Dark truth of ‘enviable’ occupation that has seen Aussie travel to 60 countries

It may sound like a career to envy, but this writer — who has been to more than 60 countries — has a few grim tales to share.

Travel writing may seem like a luxurious, enviable occupation, but regularly visiting far-flung locations can result in unsettling experiences that range from weird to terrifying. During my 13-year career in this field, I’ve been to 60-plus countries and repeatedly witnessed the dark side of travel writing. Here’s four of my wildest stories.

Guangzhou taxi terror

Somehow, I’ve just become involved in human trafficking. That is my panicked thought as I sit trembling in the back of a taxi in Guangzhou, while a woman screams in terror, kicks the dashboard, and assaults our driver. Rarely have I ever felt so terrified and confused.

It is the middle of the night, I’ve only just arrived in China, and we’re parked on the side of a freeway as puzzling chaos ensues in the front seat. My fear isn’t due to the wild behaviour of that local woman. Her violent outburst is entirely reasonable because she clearly believes she’s being kidnapped, and that I’m party to this crime.

How did it come to this? Let me explain. After landing at Guangzhou airport 90 minutes’ previous, my friend and I could find no legitimate taxis. Eventually, we had to accept an offer from a Chinese man in plain clothes who had been following us, saying: “Taxi, taxi, taxi?”.

Ronan O’Connell thought he’d been kidnapped in China.

He requested we pay upfront, before we sat in the back of his unmarked car, and sped towards the city. Just minutes later, we unexpectedly pulled into the freeway emergency lane. We asked what was happening, but received no response.

Soon after, another vehicle screeched up behind us. Followed by the disturbing sounds of a man yelling, a woman screaming in terror, and the boot of our car slamming. Then we saw that lady being dragged along the side of our car, before she was aggressively shoved into its front seat. After repeatedly hitting the driver, she looked in the rear view mirror, saw us two Caucasian strangers, and exploded into an even deeper panic.

Thankfully, things soon quietened down. What appeared like a kidnapping turned out to be a simple taxi scam. After the woman was dropped off at her Guangzhou hotel, it became apparent that we and the scared woman had all been charged full taxi fares upfront back at the airport. So by stopping on the freeway, to squeeze us all into one car, the driver and his accomplice had practically doubled their income. Never have I been so relieved to be ripped off.

Japan porn sleepover

I’m laying on the floor, trying to go to sleep, in a room filled with men pleasuring themselves. This was not my plan. That morning, I’d been leaving my Osaka hotel to go sightseeing when a staff member told me I needed to check out immediately.

I mistakenly thought I had one more night booked. The staff showed me I did not, apologised that they had no rooms available for tonight, and warned me most Osaka hotels were booked out due to a major event in the city.

When I searched hotel websites and found no rooms in my budget, the staff said the only other option was to spend the night in a nearby 24-hour internet cafe. So I went to this business, alongside Tennoji train station, and booked one of its private booths for a 12-hour block, starting from 7:00pm.

How my trip in Japan went from bad to worse.

When I returned to the cafe that evening, things quickly got weird. Firstly, I saw hundreds of porn magazines stacked near my booth. Secondly, every booth was advertised as “fully private”, because they had a curtain, and their walls were about 175cm high, which supposedly meant no one could peer down into them.

Except, that is, for this 197cm tall Australian. As I walked towards my booth, I made unexpected eye contact with a startled, sweaty Japanese man, who was clearly in the midst of a passionate activity inside his cubicle. He yelled in shock, and I rushed inside my booth, wondering what lay ahead of me. For the rest of the night, I curled up beneath my cubicle’s desk and tried to sleep. The discomfort of lying on the floor paled in comparison to being immersed in a chorus of perturbing male sounds.

Life and death encounter in Melbourne

My head is bruised, although not as badly as my ego. I’ve just let loose a loud, effeminate squeal and then rushed backwards in a panic, banging my noggin into the wall of a Melbourne home. Yet in that moment, all I cared about was staying alive.

Because, seconds earlier, I’d endured one of the most terrifying moments of my life. I was spending the day following a Melbourne snake catcher for a first-person story for a Middle East newspaper about this dangerous profession.

During a trip to Melbourne, all I cared about was staying alive.

A distressed real estate agent had called the catcher after finding a venomous red-bellied black snake in a bedroom of the home he was showing that day. After the catcher scooped up the snake, using a hook on the end of a long stick, I requested to take a photo.

As he held it in the air, the snake fell off the hook and rushed under the bed, straight towards my feet. I surged backwards, slammed into the wall, shrieked in terror and ran out onto the street. As you can guess, I’m no Steve Irwin.

Stuck in a Belgian hell hole

Urine, drugs and dirty mattresses: Three things I’ll never forget about a bizarre and revolting night spent in a Belgian hell hole. I was on a whirlwind work trip across Europe when I landed in Brussels, checked my phone, and realised I hadn’t booked any accommodation.

The only hotel rooms available were too expensive, so I secured a single room in a cheap hostel, alongside Grand Place. I waited outside this locked hostel for an hour before its young manager finally arrived, off his head on some kind of intoxicant.

He rudely told me my single room was taken, and led me to my new accommodation – a dormitory that looked like a drug den. Stained carpets, chipped walls, and dirty mattresses strewn on the floor. He told me I was “lucky” to have a proper bed. So I kicked off my shoes underneath that bed, which seconds later collapsed under my 110kg weight.

Ronan O'Connell has shared some of his most chilling stories as a travel writer.

The manager chastised me, shifted me to a bed reinforced by a cinder block, and left me with a motley crew of male guests filling the room with cigarette and marijuana smoke. Then, I had a disturbing realisation. The bathroom shared by me and nine other men didn’t even have a door. Its entrance was covered only by a curtain, so that every horrible, toilet-related sound and smell invaded our room.

I avoided that bathroom. Until, in the middle of the night, I simply had to use it. I reached for my shoes, only to realise they were still under my original bed, which now was occupied by a snoring stranger. So I had to make a harrowing choice: walk into this grotty bathroom in socks, or bare feet.

I chose the former, entered the bathroom for the first time, and immediately, my socks became saturated. The entire bathroom floor was covered in an inch of fluids. Then I turned on the light and saw the reason why: the toilet’s base was leaking. So I was standing in a giant puddle of sewerage