24 August 2006 - Home again

Good day my good fellows, well my adventures have come to a fittingly convoluted and confused end. I have been back in the UK for six weeks now, catching up with friends and family (who are all on horribly good form and who continue to build enviable lives for themselves) also I have been begrudgingly partaking in a few days of labour for that fearsome day when the bank manager tracks me down to a semi permanent address. As I cast my mind back over the past year, I ask myself that irksome question: What was all that about? The confusion that follows is prolonged, profound and indescribable without breaking out into free form contemporary dance. I find myself gibbering and rocking in the corner, desolate but for these thoughts:

Why did I ever go away in the first place?

To get a broader, more global perspective of the world. - Travel beyond Europe.

To see and experience life in impoverished developing countries. - I had inkling suspicion that life could be a little trickier than the council estates of Plymouth.

To discover a new long term life goal/career. - Decide between good will and good business sense.

Help out along the way. - Interfere.

How’d it pan out?

I can truly say that my eyes have been prised open, scrubbed, blow dried and given a jolly good creosoting. It seems that my life is destined to be an ongoing process of innocence degrading.

Living alongside people, in Boilvia, with next nothing, no opportunities and very little hope was hard going to say the least. What I found surprising was the general acceptance of such lives of hardship whilst others nearby acted like pigs but lived like royalty.

It appears that the incessant and inconceivably nasty past endured by these people has led to an attitude of apathy, punished for stepping out line or making waves and only ever rewarded for getting away with breaking the rules or taking advantage of their neighbours.

I found that football is an international institution. A game between two countries, in my mind, is infinitely more preferable to a war (apart from economically obviously).

A hard history produces hard people, unpleasant but resilient.

What goes around comes around. Cutting corners at a global level is as ineffective as cutting them at a personal one. It appears that one day we will be at the mercy of these peoples that we currently see fit to exploit, be that through produce or power…

I have less of an idea of what to do with my life now, than before I went away, ho hum.

As for helping out, well, first of all I would like to lay to rest those devilish rumours that I was seen stealing rice from a street shoeshine boy in La Paz. I was merely beating him away from my shoes, which he was insistent on polishing (for a shocking, rip off 15p) the rice must have fallen into my bag during the struggle (well, despite his malnutrition the little blighter was quite feisty). And just to straighten the record I can report that I did help an old woman across a street in Santa Cruz.

What of good old Blighty with fresh South American eyes? We’re mental really aren’t we, I mean it’s beyond safety consciousness, there comes a point where procedure can exist without objective. I mean, we’re making it up as we go along. I love it, I wouldn’t have it any other way (unless it was another way in which case I probably wouldn’t have it this way) which is what most of the Bolivians that I spoke to said.

A colossal thank you to al you lovely people who have looked after me upon my return, sent me stuff, wrote to me whilst I was away, lent me expensive and essential equipment and helped to finance the whole thing, your generosity is admirable.

Well all my very best to you all.

If we haven’t partaken in a cream tea recently, then it’s a jolly poor show and the predicament should be remedied forth with.

Humble regards to you and yours, forever yours,

Nukunu Percival Wondrausch esq. APIOL