Christmas Day

Christmas is well and truly here down under.The aroma of turkey is filling the entire house, veggies are cooking, and we are waiting for some Chinese friends to arrive and then we'll eat. This morning I had brunch with a number of friends - Malaysian Chinese, Dutch, American and Singaporean. I had brought to NZ a magnum of champagne from a vineyard I visited in Oz, so I took that and we had mimosas (buck's fizz in the UK). Oh yes, there was some food involved as well! A wonderful (if bizarre) assortment of cultural delicacies including noodles with fish cake, muffins with raspberries from the garden, lychee and waffles with maple syrup.

It is hard to believe that in less than 20 hours from now I'll be almost in Sydney, and then on to Singapore, and London. Hard to believe, hard to leave. Where did a month go?

Perhaps the strangest thing is remembering how hard it was to leave the UK -- how I felt that being here would stretch thin relationships with my friends, how the unknowns of this trip loomed large. Once on the plane I was fine, but some of you can attest to the fact of how stressed I was as my departure grew near! Okay...part of my 'leaving problem' was due to the fact that I was trying to complete two months of work in one, and not sleeping well. But now on leaving I feel a strange reluctance that reminds me of what I was experiencing a month ago. This time I am not concerned about my friendships (skype, email, facebook - they all make the world much smaller), and I will certainly be happy to see everyone I left behind in Oxford. Perhaps it is just change that I find hard. I've grown accustomed to this wanderer's life -- the joy of learning new things about people (including myself), seeing wonderful places, my few changes of clothes. Settling down to a more mundane existence again will not be easy.

So...I wish any of you who have nothing better to do on Christmas Day and are reading this a very happy day!