1) You really love your home country more than life itself. In fact, don't leave your home country ever. Period.

 

2) You can't handle walking at a pace of 1km/h which is the average pedestrian rate in warmer climates.

 

3) You can't handle big crowds of Asians.

 

4) You don't like Asians.

 

5) You are inflexible in your travel co-ordination and like to plan all your travels down to the dotting of i's and crossing of t's.

 

6) You can't handle the fact that sometimes waiters may get your order wrong.

 

7) You can't accept that Taxi drivers may take you to the wrong place, but only because they don't understand you through your broad accent. (speaking louder is not the solution either)

 

8) Words such as 'The Bali bombings', 'Schapelle Corby' and 'Bali Nine' would deter you from ever visiting certain regions. Places like Bali wouldn't want you there either nor do they need your contrived and patronising dollars.

 

9) The thought of stray dogs/cats and rabies makes you feel 'ill' or 'dirty', let alone the squirmish impact it has on you when you see it in real life.

 

10) You feel the need to shower at every opportunity/before and after meals/at sleeptime, after taking a piss etc....

 

and the clincher....

 

11) You have no desire to do your homework before arriving here and assume that you can simply rock up and there will be a tour bus/guide waiting on arrival. This is NOT the case and I strongly urge ANY traveller to read up before embarking on Asian travels. It also stops you from asking dumb questions...

 

 

I've always wondered why Subway Coke tastes so darned good? No really, out of all the fast food Coke 'mixes' I've had, it really is a truth that Subway is the most refreshing. Yet, I'm still on a quest to find out WHY it is clearly the inferior tasting Cokey goodness...hmmm...

 

For some reason I am listening to a whole stack of oldskool Elton John and The Beatles at the moment. I can't seem to shake Rocket Man/Benny and the Jets/Yellow Submarine out of my head...some real quality music, in fact maybe some of the best music ever made...it's a big call but i think i just made it without even knowing that my non-commital self was remotely able to commit such an opinion.

 

An embaressing musical moment (and interesting exchange of emails) from Simmmmoooooo Wassef - my original Sydney University "ill-have-a-large-chips-n-gravy-thanks-sweetheart" buddy. We have had this banter since day dot about him being a "newskool 80's" kid because he was born in 1982 although managed to finish up his studies with the rest of the '81 babies. So every time a potential argument would arise, it could quite easily be resolved with a quick newskool 80's "full stop to the power of infinity", per example:

 

Choti - "Simmy, what time's our econometrics lecture?"

Sim - "2pm"

Choti - "I thought it was at 3pm"

Sim - "Naaaaaan, 2pm, I swear"

Choti - "No it's not"

Sim - "But Choti..."

Choti - "Whatever Wassef, you're newskool 80's mate, let's go play some pool instead"

Sim - "OK cool, but have you got any food?"

 

 

Scroll from the bottom up. but basically i went for around 7 days where i couldn't stop humming an ace of base song (i saw the sign, and it opened and it up my eyes i saw the sign) and in my consultation with Wassef about why this was happening, I saw a day where I got the 'full stop to the power of infinity' treatment back. 7 years of pented up newskool vs. oldskool angst, rushes out only to leave me sore and gobsmacked. It must be that time of year where words such as 're-evaluate', 'resolutions' and 'goals' seem to be part of everyday questions, phrases such as 'midlife crisis' make me want a very very fast and red car....