So, I do need to do a post about India -which was awesome, apart from the bit in the hospital...and I also want to do one about Sydney which was immense, but this is just a brief update of the past couple of days cos I'm actually meant to be working - Mr Gates calls.....!
But first, just want to say a huge thank you to everyone who texted me while I was in hospital. your lovely messages and jolly photos were so massively cheering and I kept re-opening them and re-reading them when I got a bit down and fed-up, so thank you :)
All going well. Am staying with Mum's cousin Rob in Wollongong who's just turned 45 and has a lovely wife called Jacqueline and two small sprogs - Edward and Rosie. Had a two day trip to Canberra as Rob had to go for work and so we stayed in a nice apartment and had yummy meals out (Vietnamese and Malaysian, my first scallops, and all paid for by Rob's work, whoosh)! On the second day he had 4hours of meetings so I took the hire car and had an awesome time driving about the surrounding countryside at speed. It was a beautiful day and I headed up to the top of Mount Stromlo - it used to have the Uni of Australia's observatory on top but everything was destroyed in a huge bushfire in 1993 - crazy, but beautiful views! I hopped about and avoided a weird bearded man who decided he needed to tell me "you're gorgeous" - most unnerving!Radio Canberra playing all kinds of 'hits' including JT's 'sexy back' so I attempted some in-car Ross style moves - muchas entertainment. Had some lovely sitting about time enjoying the sunshine and views of the lake from the Black Mountain peninsula- Canberra was planned from scratch at the start of the last century and is based around two beautiful man-made lakes with concentric roads surrounding them and great vistas up towards the parliament buildings, I had Vogue on hand so read that and watched the bizarre 'pukeko' birds pootling about!
Got back late last night after having had to add an hour on to the journey as I had abandoned my bag (containing all worldly goods incl passport) at a bakery stop...grr and had to crack on with Gates work til about midnight but had nice family time going on in the background while I was concentrating - Rob and Jacqueline with Edward (8) and Rosie (5) sitting on them watching Monsters vs. Aliens which turned out to be hilarious - voices done by Reese Witherspoon and Hugh Laurie etc etc, so all fairly jolly!
We went out in Rob's fishing boat today which turned out to be fairly dramatic. It's a motor one, no sail and we were out with Jac, William (David's (another of mum's cousins) awesome 11year-old son who I met when he was a baby), Edward, Rosie and me and obv Rob driving and we had motored out of the harbour and were further up the coast, waves weren't too big and Rob was putting some rods out and then suddenly out of nowhere Jac said 'Rob, look!' and there was this enormous wave coming at us from the left. So, Rob turned into it, which is what you're meant to do - if it hits you on the side it rolls you over so you're meant to head into it - and it was about to crash so we went up and up into it and came down with a crash on the other side. Jac and I were holding onto each other and the children and were panicking when an even bigger wave appeared right in front of us coming directly at us and as we went up it it began to crash right on top of us just as we were almost vertical. I was convinced we were about to be pushed back over and capsize - it went right over our heads - absolutely terrifying, I honestly thought we'd had it. Soaked through to the skin, seriously panicked. We headed back in pretty sharpish. Yikes. But all fine now though.
Colin (the third brother - it goes Colin, Rob, David) is taking me out in a little plane tomorrow - excitement! But also kind of terror. Since I got to Wollongong I have so far set Rob and Jac's oven completely on fire - massive flames licking out of the oven door, then the Chinese consulate was shut on the one day I attempted to do a same day visa attempt, then I abandoned all my worldy goods in a bakery, and then we all almost got drowned. What on earth is going to happen in a plane?! Heck heck hecketty heck. Oh for nice safe Durham!
.bmp)
