The epic 63 hour journey is over and even Heathrow's T1 looks like a little bit of heaven!
No such thing as reverse culture shock for me! Obscene amounts of shopping, eating and bubble baths but it is fantastic to be back and seeing everyone again. Everything looks so smart (except Stirlingshire roads, which are actually about as potholed as those in Malawi). Trains are brilliant! Marks and Spencers is the muts nuts and I must have lost weight - dropping a dress size is a sign that I should be buying more dresses!
5 days, 7 fish dinners. 5 diff types of cheese, wine, haggis. yum yum yum yum yum (will go up a dress size before returning home!)
I do miss the warmth. My skin is already getting crap again. And we do miss the simplicity of our little hut, a bit. thinking of everyone back in Malawi but very very happy to have a sneaky wee month at home before getting a final blast of adventure.
Especially after popping back into the office. Lovely people, interesting work (and I'm glad to have a job to think about given the way things seem to have been in the past year). But wow, I'm going to enjoy the next 6 months before resuming my position behind a desk!
Yay
F x
Ps - the celebs in Heat have all changed....who (or what) on earth is Jedward?!
Wednesday 9 December 2009
Tuesday 1 December 2009
It's World Aids Day today & I'm going home
The journey has begun. Ahead three days of driving, snacking, flying, napping, and, most of all, waiting. I am not looking forward to it.
It will be brilliant to see everyone again. I can't help smiling when I think about fresh air, hot baths, crisp sheets and total silence; but there is a bit of me that is something close to sad to be leaving Malawi (albeit only for a while).
Today, for the first time, I feel almost guilty about how I live. Driving up here this morning the fields were full of people bent double, planting seeds, hoeing weeds and carrying fertiliser (where, I hope, all the money for fuel has gone). Whilst numbers are beginning to fall, 1 in 5 of them has HIV/AIDS. A lot of people are wearing red ribbons & most people will have lost someone they love to it.
The queues at the petrol stations are immense and unmoving. The country is grinding to a halt and I'm 'out of here'. Off, with more fuel than I could possibly need, to enjoy the very best of things with a large, loving, family.
Overall I'm grateful and I am ready to go. It's just going to be a bit of a mind bend being here with all its foreignness and edge and then home, with all its comfort and familiarity. A calls it 'reverse culture shock'. Let's see.
F x
Ps – For the record, I am: 1) somewhat VINDICATED over last week's panic petrol stockpiling, 2) a bit EMBARASSED about how many people I've roped into the 'getting Fiona to LLW airport' mission & 3) FUMING at A for booking me on completely rubbish flights whilst he skips merrily through Jo-berg and Amsterdam in smooth comfort.
It will be brilliant to see everyone again. I can't help smiling when I think about fresh air, hot baths, crisp sheets and total silence; but there is a bit of me that is something close to sad to be leaving Malawi (albeit only for a while).
Today, for the first time, I feel almost guilty about how I live. Driving up here this morning the fields were full of people bent double, planting seeds, hoeing weeds and carrying fertiliser (where, I hope, all the money for fuel has gone). Whilst numbers are beginning to fall, 1 in 5 of them has HIV/AIDS. A lot of people are wearing red ribbons & most people will have lost someone they love to it.
The queues at the petrol stations are immense and unmoving. The country is grinding to a halt and I'm 'out of here'. Off, with more fuel than I could possibly need, to enjoy the very best of things with a large, loving, family.
Overall I'm grateful and I am ready to go. It's just going to be a bit of a mind bend being here with all its foreignness and edge and then home, with all its comfort and familiarity. A calls it 'reverse culture shock'. Let's see.
F x
Ps – For the record, I am: 1) somewhat VINDICATED over last week's panic petrol stockpiling, 2) a bit EMBARASSED about how many people I've roped into the 'getting Fiona to LLW airport' mission & 3) FUMING at A for booking me on completely rubbish flights whilst he skips merrily through Jo-berg and Amsterdam in smooth comfort.
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