This could be Rotterdam or Anywhere, Soissons or Home

1st November

My last entry left me in Belgium, on my way to Rotterdam.  Since then I've had 20 hours in Holland which included a night out in Amsterdam, 4 days in northern France and a sneaky visit back to the UK.

Why? I can hear you wonder,well what I missed out from my Belgium post (and the rest before it ) was that I had been practically deaf out of my left ear for almost three weeks and despite the attempts of numerous pharmacists I still couldn't hear anything from the bugger!  I had tried oils, sprays, drops and even chemicals to clean the wax out of my tubes but nothing would make it budge, as a final resource I was advised to visit the local hospital to have them cleaned properly, how simple that sounds. To cut a long story short the cleaning I had done in Brussels didn't work and the doctor decided I had a possible ear infection and so prescribed antibiotics and steroids and told me not to fly, until i had finished the course of medicines and i had sought advice from another doctor In a weeks time. Funny how my trip could have been over before it had even started.

Not one to take no for an answer I continued my trip over land and hoped for the best, to be honest I had almost two weeks, well ten days, without any flights so it wasn't a huge hardship to travel overland,well not until my flight from Geneva to Tel Aviv. I was meeting people in Rotterdam that I had worked with in Italy for a reunion of sorts and then I was meeting my brother, sister-in-law and nephew in France. I wasn't expecting to be in need of medical assistance, I just didn't have the time for it.

Once in Rotterdam I didn't sleep. Wafa, Natalie, Bart and Nigel were waiting patiently for me at the eurolines bus stop and our itinerary was planned out for us and sleep wasn't an option. Well not unless I wanted to risk over sleeping and missing my very nice train to Paris.

Once we got to Wafas flat we began to catch up on each others lives.  It felt weird all sat together again, not because we hadn't seen each other for a long time but because there was not a tent in sight. Later that night we went to the house of Wafa's mum where her mum had made us a huge lamb tagine. Wafa's mum is from Morocco so it was very authentic. Nobody wanted to touch it when it first came out, it looked too pretty. The smell was amazing. It. Didn't take us long to dive in. I ate loads! The cous cous was the nicest I'd ever had and the chillies Wafa had requested for me guaranteed ring sting in the morning. I even got to use a little of my Dutch and Arabic! I think that has to be the nicest Moroccan meal I will ever / have ever had in Holland.

FOOD!

Food over and photos taken it was time to discover Amsterdam. A short tram and extortionate train ride later and the night had begun. Drinking, singing and dancing followed. That was a night of firsts. It was my first night in Holland. It was my first night assessing the prostitutes in Amsterdam 's red light district. And it was the first time I'd tried peanut butter on chips. It's not for me. Chips are very popular in Holland, much like in the UK but where we differ is the use of sauces. The sauce or mayonnaise for that matter is given freely. Very freely. In similar quantities as you would find gravy on chips in the north of England. I'm not one to judge but too much of a good thing can Ruin something and for me, the mayonnaise ruined the chips.

Train time home,I was impressed that the trains are frequent all night. Once I saw the amount of people using the train it was clear why. Arriving back at Wafas place in sunlight I became paranoid I would miss my train and spent two hours finding ways to keep myself awake before I travelled Further south, and having to say the dreaded goodbyes again.

Skip the goodbyes, the sleep on the train and a train change in Paris and I'm now in Soissons in rural France. Michael was sat waiting for me and i filled him in on what had happened with my ear and how i would have to visit a doctor in a few days time and that may result in them carrying a hitchhiker back to the. UK with them.

Whilst in France we stayed in a eurocamp caravan and i became a little to critical about. How they had set up their vans. I always feel its a bad sign when people take their work home with them. Now I'm doing it when i don't even work for the company anymore. This isn't a good sign. We visited the castle that they film the TV show 'Merlin' at and Thomas and i hired a pedalo and set sail on the 'greedy lake.' This refers to a sign we saw about the lake. I think the picture may be lost forever as it was on my phone which i lost in Tel Aviv 2 weeks later.

Yay! Found it

Because I've left it too long (bad organisational skills which i posses) i can't remember the order in which we did stuff, but we visited an underground village which Michael believed should have sky scrappers in it. I,m sure they'd look a treat in rural France. We visited lots of cemeteries and saw the trenches from world war one. Its strange. To. Think of what went on there so long ago, it looks so calm and peaceful now.

Obviously a new country also means i. Have to visit their hospital and so now was time to judge the French. On how they treated their sick. I had to select a ticket much lie you do at. The deli counter in he supermarket and wait for the machine to display my number. I feel this is a much better method than the British 'que' system. I was then sent to a different specialist in a different building who at first tried to fit me with a hearing aid (not a good sign if you ask me) and then realised what i actually wanted. Its easy to understand why. The problem occurred, he spoke no English and i speak no French so immediately this presents a problem. Thanks to google translate we over came this difficulty and i was very. Pleased when he said i had no sign of an ear infection. My elation diminished slightly when i asked how long until my hearing returned to normal. His response was a shrug of the shoulders and a typed message which read, maybe a month. I couldn't be deaf for another month, i had done it already and it wasn't getting any easier. For anyone who is actually deaf I applaud how you carry on, it was driving me insane! I have a new found respect for all hearing impaired people. Anyhow that's when i decided i would come home, see my doctor see my nurse and get them deal with in a language i can understand. And that explains why i had a little visit back home, and why i had to skip Geneva and miss a week in Israel /Jordan and so missed Petra, Wadi Rum, Aqaba and Eilat. But still i eventually have my health.