Splashback in The Gambia.
About 20 years ago. Being the fearless (idiot) traveller; I ate everything I was offered, drank same with "local" ice in it, then did it all again the next day and every day after. For seven happy days. Day eight began innocently enough with a nice fried breakfast and was topped up with some interesting lumpy, cloudy local beer from the dirtiest fridge on the planet.

By the late evening I was starting to feel a bit queasy, light headed and had curious bouts of numbness, shakes and sweats in no particular order. Taking myself to an early bed I found myself having to curl up in a ball to contain the stomach cramps which were of John Hurt/Alien proportions. Then the real fun started.Within the hour I was sitting on the greasy, tiled floor of the bathroom, shaking, soaked with sweat and trying to focus on any object my flitting eyes lit upon. I was tripping big time, cockroaches became cracks in the tiles, the tiles became swirling stars, the stars, well cockroaches again. I wondered vaguely if I might die, such was the horror of the symptoms. I toyed with the idea of crawling to the door to shout for help but that was firmly rejected as the first wave of nausea swept in. Now, we've all puked at some time or other, it's not fun but it usually makes us feel better once it's over right? Oh no.My stomach after one small lurch, turned itself inside out with such velocity that the contents hit the water, cast a graceful arc in the bottom of the bowl and sent a torrent of filth back into my face, hair and most unpleasantly, eyes.
And- there were things in there I swear I'd never eaten; things from another universe, from other dimensions, from Wes Craven's box of rejects too horrible to screen. Examining some of these objects with a mixture of fear and curiosity- they were, after all, hanging from everything nearby; I saw what I perceived to be bits of my internal organs fused with Taiwanese Christmas tree decorations and chicken soup. Maybe. All of this became swiftly incidental as the second and third waves followed, Tsunami style, to paint the areas of the bathroom that had escaped the first onslaught.

I flew home the next day, a fragile, shaky shell of the person I'd been on arrival. I didn't eat or piss for 6 days afterwards and was not right for another month at least.

Horrified with the whole experience I visited Senegal the following year....
( Infidel , shit and wrong, Fri 8 Jan 2010, 2:00, Reply)