Frankie's travels: long walks in the cool of the evening

This morning dawned dark and winter-y and I awoke pleasantly surprised to have had such a good nights sleep in a strange bed. My continental breakfast was surprisingly delicious with a fresh croissant and black currant jam. 

We took a taxi to work because we were on the getting-late side of the breakfast rush. At work I made myself useful and busy and spent too much time trying to figure out how to transfer a file from a USB drive from my laptop which is not synchronized with the Joburg work servers onto a remote server which is online and synchronized in Joburg, that I was logged in to via the WAN. I finally admitted that an elegant solution did not exist and landed up sending it via FTP to a colleague to download and save on the correct server.

At lunch I selected a splendid beef and caramelised onion pie and was busy enjoying the feeling of warm food in my belly after when a colleague reminded me of the likelihood that I had eaten horse meat for lunch... Happy food feelings vanished shortly thereafter.

We decided to walk home and on the way spied a little pub called the Quayside. We decided to return there for dinner later. This was a good decision because they have a Tuesday special menu for a set price of £6.75 for a choice of about ten dishes and a drink. And, the food was quite delicious :). . I had Scottish salmon and chips. (I have the realization now that salmon is cheaper than steak here) . We watched the news and weather report and then turned back for our hotel. My colleague wants to walk to the office tomorrow morning and there is ice and colder weather predicted for the day so an early night was agreed all round. 

Good night! 

(Yes I promised more detail on the sights this post but it was too dark to be inspired to metaphors during this evenings' commuting walk)

Frankie's travels: small blessings and long long days

The aero plane seating fairies smiled on my selfish request and granted me a two seat row to myself, an empty seat behind me and a low number of distressed children in my section. I had a very pleasant 11 hour flight to Heathrow. I watched one movie, had some edible and mostly tasty airline food, popped out my contacts, reclined my chair (guilt free of the non- passenger behind me) and slept 7 hours. It is still not the same as 7 hours in a real bed but it was much better than other long distance flights I have taken. Short of having my husband to cuddle up to, I would rate this one as best long flight ever. 

We arrived at Heathrow and I commuted from what felt like one end of the airport to the very opposite end to catch the next flight. I'll  say very little about heathrow because it was busy and crowded and efficient and not really very much fun.  i did have an odd moment wondering why two black airport staff members were speaking English to each other and not Zulu or Xhosa. My second flight was busier but only an hour long. 

I arrived in Newcastle(...upon-Tyne... For the Saffers) caught my prebooked taxi and booked in the hotel. They asked me to pay upfront for the room and breakfast and wifi voucher and I had an embarrassing moment trying to multiply by 14 to figure out which method to pay for it all with. (This seasoned traveller goes prepared with many paying options) 

After I freshened up in my room and changed smelly travelling stale clothes for smart professional threads, I caught a taxi to the office. ( I swear the taxi driver looked just like the feckless older brother from My Family tv show). My colleagues were pleasantly surprised at my apparent keenness to get to work and I was settled in the boardroom. My big mistake was not getting lunch before sitting down to work because by 3:30pm I was ready to turn into a werewolf from low blood sugar. (My husband is well experienced at taming this beast with cream crackers, cheddar cheese, spoons of nutella and the occasional Kiri). My colleagues have got into the habit of walking to and from the office to the hotel. This is a 3 km trip.... In winter 1 degree weather... Along the river front. 

I couldn't feel my ears or face by the time we finally arrived at the hotel. Beanie and hoodie scarf will be packed topmost in my bag tomorrow. But all in all it was a mostly pleasant if brisk stroll across a small section of the town. I got to see six different bridges across the river Tyne and be threatened to be mowed down by cyclists and be astonished to see people fishing in a seeming industrial river front area. (Perhaps the fishing is for amusement and not for dinner).

Once I defrosted and figured out how to operate the heater in my room, I made use of my prepayed wifi to Skype with my sweet husband. Then I packed on the warm wooly clothes and met my colleagues for dinner. I had the Cumberland sausage with mash potato and onion gravy. Uh this was perfect comfort food after a long day of travelling by air, taxi and foot. For the foodies, Cumberland sausage is a herby pork sausage and is delicious with mash and gravy :)

My body clock thinks it is past midnight so I'll be turning in for a well earned night of sleep. Hoping tomorrow will hold a few more degrees in temperature and productive impressive adventures in the office.

More about the sights of Newcastle town(city?) tomorrow. 

Frankie's Travels: ancestral homeland

I finally made the list of invitees to go visit the office based in the UK for Work. Officially I am going for training and business development. Secretly I am going to prove to the people there that our office has young engineers and to allow me to make a few friends so I can call them up for help later.

I am 50/50 split on my feelings about this trip. I am stupidly excited to be going to see a new country - especially one with so many preconceived notions in my head thanks to too much fiction and tv. It might be a fun (if expensive thanks to the 14:1 exchange rate) Trip. It will be nice to see how things operate in another office and nice to change the work schedule a bit. It is also good to stretch your self a bit contemplating making it through one 11 hour flight, getting the next connecting flight in a different terminal, getting a taxi, finding the hotel, checking in, cleaning up and getting a taxi to the office all over the next 25 hours and all on my own. Married life makes you too comfortable about never having to do things alone and despite having flown to foreign countries for several years now, this is still a bit daunting. Whoot for adventures!! 

HOWEVER.... This trip also means leaving my beloved husband alone for a week. We fight a fair bit because we are both stubborn and independent but it only takes an extra few hours without him to make me clingy and lonely and needy. I'm like a limpet trying to get Eben to wear me like a backpack. If it was me staying home and Eben travelling, I would be climbing the walls with anxiety and loneliness and quietness before Monday morning. But Eben is too strong and manly to admit to anything like that. Perhaps he will bury his time in work things and make the week zoom past. Secondly, I really wish I could take Eben with me on a trip like this. Months because I afraid t go alone but because I want to share the excitement and newness of things with him.

I'll try keep things updated with my adventures in the land of eternal mud and rain (so I hear) but I suspect the trip story will be a lot of sleep-eat-work-eat-sleep with sprinklings of snow and icy winds. 

First adventure will be praying to the fairies of aeroplane seat allocations for a rare sweet empty seat next to me. Followed closely by attempting to sleep in a cramped leg room position. 

Yaaay! Let the Travels commence!