Red Line On My Foot! Travel Infection Turns Deadly!
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Travel emergency! Alun's travel horror story sees him heading to hospital, after contracting an infection in his foot that Google diagnoses as Lymphangitis! Dangerous travel infections are Alun's vocation, and knowing that sepsis was a possibility, he didn't take any chances! Brace yourself for backpacking health tips, helping you avoid your own travel illness nightmare!
Tripping Point returns for a transport special. What's the longest train journey on earth? And just how many motorbikes are there in Vietnam? We discuss all this and more in everyone's favourite travel quiz! Continuing the Vietnamese theme, Tales of Trip welcomes a listener who's previously taught in Vietnam. This teacher's lesson planning needs more planning! Don't make the same mistake he did and listen all the way to the end!
This week's Lost & Found is giving off... "alternative vibes", as Adam's asked a question he's heard a thousand times. Support us on Patreon to access this bonus content and much more! https://www.patreon.com/tripologypodcast
Send your travel stories to: https://www.tripologypodcast.com/talesofatrip
TIMESTAMPS:
00:00 - Intro
01:27 - Alun's puts his foot in it
03:06 - Google diagnoses Alun with a foot infection
06:00 - Alun rushes to the medical clinic
11:06 - Tripping Point: Transport edition
24:25 - Tales of a Trip: Teaching in Vietnam gone wrong
31:40 - Alun's travel tips for TEFL
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TRANSCRIPT
Alun:
[0:02] Hello and welcome to this episode of Tripology. It's the only backpacking show where the hosts actually collect all the passport stamps in the whole world. I'm Alun and I'm here with the ever-infected Adam.
Adam:
[0:16] Hell of a show this week, mate. We're going to find out what on earth you've been up to for the last week. I'm going to update you on what I've been doing. Then, of course, we've got everyone's favourite travel quiz in the middle section. It's Tripping Point, making a big return for a transport and travel special and then at the end of the show it's everyone's favorite section it's tales of a trip where we hear from a listener.
Alun:
[0:33] Crikey a tripping point sounds like an anxiety inducing show if anything but in the opening i described you as infected and i was of course projecting because i've had a pretty problematic week with regards to the old health care i.
Adam:
[0:47] Thought you might have been talking about the toenail on my right foot but you've had your own problems your end of you.
Alun:
[0:52] I have mate but if you've got problem with the toenail i can solve that for you quick as you like i've got some great tips for how to deal with an infected toenail i'll be sharing those in the patreon section it's a right travel hack that changed my life when i first discovered it but yes unfortunately i uh i have become infected, of on my foot as well actually this week oh.
Adam:
[1:13] God oh it sounds awful what are you doing free diving incident some sort of i don't know what did you step on a starfish.
Alun:
[1:20] Yeah mostly starfish stepping No, you know, I've been surfing and sort of doing a lot of jiu-jitsu recently. There's a reef here, which is quite problematic when you're stepping in with your surfboard. Unfortunately, last week I stepped on something in that reef and it produced sort of a centimetre cut just from stepping on a rock. Produced a centimetre long cut, not very deep at all. It was healing well. I thought nothing of it. I went about my day. and I was lying on my bed here editing an episode of Tripology when I noticed emanating from that already nearly healed cut was a red line extending up towards my ankle now what would you do if you looked down at your foot and saw something like that what would your next course of action be?
Adam:
[2:04] A red line so you're talking about something that's absolutely part of your skin, It's not been drawn on by a biro.
Alun:
[2:11] Yeah, it almost looks as if something about the size of a mouse had taken a red Sharpie and sort of very delicately just drawn from the wound to your ankle, sort of in the night whilst you were sleeping. Not with broad, heavy-handed strokes of the Sharpie, but just sort of like a little tickle with the Sharpie. Very light, under-the-skin sort of red line.
Adam:
[2:31] Well, two things I would have done. First of all, I would have taken a photo of it and then sent it to you and asked you what on earth was going on. Secondly, I probably would have Googled what the problem was and then proceeded to contact my family and tell them that, unfortunately, I've only got a couple of months to live.
Alun:
[2:47] Yeah, well, I mean, messaging me wouldn't have been that helpful in this case because when I saw it, I thought, hmm, that's a bit unusual. A red line? What does it mean? What prophecy is this written on my foot? I tried trying to decode it. What does this line mean? What does it say about me? Does it mean that I'm some sort of special human being? but in actual fact upon a googling i learned that that red line is a telltale sign of lymphagitis oh.
Adam:
[3:14] God i mean it sounds serious.
Alun:
[3:16] Mate the worst thing you can hear as a man in his 30s lying on a bed editing a podcast is that there's something wrong with your lymphs yeah.
Adam:
[3:25] Yeah god um well without knowing really what that is but it's sounding pretty serious the panic definitely would have set in did you already have an idea of what it was before you saw the big long word with all the vowels in it.
Alun:
[3:37] You know when you see a word like that that basically means that there's a problem with your lymph system you do jump to conclusions and think oh that can't be good but i didn't know exactly what it was so let me tell you what i learned basically i stepped on this rock i had a cut some bacteria got into that cut and then proceeded to infect my blood and it was heading that infection up towards my lymphatic system and that was what that red line was that was the infection traveling through my blood vessels up towards the lymphatic system now why is that a problem it's a problem because when an infection reaches your lymphatic system it can use that system to hijack all sorts of other systems within your body and can trigger quite a nasty thing called sepsis.
Adam:
[4:26] Oh my God. I don't, you know, I don't say this often, especially if it's about you, but I'm glad this happened to you and not me because I would have been doing my pieces. I'm really, really bad when this sort of stuff happens. Did you keep a cool head?
Alun:
[4:39] Well, it's one of those things where you Google it and... sort of just to find out what it was. And Google and ChatGBT and Gemini and all those AI, products basically were unanimous in saying, look, if there's a red line coming from a wound on your foot, it's not a question of go to sleep and see how it is in the morning. It's a question of waking up in the morning might be too late. Sepsis can happen very quickly. When things go bad with lymphagitis, they go bad very, very quickly. The infection is in your blood. You need to have gone to an er yesterday.
Adam:
[5:13] Oh my god i don't this stuff scares me so much mate because i don't know if i would have done anything about it i just it's awful yeah.
Alun:
[5:23] Well that's what i thought as well i really thought like i mean it's a good fucking job i googled. I honestly thought oh that's a cute red line.
Adam:
[5:30] my god okay so you well you what do you do you're on your way to the hospital or what?
Alun:
[5:38] Yeah, it was pouring down with rain at the time. So I was like one of those miserable things where you think, oh God, the last thing I want to do is late at night. It's like 9pm. That's late at night, if you mean. And it was pouring down with rain, 9pm. The last thing I wanted to do was get on a motorcycle and drive into town and go to the R. But you really have no choice, right? So I found a 24-hour medical clinic. There's like one or two on the whole island it just so happens to be 15 minutes away from me so that was convenient i went there basically they had to give me tetanus shots in both arms because they had to clean the wound they gave me, an antibiotic cream and in order to clear the lymphagitis four pills a day for seven days worth of antibiotics that is like a strong dose of the antibiotics they've got to make sure that shit is not in your system anymore oh.
Adam:
[6:35] My goodness oh that's awful i mean i can't believe this is the first time i'm hearing it why the hell didn't you tell me that you were going through this that sounds bloody serious mate.
Alun:
[6:45] Oh you know me i don't like to fuss but do you ever have that thing when you go i find this in a medical setting quite often because now we're living in this age of google where people can really inform themselves online and you know it must be quite annoying for doctors when people come in with a self-diagnosis because i i went into the the er and i was like oh you know i've got lymphagitis can i please see a doctor and by the time the doctor came to see me she was like oh and what's the problem i was like it's lymphagitis she was like oh how do you know it's lymphagitis and in that situation do you just fess up and go like oh well i had i had a google and i think it looks like lymphagitis um i always get a bit i don't know what to say so i went oh, i it's a bit of a hobby of mine to dabble in medicine i don't know what to say and she was like oh but you're not a doctor and I was like no um but you know I once went on a date with a doctor oh some of my best friends are doctors it's really awkward situations created no.
Adam:
[7:49] I think what I would have done is maybe not given them anywhere to hide in some sort of manipulation tactic I would have said look I'll be honest I've googled it and I think it's lymphogitis if you're telling me it's not and it turns out to be, then on your head be it let's just treat it as if it is the worst possible thing and then work backwards instead of think about what it could be and then make our way through process of elimination to the worst thing.
Alun:
[8:15] Yeah that'd probably be a smart idea i mean in the end they really did a holistic treatment they shot me up with two types of tetanus you know the tetanus for protecting you against tetanus in the future and the tetanus for making sure you don't have tetanus right now the antibiotics themselves made me so damn tired and just fatigued i still managed to go to jiu-jitsu and do all the surfing and all that stuff but it's really a knackering experience god.
Adam:
[8:39] How did the uh editing go on the episode.
Alun:
[8:41] Oh good yeah good but you know so far a hundred percent of the people that have tried to edit that specific episode of topology have come down with lymphogitis whilst doing so so it's a high risk episode awful.
Adam:
[8:53] Mate awful and then the wound does Was the wound heal quicker because of the amount of drugs that you've consumed or ingested?
Alun:
[9:01] The crazy thing about this story is that the wound was pretty much already healed and now is still nearly already healed. The wound was healing normally and it was fine. It was just that red line that I think would have gone under most people's radars. But I remembered actually, once I saw the
word lymphagitis, I remember watching a documentary when I was a kid about someone who got toxic shock from an infection and ended up like losing both their arms and both their legs overnight pretty much because of like toxic shock syndrome so it really is one of those things that looks not like it should be a huge problem but left just oh we'll see how it goes could become a real real problem really really quickly so I'm glad I had to google in the internet to bail me out of what could be a terrifying situation if.
Adam:
[9:51] In doubt check it out, And make sure your bloody travel insurance covers it.
BetterHelp:
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Alun:
[11:05] There we are, it's time for the most anxiety riddled part of the show for me. Last time we played this game, I nearly lost my passport and had to backpack all the way back home to Manchester in what can only be described as a horrible twist of fate. We are, of course, speaking of everyone's favourite travel quiz. It's Tripping Point.
Adam:
[11:36] Alun, it's everyone's favourite travel quiz. It is, of course, Tripping Point, but as you mentioned, it does give you a lot of anxiety. I would imagine it gave you more anxiety in the last episode, in the last edition of Tripping Point, because the stakes were so bloody high. So what I would like to do is reduce the stakes somewhat, but still make them pretty steaky.
Alun:
[11:53] I'm interested.
Adam:
[11:53] How do you want to play this one? I know you've been indulging in the tuna over in Shargau. If you get... I think you might even get every question, right, mate?
Alun:
[12:04] Oh, don't say things like that.
Adam:
[12:05] Is it possible to buy a whole tuna?
Alun:
[12:07] Yeah.
Adam:
[12:08] Could you do that over in Sharga?
Alun:
[12:09] Yeah, it would cost about...
Adam:
[12:10] Can I afford one?
Alun:
[12:11] I reckon a whole tuna would cost about 3,000 pesos.
Adam:
[12:14] Which is what in a currency that we understand.
Alun:
[12:18] If you have to ask, then you can't afford it.
Adam:
[12:23] Okay. Well, I'm going to agree to buy you a whole tuna and you can decide to divide that up and share it with a... You can have your own fiesta. Why don't you have your own fiesta and you can invite the neighbourhood for some tuna?
Alun:
[12:34] Okay, so I'm playing for a whole yellowfin, baby.
Adam:
[12:37] Here we go. Are you ready for the question? This is a transport edition, so all of the questions are about ways in which you can traverse this wonderful planet. Are you ready?
Alun:
[12:45] Yeah, I was born ready and I've continued to be ready ever since that day.
Adam:
[12:51] Okay, you haven't got any red lines on your ankles that are making their way up your leg. Let's go.
Alun:
[12:55] I'm red line free.
Adam:
[12:57] In the late 19th century, rickshaws became a popular form of transportation across Asia. But where was the rickshaw as we know it today, widely believed to have been invented all the way back in 1869? Is it A, France? Is it B, Japan? Is it C, the United States? Or is it D, Singapore?
Alun:
[13:16] Oh, baby, baby, as we know it today, the rickshaw. I was thinking it was going to be Asian
when you asked the question, and i'm gonna have to stick with that uh feeling from the off so yeah i'm gonna go singapore.
Adam:
[13:31] Mate you're off to a bad start it's b japan i'm ever so sorry i'm ever so sorry really.
Alun:
[13:37] It was either singapore or japan i suppose.
Adam:
[13:40] Well this would be an interesting little fun fact for you rickshaws were independently invented in japan circa 1869 after the lifting of a ban on wheeled vehicles from the tokugawa period 1603 to 1868 how crazy is that a ban on wheeled vehicles rickshaw originates from the japanese word jin rickshaw which means human uh jin which is human so if you say uh ingrisu jindes that means i am an english person uh and then riki which is power or force and then sha which is vehicle so it literally translates to human powered vehicle that's pretty cool isn't it.
Alun:
[14:15] There we go anyway you win some you lose some.
Adam:
[14:17] So you're down to So three quarters of a tuna, here we go. Number two, the Logan Air flight between Westray and Papa Westray in Scotland is the world's shortest scheduled passenger flight, but how long is it? A. 18 minutes. B. 12 minutes. C. 6 minutes. Or D. Just 1 minute and 30 seconds.
Alun:
[14:38] Okay, well, that one's impossible. I think it's going to be, I reckon, 12 minutes, mate.
Adam:
[14:46] I can't believe it, mate. You're wrong again. You're wrong again. We're down to half a tuna. Get this.
Alun:
[14:51] What's the answer?
Adam:
[14:52] The scheduled time for that flight, the allotted time, is one and a half minutes.
Alun:
[14:56] That's impossible. That is impossible.
Adam:
[14:58] It is absolutely amazing. The fastest time ever recorded for that route is 53 seconds, which was registered by a pilot called Stuart Linklater, who flew the route over 12,000 times before retiring back in 2013. I mean, when people take short flights and they say it was just up and down, that's not even up, is it?
Alun:
[15:16] That's not long enough to take off.
Adam:
[15:20] It's just the end of the runway. That's so funny. Maybe the other island that it's going to, Papa Westray, is just slightly lower down in terms of elevation. It just goes off the end onto the other runway.
Alun:
[15:31] Honestly, honestly, if you're listening to this episode now and you've got both of these questions right so far, can you pause the show and send us an email or a message on Instagram at Tripology Podcast? Because I think you're lying.
Adam:
[15:46] That's so funny. If you are playing at home, do play at home. This is great. Then, yeah, let us know that you have been doing so. here we go this one is right up your street mate number three vietnam is synonymous with motorbikes and scooters but approximately what percentage share of road vehicles do they represent a 50 b 65 c 75 or d 95 i'm.
Alun:
[16:12] Gonna go big man this is just vietnam.
Adam:
[16:14] Yep so it's only about vietnam the percentage share of road vehicles that is held by motorbikes and scooters Yeah.
Alun:
[16:22] I honestly can't remember seeing a single car in my whole time in Vietnam. There's maybe a few. I reckon it's one of those things that sounds ridiculous if you get it wrong, but I just think they're so ubiquitous. I mean, am I saying that for every 100 vehicles in Vietnam, only five of them aren't? Are we talking about passenger vehicles? Would like trucks and lorries count?
Adam:
[16:48] Yeah, all road traffic.
Alun:
[16:50] Okay, well, 95%.
Adam:
[16:51] Yeah, you're right. Can you even believe it? The answer is 95%. As of 2024, there are approximately 77 million registered motorbikes in Vietnam. With a population of around 100 million people, that means that three in four people ride one. that's.
Alun:
[17:07] Really taking into account like moving goods between cities and things.
Adam:
[17:13] Yeah there are just so many i.
Alun:
[17:15] Guess there's just so many people on bikes.
Adam: [17:17] Just very quickly what's the weirdest thing you've ever seen on the back of a bike.
Alun:
[17:20] I saw once a man with sort of three daughters and the back one was carrying a whole sort of a box with 10 chickens inside.
Adam:
[17:34] God yeah i've seen a fair fair few animals as well i've seen whole sort of chicken coops i've seen upside down pigs that have had their legs tied together i've seen a fridge freezer i've even seen another motorbike on the back of a scooter being carried along sideways so i mean they're inventive if nothing else you gotta gotta hats off to them the vietnamese they love a scooter i.
Alun:
[17:53] Once fell asleep on the back of a motorcycle in vietnam so for someone looking at that they would have seen the weirdest thing they've ever seen on a motorbike was a sleeping white guy, like just nodding off and nearly falling into the road.
Adam:
[18:08] Dear oh dear oh dear here we go number four the trans-siberian is the longest single track railway line in the world if you were to travel its full route from moscow to vladivostok without stopping how long would the journey take a two days b three days c five days or d seven days one full week.
Alun:
[18:32] Um that's interesting i think vladivostok's had more mentions on this podcast than than any other podcast in the world.
Adam:
[18:41] I think vladivostok.
Alun:
[18:42] Is sort of our sister sister town basically um okay how long would it take the whole trans siberian if it didn't stop at all right.
Adam:
[18:52] Yeah so the train journey now i am speaking from experience obviously you can buy a ticket from moscow to vladivostok, and not get off the train okay you actually you can't get tickets or you couldn't back when i did it back in 2014 you couldn't get tickets um that was like a hop on hop off type thing if you want to go to vladivostok you buy a moscow to vladivostok ticket and you do it in one hit and that is one single railway line that goes all the way.
Alun:
[19:19] Okay, I'm going to take a risk here, Adam, because my intuition tells me five days, but... This has been a quiz of extremes. The answer to the flight question was the shortest flight. The answer to the Vietnamese question was the biggest number. The answer to the rickshaw question was the
most Asian place. I think when you were making this quiz, you were in a very extreme mindset. And for that reason, I think it's the longest time, seven days.
Adam:
[19:48] You can't dispute the logic. He's got it right. It's seven days, one week. It was about six and a half when I did it, but let's round it up. Well done.
Alun:
[19:56] I have read you like a little tripological book, my friend. And for that reason, I'm going to find a way to weasel a whole tuna out of you.
Adam:
[20:06] Yeah, the full journey covers about 9,300 kilometres. Absolutely gigantic. Little bonus question for you, mate, for this one. The total journey, you try and get a couple of scales of tuna back on the plate. The total journey travelling either east to west or vice versa crosses how many time zones?
Alun:
[20:24] No multiple choice.
Adam:
[20:25] No, it's a bonus question. So you've just got to think about the most extreme number that it could possibly be and say that.
Alun:
[20:32] 10.
Adam:
[20:34] Oh, unlucky. It's 8. It's 8, but that is a lot of time zones.
Alun:
[20:38] You led me astray by saying most extreme. I was on 8 and then you said extreme and I added a couple of time zones for each syllable of that word.
Adam:
[20:45] Damn, damn. Maybe I'll include some of the tuna head or something. Just a little consolation. The time is GMT plus three in Moscow and ends at GMT plus ten in Vladivostok. Absolutely mental, honestly.
Alun:
[20:58] Okay, okay. Right. Next question. I'm rumen to go.
Adam:
[21:01] Here it is. It's the last one for you, mate. Number five. Try and bag as much tuner as you can. The famous Mongol rally returned in 2024.
Alun:
[21:10] You can't say that.
Adam:
[21:11] After lying dormant since 2019. We don't need to go into why that was. participants are challenged to drive thousands of miles from europe to now kazakhstan in tiny often unsuitable cars which of the following rules make the rally all the more challenging is it a you must complete the rally without using any maps or gps is it b the cars must have a maximum engine size of 1.3 liters or is it c only vehicles older than 50 years are allowed to compete I.
Alun:
[21:40] Have no idea, Adam. I've never heard of the Mongol Rally.
Adam:
[21:43] Have you not? That crazy car race that goes all the way from the UK all the way across Europe and all the stans and ends up in Mongolia, now Kazakhstan, because of some geopolitical issues.
Alun:
[21:53] The one with really old cars and no maps.
Adam:
[21:57] Then both of those would be right, wouldn't they? It's an amazing thing. If you haven't heard of the Mongol Rally, a good friend of ours, definitely a good friend of mine, I know him slightly better than you do, but you've met him loads of times, He did that when he was 18 with a few of his friends. And my God, has he got some amazing stories from that trip.
Alun:
[22:12] So, yeah, I certainly wouldn't consider him a friend.
Adam:
[22:17] What do you think it is, mate? What's your final answer?
Alun:
[22:20] Oh, I'm going to go with... The engine size of the car one, Adam, the 1.3 litres on the grounds that I found that number a little bit suspiciously, oddly specific.
Adam:
[22:34] You're totally right. You're totally right. That is the answer. They do actually say if you can keep the engine size to about a litre, that'd be great. But if you really are, and this is sort of the words on their website, if you don't think you can cope, if you need a bigger engine, we will allow an absolute maximum of 1.3. if you're completely useless and you're unable to make it all the way with a tiny engine.
Alun:
[22:55] Well, I must confess, I really find Tripping Point much easier if I sort of play against you as opposed to try and answer the questions.
Adam:
[23:05] I do have amazing fun putting these together. I do like it. And of course, they're easy for me because I know the answer because I wrote the questions. But you always do such a good job. So maybe, I'll tell you what, mate, 3,000 pesos doesn't sound like that much. I'd buy you a whole bloody tuna and you invite the neighbourhood round for a big old knees up.
Alun:
[23:22] Just on this, on the last episode of Tripping Point, we did an Instagram post where we made a poll saying, like, did you get the question right? And an alarming number of people said that they did. And I mean, the question, there's a lot of people that claim to know a lot about travel just off the
bat. People are like, oh, you got fooled by the whole France Great Wall debacle. But for me, I was listening to the show and I knew the answer immediately. did you that's a question i have anyway the.
Adam:
[23:54] Pressure's not on them is it there's not a tuna on the line that's a fishing joke.
Alun:
[23:58] Okay mate well a beautiful tripping point but you know what i'm really craving it's my favorite time of the show it's when we dash off to tripologypodcast.com forward slash tales of a trip and hear one of our listeners greatest travel stories they've got three minutes to send us the most beautiful memory, the sexiest tale, the most daring adventure that they've ever had whilst on the road. One of our listeners has sent one in and we're going to listen to it right now.
Tales of a Trip:
[24:26] Hello, Alun Adden. I'm on my 20th take. Let's see if I can get it under three minutes. So I was teaching English in Vietnam. I managed to find a job in four hours, which was impressive.
Tales of a Trip:
[24:38] The only assets I had to my name was the fact that I was English. I could speak English and I had done a TEFL course. I'd never taught English in my life. This is a lesson about knowing what you're good at and maybe finding out what you're not so good at.
Tales of a Trip:
[24:54] I had to cover for a friend who was a professional English teacher and had been doing it for some years in Vietnam. And I was left with the lesson planning and then obviously delivering the lesson. So I thought, oh, it's easy. It's fine. Find a couple of videos, you know, get a couple of images online, print some stuff off, watch a couple of YouTube videos, whatever. Easy. The kids were, I think, age five to nine. and I remember getting in there to the lesson and for some reason the parents were there too, and the the supply teacher so I was sort of just being put on a pedestal and kind of just being looked at and being observed if you like to see what my teaching qualities were like I'd never taught before I think I did one lesson before that which was terrible so I uh I found a song beforehand and I thought right let's like you know warm them up with a song uh because that's all I've got right now. Now, this is a lesson to anybody who's planning a lesson in English. Make sure you watch the video all the way through and make sure that it's attainable for
the level of which you're trying to teach. I think they were anywhere from the ages of five to nine. I couldn't be sure. They were very young, very small. Anyway, so the first part of the song, it's nice and easy. It's about different vehicles in the construction site.
Tales of a Trip:
[26:16] The first one was it went a bit like this i see your lorry and then i'd get them to say i see your lorry which they managed you know lorry's not too hard next one i see your digger i see your digger yeah great okay they got that now at this point i'd not actually watched much further than that so i didn't know what was coming next and the next word to be honest with you i would have struggle teaching people whose native language is English anyway. The next word was, I see an excavator. I see an excavator. And this is where it all went pitong. All the kids suddenly trying to repeat after me, I see an excavator. And it just didn't work. I had no backup plan. All the teachers, the parents were looking at me, the teacher was looking at me. I just had to try and improvise so I think I just kind of skipped through the song very quickly and was like ah right to the next word and that's why you should always always plan a lesson before doing it don't try and blag these things even if you think you can do it just because you speak the language thanks.
Alun:
[27:25] Thank you very much for sending the story in. I love that one. That resonated with me on multiple levels, both as someone who has tried to teach English as a second language throughout Asia and Africa. And I've also been a music teacher, a ukulele teacher, so I've made up a lot of little songs for little kids. Mate, any experience with TEFL, with language teaching, anything like that for you?
Adam:
[27:47] No, actually, it's a massive blind spot in my travel history. And it's something that I really wish I had done. I would say to lots of younger travellers out there, if you do want to travel or at least work in an industry that allows you to travel and facilitates that travel, teaching English is definitely a great one to go into. And I just thought about it too late, I think. Maybe I'm a bit too long in the tooth. I don't know whether I'd be a good teacher or not. What do you reckon?
Alun:
[28:12] I reckon you'd be... I think you'd be good at teaching certain things. You're good at teaching me things that I don't know about when you have like additional expertise.
Adam:
[28:22] What's that? Nothing.
Alun:
[28:23] Well, you've taught me a few things about wine. I can tell if a wine's corked now, thanks to
you. But it is a popular thing, isn't it? In the travel community, doing TEFL teaching, often without any teaching expertise at all. People throw themselves into teaching. My very first job traveling, I've been traveling for... my first thing I ever did when I went traveling was teaching a little language school in China after a month of traveling I was teaching in this little Vietnamese school and it's mad actually to think back on being a 21 year old kid who doesn't know anything about anything and I was just trying to teach these kids and I didn't know the first thing about teaching so I just have all these little Vietnamese faces staring back at me one lesson I tried to teach them about first, second, and third person pronouns.
Adam:
[29:13] Blime.
Alun:
[29:14] And I explained it as me. And of course, they were like five-year-old Vietnamese children. The teacher came to me afterwards and said, I think maybe you'd have a better time teaching the adult class, Alun. I'm like, oh yeah, is that because I tried to teach... people who were too young to understand those pronouns in their native language about them in English. Is that why you think I should be fired from this role? So I do empathize with the whole debacle.
Adam:
[29:43] Yeah, I mean, I don't envy Danny. I can imagine that's an incredibly difficult position to be in when you've got all the eyes on you. Why on earth the parents were there, why they chose to be there for his lesson as well? All came undone bloody quickly, mate. I do regret not teaching English and you know I get I would implore anyone to um I guess take the plunge because we've been dealt an incredible hand haven't we being native English speakers you do realize how lucky you are there are there are lots of countries that hold it in high regard and just because you are a native English speaker will potentially give you a job without any experience obviously in Danny's case he probably wished he had a little bit more.
Alun:
[30:22] Yeah it is a beautiful thing but it is quite stressful as well you know speaking on the parents being there and observing the lesson I recall another time when I was trying to teach guitar in Australia and I had no idea about how to play guitar really I just knew that not many people wanted bass guitar lessons but lots of people wanted guitar lessons so I quickly tried to learn how to play the guitar and stayed one lesson ahead of the kids that I was teaching at all times but one day a parent came in with their with their child and the child said oh how do I play that D minor chord and I didn't know how to play a D minor chord I looked at him and then looked at his mother and said, you know it's really best when you're learning to, to know from the shape of the diagram in the book how to create that shape on the fretboard yourself so let's try and do that together now so look here
we go position one and i just managed to blag my way through it just using i mean charisma really yeah.
Adam:
[31:25] Well you also do have musical ability because you've come up with a little song like play d minor play d minor because i'm gonna now go to bed thinking about lorries and excavators.
Alun:
[31:34] Yeah very very catchy that wasn't it excavator you come up with stuff like that all the time i would recommend if you're ever in a context where you're teaching kids a language a second language now a good game is slap the board i used to play all the time with the vietnamese kids and the chinese kids what you do is you write a bunch of random simple words all over a whiteboard you might do can or spade or trigonometry and then you say those words and the kids have to race another kid to like touch the word as fast as they can they go absolutely nuts for it they much prefer that to excavators and diggers and all that shit yeah.
Adam:
[32:15] Yeah i mean uh it sounds like absolute carnage i'm not sure the parents would have been too pleased with that one either mate.
Alun:
[32:20] It's a minefield adam but it's in the minefield that if you want to earn some extra cash whilst traveling or indeed just to use your teaching services like I did in exchange for a place to stay and a few meals. You've got to get to grips with the minefield and learn to navigate it expertly. It's a cool thing. Thank you very much for sending that story in. If you have a crazy workaway story, a teaching English story, or something that you did that you shouldn't really have been doing whilst on the road traveling, just go to trilogypodcast.com forward slash tales of a trip, because we want to hear all about it. Three minutes, your greatest travel story. But right now, we're going to tiptoe over to the patreon section where we do a lost and found bit behind the theme music where we get all naughty and crazy here on the podcast lost.
Adam:
[33:05] And found section on patreon.com forward slash tripology podcast don't make the same mistake that danny did and watch the youtube video all the way to the end we'll see you there bye.
