My parents gave us a movie camera for Christmas one year, one of those "open-me-first" gifts so that we were all prepped to witness the children's gift fervour. But when we saw them in action, we put down the camera by mutual agreement and just watched, depositing their delight into our memory bank.

I have heard camera enthusiasts on this trip ruefully but briefly wonder if they have wasted their time taking pictures and not savouring the moments. But then they decide, and others agree, that it's better to have the photograph when they get home, a permanent reminder of the trip that was. I am so inept at taking pictures that an entire experience would be lost to me.

Before I wrote my play The Pact, about Isaak Dinesen's last great relationship with a poet half her age, still to be produced (I live in hope), I wrote a ten-part radio drama about a woman similar to Blixen, name and details changed to avoid copyright infringement, that was broadcast on Peter Gzowksi's Morningside. (Does anyone remember that?) In one scene she wakes up in a tent in Africa on safari. I needed to reproduce her ambience. I had no photographs but I had my diary. The morning sounds heard in a tent in Kenya are the grunts and calls of the baboons. I nailed it. On that same trip the guide on our jeep took us to watch a cheetah play with her cub. People took pictures; I watched. The guide said "Listen!" We listened. He said, "In all my time in Africa I never heard a cheetah purr until now." You can't take a picture of purring.

Yes, you can, people have argued when I tell that story now. With video cameras you get everything: movement, colour, sound. I concede.

I have just read some blog entries of a fellow traveller and I am so impressed. She knows what day it is. She knows exactly where we are. She takes pictures along the way, and puts them into her blog casually and easily. I keep blogging down in thoughts and layered memories. I have no business writing a blog, and I apologize to you.

Yesterday was a cruising day. I wrote a few letters and caught up with my diary, sort of. I ate, I slept, I talked to people and worked very hard at remembering names. I played Trivial Pursuit (an organized activity on board) with some women I dined with, one of whom sent me her blog (see above.) Oh, and I booked another cruise: Easter Island.

I have always wanted to see the behemoths of Easter Island, not to take pictures, just to see them.

I'll get to that smiling Buddha soon.

I take so long fiddling with the pictures, it cuts into blog time. I have a happy Buddha that I'm going to try to send, but not now. I mean, my computer thinks it's 6 o'clock yesterday and so do you, but by me it's 5 a.m. tomorrow. I mean it's April First here in the library on Insignia, and in spite of more hours of sleep than I am accustomed to enjoying I could sleep again right now. That's me, with trimmed bangs and waxed eye brows in Baristas, a coffee bar on Deck Five. I have an Americano coffee there in the morning after my swim, that is, when I'm here. Yesterday morning we were on a bus by 8 a.m., heading for the Mekong Delta(about 70 miles) to se the most beautiful, oldest (I think) temple where I took a picture of a laughing Buddha, before we went for a river cruise and lunch (more anon), and then a quiet, wondrous ride in a "gondola" (a four passenger rowboat, paddle-poled by a woman who pointed to her home to me in amidst the jungle of trees). That took us back to the river boat, back to the bus, back to the ship. It took about 6 or 7 hours. I had tea in Horizons where it is served every afternoon at 4 p.m., and enjoyed the departure of the ship out to the China Sea, heading for Hanoi. Having trouble keeping my head up, but I had some of my wine with fellow passengers while we waited for dinner (halibut). I managed to keep my head out of the fish and went to bed about 8:30 p.m. Still tired. Today is a brief sailing day; we dock late afternoon and I'm going to a Water Puppet Show tonight.

But I have to tell you about the lunch menu in the Mekong. On each table for six, in an open, thatch-roofed dining hall, a decorated, flat fish welcomed us. It was an Elephant's Ear (the nickname). The waiter or waitress dismantled it wearing latex gloves and a wielding a knife that proved to be less useful than skilful fingers to tear off the flesh and avoid the bones. Edible rice paper packages were wrapped around the fish with thin slices of seasoned cucumber and I'm not sure what else. Three dipping sauces waited at our plates for personal use, one with a salt and pepper mix that we wet with a green kumquat (I think); a sweet, hot pink sauce, and a fish sauce. An oval loaf that looked like bread was cut into pieces with sharp scissors; it was sticky rice. We also dipped something like spring rolls with a different wrapping into the sauce of our choice. We each received a big clump of noodles in our eating bowl, with soup ladled on. The soup had stuff in it, too. I don't know what the lumps were but they tasted good. What else? Oh, big giant shrimp that the waitress peeled for us and we dipped. Slices of fresh pineapple. And beer. (or a soft drink if desired --aargh).

Oh, dear, it's 25 to 6 here and I have to get ready to swim at 6.

More to come.