Cheerios & Milk

It's Official

2012-01-27T09:45:00.000Z

Today I turned in my resignation from a great company that I have been with for over 6 years and has given my opportunities I never imagined which have literally changed my life in every way.

I love to think back to moments in time that changed the course of your life without even realizing it. Six and a half years ago, I had a very dear friend who was going through a very hard time. I was working at Target at the time and I was pretty unhappy sporting the red and khaki everyday, especially on the weekends. After I got off of work one night at about 11pm I decided to stop by said friends house to see how she was doing. Another one of our mutual friends was there, who I hadn't really seen in a couple of years. I was moaning about how terrible unloading freight trucks at 4 am was whilst being forced to wear red and khaki and this friend mentioned that she had just gotten a new job, they were hiring and she would try and get me an interview. I asked what she did. She said that she messed with numbers on spreadsheets. Easy enough. Plus, I would get to work with fun, young people. Plus, I wouldn't have to unload trucks at 4 am. Plus, I got to sit. All day. Plus, I got lunches catered. Plus, they wanted to pay me way more. Plus, I didn't have to work weekends. Plus, not only did I not have to wear red and khaki, but I could wear whatever I wanted. Even pajamas. You get the point.
Since that day six and a half years ago, my job has seen me form amazing friendships, travel all over the US on an expense account and pay me to move to London. A city I have wanted to live in since I first came in 2003. I pretty much hit the jackpot. Sometimes I don't know how I got so lucky. I have never been one of those 'charmed' people. You know the type, the ones who always get what they want or didn't even know they wanted. The ones who coast through life with no clue what life is really like for 'the rest of us'. But these last couple of years I have had to literally pinch myself because I can't believe how freaking awesome my life is, for me. I know I haven't always chosen the most 'traditional' path, but I have stumbled along, down a path that is perfect for me.

When I moved to London, I didn't know what to expect. I did expect that two years would be forever and I'd be on a plane home exactly two years later when my contract was up. I wasn't worried about meeting people or having people to do things with. But I had absolutely no idea that I would meet people here who would be friends for the rest of my life. It is cliche to say that when you are away from your family, that your friends are your family. But it couldn't be more true. You spend holidays, birthdays, sick days, bad days and good days with these people and they become something more than just your friends.

So it is for those reasons, and so many more, why I am so desperately sad to leave London. I love everything about this city other than it's proximity to my family and maybe it's lack of good Mexican food, but even that has become bearable. But after several years of saving, planning and dreaming; an idea that was planted in my head on my first trip to Africa back in 2008 by two Aussie backpackers on their gap year, will now become my reality. I'll be leaving London on March 5th, headed to Texas for family time, a wedding, the birth of my 3rd neice and then, sometime in April, I'll head down to South America and make my way East until I end up back in Texas sometime the following year. I'm pretty sure my parents are horrified, but they are doing a good job of being supportive, as they always are. After the 'incident' last year in India where I went 'off the grid' for three days, I know this next year will be torture for them. Sorry parentals.

So here's to my last 5 weeks in London. I'm going to try and blogercise a little more because I want to remember what these last weeks in my city feel like.

Paperboy - India Edition

2011-05-05T15:05:00.003+01:00

Many times while driving Tikka across India we said to each other that it felt like we were in the middle of a serious game of Paperboy. Nintendo should really look into making a Paperboy India...it would be wild. Below I have outlined a list of all of the "obstructions" we had to deal with on the road as well as a "danger reading" so that you all might better understand what it is like to drive in India. Please keep in mind that this is while driving an auto-rickshaw, slightly smaller than a Smart Car and with no doors and only 3 wheels.

Danger Proposed - Scale of 1 to 10, 10 being "knock your socks off dangerous" and 1 being mildly offensive. Will give both a day time and night time reading as they can vary greatly.

Buses - Day(15) Night(15)

Seriously, I don't even know how to describe the way the buses drive in India. They are absolutely fearless and love a good game of chicken. They will pass any vehicle on the two lane "highway" at insane speeds only to throw on their brakes mere inches in front of you to load or unload one of their many passengers. These passengers can come from inside, outside or on top of the bus...they are everywhere. We saw some of the most horrific wreckage along the roadsides, almost all involving a bus.

Trucks - Day(12) Night(15)

These were definitely the most common of all obstacles that we encountered on the roads, also known as "Goods Carriers" or lovingly known by me as "Gods Carrier". Trucks were just a hair behind buses in the danger rating because even though we were driven off of the road by countless trucks, they seemed a bit (and I use that word loosely) more cautious than the buses. The trucks were all painted and decorated to the nines, usually with an enhanced horn that would rival The Dukes of Hazzard's Dixie horn. Actually, I lied, they put it to shame. The trucks drove with the same reckless abandon as the buses, barreling down the highway, no matter which direction traffic was going. There were countless times we had to slam on our brakes or drive off of the road to avoid head on collisions. The first day we were screaming and gasping at our shock of their recklessness. By day two we would just pull off the road then pull back on without so much as a mention, it had become so commonplace. At night the trucks became all the more dangerous as they liked to drive with their highbeams on full force which were conveniently eye-level for us rickshaws, rendering us as good as blind. For good measure they liked to flash them a few times right as they approached you, as if we couldn't see them!

Tractors - Day(5) Night (7)

ALOT of renditions of "She thinks my tractors sexy" were sung on this trip. John Deere should seriously consider moving himself to India. Tractors don't provide a substantial amount of danger other than they are very slow moving and must be passed on oncoming traffic to get around them. They are usually carrying exorbitantly large loads, usually with a few people on top for good measure. The are slightly more dangerous at night because they usually don't have tail lights so you never know when you're about to come up on one and have to slam on your brakes.

Cars - Day(7) Night (8)

Man, people in India sure are anxious to get where they're going! Cars seem to drive at least 3 times the posted speed, have no regard for vehicles smaller than them and also enjoy flashing their brights at you at night.

Rickshaws - Day(5) Night(6)

In India, rickshaws are actually taxi's. So you can imagine the many looks of confusion we got by people trying to flag us down for a ride at the point when they realized that the 'shaw was painted like a blue elephant AND that three white girls were driving! The rickshaw taxi service between towns works similarly to the bush taxi in Africa. You just stand anywhere along the road and flag down the 'shaw, hop on, then hop off when you get where you're going. We fit 3 of us in the shaw pretty comfortably with our luggage. The rickshaw taxi's usually had over 20 people on them at any one time! People on the roof, hanging out off the sides, sitting in the drivers lap...no lie. Really they were just annoying because they hating being passed by other rickshaws, so a game of leap frog usually ensued. I should also mention here that rickshaws headlights are directly linked to the accelerator. Not ideal at night if you are trying to slow down or brake, you lose your lights. This included our headlight as well.

Motorcycles - Day(7) Night(9)

Motorcycles don't really pose much of a threat to other vehicles or regular rickshaws, but to us, three white girls driving a rickshaw, they posed a threat but more to themselves. Since they were exposed to the elements, not unlike ourselves, they usually wanted to pull up next to us and have a full conversation (all while driving 50 kph). You know, like where are we from, what are our names, why are we driving a rickshaw, will we marry them, if we "want to make the sex with them"...you know, the usual. No worry that a truck is coming straight for you. Wait, let me actually whip out my camera phone and take a picture of the three white girls. Great. Now that I'm satisfied with my picture, let me pull in front of you then slam on my brakes so that I can crane my neck around with more skill than an owl and stare at you some more. At night, only more dangerous since 99% don't have working tail lights. I should also use this space to mention that a minimum number of riders on a motorcycle at any one time in India is 4. One dad driving, one mom sitting side-saddle with her child sitting on her lap or behind her and her newborn infant squished between her and her husband.

Ox Wagons - Day(4) Night(10)

I guess the ox lost the lottery to cows when it came to choosing a holy animal because they had the unfortunate chance of being born with a hump on their back that is perfect for hitching a wagon up to. After the tractor this is the most popular form of transporting goods or people from town to town in India, and much more economical I imagine. During the day these posed little threat as they were very slow, very visible and took up only a small portion of the lane. At night, however, this is a different story. Clearly ox aren't born with tail lights or reflectors on their bums, but maybe Darwin could get around to that, and their owners don't think to add any to their wagons. As a rickshaws headlight really only provides a minimal glow onto the tarmac and only provides visibility about 5 feet in front of the 'shaw, you can sneak up on these ox wagon's pretty quickly during the night. Most of the oxen have bells around their necks, but have you ever heard an rickshaws engine being pushed into overdrive, it's not exactly a purr.

Bicycles - Day(2) Night(10)

I think India is where all bicycles go to die. If I could bring one thing back to India with me next time, it would be a truck load of bicycle reflectors. So many people ride bicycles on the highways in India and NONE of them have reflectors on them making them invisible at night, well until they are 5 ft in front of you and when you are going 50 kmph that is not very helpful. Although some bicyclists try and thwart this by carrying small flashlights with them at night, but it looks more like a firefly in the distance than an appropriate means of warning drivers you are on the road.
Herds of Cows, Goats, Sheep - Day(4) Night(10)

I'm not sure shepards in ancient time herded their flocks on main thoroughfares, but hey, maybe I'm wrong. It seems to be the popular trend in modern times in India though. More importantly, who even knew that people still herded animals on foot with a shepards stick?? More of an annoyance than a danger during the day, as you'd clearly see the animals and usually just involved a little brake action and some patience. However, it seems a common theme is developing, at night this is just plain ridiculous! We did bump one cow with the flat side of our front end late one night in Bihar. But hey, it was bandit country and we'd been told to slow down for no one. When a cow suddenly appears in your 5 foot viewing radius, the best you can do is slam on the brakes and lay on the horn. I'm fairly certain that when we made contact we had almost skidded to a halt and the cow ran into us more than we did him. No, not buying it? Anyhow, it was just a love tap and no cows were injured.
Dogs - Day(2) Night(3)

Dogs are not pets in India, they are rabid, feral creatures who wander the streets and terrorize tourists with their rabid saliva. Okay, so maybe not, but our health professionals here in the UK put the fear of Rabies in us before we left that so much as a lick from a rabid dog would do us in. (**one guy on our trip actually did get bitten by a dog and had to go get a series of 5 rabies shots!) Anyways, the dogs just hang around the roadsides, cross the roads without looking (usually a honk will get their attention) but you never know if their going to scurry off the right way or the WRONG way! Every once in a while, one will get a wild hair and start chasing/attacking your car. They seem to be all the more feral at night!

Pedestrians - Day(1) Night(8)

Many folks decide to hoof it where ever the need to go, and the most identifiable way to do this is by walking on the highways. Usually not next to the highway, that would make too much sense. Sure, I get it, you have no other means of transportation. Fine. Walk yourself and your toddler down the highway full of insane buses, trucks, motorcyclists. But for crying out loud don't do it at NIGHT! Usually they stick to the edges so we're in no real danger of hitting them as we (rickshaws) only take up about 3 feet of the available lane, but if a truck/car/motorcycle is coming towards us with their brights on pedestrians become absolutely invisible on the road and we generally tended to vear towards the outside edge of the road for safety. Not that a pedestrian would do much damage to Tikka, but I wasn't looking to have that on my conscience.
Suicide Women - Day(0) Night(10)

We only encountered this once on our trip, thank goodness, but apparently it is something that happens in India frequently. One night as we were driving at night, we came around a bend and Annie slammed on the brakes and swerved. There was a woman sitting in the middle of our lane, completely motionless. She didn't budge during the whole process. She was right at the blind point in the bend, so any other vehicle, such as a truck, that doesn't have the same agility as the rickshaw would most certainly hit her. It was an extremely sobering experience.

Potholes - Day(10) Night(15)

This is more of an annoyance rating than a danger rating, but you wouldn't believe the state of some of the roads we encountered. There were potholes that could have been filled with water and been a childs splash park! I was tempted to get out and lay in some of them for reference, but I refrained because of all of the aforementioned road conditions. It felt like we were sitting on a industrial sized power plate for days, I'm surprised I escaped without adult-onset shaken baby syndrome. There were times where we were seriously driving less than 5mph for stretches of over an hour to navigate the roads. We did have to have our suspension replaced once, and I'm sure they had to after we returned her as well!

Rocks - Day(5) Night (7)

This category should really be a sub-category under the Trucks. Whenever the trucks break down, need to change a flat or just feel the need to stop in the middle of the road for an unknown reason, they generally feel the need to grab a few large rocks from the side of the road and place behind and around the side of their vehicle, to fend off any other vehicles that might get too close to them. Thing is they don't remove these rocks from the road once they are ready to move on. Thus, you are left with a smattering of ill placed mini-boulders in the middle of the road. Not a problem for most, but could do some serious damage to our pint-sized 'shaw! Obviously harder to spot at night.

Police Traffic Checks - Day(4) Night(5)

What these little diddies happen to be, are actually just a couple of barriers placed in the middle of the road that you have to slow and weave your way through every so often. More of an annoyance than a danger and a total waste of time. Although, oncoming traffic has to go through the same set and rather than taking turns the larger vehicle usually wins.

Speedbumps - Day(5) Night (10)

Again, this is more of an annoyance rating than a danger rating. Speed bumps in India can range in number anywhere from one to a series of upto 9 small bumps directly after one another. Usually to avoid turning your insides into mush, these are best traveled over while in 1st gear. These are usually placed at the start and end of villages, towns, cities, etc obviously to protect their inhabitants. However, they are not limited to these locations. Any 'ol place will do. They aren't painted, marked or signed so usually you have no idea one is coming until you are right on top of it. These were our best practices in extreme braking. In fact, I believe that if we were not so well versed in braking for speed bumps, that cow would not have made it. These were the bain of our existence. At night, as you guessed, even worse. You try going over 9 speed bumps at 50 kph and see how your insides feel!

Airbourne!

2011-05-03T10:48:00.000+01:00

Here is a list of things that we lost from either inside or off of the rickshaw during our two weeks.

1. Three cowboy hats (day 1)
2. One Pillow, twice
3. One headlight
4. One pair of flip flops
5. One Texas flag
6. One gas funnel, countless times
7. Countless empty water bottles
8. Annie

Things not recovered.

Headlight, it was useless anyways
Annie.

Day 14-the finish!

2011-05-01T17:15:00.001+01:00

No phone for the last two days, finally back in Delhi with service again! We left Guwahati at 6 am for the last 100 km to Shillong...all uphill, all winding roads and TONS of traffic!! Took over 5 hours, ran into lots of teams on the way. Tikka wasn't happy being forced uphill and tried to make us think she wasn't going to make it a couple of times, but we kept pleading with her and sweet talking her and she made it in the end just 34 kms short of rolling over 30,000 km on her...we put 3820 on her ourselves! Made it into Shillong during the victory parade so we hooked a U-turn and joined in at the front! So much fun seeing all of our new friends again and swapping stories over many well earned beers. Missed Annie terribly, didn't feel right finishing without her!
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Day 13

2011-05-01T17:15:00.000+01:00

went on elephant back safari this morning and saw a massive rhino!! There was also a baby elephant with us, we felt like kindred spirits after our two weeks with Tikka. Made it to guwahati tonight after some pretty terrible stretches of road. Had KFC for dinner, finger lickin' good! Tomorrow is lasy day, 100 km to Shillong, can't believe it is over!!
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Day 12

2011-04-28T12:49:00.000+01:00

we set out early this morning with Darleeling in mind for a day trip. We found out that it takes over 3 hrs to get the 80 km from Siliguri bc of the hills and the bendy roads so we sadly decided to keep moving forward. At a wildlife sanctuary now and going for an early morning elephant back safari to see rhinos! Great driving today, good roads and good scenery! In the foothills of the himalayas surrounded by tea plantations!
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Day 11

2011-04-27T17:38:00.000+01:00

Sad day for Rickshaw Rodeo, we said goodbye this morning to Annie in Patna who is flying home early for a wedding. There is now far too much room in the back seat and we no longer have any control of our finances as Annie was team treasurer. Took us 3 hours to find our way out of Patna this morning so we had to drive into the night a bit. Came across a sketchy scene with trucks parked for miles on the road had to weave in and out of them and people and tons of police carrying rifles. Everyone needed to get to next town to get hotels and they all thought we were a rickshaw taxi and were getting angry we weren't stopping for them. One guy grabbed Tikka and we gunned it and he ripped part of her hood!! Glad to be off the roads and in a hotel. Super early start tomorrow to avoid any more night driving.
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Day 10

2011-04-26T16:36:00.001+01:00

We had to make a game time decision this morning to bypass Varanasi since we didn't make it in as planned last night after our close encounter with a roadside ravine and well placed bush! Made it into Patna right at dusk and it was chaos on the streets. Handled it like a true rickshaw driver we've come far since our first days on the 'shaw! Countryside is still desert/farm land and pretty boring. Looking forward to getting back into the mountains soon. Huge splurge tonight on hotel. It is Annie's last night with us, she is flyinh back early for a wedding :( Had a dip in the pool and now off to a nice dinner. Three other teams are here too so maybe we'll all head out together...entering bandit territory tomorrow :/
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Day 9

2011-04-26T02:43:00.001+01:00

Last nights all of our lights decided to fail us on the highway and we had a bit of an encounter with a bush on the side of the road while pulling off. We're all fine and back on the road this morning, but no more night driving for us! Yesterday started off amazingly well with a Tiger sighting, one of the 3 dominant males in the park who the have seen in 15 days. He was napping in the bushes, then hopped up and crossed the road 20 ft. In front of us, amazing!! Heading into Varanasi now.
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Day 8

2011-04-24T14:15:00.001+01:00

We had an early end to our driving today after driving until 1am last night. Just arrived at Bandhavgarh National Park and treated ourselves to a nice lodge after some of the crappers we've been staying in. Ready for a proper shower after several nights of bucket showers. Left the hospital this morning early with hopes of making it to the park in time for a Tiger safari tonight but the roads were even worse than yesterday so we didn't make it in time. Waking up at 5am tomorrow for early morning safari...fingers crossed we'll see one!
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Day 7

2011-04-23T21:36:00.000+01:00

Long day for us, made it 500 km today even with a 3 hour hold up to replace our suspension. Today we had some of the worst roads yet, can't believe the size and number of the potholes! Had fun playing with all of the kids while we waited on a part to be delivered from a neighboring town. Also got interviewed by the state newspaper and the national news!! Witnessed a very upsetting event later in the day, saw a man getting beaten by a mob in the middle of the highway, all very concerned for him but too afraid to stop, didn't know what to do. Ended up driving well into the night and tried to book a room at the only lodge in town. Police came and got us and told us not to stay there but that there was a Christian hospital that would let "people from our country" stay there. So here we are at a hospital for the night...
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Day 6

2011-04-22T19:17:00.001+01:00

We finally made some serious distance today, just over 450 kms! Although it took us 16 hrs on the road. We average around 35-45 km/hr (that's like driving in a school zone, about 20-30 mph) with top speeds around 60 km/hr. throw in potholes, train crossings, speed bumps, filling up the gas tanks, villages...it all slows you down! Nothing much to report today, we drove on the National Highway today which was pretty boring, but allowed us to cover a lot of distance so it was worth it in the end. Had a great dinner at a roadside dhaba after a chance run in with team Compass (less) Journey..it was so fun to see another team and swap stories for a bit, we haven't seen any other teams in over three days! Off to bed for another 6 am start!
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Day 5

2011-04-21T16:28:00.001+01:00

We were treated to a bit of a sleep in this morning. We left Tikka with the mechanic last night and he worked on her all morning. He gave her a full body check and cleaned her up and changed the air filter. She worked like a dream today! We got back on the road from Bellary after 1 and have been full steam ahead. Drove thru some serious wind and rain, were preparing to lay in a ditch if needed! Batteries went out on speakers so we kept spirits high with a serious sing along marathon. Then we took a ride along the Oregon Trail with about 10 Ox Wagons and some seriously bumpy dirt roads. River forging and dysentry optional. Pulled into town tonight after dark only to see a woman sitting cross legged in the iddle of the pitch black road...suicide mission?!?!
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A List Continued...

2011-04-21T10:45:00.001+01:00

19. Warthogs
20. A tree frog (on our windshield!)
21. A peacock
22. Sheep
23. Sacrificial goat
24. Ducks
25. Shetland ponies
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Day 4

2011-04-20T19:07:00.001+01:00

another unpredictable day. Had a great early morning start, high hopes of covering lots of ground. Made it a couple of hours and then she chugged to a stop. No hopes of restarting. A rickshaw driver/ guardian angel named Vinay pulled over and towed us 9km into town on a rope. Spent the next 4 hours at 3 different mechanics. Had new clutch rebuilt engine and cleaned carborator still with issues. Vinay drove us the next 40km to make sure we were okay, such a sweetheart! Still had some issues, annie contacted a colleague in Hyderbad who found us a licensed mechanic for our brand of rickshaw in the next big town which is where we are now. More scary night driving to reach the town. Hopefully she'll be a happy ellie in the morning!
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Tikka

2011-04-20T05:05:00.001+01:00

Our baby girl is named Tikka, short for Hathi ka bache...baby elephant in Hindi. She needs lots of love and attention on the road to keep her going. We have to speaking to her in soothing voices, give her love pats, scratch behind her ears and even blow into her rear (carborator) so naturally we have come up with a few pet names for her...

Teeks
Teekaboo
Tikka masala
Chiquitikka
Chicka tikka
Baby girl
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Day 3

2011-04-19T16:32:00.001+01:00

what a day! Finally made some good progress but got drenched in a storm and tried out night driving for the first time. Discovered the horn doesn't work with the lights on, not ideal. Got run off the road by a bus and saw a goat getting sacrificed on the side of the road...blood rushing out of its neck..we all shrieked and had to pull over to regroup! We also had a stowaway for a while when a tree frog hopped on our windshield and rode along for a bit...more screaming obviously. Never caught up with the boys hoping to in the AM.
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Day 2

2011-04-18T16:57:00.003+01:00

game time decision decided to ditch Goa plans early in the day since we weren't making enough progress. Decided to start heading inland towards Mysore. We were greatly rewarded, loved the scenery of the lush mountains and tea plantations, much better than boring coast hwy. We got to practice our gears on steep winding mountain roads, we're old pro's now! Touched base with our new friends Keep Karma and Curry On meeting up with them in the morning maybe. Got stuck in terrible rain storm in Pandalur but found the nicest people...just got room and dinner for less than £5 total for all three of us :)
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Day 1

2011-04-18T16:57:00.001+01:00

epic fail today! Flat tire at the start line, drove around in circles all day, ran out of gas, had a block in fuel line...this is going the be a long 14 days! Managed to find a decent hotel even though this town isn't even on the map...another adventure awaits tomorrow!
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A family portrait

2011-04-15T21:08:00.001+01:00

So things are starting to pick up a lot now with race preparations so I think blogs with be fewer and les detailed from now on.

Thursday morning we took the train to Agra from Jaipur to see the Taj Mahal. First we went to Agra Fort, which was another Fort with a view. We are Forted out! We did have a fantastic time meeting the sweetest Indian family. It all satarted when their young son wanted a picture with me, he was so shy it was so cute. We took a pic with bim and then every member of his family then a big group shot. They were so cute! Little did we know this would be the theme at the Taj.

When we got to the Taj it was so surreal! It really is every bit as magnificent as you would imagine! I couldn't believe that I was actually there standing in front of the Taj Mahal!! We took WAY too many pictures, but we just couldn't stop. We were in SO many Indian family photos, it was crazy. They all wanted us in their pictures. They have professional photographers there you could but pics from and these familys were paying for family portraits with us in them! Wonder how many mantles we'll be on!?

After the Taj we got caught in the quickest, most intense thunderstorm and then headed back to Delhi by train for fly down to Cochin, where we are now.

We all LOVE south india!! More to come on that later!!
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A List

2011-04-14T02:08:00.001+01:00

Of animals we have seen in the last 3 days

1. Cows
2. Elephants
3. Camels
4. Horses
5. Donkeys
6. Pigs
7. Goats
8. Chickens
9. Cobras
10. Chipmunks
11. Monkeys
12. Rats
13. Bats
14. Rabid Dogs
15. Cats
16. Ox (which are apparently different than sacred cows)
17. Water buffalo
18. Annie saw a red lizard, but I'm pretending that didn't happen!

Keep in mind this was all in the cities, freely roaming the roads and doesn't include all of the birds and bugs which are plentiful as well!
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Cobras, elephants and monkeys

2011-04-13T18:25:00.001+01:00

Day two in Jaipur started early with Sameer picking us up at 9:30 and heading straight to the Pink City, which is the old walled part of Jaipur. There we saw the City Palace and the Jantur Mantur. The City Palace is still the official residence of the Maharajah of Rajasthan. He was in that day as the royal flag was flying above the palace. The royal flag of Rajasthan looks a bit like the gay pride flag but with a giant swastika on it. Kind of weird. We asked Sameer about the swastikas, they are everywhere in India, and the are really an ancient symbol meaning good luck. Unfortunately Hitler hi-jacked that one :(

City Palace has this one great courtyard with four beautiful doorways representing the four seasons. We had a mini photo session. Since it is still in use you can only view the outside areas, so there wasn't a ton to see. We did also get to see the royal carriages, which were interesting. Afterwards, we headed to the Jantur Mantur, which is kind of like some weird modern garden. Some guy built all of these different astrological sculptures in this garden and some time telling fixtures. It all was several hundred years old but looked very futuristic.

Before leaving the Pink City we all three had some henna done. Rangina was the cutest lady who did our henna. She was very sweet and we were amazed at how quickly she was able to draw the designs. Henna is all natural, made from leaves and dyed with saffron. They squeeze it out a tube like an icing bag and it dries on your skin after an hour. Then you dab almond oil on it to help keep it moisturized then the excess bits flake off and leave the orange design on your skin, which lasts about three weeks.

After leaving the pink city we headed to the outlaying hills to see Amber Fort. We stopped on the way to get a fresh coconut water, they just hack off the top of a coconut and stick in a straw! Annie was super excited about Amber Fort all week because you can ride an elephant up to the top of the hill to the fort. Annie is obsessed with elephants. We were so bummed when we got there to find out they only run the elephant untill 11am bc it is so hot after that. So we had to drive up rather than ride an elephant, a bit of a bummer. Amber Fort is high up in the hills surrounding Jaipur and had great views. The have a Hall of Mirrors which can't quite rival Versailles, but was still very pretty. There wasn't much more to see other than the views. On the way out we heard so music and turned around to see a couple of snake charmers...eeeek! I wouldn't get any closer to them than about 20 feet. But Kate was brave and pet one of them on the head! It wasn't all that cool the cobras just sit there in a trance. I always thought they danced to the music, but the just sit there without moving. Before coming to India I was a bit worried about the snake charmers, I thought they would be on every street corner. But apparently it is now illegal to own a snake as a pet in India. So fear not snake haters!

On the drive back down we saw all of the elephants being walked down the hills so we pulled over and got to pet them and take some pictures. In Jaipur they paint their elephants in bright neon colors, one even had pink toenails! Of course, with everything else in India, the elephant handlers wanted tips for letting us take photos. EVERYONE in india wants tips, you take a picture they want tips, you smile at them they want tips, you speak to them they want tips. That is one thing that is hard. Some deserve tips while others haven't but you know they are so poor but you can't give to everyone. It is quite a moral dilemma every day.

By this time it was early afternoon and super hot so we went bak to the hotel for naps in the room then Sameer picked us back up in the eveing to take us to Monkey Fort before sunset. This really isn't anything to see other than a temple at the top of a hill with a bunch of monkeys on it. It did have another great view of the city, but we enjoyed ourselves by befriending a small pack of local boys offer their "guide" services. They were really cute and fun so we let them hang around and we all took pictures with each other and gave them a small tip after. They kept trying to get us to feed the monkeys but we wouldn't do it for fear of rabies!! I ended up opting out of the pricey shot before the trip.

Next we headed out to Chakadali, a little man-made village outside of the city set up to show the tradional food, customs and dance. It is like a little mini-carnival. There was rides, dancing, boat rides, elephant and camel rides and a meal with traditional foods. We were a bit disappointed as the book and some people made it out to be a little more cultural than it actually was. It reminded me a bit of the old western town at Six Flags but indian rather than cowboys! It was overly cheesey but was full of Indian tourists from other cities. We were the only western tourists there. After we had a look around and ate our dinner we headed back to Jaipur with Sameer to Tiger Fort, his favorite place in the city after dark. It was about an hour drive one dark deserted mountain roads with no one else in sight. I only had terrible abduction thoughts once or twice. But we really had no reason to doubt Sameer and he came through with an amazing mountain top view of Jaipur by night. It was a million twinkling lights, but you could still hear the madness of the city below, the honking...the never ending Indian honking!

Sameer dropped us off around midnight promising to pick us up at 5:15 to take us to the train station for our trip to Agra. He was there right on time and hadn't slept the whole night. After a full day of driving us from 9 am to midnight, he spent the rest of the night trying to get more jobs to earn more money. If you ever go to Jaipur get in touch and I can give you Khan and Sameers numbers as they were some of the kindest and most trustworthy people we have met thus far.
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Hello, my name is Khan

2011-04-13T02:17:00.000+01:00

Jaipur!! We loved Jaipur! Again, you've caught me on another train. This time from Jaipur to Agra, but still at 5:45 am. We are sad to leave Jaipur but excited that we are headed to see the Taj Mahal! I can't believe that I will actually see the Taj in just a few hours.

I left off last time on the train to Jaipur from Delhi. It was our first train ride in India and was the best way to travel. We wanted to sleep but had a hard time peeling our eyes off of the windows. As soon as we hit the outskirts of Delhi, it was slums for miles. I've read a bit about Indian slums in Shantaram, but it was still a huge dose of reality. They were huge, endless, built of scraps and trash. One on top of another. They have no privacy and consequentially, no need for it. Dotted along the railways for miles were men, backsides facing us, doing their "morning business". Others were out having a bucket bath, washing clothes, shaving their beards. All along the railway.

Upon arriving in Jaipur we headed towards the exit ready to find a ride to our hotel. The competition is stiff for drivers, before we even reached tbe exit we were greeted by a little indian man with a big smile. Hello, my name is Khan. He convinced us with a rock bottom price of 100 rupies for the transfer, just about £1.50. Little did we know we had just met some new friends. On the short drive to the hotel he sold us his driving services for the day for only 300 rupies for the afternoon. We wanted to spend a few hours at our great hotel by the pool. We stayed in Umaid Bhawan, it was fantastic! Would recommend to anyone going to Jaipur. After a rest by the pool Khan took us to see the sights. We all three instantly loved Jaipur. It wasn't a crazy as Delhi, the people were friendlier and we had a new friend Khan. He took us to a tower that we climbed to see a great view of Jaipur from above. Jaipur is a city surrounded by high hills all dotted with huge forts.

Next, we headed the Royal Gatore which is a royal crematorium for old kings. However, these are al recent kings from the last 70 years...they still build tombs in a grand manner. Afterwards we headed off to catch a waterside view of the Water Palace. Aptly named, as it is in the middle of a small lake and looks as if it is floating.

Next we were onto some shopping at the factories that supply the shops and markets. We went to a jewelry shop that handmakes all of its jewelry. We were shown how they hand cut and polish semi-precious stones. I ended up treating myself to a new lemon topaz ring! We went to a textiles factory next. Here we saw a man hand weaving a rug on a loom. They showed us how they hand dye elaborate patterns on blank cotton canvases. We saw the dying factory where they hand dye thousands of cotton dresses in one large vat of boiling colored water, then hang them to dry in the sun. We were also treated to a little impromptu street parade along the way! I had no intentions of buying anything but ended up walking out with a new duvet cover and matching shams...oops! It is gorgeous though, white linen with white embroidery. It takes them two months to handmake and I got is all for £60!!

We spent quite a long time here so afterwards Khan took us to a rooftop restaurant called Maggis. The food was good and there was a puppet show, which creeped Annie out and was a little weird. Khan had his brother in law come meet us there to take us home when we wanted. So then enters Sameer on our little journey. Sameer is a young guy, spoke very good english and was quite a charcter. Sameer joined us on the roof terrace for a while and then Annie convinced him to give her some rickshaw driving lessons! They all think we are crazy, by the way, when we tell them what we are doing here! Annie picked it up quick and drove us the short drive back to our hotel! Our first rickshaw driving experience!! Sameer informed us he would be driving us around the next day, so we met him bring and early the next morning for a full day of sight seeing...but that will be another post. I need to take a nap on the train so I am well rested for my Taj Mahal experience!
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Butter chicken, paparazzi and wrestlemania-Delhi style

2011-04-11T02:49:00.000+01:00

Its now 5:45 am and I'm sitting in executive AC chair class on a train to jaipur. That sounds fancy and all but it just means there are old school fans attached to the ceiling and the chairs are a bit wider. Indian trains are interesting, they post a paper list on the outside of each carriage of all the passengers names for that car so you have to look for you name on the list. Somehow efficient.

I have been in india for a whole 2 hours now. I landed yesterday at 6:05 am at the Delhi airport. I was happy to be on the ground as we had the WORST turbulance I have ever experienced on a flight, and I've flown through some pretty bad storms before. It was during the morning breakfast service so people were screaming and there was food and drink flying everywherem. I lost my appetite pretty quickly! Annie and Kate were on a flight from Mumbai landing at 8:55 so I headed over to there terminal to wait for them. I didn't sleep a wink on the flight so I was exhausted. We all grabbed a cab together to our hotel, which kate and annie said I was receiving the royal treatment compared to their arrival in mumbai.
We arrived early in the morning and opted for a nap thankfully. After we woke up we headed to moti mahal for lunch, apparently the home of butter chicken...count me in! lunch was tasty, we all ordered and shared...butter chicken, chicken dopiaza, fish tikka, sag paneer and several different naans and rotis...it was a feast. Our waiter wanted to brag and tell us that gordan ramsey had eaten there they have a picture of his visit framed on the wall, which he promptly took off the wall and brought to our table. Annie, being the opportinist that she is, wanted to repeat our cuban kitchen adventure so we took this opportunity to ask for a kitchen tour. They proudly showed off their kitchen to us, let us put of chef hats and stir the butter chicken! Friends were made and many photos were taken!

After lunch and our kitchen tour we walked down to the Red Fort, which proved to be quite the adventure. It should be noted that there is no adequate way to describe driving in India, it is something you truly have to experience to understand. There is no one obeying the lanes ore which side of the road you should be on. It is opportunistic at the least. There are motorcycles with families of four weaving in and out of traffic. I kid you not dad driving, two kids/BABIES wedged between mom on the back riding side-saddle. People walking in the streets between cars as the sidewalks are for street vendors and naps for the homeless and the dogs. Thrown in a thousand rickshaws and a few cows and there you have it. So us walking to the Red Fort was more like a serious game of Paperboy or dodge ball.

We finally arrived at the fort and paid our 250 rupies to get in while locals were charged a mere 10 rupees! Inside was a collection of dilapidated buildings and some nice gardens. Everyone was sitting out in the grass enjoying the sun and each others company. It was mostly indian families and groups of friends. The three of us found a nice spot on a bench and enjoyed some people watching. I can't go further without mentioning the Indian males affection for some serious manlove. They hold hands, drape their arms around one another, lay their heads in each others laps...this is just how they treat their friends, I guess. Anyhow, while watching lots of manlove at the Red Fort it was hard to miss that the three of us quickly became a spectical. It all started with one guy asking if he could take a pic of us. We said sure next thing you know there was a crowd of about 20 men standing around us with their camera phones out taking pictures of us. This lasted about ten minutes, it was quite hilarious!

It was now late afternoona and we could see a mosque in the distance that we wanted to visit, so we started heading towards it. A short cut through a park reaped great rewards as we stumbled across some sort of naked mudwrestling exhibition. We were the only women in a sea of about 200 indian male spectators. It was amazing, there was a drummer thumping out primal beats and boys, aged about 6-18 were wearing tiny underpants, wrestling each other in a giant sand pit. There were popadom vendors walking about and cheeky little kids who vkept inching closer to us. The only white people, yet alone women, in sight.

After a while we decided to move along to the mosque. Well, it seemed we had attracted quite a following Wrestlemania so we weren't alone. We had to walk down a very crowded bazaar to get there which turned into a pretty bad situation quickly. Our gaggle of followers was mostly little boys and a few teens from the wrestling. In the crowded bazaar they started getting brave and started grabbing our rears, which obviously got a rise out of us which clearly egged them on. It got preety out of control, annie socked one of them in the stomach and finally, Kate (a legend) turning around and yelled at them "Come on you want some more, who wants another grab, come on!" They all froze, wide eyed. At this point the shop keepers realized what was happening and started yelling at the boys. It didn't stop them from following us but it did calm down the grabbing. I was very upset at this point and just wanted to get out, it was another run down the gauntlet. I should say that while this was very wrong, it was just boys egging each other on, trying to get a rise out of us. None of the grown men touched us and they came to our aid in the end. But I'll tell you this, I'm not entertaining any little boys after that, once you befriend them even for a second, there is no getting rid of them.

Unfortunately this put a damper on our otherwise great day. We hopped in a rickshaw to make our escape and clearly our driver spoke zero english and had no idea where we were asking to go. So we drove around Delhi for over an hour before we were able to get him to understand, with the help of some other drivers. By this time we were exhausted and hungry. We found a place called Rodeo in connaught square...saddles for bar stools and all. We had a couple of well earned beers and some fajitas then headed back to the hotel for our 5am wake up call.

Now on the train to Jaipur, which is why this blog was so long. Not sure ill have so much time in the future for updates. But I'll try and keep up for the rest of the trip. Until next time, I'll be riding elephants in Jaipur!
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Testing one. Two.

2011-04-02T03:00:00.001+01:00

Hey peeps, just trying to get all of my technology up and running will be trying to email posts to my blog while in India...this is my first try at it! I leave one week from today!!! Everything is in order and bought except the maps...uhhhh...might want to get on that!!
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Anyone out there

2011-01-05T17:31:00.000Z

I know I have sorely neglected the 3 people who read my blog. I apologize. New year, new start. Right? Getting back to blogging was one my list of new years resolutions, but I just put it on the list, right now. There's no official deadline for resolutions is there? Anyways, the resolutions that WERE on my list are as follows

1. Learn Spanish - I've had the full set of Spanish Rosetta Stone's sitting in my house for about, oh, 6 months. They are still in the shrink wrap. Step 1: Remove from shrink wrap

2. RE-learn how to live on a budget - This is something I used to be very good at. My parents raised me to be very aware of money and how I was spending it. I've had a job ever since I was 16, much to disliking of a certain college roomie who teased me mercilessly about my "woooooork friends" aka "juuuuuuulie" She didn't like sharing me. I was always afraid of credit cards and rarely used them and always paid them off every month, with the exception of the time I charged an entire cruise for 32 girls on my dad's credit card in college :) (hey, in my defense, they all wrote me checks to pay me back) Anyways, somewhere between my first job and my current job, I started earning more money. I'm usually fine every month and I always put away a bit in savings, but the point is, I could be saving a LOT more if I was just more aware of what I was spending my money on. Debit card OUT. Little envelopes filled with cash IN. At least for a few months so I can see how well I can survive on this purported budget I am putting myself on.

3. Blog more...see, I just added it!

And on a totally random note...last night I flew back to London from Dallas. I had the aisle seat and a larger man had the window seat. He wasn't HUGE, just tall and a little bigger. Well about 2/3 of the way through the 9 hour flight he motioned that he needed to go to the bathroom. So I stood up to let me out. When he stood up he asked if we could switch seats for the last bit of the flight, you know "to change it up a bit" I was so thrown off guard by his question, I just said "uh, sure, yeah, of course" in an apologetic tone as if I had been the inconsiderate one sitting in the aisle seat, my ASSIGNED seat, this whole time. Anyways, I scooted into the window seat and he sat down in my aisle seat stretched his legs out and said "feels better already". Seriously people, seriously. Who does that!!!!

Crazy Beautiful Life

2010-09-13T15:45:00.000+01:00

Warning: This isn't a real post. Just a filler post to let you know that one day when my life slows down I will post again. And it will include things such as...

Me deciding last minute to fly to Bulgaria to train at a high altitude training camp with my boxing gym, Rocky Balboa style. not kidding.
Me coming back from Bulgaria to find my flat robbed blind and all the fun that has since ensued.
Me having to find a new flat asap since the burgler was my upstairs neighbor
Me boxing a big british broad in front of 500 people in two weeks. what am i thinking
Me taking a last minute, 36 hour, jaunt over to Copenhagen for the weekend

I'm sure there is plenty more I have left out, but that should keep me busy for a while. In the mean time I am spending every moment of every waking hour for the next two weeks planning all of the final details for a big work conference I am in charge of that is only a week away (gulp), training at the gym for my fight at least 4 times a week, trying to find a new flat to move to and packing my old flat. As if I wasn't busy enough...thanks you punk 16 year old that has no respect for other people's property.

All that said, I am still keeping a smile on my face and loving my life!

Boxing Debacle

2010-07-27T17:01:00.000+01:00

I'm lazy so this is a cut and paste from my Facebook invite. Don't worry, if you can't swing the trip to London, I'll make sure there is a video posted on YouTube.

debacle n. A sudden, disastrous collapse, downfall, or defeat; a rout. A total, often ludicrous failure

Mark your calendars.... In a moment lacking any sort of judgement, I have agreed to box in a White Collar Fight night. No friends, you did not just misread that sentence. I have been boxing (for fitness purposes) at Rooney's Boxing Gym for the past 4 months and they have managed to wear me down and convince me to subject myself to what I am sure will be sheer embarrassment for myself and unadulterated pleasure for all of you.

I will have more details in the next few weeks, but the event will be somewhere in the London Bridge area after work on Sept. 22nd. I think tickets will be around 20-30 quid, let me know if you're in and I'll find out more about tickets.

I'm still working on my "ring" name...any suggestions are welcome ;)

I've been working on my "mean" face

Fighting Fit Update

2010-07-15T10:11:00.000+01:00

If you remember my post from a couple of months ago, you'll know we were doing a Biggest Loser competition at work. Well the competition has ended and I WON!! I won £620, but even more exciting I lost 6.5% of my body weight, which is a little more than half of my total goal! I think I could have done even better if I hadn't spent almost 3 weeks in Texas eating Mexican food during part of the competition! The three biggest contributors to my success were my boxing, my Lose It app on my iPhone and the fact that I didn't "diet".

I absolutely LOVE my boxing gym! I finally found a work out that I can stick with. I love how competitive it is and the small "family" feel of the gym keeps me going back 3 times a week. I will admit, the morning of the final weigh in, I went to the gym for a 7 am work out with Mick and he made me wear a trash bag under my shirt so I would sweat more. I little gross, but I lost almost 2 lbs (probably just water weight) that morning right before the weigh in! Oh, and they are also trying to convince me to fight in a real fight at a White Collar Boxing event in September....eek!!!

I am obsessed with the Lose It! app on the iPhone! It is so easy to track your calories and your goals. The only bummer is that is is all American restaurants, so I usually just have to find something similar, but it is still really helpful. One of my biggest problems before, I think, was that I was so confused as to why I had put on weight. I really didn't think that I ate that bad or that much, but once I started tracking it I was shocked at how badly I was actually eating. It was nice to put it in perspective! Plus I LOVE adding exercise each day and getting more calories. I have found that I have been walking everywhere a lot more lately just so I can press the add exercise button and get a few extra calories!

As for dieting, I decided not to do it this time. In the past I have used both Weight Watchers and Atkins to lose weight. While I was successful in the end goal, I found that neither were sustainable for long periods of time and as soon as I went off of the diet I went right for all of the things I have been deprived of. This time I just went for reduced calories and exercise. I didn't deprive myself of anything. If I wanted a candy bar I had one, I just made sure I exercised that day enough to work it off. I did cut out drinking during the week, but with this year as one of the best British summers...I couldn't manage to cut myself off on the weekends :) I also started cooking for myself again. When I moved to my new flat I started eating almost every meal out, since I don't have much in the way of a kitchen. But really I was just being lazy. So I am back to cooking my meals for the week on Sundays.

Everyone asked what I am going to do with my winnings, but since I owed a lot of money to the IRS this year, my macbook got stolen and I JUST smashed my iPhone screen (yesterday, ugh!!) I think the funds are already allocated :/

Summer Reading List

2010-07-05T10:50:00.001+01:00

I seem to go through serious phases with reading. I'll go for several months without picking a book up, when I try I can only get through a page or two before I lose interest...and then one day it will just flip and I'll read incessantly for a few months. Then it is gone, just as suddenly as it came. Well I have been OFF the written word here for the past few months in a bad way. I have 3 books on my nightstand, that I really want to read, but I have only managed to get a few pages into each before I try another one to see if I can get into that one, to no avail. Last week I met my friend Meg for lunch. She and I share the same affinity for travel and she took me to this amazing bookstore that is three stories of ONLY travel literature. It seems that my idea to go travel the world and then write about it has already been done a time or two! They were having a 'buy 3 for the price of 2' special and before I knew it I was at the checkout counter with SIX books (but for the price of 4!). It's going to be hard to keep my wanderlust in check with a summer reading list like this......

By examining the true story of Chris McCandless, a young man, who in 1992 walked deep into the Alaskan wilderness and whose SOS note and emaciated corpse were found four months later, internationally bestselling author Jon Krakauer explores the obsession which leads some people to explore the outer limits of self, leave civilization behind and seek enlightenment through solitude and contact with nature. "An astonishingly gifted writer: his account of 'Alex Supertramp' is powerfully dramatic, eliciting sympathy for both the idealistic, anti-consumerist boy - and his parents" - "Guardian". "A compelling tale of tragic idealism" - "The Times".

Ever since Stanley first charted its mighty river in the 1870s, the Congo has epitomised the dark and turbulent history of a failed continent - from colonial cruelty under the Belgians to the kleptocratic chaos of Mobutu Sese Seko and the current post-apocalyptic riot of robber-baron politicians. However, its troubles only served to increase the interest of "Daily Telegraph" correspondent Tim Butcher, who was sent to cover Africa in 2000. He remembered his mother's stories of her own genteel river journey there in the 1950s and his connection deepened when he discovered that Stanley's expedition was funded by the "Telegraph". Before long he became obsessed with the idea of recreating Stanley's original expedition - but travelling alone. Despite warnings from old Africa hands that his plan was 'suicidal', Butcher spent years poring over colonial-era maps and wooing rebel leaders before making his will and venturing to the Congo's eastern border with just a rucksack and a few thousand dollars hidden in his boots. He travelled for hundreds of kilometers on a motorbike, dogged by punctured tyres, broken bridges and dehydration. As he drove through the most dangerous areas, he stopped only to sleep - biking through the bush for hours and speeding up every time he passed a soldier. And then he reached the legendary Congo River, making his way down it in an assortment of vessels including a dugout canoe. Helped along the way by a cast of characters - from UN aid workers to a campaigning pygmy, he passed through the once thriving cities of this huge country, saw the marks left behind by years of abuse and misrule, and followed in the footsteps of the great Victorian adventurers, and of the visitors - such as Katherine Hepburn and Evelyn Waugh - who had been there in very different times. Almost 2,500 harrowing miles later, he reached the Atlantic Ocean a thinner and a wiser man. His extraordinary account describes a country with more past than present, where giant steamboats lie rotting in the advancing forest and children hear stories from their grandfathers of days when cars once drove by. Butcher's journey was a remarkable feat. But the story of the Congo, told expertly and vividly in this book, is more remarkable still.

In 1978, gifted student and writer Greg Roberts turned to heroin when his marriage collapsed, feeding his addiction with a string of robberies. Caught and convicted, he was given a nineteen-year sentence. After two years, he escaped from a maximum- security prison, spending the next ten years on the run as Australia's most wanted man. Hiding in Bombay, he established a medical clinic for slum- dwellers, worked in the Bollywood film industry and served time in the notorious Arthur Road prison. He was recruited by one of the most charismatic branches of the Bombay mafia for whom he worked as a forger, counterfeiter, and smuggler, and fought alongside a unit of mujaheddin guerrilla fighters in Afghanistan. His debut novel, SHANTARAM, is based on this ten-year period of his life in Bombay. The result is an epic tale of slums and five-star hotels, romantic love and prison torture, mafia gang wars and Bollywood films. A gripping adventure story, SHANTARAM is also a superbly written meditation on good and evil and an authentic evocation of Bombay life.

Paul Theroux sets off for Cape Town from Cairo -- the hard way. Travelling across bush and desert, down rivers and across lakes, and through country after country, Theroux visits some of the most beautiful landscapes on earth, and some of the most dangerous. It is a journey of discovery and of rediscovery -- of the unknown and the unexpected, but also of people and places he knew as a young and optimistic teacher forty years before. Safari in Swahili simply means "journey", and this is the ultimate safari. It is Theroux in his element -- a trip where chance encounter is everything, where departure and arrival times are an irrelevance, and where contentment can be found balancing on the top of a truck in the middle of nowhere.

Meet Balram Halwai, the 'White Tiger': servant, philosopher, entrepreneur and murderer. Balram, the White Tiger, was born in a backwater village on the River Ganges, the son of a rickshaw-puller. He works in a teashop, crushing coal and wiping tables, but nurses a dream of escape. When he learns that a rich village landlord needs a chauffeur, he takes his opportunity, and is soon on his way to Delhi behind the wheel of a Honda. Amid the cockroaches and call-centres, the 36,000,004 gods, the slums, the shopping malls, and the crippling traffic jams, Balram learns of a new morality at the heart of a new India. Driven by desire to better himself, he comes to see how the Tiger might escape his cage...

'Here we drink three cups of tea to do business; the first you are a stranger, the second you become a friend, and the third, you join our family, and for our family we are prepared to do anything - even die' - Haji Ali, Korphe Village Chief, Karakoram mountains, Pakistan. In 1993, after a terrifying and disastrous attempt to climb K2, a mountaineer called Greg Mortenson drifted, cold and dehydrated, into an impoverished Pakistan village in the Karakoram Mountains. Moved by the inhabitants' kindness, he promised to return and build a school. "Three Cups of Tea" is the story of that promise and its extraordinary outcome. Over the next decade Mortenson built not just one but fifty-five schools - especially for girls - in remote villages across the forbidding and breathtaking landscape of Pakistan and Afghanistan, just as the Taliban rose to power. His story is at once a riveting adventure and a testament to the power of the humanitarian spirit.

The last book I have read before, several years ago on a work trip to Chicago. I cried the whole flight home while I was finishing the book. It is, and will always remain, my favorite book. It is awe inspiring the impact one person can have on the world, even when they just set out to repay one village for a kind deed. If you read only one book, let this be the one, the world will be a better place if you do!

Oh and here are the three on my nightstand that I still have to get through....

We all want to help. Over the past fifty years $1 trillion of aid has flowed from Western governments to Africa, with rock stars and actors campaigning for more. But this has not helped Africa. It has ruined it. Dambisa Moyo’s excoriating and controversial book reveals why millions are actually poorer because of aid, unable to escape corruption and reduced, in the West’s eyes, to a childlike state of beggary. Dead Aid shows us another way. Using hard evidence to illustrate her case, Moyo shows how, with access to capital and with the right policies, even the poorest nations can turn themselves around. First we must destroy the myth that aid works– and make charity history.

Do you believe in miracles? This collection of extraordinary tales of survival is guaranteed to astound and inspire you in equal measure. Meet ordinary people who have found extraordinary strengths facing seemingly impossible challenges – like the woman who fell from the sky, or the man who floated 300 miles out to sea after the Asian tsunami. What is it about some people that they seem born survivors, or how does someone find the incredible strength from within not to give up on hope against all odds? Are some people just lucky? These and many other true stories demonstrate the strength we all possess to come through our life's toughest challenges, and the precious wisdom that results from surviving. This book is based primarily on conversations with survivors and experts around the world

The Poisonwood Bible tells the story of an American family in the Congo during a time of tremendous political and social upheaval. The story is told by the wife and four daughters of Nathan Price, a fierce evangelical Baptist who takes his family and mission to the Belgian Congo in 1959. They carry with them all they believe they will need from home, but soon find that all of it - from garden seeds to Scripture - is calamitously transformed on African soil. This tale of one family's tragic undoing and remarkable reconstruction, over the course of three decades in postcolonial Africa, is set against one of history's most dramatic political parables. The Poisonwood Bible dances between the darkly comic human failings and inspiring poetic justices of our times. In a compelling exploration of religion, conscience, imperialist arrogance, and the many paths to redemption, Barbara Kingsolver has written a novel of overwhelming power and passion

I'm off to read....

It Has Come And Gone

2010-07-05T10:16:00.000+01:00

as quickly and quietly as ever...my two years in London is up. July 1st marked my two year anniversary in London. I still remember exactly what I wore, what it felt like pulling up to my flat in the cab, what I ate (Bodeans!) that first day. What an amazing two years I have had. I came to London full of hope for the future, I knew I would love it and that I would make the best of whatever it would throw at me, that's just how I do things. I came to London because I knew I would always regret not coming, but I was pretty sure that I would never regret coming. But what I didn't know then, and possibly didn't even expect, is how happy I would be here. That I was about to make a life for myself here, not just a temporary existence, but a real life with real friends. It still surprises me sometimes how settled I feel here, everyday life feels like just that...but still with a little something extra! I know a big part of my happiness has to do with the friends I have made here, but a huge part also has to do with London, I have totally fallen in love with this city. I love Londons character, the charm and curb appeal of West London, the raw edge and people watching of East London. Every neighborhood has it's own identity, if you take a walk across London (which I often do) you can not only see the change, but you can feel it too. The music blaring out of the bars begins to change, the people change, the architecture changes...just when you start to vibe on your new setting. It changes all over again. I love it. I love a lazy weekend as much as the next, but it's hard to do that here. There are countless markets to discover, festivals to enjoy...music, sports, food... In the past couple of months I have my weekends have consisted of polo matches, horse races, rooftop BBQs, Pearl Jam and Paul McCartney in Hyde Park, boozy brunches, picnics, World Cup watching with people from all over the world. The list goes on...you would have to make a serious effort to be bored here!

Before you get too worried Mom...no I'm not staying here forever! But rest easy at night, I am happy!

A Tale of a Pathetic Love Affair

2010-06-23T16:27:00.000+01:00

I can't believe that I haven't blogged this one yet. Going back a couple of months here, but this one is definitely one for the books. Here lies one of my most shameful displays of my attempts to make my deluded fantasies of me and Bob Schneider growing old together a reality. I'd say if you know me well, but really if you know me at all, you are well acquainted for my long standing affinity for one Bob Schneider. If you don't know who he is, leave now. Now, I am aware that all self-respecting Texas women share a similar affinity, but I beg to differ. Now, luckily, I am a lot more self-respecting than most self-respecting Texas women and I would not stoop to the level of most to gain a few minutes of Bob's attention, as I am quite certain that would probably lead to a few uncomfortable doctors appointments and a lifetime of valtrex. Sorry, but as much as I love him, I'm not so deluded to think he's not a dirty bird. But that doesn't stop me from attending an embarrassing amount of his shows and throwing elbows to work my way up to the front row or even making posters on one occasion, with sketches none the less, to try and get him to play my favorite song. I digress.

So back in March, my trusty iLike app on my iPhone buzzed and gave me my weekly dose of new local shows of my favorite artists. I casually pulled out my phone to check out the shows and I in a moment that I can only imagine is what it is like for menopausal women experiencing hot flashes, I saw Bob's name flash across my screen. I immediately booked tickets to the show and alerted everyone I knew in the greater London area. Show time finally arrived, and with my newly acquired skills of meeting Rock Stars overseas, I was certain that this was my moment. The moment that I have been waiting 5 years for. The moment in which I could redeem myself for only being able to muster the words "wow, you're really sweaty" when I finally shook hands with Bob in 2005. Yes people, I have mad game.

Annie and I head to see the show, he is actually the opening act for Bowling for Soup. I was furious, Bob is not an "opening act". Anyways, it was a relatively small venue, so we had a good spot and the room was filled with Brits who were actually there to see Bowling for Soup (really?!) and had no idea who Bob was. There were a few Texas people dispersed throughout the crowd, so we had to really put in the effort on the sing-a-longs. I'll tell you this much, a Bob show isn't quite the same when the crowd can't do the sing-a-longs. Towards the end he asked if anyone had any requests, since it was a small crowd and he could hear a few of of Texas folk ~~cheering him on~~ screaming at him. He actually called on me. Finally, I was going to get to hear my favorite Bob song of all time. So I yell out "Tiger and the Lamb" as loud as I can and he says "No" and calls on the next girl. I was deflated. After he finished his set he wandered off stage and disappeared into the night. I was a little bummed. Surprisingly, Bowling for Soup was more entertaining than I expected, probably because of the copeous amounts of booze they consumed while on stage. Then it happened. All of a sudden out of the corner of my eye, I see Annie's arm shoot out and grab someone at the exact same time I hear her voice in slow motion saying "Boooooobbbbbbbb". Really it happened just like that. I whip around, clearly in slow motion as well. And there he is, in all his beautiful, unshaven glory. Two feet from me. He gives us a "hey, how's it going" all casual like. So we (read Annie, because I am frozen like a fish in the dead of winter in northern Siberia) reciprocate with an equally casual "not much, good show." The conversation went back and forth like this, all the while I stood there looking like a aww-struck fembot, until finally he asked us what our plans were that night. We Annie responded we'd probably go to a pub in the area, and he then said "you gotta number". At this point I snapped even further into my frozen stuper while Annie pops out her phone and Bob takes it out of her hands and puts his number in it. This is the second time I have literally wanted to jump out of my skin and kill Annie in a jealous rage. But then I remembered if she wasn't taking action, I certainly wouldn't have been. So after the show we meander over to a local pub and send Bob a friendly "what's your plan" text. We wait, and we wait, and we wait. Finally we give ourself a time limit of pathetic-ness. That comes and goes, ~~so Annie hides the blunt butter knife from me~~ we hold our heads up high and walk out of the pub. When we are on our way back to the tube I have to go to the bathroom, so I run in the movie theatre to use their bathroom. When I come out Annie asks if I just want to see a movie since we didn't have any other plans that night that didn't involve us making memories with Bob. I agree, we buy tickets to Cemetary Junction (not advisable) and large diet cokes and double large popcorns. Don't judge, we have open wounds to lick. We get settled into our seats and sit through the most boring 2 minutes of cinematic crap ever and all of a sudden Annie's phone lights up with "Bob" flashing across the screen. In what was inevitably the most silent part of the movie, Annie squeals "what do i doooooo?!?!" and I answer her back in a voice that I am sure favors Lucifer himself "ANSWER IT!!!!!!!!!!!" She runs out of the movie theatre and answers the call. She comes back and I am anxiously awaiting her arrival in my seat and she says "we are going to the tour bus" I literally throw my popcorn up in the air and start to gather my things. She then informs me, that her conversation with Bob went something like this. In ever such a casual, bored tone...

Bob - Hey, it's Bob

Annie - Oh, hey Bob

Bob- Where are you

Annie - hold on, I can't hear you, let me step outside. There that's better, we are at a pub across the street

Bob- How do I get there

Annie - You cross the street

Bob - Oh, that sounds difficult, do you just want to come to the bus and hang out

Annie - Sure, but we need to finish our beers first

Such composure, I admire you Annie. So I regain no resemblance of such composure and run to the bathroom and jump up and down like a fat kid on Christmas. We wait an appropriate amount of "beer drinking" time and then head over to the bus. But not before Annie stops by the snack counter and tells the manager that the movie was crap and we want our money back. Genius.

We walk up to the tour bus and there Bob, the Bowling for Soup guys and some of their tech guys, managers are standing outside hanging out. Bob sees us approaching and walks over to meet us. This is where it gets weird. I have finally regained use of the spoken word and Annie and I proceed to talk Bob's ear off. Not because we had a bad case of verbal vomit but because the guy who is so charismatic and charming (in my eyes) on stage has the personality of a tree stump. Seriously, it was so weird. I still don't really know what to make of it. It's not that he wasn't nice or didn't talk at all. He was SO nice to us and answered all of our questions, but he just wasn't engaging at all. He offers us beers and doesn't take one for himself, when we call attention to us, he tells us he is sober now. That. Explains. So. Much. The crazy, womanizing Bob that I have heard tales about was the "pre-rehab" Bob. I want that Bob back. Anyways, like I said, he was perfectly nice to us, and I don't know what I expected...for him to dance like a monkey for us, obviously not. But at least I got to ask him why he straight up denied my Tiger and the Lamb request and he said he couldn't play it without a band and his new band didn't know it anyways, but that it was cool that I knew that one. After a bit the bus started up and they had to head onto the next city, but Bob was nice enough to take a couple of pictures with us and walk us out of the tour bus when we left. And that my friends is the tale of how I ended up on my second tour bus in the same month.

All These Things That I've Done

2010-05-26T10:23:00.000+01:00

...I've got soul but I'm not a soldier...sorry I got distracted singing my favorite Killers song while trying to think of a catchy title for my latest act of pure stupidity. Shocking, I know. But actually, on that note...I find that I often break into song (in my head) whenever I hear a phrase or sometimes even a word that is from a song. Hence, I quite literally feel like I am walking around to the soundtrack of my life. Does anyone else do this, or just me?

So back to my stupidity. When I moved to my new flat in February, I went to the shop down the street to stock up on a few household items. They were out of the little individual gel packets of laundry detergent that I usually use that make life oh so simple, so I just grabbed a small jug of liquid, concentrate detergent. I've been happily (I use the term "happily" very loosely as I detest any form of household work) doing my laundry ever since. With the exception to the two times I recently sent out all of my laundry to be done by someone else because I had been travelling a lot and the mound of laundry had risen to shameful heights. And no, I did NOT send out my unmentionables, because that would just be weird, but what I am about to tell you kinda makes me wish that I did.

Last night, I was doing a load of said unmentionables (because clearly the rest of my laundry had just been picked up washed, ironed and folded that morning) and I must have been bored because I took a closer look at my detergent and not so quickly realized that it was fabric softener. That is right people, I have been washing my clothes in ONLY fabric softener for the last 4 months. Ew. I mean I guess they still smell fresh, but they're not really clean. It's times like these when I hate that the US and the UK don't have the same brand names. I mean in the US, it's easy. Snuggles = Fabric Softener. Tide = Detergent. Period. I mean, what am I supposed to make of a brand called Comfort. Fine, now that I know it is fabric softener, the name seems kind of intuative. But they should really add the word FABRIC SOFTENER in really large bold letters on the front of the bottle, not just talk about how cosy it will make all of your clothes in really tiny letters. Needless to say, I have a lot of laundry to redo.

Happy Birthday Ruffie!

2010-04-27T14:13:00.000+01:00

When I first met Melissa freshman year in the dorms I could have never guessed what the next ten years would hold. I can assure you that after a road trip to Dallas to see Dave Matthews that first semester that Melissa would tell you with certainty that I would not be involved in any way, shape or form in her next ten years. But, alas, I prevailed and we went on to live within a barefoot walking distance from each other for the next 4 years. She has been my most trusted confidant, my emotional counterpart, the president of refusing me whiskey, my new york hotel, the source of my inspiration for having the confidence to move to London and most of all the best friend anyone could ask for! Happy Birthday Ruffie, you'll always be older than me!!

These are just a few of the reasons that I love this girl....

Fighting Fit

2010-04-22T13:35:00.000+01:00

Over the last couple of years I've managed to put back on all the weight I lost post college (after putting on the sophmore 20) I've even been so dedicated to this I decided to go ahead and put on a little extra for good measure. Ugh, sick of this and sick of being here again. I have obviously been a member of two different gyms since I've been in London and I have done the same thing with both...go strong for about 2-3 months then drop off all together. The thought of joining another gym and running on a treadmill and going to Body Pump made me want to gag. Besides, I knew I'd just do the same thing I always did...quit going. So I decided that I needed something different that would keep my interest longer and I came up with boxing. Cara and I had done a few boxing classes in Dallas and I really enjoyed those, they were a great release of pent up frustration. Because of this I already own a set of boxign gloves and a set of pretty pink wraps.

One quick Google search later and I found out that there is a boxing gym right down the street from my office. I checked out their website and saw that they have evening boxing classes and even women's only classes twice a week. I called them to make sure that these classes were more along the lines of "fitness" rather than training for actual boxers. They assured me they were so I headed over to Rooney's Boxing Gym the next day for my very first women's only boxing class to check it out. Lucky me, they had just added an additional time for the class since their classes were beginning to get a bit crowded and I showed up at the very first one...and no one else did. So I got a free one on one with a trainer. Ouch! That is all that I have to say about that. I quickly found out that my pink wraps were unacceptable and got myself a new green pair. I then proceeded to work out with Micky, a scrappy irishman who I can't understand a word he says! We finally started speaking with hand signals and got along grand. Although I couldn't walk for three days afterwards, I went back for more this week and joined up for the year! I am loving this place. It is a legit boxing gym where real boxers train, it smells like something very sweaty died in it, there are blood stains on the mats in the boxing rings and it is an absolute sausage fest...I love it! Apparently the owner, John Rooney Jr. (who wrapped my hands for me last time) is one of the most respected and sought after boxing coaches in all of the UK...what have I signed myself up for?!?!

All of this gym joining/me being sick of lugging around 20 extra lbs came at the perfect time. We just started a Biggest Loser challenge in our department at work! So I have the next three months to lose lose lose!! My goal is 12% of my body weight, so lets see if I can reach it! I'll keep you all updated on my progress...maybe even some before and after photos if you're lucky!!

Sorry Mom...

2010-04-20T17:55:00.000+01:00

I've done it again, I've managed to sign myself up for another ridiculous challenge with Annie. Exactly one year from today I will be in the midst of crossing India via rickshaw, racing against 60 other richshaws full of fellow lunatics! I am literally so excited about this I might wet my pants! It all started about a year ago when Annie told me there was a rickshaw race across India to which I replied "when do we sign up?" Unfortunately, it's not that easy. They have three races a year, in which you have to sign up a year in advance and they sell out in under a minute. We were trying to sign up for the Winter 2011 race, but we were otherwise occupied climbing Mt. Kilimanjaro during the sign up. We had Colby try to register us, but she said it was sold out before she could even refresh her screen.

So that brings us to yesterday. Sign up for the Spring 2011 Rickshaw Run, 2pm GMT. Annie and I were exchanging phone calls and emails all morning prepping ourselves to make sure we secured a spot in the Run. I had my screen pulled up just staring at it at least an hour before sign up started. About 5 minutes 'til, I started refreshing my screen like a mad woman just waiting for that green button to pop up. I called Annie minutes before and we both had crazy butterflies...it was a massive race against the clock. But it paid off, Team Rickshaw Rodeo will be racing across India April 17-May 1, 2011!

So a little more about the Rickshaw Run. It is put on by a company called The Adventurists, which is basically is a bunch of guys who tried to think of the stupidest things you could try and do and made them possible, all in the name of adventure. The "race" is more about the adventure you have in the two weeks between start and finish and not about who gets there first. There really are no rules (other than if you lose or completely total their rickshaw you have to pay for it) and there is absolutely no support during the actual race, you are completely on your own. They give you a rickshaw, a start and an end point and say "Go!" That is it, you figure out your own route, your own accomodation, if you break down you have to find someone to fix it (which they guarantee you will break down as rickshaws are the least reliable mode of transportation). Read their warning here, unless you are my mom...don't read it Mom...really, don't. Basically, it sounds like the most fun 2 weeks ever, to me at least!

So not only is this in the name of adventure, but also charity. For each Run, they select a couple of local charities in India to support, so Annie and I will have to raise £1,000 to be able to compete. I am so excited, but I'm not so sure what I have gotten myself into this time!

You can read more about it here....http://rickshawrun.theadventurists.com/

A walk in the park

2010-04-19T12:19:00.002+01:00

Such a beautiful day in London on Sunday...spent the day eating ice cream in regents park followed by a little "punting" aka boating!

Ps. Don't you love my new iPhone app. Hipstamatic..makes fun old timey pics (thanks ruble for the tip off!)

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Best Night of my Life....

2010-03-30T15:28:00.000+01:00

Yes people...it has happened, the best night of my life! Okay, so maybe that is a bit over dramatic. It all started one february afternoon while I was at work and I was listening to my favorite band, Blue October, on my ipod. They had made there very first trip overseas last year, so I thought I'd check out their tour schedule to see if they were coming back to London anytime soon. They weren't, but there WERE going to be in Germany in just a mere two weeks!! They were playing on a Sunday night in Munich, which happens to be one of my favorite cities. So what is a girl to do but book herself a 24 hour trip to Germany! One EasyJet ticket, hostel booking and VIP concert ticket later I was going to see my boys in Munich!

I landed in Munich around 10 am on Sunday morning, I had already seen most of Munich since I've been twice before so I headed to my hostel to drop off my bag and headed in to find somewhere good to eat. Something weird happened...I was totally scared to go in anywhere and eat by myself! This is so weird for me, after years of travelling for work I am very accustomed to eating by myself, I do it all the time in London. In fact, I even prefer to go to the movies by myself...at least once a week. Why now, I am going to assume it was the fact that I don't speak a lick of German. So anyways, after trying to gather the courage at least 4 times, I finally settled on a Twix bar from a vending machine and a nap at the hostel since I had woken up at 4 am to catch my flight to Germany.

As you read before, I ponied up and bought the VIP ticket since it had a "meet and greet" with the band. Obviously. I had visions of them immediately befriending me as soon as they heard my Texas accent in a foreign land, so clearly I had to go to the "meet and greet". Well all of a sudden when I was waiting for the U-bahn I got this giant pit in my stomach, I was so nervous! I suddenly realized that they would be the first "famous" people I had ever possibly conversed with, I was terrified, what would I say to them??? So I walked myself over to a bar and got myself a tall beer and called Annie for some confidence! The beer calmed my nerves a little, by the time I showed up to the venue there was already a line of about 50 Germans waiting to get their posters signed...who brings posters?? not me, I didn't bring anything to get signed. Darn the luck. My big moment was quickly approaching, but I started to notice they weren't really talking to anyone, they were just hurridly signing the posters and feeding people through the lines...what?!?! How was I going to make my everlasting impression?? When it was my turn, I got to take a picture with them so I approached them with my best "Hi Y'all" hoping they would hear my Texas drawl and the rest would be history. Epic Fail. But here is the picture...I look as giddy as a fat kid with cake and they look like they'd rather die than be standing there taking this picture.

While waiting in line I met a lovely Austrian girl named Daniela, she was still in high school and had lied to her parents and taken a train to Germany to come to the concert! Had no idea that they had so many Germany fans! After my picture, we were all basically kicked out of the concert venue to wait outside in the cold until the show started. I was so annoyed!! The venue was in the middle of nowhere so we just had to sit there for 2 hours. I was starting to rethink my whole decision as I saw my image of how this was all going to go down slipping through my fingers. They finally let us back in and Daniela and I got a prime spot right at the front. Before the show started I went to go get a beer and passed by the merchandise table when I had the sudden realization that the merchandise guy was probably from Texas too, so I stopped by and sure enough he was! So I chatted with Dave (the merch guy) for a while, it was nice to find another Texan in the crowd of Germans. Once the opening band went of I went back to my spot with Daniela and we enjoyed the show, they were amazing as always, Justin is always one for the theatrics :)

Towards the end of the show, I went back to the bar to get another beer and I passed by my friend Dave again and offered to buy him a beer, which he accepted. I came back with our beers and stayed back with him the rest of the show while we drank and chatted. He told me the band was coming back there after the show to sign more autographs, so you know I hung around. After everyone had cleared out a bit I bought the band Jaeger shots, since Dave tipped me off that they are Justin's favorite (mine too!) and the rest is history!!! They invited me to come back to their tour bus and hang out...not lying....I hung out in Blue October's tour bus with the band until about 4 am. Best. Night. Of. My. Life.

They are actually all amazingly nice, cool, laid back guys. I did have to leave for the airport in a mere 3 hours and go straight to work so I managed to make myself go back to the hostel at 4 am (what was I thinking, I should have gone straight to the airport from the tour bus!) My new friend Dave was so sweet and walked me back to the train stop (I miss Texas boys for this very reason...covered in tattoos but still a southern gentleman!) So I now have the email address and phone number of Blue Octobers Merch manager, saving that one for sure! He emailed me the next day to tell me it was good to meet me at the show and that he hoped I had fun on the bus and to let me know next time I come to a show...you bet I am Dave, see you soon!!

Me and Dave

Zanzibar - Stonetown

2010-03-25T23:26:00.001Z

Well folks...here we are, my final Africa post. And only a solid 2 months after I got back, way to go me. I have also missed NUMEROUS blogable events over the past two months...including the best night OF MY LIFE! Don't worry...I'll get to that!

So since my first Zanzibar post was getting OOC (out of control) long I decided to cut off after my trauma at the beach and do another post for our day in Stonetown. I'm not sure if I mentioned this {and I'm too lazy to look} in my last post, but it should be known that Zanzibar had been without power on the entire island for like 2 months solid when we were there! So the entire island was being run off of generators...big, loud, gas powered generators. They whole island was abuzz...sorry I couldn't resist. After our fabulous, yet slightly traumatic {for me} 3 days at the beach we headed into Stonetown for our last night. Stonetown is a tragically delapidated city with an even more tragic past. Stonetown was home to the last working slave market. It only closed in 1873 and I forget the exact numbers, but we are talking hundreds of thousand of slaves were trafficked through Stonetown. Disgusting.

We arrived in the city around lunch time and I think we were all quite shocked at the state of it after spending the last few days relaxing on a beautiful resort. The town is made up of a bunch of decrepit stone buildings, with narrow dirt alleyways weaving throughout them. The lack of electricity only exacerbated the situation. Stonetown is predominately Muslim, so very few women were seen on the streets. Mostly men, trying to sell you something and loads of children, most barefoot, trying to get a little attention. The stark contrast of the city set in one of the most beautiful locations ever really can't be avoided.

We went for lunch at this great Arabic restaurant...minus the fact that my chicken was on the bone and they had no AC, it was a pretty good lunch!

After lunch we walked along the seawall and saw these little bits of preciousness playing in the waves!

After lunch we visited the House of Wunder, which is an old house belonging to royalty which has now been turned into a museum documenting the history of Zanzibar as well as the Slave trade. After the museum we headed to the local markets.

The fresh fruit/vegetable market...no thank you

Some GIANT 'nanners

Some Rambutan...fruits, similar to lychee

The fish market...you can count me OUT!

After deciding that I was not going to eat any non packaged foods in Stonetown we headed over to the location of the slave market. There has since been a church built over the spot, but there is a memorial statue to commemorate the event. We had a very adventagious tour guide who was not afraid to ask for his tip afterwards :)

After touring the old slave market we just wandered the lovely streets (ahhhm....alleyways) and did a little shopping from the oh so kind shopkeepers who couldn't wait to get us in their shops.

said "street"...this is the main drag

a more scenic street view

That night we had our last dinner on the rooftop restaurant of our hotel...it was actually really nice, but I did opt for the veggie risotto after seeing the fish market earlier that day! We were advised not to go out wandering the streets after dark since Stonetown isn't the safest of towns. So we spent our last night up on the rooftop hanging out with each other. We had a great group on this trip, we really lucked out!!

We just had time for one last "lunch with a view" the next day before we had to head to the airport. I had another stellar trip to Africa, one I won't soon forget. Again the people of Africa have amazed me with their joy, graciousness and their endurance. They face more challenges daily than most face in a lifetime and once again I have been reminded of the abundance of grace in my life.

I'll leave you with this little gem! I think this lovely lady came to Zanzibar and never went home :)

Zanzibar - The Beach

2010-03-08T17:49:00.000Z

Now before you get all jealous about me getting to go to Zanzibar, which is absolute paradise, please keep in mind that I earned it!! Not only did I spend 6 days climbing the tallest free standing mountain in the world without a shower, a toliet, a full nights sleep, etc...but I also went through the seven cirlces of hell to actually get to the island! It all started back at the Kilimanjaro Mountain Resort, to which we got to return after our 6 days on the mountain. It was such a treat to stay in a nice lodge with a swimming pool and nice rooms and showers...oh the showers! All was grand on our first night back. The next morning we woke up and I couldn't move! I was SO sore!!! The entire time on the mountain, I never once woke up sore, I attribute the soreness to the journey back down the mountain. As I mentioned in my previous post, I FAR underestimated the downward journey, I was so focused on the journey up! Well, let me tell you friends, besides the summit day, down was by far the worst part! It kills your knees and your hip flexors, not to mention you are sooooo over being on a mountain with no toliets or showers! So anyways, the day started off STIFF, but I couldn't complain, I was on my way to Zanzibar...just one short 2 hour flight separating me and a relaxing day on the beach. Not so my friends, not so.

First we had to make the 2 hour drive on the ever so bumpy roads back to the Kilimanjaro airport in our less than air-conditioned van. Not so bad. We get there, rushing to the check in counter all 11 of us with our 15 bags to be checked. What's that you say, you over sold the flight. Of course. I should take this time to mention that the airport systems in Africa do not run like the well-oiled machines you are so accustomed to in the states. There is not much official about any of it, think hand written boarding passes, outdoor waiting rooms with dirt floors, you get the drift? So it turns out that 3 of us are going to have take a different flight from a different airport. They were about to close our gate so the three of us who hadn't gotten our boarding passes (of course, we all know which group I was in) were separate from the rest of the group and given all 15 of the bags to be checked, chucked into a van with the luggage and were speeding off towards the Arusha airport before you could even say Hakuna Matata! What?!?! I'm sorry, can someone please give me some more details? Am I headed off to a Kenyan brothel never to be seen or heard from again?? No, no...we were assured the Arusha airport knew we were coming and we were guaranteed to get on the plane to Zanzibar with all 15 of our groups bags. Phew, that was a close one!

So about and hour and a half later we pulled up to the Arusha Airport, which was the dirt landing strip airport that Annie got to fly the plane and I wanted to push her out of the cockpit (and the plane altogether) and fly the plane myself...remember?? What do you know, the tiny departure check in desk was crowded with tons of people trying to get to Zanzibar. It seems that over booking flights is not only a problem for the Kilimanjaro Airport. We march straight up to some official-ish looking person and tell them we have come from the Kili Aiport and have been promised to be put on the next flight to Zanzibar with all 15 bags of luggage we just unloaded. He looks at us with a mocking grin and says "of course you were, but it's Africa". Luckily, he calls up some people and identifies who we are and gives us some of those official hand written boarding passes. As for the luggage it is taken away in a little buggy and rolled to the side of the runway...that must be a good sign. We go to wait in our high tech departures lounge aka. a patch of dirt with some white plastic lawn chairs. Two hours later we are boarding the plane, but we can see that our buggy of luggage has not moved an inch. I'll give credit where credit is due, Dave fought tooth and nail to get that luggage on the flight, but they weren't having it. Apparently when it is hot out the air is thinner (or thicker, I forget) and they can basically only carry the passengers on the plane because of weight restrictions so our luggage never stood a chance. They told us it would be on the next flight to Zanzibar, tomorrow.

So we finally arrived in Zanzibar about 4 hours after we were supposed to and met up with the rest of our group, who I didn't envy for a second. They had been waiting for FOUR hours for us at the airport in Zanzibar. I should mention that the airport is almost entirely outdoor, there is no air conditioning and the humiditiy is about 110%. We all made a trip into town to get some necessities since we would be without our bags for at least 24 hours. You know, toothpaste and swimsuits! The swimsuit I had to buy was not documented and has been donated to charity already as it was about 4 sizes to small and the top was made to cover a 12 year old girl who had not yet gone through puberty. But I will show you a picture of some of the awesome shirts the guys got to wear.

We finally arrived at the Fumba Beach Lodge and it was paradise! We were greeted with fresh coconut juice and then we had just enough time to put on our tacky swimsuits and have a few beers in the pool and watch the sunset!

Sunset from Fumba...not too shabby!

Then we all "got ready" as much as you can with no bags and enjoyed our first dinner at Fumba, it was amazing as was every other dinner we had there! Then it was off for an early night to bed as we were all exhausted from our days crazy journey! The lodge has a bunch of these thatched roof bungalows, which were really awesome, until I realized they did little to keep the abundant amount of gecko's out of our room. You can imagine how restful my sleep was while at Fumba. How is it possible that these stupid lizards can haunt me across the world! There is a light above the front door to the bungalow of course all of the nasty lizards congregate right above the door and just stare down at you daring you to open the door. Well, clearly, I couldn't possibly be the one to unlock the door. So Annie, who is also deathly afraid of these things, got nominated to open the door and then I would run as fast as I could into the room and she would slam the door shut. That was the plan. The first night, she finally pulled herself together and went to put the key in the door and a lizard CAME OUT OF THE KEYHOLE!!!! She screamed, I screamed....we heard people laughing across the whole property. By this time our fellow travellers had come to know our mutual fear of lizards very well. Luckily, Dave came to our rescue and opened our door, as we made him do every other night as well. Needless to say, this was not the last time we were driven to screams due to lizards over the next three days.

Our room at Fumba Beach Lodge

The next morning I had to face my second biggest fear (behind lizards, of course) snorkeling! Yes, people, I am terrified of the ocean! I have been ever since my family went to Mexico when I was 11 and I went snorkeling with my Dad and my sister and we saw a barracuda and all I could think about was that episode of Flipper (my favorite show at the time obviously) where the girl is attacked by a barracuda because she is wearing a sparkley necklace and barracudas are attracted to shiny objects. And of course I was wearing a nautical themed swimsuit with a giant golden anchor embroidered on the chest like a freakin' bullseye, thanks Mom! Clearly she did not watch that episode of Flipper. Anyways, so I am emotionally scarred. I have tried snorkeling a handful of other times and they all end the same way, with me hyper-venhilating and sucking in copious amounts of salt water in through the snorkel. Well, I was determined to give it another shot, I mean, I was in Zanzibar! I had even bought an underwater camera for the occasion. I should mention that while, yes, I did buy the camera for it's underwater functionality, the real reason behind that was that I lost a camera a couple of years ago in Cabo by dropping it in a glass of beer and I figured if it was waterproof it was beerproof too! Anyways, so after a mild panic attack I put on my wetsuit - to protect from both sunburn and jelly fish, how convenient (please note heavy sarcasm). We had to wade out to our dhow (traditional Zanzibari boat) and headed off to the reef.

The dhow is basically a bunch of old rotting wood nailed together, so as you can imagine, I was less than pleased to be sailing out over open water in this "Titanic waiting to happen". All of a sudden we stopped in the middle of the ocean and they told us to jump in! WHAT?!?!? The only snorkeling I had ever done was the kind where you rent the equipment from the guy on the beach and wade out and see what ever you could right off of the beach. And I had enough of an issue with that. And this guy wants me to jump out of this ~~future shipwreck~~ perfectly good boat into open water. I mean has he seen the movie Open Water. Somehow I managed to step outside of my body for a few moments and climb down the ladder into the water (I don't jump into any body of water, as a promise to my mother, after the "incident" at the lake that fateful 4th of July in 2005). I did a few breathing exercises to calm myself down so as not to inhale a lungful of water and then I did it, I assumed the position and put my face in the water. It was BEAUTIFUL!! I had never seen a coral reef before, well in person, and I never imagined that it could be so pretty. Now I get why people are addicted to scuba diving. But don't expect me to do a 180 anytime soon and grow fins, I still have a very healthy ~~fear~~ respect for the ocean and all that inhabits it...aka. sharks.

Proof that I got in the water

Nasty Sea Cucumber

We were supposed to have about 90 minutes to snorkel, but the weather got bad after 45 minutes and the water got really choppy and got stirred up so much you couldn't really see anything anyways. I will say that I did enjoy myself, but that does not mean that I wasn't a tense, nervous wreck the entire 45 minutes that I was in the water. I would turn around at least 4-5 times a minute to make sure that Jaws wasn't creeping up on me from behind. So we had to get back on our dhow after only 45 minutes and we were wisked off to our private island to enjoy a picnic on the beach as well as a couple of hours relaxing on the beach. Oh what paradise!

View of our Dhow from the private island

The next day we all spent hanging around the resort, mostly by the pool. I also got a 90 minute massage in a treehouse in a Boabab tree, awesome! The spa was literally a treehouse built in this giant tree! It was so peaceful and all you could hear was the sound of the wind rustling the leaves and the waves in the distance. I could get used to that!

A bunch of dhows

View from the hammock that I spent the better part of the day in

Simba...the lodge's dog...we made friends, he hung out with me on the beach all day!

That night was our last night at the resort so we got to have dinner as a group on the beach by candlelight...very romantic! It was also a full moon, which was very cool to see the moon's reflection off of the ocean. Since it was our last night at the lodge (we were headed to Stonetown the next day) we decided to have our very own full moon party on the beach! It was very tame, by Thailand standards, but we stayed up until almost 5 am drinking beers on the beach and hanging out...a very memorable night!

Our very own Full Moon Party

Since this post has gotten rather lengthy, I'll stop here and continue on with Stonetown in another post! I am am also still uploading my Zanzibar pictures to Shutterfly so look for those tomorrow!

Tanzania - Mt. Kilimanjaro

2010-03-04T18:42:00.000Z

So I failed epically on last weeks promise to finish my Africa blogs! I do have somewhat of an excuse since I was without internet at my new flat until last night. Now I am up and running and I have lots to catch you all up on, but first I have to finish writing about my Africa trip! This is the most important (and maybe most awaited) entry from my trip, since it was the whole reason for the trip in the first place!! It was funny, on the trip we were all saying how all we were focusing on and preparing for before the trip was the Kili climb and that we almost forgot about the safari and the Zanzibar portion!

I left off on my last "Africa" post after we had spent about 4 days on safari in the Serengeti and we were on a small plane (being flown by Annie...still SO jealous I could scream!) headed to the Kilimanjaro Airport. We had about a 2 hour drive to our hotels for the night, the Kilimanjaro Mountain Resort. Let me tell you, this place was a treat! It was such a nice place to spend the last night before we were going to be camping in tents for the next 6 nights with no running water or toliets. We spent most of the afternoon in the swimming pool, gooding off and having out obligitory Kilimanjaro beer...they say it helps with the altitude, ha! I, in true "lauren fashion", almost sprained my ankle the day before our climb...not surprising! We were all taking running jumps into the pool and I slipped and fell into the pool (luckily). Never fear, there is definitely a picture of me mid-air, flailing about with a look of pure terror on my face. I am NOT, however, going to post that picture on my blog (for one, I am in a bathing suit and for two, the look on my face is truly embarrassing). If you are so inclined, the picture is posted on my shutterfly site, you can go hunt for it if it really means that much to you. Luckily, my ankle was only sore for a couple of hours...I can honestly say that I remember exactly what I was thinking at the exact moment the camera caught me mid-air with the look of horror. I was thinking "OUCH...no friggin way did I just sprain my ankle the DAY before this climb...how typical!" We also tested out the underwater feature on my camera and got some pretty good pics! After our swim we had our preparation meeting with Paulo, when he explained everything we would need to know about the mountain, what to expect each day, etc...I was thoroughly horrified by the end of the meeting, even though Paulo kept referring to this as the "easiest part of our trip" or as a "piece of cake". I kept asking for my cake {one day we actually GOT cake on the mountain, i had 4 pieces, it didn't help}

The next morning we all brought our "Kili" bags down to reception, this of course after Annie and I packed and repacked our Kili bags about 10 times the night before. We had a duffel bag that had been provided to us and we were only allowed to pack in that one bag, and it couldn't weigh more than 15kg...it had to fit our sleeping bag in it and everything! That may sound like a lot for 6 days, but I had a small pharmacy with me if you will remember. We had to drive for a little over two hours to get to the base of the mountain where we would meet our porter and guides. Luckily, I was in the Land Cruiser that did not get a flat tire as it was about 100 degrees outside! We took the Rongai route, which is the only route that goes up the northern/Kenyan face of the mountain, so it took a while to get there. When we arrived we were met by our 39 porters and guides. thirty nine. There were 10 of us climbing, but we had 39 porters! We were quite literally a small village moving our way up the mountain. Of the 39, we had 6 guides who stayed with us during our hike each day and helped up set our pace, made sure we were drinking enough water and kept us heading in the right direction. The rest of the 33 were porters. These guys are amazing, they truly have the most difficult job on Earth! They carried, not only our 15 kg bags (on their heads, none the less!) but also their own bags, enough drinking water for all 50 of us, all of our food for the next 6 days, our tents, etc. And not only did they carry this, but they would stay behind at camp each morning after we set off for the day and pack camp up then within an hour they were already flying by us on the trail and had our next camp set up and a hot dinner ready for us by the time the 10 of us made it to the next camp. Ridiculous!

So after we met our guides, we set off! Our pace was so slow it was almost embarrassing. I really couldn't believe how slowly they were making us walk. This was honestly what I was most worried about, the pace. You see in my everyday life I am a slow walker, I always say that I like to meander through life. When you add an upward slope to the mix, I'm even slower. I was so worried that I would be lagging behind at the back of the pack everyday trying to keep up. But we seriously walked so slow I was at the front! I have photographic proof!

The first day was actually a really nice hike, it was pretty warm down at the base, but for most of the day we were in the rainforest so there was lots of shade. The incline wasn't very steep and we only hiked for about 4-5 hours. Our first campsite we had all to ourselves, one of the benefits of hiking the much less used Rongai route. We all got settled into our tents and then had our first dinner on the mountain. I was shocked at how good the food was on the trip. They cooked everything on a couple of gas burners and they turned out food that I wouldn't be able to cook in my kitchen at home! Annie and I shared a tent the whole time, and we were SO glad that we were sharing with a friend. There is absolutely no privacy in these tiny tents and they are tight quarters! Plus, it was FREEZING at night, so we snuggled.

The next morning, after barely sleeping a wink (due to the fact we were on a slope and kept sliding down!), we were woken by our porters at 6 am with "morning tea" and "washy washy". Seriously, this kind of camping is awesome! The porters wake you up and ask if you want coffee, tea or hot chocolate...how many sugars, milk, they make it just how you want it. Then they pass it through your tent and you get to stay in your sleeping bag and have morning tea while waking up a bit! Then they bring you a bucket of hot water for "washy washy." To be honest, I didn't even bother after the first day, I just gave myself a wet wipe bath and used the hot water to soak my feet in! We had breakfast of scrambled eggs, bacon, toast, fruit and oatmeal and then we were on our way for day two on the mountain!

Day two was going to be quite a bit longer than day one, we hiked for around 8 hours the second day, athough we did get about an hour break for a hot lunch! The second day wasn't very steep, we were crossing around the side of the mountain, so it was just a gentle slope, but a very long time to be on your feet. Day two was going well until it started raining. And raining. And raining. The last two hours of our hike it rained steadily the whole time. Genius that I am, felt like I had spent too much money on equipment already so I didn't buy the waterproof pants like they "highly recommended". I did have a rain jacket and a rain cover for my daypack (thank goodness!) but from the waste down I was absolutely drenched! I'm not going to lie, it was pretty miserable. Oh and I also had a pretty epic fall, again, not surprising at all! To my defense the rocks were really slippery and we were going down a big rock face at the time.

We finally made it to our camp that night and it was still raining and kept at it through most of the night. It was impossible to dry any of our wet clothes, so I had a disgusting bag of mildewed clothes when I got back! We were all pretty miserable that night, but when we woke up the next morning, it was a beautiful day and I woke up to a fantastic view from my tent!

The peak you see is Mawenzi. Mt Kilimanjaro actually has three peaks; Kibo is the highest and the one we were going to conquer, Mawenzi is the second and served as out campsite for the next night, and Shira is the third and smallest. With the sun shining, we set off towards Mawenzi. This day was a little steeper than the other days, but was also shorter at only around 5-6 hours total hiking.

This is our group of 10 at 4000 meters, were were all pretty excited about this milestone!

As you can see, a little steeper this day...

This is us at the top of the Mawenzi ridge on our acclimatizing hike. Most days after we arrived at our next camp we would go on an acclimatizing hike, these were only about an hour or so, but they would help us acclimate to the altitude better. As you can see the altitude had started to affect us all!!

This night we slept at the base of Mawenzi and it was C.O.L.D. We woke up early, around 5 am, on our 4th day and headed off. We were all getting excited and nervous as this was our final day before our summit attempt! This was a long day to say the least. I think we hiked around 8 hours this day. First we had to decend from Mawenzi and cut across to the saddle. Don't get me wrong, the downhill was a welcome change, but why did I have to go up the day before just to go down the next day??? The saddle was the most deceiving thing you've ever seen! We could see our next campsite as a spec in the distance. It only looked like it would take a couple of hours to get there, oh how wrong we were! about 5 hours later we finally had conquered the saddle. The saddle is almost completely flat (except for the last half hour, which was pure ~~hell~~ bliss) but it is grueling. First off, it is never-ending, second we are above 4000 meters and altitude is starting to really affect your breathing and third, did I mention that it is never ending!!!

This is the whole group about to take off across the saddle. Basically, it is that whole stretch of land between where we are and the base of Kibo. Oh yeah...that's Kibo!!!

So the above picture may give you some idea of how difficult the summit climb is. Like I mentioned above, the saddle took us about 4-5 hours to cross and it was relatively flat. You can see that Kibo is obviously jutting up pretty steeply and we climbed from the base of Kibo to the top the next day, so that is a lot of altitude to gain in one day! So we finally made it across the dreaded saddle to our next campsite, Kibo Hut. This is the base camp for the summit and where all trails converge. It is a much bigger camp with a lot more people, it reminded us that we weren't the only people on this mountain! We had an early dinner and then were meant to go to "bed" by about 6 pm just to be woken up at 11pm to start getting ready for our middle of the night summit attempt! I say "bed" because we clearly didn't sleep! It was so friggin' cold there was no way I could sleep. Plus the altitude apparently affects your ability to sleep as well. If anyone is keeping track, at this point I had only "slept" for a combined total of maybe 5 hours the entire 4 nights we had been on the mountain. Delerium. So we "woke" up at 11 pm and put on our million layers, which the sheer act of getting dress had me out of breath! I wore 5 layers, top and bottom and was still freezing. You do the summit hike in the middle of the night because the mountain is made up of scree (loose gravel) but in the middle of the night it is so cold that the scree freezes into a more solid form making it easier to walk up. How convenient. I, of course, wasn't ready on time so I didn't have time to eat a full breakfast or re-adjust my backpack to accomodate for the 4 extra layers of clothes I had on under it so I got off to a rocky start.

Promply at midnight we started our ascent. I was quite flustered from the whole no food, awkward backback issue. About an hour into the hike I was done. I knew there was no way I was going to make it to the top. My backpack was not adjusted properly and was causing my sciatica in my back to act up, I was freezing, I was starving and I wasn't able to drink enough water since it was packed away in my backpack. {word of advice for anyone who wants to hike in general...buy a camelbak! I didn't have one and it is very difficult to reach around and get your bottle out of your bag, especially with 28 layers of clothes on} On the way to the top we had 5 check points along the way to know we were on track and also to take a small break (1-2 minutes small! If we stopped longer than that we would start to freeze). At this point we were still about 45 minutes from our first marker and I was this miserable, I didn't see how I could make it to the top. Isaac, one of our guides, literally saved me! He offered to carry my backpack for a while so I could rest. After this, I figured I had to carry on at least to the first check point. In my mind I had already decided that I was going to turn around at the first check point. So for the next 45 minutes I just kept thinking "left, right, left, right" to keep moving one foot in front of the other. Somehow I made it there, I was still really considering quitting. At this point they decided to split our group of 10 into two groups, the "fast group" and the "slow group". I don't think I need to tell you which group I got allocated into! This made me feel a little better as I knew I could keep my pace slow and now I wasn't worried about holding any of my other group members back. So I decided to keep on going.

The second checkpoint was another 2 hours away. This entire 2 hours, alternated thinking my usual "left, right, left" with "you can do this, you can do this, you can do this" and also a little "how embarrassing will it be to tell everyone at home you didn't make it" {just for good measure} and good thing I did because somehow I made it to the next check point! They told me the third checkpoint was only about 45 minutes away and it was called Jamaica Rocks...I liked the sound of that. So I kept on going.

About an hour later we were at Jamaica Rocks, now you have to keep in mind that it is pitch black outside and all you can see is directly in front of you from the light of your tiny head torch. I was ectatic to be at Jamaica Rocks, the next stop was Gilmans Point! When you looked up into the darkness all you could see were little trails of head lamps weaving their way up the darkness. It was really cool, but also really discouraging, I kept thinking they looked so far away! We started weaving out way around some boulders and climbing up and over some. I didn't mind too much, I was still just concentrating on keeping one foot in front of the other at this point. After about an hour the sun started to rise, we faced back to watch it for a few minutes and it was an amazing site. It also gave me hope that we must be close to Gilmans point since we were supposed to watch the sunrise from Gilmans Point...so we couldn't be too far away, right??

Me and my life-saver, Isaac, at sunrise

So I turned back to face the mountain and look up to see how close we must be now that the sun was shining its light onto the mountain. This was the second time that I was sure I had to quit and go back down. I was staring up at a never ending boulder field up, up, up. I was exhausted. I had no energy. I had barely been able to drink a liter of water (I should have had at least 2 by this point). I was so done. This was all an internal battle I was having with myself. I never actually voiced that I wanted to quit, but I think they all knew it. Somehow we kept each other going. Jamaica Rocks took us over 2 hours to get up, I was so weak at this point that I kept falling over. Not because I would trip, I would literally just take a step and fall over.

See exhibit A.

This picture should also give you a good picture of what Jamaica Rocks looked like. Needless to say, I no longer like the sound of Jamaica rocks!

At one point, I remeber hearing Annie (who was in the fast group), cheering me on from Gilman's Point. That gave me a lot of encouragement to go on and also that we couldn't be far away. I was wrong again, it was still about 45 minutes before we finally reached Gilman's Point.

My first steps up on Gilman's Point

By the time we reached Gilman's the fast group had already gone on to Uhuru Peak, the true Summit of Kilimanjaro. Our group decided to finish at Gilman's. Gilman's is actually the top of the mountain. Kibo is a giant crater and Gilman's is on one side and Uhuru is around on the opposite side standing only a couple hundred meters higher, making it the true summit. It is a 3 hour round trip journey to Uhuru and I was so weak I couldn't stand, literally...you saw the picture of me falling and it wasn't the only one! Plus, it is considered a successful summit attempt to reach Gilman's Point and you get a certificate and everything...so count me DONE!

Me, looking across the crater at Uhuru, thinking "No thank you"

The "Slow Group"

The worst part was that we still had to go down! It took us about 2 hours to go down what had just taken us 7 hours to go up! It was exhausting, but at least I got to "ski" down the scree! The gravel was now loose since the sun was up, so you literally just run straight down letting the gravel carry you down. It was actually really scary at points and I had a few tumbles, but none of them hurt, it was actually kind of fun to roll down!

This is from the bottom of the scree hill looking back up, you can see my tracks down.

I know this post has been so long, so I'll spare you the details of the next two days descending the mountain. The highlights are that the journey down was much more difficult than I anticipated. I forgot to put on my sock liners and got some wicked blisters on the last day to show for it. My knees were killing me. I was so ready to be off of the mountain. No shower for 6 days. Yeah that about sums up the descent!

Here is a picture of us with our 39 porters and guides on our last morning on the mountain. They sang us some songs and were on there way!

This last picture is me with my new luggage for the rest of the trip. I left my backpack with the porters on the mountain and all we could find for me to put my stuff in was this awesome mail sack. It got dubbed the "white ball" and I even shrink wrapped that sucker at the airport and sent it home with me to London!

That's all for now....up next, Zanzibar!

A{nother} Change of Address

2010-02-21T14:03:00.002Z

I'm goint to take a small break from my Tanzania posts (still two more to come!) and write about my past week, maybe you'll understand why I have been so delayed in posting all of my pictures and stories from Africa! Last weekend I finally finished packing up my old flat at 5 am, just in time for the movers to arrive at 8 am! We loaded up and moved over to my new address in Camden! I am so in love with my new flat, it is so much smaller than my old flat, but it is so cute and I LOVE my new location. I am so much more centrally located and it takes about half the time to get to work every day {best perk ever}. I am only one block from Regents Park, which will be so great in the summer! I am {of course} still unpacking, I swear it is never ending! I didn't get to spend my first night in my new flat because my friends Elsa and Laura Gray had a Mardi Gras party at there house over on the West side of town. The party was fantastic, Laura Gray went all out and made Jambalaya, homemade King cake and Milk Punch! Milk punch, is my official new favorite drink...milk and whiskey mixed together, it's like it was made just for me! Now, I don't know all of the ingredients but it tasted kind of like a white russian, but better. I was planning on spending the night at my old flat, since it was closer to the party, but we ended up staying up until 4 am so I just stayed at the girls place. The next morning I had to go over to pick up some final things and let the cleaners in to my old flat. I dropped 8 trash bags of clothes, shoes, etc off at the charity shop...EIGHT! How is that possible??
This week I have meant to focus on getting unpacked, but I have had a hard time getting that done. Monday night Annie came over to see the new place and we went out for Thai food and then came back and I tried to help Annie enter the 21st century by uploading her new iPhone! Tuesday I headed over to Meg's to watch The Bachelor with Meg and Lauren {downloaded from iTunes, of course}. Vienna.....seriously!!! That is all I have to say about that. Wednesday, I was planning for a night of unpacking, but Kelly called and invited me to go see Vampire Weekend with her at Brixton Academy since she had an extra ticket. The concert was great, but I think my favorite part was sushi before hand at Tsunami...amazing! Thursday, Meg came over to see the new flat and we cooked dinner in my new "kitchenette". We had a great time catching up and cooking a healthy dinner (we were both in need of some vegetables). Then Friday, again I planned for another night of unpacking but Meg called and was going to see a Valentine's Day at the movie theatre that is just two blocks from me so how could I resist! If you see a trend developing, it is that my new neighbor Meg is going to keep me from being productive!!
Today I am going to get my flat totally unpacked and then I have all of next week to finish my Africa posts! If I blog it, then I have to do it, right!?!

Tanzania - Serengeti

2010-02-10T16:50:00.005Z

After we left the amazingness that was the Ngorogoro Crater after my lunch from hell, we struck out west headed towards Serengeti National Park. The drive took ages and it was hot and dusty! We all spent most of our time over the next 4-5 hours in the 'Mean Green' like this.....

I woke up from my nap sunburned on my left side with a thin layer of orange dust coating my body. The highlight of the trip came at my expense, obviously, when a HUGE dung beetle came flying in the top of the vehicle and pegged me on the arm! I thought a rock had hit me, it hit so hard. After I screamed I looked on the ground of the truck and saw a little guy very similar to this...

I mean...sick! Those guys are big and I can assure you that their shell is hard and durable. He was still moving so Annie started screaming and crawling on top of her chair. Dave came to the rescue and flung him back out of the truck. I mean, seriously, hit by a dung beetle in a moving vehicle...I couldn't make this stuff up if I tried!

We finally made it to the entrance gates of Serengeti where there is a big gate, so like the tourists we are we all got out to take a picture under the gate. The local Masai ladies have caught onto this, so they were there to greet us at the gate and were more than happy to pose for a picture with there precious naked babies...and then accost you for money afterwards. And then follow you to the car and ask you for more as the 1000 ($1) shillings you gave them was not an adequate payment for a photo. I mean to their credit, they did get up and put on all of their fancy jewelry and do their hair and everything...okay so they just put on their fancy jewelry.

After we sufficiently filled their pockets we finally got our group photo...

We stopped at the rangers station/rest stop to register and they have a big rock outcropping that we could climb up to have a view of the Serengeti. When I made it to the top (I said big, it was really just one big rock that took about 2 minutes to climb up) I was gasping for air. I was beginning to wonder if it was such a good idea for me to climb up Kilimajaro in a few short days. But alas, the others were a little out of breath too so I made myself feel better about it. The view was pretty spectacular, my photo didn't really grasp the magnitude of the size of the Serengeti or how beautiful it is so I'll spare you that photo since there will be many many more photos in this posting. The one photo from the rock I will share is slightly disturbing. We found this creature on top.

I wasn't quite sure what to make of him. Opposing forces were tearing me in two different directions. On the one hand he is a lizard and by sheer principle, I hate lizards, all lizards. But on the other hand he was half hot pink and half purple, my two favorite colors! I decided to hate him in the end, because lets face it, he's still just a lizard. I did actually, in true curiosity, ask the Paulo if he was really that color or if someone spray painted him. True story. Sometimes I even embarass myself with the things that come out of my mouth.

That night we stayed at a permanent tented camp just outside of the Serengeti, the name escapes me at the moment, but it was pretty cool. There were permanet tents with cement floors and real bathrooms with running water attached. Not too shabby. We got there just at sunset, which was gorgeous, but then we quickly realized when it was time to walk to dinner that we forgot to bring our flashlights with us. Now to say it is dark in the middle of Africa, miles away from civilization, is the understatement of the century. It's comparable to saying something along the lines of The Hangover was funny or that George Clooney is handsome, while both are true they are both gross understatements. You see my point. Good. So it was dark and Annie and I were stranded a 5 minute walk away from the dinner tent with only the light of my iPhone to guide us across the wild plains of the Serengeti to dinner. A bit dramatic, I know, but it was really scary, we could only (just barely) see the ground in front of us and we had no idea what was lurking around us waiting to jump out and get us. I mean, seriously, at night they had guards walking the perimeter of the camp with bows and poison arrows. Luckily, we survived the walk to dinner and they kindly provided us each with a flashlight.

We had a great dinner that night, but the highlight was Paulo telling us all about the Masai and their customs and traditions. Paulo is full blood Masai and is also a revered Masai warrior. My failing memory would do a disservice to the stories he told, but I vaguely remember the following being mentioned: A lot about bringing disgrace to your family (and how to avoid that), killing a goat with a single punch, being circumsized infront of the village without making a single sound, being left in the wilderness by yourself over night, worshiping trees and rocks and such, again...I have a failing memory. Anyhow, it was all very captivating and I loved hearing his stories. You'll have to go meet your own Masai warrior if you want more details.

After dinner Annie and I made the treacherous journey back to our tent and decided to sit on our back porch and star gaze and such. That is where we met our friend Sam. Sam is one of the aforementioned guards with bow and poison arrows. Sam joined us on the porch and showed us his poison arrows and let us hold his bow. We asked him to protect us during the night. We think he may have misunderstood our request as he showed up on our porch the next night and sat on the chair outside our tent for an uncomfortable amount of time while we were inside of the tent getting ready for bed. Awkward.

The next day we headed out into the Serengeti, whose size is unimaginable. It seems to go on forever! Unlike the Ngorogoro Crater, you can go for long stretches without seeing a single animal, but then all of a sudden stumble upon a lone leopard resting in the branches without the slightest warning. That is the beauty of the Serengeti

To avoid being too long winded here are some of my favorite pics from the day with a few stories along the way....

Giraffes in a V formation

Peekaboo!

We went to this hippo pool that was FILLED with hippos, literally hundreds! We were able to get out of the truck and stand on the side of the pool up on a ridge and watch them for about 30 minutes. Hippos are loud and smelly!! They poo all of the time and they flip their tail around while they are doing it, flinging the poo everywhere. so gross. My feel also got attacked by ants while we were at the pool...I got 27 ant bites on my poor feet, I'll spare you the picture!

When we were crossing a river we pulled over to look at some crocs and notices a whole troup of monkeys on an island in the middle of the river. One of the crocs slid into the river as the monkeys were crossing, and we quickly realized why they were jumping across the river!! They would each back up and take a running leap one by one, I managed to catch this one mid-air! The last monkey that you see on the left standing on the rock alone had cold feet! It took him a few minutes of pacing back and forth to gather the courage to make the leap. No worries, he made it over just fine.

Some more baboons, hanging out on a bridge

Some impala displaying a little male bravado

This lady was NOT pleased with us being so close to her family...she danced around our truck, trumpeting for a while until we decided to save her the heart attack and drive away!

we drove right into the middle of a huge heard of elephants, we were completely surrounded. it was a little scary to have so many of them around us with really no way out. They weren't too bothered by us luckily.

One of my favorite pictures of the trip! We came across two eagles fighting it out. You can't see the other eagle because he is hiding out in the grass. When this guy took off the ground, I had my camera zoomed in so tight on him, I actually jumped back because it looked like he was coming at me!

Love me some lions!!

I LOVE these gnarly trees that are stripped down to their bark, against the blue skies...gorgeous!

After our time in the Serengeti was up we flew from a dirt airstrip in the middle of the Serengeti back to the Kilimanjaro airport to start the "easiest part of our trip" as Paulo would say!

Annie flirted herself into the cockpit with Pilot Sean and he let her FLY THE PLANE for about 10 minutes, I have literally never hated someone so much in my life, I wanted to die with jealousy!! I have since forgiven her.

There are many many more pictures on my Shutterfly site

Tanzania - Ngorogoro Crater

2010-02-05T18:22:00.001Z

Okay, here I go...the first Africa installment of several more to come! I am up to my ears in pictures and I am still very early in the editing process. I need to get my 1000+ pictures down to a more manageable number, even I get bored after the 50th picture of the leopard in the tree! It's so hard for me to stop taking picture, I am VERY trigger happy on safari! Every fraction of an inch an animal moves warrants at least another 10 pictures!

I'll start off by saying my trip to Tazania was beyond amazing and exceeded my expectations, which I didn't know was even possible! When I went to Botswana last year, my love affair with Africa began. My trip to Tanzania has deepened that love to the 10th degree. The landscape of northern Tanzania is awe inspiring and quite literally leaves you a little breathless. See below for proof if you don't believe me!

Annie and I set off for Tanzania on Kenya Air, which my mom was a little worried about (but lets be honest, what wasn't she worried about!) In the end she had nothing to worry about, Kenya Air was great and they even had little animals on the pillow cases, love it! We flew into Kilimanjaro Airport via Nairobi and met our new travelling mates and soon to be friends for the first time. We had a very diverse group of 10....Annie and I were the youngest at 27 and the oldest was Mama Jenny at 63. I believe the word is gumption, yes, Mama Jenny has gumption. She is one tough lady! We also met our tour leader, Paulo, who became a great friend over the two weeks. Paulo is a fierce Masai warrior and shared his amazing stories with us...more on those to come!

Upon arrival we piled in our minivan and headed off towards our first destination, the Ngorogoro Crater, also catching our first glimpse of Kilimanjaro! We pulled over to the side of the road for pictures and the butterflies began, the mountain is HUGE! It took us a couple of hours to reach the crater, but we stopped several times along the way to enjoy the roadside scenary...like the picture above! The above picture is the eastern wall of the great rift valley that runs along the entirety of Eastern Africa. Spectacular views! We finally had our first view inside the crater by late afternoon before reaching the Rhino Lodge, where we would stay for the night.

Me and Annie looking over into the Ngorogoro Crater

More roadside scenary

Sunrise at the Rhino Lodge

The next morning we woke up really early, the first of MANY early mornings! At least in Africa early mornings are rewarded by the most amazing sunrises! We ate some breakfast and headed off into the crater for a day of game viewing. The Ngorogoro Crater is was created when a volcano imploded and is like it's own little (or not so little) oasis. It is absolutely over run with wildlife, most stay in the crater their entire lives, they really have no reason to leave. We were amazed once we got onto the crater floor at how many animals there were EVERYWHERE! The previous day when we had looked down into the crater, you couldn't see anything, it just looked like a giant empty crater filled with grass and a lake. It just went to show us the sheer size of the place. Zebra and wildebeest were in the most abundance, they are scattered everywhere, intermingling and leveraging off of each others natural abilities. The zebra don't have the best sense of smell but their eyesight is excellent while the wildebeest have a great shnoz but can't see too well. They are a match made in heaven!

We were super lucky and within about 5 minutes of being on the crater floor we came across two cheetah roaming around together. I was thrilled as I didn't see any cats on my last trip to Botswana! They said these must have been two young brothers, as they were still travelling together, adult cheetah travel on their own. I will say that the cheetah is one of the most majestic animals I have ever seen. They have so much grace and their bodies and quite svelt! Their heads are super tiny, pretty funny looking! The black tear drops under their eyes are one of their defining features. These guys are notoriously shy, but these two brothers didn't seem to notice us at all. They just carried on as if we weren't there crossing the road right between our two vehicles. Then they just wandered off into the distance until we couldn't see them anymore. It was definitely a highlight of the day!

After the buzz of our cheetah sighting wore off, we continued on and saw many animals all living together. It was amazing, I kept feeling like I was in some game park where the animals had all been placed there for me to see, I had to keep reminding myself that this was nature at it's best! We saw herds of elephant, 1000's of zebra and wildebeest, both grant and thompson gazelle, many warthog families, monkeys, hippos, a lake full of pink flamingos (!), rhino, ostrich, etc etc etc!! Being on the floor of the crater was a truely incredible experience. You look around you and you are surrounded by these giant walls, it makes you feel so tiny.

In the distance we saw several safari vehicles congregatings so we headed over to see what the big fuss was. It turns out it was two lions having a little mid-morning snack...I think some sort of gazelle...sorry for the graphic photo!! We watched these two guys for at least 45 minutes as they devoured this little guy. We didn't see the actual kill, just the aftermath. They seemed to keep the carcass in between them and then they would just get up and go grab another piece, go back to their spot with it, lay down and tear in...then repeat until they were satisfied. Towards the end, the hyena's started closing in, hoping for some scrapes. They patiently waiting their turns, waiting for the lions to leave before closing in. You could tell it took all of their restraint to wait their turn, as they kept inching in ever so slowly.

After the lions it was time for lunch and we headed to a nice little corner of the crater by a small pond and ate our packed lunches that we brought with us. We couldn't get out of the safari truck to eat our lunches because the birds are onto the fact that this is where the tourists come to eat lunch! They literally start dive bombing the cars! So we staying in our trucks and ate our lunches...this was the lowlight of the day for me, but I think the highlight of the day for the others in my truck! To start with, most people know I am scared of birds, well these little guys started perching themselves all over the top of our open-topped jeep and staring us down with their beady little eyes! The bigger birds were dive bombing back and forth. I was already on edge when I opened up my lunchbox to find that our main entree was a chicken leg! ICK!! I HATE eating meat off of a bone. I think this stems from the fact that I don't like eating anything that resembles the form it had when it was alive. Hence I don't like shrimp, meat on bones, etc. So there I was cowereing in the corner of the car, grimacing as I choked down what little meat I could get off of the chicken leg without actually touching the bone, all while keeping my eyes glued to the birds looking for any sudden movements. I was a mess! I was laughing that is was my own personal hell. Everyone on the trip was wondering how I had lived to the age of 27 by the end of the trip with all the things that I was afraid of!

Our lunch locale

After lunch we headed back up to the rim of the crater to make our long drive to Serengeti National Park. On the rim of the crater and all along the roads almost the whole way to Serengeti there are tons of giraffes...I mean seriously, thousands of them! There are actually no giraffe inside the crater because they can't get down the steep walls, so they just hang out up top with all of the trees!

When driving from the crater to the Serengeti you are in the heart of Masai country. The masai are everywhere herding their cattle around to greener pastures. It is pretty remarkable to see a huge herd of cows with one red spec in the midst. Cows are everything to the Masai. They are a reflection of status, food, currency, they are their sustanance. I did find out that with my fair skin and my blonde hair, I'd be worth at least 20 cows, which is 13 higher than I was offered in Botswana. So I think my future husband definitely resides in Tanzania rather than Botswana! The Masai are nomadic, moving to the greenest pastures for their cows. They belong to no single country and are allowed to move between Tanzania, Kenya, and Uganda freely. Some even make it as far south as South Africa.

Masaii and their noble steed :)

A Masai village, called a boma

By late afternoon, after 12 long hours in the safari vehicle we finally reached Serengeti National Park, which is where I will pick up next time!! As usual, there are many more pictures on my shutterly site. lwaterfield.shutterfly.com

Passport in Hand

2010-01-14T13:04:00.000Z

Phew, my passport is back in my possession! Yesterday I went back to the Tanzanian Embassy to pick up my passport with my Visa for the trip. To be honest, I was a little nervous leaving it there. It wasn't the most organized place and to just hand over your passport to a perfect stranger in return for a little pink slip 6 days before you are supposed to leave the country, it was a little nerve racking! But I should have never doubted them, it all went very smoothly. Don't make fun of the photo, sometimes they don't accept photos where you are smiling, and I haven't really mastered that whole "smiling with your eyes" thing that Tyra goes on about even though I've watched just about every season of America's Next Top Model! It really is ridiculous, they make you pull your hair back and not smile...can we say Mug Shot!

Long Time, No See

2010-01-14T12:54:00.000Z

I just couldn't stay away, iPhone, oh how I've missed you! I will admit, I am usually pretty late in jumping on the technological bandwagon. But with the iPhone, I was actually all over that, I had the 1st generation iPhone when it first came out a few years ago. It served me well until the day that I moved to London and has sense taken over as my main ipod, since my original ipod was only 4GB. When I moved to London I went back to the blackberry, for reasons that I can't really remember now. I did love my Blackberry, especially her keyboard and most recently I have become obsessed with BBM. For a while there I only had a couple of BBM friends, but recently I have had an explosion of BBM friends so you can guarantee that my BB was glued to my hands for the last few months! I think BBM will be the hardest to let go of, why hasn't Apple come out with the equivalent for iPhone yet, I mean seriously!!! But as much as I loved my Blackberry I also missed my iPhone, so when my contract was up for a free upgrade, I just couldn't deny myself any longer! It actually works out perfect, because I almost asked for a new ipod for Christmas because the battery on mine wasn't holding up too well anymore. So I killed two birds with one stone! I am all synched up and ready to go! The first time around there weren't all of these Apps like there are now. I am very intrigued by these little guys, but a little lost. So please, all my iPhone buddies out there, let me know your favorite Apps!!

Just like a Pill

2010-01-12T01:00:00.001Z

I'm officially a geriatric...I need a pill box! Don't get too excited, I only need it for my trip to Africa, life in my mid-twenties will resume when I return. Now I'm no Scientologist, but I don't really use medicine. It's not that I don't believe in it, it's just that I don't really require much, or I'm too lazy to take it. One or the other. I've never really taken any medication on a daily basis. I mean I went to the allergist a couple of years ago and had the full barrage of tests, scratch test on the back and all. He kindly wrote me a prescription to combat the extreme allergy that I have to grass and I just found the prescription in the back of a drawer in the bathroom at my parents house over Christmas. I had never even filled it! I rarely even take advil as I am blessed that I am not really affected by headaches or hangovers. Tonight I got back from Boots (drug store) about 80 pounds poorer. For the next two weeks I will be taking the following medication on a daily basis: Doxycylin for Malaria, Diamox for Altitude sickness, Glucosamine for Joint Health, Ginko Biloba for hekp with the altitude, Claritin for allergies, and I also have a battery of medicines for ailments that may creep up on me while I am there. They include Aleve and Arnica for muscle soreness, immodium (for you know what) and rehydration tablets. I have an entire gallon sized zip lock bag full of medicine!

Like Riding a Horse

2010-01-11T17:38:00.000Z

I have fallen off, but I am back on the horse. It was not, but should have been, one of my 2010 new years resolutions to blog more! I really lost my steam there at the end of last year. I think I was just too busy having fun and enjoying myself, which is a good thing! I have racked up quite a few blogworthy things over the past couple of months that I was on hiatus, including : Girls Christmas Market trip to Vienna/Bratislava, Cole's visit to London for Thanksgiving, my trip home to Texas for Christmas, NYE in New York, me deciding to move yet AGAIN and my new flat in Camden, and most recently mydecision to make the return back to the iPhone (it arrives tomorrow!). I will do my best to cover these in future posts over the next couple of months, but lets be honest, if you are really interested in any of these things then it is probably best that you give me a call and we can chat about any or all of the above topics!

This post however, is dedicated to my pending trip (5 more days!) to Tanzania! The focus of the post will center around how I did absolutely ZERO to prepare for climbing the tallest peak in Africa standing at a mere 19,000 ft! It will also touch on how I thought I would have very little to buy as I pretty much bought out the REI last year when I went to Africa. Oh how wrong I was. In addition to everything that I purchased last year (please see here http://cheeriosandmilk.blogspot.com/2008/10/granola-its-not-just-for-breakfast.html) I am now also the owner of hiking boots, trekking poles, a very fancy Opsrey daypack, a puffy jacket, about 6 pairs of hiking socks, sporty sunglasses (i'd look like a fool hiking up the mountain in my fendi's!), about 3 layers of gloves, one of those nifty wool hats that covers your ears and has dangly strings that look like braids, a pair of Keen's, a steel water bottle and personal water filtration system, a heavy duty head lamp for our middle of the night summit attempt, one pricey set of heavy duty base layers (aka fancy long johns), several tops made of breathable, wicking material, and a years supply of moleskin for all the blisters that I am sure to acquire! I am also now protected from hepatitis A for the next 20 years after getting my booster and I am a certifiably protected from Yellow Fever...and I have the certificate to prove it (that must be carried with my passport at all times). Speaking of my passport, I don't have physical custody of it at the moment, which is slightly terrifying to me! I dropped it off at the Tanzanian Embassy this morning along with my Visa application. I paid extra for the express application so that it would be ready by Wednesday rather than Friday.

Now comes the scary part. Packing! The company who we are doing our trip through, Exodus, sent me this kitbag in the mail that I am meant to pack everything for the mountain portion of the trip in. We have to pack in these bags and they are not allowed to exceed 12 kg, that is roughly 26 pounds!!!! I think my purse weighs more than that! How the heck and I supposed to fit everything that I just listed in a duffel bag and make it weigh less than 26 lbs?

Oh yeah, didn't I say something about training for the mountain. Yeah, well, I didn't. At all. So that is pretty much all there is to say about that. There is one day where we will be hiking for 15 hours. I am pretending like this isn't happening, that is how I am getting through this with a smile. I'll be back on February 1st. Wish me luck :)

Blades of Glory

2009-12-10T17:37:00.002Z

Last night I finally got to go ice skating at Tower of London! Christmas is great in London, they have so many lights and trees up. There are four different venues to go ice skating at in the city and I think that the Tower of London is by far the best! I mean you are ice skating in the moat of a castle that is almost 1000 years old, how much better can you get!

Thinking and Thanking

2009-11-27T12:47:00.000Z

Apologies for my terrible blogethic these past few weeks. I have been so busy enjoying life and have had plenty of blog worthy moments, but I just haven't had it in me to get back on the horse. With my 2nd Thanksgiving in London come and gone, I couldn't go without a Thanksgiving post to remind myself what all I have to be thankful for. Luckily, it is a lot and I don't need a holiday as a reminder. Although, it is a great holiday and a great reminder! A year ago had just celebrated my first Thanksgiving in London with some new friends and I was anxiously awaiting the arrival of my family for their first visit. A year later, yesterday, I celebrated Thanksgiving for a second time with those same people (although they are much better friends now and we had the lovely addition of Haper Rose Money celebrating her first Thanksgiving at only 3 weeks old!) I also had the fantastic pleasure of celebrating with Cole, he gave up his Thanksgiving with his family to come and visit me in London!! So even though I wasn't with my family on Thanksgiving this year, I was definitely in the company of my "London Family" and I had a HUGE piece of home with me since Cole was with me as well! If I can't spend the day with my family, I can't imagine a better group of people to be with in their place.

This year has brought me so much to be thankful for. I have really settled in here in London, I have amazing friends and I absolutely am loving my life! I gained another neice, Ainsley Kate, who I can't wait to cuddle with in a couple of weeks! My relationships with my family and friends back home are still strong as ever (thanks in part to modern technology!) I have travelled to some amazing places and I have some really fun trips planned to look forward to in the coming year. I've had lots of fun visitors in this last year (Mom, Dad, Lindsay, John, Hayden, Lindsey H., Melissa, Courtney, Mom (again!), Aunt Linda, Cole!!) and I hope to have many more next year (hint, hint to anyone who wants to come). There is much to be thankful for :)

A Wee Bit of Fun

2009-11-12T16:23:00.001Z

Well my friends, I'm not sure whether you would call this Spontaneous or just downright Irresponsible. I'm sure it's a little of both, but either way, I am glad I did it. It was late Sunday night a little after midnight and I am sitting on a Night Bus on my way back to my flat from Kings Cross wearing the very same outfit that I left the house in Friday evening to meet a few friends for dinner. How, you ask, did I arrive in this situation? Good question, lets rewind 48 hours to the beginning of this little story.

It's Friday, I rush home from work, shower, change clothes and head out to meet friends for dinner at The Blues Kitchen in Camden and then for drinks and dancing at Proud. I get to dinner and there are a few new faces there...Bill, just moved here from NY and is friends with my friend Kevin...and Jill, is over visiting Bill for a couple of weeks from NY. I end up sitting next to Jill at dinner and we start chatting. She mentions that her and Bill are leaving in the morning to go to Scotland for the night. I mention that I haven't been to Scotland yet and I am hoping to go soon. Soon, you say...Jill says she thinks I should go tomorrow. I say, Oh but I can't I don't have any clothes, etc, etc. She says you can borrow mine...I say, Okay! We book my train ticket on Kevin's iPhone, finish dinner, go dancing at Proud, I crash on Bills couch and we are on our way to Kings Cross to catch the train at 7 am, a mere 5 hours later. Jill has lent me a comfy sweater to throw over my outfit and given me her travel toothbrush that she acquired on her flight over, I'm set! By 10 am we have made friends with some lovely (read rowdy) Englishmen headed to Newcastle for a football game. They like us and share there Jack Daniels with us freely. Did I mention it's 10 am? Sheesh!

We roll into Edinburgh around 1 head to the hotel to drop off our stuff ,what stuff you ask, oh that's right I didn't have any "stuff" Then we head to a pub for lunch and decide to pass on the Haggis. Google it if you don't know. Then we are off to the Castle for some site-seeing. The Edinburgh Castle is smack dab in the middle of town so it is easy to find. After wandering around the castle we did some shopping on the Royal Mile...aka Tourist Trap Row. Then we settle into another pub and meet some locals and a smattering of Norwegians...which is quite ironic since Jill is half Norwegian! After that we headed to dinner at Pizza Express (the Scottish fare didn't hold much appeal for us) and then we went to Bar Kohl a Vodka bar where I rediscovered my love of White Russians. We tried to rally and make it a night for the books, but when we ended up at Espionage, think underground KGB-ish club, we realized that we had started way too early in the day. So we cut our losses and headed back to the hotel before midnight.

The next morning we woke up, showered, I put on the same clothes then headed to do the Underground tour of Mary King's Close. You see, Edinburgh was built up rather than out. They built streets and buildings ontop of one another so there is a whole underground world underneath the streets from many many years ago. You can still go down there and wander around. They tell you some of the history of the town and what life was like back then, all about the Plague, etc. I'll tell you what, if I had to go back in time to live back then, my one luxury item would have been a pair of golashes! I'll spare all of the gory details, but lets just say they didn't have sewage plumbing back then! YUCK! After the tour we had a few hours to spare before we had to catch our train back to London so we did a little more touristy shopping, met William Wallace, drank in a couple more pubs then were on our way back to London around 7 pm. It was a whirlwind of a trip, but a lot of fun and I'm so glad that I went! I now how two new friends and a lot of Scottish memories! Scotland, check!

Pics from the Castle....

Because everyone needs a picture sitting on a cannon!

Just checking to see if the rumor is true...

Meet Bill and Jill

EEK...I am such a geek!

William Wallace was one chatty fellow

I'll leave you with a very Scottish image...

A Halloween Miracle

2009-11-03T12:47:00.000Z

I finally recovered from the week spent on my death bed, and just in time for Halloween! It was a true Halloween miracle!! I spent all of last week quarentined in my bedroom with a terrible sore throat and fever for 4 days straight, it was miserable! I was so worried that I wouldn't be better in time for Halloween, I LOVED my costume that I had bought for this year and I did not want to miss my chance to wear it! Luckily I came around on Friday with a miraculous recovery! Ever since Britney's Circus tour this year, I knew I wanted to be a Ringmaster!! I found the Perfect costume and was so excited!! I wasn't trying to go as Britney, but so many people thought I was that I just gave in by the end of the night. This year I had two parties to go to. The first was at Kim and Langfords flat and was a Tube themed party...Mind the Gap!! Everyone had to come dressed as a Tube stop or a Tube line. It was really fun to see how creative everyone got!!

Christine as "Chalk Farm" Frances as "the Bakerloo line" Me as "Oxford Circus" and Kim as "Greenwich"

After the Mind the Gap party I headed into the city to a party sponsered by the Texas Exes. It was a huge party with a bunch of Americans, so much fun!! I met up with Annie, Colby, Meg and Jackie! Meg and Jackie are lifelong friends from Connecticut and have spent every Halloween together for as long as they can remember...aren't they cute little flappers! It was a great Halloween, my only greivance is that I left my whip in the cab between parties..boohoo!

Meg, Me, Jackie and Annie (as Beyonce!!)

Me, Colby (as a cat) and Annie

aren't we cute!

The Future Lauren

2009-10-13T15:16:00.001+01:00

You know those times in your life when you feel like not much is happening, but in reality there is a lot going on around you? That's what the past few weeks have felt like for me. I guess that means I'm finally really settling in here and London is starting to feel like my home. All the things going on don't feel new and exciting anymore, they are now just a part of my everyday life. That is not so say I am bored, by any means!

The possibilities here are endless, this rang true when I realized something the other week, something that I didn't even realize I was doing. So most people who know me probably know that I like to change things up from time to time, I'm not a fan of routine. I get antsy doing the same thing too long. I had no idea I was doing this until the other day when I was walking home from the tube, but in the 9 months I have lived in my new flat I have probably gone to work or come home about 10 different ways. I'll get stuck on one route for a few weeks, then inevitably I'll change it up and start taking a new route a few weeks later. It is so strange, I really never made a conscience decision to change my route, I just kinda took a different way one day. I guess this city is good for a person like me, there are about 5 different bus routes and 3 different tube routes to and from work for me...and that doesn't include all of the different ways I can walk.

I have also found myself worried and stressing about the future, something I traditionally have never participated in. I have always been one to live for the moment and let future figure itself out. However, for some reason I have been so focused on the future lately. Whether it be which trips I want to take a year from now, when am I going to end this London adventure, what area of London do I want to live in next, what job I want to have 5 years from now...I have been stressing on every little detail of these questions trying to plan out several different scenarios for each. I don't know when this started or why, but I am going to make a conscience decision to live in the now and enjoy each day without really worrying too much about what the future holds...as my new friend Meg taught me..."I'm going to let the Future Lauren worry about that" Some may call it reckless, but I am ready to embrace the old me, I know she's in here somewhere!

Unprepared

2009-09-29T17:15:00.000+01:00

This past Sunday Annie ran in her first half-marathon! I am so impressed, she finished all 13 miles in under 3 hours and get this, the most she has ever run is 6 miles and that was months ago! I am starting to worry about Kilimanjaro, if she can run 13 miles with little to no training, how am I going to keep up with her on this mountain! I feel so unprepared!! Speaking of unprepared...Jackie is arriving in the morning, I need to finish cleaning out her room!! Not sure if I've mentioned it on my blog yet, but I have a flatmate for the next 3 months! Jackie is Kelly's best friend from home and she is moving over to London for the next 3 months so she is going to live in my extra room. I am SO excited to have a roommate again, I like living alone...but it gets kind of boring to be quite honest!

Annie about to cross the finish line! Gotta love that fanny pack!

Me and Annie after the race in front of the O2 Arena

Baby I Got Your Money

2009-09-25T17:49:00.006+01:00

Last weekend I had the pleasure of hosting a baby shower with Kim and Christine for our friend Frances and Baby Money!! Yes, Frances' last name really is Money! She and Carl recently found out they are expecting a girl so her name has since been changed to Lady Money. We had so much fun planning this shower, this is my first baby to host! Frances, Kim and Christine are all Americans and Southern girls as well so we went all out for the baby shower...all of the British guests did not know what to think about all of this! (they don't do baby showers in Britian, it is actually considered bad luck to give the mother a gift before the baby has arrived) Frances was nice enough to let us throw the shower at her flat, which is fantastically located right in the heart of London in Covent Garden/Leicester Square. Here are some pics from the day!!

Our drink station, complete with Mimosa's and Sweet Tea!

Our main table with all of the yummy food! We had breakfast casserole, pork tenderloin sandwiches, spinach artichoke dip, spinach and fruit salad, fruit kebabs, and spinach and feta tarts!! (Frances is a vegetarian, hence all of the spinach!)

Our clothesline of onsies!!! All off of Frances gift registry!

We also did some candy bowls with Pink candies

Our diaper cake!! We all met at Frances' the weekend before to embark on the new adventure of making a homemade diaper cake! It was a first for all of us, but I think it turned out pretty good!! Although here is London it is actually a "Nappy Cake"! The cupcakes are from Primrose Bakery where Frances is actually a pastry chef!

Playing one of our games, Guess the Belly Size! (which I won!) Our second game was name as many baby items as you can (which I also won, thanks to Lindsay, Hayden and Ainsley!) and the last game was Guess the Flavor in which we had to TASTE baby food and guess what flavor it was! I was so sicked out by this, I did NOT want to participate but they made me. I lost this one, but probably only because I took the most miniscule bite of each!!

Isn't Frances the cutest pregnant girl...she is 6 months along, believe it or not!

A few of us stuck around afterwards to continue drinking Champagne on Frances' balcony since it was such a nice day outside!

Life's a Beach

2009-09-21T17:23:00.000+01:00

A couple of weeks ago I had to go to Bournemouth to visit a client for work. My meeting ended early and I had a couple of hours to kill before my train back to London, so I had the cab driver drop me off at the beach! He said I must be the luckiest girl because this was the first day of sunshine they had seen in weeks! I was so excited, I had no idea that beaches like this existed in Britian, oh how I wasted this summer! I had a great couple of hours hanging out on the beach and I even got some fish and chips right on the beach! I was in my suit, so I got a few strange looks, but I just took off my jacket and rolled up my pants an plopped myself down on a beach chair!

Never Have I Ever

2009-09-18T14:02:00.000+01:00

Seen a cuter picture than this!!!!!

Snog

2009-09-17T10:13:00.009+01:00

Here is your British vocabulary Word of the Day! Seriously, they actually do use this term here. I personally hate the word and think it is gross, but unfortunately, I hear it all the time...especially from screeching teenage girls on the tube.

Verb. snog - touch with the lips or press the lips (against someone's mouth or other body part) as an expression of love, greeting, etc.

Last Friday it was an okay day outside...and let it be known that by okay I mean it wasn't freezing, windy or raining...so I decided after work to take a stroll down South Bank and catch the tube at Westminster the rest of the way home. It is about a 30 minute walk and I love walking along the river, next thing I knew I had walked the entire 2 hours home. I love walking home because I discover so many new restaurants, shops, and areas in London I never knew about. When I got to South Kensington, about 3/4 of the way home, a store front caught my eye...you can probably see why...

Anyways, I was intrigued, so I crossed over to have a closer look to see what this was...maybe a kissing booth of sorts?!!? Alas, it was not, it was a frozen yogurt shop. Once they see you peering in through their windows you are sort of obliged to go in and order something. So I went in and Snog was another one of those Organic, natural frozen yogurt places like Pinkberry in LA or Berri-pop in Houston. Moriarty took us all to Berri-pop when I was in Houston a few weeks ago, and sorry Courtney...but I wasn't a huge fan. It wasn't bad, just I think I prefer my fro-yo artificial and sugary! Well once I was in, I had to order so I ordered the smallest size which was still huge, but only had 130 calories or something like that, so the last 30 minutes of my walk were consumed with having a Snog! Haha, sorry, couldn't help myself :)

Arachnophobia

2009-09-15T14:39:00.000+01:00

If you are scared of spiders you may just want to skip this post! When I got back to London a couple of weeks ago from my trip home to Texas I found a new flatmate had moved in while I was gone...he didn't last long, the met the bottom of my shoe...three times! He was just chillin' in my bathtub, yikes! He was the size of my palm, seriously, HUGE! He was also the 2nd little fellow like this I have found in my flat in the last month, I have a serious problem with that. I say He, because I know he is a He and not a She. I googled "Common British House Spiders" and found out he is just that, he is called a House Spider (original, huh!) They are most common in the fall b/c it is mating season and the ones you find scurrying across the floor or trapped in your bathtub are usually the males looking for some females to love. Ick, I hope I caught my boys before they found any females, I don't have enough room for all their babies in my flat!

Sweet Stitchings

2009-09-11T13:56:00.000+01:00

I am so excited and proud to announce that my Mom has started her own business, Sweet Stitchings, doing embroidery and monogramming!!! For those of you who don't know my mother personally, she is immensely creative and talented! I seriously only have a fraction of her creativity. She has always loved sewing and even owned a small business smocking baby clothes when my sister and I were babies. She has decided to turn her gift and passion into a business yet again! I have already put her to work making a few things for some of my friends who have recently had babies! Please check out her blog to see some of her work, she is still working on getting together her actual website and pricing, but it should be up soon!

sweetstitchings.blogspot.com

Are You Ready for Fall? - Day

2009-09-10T06:42:00.000+01:00

For a day in the City:

Fall Casual by lwaterfield featuring French Connection

My New Obsession

2009-09-08T09:39:00.002+01:00

Polyvore.com

This is my new obsession!!! It is so much fun, you can create inspiration boards, I had so much fun doing this and I am working on several more Fall related inspiration boards so be prepared to see many more of these little gems on my blog!!

Are You Ready for Fall? - Night

2009-09-07T16:27:00.004+01:00

For a Night out:

Fall Dress by lwate rfield featuring Chanel

A Year in Pictures - The Post

2009-09-02T15:36:00.002+01:00

(***photo album in separate post below!)

This is a book I made for my dad for his 60th birthday this year. He and my mom bought me this camera last year before I moved. Hopefully, he doesn't think it was a total waste of money! I have been sitting on this book for a while now, but I am happy I can share it with you all since I gave it to him this past weekend while our family was together in Houston. His birthday isn't until October 7th, but I wanted to celebrate with him while I was in town so we threw a little surprise dinner for him Friday night!

When I was putting the book together for my dad, I thought "hey, I kinda want one of these too!" Easy enough, I just pressed the little up arrow when I was checking out and ordered myself one as well!! I think this is something I am going to do every year...hopefully for the rest of my life!!

Oh, and for anyone who might be interested, the cover is actually a photograph I took of a ceiling in the Royal Alcazar (palace) in Seville. I love taking pictures of patterns!

Here is a list of the places I have travelled in my first year of living in London (note: this is more for myself since people as me this question all the time and I always draw a blank...my short term memory is failing me FAST!)

San Sebastian, Spain - with Kelly - August 2008
Munich, Germany - with Amy - September 2008
Africa (South Africa, Botswana, Zambia, Zimbabe) - with Amy - November 2008
Windsor, England - with my family - December 2008
Paris, France - with Lindsey - February 2009
Prague, Czech Republic - with Kelly & Desi - March 2009
Albufeira, Portugal - with Melissa & Courtney - April 2009
The Lakes District, England - with Annie - May 2009
Istanbul, Turkey - Annie & Mary - May 2009
Seville, Spain - with the Hernandez family - June 2009

A Year in Pictures

2009-09-02T15:33:00.001+01:00

Click here to view this photo book larger

More Ainsley Lovin'

2009-08-27T13:42:00.003+01:00

Don't be fooled, the actual reason I came to Texas was for Ainsley's birth, Hayden just demands a little more attention these days! Here are some pics of sweet Ainsley Kate from this past weekend!

Look at those teeny little legs!!

Sweet angelic little face

Ainsley and her LaLa

Just Keep Swimming

2009-08-26T17:45:00.004+01:00

Finding Nemo is one of my favorite movies ever, I just love Dori!! But now my favorite little fish is Haydenbear! This girl loves to swim!! She also happens to love Nemo and we got to watch it together early Saturday morning while the rest of the house was still sleeping! This weekend my parents stayed at a brand new hotel they just opened in Town and Country Village in Houston so we took Hayden swimming. I forget the name of the hotel, so I am not a very good reference for them, but it was really cool!! I don't think their clientele is geared towards kids at the pool, as you can probably tell by the swanky cabanas in the pics below, but Hayden had a fabulous time!

Is there anything more precious than this girls smiles and laughter!?!

Hayden is so fearless, she LOVES jumping into the pool...although she is not so much a fan of her face going under water!

Testing out my new camera's underwater abilities for the first time!! Pretty cool!

Again, is there anything sweeter!?!

Hayden's fishy face

Little Miss Sassy

This is the hotel pool...not so much kid oriented, but pretty nice!

L.O.V.E.D. this mirror in the hotel

AND this chandelier is fabulous!!

Roadtrip a la Tejas!

2009-08-19T15:06:00.003+01:00

Sunday I had to leave Houston to drive back to Dallas to work during the week. I made some pretty lofty plans for my little road trip. Sunday I was in Houston, San Antonio, Austin and Dallas...all in one day!! I woke up Sunday morning after spending the night with Cargill and Ruffino and drove up to the hospital to see Lindsay and Ainsely one more time then got on the road about 10:30. I drove to San Antonio to visit Christina and meet baby Davis!! I am so happy that I got to see Tina and meet Davis while he is still a precious newborn!! He is only 3 weeks old and his mama looks great! It was so nice to catch up for a bit, although I was sad it had to be so short, but I had a lot of driving left to do!

Me, Davis and Tina!

I stopped off in Austin on the way to visit my aunt and uncle and was surprised by getting to see my two cousins as well! My Aunt KK had shoulder surgery last week so I wanted to stop by and see how she was doing and get a chance to catch up with every one while I was in the states! After I left Austin I was in a mad dash to make it to Dallas for the Blue October concert at the House of Blues! I made it with about 10 minutes to spare, safe and sound and no speeding tickets! It was a long day, but I was so glad to see my family and friends and I had plenty of time to enjoy a Butterfinger Blizzard and a Coke Slurpee along the way!!

****I just posted a ton of blog entries so scroll down to see what I have been up to since I got back to Texas last week!

Swim Diapers Do NOT Work Outside the Pool!

2009-08-19T14:47:00.004+01:00

Everyone was spending all of their time up at the hospital over the weekend with Lindsay and Ainsley and hospitals are not all that entertaining for 2 year olds, especially two year olds who are not all that interested in their new baby sister! (Hayden was very cute with Miss Ainsley, but she just couldn't hold her attention very long!) So on Saturday I took Hayden to go swim at the Houstonian. They have a fantastic pool that is great for kids, we spent several hours swimming and eating out by the pool. It was such a fun day and I absolutely LOVED getting to spend some time with just me and Hayden! I think she liked it too :)

Me and Hayden all dressed and ready to go down to the pool...this is after about 15 minutes of chasing her naked booty around the hotel room trying to put her swim diaper on...she thought it was hilarious to run away from me...truth be told it was pretty funny!

The awesome pool at the Houstonian, this pic doesnt do it justice, they have two kiddy pools, a waterslide, a waterfall, a hot tub...they have it all!

Hayden loved playing in the water fountains!

Hayden and LaLa in the big pool!

This girl is truely hysterical! This is how she "swam" in the kiddie pool, she crab walked around the pool like this the entire time, it was so funny!

Hayden by the waterfall, she was scared to death of this thing at first. It was really loud and was coming down really fast, but she warmed up to it after a little bit, she really loved when I took her behind it!

Eating lunch by the pool...this is when I found out that swim diapers only work when IN the pool...she peed all over the Houstonians nice lounge chairs...oops!

Her kids meal came with a free ice cream...she picked out the biggest popsicle of course. The girl ate the entire thing and loved every second of it!!

Layin' Over in Chi-town

2009-08-19T14:25:00.002+01:00

Thursday was a LONG day of traveling for me. I was awake for practically 26 hours, yikes! It all started off very frantic as I had overslept Thursday morning and woke up to the cab driver calling saying he was outside my flat at 5:30 am. I still needed to shower, so I asked him to wait 15 minutes and I am astonished to say that I actually showered, dried my hair and flat ironed it in 20 minutes! I had to lay over in Chicago since I was flying directly to Houston so I decided to make the most of it and opted for the 9 hour layover rather than the 2 hour so I could hang out with my friend Emily who lives in Chicago. I love the story of how Emily and I met. Two years ago I had to go to Chicago for three weeks for work and I didn't know anyone there so it was going to be a long three weeks. My friend Cole said he had met a co-workers sister who lived in Chicago and I should call her...at the time I wasn't as shameless as I am now and I was not up for calling a stranger but low and behold, about 5 minutes later my phone rang and it was Emily! We hung out the whole time I was in Chicago and I have since made several trips to hang out with her and Big Gay Buck (her chocolate lab)! It is so funny because she and I have never lived in the same city and have really only hung out a handful of times, but she is a great friend of mine now, thanks Cole!
So back to this trip.... I landed in Chicago about 10:30 am and Emily came to pick me up then we headed into the city for some day drinking, luckily there was traffic so we didn't sit down for our first beer until just after noon so we didn't have to feel too bad about it! She put me on the El back to the airport around 5pm only for my flight to be delayed about an hour. I was supposed to get into Houston at 10 pm that night, but didnt land until after 11 and they took forEVER to get the luggage out so I didn't get to the hotel with my parents until 1 am...that is 7 am London time...a full 26 hours with only a couple of short naps on my flights. Oh and I left all of my liquid makeup at security at the Chicago airport, UGH!!!

My new parking lot...I wish!

Me and Emily at Beer Bistro

Ainsley Kate Wagner

2009-08-19T14:10:00.003+01:00

She's here!! Sorry for the delay in post, things have been absolutely crazy busy since I have got back to Texas on Thursday, but more about all that later! She was delivered Friday morning at 9:31 am. She was only 6 lbs compared to Hayden's 9 lbs. so she is so teeny!! Lindsay's c-section went much better this time around and she is healing much faster than she did with Hayden which I am sure she is very glad about. They all went home from the hospital yesterday and I am so excited to get back to Houston this weekend to spend some more time with them both! I don't have many great pics of her yet, I'll have to steal my dad and sisters pics later, but here are a couple from the day she was born! Here is the precious girl!

Yeah I Like Texas, Man There Ain't No Doubt

2009-08-12T11:52:00.002+01:00

As you all know I like to steal lines from songs for my blog titles! I have been preparing myself for my trip home by listening to lots of Pat Green, the man loves to sing about Texas! I can't wait, I leave tomorrow morning! I have a layover in Chi-town to hang out with Wiggles and then I am Houston bound to meet my new neice Ainsley Kate when she forever graces us with her presence on Friday morning! I'll be in Dallas on the weekdays and Houston on the weekends for the next two weeks so everyone get ready for some Texas fun!

P.S. Here is my 2 cents on the National Healthcare System which I got to test out yesterday...gross, inefficient and unhelpful!

W.A.W.

2009-08-05T12:57:00.007+01:00

In this world of text messages and twitter that we live in, people seem to have an affinity for abbreviations so I decided to make up my own. WAW...What A Weekend! I have developed a format to my weekends lately that I am thoroughly enjoying. The formats goes as such:

Friday - come home from work, put on pj's, eat dinner in front of TV, read book, go to bed
Saturday - sleep in, stay in pj's all day, read book, do some cleaning, lounge around, meet friends for dinner/drinks at a fun new place, go to bed abnormally late
Sunday - go to brunch, do something fun around London with friends, come home make lunches for the week, read book, iChat, go to bed

I had another great weekend, true to format, this past week! Friday night, please refer to the format above as I did not deviate and it is quite boring! Same for Saturday afternoon. Saturday night I met up with Annie, Colby, Stefan, Ollie, Corrina and Annie's friends visiting from the States, Jack and Ashley. We had dinner at Floridita. It is a fantastic Cuban restaurant in Soho, they have great food and even better atmosphere. The dining room in downstairs and they have a live Cuban band and a huge dance floor. People are dancing all around your tables as you dine, it is fun fun fun! After dinner we all went to a house party in Covent Garden. They have a fabulous flat with a rooftop patio you can see all of London from! The night ended around 4 am with Shwarma and a slumber party at Annies!

Floridita

Colby, Annie, Me

Stefan, Corrina, Colby, Me, Ashley, Annie, Jack, Ollie

The next morning some of us headed to brunch at S&M...(Sausage and Mash get it!!) for a traditional English breakfast. After that we headed out to Greenwich, I was really excited about this because I haven't been to Greenwich yet and we had a beautify day to do it! We took the train out to Greenwich and hiked up the hill to the Royal Observatory, which has the best view of London. We also straddled the Prime Meridian, pretty cool. After that we took the boat back to London down the Thames. This was also my first time to do the boat ride on the Thames, what a day of firsts! I love living in a city where every day presents new opportunities!

Me & Annie straddling the Prime Meridian

Jack, Ashley, Me & Annie in Greenwich

Laurenproof

2009-08-04T17:04:00.007+01:00

I have been on the hunt for a new digital camera, just a small point and shoot to replace my old one, since the screen randomly decided to give up on me and start over exposing everything making it impossible to take pictures! Let me just start this off by saying that this is my 5th digital camera in 5 years. One lost a mean battle with my keys in my purse, the screen on the back came out the clear loser. One lost a short battle with a glass of beer in Cabo a couple of years ago...it sunk right to the bottom. And the latest one, well I can only assume that it suffered one to many encounters with the pavement.

So in my research I came across the Olympus Mju 8000 Tough. It is waterproof, shockproof and freezeproof...basically it is Laurenproof!! I have already lost 3 cameras to 2 of the 3 "proofs" it deters (I have yet to leave my camera in the freezer, but I wouldn't put it past me!). I also thought it would be an excellent camera for my upcoming trip back to Africa to climb Kili...I'll get to test all three of them at once! I received my camera in the mail today and I am excited to put it through its paces in this little thing we call life...my life that is!

Meet my new, durable friend!

Pictures Galore

2009-07-28T15:32:00.002+01:00

I realized that I have totally neglected my Shutterfly share site the past several months, so I went on today to add a bunch of my pics from the past few months of trips!! So if you are interested in seeing ALL of the pics from any of my trips there up there for you!

lwaterfield.shutterfly.com

Happy Birthday Hayden Claire!

2009-07-25T19:48:00.002+01:00

Happy birthday sweet Hayden!! I cannot believe that you are two years old today, time has flown by so fast, I'm sure your mom feels that even more! I am so sorry I can't be there to celebrate with you today at your Elmo birthday party, I know last year I promised that I wouldn't miss your birthday this year, but your mom had to go and turn 30 this year, so I thought it would be good to surprise her earlier this summer. I am so glad I got a chance to give you your presents early and watch you open them! I love you so much and I can't wait to see you in a few short weeks when you will become a big sister!! Love you lots!

Love,

LaLa

I knew it!

2009-07-23T12:40:00.003+01:00

I'm hooked...just finished the 2nd Harry Potter book and I am loving it!! I can't wait to finish them all so I can start watching the movies! I don't want to watch any of the movies until after I finish all of the books so I can preserve my mental picture of Hogwarts and the characters and continue to use my imagination! Although, with this 6th movie out I keep having to plug my ears at work as all of my co-workers like to talk about it! AND yesterday someone on Facebook posted a TOTAL spoiler in their status update, I was so angry, why would anyone do that!?!? I read the first couple of words then shut my laptop immediately so I didn't get the whole thing, but I got the jist of it...ugh! So no spoilers please :)

Cafe Sol...Where the Heart Is

2009-07-17T10:10:00.005+01:00

Last night Kelly and I had girls night to catch up on all of the things we have missed in the last couple of weeks while she was visiting her family in the states. We went and got manis & pedis and then went to Cafe Sol, our old standby down in Clapham. When I lived in Clapham Kelly and I were regulars at Cafe Sol. It calls itself a Mexican restaurant, but I know differently so I always just get the Beer Chili. Poor Kelly has never been to Texas so she actually thinks that this is what real Mexican food tastes like and loves their Chimichangas...oh how I long for the day that Kelly can make it to Texas and I can show her what REAL Mexican food is all about! Anyhow it is one of our favorites, we have shared many long, hilarious conversations over chimichangas and chili at this place! Now it has even more significance in our friendship because last night at dinner Kelly asked me to be a BRIDESMAID at her wedding!!! I am so exciting about this and I can't wait to get started with the planning!! Kelly is such a special friend, we seriously knew that first day we met for lunch just one year ago that we would be in each others lives for the rest of lives. It is so rare that you find a friend as special as that and I am so thankful that I have found Kelly!

Kelly made the shirt...how cute!!! At first I didn't see the back and I was like, "what a fantastic black shirt...thanks kelly :)" She promptly told me to turn it over!

Be Very Afraid

2009-07-15T13:59:00.005+01:00

I myself am quite scared of what is to come! So, it is no secret that I am a Twilight fanatic. Yes, I know it is shameful, I am a grown woman, but I just can't help myself. Trust me, if I could, I would. The funny thing is that I was so anti-Twilight before I read them as I have discussed in previous posts. I am historically anti all things fantasy, vampire, tween, cult, etc. But since I LOVED Twilight so much and they have been compared so much to the Harry Potter books (which I obviously didn't read...fantasy, tween, cultish) I have decided to bite the bullet and read Harry Potter. Now, when I decide to do something, I do it whole heartily...see what arrived on my doorstep yesterday from my friends at Amazon.

That's right, the entire Harry Potter Box set. I started reading the first one this morning on the tube, I am only 20 pages in and I am already loving it! I am very worried what this might mean to my social life in the coming weeks. Judging from Twilight I am doomed to locking myself away in my flat and turning my phone off and reading late into the night...hopefully I won't be AS fanatical about it. I have decided to read all of the books and then start watching the movies. I have never seen any of the movies so I am excited that I get to create the whole thing in my imagination first! I'm only about 10 years late on this train!

Busy Bee

2009-07-15T13:08:00.007+01:00

I had such a fun weekend this past week and the rest of this week has been great so far as well. Friday night I went to dinner with some friends to welcome Christine back from a 2 month stint in the States. She and Robbie got married a couple of weeks ago in Seaside, Florida but Christine went back several weeks early to get everything ready for the wedding. I was so sad I wasn't able to make it but from the pictures it look GORGEOUS and like they had an absolute BLAST! The whole wedding ended up in the pool by the end of the reception! Anyways, we went to this great tapas place is Soho called Saltyard. It was delicious!! And my opinion can be trusted since I just got back from Spain :) After dinner we went down the street to the Charlotte Street Hotel for some drinks in their bar. It was such a cool place, we had a really fun evening and it is great to have Christine back in London!

Saturday I was pretty lazy and hung around my flat for most of the day, after lunch I was bored so I decided to walk over to the movie theatre in my neighborhood and see Bruno. This movie was TERRIBLE! Seriously, don't waste your money, I didn't laugh ONCE. Not even a little chuckle. I was horrified and I'm sure I had a horrible look on my face throughout the entire thing. I loved Borat, so it's not like this type of humor is lost on me, this movie was just that bad. They were totally trying to way to hard for the laugh and it wasn't funny...it was just offensive for the most part. Anyways, don't see it and if you do, don't say I didn't warn you! Later that night I met up with Annie and some other friends to go to Kensington Roof Gardens which is a super fun club that has a fantastic roof top terrace. Unfortunately, it poured rain all night long so we were stuck inside for the majority of the night and it was HOT inside that club. But we danced all night long and had a blast! Oh, and by the way I am not drinking at all for the month of July and so far it is going really well. Surprisingly, I don't miss booze nearly as much as I thought I would. I thought it would be especially hard not to drink at a club, but I actually had just as much fun and I felt great the next day! The next morning Annie and I went to brunch at this great restaurant in Shoreditch called Albion. It is so cute and very tasty. They sell fresh veggies, fruit, pastries, etc in the front of the store and the rest is a restaurant. After breakfast we rented The Wrestler and laid on Annie's couch for the majority of the day! The Wrestler was ok, but I was hiding behind my pillow screaming for most of it...I don't do well with blood or watching people hurt themselves or other people so I was not a fan of the part where he and that freak hillbilly were stapling each other and wrestling in barbed wire...ICK!

How cute is it that they sell fresh veggies!

Monday night I met up with Christine and Francis again for dinner for a better chance to really catch up. We went to my new favorite restaurant in Soho called Inamo. It is so much fun!! Anyone who comes and visits can expect to visit the place! They have these awesome touch screen computerized tabletops where you can view your menu (with pictures) order all of your drinks and food, change your background like a decorated table cloth and even play battleship against your fellow dining partners! It also has great food, it is Pan-Asian, so they have a little bit of everything. I had the Cinnamon Chicken, which sounds really weird, but was actually one of the best things I've eaten in a long time.

Last night I got to see my dear sweet Kelly who is back from 10 days in the states!! I missed her so much so it was great to get to see her. We met up with her friend Jen who is getting married in two weeks in her native Sweden. Jen wanted to get all of her girls together for a fun night before she heads off to get betrothed so we had a fabulous dinner at Bistro1 and then went to Karaoke Box for some hilarious fun! This was my first time to ever do Karaoke and I actually had a REALLY fun time...even with NO alcohol, which I always thought if someone actually convinced me to do Karaoke it would be b/c of highly impaired judgement! I haven't sung in front of anyone since I auditioned for the 5th grade talent show and sang Garth Brooks "The Dance" and Mrs. Johnson told me to start over and sing in my real voice. I was crushed! They do karaoke a little different over here, you aren't in front of an entire bar instead you actually rent these tiny rooms just for your group. You get your own karaoke machine and you just belt it out in your little soundproof(ish) room, so fun and less to be embarrassed about as you are among friends!

LOVE karaoke...we has SO much fun!

My and my Kelly reunited!!!

As you can see I've had a jam-packed last few days and it is starting to catch up with me. I'm just going to the gym and staying in tonight to catch up on some rest. But I have another full weekend ahead so I'll keep you guys updated!

***I'm posting lots of links to the places I went since I have been SO bad at taking pictures lately. My small camera I take with me everywhere is on its way to the graveyard unfortunately! That will be my THIRD digital camera to bite the dust, I need to be a little more careful with these things!

Isn't It Ironic...dontcha think

2009-07-07T16:37:00.005+01:00

I find it quite ironic to celebrate my countries independance in the country we fought and won our independance from...but none the less, the show must go on! The UK Texas Exes had a picnic in Regents Park on Saturday with several other University Alum groups in London. Not the A&M Alum group I might add, why you ask...because they don't do anything! I have been less than pleased with the Aggie alum group here, they hardly ever do anything, so I have been adopted into the UK Texas Exes as they have lots of fun events to go to! It was actually at the Texas/OU watching party last year that I ran into Annie! I digress, back to the picnic...we had TONS of american food (I made yummy corn dog muffins!), great weather, tons of people, etc. We stayed out at the party playing frisbee, throwing the football and drinking warm wine (ugh!) until the sun went down around 10 pm. That's right people, 10 pm, don't be too jealous the sun sets around 4 pm for about 7 months of the year! All and all it was a successful (much more so than last year when I had only been here 3 days!) 4th of July celebration. It only lacked fireworks! Although I miss spending the 4th out at the lake or floating down the Guadalupe!

Wimbledon

2009-07-06T16:47:00.007+01:00

This post is a little delayed, but last week Annie and I went out to try and catch a game at Wimbledon after work. We headed out to the tennis grounds around 4 pm expecting to have to wait in the queue (English word for line) for a couple of hours just to get into the grounds. Well lucky us, there was no line at all!! We just walked right up, paid our 5 pounds to get in and there we were! So what they do at Wimbledon, is have a ticket resale booth. As people leave matches early they have to turn in their tickets for their seats then people that show up on the day of with no tickets can buy these seats. When we showed up the Roddick/Hewitt match was playing on Court No. 1, the line at the ticket resale booth was really long so we decided to go join the rest of the crowd on Henman Hill and watch the game on the big screen. This actually turned out to be really fun. They have this huge hill outside of Court No. 1 called Henman Hill (named after some English tennis player) there is a HUGE big screen set up so everyone parks it on the hill and watches the match. It is fun b/c you can bring food in and picnic, plus you can buy Pimms and Strawberries and Cream, etc from all of the vendors on the grounds.

Me and Annie on Henman Hill

The view from the hill

Our Texas boy!

Me and my Pimm's!

Yay, Roddick won!! Too bad he couldn't win the whole thing!

On the way out we saw John McEnroe on top of the BBC Media center set up for commentary!!

This Time a Year Ago...

2009-07-01T12:50:00.003+01:00

I was being dropped off from the aiport in front of my new flat to begin this adventure! I truely cannot believe that a year has gone by since I moved here. It has gone faster than I would have ever imagined. It is a weird feeling, when I am back home it feels like I never left but I am also so comfortable and happy here in London. I never really thought I would have made so many friends so quickly here in London, and not only friends...but some friends that I know I will have for life. I am so happy with the last year, the friends I have made, the friendships I have been able to continue from a distance, the places I have travelled (9 countries to be exact!) and the things I have done! Here's to another year, I can only hope it is as good as the last!

Celebrate We Will, for Life is Short but Sweet for Certain

2009-06-29T10:39:00.003+01:00

Last week Annie and I went and saw Dave Matthews at Brixton Academy! He was in town to open for Bruce Springstein in Hyde Park on Saturday night, but he had two smaller shows at Brixton Academy during the week. This is an awesome venue that is about the size of the Granada theatre in Dallas....it was so amazing to see Dave in a venue that small! I have seen him 4-5 times before, but only at Starplex (when it was Starplex back in the day) and at the old Dallas Cowboys stadium, so this was quite a treat! The show was amazing, he mostly played all new songs off of his new album that is a tribute to LeRoi..his saxophonist who passed away last year. He only played about 4 old songs, but the new ones were great! Forgot my camera, so no pics to make you jealous and show you how close we were to Dave :(

Sevilla - Palace - The Alcazar

2009-06-25T10:10:00.001+01:00

The royal palace in Seville is called the Alcazar, it was originally a Moorish fort and Alcazar mears "palace" in Arabic...thank goodness for Wikipedia! The royal family of Spain actually still uses the palace when they are in Seville. For the most part it was an emtpy maze of building with lots of moorish arches, tiled patterns and dead ends!!! It also had some beautiful gardens, hard to appreciate in 110 degree weather though! Although we did appreciate the many fountains as we used them to cool ourselves off periodically. I'm sure the King and Queen would love to look out their window and see us practically bathing ourselves in their fountains!

Lily pad pond at the entrance

One of the ceilings
Courtyard

One of the many little courtyards...this one smelled amazing b/c of the Magnolia trees

Further confirmation of my theory that they number 3 is significant in Arabic culture...I should wikipedia that and see if I am right!

Another courtyard

Moorish architecture

Another courtyard...it was really hard to find your way out of this place!

They had tiling like this all over the walls and floors of the palace, each room was a different pattern

headed out to the main gardens

mossy fountain...we did not use this one to cool ourselves!

PEACOCK!!!

pretty flowers

Zeus...this is the fountain we cooled off with...his water was a little cleaner!

The baths....you have no idea how close I was to jumping in...instead Ana and I resisted and headed back to the hotel pool..