PS from Bolivia, 28/04/08

Well, I´m back after all... Good job I didn´t get up at the crack of dawn this morning because my flight to La Paz is 2 hours late. As it happens, I chose to ignore some people´s advice to leave at "7am tops" because I fancied a decent breakfast, and a proper goodbye with my favourite cat... I felt that a 8.15am departure would suffice. It did, phew.

It did take 4 hours to get to Cochabamba and we did come across a fair amount of trucks on the windy roads but managed to overtake all of them safely. There was no blocked roads nor landslides (THANK GOD. I was worried as it poured down again last night... the sound of the rain woke me up and that´s with my ear plugs, so, say no more !). I still arrived at the airport with one hour to spare before check-in. It gave me time to check my emails and to have a decent meal as a little treat. I am still on holiday after all... even if the long way back home has officially started. 2 days to go I can put the key in my front door...

The scenery from Villa Tunari to Cochabamba was spectacular. I enjoyed it even more second time round. Bolivia is really a very scenic country, it´s such a shame it has a bad reputation for thefts and all... I must say that all the locals that I have met have been really really nice. I just wish I could have chatted to them a lot better than in my broken Spanish. They all wanted to come back, bring papa and mama over (who would have loved my hotel for the beautiful peaceful grounds AND for the cuddly cat --- my mother adores cats, I guess I take after her except that I upgraded to the bigger models). The first 2 hours of the journey were totally lush, green mountains as far as the eye could see, valleys and peaks and rivers in between, or waterfalls... and hundreds of different plants, just from the road side. The variety and incredible richness of rainforests never cease to blow me away. I can never quite get used to it... I have seen more rainforests than I can remember but I still find them totally amazing. Then the scenery changed to more barren hills, more gentle hills too, with lakes and all sorts of colours of yellow, green, brown and beige on the hills... It was like a painting really... very much like the famed Lake District in England... and I was actually able to take some decent shots with my digital cameras as we drove along. In hindsight it´s really a good thing that I did not bring my super expensive SLR camera because I would have hardly used it and would have been worried sick all the time about having it stolen as it does not conveniently fit in a pocket. Besides, with the smaller one, I was able to do some neat videos which makes a big difference... I got a 30 second film for instance of Tigre doing a loop around a branch as she was trying to eat her tail. That would never work as a single frame. Tigre has feline HIV but looked really healthy. I´m sure that feline HIV is not compatible with the human body though as she has bitten a fair amount of volunteers in the past, and surely she woud have had to be put down or left alone if there was any danger of anyone becoming seriously ill as a result. They can´t risk another lawsuit.

The organisation that runs the park, Inti Warra Yassi cannot afford bad publicity either. I am not sure who the animals belong to and whether they can buy some of them in the long term but a fair few are not theirs and so they cannot release them until they get the authorisation to do so. Unfortunately, because of bureaucracy being what it is the world over, some birds have waited up to 5 years to be released, simply because no one is willing to sign on the dotted line. Yet they are better now and ready to go... It seems a bit crazy... and completely against the park´s ethics as they want to rehabilitate and release as fast as possible. I know that a year ago, they were getting ready to move a jaguar from Machia to their other park (even more basic, in the middle of nowhere, with no water and electricity) and for some reason they had to put the female jaguar, called Katie, to sleep, and it all went wrong and she never woke up. So, they panicked, tried to cover up her death... bought another jaguar that they also called Katie... but eventually they got found out when inspection time came round and now they are being sued and if it all goes from bad to worse, then Machia may close down. They do not even own the land where all the cages and treks are, they rent it from the government. So, if the government does not approve of their dealings, they can just claim the land back and God knows what would happen to all the animals. I cannot imagine poor Quirqui having to go back to a zoo, it would finish him off (his life expectancy is 15 and he is 15 anyway... ). So, for all I know, the experience I have just had may not be around for many more years...

I was told that I was real lucky to have worked with cats when I only stayed 10 days because usually they will not let anyone near a cat unless they stay minimum 1 month, to give the cats more stability. Some people come and work in the quarantine area with the birds or the monkeys and never get to see ONE cat, not even for ONE day. I guess if they had had a jaguar still, I would have never seen him either... like the other pumas, he would have been on a leash on a dangerous steep trail somewhere and I would have only caught a glimpse from a distance, if that...

I heard that the locals who live in the village next door kind of resent the park too and would like to see it turned into a zoo, because as it is, you are not allowed to see the cats or to walk on their trails much, so they only see monkeys and maybe Baloo the bear... if he happens to be around. If the animals were in cages, it would be easier to see them and they believe that it would bring a bigger revenue to the community as more people would drive by the village see them. I beg to differ since only the volunteers stay overnight (at least in the more basic hostels) and we also buy hundreds of bottles of fizzy drinks per week (make it an average of 3 to 4 bottles of water or fanta or coke x 60 volunteers/day and it soon adds up). Truck loads of stuff were coming in to restock the fridge... So, they have conveniently forgotten all that too. The two internet cafes are also packed with foreigners every single night too... all of these little things amount to a lot. The guy who had to drive me all the way to Cochabamba today would have got a big pay check too... probably more from the 4H to get here than in his normal working week running small errends in the next 5 miles around Villa Tunari. So, beats me....

I still have mixed feelings about Machia. I may have mentioned that the vets in Bolivia are against euthanesia for instance and so they will feel it´s more morally right to let an animal suffer for a few days before he dies than to speed up the process with a lethal injection. I guess culture comes into it, as always. I too may think the way they do if I was born and bred in Bolivia, who knows !??? It´s really hard to judge too harshly when upbringings are SO different from one continent to the next...

I don´t know if I was "lucky" re- my working with the cats or if they made an exception because I paid so much more money than the average volunteer. I checked with the Finnish couple who had only come over for 2 weeks too and they were asked to contribute $120. I cannot remember if it was each or for the two of them but it still doesn´t compare to my $600... and $600 to Quest for organising everything plus my $1,500 air fare on top. The Finnish couple had an amazing deal because they told me that in Finland they now have a new scheme whereby the government will pay workers 45% of their salaries to go away for a few months so that their employers can put college leavers in their jobs to give them work experience. And because they bought their flat a year ago, they can now rent it when they go away for a year, and ending up making more money having a fantastic time abroad than if they had stayed in Finland, paying Finnish prices for various things. Flipping eck,I wish they would do that in England ! One of my biggest problem is that my rent is fairly substantial (even though I only pay 49% of the market value) and so for every month I spend abroad, I pay a lot for not even being there... whereas if your mortgage is paid for by your tenants, it´s a whole different ballgame. I can now see the wisdom in buying... except that I never made enough money to buy really. I won´t complain too loudly though... I do realise I am incredibly lucky to afford 5-6 trips per year all over the world... and so long as I have enough money and time to do that, I feel truly blessed.

I´d better go through security now and make a move... I don´t want to become toooo complacent and miss my flight... My little grey and white booties cat must have sensed I was leaving last night because he was purring on my lap for an hour and then I had to kind of try and get up to go to bed and he just kept digging his claws further in as if to say ´noooo´... so I´d give him an extra 10 mins, then try to get up again... same... eventually I had to be firm but it was heart breaking. He looks 8 months but he´s actually 3 years old. His breed is such that they have a small body. He seemed to have fattened up a fair bit the 10 days I was there anyway. I could feel it when I picked him up - heavier. The guys from the hotel told me that he always begs and tries his luck, it´s like a habit, even when he´s not hungry (I can believe that, I had a cat once that was just like that and knew just how to wrap my dad around her little paws)... and because he´s sooo affectionate everybody falls in love with him and gives in... I felt happier about that. Last night when I got home he was on someone else´s lap, having a great time... ´Traitor, I thought, whoever has food wins´... ;)

Righteeo, on this note, I´d better get going. Good job my flight to Miami is not until tomorrow morning. 3 flights in a row would have been a bit insane and risky with all the delays. Besides, the people who looked after me in La Paz were really nice so I´m looking forward to seeing them again too.

Till next time, from Italy most likely (see PS to my earlier post)... Bisous, moi xxx

Last update from Machia Park, Bolivia. 24 April 2008

Well, I´m back... as promised. This will be my last update from Bolivia unless I miss a flight... which is possibility due to all the landslides and all that cause road blocks and other delays.

I have spent most of the last 3 days with Quirqui, the lovely grey brown puma, and it kind of grew on me... even though you do do VERY little with him. If you give him a ball to play you are lucky if he lifts one paw to try and grab it, even more lucky if he even tries to roll on his back... On the days when it´s very hot I took it upon myself to get a sponge and to keep it cool by wetting the top of his head and body. He liked it so much that he lifted its head as if to say ´this is a great idea, can you cool my neck too por favor !?´.

Officially we are supposed to speak to all the animals in Spanish not to confuse them but I always forgot.... I am sure the cat didn´t really mind and just went by tone of voice. And then as I was trying to think of ways to keep him entertained one of the Finnish guys who works nearest to me, in the macaw area, brought me a beautiful blue and red feather and a huge leaf... none of which impressed Quirqui in the least. ´Been there, done that, seen it all before, rattle your brain a bit more´... type of look. So I used the huge leaf as a fan to cool him down further. You would have thought he was a Pharaoh or Pacha of some sort. Anyone seeing him fan this cat and bring him his water bowl right under its nose would have thought I overdid it, but poor Quirqui has had such a rotten life in the zoo (they didn´t treat his eye infections and gum disease) that it was nice to go overboard ! ;) I heard they even fed him bread because they didn´t want to spend too much money feeding him meat. No wonder the poor kitty lacked all the precious minerals and vitamins needed to develop a good bone structure.

On Monday night about 3/4 of the volunteers turned up at my hotel for a big dinner. But because we hadn´t ordered a buffet, some had to wait 3 hours to be served. Dire. However, I got to talk to some people I had only briefly seen before and one guy showed me an hilarious video of a female capucchin monkey on heat. She had developed this massive crush on him and became massively jealous of any other female monkeys he might even glance at... To show him that she had the hots for him she kept holding her breasts out towards him and every time he´d turn away to look at something else, she´d jump into his field of vision so that he´d be forced to look at her again. You had to see it to believe it... He had started the video with her wobbling her breasts towards him and then he pretended to film an ant on the ground and sure enough, within 5 seconds, there she was, grinning at the camera, fondling her breasts again... then he pretended to zoom in higher up and within 5 seconds she´d leapt on a branch and was grinning at him, right where he was filming. Amazing. We were just rolling with laughter. I asked him today if he could do me one with my camera but today is 3 days later and she is no longer on heat, so he´s ´history´ and she´s ´over him now´. To start with he was really worried so he went to talk to the vets and they explained that she is on heat for 5 days ever so often and then will behave in this way towards men that take her fancy. He said she was even ´doing things with her tail that he couldn´t really describe not to be too graphic´. Hum.

The day after I was really thinking ´gee, how am I going to kill 7 hours' ... when Quirqui wants to do SO little, the days do drag, believe you me. I still appreciate the beautiful surroundings though and the jungle is SO lush, everywhere you look, you will discover a new plant you had not noticed the day before. The whole environment is so incredibly rich, even though the Machia Park is built on a secondary forest. But it is still very beautiful...

However, the morning went pretty fast as the vets brought a boa for the cage next door. He was huge, and Quirqui was very intrigued. One of the vets came to stroke him, he smelt the scent of the snake on his hand and started hissing. Quirqui may have dodgy legs and dodgy eyes but he still has a good nose it seems ! They had to operate on the snake because it had tried to eat a dog. The owner tried to rescue his dog but putting a stick in the snake´s mouth to hold it open, and by doing so, had torn the side of its jaw. They had to operate and will need to feed him chicken in a huge syringe for a while, but as soon as his jaw has healed, they will release him. I asked if a boa could kill a man but they said no, however, it could strangle a child. They don´t have much venom nor teeth, as their weapon lies in their muscle power. When there are hand feeding him there are always 3 of them doing it. One to hold the mouth, one to hold the tail and a 3rd to open his mouth with an instrument and shove the pieces of chicken in it.

Having lots of time on my hand I got a book out of the Book Exchange cupboard that was called ´Travelling Well´. It was very interesting and I will probably buy my own copy when I return. Most people have got parasites here so I was reading on what to do to avoid contracting them, but it seems that they can be everywhere... even on bank notes, door handles, not just food or monkey poo. So, it is pretty difficult to avoid getting them. I use my anti baterial gel every day before I eat and after I use the loo, as recommended, and so far, so good... I was actually surprised to read in the book that one quarter of the world population has got hook worms !

After a hard day at work - NOT - I went back to my hotel for a swim. I do value this as I never get the chance to go to the pool much when in London and I do enjoy swimming tremendously. It is fantastic to have the whole pool to myself and not to have to fight with the kids who want to splash in my lane. Bliss.

I have a kind of routine now whereby after my meal or swim I had a little cuddle with the grey and white cat. He is so precious. I could stay another week just for HIM. He talks to me so readily too. He is SO smart, I am sure I could teach him lots of tricks. I just have to point to my lap and he will come and jump on it, and I just have to call him once, and he will come running, wherever he is. I was worried that our ´affair´ would go pear shape 2 nights ago because as I was in the pool a whole coach load of tourists pulled in the driveway. Shock and horror. No more peace and quiet... and they were ALL French. Of all nationalities, I couldn´t believe it. Talk about ruining the ´exotism´... English would be bad enough, but FRENCH !?? I never let it on that I could understand everything they were saying... I always find it interesting to ear'drop on conversations, when one has nothing better to do anyway!

I overheard one say ´they have a pool here, didn´t you see la dame swim in it!?´... Now, I can no longer feel my French, but ´la dame´, to me sounds like "the [older] woman" is implied. Which made me feel SO old. My sister may dispute this, but I remember saying ´dame´ when I was a kid referring to senior citizens. Shooot... No one has said ´the girl´for a LONG time now. Sigh. Like I haven´t been called ´Mademoiselle´ for years now, everybody assumes I´m a ´Madame´. Oh well... still, just to show I´m not resentful I did my good deed by translating the Spanish - English menu into French for them. I tried to imagine my mother in this situation and figured it would be a nice thing to do... it didn´t take me long as the menu doesn´t have more than 4 choices of meat - poltry - fish - vegi stuff - soups - desserts. Plus it did kill another 15 minutes.

The day after, to help relieve some of the boredom, Karen, who works with the other ocelot and keeps coming back year after year, took me to see Tigre. She was as beautiful as Millie. SO playful. I really enjoyed my morning with both of them. Karen is my age and loves travelling as much as I do... she has lived in the Galapagos islands on and off, cruised French Polynesia last year on a millionaire´s private yacht... she just does all sorts of weird and wonderful things. She was a minefield of information. She loved Tigre to bits and said that the cat is what keeps her coming back. To get to her cage was quite hard though as you to walk upstream, in a dry stream... though some rocks were still a bit slippery. She was SO fit compared to me, boy.... AND she told me that during the rainy season it´s far more difficult because you still have to use the stream as the only way up and so you have water gushing down into the stream left right and centre and sometime she is knee deep in water, unable to see where to place her next foot and having to fight the strength of the current. I mean, is this insane or is just me !??? I would never do anything as crazy for a cat... and God knows I do love them, but not to the point of risking my life and my health for them. She told me that one day a girl who looked after Tigre when she wasn´t around completely got lost and had to spend the night in the jungle. The cat had kept walking and walking beyond the boundary of the park so the poor girl got completely lost... and as soon as it gets dark, you stand no chance in the jungle as everywhere you look is the same and there are hundreds of trip hazards that you need to be aware of... including bullet ants and the nasty spikes on many trees. And some are as long and sharp as needles. So this poor girl found a river bed and slept on the sand and tried to cover herself with rocks to stop the mosquitoes from biting. She was found the next day by two passer bys who assumed they´d stumbled across a dead body, and who drove her to the park on their moped. Thankfully they were GOOD men. Karen said that they did have a search party for her but because she was beyond the park boundary, they didn´t search there. Also, it doesn´t matter how much people people shout your name, if you stand next to a stream, the sound gets diluted and you will never hear it. Karen got stung by bullet ants 3 times... each time she couldn´t feel her hand for 3 days. Geee. Not for me, thank you very much. I know I will disappoint my greatest fans who may think that I am a super woman, but... as I said, nope. I realise that I have to know my limits, and I definitely discovered that about myself here. Looking after the lion cubs in Africa was a piece of cake in comparison to this.

I asked Karen how on earth she could have afforded to retire at 40 and to travel the world and she said that she had worked in a bank for 5 years and saved up all she had, and then she had a house that she sold for 40,000 Canadian dollars... which goes a LONG way in the 3rd world. So, she is very happy. Interestingly, she didn´t use to travel much as a child at all, so... I guess there is some truth in the adage ´you have to be grateful for what your parents gave you and for what they didn´t´... what they didn´t, gave the taste to do it all herself, as it did me.

The afternoon, back with Quirqui was more boring. We were a bit worried about his excessive lack of energy... could not be bothered to eat, didn´t even stand up to pee... nada. Didn´t even chew on Sarah´s arm and that´s his favourite past time. So we told the vet but they said it was quite natural for cats to be real lazy every 4 months or so. Besides, in the wild they would be lucky to get a good meal every 5 days.... to be fed every day is a luxury. So I thought I´d wash his blanket/duvet as the whiff of urine that emanates from it reminded me of my incontinent clients too much. In doing so, I ended up snapping a tiny thorn in the palm of my left hand. I didn´t even notice until later in the day when I couldn´t make a fist with my hand without it hurting. Upon close examination I noticed a black spot. No mention in my book on how to retreive a thorn so I did what mother taught me way back.... went swimming for 30 mins, showered with hotter water for 15mns, to make my skin all wrinkly, got a needle out, applied my Chinese white flower oil as a kind of local anaesthetic, put the end of the needle in the blue part of a flame to kill all germs, picked at it, used the tweezers and out it came. Phew. It was so tiny. I was amazed. The ´wound´(if I dare call it that, but it sounds seriously OTT) had become all red and sore and I had feared infection (especially as there is so much bacteria in soil and water here) but I was fine next day. I thought to myself ´if this is the extent of my injuries after 10 days in this mad park, I have done pretty well ! ´. As I am writing this, people are still going to the hospital EVERY day for parasites... today was Sarah´s turn. She thought she´d grab the chance I could baby sit Quirqui one last afternoon to get to the hospital and ask for a test.

After my swim last night, I was reading the last chapter of the (very good) book I had found at Miami Airport when there was a knock on my door. The chaps from the hotel were doing a BBQ and invited me over as I was the only guest they had. I thought ´why not !?´... It gave me the chance to practice my Spanish for 90 mins as I never get to speak much at Machia (except maybe ´sandwich con queso por favor´to the cook. That´s pretty much it. Dire, I tell you. I knew I made mistakes as soon as I´d said some of the stuff I said but we got by... I believe I would improve faster if I had no choice and more practice but improving my Spanish just didn´t work out on this trip. Pity. They even gave me a whole jar of real lemonade as I told them I didn´t drink alcohol and their lemonade is the best I´ve ever had. SO much better than bottled fizzy stuff. Just doesn´t compare to what a good real lemonade should be like. I was telling them of my travels and working with the pumas and how they have to feed them pollitos (little chickens) and they told me ´oh, here in Bolivia in the circus they feed live dogs to the lions, people think it´s good entertainment´. I was shocked. I bet the lions are starved before hand so that they can pounce on the dog even faster... I am amazed SOS Animals has not stepped in (it is their RSPCA equivalent I understand).

This morning, my last morning, I worked with the ´Small Animals´. Caotis (that love to curl up on your knees and sleep in a ball, enjoying being patted and stroked), Coochi Coochi (no idea how to spell that but it sounded like this) and tyaras (that are more vicious and look like ferrets). We had to clean their cages, get the poo out, spray bleach, brush the boards, hose them down with water, then get their bananas and papayas for lunch, fight off the monkeys, etc. It was actually hard work. I sweated a lot and I realised that looking after Quirqui wasn´t so bad after all. I was desperate for a shower by 11am and I knew that because I had to go to the internet cafe tonight, it would be a fair few hours before I get to smell good again ! And the worse part is that since my insect repellent got washed away with sweat, it stopped working earlier than I realised so that my arms are now pretty repulsive to look at as sand flies had a field day.

It poured down this morning, so much so that we couldn´t do anything for a while. Then when I enquired where were the heavy duty gloves to get rid of the poo and all, I was told ´there is no glove, just a brush and broom´. Oh no, no, no.... call me picky, but I refuse to touch poo with no glove protection, especially in view of the fact that SO many people around me were affected by parasites. So I walked to the village next door (5 minutes) and bought 6 pair of gloves. Nurse Sylvie on target and on duty. I figured that anyone who has to handle poo should have their hands protected. But of course I wasn´t banking on the flipping monkeys who within 2 hours had stolen one of my mine and the coatis had chewed another one. So much for my good intentions. But hopefully I did my bit to spread the message ´you will be no good to the animals if you do not learn to look after yourself FIRST´.

So, in effect, when Sarah asked me to look after Quirqui this afternoon while she went for her parasite at the hospital I felt quite relieved. He was in a more playful mood today. I sensed he wanted to chew on my arm again but I didn´t want any more bruises. I scratched him a lot around his neck though and he did purr... I was very happy. I think it´s the first time he purred with just me around. Usually Sarah gets all the purring. So I felt I´d made small progress... just 3 hours before leaving him for good. But hey, better than nothing.

Tomorrow I have to go back to Cochabamba for my 2.45pm flight to La Paz and there´d better not be any serious landslides or road blocks. If so, I may miss it and hope I will be able to catch a later flight, even if I have to pay more. It´d be better than missing my connection to London after my 6am departure for Miami, as you may remember that my tickets are not officially ´linked´. So I´d have to fork out a lot more money to buy another ticket for that on the day, or the day after, God forbid. I won´t even ´go there´in my head...

My mobile phone is still barred so I am not sure when I´ll get the chance to call anyone on my return. I am at the mercy of Orange... and seriously p... d off by now. Oh, and the main disaster of the day is that I lost my lovely safari hat. The hat I had had for 10 years... When my driver dropped me off here on the first day, he took my suitcase off the boot and then drove off. I assumed he was driving off to park the car around the corner, but no, he was gone for good, and my hat was on the front seat. He never said good bye or anything... didn´t wait for his tip, so when I realised he was gone I asked the park to call his office to ask them to call him so that he could drop it off on the way. They assured me he had and all was in order. But today, when I confronted them with it, it turns out the guy never handed over my hat and is nowhere to be found.. ´he´s gone on vacation for 10 days´ is the official line. Right, as if Bolivianos could afford to take a 10 day vacation. My better guess is that my hat has been sold at the market for a few BS. I tried to say I wanted compensation but no one wants to take responsbility ´if we find it again, we will ask an English volunteer to mail it back from England for you´... yeeeeah, I could be waiting a LONG time. So I am really annoyed... But I guess it´s only a material thing. Best to have my health still fine... but still, you know how it is... one gets annoyed all the same. Mainly because the culprit will never be punished ´it´s Bolivia you know´... but I was very nice to this man, shared my food and water with me, and so I just felt doubly betrayed. Oh well... another lesson learnt I guess.

I´d better sign off my driver will be here in about 5 minutes on the dot ! Bisous, moi xxx

PS - the next holiday will be in Italy, last week in May 2008, with my parents and sister. NOT as exotic, but supposedly very beautiful too, nr Lake Como... ´whose beauty is legendary´... so I´ll see if I get the chance to give you some feedback via this blog in due course... Ciao !

Lazy Quirqui... 21 April 2008

Well, 3 days have gone by and there isn´t that much to tell because Quirqui is not the usual puma. He is beautiful to look at, but doesn´t do much at all. I have taken some cute shots though of him relaxing like a pussy cat. He has a beige grey overcoat, is whiter under his belly, and the very end of his tail and ears are brown. He has these amazing grey eyes and because he purrs so much, he looks pretty innocent.

However, on the one day that Sarah had her day off he did put me to the test (I had been warned) and did apply quite a bit of pressure when he had my forearm in his jaw. The thing to do is to remain totally calm, NEVER shout otherwise it excites them even more, and not react or pull back otherwise they will do it more often as it will become a game for them. It was borderline to hurting me but not excruciating. The one time I tried to retreive my arm he would squeeze tighter with its jaw and keep it more firmly place with its huge claws. He showed no interest in other toys, just my arm (because Sarah spoils him rotten and always plays with him and lets him chew on hers, but he is super gentle with her because she´s worked with him for 2 months so she´s passed the ´test´with flying colours by now). He did bruise me internally and I felt it even more the day after but I have survived. I just took a photo of my forearm with teeth marks and scratches for the record. His teeth have been filed, thank God, so they are not super sharp, otherwise I could have got into trouble. It did cross my mind that its jaw are meant to crush bones and that he could have easily done that to my arm, had he so chosen, but then I also tried to remember that he had never ever done that before and so it´d be really bad luck if I were its first victim.

As I said the other day, most people have got accidents here. I saw a guy with a leg in plaster today, and yesterday there was another guy who needed 3 stitches on his ear because another puma had ´attacked´him. As he was the new guy on the block / trek, the more experienced volunteer had warned him that Sishiou (the redder puma) was going to put him to the test too, as a ´rite de passage´type of thing. So, the new guy was kind of prepared. The puma took him to a dead end trek and they just knew it was an ´ambush´... so the chap was expecting Sishiou to pounce, however, because it had rained all night, the poor guy slipped on the mud first and his face hit the ground quite hard which startled the cat so that he went for his face instead of his legs (to bring him down). The cat managed to chew some of his ear off and so understandably the poor chap was pretty shaken and asked to work with a more predictable cat next time.

When I hear stories like this, it makes our Quirqui quite a pussy cat. He is unable to pounce due to his arthritis and he is real gentle 99% of the time. Most people like to walk past its ´house´just to greet him, pat him on the head, or offer their forearm for him to chew on for a minute or two. Everybody loves him. He is SO beautiful too.... I haven´t seen the others, but I heard they are a bit smaller and redder (because they come from different parts of Bolivia). But Quirqui is quite big, Sarah laid down next to him today and his body, with back legs outstretched was as long as hers. He is as big as a lionness I´d say. Same type of body and muscles.

On the one day I worked on my own with him I could tell he missed Sarah. He was like calling out for her, which I thought was quite sweet. And today when she came back, he was extra cuddly with her... like lying next to her, nose to nose, and putting his two paws around her neck, it was just priceless. I took some great photos. She said he had never behaved like this before so I guess it was a case of ´you don´t know what you´ve got until you´ve lost it´.

Sarah had first worked in Monkey Park but within 20 mins one tried to chew off her thumb so she gave up. It was such a vicious attack that 2 months on, her thumb nail is still cracked in two. She told me that another girl got jumped on and a monkey bit her bottom lip so hard that half of it fell off. They didn´t stitch her up but I can imagine she´d look slightly disfigured now. Lip texture is not something that´s found anywhere else on the human body for a graft. So, for all of these reasons, I am really wary of monkeys. We see plenty around (3 types) Q´s house and I even bought a water pistol today to try and protect myself. Some love it, some hate it. Most of them like to wait along the path to hike a free ride on someone´s rucksack but I never let them do that to me... I´d be worried that they´d bite my ears off. I just do not trust them at all. There have been more injuries caused by monkeys than with any other animal.

The job I have is totally boring... Quirqui is beautiful to look at but doing this 7 hours a day is pushing it. I´m ready to go home... 5 days early. Sorry to disappoint. I really feel they do not know what to do with me here. It is obvious that Sarah is doing a great job and does not need any help (she has been doing fine for 2 months without me), so it´s a shame that I cannot be more useful really. It´s hard to find a happy medium here. It´s either so active that you risk getting injured, or so boring that you keep looking at your watch.

There are few animals that pass the ´Quirqui´s house´ too which helps me be distracted. We have lots of tortoises and I like to give them water from its bowl - they always appreciate it. They have some humming birds and amazing butterflies. The big blue morphos and one that is yellow underneath and purple on top.

Sarah told me that once she saw a vivid red snake coming down from a tree, crossing over her hamac to the other tree. Thankfully she wasn´t reading in the hamac at the time. Quirqui just sat up and stared but didn´t move. She was trying to get him to chase it (he is SO inactive it´s untrue) but he wouldn´t. So maybe he could tell it was a poisonous snake !? He once had a frog that was trying to escape from another type of snake... the poor frog ended up straight in front of its nose instead (it must have looked back instead of forward !?). Oops. Another case of sealed fate I guess.

Oh, and I also find wildlife in my room at night. Big juicy cockroaches. Usually one per night. Either behind my curtains or on the walls. I guess they come in from under my front door as there is a big gap underneath. They don´t bother me as much as ants (they too can give you vicious bites) or mosquitoes - you can tell how long someone has been here just by looking at the state of their hands. If it´s flawless, they have just arrived, if it´s covered with white spots and sores then they have been here a while.

The guys who work with the mad pumas, the ones that run up and down steep treks, come back completely drenched inside out. They can turn their boots over and water comes out. You assume they have gone for a dip in the river but no: it´s pure sweat. So much so that it causes them all sorts of open sores on their feet... the skin cracks between toes and all. The things one does for love... boy. This is when I know I am getting too old for this... because I´m not willing to suffer anymore - not within reasons anyway. Today was SO hot, I was sweating doing nothing, so I can only imagine how tough it would have been for anyone walking the hectic cats.

To help pass time I went to the market (15 mins walk) and got our puma some baby toys. A bright pink ball on a string, and another set of 3 balls together with little bells inside so that it could intrigue him. Did I mention that Quirqui has got cataracts !? I noticed this the moment I first set my eyes on him. So, I figured that if my visually impaired people can see bright colours a lot better, surely so could it. My theory proved correct. He is far more interested in the new bright toy than the older, browner ones (that probably blend too much with the soil around him). I conducted an eye test on him (same as you´d do with babies, who cannot talk) and gathered enough info to work out what kind of colours would most appeal to him.

Everything around his ´house´ smells of urine though, we are trying hard to disinfect it all but the smell tends to linger in the air and just reminds me of my incontinent clients! But otherwise, work truly feels like miles away... This is such a complete break from life in London, I feel totally refreshed already (mentally anyway). I think a week would have been enough, in hindsight. A girl who works with the other ocelot (one of the many volunteers who comes back for 4 months every year) had promised to take me to see Tigre, the killing-machine (she has to kill 3 animals per day for her to feel she´s had a good day) but she didn´t show up. Pity.l I also tried to go and see the baby puma as he´s just starting to walk and looks so cute and funny, but never got to see it as it wasn´t in the garden every time I showed up. I was SO frustrated. I heard he´s full of spots on his coat and looks adorable. But I did see some tucans and macaws on the way, via the aviary (where volunteers can get injured too... birds will chew off their shoulders or other body parts!).

The day before, Sarah and I tried to keep busy by making a swimming pool for Quirqui. When he was a bit younger and fitter he could walk to the river and enjoyed it, but now all he can manage is 20 yards, tops. So Sarah had dug a nice big pond enough for him to lie down in it on a hot day and layered it with a plastic lino. We then collected some flat stones to put at the bottom and filled it up with several buckets of water. But so far he has shown zero interest in it. He won´t even put a paw in it. I have tried to make him wet by pouring water on him and he seems to enjoy it but not enough to want a good soak, which is really frustrating for all parties. It was hard work to bring all the rocks from one end of the park to another, but at least it gave us some exercise. I feel I´m getting fatter already just after 3 days of inaction.

Vanessa has been working with another girl for 3 days now, so the ´theory´that Millie walks better alone is a lot bull··· I think. There´s something fishy. Maybe Vanessa felt I just couldn´t keep up. Which is true, but I wish she´d told me to my face. But I´m too old to bother making a fuss about it. Besides, when I see them come back looking shattered I feel I´ve had a really easy day in comparison (though a bit TOO easy in fact).

I also heard that Quirqui is the only puma at the park that purrs. The others don´t seem to do that, so it´s nice to help us monitor his mood. He had such a rough life before he came to the park, it´s lovely to be able to make his last few years so much nicer. He seems to be incredibly forgiving. He is also easy enough to ´read´. The odd groan, the very end of the tail moving, and you usually know when he wants to be left alone.

Amazingly, I still sleep 10 hours a day though I really am not doing much exercise at all. I guess it´s all this fresh air. When I get back to my lovely hotel (set in the middle of the jungle with a kind of botanical garden around the lodge) I like to change into a skirt and wash my hair and condition it and just feel like a ´lady´ again. At the park you are either caked with mud or sweat, neither of which are particularly appealing.

At the moment they have about 60 volunteers and people come over every single day to ask for work. They have all googled ´voluntary work with animals in South America´ and the park came up top of the list it seems. We had 2 more people from Finland, some from the USA, another one from Denmark tomorrow... The French volunteers are pretty much the only ones who haven´t spoken ONE word to me. They talk to Quirqui or Sarah but they completely blank me out. Fine by me. I don´t particularly want to know them either as they all chain smoke. I guess I took the novelty out. Or maybe they are annoyed because my English is better than theirs... but then their Spanish is better than mine. I hardly get the chance to use my Spanish so when I do it really sucks... I make so many mistakes. I am useless. I have no idea how people can understand me.

I continue to enjoy the local cuisine tremendously. Never feeling sick or whatever, touch wood. One day (to pass time!) I worked out that our lovely cook is paid 150 times less than I am, i.e. she has to work 150 hours to earn as much as I do in ONE. It is SO sick. Even the vets here only earn 30BS per day (1 dollars is 7BS) but if a cat or monkey rips off their rucksack and they need to buy another one, it will cost them 40BS and the park doesn´t buy it for them. Some people are seriously dedicated, I have to say.

Bolivia is the cheapest country in South America so our money lasts a loooong time. I think I only spent the equivalent of 10 dollars on all food and drinks in my first week. It could explain why so many people can afford to come back year after year. You work for 1 week in your home country and you can stay here for 3 months pretty much... What was expensive for me was the fee I paid to contribute to the park´s expenses, I was charged the equivalent of 600 dollars for 2 weeks which would be too much for most students but it seems that no one else has paid that at all. People just show up. Not that I mind as it´s for a good cause, but as usual, I seem to be ripped off wherever I go, hum. I just hope that the park did get the 600 dollars, and not just 10% (when I worked at the lion park in South Africa, the in-between agency kept 90% of the profit, sickening).

On Sarah´s day off my driver happened to have ´The Bible for children´on his dashboard. It was a lovely 450 page book, with about 3 sentences per page and a lovely painting illustrating each story. I asked if I could borrow it and it helped me kill 5 hours and brush up on my Spanish a bit. Everybody I have met here is Catholic, but I understand the elders still pray to Mother Nature.

When I got back that day, I went for a swim in the pool, 40 lengths... I had been sitting on my butt all day and felt I really needed to burn some calories. Whenever I get back, I have the house cat waiting for my return. I am used to waiting on Quirqui (I bring him his bowl of water, wherever he is, to save him walking as its legs are so bad) and this little cat must sense I am weak because he will not leave me. He is real pretty, all grey with just a white neck and white booties. Small body, probably just 6-8 months old. He meows all day long, as if he was starving. I share my breakfast with him (it will even eat bread it´s so hungry) and I put some hot milk on a saucepan too. Then at night I buy a sandwich and then I also buy meat for the cat. Then I cut it up for it, make it sit on a stool and hand feed it. The reason I make it perch on a stool is because there are 5 dogs in the hotel and they always steal its food - I reckon it´s why it looks so lean, the dogs look fine. The dogs are all pretty big (one is a German sheperd) always chase me when I come out of the pool and most people wouldn´t like it but after you´ve had your arm in a jaguar´s jaw, dogs look fairly harmless !! I usually turn round and pretend to chase them back and they look totally puzzled and stop barking. The little cat´s jaw look like child´s play in comparison. It is so happy on my lap in the evening, it tends to squeeze his paws and claws tighter but I hardly feel it. Certainly leaves no mark. And I know just where to scratch it for it to purr like crazy... In fact, I tend to do a little experiment, and scratch the grey and white cat and Quirqui in the same place (left and right of their neck, under their ears) and they pretty much react in the same way. Both very contented.

It was raining hard yesterday so I was really happy not to be on the treks if I´m honest. Just to walk to the toilets I almost slipped and twisted an ankle and that was fairly flat. Talking of which, we always have to keep the toilet doors locked because if not, the monkeys go in and steal the toilet paper. And I do not mean the clean toilet paper on the roll... oh no, the soiled toilet paper that goes in the bins (here you cannot flush toilet paper down the drain as it will block it). Then many get sick as they pick up on parasites and all sorts... no wonder. YUKKY.

Righteeo, I´d better sign off. My driver is coming in 10 mins and I want to proof read this quickly. We have a small party at my hotel tonight... I´m usually fast asleep by 9pm but I´ll try and be sociable and stay up a bit.

I´ll be finished in 3 days (my last day will be 24th, Thursday) and, as I said, I´m ready to go already. It´s sad, having booked this and looked forward to it for 18 months, but it´s not at all what I expected. However, I have taken some lovely shots and it has been a huge priviledge to work so closely with an ocelot and a puma. I will never look at them in the same light again. I am just a bit gutted there is no jaguar as it would have completed the picture nicely. Oh well...

I will try and log on again just before I leave for the UK... till then, take good care. OK !?

Introducing Quirqui, 18 Avril 2008

Well, I got to work today to be told that I wasn´t adventurous enough to work with Millie. She really needs to go off trail and Vanessa felt that she was not progressing as much with two people. Like she´d become more lazy again. This surprised me as, by my books, Millie was walking enough, but in some ways I was relieved as the job was really too dangerous by my books, so I didn´t argue too much. I´ll miss little Millie dearly and will never see her again as her cage is too high up for me to trek for 40 mins to catch a glimpse of her again, but it´s also good to have different experiences.

I was told that they could put me with Quirqui, the 15 year old grey puma, for 3 days and maybe with the ´small animals´the remaining 3 (they have caotis and taryas -spelling?-).

Quirqui´s story is another sad one. He was kept in a zoo for a decade and they put him in a small cage where he could hardly move so he developed muscle loss. They also didn´t feed him properly so he lacked vitamins and ended up with a twisted bone on his front leg. Plus, now he´s getting older, he´s got severe arthritis. When he walks he looks more like a bear than a puma, poor little thing. It´s really painful to watch. But when he lies down he´s really gentle and purrs as soon as you rub his head. It´s actually quite amazing to see that a mountain lion that has been SO badly treated by humans can still be so lovely (some of the other pumas were used as pets till they got too big and started to jump on people for fun... the families didn´t like it and broke their back legs to stop them jumping). Some really sick stories.

But Quirqui has been given a new lease of life and though he can hardly walk more than 100m now he is quite contented chewing on our arms lightly. The good side of being with him is that it´s now possible for me to have a decent lunch break and to use decent toilets... but the down side is that it´s really boring as he does very very little, he has bad breath (he used to have gum disease) and he dribbles a lot... so if you give him your arm to chew on, you soon stink. Oh, and his ´house´smells of urine as he is an old man and now incontinent so cannot be as clean as Millie.

But outside that, I´m working with Sara who is Danish, 19, but really nice. She has been working with him for 2 months and has not had ONE day off YET... so in 2 days I will look after Quirqui all on my own to give her a break.

I took some great shots today. As I am not working so hard, I looked more relaxed and more human so my pix with Quirqui will actually look better than the ones with little Millie.

Voila... It´s now 7pm and I´ve asked my driver to come and pick me up at exactly 7pm, to avoid having to call him, so I need to sign off. I do hope you are keeping well too. I must say I have totally forgotten the concept of work. It is relaxing for me to do NOTHING... such a rarity when I am in London. I´ve even started reading a novel ... and I have to add it is about 20 years since I last had time to read a novel, so... say no more !!! But when Quirqui snoozes, there is not much to do and ditto once I´m back in my hotel room.

Till next time... probably in 3 days again I guess. When I have a bit more to say... ok ?

With Millie, days 2, 3 & 4

I´m back... amazingly. These last 3 days have been TOUGH. Boy... first of all, when I last logged off I was going to call my driver to ask him to pick me up again and lo and behold, the internet cafe did not have a telephone for me to call him. Eeek. I found a customer who had a mobile phone, who was willing to let me use it, I called the driver, twice... no reply. HUM. So I was like ´¿que puedo hacer?´(´what can I do´). There was NO way I could have walked back, it was way too far and half of the journey was in total darkness with no street lights. So: el chico del internet cafe told me ´No worries. My friend next door is a taxi driver, he´ll take you back for 20BS´(that´s very cheap). But then I didn´t know the guy, he could have been after my handbag, or my body... but he did have an official taxi car so I had to trust him. In fact, he was very nice, but this is just the kind of situation when my mother would have completely flipped... I just prayed hard.

I got back to my hotel that is starting to feel like ´home, sweet home´and slept like a log. All the exercise had worn me out. I even asked for a small heater to be put in my room to help my clothes dry faster because otherwise, with all the humidity in the air, clothes take up to 3 days to dry, which is no good (did you also know that in La Paz, because of the altitude, water takes twice as long to boil ?!). Yep. Aren´t I a mine field of useful information ?!

On the second day I spent with Millie, she took us down some really difficult treks. I seriously questioned my sanity for allowing this cute kitty´s health to supercede mine. My thighs were killing me... it was equally tough to go up as it was to go down (extra pressures on the knees). By noon I thought to myself ´10 days of this will be MORE than enough.... I have no idea how people can do this for 5 months´... It wasn´t exactly ´torture´ but it wasn´t exactly pleasant either. Some volunteers are like gazelles, and even Vanessa is up and down treks in record time but she is 20 years younger AND she has longer legs which can make a big difference when you have to climb above tree trunks that have fallen down in the path, or go up a massively high step. But then Millie is such a cute kitty, we were like parents cooeing over their child ´oh, isn´t she just beautiful?´.... On day 2 she even sat on my lap for 20 minutes. The trick is to not show her our hands... if she does, the temptation to suck the thumb is too strong and she can turn agressive if you try to then weane her off it. Her health is such that she really cannot settle on your lap for too long, ideally, she has to keep moving... But considering how badly all my muscles ached, I was personally grateful for a lazy cat. She can still go from passive to agressive but because I´ve been brought up with cats all my life, it doesn´t really bother me. I just watch the very end of her tail and when it starts to move.... I get ´ready for it´.

At other times, she´s the one who´s really thoughtful and will turn round and come closer to me as if to say ´come on, old lady, keep up, are we going too fast for you !?´... When she´s the one who wants to lie down for a while we then tempt her by squatting down. If she sees a lap, she´ll go for it. And as she gets up to move closer, we get up too and then can keep her moving... hopefully.

The 2nd day was quite tough because the treks were still quite slippery. I slipped a few times and once one leg went ahead whilst the 2nd leg stayed stuck behind and I did think ´oh shoot, I will tear a ligament any time soon´... The more I asked around, the more I found out that many people had broken legs and all, some strain ankles on the first day... and others just get badly injured working with the animals. Not so much the cats though, but more the monkeys who have such vicious teeth.

I did a few fun videos but not that many photos with me actually. I took a lot more with Vanessa as she´s been working with her for 2 months but had no record of it. I figured I could take more with me once she´s more at ease with me...

In some ways I couldn´t wait for the day to be over because I just wanted my legs to walk on a flat surface for a change. But it takes 25 mins to walk back down to the entrance and with every step (probably the equivalent of 25 flights of stairs) I was like ´ouch, ouch, ouch´.... Vanessa, who is super fit compared to me, will run back and forth in 40 mins or so. On day 2 she´d lost Millie´s vitamin C container (it fell out of her pocket) so she had to go back to get some more. I then realised that it wouldn´t be possible for me to do this job all alone because I could not do that for a start... I would not have the energy. Also, I had NO idea how Vanessa has got such a good sense of direction but I am utterly lost as we are not even walking on the trails... we are going all over, in no specific order... only Millie´s order... and even on trails I have no idea where I am, so, off trail, forget it... there would have to be a search party every night !

That night I went back to my hotel aching all over and headed straight for the pool to try and soothe my muscles... The water was a touch cool but ok still. The scenery was great, jungle all around... I loved it. But 30mins was enough. I then went for a semi hot shower (could not get it to be really hot) and afterwards covered myself with white flower oil that soothes the muscles. Just to climb the one step to my bathroom, which is about 15cm high, I was in agony. I thought to myself ´oh my, how on earth will I manage tomorrow?´.

The 3rd day was equally bad in a different way. I still ached, but Millie went in places where I would just never go on my own... almost jumping off cliffs... ok, not mega high cliffs, but say 2.5m high, and Vanessa would just ´bum it all the way down´and grin and bear it and I was standing on the edge thinking ´I just cannot do this... if I can, I cannot get back up´.... So I told her ´Look, I just cannot jump, it looks too scary to me´.... She was ´fine, don´t worry, go back to the trail and I´ll find you. I know where you are, I´ll try and get Millie to walk back your way at some point´ And we had to do this a few times because it just got more and more hairy.

Vanessa is fantastic for Millie, but she totally spoils her. It has improved her health greatly as by encouraging her natural behaviour (ocelots prefer to walk off trails, unlike pumas) it has made her walk more. Before, with volunteers, who, like me, were not really keen on ´roughing it´(or ´risking their lives´more likely) she soon got bored and prefered to just settle on their laps and suck their thumbs all day, which was the worst thing for her health... she´s then get more kidney stones, pass blood, and be in agony. She also ended up with two absesses and the vets were not sure how to help as they only had gas to put animals to sleep, no proper injections, due to lack of money. One day the pain got too much and she just chewed her own skin to drain them. So one of our jobs is to squirt some (purple) liquid anti biotics on her wounds to help it heal. So that every time I take photos of her, I have to go for the non purple side ideally ! :)

The thing that´s impressive with Millie is that she is house trained. She has a bowl for her food, her bowl for her water and a large bowl for her faeces and she always uses it. I think that cats like to be clean. She always licks herself and smells lovely. Talking of food though, we, thankfully, did not have to feed her a live chicken after all. The fate of the chicken was still sealed though. It had stayed for 5 days with the boa and the boa had not wanted to eat it, so before we got to take it up to Millie, he was first offered to the puma next door who killed him in 20 seconds flat. Phew.

And while on the food subject, our cook, who is wonderful and so hard working is only paid 50 dollars a month and works from 7am till 6pm most days. In fact, ´every day´would be a more accurate statement because she has only taken 1 day off in one YEAR. And here is me, little me, who was complaining about having NO time in London... what do I know !??? I have no idea how this poor woman can get on with her own household chores, bringing up her daughter, etc. And she´s always smiling. Most of us Westerners would be on anti depressant with such a gruesome regime but she looks contented. Or maybe she´s just a good actress!?

When we got back to Millie´s cage that day we found that a bunch of monkeys had managed to get in and stolen her meat. We had put a lockpad on the door, of course, but they are so smart, they can use any trick to get in if they really want to. So, Vanessa had to jog all the way down again, and all the way back up again so that Millie could have her dinner before we put her away for the night. I then realised that at 43, it was time I retired from all my mad adventures... It is time to hang my hat and admit that I am too old for these crazy things after all. I also realise that as we get older, we do get more scared about getting injured. I´m sure that at 23, I too would have bummed down the landslide and thought ´what the heck if I get my hands pierced on some tree spikes´... but at 43 you think ´shoooot, that would really hurt if I didn´t have my gloves for protection, and I do need my hands to type up my blog and do a lot of things´... It is a fact of life that perspectives do change as we get older I guess. I always think that my mother over does it and over worries it, but who knows, maybe when I get to be 73, maybe I too will fret as much ?! Perish the thought.

But Minnie was much more used to me already by day 3... and she & I had had quite a few friendly ´head butts´. If you have a cat or have watched documentaries on lions in Africa you will soon work out that cats like to greet each other with rubbing their heads against one another. I did a lot of that with Millie. When I could see she was in a dozy mode and not going to turn agressive, I´d give her my nose so that she could rub hers against it, and then my forehead so she could rub hers on mine too. It was sooo sweet. She loved it. I did too ! :) It really helped us bond further.

We got back to the base and one of the other volunteers had just had to get an anti asthamine jab after being stung in the face by a wasp, whilst cleaning the bird cage. It was right next to her eye and it looked rather sore. I tell you, disasters happen every day here and I guess I would enjoy this holiday a lot more if I knew for sure that I will get back to England in ONE piece with everything in working order. Yesterday another girl was sick as she had some parasites and kept needing the toilets (not great when facilities are so basic). Thankfully, because Vanessa and I walk so hard and sweat so much we actually do not need the toilets all day... but still.

I also don´t like the walk back because capucchin monkeys are always watching what we are doing and are known to jump on bags and unzip them. In fact, they are really determined creatures and they will get what they want, whether you try to stop them or not. They stole a girl´s camera last week, and if you try to stop them, they will bite your fingers off. They can be very agressive so you either use a padlock on your bag or watch them rip them apart from a distance. Hum.

I got back to my hotel and was shattered again. I had a quick look at some of the photos that we had taken earlier that day and I look like I´m on LSD. I had slept 10 H the night before and I still had big bags under my eyes... and Vanessa looks so fresh compared to me. Just as I said: Sylvie is getting past her peak to play the adventurer that she thinks she still is, but is not really.

First day with Millie, 15 April 2008

I had slept 10 hours the night before so was pretty refreshed when I woke up to the sound of birds. I prepared my first aid kit and added it to my ruck sack and went for my breakfast. It was drizzly all day but many lovely birds were still flying around the grounds. I went back to my room to grab my binoculars to enjoy them better.

They served me a very nice continental breakfast and then my driver came right on at 8:30am. The park is only 10mns drive away and when I turned up everybody else was having their breakfast. The food is really good at the sanctuary (all vegetarian too) and very cheap.

At 9am we first went to pick up some thick grass that Millie likes to eat... Whilst there we met a volunteer who was playing with her puma and we also met Baloo, the lovely spectacle bear that was also rescued from the black market. Baloo is an adorable bear, only a few months old, who is taken to the river every afternoon for a swim to cool down (as his fur is so thick). I did a couple of neat videos of the puma purring away, chewing on his volunteers´arm, and of Baloo fooling around, rolling on his back and all.... It doesn´t take 5 minutes here to see how happy the animals are with people. They have really made it as much fun as possible for them.

We then spent a good 40 minutes trekking to get to Millie. I never thought I´d get there. I would have never found it. I asked Vanessa why she was SO far away from the others but she explained that most cats are very territorial and ocelots, in particular are very solitary animals. They cannot stand to share their trails with another ocelots. They can get by with pumas, just... but it´s best to have some enclosures very far apart from one another so that the cats can spray the trails as their own.

We called out to Millie when we got nearer to her cage and she started to rub her head against the cage to greet us. She is a beautiful cat and her coat is as unique as a finger print. This is why so many get shot down by hunters. I let her sniff my hand so that she could lick it and get to know me. She likes to sit on people´s lap as soon as we sit down and sure enough, as soon as we got her out she tried to jump on me to grab my hand and suck my thumb. I let her do this for a little while just to gain her trust and increase our connection.

We then started to let her walk wherever she fancied and that meant some pretty hairy treks. Muddy slopes and steep drops could look pretty unnerving to say the least. These were the hardest jungle treks I´d EVER done with no safety net ! Thankfully, I had come prepared with some thick gardener´s gloves that proved invaluable as I tried to hold onto branches or roots of trees to regain my balance more than once. Some trees have got spikes coming out and so it´s great protection from those too... and from Millie´s claws and teeth.

We were just getting settled after 2 H and she had jumped and my lap and was suckling like a baby, and Vanessa suggested she takes a photo of me with her, and as I tried to move my hand into my waterproof jacket to give it to her, Millie didn´t take to this kindly and started attacking my hand quite viciously. At the time, I wasn´t wearing my glove as I was happy to give her my thumb, but as she became more and more agressive I really had to pull her away and open her jaws with my free hand. I didn´t freak out (due to previous training with the lion cubs who were also unpredicatable) but I let her understand that I was in charge and she could not just dig in her teeth and claws willy nilly - or Willy Millie... whichever. I had some antiseptic to clean my scratches and it hasn´t got infected it seems. No pain now but I have got quite a few scratches already.

The people who handle the pumas have got a MUCH tougher jobs though. These guys love to RUN and you´d better follow, wherever they want to go too... sometimes it means down a really slippery and rocky slopes where you could easily break your neck or legs (and indeed, some have broken legs on day 1). In such hairy paths they have what they call ´runners´ - wires where you can clip the leash on and so the cat can run ahead at full speed as you are taking a bit more time to try and catch up in a safer way. But everybody who works with pumas is covered in mud day in, day out... I haven´t seen a red puma yet, just a grey one (and I noticed instantly he had cataracts!) but I hope I can soon pass one along a trail.

As it drizzled all day, the paths today were pretty tough. Even the branches seem to rot easily. I had to really test every branch before I properly pulled on them to pull myself up some steep tracks. There are almost no stairs where we are going... it´s all Indiana Jones style, except that we don´t even have a machetee ! I know that most of you reading this would absolutely hate it... it is pretty scary... but the cat is so beautiful, it seems surreal to follow her on a leash. She´s really like a splash of beauty in the mud !

I could feel my knees and leg hurt quite a bit as the day went by... I am using lots of muscles I had forgotten I had (!!!).... I am just pleased that Millie is such a placid cat. She spends a lot of time sniffing around and not running much at all. Tigre, the other ocelot, runs ALL day I heard and most people are exhausted by 5pm. But Millie gives us time to adjust and not sweat too much. However, come 4pm it can get quite chilly, even in the jungle and this is when you start to wish she would move faster so you wouldn´t get cold. It´s really hard to find a balance... what to put in the rucksack. You don´t want it too heavy otherwise it is a huge hindrance when you try to climb up ... or down.

We had a picnic lunch, we had bought a sandwich before we set off. It´s best, as I didn´t fancy hiking back 40 mins to the camp to get a warm lunch. Even their sandwiches are delicious... and tonight they even treated us to a huge bowl of pop corn. Wow.

There are people from all over the world (Denmark, Netherlands, UK, Israel, Canada, 3 from France even, though I haven´t talked to them yet because they all chain smoke which I despise). But no cute guys, most of them can´t be bothered to shave as the work is so rough... so I will not find Mr Right Enough here -- should I be looking, but I am not even looking, as you know. I am just mentioning in case some of you hoped I would ! :)

I´d better call my driver now and go back to my hotel ... it´s 8pm and I have been typing for exactly 2 hours. Bolivia and Miami are on the same time zone, so it´s great as I´m only 5 hours behind from the UK, though I feel a lot further than when I was in San Francisco... such a massive change of scenery.

I do like Bolivia... I feel very safe here, though it´s the poorest country in South America. Yesterday for instance I went walking around the village with all my valuables in my money belt and I never once felt threatened... People seem very laid back and accepting of foreigners. I think that they know that the organisation brings a lot of revenue for the local community... we foreigners buy food, drinks, employ a lot of people (including my driver for instance), give business to local hostels and hotels, etc. So I think they are grateful. So far I have only had very pleasant experiences anyway... long may it last ! I just wish my Spanish would improve faster but since I´m speaking English with Vanessa all day, I guess it won´t... pity.

I am not sure when I will next log back on... maybe in a few days. I reckon that all days will be the same from now on. I just hope Millie will settle with me pretty quickly. Vanessa told me that I´d already done a lot better than she did. With her she groaned for 10 days... with me, she only groans on and off... But to be two volunteers works well with her temperament... I can use a toy and drag it in front of her to get her moving. She needs motivation as she can be quite lazy. So we are trying to be inventive to keep her healthy ! We also have to be inventive to give her her medication... Wish us luck...

Bolivia - The Real Adventure begins... 14 April 2008

I went to bed at 8pm, took 2 sleeping pills and managed to stay fast asleep till my alarm went off at 4:40am for my 7am departure to Cochabamba (Quest Overseas, who arranged my trip here had warned me that I most likely wouldn´t make the connection the day before as the AA flight was always late ... they were right, I would have missed it since I came out of the airport at 7:30am).

The flight to Cochabamba was on time though and only took 30 minutes. We flew near a nice mountain chain, I am assuming, maybe wrongly, that it must have been the Andes... ? We landed on time and I wasn´t worried in the least... but soon got a bit nervous when I realised that my contact was not ´waiting for me with my name on a board by the arrival gate´as stated in my schedule. I waited 20 minutes... nada. IF my phone had been working, I would have texted Miriam, but of course, it was still barred.... So I had to find a phone company that could help me make the call. Then as she could not call me back nor text back even, I had to keep calling her to find out what was going on. Eventually, the girl who was waiting for me, but in the wrong area, found me in a call box. It all took an hour though...

We then promptly set off to Villa Tunari nr the animal sanctuary , in a private mini bus, but the journey was not as smooth as we´d hoped. Within 30 minutes the road was blocked off due to a traffic accident so we had to cut across some dirt roads in some fields to get back on track (it was like being on a safari but without the animals to look at). We then were able to continue fairly ok for an hour, and the scenery became more and more barren (and to my eyes: boring) as we kept going up... But then as we gradually went down, the cloud forest started to appear with much lusher vegetation... and its own problems too. There were many signs that said ´this is not a geologically stable region´and I wasn´t sure what they meant... I assumed earth quakes, but it was in fact land slides. We were 20 minutes away from where we needed to be when we hit this massive traffic jam. Trucks going back miles it seemed... as our mini van was smaller we managed to get to the front of the queue on the other side of the road only to find out that the terrain had collapsed and they had a bulldozer there trying to rebuild the road as quickly as possible. We were lucky, we only waited 30 minutes... some people wait all day depending on the damage. I kept thinking ´good job this didn´t happen on the way back, when I have a plane to catch!´. Landslides are very frequent and most people seem to have experienced them here... My Brazilian nuts came in quite handy as we were all getting quite hungry, waiting over lunch time.

We eventually reached the park and I got my first briefing... and I wasn´t very impressed. ´First of all, you need to understand that this is no fun but hard work. On hot days you will be soaked with sweat, on wet days you will soaked with rain. No photos are allowed in the first 5 days, we want you to stay focused on the animals at all times and if you take photos, you will be distracted too much and not watch their behaviour carefully... You are not allowed to go and have a look at the other animals either, unless you happen to walk the same trails... as we want to offer them stability... and many are in quarantines so ´no go area´. You have a choice of 2 jobs: one with monkeys and one with birds. Any questions!?´.... I said ´well, as much as I like birds, I really had set my heart on working with an ocelot, I booked this trip 18 months ago and for 18 months I´ve been looking forward to working with a cat... if I wanted to work with monkey I could have gone to Africa and paid half the fee, if I wanted to work with parrots, I could have gone back to Brazil... the ONLY reason I came to this park was to work with cats, so I´m pretty disappointed to say the least´... She first said ´we only have 2 ocelots and they already have a volunteer... but I´ll have a chat with the vet, see what he thinks´. They have no jaguars here anymore... I was really disappointed. Most of the jaguars are in the sister park, 300 miles away. I have seen photos of the baby jaguars they used to have and they looked SO cute...

Then she came back and said ´Ok, we can let you work with Millie. She´s already with Vanessa, but she´s a quiet cat. She´s a pretty sick ocelot though, so you´ll need to read her medical files. She has a kidney problem and if she doesn´t drink often she will get an urinary infection. To encourage her to drink, you have to get her to keep walking... if she sits on your lap for too long and doesn´t walk 3 hours a day at least, she will pass blood again´. Poor little Millie sounded in bad shape. Her mother had been killed for her fur when she was 3 weeks old. She had then been sold onto the black market and the park had got a tip off and rescued her. However, because she didn´t get her mother´s milk for as long as she needed, her immune system was much weaker. She also had a tendency to want to suckle on thumbs for comfort. Her file said ´Millie is a very affectionate cat, but she will test you and will turn on you sometimes for no good reason. She is also very playful and likes to chase mice and snakes´. Vanessa told me that the day before she had played with a snake for 30 minutes and then walked away leaving it half dead. Vanessa, who is from South Africa and was used to snakes, said she had to find a rock to finish it off because the poor snake was going to die a slow death and she couldn´t bear it. I know I would have hated to do that... but woud have equally hated to walk away leaving to suffer so much. Vanessa is trying to teach Millie that if she kills anything, she should eat it, not just play with it.

I really like Vanessa, she´s 23 (she could be my daughter, scary or what !?) and she is really keen to keep Millie as happy and comfortable as possible. She is even willing to walk off trail which makes it extra difficult for us, but extra interesting for Millie... she was previously bored with the normal trails and would not walk very far as a result. She has now a little ´pouch´ that we are hoping she will lose with more exercise.

She is a beautiful cat, but I didn´t get to see her until the day after. My first day was just getting to know the sanctuary a bit, and the village next to it. I was shown around the monkey area but one jumped on me straight away and I kind of froze. I feel really uncomfortable around monkeys. They have big teeth and look unpredictable... I did see many coatis though and that was grand. They are so cute... they had a few small ones too. They also have some animals that I´d never seen before and didn´t even know existed...

The sanctuary is doing a great job of rescuing injured animals. Some have been seriously traumatised and need a lot of tender loving care to get past their fear of humans. I didn´t really speak to anyone on the first day (except when I was introduced to Vanessa) but I did notice that most of them looked filthy from top to bottom, covered in mud, and that their hands were covered with mosquitoe bites. However, it seemed that most of them were coming back year after year... as they so loved working hands on with such beautiful exotic animals.

They have a baby puma I was told, but I wasn´t allowed to see it. I did go to the aviary instead and saw many beautiful parrots and macaws and two tucans, all in cages though (but they do let them out sometimes). But it was not as exciting as seeing them fly freely. However, I was told that the day after, about 10 of them would be released back in the wild as they had completed their rehab programme and proven that they could find their own food in the wild. Yipee. Everybody was really excited about that...

I was told that Millie would be fed a small chicken the next day, to see how she would react, and I became very wary. I mean, I never thought for one second, that to look after a wild cat would mean to actually feed them live baits.... I am SO squeamish, and I overheard a lot of volunteers talk on the same lines ´my puma spotted a snake and it was pretty brutal how he played with it´... oh geeee. I felt faint just at the thought of watching it. Millie is kept in an enclosure way up a trail and we were due to bring her the chicken in a rucksack. Poor chicken.

I left the park that day, at 5pm, feeling relieved I was given work with a cat (I would have been SO disappointed if not) but nervous about what it actually meant...

I have an allocated driver for the next 10 days who took me to my hotel afterwards. It is on beautiful grounds and I have a fairly big room but the shower is only luke warm. But all windows are screened and they have a few pets and I made friend with their cat within 10 minutes of checking in. She was on my lap purring as I was waiting for my dinner. They even have a swimming pool and a crystal clear river at the bottom where you can swim safely but I guess I will never have the time to do so... I took another 2 sleeping pills and was fast asleep at 7:30pm for a 7:30am wake up call. The people who work with the cats start at 9am, the ones with the birds or monkeys start at 7am... phew.

Getting to La Paz - 12 April 2008

Greetings from Bolivia... It took me 3 days to get to the park where I´m now working and the journey was pretty stressful from the start.

I woke up that morning and found that Orange (my mobile phone network) had barred all incoming and outgoing calls due to a misunderstanding. I badly needed my phone to be in working order as it was the only way that my contacts in La Paz would be able to get hold of me if there were any changes in plans. I wasted a lot of time and money to try and get this sorted, but in vain.

I was leaving for Miami from Heathrow Terminal 5 and it didn´t help either as only 10% of the phone boxes are connected (as the terminal has only just opened). So I couldn´t even call my parents to let them know that this was the problem, should they have tried to contact me too... (and I tend to worry about my mother fretting as she would not have understood the msg in English that explained why I could not pick up .. and my sister was in Madrid all week end so I couldn´t call her either... not even from a call box).

After all this stress, the BA flight was actually quite as stress free experience. I managed to get aisle seats at the last minute as I was sitting in between a couple who wanted to sit together. So that worked out just fine (I had tried to reserve an aisle seat on line the day before, but the BA system had crashed so I could not print my boarding pass) and of course, by the time I got to the airport, all the aisle seats were gone.

The movies were great too, and I watched 3 in a row (I´d give ´PS I love you´top marks -- just my kind of movie, totally loved it, cried a lot... ) and so the 8h45 mins flight didn´t seem that long after all. Food was good too. No problem for once.

The 5 hour wait in Miami was more painful... 3 flights landed within 30 mins of each other, and on mine we were 360 passengers, so if you do the maths, that´s roughly 1,000 people to go through Customs. Good job I had 5 hours to kill... by then I was getting quite tired though as it was 2am in my head. I found Miami airport very confusing and far too cold to even try and sleep on some seats (besides, you could not lift the handle on the seats so you were truly stuck to have a decent rest). T5 was much more comfy in that respect...

Then I eventually got onto my flight for La Paz and had managed to secure, miraculously, 3 seats to myself (I was the only one who had -- I really felt God had answered my prayers) when 10 seconds before take off this girl comes from 3 rows behind and barges in and says ´I´ll have to sit by your window, I´m seated next to a guy who has bad breath of smoke and alcohol, I can´t bear it´. I said ´Do you have to sit HERE ?? I mean, there are another 50 empty seats on this plane, at least, I have been on the go for over 20 hours with NO sleep, I really need to catch up, please go elsewhere´. She completely ignored my plea with a ´No, yours look best, that will do me fine. You don´t have to worry about me, you can use the seat in the middle´. ´My spine won´t stretch that far, I cannot crouch over 2 seats comfortably´ I grumbled back. She still couldn´t care less. .. I turned to an air hostess in desperation ´I really need to catch up on my sleep, can´t YOU do something?´, and she said ´Well, you have not paid for the other 2 seats either so she can do what she likes´... I was fuming. This girl was up all night reading magazines, she truly could have sat anywhere. I was so annoyed and SO acutely frustrated that I was unable to sleep more than 30 mins out of 6H... grrrr....

When we landed in La Paz, it was a beautiful crisp morning which helped me keep awake (by then I had not slept most of the past 26 hours). There was not the snow predicted by the BBC weather forecast but there were snow capped mountains all around... though the city looked rather plain, with mainly small red brick houses with flat roofs and a few churches standing out here and there...

My flight was 1H late landing and then my luggage was the last one to arrive on the conveyor belt (I still felt happier to have waited 45 minutes when some people lately have had to wait more like 2 weeks !). By the time I came out, my poor driver had been waiting for me for 2 hours, as of 5:35am, pretty painful... His name was Hugo and he was the father of my contact, Miriam. He was a charming man, who didn´t speak any English beside ´Hello´ so I had to get going with my Spanish -- and I felt seriously rusty. But we got by...

My apartment was very spacious. I even had a huge kitchen all to myself that I barely used. I noticed there was no central heating though and that the bathroom needed a serious clean. However, Miriam (who lived in the flat below) soon sorted me out. She brought me a heater that blows hot air, cleaned up the bath tub within 10 minutes and I was able to have a nice hot shower (very hot too) and catch up on my sleep for 4 hours. I didn´t want to sleep too much as I feared I may not go back to sleep on time that night.

Then we went for a stroll around the capital city (the highest capital city in the world) and it was pretty much exactly as I´d remembered it... San Francisco church still standing, the countless stalls all over the streets, most of the older women had their black bowler hats and skirts to knee high, with babies wrapped in a colourful shawl on their backs. I picked up some great bargains. Such as trekking socks that cost me 20 dollars equivalent in the UK were only 2 dollars equivalent here... and I bought 2lbs of fresh Bazilian nuts... absolutely delicious. Far better than what you buy in the shops in Europe when they are all dry by then.

I did suffer a bit from altitude sickness and certainly felt it every time we walked up a few flights of stairs. My heart would really pounce in my chest. To help relieve the symptoms Hugo gave me some cola leaves to soak in hot water and drink up regularly. I also went to the chemist to relieve the nauseous symptoms and they sold me a couple of pills (here you can only buy 2 pills out of a pack of 56 if need be - great !!!) and I took one and within 15 minutes I felt instantly better. I was well impressed.

Miriam and I then went to an English pub for an early dinner... I know how it sounds... but she wasn´t sure she could get me decent vegetarian food in a Bolivian restaurant. It was good but people in there smoked and I really am not used to that anymore so as soon as we got home I had to wash my hair and put some of my clothes away in a plastic bag.

My Spanish is still rusty, I really should have revised my past tenses a few weeks before coming over, but you know how utterly frantic my life is... I just never found the time... I guess the only ´dead´time I have is at the bus stop waiting, or in my bath... but sometimes it´s good to do NOTHING... I never seem to do ´nothing´anymore.

La Paz was actually a LOT warmer than I expected by day. When I landed it was 7am and so it was still quite chilly, maybe 5C or so, but in the afternoon, it must have been 15C and so I was seriously over dressed. I kept stripping as we went along... and I got tanned really quickly too on my face. S15 is just not enough when you are that high up, S50 would have been more appropriate.

I had taken 300 dollars with me, but was told that Bolivians no longer ´widely accept dollars´ as the currency is devaluating too fast. So I basically had to get BS from an ATM... thank God for those. I just wish I didn´t have all these dollars with me now as I dare not leave them anywhere ... so I keep them in my money belt at all times. Not great either.

Romania project - Easter 2008

I'm a bit late in updating my blog - sorry- but every time I get back to London in between trips, I have no life left.

Bucharest itself was ok-ish, but not the kind of city where I'd particularly want to go back to as it's not visually pretty (by my standards). They do have a few Parisian styles type of architecture but it's only because some of their architects went to study in Paris, I understand. Outside that, the vast majority of the town is made of blocks that look like English council flats and that don't have any appeal to them whatsoever. I hardly took any photos.

The roads are very wide too, to allow for the tram lines, and the zebra crossing points are almost all washed out, so, unless you have local knowledge, it's hard to work out where you're supposed to cross.... and I guess that if you are a driver from out of town, it's hard to work out when you're supposed to stop (pedestrians have right of way then). For all of these reasons, I couldn't advise our blind students that they even attempt to cross the roads on their own. I was quite nervous myself, being fully sighted.

The language itself sounded quite nice, fairly soft and I was surprised to see that I could actually understand quite a lot of the written text - and some spoken words too. It seemed like a blend of Italian and German. Some words also sounded very French. I didn't realise that Romanian was also a latin-based language which explains a lot. They have the same alphabet but different accents on their letters - sometimes.

It is a fairly poor country though, wages are about 1/4 of what they are in Western Europe and so whereby 10 years ago there were 21 million Romanians, I understand that there are only 17 millions now. People are desperate to find a brighter future elsewhere.

Anyway, as you know I was there to pass some of my knowledge onto teachers who worked with visually impaired children and young adults. I was very honoured to find out that many had travelled several hours by train to get to Bucharest for the chance of hearing what I had to say.

We were blessed with great weather... a bit cold at night but quite pleasant by day, which was crucial for us as we had to do a fair amount of mobility. Romania was further South than I had expected, and Bucharest is only 40 mins away from the Black Sea and quite near Turkey (only Bulgaria stands in between), so I guess it explained a lot.

Some of the blind students that I met already had canes but had never been shown how to use them properly. There are 7 tips to holding a cane safely, from the position of the hand (body-centred), to the width of the arc when you swing from left to right (just beyond your shoulder, no more, no less), to the body posture, tension in the hand, where you place your index, and insuring your cane is on the ground at all times. Walking in steps is not always easy so I'm personally a bit more leniant on that - so long as they have a good rhythm it's all that matters. So, beside walking safely, I was keen to show them that they could also walk comfortably. Doing that is the 'mobility' part of things and is the main bulk when you have some residual vision.

When you don't, then you have to look at orientation too.... and using all your other senses to figure out where you are (sun, shade, draft, slopes, textures, drops, trees, sounds of traffics, smells of shops, etc). I had brought books on mobility that they will translate so that the teachers can look back on them eventually, but it was full of technical jargons that is specific to my job and that wouldn't have made any sense when looked up in a dictionary. Things like 'indenting' (at a road crossing - i.e. away from the busiest junction), 'squaring off' (placing your heels in front of a kerb before setting off to make it easier to walk in a staight line), 'popping up' (with a cane, when you find an obstacle), pendulum, 2 point touch, 3 point touch, etc. None of this can be easily explained in words, you need to see it demonstrated. So, I really wanted to work on all these concepts so that when they eventually get the books, they will be able to visualise in their heads what it meant.

We also spent some time indoors, demonstrating the importance of lighting and contrasts when writing or cooking, using simulation spectacles that show what different eye conditions look like - blurred vision, patchy vision, tunnel vision, peripheral vision, etc. Each eye condition has its own set of problem but even people who just have 'light perception' can still use this to orientate themselves. We had a session on how best to read and write (the "3 Bs rule" - bigger, bolder, brighter will solve 90% of problems), and how to make a cup of tea safely. Playing with contrasts, lighting (equally essential) and LLI (liquid level indicators, that beep when you are an inch away from the top as you pour water in your mug) all made a huge difference. It was good fun and educational and as a result, they managed to retain a lot of information in those 3 days and all enjoyed themselves. They seemed hungry for knowledge and when I did a little test at the end, they seemed to have remembered a lot. They were also very keen to work under blindfold to understand the concepts better - and the fears too.

Stan & Camelia were lovely hosts (I was staying in an annexe next to theirs). They have a super cat, Pepper, and a female labrador, Chloe, who will become the first guide dog there - if she can behave herself. So, I've met the dog who will make history I felt ! :) They are devoted Christian and 'what you see if what you get - they walk the walk and talk the talk'. Not many people do that these days and it's always refreshing to see the best side of human nature at work, when we are bombarbed by sad news on TV, caused by the worst side of human nature usually.

Stan, in particular, had some incredible stories to tell. He even told me one evening that he'd met an angel... and from he described, I totally believe it too. He is a pilot and has had a few engine problems with his plane in his days. One day he just about managed to land safely in a small airport but was unable to take off again. He tried to start the propellors at the front, manually, by leaning on them to make them spin, to no avail. He said he tried for over an hour until all his muscles ached, but was unable to move them by even half an inch. They seemed completely jammed. Just as he'd given up, a guy came from nowhere... from behind a shed maybe... and told him 'look, go back to your seat, do everything you need to do to be ready for take off and I'll spin the propellors for you'... Stan was a bit dubious but obeyed anyway. He did as he was told, then gave the guy the thumbs up to mean 'ready now'... and the mystery man just spinned the propellors with no effort whatsoever. Supernatural strength. As Stan took off, he looked back down to wave at him as a thank you but he had completely vanished (most angels do - I've read lots of stories on the theme). He thought this miracle had happened for his benefit but 10 minutes later, he picked up a distress signal from another aircraft and was able to relay their SOS to a local airport so that they could clear the landing strip for them. Stan told me he felt sure that the angel had stepped in for *them*, because if he hadn't been in the air to relay their messages, God knows what would have happened...

Another time, when working as an air-ambulance pilot, about 5 years ago he told me that he got to know a man who had a daughter with severe kidney problems. She was on dialysis most days and only had 6 months left to live. I guess the mother had died so she was all this man had left in the world. The father knew though that he was a compatible match, blood wise, to become a live donor, but in Romania, nobody wanted to take this on. Stan endeavoured to call around all hospitals he knew of in Europe and found one in Ireland that was willing to do the surgery. Better still, they were happy to do it for nothing so long as Stan could fly them over. He then called the father who was over-the-moon and the surgery was scheduled for the following week-end I seem to recall. However, a few hours after Stan had told this man the good news, the Irish hospital called back and said 'oops, sorry, we didn't realise that Romania isn't part of the EU [yet], so we cannot do this procedure free of charge. There is no reciprocal agreement with Romania. We can still do the surgery, but only if this man can find £25,000'. Shock and horror. As you can imagine, there was no way this poor man could afford such a huge amount, all the more so by Romanian standards. His daughter only had 5 months left, not 5 years (which was probably the minimum amount of time needed for him to save that much). Stan being as Christian as ever, told me he could not find it in him to call this man back and tell him that his daughter's life was worth £25,000 - which is what it boiled down to, in effect. Stan also felt he could not stand back and do nothing. He gathered his sons and they all agreed that if they sold their house and downscaled, they could probably find £25,000 in the profit margin. He told me that they all felt it was the only way forward and that they could not let this girl die so they would take it upon themselves to find the money. He went to bed that night probably serene, thinking he'd taken the (morally) right decision and was going to visit an estate agent on Monday to put their home on the market.

However, that night, he had a premonition (God often talks to people in their dreams, as the Bible often shows). A man that he had met 5 years earlier, an Irish journalist, came back to him his mind. When he woke up, he dug out his business card, called him and explained what had happened. The guy was very interested in the story and agreed to fly to Romania same day to meet the father & daugther, take photos, etc. He ran the story in the press on the Monday, and by the end of the week they'd managed to raise £25,500. The surgery was able to go ahead on schedule, was a massive success, and this girl is still in contact with Stan.... She actually wrote to him recently to say she'd just got married and had a baby. I cannot imagine how rewarding that must have felt... that through his sheer determination and compassion, he had saved, in effect, two lives... one on the way out, and one that wouldn't have been.

All of these stories really warmed up my heart and I felt I learnt more from them than they probably learnt from me. I had a lot of practical knowledge to share, but the spiritual knowledge is the most important. Renewing my faith in the power of prayers, etc. It was humbling.
They are both exquisite people and when you see them at work together, you really witness how love, faith and determination can move mountains. It renews your faith in the human spirit and in the best in all of us. They have done SO much for the most vulnerable people of Romania... I felt very priviledged to be a part of their venture - and to know them at all.

If you want to read up more on what they do, you can log onto their site at
http://www.lightintoeurope.org/