The Further Adventures of an Idiot Abroad by Karl Pilkington Page B

was in a town in Spain being pelted with tomatoes as she harped on about
     how much fun she was having. I liked to see if she would be as cheery if I bumped into her at her Tesco Local and chucked a tomato at her head from the veg aisle.
    The video showed a truck turning up and dumping off thousands of tomatoes, and locals and tourists throwing them at each other. I’d hate to live in this town ’cos it must make a
     right mess. I can’t be doing with unnecessary mess. It’s like confetti at weddings. I don’t understand how confetti isn’t classed as littering. The other thing is
     it’s a waste of tomatoes. If they have to do it they could at least use one of the less useful fruits, like kumquats.
    I got to the hotel and had a shower.
    I got a call from Stephen telling me that I was going to get some training in one of Thailand’s national sports, Thai boxing. After doing series one of
An Idiot Abroad
these
little surprises don’t shock me as much. I’ve come to accept these mad little diversions but I’m still always on edge. It’s like waiting for a jack-in-the-box to pop out,
you know it’s gonna happen, but you’re not sure when. I used to have the same problem when I visited Ricky in his old flat. He used to jump out of the bin cupboard as I walked down the
corridor on his floor, but I used the jack-in-the-box example, as I’m guessing more people could relate to that, as most of you won’t have mates who jump out of bin cupboards.
    What is it with Spain? If they’re not throwing tomatoes at each other they’re running down alleyways avoiding rampaging bulls! It’s like they’re
     living in a computer game. I suppose this is what happens when you live in a place that has good weather most of the year round – people come up with daft outside events. We only have a
     bit of sun each year and a group of people in Gloucestershire came up with the idea of rolling cheese down a hill.
    This is when a group of people take over a public place for a short space of time and dance, sing or have a pillow fight. My problem would be getting to the right place.
    I’m always arranging to meet Suzanne somewhere and then getting it wrong. The amount of supermarkets I’ve walked around in trying to find her, to then realise I’m in the wrong
    one. I don’t need this sort of thing in my life. I don’t really like taking part in group activities. Suzanne always reminds me of the time she took me to a party when we first met
    and she got involved in doing the conga. Everyone at the party joined in and went round the pub and into the car park before coming back into the pub. When she came back in there I was doing the
    conga but on my own by the bar.

    I did a little bit of boxing when I was younger after seeing the film
Rocky
starring Sly Stallone. Films did this to me. I tried joining a dance club after seeing
Flashdance
on VHS, but I didn’t get that far with it, as when I got to the dance studio, it was shut and was being used as a warehouse to house toilet rolls. A storyline
Fame
never went for. My boxing training was at the youth club and it wasn’t very professional. It was once a week and it was run by a big fella who owned the Chinese chippy. I think
his main reason for doing it was to get tough young kids as his mates, so he didn’t have to pay protection money to some local gangsters to look after his chippy. He was hardly like the
trainer Rocky had. Instead of thumping frozen meat, he battered fish.
    I arrived at the Thai boxing venue and met my trainer. His name was Ming. He seemed a little bit annoyed that we were late. I told him it was ’cos of Songkran. He wasn’t wet. I doubt
anyone would be chucking buckets of water at this fella. He was an ex-champion. Ming didn’t speak much English, so there was very little talk, but lots of training. An hour of press-ups, star
jumps, kneeing a punch bag and sit-ups while his pet dog jumped all over me, then into the ring to spar with him. He gave