. The 'warm up' guys come out and toy with the bull, making it angry and confused. There are also padded horses that the bull is forced to charge - i wasnt sure about that bit especially when the horse fell. About 6 knives are thrown into the bull and by now it is very weak and angry. The matador - clad in his skin-tight lycra and sequins - then plays with the bull and the crowd, with a series of 'oles!'. Then, usually decided by a mixture of a bell, the matador and the crowd, it is time to 'finish off' the bull. A sword is plunged into the bulls head and in theory it crumples and dies. However this happened only once. More often it has to be finished off with a quick dagger to the head. The worst was when the matador was rubbish and it took him about 4 tries with the sword and still didnt manage it. idiot. In the course of the afternoon/evening maybe about 9 bulls were killed. We were assured they were eaten after and not wasted but even so...
so all in all, it was an experience that we felt we should see, but i dont really understand why you would go week in week out and i dont think i would go again!

Lucha Libre
Now this is a Mexican sport that i would go again and again to see...and in fact we did! the first time we arrived late and only caught the last 30 minutes so obviously we had to go again..and then one more time...
So what is it? Basically its a form of wrestling, but its very improvised/planned, no-one really gets hurt and they all have silly names and wear sparkly masks and outfits. Its very good fun to watch if you get in the spirit of it, and with a few beers it definately is very funny! Favourite wrestler definitely has to be 'Mr Porky'.

pilgimage
on the bus to mexico city we saw hundred and thousands of pilgrims walking to the basilica de guadelope to pay homage to the virgin mary - there seemed to be a competition on who could carry the biggest framed photo on their back. So on the 12th we ventured to the basilica to see what the deal was. it was mental. they had all gathered there as it was on this date and this place where she was supposedly once glimpsed and they wanted to get a glimpse themselves. it had also turned into a sort of virgin mary car boot sale, with caps, statues, t-shirts, all sorts on sale. crazy, crazy times.

Yasne's christening
18th December was the christening of Yasne, Renes and Juans daughter. As we had brought no formal attire for such occassions we had to borrow dressed from the family and shoes. Well i couldnt. my size 7 feet are apparently feet of a giant. So the morning of the event arose and i still had no shoes. no worries. An hour before it started and i was running around the mall in search of appropriate shoes! shoes found, dress on, and off we went! I havent been to a christening before but im told they arent as big as this one was. there was a 3 course dinner, a chocolate fountain, a bouncy castle, various forms of dancing, a drag act and instead of bottles of wine, bottles of tequila! well why not?!

xmas
So xmas was spent re-living our childhood with copious xmas films, including home alone and elf! We also got invited to an uncles house for a very traditional xmas eve dinner of....pork and spaghetti carbonara! not forgetting the jelly and, of course the tequila! It was a very funny night! oh and xmas day dinner.....lamb tacos!! Even in Mexico we have to do the traditional boxing day walk...only here it was 25 degrees and we walked amongst the pyramids....

India!
so after an epic few days of travel we flew into Mumbai on the 29th December and got the train down to Goa, arriving on the 30th. New Years Eve on the beach was an entertaining experience. Goa is full of European, Russian (a lot of Russians) and Indian tourists around new year and to be honest its pretty horrible! its full of indian tourists running into the sea fully clothed, attempting to swim, remembering that they cant swim, and either half drowning or shrieking the 12 year old boy giggle and running back out. On the eve itself, the beach was full of people drinking and dancing by the beach shacks. Where we were based, there were a group of indians dancing like, well, mentalists really. there were uncoordinated limbs flying everywhere. Watching, we felt pretty confident about our own dancing so went and joined in. one guy came up to me and wanted to show me his various impressions of dancing animals. others would produce what they believed was an epic dance move only to fall face down in the sand. One lad in particular was keen to show his break-dancing moves. the first wasnt so bad. however, it proved to be his best move. we left them to it, and went back to the fireworks. later, we spotted an area where nobody was dancing, so started a social experiment. if we started dancing, would anyone join us? Oh yes. it was the same crowd - the animal dancer and the 'break-dancers'. And they had new moves. We attempted to establish a dance circle of sorts but lets just say they didnt really understand the concept! so the dance moves of choice were the leg spin which involved hitting about 10 members of the audience, the chair spin which involved falling flat on the floor and the combined forward roll, which well just ended with them rolling into each other. Nice. Well done. Still they seemed pretty happy with the results!

diving
Pretty much my only other experience in Goa thus far has been the diving - i am now a certified advanced open water diver! yay! it was a really good crac, some very funny and amazing people and i would definitely recommend both the company - barracuda - and well diving itself!

Tomorrow im on a train heading to mangalore, then it is down to kerala for elephants and the backwaters!

Tulum
Mexico is/has been a bit of a do-it-yourself experience as we have no guidebook we are relying on meeting people on buses and their recommendations. It has worked out pretty well so far! From Belize we got a boat to Chetumal (mexico) and a bus up to Tulum. Fairly toursity Tulum was still a great experience. I indulged my new underwater passion and went snorkelling again - this time it was in a senote (a sinking hole) located in a cave called "Dos Oros", literally meaning 2 eyes because a cave entrance is known as an eye and this had 2 entrances. Genius. The snorkelling was wicked. We were guided in and around the cave, seeing stalactites and mites all around, divers underneath us (here i was green with envy and have now actually booked my diving course in Goa yay!) and we got to do a bit of snorkel-diving i like to call it.

Chichen Itza
So even though we were pretty ruined out, we kinda have to go to one of the wonders of the world...(im on 5 now, only 2 to go!!). Although i have to say i have seen better and the highlight was a middle aged lady clad in a glitzy gold bikini and heels, accompanied by a very normal, socks and sandals husband and 2 very embarassed children.

Mexican food
You learn pretty quickly that every food or drink item comes with either chilli, salt or lime - most often all 3. Buy some orange segments on the bus - they come with chilli and salt. Fruit lollies - mango and chilli, pineapple and chilli.....sweetcorn on a stick - chilli and lime....

The food is pretty good i have to say, its not like we get at home. Theres no huge burritoes, no fajitas or crunchy tacos...Tacos are instead soft, flour or corn tortillas with meat that you can either have as a snack or have 7 and make a meal. Most of the food is like this, they are small but you have loads of them. Pozole is my new favourite...kinda of like a chicken soup or stew that you had tostadas and salad too. Tostadas are crunchy tortillas (think the taco shells we know but laid out flat) and you have meat and chilli and lime on top. Mexico is failry americanised though, and the mexicans favourite food, aside from tacos, seems to be dirty sausage. You know, the wierd pink things that come in a tin. They have them fried, battered, cut into shavings...its wrong, so wrong...Or ypu could crispy fried chapulines (grasshoppers) or Mole, a wierd chocolate and spice and other stuff sauce with some sort of meat. It was disgusting!!

How to drink like a Mexican....
So you think you know how to drink corona? Put the lime in the bottle? Think again! The thing to do is have a tray with copious amounts of lime and salt. Put the salt inside the rim of the bottle. Suck a wedge of lime and sip the corona/Dos Equis/Sol. Repeat. Or if you have a glass, ask for a michelada and you get salt on the rim of the glass and lime juice inside the glass. Its gooood! Picture this - you are in a sports bar watching footy. You are surrounded by big, burly Mexicans. Typically they should be drinking big manly pints. Instead they are daintily sucking wedges of lime and sipping dos equis out of a bottle....

Merida - Yucatan Fair
Whilst in Merida, our hotel `man`recomended a local feria that all the mexicans go to in Xmatkuil. It was like a fun fair of sorts that goes on for 3 weeks in a town, but it takes over the town so next to the dolphin show is shop selling washing machines, then there is a multicoloured castle and a phone shop...we saw..

• children dressed in clothing and dancing to songs in a way that would be rather inappropriate in England....

• `cuddly toy`cigarettes being won by children

• a horse show, where the highlight was the indivdual competition. You ride your horse as fast as you can to the white line, stop and the judges measure the length of the horses skid. A bit like an inverted long jump. Then spin your horse around in a clockwise direction until it gets dizzy. Repeat in an anti-clockwise direction. The judges look at their clipboards. Then you make your horse walk backwards...Their is some serious discussions and clipboard studying amongst the judges. The crowd waits in anticipation. A score is announced. The crowd applauds. And repeat.... It was exciting....

• various lassooing of bulls and other animals.....

The bus curse
Now we know that I dont like buses. But we now think we are actually cursed.

1. From San Cristobal to Oaxaca. We get the night bus and all is well until we stop at 3am and the driver announces we are having 30mins for a toilet stop - who takes 30 mins to wee?!! Anyway 15mins into it we are off, only to stop again at 4am. The bus driver shouts something but in a semi-comotosed bus state i ignore him and instead think how nice it is to actually get some sleep because the bus isnt moving. I awake at around 7am and find that we are still not moving. Through various `conversations` - mime and charades mostly - i establish taht the stop is due to A) an indigenous protest march blocking the road or B) a broken road. Yes they are very different! By 9am, we find that the bus (and the 50 others stopped around us) arent going to move until at least that evening. However, small cars could get through. So clubbing together with 5 fellow tourists and some locals we get a ride on a pick up truck to the nearest bus station where we do manage to get a bus through to Oaxaca. On the wat we encounter the family business - this consisted of the mum sitting on a plastic chair at the side of the road, holding a piece of rope across the road stopping any vehicles coming through. Her numerous children would then grin innocently at drivers, shaking tin cans and demanding money before the mum would then let go of the rope and you could drive through...If i dont get a job back in England I may well try this one....

1. From Oaxaca to Benito Juarez and back

1. Oaxaca to Mexico City

Best fancy dress
This was either the adult sized xmas tree or the buzz lightyear or the Mr Potato Head or the fish or the....

Mexico City
so I am speeding through to try and get up to date! We are in Mexico city, staying with Talis (from Sheffield Uni womens footy those who remember!) and her family for xmas. It is strange, being hot in december. In the main square they have set up an arena for structured snowball fights (the kids get a box of snow and a helmet each and hide behind plastic trees) and an area with moulds to make small snowmen...all because they dont get snow here! We have also been to see a bullfight and some mexican wrestling, but i shall endeavour to write more in the next blog! Happy xmas all!!