Hello hello!!

Well I have finally left Spain and laundering behind. It was a good last few days, we had our staff lunch on the island and got to use the swimming pools, on Wednesday, and on Friday afternoon we played watersports with the jetskies and skibiscuit things, which was so fun!!! Incredibly sore arms afterwards though!! Apparently I did a spectacular tumble across the water one of the times i flew off!! Saturday I went to Eivissa city with Franco and hung out on the dock and Saturday night went out with Lorena, it was Sant Miguel day and there was a huge party in Sant Miguel, with half the island there, fireworks, and lots of fun! Sunday, we had a bbq at Willy's house with the whole gang (Willy, Lorena, Cayetana, Franco, Domingo, Israel, Yannick, Sandra, Suni, Audrey, Benoit and me) which was nice except lots of tears at the end (very hard saying goodbye to such great friends!). Suni drove me to the airport Monnday morning.

Arrived in Muncih Monday afternoon, very strange, I kept trying to speak to people in Spanish (one little girl said to me, 'sprechen ze english?' and i answered 'si...i mean..yes..') which is very pointless, they're more likely to speak english tha spanish!!! I met up with Clare and Hannah and spent the next couple of days over-indulging in beer and chicken at the Oktoberfest!! There were a lot of very drunk Aussies-it seemed like the whole of Australia had come to Germany for the occasion!! On the first night I had too much beer and woke up with a very sore and upset tummy, so after that, I just watched the others drink themselves stupid.

Gladly leaving behind Munich, beer and rowdy Australians, Clare, Hannah and I donned our packs and hopped on a train to Lucerne, Switzerland. With no accommodation booked, we arrived hoping someone would jump out and provide a bed. Unfortunately, no one did, however, two yellow signs saying "hostel" and "backpackers" pointed encouragingly down the road. So we happily set off on a bit of a wild goose chase! The "hostel" turned out to be a big (expensive) hotel and the signs for the "backpackers" vanished. We were now about ten minutes walk away from the train station, and I was busting to go to the toilet (my tummy was still upset). We decided to keep walking a bit and (thank God) came across the yellow sign again! The evr elusive "backpackers" didn't seem to be getting any closer and I was getting pretty desperate (plus the packs were heavy and it was getting dark). As luck would have it, this story has a happy ending!! I found the cleanest public toilet in the world and the "backpackers" practically appeared before us! They had hardly any room, but some people hadn't turned up so they gave us a double room with a mattress on the floor, for the same price as a dorm!! Privacy!!!

That evening, we walked into the town to buy some groceries and shoes (for me, i only had a pair of thongs - not the best hiking shoes..). That night was the real beginnineg of my Swiss experience, although I had had an upset and sore tummy for three days, the 'runs' to the toilet (excuse the pun) began in earnest!! By the morning, I had probably used up half of Switzerland's annual toielt paper supply!! Instead of a fun excursion up a mountain, Hannah, Clare and I went to the doctor to get me fixed. After what felt like eternity in the waiting room, I got to see a doctor. He didn't have some miracle cure, he took a blood test which indicated possible infection, but claimed that, althoungh in Australia or America I would be given antibiotics, here in Switzerland they would ride it out, as it would undoubtably go away in a couple of days with or without medication. Accepting Immodium (to block me up) and some disgustng painkiller, and feeling very ashamed of my drug-crazy, weak heritage, I returned to the hostel. I stayed in bed all day, only getting up to go to the toilet. The enxt day was our last, so we had to check out at ten in the morning. I slept all day in an armchair in the lounge, while Clare and Hannah went up into the mountains. I was dreading the trip to Interlaken!!!