Bali Kiss

That Chinese Red Shit

Forget Antiseptic lotions and band aids. Throw out your Mercurochrome and sterile swabs. Alongside a packet of cotton buds, a mere single item is now required in your western first aid kit. Ho Choa Hu... not quite a house hold name, yet lauded in coral reef cheese grated circles by it's more vernacular name... That Chinese Red Shit. It's a miracle cure for just about anything with a pain quota to back it up.

How to cure (most) flesh wounds while on a tropical island:
1.) Follow clear instructions before proceeding "re-application lotion until health is happy"etc
2.) Find discarded chair leg or old palm fond and insert in mouth for bite protection.
3.) Apply chinese red shit generously to wound and scream in wonder as thick red goop proceeds to simultaneously cauterize and kill everything it touches in a wonderous display of fizzing, bubbling and hissing.
4.) Discard palm fond and hobble about, muttering obscenities and perspiring until pain subsides.
5.) Repeat every few hours until scarification is complete.

A Lament to Surfing

I love surfing. Unfortunately, over the years and (more poignantly) over the last 3 weeks, I've come to realize that surfing tends to attract a disproportionate number of, well... surfers. Strange that such an historically spiritual pursuit should be dominated by men (primarily) who's idea of soulful is Limp Bizkit's rendition of George Michaels "Faith".

Things I've learnt from hanging around with surfers:

-> Don't refer to the tent scene in Brokeback Mountain has art. This causes a primary response shutdown in the blue-blooded surfer male, involving a glazed look in their eyes not dissimilar to that seen in fluffy toys (just a lot less cuddly). I presume this is a primal heterosexual defense system aimed at preventing contamination by any form of modern sensitive thinking.

-> Always have up to date weather information on hand to bandy about. This will put any skittish man-herd at ease, in much the same way that having a working knowledge of Tri-Nation's Rugby will (I tend to fail to dismally in the latter and I'm justifiably and swiftly dispatched to the "kinda gay" pile)

-> Don't live in Australia. I strongly suspect its full of them.

Surfing My Sweets , i think i might need a divorce....i don't think i can stand your other lovers anymore....

Birthday Babylon

Saturday 30 August was my 35th Birthday. And in fabulous style I managed to rustle up a small posse to head into Indonesia's very own Heart of Darkness,the infamous Kuta Beach, Bali. For those who are not news-hounds, Kuta is such a despicable, heinous pit of western decadence that extremists have tried to blow it up...twice. This initially caused a suitably satifisying stampede of Antipodean yobs back to their outback trailer parks... but alas, like any herd of semi-intelligent mammals, they have now drifted back to take up there god given right to get pissed and fall about in other peoples front yards.
Of course when (literally) in Rome, the evening was as blur of overpriced and under-spirited cocktails, he-she solicitation and a truly awesome rendition of Stairway to Heaven by the Espresso Bar Band... and some real sexy guys in a neon cage gyrating to Indo-techno.