Well the old body continues to give up on me and break down at perplexing and depressing frequency.

The writing up of all the thousands of butterfly notes pinned to books, guides and other travel memorabilia has all but ground to a halt, it's difficult to get motivated when you spend half your time talking to God on the great white telephone or pebble dashing the same receptacle at painfully sore, frequent intervals. Over the christmas period I was once again hospitalised, this time only overnight. A yeast infection has taken grip of my mouth and digestive track, gastric ulcers cause acid burns in my chest and curiously enough chronic bronchitis has also set in. The enzyme count in my liver reached a dangerous 180, where 40 is normal.

So I stopped the drinking, not as hard as I thought, even over the Christmas period, I began to get better but oh God so slowly. And with relapses - out of nowhere more spontaneous throwing up recurred, I was on about a dozen or so different medications, pills, tonics, medecines the whole nine yards. I wasn't chronically ill, just chip-chip whittling away at youre confidence, ego, desire to be...I'm survivng but not living. Eating has become a real ordeal, the giving up of drink didn't restore any appetite at all, I now dread having to eat. I am hungry and yet have no appetite, I eat squirrel spoonfulls of food and lose interest, each mouthful a battle like some anorexic teenager.

And having made some small measure of recovery, the last week has seen everything roar back into view, so back to the hospital for what? More of the same? Temporary relief but no cure? I feel too weak to make the long journey home, if its not the throat its the bowels, I daren't go further than a hop way from a lavatory. So each day grinds listlessly on, melding from the day before to today to tomorrow, with no relief, no respite, no promise that I'll be well one day soon. And this has been going on for some six months or so.

And yet there are things to be grateful for. My blood pressure is good, my pulse healthy, my cholestorol low. The blood tests show me to be HIV free, and there's a good reason that I mention that here and now. Allow me to introduce Dave. Dave came to Thailand divorced, seeking a better life than in wet and windy Britain. He sought to escape his past and make a new start for himself, away from a country that wanted little to do with a middle aged man and his midlife crisis. He planned it all, saving, shifting things around, taking long holidays in Thailand, getting to know the feel of the land, the people, the culture before making a commitment. He met the usual wastrels, the alchoholics, the predatorial bar-girls and manoevered his way around such tempting vices.

Then he met Pomi. Pomi worked in a local mini-mart, just around from a property that he had bought. She was sweet, pretty, of similar age to him and as a bonus spoke very good English, whereas his Thai was dire despite countless language classes. Old dogs new tricks he assumed. They hit it off splendidly, and soon a fast friendship grew out of the shoots of simple, mutual admiration. Eventually, they decided to get married, he'd followed all the correct protocols, met with the family and won their approval, for Dave wasn't the fly-by night chancer, he wanted Pomi to be happy, and that meant making sure her family was happy. In Thailand you marry not just the girl, you marry the whole family warts and all. But Dave didn't yet have enough money to make a clean break of it and move completely to Thailand. He had to leave Pomi for most of the year and work hard, scrimping and saving for that magic moment when he could finally spend the rest of his life with Pomi and her wonderful family.

One day Dave got an email.

His wife had been taken to hospital, apparently with a chronic chest infection. He wasn't too worried, these things happen, as I know all too well. It wasn't practical for him to drop everything and leave for Thailand. He insisted that she was put in an international hospital, and to his wonder, through friends on the internet in Thailand, found that along with her family, complete strangers were turning up to visit her, to help her, some even paying her bills before he could wire the money through. He wrapped up affairs in Britain as well and as quickly as he could, and bought a ticket to go and see her, a matter of one week. In the meantime, confusing emails spoke of Pomi's deteriorating condition, nobody seemed to be able to tell him what was happening.

By the time he arrived at the hospital he was greeted by half a dozen well-wishers, none of whom he'd met before, all Thai.

For Pomi was dead.

The chronic chest infection was in fact a manifestation of full blown AIDs. From hospitalisation to death, a mere ten days had elapsed. Dave was of course devastated as was her family. Pomi wasn't a bar-girl, Pomi had only known one or two men in her life, all of whom had probably visited prostitutes behind her back. She had no reason to be worried about HIV, she was a good and modest woman who had met at last the man with whom she'd sail into the future, even if it was such an unexpectedley short journey.

Dave isn't bitter. He's just more philisophical. He was stunned by the Thai people and the ex-pats once they'd got wind of the tragedy, their unflinching generosity of both spirit and mammon. He knew in his personal tragedy that he'd been shown a way of life more uplifitng, more human and more fulfilling than anything he could expect back in Britain or indeed in the material west.

Dave still hopes to meet someone that can fill the gap in his heart, but in the meantime he's dedicating his life to HIV education among Thai people, where oddly enough the big risk groups aren't so much the sex-workers but the everyday, get by each day, Thai women and men, youngsters especially, that play with such a dreadful fire of passion.

I started this post as a moaning minnie, feeling sorry for myself and my many withering ailments, none of which is life threatening. And yet there is always a story more deserving, more important than wallowing in self-pity. And this story as I tell it tonight, has raised my spirits more than anything else I can remember over the last few days. My pains are as nothing compared to the many devastations that ordinary people, through no fault of their own, suffer on a daily basis the world over.

From tsunamis to earthquakes to the long, cold, deadly fingers of disease and starvation, I am still lucky to simply be breathing and alive. And I should appreciate such a fact, no matter how painful.

There are stars out tonight, and I look up and across the ocean, not within, thanks to Pomi and Dave. Pomi lives on, she's inspired me to a strange yet familiar feeling of joy in the human spirit, of hope amongst the hopelessness, and although I never met Pomi, I see her face mirrored kindly, in the infinities of space and time, echoing like a silent bell in the dark deeps.

yechydda,