Tales from Tanzania - Day 8 (Kilimanjaro summit)

So here we are - summit day.  Or more precisely, summit night.  Because this is a long, looooooooong day that basically carries on through the night and into the following day.  We left the Karanga camp (13,106 ft) in the morning and carried on up to the Barafu camp (15,331 ft) and it only took us about three or four hours at a gentle pace, so in spite of the serious altitude, I felt great at this point.  I don't know why, but I was feeling so much better than I had for about three days, I was really pumped to get this thing done.  We were supposed to have lunch, sleep, then have dinner, and sleep again until they woke us at 22:30 to get ready to head for the summit, but really, who could sleep???  I hadn't slept since we left Moshi, it wasn't likely I was going to nod off before summit night - far too exciting!

But 23:30 finally arrived and the nightmare began.  They tell you that you have to go up at night so that you can arrive for sunrise at the summit, but I have another theory: they take you at night so that you can't see the ridiculous impossibility of what you're about to attempt, because if you could actually see it, you'd run away screaming into the night.  Even the first five minutes were insane - suddenly we were scrambling up this sheer rock face (sparkling with frost, I might add, just to make it extra slippery) with nothing to hold onto.  I had to stop at the top of that section for a minute just to catch my breath - partly from the lack of oxygen, partly from sheer terror.  And then it settled into a bit of a routine: scramble up, slide back, try to breathe the extremely limited oxygen, pray that you won't take that one false step that will send you off the edge to a painful, broken death.  People seem to think that just because you can get to the top of Kilimanjaro without specialized mountain-climbing equipment that it's some sort of easy stroll, complete with rainbows and unicorns.  Well, it's not.  It was the most terrifying, most difficult ordeal of my entire life and there were moments when I was utterly convinced that I was going to slip and fall to that aforementioned painful, broken death.  And having one ignorant, selfish person in my group who kept stopping because she basically wanted the guides to baby her up the mountain while the rest of us were risking exposure and frostbite made it all the more exhausting and difficult.

I wish I could describe it better for you, but basically, your whole world shinks down to the small circle of light from your headlamp, the pain of your fingers and toes freezing (and they will freeze, no matter how many layers you bury them in), trying to follow your  guides up the "path", the agony of trying to suck in air that just isn't there (I hyperventilated three times on the way up and that was not a pleasant experience), the sheer exhaustion of carrying on upwards and then more steeply upwards and then even more steeply upwards.  The cruelest trick of the whole ascent is that the very hardest, steepest, slipperiest part of the trail is the last slope up to Stella Point, when you are already on the very last molecule of energy and willpower that you've ever possessed in your entire life.  Everyone goes on about Uhuru Peak - yeah, yeah, it's the tallest point, whatever.  If you survive the revolting ordeal of getting to Stella Point, then spending another 45 minutes wandering over to Uhuru Peak is nothing.  That's the easy stroll.  Of course, at that altitude it's too dangerous to stay there for long and of course there's still next-to-no-oxygen, so even the easy stroll is no picnic, but I can't imagine not doing it.  My personal reserves of everything (energy, willpower, guts, whatever) were completely gone, but I still dragged my sorry arse over to Uhuru Peak and applied lipstick before my photo at the sign.  Yes, that's right - I was filthy, smelly, and exhausted.  I had eyes nearly swollen shut and a nose that was constantly oozing blood-streaked, khaki-coloured mucus that was the consistency of wet cement.  I had hair that was so tangled and dirty that it was basically one big dreadlock.  But goddamn it, I still had standards - there was no way that I was getting that once-in-a-lifetime photo at Uhuru Peak without hiding my cracked, chapped lips underneath a layer of Revlon's finest.  And the fact that my pink lipstick happened to match my pink jacket?  Well, that was coincidence, but certainly a happy one... 

Tales from Tanzania - Day 7 (Kilimanjaro)

 This morning dawned bright and sunny and I was able to see what I hadn't been able to see through the mists of the night before:  the Barranco Wall.  Any of you watch Game of Thrones?  You remember the Wall from there?  Well, other than the fact that it's not made of ice, there's a striking resemblance. And it was not fun  to try and scramble up this thing, especially with three litres of water on my back, which threw me considerably off-balance.  It was a nightmare to climb, particularly one jutting section of rock which you basically have to try to contort yourself around like a spider monkey because there is nothing below you if you fall.  Cripes!  The guides all shout at you "Kiss the wall, kiss the wall" - are you kidding?  I was so close to that damn wall that I think we might be married now in some cultures.  Anyway, an amazing thing happened once I eventually made it to the top and turned around - I was above the clouds.  Behind me was the mountain (terrifyingly close at this point) and in front of me...an ocean of white, fluffy clouds.  I've only ever seen that from an airplane window before, so it's pretty spectacular to be standing above them.

The rest of the day was a long slog along fairly decent trails until we got to the Karanga Valley, which is just a cruel, cruel sight.  Because you can see the camp just there in front of you, but in order to actually get there, you have to descend an impossibly steep, very slippery downhill trail and then drag your exhausted self all the way back uphill on the other side (equally steep and slippery).  It's torture.  But the best thing about it is that once you arrive, you are now done for the day and enjoying your pre-dinner tea and popcorn, while the people who are on shorter treks are forced to carry on up the trail...

Tales from Tanzania - Day 5 and 6 (Kilimanjaro)

The third day of the trek was supposed to be easy.  Well, not so much.  It was a bit easier than the previous day, but there's really no such thing as "easy" on Kilimanjaro.  We crossed a plateau (and you'd think a plateau would be flat, but nope, uphill all the way!), and made our way along some rocky trails and although this was a long day of walking, it wasn't too horribly strenuous.  The thing you hear most on Kilimanjaro is to walk pole pole (pronounced polay polay), meaning slowly.  Yeah, not a problem, because slowly was always going to be the only way I was going to drag my arse up that damn mountain!  But today was the day where I really found my pole pole pace and stuck with it, which was helpful in conserving energy.  Which I needed because this was the first day when we hadn't really had a descent built into our hike, so in the interests of acclimatizing to the altitude, after we reached the Moir Hut camp, we had to hike up higher and stay there for about thirty minutes before coming back down.  I cannot begin to tell you how much I didn't want to go on that hike, but in the interests of giving myself the best chance of making it to the summit, I dragged myself along.  And in so doing, discovered something very interesting - descending is more difficult than ascending.  Seriously, there wasn't one downhill surface on Kilimanjaro that wasn't horribly slippery, and the very real possibility of breaking an ankle or twisting a knee after already doing all that work was just unbearable.  So although I hauled myself uphill like a sack of potatoes, I picked my way downhill like the daintiest of  ballerinas.  It's hell on your knees (and your wrists, if you're using trekking poles, which I was), but falling would have been a lot worse...

The fourth day took us from the Moir Hut camp (13,580 ft) to the Barranco camp (13,044 ft) via the Lava Tower (15,190 ft).  Yes, you read that right - we basically spent the first half of the day climbing up, up, up to a very high point and then climbing down, down, down to a point lower than we'd been the day before.  Seems crazy, but again, it's all about the acclimatizing.  And when you are at the Lava Tower, eating your lunch, you are way closer to the summit than you have ever been and the sheer size of that damn mountain looming overhead is quite daunting.  But nonetheless, after lunch you slither your way downhill (again, verrrrrry slippery) through the spectacular and otherworldly Barranco Valley until you reach the camp.  By the time I got there, the mist had rolled in, and there was a slight drizzle, but that was really the only time we got even a little bit damp, we had spectacular sunshine all throughout the trek.  But that was the night where Altitude decided I wasn't really suffering enough and decided to fill my sinuses with revolting sludge.  And constantly re-fill them with more revolting sludge, no matter how many times I blew my nose, which was a lot.  A. Lot.  So, to recap at this point:  I'm filthy, I'm exhausted, I haven't slept in five nights, my eyes are nearly swollen shut, and I'm constantly blowing my nose.  I swear to god, I cannot imagine why couples climb Kilimanjaro together, because I promise you, you will never be less attractive in your entire life!!!

Tales from Tanzania - Day 4 (Kilimanjaro)

So I started the second day of the Kilimanjaro trek exhausted from not having slept the night before, but at least I had one thing in my favour:  I'm used to it.  I've been an insomniac for years, I've tried everything to fix the problem and nothing (aside from strong pharmaceuticals) works.  And since it's not a good idea to take sleeping pills at altitude, for the very good reason that you might not wake up again, I just had to suffer through it.  C'est la vie - tired is not the same thing as sick, so you have to keep on going.

And this was a tough day - our hike kept us in the beautiful rainforest for about an hour or so, then we got into the moorland.  Still beautiful, but in a slightly austere way, with heather shrubs taller than your head and steep, steeeeeeeeep slopes.  In fact, I think I can sum up the second day quite quickly: up the rocks, down the rocks, up the rocks, down the rocks, up and up and up and up and up and up and up the rocks, slight flattening of the path, and then down and down and down and down.  We stayed that night at Shira 1 Camp, which is at 11,500 ft, so we were already at a substantial altitude.

Speaking of altitude (and I am going to capitalize it from now on, as if it's a person, because Altitude is a bit like the Norse god Loki - capricious and sometimes malicious, and you never know what it's going to do to you), my personal experience with it was not at all what I had expected.  I had expected terrible headaches (which I never got - a couple of small twinges, but nothing bad) and major nausea (nope, not once).  But what I got instead?  Difficulty catching my breath after exertion (and since you're exerting yourself the entire damn way, that was no picnic) and swelling up like a boiled bratwurst.  Seriously, I couldn't believe it.  I thought my feet might swell a bit, like on a plane, but they weren't the problem.  My fingers swelled, my bosoms swelled (all right, you cheeky monkeys, that would normally be a good thing, but not in this case), my face swelled and worst of all, my eyes!!!  Are you kidding me?  I was prepared to be cold, I was prepared to be filthy and I was prepared to be exhausted, but I wasn't prepared to be ugly -  jeezus, not the face!!!  But sadly, this turned out to be the case - from the second night onward, my eyes were swollen so badly that I looked like a Shar-Pei and it was an effort just to keep my eyelids open against the ocean of fluid pressing down on them.  Thanks, Altitude - thanks a lot...

Tales from Tanzania - Day 3 (Kilimanjaro)

This is how not to begin your Kilimanjaro adventure.  The night before you go, do not meet a group of ex-Marines who have just arrived back from their own successful trek and do not celebrate by drinking with them.  Because if you do, you will begin your own trek with a hangover that will make you want to throw yourself off the nearest mountain, never mind go and climb one.

We started off around 9am on the first day and we spent a few hours on the road, picking up the rest of the group and driving out to the Londorossi Gate where they sorted out the permits and so forth, finally arriving at the Lemosho Gate, where we were starting the trek.  It was a reasonably easy and short hike (about two and a half hours), there were a few steep sections but really not too bad.  And the stunning ancient rainforest scenery was definitely my favourite section of the whole trek - I'm talking serious Tarzan territory here and thinking about buff men in loincloths swinging through the trees certainly helped me pass the time on that particular hike...

Plus:  monkeys!!!  And not just any monkeys either - Colobus monkeys, which I had never even heard of before, never mind seen.  They're gorgeous!  If I had to be a monkey (boy, if I had a dollar for every time I'd said that...), I would totally be a Colobus monkey.  They're black with big fluffy white tails, which they swish around like they have their very own built-in boa. And they just sort of drape themselves over the trees in a languid and rather glamorous way.  So fabulous.

Anyway, as we were hiking, our porters went scampering past us on the trail, not only carrying our luggage - on their heads, no less - but all of the supplies for our camp (Mti Mkubwa at 9,498 ft).  So by the time we arrived, our tents were set up and they brought us a basin of hot water for washing, after which we went to the mess tent for hot chocolate and popcorn, then a short break before an extremely delicious hot dinner.  No complaints here - I was very happy with that start to the trek and I went to bed looking forward to a good night's sleep as I was extremely tired (and have I mentioned the hangover?), but nope, my ugly friend insomnia came to visit and I didn't sleep at all that night. 

Tales from Tanzania - Day 2

So yesterday, after I got back to the hotel (and slathering myself in insect repellant so toxic that it could strip the paint off a Buick), I wandered down to reception to see what there might be to do.  Well, there was a bar.  Problem solved.  I had actually brought along my kindle to catch up on a bit of reading, but instead I got chatting to the only other person there, who, as it turns out, will also be on the same trek with me.

I haven't met any of the others yet, but so far, its me and Perrrrr (it's actually Per, but I got it wrong the first time I said it and was so firmly corrected that I now buzz that "r" for about a minute, just to make sure).  He's a Swedish engineer who was raised in Zimbabwe, so not only does he speak English and Swedish, but three African languages as well, which is all kinds of useful around here so he promptly became my new BFF.  Speaking the local lingo makes the waiters much nicer to you (which is true everywhere but Paris), so we pretty much just stayed put and drank the bar dry.  As you do.

Tonight I meet the rest of our group - I think there are about six of us altogether and I'm hoping for an interesting group.  Perrrrr is good company and of course I'm awesome, so if we get a nice mix, that will make this thing much more fun.  Gentle readers, I hate to love you and leave you, but this will be my last chance to post on here for about a week.  But stay tuned - I'll update as soon as I can, and if the most un-outdoorsy person in the world doesn't end up with about a million stories after climbing freakin' Kilimanjaro?  Well, I'll eat my hat (and my balaclava, because yes, I now own one of those as well)...

Tales from Tanzania - Day 1

Last night I changed planes at Doha airport, and as I approached the gate, I saw them:  a herd of sweetly earnest, crunchy-granola types swathed in fleeces, wearing their hiking boots, and carrying their daypacks as their carry-on luggage.  Ladies and gentlemen: the Kilimanjaro trekker.  Quite frankly, I almost changed my mind about the whole thing right then and there.  I mean it, there was a final call for the flight to Paris and I had a serious moment of "I wanna flee back to the land of rude (but chic) city people, I don't know how to do this outdoorsy thing with these outdoorsy folk."  But I went. And here I am.

And so far, so good.  If you're going to do this whole crazy thing, I recommend flying into Kilimanjaro Airport - it's pretty much idiot-proof, which is exactly what I needed.  You go in, the visa forms are on the counter, you get in the line with the huge, bright yellow, hard-to-miss sign saying "I NEED A VISA" (as opposed to the other line, which says "I HAVE A VISA" - you'd really think that would make it idiot-proof, but no, people still somehow manage to get into the wrong line.  I despair sometimes.).  Anyway, you fork over your cash to the nice man at the window and then he sends you to another nice man at another window and you get your completely unflattering and unrecognizable photo taken and the visa slapped into your passport.  One belt for luggage retrieval and you're outta there.  I had booked an airport pick-up and bless him, there he was with the sign AND my eleven-letter last name spelled correctly. 

This isn't my first trip to Africa - I took a pretty good trip around Cape Town and surrounding area a few years ago, and I've been to both Morocco and Egypt (although they're both so much more like the Middle East that it's hard to think of them as African).  But this is my first time in AFRICA Africa and even the drive from the airport had me mesmerized.  It starts off pretty much as you'd expect - beige and dry and pancake-flat, but the closer you get to Moshi, the greener and hillier it gets.  One of the many (many) things I dislike about living in Saudi Arabia is the lack of colour.  Beige dust, beige sand, beige buildings, white thobes on the men, black abayas on the women.  Here?  Colour EVERYWHERE.  We passed the Masai market, which was swarming in long, lean men mostly wearing their traditional crimson, but I saw a few of them sporting my favourite shade of purple and there was one dapper gentleman swathed in a jazzy little patterned number which I deeply coveted for my own wardrobe.  Sadly, it seems as though they were only selling goats and sheep (I considered a sheep, but it would be quite hard to pack), so we moved right along.  Did I mention the greenery?  Green is a big deal when you live in a desert, and Moshi is very green.  Trees and lush plant life everywhere, along with patches of scarlet and magenta flowers and the smell of woodsmoke in the air.  I wasn't expecting it to be so pretty.

And the signs.  The signs might be my favourite thing.  I saw one for "Medium School".  So is this the school between Large and Small?  Or a training academy for psychics?  Sign on a gasoline truck:  In God We Trust.  Well, I'd personally like to trust in your driving skill, sir, since you're transporting about a bajillion gallons of flammable liquid, but that's just me.

Anyway - I'm staying at the Keys Hotel just outside of town, which of course necessitated Adventures in Taxi Procurement in order to get into town to buy some snacks and internet time (yes, people, I did this for you - the bottle of wine in my bag is just a bonus.).  The hotel is...well...let's just call it rustic and leave it at that.  I have the occasional success with wifi out there for messaging, but I think a blog post from my phone would have been beyond both my patience and the wifi.  But it's clean and the bed is comfortable and I'm pretty sure it's going to look like heaven when I come down from the mountain (wow, it's all so biblical - maybe I'll find some stone tablets up there while I'm at it.) after sleeping on the ground for a week. 

Well, I'd better go - I have a delightful evening ahead of me: unpacking my suitcase and re-packing my Kilimanjaro stuff into my North Face duffel bag.  Yes, that's right - I am now a person who owns North Face things.  I am now a person who owns polar fleece.  I am now a person who owns a headlamp.  Oh god - am I actually becoming one of those crunchy-granola types?  I am now a person who needs a drink!  And if you've read this far and enjoyed any of it, please consider donating a few dollars/pounds/euros/whatever to Doctors Without Borders (my Just Giving button at top right).  Come on, if I'm going to go all sweetly earnest, I might as well be all good-deed-doing, too.  Ugh.

Miss K on Kilimanjaro - Sweat Buckets Challenge

Has it really been two years, gentle readers?  I'm afraid it has and I'm not sure if any of you are still out there wanting to hear my ramblings, but if you are, I do apologize for the long delay.  Who knew that life out here in Saudi Arabia could possibly be so...interesting!!!  For a while I was afraid to blog because I wasn't sure how much we were monitored and how much trouble I might get in, but I think  that as long as I keep away from certain controversial subjects and only allude suggestively to certain other subjects (if you know what I mean by that, and I think you do, you saucy monkeys), it will be fine.  And wow, do I ever have stories to tell!  But I'll have to tell them a little later because right now, there's a countdown on for an unpleasant (and very sweaty) challenge that I'm willing to do for an extremely worthy cause.  I put it out there on facebook and now I'm sending it out to you as well, I hope you'll help out by donating either at the link below or by clicking on the button on the right hand side of my page:

"All right, I promised you I'd do a challenge in place of the ice bucket for an equally worthy cause, and the best part is that YOU get to torment ME. I'm donating my upcoming Kilimanjaro climb to Doctors Without Borders (also known as MSF -Médecins Sans Frontières) - I've covered all the costs of the trip myself, so all money raised goes to help this fantastic cause. My donations page is at https://www.justgiving.com/Miss-K-on-Kilimanjaro/ and your challenge is this: for every 100 pounds raised (you can donate in other currencies as well) between now and tomorrow (2 Sept) at high noon Saudi time, I will spend one minute outside in the blazing Arabian sunshine in my full summit night outfit (which consists of: hiking boots, three pairs of socks, three pairs of gloves, a balaclava, a fleece headband, a hat, a full set of silk long underwear, a full set of wool long underwear, fleece pants, hiking pants, waterproof pants, two fleece tops, a down jacket and a waterproof jacket with hood.) The temperature tomorrow should be around 43C, so however long I have to do it will be exceedingly unpleasant! And I'll film it for proof, not to mention comedy value... Right now the total is at 220 pounds, so I'll be out there for just over 2 minutes. 300 pounds would equal 3 minutes, 500 pounds = 5 minutes, etc. (But I'm putting a maximum of 10 minutes on this because I don't actually want to die of heatstroke. I doubt we'd get anywhere near raising a thousand pounds in a day anyway because I'd like to think you don't want to torture me that much, but you never know!) You've now got 15 hours - go for it, every little donation adds up..."

Thanks in advance for any donations you might choose to make, and there will be stories coming...

Miss K - back at the keyboard

What?  Could it be?  Miss K has finally come out of hiding to start posting again?  Yes, gentle readers, I am back. Again. Some more.  It has taken me slightly longer to get myself sorted out in my new life than I had thought it would, and this is why:

1.  Orientation. I had general orientation, I had company orientation, I had department orientation.  It was all very time-consuming and I was so damn oriented that I actually had no idea where I was or what I was doing most of the time!

2.  Internet access - Well, they say that living in the Middle East teaches you patience, and they're not wrong.  It took days just to get my log-in ID and then ages before my wifi got set up at home - it's not that I couldn't have used the connection at the library but it was very hit-and-miss and I just ran out of patience at that point...

3.  Bureaucracy - there were layers upon layers of things to deal with and wait for.  I couldn't get a phone without a bank account.  I couldn't get a bank account without a permanent company ID.  I couldn't get a permanent company ID before I got my passport back.  I couldn't get my passport back until I got my multiple entry-exit visa.  And I couldn't apply for my multiple entry-exit visa until I got my iqama (my residence permit).  You see what I'm saying?

 4.  Social life - when you move to a new country, you have to get out and meet people and the only real way to do that in a place like this, when you're living on a compound, is to go to absolutely every single thing you're invited to, whether it's grabbing coffee with a colleague or going to an enormous party on another compound that goes on until 3am.  You name it, I've been doing it. Out for dinner?  Sure.  Beach party?  You bet.  Mongolian BBQ (don't ask)? Absolutely.  So my time has been well-spent in the sense that I now have a pretty good social life, but that has meant my sad neglect of you, gentle readers.  I am sorry about that, but I had to make friends here - after all, you're not going to come to spend party weekend in Bahrain with me, are you?  (Actually, I shouldn't ask that - knowing you cheeky monkeys, you probably would!)

5.  Housing - I am very happy with my housing situation here, but the decor?  Well, let's just say that the prison hospital waiting room from 1972 called up and they want their furniture back.  So I've been haunting Ikea and various other home stores in order to get my place looking decent.  But it's no easy thing to go shopping here - I will go into detail in a future post, but believe me, it's a verrrrrrrry time-consuming process...

So that's basically what I've been up to here so far - it hasn't been particularly exciting, but unpacking and settling in never really is.  But I do have lots of travel planned and I do have about a billion photos from Paris that I still need to sort through, so I'll have more posts coming soon.  No promises as to when (you know what I'm like), but soon-ish...

Scenes from Saudi Arabia #1

Even in a remote province of Saudi Arabia, there is still no escape from Spongebob Squarepants. Now you know...

Arabian (days and) nights

I'm sorry, gentle readers, have you missed me?  To be honest, I've kind of missed myself - the past few weeks have been so crazy that I feel like I have been a bit lost!  Relocating to a foreign country when you're already in a foreign country, having also gone there from another foreign country - well, it's no picnic, my pretties.  I'm sorry I haven't been able to post, but now I have a zillion things to tell you about - thoughts on serendipity, the insane amount of work it is to close down your life in Paris, my first impressions of life here in Saudi Arabia, and much, much more.  BUT - I know, I know, there's always a but - the problem is that my home internet access here hasn't been set up yet, so I am writing to you from the terrace at my local library, basking in the balmy 25C temperature at 9pm, and admiring the amazing crescent moon in the sky.  Which is all great, except that my laptop battery is about to die and I simply won't have time to write anything else right now.  But I shall return shortly, my pretties, and start posting more regularly...promise!!!

Letters from London #8

All right, my pretties, I know you're thinking that I haven't posted recently because I had a craaaaazy St Patrick's Day here in Paris and I've been recovering ever since, right?  Wellllllll, no.  I did go out for St Paddy's with a bunch of Irish people and we did go to some Irish pubs, but at a certain point we just got fed up with the crowds and ended up at a champagne bar instead.  Not very authentic, but far more relaxing...

Anyway, my absence was not caused by too much partying (unfortunately), but rather because I've been in London and my internet access there was very sporadic and I just didn't get a chance to post.  But since I'm mentioning London and since it's late and I just need to post something, how about another Letter from London?

Written somewhere around July 2001

Well, after the overwhelmingly positive reaction to my last letter, I've decided to turn over a new leaf.  Yes, I'm ready to become a kinder, gentler Miss K.  From now on, I shall be nauseatingly nice, sickeningly sweet and a beam of sunshine in the lives of all those fortunate enough to come into contact with my saintly-yet-humble being.  I will forsake malice, spite and cynicism in favour of graciousness, charm and generosity of spirit.  People will come from all around simply to bask in the warm glow of my goodness... Okay, did anyone buy that?  What, not even for a second?  Oh c'mon... Anyone?  Friends?  Relatives?  No one? Really??

Anyway, I don't have a theme for this letter, so here are some random thoughts about nothing terribly interesting.....

New Experiences (A) - One of the many things I like about London is the opportunity to try things that I might not have done in Toronto.  For example, I took a ballet class for the first time in my life a couple of weeks ago and thoroughly enjoyed it.  For those of you who are rolling around on the floor laughing hysterically at the thought of me doing anything that requires grace and coordination, go right ahead.  Your mental picture is entirely correct - I galumphed around the room like a drunken lumberjack, sending willowy ballerina types fleeing in terror, and I made a total fool of myself.  Like I said, I had a fantastic time.

New Experiences (B) - Another thing I just tried was floating.  Huh?  What's that?  Well, it's a bit hard to describe, but basically you hop into a sensory deprivation tank and float in water that has about 800 lbs of salt dissolved in it.  And that's all: you just lie there in the dark and float for an hour like a cross between an astronaut and an embryo.  Question - why?  Answer - Because it's quite possibly the most relaxing thing you'll ever experience.  Strange but true.  Once you get the hang of it, you totally lose track of your body and you just feel like a big ol' head floating around in the dark.  I know, it sounds weird, but ohhhhhh, it's soooooo gooooooood....

Music - I've always been a fan of the blues, and it amazes me how well songs from the 1920s translate to the new century.  I recently picked up a Bessie Smith CD and really, you'd think she was singing about my life.  For example, here are some of the song titles: "Me and My Gin", "No One In Town Can Bake A Sweet Jelly Roll Like Mine"(if you know what she's saying, and I think you do), "Empty Bed Blues", "I'm Wild About That Thing", "A Good Man Is Hard To Find", "You've Got To Give Me Some", and my personal favourite - "Put a Little Sugar in My Bowl".  Sing it, girlfriend....

Fashion - Ladies: I hate to tell you this, but London fashion has clearly lost what passes for its collective mind.  You can be totally in style this season if you wear any of the following: 1940's floral prints, army camouflage, disco diva, cowgirl, or any combination thereof.  I've always prided myself on my eclectic style, but this might be a bit much even for me.  We shall see.

Work - I'm currently employed in Hell, which means that I work for the Devil.  Yes, the Devil has many names.... Satan..... Beelzebub..... Lucifer.... Stephanie. You might not have been aware that the Supreme Evil Being in the universe is currently incarnated in the body of a petite woman from New Zealand, but now you know.  Consider yourselves warned.

Today's Story - I thought I'd share this experience with you even though it has absolutely nothing to do with London.  When I was in Los Angeles a couple of years ago, I visited the famous slutty-lingerie store Frederick's of Hollywood (much to everyone's surprise, I'm sure).  As I was browsing, the following happened: a young English couple skulked into the store, clearly embarrassed at being there.  They approached the salesgirl next to me, and the English girl (who had a huge rack) shyly asked her: "Excuse me, but do you sell minimizer bras?"  An ominous silence fell.  The ultra-sassy black salesgirl (who had waist-length blonde braids, four-inch fingernails and more attitude than Madonna) looked at her with the undisguised contempt she might have shown for a urine sample and drawled, "Giiiiirl....this is Frederick's of Hollywood.  We MAXIMIZE!!!"  Hee!  Heeheeheeheehee!!!

Shamrocks and shenanigans

Oops, sorry, my pretties - it's been rather a while since I posted, but I hope you'll forgive me as it's all a bit of a blur at the moment while I deal with all the things I have to do before I move away!  But Miss K has plenty to tell you - in addition to running around Paris like a maniac, checking things off my "must-see/do-this-before-I-go" list, I've been on road trips to the Loire Valley and to Normandy on the last two weekends, and as soon as I sort through the bajillion photos I took, I'll be sure to tell you about those rather fabulous adventures.  

But in the meantime, here we are on St Patrick's Day, and as it's my third (and final) one in Paris and I've posted about the last two (I still can't believe there was reggae in 2010 and  The eyes have it. Well, they used to in 2011, which happened right after St Paddy's Day, so let's count that as my entry from that year, shall we?), I should probably keep on with tradition and post about this one too.  Well, gentle readers, pray for me and my liver, because this year, I am spending St Paddy's with actual Irish people (and plenty of them)- which bodes extremely well for a good time, but I shudder to anticipate what sort of state I'll be in tomorrow!    Well, as long as there's no black eye this year, it will all be grand.  I'll let you know how it turns out as soon as I can string together a coherent sentence, so....probably somewhere around Tuesday? 

Big changes

Have you seen the movie "Up In The Air"?  Well, there's a scene where George Clooney's character describes being in an airport as his home - and I know the intention was to make everyone think "oh, that man's life is so empty", but honestly, it just made me envious.  Do you realize that it's been more than a year since I've even set foot in an airport?  This wouldn't bother a lot of people, but Miss K is a travel weasel and an airport is my natural habitat - I don't do well in captivity and for me, not being able to afford to travel has been like a prison.

But, my pretties, I have some big news - this travel weasel is staging a prison break, and this blog is going to be changing, for the very simple reason that my location and circumstances are going to be changing.  Yes, it's true - after two and a half years in Paris, I am moving on to sandier (and far more lucrative) pastures: Saudi Arabia.  

I hope that tales of my expat life there will still be of interest to you, but my plan is to change the Expat Postcards to more of a general travel blog - you seem to have enjoyed the Letters from London (thus far, there are still more to come) and I have a number of similar posts that I wrote about other places I've visited (which I'll post in due course), and since I plan to be on a plane to somewhere new and exciting every time there's a three-day weekend or a holiday, there is plenty still to come.  So I'm hoping that you'll still tune in for more of my silliness?

And don't worry, Paris won't be disappearing completely from this blog, I still have a zillion photos that I haven't posted and lots of stories to go with them, so you'll still get your Paris fix from time to time...

Favourite Paris photos - 52

Garance!

Well, gentle readers, today I hang my head in shame -  I just met fashion blogger extraordinaire Garance Doré, (one of my personal style favourites) and I was wearing the most boring outfit of all time.  Ugh.

Let me back up a bit - I like to keep a few outfits ready to go at all times (the clothes, the footwear, the accessories, even the underwear, all carefully chosen and hung up together so that I can just throw it all on and get out the door), which makes me sound like one of those ridiculously organized people who has their entire life under control, but nooooo.  This is actually the reason:  Miss K is not a morning person.  I can't even begin to tell you the number of times I've been late for work because I've been staring, slack-jawed and bleary-eyed, into my vast wardrobe, trying to find something, anything to wear (I'm not the only one, right?).  So a few years ago I got into the habit of spending a couple of hours on the weekend putting together my outfits in advance for the coming week:  outfits for work, outfits for social occasions, casual outfits.  And this has worked very well - no more last-minute panic about what to wear, with the added benefit of ensuring that I actually wear everything in my wardrobe.  Ladies, you know what I'm saying - there are always a few things lurking in the closet that never get worn because you never have time to figure out what it actually goes with, and so you end up wearing the same old things over and over again.  

So, as I was saying, this little system has been working well, but today I learned a valuable lesson:  one should also have an outfit ready to go in case one has the opportunity to meet a style icon such as the fabulous Miss Doré, as mentioned above.  I checked her blog this morning (which is http://www.garancedore.fr/en/ - if you are at all interested in fashion, you should definitely be reading it) and she mentioned that she would be doing an interview today in Paris, to which she invited her readers.  Well, of course I had to go, but with only 10 minutes to get ready, what to wear to such an occasion?  Not that she would care what I was wearing, but I cared.  But I panicked, flailed around, threw on a black sweater-dress and went.  God, how embarrassing - dull, dull, dull! 

But at least I got to meet her - I have read her blog for years and I like her writing style so much, she really inspired me to start this blog when I moved to Paris.  And she was just as delightful in person- she stayed for ages after the interview to sign autographs and pose for photos with fans, which was particularly nice of her since it was boiling hot in the room and she must have been dying to leave.

Anyway, so the moral of the story is this:  always be prepared to be fabulous, even at short notice.  Really, shouldn't I know this by now???

Letters from London #7 (Part 2)

Continuing on from the previous (these are actually #6-10 on my original list, but the numbering has gone weird and I can't be arsed to sort it out)...

1. I love St Paul's Cathedral, The Tower, The Eye, Westminster Abbey, Camden Town market, the Imperial War Museum, Trafalgar Square, Madame Tussaud's, Hampton Court Palace, Hyde Park, St Bartholomew-the-Greater, the Golden Hinde, the Globe, Somerset House, the National Gallery, the National Portrait Gallery, Leicester Square, the Tate, the Tate Modern, St Bride's, Soho, Harrods, Harvey Nicks, the London Dungeon, the V&A, Borough Market, the Houses of Parliament, the Portobello Road market, Southwark Cathedral, Oxford Street, Lavender Hill, want more? I've got more....plenty more....don’t even get me started on pubs.

2.     I love the fact that you have to hail buses.  You might think that standing at a bus STOP would be enough of an indicator that the bus should perhaps do something other than keep right on going, but you would be wrong about that.  No, you actually have to wave them down to make them stop.  The first time I did it I felt like an absolute idiot, but I have since seen the error of my ways and realized that this is a stellar opportunity for me to strike a pose.  I now hail my bus with all the flair and élan of Audrey Hepburn hailing taxicabs in "Breakfast at Tiffany's" - admittedly, I'm not dressed in Givenchy and I'm not a European aristocrat, but I do my best. 

3. Speaking of European aristocrats, I recently applied for a job working for Prince Charles. Okay, not actually for Prince Charles himself, but for someone who works for someone who works for someone who works for him.  I didn't get it, of course, but I love the fact that these opportunities exist here.

4. I love the situations I find myself in.  I was in a Japanese restaurant in Soho last weekend where they sit several groups at one large table and this is what was going on around me: a couple of Asian students with approximately 600 books on astrophysics, a middle-aged French couple who ate their body weight in sushi and never spoke except for grunting with pleasure and ordering more food, and my personal favourites:  an earnest lesbian vegan couple sitting beside me (sample of conversation: "If you left me, I'd have nothing but my dog."  Hee!).  As we left the restaurant, we were almost run over by a huge group of Hare Krishnas in robes and woolly hats (well, it was cold out), out for a night on the town with their bells and gongs.  Interesting.

5. I love the people you meet.  Due to circumstances which would take too long to explain, I was at a big charity party last night.  I had just gone to get my 470th glass of champagne when I suddenly realized that I was standing next to Elle Macpherson.  (Yes, someone who grew up next to a swamp in the deep dark wilderness of rural Ontario is now hanging out with international supermodels – that's right, check out the coolness of me.)

Q - Is she really that tall? 

A - Yes. I looked waaaaay up at her from my pathetic 5'8" (cursing my the genes inherited from my tiny mother) and she's about 6' tall.  Hate her.

Q - Is she really that gorgeous?

A – Annoyingly, yes.  I comfort myself with the fact that she's obviously a member of an alien species trying to conquer Earth and not actually a woman at all.  Hate her.

Q - Does she deserve her nickname of "The Body"?

A - Yes.  Really hate her.

Q - Is she sweet and charming and gracious?

A - Yes.  Hate her, hate her, hate her.

Q - Is it incredibly vexing to discover this?

A - YES!!!  TOTALLY HATE HER.

So there you are: "10 Things I Love About London".  I leave you with a final image: as I was leaving the Tate Modern a few weeks ago, the setting sun turned the sky behind St Paul's into a wash of gold and lavender, the river smelled like a fresh spring day, people were smiling and happy and I was suddenly exhilarated beyond my powers of description to tell you about it.  I was broke, I was unemployed and I was more celibate than the Pope, but all I wanted to do was sing and dance my way along the South Bank.  If I had been wearing a hat, I probably would have twirled around and thrown it up into the air (even though you can only really get away with that sort of thing when you're Mary Tyler Moore and it’s the 60s and you have your own TV series).  That particular moment has passed, but they do happen pretty often.  Frightening, isn't it?  Hey, if the thought of the ol' kid acting like a frisky kitten hopped up on speed is disconcerting to you, imagine how alarming it is for me. 

Letters from London #7 (Part 1)

Gentle readers, I am off to London tomorrow for a brief visit, and in honour of that fine city, I think we should delve back into the archives of my Letters from London...  (This is another long one, so I'll split it up and post the second half tomorrow. )

Written somewhere around May 2001

For those of you who have been wondering about my disappearance off the face of the earth for the last couple of months, allow me to explain.  No, I did not crawl into a cave to hibernate and live off my body fat (although anyone who has seen the size of my arse recently might suggest that this wouldn't be a bad idea),  I actually went through several weeks of a financial crisis so severe that it involved me staying home every night and existing on nothing but jam sandwiches.  But I'm now solvent again, which makes me as happy as a masturbating monkey, so I thought I'd do something a little different in this letter.  After my last effort, someone with a stunning lack of imagination accused me of not liking London, so this one is officially titled "10 Things I Love About London".

1. I love the fact that I don't need a name here.  I have been addressed as dear, darling, ducky, love, lovey, mate, sweetheart, petal, poppet, and many more.  You might not think that I would enjoy this, but I'm actually quite charmed by it.  Hey, I'll take terms of endearment wherever I can get 'em.

2. I love the fact that tax is hidden in the price of products.  If something is priced at £10, then £10 is what you pay for it, as opposed to having tax added on at the cash register.  Taxation is a bit like your parents having sex -- you know it goes on, but you really don't want to think about it. 

3. I love the way that small things become absolutely essential.  I used to think a hot water bottle was a pleasant thing to have tucked next to my feet from time to time.  Since I moved to London, my hot water bottle has become the thing I love most in the world - I'm eventually going to have it bronzed and endow a scholarship in its name. 

4. I love the fact that almost every office job gives you four weeks holiday a year to start with. How good is that???  I need to stop temping and get a real job just so that I can go on vacation for a month.

5. I love the fact that the English pickle everything: pickled eggs, pickled walnuts, pickled peaches, pickled cabbage, pickled limes (does citrus really need to be pickled?  I ask you), and I swear I once saw pickled newt. It seems like the only things they don't pickle are cucumbers.  Okay, okay, they do sweet pickles and some tiny horrible things called gherkins, but try to find a decent dill pickle anywhere in the land?  Good luck.  Grail, schmail - if King Arthur had really wanted to send his knights off on an impossible quest, he would have forgotten about some overrated mystical goblet and sent them off to find a nice jar of kosher dills instead.  Hey, it might not be the stuff of legends, but they really improve a sandwich...

Things you might see on a menu

You know what I like?  I like it when a restaurant menu just says what's what.  I mean, come on - greedy pancakes?  Okay, so it's not perfect English usage (yeah, as if I should snark at anyone else about that - hee!), but boy, it sure is descriptive, right? Mmmmmm, greeeeeeeeeedy pancakes.  Love it.  And don't even get me started about the alcoholic pancakes - I actually had something else when I ate there (I know, right?  I'm an idiot), but rest assured I'll be going back to try those bad boys out...

Penis bread epiphany

You might think, from the title, that perhaps I have had some sort of epiphany about penis bread, but no.  Despite the fact that I post about it every so often, I don't actually spend much time thinking about penis bread at all, unless of course I am wandering through the Marais and find that the always-delightful Legay Choc bakery has done something new and exciting with it, which they did for the holiday of Epiphany.  This holiday is rather a big deal in France, and if I could be bothered to go into detail about it, I'm sure you'd find it very interesting.  But I'm lazy and there's a whole internet out there and I wouldn't want your mad Googling skillz to go to waste, so go ahead and look it up if you like.

But the point is that Epiphany in France involves a special cake called a galette, which you can buy anywhere here all throughout January.  Galettes come in all sorts of variations, but I've never seen this version before...