It's not the same when it's hot.

juxtaposition

It would seem that I left the UK just in time to escape the snow. Not actually entirely sure whether I'm pleased about that or not. I don't fancy the struggle to slide into work without falling over, scraping the car and waiting for the damn thing to warm up along with you in it, or the cold, cold, cold. However it's been a while since I've been in snow and I love that child-like excitement of waking up to a white bright blanket of  stuff reflecting the light of the sky.

The weather in South Africa has been a bit nuts. We've had some truely magnificent lightening shows with huge claps of thunder that rattle your teeth, along with driving rain that just slaps you all over depending on which way the wind is blowing, but especially when on the top of a hill. I made the mistake of going to the loo in this weather (a ten metre walk from my hut) and I was soaked before I even got there. Not gonna bother trying that again. I shall hold.

There is always talk here of different cultures as the tour guides provide village tours where you see more of the local area and learn more about the culture and traditions of the people living here. I think this is my cultural moment as a Brit. A whole damn post chatting about the weather. But that's fine. I have no intention of losing my culture despite living here. I'll take the best of both, the best of British and enjoy my weather ramblings.

getting with it

I live in a small community in South Africa. Community or “ubuntu” is an important concept in the culture here. Everyone pretty much knows everyone. I know some. Everyone knows me.

I have to consciously remember not to be a miserable Londoner... avoiding eye contact, definitely not greeting strangers, walking fast... all this I must now forget so as not to cause offence.

I quite like it. But not when I’m running late which is frequently, because then it is very hard for me to have the time to enquire after someone, their mother and their grandfather’s dog. But I do anyway – a short short version.

I’m still playing chase the visa. I wish I could say it’s been fun. But it hasn’t. And it’s not. But I will have a huge party if the illusive visa comes to me. Everyone’s invited!

polarisation

I’ve some to the conclusion that I live in extremes. Two different worlds, poles apart, one extreme or the other. 

I am now back in South Africa. Although the visa application is still pending. I drowned in paperwork for a while and then started swimming and now I’m trying not to drown in my own impatience.

I’m in my hut. On the internet. Very cool. Not so cool has been the last 48 hours without electricity. Therefore no internet, no hot water, no cooking. I suppose I could’ve made a fire to cook on. But it was raining. A fail before I even started. The clever people round here cook with gas. So I think I need to make a plan. And soon.

the views, the views, the views

So I’m back. And it’s glorious. To see my man. To see my friends. To see the views. To see the sea. 

Not so glorious is not seeing my family and friends back in the UK.

warm fuzzy feelings

So I've left my UK place of work this week. I have fairly unusual warm fuzzy feelings.

I teach stuff. Some of the girls I've been working with over the last few months got together to bring in cookies, a card and a pressie for me. Since they can be rather difficult teenagers I was hugely touched.

My surrogate little sister and colleague also got emotional and I struggled leaving one of my closest friends.

It's never nice to leave. It's always nice to be missed.

travel admin

So much last minute admin to do. And just less than a week left.

There is the travel insurance. Putting a a monetary sum to the unthinkable.

Travel vaccinations against Polio, Typohoid, Diphtheria, Tetanus, Hepatitis A, B and C and checking my immunisation against whatever may be lurking in the area. Luckily I'm quite up to date with all these arm attacks via needles. But I had to get a booster shot. It's been over 12 hours and my arm STILL hurts to the point where I try not to move it.

Such pain for such a luxurious concept of "going to live overseas".

Welcome to some of my many realities.

explain this

How exactly am I gonna fit everything in? Some friends of mine were having panic packing moments due to the fact that they are going overseas to get married - three and a half weeks in total. I realise it's a momentous occasion, lifetime commitment and all that, but really. Three and a half weeks? Not crossing over different seasons? Not hot and wet, then hot and dry, then kind of hot, then warm, then cold, then cold and wet back to warm, hot, hot and wet?

THIS is what I have to pack for in area with very little tar on the roads, an awful lot of mud or dirt depending on whether it's wet or dry, a good helping of sand and ocean and some good old fashioned gravelly, lumpy, rocky stuff underfoot.

So it boils down to shoes. And waterproof clothing that somehow keeps you cool and keeps you warm at the appropriate time of year. Oh and hoods. I am embracing my inner hoodie. May I also point out that I have just one 65 litre rucksack. I look like a turtle. On a good day. Most days I try not to fall over while looking like a lunatic taking part in a rucksack lifting Olympics.

Happily I like shoes. But there is no way in hell, heaven, earth or the universe that I can get pretty flip flops, gladiator sandals, waterproof flip flops, comfy trainers, hiking trainers, ugg boots and waterproof boots into my rucksack.

Unless of course I give up all clothes and toiletries which could be quite deeply disastrous. I suppose I could go barefoot though. But I really do like shoes. A little too much.

a flying pain in the ...

Air Passenger Duty. APD. Also known as TAX. It hurts. Apparently it's going up by as much as 55% as of Monday 1 November. Boo Hiss. My flights to South Africa are already made up of 50% of "taxes, fees and surcharges". So I can only assume that long haul flights will become unaffordable. And I will be stuffed.

I can understand one perspective of reducing your carbon footprint and keeping climate change in check. In fact I positively agree with it as I think we are trashing out planet. Without which we are nothing. Can't we just offset our carbon footprint instead?

Better that than paying random taxes to the government with no knowledge of where this money goes. If it cannot be accounted for regarding climate change research, expenditure etc., then if this is the reason for raising taxes then it is not good enough.

I want to know more. I want to know why.

I do not want my hard earned money going into a random pot to pay for MPs and Lords expenses or anything else unrelated to travel, the climate or the environment.

I am deeply peeved.

my roots

I'm off to South Africa in less than three weeks. I'm gonna miss my roots. As much as I rant and moan about England, really, it isn't all bad. The obvious benefits are much loved family and friends. But there is the shared cultural history, the particular set of codes Londoners define the way they move around the city, the shared sense of humour and common understanding of sarcasm.

This drives me slightly batty after prolonged periods abroad when I just need to speak to an English person to have a conversation with a shared language, shared cultural history and a deep understanding of sarcasm - the lowest form of wit apparently, but it works for me and I miss it when people just don't get it.

I'll miss four seasons (not Vivaldi - already on my iPod) but our very own, very temperate climate moving gently from summer to autumn, to winter, to spring and back to our usually slightly disappointing summer. Although I have to say that this summer was pretty good by our standards. 

Now the leaves are starting to turn, the air is crisper and I can feel winter coming in the air. In three weeks time my body will be rudely assaulted by sunshine and humidity confusing my poor English-ness. Not that I'm complaining all that much. I'm going into summer when here it's gonna get to the point where it's so cold and miserable, people will use the weather as an excuse not to go out. Like I do. I seriously dislike being cold. But I'll miss the spring blossoms. One road in my area erupts into pink and white blossoms - new life on old trees showing off and rightly proud. Sometimes I'll take a drive down it because it is just so pretty. Even when it's out of my way. 

So yeh. When I'm overseas I miss my family. I miss my friends. I miss my country. I miss my people. I miss weird things like cheese platters. Even though I rarely eat cheese on platters, but I do eat a lot of cheese. I miss loads. But I'm still going.

staying real

I don't work in an office. For now. But I am surrounded by office politics. Is this par for the course for any job? Are some jobs or working locations worse than others?

I am surrounded by a majority of females at least half of whom are well under half my age (and I am not really that old).

It is now more about policing their work, or lack of it, than actually fulfilling the job that I am paid for. Making work "enemies". Do I care? Not really. But frankly my dear, I have better things to think about. And to spend my energies on. And frankly, this is just sapping it out of me in the worst possible way. Shit.

I have happily given a lot of myself to this job. If you do something, you may as well do it properly. So I try. But I didn't imagine that it would overtake everything. My thoughts, dreams, visions, plans are taken up by this temporary job that has been part of my life for a long time. But. I am EMMIGRATING for f***'s sake. My thoughts and actions should rightly be elsewhere. But I am running at 50%. And damn that sucks.

I am seriously, officially over it. I cannot function anymore this way with conflicting life priorities.There are a small handful of people there that I would consider friends, or at least suffering from an intellectual ability. The rest of them need to grow up. Get a brain (cell). Get with it.

A narrow mindedness in the people I have to deal with suffocates this job. I really wish that people would get real. Get some perspective. Not a bubble.

the visa the visa the visa

It is taking over my life. As it should. But it is a touch overwhelming. Just when I think I've got things sorted, more stuff just flings itself at me demanding my attention. I now have folders within folders. Filed, labelled, organised, filed again. Moving to the Rainbow Nation involves an inordinate amount of paperwork. I suppose much like moving to any other country in the world. It is all the same in that respect. But damn am I overwhelmed by the enormity of it all.

for the first time..

.. in eight years I have been on holiday.

I travel loads as a bonafide "traveller" complete with backpack, occasional Lonely Planet and a deep interest in culture and a dedication to getting off the beaten tourist track (which I only really ever managed in Western Australia, Fiji and Vietnam).

But a week long holiday? Me? Nope. Not since 2002. Not since "wayzback".

The landscapes were stunning - white and terracotta washed buildings, out into the sand dunes, towards the lagoon ocean with variations of blue running through it making it all rather picture perfect. Apart from the buildings that are half built, slightly wonky looking and have been that way for the last two or so years. The global economy ground to halt and along with it so did the tourist buildings designed to accommodate ever more tourists who no longer have the disposable cash to be tourists. So a landscape beautiful, yet sometimes blighted.

The culture was overrun by ex-pats with a certain accent that sends me running to the hills screaming loudly and rocking gently, but to be fair, there was always a smile and a greeting which is more than can be said for what you get in London.

The locals on the most part were delightful but I never got to practise the local language since they all cut you short and speak in a hackneyed, cockneyed, accented English. It was far better than my hideously basic attempts but ultimately meant that I learnt bugger all of their language, despite being determined to be different to all the others who had been in the country for years and can barely speak a word. So I tried. But ultimately I failed. Every time I tried to think of the word I was looking for I would invariably get the Xhosa version of what I wanted in my head. So painfully, out spurted the English version translated in my head from English to Spanish, to Xhosa and back to English again. I had a headache. An African language on a European island generally doesn't translate easily. Funny that.

Yet despite all that I had the most delightful time. I needed it. Wanted it. Had it. Loved it. Hurrah.

what is the glass?

So it's the age old question of optimism versus pessimism. 

Is the glass optimistically half full or pessimistically half empty? 

Or am I allowed to be utterly ambivelent on every level by saying the contents of the glass are just halfway? 

I wish it was half full.

and now for something completely different

Panic packing! I am going on holiday. Just for a week to a Spanish island to quaff copious amounts of wine, chew the cud and enjoy some yellow stuff in the sky. And I have borrowed a wheely suitcase. For a person generally moving around with one gigantic rucksack attached to my back, a wheely suitcase is so frightfully decadent and rather hypocritical of me - but I think I'm gonna enjoy it for this week away.

I haven't been "on holiday" for about eight years. I realise some people may have the urge to throw their hands up in the air at this point shouting at the computer screen as I am not often in the UK and forever wandering off somewhere like a naughty child. But I always work. I travel, I work, I travel, I work and actually I'm now trying to make the travelling work by settling in my glorious little spot in South Africa. But I always work. I haven't had a real holiday for well over a year now. I cannot tell you how much I am looking forward to it.

one of many reasons...

So I found an article today about the quality of life in the UK and it ain't great. 

I have many reasons for moving half way around the world. It really is almost half way - a direct flight takes just over 11 hours whereas if you try and make it to the Pacific islands such as Fiji or Australia and New Zealand it will take you at least two long-haul flights pretty much totally 24 hours worth of travel. 

Sometimes they say that it's not the destination but the journey that should be the focus of travel. Up to a point I agree, but if you want to get somewhere specific because that is where your life journey begins, then travel in this 21st century of soul-less airports and cramped economy flights is really not quite the "journey" we had in mind.

Anyway, the daily treadmill that can be life here is something that I've moved away from over seven years of bumbling gently round the world. And I just don't get it anymore. I cannot fathom this life on a permanent basis. Even though a lot of the time I enjoy it, it's just not enough. It's startling realisation you tend to get in your thirties that comes under the heading of "is this it?". Maybe it is. And maybe I should have studied philosophy so I can at least attempt an academically challenged response to the meaning of life. But I didn't. And I haven't. I enjoy my amateur philosophy of number 42. And my meaning of life is living with no regrets so that pretty much covers it all - taking actions you want to take for the best possible outcome, treating people with the respect and love they deserve (or don't!) but ultimately living life striving for contentment and happiness without any major **** ups along the way.

there is a light

It's not pretty and it's not sexy. For those living with HIV in South Africa, life can be hard. Improvements have been made since my first visit to the country in 2003 when there were no ARVs available in some rural areas - these drugs are essential for maintaining health and wellbeing and slowing the progression from HIV to AIDS.

Last weekend's papers reported a fantastic 25% DROP of new HIV infection rates in 22 countries in sub-Saharan Africa - the combining factors of strengthening healthcare capacity, education campaigns, condom distribution, community workshops and a seismic shift towards safer sexual behaviour. 

The Millennium Development Goal (MDG) 6 is to halt and reverse the spread of HIV/AIDS by 2015, but on this basis it would be easy to surmise on a very basic level that it will take until 2040 to achieve this in sub-Saharan Africa alone, nevermind the rest of the continent and the alarming rise in infection rates being seen across Eastern Europe and Central Asia. All this however is threatened by a considerable drop in funding for HIV/AIDS projects in Africa - a huge humanitarian health disaster that benefits no one since it stands to reason that a healthy and robust population costs far less than one in the clutches of a hideous infection.

I stay optimistic that these essential programmes that run especially in my spiritual home of South Africa, continue to be funded enabling them to carry on their hugely vital and entirely necessary work. There is no choice. They have to.

the beginning...

I am in a minority. And proud. Not only am I blonde (ish) but I am trying to migrate from the UK to South Africa - I think it's usually the other way round if parts of London are anything to go by.


I have many hoops to jump through in order to complete my visa to a different life. On top of a more or less full time job, part-time long distance volunteering and random housework I seem to have another full time job involving hoops... Medicals, x-rays, bank statements, signatures, evidence, copies, scans, copies, scans, more copies, more scans, it goes on and on and on. All to be in the place I love with the person I love. So much admin for such a fluffy concept.


And yet life still continues despite the swirling thoughts, the doubts, the rationalisations (is that a word??), the justifications, the dream. Political sensitivity at work, despite it not in any way involving "politics", brain power and buckets of research needed for the volunteering and deep, deep organisational skills to apply for the visa.

Today I am tired and also slightly despondent. But this is nothing to do with the visa and more to do with my UK job whereI have gone above and beyond many times over only to be told "I don't like your attitude". Eh? WTF?? So game over where that's concerned. I shall work to rule. As the others do. Who are supposed to be in charge. What pants.


Another bright shiny day tomorrow to enliven in anyway I choose. And I choose to start on my visa application form; the easy bits at least. A step in the right direction. A vote for optimism over eejits. Hurrah.