breaking my heart

I'm spending Christmas with family friends in Ireland and just called up to confirm that they had all my flight details etc and got to talk to the kids, Sean and Daisy. I can't believe I didn't blog about my trip there at Easter. I thought I did but cannot find a post about it anywhere. At any rate, the relevant point about that trip was that Sean, who at 4 years old (now 5) was really getting into his words, realised that Aynia rhymes with lasagne so I spent 5 days in Portugal being called Aynia Lasagne which is something I haven't been called since I was 8 years old and thought I had done a pretty good job at stomping out. However- when a 4 year old boy with a heart-stoppingly cheeky smile is so proud of himself for 'inventing' this name for me, well I just didn't have the heart to quash it.

When I got to talk to the kids just now, Sean gets on the phone and proud as punch, announced, "Hello Aynia Lasagne!" to which I had to reply, "Hello Seany-prawny" (you say it's lame but it was his suggestion). But then Daisy gets on the phone and, bless her soul, she proudly tries to say the same thing but it comes out more like 'Aynia lagnana' and my heart nearly broke from the übercuteness of it all. I'm only going to get to see them for a night and part of a day before they fly back to Portugal so goodluck to their family getting near them in that time.

island paradise

That's it, I'm moving to Rarotonga. Or at least going for a VERY long holiday. Apparently their library is chocca-block stocked with quality literature (my penchant for this is my now-not-so-secret shame) and between that, the sunshine, the sand and the scuba, I could be happy for a veryvery long time.

pining

Fresh on the heels of my Egyptian trip, the aftermath of which is a strong rekindling of my need to live by the ocean and be on the water, I decided to add insult to injury by checking out Kura's blog. She's living in Rarotonga and the bitch (I say that with love) manages to make it sound and look pretty bloody idyllic. Her husband just completed his PADI course and saw eagle rays and sharks. Eagle rays and sharks!!!To say I'm spitting with jealously would be an understatement. I have to keep reminding myself that there are reasons for my being in London at the moment and have to resist the urge to ship myself across the world and spend all my life savings (which is sweet f*ck all at the moment and would get me nowhere) getting myself into the water. I've been back for almost 2 weeks now and it's still pretty much all I can think about, I think I've caught this bug bad. I also think I need to stop whinging and moaning about it though as I'm wearing out sympathy and starting to get a smidge annoying... ;-)

living on a prayer

I came across this photo in my weekly UK Climbing newsletter, for some more stunners check here but this one was definitely the winner.



The caption reads: James McHaffie on the finishing jug of Masters Edge - look at that run out! For those not in the know, 'runout' is the distance between 2 pieces of kit and if you look at the photo, that lad has a looooooong stretch of rope below him not clipped in to anything and it makes my breath catch to think how big a fall he'd take if he came off. "Eeek" doesn't even begin to cover it.

not surprising really

Killing time on a Friday, I had to try this philosophy quiz I saw on Marie's blog.



Apparently I'm existentialist (no surprise) with a penchant for justice which is pretty much me.

joining in

So I've come back from my holiday all rejuvenated and inspired and all go-go-go and eager to do new things. I spent my flight back from the UK planning my holidays for next year and let me tell you, they were awesome and action-packed. But then I spent the Monday night doing some rough budgeting and planning and the sad reality is that I can't afford to do them all so will have to pick and choose. Plus there are things in London I'd like to do as well and ultimately it comes down to an annoying financial balancing act.

I've decided that I'd like to take up swimming because it makes sense to be a good swimmer if you're going to be a diver (and by good I don't necessarily mean styley, more like stamina) so after some research, my local community centre pool is looking like the best bet. They also offer courses of all sorts and reading through their brochure yesterday had me laughing out loud and regaling my colleagues with quotes.


Now I love flowers and have always though I might enjoy something floristry-esque but TEN WEEKS worth of 2 hr sessions? I don't know.... I like that the course is "open to all levels" although it made me giggle as I tried to imagine what "extreme floristry" might be like: "not for the faint-hearted and recommended for people with over 300 hours floristry experience this course is a rewarding experience in dealing with the more adventurous side of floral arranging..."


I might have been peeing with laughter over this one if I wasn't almost silenced by shock. I mean it's great that they have a course introducing people to Macs but really 1Macs are pretty bloody intuitive and you'd think it's PCs that need the intro course and 2 How the HELL do you need EIGHTEEN HOURS to decide whether "a Mac is for you!"?!?!?! You'd think just one hour (max) would be enough....


This just amused me because there is Spanish stage 1 and 3 but what ever happened to stage 2?

oh I do like to be beside the sea

This was my instructor Claudio. Or rather, this is Claudio who was my instructor. When I did things right I'd get the okay sign, if it went rather well I'd get the okay sign with both hands and when I got something perfect it was full on rock hands like in the pic. We had a ball. It's funny how well you can communicate things underwater even when you can't talk. (And yet at the same time some things are very confusing.... ;-)


Claudio again. He's inflated his drysuit to try to make it look like he has big muscley arms. Goodluck.


And here is me with some people who were on my boat and their instructor. We've exchanged emails but you never know how good people will be at keeping in contact. Jess is Irish and I think we were without a doubt the two craziest girls of whichever boat we were on, we made a right pair.

I can't pinpoint exactly what it was that made my holiday so great because it was a combination of the people and the place itself... Camel is a great place to stay and the staff are genuinely friendly and helpful and it was very cool to come back and have people remember me from 9 months ago. Now I'd like to put part of that down to the staff being cool but I will also have to take part of the credit myself as I make a point of smiling nicely and saying hello and thank you and all that. Especially traveling by yourself, I think it's important. Heading over, I had been a bit anxious about being Little Miss No-mates (3 weeks by myself in Greece seems 5 years ago, not 2 1/2) but I had an absolute ball. I was on boats regularly with some of the same people so we'd meet up for dinner or drinks in the evenings. There is definitely something to be said for traveling solo because it does force you to socialise whereas otherwise it's easy to just be lazy and hang out with the people to are on holiday with.

Despite being a busy place (even in winter, Sharm is a tourist meca), the atmoshpere still feels very laid-back. Maybe it's the sun, maybe it's being by the ocean. Regardless of what it was, it was a reality check for me. I love my job, I love the friends I've made in London, I love my flatmates but I'm not living the lifestyle I want to. I'm a seaside girl, I will have to be honest and even on my last day, when I couldn't dive, I got myself onto a boat for half a day so that I could at least be on the water. Some might crassly describe me as happy as a pig in shit when I'm on a boat but I prefer to be compared to a dog hanging its head out the window of a fast car. But my time here (London) is not yet done so I'll just have to last it out.

oh I do like to be beside the seaside

I'll write something decent very soon but for now, here's a pic of me diving.