Lewis the Lion

A year to the day since Lewis the Lion returned from his epic world-wide journey, he felt dreadful that he’d never managed to upate his blog and complete his story from his travels around the world. But what another incredible year he had lived out, with so many more stories to tell.

Funniest of all was that his life seemed to have come full circle from when he first started his adventure in the first place as he was now living in that place where he first ‘dipped his paw in the water.’ He was now an official resident of the United Arab Emirates and was living in Dubai!

Dubai Marina skyline with metro

So, Lewis the Lion has made a pact with himself that he will finish his tale of his incredible trip around the world over the coming months so watch this space…

Lewis the Lion stands on the balcony from his new home

Lewis the Lion at the Almas Tower – JLT

Did you ever start something that you had difficulty finishing? How did you motivate yourself to persevere?

Visiting his last Asian country for the time being, Lewis the Lion contemplated some of the things that had surprised him to date of this fascinating continent.

Here is a list of some of his biggest Asian surprises in his observations:

* The number of young people carrying technology or electronic devices around with them: mobile phones, tablets, computers – even in the middle of the jungle! For instance, Lewis the Lion discovered that approximately 70% of the Indian population have a mobile phone but only 60% have an access to a toilet!

This solar-panel backpack can charge your phone or computer whilst you’re on the move!

* The number of people that can be crammed into or onto a vehicle at any one time, including luggage, animals, goods, etc.

Five on a bike – it’s all quite normal in India!

Flat-back vans crammed with people in Tana Toraja, Indonesia

* How there are aren’t more accidents on the roads: traffic is constantly beeping to overtake and driving into the oncoming car lane

* When asking for directions, people will give you an answer whether they know or not

* The scale of political campaigns, even 6 months in advance

Political campaigns start months in advance

* The sockets. In just four countries, he’d encountered four different type of plug sockets! His international travel adapters came in very handy indeed

* Haggling for goods – everything is negotiable

* In countries like India and Malaysia, there tend to be big families. Many people marry young (often through arranged marriages) and whole extended families live together.

Lewis the Lion wondered if someone were to visit Europe or the UK for the first time, what things would surprise them about the British or European culture?

See if you can interview someone who is visiting the UK for the first time or someone who has come to live here.
Ask them about what they have found intriguing about the British or the European way of life? What were their first impressions? Were they positive or not?

Vishnu and the Scene of the Churning of the Milk Ocean

The next morning, Lewis the Lion, Helen and Sinead were back at Bangkok’s impressive international airport: the Suvarnabhumi aiport. Before Helen went through passport controls, she made sure that she stopped off at the chemist to buy lots of rehydration sachets and diarrhoea tablets as she’d heard that in India if you weren’t careful as a foreigner you could suffer from something called “Delhi-belly” and she certainly didn’t want that.

Typical Thai food products at Bangkok airport

However, she was happy to be leaving behind certain other Asian foods and in particular the Dorian fruit which she spotted a box off inside the airport!

Sinead waves goodbye at Bangkok airport

Lewis the Lion and Helen felt quite sad to wave goodbye to Sinead as they went off on their separate ways: Sinead flying back to the UK (where apparently it was thick with snow!) and the travelling friends flying back to Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia before catching a connecting flight to New Delhi, India’s capital city.

Back in Malaysia, Lewis the Lion noticed that the clocks had gone back an hour, which gave Helen some extra time to catch up on some e-mails in the airport lounge. However, Lewis the Lion came across a rather interesting photo in a toilet cubicle: a sign of which he’d never seen before in his life and it made him laugh!

Lewis laughs at these instructions in the toilet cubicle

Can you see the image to the bottom lefthand side of the picture? Well, Lewis the Lion learnt that apparently there is a high case of people breaking toilet seats as they transit through the Malaysian capital. Mainly because in many Asian countries, they do not have toilets they way that we know them in the Western world. Instead they are used to squat toilets so western-style toilets can be quite baffling for them which is why they need to be reminded not to stand on the toilet seat!

A traditional Asian squat toilet

It wasn’t long before Lewis the Lion was boarding his next flight; this time to New Delhi on a huge aeroplane. Helen had been allocated the wrong seat as she’d specifically paid for a window seat and so had to wait until the very end before she and Lewis could be sat down. It was worth the wait though as Lewis just loved looking out of the window as the plane soared high above what looked like a sea of fluffy, cotton wool clouds.

Flying up above the clouds

As had been the case on many of his journeys as he crossed country boundaries, flying to India was no exception, as even with Helen’s Indian visa stamped firmly in her passport, she still needed to complete a landing card to present on her arrival to passport control.

Completing the landing card for arrival in India

On this flight, Lewis the Lion got his first little taster of what was to come over the following weeks as he and Helen tucked into a delicious Indian style meal which included chicken curry, rice and chapatis.

Lewis the Lion’s first taste of true Indian cuisine on the flight to New Delhi

What was intriguing was at the end of the meal, the air-stewards came around with small packets of ‘aftermints.’ Lewis the Lion wondered if they were a bit like “After-Eight” dinner mints but there was no chocolate in sight.

Aftermint?

Instead was a packet of various types of sweet seeds that had a minty and aniseed taste to them. A very unusual taste!

Some minty tasting seeds

As Lewis the Lion checked his inflight journey screen, he was surprised to see that New Delhi had one of those strange half an hour time zone changes, just like he had experienced when he had been in parts of Australia too. New Delhi was in fact two and a half hours behind Kuala Lumpur time (and seven and a half hours ahead of UK time). What also surprised him was rather like the particularly cold snap that the UK was facing this winter, New Delhi had had freakishly cold weather by their standards for that time of year too. They had never experienced such low temperatures in many years with temperatures in New Delhi hovering around the 12 degrees celsius mark. Helen would have to make sure that she wore warm clothes as it would certainly colder than the 30 degrees plus they had got used to in Thailand!

Lewis the Lion arrives in India at nighttime

As in so many times on this extraordinary journey, Lewis felt a wave of excitement as the plane started to descend over New Delhi. It was twilight and the twinkling lights of the city lit up some of the city’s impressive monuments and religious sites as they came into land. Lewis the Lion was both nervous and excited all rolled into one as he landed in India. Of all the countries he had been to on his travels, he was very much aware of the fact that this was perhaps one of the poorest countries that he had visited and so was a little bit nervous about what he might see and experience there.

Lewis the Lion is welcomed to India: in Hindi and in English

However, the airport itself was a fine affair and its sign proudly welcomed Lewis the Lion and the other passengers to India in both English and Hindi (India’s two main languages).

Huge hands in Indian dance style greet the passengers at passport control

Lewis the Lion started to smile to himself as he waited to come through passport controls. Above his head were huge statues of hands, decorated in henna and holding certain poses used in classical Indian dance. Lewis the Lion wondered if he might get to see some of this style of dancing on his visit to India? Perhaps even in a Bollywood film?

The women’s and the men’s toilets

Straight away, Lewis the Lion started to appreciate the Indian cultural dress in the airport as even the toilets had pictures of traditionally dressed men and women to depict which toilets were which: the men’s or the ladies’!

A taxi driver from the hotel came to pick Helen and Lewis the Lion up and just this once, Lewis the Lion was very grateful to be taking private transport to get to his destination. It was dark and late, the traffic was as he might have expected, chaotic and noisy (but he will tell you more about that in one of his next blogs). It had been a very long day of travel passing through three Asian capital cities but Lewis the Lion was resolutely grateful to have arrived in India safe and well for now.

Lewis the Lion was intrigued to try the Indian after-dinner mints on his flight. What’s the most unusual food that you have ever tried? What was strange about it? Did you enjoy it? Why or why not? How would you encourage other people to try that food too? Design a poster for it.

Lewis the Lion catches the ferry back to Koh Samui

Lewis thought that at times there seemed to be angels here on earth. It was strange that sometimes, when he was at the point of his greatest need, just the right person, often a stranger, would appear just at the right time. Never was this so true as on the day that Helen had to collect her visa from the Indian Embassy in Bangkok. Lewis the Lion, Helen and Sinead had arrived back from Koh Samui to hit terrible Friday afternoon traffic. The Embassy office shut at 6pm but you needed to arrive before 5pm to be seen and have in hand a token to say that you had queued. Helen and Lewis the Lion were getting more and more anxious when at 4:30pm they were stuck in the full heart of Bangkok’s rush hour traffic and they weren’t moving anywhere fast: in fact they weren’t moving at all! Whatever would they do if the office had closed and Helen hadn’t collected her passport?

Lewis looks out over the Bangkok skyline

They were due to fly to India the next morning and these public offices were shut on a Saturday! If she couldn’t manage to pick up her passport, it would no doubt trigger a series of stressed phone calls to rearrange a whole load of planned activities for their arrival in New Delhi. Lewis the Lion sat in the back of the taxi and willed it to move.

‘How far away are we?’ Helen questioned anxiously.

‘It’s only on the next corner about a mile down the road,’ replied the taxi driver.

Lewis the Lion wondered if it’d be perhaps better if they were to get out and walk the remainder of the way as it was now 4:57pm! But with all their luggage in the back of the car, maybe that wasn’t such a good idea after all? So, they decided to wait until the taxi eventually reached the Indian Embassy at 5:10pm. Lewis the Lion crossed his fingers while he and Helen ran off into the building, while Sinead waited down below.

They got to the security check-point at the doors to the Embassy offices but the guards shook their heads. If they hadn’t collected a token before 5pm, then they weren’t getting in. Helen started to plead with the security officers explaining that the traffic had come to a standstill. They were immovable. Lewis the Lion and Helen were in a real panic now. What were they to do?

Just at the point when they were about to give up hope, a man who was stood next to them said the security officers, ‘It’s OK. They’re with me.’ as he waved his token number 109 at them. Helen’s jaw dropped open in disbelief. This kind man had saved them by the skin of their teeth.

He introduced himself as Paul and it turned out that he’d been waiting his turn to pick up his passport too but had had to leave the waiting room to take a phone call. When he’d seen Lewis the Lion and Helen clearly panic-stricken at the thought of not being able to pick up her passport, he stepped in to help. Lewis the Lion and Helen both thought that he was very quick-thinking and very kind to offer to help them. It seemed like he was an angel here on earth, coming to save them at the eleventh hour!

Phew! The Indian visa is picked up in the nick of time.

They then entered into the offices and waited in turn to be seen together with Paul. Lewis the Lion and Helen both beamed with delight as her passport ready-stamped with the Indian visa was handed over to her. From there they thanked Paul profusely and happily made their way to join Sinead again. With passport in hand they were then able to enjoy their last night in Bangkok: a stay in a rather posh hotel in the Sukhumvit area called The Four Wings Hotel. They also dined in a wonderful restaurant called Soul Food before the excitement of the day started to take its toll. It was off to bed for Lewis the Lion as tomorrow he would journey to his last country on his worldwide adventure: India…

Has a stranger ever helped you out in a time of need? What happened and how did it make you feel?

One day in Koh Panghan, Lewis the Lion spotted a poster advertising some Thai Boxing (Muay Thai) at the Kobra Club and Stadium.

Lewis the Lion sees a poster for some Muay Thai Boxing Matches

He’d heard that Thai boxing was the most popular sport in Thailand and was quite intrigued. However, for all he was a lion he was a bit squeamish at the thought of seeing people fighting in a ring so was rather relieved when he realised it was way past his bedtime anyway and for once, he was glad not to be joining the adults.

Sinead and Johannes prepare to watch the fight

So, Helen and Sinead together with their diving friend, Johannes, went instead and reported back.

Helen and Sinead pretend to be boxers outside the Kobra Club Stadium!

The competing fighters (ten in all) were representing their own clubs and so were fighting for the honour of their club. Some of them were first timers, even foreigners taking on native Thai competitors. However, there were also trainer experts taking on other trainer experts so it was set to be an exciting evening.

The boxers throw punches at each other

Helen thought that Muay Thai boxing seemed a bit like dancing on the spot to some unique, plinky-plonky music (Thai piphet music) which sped up as the fight intensified, with a few kicks and punches thrown in. The more expert they were the more spins they seemed to manage and to the untrained eye, it looked much more like ‘the karate kid!’ Click here to get a flavour of the evening.
However, more than the boxing itself, Helen and Sinead enjoyed the spiritual and ritualistic side of the sport as the whole evening kicked off with great dignity as everybody stood up respectfully to listen to the national anthem.

The ritualistic start: the boxers dance around the ring

When the boxers entered the ring in their blue or red shorts with their sacred rope headbands (mongkhon) and ritualistic pieces of cloth tied around their biceps, they bowed and prayed in the direction of their birthplace and then at each corner post (north, south, east and west). Thus, they honoured their teachers and the spirit of the ring. It was as if they were psyching themselves up or mentally preparing themselves for the impending fight. They then did a slow dance to prove to the audience that they were performers as well as boxers. Helen thought that this was entertaining, even if some of the foreign boxers looked a little bit awkward with it!

The competing teams wear blue or red

A bit like Lewis the Lion, Helen felt a bit of a wimp at times as struggled to watch the violence of the fight, as Thai boxing can be quite brutal. (Any part of the body, except the head, can be used as an offensive weapon in Muay Thai). She wanted to watch but simultaneously didn’t, so lots of times she watched behind her fingers! This was particularly true when one of the more elderly Thai competitors had clearly taken a bad blow to his ankle which put him at an unfair advantage even if he was clearly the stronger and more technical fighter. Some of the fights came to rapid conclusions with knock-out blows but sometimes it wasn’t obvious until right at the end who had won the fight. With the cheers from the crowd and the ever-increasingly fast music, tensions really rose especially with the final fight between the two club trainers.

The final fight of the evening: two of the trainers

It was nail-biting stuff, right until the last blow when contrary to the fight, the competing blue club managed to win the fight. Helen was secretly glad when it was over as didn’t think she could take any more of seeing people get hurt, even if it was for entertainment value!

In Thailand, Lewis the Lion realised that many children learn Thai boxing or a martial art from a young age. Do you think it is good to learn a martial art? Why or why not?

One of the “must do” activities that Helen wanted to do in Thailand was to do a Thai cookery class because she had always been a big fan of Thai cuisine as it always tasted so clean and fresh. So together with a girl called Masha from the Ukraine and Lesleigh from Australia, she and Lewis the Lion enrolled on a course in a Thai cookery school called “My Wok and Me” in Thong Sala on Koh Phangan.

The first thing that she had to do was to decide on three dishes: one starter and two mains. So she opted for:

* A coconut milk soup with chicken (Tom kha)
* A Thai red chicken curry with mixed vegetables (Kaeng phet) and
* A king prawn Thai style fried noodles (Phad Thai)

But first of all, these want-to-be chefs had to visit the local market with their teacher, Oi, so that they could buy their ingredients.

Lewis the Lion couldn’t believe how much fun he had there! His eyes nearly burst out of their sockets to see such a vast variety of fresh foods, many of which he’d never seen in his life! He was only glad that Oi was on hand to tell them what they all were.

Later back at the cookery school, she did a special tasting session before they started to cook where Lewis the Lion got to try some exotic fruits and foods, some for the first time:

* Mangosteens
* Langsats
* Rambutans
* Dragon fruit
* Rose apple

He also got to try some sticky sweet rice that was parceled up in bamboo leaves.

Lewis the Lion then sat back and enjoyed watching the chefs at work as they chopped the vegetables and prepared the fish and meats ready for cooking, with Oi guiding them along the way.

When they had everything ready, only then did they move next to the stoves to start cooking and Lewis the Lion was surprised at how quickly they then managed to rustle up this amazing smelling and tasting food. (Helen also told Lewis the Lion that one of the best things about this experience was that they didn’t even have to clean up: the staff at the cookery school did that for them. What a rare treat!).

Before long, the three chefs sat down to enjoy a true Thai feast. Helen told Lewis that she didn’t think she’d cooked more delicious food in her whole life: the ingredients were so fresh and flavoursome! She only hoped that she’d be able to recreate some of those dishes when she got back to the UK.

Here is a photo gallery of Lewis the Lion and Helen’s Thai cookery experience:

Helen told Lewis the Lion that Thai food is one of her favourite international cuisines.

Do you have a favourite international cuisine? If so, what is it and why?