Hello again friends and family.

Well, we're back and thankfully our GP has now given Joseph a complete clean bill of health. He's back to his normal happy and chattering self. Our doctor assured us that his treatment in Thailand was thorough and appropriate, although had he been in the UK they would have let us go home earlier.

We're really glad to be back, a bit jaded, but supported by good friends. It's good to be surrounded by the familiar again.

So now we're on to final preparations for Sri Lanka. Friends to see, a few things to sort on our house, finances etc; visas are now applied for and our send off is almost prepared. After the weekend we're off to see Sarah's parents, then my family before we head for the sun.

Any of you who want to keep in touch with us out in Sri Lanka by cheap phone calls can do so for free using Skype - look it up on Google, download the free software and type our email address into the advanced search, then add us to your contacts and give us a call when we're on line. You'll need to buy a cheap headset (headphones with microphone) to make the call.

That's all for now. We'll probably update this site sometime next week.

Getting home

Hi all,

Latest is we should be flying home Monday, arriving in Manchester Tuesday.

We're all doing well but want to get home now.

Mike

Update on Joseph

The saga unfolds

We had an unfortunate incident last night when the IV drip perforated Joseph's vein and his arm filled with fluid, doubling in diameter. It was very painful for him, but we now know he's fine. The swelling has reduced to almost normal and he has full use of his hand and arm.

We're hoping to be back in the UK on Monday or Tuesday still, but the insurance company have rebooked our flights for 30th September without consulting us. Not sure why, but we're trying to get them to bring them forwards.

We've now missed our scheduled flight home and not been able to get in touch with our friends who are travelling with us, so they'll be concerned about us . . . we've left a message with their check-in desk and our friend who will pick them up.

We're fine. Not stressed or anything . . . the doctors here are great and Joseph is clearly getting much better.

Joseph receiving physiotherapy
- 30 minutes of back slapping
and he even managed to fall
asleep during this!

Week 2 - Asia with a sick baby

South East Asia continues

Well you can read about our great first week below. The last part of the second week was intended to be relaxing holiday for us in Chiang Mai, North East Thailand. Unfortunately it's not quite worked out that way as Joseph has been admitted to hospital with pneumonia and our return is delayed.

His condition isn't serious, although it would be if untreated. Joseph was admitted at 5pm on Thursday 22nd September. He's been coughing and had a runny nose for 5 days, had a high temperature for one night, then didn't sleep much for 2 nights and became very lethargic after that. He's not been eating much food or drinking much.

We sought medical advice in Laos and were told it was just a cold. The doctors here say that's true, but it's now progressed into a worse infection, and this can happen wherever you are in the world and there's nothing we could have done to prevent it.

He still has a bad cough - they found white spotty shadowing which on his lungs which indicates pneumonia. He's now on an I.V. nutrient drip with a course of antibiotics plus various medicines to enlarge his airways and decongestants. He also has an ear infection.

The hospital is very good.Our UK doctor has confirmed the diagnosis and treatment are correct.

Our flights have been delayed so we'll be a couple of days late returning to the U.K.

Photo 1: Joseph in cute hospital
pyjamas in play car with drip holder

The Highs and lows of Asia with a baby!

South East Asia
Well we started with a great week in Laos, visiting our close friends, seeing some of their work, and having a great time catching up. Laos is just beautiful, the people are friendly and we just love the food and weather.

At the same time it's really hard seeing a country in such need. They spend only US$1 per child per year on primary education, have appalling road safety records (it's quite scary driving there!) and we visited the only hospital in a major town and you'd be ashamed to let a farm animal go in there.

Laos is the most bombed country in the world - as Vietnam war pilots were instructed to dump their munitions as they left Vietnam, although they were not at war with Laos. It has also been sprayed with billions of gallons of pesticides so the Americans could route out the Khmer who were alleged to have sided with the Vietnamese. Unfortunately this means that there are huge numbers of still births and birth defects today and people (mostly children) frequently lose limbs as they come across unexploded munitions. 6 tonnes of bombs were dropped on Laos for every one of the 6million inhabitants (36 million tonnes !).

We'd like to come and help here, but can't find the right openings. But, who knows what Sri Lanka will lead on to?

Sorry for the despondent bit, now here's the fun side:

Jason, Olly and I (no girls allowed) went off road dirt biking, - excellent fun, especially watching Olly (who has never ridden a motor bike before) twang into trees, disappear into ditches and generally try to avoid sticking to the track! He warned us he is known in mountain biking circles as "tree hugger". O.k. . . . . I have to confess I had a couple of spectacular encounters with a bog and some challenging low branches. . .


Photo 1: bikes


We also managed to get a good mountain bike trip in - crossing the river with our bikes in canoes was fun - even though we called this part of the trip work!














Photo 2: Dodgy scaffolding Photo 3: All of us

More photos on the right hand side of this blog.

Sorry this is a lot longer than we'd like to make each blog page, but a lot has happened in a short time!

Loft done! Hooray!

Looks lovely ... we are enjoying it for a week or two