Details

Insurance. Camera, memory cards, flash drive. Mobile phone. UK sim card. Bank account, National Insurance number, utility bills, confirmation of address. Debit cards, travellers' cheques, exchange rates. Passport photos. Photocopies.

All the little, niggly bits that go with flying away, with leaving the wonderfully comfortable (and frustrating) life that has been carved out for me here. Somehow, seeing to all this yourself makes it seem much more real. Every task has an aura of challenge, responsibilty - and so, its completion also carries a finality. A sense of something being done.

I like this feeling. Shall do more, from now on. 

Deep Breaths

I've found a flight, and it's pretty damn near perfect. 

The booking has me leaving on the 12th, just as we'd like - there's an overnight stopover in Seoul, with all transport and accommodation paid for by the airline, and I'll fly direct to Rome. This is good... Now I just have to find a way to talk, to plan, to think and behave normally instead of as someone who is bewildered, disconcerted and awestruck by her fate. It's very hard to believe that this is happening. So big, and so much a dream.

Redirect

We're back on!

For the last (how long is it?)... four months, I have been waiting to be cleared to return to the UK. And, finally, it's happened. This is very, very good! (In times of great excitement, all eloquence is lost.)

I'm hoping for a flight out on the 12th of June. Today - or tomorrow, really, as it's closer to midnight than dawn - is May 26th. So that's a week and a half to pack, find travel, check with relatives, say frantic goodbyes and generally go out of my mind with giddiness/stress/excitement, followed by half a day on the bus to Christchurch, five days to meet family, repack and have my mind filled with advice, half a day at the airport, another half on the connecting flight to Auckland, and finally a day on the plane, stretched out on the seat (or seats, plural, if all goes well), eating fresh fruit and drinking... Well, maybe this time I'll have wine. Why not?

Add Singapore (or Hong Kong, or Sydney or Dubai or wherever the fates determine my stopover to be), a second flight over Asia and Europe, and one more dose of dimmed, overtired, hyperemotional bliss...

And then, London. 

I can't wait.