I have returned to Mandalay after an exciting weekend in Pyin Oo Lwin. Sunday morning, I woke to meet Adam at 6:00 o'clock for a stroll through the botanical garden, and we engaged in interesting discussions for the 1.5 hours before we returned to a cup of coffee and being picked up by Eddy, his friend. He took us for a breakfast of excellent strawberry yoghurt -- the area is famous for its strawberries -- and afterwards helped me arrange for my own motorcycle, with which I went touring about the town. First, I visited the Chinese temple, followed by two Pagodas before fleeing the midday heat to the Be waterfall, where I first tried to get some food. Thankfully I have the Lonely Planet Burmese Phrasebook on me or else I would have had no chance, but eventually I ended up with some vegetables and rice, which at least did the deed. Following lunch, I went for a swim (which you are not supposed to do) in the waterfall pond, joining several dozens of Burmese cooling down. My attempts to dry and read where thwarted several times by excited folks doing almost everything in their power to get me back into the cold water. So I did. Eventually, the heat lowered and I decided to head back to the city to find an Internet cafe, and meet Adam and Eddy for a visit to a remote village, but the first half of those plans were changed when by the side of the road, I saw an old monk carrying two heavy bags and offered him a lift. He gladly accepted and I took him about 10 miles off the main road, uphill on a dirt track until we reached his village where we were greeted by the other surprised monks, who subsequently invited me for tea. I enjoyed the time, although only the monk to whom I had offered the ride spoke English and did not deviate from his topic how much he hated the Japanese -- he had fought in the war against the Japanese 60 years ago. On the way back I got lost several times but eventually managed to return the motorbike and make it to the lodge for a shower, before we drove off to the remote village. On the way I learnt that Burma is actually much richer than Laos or Cambodia, that noone in this country has to starve because of the vast amount of natural resources, but that poverty still exists all over the place, even though I found it to be not as extreme as back in Laos when I decided to come back with clothing for the children. But seeing (and being told) that the people in the village we visited were definitely among the poorest in the country, I decided to distribute the clothing I took along, which was well received and even documented on video by Eddy. Still, in the end, I was not completely satisfied because these village people were rich (albeit living in beaten huts and wearing torn clothing) as opposed to the ones who hosted my cousin and I 15 months ago in Laos. However, given that Pyin Oo Lwin gets very cold in the winter and the clothing I took was mostly warm clothing (like fleece sweaters and cord trousers), it was probably a lot better to leave it here rather than to take it to other (warmer) parts of the country. So now I am carrying an empty backpack with me, and the temptation to fill it with the many handicrafts and goods on sale here is almost unbearably high. That night, Eddy's wife invited us to a traditional Burmese dinner at their house. Unfortunately, Adam felt a little sick and couldn't join, so I went alone for some excellent food and had to drink the bottle of Australian Sauvignon Blanc all by myself. I doubt thought that it was due to the elevated alcohol level of my blood that I thoroughly enjoyed the screening of some videos of traditional Myanmar martial arts, as well as videos from the water festival celebrated in the country at the same time as in Thailand. While Songkhran in Thailand was almost excessive, the Burmese put more value on tradition, and intersperse the soaking with traditional dances, which looked absolutely wonderful. I am sure to return, even though April really is not the month to come here -- it's boiling hot outside. Now, back in Mandalay, I first embarked on a little expedition to the MICT, which is a computer centre with a bunch of schools in town, to distribute some of the Ubuntu CDs I had brought. It was good to know that most of the folks I talked to had heard of Linux, but that they never tried it because it's impossible to obtain. Now, almost a dozen CDs are with managing directors of various stores and schools, and they all know that they can freely copy them as many times as they like. If it turns out to be popular, maybe Canonical can arrange for a larger shipment to companies in this country, probably via Bangkok. I am leaving Mandalay tomorrow for Bagan, taking an express ferry at 6:00 o'clock, which should get me there within 9 hours. I am unsure what's next, but after 2-3 days in Bagan, I will either fly to Hohe and visit Inle Lake, then to Yangon, or just make my way on land to Yangon immediately. Flights come in at about $50 each, so while cheap, I am not sure I brought enough cash with me to afford them. You cannot use credit cards or traveller cheques in Burma. Stay tuned, and thanks for reading along.

This third day of the Songkhran festival in Chiang Mai, we again failed to stay dry, but escaped the fury a bit with a two hour river cruise, including a visit to an herb garden, and an expedition to the zoo. The zoo was unlike anything I would have expected, but showed how lazy the Asian people really are: most animal cages were accessible by car, and it was somewhat foolish of us to try to reach the aquarium by foot, but we were lucky to have a friendly Tai give us a lift with his pickup. We also witnessed the feeding of a panda bear, which is apparently a rather rare animal, or at least that's the way it was hyped to be. My favourite was the black panther in a cage with a leopard, in between the tiger and one of the very rare white Bengalese tigers. This tiger's skin is white and thus makes it rather difficult for it to attack in the wild. I described it as a evolutionary permutation with low fitness. Aline claims that these tigers are artificially bread these days, which makes it all the more peculiar. We returned to the city for another round of splashing bveefore stopping over at Julie's Guesthouse, the place where I was to meet a lady running clothing and other support items to refugee camps. It turns out that this is a programme by D.A.R.E., in which her guesthouse participates, running the goods to the Burmese refugees living in Thailand. The clothing I had brought along are destined for people in Burma though (there is surely an equal need), so I guess my options are down to a single one: take them with me, skip the monestary, and travel the country myself. So today I went ahead to buy my next two air tickets: I am flying out of Chiang Mai to Mandalay on the 20th, and I return to Bangkok from Yangon on the 4th of May. That will give me more or less 13 days in Burma (I am calling it Burma now, not Myanmar, since that is what the Burmese and the Thai people use) to get from Mandalay to Yangon, and having heard a bunch of times now that travel within Burma isn't all that easy, I figured out a way to do it: I shall spend a few days in Mandalay and meet some people, then hopefully find a student with good English skills to embark with me on the journey, meaning I will pay travel and hotel expenses for him/her, in addition to a flat, daily "wage". Until then, Aline and I have 4 full days left in Chiang Mai, so the 1-2 day trek has once again risen high in my list of priorities. Tomorrow, we are going to cooking school, and there is also rock climbing, a go-cart track, and various other things to keep us occupied. Thanks for reading along.

It's been a busy three days since I last wrote. The climax (or lowest point) must have been the loss of my wallet with about 800 Bhat of cash (16 EUR) and a credit card inside. I left in on a telephone in a bus station in Khon Kaen during a very stressful moment trying to get to our next destination. Luckily, within ten minutes I noticed the loss and could cancel the credit card, so the damage is minimal (although I should hope that one day it hits me hard because I apparently never learn and leave my things all over the place -- like the camera on the return trip from Zanzibar/Tanzania). Anyway, shortly after the loss, we ended up in a very fortunate situation ("more luck than brains"), but more on that later. Last time I wrote, we were in Khorat, headed for Phimai the same evening. With about four hours to spend, we opted for a massage, and I chose the traditional style with a weighty woman bouncing up and down my body and twisting it into unnatural shapes. Nevertheless, I felt absolutely great afterwards and am looking forward to the next time. The massage took a little longer than expected, and when we finally made it to the laundry place to pick up our load, they had just closed. But nothing is impossible in Asia, and soon we had one person tell another to find the owner in a hairdresser shop, and she happily made an exception and handed over our bag. Feeling very good, we headed for the bus terminal to find the bus leaving 90 minutes later than planned, so we spent the time watching the busy life of Thais departing and arriving before riding for 90 minutes to Phimai, where we had to wake the owners of the guest house despite having called in earlier to let them know of our late arrival. The room was spartan but moderately clean, and we passed a night only disturbed by the continuous sounds obviously made by cockroaches, though none seemed to be in our room itself. Jokingly, I remarked that there is nothing to worry as Thai cockroaches would take off their shoes before crawling onto the bed, but I am yet unsure whether that was reason enough for Aline to finally drift to sleep. Phimai is a tiny town housing a beautifully restored Khmer temple, said to be the best preserved in Thailand. Without a guide, and with the heat picking up to a stifling level already at 9:00 o'clock, we decided to better spend the time in a bus, traveling north to Udon Thani, but first spent a visit to the Phimai national museum, and the "Banyan Tree," a huge assembly of trees with Thais picknicking in its shade. Leaving Phimai with a bus, we had to hop on another in Thalak Ke, about 10 kilometres away from Phimai, but our initial joy of catching an air-conditioned ride for the 4 hour trip to Udon Thani was severly lessened when the bus pulled in and was completely crowded. We stood pressed against each other for the first 90 minutes of the trip, until we reached Khon Kaen, where lots of people got off before lots more got on, but we were able to get seats in between. Having arrived in Udon Thani, the plan was to leave the same day for the Laotian border to catch a boat along the Mekhong river to Chiang Khan, but that seemed impossible without a visa for Laos, which is $30 per person and a little too much for the joy of the journey. A little disappointed, we stayed in a luxurious hotel (10 EUR per night) and strolled around the city at dawn, chatted a while with a Welsh expat about old European men coming to Thailand to find women, and finally headed for the Mandarin restaurant, suggested in the Lonely Planet. The place was sketchy, with a loud television set blasting some Thai soap opera, and the staff really misunderstood the meaning of "appetiser" and "vegetarian", so that I ended up eating a giant plate of "Chinese Hors d'Oeuvre", Aline's spring rolls with shrimp paste, and the Pad Thai I had ordered. They forgot the noodles, and Aline's Tofu portion was too hot, but our tummies stuffed, and we sank into bed early. The night was horrible, I was plagued by stomach aches and the fear of a repeated experience -- the last time I ate Pad Thai along this meridian was in Vientiane, and I came down with food poisoning, and I felt exactly the same way as back then throughout the night and morning. I stayed in bed long but fortunately found that I had just put too much food into my belly (which wasn't used to it, we had been eating sparingly), and walking solved the problem. Weighing our options, we decided on the route of the next two days. Initially, it was to be Loei and the Phu Kradung National Park, but seeing that it was a little too difficult to reach with public transportation, we decided to head back to Khon Kaen, forget about Udon Thani and the lost day, and continue to Nam Nao National Park along the route 12 between Khon Kaen and Phitsanulok, with an optional stop shortly after Lom Sak for some whitewater rafting. It was after being told that all busses were overbooked (remember, Songkrat, the New Year's festival bringing every Thai back to his home, starts this week) and our furious attempts to find a hole to slip through that I left the wallet on the telephone. I noticed the loss on our way to the other bus terminal, but it was too late, and it didn't help that nobody spoke English anymore (basically ever since we left Ayuthaya). As said, the money wasn't a big loss, the credit card immediately cancelled, driver's licence and insurance cards also being no biggie, but the wallet still contained one item of interest: the receipt for the cargo bag with the children's clothing waiting for me in Chiang Mai (hopefully). We had our friendly Tuk Tuk driver took us to the tourist police to file a report, with which we should be able to reclaim the bag even without the receipt -- Aline also fortunately took a picture of the bag. But the tourist police was out for the day and as we came to realise the misery of our situation -- it was about 18:00 o'clock by now and we were looking at losing another day on our journey, a friendly women with very good skills of English walked around the corner and told us to hop on her car. We were so glad to be able to follow someone's command that we didn't even ask where she was taking us, but on the back of the pickup, we learnt from her two students that she was an English teacher taking us to the police headquarters. There, we got the report and again boarded the pickup heading back to the city. We still did not know how to continue from Khon Kaen towards Phitsanulok in the lower north of the country, but the lady offered to negotiate a rental car for us after heading to another police station to help her student with a report against a British man, who had left her in the top-end hotel without paying the bill. Fortunately, she knew the real name and telephone number of the guy, so he'll surely get his share, that bastard. The rented car with driver to Phitsanulok would cost us between 4000 and 5000 Bhat (80 to 100 EUR), which we thought was too expensive, and it was again our lady friend who decided to head for the busses again and try her luck. She got us on a 2nd class bus to Phitsanulok, leaving Khon Kaen at 3:45 in the morning, and with about 7 hours to kill, we took her and her two students for dinner and to a discotheque as a form of thanking her for her help. Her name, by the way, is Jill, and she runs the "Khon Kaen Language Centre", teaching English, Japanese, German, and Spanish to about 20 students, half of whom live in her own house as they come from far away. We talked much with her and her students that night. Dinner was a huge buffet with everything you can imagine, including cow stomach and pig intestines (and yes, I tried them both, though I need not do that again), and grills at the tables for a very cozy atmosphere (if it hadn't been for the live band that was playing just a tat too loud). Jill apparently spends her days helping other people, not only learning languages; people come to her for relationship troubles, legal issues, or other difficulties such as my lost wallet. She does not choose to help people, but feels that as a Thai, she must. This attitude prevails throughout the population (as soon as you leave Bangkok and the tourist centres in the south) and is maybe the most important reason why this country is such a great place to be. After dinner, we ended at a discotheque with another live band, including singers and dancers, and even though it was clearly too loud for my taste, the band was very good, and we had a splendid time getting drunk on Thai beer -- after all, what else was there to do until the bus left. I also found out that Jill runs an Internet cafe and consequently left her with 10 Ubuntu CDs to try out, and give away to her computer-savvy students. It was great to explain to her what "free of charge" means, but very hard to actually get her to accept it. After the discotheque, she took us to her house for showers and a quick meal, and I tried to demonstrate Ubuntu to her, but did not succeed within the small time frame I had available. The reason was that her house uses static IPs, and I could not figure out how to tell the Live CD to use a static IP -- it did not ask me. Anyway, this isn't anything I cannot solve via email once I return to Switzerland. We left the city on time and were looking at 5:30 hours of an uncomfortable, rocky bus ride, but thanks to ample space, it went by quite quickly. We gave up on the plans for the national park and postponed the "experience of nature" until Pai (see below), and also found out that April is not the month to go whitewater rafting in Thailand, so without any stops, we reached Phitsanulok and quickly headed for a hotel to sleep through the midday heat, a little too long unfortunately to still get some errands done, like cashing traveller cheques. I am now sitting in an Internet cafe in Phitsanulok, and we did get most of our to do list done. We'll stay here for one night, enjoying the "food festival" over at the night bazaar, and head for Sukothai tomorrow. Having made the acquaintance of a very helpful employee of the Thai Tourist Authority, we now have the possibility to ride along in his van tomorrow, iff he makes it back from Bangkok in time; otherwise we'll go by bus and meet him there for another festival and a light show in the old city of Sukothai, which is now known as the historical park, which the Lonely Planet describes as "Thailand's most impressive World Heritage site". Also, tomorrow, Songkran starts in Sukothai (a day before the official start), and we have been told that Sukothai is one of the two best places for the event on numerous occasions. The other is Chiang Mai, and we were lucky to get two seats on a plane leaving Sukothai for Chiang Mai on the 14th, so we'll get to spend more or less two days in each of the "party centres" (Songkran ends on the 15th, though some cities just keep on going). I have to say that I am very excited about witnessing this event. All the shops in all the towns keep piling water guns on the streets, and for three days, the camera will be better left in the hotel as the entire city soaks itself in water. I cannot wait to buy one of the biggest guns, make a run for the all the Thais, and then give the gun to a child. While I am talking about plans, I might just as well continue my brain dump. From Chiang Mai, we are currently looking at 2-3 days in Pai, a village north-west from Chiang Mai with beautiful landscapes and many hill tribes within walking distance. I'll be leaving Chiang Mai for Yangon in Myanmar, and am currently faced with four choices as to how to spend my remaining time in that country. Mind me while I share these options with you: The simplest options would have me drop the clothing and gifts off at Julie's guest house; Julie is Swiss or German and frequently organises for clothing and similar items to be sent to refugee camps in Myanmar. Then, I could travel to Myanmar and be free to spend the time in Yangon and Mandalay, showing Linux to people, head out into the countryside, or spend my time in the monastery to which I have been invited. These options all appeal to me, approximately in decreasing order. The last option depends on whether Julie organises a trip to a refugee camp anytime soon, in which case I may be able to go along. I'll keep you posted. That's it for now from me from southeast Asia; we're off for the night bazaar. Thanks again for reading along.

The day of our departure to Thailand was remarkably stressless, I even found the time for lunch and coffee with one of my dearest friends. We had plenty of time catching the flight to Vienna, and if it wasn't for the filthy Danish sex tourist who kept burping, snorting, and generally being a bother next to me on the fliught from Vienna to Bangkok, I would have said the trip was perfect. We got in to the city in the afternoon, found a fair hotel next to Sukhumvit Road and headed off to run errands, cashing traveller cheques, drinking juices, and walking around. Just ready for sunset, we got up to the 59th floor of the amazing Banyan Tree Hotel, and two further flights of stairs led us to the roof-top bar. That evening, we went through Patphong and Soi Cowboy, the two centres of the infamous Thai ladyboys, and after a beer or two, we headed for the hotel and drifted away almost immediately. Our plans to head for Lumphini Park in the morning to participate in the Tai Chi sessions were foiled by oversleeping, but we can do Tai Chi on other days. Rested, we headed for the train station to send off the bag with clothing via train cargo to Chiang Mai, where it will (hopefully) be waiting when we arrive in two weeks' time. This message reaches you from Chinatown, we're catching something to eat before going 3rd class to Ayuthaya. Tourists usually take a taxi for 1000 Baht (about 20 EUR), we pay 15 Baht each and will be in touch with the locals. This being my first post on my trip towards Myanmar, so there's nothing much to write. One thing I found noteworthy is the change in the way taxis work these days. Two years ago, I learnt to insist on taxis starting their meters rather than quoting a price up front. Last year, my cousin and I made first experiences with taxi drivers refusing to go with the meter. This years it's nearly impossible; apparently too many tourists didn't think enough and now the drivers are unwilling to give up the profit from ripping them off. Example: Sukhumvit to Hua Lamphong station was 69 Baht in a taxi (our hotel told the driver to behave), and I sure we would have been quoted 200 Baht with a possibility to bargain the driver down to 140 or so. Anyway, that's it form today. I'll write again from Ayuthaya or Khorat.

During my trip to Copenhagen, Denmark last weekend, I was booked into a fancy hotel described all over the Internet as the in-hotel of the city (it wasn't my choice). The building had just been converted from a department store to a hotel. After checking in to my room, I noticed that my bathroom lacked a shower curtain, so I promptly went to the front desk to ask them to change that. The guy behind the desk was so incredibly stupid as he smiled at me and answered: "that's because of the design; a shower curtain would not fit the design." He was probably previously selling underwear in the department store and had his role recast without any training. Unfortunately I failed to take a picture of the bathroom, but if there really was some design at work, it was so subtle that you couldn't notice: a regular bathtub, a sink, a toilet, a mirror, and two towel-hangers... nothing more. Oh, and there was one of those blue lines on the otherwise white tiles approximately two metres from the floor. You know, one of those "designs" that you will find in almost every bathroom built in the last five years. Anyway the lack of shower curtains is only one of several reasons why I would never check in to that hotel again, nor recommend it to anyone.

It all started with about 15 kilogrammes of children's clothing... wait, let's try again: It all started last year on my trip to Laos, about 14 hours walk from Luang Phrabang (the tourist capital). We were guests to a community somewhere up in the hills north of the city, where the children either wore some threads (it couldn't be called clothes anymore) or nothing at all. I felt pity, especially because people from those areas freeze very easily, since it's always hot there. I decided to come back. So when my girlfriend's mother, who runs a second-hand clothing store for children offered I'd take some before she clears out last year's "collection", I gladly did, even though I didn't have any concrete plans yet -- plans, yes, but no concrete ones. So with the clothes in my flat, I felt obligated to do something and finally ended up booking my trip to South-East Asia. Well, Bangkok, from there it's all do-as-you-go. It turns out that by rare circumstances, my girlfriend will be accompanying me for two of the five weeks I have set aside. The rest I am alone. And I wanted to go to Myanmar [0], which is the last of the countries on the South-East Asian mainland I haven't yet visited. But just today, I called the German Department for Foreign Affairs and was informed that Myanmar is fighting with bomb attacks in the cities and avian flu outside -- aside from the internal frictions caused in large by the ruling militia. Anyway, I am less afraid of the flu than of bombs, which are a risk -- however low -- that I won't take because I don't have any influence or control. So I am reconsidering (and I would love to hear any advice you may have). There are, of course, plenty of alternatives: for instance, the circle Chiang Mai, Laos, Hanoi, Hue, Saigon, and back. The clothes will be welcome (and needed) mostly anywhere, and I have at least some experience with the other countries. I doubt I will actually go back to Luang Phrabang because the only sensible way to do so is by spending two days on the boat from Chiang Khong, or flying in to Vientiane. I don't want to do that boat ride again, and I don't have money to burn either (despite flights being rather cheap over there). Anyway, my intention is not to travel and be a tourist, but instead to teach computers. I've done this before and noticed the need, and it's really not hard to get a bunch of interested kids into an Internet cafe, which you "rent" for the day for $20. I don't speak any of the languages there, and few speak English, but it's surprising how little speech is needed (maybe that's Bhuddism?). Sounds like Hanoi or Saigon will be the best places for that. Phnom Penh (in Cambodia) also has me interested. My flight's on the 4th of April, and I shall not return until the 5th of May, although the return date is flexible. I am excited, but also feel somewhat weird. Last year, I took a full turn in my life but have since been disabled. Now that I am regaining control over my body, but at the same time wondering whether a Ph.D. is what I want (I could just do Debian without the academic appendix, and probably earn money more effectively), I am burning to actually dive into the matter to be able to finally answer that question. The trip to South-East Asia just pushes this further out into the future. Some of you may wonder why I am even daring to bother with such petty concerns -- after all, they aren't really existential, more like luxury (compared to some previous troubles in my life). Well, I don't have an answer. I feel weird about it all, and it's been weird to be disabled for the better part of that last half a year, just after quitting my previous job. At least I am maintaining my optimism.

[0]

Moray Allen (of the Debian project) was actually the first to give me a good reason (in Brussels) to call Myanmar Burma instead/again -- it seemed backwards before. But apparently, Myanmar was the name chosen by the militia in control, which is undoubtedly not to be supported. Burma has the negative taste of Britain to it -- negative only in the light of the tourist boycott Tony Blair called out last year. I will stick with Myanmar as do most other sources.