On Mardi Gras in good old Carnival style some 800 identically dressed men go to the streets of Binche in south Belgium to fight for their freedom from feudalism like they used to some 400 years ago. In colourful uniforms with padded bellies and hunchbacks individual Gilles walk chaotically up and down the town stamping their clogs rhythmically to the sound of their personal drummers to pick up some fellow Gilles from their homes. After a while small groups of them form and along with their personal drummers trot their clogs on the cobblestones from one drinking establishment to another.

There doesn’t seem to be any age restrictions so they start from the clog wearing age to wheelchair ones capable to stamp their feet. Although there seems to be some distinctions in the ranks. Novice Gilles get up early in the morning and wearing identical masks march straight on the Town Hall. “Approved” ones are allowed to trot through all the bars and tavernas till the early afternoon when the real battle starts.

Clans of Gilles turn to the streets with long baskets full of blood oranges to start defending themselves. Crowds of friends and relatives follow them with massive sacks of ammunition. It is not clear why oranges have been originally used as offensive weapon or how XVI century paysans managed to import some 6 tonnes of them from Sicily. Nevertheless they start marching through the centre of the town throwing them more or less violently into the crowd. Oranges get squashed, splatted, caught, eaten or collected for later. Interim result is that most people look like Sissy Spacek in Carrie horror movie. Ambulances get busy and the battle goes on for a coupe of hours till even the senior Gilles wearing some 2 meter hats of ostrich feathers get to conquer the Town Hall.

Slight drawback is that the locals keep spraying some sticky foam all over people and with complete lack of public conveniences there is little one can do to clean it off. Also serving good old Belgian beer traditionally in relevant glasses and in large quantities leaves the cobblestones scattered with broken glass and mainly blood from oranges running down the streets.

My score was: caught two oranges, got badly hit by one on the forehead, was handed one while licking off my face after the first hit and apart from two badly dislocated fingers I really enjoyed the event.

Take a look at Krys’ web site: www.krystyna.com/Gilles.html

Founded in 1982, Conservation Volunteers Australia is a national, non-profit and non-political organisation. CVA completes essential conservation projects, which could not be tackled without active community participation. The projects are as distant, diverse and unique as the Australian continent itself – for example, radio-tracking echidnas on Kangaroo Island; malleefowl surveys in Victoria’s Little Desert; construction of the Larapinta Trail in the Northern Territory; landcare projects in Tasmania and koala surveys in Queensland.

Conservation Volunteers Australia welcomes everybody with a love of the outdoors and interest in the environment to take part as a volunteer. Our volunteers come from all over the world, including Korea, Denmark, Japan, Britain, Canada, USA and Germany. If you are looking for an opportunity to:

· visit some amazing locations,

· meet a broad range of people,

· learn about the Australian environment, and

· volunteer overseas

then volunteering with Conservation Volunteers Australia and having a Conservation Experience is for you. The Conservation Experience is a six-week program especially designed for overseas visitors to Australia. It is the perfect way to visit some of Australia’s special places. The cost of AUD $966.00 (just AUD $23 per day – around £8.20) includes all meals, accommodation and project-related transport. You can join the Conservation Experience on any Friday (subject to vacancies), from any of CVA’s office around Australia. For further details, visit our website at www.conservationvolunteers.com.au or email info@conservationvolunteers.com.au or write to Conservation Volunteers Australia, Box 423, Ballarat Vic 3353

Meeting news from our branches around the world.

Oman is a fascinating country. For anyone who has been to Zanzibar, there are striking architectural similarities, but it is not all about modern or ancient towns, there’s desert, mountains and, of course, the Arabian Sea! Most of the dive operators are attached to hotels. There is one dive operation, called Dive Oman which is about 45 minutes drive south from the airport at Muscat Dive Oman is run by Bernard and Stephanie, a lovely couple, (French and Dutch) and is part owned by the poshest hotel, which is close by, called the Al Bustan. Bernard can be contacted on: diveoman@omantel.net.om

Here, you can stay right on the beach in a range of accommodation, from air con rooms to a shared dorm. The bay from here is superb, not much to see snorkelling, but it is very pretty, and a short boat trip away, you will be able to see dolphins.

The diving is very good for the novice and intermediate diver: there are no currents to speak of, you’ll find it difficult to get deeper than 20m and the visibility is generally 15m +. The corals are not as colourful as say the Red Sea, but this is more than made up for by fantastic amounts of fish! Great for macro photographers too! You get loads of them and they are so unafraid! The Beetle did not see anything particularly large, but there were lots of turtles, and the occasional docile reef shark, and in the right season, there are whale sharks. Visibility ranges from 15m+ and the water temperature is around 25 degrees C.

Dive Oman is a very safe dive operation, not run by cowboys, good air – reasonable equipment although the Beetle has her own. A proper briefing preceded each dive and although few dives were guided, it was very safe and almost impossible to get lost!

If you stay at Dive Oman, they are stuck out in the middle of nowhere and only have food at weekends i.e. Thursday and Friday, so you'll have to hire a care and go off and find something yourself the rest of the time.

If you are British, you can buy a visa at the airport, around £16 or $23. If you have an Israeli stamp in your passport, forget it, you’ll have a hard time getting in. Also, the Omanis are the worst drivers the Beetle has ever seen, even worse than the Egyptians! And that takes some doing! So driving can be fraught! The Beetle drove as a female over there, which is possible but a major novelty, so she had cars overtake and then sit on the other side of the road just staring in as she drove! The dress code is long and baggy: don't wear shorts outside the dive centre and females should wear long baggy trousers and long sleeved shirts or long short sleeved T shorts.

Other dive operators include Blue Zone and Ecodivers bluzone@gto.net.om

Dive Oman have a web site: http://www.diveoman.com.om/

Next month: more on the sites of Oman

6th April Kevin Morgan kicked off with a wonderful slide show of dolphins, whales and other marine and bird life ranging from Antarctica to the Bahamas! We all left feeling wiser and almost confident of being able to distinguish bottle nosed dolphins from spinners! His slides finished with an evocative tape of the sounds made by whales.

After the break, Cass Gilbert showed us some fabulous pictures of Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan and Kyrgyzstan (and other places ending in “stan” that the beetle cannot spell!) Amazingly, he completed this incredible journey by tandem, through parts of the old Silk Route, past ancient cities, churches, mosques, and markets, occasionally, with his female tandem partner cycling in veil and long trousers, much to the bemusement of many locals.

London meetings are held at The Church of Scotland, Crown Court, behind the Fortune Theatre in Covent Garden at 2.30pm the first Saturday of each month, except that due to public holidays, May’s meeting will be on Saturday 11th May at 2.30pm. June’s meeting will be held at 2.30pm on June 8th.

For more information, you can contact the Globetrotter Info line on +44 (0) 20 8674 6229, or visit the website: http://www.globetrotters.co.uk

On May 4th Mike Luongo will be giving a slide show and lecture about Lake Titicaca and the Border Regions of Peru and Bolivia. As well as touching on Venezuela. It's a story of lots of water, Incan heritage and South American politics. Learn about mysterious islands made only of woven grass that ancient people made to escape war. You'll see images of the highest navigable lake in the world, of colourful Carnival in Puno, Peru and of deadly natural disaster in La Paz, Bolivia, a city that thrives on laundered money. Michael is a New York based freelance writer and has travelled to more than 45 countries, and written on more than 30 of them. Latin America, with its mix of native and conquering cultures is among his favourite regions of the world. Best known for his work on gay travel destinations, he has been in Our World, Out & About and numerous regional publications and websites. He is also a co-editor of Continuum Press's Gay Tourism: Culture, Identity and Sex, the first academic book on the gay travel industry.

Note: some folk have mentioned wanting to get together for drinks etc. after the meeting. I will bring this to everyone's attention, and we'll see how it goes.

New York meetings are held at The Wings Theater, 154 Christopher Street (btw Greenwich St and Washington St), to the right of Crunch Fitness, in the Archive on the first Saturday of each month at 4 pm. $8.00 for members, $10.00 for non-members.

Skagway, Alaska is quite impressive – one shack and a runway!

Pyongyang, North Korea – loads of staff servicing very few flights!

Canaima, Venezuela, says the Beetle, is quite funny, a tiny strip cut out form the surrounding jungle with a wooden café close by with tens of stalls operated by companies all offering trips to the Angel Falls.

Write in and tell us your best airport nominations! the Beetle

The last meeting was on March 15: Bruce Weber talked about Yucatan.

For information on Ontario meetings, please contact: Svatka Hermanek:

shermanek@schulich.yorku.ca or Bruce Weber: tel. 416-203-0911 or Paul Webb: tel. 416-694-8259.

Meetings are held on the third Friday of January, March, May, September and November. Usually at the Woodsworth Co-op, Penthouse, 133, Wilton Street in downtown Toronto at 8.00 p.m.

Music and travel have been synonymous since the hippies took their music along with them in the sixties. Certain pieces of music have the ability to remind of places we have been and the experiences we enjoyed there. Here are my top 5 that evoke cherished memories of my travels.

Istanbul – “Mea Culpa” by Enigma, it was the first time I had heard this piece, as it woke us from our sleep as well pulled into Istanbul in a January snowstorm. It was a wonderful way to arrive in a place I had long wished to visit.

Iran – “Silk Road, God is Good” from Lonely Planet. This haunting piece will remind anyone who has travelled in the Middle East, but for me particularly of Iran, of the early morning call to prayer resonating from the towers of the ornate mosques.

Yangshuo – “Linger” by The Cranberries. One of my abiding memories of this lovely Chinese town is this song wafting out of virtually every Restaurant and backpacker hotel in the place. Whenever I hear this song on the radio at home it always evokes memories of China.

Australia – “Highway” by Gond Wana Land from the album, “Let the dog out”. Our bus driver played this super album as we crossed Australia’s Red Centre, the didgeridoos providing a fitting accompaniment to the landscape that passed outside the window.

France – “Anni Rose” by Tulka from the Buddha bar album by Claude Challe. This piece will always be a reminder of happy days and warm evenings in the south of France, while doing an Astanga course.

Write in and tell us your musical memories and associations! the Beetle

The May 11 meeting will meet at the library at 3 p.m., if you were not able to make the April picnic. The picnic went swimmingly – great weather, great company, good food – thanks to Christina for organising it!

Meetings are held at 3pm at the New Braunfels Public Library, 700 E. Common Street in New Braunfels, Texas. The meeting ends at 5 p.m. If you would like to continue travel talk on a more informal basis, we plan to adjourn to the Hoity-Toit, a local New Braunfels establishment.

If anybody would like to enquire about meetings or help Christina, please contact her on: texas@globetrotters.co.uk