My Trip to In-di-YEAAAAA

Right, let me try and recall what happened chronologically...

25th Jan - My sister's birthday, and joy I remembered it without being reminded. Brownie Point! It was also the day my contract at the terror home with Lauren ended. Oh she said I was her best housemate and that if I wanted a place to stay (when I return from India) that I should ring her... imagine my shock. Now Jay, I know you know this one.. but what's a polite way to say HELL NO?!. 

Anyhoo, that night I was all set to head homewards. I had travelled with Emirates this time as oppose to British Airways, so had a stop over at Dubai. Honestly, when my dad booked these tickets I thought this was some sort of test... I mean who in the right mind would let their shopaholic daughter linger about at a shopping festival for 5 hours?...Ans: my genius dad. But he did well. I was so exhausted from my lack of sleep, carrying about my lil luggage and my need to ensure I was going to catch my connecting flight that I couldn't think about shopping. Ok, that wasn't the ONLY reason. I was just surprised by the prices- I had this irking feeling that I was being cheated cause I didn't have a clue of what's the running rate of a commodity was. And the stuff I saw wasn't any cheaper from clothes I saw here in the UK. What are they calling a sale?

26th Jan- I kissed the ground when I landed. I hate long haul flights and air food. I was so happy to be home and on ground level. 

I was really happy that weekend, had attended a program that Green Shield had scheduled. I met with some of my juniors and teachers. My dad and sister came down from Singapore and showered me with attention and stuff to carry back to Lancaster. Later during their visit, we headed to Kerala, a south western state in India. I was really looking forward to a nice massage, some sunshine, sand and water. I was elated with the first place we visited called Kovalam.

We stayed at a resort just by the beach. It was perfect! I loved every moment of it. My mum decided to pull out this kite she bought during the kite festival in Singapore. It was fun watching the kite flying about going crazy with the sea breeze! The wind was so strong it carried the kite into a distant coconut tree. My dad managed to let a nearby coconut vendor know and requested his expertise to help us get it back... You see, in Kerala, there are many coconut vendors who are trained to climb up the tree with no equipment- just bare hands! They learnt the trick of the trade from monkeys- no joke! It's really skillful you know, made me wanna do it... and I tried but cracked my nut in the process. Ah what's to loose, it was half cracked already!

Further from there we went to Trivandrum, the capital of Kerala where we ate some authentic Kerala dishes. There's a thing in India where we can order a "meal" in a restaurant for lunch and dinner. The meal constitutes a three courses of rice (in south India, Indian bread in north India) with approximately 8 side dishes. The meals are well liked because of the variety and of course the unlimited refill. (There's a google image for your eyes to feast on).

The capital was interesting. There was a clear Arabic influence in the shopping malls. For those of you who don't know, a lot of malayalies (people from Kerala) travel to Saudi Arabia to earn a pot of gold. Umm.. Gold, that reminded me. My mom and aunt went berserk with the amount of jewellery shops there. I don't understand why...but its a prestigious thing to own jewellery and stuff. To add to my misery, because I hate gold, the jewellery shop had a sale. So my mom's eye struck gold and my dad felt his wallet burn. I think I pretended to have a heat stroke just to get my folks out of the shop. So we are back to our resort to catch dinner and a cultural performance called Kathakali. A little fact, this dance usually narrates a story in exaggerated facial expressions and dance moves with consistent drum beats.  The good character has green painted face with a rice ground paste beard that takes half a day to shape and dry. The evil character has a red and black painted face. I am freaked out of my mind when I see them all dolled up with that exaggerated make up. Worse, the women characters in this classical dance performance are sometimes men. Yikees!  But I was distracted by a platter of food and I felt so much better.

The next couple of days we ventured out to the other beaches dotted around the coastal region of this Spice trading state. We travelled further south until we reached Kanyakumari. The tip of the peninsular sub-continent where the Arabian Sea, Bay of Bengal and the Indian Ocean meet. It was a bit saddening when I learnt that the tsunami in 2004 affected them in an adverse manner. The water ate into the coastal region affecting the fishing industry. Many families were lost as well. It was all a bit sad but the young fisher boy tells me that they get big fish from close to 50 m from the coast into the sea/ocean!That's a good thing! We then hopped into a boat that sailed us to two famous spots further into the water, The Vivekananda Memorial and the Thirukural statue. Story has it that the two statues helped break the high tide during the tsunami that spared many. Local residence believe they were spared by the grace of the highly spiritual Vivekananda. The next morning my family packed our bags and headed home.

I loved my trip, but I was elated to be back home in Bangalore. I had caught up with my friends and the Bangalorean trend. I really missed home, was happy to be back. A week flew past and it was time for me to head back to sleepy Lancaster. It was a fabulous trip back. I flew business class because the officials gave my seat to another passenger despite my check-in receipt stating otherwise. Ha! Well business trip was grand till Dubai. Then flew economy from there to Manchester. It was lovely to have Pat greet me from the airport. I knew a royal pampering had been planned. Yay!

The end.

Los experiancas centroamericanos

Hello my dear Lancaster Familia!

Como está mis amigos? It`s difficult for me already to remember my English after so much Spanish and Caribean-vibe here in Bocas del Toro, but I´ll try my best. Bocas is a group of paradise islands with loads of Rastafaris, Hippis and Americans who got stuck here in this beautyful spot. It feels like I´ve been here since forever, but in fact it has only been two weeks. I do like the vibe here though, very tranquil and laid back with good food, nice beaches and very nice people (muchos guapo chicos latinos, mmmh, which means: lots of beautiful Latin-guys). However, the rain in the last couple of days has given me soar throat and cold-like symptomes. I sincerely hope its not Malaria, since I didn´t get a shot against that and the mosquitos are like little monsters who are just celebrating a feast with all that foreign blood . But we will see. Maybe I´ll have to proove myself in an only Spanish-speaking hospital. Well, I´ll keep you updated on my state. Classes are going well and I feel comfortable speaking the language, however, u never know what the locals think of me mixing the words and conjugating incorrectly. But I think for the most part they understand me.
Last week I´ve been going diving and saw loads of colourful fish, but the sad thing is that the waters here are very much poluted as well and corals have died. Did you see some pics on facebook on my trip to the remote island???
My time here in the internetcafé is running out and I have to prepare for my telephone interview on Monday! Yes, you´ve heard right. Six Senses Hotels and Resorts want to interview me for a Social and Environmental Manager position in the Malidves. Laamu Atoll. Isn´t that near your place Jay????? Maybe half way already. And to India it is not far either. Waaaaahhhaaa. Please hold your thumbs for me because it would be soooooo exceptional if I could get that job.
Although I have met sooo many nice people here already, I miss you guys a lot and I am really looking forward seeing most of you on New Years. We´ll keep in touch and I´ll post some photos soon (since I forgot my camera this time). Anyhow, I am sending A BIG HUG TO EACH OF YOU & muchos besos. Hasta Luego!

My Halloween Hangover

So it was my little flatmates 7^th birthday, and her mom announced that we’ll make it a Halloween themed costume party. To be honest we (Rupal and I) weren’t that excited and Rupal quite reluctantly bought some masks the previous night. Since I sit at home and listen to radio the whole day long while making those terrible applications, I was sort of inspired by the RJs talking about Halloween costumes, and I thought of getting my lazy bum off the chair and make myself some costume. I thought for a while and settled for the tried and tested ‘catwoman’. But after looking in my suitcase and around the house, the only useful material I could find was foil paper. So I had to water down the idea and settle for just ‘cat’. Hahahha. So, I made myself some ears and a tail and painted some whiskers on my cheeks. I thought it was going on pretty well. The kids were getting excited, and I just thought to myself –

‘Thank God for putting some enthusiasm in me’! Rupal came in by then, and she dressed up as a witch complete in black, a complementing hairdo and cap, broom stick, and red lipstick. However, the ‘halloween star’ of the evening was one the guys whom I painted as ‘The zombie joker’. The real star of the evening was of course Cris – the seven year old ‘pretty lady’ ... well actually no ... ‘hot bombshell’ is what she is prefers being referred to as ;-P

We even managed to fit in some divali celebration (divali is just round the corner – 5^th November) by bursting crackers and lighting some fireworks. There were rockets and flowerpots and hand glitters. After that we came on top and played some kiddy party games which is always fun especially when washed down with some wine ;-) Aha... enter wine, and now begins my real Halloween ! So, apparently I had a bit too much. Well, Rupal claims that I had some of her glasses as well.. so I don’t have a count now. But I know what followed was sheer horror.. like the real one. Well, not immediately of course. I do have evidence of dancing around – thankfully pretty composed.

I don’t remember having any dinner, and the next thing I remember was lying on the floor in my bedroom with Rupal standing over me and blabbering something ‘are u okay ? ... what is happening ... fi get up ... what are u doing there ?’. That must have been in the middle of the night sometime. The next thing I remember was waking up in the afternoon with a massive headache and the whole bedroom being messed up. There was a really odd odour as well all round (well ... uh... yucks I know), and I just could not figure out what was happening. With my head still spinning, I tried to sit up but could just not do it. Rupal woke up as well, and she seemed pretty okay – well not as bad as me, and she was still rambling about me having her wine. Hahahahah. She made me some coffee which I could not even sip. Well, I was living a nightmare. We pulled apart the curtains for some light and then realised that the whole room was a mess. I seriously have no memory of what happened and felt so embarrassed. There was no way we could let the kids enter the room - which they do very often ! And with me having a head as heavy as a hundred pumpkins, it was upto Rupal to do the honors of cleaning around.

After feeling miserable for another couple of hours, I finally got the strength to get up from the bed and get all that poison out of my system. Horrible, terrible. I thought I was dying – seriously. ! hhahha I’m laughing now, but it was the worst I’ve ever felt, well almost ! After talking some nonsense for some more time, I finally slept relieved and got up at eight at night. What an utter waste of an entire day. I’m just glad I am alive and fine, it got really scary with me getting breathless and pale and with Rupal suggesting we should go to the doctor. I almost thought I was poisoned. It is now officially in my book – No more white wine for me – Never Ever ... No NO NOOO.

Well, it was a true Halloween night for me, and I am still nursing some cuts and bruises on my feet. And I have no idea where that came from! Hahahha... well something like the movie ‘The hangover’. I’m just glad I have all my teeth intact and there was no tiger in the bathroom ;-)

Well, phew ... so that’s it from me. A bit gross I know, but that was as “happening” as it gets (pun intended).

Hope all of you had a lovely... errr.. scary... Halloween ! Take Care. Eagerly awaiting New Years !

Love

Fiona

When the Irish met, a party broke out

Carrie-Ann and Lorna arrived on the 6th Wednesday. The two good friends that Pat meet at UCC during his undergrad. They were classmates, doing chemistry of some sort. Anyway, Pat had been excited about their arrival for a while now, and had been freaking out about what touristy things we could do- Classic Pat Moment! Of course this was about when I took my cue. I seem to have an inclination to event planning and organising fun things to do. Maybe I need a change in career direction... erm. Nevermind about that for now, lemme tell you all about the what went on during their visit.

Wednesday night, Pat made some dinner- famous oven baked crispy chicken with pepper sauce and mashed potatoes on the side. Delicious! James, one of Pat's work colleague, someone I am not necessarily fond of and I shall refer to as Creepy just for convenience... So, Creepy decided to come over to check the acoustics of his guitar in the living room at Pat's place. You see, Pat had organised a house party on the Friday and Creepy had been psyched about it- wanted to play his guitar, drink Absinthe and sing away to his glory. Oh and of course do what he does best, creep the girls out with is creepy stare. So while Pat, Carrie-Ann, Lorna and his housemates were conversing and dining, Creepy decided to sing away and strum his guitar like he was some talented one at a jazzy restaurant.

The next day Carrie-Ann and Lorna had a tour guide of Pat's "fantastic" lab. Freshers week was on, so they were entertained with some stalls and sales. I, meanwhile, needed to unwind and look into what we could do the following days.

Friday night was finally around, people were buzzing in the house. Pat's housemates, colleagues from work, friends from Cork and me were on the guest list! That night was memorable on several levels. The drunk drama- always so amusing. Everyone has their own version of the same incident. The Absinthe story wasn't the best one. It got the best out of few, fruits thrown about in the kitchen, Creepy sitting out the house in the cold for 40 mins, bit of drama here and there. But it was great fun! Came back home after a aching hour and a half of dancing at The Lounge at 5:00 am the next day! People were asleep on the floor in different rooms. Man, what a night!

The Saturday we decided to take it easy. Went to town, walked by the canal, popped in at White Cross, because a band was playing live there. There was a Lancaster Music Festival for the weekend, so there were bands playing at different avenues. The town was buzzing! Plus, the new comers at Lancaster have arrived by the thousands. So, a lot of new faces. Reminded me of my first week at Lancaster... :') *sniff*
We then headed over to Lisa's, (the man-girl I was talking about earlier- check the recent FB pictures) where we watched X-factor.

The Sunday, Lisa and her somewhat boyfriend, Matt, the Irish girls, Pat and I went to Windermere. We had breakfast at The Lighthouse Cafe, and strolled down to the lake where we took at cruise around. We stopped by at this aquarium. Where oddly, we found a special variety of tiny monkey's, a snappy small croc, amphibians that creeped me out, Asian otters, among fish and tiny sea creatures! Someone should have told them that aquarium is derived from "aqua" meaning water and "rium" meaning place/ room, therefore only water bearing animals should be there. But the mammals were an interesting twist!

The Monday morning they left, I headed into to Stopford with a heavy head and the need for sleep. Pat and I have a cold and sore throat. I took a day off to well, not do anything but pamper myself today... by cleaning my room up!

Man what a week! I'll leave it to Pat to let you know the details of what happened when and where. Or maybe he would cover the next story about Sheehan's visit this weekend. Which reminds me, Fifi, you could come down the weekend with Sheehan if you'd like, lemme know!

I think I hear the ice cream man by the corner of my street, time for me to race up to him!

bye for now!

Sick, so I finally made it here.

That sums up why I'm here. Believe you me, it's Sunday and I had planned last night to be back in the office to, well, catch up on many things relative to my thesis. Fortunately or otherwise, I woke up with sore throat and a throbbing head . With nothing else to do, I finally found the time to make my presence known here.

In other words, I do miss you guys, don't get me wrong. It's on days like these that I get to reminisce the Lancaster experience with nostalgia.

Perhaps a comprehensive update on the one month since I arrived in Singapore: the heat is despicable.

I have no idea therefore how Caucasians (how white Westerners are called here, rather inaccurately - so Pat prepare!) get to enjoy the tropical sun in Sentosa when it is in fact hovering around 35 celsius. The one thing I have always been concerned about is how to avoid getting even darker and developing skin cancer along the way.

I got a fantastic place on the 37th floor of a high rise residential building in this area called Queenstown. By bus, my office at NUS Bukit Timah Campus is accessible in less than 30 minutes. At night though I choose to walk home which normally takes me an hour, that is if I don't pass by the local market.

A brief digression: If you hadn't known yet, Spar at Lancaster was my hangout place after a full day's workload. For some reason I find joy and reprieve in carrying home a piece of banana and a can of tuna but only to decide later on that I wouldn't eat them anyway.

Well, walking home justifies my lack of exercise in this country. The first time I went to the gym I had to compete with Law undergraduates who were taking turns in using the treadmill and crosstrainers. Little did I know that they were reserving those for other friends of theirs who were to come much later. I had no choice therefore but to stick to this rowing machine which I grudgingly used for the next 45 minutes. And that was the last time I was at that gym. It's simply immature to scold those Law undergrads. They might bring me to their moot court on campus and have death penalty pronounced on me on the spot. My ultimate aspiration is for my body to decompose in Philippine soil.

The view from my place, I must say, is simply gorgeous. From here one can have a glimpse of Bowland Tower at Lancaster, if my sight serves me right. Well, any of you guys can stay here. I have a nice flatmate (there are only two of us) who is the Vice President of SwissRe, a global reinsurance company. He always gives me a treat. Invoking the hardship and poverty of being a student always works, I must say. I don't know how I would behave once I finish the PhD.

I may have more to say but this has been getting longer than usual already.

It's good to be here and to be reading everyone else's entries. So shall we start counting down to Manila already? I will be home for Christmas!

*The Mainland European Times*

Hola amigos!

Cómo es? Bien??? Yo soy muy bien! Yo tengo mi una clase de espanol. Comprende?

From the above you can notice that I have had muchos clases de espanol (many Spanish classes). It's tough having 3 hours of Spanishness all over you, but I have to admit that I am loving it. Spanishness, I define as a flood of emotions and RRR's which is a rrrrrr-sound but made with your tongue in front of your upper front-teeth (try it, please, so I can see that I am not the only Spanishspeaking-retard). This said, I also have to admit that I am probably the slowest learner in the entire group . If that has to do with the busieness of the rest of my day, or if it has to do with my language abilities, is for somebody else to judge. So my weekdays are filled with attending classes every day for 3 hours, then have a Lunch on the go in the beauty of the subway, and then start working at my dad's company at 1pm till 8pm. My day finishes with Spanish deberras (homework) and dinner (which my mom is a specialist in preparing it), then I fall into deep sleep at 11pm and wake up at 6am again. Uff, telling you this is even tiring to me.

Anyhow, my weekends are splendid!!!!
Right now I am sitting in the mountainhouse in Austria, the sun is setting, the tiled stove crackles with a warm fire and I am enjoying a hot milk with honey ..... well, it all sounds pretty cozy, ey? But all these blankets wrapped around me and the three layers of clothes is because our heating installation doesn't have any more oil. I guess this is how it will be when the world will run out of oil eventually / or how the mountain people felt 200 years ago. The greatest challenge was taking a shower with ice-cold water which felt like it had just sprung out of glacier mountains. After a power-shower which left me with blue toes, I felt the appreciation for not being born a century ago.

This reminds me that, 200 years ago there was a bavarian King called King Ludwig I, who held a horse-race and festival with free food and beer for the entire city of Munich. Now, the Oktoberfest is no longer a horse-race, but a 16-18 day beer festival, attracting 5 billion people from all over the world per year. You can imagine it just like Blackpool's venture/fun-park but 5 times bigger and aimed mainly at drinking beer. The autoscooters, rollercoasters and haunted houses are just for entertainment after the drinking madness. So this madness I dared to go. My first visit was with my parents where we met my brother and his girlfriend. In the first picture you can see my brothers gf, my mom and me in traditional bavarian dresses. It was just such a beautiful day because we strolled from beergarden where we had roasted chicken with potato salad to booths with glaced almonds, cotton candy, chocolate glazed fruits - I felt like I was in Cockaigne!

Besos y hasta luego,
Vuestra Johanna

The buzz at Lancaster CIty

So although I've not been doing something solid, I've been finding out details about things and socialising quite a bit... Where do I begin?

Job wise:
Been applying for jobs... I'm going back to the company I had been interning with on campus, starting Monday. Just to while away time and keep an eye out for the current environmental news. That sorta thing. I'm considering a part-time job at Lancaster City. Will keep you posted on that when it's finalised though.

Social wise:
The past week, I've been avoiding spending the evenings at my place, simply because I dislike having to deal with my live-in landlord, who is undoubtedly immature, inconsiderate and OCDfied. So, Pat and I have been hanging out with Pat's housemates friends, Lisa (the big girl-boy), Matt (her boyfriend of some sort) and Anna (the lesbian). We caught up on X factor at Lisa's place yesterday, had a couple of drinks the previous week and had dinner the week before that. Lisa and Anna are really nice to talk to. I always did like Lisa for some reason.

We hung out with Mike (Pat's colleague from work) and his girlfriend, Sam's place on Friday. Well, Pat and Mike were playing the new FIFA game, then after realising Sam's and my bored face; we watched Rush Hour 3 and the Planet Earth series. Speaking of movies, Pat and I watched The Other Guys and I think it was really really funny. I loved it!

Lancaster news updates:
Return tickets now cost GBP 2.25 as oppose to 2.15 while single ticket cost GBP 1.50.
The new students moved in on Saturday, campus recruit was busy accommodating the new batch of freshers. Common Room is cleaned out, I think they put in a new sofa set though. Lancaster City night clubs are back in business having noisy drunk fools strolling about. The weather is grim, raining some days sunny the other days.