Wish you were here...

It’s already August, and I am still in London. My friends, on the other hand, are variously busking their way around central Europe, continuing the work with the NGO they set up in Guatemala aged 19, and exploring Malaysia.

Maybe I’d be fulfilled with a deckchair and an ice-cream, but such a break is overshadowed by the knowledge that, in a month or so, I’ll have to admit to my colleagues that I chose Bognor. I experienced no exotic cultures, I had no epiphanies, and nothing changed my world perception. I just tried all the new Magnum flavours, and wore a hat.

With a growing trend for vacations in perilous climes, my choice of destination would certainly not impress during post-holiday chats around the water cooler. And so it is that I must succumb to peer-pressure and find an original experience, an authentic one, brave and preferably devoid of pleasure, to prove my intellectual worth.

I already have a South-America-envy complex, jealously attacking anyone who’s done the Inca Trail. I feel deeply roused to inform them about the far superior, but less-visited unspoiled ruins in the Sacred Valley down the road (which they must have missed) or to insist that a visit to Bolivia was much more rewarding anyway.

I could up my kudos further with tales of a downhill ride on Bolivia’s “death road”. What could provide a more impressive anecdote than one detailing the exhilaration I experienced hurtling down an unmade third-world road on a top-of-the-range mountain bike? Especially when hundreds have fallen 1000m to their death from said road, in minibuses with poor suspension? What dilemma could be more deliciously self-indulgent to post on a live travel blog than the one deciding whether or not to ride?

Surely not much could trump being one of only 9,000 annual visitors to the Kingdom of Bhutan? Near impossible to access and entirely without public transport, I picture myself with beautiful, photogenic locals in their national costume. Posing underneath the unique architecture of a Dzong castle, smiling, serene with Buddhist philosophy. Hell, they even do mountain-biking tours! Never mind that behind the national-dress lies the violently enforced nationalism of the Druk regime, which has generated more refugees per capita than anywhere else in the world – the flora and fauna is unsurpassed.

Then again, pretty towns just don’t cut it anymore. What’s new to say about a village that makes its own regional cheese? I want to visit a truly unique town. Spoiled, but highly unlikely to be spoiled further (promoted euphemistically in tour-guide blurb as being frozen in time). And so it is time to take a guided tour of Chernobyl. Operators provide sight-seeing tours of the nuclear power plant where the disaster occurred, including Pripyat, or “the Dead Town”, where visitors can explore the abandoned town, with its derelict buildings and discarded possessions. Lunch is provided (but cooked outside the fallout zone), and for a souvenir? An official printout of my radioactivity levels. That would be a worldly thing to casually find at the bottom of my handbag.

As of September, I’ll be cooped up making notes in a library basement, pretending to have a positive attitude towards learning. So why not make the most of this summer by taking up an extra-curricular activity and learning new skills? At KGB military school, for $1,900 (excluding flights) I can learn how to drive a Soviet tank, fight with knives and master special mind control techniques. Where others immortalise their gap-year friends, I can become nostalgic about the amazing people I met at Ukrainian Spetsnaz training, and reminisce about how we bonded during hand-to-hand combat sessions.

Ecotourism is so 2003. Back in the day when we thought climate change would imperil the world in 25-30 years, holidays were all about supporting the rainforest, by staying in some poorly ventilated wood hut, getting up at dawn and sitting in silence to see hear the rare mating call of the cock-of-the-rock.

Now, according to Operation Shiloh, there are far more pressing concerns. To deal with this amorphous threat – both the known unknowns and the unknown knowns – I should worthily spend my summer learning counter-terrorism for civilians. OpShiloh’s programme, developed in conjunction with the Israel Defence Force, provides the training essential for today’s dutiful American citizen. In order to “contribute to our collective safety”, participants undergo live fire exercises with automatic weapons, tactical paintball terror simulations and a tour of nighttime civilian guard duty.

And if I acquire a taste for military conflict, one British company offers group tours of Iraq. It’s a responsive company, and has recently changed the itinerary to avoid those pesky insurgents in the area around Baghdad. I should get in there quick to see some real action. Lodging in 4/5 star hotels is no longer guaranteed, due to damage in the war or requisition by military forces, but roughing it is surely all part of the fun. Afghanistan may have been knocked off the headlines by more recent military offensives, but it remains a dangerous attraction to the new breed of tourist. Bomb attacks and kidnapping of foreigners have increased in Kabul since mid-2004 and visitors are advised to “keep off the grass” to avoid land mines. But despite this, the current outbreak of cholera, and the unknown effects of the depleted uranium weapons used by the US army, visitors remain keen to witness it all first hand.

Travel Afghanistan claim that there’s no place like it in the world. On reflection, perhaps a week in Bognor doesn’t sound so unappealing. After all, there’s also no place like home.