The Taj Mahal is situated in Agra in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh. It was built by the Moghul Emperor, Shah Jahan in memory of his wife Mumtaz Mahal and is the 7^th wonder of the world. It’s worth noting that the Taj Mahal is closed to visitors on Mondays.

There are three ways you can reach the Taj Mahal from Delhi. You can fly with Indian Airlines from Delhi to Agra. The airport, Kheria, is about 6km from Agra and can be reached at fixed rates by taxis (Rs 75) and auto-rickshaws (Rs 50).

There are several trains that connect Delhi with Agra. These include the Shatabdi Express which takes 2 hours, or the Taj Express 2 ½ hours or the Intercity Express which takes 3 hrs. The third option is to travel by car from Delhi to Agra. There are express bus services (a/c and non-a/c) are available from Delhi, Jaipur, Lucknow, Gwalior, and Jhansi. Distances to Agra from the following are as follows:

Mathura – 58 kms Bharatpur – 60 kms Gwalior – 118 kms Delhi – 203 kms Jaipur – 236 kms Khajuraho – 393 kms

In Part 1 of Ingrid’s tale, she discovered that she had Dengue Fever. In Part 2, we hear about how she was treated and what happened next.

We entered the hospital. I felt like I was walking into one of those bars in a western movie where every one stops and stares at you. My head felt dizzy and focusing was impossible. What was happening to me? Looking back, I must have looked really spaced out.

The nurse once again took my blood pressure. She shook her head, checked the equipment and took it again. Not convinced, she took it once more. She told me to remain seated and rushed off to the doctor’s room. I was called in and informed that my blood pressure was 96/80, so low that it was not pumping blood to my brain properly. I was immediately put onto a bed. Before I knew it, they were after my blood again – this time – I was too weak to care.

Noi waved a form in front of me. “What food you want?” she said. I realized then that this was not just a day visit. Thai or Chinese at 80baht or Western at 250baht. Which would you choose at those prices? I chose the Thai, signed the form and was taken to a room on the 7^th floor.

As they wheeled me into place, I looked down at the drip in the back of my hand. My eyes widened. I blinked and took a second look. Was I hallucinating? Like something out of a horror movie, I could see ants running up and down the drip and under the plaster. Was I the only one concerned about this? The nurse ignored them at first, then she carelessly slapped them away. Ow!

Two hours later, with the little energy I had, I was still removing ants from various parts of my body. I asked to be moved. Off they wheeled me to another room but, before we settled, I looked down at the bedside table and spotted an ant, so off we trouped again. Eventually an ant free room was found – it had a pet gecko instead.

During the next 24 hours, I had no idea what was happening. I was constantly nauseous, feverish, had a banging headache, backache and leg ache. I did not know if I was going to live or die. When I pressed the call button, three nurses would skip in and stand to attention at the end of my bed. After telling them what I needed, they would smile, nod their heads and disappear. Great service but no reward. After a while, I would have to call again. They had obviously misunderstood. Often, it would take lots of exhausting hand signals and facial expressions before they would realise what I needed.

Day two in Hospital. I was not feeling any better nor any the wiser as to my condition. Feeling extremely nauseous but starving, I was happy to see my first breakfast walk in on a tray. I lifted the lid and to my surprise… squid soup! Oh yuk! Not something I would eat if I felt 100%. I gave the brekkie a miss.

After the much improved lunch, I was watching a low budget Hollywood movie when there was a knock on my door, followed by the priest! Oh my God, this is it, I thought: this illness is terminal – my time has come. I was a little alarmed that he had come to give the last rights but so delirious I could not find the energy to be scared. He smiled and told me he was visiting because he wanted to practice his English.

Every day the doctor would visit at around 5pm. He would look at me, ask me if I had any bleeding or rash. I would reply no. He would nod, turn around and walk back out again … Er hello some sort of information would be nice Doc!

Over the next few days there was no improvement. It felt like groundhog day. The repeated rubbish movies on the only English speaking channel, the continual disruption of my snoozing as a piece of rubber was slapped round my arm, cutting off my circulation. A needle was jabbed into it extracting more blood, scaring the life out of me.

On the fourth night came the grand finale – the rashhh!!!! It was more than just any old rash. It lasted over twenty-four hours. My face swelled up like a car’s airbag on impact, my hands and feet swelled, went bright red, itched like crazy at first and then felt like they were on fire, aaagh damn that Dengue!

Anticlimax: on the sixth day the doctor came in, looked at me, turned around and walked out again. Ten minutes later the senior nurse entered and told me I could go home. Three days passed before I snapped out of it and got my energy back. Within a fortnight I was back on the island where I caught the disease. Crazy or not, I was determined not to let the Dengue fever put me off my trip. This was my horse and I am so glad I got back on it.

Later I discovered that the deadly Dengue Haemorrhagic Fever not only occurs in young children but also in people who have caught one strain of Dengue Fever and then catch another.

Hurry up with a vaccine. Please!

If you would like to contact Ingrid, who is currently in Chile, you can e-mail her on:gr.ing.a.rid2003@hotmail.com

Save the Earth Network is a Ghana based organization, founded in 1998 and dedicated to promoting sustainable development, agro-forestry, environmental conservation, international solidarity through voluntary work and cultural immersion in Ghana.

We aim to positively contribute to help reduce poverty, hunger, malnutrition, disease, illiteracy, drug abuse, unemployment, and environmental degradation, which are increasingly becoming the order of the day in most parts of the developing world. We are a networking tool for environmental, social and economic development activists from Ghana and worldwide. We offer volunteer placements in Ghana in areas that includes renovation and construction of school buildings for poor rural communities. Teaching children English language, mathematics and Christian religion at schools for under-privileged communities. Caring for orphans, destitute and abandoned children in foster homes and orphanages and providing them education; HIV/AIDS education, reforestation (environmental conservation), agro forestry and rejuvenation of degraded farmlands through tree planting; organic farming, primary health care and other community development programs.

Volunteers can participate in most of the volunteer programs all year round. Volunteers mostly work alongside staff and volunteers from the local community. Special skills, professional qualifications or previous experience is not required of volunteers in most of the programs. What is required is motivation, charisma, initiative, drive and the compassion to assist the underprivileged overcome their challenges and their struggle for dignity. Volunteers work four days a week, (Mondays to Thursdays) and they will work a minimum of four hours a day – it depends on the volunteer. We arrange for the volunteers to stay with good host families. Piped water and electricity are mostly available. Meals, a private room and bed are provided to each volunteer. Volunteers can participate in most programs from a period of 4 weeks to 52 weeks or more.

If you are interested in participating in any of our programs or would like to contact past volunteers, please contact: Eben Mensah at Save the Earth Network, P.O. Box CT 3635, Cantonments, Accra, Ghana. Tel: 233-21-667791, Fax:233-21-667791 or e-mail: ebensten@yahoo.com

Number one passenger airport of 2002 is: Atlanta Hartsfield!

Atlanta retained its title as the world's busiest passenger airport last year as passenger numbers rose to 76.9 million, an increase of 1.3 percent over 2001.

Chicago O'Hare was the second busiest with 66.6 million passengers and Los Angeles LAX was third busiest with 56.2 million passengers.

London’s Heathrow was the busiest outside North America with traffic of 63.3 million.

Figures released today by Airports Council International-North America showed that although more than 1.3 billion people boarded planes last year, passenger numbers were down by 2.6 percent.

Source: Airports Council International-North America

Continuing our recent theme on visiting Germany, we had the Beetle’s report on Munich, and now Padmassana has sent us this trip report from his recent visit to Berlin. This is how he found Berlin since he was last there, before the wall came down in 1989.

You have got to visit Berlin – this now has to be the best city in Europe. There is so much to do – Berlin has changed out of all recognition since I was last here. Shops are open on Saturday afternoons, but I think even the Beetles credit card would go sick at the thought of shopping on Kudamm!

I did a walking tour (www.berlinwalks.com) for 5 hours one day, just walked into “Mitte” the heart of the city that used to be in the East. It is a vibrant place now, not the dour way it used to be. The ghost stations are open again but have been left with their 1930’s decoration. Checkpoint Charlie is still there, but on the east side where you went through all the stuff to get in to the east are shops and cafes, it is unrecognisable now. Also the air is not full of the exhaust fumes from the East German Trabants; now the east has BMW’s and Merc’s, as well as McDonalds!

I was the only one on the walk who had been into the East pre 1989, I had to describe to an Aussie couple what it was like, it was hard to remember where the big shed was at Checkpoint Charlie and the chicane in the road. They couldn’t believe the palaver involved back then in getting into the GDR.

I never dreamed the last time I was here that I would be able to walk through the Brandenburg Gate, but I did yesterday. Where the wall was taken down they have replaced it with bricks in the road to show where it was. The biggest change is Potsdam Platz, I remember it as a concrete wasteland, with barbed wire and tank traps and towers with machine guns and massive flood lights, now it is an area of new modern buildings like the Sony centre. I like the public art in Berlin, it’s fun, there are lots of bears, doing various things as adverts for local businesses.

There are lots more places to eat than I remember, and apart from my daily milkshake, I haven’t eaten any burgers, rather I paid a daily visit to the excellent Kamps bakeries, which do hot sandwiches and the Turkish Imbiss stube, which do good kebabs.

I visited the Pergamon museum on Museum Island after the tour, lots of fab stuff from Pergamon, Iran and Babylon. Went to visit the Reichstag next, but the queue was a joke, so I walked up Unter Den Linden to the TV tower (aka The pope’s revenge), so called because when the sun shines a cross appears on this communist, atheist piece of 60’s architecture, only 6 Euros to go up for great views of the city.

Back to the Checkpoint Charlie museum (7 Euros), which has been greatly enlarged and is now very interesting. Had a look round Potsdam Platz, and bought a then and now postcard as a reminder, which they stamp the back with a GDR customs stamp. Went via the Topography of Terrors which is an exhibition about the Gestapo in their former dungeons, unearthed when the wall was dismantled. You can borrow a commentary tape in English, which guides you along the exhibit in about an hour. Nearby a bit of the Berlin wall is left, which now ironically has a fence round it to protect it from people stealing bits!

Wandered back to the Reichstag the line had shortened, queued for 30 minutes, then you get the lift up to the glass roof, best views of Berlin possible and it’s completely free, which is why the lines are so long. The idea is that people can look down on the German parliament, and the politicians can look up and be reminded as to who really has the power.

I had planned on going to Potsdam itself to see the palaces. I found out that it’s best to book Potsdam in advance because UNESCO limit the number of visitors who can go around the palaces and it doesn’t take many coach parties of 50 or 60 to fill it up. So abandoned this idea. Potsdam lies at the end of the S2 line. It’s really weird going through the stations now they are open as I remember the dark ghost stations. You can tell the old ones because they have green tiles. Instead I visited the East Side gallery. This is a bit of the wall next to the river in the east. It has the famous mural of a Trabant coming thru the wall with Honecker and Brezhnev kissing on the back seat, and another brilliant mural like a cartoon of the wall and people trying various means of escape.

I tried to go to the Documentation museum, but it was closed: Lonely Planet failed to mention it’s only open Wednesday – Sunday!

The weather was incredibly hot, so I went on a river trip for an hour (7 euros) which is nice as you get a different perspective of the city. The commentary was in German, but luckily could remember enough German to understand most of it including some of the jokes levelled against the German politicians who have moved from Bonn, they are now called “Gastarbeiters”.

So that was Berlin, I hope its not another 15 years till I get here again. I strongly recommend it – give it a go and visit!

If you’d like to contact Padmassana, click here: Padmassana

The Burma Campaign UK is calling for a boycott of all Lonely Planet (LP) publications until Lonely Planet withdraws its Burma guide from the market.

The Burma Campaign say that the development of hotels, transport and tourist attractions to encourage visitors to Burma is directly linked to mass human rights abuses. There are well-documented mass human rights abuses directly linked to the development of tourist infrastructure and the tourism industry. The United Nation's International Labour Organisation reports that “the military treat the civilian population as an unlimited pool of unpaid forced labourers and servants at their disposal. The practice of forced labour is to encourage private investment in infrastructure development, public sector works and tourism projects.”

Independent tourists are required to exchange $200 when entering the country, while many hotels, domestic airlines and other 'dollar only' retail outlets are fully or jointly owned by the regime or its associates – so local people see none of this money. Tourism currently benefits only a tiny percentage of Burma's 48 million people. Eighty per cent live in rural areas and do not in the main benefit from current forms of tourism.

Millions of men, women and children are forced to labour, under the harshest conditions, on infrastructure projects across Burma each year. Many thousands more have been forced from their homes to make way for tourism developments or as part of so-called 'beautification' projects.

Added to this, tourist dollars go straight into the hands of the dictatorship. For these reasons Aung San Suu Kyi, the British Government and the European Union have asked tourists not to visit Burma. Against the weight of this advice, Lonely Planet publications continue to promote tourism to Burma through their Burma guide.

Rough Guides has already adopted an ethical stance with regard to Burma. They say: “There are occasional instances where any benefits (from tourism) are overshadowed by the nature of the social and political climate. Apartheid South Africa was an example. Burma, with its brutal dictatorship, state control of the economy and forced labour used to build its tourist infrastructure, is another. As long as the military regime remains in power and Aung San Suu Kyi – leader of the democratically elected National League for Democracy – requests that tourists do not visit, Rough Guides will not publish a guide to the country.”

What do you think? Do you have a view? Write in and let and tell the Beetle.

Globetrotters meeting on October 11^th at 2pm

If you like independent, adventuresome, fun, daring, exciting, “off the beaten path” travel, this club is for you. Our meeting begins at 2 P.M. Come early so you won't be late! Enjoy handouts, travel talk time, and door prizes!

Dates of future meetings: November 8^th.

For more information about the Texas Branch or if you would like to help Christina, please contact texas@globetrotters.co.uk or register for email updates at our website (click here) or call Christina at 830-620-5482.

For information on Ontario meetings, please contact Svatka Hermanek: shermanek@schulich.yorku.ca or Bruce Weber: tel. 416-203-0911 or Paul Webb: tel. 416-694-8259.

Meetings are held on the third Friday of January, March, May, September and November. Usually at the Woodsworth Co-op, Penthouse, 133, Wilton Streetin downtown Torontoat 8.00 p.m.

Stop press, the NY October meeting has been cancelled.

For details of forthcoming meetings email newyork@globetrotters.co.uk or register for email updates, click here at our website.

New York meetings are held at The Wings Theatre, 154 Christopher Street(btw Greenwich Stand Washington St), to the right of Crunch Fitness, in the Archive on the first Saturday of each month at 4 pm.

Globetrotters meeting 6^th September 2003 by Padmassana

We had a very special guest join us at the September Globetrotters meeting, despite not being announced, we were honoured that Mary-Jane Sweet from the Texas Globetrotter branch popped in to say hello (and enjoyed a pint or two at our local pub!) on her way back from a solo trip to Prague. Great to see you Mary-Jane, and thanks for coming to say hello!

If you are coming to London and have time on the first Saturday of every month, contact the Beetle, and she will arrange to meet you and bring you to a London Globetrotters meeting.

John Gimlette was our first speaker who introduced us to the South American country of Paraguay. He told us that 60% of cars in the country are actually stolen, usually from Argentina and Brazil and that many of the people live by selling goods on the streets, anything from oranges to goldfish in plastic bags. John showed us a photo of the Legislate building in Ascunsion that has a hole in its façade, this is due to a tank that was supposed to be starting a coup, however nobody else turned up and the tank ran out of petrol! John’s slides showed us other aspects of Paraguay including a British built railway that was closed in 2000 after a girl was killed and the Mennonites of German descent that live alongside the native Paraguayans but still speak a 16^th Century Germanic dialect. We also saw the two Italian built gunboats of the Paraguayan navy dating from 1928, not to mention the fact that Paraguay is a landlocked country! To read more about Johns adventures in Paraguay read his book entitled “At the tomb of the inflatable pig”.

Our second speaker was ex Globetrotters President Richard Snailham who last spoke to Globetrotters 33 years ago. (Padmassana was 6 at the time and needless to say was not present!) Along with intrepid explorer John Blashford Snell, Richard took part in an expedition using read boats on the rivers of Bolivia and Paraguay. Like John before him, Richard gave us a few facts about Bolivia, such as the country is named after Simon Bolivar and that the Bolivians have a poor record of going to war which currently leaves them at 0-7. Like Paraguay, Bolivia has a navy despite being landlocked, he showed us pictures of two warships that were originally British. The expedition aimed to follow the rivers using a traditionally built reed boat and with the help of the Bolivian navy’s low loader they got to their starting point. However not without having to chop bits off the boat to get it under road bridges and giving La Paz a power cut when trying to get under electric cables. John showed us photos of the boats progress down river which was slow, mainly due to the low water level, which meant they had to portage the boats on lorries to find water deep enough and at one point having to push the reed boat with a dinghy with an outboard motor in order to not be pushed back from where they had come! Part of the expedition was medical, this included two dentists who removed over 1000 teeth during the trip! Eventually they ran out of navigable river so one boat was given to the Bolivian navy, one to a children’s park and the third, they burned! To read more about Richards’s journey pick up a copy of his book “Kota Mama”.

Coming up on Saturday ^th October, Roger Widdecombe will talk about: “It ain’t a Holiday,” his experiences on taking part in Raleigh International expeditions Ghana W Africa. Roger took part in three Raleigh International expeditions to Ghana from September 2001 to September 2002. Acting as a volunteer member of staff, he undertook the roles of expedition photographer and fundraiser and also staged the first sponsored Abseil Challenge event to be held in that country.

Following Roger, Juliet Coombe will be telling us all about Great Festivals around the World. This is Juliet's latest publication – how to party your way around the World while discovering the origins of each fiesta.

London meetings are held at The Church of Scotland, Crown Court, behind the Fortune Theatre in Covent Garden at 2.30pm the first Saturday of each month (exept for bank holiday weekends). There is no London meeting in August, but we will be back in September. For more information, you can contact the Globetrotters Info line on +44 (0) 20 8674 6229, or visit the website: www.globetrotters.co.uk

Meeting news from our branches around the world.