teaonthestairs: ([bsg] six //)

I'm in Spain! Hi! From Spain! I've been here a week, down on the Mediterranean coast doing the roadtrip thing with my parents and sister. My dad took a week off work (big thing for him!) so we could do a family trip. It was enjoyable - except the part where I got sick. Seriously - why now!?! I had to spend a day in bed being grumpy and sleeping and then a couple of days being snotty and grumpy. But at least, what with traveling with the parentals, I didn't have to pay for anything and we had a car. Though driving in Spain - insane, the streets a smaller then the car, well that’s what it seems like!

The parents left to head back home to Geneva this morning, saying goodbye at a horribly early 8am. I just grunted at them and went back to sleep. Little Sis and I moved out very, very heavy bags out of the expensive hotel and into the cheap youth hostel on the other side of town, by foot! We are too cheap to do the bus thing. We got lost and I nearly died. But the dorm is nice and we went to the cathedral and played 'spot the horrible fashions, the children dressed exactly the same and the fake designer bags' for an hour - because we were too lazy to line up to go into the cathedral. 

Seriously - the parental need to dress kids in exactly the same outfit is fairly strong in Spain or maybe just Europe in general? We saw like 16 pairs (sometimes three kids!) in matching outfits! Why? Why!?

Okay, onto other adventures

Austria

Involved a Sound of Music tour and lots of bad sing, dancing and posing for pictures in ridiculous positions (mind of the gutter! this is a PG movie!). There also might have been some skipping. We saw first snow! it was pretty! and cold! until it was just cold and inconvenient (like when we trudged for three k in the snow looking for McDonalds) There was also Christmas markets and playing H&M vs. McDonalds (McDonalds won 5/7), eating chocolate crepes for dinner two nights in a row (shut up) and also the Opera.

Look a my cultural creds! We saw Salome and it was beautiful and the singing was so pretty and we had little screens with subtitles in English so we knew what was going on! and we paid less for the tickets then we paid for Breakfast - 3 Euro! So worth it!

Switzerland

Well, really it’s been less travelling around Switzerland then bludging in Geneva at my parents. Comfy beds! Internet! Shopping! It's been so fantastic seeing my parents, it’s been like 11 months! I have missed them so much and it so great just to see them every day! And speaking to them! Plus mum's cooking! How awesome! But it is kind of weird coming 'home' again after living nearly, kind of, independently for a year. I don't think I could go back to living full time with mum and dad, I like doing things my own way to much! Luckily what with Sweden and then the end of uni when I get home, and mum and dad mostly certainly staying in Switzerland for another couple of years, I don't think this will happen!


Hmm, that is the end of my adventures so far - I mean not really, I haven't said much about Spain, but  whatever. Little Sis and I are off to Madrid tomorrow, and the France next week. Then Germany, then back to Switzerland for Christmas and then England for Hamlet! And then Cardiff for New Years and the Sweden! for uni. Whoo!

(Inbetween various adventures had a breakdown and declared I was not going to Sweden. Stupid mountains of paperwork and visas, and medical tests and police checks and whatever. Am back on track - hopefully another one won't happen until at least Feb) 

teaonthestairs: ([misc] very destressed)

My littlesister and her boyfriend just paid for their flights to Europe! They have their plane tickets and its KILLING ME! I want to run out tomorrow and get mine! but I can't until I talk to my advisor so I can get a confirmation that my sweden exchange is going ahead! Seriously! I'm going to cry if I don't get an email from him soon! I just want to get an appointment with him - any day of the week! any time! Seriously RESPOND TO MY EMAIL! 

My favourite travel STA person is leaving as well, her last day is tomorrow and I SO wanted to book my tickets through her. She did Kenya for me and we were in the same kickboxing class. 

I am so woe at the moment that I feel the need to use my Very Distressed icon. 

*is late for work*

teaonthestairs: ([misc] very destressed)
After Kenya (or how Rosie is NOT dealing 15 months on)

It's been fifteen months since I left Mombasa, Kenya, in body at least - I confess, I walked through Mombasa airport with a sigh of relief, because I was leaving and I was tired and sick and more then a little heartbroken, I never really felt any kind of passion for Africa - it was never somewhere I talked about going, in fact I told myself I wouldn't go at all - I just wasn't interested. Not like Asia, not like Europe and Russia and the Americas. I've always known I would travel through Asia - I would experience India, and eat my way through Vietnam, and sun bake in Thailand. Europe was always on the map - how could I not want to explore the Greek islands and dance my way through Spain and write bad poetry in the UK? Africa was never a dream - I didn't want to go on a safari, I was not interested in the food and the sheer size and need of it scared me, I never thought of volunteering there until I accidentally did.

Don't ask me why, or when I decided it was Kenya I was going to go to - I don't know. I joke that it was exams that did it to me - never book a holiday when you are studying for exams right? Or maybe it was because the travel agent priced a trip to Kenya for me as an example, and I held onto that as something to hold on to. I don't know...

But somehow I ended up there, flying into Mombasa airport at 2 in the afternoon and getting knocked over by the humidity, the poverty and the homesickness )

I'm tired, and angry, and (once again) teary eyed. I have a written guide to volunteering I'm going to post soon. But not tonight - tonight I'm angry and upset and feeling useless.

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teaonthestairs

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