Yes, it's me; the Ginger Broad and I'm back in Bloggerland!
Well, it is that time of year after all, when I strap on my little grey and pink ruck sack, lace up my pink and grey walking boots, grab my pink covered passport and head off out of this dreary, cold and wet winter weather to somewhere hot and alluring for a few weeks. And this year I'm returning to Asia, well South East Asia to be more precise; in fact I'm flying off to Indonesia, where it is a lovely 30 degrees, sunny and right in the heart of its rainy season! (Something the travel agent omitted in telling us when we booked the tour back in June!).
Now, those of you that followed my blog last year through Mexico, Belize and Guatemala (and the infamous 'Chicken run buses'), may be pleased to know that once again I am travelling with my fellow Inquisitive Explorer, the one and the only 'T.C.' The acronym stands for 'Travel Companion' as yet again my friend of many years has demanded to remain anonymous in my blogs; for fear that after reading it, people may think her a bit strange and then she would feel embarrassed if they should ever meet her in real life. However, should any of you actually meet her in real life, she does tend to introduce herself with "Hi, I'm T.C. Have you read the blog? If so please know that Rosalie is prone to exaggeration and I'm not that neurotic".
Dear reader, please note that I don't exaggerate and that she IS that neurotic!
This last year has been a tough one for me; one filled with milestones. As many of you may remember, my father had been diagnosed with Motor Neurone Disease just before I left for Central America in January. Then the week after I returned in February he passed away.
It was a shock for us all that it happened so suddenly, but in many ways it was a relief too, as he didn't have to suffer for too long from such a disgusting disease. I have to say that the love and support my family and I have received both during and after from people all over the world, has been both overwhelming and amazing. And I feel honoured to have had a father so loved and respected.
Grief has a strange effect on people, as a good friend said to me; "The landscape of your life will be for ever changed". And it is so true. Over the last year, we have celebrated birthdays, anniversaries and festivals tinged with sadness. I have lost some friends but gained some new ones too. My emotions have run from one extreme to the other (as has my waistline) and I made a promise to myself that I would not make any major decisions about anything for a year.
That said, I went and made a huge decision and suffered my second big loss of the year ... I cut my hair off! My thick, curly, ginger hair, that people have known me all my life for, went from this:
To this:
And yet I feel strangely liberated by my new short cropped curly mass. Not only can a tin of hair wax now last me months instead of weeks! But I feel comforted knowing I won't be spending two weeks walking round Indonesia with a huge frizz ball on my head from the pouring rain, or the 39 degrees of burning heat in Australia when I visit friends in Perth for the week afterwards!
"Why Indonesia", you may ask? Well the fact is T.C. and I agreed to return to Asia, however my little travel companion has refused to ever go back to India again (2011/12 blog) where her OCD got 'slightly' out of contol - as did our bowels! Sorry mum! (My mother has asked me why I always have to write about bowel movements in my blogs, I tried to explain that it is a normal obsession for most travellers, but she didn't believe me until I pointed out that in the three years I have been doing these annual blogs, my most popular posting is one from India entitled 'From Trichy to Thanjavore' in which I had mentioned mine and T.C.'s experience with a hotel night watchman who suffered from a bad case of flatulence! Within the last year alone that particular post has had over 250 hits ... From the Ukraine!!)
So, T.C. and I agreed on Asia - which turned out to be extremely fortuitous considering we had originally looked at a tour that travelled through West Africa and those bowel stories would have been far from entertaining!
I had already travelled through Indo-China, T.C. had been to China and we wanted to go to a country that neither of us had visited. For a long time I have wanted to go and see the Orangutans before they become extinct, but Borneo was too expensive so we agreed on Indonesia and somehow the travel agent managed to talk us into signing up to a two week tour that travels from Jakarta and finishes in Ubud, completely avoiding Sumatra where the Orangutans inhabit?! We were then encouraged to put our deposit down as soon as possible on this 'extremely popular' tour to save disappointment as the places would get booked up fast.
With the deposit and balance fully paid up you can imagine how "disappointed" we feel now that we have recently discovered that there are in fact only two other people booked on this tour with us (Apparently two women both called Jo) and the reason that there are not many takers is because, as I mentioned earlier, this is the heavy rain season!
And so, with our sense of humours packed (and possibly a large canoe), we are now prepared for almost 24 hours worth of travelling which involves two flights on Qatar Airways sandwiched either side of a two hour stop over in Doha! (I decided to buy a new passport as I didn't think travelling through a country that has been 'entertaining' the head of Hamas was the best place to have a passport with an Israeli stamp on it!).
I suggested to TC that maybe we should each pack a pashmina in our hand luggage, so that should we be delayed in Doha for any reason, we could cover our heads with them. I meant this as a sign of respect whilst waiting in a religious Islamic country, but when TC responded with "Yes, good idea, but you will blend in better than me because you have brown eyes" I realised she may have thought I meant as a disguise?!
To be honest for some reason I am feeling very nervous about this trip. But suffice it to say I do hope that this blog will be as entertaining for you all as it has in the past.
So come on TC grab your bags (and don't forget your pashmina) 'Indo-needs-ya'!
Next stop Jakarta (via Doha) here we come ....
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