Mr Walker’s Fingers

They sell the remote Andean paradise of Vilcabamba, Ecuador online as The Valley of Longevity – a cheap, beautiful, magical place where you can re-start your life, connect to nature and fulfill your dreams. But beware of sharks in the waters if you’re hunting for a peaceful place to relocate – all is very much … More Mr Walker’s Fingers

The Blood Edge… Ecuador’s Progress for the People

Seven years on….. trails of blood and the sweat of healthcare workers mark the way to President Correa’s constitutional promise of health care for the people. Dr Maria Cordez works in a sparsely appointed concrete bunker in the dusty heart of downtown Raita, on Ecuador’s dreamy Pacific coast. The clinic serves villagers from hundreds of pueblos speckled higgledy-piggledy along … More The Blood Edge… Ecuador’s Progress for the People

Eat shit and die…

It was a long ride out. About two years, in all… but the final push was a grind, lurch, scramble out of Cuenca, through sunsnakes that rose over the baked-down rubble and concrete to Guayaquil’s inconvenient bus terminal, before plonking down in the right seat on the wrong bus. There was a slight commotion that … More Eat shit and die…

Voodoo in a Pinstripe – Kingdom of the sick #1

After the announcement last week of Angelina Jolie’s ‘decision’ to remove her healthy breasts because of medical advice, and the trillion-dollar industry that is benefiting from her influence, I decided to publish a little story from Sydney in 2003, when I was told I was terminally ill and would never walk again… in support of … More Voodoo in a Pinstripe – Kingdom of the sick #1

A Sticky End

Pitter  patter …  pitter    patter… a pit-pat-pitter splat …a blat splat ting! The smoky Andean twilight of the second last day of the world is giddy with raindrops. They hurl in sideways from a ghostly-white dusk and drum their little bodies, fat with Amazon, upon the domed roof of my new adobe home. These orbs … More A Sticky End