Last Night In France

It's 01:15 and I really should be tucked up in bed asleep but having had three days of solid sleep care of the Arctic Measles I've found I'm back to my usual insomnia. I like to think it's a sign I'm getting better.

We leave for Qatar tomorrow, some would say to tempt fate in Doha, which I'm sure will be fine. Gene & I are looking forward to catching up with our favourite limo driver while we're there. The whole day spa thing is a little out of the question in light of recent events. A pity because we'd been looking forward to it for most of the trip.

Am feeling much better and made contact with the world again today (ie. started looking for work and called family & friends). That was lovely. It's nice to be back in the world even though the world is currently still a little sore. The paracetamol's looking after that though.

In answer to Nick's comment on my previous post I must admit I didn't feel particularly medieval during the chicken pox although I did spend some brief moments gazing wistfully out the window at the happy people outside before hiding behind the curtains incase they saw me. More fairytale trapped in a tower due to being a disfigured, misunderstood creature than medieval but an interesting description of the experience of chicken pox from your family. I'll have to ask other Nick how he felt about it... He did go sledding though so I doubt it was medieval. Sorry Rami I don't think the story will be illustrated any time soon. You'll have to use your imagination.

So here we are. We've made it to the end of our whirlwind tour of Europe. It's hard to believe that we've been here since Christmas Eve. Time seems to flow differently when you're on holiday. It's been great fun having gone through a variety of countries where we've all spoken the language, not spoken it at all, or had one or two members of the party speak the language. Norweigan was a tough one to pick up. We've come away with only one word takk which means "thank you". Still it was a good experience for us to muddle our way across borders with our phrasebooks and we're looking forward to doing it again.

Tomorrow we start the journey home navigating our way back through Asia. We're still on the waiting list to get back to Australia so we're making plans to show Nick around Singapore for a few days. This largely revolves around all the great places and foods to eat as well as a tour of the Esplanade. We're theatre geeks at heart, how could we not?

We've already started discussions of the first things that we want to consume upon our eventual return home.
Gene - large Aussie with garlic and chilli
Nick - Boags draught

Me? I just want some vegemite on toast. Some biltong too (although it's South African so not particularly patriotic and I had some in the UK anyway).

Having been away for a few months now I'm expecting the city to be, as they would say in Doha, same same but different. My Dad posted some pictures he'd taken around Melbourne and it was good to see the city sights again. It's not something that I've really taken much notice of until we went away. While we were flying to Paris from Oslo I was reading the inflight magazine and there was an article on Melbourne. The photo accompanying the article was an old photo though. The old Gas & Fuel buildings were still standing opposite Flinders Street Station with St Paul's peeping out from behind them. No Fed Square in sight.

While it will be good to see the city again it really is the people I'm most looking forward to seeing.

Almost home but not quite. No ticket back yet and our house in storage. It's a little odd but strangely liberating.

Speed posting due to poor battery life

What a Christmas! After the long hours spent in Dubai airport we arrived in France's Charles De Gaulle airport and waited in the long queue to get through passport control. There was a loud cheer as another officer joined the sole person who had been processing the plane load of passengers.

All of our luggage arrived safely with us and we were off to catch the RER B train to Gare du Nord which is our closest train station. The Hotel Magenta where we're staying is about a block away from the station and we rapidly discovered that even with our culling of random luggage we've still got too much stuff...

We had our first meal at Hippopotamus which is like a French fast restaurant chain (Sizzler without the buffet). The wine was lovely.

Christmas day was spent with some of Lisa's friends who kindly took us in, fed us and allowed us to share in their Christmas meal.

Yesterday my post-show blues/cold sank in. That was less good but was helped by my brand new lined boots which are much warmer than my other shoes and Gene's purchase of cold/flu tablets for me today. We also checked out Montemarte, Sacre Cour and Notre Dame. Plenty of pictures taken. Mulled wine is a definite favourite over here.

Tonight we'll visit the Champes Elysees and enjoy dinner with Lisa again.

Must run as my laptop is running out of battery rapidly... must fix that at some stage. Off to bed to rest a little before re-packing gear for our train trip to London tomorrow.

Gene's Aunt Jackie has kindly offered to put us up in a place in Guildford which is where we'll be basing ourselves for the coming weeks until we journey to Norway & southern France.

A bientot!