Back to Toronto, my 2nd home

G’day all,
Sorry it’s been such a long time since my last update but I’ve just been having too much fun to get on with it. It’s been a great past week or two with non-stop fun and not a moment to ponder. After Morocco I caught the ferry back across to Spain and met up with Sean, Des, and Shane in Seville for one last night of partying together. I literally rocked up to Seville just before it got dark and met the guys at the hostel. They told me I had 10 minutes to get ready because we were heading off on a pub crawl so I didn’t have to for a shower or anything and headed like a feral. We had a pretty big night and drank a dangerous cocktail of various drinks included in the pub crawl. The following day I said my farewells to the guys and headed off alone to Lagos in Portugal. I knew I wanted to do some surfing in Portugal and Lagos had a nice ring to it so I blindly headed there with no expectations. Lagos is a small party town which I grew fond of the minute I stepped off the bus. There didn’t seem to be any Portuguese people in Lagos though as the whole town seemed to be run by young people from all over the world. I was met at the bus by a guy who took me to his hostel called the ‘3 Monkeys’ where I had a brilliant time. Within the first 20 minutes I was already booked onto a surf trip for the morning so I rested up for the big day ahead. Each morning I stayed there I had the biggest English breakfast and stuffed myself full before surfing. The surfing trip was more of a ‘learn to surf’ trip and everyone was pretty much surfing for their first time. I’ve grown up in the surf but have always body-boarded so surfing to me was fairly new too. Being the only Aussie on the bus, there were huge expectations on my shoulders to lead the way on the waves but I really had no idea either. We drove for almost an hour to the west coast of Portugal where we met some seriously nice waves and good weather. We surfed all day and by the end of the day I was starting to cut some moves on the waves and quickly booked myself onto the trip again for day 2. I had a great time surfing both days and can’t wait to get into it when I get back home now. I never really got to see much of the town of Lagos as surfing took up all my time but I had a little walk around just before catching the bus to Lisbon. I only spent one night in Lisbon and it seemed like a nice trendy little city but on Tuesday I flew off to London. It was nice to be back on a plane again but felt even nicer to be able to speak English for the first time in almost 3 months and be understood. People always say my accent is too strong and I end up finding myself trying to put on a bad American accent to get by sometimes. London was just a flyby visit to see my cousin Dave before flying off to Toronto, Canada on Wednesday. I was really excited to come back to Toronto as it feels like my second home and most of my best friends live here too. The weather was perfect when I arrived and I was met at the airport by one of my best mates Rob. My cousin Dan flew into Toronto a few days earlier and within a few hours we were all reunited at Rob’s new house drinking a few beers. Rob and Steve are my best two mates in Toronto and they recently moved about 5 houses away from each other in this really nice new area downtown. Dan and I have been in Toronto for the past week now staying with Rob and Steve and having a brilliant time catching up with all my footy mates each night with some quiet beers. On Thursday I showed Dan around town a bit, being my old home 2 years ago. We had a pretty casual day and went to the CN tower and soaked up the sun walking between the skyscrapers and china town. On Thursday night we went to footy training with my old team the “Central Blues” and found ourselves on the roster to play on Saturday. I couldn’t wait to play again and trained as hard as I could after no exercise in about 6 months. On Friday I wad so sore I could hardly walk and was wondering how I’m going to get through the game but after the warm up on Saturday I was good to go. It was a great feeling being re-united with my mates again and playing for my beloved Blues. We headed out to play a town called Guelph about 80km out of Toronto. On the drive out we traditionally listen to our pump up music as we cruised along the freeway to the game. The field was quiet rough and was layed in flowers and weeds and had a lethal looking cricket pitch waiting for us wanting to rip our knees up in the center of the field. We played really well in the first quarter and I got a nice hand pass off to Dan who kicked a goal and Rob kicked another. After that unfortunately we got goal after goal kicked against us and ended up losing by about 7 goals in the end. After the game we had a barbie and some beers before partying the night away downtown like the good old days. Dan and I planned to stay in Toronto for another week but after working out our plans decided we better leave for New York on Wednesday otherwise we will be behind schedule. The past few days I’ve been showing Dan around a bit more and we had a nice day down at the beaches in the sun. Last night we had some farewells drinks with Rob and Steve and today we head off to Niagara Falls then onto New York on a overnight bus from Buffalo. We had a really nice time in Toronto and thank Rob and Steve for having us but it’s time to move on. Next Stop….New York.

Woodsy

Chaotic Cairo

G’day all,
There’s only one problem with Egypt….too many bloody Egyptians. They would have to be the most friendly and finely trained conmen I’ve come across I’d have to say. They are so good they almost put you in a trance to hand over cash before you even realize it, then half an hour later you shake your head and realized you paid triple. Every street you walk down you are a target with “Where you from my friend”, “What’s your name”, “Can I help you”, “Welcome to my country”, or even “G’day mate”. Just when you write them all off as scammers and you begin being rude and evasive to them you meet one that acts exactly the same but just wants to know about you and say hello and nothing more. My first impressions of Cairo was ‘this place is bloody mental’ but after a day or two it kind of grows on you in a funny way and you begin to like it. Apart from maybe India it would have to be the dirtiest polluted place I’ve ever been to. Every building looks like it was built 60 years ago and not cleaned or maintained since. There is layer after layer of greasy dirt on every wall, floor and shop window you see and when you try to breathe in you feel like you are in a cave so much dust sucks into your lungs. Almost every car looks at least 30 years old and has huge dents on every panel and trying to cross the road, well that’s another story. The traffic is probably worse in India and Vietnam but they are mainly motorbikes and rickshaws while in Cairo every single car looks completely un-roadworthy, no lights are used at night, and everyone just swerves around the road ignoring any lane that was ever painted on the road. At night you can hear a million car horns no matter what time of the night it is and the street lights are so badly lit that you can just see the outline or cars until they occasionally flicker the high beams to indicate a near car crash. I’m not saying all this in a bad way because this is what makes Cairo such an exciting city and that’s why I’m beginning to love the place. I’ve been staying at a backpackers downtown called “Dahab Hostel” which has the dodgiest lift you’ve ever seen but a great chill out atmosphere on the roof top full of European travellers. Back to that lift… now that’s something else. It looks like something out of a horror movie and is swinging through this cage between a spiral stairwell by this rusty old cable, so much character and a bloody good rush. On day 2 in Cairo I went to the Egyptian Museum which was so huge I ended up power walking through it just to make sure I saw everything before my legs collapsed on me. It was really awesome though seeing all the mummies and tombs and gold and jewels but it was so poorly displayed for what it was. Yesterday I went to the Pyramids and no matter how many fellow backpackers warned me not to do a tour because you get ripped off, I still managed to get conned into a tour by a smooth Egyptian man. I was so annoyed with myself for getting ripped off when it was my one and only plan that day to not get conned into a tour, that it put me in a bad mood and I didn’t even enjoy the pyramids. What I did to however was something very Aussie, and I went back and conned the conman. I went back into his office wearing my “www.paulwood.blogspot.com” t-shirt and told him I work for Tourism Australia and Lonely Planet and told him he lied to me and ripped me off and he chose the wrong person to pick on. After having a little talk to him I ended up blackmailing him into giving me 70 Egyptian pounds back and returned to Cairo with a smirk on my face. Late yesterday I went to Islamic Cairo which is a very interesting part of town and is full of tiny little laneways loaded with bazaar markets, mosques and tiny little assorted work shops. I got so lost it took me hours to get home and I ended up catching a taxi because I walked 45 minutes in the wrong direction. Today I left Cairo and took a bus 6 hours south to the coastal town of “Sharm el-Sheikh” which is on the Red Sea and is world famous for its scuba diving. I didn’t do my research too well though because I now realize I feel very out of place here. I swear I’m the only backpacker in the town as this is where all the rich Italian and Russian middle aged tourists come to dive and the backpackers go to another town about 85km away called Dahab. Everything here is 5 times more expensive than Cairo but at the same time it looks like such an amazing town I have no regrets coming here accidentally but will catch the bus to Dahab tomorrow. The town is situated on a nice little cove with crystal clear waters and is surrounded by these beautiful desert rocky mountains. There is a really nice market in the middle of the town and this outdoor restaurant that is chiseled into the edge of a cliff and lit up by lights. On Monday I will be busy doing a Scuba diving course for 4 days to get my PADI certificate in diving so I will update you after that.
Keeping it cheeky,

Woodsy

Galway, Paul's Way....…All Settled In!!

G’day all,

It’s been a while since my last blog update but I’ve been in Ireland for almost 2 months now and I’m finally all settled in with a full time job and it’s all going to plan so far. It’s been an extremely busy past couple of months with lots of job searching, footy kicking, partying and visitors coming in and out of our bachelor pad house we call “club 43”. My cousin Dan moved into our place about a month ago and since then our house has been the centre of partying and our social life in Galway with a weekly and sometimes nightly gathering of pre-drinks and laughs before nights out on the town. I first got a job here doing bar work for one of the big hotels. It was pretty nerve raking because I know sweet bugger all about working behind the bar and was thrown into the deep end because I’m Aussie and they assume every Aussie lives in a pub. The hard part was I couldn’t understand half of what the Irish people were ordering nor how to make it so I had to wing it the best I could. I had to walk 45 minutes each way to work in the rain and it was getting really tough but was so glad that just before my 4^th shift I got another job working only 5 minutes away from my house. For the past 6 weeks I’ve been working as a salesman in a fancy home store selling all sorts of cooking gear and loving it. I don’t know much about cooking at all or selling stuff but I find that I can get away with anything with my accent and my customers just love asking me about Australia. Everyday I get the same thing over and over and over and over again: Where are you from Australia or New Zealand? What brings you here to this weather? How long are you here for? What do you think of Galway? Why Galway? When did you get here? All my work mates just laugh every time I get asked because I just switch to auto pilot and say the same old lines back each time. I was given a real fancy pancy suit for work too and had to get my hair cut to look the part so now I’m clean cut Paul instead of backpacker Paul. Everyone I work with is super nice and we are always having a good laugh or “good craic” as the Irish say. If Galway had good weather it would be the best place on earth but I’ve never seen such depressing weather in my whole life. It is supposed to be summer here but it seems to rain and drizzle every single day and night. We did have one good week where the weather was around 25 and sunny for about 7 days straight but now it’s back to winter weather again. The town itself though is amazing and it is a buzz every day and the night life is unreal. You can literally go out any night of the week here and find a packed bar or go on a pub crawl. A few weeks back we went and saw the famous Australian stand up comedian Carl Barron do a gig at the local pub and had a great night and all got to meet him and get photos with him. At the moment I’m a bit partied out though if that’s possible as for the past few weeks I had two of my best mates in the world Rob and Dan come over from Toronto in Canada to visit for two weeks. They left last Friday but WOW was it a big few weeks while they were here. We pretty much went out every single night of the week for two weeks while I worked full time during the day each day. We had such a great time and we did a couple of trips with them. Tate got his work car one day and we all drove down to the “Cliffs of Moher” which were awesome and the weather was great that day. In the second week I had two days off and we all got a rental car and drove down to Cork where we stayed the night and partied. The following day we went to the Blarney Castle and then drove to Cove to see where the Titanic left the wharf for the last time before sinking. It was so good to see the boys again and we had quite a few kicks of the footy while they were here too. At the moment it’s just me and Sean alone in Club 43 as the Canadians have gone, Dan and Shane have gone to Egypt for the week, Kate has gone to New York and Tate has a new sales job roaming around the country side. We also still have our Kiwi mates here and these two legend Melbourne guys I met in India Scotty and Pud to party with. Towards the end of July Galway is going to be going crazy as the arts festival is on and then the much talked about Race Week. Race Week is supposed to be absolutely mental as a million people come to this town of 70,000 for a big horse racing festival. All the locals tell me I won’t believe how crazy it is until I see it so I’m looking forward to that. We had an interesting bit of publicity in our street over the past month. About a month ago a dead mans body was found chopped up in pieces in a freezer in our street only about 10 doors away from our place. Apparently he was killed about 4 years ago and he was a drug dealer.

Thanks about all for now,

Woodsy…..having a ball in Galway