twenties

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There's not enough time in my 20s to do everything I want to do. 

Seriously, the decade between when you turn 20 and when you turn 30 needs to be at least 20 years.  

You're young enough to have open horizons, endless possibilities and dreams and goals and hopes. You're beautiful and your body is young and fit and strong and healthy. You're old enough to do cool stuff like drive and travel alone and get into bars, and old enough to be role-models and teach others and take charge of some responsibilities, but you don't need to be a wife or parent or a boss. 

You're old enough to fall in love and experience heartbreak but young enough to quietly believe it will happen again one day. You can study something, change your mind, study something new, work for a bit, head off overseas, see what you like. Free.

It's the perfect point of life. 

I've been goal setting, and the amount of things I want to do before I turn 30 just don't fit on the page. There's not enough years. I've studied, worked, then travelled. Now I'm working again. I want to study again for two years, then work in a proper job for two years, then I want to head off and travel again. After that I'll work some more, and then suddenly I will be 30 and married with kids and a house if things go to plan (somewhere along the way I will find a nice husband.) 

Luckily I've met some cool girls who are 30 but don't seem old- they're fun and still changing their minds and travelling and falling in love and starting new jobs. I know life doesn't end at 30 and they've inspired me not to get old too quick. 

Here's to living every moment, fitting it all in, growing up, and feeling like you're mid-twenties forever :)

here and there

On the ferry over to Manly I see planes slicing up into the sky over the Harbour Bridge. One after another they cut diagonal towards the heavens like they’re on a conveyer belt, evenly spaced. I remember in London, Tom telling me that wherever you look in the London sky, you will see a plane. No matter where we looked, trying to catch a corner of empty sky, there was a crawling ant plane somewhere in our peripheral vision. Not here. A dusty quarter moon caught my eye in the dry blueness, but the rest of the sky, I am happy to notice, is empty. 

glorious acquisitions

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For my birthday a couple of weeks ago one of my best friends gave me a fantastic present: a plain umbrella with a sunny blue sky on the underside of it. It's one of the things I've always wanted, but couldn't remember having told anyone about it!

There are a few items like this that I hope to acquire over my lifetime. Not bucket-list experiences: physical things. I wouldn't go and buy them on Ebay for myself, I just feel that at some point they will cross my path in a meaningful way, and I will end up with them.

my glorious, coveted acquisitions

One of those 'best friend' heart necklaces that snap in half
A secret diary with a lock
A dreamcatcher
A locket that really opens
An umbrella with blue sky underneath
A ship in a bottle
An old-style world globe with sea monsters etc painted in the oceans
A hammock

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Found a forum online discussing this exact subject.

What's the silliest object you've always wanted to own?

I don't mean the object itself should be silly. I'm talking about things that have little or no use in everyday life or hobbies, which you want to own anyway because of some sort of infantile infatuation or such.

For me, it's gold coins. I've been playing games since I was 5 years old and ever since seeing Mario pluck them out of thin air, digging up countless brimming treasure chests and diving into dragons' hoards full of 'em, I've wanted to own a genuine cache of gold coins, preferably chest-style. Heck, with today's gold prices it wouldn't even be half as useless as it first seems. So, what oddities and kitsch would you spend your hard-earned dough on "just because"?

Time to quiz the amigos.

Blondie: "one of those leather chairs from the 70s that has wooden arm rests and legs"

Frenchy: "a Japanese relaxing sandpit thing- you know with accessories and a rake and you can rake the sand and move the little objects"

Footsy: "a Paddington Bear coat"

Peruano: "a secret space under a loose floorboard, to hide things in"

What's yours?

"real"ity

A proud Michael delivers his snowmen for tasting. The delicate plating up begins.

Will the judges’ palettes be cleansed of past abuse?

-With the kids, in Ayacucho? They are kids, who nobody wanted,

-Are they orphans?

 -or maybe the government took them out of their house because they were being raped, they were all affected by the terrorism

- … I didn't know about terrorism in your country

… A look.

Time is Kate's enemy as she wrestles with her protein.

It's time to Cook For Your Life!

-It was for 20 years, I told you about the bomb near my house, the crater

-Nah you didn't tell me that

-and one of these kids, he was twelve-years old but his body looks like six-years old, I told you about him?

-No

-because his mom put him in a little room this big, with chickens, when he was a baby, and just threw chicken feed in there and he lived in there for eight years, and so his body never developed and his brain never developed

Kate and Michael arrive for the most important day of their lives.

-He didn't learn to talk?

-Of course not! He is like an animal, he doesn't know what other people are, he doesn't know what himself is, he didn't have a name, he can't talk, he

The Masterchef 2011 champion is crowned

-does coprophagia. Coprophagia. You know?

-No?

-Eats his own shit. 

... A glance.

-We tried to teach him to stop that, he's been in there four years now, and he can never learn to be normal. You talk to him, and he doesn't know to look at your eyes, even dogs know to look at your eyes when you talk to them.

[a conversation. Channel 10 blaring "Reality TV."]

moving forward

This time last year I was in Croatia. 

I keep doing that— this time last year I met you at the border of Thailand and Laos. Today last year I was in Budapest/ Berlin/ Lake Bled. It makes my heart sink a bit every time I think that, and I'm trying to work out why. It's almost a feeling of despair; that time is flying past so quickly now I'm at home, that these (the most incredible experiences of my life) are slipping away further into the past, that I'll forget them, that they won't be live memories, that they'll get confused and forgotten. I'm scared I'll get stuck at home, in work, that travel won't be close. That I won't be the person who "was travelling last year" but will be the person who travelled ages ago. 

The first time I felt this was when I'd been home a month. I had spent just one month in Cusco, Peru, and formed a life there. I knew my way around a new city. I was a familiar face at the language school, I could greet everyone, and I made great friends in my classes. I formed relationships through a new language with 20 little kindergarten students. I knew their names and games and songs. Seeing them every day meant I grew attached enough to miss them. I did so much in that one month: trips to Machu Picchu and Huacachina, horseriding around the Sacred Valley, had Flick come and visit for a weekend, lived in a homestay and then a hostel, went to nightclubs and restaurants and street stalls and markets.

Cusco

Then, I was home for a month and did nothing. Didn't form any new relationships. Didn't learn anything. Didn't discover anything. Felt depressed. Had no money to go out and do anything. I was recovering and recuperating and relishing in having my own private room space to myself where I didn't have to be guarding my things all the time, but, staying still for so long felt wrong. It felt like going backwards.

The next heartbreak was when I realised I'd been home for longer than I had been away: eight months. What a kick in the guts. The eight months travelling was like a whole lifetime. I was a new person after it. The eight months at home flew by in boredom and frustration at rejected (and mostly ignored) job applications, and having no money. I couldn't relax as if I were on holiday, because I had no date that I knew I'd be going back to work. I was constantly job-searching and applying and waiting for phone calls.  

But then I really thought about it, and realised I haven't been stationary this year. Once I got onto the right track, everything has been working perfectly for me, I just had to work out the right direction to go in first— which took five months of applying for the wrong jobs. 

At the start of the year I wanted money, and experience for my future career in the writing/ editing industry. I was applying for full-time admin and customer service roles, for entry-level editorial team and copy-writing. I didn't get the jobs I wasn't excited about, and I didn't have enough experience (even for entry-level) for the ones that I was excited about. It felt like a vicious circle until I changed my attack: I need experience, so I need an internship, even if it's unpaid. I contacted about forty publishing houses. First thing I did right all year. First step up. Found myself in a wonderful little boutique publishing house once a week. 

Now for money: I wanted a job which would better me, enrich my life, so I would enjoy learning from it and it wouldn't feel like I was wasting my time or life. I wasn't finding anything. I stumbled across an outdated ad for a job at lululemon athletica Chapel St, and recognised the Manifesto on the website (a whole heap of inspiring quotes that resonated with me) as the manifesto I'd seen on a shopping bag belonging to a girl called Nadeane who I became close friends with while travelling. She had told me that she used to work for the shop that the bag came from, but I had never heard of it. She was into yoga and running and health and positive thinking and personal development, and I actually think she's the most amazing person I've ever met. She helped me a lot getting through personal things while I was feeling vulnerable and alone, as I met her and travelled with her in Asia, and then went and stayed with her in her apartment in Los Angeles a couple of months later.

I was joining the dots: she inspired me to be a better person... my New Years resolutions included getting back in touch with my body, doing fun runs, starting yoga... I e-mailed lululemon Camberwell and they said to come in for a drop-in interview.

lululemon manifesto

From wanting a full-time "proper job" I found myself coveting a part-time retail job. Didn't see that coming, but it was the first thing I felt passionate about since getting the internship, and the first job I knew I would be shattered about if i didn't get it. Now I have two jobs I love, and neither of them were advertised. To me, that proved that you need to go after the things you want and make them happen. Don't just apply for what's out there.

To me, this retail job is not about the clothes. I wouldn't be interested in working in just any clothes shop. lululemon is about goal-setting, personal development, forming relationships in the community (we are reimbursed to go and do fitness/ yoga classes) living in our bodies, and elevating people's lives. Inspiring people to be more active and healthier, and therefore happier.  

My 4-year relationship ended on the 1st January this year. That was difficult and I couldn't see how I was ever going to feel better, but I knew it was the right step forward. I wanted to keep that travelling feeling of excitement and possibility open when I got home, so went to a few Couchsurfing meetings in Melbourne to meet new people, and thanks to that I have a French housemate and a new relationship. I can practise languages: a passion of mine. With the two new jobs I have new close friends with similar interests to me. 

Almost everything I do is working towards my goals. I don't have time for anything else. I'm realising that this year is not a waste, an empty expanse stretching out with travel getting further behind me. No. This year I'm moving forward, a lot! New jobs are pushing me towards my goals. New people and friends are making me a better person. New fitness and activities and passions— like yoga. A new relationship. A new outlook on life. 

So this time last year I was in Croatia having one of the most fun weeks of my life. 

It's okay. A lot has happened since then. I can accept a year has passed.  I'm moving forward, I'm improving, I'm going towards my goals, and travel will never be far away. 

bikram #4 & #5

Thursday 14 July 6pm, Prahran.

Wasn't sure how I was going to go after running group at 6.30am and then a day of internship, but this was by far my best class yet! Maybe it was the 4L of water I drank throughout the day. Maybe it was the excitement of having two giggling lulu friends joining me. Maybe the heat was different. Maybe it was the 5pm orange.

Who knows, but I felt great. Super sweaty but not like my insides were melting, like some of the first classes. Didn't get dizzy once, no headache, had great energy. I never even imagined it could feel this good. The room was pretty packed but with quite a few beginners. Triangle pose is still my worst, I can't even hold it long in a non-heated room. Friends L1 and L2 were pulling funny faces in the mirror so I nearly lost it a couple of times.

It was L1's first time at bikram and she did great. Red in the face but I swear she didn't even look sweaty, maybe her brand new super absorbent towel soaked it all up. I wished I could telepathically tell her how long there was to go, remembering how endless it felt at my first time.
L2 was really flexy but she only drank 2L of water today and had a couple of moments of panic when she thought she was about to lose her sushi in there. She had to lie down a lot.

The instructor spoke kind of quietly and monotonously, she sounded like a racing commentator. "Aaaand headtothekneeifyoucan'treachyourkneebendyourkneenowlockyourkneelastchancelockyourkneelockyourknee" etc. My intention for the class was to try and be the first one into each new pose, not lagging or dawdling to try and shorten the amount of time holding it, like I have so far. This attitude helped. I was walking on air afterwards.

*We shared a coconut water after. Forgotten the brand name but it was in a glass bottle. It tasted overwhelmingly like cornflakes and milk... ugh

Here are the postures. Looks easy enough, right? Not in 40 degrees C!

Tuesday 19 July 6pm, Prahran

Well, bikram kicked my butt tonight.

Had a small panic as we walked into the room tonight, it was very hot already. It stung and dried my eyeballs. L1 and L2 were with me again and I saw what I can only describe as sheer terror on their faces.  Sweat started dripping down my arms in the first breathing exercise, and I wasn't doing it properly for some reason- I had to cheat with extra inhales when we were supposed to be doing one long exhale. The skinny girl in front had a bit of a death rattle going on with her breathing, but everyone else at Prahran is comparatively quiet to those exorcisms I witnessed at Richmond. 

In the first half-moon pose with my arms straight up, my hands felt like they were being burnt from the hot air blasting in from the high vent behind me. I can't escape the vents anywhere! I couldn't wait to bend sideways to get my hands out of the furnace. But bending was where The Troubles began. After bending forward to touch the mat, and standing up slowly, I got really dizzy and my eyes went black, so I stood there swaying -waiting and waiting for my vision to come back- and my hearing went muffled too. Felt like I was underwater. It seemed to go on for ages and freaked me out a bit, and I really didn't want to fall over, so sat down. In the first pose!! Whyyy?!!? I must have been the first one down, and after such a great class last week, I don't understand. I'd prepared exactly the same: drank 4L (2L water and 2L weak Gatorade) during the day, had an early healthy lunch, and then an orange at 4.30pm. Pissed me off because I'd understand being dizzy if I hadn't drunk enough today, as they explain  "It's not unusual to feel dizzy or nauseous... Practicing yoga in a heated room reveals to us our present condition, and inspires us take much better care of ourselves" but I don't know how I could have prepared any better for today! 

The room was packed with over 40 people. The instructor was the guy in board shorts I'd had for #3 at Richmond. He said more good things about changing your attitude, trying harder, making the choice, but I was struggling so bad that I couldn't even muster a smile when I tried. I dawdled and sat out and lay down slowly and sat up slowly. I was hating it, every time I stood up I got dizzy and saw black again. A beginner tried to leave but was convinced to stay- she wasn't happy about it! Then he joked that there were only 15 poses to go (when there were really only 2 to go) and she believed him, and moaned. My two beautiful lulu's were struggling too.

My intention for the class was not to keep wiping the sweat off my face, because it would just come back anyway. Made an effort to do this but kept finding myself doing it unconsciously. Sweatier than normal? Hotter than normal? I could see continuous rivers pouring off everyone. Kneeling down for a lot of poses I watched skinny girl in front, and her bike shorts were running like a tap. That's only a slight exaggeration. Sitting here on the couch typing with cold fingers it's hard even for me to remember how hot it was in there. It's like another world. A weird, fluorescent, intense, smelly world. Imagine a sauna in a South East Asian country, but with a very distinctive odour blend of sweat, carpet, and incense. Eau de Bikram. Bike shorts soaked. Singlet soaked. Towel soaked. Pressing hot face to dripping knees. When the instructor walked by me and clapped his hands I felt droplets rain down on my back.

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There were some poor people in cotton t-shirts and full length leggings, I don't even know how they stayed in the room!

So, I think I'm a bit over Bikram for the moment. I've made it sound atrocious, I know. If I'd had a great class last night, so two in a row, I think I would be hooked and buying a monthly pass. It felt amazing last Thursday. But just the fact that I couldn't have prepared my body for it any better, it feels like the luck of the draw if I'm going to have a good class or not. I know I'll forget the pain and crave doing it again, in a month or so, looking for that euphoric feeling I got last week. Time heals all wounds. Or maybe I'm just a sucker for punishment. 

We don't look as hot as we were!

Notes On a Birthday Alone [but not lonely]

Blue Lagoon

For my round-the-world backpacking trip last year I pre-booked plane tickets between continents and left everything else unplanned. I knew exactly which day I would leave Asia for Europe, Europe for America etc, but my movements within the continents were left open to spontaneity. A nice mixture of structure and freedom. Planning these flight dates, I realized I would be spending my first birthday on my own; and as a present to myself decided it would be spent somewhere mysterious, exciting, alien. How about Iceland as a week-long stopover between Europe and America.

Viking Cemetery in Reykjavik

Stone cairns at Gullfoss, glacier behind

I didn't know anything about Iceland.

I didn't know anyone who had been to Iceland.

Looking at a map, it's pretty much the furthest away from home I could be! This was an allure. I had grown up with wonderful family and friends who always spoilt me on my birthday. But I wanted to be the kind of girl who spends a birthday alone, adventuring, in Iceland. My heart pumped harder whenever I thought about it.

American continental plate

People looked at me with pity when I told them yes, I was travelling solo, and yes, I would have a birthday alone. Yes, I chose this for myself. I was excited. I felt like I was running a private little social experiment: what happens if you have a birthday without anyone knowing? If no-one knows it’s your birthday, do you still get older? I wasn’t worried at all. Solo travel isn’t lonely; I made friends everywhere I went. I never got homesick. My birthday would be a mystery adventure... who would I meet and what would I see?

"I guess not many people would choose to have a birthday on their own," I remarked to Christine, an elderly family friend who put me up in London, the night before flying to Iceland. I knew it was weird, this desire my brain had. But she —longtime solo traveller after her husband died— got me. "Well, lots of people have never done anything alone." she said. "It's good for your soul."

Blue Lagoon

And so. The sun rose on the morning of September 22, 2010, just like any other day. But I'd been away from home for five months already, and I was on my own in a bunk bed in the most northerly capital city in the world. I snuck downstairs early, before anyone else woke up, to sign into the Skype date I'd set up with my parents. It was something like 6.15am in Reykjavik, 4.15pm in Melbourne, Australia. They'd already had my birthday without me.

Skype wasn't working; the Internet was down. Strangely, I began feeling a bit wobbly. I gritted my teeth, kept re-starting the modem and signing in and out. Finally Mum's name was in the 'on-line' list. I almost cried at her reliability and familiarity. She was there for me. Then something went wrong with the sound. They could hear me, but I couldn't hear them, so they had to type.

My throat choked up with the frustration. I didn't know I was going to be this emotional. Tears welled dangerously when Dad meticulously typed, "You look a bit tired, or are you feeling sad?" I wanted to be home with them, not sitting at a computer in an empty lobby before it was even light outside. My little cousins all came into the screen and I felt awkward talking to myself, silence ringing in my headphones. A lag meant that I could see them laughing mutely a good couple of seconds after I'd stopped talking. I felt so far away. I couldn't wait to sign out.

Then, Boyfriend-At-The-Time failed to sign in at the agreed hour. I was shaky and miserable and homesick for the first time and just wanted to hear his voice. He finally signed in and Skyped my iPhone three minutes before I had to leave on a bus. No video, but at least the sound worked. "Sorry babe!" he said. "Have an awesome birthday!" I kicked myself for even being tempted to stay and talk to him rather than hop on the tour bus. I was sad, and mad at him for not being online earlier, and confused at my own emotions.

Rift Valley

"This is what you wanted, this is where you wanted to be" I repeated to myself over and over until the incredible landscapes swallowed up my sadness and I was filled with that travelling feeling that the world is truly magical and weird and amazing, and here I am in it.

I made friends with two English girls from my hostel on the tour, but didn't tell them it was my birthday straight away. It dawned on me that there must be some sort of etiquette. I felt like if I said, “Oh hey, it's my birthday and I'm all alone and now I'm friends with you” then it would be like I was imposing some responsibility on them to celebrate with me, or do something for me. Maybe I was over-thinking it. But I told them eventually, because they had wondered why I got up so early from our dorm. They cracked genuine smiles, said “Oh really! Happy birthday!” and gave me a squeeze. They asked about my age, my travels. They were both on their way home from an internship abroad in New York. We were mesmerised together by the bubbling hot water pools, the lava fields, the spouting geysers. Alone but not lonely; I was grateful for them.

Gullfoss

Standing at a waterfall called Gullfoss I had a mini-revelation. The girls had retreated to the bus because of the cold, but I was high on the energy of the place and felt on top of the world. Below me the raging waterfall crashed down two rocky drops, and rainbows spurted out of the canyon. To my left was a flat white horizon of crawling glacier; straight ahead stood snowy, craggy mountains; and to my right looked like a scene out of a Wild Western: dry desert, wild horses, strange rock formations. The cold, clean air meant I could see for miles. I felt like I was on a farm, in the Grand Canyon, on the moon.

This was my birthday. I would always keep this memory, untainted by changing relationships, as my own. No matter what happened in my life, I would always have turned 22 in Iceland, in this dreamscape, with messages of love from home buzzing in my pocket.

Wild horses

Later that evening I got chatting with an American guy in the kitchen, and instead of dragging strangers out on the town for a birthday drink I decided to go driving with him into the country to look for Northern Lights. I had thought that September was too early to hope to see the lights, but apparently they had been out in force recently! This had been on my bucket list since I read His Dark Materials in high school, and I couldn't contain my excitement. Imagine seeing the Aurora on my birthday!

It was 0 degrees Celsius when we drove out of the city lights and into an eerie fantasy movie. A full moon and clear sky showed the stars in warped positions at this strange latitude. Lakes gleamed silver, mountains loomed in the darkness, and solitary triangular cottages dotted the empty lava fields. The landscape played tricks on the eye, and especially on my rampant imagination. Rock formations, shadows, holes and hills turned into creatures running beside the car; no wonder their mythology is full of elves and trolls and witches.

I thought the moon was too bright for the Lights to be seen, but at one moment a misty white streak appeared; so subtle that it could have been a trick of the eye. "This is it!" he said. We just had to wait to see if it would suddenly burn green or purple. Instead, it dissolved. I wasn't even disappointed. I was inspired and excited and exhausted: I'd stretched my birthday out from the ten Australian hours before I woke up (when friends wrote messages of love and support on my Facebook wall), to midnight Iceland time out here in the fantastic darkness.

For the first time on a birthday I actually felt older, but in a good way.

Bright moon and Jupiter

Twenty birthdays in Spring in the Southern Hemisphere. Two birthdays in Autumn (I turned 16 in France.) One birthday alone. I know how it feels now and I never need to do it again, but I think it was good for me. Now I can really appreciate having loved ones around me on my special day. And while I’ve forgotten how I’ve spent most of my birthdays (in restaurants and movies and bars) I know that despite having no presents, no cake, and no singing; this one I’ll remember for the rest of my life.

How about you? Have you ever spent a birthday alone?