Sunday 23-11 - The End.

This post marks the end of my travels. The time has come to restart everything put on hold. My life continues.

I spent more than six months planning for this year. Its hard to believe that its all over. Now the potential of the future is the memory of the past. For the most part, good memories. This year has had good times and bad times. Times of anger at myself and the world. Times of joy and gladness and comfort. Feeling close and feeling alone. Ups and downs.

I have traveled by

-Plane
-Train
-Bus
-Tram
-Funicular
-Subway/metro
-Taxi
-Sherut
-Car
-Minivan
-Boat
-Ferry
-Felucha
-Donkey
-Camel
-Horse and cart
-Segway
-Piggyback ride
-Foot

I´ve been pelted with tomatoes.


I´ve slept outside a Spanish train station.


I climbed and volcano and swam in a volcanic spring.


I did things I could have otherwise only dreamed of doing.



When I left, I had an idea in my head of the person I was going to be when all this was done. I didn´t know how I was going to become that person, I didn´t even know what that person was supposed to be like. I guess I had on of these movie ideas, getting of the plane transformed.

Now I have stepped off the plane. I don´t think I am that perfect person I imagined. But now I know what type of person I want to become. I know what it is I need to achieve. I think that might be better. I have something to strive for now, a path to follow.

Thanks everyone for reading this blog and following my journey. It has meant a lot that you could all share it with me. It made me feel a little less homesick, when I was feeling blue.

So here I go. Back into the world. Into my life. Into the next great adventure.

Wish me luck.

Friday 21-11 and Saturday 22-11 - Flight home

The day started with sad farewells from the flatmates. Then Dani and I left hers. I made sure I had every with me.

Getting to Karens flat I realised I had left both my laptop cable and my phone. But we were hungry and hadn´t eaten yet. So we went to the over priced and touristy but interesting My Old Dutch pancake house. They specialise in bizarre combinations on thin enormous crepes.

I had a small starter of cheese baked in bread crumbs. Then chicken curry and chutney pancake. Very strange. Dani and I were both quiet. It hadn´t quite hit me before, but I was so close to leaving London for what could be a very long time. There were so many things I had gotten used to. So many things I had gotten comfortable with. I was going to miss this crazy city.





I tubed back to Danis to get my forgotten bits and then returned. I finished packing and got ready to leave. In the end I had taken my winter boots out of my bag and posted 2 kilos of books by sea mail. Hopefully these things would keep me under the weight limit. Then Dani and I sat watching bad American TV until the time came. I tried not to make a big deal out of it, after all we would see each other three weeks later. But it was emotional.

I was 3 kilos over weight, but the lady let me through without mentioning it for some reason. I did put on the young, lost and hopeless girl routine. Maybe that helped. You just have to tie your hoodie around your waste and look terrified. I looked for free wifi, but couldn´t find any. So I found a quiet spot to draw the time away.



We were 45 minutes to an hour late in taking off. I didn´t really mind. I watched The Incredible Hulk and The Incredibles, then the Big Bang Theory. There was Chinese chicken with rice for dinner which wasn´t too bad. The sleep was ok. There was a full plane. But the guy next to me disappeared 20 minutes into the flight, so I had 2 seats to sleep on. I enjoyed the breakfast they served. It had the yummy lemon and orange yogurt I tried at Karens. The eggs weren´t bad.

On landing there were a bunch of names called over the loud speaker that had to report to the ground staff. Mine was one of them.. I´ve never had my name called over an airport or plane speaker. It was interesting. Except that we had no idea what it was for. I thought thats just what I need, a lost bag to deal with. It turns out they just had to re-enter some passport numbers for some reason.

The idea of Australia started to excite me. I was liking more and more the idea of being beck there. Everywhere I went waiting to board, there were Australian accents. The flight over was short and easy. My mum and dad were waiting for me at the airport.

It was raining, pouring as I stepped out into the Perth air. It was a gorgeous night. I as tired, but buzzing. I was home.

Thursday 20-11 - Trek for tiles

I woke up early enough to good bye to Karen and Aiden before she left for work. It was sad. But I knew it probably be too long before I saw her again. The nanny came to look after Aiden and I said a good bye to him. The next time I saw him, he would be much much older.

I set off to Danis. We went out to our favourite local for a huge and unfinishable breakfast. The plan was to stay around the house and watch movies together. I realised I had things of Karens I needed to get back to her,I so I tubed back to the flat first. When I returned Dani and Maria had already left the house to go on a house errand. So I joined them.

The massive party on Saturday had left the roof ties in a wreck, so Myles had ordered some new tiles and asked the girls to pick them up. He said a few of us should, as they might be heavy. We took the bus to Bow church. Then walked in the bitter cold for what seemed like a strangely long time. We should have looked at a map book sooner. We had gone the wrong way and walked half way home. We were too tired to walk back so we took another bus back up the road.

Back to where we started. We finally found the address, only to see posters all around that read:

We have moved.

We decided we weren´t going to give up on this, so we walked in the direction of the new shop. 15 minutes and a few wrong turns later we found the tiles shop. We looked very out of place, three small girls in nice clothes lost among the bricks, fork trucks and large men in reflective vests. We stumbled into the office and up to the counter.

We told the nice guy there which order was ours. He looked at us and said ¨Did you bring a car?¨
He subtlely laughed at us when we said no. Apparently Myles had ordered many large, heavy tiles and not fully explained this us. Somehow the three of us would have to get these home.

The man was a champ though, he called a minicab for us and even took some money off the price because he felt sorry for us. Over the awkward next half hour we got the tiles into the car and back to the curb of Dani´s house. It took two people a time and three trips to get them all upstairs. It gave us a sense of satisfaction though.

Then came our reward. we sat on Dani´s bed. We drank hot chocolate with mint baileys, ate biscuits and watched the Tick. It was a good afternoon. In the evening I said goodbye to the room mates in the kitchen. The boys went up for a bit of late night roof tiling and we settled or a quiet and relaxing evening. This was my last night in London. In Europe.

For a while at least.

Wednesday 19-11 - Welcome

Dani and I met up. We went to the Wellcome collection. It was a collection started by the explorer Henry Wellcome. It is an exploration of medicine, health and the human body. We had wanted to check it out for ages, but had never gotten around to it. But time was running out. The exhibit was an interesting mix of art and interactive activities. There were sounds chairs that talked to you when you sat on them.



An assortment of human body themed pieces.





There were see through bodies with flashing lights and exhibits about obesity.





We decided to move into the design museum next. So we tubed to tower bridge. The sky was so amazingly bright. Maybe it was my leaving that made the twilight all the more vivid. I was really going to miss this place.







We got lost on the way to the museum. By the time we got there the place was almost closed. There was enough time to drool over everything in the gallery shop before heading back. We took the longer route, strolling down the water front.

It was the last evening I was going to spend with Karen and Aiden for a while. So we wanted to make it special. Well, special enough for Thai take out and wine. We drank and watched TV. Topped off by Dani going out to get crunchie icecream.

Tuesday 18-11 - Hummus and haircuts

I finally got around to getting a fringe trim. It was getting to point of vision obstruction. But I had a nice chat with my London hairdresser. I told her about my tattoo and then she told me about hers. We shared stories about pain and itching.

I walked down to the British Museum to pick up the last bits on my list. It was good to get things done. I was supposed to meet Dani for lunch but it was going to be a late lunch. So I walked down to Long Acre to H&M to pick up the bits I saw the day I forgot my purse. I found a spotted shirt, black skirt and blue vest.

I met Dani for a late lunch. We went to Hummus Bros, a place that specialised in hummus and pita based dishes. Mine was a ring of hummus and a tomato sauce chicken centre.



The rest of the night was a chilled evening of rosé wine.

Monday 17-11 - Too much

Monday I spent trying to organise my life and my leaving. I suddenly realised that there was not long to go before I got on that plane back to the rest of my life. I had built up a lot of memories over this year. I had also built up a lot of things. It hit me that I only had 20 kilos of check in baggage. The bits and pieces I had built up far exceeded that by the look of things.

Just the books weighed a ton. Or five kilos to be exact. Gifts weighed up to 7, the bag itself came in at 5. Already I was up to 17 kilos of 20. I would probably have to post some things back home to make the limit.

Aiden was back from his day out. I played with him for a while. I was really going to miss his little smile.

I had to go out and fetch more E45 cream, seeing I had left the tub at Dani. I needed the moisturizer for the tattoo, once a day or the first 2 weeks. It kind of helped to sooth. There was still a bit of flaking. But the itching was also starting. I kept wanted to scratch, but wasn´t allowed to. It got worse at night, so I took my mind off it with TV.

Sunday 16-11 - Aftermath

We woke up at 9am. The sleep wasn´t great, but it was better than nothing. The music was still pumping in the other room. Dani and I got up to have a look. There were still people dancing on Maria´s dance floor. A few were huddled on the couches. The stair cases were clogged with people half dazed.

In the light I could finally get a good look at the state of the place. It wasn´t pretty. The floors were covered in club scum. Everything secured had been torn apart. The bed was covered in mysterious stains. There was dirt on parts of the wall no one could even reach. Out of the bedroom followed the trails of empty cans and bottles. There were unmentionable things in the toilets and showers.

My head was hurting despite the small amount of alcohol I had drunk. I was annoyed at all people,especially those who showed so little respect for other peoples things. Michael was manning the laptop music. None of the other house mates were anywhere to be seen.

After surveying the damage Michael and I picked up some garbage bags, bottles of cleaner and paper towels. We shut down the music and started picking up the sea of trash in Maria´s. I opened up curtains in hope of persuading the hangers on to leave. They just wouldn´t go. It was 11 or so before the dancing stopped.

We were feeling awful and had to get our of the house. So Michael, Dani, myself and 2 other guys walked down the road to an old mans pub. We had a pint and lunch. I had pad Thai. It was spicier than I expected and ended up making me feel even worse, but at least it was food in my stomach. We sat there for as long as we could, putting off the inevitable clean up.

But enough was enough. We walked back and continued the clean. The stragglers were gone. Dani went up to the roof to check the damage and I followed. There were broken tiles, caved in areas and for some reason a fire extinguisher.

I started mopping floors while other tackled the surfaces and the kitchen. After a while I decided I had done enough. I went to Karen´s to finish my recovery. When I got there I found out that Aiden had also not been feeling well. Neither had the babysitter. It seems that this virus had been all over the city.

I showered and rested for the rest of the night.