Burma Border Ben
July 2006
Burma Border Ben Events
NIGHTSTRIDER
Diary - Back on the Border

June 2006
Walk 16 - The Whole of the Thames
Walk 15 - The Vea Lally
Walk 14 - The Lea Valley
Walk 13 - We finally reach Portsmouth

May 2006
Walk 12 - East End Exploration
Walk 11 - Winchester Woes

April 2006
Walk 10 - Leith Hill Revisited
Walk 9 - Saint Swithun's way
Walk 8 - The Thames Trail

March 2006
Walk 7 - A Made Up Adventure
Walk 6 - Boxhill Bone Shaker

February 2006
Walk 5- High Chart Challenge
Walk 4 - East End Exploration
Walk 3 - Surbiton Striding

January 2006
Walk 2 - Richmond & Wimbledon Parks
Walk 1 - The Thames Trail

May 2005
Diary - The Home Straight

April 2005
Diary - Sun, Moon, Stars
Diary - Occupants of Interplanetary Craft
Diary - Ben Time
Diary - Sweet Nourishing Gruel
Diary - A Picture Postcard
Diary - Ma Sandar's View

March 2005
Diary - Grange Hill Days
Diary - BBBBBBBB
Diary - Burma Border Survival Guide
Diary - the End of Exam Picnic
Diary - All Change Please

February 2005
Diary - The Whistle Stop Cafe
Diary - That Aint No Fortune Cookie
Diary - Sleeping with the Enemy
Diary - Sweet Valley High
Diary - Border Buddies
Diary - Food Glorious Food

January 2005
Diary - Goodbye Bainton
Diary - Amid the Chaos of the Day
Diary - Top of the Thailand Pops
Diary - Father Christmas Goes on Holiday

December 2004
Diary - Linguadrama
Diary - Happy Mae La Oon Camper

November 2004
Diary - That Feint Sour Panic
Diary - Lizard Life
Diary - Chiang Mai Hello and Goodbye
Diary - Two Hours and Counting

October 2004
Diary - My Last Day
Diary - Flights, Visas and Jabba the Painful
Diary - The Party
Party - The Burma Ball

Diary - That Aint No Fortune Cookie

Freddy Kruger? Jason? The person with that scream mask? Pah! They all pale compared with this, a more-scarey-than-the-alton-towers-ghost-train tour through a select few of Mae La Oon's freakiest non-Kingdom Humania...


First up, a chicken.

dastardly chicken.JPG
This chicken is named dastardly chicken because it represents all the chickens of the camp, who are all dastardly, particularly the dastardly cockrels. They begin to cock-a-doodle at maybe four a.m., they cock-a-doodle underneath one's hut, they take over one's hut when one is away, they cock-a-doodle from morn til night. If they don't stop it I'm going to invent a new game called cock-a-through-the-hoop. It involves chickens and hoops. One likes the idea of this game.


DVC00425.jpg
BEEBEETLE - the clumsy thug of the Mae La Oon skies, terrifying as it flies, thoroughly stupid every time it crashes into anything and falls on its hard shell of a back (it can't flip itself back over easily at all), no longer the feared arch enemy it once was. Oh no, BEEBEETLE's positively cute by comparison. By comparison to...


oh lord.JPG
The scariest living creature known to man. I say creature because surely this can be no mere insect. Creepy, crawly, and disgusting - these freak me out. Like Brave Star, these things (or maybe thing - I have never seen two together, maybe its like a revenge thing like in Jaws 4: The Revenge)) have the "strength of the bear" - Thein Tay Oo tried to yank one off its perch by a light one night (with use of his whole body) and just succeeded in borrowing one third of an antennae, to the thing's disgruntled displeasure. I wanted to photograph one on the floor of the office once, and as I zoomed in closer and closer (physically and photographically), the thing decided (and I didn't know it had wings), to take off and leap at me. Alas this sent me crashing backwards onto a pile of chairs and computer batteries. Alas the room was full of students. Alas from that moment on my pretence (that I'm not afraid of insects) was blown. Alas from that moment on the students have been actively on the lookout for these beasts to pick up and wiggle near my unexpecting face. Get me the hell out of here mum.

DVC00378.JPG
Excuse me, but just what the f**k are you?

DVC00424.JPG
Apparently it can receive the BBC world service and live football.

MT