11.40pm, Wednesday July 29, N's bed ....this too shall pass

I wanted this trip to clarify things and send me through some sort of fire and back out again burnished more beautifully, but this was not exactly what I had in mind. My work and revelations were supposed to revolve around issues of competence, independence. Instead I feel no more competent and no more independent, but my trials have revolved instead around men.

Today I received two very different emails. One from MS, who in response to my emotional farewell email sent back a couple of sentences with incomprehensible sentiments, as they appeared incomplete and clipped from his previous three-line email. The other was from A, responding to the birthday email I sent him, making it clear that he does not want to hear from me and has a lot of repgnance for who he thinks I am. Fair enough, I guess. He's been telling me for two years that he doesn't want me to bother him and, as usual, I needed him to hit me over the head to listen to him over my own desires.

So, at last, I close this 12-year chapter of my life, and I must admit that MS was a part of this closure. It let me know that it is possible for me to find another man whose generousity is genuine, whose smile is full of joy, and who my body likes too.

I have also learned not to play casually with boys because I cannot handle the end of the play. The feeling of being with M was addictive and I don't like living without it.

For someone who wants to be single, I sure spend a lot of time thinking about the guys who impacted upon me romantically. There's only four, but they are never too far from my thoughts. I think I need to stay single for along while - until I can put men in proper perspective.

D told me that she loved my smile. I think this is the best compliment anyone can receive and I believe this is the first time anyone has complimented my smile. Women - I should stick just with them.

8.00ish pm, Sunday July 26 ....full

I have just eaten too much dinner. It was so good and I wasn't feeling full, until now. D made whole wheat pasta with tomato, artichoke and black olives, while I breaded, herbed and fried eggplant slices.

D's family is lovely. L is the type of man Steinbeck writes about: sweet-natured, smart, competent, patient and great with children. B, the little one, is, like all one-year-olds, self-entertaining. He is squirmy and warm and quite a little dancer. True to form, I've bonded with the baby and the dog, a chocolate retriever with a big, warm, wet smelly tongue.

This morning we joined C and S for a trip to the Cave of the Mound, a large cave featuring the shiny plastic look of stalactites and stalagmites. Anice tour, but I don't find cave formations to be as beautiful or impressive as I should. I preder a forest, which is much more mundane. Maybe it is the unspectacular colours of the formations that don't do it for me.

Last night D and I again talked into the dark, though not so late as the previous couple of nights. After returning home from the caves and eating a lunch of fruit salads and vegie burgers we went to the Sow's Ear Cafe cum knitting shop, located in an imitation Victorian house. A lovely cafe, there was a string of skeletons wrapped in tiny shawls, one with a tiny knitted sock hanging from his foot. There were ladies knitting at long wood tables, armchairs in the window, coloured skeins of yarn hanging on the back wall and male staff, one young man sitting in the back of the shop, knitting. Out front were metal tables with rainbow umbrellas under which D and I sat to drink our coffees.

For dinner I bought a bottle of Penfold's Koonunga Hill Shiraz Cabernet, a not very expensive but quite lovely wine, all agreed.

?, Saturday July 25, D's basement ....babyless

The sun came back out today. D and I went to State Street to listen to a folk duo, and we ate lunch at a Nepalese/Indian/Tibetan restaurant. It wasn’t much like New York or Australian Nepalese/Tibetan food but was absolutely delicious. I had grilled marinated tofu with vegies, and rice with spinach. It sounds basic but the sauces were unidentifiably lovely. D's sister C and her boyfriend joined us at the restaurant. C's boyfriend was friendly and chatty and enjoyable to be with.

We all head off to a street fair where the three of us gals got a free iridology consultation. My eyes say that I have a strong constitution but, as a result, I take too much on and get stressed. This means I have to watch my vitamin levels, especially B. Also, I have liver issues and should watch the type of fats I eat or learn to regularly detoxify my liver.

We didn’t spend too much time at the fair. We wandered with microbrew in our hands and peered at the arts and goods in the stalls. People here in Madison look healthy, clean cut, normal.

D and her husband's dog Barley is down here with me, breathing heavily. His sleepy rhythmic breathing has been keeping us company, a relaxing soundtrack behind the chaos of children.

Yesterday D, her youngest son B, and I drove down to Willy Street and ate Laotian food. D had a mango curry and I had noodles and tofu with spicy sauce. I ate my first egg roll in many years (Chinese restaurants don't have them here in Australia) and enjoyed my meal thoroughly, though it was more Thai-like than Vietnamese-like. D was unable to sit down as B was in the mood for exploration. She chased him around the nearly empty restaurant, flipped him, threw him, twirled him. Lucky boy.

That evening D's husband, L, cooked us grilled mushrooms stuffed with gorgonzola, and I helped make garlic bread. I nursed a few glasses of Pymm’s and ginger ale. I had never drunk Pymm’s before and I love it – a refreshing, cool vegetabley flavour.

After dinner D and I went to see Moon at the Sundance theatre. The movie wasn’t as good as I had hoped. But then, I didn’t know what it was supposed to be about other than that it was a psychological space mystery. And I don’t find the subject of clones to be particularly interesting.

D and I have stayed up late in the nights having good, long heartfelt chats about our lives, personalities, confusions and desires. It is great being with her. Just because we spent formative years together does not mean we would get on now or be similar. And in many ways we are very different, yet we have a similar way of viewing ourselves in the world at a very basic level. Is that the NY suburbs? Mothers that were drawn to each other, though they were not close friends? Or something essential in us that drew us together even when we were 3?

We’ve grown up very differently, have made different choices, and yet here we are, vaguely dissatisfied, questing, questioning, and looking for more.

9.21pm, Thursday July 23, D’s kitchen ...the modesty of children

After playing a loud game of Operation (with electronic laughing, toilet flushing and nose blowing for current generations of kiddies), D asked her 5-year-old son if he wanted a bath or shower. He said to her, ‘A shower but she can’t watch me!’. I told him I had been planning on taking a bath WITH him.

Wednesday July 22, 3.00pm, Cleveland airport Terminal D Field Grill ….see you in another three years

I have left behind my family and am onwards to the little girl I grew up with in my formative years. It is a sort of 25-year reunion. I haven’t seen her since I was 8 years old.

Pennsylvania’s forested roots are obvious. Flying over the state you see carpets of green trees ocassionally broken by patterns of houses and then farms. There is more forest than town, as if the forest was mostly untameable. Pennsylvania changes into Ohio as the forest occasionally breaks into dense suburbs, first arranged like the cubes, squares and parallelograms of Andrei Bely's Ableukov in the novel Petersburg, each house on the end of a straight driveway, sticking out from the street. As the landscape becomes more urban, houses are crammed together in lines of squares and rectangles, not necessarily parallel or perpindicular to each other. The fields are replaced by neighbourhoods and in between the country towns of Pennsylvania and the urbanisation of Cleveland there are big stretches of farm.

Yesterday Mom, Aunt G and I went to Pittsburgh’s Strip District, where Italian, Asian and Middle Eastern supermarkets sell meats and cheeses, pastas and breads. There are restaurants and delis, grill bars and cafes. We ate in a Peruvian chicken place, where I had yucca chips, and rice and beans, and a bottle of blue corn juice chicha. We wandered around a craft gallery/shop exhibiting Latin American artists' takes on colonial impact. So there was a platinum-coated plantain hanging from a chain, animal caracases made out of used fabrics, and body suits constructed of canvas printed with photographs of skin and stitched together patchwork style – creepy and ugly.

My second pen just ran out, so enough for now.

Monday July 20, 11.00pm, Aunt G's bedroom

Today it poured with rain. Aunt G made me eggplant parmigiana and Uncle J absolutely creamed Dad at gin. Mom, Dad and I went to see Aunt L at the retirement home she lives in. We took her to Chipotle Mexican Grill (a chain) for lunch and to see Harry Potter and the Dark Prince. She wasn't too annoying, despite the reputation that precedes her, though by the end of the afternoon she had begun to stink of pee.

Mom didn't come to the movie with us and when it was time for us to all meet up again it was raining about as hard as it can rain. There was the briefest lull in which Mom decided to run across the street in her white blouse, with a plastic baggie over her head. She was an odd sight with the makeshift headgear and got soaked through anyway. We had to buy her a new shirt since Aunt L didn't want us to leave yet. Dad and I convinced her to buy a fitted scoop-necked shirt with stripes in beautiful shades of roses and blues. She looks great in it but probably won't ever wear it again because it fits her.

When we arrived home, Aunt G had not only made me macaroni with roasted tomato and chick-peas but also another eggplant parmagiana. This is because, last night, when I was not hungry exactly, but wanting to eat a few hours after a dinner of salad, pasta salad, string beans and bread. Mom and I were going to hard boil an egg and mix it with chickpeas and mustard, but Aunt G insisted on frying zucchini slices and onion. When my Italian aunts sautee vegetables it tastes much better than when I do, so the zucchini, chickpeas and egg tasted wonderful.

When I was pacing around in the kitchen trying to decide what it was I wanted to eat I kept saying what I really wanted was eggplant parmiagana. And, wallah, the next day, there it was. She doesn't take thank yous very gracefully.

9ish pm, Sunday 17 July, Aunt G's dining room ....being with family

You really recognise where you come from when you go to a family reunion. 34 people were expected for yesterday's gathering in Elwood City, Pennsylvania. This gathering, which I assumed was one of the normal summer gatherings that we used to have at Aunt L's house, turns out to have been organised in my honour - because I am so rarely in the country. This induced some guilt, but also an emotional swelling in realisation that a lot of family were coming out in part to see me. Or more that my Aunt G thought it the right thing to do, that the family gathers to see me. And sadness that the big family gatherings no longer bring the family hoardes back to the centre of the family tree, the reason why Aunt G does not regularly organised them any longer.

I don't think visiting the relatives was ever a fraught experience for me before, but in my adulthood, like so many things that are no longer unambiguous, its given me a lot to think about.

It is a family that loves nothing more than to eat and where most of the people over the age of 25 are chubby. Most of my young cousins, twenty-somethings, are quite attractive, and thin. It is probably only my parents who go on and on about dieting, but I feel more anxious about my weight and looks here with my family, am concerned more about being judged and found physically wanting. These are age-old issues for me but perhaps are compounded by the liberal sprinklings of criticism my family produces. Despite their overt tolerance, there is a lot of gossip, complaining and criticism going on in private conversation, which makes me a little uncomfortable. Probably because I am the same way - just narky about different things and different people than they are.

Also, compounding my insecurities is my singledom. I love being single, but in a family where everyone is married off with copious kids, I am afraid they think I am unwanted rather than single by choice. I don’t want my young cousins to think I’m too weird to find a man. They have all come with their boyfriends or babies. The more boyfriends and babies there are, the less I want to have anything to do with them and the less interested I am in talking to and getting to know my cousins. I was originally so excited to find out what these young people were up to. I have such fond memories of them as toddlers. But they showed little to no interest in me and I never overheard any conversation about work or studies or projects. I did hear about wedding plans and engagements. I do have one cousin who is also a traveller, travelling more roughly than I do, but she was not in the country.

So I am watching myself turn into a crusty old spinster - and worse, being proud of it. I have to accept that most people want to pair up and bear children and that this is mostly not a feminist issue and no one cares if I am different. Though also excited about seeing my old uncles and aunts again, by the evening of the reunion I was bored with the aimless chatter, at not having a really meaningful conversation with anyone except for my cousin with a history of alcoholism who can barely bear the fact that no one in the family likes her. My aunt, who organises, cooks and cares for everyone seems stressed and not like she's enjoying herself.

I find myself contrary here, arguing with my dad over our opposing degrees of respect for authority figures, when really we aren't so far apart in our views. It is just that I need to resist his conservatism. I'm not usually like this with him, though, at least I don't think so. Definitely not over the phone.

I am hungry here because idle and unengaged, and picking my split ends. On a more positive note, I had a good time with my sister after we had a long heart-to-heart last night. I admitted to insecurity over her body being so much better than mine. She admitted being envious that I am not as fearful of some sorts of things as she is. There is so much for me to overcome: self-emphasis on attractiveness, the need to accentuate my rebelliousness, a tendency towards the critical. And I know all this. Generally I feel I've made progress. Not so with my family – it was a regressive experience.

12.10pm, Friday July 16, ACKC Cocoa Bar ....gay men in tulip fields

Artfully Chocolate Kingsbury Confections is a large cafe cluttered with three-tier stands of chocolate and brightly-patterned artist-glazed round tables in addition to truffle and cafe bars. On one wall are mosaics for sale, depicting gay male romantic scenes – beach, shower, tulip field with rainbow.

I am eating a warm dark-chocolate gooey cake with dark chocolate sauce in the middle. Sending that email to MS must have been a good idea despite my doubts about its tenor. I feel much better this morning – like my old cheery self. A nice way to go to Pennsylvania and reunite myself with my extended family.

Last night J cooked us a dinner of avocado soup and a spiced carrot and coriander salad (it was supposed to be with parsely but I love coriander). It was very nice. After dinner we walked to the ACKC but it was closing, so we went to a local bar instead for a quick beer.

I am sorry I am not staying longer with J as it is lovely to be with her, despite her doubts about my armpit hair and hippy clothes.

afternoon, Thursday July 16, Museum of American History cafe ….subway debacle

I am eating a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and looking out at the Department of Commerce and the Environmental Protection Agency. I have been through the First Ladies exhibition to see some of the inaugural gowns of the presidents’ wives. It was a disappointing exhibit because a)most of the gowns aren’t there and b)the exhibition is laid out in such a way that the information about the women and their dresses were not in the same place, nor was anything organised in chronological order. I couldn’t get a good sense of the flow and relationship of fashion, history and women’s changing roles.

Lately I haven’t felt much like writing, other than heartfelt and unsent letters to MS. I am still in mourning for him and angry that I am so. I finally sent an email this morning expressing my disappointment. I needed to do something so I could move on.
I’ve been enjoying my time with my sister, N, and stayed with J last night. We had dinner with N and her feminist friend and the four of us argued over noodles at a Thai restaurant. I ordered spicy Thai soup but it wasn’t a laksa.

Afterwards, J and I headed to Gibson’s, her favourite bar. Gibson’s is modelled after a speakeasy, all dusky earth tones and only accepts a certain amount of people into the bar at one time. J gave her mobile number to the host at the bottom of the stairs and we hung out at the bar next store while we waited for our text message telling us there was space in Gibson’s for us. We drank old-fashioned cocktails and yabbered about boys. Then we went back to J’s apartment, which she has decorated herself in awesome fashion, and continued talking over wine. J’s bathroom is a good example of her design skills. She painted one wall in black and pink strikes, hung a black-and-pink art-deco-patterned shower curtain, put a pelvis (bones) on the wall and a Barbie on the toilet top.

Yesterday I went to a talk at the Library of Congress. An academic lectured on the lack of acknowledgement of women’s roles in decolonization history. It wasn’t a very interesting talk for me. Most of what was said wasn’t news.

More interesting (and distressing) was my intrusion into a total stranger’s life. It happened in the public transport system. On the way out of a subway station I stuck my ticket in the turnstile and it beeped at me. I didn’t know why it beeped at me but the guy behind me stuck his ticket in, the gates opened, and we walked through. A female security guard swooped on us immediately and began questioning us. Did we know each other? Why was he letting me get through on his ticket?

N and I explained that I was a tourist and didn’t understand what had happened. It happened so quickly, and I hadn’t realised my ticket didn’t have enough credit on it. The security officer let me go and pay for the ticket but she insisted on fining the guy who came through behind me. N and I waited for him to emerge from under the shadow of the vicious guard so that we could apologise, offer him money, at least give him N’s details so he could protest the ticket. But we never saw him emerge from the station and we eventually left, all flusteredly worked up and horrified.

I am now in the Library of Congress Jefferson Building. It is insanely beautiful, with tiled floor, collonaded balcony, stained-glass ceiling windows, and bright gold, yellow and deep blue frescoes along curving ceilings. The walls depict hazy sunny murals and famous quotes from literature.

This whole town is insane. The magnitude of its architecture beats Europe, I think. It is all so clean and sparkly and enormous and grand. No wonder the self-importance that goes on here. These government buildings were built to glorify the public servants that work in them. Unlike in Canberra, where public servants work in office buildings like the rest of us.

7.00pm, Friday July 10, bus to New York City ...liberty

I have now seen Philadelphia (I suppose I must have been there with school when I was a child, but I don’t remember...). At least I've seen the historic district: the Liberty Bell, much smaller than I'd imagined, Independence Hall, Ben Franklin's printing press, the cemetery where he is buried, a cream-coloured Anglican church with a beatiful organ. We arrived into Chinatown, but there was no time to see where Philadelphians actually live.

Back to Saturday night in Caracas... S and I finally left to go dancing around 2am. By that time I was ready to go home, I was so tired. But out we did go, into the wilds of safe and wealthy Caracas to find a regaton bar. We danced across from the bar, hugging a couple of chairs, with our $35 bolivar gin and tonics (!!). There was a small square dance floor in the front of the club, from which a girl who was with a few guys kept poking her head out to talk to S. After this happened a few times, S told me that the girl wanted S to dance with her group and did I mind. Of course not, I said. But the girl and one of her male companions got S onto one end of a sandwich, grinding away. It was very strange. S and I left pretty quickly after that, speculating on what that was all about.

Meanwhile, back in New York.... On Tuesday night, SW and I went to a Mets game. We had excellent seats three tiers above homebase. The Mets lost to the Dodgers 8 to 0. They kept getting out very quickly and only had four hits the entire game. They were only slightly better in the field than they were at bat. A lovely old usher explained to us that the Mets’s four best players were out with injuries and minor leaguers were replacing them. However, the next night the Mets beat the Dodgers, as SW and I noticed on the television playing in the hotel bar while we were sipping cocktails.

MS still hasn't emailed me back. It has been a week since I emailed him. I read an email from J today asking when I would decide to give up on MS and just remember our time together as a great experience. I'm getting there, but I’m not ready to let go yet and not sure what to do or how long to wait before I do it. Two weeks? In any case, reading the email from J tinged my day with sadness.

11.00pm, Thursday July 9, hotel room ....another long day

I walked and walked today. Good thing too, as I had Nathan's cheese fries for lunch and Indian food for dinner. SW and I slept in, had complimentary breakfasts at the hotel, and then made our way to Coney island on the F train.

SW wants to see dodgy New York and so far I have failed him. When I visited Coney Island in 2005 I found it a lower-class area: dirty, empty lots, black-sanded beach of Hispanic and Arab families. (This is my memory.) I loved it – it had character. Now the beach has normal-coloured sand, the sun-bathers are white people, and down the boardwalk a bit an enormous complex of luxury apartments has gone up. So, no real dodginess.

SW and I rode the WonderWheel. Its carriages slid down individual tracks as well as revolved slowly around so it looked like - and was - more fun than a normal ferris wheel and, of course, offered great views.

SW and I walked to one end of the very long boardwalk and head into the residential streets. We saw blocks of old brick Brooklyn houses, fronted by small flowering gardens. We ended up walking to the Sheepshead Bay station (I think; don’t quote me on that one). When I asked a few cops how to walk back to the Stillwell Avenue station (accessible) they told me it was too far to walk. But I've walked from there to here, I said. I don't think they believed me and directed me to a bus. We took the bus.

Our next stop was Prospect Park. We walked through the park to Grand Army Plaza, oohed and aahed over the sculpture there. I went in to the grand Brooklyn Public Library to pee and then we walked the gorgeous streets of Park Slope, with their rounded brownstones and elegant front stairways. Such a gorgeous part of town. You can imagine begowned 19th century ladies wafting out the front doors. After walking through some residential streets we walked down the main street of 7th Ave, where we decided to have an Indian dinner, sitting in the open front of the restaurant. The vegetable korma was lovely and the mushroom saag good too, though neither were spicy.

SW and I continued on our way to the Dekalb subway station and finally hit a more ordinary area - Flatbush Ave, a major thoroughfare in a black Brooklyn neighbourhood, all multi-laned road, ordinary city signage and meaty restaurants. Definitely not a beautiful area. SW used the internet in a hot convenience store in order to imbibe the local vibe, surrounded by black men.

10.00pm, Wednesday July 8th, hotel room ....getting exhausting

I really must finish recording the story of my last full day in Caracas. After leaving Louis the Ecuadorian on the heights of Avila, S and I drank beer, bought boutique chocolate and then head back into town to meet F. The three of us went to a very sophisticated hotel bar, decked out with hammocks and couches, big squares of creamy canvas sheets covering the ceiling, with low lighting and a greenish sea tinge. There were two levels of rooftop bar overlooking the city and it was this view for which S brought me there. The menu at the bar was very expensive (and it was my treat), so we ordered a pizza to share amongst us. It turned out to be delicious – covered with arugula, goat's cheese and olives. S had a glass of wine.

We parted ways with F after chilling ourselves looking out over Caracas. I bought a bottle of red to take to M's apartment, stuffed with other couchsurfers and many boxes. M was moving back to her parents’ house. I talked a bit to a lovely couchsurfer but he left and then I felt bored and quiet as all the gals joked around, putting moving boxes penned with faces on their heads and dancing and laughing. I didn't really get the joke.

As the evening wore on – remember, I had only a couple of hours of broken sleep on the bus the night before - M spilled a glass of wine on S's pants and we had to wait for the pants to go through a wash and dry cycle before we could head off clubbing in search of reggaton music. I was fading.

MS called me on S's cell phone that evening. It was a bit public, the other couchsurfers twigging that something had happened between us (M has met MS and the other girls had heard about him, I think). I was a little embarrased but stoked, of course, and I went into the bedroom to talk to him. I had trouble understanding him what with cell phone and accent, but I think he babbled on about staying at his friend's place and talking with his family. He said he had called to make sure I arrived in Caracas okay. He texted afterwards. And now I get one email in 10 days. It is a difficult adjustment.

Today SW and I went back to Bloomingdale's to revisit the Ralph Lauren turtleneck. We went to see Hope Davis, Marcia Gay Harden, Jeff Daniels and James Gandolfini in 'God of Carnage' on Broadway. We both enjoyed the play, though SW more than me. I found it funny and always enjoy narratives about how awful marriage is, but ultimately it was mainstream and offered nothing new. The acting was strong but not remarkable and Gay Harden, who won an Oscar, was, for me, a bit too forced. I felt like she was onstage, acting. The others were more natural and I liked Hope Davis best. What I liked about the play was that no one changed. The play had an emotional trajectory but it was one of slowly revealed depths of defensiveness, hostility and dislike that each character had held repressed, not one of resolution, not even revelation, only release. Also, the Gay Harden/Gandolfini couple should have been Jewish (only a Jewish mother and son would have the phone conversations that took place on stage) and Gandolfini is as Italian as they come. The ethnic dynamic may not have been written as between a Jewish and WASP couple (though Yasmina Reza, the playwright, is Jewish), but that is certainly how it seemed and it would have been better made explicitly so.

noonish?, Tuesday July 7, Carl Schurz park ....another beautiful day

Still I am blessed on this trip. The rainy season, late, hadn't arrived yet in Caracas while I was there, and in New York City it had been raining, raining up until I arrived. Oh, it has rained some: when we were on the pier with SA, once when I was walking to get SW, but it didn't last long and the summer heat ensured I dried off quickly. Mostly my vacation has been full of sun and in New York it is only warm, in the 80s. Utterly, utterly pleasant.

I love this park on the East Side. It has an octagonal-patterned walkway above the river, lots of grassy areas criss-crossed by paths, different levels of courtyard, garden and bridges. Now I sit on one of a curving line of benches overlooking the river near the uptown end of the park, all the benches to the right of me holding at least one person, all the benches to the left of me empty bar one. I can see two bridges, one a rust-coloured metal arch, the other held up by curving wire triangles. There are a couple of little cruising boats and the sound of a helicopter overhead.

Yesterday SW and I went to the Bloomingdale's on 57th and Lexington. He bought a punkish designer t-shirt, ogled an enormously expensive Ralph Lauren leather- sholdered black narrow turtleneck knit and failed to find shoes. Then we went to Queens, where I spent two and a half hours at Aunt K's apartment looking up buses and flights. I booked SW and I a trip to Philadelphia for Friday. We ate papusas - one filled with cheese and a Spanish herb, one filled with beans. We ate a corn tamale served with sour cream sauce. Everything was delicious. The papusas came with hot salsa and a bowl of cabbage, like coleslaw but without mayonnaise.

SW and I walked around Woodside for a half hour or so and then left to catch a gig at a jazz bar. Only SW must have gotten the dates wrong because the bands at the East Houston St venue were not jazzy. Nor were there many people there to see the bands. The walk across 4th St was not as beautiful as I remembered. Perhaps more tenenments have been lost. When I got to 10th street I couldn't remember which building was home to my old apartment and I saw a big rat in Tompkins Square Park.

I lamented the garbage in Venezuela but here there is not enough! I associate garbage with a crowded city of people, full of the lower, uncouth and/or rebellious classes. NYC's people now seem so controllable. Obeying rules, respecting each other. I think I want this, but it is very boring in New York. Why go there? Now I will tell people the only reason to come to Manhattan is because it is pretty. And to perve on cute boys.

10.00pm Monday July 6, Moonstruck Diner, 2nd and 58th ....lonely

It is lonelier sitting alone in a NY diner than anywhere else. I feel...single...rather than on my own. I have ordered an ice-cream float: diet Coke with strawberry ice-cream. This is a silvery narrow diner with a neon-blue fish tank in the back and iridescent water-blue glass-tiled tables.

It is time I write about my last Saturday in Caracas. S and I decided to take the cable car up El Avila, at the peak of which is a tourist station with a view of the sea and the city. It threatened to rain all day but the fog was not too bad and the views of the city travelling up the mountain were indeed spectacular: Caracas looks white and clean from a distance.

S took up talking with a cute Ecuadorian computer professional on the cable car and she invited him to spend the afternoon with us. We took him ice-skating - his first time - at the tiny indoor rink at the top of the mountain. Also at the mountain peak is a famous, very '70s, retro hotel and many neat and tidy kiosks, gleaming with stacked and ordered goods inside. It is little non-Venezuela up in the heights of Caracas. From a kiosk, Luis, the Ecuadorian, and I bought cachapas con queso and chichas. Louis had never had either before and he seemed to like the corn pancakes and rice drink as much as I do.

My ice-cream float has come. It looks beautiful - a thick glass of Coke with a scoop of ice-cream perched on top, shoved next to a squirt of whipped cream with a cherry on top.

Ice-skating was difficult for all of us in ill-fitting skates and attacking a very scraped rink, so 20 minutes was more than enough time for a round. Louis clung to the side of the rink, not really getting the hang of it until S told him to tighten his skates. One needs those ankles supported. I tried to show off my skating abilities but I my ankles kept turning out and I didn't skate very well.

I am reading Other Voices, Other Rooms. It is such a sad book, the world so different than today's - today's people, today's children, today's writers, today's books. This makes it hard for me to believe it.

But I should go. I haven't been sleeping so well.

5.00pmish, Sunday July 5, patio of Hotel Bentley ....sore feet

I have been walking all day and my feet are sore.

This morning, Dad came to the city and met SW and I at the hotel. We went to see Grand Central Station. Dad hasn't seen it since its 1990s renovations, its bright new constellated blue ceiling and shining marble floors.

We walked through a street fair on Lexington Avenue. SW bought sweet corn and Dad and SW bought Kashmiri woven rugs. There were two beautiful rugs with deep-coloured big flowers and butterflies which I loved, but I'm not in the market for a carpet right now.

Dad kept commenting on how clean the city is now. He loves it. I find it sterile - clean, well-behaved, orderly. I was thinking how no one seems to beep anymore (though coming from Canberra SW thinks they beep a lot). I noticed a 'don't beep, $350 fine' sign last night. The only chaos I have seen so far is in Times Square, still crowded with tourists ambling at a crawl. Barely chaotic.

Dad left to go back home around 1.30pm and I got falafel in a gyro pita and bought a $9 bra at Strawberry's for my 'new' (op-shop) shirts that I bought with Mom. Both will look much better with my boobs lifted. I like NY's falafel balls better than Australia's, and the bread, but Australia's falafel-sellers add better fillings, tabouli and hummus included. The falafel was $6.

Now SW and I are resting. There is a movie theatre a block or two up the street, so maybe we will go to the movies tonight. I bought a roll, tomato and avocado for dinner in the hopes that I can revert to my light South America eating.

12.30am, Sunday July 5, Bentley Hotel ....firework extravaganza

I have returned to SW's fancy hotel room with him. The room has one full wall of window that stretches around the corner of the room with a view of the East River. Nice room, but shit location. No subways on the far east side.

SW, Dad and I tried to see a show together, but Hair wasn't in an accessible theatre, God of Carnage only had non-accessible seats available, Waiting for Godot wasn't offering discounted tickets, and The Fantastiks (back in production! Yay!!!) is in a theatre a walk up a steep flight of stairs. We decided to go to the Frick, Dad's favourite museum, instead. It was closed for the July 4th holiday.

To the Met, then. I forgot how many really famous paintings are at the Metropolitan Museum of Art: Monets, Degas', Reniors, Picassos, Seuratts, beautiful, beautiful van Goghs, Gaugins, Klimts. The best of the best. They should probably all be in France.

We walked through Near-Eastern, Pacific and South American art galleries, then to the Arms and Armor collection, SW's desire. We were all impressed at the intensely intricate work on the armour, swords and guns. Beautiful works of art as well as weapons.

armor at the Met

We walked downtown towards the evening's fireworks celebration and had trouble finding places to eat on Broadway and West End. I remember that about the Lincoln Centre area. We ended up at a fancy Chinese place. SW and I shared unspicy Szechuan eggplant and crispy bean curd sheet ('duck') wrapped in tortillas. Both dishes were nice but a bit expensive and skimpy on the portions.

After dinner, Dad, SW and I walked to 57th Street, followed the Fourth of July crowd, and ended up on a bridge in a barricaded square to wait for the fireworks while the sun set. After 9.00pm far away fireworks began to puncture the dark and there was a general fear that these were the city fireworks display and we had all picked the wrong spot to watch. But at long last the Manhattan display began, five simultaneous locations along the river. A nice show - blooming flowers dying in the sky, dandelion puffs dispersing, cube and planet and kiss shapes slowly blowing apart.

July 4th fireworks

When it was all over, thousands of people left, taking their garbage with them. How un-New York. I was disappointed in this display of respect and obedience.

Afterwards Dad went to the subway and SW and I found a bar at fancy hotel on 54th Street. I had a $12 glass of reisling and gorged on the complimentary nuts, wasabi peanuts and pretzels. It was a small dark masculine bar, muted, with big leather chairs and a King Cole mural behind the bar and no background music.

night, Wednesday July 1, Queens ....pizza

Dad arrived in the city this evening. We ate delicious Korean food. New York is still so cheap. Mom and I saw organic peaches for $2.45 per kilo. A bottle Dr Pepper was only $1.25, a hot pretzel $2.00, and a slice of cheese pizza is $2.50.

At the Korean restaurant Dad and I were brought cold omelette slices with a selection of pickle. We ordered grilled dumplings - delicious - and I had a cold noodle dish, refreshing, with a peanuty or sesame flavour towards the bottom. Dad ordered meat. So much food for $20.00!! The waitress, however, spilled kimchi all over my brand new skirt and I doubt it will come out. Poor girl, she was so apologetic.

SW, Australian, arrived in NYC and had his first slice of NY pizza downtown near the World Trade Centre site. He really like it. He said he didn't much like Australian pizza but this he liked and agreed it is very different. I, of course, also thoroughly enjoyed my pizza slice, something I dream about, along with hot pretzels and Mexican food, in Australia on an occasionally regular basis.

L (high-school best friend), J (her husband), A (her cousin, also with us at White Plains High), SW, and I wandered around South Street Seaport, stopping for micro-brew beer at the Heartland Brewery. L is very pregnant. She and J are in the process of buying a house and their baby boy is due on the 12th of August.

Last night I had an email from MS finally. It was only short, a couple of lines, but I felt such relief hearing from him. He wrote that he was bored without me.

?, Wednesday July 1, Veniero's cafe ....I live in hope

Every time I am in New York I come to Veniero's in the hope that Eva, a lovely Polish woman who married and was divorced by my cousin, still works here, though I wouldn't wish anyone to have been waitressing for more than 10 years. But, of course, no Eva.

I have spent the afternoon with W, which is always fun. We ate at Caliente Cab and I had a mixed plate with a vegie burrito and a bean tostada, a side of rice and refried beans. Ahh, Mexican like I remember it!

It has been strange to be here, in New York, with my mother, surrounded by New York accents. After South America, New York is all of the sudden not so exciting. Comparatively there is hardly anyone around. The familiarity of it is strange: that I know which subways to catch and where certain shops and cafes are and I don't live here, haven't been here since 2005. Despite my lack of awe for the city, wandering around the West Village is beautiful - 12th and 11th streets, especially the residential bits with their graceful brick or painted walk-ups and lines of trees and tiny corner parks: lovely.

On Friday, our last day together, MS and I browsed one of the Fundacion Librarias bookshops. MS bought two books, one called 'Happy Travels, No Smoking' ('Feliz Viaje, No Fumar'). We wandered around the ethnological museum and ate Middle Eastern food.

The government bookshops sell a series of black hardcover numbered books of Latin American classic literature and non-fiction. There are more than 200 volumes. The Puerto Ayacucho shop also sold expensive locally made art and jewelry in plastic display cases and housed a spray of book piles and boxes that a girl was sorting through.

The ethnological museum contained a collection of artefacts from several Amazonian tribes, including the Piaroa, which is the tribe Tito, our Amazon guide, is from. I saw beautiful woven baskets, hunting and fishing weapons, models of long- and round- houses, historical photographs. MS read to me about the differences amongst the tribes, such as being more nomadic or more agricultural.

I was curious to try falafel in Venezuela so I appreciated that MS remembered where the shwarma joint we passed was. The only diners in the restaurant, we chatted with the proprietor, who was surprised to learn that there is Arab food in Australia. I asked where he got his tahini from, since I had to make tahiniless humus on Margarita. He gets it from Caracas, where it is imported from Syria.

Watermelon juice goes well with falafel.

The food did have a slightly different flavour than Australian Middle-Eastern food. The dips (humus and babaganoush) had a similar unidentifiably different flavour and the falafel had a beautiful melt-in-your mouth fried-crispy crust but was not spicy and was a corianderless pure beige colour.

MS and I ate a lot (a falafel platter and mixed plate with chicken, beef and dips) and both thoroughly enjoyed it.

Getting back to S's on Saturday morning was a bit of a drama despite my happiness at arriving 'home' to her and her family. I arrived at S's apartment thanks to an expensive cab ride from the Lavandera bus station around 8.00am. I hadn't been able to call her, as the previous evening her mobile phone kept telling me there was no service and then I had no credit. I had hoped just knocking on her door would be sufficient to get someone to open up, but no luck. I left a note under the door saying I was here, the phone wasn't working, and I'd go look for a place to call her.

I walked down the 18 flights of stairs and made my way to the communications centre, which was roundly closed on a Saturday morning. I walked back to S's building, eyeing the fresh-white-cheese seller at the entrance to the complex. In the lobby I looked for a powerpoint to charge the phone and, lo and behold, I found one.

Without MS I am distracted and mentally restless. I emailed him on Monday but have not heard back. I hate this, this inevitable waiting and guessing despite the fact that he doesn't owe me an immediate reply, especially when he doesn't have internet access at home. Yet I want him to have stopped by the internet place after work on Tuesday in order to be in touch with me. Boys just take my life out of equilibrium - I don't like it. I can't just shut off the swell of excitement I feel. I think and think about MS.

9.30pmish, June 28, on plane at Miami airport

US security is stupid.

Caracas airport was crowded. I waited in the wrong line for a long, long time because it was so crowded I couldn't tell where the line was going and there were no airline staff members directing people to the correct desks. I did ask a woman in the line which airline she thought the line was for, and she also believed it was for the American Airlines check-in. She must have figured out earlier that this line was indeed not the AA check-in line because she and her family shuffled off the line at some point considerably earlier than I did. Luckily when I finally did see my line curving around into a separate entrance for a South American airline and went off to seek the AA line, I found it next door and not crowded. Still, when I arrived at the check-in counter there was a problem with my ticket. The attendant consulted her fellow colleagues, got on the phone and consulted someone on the other end, waited, wandered, and finally resolved the issue, whatever it was, as I stood nervously waiting, divided from her by a big white counter.

American Airlines puts you through security at its own gate after you've been through the airport's security process. Then you and your personal items must be scanned again at the US transfer point, because in the transfer and immigration corridors and halls and during the chaperoned bus ride there is opportunity to mingle with unsecurity-checked people likely to pass on bomb-making plastics at every turn. At the transfer point, everyone had to take their shoes off and plonk them on the conveyor belt.

Getting somewhere is a long idle process of waiting, so it is good to travel for a long time.

It is strange to be surrounded by American accents. I felt like crying in the airport - I didn't want my South American holiday to end.

After our walk in the Amazon, MS and I once again lowered ourselves into the shallow water of the river, in a pool a little sheltered from the main river. After this brief cool-off we, our fellow-travellers, and our guides, climbed back in the boat for our four-hour journey return to Puerto Ayacucho. We were served heaping plates of spaghetti for lunch on the boat, hold the ground beef for mine. I was stuffed from the big breakfast. Nevertheless I asked if there was leftover chocolate cake.

The journey back was calm and uneventful, except for a bit of rain. We were picked up by our tour agent and in the jeep we told him that we were unable to do the tepui walk. After everyone else had cleared out of the office, MS talked to the agent about our disappointment in not going on the walk, which was the very point of the excursion. As MS went on and on the poor agent looked increasingly like he was ready to cry. Not that he offered us any money back, mind.

I couldn't even speak - when MS looked to me for agreement I simply said, 'En Espanol mi silencio', which is not a grammatically correct sentence. I felt bad for the guy, though, and wished him a good weekend as we left. MS and I had talked about asking for $500 bolivars each back, but in the end MS couldn't actually ask for this anymore than I would have been able to. Andreas had been more sanguine. When I asked him if he was going to ask for money back he said no - he got a walk in the Amazon and Tito found us things to do and this kind of thing happens in Venezuela a lot anyway and Venezuelans don't take criticism well. MS agreed that Germans don't ever complain but that Venezuelans certainly do.

I am thinking of my mother and the face-wide smile she will have when she sees me. It's lovely. And reminds me of all the people who love me so much and I feel so lucky. Lucky to be and have been so well loved, not just as a daughter, but as a friend, a lover, a person. Bless my life.

?, airplane, ....the young Amazon

We are beginning our descent into Miami. I have been trying to sleep as I had only around five hours of sleep last night and a few hours the night before that. I am on an older plane - public screens for the movie, a place on the armrests where ashtrays used to go.

On early Friday morning in the Amazon, I woke MS up so I could crawl into his hammock. I had only slept a little because, again, I was cold. I rolled myself into MS's hammock, accompanied by another fit of giggling, and cuddled with him, trying to locate a suitable position for the arm crushed underneath my body. I failed in this task and only stayed with him long enough to get warm. I was up early again, with Sylvano, hanging out for the coffee to be ready.

That morning I finally walked in the Amazon forest. A white-shirted, bare-footed Indian guide (from the Piaroa tribe) with a big knife led us through the narrow-trunked trees, wet brown leaves, tall palms and wiry saplings. He kept twirling a stick into holes, only once rewarded with a procession of large 24-hour ants, which the boys laboriously photographed while I watched huge, white-tipped mosquitoes circle around us hungrily, and withdrew my arms into my clothes.

Though the knife-weilding was impressive, slicing neatly through beautiful palm stalks and other green flourishing things, the forest was not particularly dense. Why couldn't MS and I find a way in yesterday?

So my four-hour tepui walk became a one hour in and out forest tromp. I suppose I can at least say I went where probably few tourists have gone before. I was surprised by the apparent youth of much of the forest, of narrow smooth trunks and new palms. Only a few trees looked old, with lush, thick, marked trunks.

It is funny how one reacts to the accomplishment of one's dreams. I was thrilled to be in the Amazon. But it wasn't unadulterated pleasure. My second analysing self was still there, monitoring my reactions, worried that I wasn't paying appropriate attention or savouring each and every moment.

I thought about how the forest wasn't as grand as the tree fern forest of the Dandenongs or silly like the Australian scribbly gums or playful like the symbiotics that wrap their roots wildly around obliging trees. There were no crazy exposed wall-like roots to clamber around or loads of mossy, fungally ground cover. The Amazon was simply wet and green and quiet in its spindly dignity.

the not-so-mighty Amazon

3.00pmish, Sunday June 28, AA airplane ....to the US

My South American adventure is over. I had a great last day with S, who said she would miss me. Last night MS rang me on her mobile and chattered at me for 20 minutes or so. I think I understood about three quarters of what he said - I hate mobile phones. It was so nice to hear him speak, his cheery sentence structure and distinctive voice. I had already been missing it. He followed up with a message to S's phone telling me not to miss him too much - we would see each other soon. I think that's what it said - S took the phone away from me too fast. I love that he called and texted. I love that he doesn't hold back those impulses. It is lovely to be that well-regarded.

I must finish the tales of the last days of my Venezuelan adventure. Take your mind back to the Amazon, a group of four disappointed excursionistas wondering what exactly our guides had in store for us.

When MS and I arrived back at the river from our failed attempt to weave a path through the forest, we found Tito and the boatman beaming over beautiful huge fish they had caught. MS took photos but it pained me to see such beautiful creatures dead, one huge fat fish gutted by a spear.

MS and I played in the water for a bit, me finally ditching my bra and shorts for my swimsuit. Dinner that evening was platanos, avocado, rice and a salad with tomato and cucumber. We were provided with a bottle of red wine this time and for dessert a chocolate cake with chocolate frosting to celebrate...something. I can't remember what. A birthday? A holiday? Silence reigned while we were eating, but I talked for a couple of hours with Andreas, about Germany and its social democracy, lazy Berliners.

In the evening, MS and I decided to experiment sleeping together in a hammock, partly because we were both so cold the night before. I got into the hammock first and when MS rolled in, me trying to move to one side of the hammock, I burst into a hysterical laughing fit. I couldn't move and it was all so awkward and immobilising. It has been a long time since I laughed like that. Us trying to get comfortable in a hammock was hilarious. Finally I found myself with my head on MS's chest and our legs tangled together and I actually slept for a while. But when I woke up I shifted a bit and suddenly felt suffocated, like I couldn't breathe properly. I allowed a slightly panicky feeling to overtake me and finally told MS that I was uncomfortable and suggested we sleep in different hammocks.

Back here on the plane, we are stuck on the runway waiting for paperwork to be completed because one of the fuel tanks isn't working. This is not a problem for flying, the captain assured us, but the plane still needs dispatch permission to fly with one out-of-order fuel tank. The captain spoke to us again to explain further that the legal requirement of 12 fuel tanks is excessive to the practical requirement of only eight working tanks for the plane to fly, and even if they suddenly broke, gravity would come to our rescue. The problem of the busted fuel tank is thus a problem only for the maintenance men. If this was a problem, the captain said, he certainly wouldn't be flying because of all the billions of lives on the planet his is the most important one.

5.00am, Sat June 27, bus, ...my life as romance movie

I am in Maracay. The bus stopped and I transferred to a new bus. Almost too late. I didn't really know what was going on, but the bus driver figured out I wasn't meant to be on the bus.

The last blog trailed off because MS got me. After getting off the bus at the darkened rest stop, I peed and had a meander, peered at a black body of water and got bored. I got back on the bus. Soon I heard knocking at the curtained window. I peered out but didn't see anyone. I couldn't think why someone would be knocking at the window. I heard it again, looked again, saw nothing...and then I got it. The tall, thin figure walking away from the bus was MS. His bus, too, had stopped here. His bus left a half an hour after mine did, and here I have been at this rest stop for half an hour. I gathered together my things and ran to the door that separated the passenger area from the driver's booth. It was locked.

I am passing a lake with the hues of sunrise. Now back into green farmland. On this new bus, on the top level, I passed through a beautifully green, treed lush town, with single houses set back on grassy hills, curving gentle stone stairways leading up to them. In the half light it looked like the nicest town I've seen in Venezuela. Simple concrete houses, but fewer walls and gates and better upkept. Rolling jungly hills with the sparkle-lights of habitation. I have also passed a shantytown; a settlement of standard rectangular houses row after row in a field; and an industrial area. I suspect I am now on the outskirts of Caracas, industrial with farmland and a view of the hills in the distance.

Last night, confronted by the locked white door, I knocked and knocked to no avail. I went back to my window in the fourth row, back to the door, pounded on the closest window to the door, and finally gave up. I started to write and saw MS pass by my window. I knocked on the glass, scaring the girl in front of me, but he didn't hear. Then, suddenly, the bus started moving. I couldn't figure out what was going on as only a few of the passengers were on the bus. I am puzzling over this mystery, pen still poised over paper, when I feel a touch on my arm and there is MS, between me and the door, grabbing my hand as I gathered my things again. I was full of joy.

MS led me off the bus and said we were crossing a river and took me to a bench on the barge that was slowly carrying both of our buses and trucks and cars across the river. He had no idea where we were either, but thankful for small favours we kissed and kissed and I was party to another one of those killer smiles. I am so glad he persisted in getting me off that bus.

In fact, we kissed for too long and we had to run to catch his bus, mine having already left the barge. We took running jumps onto his bus, which had already started moving off, and waited till we caught up with my bus. I wasn't sure what exactly was going on (and was half hoping I'd have no choice but to end up in Valencia with MS) and wanted to keep touching MS but suddenly I had to rush off the bus to face mine, boarding sheepishly.

5.45pm, Sunday June 26, bus ....over

I have just gotten settled on the bus to Caracas for my 12-hour ride. MS and I kissed goodbye many times. He still smiles at me. I talked of coming back, we talked of meeting in Italy, but I wonder what shall happen. Do we meet again or does our month stand alone as something out of a book someone else was writing? It is difficult to imagine emailing MS, but I look forward to reading his writing (he has a blog where he posts his creative writing).

Last night wasn't great. I was sad because MS wouldn't dance with me and I wasn't over it in the morning. I was sulky. I wanted so much not to be sulky but I couldn't talk myself out of it. I blame it on hormones. I did find my goodwill this afternoon after MS asked me what was wrong. Thankfully - MS and I could leave each other on a good note.

MS has just appeared on the bus for more kisses. He looks beautiful when he smiles and everything about him loosens up and his eyes crinkle.

The sunset through the darkened bus window is also beautiful. Grey cloud a few shades bluer than the sky, glowing white clouds, flat and spread, a holy white glow and beachy peach glow highlighting the darkness of the dark clouds. The sky has been such a welcome co-traveller with me.

They don't believe in reading lights on buses in Venezuela. It is already getting too dark to write and there is much to report. I shall have to wait till sunrise. Viewing the mountains, wandering amongst the rocks searching for passable rainforest, bush-whacking with a barefoot Indian, rice, plantains, avocado and red wine for dinner. Today's falafel...

[About an hour later...]

The light is on. The bus has stopped after only an hour of travelling. We are somewhere with bain marias, fridges and hawkers, a place I saw only fleetingly as the power went out just as I stepped off the bus. I feel like I am in a romantic comedy...

early in the morning, Thursday June 25 ....a disappointment

Yesterday was a disappointing day. The point of this excursion is to walk up a tepui, a four-hour trek through the rainforest. However, there was no small boat waiting at a village to take us to the beginning of the trail down a narrow canal, so we couldn't go. We took the tin-roofed boat into the small channel, a beautiful ride where tree branches scraped the boat and it had to be steered between the lush banks of the forest, but a tree branch crossed our path, ending the journey. We stuck a tree branch in the water to see how deep it was and it was considerably deeper than person-high. That ended our chance to climb the tepui.

felled by a tree

Instead, our guide, Tito, took us to another spot down another canal. Our route to shore was perilous, our feet balancing on underwater tree branches to keep us only knee-high immersed in the river. Or not balancing. I failed to negotiate the tree branches and fell in. It was funny but I kept myself from laughing because I was in no mood for hilarity. I was sour about not going on a 4-hour Amazon walk (the boys were more philosophical than I). I had eaten a huge breakfast - two cheese-stuffed arepas and eggs - and then a big lunch of potato salad and a cheese sandwich. I was stuffed and needed to walk!

But now today's breakfast is about to be served. It is cloudy, drizzly-droppy, the mountains disappeared behind clouds. My clothes are still wet from my accidental river dip, which by the way, was only the first to occur. On the way back to the boat Sylvano, then MS, both lost their balance. Only Andreas and our guide survived.

Having fallen into the water and clambered up hills of volcanic rock strewn with the occasional flowers and low vegetation, I get a good view of the tepuis. This is what we get instead of climbing one. It IS a beautiful view, just not a walk through the Amazon.

I am still surprised at all the rock in the Amazon. However, I am not unhappy to be wet on this hot, sunny day.

After everyone has shot their photos we go back to the boat and this is when Sylvano slips in front me and the MS behind me, though I don't see him because I have just walked right on into the water. Easier that way.

a view, my wet socks and volcanic rock

So we power back to a new camp near a small waterfall - more like light rapids - right in the middle of the river with a current that disallows us to actually swim in it. We are safe only near the bank, more pocked rock. Andreas jumps right into the water for a swim, venturing futher than the bank while holding onto a life preserver, but MS and I decide to go find rainforest to walk through. I don't really know what is going on as our guide, Tito, isn't forthcoming with information, even in Spanish.

MS and I clambered over rock and crouched through fern thicket. We skirted alongside the forest but had trouble finding a way in. Either the trees seemed impenetrable or the earth was swampy. We finally gave up looking for a route through the forest. I am sporting the very sexy mosquito-chic look. My legs are generously dotted with little red welts. Everyone is very impressed.

7.09am, Wednesday May 24, the Amazon ....sleepless night

Yellow and white butterflies flirted with our bongo (the native name for our boat), keeping pace with us, and a bright orange narrow-winged butterfly almost came inside. It may not be orchid season but there were trees with bright purple flowers and occasionally I spotted a red bromeliad. The trees were reflected perfectly in the water and palms rose one or two metres above the canopy.

Dinner this evening was rice, a salad with mayonnaise, two slices of cheese, and papaya. Best, our guides brought a bottle of white wine for us. I talked for a long time with Andreas, who told me about his experiences working in a hospital in Merida and about socialism in Germany. He says 'West' Germany always feels it has to prove that capitalism takes care of people so it has a good social network. The unemployed are paid, new mothers get three years off on 70% pay and must be taken back (hence women have a hard time getting contracts) and no one works in Berlin. Berlin is therefore cheap, home to artists and bohemians and provides two of everything: opera houses, national theatres, etc. The government, however, monitors people - their phone and internet usage for instance - and even arrested an academic researching leftist terrorist gangs that destroy rich people's property. But there are no guns.

In Venezuela, there are guns. Andreas says he's never seen anyting like the Merida emergency room. He says the government orders new equipment for the public hospitals but the doctors steal it for their private clinics and make their patients pay. He also provided a different story of the two-year medical degrees than the cynical J did. Andreas said people with this qualification are being sent to Indian villages and are better than no doctor at all, especially when much of the medical needs are simple, such as inoculations and nutrition advice. They are not undertaking surgery, Andreas said.

On the other hand, he spoke of being sent to interview people when he first arrived in Venezuela and spoke no Spanish. He was part of a research team that he had not much regard for and the researchers wanted him to hurry up. He thinks this is a crazy country, and violent. He doesn't get it. He mentioned little things like he can't figure out when 'let's meet at two' actually means let's meet at two. Only once in a while does it seem to mean this.

Last night I saw maybe half of the stars of the night sky - as compared to the one percent of stars I usually see. It was beautiful and amazing. I couldn't find Orion but I did find the Southern Cross. I told MS that the stars rivalled him for my attention. He, laughing, told me I say things no one else does. In his arms I watched shooting stars.

I didn't sleep much at all last night, though I know I did a little because I dreamed of a long-haired, thick-spectacled hunk of a man crawling into my hammock. One of its ropes split and I was guilty about breaking the hammock. I was too cold to sleep. In the boat, when I want to be watching the forest, I am so relaxed I fall asleep sitting up, but in the hammock, in the early hours of the morning, I am too tense to sleep, even though I want to more than anything.

This camp is even more rustic than in Canaima. No blankets or pillows, no electricity, a toilet in a grass hut that I don't know how to make flush, several sand-bottomed palm-roofed huts.



our camp

6.30ishpm, Tuesday May 23, Amazon camp .... in the jungle

I am sitting on a broken cane-weave chair overlooking the Siapa River, an island of trees directly in front of me, a cloudy sky going a washed-out watery light blue and tinging a black cloud orangey-pink above me.


writing at sunset


Andreas, one of our two travelling mates, just brought me an enormous green wrinkly twisted seed pod filled with big yellow seeds embedded in a white moist fluff that looks like bread. The seeds taste like heaven, sweet and flowery.

My three fellow travellers and I and our two guides took a four- hour boat ride to get here, with another hour dedicated to playing in a waterfall.


off to play in the falls of the Orinoco

Andreas is a malaria researcher on exchange in Merida from Germany for his medical degree. Our other companion is an Italian photographer who does not speak much English. Both are handsome, Andreas with bright shiny dark brown eyes, the photographer with a gentle demeanor and full head of grey hair.

The four of us left this morning from Puerto Ayacucho in a Jeep, with the tour booker, a colleague of his and our native guide. We stopped to clamber up a rock mound and look over the forest and then continued to the port, a parking lot town in a military zone. On the way we passed little towns and missions, with houses of mud brick, painted concrete, or thatch, with tin or palm-thatched rooves. The concrete houses resemble Australia's public toilets, with their multi-square ventilation grates in place of windows. MS explained that missions are literally on a mission. It is not necessarily to produce something, but could be to house women or children or achieve 100% literacy. In return for the mission, residents get medical care.

On our river journey down the Orinoco and Sipapo rivers we passed many cleared spaces and a few native villages - hardly the heart of the Amazon.

It is almost perfect here, in this cleared jungle space with the light sounds of bugs and frogs and other chirping, whistling things, the gently rippling water reflecting the trees and the sky, the mud brick and leaf-weave round huts of the camp, a lagoon down a path from which emerge the trees of the forest, one masquerading as a telephone pole right in the centre of my view. I saw a tiny green snake rear up its body and a pineapple growing. I've never seen a pineapple growing before - so cute, emerging in the centre of a sprig of ground palm.


cute, cute, cute

The only things marring the scene are the occasional sounds of boat motors and the mosquitoes and bugs, but they aren't too bad yet. Now I can smell dinner cooking.

Just before arriving at the camp we stopped at a native village to get supplies. Hot and dusty, five little children graced us with their picturesque presence. An older little girl in a sundress held two younger children with each hand and a little boy in underwear and a blue and yellow beanie ran ahead, smiling back at us flirtatiously.

Ah-Ah-ah-ah-Uh-uh-oh-Ah, as Tarzan so eloquently says. I am in the Amazon! I wonder how many people dream of travelling the Orinoco because of Enya?

The Orinoco and Sipapo rivers are considerably wider than the river in Canaima and the forest different, as promised, but also a bit flooded from rain. There are hills and the occasional tepui in the distance - one of which we are going to hike tomorrow - but it is not as green and mountainous as Canaima, no forested walls in front of us. Beautiful, with the expected occasional stand of palms and spurt of ferns in the tall long trees and clinging vines.