Last night we had an absolutely marvelous dinner at the Faena Bistro. Seriously, it was one of the best meals I’ve ever eaten – a glorious mix of molecular gastronomy and Argentinean traditional. So so delicious.

But I thought I’d use it as an example to show you what the difference is between going out for dinner with a working pancreas, and going out for dinner as a diabetic:

* 7.30pm: We arrive early to shoot a few of the dishes before the other guests arrive (nothing like a bright flash going off every 30 seconds to spoil the mood). I haven’t eaten for a few hours (in preparation of the big meal), and I suddenly start feeling a little light-headed. Turns out that walk to the subway station (which was supposed to be 5 blocks and ended up being 10) was more strenuous than I thought, and I’m going low. Fast. There’s nobody else in the restaurant and everybody in the kitchen speaks Spanish. I have extremely limited Spanish skills. I mutter the phrase, “Soy diabetico, quiero jus de frutas,” which I think means “I’m diabetic, I need fruit juice” to myself a few times, then brave the kitchen.

Thank goodness one of the chefs understands a little English and can get me a Coke. Crisis averted.

* 8.15pm: Our first course arrives – candied spiced walnuts, homemade pretzels, miniature cheese scones and a white martini smoothie (in a shot glass). While I’m enjoying the range of extraordinary flavours, I’m thinking to myself, “How many carbs are in this, I wonder?”

* 9pm: I decide to simply take the plunge and take a rough amount of insulin that will ‘probably’ cover most of the 6 savoury course tasting menu (I’ll deal with dessert later). Roughly two carbs per course, perhaps? Fried egg foam has me flummoxed. But there’s rice and breadrolls, both of which I recognise.

* 10.20pm: I realise I way under-calculated the amount of insulin I should take, and take a second jab, this time hopefully including the dessert, a modern-day interpretation of lemon meringue pie with a soft biscuit base, lime ice-cream and lemon cream (that looks a lot prettier than it sounds – see below).

I am given some top-class stares from the waiting staff and the other guests as I jab into my stomach as discreetly as possible while lifting my already-rather-mini-skirt. I calculate in the 10 blocks we’ll have to walk after taking the subway home, so take a little less insulin than necessary.

* 10.25pm: More dessert! Mini Magnums and three raspberries on a stick. It’s a once in a lifetime meal, so I eat it all…

* 10.30pm: And now it’s time for my long-acting night-time insulin, so another public injection. They must think I’m a heroin addict!

* 10.45pm: The subway that was supposed to close at 11pm actually closes at 10.45pm… So there goes my 10 blocks of walking! We’ll have to take a taxi.

* 11pm: Hop out of the taxi a few blocks early so we can walk off some of the feast. The few blocks are further away than we thought, so end up walking around our neighbourhood for half an hour; but with full bellies and happy hearts, we’re not complaining.

Everyone told us we would love Argentina, and Buenos Aires in particular, but I didn’t really believe them… Neither of us are city people, and so far on this trip we’ve tried to skip out of most cities as soon as we can. Too much noise / pollution / traffic, not enough charm.

Not so with Buenos Aires. We’re staying in the charming barrio of San Telmo, which is all cobblestoned and run-down-colonial, and it’s full of cafes and antique stores and markets and fresh fruit and bread and meat and cheese. Everyone seems to wake up at 10 or 11am, and it all feels very laid-back and chilled. A real treat after all our travels.

Now that we have a return date (10th of February, even earlier than anticipated because we could only change our flights to that date or the beginning of March, and our budget won’t give us till March), it seems to have sunk in just how far we’ve travelled and how much we’ve seen. Mark and I have been taking it reallllly easy for the last couple of days – the easiest we’ve taken it in months, in fact. We’ll do something in the morning, rest during the hottest time of the day (it is HOT), and then do something late afternoon, early evening, slipping into a late dinner and a couple of hours wandering around the various areas of the city. Of course, the heat has been a problem again (with such temperature-sensitive insulin, why is that not a surprise?) We made the foolish mistake of walking around during the hottest time of the day on our first day here, which deactivated my insulin… Only I didn’t realise till the next morning, when I woke up high and figured out that my night insulin wasn’t working. Which led to a whole day of upside down blood sugar. Bring on a fridge! Please.

The fact remains, though: this is a cool city. There’s the tango, of course, and the steak (simply superb), and the people drinking coffee at every turn, but there’s also a lot of character and charm, and it feels like you can get up close to it, like you can have an emotional connection to it (unlike Paraty, in Brazil, which was just too pretty to connect to). We’ve also had the rare pleasure of a friend for the last few days! Our dear friend Steve is in Buenos Aires at the moment, so we’ve spent the last couple of days wandering around the city, eating empanadas (these delicious pie-like creations), going out for long dinners, and generally talking talking talking. Steve’s also been travelling for months, so it’s been really interesting discussing how we all feel about our travels and our imminent return home.

More on that later.

For now, here’s a taste of San Telmo, where we’re staying:

And if you’re curious about our wonderful stay at the Hotel das Cataratas, right across from Iguassu Falls, here’s a little clip to show you just how close to the falls we actually were!

PS – Remember our crazy experience with the Reincarnated Beatles in Indonesia for New Year’s Eve? For some reason the clip didn’t load properly, so if you’re still curious about them (and you should be!) check them out here.

So here’s the first of our South America video diaries (we skipped out a week of video diaries while we jetted back to South Africa for insulin- and family-time, so we’re now on Week 17).

I must admit, the beginning of our time in Brazil had me feeling a little discombobulated – mind in one place, emotions in another, body somewhere else entirely. I suppose that’s what you get for trying to visit 3 continents in 1 week! And now? You’ll have to watch to find out…
As well as to see some of the truly amazing sights that we’ve been lucky enough to see since we got here.

Really cool. I promise.

So today, 15 December 2009, marks our halfway point in the trip: we’ve been away three and a half months, we have three and a half months to go.
Yes, alas, although we intended to be away for 9 months, it turns out travelling around the world is more expensive than we’d anticipated! So we’ve had to change our 9 months into 7 months, returning home at the beginning of April 2010. I’m sure in some ways it will turn out to for the best – perhaps it was slightly insane to plan our return date for one week before the World Cup begins, when the whole country will be turned upside down!

I thought it fitting, at this halfway point, to reflect on what it is we’ve learnt so far… Here are some thoughts:

• Travelling is a great teacher. I had no idea I had so much to learn – about myself, about our relationship, about life in general, until I was whisked out of my comfort zone and into completely unfamiliar surroundings.
• A place is made more beautiful if you stay somewhere beautiful. Or, at least, somewhere quite beautiful. We made the decision early on to choose comfort over budget, and it was a really wise one, I think. The times we’ve stayed in really stunning luxury accommodation have been amongst the highlights of our trip so far – where you stay, it turns out, makes a huge difference to how much you enjoy staying there.
• Mark and I make a great team. I always knew this, but in the last couple of months it’s really been put to the test. Travelling with someone 24/7 really shows you their real character, you get to see them tired, grumpy, hungry, sick, worn-out and irritable. And if you still love them after all that, that’s saying something!
• We’re tougher than I thought. Apart from the last week of bad health, Mark and I have hardly been sick at all, despite strange food, strange beds, strange transport and strange weather. It turns out we’re tougher than I thought we would be… It’s amazing how adaptable the human body is.
• There are many forms of transport. Before this trip I’d done a bus, car, bike, scooter and boat. Now I’ve done a becak (bicycle rickshaw), horse-drawn cart, bemo (open-sided minibus), ferry, train and moto (motorbike taxi) – and that’s only in the last week!
• Control isn’t always necessary. This is my hardest lesson, I really like being able to have things as much in control as possible. But you learn, when it’s late afternoon and you don’t know where you’re sleeping that night, and you have to move on tomorrow but you’re not sure how, and there’s no way of finding anything recognizable for dinner, that sometimes you just have to release control. And it is a rather lovely feeling, in fact.
• Going slow is key. To rush around while travelling takes all the joy out of it. You don’t get to experience anything or relax anywhere or have any authentic interactions with people. The slower the better, as far as I’m concerned (and don’t ever only spend one night somewhere – it’s not worth unpacking for!)
• It is possible to travel well with diabetes. I’ve had my fair share of ups and downs these past few months – insulin not working, crazy food, hormones and weather making my blood sugar do unusual things – but all in all it has been SO manageable. Much easier than I thought, in fact. Which just goes to show that although travelling with diabetes is more of a challenge than travelling without it, it’s just one more thing to think about, not something to make you give up entirely.
• Practically:
- Packing and unpacking your suitcase is a nightmare if it’s too full… These incredibly useful Vac Bags have saved our lives on a daily basis. They take all the air out of your clothes so massive piles of stuff shrink into delightfully packable flat packs.
- The rumours are true: You don’t need to change your clothes as often as you think.
- We will never again take being able to drink water out of a tap for granted. Months of bottled water makes tap water seem like a luxury!
- Travelling when you’re sick is just awful. Our solution? Take vitamins every day, don’t try dodgy food, and don’t overdo it.
- Sleep is very important if you want to be able to enjoy every day to the fullest.
- Backpacks give you a sore neck, and let you (mistakenly) believe you have enough space to buy things you don’t need. Suitcases are better.
- Patience is vital.
• We are the luckiest people in the world. To have been able to have these months together, exploring this wonderful world of ours, has been such a gift. And every day we’re able to continue doing it is one more day I feel like the luckiest girl on earth. Here’s to the next half being just as wonderful as the first half!

So this blogpost is a long time coming… I apologise. It’s been a crazy eventful week – as you’ll soon see.

Interestingly, though, it hasn’t been all good or all bad. I suppose that’s like life – some highs, some lows.

First off, to set the scene: When I last blogged we were in Jakarta, the capital of Java, in Indonesia. Mark had a bad cold and we were both exhausted from our long travels to get to Indo and the hectic pace of our last week in Vietnam. From there we went to Yogyakarta, the ‘cultural heart of Java’, on a delightful train (seriously, the best train we’ve been on in South-East Asia). It took about 8 hours, but it was so comfortable the time flew by. We stayed in Yogya for 3 nights, spending a day at the incredible temple of Borobodur – the largest Buddhist temple in Indonesia. For some reason, all the local tourists kept asking Mark and I to be in photos with them! We managed to catch it on film, here:

We spent all day exploring Borobodur (we chose to take the local bus instead of a tour, so we had 2 hours each way sitting next to and chatting with the locals, which was waaay more interesting than sitting in a sterile tour bus). By the time we got back that night we were exhausted, though, so we went for dinner just down the road, and I ordered ‘comfort food’ – fillet of chicken, which I thought would be sauteed, but turned up fried. And dangerous. I woke up in the middle of the night with a nasty case of food poisoning and spent all of the next day unable to move from my bed except to crawl to the toilet, and with honestly the worst headache I’ve ever had. Food poisoning is the devil! I had no idea how vicious it was. It’s the worst of both worlds – headache and nausea. Eeuch.

The next morning we had a bus to catch, at 7.30am. I woke up feeling better, but still weak and now with Mark’s cold (obviously my immune system had taken a hit from the food poisoning). We spent 11 hours in a minibus that day, a minibus with only the vaguest sense of air conditioning and a driver who knew no fear – he quite happily overtook other cars even if it meant bearing down on the wrong side of the road towards a bus! Yikes. Still, we got to see a lot of stunning Javanese landscape (endless rice paddies, lots of farmers, interesting small towns) and actually sitting down all day probably did my cold some good. We eventually arrived in Cemoro Lawang, a small mountainous village near the famous Gunung Bromo volcano, around 7pm that night, and were lucky enough to be booked into the delightful Java Banana hotel. What a treat.

Most people, believe it or not, make this arduous 11 hour journey for just one night. Gunung Bromo is still active (but only smoking) and the thing to do while in Cemoro Lawang is take the sunrise tour:
You wake up at 3am, take a jeep for an hour to the lookout point at Mount Penanjakan, where you can watch the sun rise over the volcano. Then you take the jeep down to the foot of the volcano and walk up to the crater itself. Awesome!
Here’s how Java Banana describe the sunrise:

“Little by little, from a state of darkness, minute by minute, the sun unveils the dawn in Bromo-Tengger-Semeru, in its incomparable beauty. Mount Bromo stands in the middle of the Tengger caldera and greets the morning, welcoming it with its periodic puffing of smoke. Bromo is visibly the most active and the most prominent on the stage of the theatre of Bromo-Tengger-Semeru.”

How could we resist? So the morning after our day of minibussing, we woke up at 3am to the freezing cold, and set off in the darkness to watch the sunrise. It was really exciting, actually, heading off into the great unknown, about to see our first volcano. And the sunrise was beautiful, illuminating the scene from total darkness to total light in a subtle but spectacular way… Mark will post pics soon, I promise.
It was also FREEZING, unbelievable seeing as we were so boiling hot the day before! From the sunrise vantage point we headed down to the base of the crater, and walked right up the rim, so we could look inside the volcano belching sulphurous smoke. Pretty darn incredible. Take a look:

We spent the rest of that day resting and recovering, and trying to find an alternative route to Bali, so that we wouldn’t have to do another 11 hour minibus trek! We ended up taking the train for most of the way, but it still took us over 11 hours… You can read all about it here, it was a really difficult day.

So there you have it! Our most eventful week ever. We had ancient temples and volcanoes, food poisoning and colds, all-day minibus journeys and diabetic drama. What more could anyone ask for in a week?
Well, some peace would be nice. I’m feeling worn out, to be honest. This week we plan on taking it easy. Having some down time in Sanur, where we are now (on the coast) and then heading inland to Ubud. I’ll keep you posted, I promise.

How has your week been?

Yesterday was so awful that I feel the need to get it off my chest, before I catch you up on Our Most Eventful Week Ever (capital letters intended).

It was without doubt the worst diabetic day I’ve had since I came out of hospital post-diagnosis.

Before I begin, let me explain some numbers, so that what I say makes sense to you:
Non-diabetics (normal people) have blood sugar between 4 and 7. Diabetics should always aim for below 10 – 7 is the magic number, but I’m happy anytime I test in the 8s too. Between 10 and 12 is high, over 12 is really high, over 16 is dangerously high and I start panicking. I’m hardly ever over 16 – it means something has gone very wrong (i.e. my insulin isn’t working).

Yesterday, Thursday the 10^th of December, promised to be a somewhat challenging day before it began. We woke up in Cemoro Lawang, the mountainous village not far from Gunung Bromo, the most famous volcano in Java, Indonesia. The plan was that at 9am we would catch a public minibus down the mountain to Probolinggo (1 hour), then catch a train to Banyuwangi (5 and a half hours), then catch a ferry to the port of Denpasar (45 minutes), a bus to Denpasar city (3 and a half hours), and a taxi to Sanur (20 minutes), where we would finally be in Bali and wouldn’t move for 5 days. That’s what was keeping me going: the thought of staying put for a few days. I’ve had a cold all week, so my blood sugar has been slightly high the last few days (I blamed it on infection and simply took more insulin). All in all, though, I was feeling strong.

Everything went smoothly till I tested my sugar two hours after breakfast (we’d just boarded the train) and found it was 15.9 – crazy high considering I’d taken slightly more insulin than usual at breakfast, because of my cold. I thought maybe I was going high because it was so hot (SO hot, like sitting in a humid oven, and we’d been waiting on the platform for an hour) and took another 3 units of insulin, which would definitely take me down to below 10. So far, not too worried.

Two hours later, I tested to see if the insulin had worked (you have to wait 2 hours for it to get into your system).

It hadn’t. I was still really high – 13.4.

So I deduced that the heat had killed my insulin, and took a fresh pen from the cool pack in my backpack. Not too worried. Fresh insulin would sort me out in 2 hours. I had a small lunch, took a generous injection, and waited.

2 hours is a long time to wait when you’re not feeling too well and not sure what your blood sugar is going to do.

When I tested at 3.45pm my blood sugar was 18. The highest it’s been since I came out of hospital over two years ago and figured out carbohydrate counting. The 2nd pen had obviously also been heat damaged, and wasn’t working at all.

And this, dear friends, is when I freaked out. Because if an insulin pen that was in my cool pack wasn’t working, that means that all the insulin pens in my cool pack might not be working. I’ve been as careful as possible with my insulin, but as you know it was left out of the fridge for 2 days last month, and most of the places we’ve been staying in lately haven’t had fridges, so it’s been going in a communal fridge. The weather is so hot here that to take it in and out of the fridge probably doesn’t help, and I’d come to terms with the fact that it wasn’t as effective as fresh insulin. But if it wasn’t working at all that was dangerous. Really dangerous.

We were only due to arrive in Sanur after 10pm. If the next insulin pen didn’t work I wouldn’t be able to eat anything until we could find a hospital or emergency room that could sell me insulin. We’d have to buy insulin to last the next 3 weeks. Who knows if that wouldn’t get heat damaged too – Bali is having its hottest summer ever known.

But on top of all these fears racing around my head was one clear question: Were we idiots for trying to do this? Was 4 months too long to travel in sub-tropical climates with diabetes? Was I being really stupid and careless with my health? For the first time since we left home, I felt scared. I wanted to go home.

But of course I couldn’t. I had a ferry to catch. Two hours later, on board the ferry to Bali, I checked my blood sugar again, and Hallelujah, Praise Every God in Heaven, it was fine. Totally fine. So now I’ve found a magic insulin pen that still works perfectly. I need to test all my others so that I don’t have another yesterday happening to me again in a hurry.

When we finally arrived after 11pm last night, I was completely exhausted and hollowed out. I can handle travelling with a bad cold and stuffy head. I can handle a 14 hour journey. I can handle high blood sugar for 8 or 9 hours (although I’d rather not have to ever again, thank you very much). But a 14 hour journey with a bad cold and high blood sugar is too much for me. Being that high is so awful. I couldn’t stop crying, my head felt full of clouds, my body felt weird and hot, and there was no sense of balance in me, no rational thought to cling to. I honestly haven’t felt scared of being diabetic since I got my eating plan and got it under control over two years ago. Yesterday was the first time that I really felt the weight of my condition.

Poor Mark was wonderful. Calm and soothing and practical, figuring out how we could get to a doctor or a hospital as soon as we arrived, and not getting freaked out by my constant tears.

And now, today, I feel shaky. My blood sugar is fine and I’m eating really normal food to keep it that way. I’m going to test the other insulin pens over the next two days and chuck out anything that doesn’t work, so I’m pretty sure this won’t happen again. Yesterday, of all the days of this wonderful trip, is one day I would not want to repeat. Not for anything.

And just recovering from the trip here. Well, the busy week leading up to the trip here, and then the actual trip itself.

I foolishly thought that because we were flying (from Hanoi to Ho Chi Minh at 2pm and then from Ho Chi Minh to Jakarta at 8pm, arriving at 11.30pm) that it would be easier than a land border crossing. Well, no. Yes and no – the actual travel was easier, but finding real food (at a semi-reasonable price) in an international airport is a nightmare, and all the waiting around in queues is pretty exhausting.

And, of course, as is now common, my blood sugar was crazy all day. I think I might be allergic to border crossings.

Actually, I started a new insulin pen the night before, and realised when my sugar went through the roof at breakfast (17! One of the highest readings I’ve ever had!) that it wasn’t working. At all. Of course, seeing as I was high and not thinking straight I’d already given myself a come-down shot by the time I figured this out, and seeing as insulin on its own is usually pretty powerful (even if it’s not working 100%), I didn’t want to jab twice and risk going low on the plane.

Turns out the bad pen wasn’t working at all, so I stayed high for hours until I could test again after lunch. Bleerurgh. By now I was feeling truly rotten. Emotional, irrational, cotton wooly, hot and cold, all kinds of horrible.

I had taken a new pen from my luggage before we checked it in (thank goodness!) and the moment the insulin started to work I felt instantly better – like a fog lifting.

So we arrived in Jakarta at about half past midnight and woke up exhausted yesterday. Mark had a cold, I had a whole heap of tiredness, and we’ve spent the interleding day and a bit catching our breath and aiming for somewhere halfway human. We’re staying at the very comfortable, extremely stylish Alila Jakarta (a lovely business hotel) which is the perfect place to gather our energies. Feeling a LOT better today (both of us), and we’re off travelling and finally seeing a bit of Java in Indonesia tomorrow.

We’ve actually recorded a new video diary, too, but we still have to process it so it’ll be a tad delayed. I think we need a slight break from all the constant uploads too, so if you’ll excuse us, we’ll be taking it easy for the next couple of days!

In the meantime, any tips about Indonesia (on here, on Twitter, or on Facebook) are, as always, appreciated…

It happens, I think, when you’re travelling this much.
Here’s our latest video diary to find out what’s raising my blood pressure (but hopefully not my blood sugar!)

I realised today that I usually only blog when things ‘happen’ – not when everything is going smoothly.

So today I would like to say: I am one happy diabetic. I have had pretty much perfect blood sugar for the last couple of days (really, no highs, no lows, just an even keel) and I feel really healthy and well. I’ve got lots of energy, I’m sleeping really well, I’m eating as well as I can (although we’re battling, again, to find another with even a semblance of wholewheat in it!) and I’ve had a couple of days of ‘forgetting’ I’m diabetic. Of course I don’t ever really forget I’m diabetic, but some days it’s so easy that it doesn’t seem like a big deal.

I love these days.

I think part of the reason my blood sugar has been behaving itself so well is because the weather has changed. Does that sound crazy? I don’t think it is… A couple of diabetics I know have said they notice a link between hot weather and topsy-turvy blood sugar readings, and I think I agree with them. Just think about how you feel when it’s hot outside (I mean really hot, midsummer heat wave hot, as it has been the last few weeks). Sweaty, tired, thirsty – it must have an effect on blood sugar.

Midway through our stay in Hoi An the weather shifted from unbearably hot (unable to go out between 11am and 3pm hot) to cool and drizzly. Lovely! And now we’re in Hue, 3 hours further North, and it is COLD. Wintry! Amazing. I didn’t think it was possible. I’m enjoying it today, because I’m indoors and it’s cosy and warm. Yesterday, though, wandering the streets of Hue and trudging over the Perfume River, I was not such a happy chappy…

(I think this is my sarkiest Best Moment of the Day ever!)

PS – If you’re looking for an easy way to look at all of our videos, I’m very happy to say we’re now to be found on ICYOU (Intensive Content for your Health) – a health video website. Check it out here!

So I might think I’m a pretty savvy diabetic traveller after having tackled Malawi, Swaziland, the USA, Canada, Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam, but that’s nothing in comparison to Alex Williams, a type 1 diabetic from Australia who has zigzagged all over the globe, and is planning to walk across the Sahara desert next year in the Marathon des Sables. Pretty impressive stuff.

Here’s what Alex has to say about travelling with diabetes…

1. Hello! Please could you introduce yourself – name, age, how long you’ve been diabetic?

Hi. My name is Alex Williams. I’m 52 years old and have lived with type 1 diabetes for 36 years.

2. Where have you traveled?

I’ve travelled all over the south east coast of Australia, from as far north as Townsville all the way down and around to Adelaide. I can put my hand on my heart and say that I’ve probably driven on every stretch of highway in the state of Victoria. I started travelling the minute I got my driver’s license at 18 and haven’t stopped since.

My international travel started 25 years ago when my soon-to-be wife took me to “meet the family” in New Zealand. I was blown away by the beauty of the North Island and caught the travel bug there and then. But how do you describe to someone who has never done it, the adventure and curiosity of seeing an airport in another country, and then the strangeness as you drive through the city for the first time?

I’ve been back to New Zealand once since then, but as we were staying with family, there wasn’t a lot of diabetes adventure involved.

Fifteen years ago I got a job in Saudi Arabia. I travelled there on my own for the first trip and shared a flat with another westerner for 12 months. Then my wife and children were able to come over to join me in Riyadh, where we lived for the next 4 years. Each year we would do an international trip somewhere. Sometimes it was back to Australia to visit with family in both Brisbane and Melbourne, and sometimes it was elsewhere. During this time we did a 4 week driving tour around Great Britain in a Kombi Campervan, driving almost as far north as John O’Groats and south to Southampton. We spent a week in London just enjoying the history, the culture and the sheer joy of being there. http://www.geocities.com/alex_of_oz/Saudi_pages/Pommy_trip.html

During this time we also did a 5 week driving trip around Western Europe, flying from Riyadh to Paris via Jeddah and then driving from Paris to Luxemburg, Germany, Austria, Italy, France, Switzerland and then back to Paris. We stayed in Paris for a couple of days, and then caught the overnight train to Rome, where we stayed for a week of walking. Many interesting things happened including nearly getting arrested in Rome. http://www.geocities.com/alex_of_oz/Saudi_pages/Europe_99.html

I also managed to squeeze in another trip from Riyadh to Glasgow, this time for business. The interesting thing about this trip was that the night that I was flying into London before swapping to the plane for Glasgow, was also the night that Princess Diana died in Paris. My whole trip to Glasgow was over-shadowed by Diana’s death. I caught the train from Glasgow to London on the day of Diana’s funeral. That was an experience that I will never forget. The flowers arranged around the gate to St James Palace were truly incredible.

Travel took a back seat for a few years until about 2005, when I travelled to Bangalore in India for four and half months. This was a business trip in which I was meant to train them up so they could take my job. I still have my job. This was also the first time I had travelled in a third world country, so the food, hygiene and medical side of things were interesting. All went well with few dramas. While there I wrote a number of stories, with one focusing pretty much on my being diabetic – http://www.geocities.com/alex_of_oz/Bangalore_stories/Missive_8.html

There is another story that talks about the time we were travelling between cities and I started to have a hypo. That can be found in the India stories here – http://www.geocities.com/alex_of_oz/Story_index.html

The last trip I did, which was 3 years ago, was a 4 week trip back to Bangalore. This time the food caused me some difficulty because I was staying in a serviced apartment where I was reliant on other people providing and cooking the food. You don’t realize how reliant we become on our “western” time schedule until you are living in a third would country where time is much more flexible.

3. What was the most difficult thing about traveling with diabetes?

For me, the most difficult thing about travelling with diabetes is keeping track of where there is a reliable source of food, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. For example, lying down on the public seating benches at Rome airport to stay until the first plane left in the morning, only to discover with 2 minutes to spare that the food shop that we can see just across the walkway is not staying open all night as expected, but is about to close and won’t open again until the plane is airborne. And guess what? I don’t have any emergency food in my bags.

Another difficulty is the effect that the jetlag, time differences and physical and emotional stress has on the sugar levels. There is an underlying constant awareness that the sugar level can plummet at any moment, which is especially stressing when travelling by yourself. This happened to me while in a hotel in transit in Bahrain; the sugar plummeted and it took me 2 or 3 or 4 hours (see what I mean) to get it back. However that was not in time to catch the airport shuttle bus!

4. How prepared were you before you left?

I believe I have experienced most things a diabetic can experience while travelling, and learned from the experience. Yes, I have woken up in intensive care in hospital in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia after having a massive hypo. I needed to go under a general anesthetic so they could put my arm back in place. I had managed to dislocate my shoulder while having a fit in the hypo.

I have found myself without food, and learned from the experience. I have found myself with nowhere clean to have my injection, and learned from the experience. I have been challenged by the customs officers in Jeddah airport when they saw my injection kit, only to be deflated when I told them “Sucre dam”, which means “sugar blood” in Arabic, which is their way of referring to diabetes. I learned from the experience.

And I’m sure I will learn more when I travel to Morocco and walk across the Sahara desert.

5. Do you have any hints or tips for diabetics who want to travel?

• Always carry a doctor’s letter
• Always carry extra insulin and equipment
• Always have emergency food with you that is robust
• Always know where food can be obtained
• Write lots of lists, to reduce the stress level and therefore the hit on sugar levels
• Always pack your medical kit and emergency food in your carry on luggage
• Maintain 2 medical kits; one for your carry on luggage and one for your suitcase
• So long as you plan properly, there is no reason why you can’t travel
• Finally, NEVER rely on airline food