Home again! It's great being away, but it's always nice to sleep in your own bed too. I arrived back on saturday afternoon and spent saturday night catching up with Raj (whom I also shared a flat with while I was contracting in Leeds, as well as Rupes) and playing poker until the early hours. Then yesterday I got the train back here, watched the manure v arse game (possibly the only time I'll cheer manure on), went for a couple of pints with U and K and then hit the sack early.

I've got so much to do today it's not funny. I may just do one of the things and then go to sleep again. It's a strategy that's worked before.... :)

I found some more photos on my phone from the Friday of the seven's where we all (well, 10 of us) dressed up in 'Where is Ben Phillips?' t-shirts (an in-joke among the Jockey Club crowd). Here's Rossi pointing out the real Ben Phillips....

My last thing before I start doing washing is to complete the RSCI after the Hong Kong round of curries. Though special mention does go to the Sag cooked by Raj's mum on saturday - good and hot! Anyway, the principal of the Red Squirrel Civilisation Index is that to live anywhere in the world you need a good curry now and then. Any place that cannot rustle up a good curry is not worth living in. After exhaustive research I have discovered that possibly the simplest dish that you can get in most curry houses in the world is the Lamb Sag, plus a plain Naan.

So it works like this, the base line for a civilised city is a Lamb Sag from my local curry house cooked the way I like it, and washed down with a couple of pints of Kingfisher. This would score 100 points on the RSCI. Points are deducted for heinous crimes such as fatty lamb, not enough chilli, no Kingfisher etc. etc. The additional rule is that it has to be a curry house recommended by a local as the best curry house in the neighbourhood, rather than some dive I wandered into off the street.

So the results of my little tour are as follows (in order of my trip):

a) Tokyo - recommended by Lonely Planet guide and hotel receptionist. Consistency and appearance were excellent, however points were lost for small portion and not being hot enough. Initially things were looking good as they had bottles of Kingfisher but this was brewed locally under licence and was just Asahi as far as I could tell. More minus points. The clincher was the honey-glazed Naan bread. Just horrible.

RSCI rating : 82.5 points

b) Sydney - recommended by Becky, the cousin of foreign girl 1. This was a more traditional Indian than an english-style one and Lamb Sag was not on the menu that day so points were lost. The replacement vegetable biryani I had was superb though (with lime pickle) and the portion was huge. Points were lost for it being a BYO restaurant and Kingfisher was not available in the local bottle shop. Bonus points were awarded for having the end of the England v India test match on live which England won.

RSCI rating : 94 points

c) Christchurch - recommended by motel owner. Nan bread was excellent, but Sag was just not hot enough for me (despite a specific request for it to be a bit hotter). No Kingfisher either. A point was lost for not being able to order a curry without rice. A strong showing, but rather bland for my tastes (not unlike Christchurch itself).

RSCI rating : 91 points

d) Hong Kong - recommended by Rupes. Excellent Bhajis to start with as the mint dip had quite a lot of chilli in it too. Sag itself was more spinach than lamb and was a bit creamy for me. Didn't stop me eating it all though! :)

RSCI rating : 92 points

So I was quite happy with the standard of curries all over the place, but the final table looks like this....

Red Squirrel Civilisation Index
Sydney	94
Hong Kong	92
Christchurch	91
Tokyo	82.5

A big thank you to everyone I met out there or stayed with - you know who you are!