a word of caution

over dinner at the chinese tonight (it was buffet night; spring rolls were not actually cooked, and cold, but there were cakes and donughts also on the spread! bring on goroka style chinese), we were laughing about this; i've met the daughter, and she's cool, and it is not that it's untrue, but...

Annemarie from Thorn, Holland writes: [on the bbc travel website] I have been to PNG for a month on holiday as my daughter lives over there and works for VSO. I know by experience that PNG is a very dangerous country for a woman alone to travel by herself. It's a beautiful country and when you stay in one of the lodges or expensive hotels it's a nice experience. But it's also a very corrupt and criminal country where HIV and AIDS are expanding dangerously. Travelling without an experienced PNG guide is not recommended at all. It's expensive to live in and expensive to travel to. You paint a very luxurious picture and you do not tell about the violence, the 75 % of the people who are jobless, the trouble to get money to the right places, the handicapped children/people who are living hidden from the world because families are ashamed of them, the trouble people have to live in the past and the modern world etc. Maybe it's not useful to tell this to a travel programme but it's the truth.