Hello, little blog of mine. It’s been a while. Let’s dive
in, shall we?
First, leaving the UK; thank Thor and all good things all the volunteers were together for that! Saying goodbye to my family was...a gut-wrenching, physically tearing five minutes. If I'd had it my way at that point, I'd have clung onto my man for the whole year, rather than leave him. But leave I had to, and leave I did. It hurt, but thankfully there was everyone waiting with cuddles, tears in their eyes, the same pain in their hearts and adventure on their lips. We got each other through, again. Shortly after, we were chatting, taking our minds off things and things started to feel normal again. We could finally get excited. That first plane journey was a treat, so comfortable, a vast, empty airborne locker of cosiness, plus Kevin's hand to hold when it took off, which was a necessity. We flew over Dubai and saw the whole island, lit up like trails of fiery soldiers headed to battle, it blazed with the glory of decadence and life. That was a good moment, the young island which felt so full of promise and life, radiating up to us in our metal bird, very exciting. However, then we came to change at Mumbai...things went downhill, immediately we were hit by heat and stench, pure India, I suppose. The men in our party were inexplicably separated from the women, to be let through security without sign of fuss or suspicion. While we, the women, were huddled into a compact line, made to remove items from bags, despite being very obviously overloaded, then made to wait even longer while they let through Indian women with token wheelchairs. They didn't need them, one woman was wheeled straight to the front of the security queue, ahead of all the sweating, drooping, baggage-lacerated foreigners, just to be plonked in front of people actually standing in line for the beepers, where she stood up with no difficulty and strode right on through the machine to collect her bags at the end and waltz off like a swan sprung from the womb with full mobility. So after that trip to security took the full two hour layby we had in Mumbai, we legged it to the gate, to our tiny, tiny jet plane which we shared with a lot of disrespectful, demanding, impolite Indian men, all apparently intent on getting bladdered on complimentary booze and groping the stewardesses. Safe to say we've all been put off India now. (Sorry India vols!)
First, leaving the UK; thank Thor and all good things all the volunteers were together for that! Saying goodbye to my family was...a gut-wrenching, physically tearing five minutes. If I'd had it my way at that point, I'd have clung onto my man for the whole year, rather than leave him. But leave I had to, and leave I did. It hurt, but thankfully there was everyone waiting with cuddles, tears in their eyes, the same pain in their hearts and adventure on their lips. We got each other through, again. Shortly after, we were chatting, taking our minds off things and things started to feel normal again. We could finally get excited. That first plane journey was a treat, so comfortable, a vast, empty airborne locker of cosiness, plus Kevin's hand to hold when it took off, which was a necessity. We flew over Dubai and saw the whole island, lit up like trails of fiery soldiers headed to battle, it blazed with the glory of decadence and life. That was a good moment, the young island which felt so full of promise and life, radiating up to us in our metal bird, very exciting. However, then we came to change at Mumbai...things went downhill, immediately we were hit by heat and stench, pure India, I suppose. The men in our party were inexplicably separated from the women, to be let through security without sign of fuss or suspicion. While we, the women, were huddled into a compact line, made to remove items from bags, despite being very obviously overloaded, then made to wait even longer while they let through Indian women with token wheelchairs. They didn't need them, one woman was wheeled straight to the front of the security queue, ahead of all the sweating, drooping, baggage-lacerated foreigners, just to be plonked in front of people actually standing in line for the beepers, where she stood up with no difficulty and strode right on through the machine to collect her bags at the end and waltz off like a swan sprung from the womb with full mobility. So after that trip to security took the full two hour layby we had in Mumbai, we legged it to the gate, to our tiny, tiny jet plane which we shared with a lot of disrespectful, demanding, impolite Indian men, all apparently intent on getting bladdered on complimentary booze and groping the stewardesses. Safe to say we've all been put off India now. (Sorry India vols!)
That took four and a half hours, I believe. One hour
would’ve been too long, it wasn’t a pleasant ride. Eventually, however we
arrived in Bangkok and were met, bedraggled and yawning, by Lucie. Wonderful,
wonderful Lucie, who shepherded us through the airport and onto beautifully air
con’ed mini buses to a lovely clean hotel, where she said the most glorious,
longed for words we’ve ever heard from human lips…“Today you can sleep for the
day, no need to do anything but sleep.” Glorious, and exactly what we did.
Those couple of days in Bangkok were lovely, so relaxed and Western-friendly…we
had a toilet that flushed. I miss that toilet. And we got toast for breakfast!
Toast…two things, friends, to never take for granted; clean, flushing toilets
and toasted carbs. You truly don’t know what you’ve got ‘til its gone. I love
you, toilet. I love you, toast. Wherever you are.
Ahem…moving on.
Okay so, second day in Bangkok was brilliant, lots of
touristy sightseeing and market-buying, etc. Relaxed. Then we had to say
goodbye to a few people, as they headed off to their projects that night, the
rest of us stayed the night and then headed to ours in the morning. Morning came;
we hoisted our life-heavy bags onto our tiny, frail bodies and headed to the
train, waved goodbye to Lucie, our guiding light, and spent the next five hours
sweltering on a rickety old tram-train. Food vendors walking up and down the
tiny, narrow aisle singing their products; buckets of ice carrying questionably
coloured fluids, stacks of even more questionably coloured meats, wandering up
and down and up and down, while we dosed in and out of consciousness, leaves
stroking past the windowless sides, the smells and sounds of the city ever
diminishing and becoming green country while our tired, foreign eyes tried to
make sense of it all. After many awkward attempts at Thai “where are we?”’s
with the security/conductor people, who really were very friendly considering
how annoying we probably were, we
finally did arrive at Nakhon Sawan, where we were met by gorgeous Pe Ae, Pear,
countless others, all so excited to see us, like being welcomed home by our
families. And there is the end of our feeling completely comfortable for quite some time.
The ongoing story of our struggle to adjust continues in the
next instalment with “The Woeful Misadventures Of A Geordie Away From Greggs.”
Peace.
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