The Australian High Commission currently advises that there is currently an epidemic of the mosquito-borne disease Dengue Fever in Tonga on the main island of Tongatapu. Anyone visiting Tonga is strongly advised to protect themselves from mosquito bites at all times.
You do not want to catch Dengue Fever – see Ingrid Style’s article in this e-newsletter about her Dengue Fever in Thailand.
A retired Florida schoolteacher who went to Iraq to serve as a “human shield” is facing hefty fines, which she is refusing to pay. The US Treasury said that Faith Fippinger, 62, broke the law by crossing the Iraqi border before the war. Her travel to Iraq violated U.S. sanctions that prohibited American citizens from engaging in “virtually all direct or indirect commercial, financial or trade transactions with Iraq.” The government also has asked Fippinger, 62, to detail her travels to Iraq and any financial transactions she made. In her response, Fippinger wrote that the only money she spent was on food and emergency supplies and that “if it comes to fines or imprisonment, “please be aware that I will not contribute money to the United States government to continue the build-up of its arsenal of weapons.” Since she won't pay, she said, “perhaps the alternative should be considered.”
If you have a travellers tale that your aching to tell. Then why not visit the “Travel Sized Bites” section of the Website and share it with the world. Travel Sized Bites
Are you a UK resident, going on holiday in October or November, but haven't decided where? Do you fancy letting us plan it for you?
If you want a holiday with a difference then call us on 023 80 712568 or email us at iwthol@granadamedia.com for an application form.
Meeting news from our branches around the world.
Southwest Airlines, the highly successful US low cost airline – the one that Ryanair is modelled on, has fired two pilots (both men) for allegedly taking off their clothes whilst in the cockpit, in flight.
Southwest is famous for being offbeat. When they started flying in 1971, flight attendants wore hot pants (one assumes the female ones) and were chosen for sex appeal and they are known even today for making funny in-flight announcements, sometimes even in song.
This is not the first time that pilots have behaved badly – America West fired a pair of pilots last year for being under the influence of alcohol in the cockpit after running up a $142 tab at a Miami bar the night before. A Northwest Airlines pilot was arrested in January, after a loaded gun was found in his carry-on.
The World’s Top 5 Cleanest Countries
New Zealand comes 6th, Australia 7th, the US 11th, the UK 16th.
Source: http://www.aneki.com/lists.html
Win a Frommer’s guidebook on Amsterdam 2003. See www.frommers.com for info on Frommer’s guidebooks.
Some people have said the quiz is difficult, we say do some research; try google.com or Ask Jeeves, if you need help with the answers.
The winner of last month's Moon Guide on Fiji is Eileen Hobson.
Five galleries illustrate the history of the performing arts in the UK. The collection includes displays on theatre, ballet, dance, circus, puppetry, opera, musicals, rock and pop. There's usually a daily workshop on performing arts subjects, such as pantomime and making a play.
The museum is found in Russell Street, Covent Garden.
Open: Tue-Sun, 10:00-18:00.
Tube: Covent Garden
Enquiries: 020 7943 4700
Entrance: FREE admission for individuals.
After our usual gap of one month, London Globetrotters meetings are back at 2.30pm on Saturday 6th September.
John Gimilette will talk about Paraguay – The Island surrounded by Land. Award-winning writer, John, takes us round a country that has emerged from centuries of isolation. As one of the most beguiling and eccentric places there is, we visit a vast lost ocean, the battlefields of the bloodiest war man has known, picked Victorian warships, cannibals, a highland ball and plenty more. John's book “At the Tomb of the inflatable Pig.”
Richard Snailham, Globetrotters Vice President will give a talk: On Reed Boats down rivers in Bolivia and Paraguay. Following a hunch that cocaine and nicotine might have reached the Old World from the New in very early times, John Blashford-Snell had three reed boats built on Lake Titicaca and tested them out on the Desaquadero river and subsequently reaching Buenos Aires and Belem in similar craft.
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. 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
In a bid to step up flight security, China plans to use policemen disguised as crew members. The undercover police, who may be armed, are undergoing training and are likely to be deployed in October this year.
British Airways has suspended all flights to Saudi Arabia after receiving evidence of a planned attack on a UK jet at Riyadh airport.
Expect to get some good fares between New Zealand and Tasmania: Air New Zealand (ANZ) is to launch a low cost service Tasman Express on October 29th on its trans Tasman route. There is already an Emirates service across the Tasman Sea and Virgin Blue has said it intends to start flights between the two countries later this year.
ANZ also plans to cut the price of fares from Auckland to Sydney by 45 percent to NZD$189 (USD$111) one way, while the total reductions would average about 20 percent.
India's first budget airline, Air Deccan has just started with flights from the southern city of Bangalore. Air Deccan aims to undercut other carriers' fares by 50 percent, will start with one daily service to Hubli and Mangalore, but plans to expand quickly to 20 flights per day to destinations in the south of the country. India's civil aviation minister, Rajav Prat Rudy said: “The days of flying being a symbol of only maharajas or the rich are over.”
Pilots in the US are pressing the government to train more cockpit crews in the use of guns after new warnings about possible terrorist hijack attempts.
The US government has put out a worldwide alert that terrorists may be plotting more hijack attempts on commercial airliners this summer. According to a report from CNN the targets could include Australia, Italy, the UK or the eastern United States. However, the intelligence is still being evaluated and some doubts have been cast on its reliability.
You know when you’ve been Dengued. Or do you’
After spending two weeks in the south of Thailand, I caught an over night bus from Sarat Thani back to Bangkok. That morning, to my surprise I managed to reschedule my flight due out the following day to Australia. Delighted that I had extended my stay in Thailand I went out that night and celebrated.
After sleeping for four hours, I woke with a rumbling stomach. I tried to ignore it. Dozing in and out of consciousness, my bowels decided that I needed to perch on the toilet. In Thailand, this seemed hardly unusual and I was not alarmed until daylight appeared: I realized I had been decorating the toilet at least ten times in three hours. Was I glad not to be on that fourteen-hour flight to Australia!
I had a persistent headache throughout the day and I noticed a pain in my lower back had become worse. That afternoon I went to the cinema. While seated the pain in my back spread down into my legs. Constantly fidgeting, I struggled to concentrate on the movie. The walk back to the house was exhausting so I went straight to bed.
OK so every one has been ill or felt pain at some point in life. Independent self-diagnosis of symptoms overrides concern about our well being and we often think nothing of it. Let’s look at the symptoms:
Diarrhoea – Is that not compulsory when travelling abroad?
Back pain – My backpack, one week sleeping in a wooden hut and then the overnight bus …..
Fever – What fever? It was the beginning of May – 40 degrees centigrade plus – Thailand's hottest time of year. The rainy season was building up and the air was extremely close.
Headache – Not much sleep recently, possible dehydration from the heat and, … erm …. hangover.
Leg ache – Did I drink any cheap Thai whiskey last night?
The next morning, I was no better. Noi, my host, took me to the doctor. Once inside the hospital, the nurse routinely took my blood pressure before seeing the doctor. I recounted my symptoms and he suggested I have a blood test. OK, so I hate needles! It’s not so much that I hate injections – they just jab into you and then that is it over and done. No, it’s the searching for a suitable vein first (can understand that, Beetle!).
The nurse hunted up and down my arms and around my hands for ages. Hurry up, I thought. I started to hyperventilate. Failing on the first vein, the nurse got some blood on the second. Then another needle appeared with a clear bag of liquid attached to it. I became nervous again. “What's it for?” I asked Noi. 'It is to make you strong” she said. “OK but what is it?” I asked. “Water. Don’t worry. It is OK” Noi tried to reassure me. “I will come back in six hours when it is finished.”
Six hours! Now lets slow down a minute. If I go to the doctor back home, I do not get put on a drip of water for six hours. Promising to drink plenty of mineral water, and with a recommendation to return in three days, I left the hospital.
Two days passed and I still felt unwell. I decided to have a flick through my travel health book. OK, what am I looking for here? I started with back pain. Sprains. Slipped discs… other types of back pain: Dengue Fever. What is that, I had never heard of it before. I read the symptoms. Hang on a minute – back pain yep, fever yep, diarrhoea yep, banging headaches yep. Oh no! Please don't tell me, I have this …… wait for it … tropical disease!
I realised it was quite possible. The white-backed mosquito carries Dengue Fever and outbreaks are particularly common in South East Asia – where I had been. They generally bite in the daytime. On reflection, I had fallen asleep in my hut one afternoon and woke up to find a circle of mosquito bites on my left leg.
I read on: although the symptoms are similar to that of Malaria, I discovered there is nothing you can do to prevent catching it, except slap on lots of insect repellent. A vaccine is still in the process of being developed. The good news is that you cannot catch it from another person. The bad news is that it is serious. There are four different strains of Dengue fever. Catching one kind only gives immunity to that strain. There is also the far more serious Dengue Haemorrhagic Fever, which causes the sufferer to bleed to death without immediate medical attention. This usually only occurs in children under fifteen.
Gulp…what if I am infected, am I going to die or be permanently affected by it?
It was now day three and I was feeling worse than ever. For the first time in my life, when a doctor has told me to return, I had to obey.
In part 2, Ingrid tells us of her stay in a Thai hospital, visits from ants and priests and how she recovered!
If you would like to contact Ingrid, who is currently in Chile, you can e-mail her on:gr.ing.a.rid@latinmail.com
1. Angola: Luanda
2. Cyprus: Nicosia
3. Laos: Vientiane
4. Nepal: Kathmandu
5. South Korea: Seoul
· 0 out of 5 – you need to get out more!
· 1-3 – not bad
· 4 – very good! You are a Globetrotter!
· 5 – are you sure you didn’t sneak a look?
The Pacific island of Guam is known for very high rates of a degenerative disease that looks like motor neuron, Parkinson's and dementia, but cannot be firmly identified as any of them. Researchers believe that this higher than average incidence could be due to eating a bat, also known as a flying fox. The flying foxes feed on seed containing a chemical highly toxic to human brain cells. When humans eat the animals, high levels of the chemical, which had accumulated in the bat tissues, was passed on. Flying fox is a delicacy in many parts of the Pacific, including Tonga, Vanuatu, New Caledonia.
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 St and Washington St), to the right of Crunch Fitness, in the Archive on the first Saturday of each month at 4 pm.
Ben Sessions from Houston, Texas wrote in to recommend: “a wonderful travel-accommodations club. My wife and I often travel in the US and Europe researching our ancestors and visiting relatives, old friends and new friends. We belong to a travel group The Hospitality Club, which has members worldwide offering free accommodations for travellers. It is free to join and all the members are listed on the internet by country and city. We spent June in Germany and met and overnighted with several members. They were wonderful and quite accommodating. Frugal folks who like and/or need to travel will benefit greatly from this organization, (members have the option of being a host/hostess or not.)
Muir’s Tours recently launched their volunteer teaching programme in Peru and it is proving to be very popular with Gap Year students. They have now set up another teaching facility in the ancient settlement of Huancayo where you can experience pre Inca culture and hospitality.
For more information, see http://www.nkf-mt.org.uk/volunteer_Huancayo_Peru.htm
If you a planning an overland trip in west Africa, then please note that the Nigerian Government has announced that it is closing its borders with the Benin Republic with immediate effect due to an increase in cross-border crime such as smuggling and human trafficking. The main border crossing into Benin is not far from Nigeria's commercial capital Lagos and it normally carries travellers and traders from Benin, Togo, Ghana and beyond.
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 Street in downtown Toronto at 8.00 p.m.
Need to convert currency?
Take a look at The Globetrotters Currency Converter — to get the exchange rates for 164 currencies or The Globetrotters Currency Cheat Sheet — to create and print a currency converter table for your next trip.