Where do I start?? I thought I had experienced suffering before in my life but nothing comes close to living in Disney village!

Perhaps I should back up a few days. London. My second London gig was a far cry from the first. Armed with my guitar and a few CDs, I hopped onto the tube, made a change at a crammed station at peak hour and found myself on the wrong tube. Having figured this out, gotten off and changed to the correct train without too much time lost, I declared myself a tube expert.

I was pleasantly surprised to walk into the venue- The Metropolitan and find an intimate upstairs area full of tables and large, deep couches with a tiny stage nestled into one end of the room. The gig was being organised by the lovely and talented Rodney Fisher (Goodshirt).

Rodney’s honest lyrics and soothing delivery captivated the small but appreciative crowd. So much so that by the time it was my turn, I felt quite intimidated and took the stage quite reluctantly. But with the help of a decent pour of Scotch by the kind barman, I played an intimate, gentle gig - the type where you sit down facing a front row that you could touch if you reached out beyond the mic.

The next day I repacked my oversized suitcase and Haydn, Stas and I headed for the Eurostar train station. After a few difficulties proving my identity without my stolen credit card, we piled onto a big train that was to take us under the Channel to the city of Paris.

After arriving happily into Paris Nord, what followed was a long and confusing ramble through Parisian tube stations. We happened to be travelling at peak hour once again and the chaos was increased by language barriers. The final train to Euro Disney was a double-decker train and we stood in the tiny entrance with our piles of luggage, receiving French glares and curses for 40 minutes. The entrance to Euro Disney Village loomed before us, cruelly placed between us and our hotel. On aching feet, we hobbled onward and suddenly found ourselves in a strange world of giant mushrooms, families of painted skeletons and bounding cartoon characters. It was Halloween of course. Not only were we confronted by the sickening neon reality of Disney Land, but hundreds of ghosts, gouls, witches and zombies of all sizes and shapes also filled the cartoon streets. Most units of scary creatures came in the form of two small running ghosts, warily followed by two taller monsters – a Frankenstein’s monster with a zombie bride pushing a pram containing a tiny ghost baby. Scattered throughout the Halloween revellers were bemused Buddhist nuns and monks on route to the same Dharma festival as us, walking slowly amongst madness in robes, blending into public more than they were used to.

The madness didn’t stop when we arrived at the hotel we were to be sleeping at during our week-long Buddhist festival. When we finally got to the oasis of our room, we had to sit down and seriously contemplate whether or not we had in fact just seen Mickey Mouse dancing with a pumpkin-headed man, to the tune of ‘We Will Rock You’ in our hotel foyer!