3 Years, 11 Months Ago ...

... I was sitting in Singapore Airport starting a new adventure - waiting for a flight to Beijing that would take me to the start of the Trans Mongolian Express before travelling across to Europe and then finally to London.  3 years 11 months later I am waiting in Singapore Airport waiting for a flight to London to take me to, well, work.  How times change :(

Sadly my 3 weeks of holiday are over in Oz are over.  Has been a great trip.  The highlight of the trip was definitely managing to  catch up with a lot of people - family and friends - some of which I havent seen for years.  Unfortunately with only three weeks on my hands I didnt get to catch up with everyone I would have liked too - next time - I promise.

Feels strange going back to London this time.  Little less sure its really where I want to be right now ... but we'll see.

Half Way

In keeping up with tradition , I am posting from Singapore Changi Airport.  Got to fly on the new A380, that thing is huge.  Sadly I didnt splurge out on one of the suites, instead settling for the  character building cattle class.   The inflight entertainment has had a bit of a revamp - you can now take your own usb stick on board, plug it into the seat in front of you and watch your own movies, or even more exciting, read your very own pdfs.  Unfortunately I didnt know this ahead of time so instead got to choose from the selection of TV/movies they already had which, luckily, is pretty decent. I settled for a various episodes of House, Inbetweeners (missing the new series back in the UK :( ), Peep Show and Flight of the Conchords in between random bouts of sleep.

I think the reason I go home to Oz every year and a half or so is that it is just long enough to forget how painful the flight is.  12 hours sitting still is a lot more tiring than it sounds.  And I am saying that with half the flight left !!  Luckily I have managed to score an emergency exit seat on the way to Melbourne so that should make things a bit less painful.  

Below is a picture of my faithful chariot - courtesy of the wonders of digital cameras, laptops and free wifi.  Aint modern life grand.

Airport Bound

Just about to head to the airport to catch my flight to Oz.

Stopping off in Melbourne, Adelaide and Perth so I'll hopefully be catching up with a few you.

:)

Berlin

A couple of weeks ago I took a long weekend and spent 4 days in Berlin. I stayed in Penzlauer Berg, a suburb in former Eastern Germany.  It was a really interesting area - lots of cool little bars and places to eat.  It was a pain not being able to speak German - I really hate trying to order things in English :( All I really mastered in the way of German was "zvei becks" - but hey,  it went a long way !!! Anyway, the trip is old news now, but I had an awesome time and I definitely want to go back there some time soon (at least not leave it for another 12 years). I only took my point&shoot camera but I still managed to get some shots to pad out the blog ....