Christmas...

I had a small argument with JW last night,
he was upset, because for the umpteenth time in a row, we are spending xmas with my family.
At this time of year especially, he finds it difficult living so far away and misses his parents back home in Cape town.
I sometimes take it forgranted that I have my parents just across London (and soon will be in the same house!).
JW's mum has 9 sisters and they all have children and grandchildren, so Christmas can be a massive affair for him,

For me, Christmas this year will just be us and my parents.
My sister and her boyfriend are living in Uruguay at the moment, and after my Grandmother died a few years ago, the extended family has dispersed off.
Though we still traditionally do boxing day lunch at my aunts with my cousins.

The argument cooled off and I promised that the year after next we will go...(next year we will be travelling!)
I'm looking forward to it already, Cape Town is in summer at Christmas and at time of writing is...22c and sunny (bit of a contrast to London's 0c and icy today)

Inspired...

At the weekend I watched some of Michael Palin's 'himalaya'

He reminds me so much of my Dad, actually he was travelling through Sudan at the same time my Dad lived there, shame they didn't bump into each other!


Anyway, I was watching the one where he is travelling through Tibet, and it made me really inspired and excited about going...

Dream, dreamer

Im daydreaming a lot about travelling.
I wish I could just go tomorrow.

This is really the hard bit, the waiting and planning stage. I'm not looking forward to the next few months.

At my Christmas party last Friday (particularly messy by the way) it was announced that our offices are moving across London, this coupled with the fact that I am moving to nowheresville (with my parents) really left me pissed off.

I'm just going to have to brave the 1.5 hour bus/tube journey everyday, and get used to getting up earlier.

(bye, bye 10 minute tube journey I love you and will miss you)

Also, my mother called me in a super stress about us moving in with her, saying that we wont have enough time to do everything. And even suggesting that we should stay where we are and offering to help pay our rent! As amazing as this offer is, it pissed me off even more, because I feel like all the set-in-stone, already-made decisions are crumbling and I'm not sure where we are with our plans.

Besides, our landlord hates us, cos the last ever rent is going to be a few weeks late, as we are so broke, and he is probably not going to be happy if we turn around 3 weeks before we are meant to leave and ask if we can actually stay because we changed our minds!

Also, I think we can save much more money by moving in with my parents than staying where we are, even if they were helping with rent.

And on a non-selfish train of thought, my parents really don't have much money to spend on me (my Dads retired, and my mum is almost there)

New Years Eve

I really wanted to go away for New Years,
London can be a wicked place to be when the clock strikes 12, but I wanted to do something a bit different.

The original plan was to go to Stockholm, and a Swedish girl I work with offered to fill me in on all the nye parties.

But, as always, I had to change my plans because of... money...
You see, in October, we went for a romantic spa weekend in Budapest, which was lovely but left us totally broke for the next month,
so I really don't want to do that again, especially with moving, and Jan already being a month without money (for us all I'm sure?)

Anyway, so now I'm not sure what to do, I cant find any cheap deals
and Hogmanay is all booked up.

I know its a bit early...

But as I get rid of stuff in my flat (sold the dining table- yay!), I start to think about stuff that I need to buy for travelling.

Here a few things that I want to take with...

1. Swiss army knife- Reminds me so much of my Dad whist in some middle of nowhere, and Dad always had his swiss army knife to cut up an apple or tweezer out a splinter. I really want one, you never know when you'll need a corkscrew in the middle of the jungle right?

2. Cushtie- Every time I'm at a service station or airport, I mull over buying one of these, I figure now that I have a good excuse I can justify spending a tenner on a bag of beans (I secretly want the elephant one!)

3. Good boots (not too stylish, but useful)

4. A large sarong

5. Backpack not sure what size yet, depends how much junk (like the stuff listed here) I take!