and now for some lovely parting gifts!

it's important to have traditions to cherish and celebrate with those you love. for example, federico and i enjoy getting violently ill whenever we see each other. it's important to honour such special times and remember where you came from.

i personally have been enjoying some lovely parting gifts from india. a spirited tag team of giardia and ecoli flared up for a week or so to bring me a 39.4 degree fever, soak-through-to-the-mattress night sweats and stabbing pains in my right side. jumped through (well, crawled through is probably more accurate) some beaurocratic hoops set up by canadian and italian health care professionals and now i´m feeling right as rain. that's why i love india- it is a land of such unbridled generosity, even so long after i've been gone. it is a love i will feel in my heart and intestines for a long long time. thanks india, it's been swell.

let's hope that italy proves slightly less infectious.