Cambodia

Leaving Myanmar was more straightforward than the guidebooks and blogs implied. Unless we just luckily slipped through the net, the US$10 'departure tax' no longer exists, no one searched our belongings to ensure that we did not take any local currency with us (I smuggled out around 10 pence worth - rebel), and no one checked that we did not remove artefacts of national importance, as stated at immigration.

Back in Bangkok, we made the snap decision to leave straight for Cambodia - staying overnight at Aranyaprathet in a sleazy hotel with the thumping night club next door, before crossing the border the next morning.

Stories abound about the enourmous number of visa scams at all Asian borders, but this border, as a backpacker favourite, is notorious. So when we hired a tuk-tuk driver to take us straight to the border, we were comforted to be dropped off at an impressive building with a large car park, air conditioning and formal desks where uniformed staff were on hand to help fill in the forms.

Only two things were unusual - all the pens were from various different Thai banks and private companies; and the standard $20 fee was to be paid as 900 Thai Baht - which a little maths tells us is $30. When the manager assured us that this was the official visa application room (and indeed there was a digital photographer on hand for those who did not bring photos), we would have trusted him... were it not for the fact that just a few days earlier friends had gone through and confirmed the price was meant to be $20.

The manager invited us to go to the passport control to confirm the price - a long queue and about 20 minutes walk away. We called his bluff and went. Sure enough, we strolled out of Thailand with no fees whatsoever, and found the real visa point much, much further on; the well oiled scam, where taxis will take a cut for dropping you at the large building placed and designed just to fool us Westerners must take in a massive sum each month - enough to fund a large staff and building; and it's easy to be none-the-wiser. They will process your visa for you - by going themselves to the real place, taking a 50% cut and wasting a huge amount of your time.

On the other side, we presented our forms, and were told the fee was $20 plus 100 Baht administration fee. The hand written sign concurred. The official sign did not. A brief refusal to pay any administraion fee resulted in getting our Cambodian visa for the real price of $20 and not paying any bribes, or submitting to any cons - there are plenty of destitute people to give money to in both these countries. Corrupt border police are not the correct ones.

The scams continue - a free shuttle bus stands ready at the border to take tourists to the 'international bus terminus' a shed in the middle of absolutely nowhere where one bus company sets a falsely high price for a trip to Siem Reap - once there, there is no choice but to pay - bribed police stop taxis and minibuses approaching the terminus, so all duped people pay the bus company or walk dozens of miles. We walked a mile or so from the border to find a cheap taxi to take us traight to Siem Reap. Hot, and irritating, but worth it on principle, even though it didn't save all that much time or money.

En route to Siem Reap - we passed the scene of a car crash - where a truck had driven off the road and hit an electric pylon - the cables subsequently pulling down around another 8 pylons on either side. Watching work men dig a hole with hoes, while others built by hand brick foundations for a pylon that had yet to arrive and be assembled (if it had even been ordered) - we were blissfully unaware of the implications - that most of Western Cambodia was without its link to Thailand's power stations, and hence without power - and was to remain so for at least the duration of our stay.

Even our taxi driver screwed us - by dropping us outside town and forcing us to take a tuk-tuk to our booked hotel. The benefit of the massive number of tourists staying in Siem Reap is an extremely high standard of accommodation. $20/night got us a large ensuite with TV, DVD, balcony, access to the DVD collection, free wifi and PC use, free bike rental, and nice service. The powercut got us a boiling hot room with not even a fan, candlelit toilet visits, and not much use for a DVD player. So important is the tourist industry that the centre of town enjoyed a specially diverted electricity supply during evening and night, so that the bars, restaurants, shops and pickpockets could make their living.

Siem Reap, while quaint, really is a tourist reservoir; just next to Angkor, the world heritage site filled with dozens of temples and religious sites up to around 1000 years old (a little toddler compared to Jerusalem, but who's counting), the town is bursting with pubs, overpriced Western food, loud music, baseball cap and flip flop shops, and not a hint of Cambodia. But to buck the trend slightly, we took bicycles instead of the lazy tuk-tuk and headed up to the temples for sunset, meeting up there with the other 6000 tourists who visit every day. Nonetheless, the awesome architecture and stunning views as sun set behind the towers of Angkor Wat were only slightly dampened by the masses of flashing cameras, and the local mothers parading their disabled children with gross deformities and / or hydrocephalus to make a quick buck (see below for why this scene was yet another con).

The next day we enjoyed an early start to get to the temples before day break and the rest of Siem Reap's tourists arriving. Cycling through silent roads of countryside, past temples engulfed in the roots of giant trees was bliss, until the tuk-tuks arrived and every view was slightly changed by a Japanese tour group, a hot and grumpy child, or a vendor shrilly shouting, "Sir? Lady? You wan' some col' wader? Col' coca-cola? Hot caffeee? Hammock? Baseball cap?"

Like seeing the ten best movies of all time back-to-back, by late afternoon we were fully numbed to the greatness of what we saw. Realising that even the most ornate and intricate stone carving from 1350 was inducing a teenage-style shrug, it was time to head back and enjoy a different culture for the evening.

In true middle class style we attended a cello concert, which was truly inspirational, but not for the music. The performer, Dr Beat Richner, is a Swiss paediatrician who has dedicated his life for the last several decades to the children of Cambodia. Previously a comedian-cum-celloist known as 'Beatocello' in his home country, he is now the founder and director of 5 children's hospitals throughout Cambodia, and plays twice weekly concerts to encourage the visiting wealthy to fund his entirely free hospital, the visiting young to donate blood to deal with the endemic Dengue fever, and the visiting young married couples with a little cash and fresh blood to give both. The hospitals received just a few percent of their costs from the government, and provides western medical services to all who require, even covering patient's travel expenses so that no family need become more destitute to care for their children. So engrained is the corruption in this country that even the cleaners earn more than 12 times the national average, to eliminate the temptation to extort money from patients' families. For those interested in donating, look for 'Kantha Bopha hospitals', named after the late King's daughter, who died of leukaemia. The cello performance only took about ten minutes, but hearing his stories of Cambodia and watching videos of hospital life during the rule of the Khmer rouge were equally, if not more, entertaining and moving.

We made a quick morning getaway to Cambodia's capital, Phnom Penh, by bus. Once again, a single stopover in 6 hours at a cafe in the middle of nowhere, most likely owned by the bus company or offering back-handers, enticed a bus load of tourists to pay stupid fees for mediocre food; even the bus times in each direction were calculated so that we would be gone in time for the bus travelling in the opposite direction to arrive - they in turn would be out just in time for the next bus in our direction to arrive.

The capital is a semi-metropolis where Cambodian culture still bursts through in pockets among the luxury coffeeshops, internet cafes, and budget hotels where $13 may get you air con, but no windows. Street vendors will sell their fried chicken feet and entrails just outside places offering burgers for twenty times the price. The buzzing central market hosts stalls selling herbs, veg and live chickens alongside genuine top-brand rucksacks for a few dollars, and genuine Rolex watches for just $30. All genuine. Real. Gold. Honest. Tourist drive-by snatch muggings are a daily occurrence, with us meeting three victims in 36 hours.

Having checked in to a grubby little hotel in the middle of touristville, we headed out to explore. Hiring a tuk-tuk for the day, we followed the voyeur-tourism trail, first heading to Tuol Sleng, formerly a high school, but which reached world notoriety as Security Office 21 - a detention and torture centre of the Khmer Rouge in the middle of the city, where people would be sent for protesting against the regime, having an education, being monks, not reporting other people who did not support the regime, or in the case of some of the Khmer Rouge's own soldiers, not arresting enough people... or in the case of many survivors, no reason whatsoever. The site itself was remarkably poorly put together - a random mismash of photos, torture instruments, cells and the occasional testimonial, with little educational value or emotive presentation. Here and there, some cash would buy you a photo opportunity with a survivor, or a little more cash would pay for one to give you a tour and show you their own cell; given the horrors that occurred here, the site could be used for so much good - after the investment at Yad Vashem holocaust memorial in Jerusalem, where an incredible analysis of the events leading up to the largest genocide in history is catalogued and presented alongside so much explanation and documentation, and where survivors volunteer their time to talk to children to educate them in tolerance, and all funded by the government due to its significance to the state's identity, it seemed bizarre to be paying for smiley photos with survivors of Cambodia's own massacre.

Like the many victims of Tuol Sleng, our next stop was the killing fields at Chuoeng Ek - the surprisngly small compound where thousands of people were exterminated at the hands of the regime. As most of the buildings were demolished before the government realised the importance of preservation, little remains except pits where remains were exumed, and a large modern memorial - a tall tower fillled with thousands of skulls of the victims - grouped by age and gender. As one walks through the grounds, the occasional human bone wrapped in an old piece of clothing sticks up through the ground, where rain has eroded another burial site. Signs request from tourists not to touch the remains - but to leave them for the staff who periodically do the rounds and gather up pieces to re-bury. The occasional chicken roams freely around, pecking at the ground.

 

 

Cambodia is a country still shaken by its past, unable to come to terms with its history, while suffocated by corruption and trying to cash in on voyeur tourism. As it looks to a brighter future, so we looked onwards to Vietnam.

Bangkok and Burma

Monday 18/02/13

Before I even finished writing the last blog entry, the adventures had already begun. While somewhere very high up, trying to doze on the long flight, I felt a thud; the sort of thud one hears when a large bag falls on a hard surface. In this case, it was followed by a little murmuring - enough to make me hesitantly remove my complimentary eye shade and ear plugs. Looking in the direction I'd sensed the thud, I saw a pair of feet lying in the alley.

I'll tell you from the outset that this isn't an exciting medical emergency - a middle aged man with a history of vasovagal syncope who has a syncopal episode after standing up for a pee, after 4 glasses of wine and 7 hours into a night flight, with no significant clinical findings is hardly noteworthy... but what IS noteworthy was the implication. I decided that to play on the safe side I would check the guy's blood pressure before sending him off to sober up. Other medics beware - the minute you use any of the flight medical equipment, even if just a blood pressure check - you are declaring a medical emergency. All the medical boxes (and there is an impressive checklist of medical gear on an A380) were brought from the front to the rear of the plane by a hoard of in-flight crew. Contact was made with the international aviation medical emergency control room in Kansas USA, where some shmuck doctor was on hand to thank me for my assistance, and I had to spend my shut-eye time writing a report and explaining to a charming Singaporean lady with crap English what vasovagal syncope was. Of course, after that the lid was off - I was no longer simply a human being - no no. From then on, all staff called me Doctor Albert, and most came by, one at a time, to thank me for 'saving the day', and 'keeping us all safe' (and on one occasion, to ask me what the long term side effects would be of continued zolpidem use on an intermittent basis) - all I'd done was check a guys pulse, check he wasn't post ictal, and stuck an automatic BP machine on his wrist. AND ALL I WANTED WAS A BUSINESS CLASS UPGRADE. But no - now an eternal point of contention between me and Debs, they could not upgrade both of us, so I missed out, instead settling for the consolation prize of a duty free voucher. Words are cheap. I wanted a fully reclining bed and soft slippers.

Thanks to a late departure, we missed our connection at Singapore - which was fine with us - after a lavish complimentary meal at a vegetarian Indian restaurant in Changi Airport and a quick tour of the cactus garden on the rooftop there, we boarded the next plane, 2 hours later. Nowhere near the quality of the A380 (seriously, it felt like business class - from the incredible menu to the legroom, to the attentive staff, to the mouthwash in the bathroom, and the huge amount of storage in the cupboard between the chair and the window), not sure I ever want to fly anything else ever again.

Bangkok 

Landing in the metropolis, we took a long hard look at the map and decided that the directions to our first night's accommodation - a simple room for ten quid a night courtesy of Air B'n'B were complete trollop. So we set off instead on what seemed to be a much shorter and cheaper journey on Bangkok's skyrail and underground to arrive somewhat smug in the required neighbourhood not much later than we expected to from our missed earlier flight.

Unfortunately, finding the building was another issue. In the poorly lit backalleys of Bangkok, where perhaps one in ten buildings has a number on it, and they use the Israeli system of number ordering (start at one, then two, then 17, then the age of your first cat when you were six, then divide your least favourite number by 4.28 and round up until you get to an integer divisible by 17 etc), the system is made even more complicated by the fact that we didn't know that a side street apartment has at least three numbers. So we were in room B, apartment 19, building 34, on the side street closest to 55 Soi Sri Bumphen / So Si Bumpen / Soi Sri Brumphen (depending on whether you're using Google maps, Lonely Planet, or offical directions. Naturally, the very first person we spoke to in Thailand turned out to be an Israeli expat - but even with his ten years in Bangkok, he didn't know the road numbers on the street where he lived. With the help of a Thai lady who sent us in the wrong direction, then realised her mistake and came running after us to apologise and correct herself, we found the room - let out by two guys, one Thai, one Russian - who seem to make their living by renting some rooms, doing some laundry, selling some underwear, and plying the blackmarket with small mammals such as the baby squirrel that disappeared during our stay. I like to think that all these trades are independent of one another. But I cannot be sure.

Tuesday 19/02

Our first morning - and I was now officialy thirty years old - we headed out of our room to be hit by the wall - less of heat, but of humidity - that summarises life in this city - breathing feels like effort, everything rubs, and getting on to a packed train is sheer bliss thanks to air conditioning.

One of the big dilemmas of our trip planning was whether or not to go to Myanmar. On the one hand, this fascinating and unique country would be an amazing place to see, especially now that it looks like the military regime may be loosening its grip on the population; as international trade sanctions start to fall, and foreign investment rises, this could be the last chance to see the old Burma. On the other hand, the foreign office warnings, border fighting, interrogation of visitors, not to mention the difficulty in getting a visa, make it a little less comfortable than shuffling through Thai customs with a thousand other tourists waiting for a free and inevitable visa.

So, naturally our first stop was the Myanmar embassy in Bangkok. Form filling, lots of queueing surrounded by the other folk trying to get off the beaten track, and a big wad of Thai Baht later, and it was off to rejoin the trail of the masses - boat up the Chao Phraya river to Wat Po to look at the giant reclining Buddha, lots of smaller Buddhas, and then onwards in a Tuk-Tuk to a giant standing Buddha, a big Buddha on a hill, and at the request of the Tuk-Tuk driver, to a couple of tour and travel operators where people woud try to sell us overpriced bus tickets,. and in the case of a Welsh ex-pat called Steve, tell us that all our travel plans for South-East Asia were crap and we should pay him a lot of money to arrange for us a trip that he would like to do which takes in to account none of the things we came to see.

A Tuk-Tuk, if you were wondering, is an incredibly fun and hilariously dangerous way to get around - effectively the front half of a motorbike attached to the back half of a cart, these very light vehicles, driven by a driver often sitting on a plastic seat, and naturally devoid of walls, doors or other luxuries like seatbelts. They re fast, cheap, and seemingly exempt from both the highway code, and the laws of physics as they drive on the wrong side, swerve to avoid oncoming lorries, and squeeze through gaps that an average human wouldn't get through.

Food was an interesting subject from day one in Thailand.

Firstly - if you like fresh food, keep away - artificial preservatives may be frowned upon in the UK but here they seem unavoidable in most foods - the most repulsive example that springs to mind is that, in the 30 degree heat, one can buy in almost any corner shop a tuna sandwich sitting on a none-refridgerated shelf, with a use-before date 5 days in the future.

Second - veggie food is easy to come by. Vegetarian delicacies here include chcken, sausage, and ham. Many shellfish are vegetarian. Rice must always be seasoned with oyster sauce, and even the carrot sticks we tried to buy were seasoned with shrimp powder.

Third - the Thai diet is incredibly unhealthy. If living here on a shoestring, street-eating is the way to go. The smell of grease, fat, and burning scum at the bottom of a vat of an unclassifiable cooking animal permeates all clothes, and giving the lack of a breeze and high humidity, sits on the street throughout the night. Every few metres on every busy street, someone wil be selling something 'edible' - from tiny omlette things, to pad thai rice, pigs trotters, or soup. If you go to the tourist ghetto, you can add beetles, crickets and scorpions to that list. But as you can also find Bangkok's only kosher restaurant on the same street, it's not too tempting to put a scorpion in my mouth when I'm used to treating their venom.

That all said, if you are prepared to risk requiring a lot of imodium - which you have to be if you wish to eat - there are veggies, fruits, and inoffensive rice and noodles to be found on many a corner.

The next day or two of wandering in Bangkok flew by as we used the time to prepare to our last minute trip to Myanmar (Burma). In this country that only changes money from crisp, unused US dollars dated 2006 or later with no pencil markings or other defacements, and runs a strict policy of internal currency, we had to make the most inefficient money deal ever - change our Sterling travellers cheques to Thai Baht, take the Thai Baht to another changer who provides US dollars meeting Myanmar's rules, so that we can get to Myanmar and change them again into Kyat (pronounced Chat). Combined with flight bookings, trying to find accommodation (Welsh Steve assured us that we couldn't find accommodation in Burma without booking in advance so we got scared into booking- of course, he was talking crap), and making a tentative itinerary, the time blurred by until we were on a taxi to Don Mueang Airport - the diddy one in North Bangkok - the Luton to London's Heathrow.

A short flght later on Air Asia (basically Ryanair with a different colour scheme and more noodles), we were in Burmese airspace. As we descended towards Yangon, we passed the mountainous Eastern border region and the arable plains - at the end of the dry season, an expanse of straw and brown fields.

I may be pretty clued up on my Israeli history, but I'm very lacking in Myanmar knowledge - I'm going to write my interpretation of the brief history of the region because it is very relevant to our experiences there. I apologise for any misinformation, lies or bias. Any claims of damage as a result of this information, or lost marks if someone plagiarises to write a history project, will be disregarded with cheerful disinterest.

Burma gained independence in 1948 from the British, spearheaded by General Aung San. In 1962 General Ne Win led a military coup and gained power. With extreme socialist ideals he isolated the country and decimating the economy over a period of decades when the rest of Asia advanced, suppressing peaceful protest, arresting opponents and imprisoning Aung San Su Kyi, the daughter of the General of the same name, who became a prominent face in the democracy campaign, and later the leader of the National League for Democracy - which in the last elections before she was put under house arrest, gained 82% of the vote - which the military junta decided to totally ignore.

The leadership decided to change fundamental features of the country - the name was changed from Burma to Myanmar even though most locals, the US and UK, and even the NLD continue to use its former name. The capital Rangoon is now Yangon - and is no longer the capital (now Nay Pyi Daw).

Gradually things are starting to change - the country has opened its doors to foreigners in the past couple of years, and while still limiting movement in the country, deciding where you can go, no longer restricts them to plane and train - as long as you declare your passport number and where you're staying, you can take a bus too. Yay.

Based on the impressions all this gives, we were somewhat disappointed to land and step into an airconditioned jetty leading right into a shiny airport fit for any modern city. A billboard proudly announced that for the first time in history, one bank will allow use of Mastercard in the country. There is still no international mobile phone roaming there, but it surely isn't far behind.

Changing our crisp, unused US dollars for local Kyat, our $100 bill wass exchanged for 85500 Kyat - the largest note of which is 1000. Leaving the airport with the fat brown envelope, I felt rather wealthy. Despite the customs decaration regarding bringing gold into the country, we successfully managed to smuggle our wedding rings in without even taking them off.

Entering Yangon, the feeling was a world apart from Bangkok - dotted with the occasional new car, lorries from the 1950s, buses with people literally hanging out of the doors and on the roofs, and masses of old motorbikes and bicycles filled the cramped streets. At the same time, adverts for smartphones, construction of new lanes and flyovers, and large digital displays promoting local business created a bizarre paradox of new pushing in and covering the old.

We arrived at our guesthouse in the late evening as the streets were dying down. In Myanmar, your money will not get you anything like in Thailand or (we hope) the rest of Asia. Our $25/night room did have air conditioning, but no windows.. and plenty of mosquitoes. Having settled in, we set out to see a stupa just around the corner. The feel of Yangon was so relaxed - so quaint and quiet compared to any other (until recently) capital city. Locals would curiously look at us, unsure what to make of these rare foreigners, while children would just stare; but a quick smile and a hello (mengel-abba) would without exception break even the most sceptical glare into a big smile and a hello. Arriving at the stupa in early evening, people were praying in peace, the incense settling on the still air, and the quiet buzz of the electric pylons powering the LED lights around the buddhas' heads drowned out the mantras of the monks. The modest little place, even with its grand golden stupa, felt a hundred times more real and significant than being herded past the far bigger and ornate temples of Thailand with a thousand other tourists.

The complimentary breakfast consisted of two pieces of toast, one boiled egg, one banana, and one cup of instant coffee, and we headed off to explore again - deep in the Muslim market just west of the centre of town, down a narrow street filled with traders sitting on the floor selling only fresh natural fruit, veg, nuts, fish and meat (and decapitating the living fish only when bought), we came across Myanmar's only synagogue - home to the 25-strong community who 100 years ago numbered 3000. Mostly Iraqi Jews who moved over the last couple of centuries, this beautiful building was just like any other Sephardi synagogue, with its stunning silver torah scroll cases, and a mikveh next door, 4 metres from being full at the end of the dry season. Pictures of David Ben Gurion, Israel's first prime minister, visiting and meeting the Burmese Prime Minister, and multiple other photos of dignitaries throught the decades consituted a tiny museum of Burmese Jewish life, and the man who now heads the community gave us some shabbat candles as a little memento.
Onwards to the waterfront, where we paid $2 for the ferry ride across the river. Cheap, you might think? No. Well, yes, but not when you know that it costs 50 kyats (about 6 pence) for a local. Between the two of us and a single other tourist on the boat, the government made about as much money as from all the other passengers put together.

This ferry 'cross the Mersey took us to Dalla, a very simpe township of bamboo huts, many without electricity, and the occasional wealthy person who has made his money by fishing in the right areas who may have built a solid house, even with a car. Just a week before we arrived, the municipality had replaced some of the dirt tracks with concrete roads - a sign perhaps of the change taking place here. We hired a rickshaw to cycle us round, and it was rare for people not to wave and shout 'hello' and laugh as these two fat westerners were pulled round on a cycle rickshaw around their beautifully kept village.

That evening we took an overnight bus to Inle lake - 13 hours drive up in the North of the country. Once again, the government's $5 entrance tax to this area is a nice way to fund their regime, but unless willing to risk the consequence of sneaking past the booth - not easy in a taxi - unavoidable.

Having arrived at 0500, we were delighted to find one of the last remaining rooms anywhere in the town of Nyaung Shwe very quickly and headed out to try and see sunrise. As we walked along a canal, we were invited to hire a boat with an English-speaking driver, and ten minutes later were speeding down the miles of canal to the lake itself, not realising that the miles of marshland between the town the the lake are marked as water on the map. As fishermen stood on the very tips of their boats, balancing on one leg while pedaling with the other on the utterly still water, a beautiful sun rose over the mountains, and we headed over the lake to find breakfast in a small market, devoid of tourists - so much so that once again WE were the attraction. As we sipped coffee and ate some sort of samosas and mashed beans from another vegetarian street seller, we sat on the tiny chairs that toddlers use - this being the norm in most eateries in the country.

As the day broke, the lake showed its true colurs - a place that is much more developed for tourism than most of the rest of the country, but still small enough to feel special. We sped over the lake to villages built entirely on stilts in the lake, to see silk workshops, cigar 'factories' (two women sitting on the floor with pots of tobacco, aniseed, tamarind and coconut, rolling them up in fresh leaves with some bamboo as a filter, before sticking them shut with sticky rice), a monastry, and a posh floating restaurant where the boat pulled up at a bambo pier, and we were welcomed with cold face towels and a balcony seat before homecooked rice and noodles - for about $3 each. We added our own fresh tofu, bought that morning in the market.
The next day was no less beautiful as we hired two bikes to travel around the lake, visiting a winery, watching the farmers ploughing their fieds with oxes, and harvesting the corn with scythes, and found in one miniscule remote village, where children ran about with a wheel and stick, a bamboo hut with just four chairs, selling just one single meal - a vegetarian traditional Shan province meal. $1.50 each bought a freshly cooked tofu curry, potato curry, tomato salad, rice, and an avocado milkshake.

We were very sad to leave Inle lake when we climbed aboard the night bus to Mandalay. In contrast to the last bus we took with ample leg room and air-con, this one was sheer hell. For the 9 hour journey, we sat in seats so tightly packed that even Deborah's knees were flat against the seat in front. The aisle was lined with fold up chairs so that there was no aisle at all, and therefore not even a place to stand or to stretch one leg out. And to top it off, they decided to play a Burmese karaoke TV show, where one after another, video remakes were played. I stopped counting and entered a traumatic coma after the tenth consecutive 'Gangnam style' video. Honestly.

When we arrived in the unsigned wasteland outside Mandalay that is considered a bus-stop, at 3am, a quick taxi ride took us to the 'hotel district' - a sprawling grid-system of roads where packs of dogs exploit the cool night air to wake up from the hot day's moping around panting and terrorize unsuspecting tourists wandering the deserted streets looking for a bed. A lot of barking and thoughts about rabies post-exposure prophylaxis later, we had found one of the few unoccupied rooms in the city, courtesy of a brand new hotel that just opened its doors. Treated like royalty by staff who stop and bow when they pass, we were escorted to our room - with all the mod cons, even television, fridge and wi-fi. When asked for coffee to go with the kettle, it took four staff - one to go out at 4 am to buy coffee (they had just run out / never had a coffee drinker before), one to bring it to the room, one to hold the door to the room open, and one to run off and find a silver tray to pass the coffee over the threshold. Plus the manager to oversee the important transaction. Shame they bought tea by mistake. I decided not to tell them.

Mandalay is a city of contrast - big and covered in smog, with the same small-town feel of the capital. An economic and cultural hub with massive Chinese investment meant that the next day we went out to streets full of cars, in particular Chinese jeeps which pumped out masses of smoke and noise. Large buildings, smart phones, and LED adverts adorn the streets, as do the multiiple Chinese language signs and shops catering for the expats cashing in on Myanmar's impending boom.

Exploring the city on foot revealed the slums, just an alley or two away from luxury banks and businesses, where running water, sewers and surfaced roads have not been installed in the wood and corrugated iron shacks. Alongside the jeeps, impossibly old bicycles and horse-drawn carts negotiate the hectic junctions.

A guide to Burmese highway code.

1. Drive on the right.
2. Do so in a right-hand drive vehicle. Don't ask why - no one seems to know.
3. Drive with no shoes.
4. If red light shows, go.
5. If amber light shows, go.
6. If green light shows, judge situation before proceeding cautiously as other people may be on red.
7. If turning left, drive on wrong side of road before junction for up to 200m. Don't worry, everyone accepts this as normal. Once turned, drive through oncoming traffic at your leisure to regain your place on the right side of the road.
8. If turning right, traffic lights do not apply.
9. When crossing a junction, give-way laws do not exist. DO NOT STOP. Proceed at a steady consistent pace aiming for gaps between crossing vehicles and adjusting your speed accordingly. He who beeps first (or rings his bicycle bell) first or for longest and with the most enthusiasm is deemed to be the next person to cut through.
10. Helmets are for losers. So are lights, chain oil, brake lights, indicators, and brakes.

Debs and I cycled through a huge chunk of the city to reach a temple in the South; I raced a young monk en route. I felt it only fair to let him win. He was in sandals and robe carrying his alms. I was on a bike. Amazingly, the driving system works. Cutting corners, moving at steady speed and exploiting gaps between other vehicles means that the traffic keeps moving, even though the roads are wholly inadequate. We didn't see a single accident, which really defies probability. There were very few damaged vehicles around, and not too many damaged people either. One or two glasses of cool, crisp Mandalay beer the the roads were much less scary.

We had just 36 hours in the smog of Mandalay, so extreme that when we climbed Mandalay hill to watch sunset (apparently with every other tourist in the city - it was heaving up there), the sun set about ten minutes early - as it disappeared behind the smog long before it reached the horizon. It was time for what I expect will remain one of the epic experiences of our whole trip - the train from Mandalay to Yangon.
The dated, decrepit, dangerous Burmese rail network, built by the British in the imperial days, is even more like a time warp than the rest of the country. Known for delays, derailments and probably some other 'D', we boarded at a station where the platform overflowed with well wishers, porters, cargo, old leather trunks and livestock.

Seating options varied between 'ordinary class' which would get you a wooden bench in a packed carriage with a single toilet between around 100 people with holes for windows and no lights, to 'upper class' featuring reclining soft seats, and for real luxury, a sleeper carriage - a four-person en-suite berth complete with closeable windows, metal toilet with hole down to track, running water, and a ceiling fan. Windows and metal shutters could be lowered, but in the absence of air conditioning, was not recommended.
Given the 15 hour planned journey, we invested in sleeper tickets for the overnight ride. At $33 each (obviously, government foreigner tax - locals pay something in the region of $2 for a sleeper - which few can afford), it was worth every single cent.

As a guard escorted us to our carriage, we took in the art-deco surrounds of the ornate railway station. [Translation: As some guy in a sweaty shirt pointed us to our 50 year old filthy door, we looked at the crumbing remnants of a once beautiful station]. We found our two plush seats, each as wide as any business class flight and ready to be collapsed into a full size bed, and relaxed by the window to take in the sounds and sights of the platform. [Translation: The threadbare seats, not upholstered since the train was moved to Burma from India in 1990 (too old for the Indian network), collapsed as we sat on them, as their slide rail has broken over the years, meaning the running wheels on one side hung loose. Not, we hoped, a metaphor for the rails of the train. People popped up at the window to inspect the white folk, and the children of the train found immense joy in being photoghraphed and shown themselves on the little TV screen on the back of the camera.]

A waiter came to ask our orders for the evening meal in the restaurant car, where we could transfer when the train arrived into Thazi 4 hours later. [Translation: Noodle or rice? No chicken. OK. Beer?]
Some 12 carriages away from the engine - also an Indian retiree - we neither heard nor felt the train ever so slowly move off. As children ran down the track to race the train, or hung off the side to hitch a ride downtown, we passed into the poorer and poorer suburbs until green broke through and the fields, lakes and hills of Burma passed by as the train happily threw us from side to side. A peep out of the window revealed dozens of heads leaning out, ducking as a tree, fence or pylon reached them. The gaps between carriages were filled with people escaping the crowding of 'O Class'. People in the villages aside the track would eat, wash, defecate and undress as we passed, seemingly unaware that for a few seconds they had become a peep show. Children would almost unanimously stop and wave, faces lighting up when we in the carriages waved back.

Sun set, the train chugged on, and at Thazi when the train slowed, a man ran alongside our window with a plastic bag with two polystyrene pots of noodles and rice, a bottle of beer, and a glass beer mug. Payment was made through the window, as the man apologised that the restaurant car was not opening. Some 12 hours later, the same man would run alongside the window to politely request we return the beer mug and to take a breakfast order which we declined.

I am often a little unsympathetic to beggars - I am more inclined to give money to someone trying to sell a piece of straw than to someone who expects money or nothing. But when grown men and children came to the window to beg not for money, but for food, the guilt of travelling in this relative luxury became ever more acute. We quickly made up some parcels of food from the fruit and snacks we had bought along the way, and passed through the barbed wire designed to keep the poor away from the rich folk what we could before the train gained too much speed.

Deb got bottom bunk, I got top - a hard, narrow piece of wood with a thin mattress and a lumpy pillow which would have done nicely except that when the train reached top speed - which felt like 100mph and was probably more like 40mph - the jolts of the carriage literally made my entire body leave the bed. Each landing created a new point of discomfort, especially when the metal side railing was involved.
The journey ran smoothly, and we pulled in right on time at 0615. When we gathered our things together, the platform guard confusedly pointed out that we had a long way to go - about 3 hours. No particular reason - the train just went slower that night.

Some 18 hours after departing, we arrived at Yangon, not one person surprised or rushing after a three hour delay. A much needed shower later, we set off to Shwe Dagon, the largest pagoda in the city, where 8 hairs of the Buddha are said to be buried. Lunch at a little street stall - more delicious noodles, vegetable soup, and a long chat with a drill-engineer-cum-monk who had travelled 450 miles to see the pagoda, and invited us to sit with him, before trying to pay for our meal.

If other countries on our trip are half as special as Myanmar, I'll be very happy. Good, honest people, devout yet modest, happy yet impoverished, proud of their country despite oppression and intimidation. A country so far all but untouched by Western commercialism, yet so welcoming of Westerners - even if that is in part due to stickers in public places ordering, "Take care and warmly welcome tourists".

Words and even the many hundreds of photos we took will not do this one week justice. If Bangkok is anything to go by, South East Asia is already first world and tourism has made it a homogeneous lump of tourist experiences. Burma still feels real.

Musings at 35,000 feet

It's time to resurrect the blog. Almost 12 months since the last entry, and there has barely been a single moment to write anything - and that's no exaggeration. Since well before the end of the army, life has been hurtling by - during the final six months of the army, every free moment (and there certainly weren't many) was spent trying to figure out what next; where to live, what to do to make a living; basically what we wanted from life, while simultaneously trying to plan the immediate future afterdischarge - to go straight to specialist training, or to make up for the time apart by splurging our meagre earnings on a once-in-a-lifetime trip. Happy dilemmas, no question. But stressful ones at the same time, and not helped in the least by the two camps interfering on each side.

"Go travel - you'll never get another chance. Spend every penny, see everywhere." "Don't you want children? You're both coming up to thirty; what if you have problems conceiving? You can travel when you retire, but the fertile age is only a one-off."

For better or for worse, the travel bug won. And so began the super-stressors: trying to make the money to fund such a trip, and then of course, where to go. How much money could we make in a reasonable non-specific period of time, and how far could we travel? Where are the most important places to go to and what can we put off until, say, retirement?

It quickly became evident that a trip to the UK was in order. 18 months of army service without seeing most of my family apart from brief visits to see us in Jerusalem, a desire to keep my foot in the door of the UK medicine establishment, and the chance to earn more than double the salary I could earn in Israel made this first step very clear.

Of course,there's also the building yearning for the old life - the polite drivers, the British TV, the customer service. No matter what perks life has in Israel, ignoring for a moment the ideological fulfillment and meaning that life has, and notwithstanding the completion of a dream to be an Officer of the Israel Defence Forces, the sheer joy that my Britishness generates when a pedestrian smiles and mimes 'thank you' when you stop at a red light and don't run them over is surprising. Of course I'm going to stop. But why shouldn't I be thanked for not commiting murder? Why should that snooty Israeli feel that it's his/her right to walk in front of my car without saying thank you or even acknowledging the effort I just made by first elevating my right foot, and then depressing it a few inches to the left? It is perhaps petty, but day after day of the ingratitude (or, for the sake of argument, the lack of expressed gratitude) builds up, and wears you down. Day to day non-events, like queueing at the supermarket generate irritation at the check-out person's bad attitude, whereas a little smile would have changed the whole experience to a positive one. After three years of the same, and half that time in the dregs of society working with the young runts who comprise Israel's young conscripts, I have not adapted; instead, I have had my pride in my Britishness reaffirmed. The British culture is not 'different'. It's better. And the simple concept of mutual respect, a Jewish concept as much as a British one, needs to be applied for Israeli society to progress and be the light unto the nations that Israel needs to be to achieve its potential. Many people will say they prefer the honesty of Israelis who will say what they mean. Well, I don't. I prefer tact, subtlety, and patience. It works in civil society, and it's nicer.

Looking back so long after leaving the army, it is very hard to think of juicy stories to tell. There's the time a Palestinian and his British activist walked into the middle of a live-fire exercise where I was the doctor on standby. As the subtle officers started to shout at them to "get out, or you'll be shot", I quickly saw the opportunity to prevent a classical media distortion. When it was explained by one British gentleman to another (even though one was in combat greens with a loaded M16 machine gun and a 20kg medical kit, and one was in sandals with a keffiyeh around his neck) that the broken English was not a threat, but a cheerful warning that several tanks were loaded and pointing in their general direction, they were far more willing to move along, and The Guardian was not compelled to write its usual sh!te about Israeli soldiers shooting at the British Friends of the Earth bloke who was wandering next to the site where, so it is rumoured, we Israelis genetically modify Palestinian kids so that we can make them into felafel, or sell them for Tesco burgers.

After a handshake with both guys, as they turned around and walked in the other direction, one of my soldiers cameup to me as asked, "why did you bother talking to them? Why not just tell them to get lost?" And that, ladies and gentlemen, is how one of the most moral and humane armies in the world can be so midunderstood and misrepresented by a misguided press looking for a classical underdog tale.

Incidentally, on the same day, one of my soldiers was bitten on the face by a camel spider. Have a search online a find a picture. Lovely things, about the size and fluffiness of a small kitten... but with ten legs. Yes. Ten. And although it is non-venomous, its bite is so vicious that you treat is just like a wild dog bite. Beats the usual dull scorpions.

So... September, and suddenly I'm a civilian. Home each night, choosing what clothes to wear, rather than just the bits no one will see. And instead of flashing a card before taking my gun into the bus station, cinema, bar or nightclub, having my possessions checked to make sure that I don't have one at all. Inconvenient. But worth it. My bed, my diet, my entertainment, my shower. And my wife. After trundling through 18 months of isolation, we could start to live like a couple again. Dates to the theatre, restaurants, seeing friends, and getting stuff done. Bliss.

October, and we're onto the next step of the big plan. Back in the UK, enjoying all the novelties as mentioned above, and getting to know our now-much-larger nephews and neices. Mum's food. Seeing the friends who haven't had the desire to come visit us yet. Hrmph.

November, and we're getting back into the flow of British life. Both seeking out locum work, which sadly is no small feat these days for a pharmacist; as Deborah picks up the odd shift here and there, I settled for the only safe option to ensure our trip could go ahead, and accepted a full-time job for two months all the way over in Wakefield and Dewsbury. Somewhat misguided by the clever person who advised me that Dewsbury was a very posh area where most of my patients would be pony-accidents or sore throats, I was surprised to have abuse hurled at me by the drunk and smashed-on-coke-and-hypoglycaemic-after-taking-his-own-mother's-insulin-for-a-laugh distant cousin of a July 7th bomber. NOW I remember why I left the UK. Turns out that Dewsbury is NOT the same as Daresbury.

December, and I'm tired of commuting across the country. Deborah and I decide that if we did it in the army we can do it in the UK - I take a room in the hospital and live like a student; obscene hours in A&E, roll back to bed, get up, do some planning or learning, make myself a meal for one in a communal kitchen, and get ready for work; perhaps with a little exercise and fresh air thrown in here and there. Debs, meanwhile, moves in with her folks, and we split the times where I have enough of a break to justify the perilous snowy M62 to come back between seeing her folks and my own.

January, and the money starts to accumulate - guestimated budgets, enough money to buy tickets, and suddenly we have a departure date, a plan for an itinerary, and a lot of work to do.

February. Work is completed, the plan to save up for the trip was more or less successful (although thanks to the pharmacy world being swamped with locums, much much less successful than hoped) - but we still have enough to delay bankruptcy until later in the year, so it's all systems go. Packing, tying up a million loose ends, shopping to buy smaller and lighter versions of everything we may need, saying goodbye to family and friends.

NOW: 17th February 2013, 2358 GMT, 100 miles North of Tehran. Deborah is curled up next to me wrapped up in a Singapore Airlines blanket, snoring in that nice girlie way that isn't really snoring. I'm listening to 'Du Du Hao' by Claire Kuo on my shiny Airbus A380 enertainment system, the lights are off, and as I sip a glass of mineral water and nibble on my fresh fruit platter before taking out my own blanket to get some sleep before our descent into Singapore in seven hours, the title of one of my friend's blogs springs to mind. "Don't forget to breathe".

The trip ahead is about exploring, seeing places that only the priviledged few get to see. It's about gaining perspective on what is truly important in life, and appreciating the opportunities we have been given. But for me, right now, what I really want is to just slow down, enjoy the present and not think about the future, and breathe.

Two years and counting

It’s just a little bit more than two years since Deborah and I made that life-changing step on to a plane at Heathrow. Two years of new experiences, new people, new food, and a new perspective on life. I think it’s safe to say that the novelty of change has worn off, unless I make a conscious decision to think about where I am. The momentary buzz of excitement, pride or disbelief garnered from a drive through Jerusalem, or past Nablus, or even while looking at the Hebrew signs and labels in the supermarket, has given way to an absence of any sort of emotion at all. It’s become exciting when packages come in English, not because the Hebrew is difficult to read any more, simply because it’s a novelty. It’d be very nice for every day to feel amazing and special but of course that is both unrealistic and paradoxically impossible – how can every day be special? I suppose that this is the epitome of the Zionist dream, to simply live here and feel normal.

Far more exciting for me than the two year mark after aliyah is the one year mark in the army. That means that I have less than 6 months to go, and if I had enough energy left, I’d count down the days, hours, minutes and seconds. Plenty more of the same thankless stress, lying soldiers who want out and are willing to waste my time to get it. More outbreaks of disease, because unless I physically go and wash the hands of every soldier, they will continue to poo and then eat without a second thought, or cough out their infectious mononucleotic sputum into their hands before manhandling the carcinogenic cyclinders of dried tobacco leaves that belong to their friends (which are seemingly part of the compulsory equipment of every young soldier. They will continue to rub their viral conjunctivitis infected eyes, sneeze into the air, drink from the bottle of the soldier with the cold sore, and fail to report to me the case of whooping cough until another ten soldiers have already caught it.

My first group of soldiers completed their training and has already spread out to the battalions across the West Bank and borders of Israel – leaving Deborah and me a fantastic opportunity to have a holiday last week.

The giant balcony of our fab room at the Daniel Hotel, Eilat

Time trials in a Mazda 2 - the abandoned runway we happened across at Arad

From left to right: Deborah and a camel. Hiking in the wilderness of the Northern Negev desert

We started with a lovely weekend with my cousins on Kibbutz Degania Bet by the Sea of Galilee – blooming with flowers, blossom and animals at this time of year, along with a chance to enjoy the hundreds of Nigerian and South African tourists who have come by the coach-load to be Baptised in the Jordan River – Big J style (although I don’t think he came on a coach). From there, we headed down to the Dead Sea, where we hit the jackpot. A still-unused engagement present promise from Deborah’s sister and brother-in-law (Rob and Amanda – thank you!), plus my birthday presents from them and Deborah’s parents (thank you too!), provided us with a last minute booking for two nights in a top room in the five star Daniel hotel, with meals. Too cold to walk down to the Dead Sea for a swim? (Well, it is at least 2 minutes walk)... No problem! Just enjoy the Dead Sea pool of heated water pumped up specially to the hotel. All the fun of the floatiest body of water in the world, without stones, dirt, or a risk of feeling remotely cold. Don’t feel like sitting in the beautiful sunshine in public? No worries, enjoy the private sun beds on the private balcony, with its uninterrupted view of the Dead Sea and Jordan, with enough room to build a house (seriously, the balcony was bigger than our apartment). Even though we’ve been married for almost two and half years, the hotel still managed to throw in a bottle of wine as an engagement present...

Jordan, Syria and the Red Sea, from Eilat

Gaza from Israel

On the way back to Jerusalem, we made a significant detour across the country to Gaza, where Deborah had her first taste of voyeur tourism; driving around the local villages in search of the famed Calendula and Anenome fields of spring, and exploring the sand dunes and fields of the northern Negev desert – 70 years ago barren wilderness and now a key part of Israel’s agricultural industry, we managed to fit in a view visits up to the border, and even an army base (much less of a novelty now than it used to be...). After a compulsory visit to Ikea (because what holiday would be complete without a trip to look at mass produced furniture), and Kika (the Austrian rival) we spent a day or two in Jerusalem to continue my DIY attempts in the apartment (almost ready for painting now!), and finished our week of recuperation in Eilat – Israel’s answer to Las Vegas (or Blackpool).

So, back to work. Hooray.

While sending my soldiers out to fight, I have successfully been able to pass the buck on an array of irritating soldiers whose complaints just don’t make sense. For example: the guy who believes he has developed reflex sympathetic dystrophy – an extremely rare neurological disorder subsequent to nerve damage after a sprained ankle; even though he has no positive findings on examination whatsoever, except for excruciating pain when anyone so much as breathes on his foot. But oddly, he walks without a limp, and can even manage to run to get a place in the lunch queue... When I have a soldier who doesn’t feel his treatment is working, I no longer need to worry about him coming back for follow up with the same complaint; I simply tell him to, ‘Give it a month. If it doesn’t improve with these tablets/exercises/exemptions/rest days/massage/other placebos, come back and see me.’ All in the knowledge that one month from now, he will be on a base far from here, either harassing some other poor overworked shmuck, or trying to harass him and realising that he can’t get an appointment.

What does all that mean? Two things. The first is that in a few days, the nightmare will start all over again, with a new intake of new soldiers. Another group of several hundred lost souls plucked prematurely from their mothers’ breast, or in the case of those who deferred army service to go travelling in South America (a rite of passage for young Israelis these days), saved from the brink of mental destruction secondary to cheap Columbian crack, will arrive to have their existences physically and mentally changed for eternity. Another group of little children who will quickly learn how to pretend to be something they’re not.

The second thing, which troubles me far more, is that it appears the army has broken me... or built me, depending on the aim of medical training. I have learned that much as I would like to have a regiment of happy, healthy soldiers, grateful for their care and enjoying both the military and the medical experience, it’s simply not going to happen, and the only way to maintain my sanity is to embrace that fact. When you’re treating a community of young healthy people, most of their complaints will go away with or without me. And the ones that truly need a doctor often won’t get better anyway. If the knee still hurts even though the examination and imaging say nothing’s wrong, then either:

a) You have a sore knee, or

b) You’re lying

...so there’s no point in another referral to the orthopaedist, and letting you out of training will only delay your physical fitness and reduce your ability to fight. I could spend the next ten minutes explaining all this to you, ending in a nice haggle to decide how long your exemption from carrying heavy weights lasts for, or I could be a rude, abrupt (Israeli) doctor, tell you ‘Ein ma la-asot’ (There’s nothing I can do for you), and then shout ‘Next!’.

Thus, the English doctor has adapted.

What I would say this time last year	What I say now
Hello, I’m Dr Adam, how can I help you?	Yes, what’s the problem?
Is there anything else that’s bothering you?	Only got time for two problems. Choose the most urgent, and you’ll need to make another appointment for the other things another time.
I know that you’re here now because of the genital itching, but I see from your notes that I saw you last month with some mild headaches after long periods without drinking. I explained to you that it appeared to be as a result of mild dehydration, and said to come back if the problem didn’t resolve. How are you getting on now?	[Quickly reviews notes, spots unrelated problem, doesn’t ask the patient and hopes that the patient won’t mention it, suggesting either the problem has resolved, or isn’t bad enough to warrant any further time-wastage.]
This tablet is both a painkiller and an anti-inflammatory drug, so it’ll help with the pain in your knee and also your sore throat. You can take it up to three times a day, with or after food ideally. Only use it when you need to, and don’t feel that you need to finish the course.	This’ll help. Up to three a day with food. Ask the medic if you have any questions.
The pain in your chest is caused by a muscle strain. It can be a bit scary, but it’s very common and will go away in a few days. Do you smoke? There’s nothing to worry about just yet - your heart and lungs are very healthy; and will carry on being healthy if you can stop smoking. Have you considered trying to quit? Let me explain the damage cigarettes do to your health...	It’s just a pulled muscle which will feel better in a few days. But if you don’t sort out your smoking problem then in the future you might be talking to me after your heart attack, or about your cancer treatment. If we find the cancer before it’s too late.
Do you have any questions?	Next!
Hope you feel better. Have a good day!	NEXT! Put your socks and shoes on outside, I need to see the next soldier.

These ‘modifications’ have done wonders for my figures – seeing around 30% more soldiers per hour than two months ago. But what little joy there was in treating a self-limiting overuse-related muscle sprain before (I know, I know, there, there, it’ll be ok. Poor thing.) has been surgically excised from my day to day treatment by the constant pressure to see more people, and the horrible realisation that so many of the soldiers are at best exaggerating, and at worst, lying.

In a different field of army experience, I reached a new realm of food in recent weeks. After months of rushed meal times and the occasional missed meal because of a late clinic or meeting, I some time ago discovered the kitchen store, a walk-in fridge kept under lock and key, where the wonderful army basics of chocolate milk, cheeses, jam, vanilla puddings, even the occasional yogurt with some genuine fruit somewhere inside it, are kept. As somebody worth keeping sweet, the kitchen staff is only too happy to grant me free access to this room at my whim. I’ve never been a fussy eater in my life, and although I’m very careful at home to eat healthily, I long ago resigned myself to the fact that my army diet would be somewhat limited, with some semi-literate half-brained pleb responsible for ordering the required foods for a base the size of a large village. Initially, it was a real treat having free access to treats, filled with sugary E-number goodness. Only when I stumbled upon a much less-used kitchen store (which is so unpopular that it is kept outside, without any sort of lock or protection, did I discover that it is in fact possible to eat well in the army... another walk in fridge holds a weekly supply of fruit and vegetables; even the occasional luxury goods of avocados, peppers, aubergines, sharon fruits and oranges. I don’t know if it’s an indicator of my advancing age, or the sheer overdose of carbohydrates and fats in 12 months of army service, but never before has the sight of a vegetable selection filled me with so much excitement. Like a ten-year old boy stealing apples from the farmer’s tree in 1935, I can be seen in the hours of darkness scuttling away from the kitchens, pockets stuffed full of prized pickings to fill my stomach and fight off scurvy.

Juicy tidbits from the medical file

Although the events of real medicine are not a regular experience on my base, they have accumulated over time. A few weeks ago I was thrilled to evacuate my first patient with a real prospect of a broken spine to hospital, after falling from a height during an exercise in the middle of the night. Due to various other activities the same night, instead of my usual proper ambulance, I was dispatched in a real army one – the big scary sort with bullet proof walls and no windows... and barely enough space for a patient, let alone a medical team. As we hurtled through the West Bank, driver taking the corners at (excuse the pun) break-neck speed, gun in lap, intubation kit on standby, patient strapped to a solid board with collar on, I almost had a feeling of purpose. But then his CT scan turned out to be clean, and I’d just lost a night’s sleep because of a cry-baby.

The last time I had a legitimate referral to hospital was when a soldier had spent his day painting a room, without thinking to open the windows. When he left the room, feeling suitably sedated and high on fumes, he lost his balance just as he failed to notice the steps in front of him, falling to his doom, with a head injury, a few chipped teeth, and a nice little hole in his cheek. The rest of him was fine though – his head broke the fall nicely. I could rant for ages about the comedy of errors that pursued (for example, receiving an order to send the ambulance to another base without its doctor because there was already a doctor there... meaning that for the next 3 hours there would be an ambulance without an complete ambulance team, and a doctor without transport), but instead I’ll just moan about the fact that the idiot was wearing a different soldier’s dog tag. Of all the ridiculous things I’ve seen in the army (and there are many), never before have I ever seen anything so appallingly irresponsible. As a result, this guy’s medical record is completely clean, while some unsuspecting friend of his has a record of a traumatic brain injury.

Before I sign off, I want to add an insider’s perspective on the latest events of the Mid-East conflict. I’d love to divulge the full details of the atmosphere and beliefs of the army and their policies, but of course I won’t. What I will say is that things are steadily and relentlessly coming to a head with Iran. In the past few days, the first specific evidence of research into nuclear weapons has been discovered. In other words, the first really good reason for a pre-emptive strike on arguably the most dangerous regime in the world, has surfaced from the depths of rumour and presumption. On the same day, Obama has once again backed down and contradicted all the previous statements of the US defence secretary, congress, and his own office, by declaring that Israeli military action against Iran will damage the United States. Because as we all know, America needs its oil far more than we need to prevent a nuclear holocaust.

Closer to home, this weekend has seen a massive rise in violence on the Gaza border, which started just a few hours after one of my home-grown soldiers was severely injured during an arrest mission in Hebron; while re-arresting one of the murderers released as part of the Gilad Shalit deal (after being involved within just a few weeks in further terrorist activity), a second terrorist cut the soldier’s throat with a Stanley knife. Credit goes to the commander’s quick-thinking first-aid actions that undoubtedly saved the soldier’s life (he’s currently stable in hospital after a severed carotid artery), and according to the current version of events, to the soldier who after having had his neck cut shot dead the first terrorist and incapacitated the second. Since then, dozens of rockets have been fired into Southern Israel from Gaza, landing in and around the Eshkol area (where Deborah and I were flower-hunting last week), and Israel has assassinated another big-wig Islamic Jihad terrorist.

And once again, I remain in the ironic and disconcerting bubble. While the world seems to erupt around me, I gratefully remain in my base, deep in the middle of the West Bank, just a few miles from the terrorist hot-bed that is Nablus, and do not hear a peep. Deborah came to visit this weekend while I was on standby in the base. We ate, we slept, we had a beautiful walk in the sunshine looking at the rare irises, calendulas, and a myriad of other flowers, the dozens of lizards, caterpillars, spiders and other bugs, we climbed a hill to enjoy the views of the Jordan Valley, and the rolling green hills of Israel in the spring, in the perfect 23 degree warmth and light breeze.

I think I’ll oil my gun tomorrow.

Happy families

Many people have commented that the blog has gradually taken on a negative tone over the recent months. It’s not the most surprising turn of events – life is difficult for both of us, while I’m in the army. While I’m on base, Deborah is home alone while I work endlessly with dozens of repetitive medical cases. Long hours, irritating lack of facilities and resources, ungrateful patients. When I come home, we endeavour to make the most of our time together, but that time is very short, and once I recover from the fatigue of a long period on base, it’s time to start getting stressed about the imminent return.

I’m writing this on a plane from Manchester to Tel Aviv. When the opportunity arose to take a week off while my soldiers were in the process of transferring between bases, I decided that I would seize the chance to see my family. No friends, no locum work to raise cash, just some quality family time, to break up the would-have-been 13 months between parental visits. Deborah has started work in Shaarei Tzedek Hospital now, which is great news in every way, except for the fact that it means she hasn’t been with me on this trip.

We’re coming up to the two year mark since we made aliyah; a good time to stop, take note of where we’re heading, and so assess if we are who we want to be, doing what we want. On paper, we’ve achieved all our dreams, including those we could only have hoped for: we both have the jobs we dreamed of, own a home in Jerusalem, have made great friends, speak the language, and can be proud of the fact that we took the plunge, came to Israel, and as the cliché goes, are helping to build Am Yisrael.

But something is missing.

With the exception of those people most inspired and motivated by faith in G-d, as time goes by, ideology fades. It’s difficult, for example, to ration my showers to a couple of minutes to save every drop of precious water in our arid land, when some Israeli-born soldiers are quite happy to wander off to answer a phone call, without turning off their shower first. It’s difficult to work 100 hours per week for a salary less than half that I would receive in the UK, when so many Israelis ask me for advice on how to get work permits abroad. And I’ll never come to terms with watching ultra-orthodox men drop litter on the streets of Jerusalem, the holiest place in the world for them, when I wouldn’t dream of dropping a piece of paper even in the slums of Manchester.

I can’t tell you what is missing from life – but something is affecting our fulfilment. Is it lack of purpose? I don’t think so – even here we can both confidently declare that our jobs give something to the country and the wider population. Is it financial security? No – we’d definitely be better off in the UK, but we aren’t struggling either. Is it gratitude? Perhaps in small part - now especially, during my army time, I dearly miss the simple ‘please’ and ‘thank-you’ of a happy patient.

One thing that is clearly missing – family.

We were under no illusions when we made aliyah. We knew we were leaving family behind; but for a greater good and a bigger picture – to create our own family here in Israel, so that future generations could grow up at home, with their families close by. Our own deprivation would be a small price to pay so that one day our children might grow up close by – even if our kids might not get to spend every weekend with their grandparents, at least we could spend time with our grandchildren one day! Plenty of other people have gone through the same thing... but sometimes the timing is better; they may move when the kids are already a little bit older. Perhaps they have family in Israel, or parents who can visit every month or two.

Whatever the reason, suddenly the distance between our parents and us has been profound. From babysitting to teenager advice, from moral support during labour to help deciding which school to send them off to, we have lost a very useful commodity! All that said, despite the tone of this email, Deborah is NOT up the duff; the plan still remains that we wait until my release from the army, and have a once-in-a-lifetime year trip before we start settling down and trying for sprogs. However, as our friends start to be fruitful and multiply, at home and in the UK, we’ve found yet another reason to appreciate good, loving and supportive parents. Despite the difficulties and frustrations of living in such a special place (no, not Liverpool), at the very least it gives us an appreciation of family that so many people just take for granted.

There are many questions and choices ahead. A lot to decide, and a lot at stake; do we stay in Israel, or come back to the UK? If we come back to the UK, how long for? But whatever our outcomes and wherever we end up, we will have tried our best.