Sunday 30 December 2012

5 countries in 36 hours

In the 60s there was a film which poked fun at Americans touring Europe, titled ' If this Tuesday, it must be Belgium '.
Well as I needed to get back to see the doctor, I brought forward my return, and did my own Central America version.
So on Friday teatime I said goodbye to Alice in Cuba, by suppertime was in El Salvador, Nicaragua for bed on Friday and breakfast on Saturday, (I stayed in the hotel opposite the airport, walked over to check in my baggage and went back for breakfast - I paid the same for a double room with amazing shower, and a copious breakfast that I did in Habana for a room in which the bathrom had a toilet that took 5 minutes to finish its percussive flushing, and a window onto the kitchen from which wafted the smell of gas (and not  forgetting the powdered instant tea!) - BUT it was very central and we were supporting the ongoing Revolution).
As Nicaragua is a few hundred miles near to the equator, the sun rises with a vengeance straight up at 6 a.m., and it's tropically warm by 6.15. - different to the sometimes cloud-muted slower incline in Habana, so  breakfast by the pool had geckos running back and fro and to.
The USA for Saturday lunchtime and eventually England for Sunday breakfast. On the plane over amongst the cliche-ridden films, featuring stars instead of actors, fastcut to generate interest in the totally predictable storyline there was Breakfast in Tiffany's - how had I got to my age 'baht seeing it? So I did and enjoyed all the little touches which Almodóvar lovingly referred to in his ' Women on the edge of a nervous breakdown '. 

Things to look forward to -
different clothes to those I've been wearing for the last 2 months;
putting toilet paper in the toilet;
newspapers in English;
going to the library;
Indian restaurants;
sleeping in my own bed;
good soap;
wifi;
marmalade;
a wide variety  of cheese;
playing gamelan;
Seeing a doctor who speaks something other than Spanish.

Things not to look forward to -
the weather;
the Coalition government;
Jet lag;
English reserve;
The knife

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