The other night we dropped in to Barista for our post-lecture coffee, and there were these two blokes sitting in there chatting away. When we sat down, they said – with great big friendly smiles on their faces – to Rob (Dutch), Ricardo (Colombian) and myself: “You are English, yes ?”. We made it clear…

OK, that's another exam out of the way. 2 down, 6 to go. Although for some stupid reason I'm considering rushing the last two and tacking on another 9 day course. Maybe I'll wait til I get this exam (shaping up to be trickier) out of the way on Monday or Tuesday and then see…

The stuff I posted earlier today – which is dated from a few days back – I actually wrote before, it's just the pace of this course has been so flat out I hadn't had a chance to edit the photos and get all that organised. But as I take a brief break from study…

On Sunday my learned colleague Rob & I elected to get the hell out of Shimla and see some of the surrounding countryside. To wit, we forked over the hefty sum of 1125 Rupees each (about 12 pounds) and hired ourselves a 4WD, driver and tour guide for the day, and set off to the…

First week down, so here's some more choice tidbits and photographs… Our class consists of Rob the Dutch Dude, our instructor Sukhdev, and myself. There's a big old theatre in town, which was built when this was the Indian Summer Capital when the English ran the place (it gets wayyyyy too hot down in Delhi…

Exams, buildings and mountain views are all very well, but the thing you're all desperate to know is “What's the beer like ??”. Being the scientifically inquiring type, I set out to test this very concept the other night with my new learned chums, Brett the Aussie and Angus the Irish Bloke. The beer of…

WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! I just passed my first ever Microsoft examination, which confers upon me the globally recognised status of Microsoft Certified Professional. But you can call me “Mike”, for short. So that's one exam down, about another 6 to go.

So the question on everyone's lips is, “What's it like in Shimla, Jason ?”. Well I'll tell, shall I ? This place is fricken' great – admittedly this is my first time in a non-Westernised country, so a lot of the stuff which seasoned travellers regard as pretty standard is still wiggin' me out to…

Wow, got to Shimla today, and there couldn't be two places more different ! After driving for what seemed an interminable distance across flat, dusty terrain our bus started up a gradual incline and the landscape became incredibly green. The roadside was even peppered with gum trees ! I mentioned that the traffic in Delhi…

Hmm, that was well done… never made it to the Red Fort – apparently it was closed, but then I also had a little trouble working out wha tin the hell the guy was trying to tell me about getting a cab out there. In the absence of any other good plan I elected to…