What's Your Favourite Holiday Memory ?

Tex and I have had some truly memorable holidays over the past few years, having been fortunate enough to travel variously to France, mainland USA, India, Hawaii, South Africa, Indonesia and Fiji but none has been more enjoyable - or demanding - as our 2007 trip to South America where, amongst other things, we trekked the Inca Trail to Machu Picchu. We do a lot of bushwalking in the Blue Mountains around our home, but this trek was incredibly taxing, not only because it was undertaken at high altitude, but the track was rocky and uneven and consistently steep :) But, the view at sunrise after three really difficult days trekking was a sight that will take some matching:





We have a sponsor child (named Junior) in Cusco, Peru so took the opportunity to visit him and his family during this trip as well. A highlight of this part of the trip was surprising Junior and his classmates at his school.



At this stage, Junior goes to school in the local village, but next year when he starts high school, he will have to walk two hours there and two hours back - then he'll have to help his dad on their farm when he gets home in the afternoon.



Watching talented Peruvian women dye, spin and weave alpaca wool into amazing, brightly coloured garmants, in a small village outside Cusco, was another highlight :)



Our trip was completed with a few days charging down the Amazon River, and staying in an eco-hut in the middle of the rainforest, with monkeys, macaws, cayman and tarantulas screeching, creeping and crawling all around us ! There was no electricity and lots of scary moments for this arachnophobic - but we did manage to catch a pirahna (even though it was only a few inches long - check out the teeth though :)



We are currently planning our holiday to Ireland in May this year, so that may eventually top my list. But for now, our adventures in Peru have given me my favourite holiday memories :)

Unadulterated Greed

I hate Christmas. For starters, it is probably the most stressful time of year for me, for there is always the tension between the expectations of my parents and siblings "you've got to "do" Christmas, otherwise you are depriving your son of all things magical" and what I want to do (laze around a pool reading a book, relaxing and forget all about family expectations). Then there are my expectations (that this year will be different and family will all spend a bitch/whinge/snipe-free happy state of being) which are inevitably never met. But, worse of all there is the relentless, unadulterated, grasping, greedy commercialism that seems to start earlier and earlier every year. For fuck's sake, the tinsel and trees appeared in the shops just moments after the freaking Easter eggs had been taken off the shelves. AND, I hate the glossy, tree-destroying catalogues which appear in my letterbox months before, enticing people to spend, spend, SPEND and get themselves into debt, debt, DEBT. Because as we surely know, the degree to which we love someone is directly proportional to the amount of money we spend on their Christmas gift/s.

At work right now, I am surrounded by people who are rapidly working themselves into a frenzy with all the shopping, wrapping, posting, spending - putting everything on credit and buying things they cannot afford for people they don't really care for, because "that's what you do at Christmas". They will then spend the next month standing in queues returning gifts they don't want/don't like/don't need/don't work and a further 6months in a post Christmas funk, trying to pay off the credit card bill.

Tex and I recently went to Peru to visit our sponsor child. He and his family live in what most westerners would describe as abject poverty, but they are happy. Our sponsor child walks over 2 hours to school and back each day, then helps his father on the farm the rest of the time. We took him a soccer ball and pump and a T-shirt with an Australian flag on it and you would have thought we had given him a million dollars. He and his family have a rudimentary roof over their heads, basic food to eat and as much love and affection for each other as I have seen anywhere.

Most people would feel sorry for them - but as I look around my workplace and see unhappy, harried faces, I know who I feel more sorry for.