Thursday, 20 November 2008
Monday, 3 November 2008
Half term
Half term is great if you are a child or a proper fully-paid up teacher.
It is rubbish if you are a supply teacher, because it becomes a week with no work or chance of salary.
However, it was nice not to have to go to school.
Even so, I'd left my previous position as 'child management professional' in Birmingham because of a promise of a job in Nuneaton. So I was looking forward to a new challenge of teaching Spanish. Yet somehow God has closed that door and this morning, Monday, I find myself with a lot of time on my hands and without a lot of money. But, hey ho, I've got lots to do for Kid's stuff at Church and so in the meantime I might as well get busy for God and trust Him to provide for the bills and food etc... THIS is yet again living by faith.
It's most frustrating to not get a job that I can settle in and then at the same time it's really exciting because God has to come through with a miracle to provide, and THAT is what I'm looking forward to this week.
Philippians 4
"I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances. I know what it is to be in need and I know what it is to have plenty. [...] I can do everything through him who gives me strength."
Well, I'm learning in any case. Not quite there yet, but I'm on my way.
It is rubbish if you are a supply teacher, because it becomes a week with no work or chance of salary.
However, it was nice not to have to go to school.
Even so, I'd left my previous position as 'child management professional' in Birmingham because of a promise of a job in Nuneaton. So I was looking forward to a new challenge of teaching Spanish. Yet somehow God has closed that door and this morning, Monday, I find myself with a lot of time on my hands and without a lot of money. But, hey ho, I've got lots to do for Kid's stuff at Church and so in the meantime I might as well get busy for God and trust Him to provide for the bills and food etc... THIS is yet again living by faith.
It's most frustrating to not get a job that I can settle in and then at the same time it's really exciting because God has to come through with a miracle to provide, and THAT is what I'm looking forward to this week.
Philippians 4
"I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances. I know what it is to be in need and I know what it is to have plenty. [...] I can do everything through him who gives me strength."
Well, I'm learning in any case. Not quite there yet, but I'm on my way.
Sunday, 5 October 2008
one minute...
... one minute I am blogging away merrily and the next I start getting emails from people asking what's happened to my blog....
I AM still here and alive, I've been a bit busy over the summer doing, amongst other things:
I AM still here and alive, I've been a bit busy over the summer doing, amongst other things:
- a week of soggy camping at New Wine where we had to move my tent on day 2 cos it was in danger of flooding, and we taught Antonio (from South Africa) that English summers are indeed colder than your average Durban winter day, that the sun doesn't often visit in August and that we the Brits taught the world how to do BBQs!!! (only joking, it's a Braai.) On the plus side, Jonny (lovely boyf) got to meet and greet lots of church folk and we heard some amazing teaching from all sorts of great speakers like Heidi Baker, Bill Johnson and the like. Awesome stuff and for that reason alone I shall forget about the rain and be back next year.
- Testing out the NHS as a mystery patient. Firstly, I got ill enough to check their weekly care in a ward of Warwick Hospital, then I spent a great deal of time phoning round the various departments to try and ascertain just when I was going to get an operation, then I managed to convince the nurse in pre-op that neither I nor anyone in my family has CJD (I thought it was fatal in any case?) before finally testing out their anaesthetic during a brief but major laparoscopic choltestectomy (check out the big words!). In other words, they removed my gallbladder by keyhole surgery. Truly it is a miracle. Apart from feeling like I'd been shot or an elephant had accidentally trod on me, which took about a week to improve, I was absolutely fine and can now manage a fish and chip supper with no bother whatsoever. The wonders of modern medecine eh! At least I can now enjoy houmous again.
- Following on from this excitement, I went through a brief period of self-pity at my state of unemployment before landing a supply teaching job in the lovely Birmingham borough of Handsworth. I say 'lovely', but it's your classic race riots, gangland area where several of my pupils have lost friends to gang-related shootings and drugs are rife, although thankfully not in my school. I feel relatively safe though because my classroom is on the third floor of a tower block with kiler stairs. No one is going to bother climbing them to attack me, not even Ofsted inspectors last week could make it up there. Pupils need several minutes to recover from the hike, although it doesn't stop some of them taking it out on each other with a few well-timed punches being thrown. Modern teaching eh! I'd forgotten how much fun it could be!!
- And then my lovely boyfriend Jonny moved over to Leamington to be nearer me and that's been a blessing and a challenge. Suddenly I have to stop being selfish and consider someone else for a change, which is quite tricky when you have a bad day at school and just want to do nothing but watch yet more 'Friends' on E4. He's still without a job and needs one soon, but God will provide, we have no doubt. It's just that a lead would be nice... It is brilliant to have him over though, and definitely a step forward from a long-distance relationship to a proper 'normal' relationship day-to-day.
So that's me for the moment. I'll try to blog more often, I need to get back into the habit! Remind me if I forget and you miss me ;-)
Tuesday, 22 July 2008
Old Testament time
For some reason, on the way back from London I started reading the book of 2 Chronicles.
It was fascinating. I must have been in the mood for taking in all of the different names and information therein, as I continued reading it yesterday and this morning finished it, read all of 1 and 2 Kings and drew lots of pretty charts listing who was king of Judah and Israel at each moment and which prophets (major and minor) go where...
And when you start looking into it, a lot of things click into place. It's clear that God was quite obvious when he gave out laws and rules and yet the Israelites seem to fail on the first one before even looking at the rest of the commandments. The Kings went from a good one who set up the temple, sought God's face and followed his laws through a variety of less good kings who allowed, encouraged or tolerated idolatry and then along comes another good king who sets things right, and then he's followed by an even more evil one who destroys all of that and sets up idols again. Is it any wonder that God might get a bit tired of all of this, after he sets up a clear covenant and mandate and then people just do their own thing?!?
And then suddenly all the doom and gloom, and yet also the hope, in the minor prophets makes more sense. There are some great stories in these books, I suppose with hindsight we can see how stupid some individuals were and also how clever God is in dealing with them. And yet throughout it, God maintains His promise to have an heir to David on the throne and so he allows crazy and evil kings to continue so that they produce an heir until eventually we get the exile, which I guess had to happen sooner or later given the circumstances.
Fascinating stuff, why has no-one made a movie, or epic tv series of all of this?
Anyway, I wonder if we're not so much different today. God sets out clearly what we are supposed to do. Loving the Lord our God with all our heart, mind, soul and strength; loving our neighbours as ourselves. Fixing our eyes on Jesus and living for him. Being transformed by the renewing of our minds; Healing the sick, raising the dead etc etc. And yet so often we get distracted or we rebel, like those early Old Testament Kings, into following 'other gods', and then we wonder why we end up in a pickle.
Thank goodness for grace. That God is patient and tries to correct us when we fall down or run away. But the challenge remains in our lives to 'destroy the high places' and commit ourselves to follow wholeheartedly the way of the Lord. To have a heart like Josiah (who gets very little press really, despite being quite cool!)
2 Chron 34v2-3
'He did what was right in the eyes of the LORD and walked in the ways of his father David, not turning aside to the right or to the left. In the eighth year of his reign, WHILE HE WAS STILL YOUNG, he began to seek the God of his father David... '
And all of that was fulfilling a prophecy spoken about him about 300 years previously, when the Israelites were rebelling and breaking away from Judah. 1 Kings 13v2
God's always got a plan. There's no fooling Him. And that's the best bit about being in the Kingdom of God. (well maybe not THE best bit, but it's pretty good all the same.)
It was fascinating. I must have been in the mood for taking in all of the different names and information therein, as I continued reading it yesterday and this morning finished it, read all of 1 and 2 Kings and drew lots of pretty charts listing who was king of Judah and Israel at each moment and which prophets (major and minor) go where...
And when you start looking into it, a lot of things click into place. It's clear that God was quite obvious when he gave out laws and rules and yet the Israelites seem to fail on the first one before even looking at the rest of the commandments. The Kings went from a good one who set up the temple, sought God's face and followed his laws through a variety of less good kings who allowed, encouraged or tolerated idolatry and then along comes another good king who sets things right, and then he's followed by an even more evil one who destroys all of that and sets up idols again. Is it any wonder that God might get a bit tired of all of this, after he sets up a clear covenant and mandate and then people just do their own thing?!?
And then suddenly all the doom and gloom, and yet also the hope, in the minor prophets makes more sense. There are some great stories in these books, I suppose with hindsight we can see how stupid some individuals were and also how clever God is in dealing with them. And yet throughout it, God maintains His promise to have an heir to David on the throne and so he allows crazy and evil kings to continue so that they produce an heir until eventually we get the exile, which I guess had to happen sooner or later given the circumstances.
Fascinating stuff, why has no-one made a movie, or epic tv series of all of this?
Anyway, I wonder if we're not so much different today. God sets out clearly what we are supposed to do. Loving the Lord our God with all our heart, mind, soul and strength; loving our neighbours as ourselves. Fixing our eyes on Jesus and living for him. Being transformed by the renewing of our minds; Healing the sick, raising the dead etc etc. And yet so often we get distracted or we rebel, like those early Old Testament Kings, into following 'other gods', and then we wonder why we end up in a pickle.
Thank goodness for grace. That God is patient and tries to correct us when we fall down or run away. But the challenge remains in our lives to 'destroy the high places' and commit ourselves to follow wholeheartedly the way of the Lord. To have a heart like Josiah (who gets very little press really, despite being quite cool!)
2 Chron 34v2-3
'He did what was right in the eyes of the LORD and walked in the ways of his father David, not turning aside to the right or to the left. In the eighth year of his reign, WHILE HE WAS STILL YOUNG, he began to seek the God of his father David... '
And all of that was fulfilling a prophecy spoken about him about 300 years previously, when the Israelites were rebelling and breaking away from Judah. 1 Kings 13v2
God's always got a plan. There's no fooling Him. And that's the best bit about being in the Kingdom of God. (well maybe not THE best bit, but it's pretty good all the same.)
Monday, 21 July 2008
work update
On the days when I am not being a supermodel (see previous post), I've been busy looking for more jobs...
I'm now officially registered unemployed. Its so odd to go to the jobcentre and pass the bouncers to sign on, but the characters one comes across in the jobcentre could provide inspiration for a number of best-selling novels...
Since signing on, I've been head-hunted by 2 supply agencies and also have a job interview on Wed for a completely different job, working with people affected by HIV. It could be very interesting, despite the commute to work, it's a fair way away. Anyway, we'll see what happens.
It's funny though because people say you should take time to adjust to being back in the country after working and living abroad. The official stance is that it takes half as long to recover as the time you spent abroad, which means normal service will resume for me in October... I didn't really relax when I came home from Africa and my recent stay in hospital and sick leave gave me the opportunity to chillax and that's what I've done. All worries about needing to rush into a job have vanished. I know that God will provide and I don't need to get anxious or guilty about enjoying some free time. For goodness sake, I worked loads of 'overtime' in S.Africa and need to recover from that... I'm doing ok at adjusting though, sometimes there are good and bad days.
The strangest thing is that I seem to have lots of friends around here, but my social life has become family-orientated... This needs some attention I think. It's always hard to return to your old town, people move on. It's even harder when you have a long-distance relationship going on at the same time, thankfully it will become a closer-distance relationship very soon when J moves to Leam in September, then we have to negotiate the new game of couple-dom....
I'm now officially registered unemployed. Its so odd to go to the jobcentre and pass the bouncers to sign on, but the characters one comes across in the jobcentre could provide inspiration for a number of best-selling novels...
Since signing on, I've been head-hunted by 2 supply agencies and also have a job interview on Wed for a completely different job, working with people affected by HIV. It could be very interesting, despite the commute to work, it's a fair way away. Anyway, we'll see what happens.
It's funny though because people say you should take time to adjust to being back in the country after working and living abroad. The official stance is that it takes half as long to recover as the time you spent abroad, which means normal service will resume for me in October... I didn't really relax when I came home from Africa and my recent stay in hospital and sick leave gave me the opportunity to chillax and that's what I've done. All worries about needing to rush into a job have vanished. I know that God will provide and I don't need to get anxious or guilty about enjoying some free time. For goodness sake, I worked loads of 'overtime' in S.Africa and need to recover from that... I'm doing ok at adjusting though, sometimes there are good and bad days.
The strangest thing is that I seem to have lots of friends around here, but my social life has become family-orientated... This needs some attention I think. It's always hard to return to your old town, people move on. It's even harder when you have a long-distance relationship going on at the same time, thankfully it will become a closer-distance relationship very soon when J moves to Leam in September, then we have to negotiate the new game of couple-dom....
On being a model....
When you have hours to spare each day you sometimes enter competitions. In this case I won a make-over and photoshoot day in London and went this Saturday with my good friend Natalie because it was her Birthday last week.
So I set off down to London on Saturday morning, braving a migraine and the Chiltern Line crowdedness of their Saturday run to London (why don't they ever put extra carriages on - there are always people standing!!?!?) We had a brief stop in Banbury whilst the paramedics pulled an unconscious man off the train (possibly collapsed from sheer numbers of people???). The guy sitting next to me on the train was extremely anxious because he'd already had to switch to this train cos Euston line not running and was due to be at an important meeting at 11 when we were due to arrive in London at 11.06. He was frantically phoning various people to work out the best way to get there, before settling into listening to his i-pod at an extremely high volume. Now, I have a reasonable volume of hair covering my ears and I also think I might be a little deaf (cos I always have to turn the TV up) but I could still hear every word of his selection of indie tunes as he tried to forget his impending disaster of a meeting... I must be getting old not to appreciate that...
In any case, because I'd loaded up on codeine I managed to sleep the rest of the way to London and on arrival the adrenalin set in because of the sheer number of people at Marylebone. I just had to grit my teeth and push through, no time for a bad head...
Thanks to my humble Oyster card I didn't have to queue for several hours to get a tube ticket. The nice people of London Transport had decided to close both the Jubilee AND Victoria lines for all of this sunny summer weekend in London, causing widespread confusion amongst the tourists who had carefully planned their journeys around town. But I made it to meet Nats ok at Oxford St and then we soon left the main crazy streets for the more tranquil side streets. This is what I like about London, the bits behind the scenes.
Anyway, we arrived at 'Covergirl - London's premier photographic studios' (apparently) in good time and then our pampering session could begin. We had hair and make up done before a session in various outfits and poses in the studio. It did seem that every photographer was Eastern European, but they were all very friendly nonetheless. Apparently I am very photogenic and take great photos first time... (I knew I should have picked super-modelling as a career!!!) Afterwards we got to edit out the photos we didn't like. There was opportunity for air-brushing but none of that for us... oh no, we are naturals!
In any case, despite the ridiculous cost of buying photos, we managed to get 3 out of them. Result. To give you an idea, a set of 10 photos comes out at £600! However, I have to say that the guy was really nice and when I spun him my jobseekers allowance story, he didn't put any pressure on at all to buy any. So I did well to get some photos for free!
Later on, the big curls in my hair fell out leaving me with oddly straight hair, the make up took a lot of cleanser to remove and we were both totally exhausted from all that sitting around all day between shots. It must be hectic to be a real model, and you never realise how tiring it can be just to be so gorgeous!
Sunday, 6 July 2008
On being creative
Finally, after a few days of unemployment and a brief moment of inspiration, I've managed to complete draft 1 of my novel.
This is the novel that was conceived back in the year 2000 when I was stuck for cash in Italy. Better late than never I suppose. I wrote chapter one back then as an introduction and practice to see if I could do it and it was fairly well received by those who I allowed to read it. So we'll see.
I'm just printing it out, then the process of editing and re-working a lot of it begins. So the first draft will probably be far from the final product (if indeed, anyone wants to print it!)
This creative splurge comes after preparing a very visual and exciting sermon for this evening on Psalm 145. The talky bit will be available on the internet from tomorrow I think, but the visuals are not - unless I upload them onto here... we'll see.
There are at least 2 other writing projects in progress at the moment and so I reckon I might as well get on with that. I've registered with Jobseekers, but have to wait a week before interview. In the meantime the internet is not leading me towards any particular jobs and it's raining so wandering round town window shopping has to be put on hold for a few days...
Back to my laptop...
This is the novel that was conceived back in the year 2000 when I was stuck for cash in Italy. Better late than never I suppose. I wrote chapter one back then as an introduction and practice to see if I could do it and it was fairly well received by those who I allowed to read it. So we'll see.
I'm just printing it out, then the process of editing and re-working a lot of it begins. So the first draft will probably be far from the final product (if indeed, anyone wants to print it!)
This creative splurge comes after preparing a very visual and exciting sermon for this evening on Psalm 145. The talky bit will be available on the internet from tomorrow I think, but the visuals are not - unless I upload them onto here... we'll see.
There are at least 2 other writing projects in progress at the moment and so I reckon I might as well get on with that. I've registered with Jobseekers, but have to wait a week before interview. In the meantime the internet is not leading me towards any particular jobs and it's raining so wandering round town window shopping has to be put on hold for a few days...
Back to my laptop...
Monday, 30 June 2008
living by faith
I've finally come up with a title for my blog. It's taken a while.
This accurately describes my current situation. I've been here before, heading off to Italy on a whim and a prayer and seeing great provision for my time there, the same with going to South Africa, where God provided abundantly and enabled me to bless many people out there by sharing what I had.
And now I find myself back in the UK and without means of earning money. In the natural, it's all rather strange. I'm highly qualified and yet out of work. I guess this happens quite a lot. I've applied for jobs but none have been successful. I've scrolled through pages and pages of internet adverts and this has been largely fruitless. And the thing is, while I'm hoping to hit on something exciting that will be the perfect job for me, I also have in the back of my mind a little idea that this particular search is pointless as I won't find the job for me here.
The only thing that keeps coming to me is the singular word 'WRITE' and also a very strong sense that I will be 'IN THE RIGHT PLACE AT THE RIGHT TIME'. Hence the re-starting of my blog. And so it's a waiting game.
Last week I went on a conference in Leamington Spa called 'Voices'. It was run by the Listening to God team that is part of The Well Christian Healing Centre. The main speaker was Steve Witt from Cleveland, Ohio. He shared many stories and taught us great stuff about prophecy. If you are interested, get his new book called 'Voices'. It's very good and covers a lot of what he shared with us. There's nothing like being there and experiencing God working through him live, but if you couldn't be there, the book makes up for that.
God is our heavenly Father who loves for us to play with him, like a human father wanting his toddlers to come and engage with him. He weaves mysteries into our lives so that we stop and try to figure them out and in the process draw near to him and that's when he reveals to us what the mysteries mean. It's not some strange 'I'll hide all the good stuff away' gesture on God's part, more a game of hide and seek; but God doesn't hide things very well and so it's not too difficult for us to find what he wants us to find, when we turn to him and ask him. Like Moses and the Burning Bush. There were loads of bushes burning in the desert, it was hot and things spontaneously combusted at times. The difference with this one was that the bush was not being destroyed by the fire. And it's only when Moses turned aside to investigate further did God speak to him.
2 questions to ask God in times of mystery:
- What does this mean?
- What must I do?
It's like God is there, wanting to engage with us and waiting expectantly for us to turn aside and look to Him and engage with Him. We need to chase after more of God, if that's what we want. We can be open to Him moving in our lives, but maybe 'being open' is not enough, maybe He wants us to chase after things instead, to take a step in the right direction, a step of faith, a step towards the unknown and possibly downright weird and then He moves in to meet us.
Well, now I'm at that stage of coming to the end of my official sick leave and facing uncertain times. Someone gave me a blessing at the conference which simply said 'Bless your finances - that you will not be without' (and they didn't have a clue about my situation). So I know that God's got it all under control and He will provide.
Sunday, 29 June 2008
long pause
Sorry about that... there seems to have been a rather long pause since I last blogged.. over 3 months in fact.
Much has happened, too much to go into now. Here's a brief overview:
March - Trawled the internet, papers, temp agencies for a job. Looked again. Eventually got one at Aston Martin in Gaydon. Very excited.
Also, went to Germany to see the Young Zulu Warriors in concert - excellent as ever. Came home and met my boyfriend (had to mention him, he's been pestering!! ;-) )
April - Spent a nice weekend with new boyfr showing him the delights of Warwickshire. More Aston Martin - lots of part numbers and computer screens. Managed to stop the track twice (almost the equivalent of causing a stock market crash!). Not really my fault but I did press the buttons.
May - The early mornings are taking their toll and exhaustion starts creeping in. Long hours for not so long-lasting pay... spent a weekend in Belfast with boyfr with him showing me the delights of N.Ireland. We come dangerously close to Boyzone...
June - Go to a women's ministry meeting and get prayed for and anointed. The same night I dismay my housemate by getting her to take me to A&E at 3am because I'm in pain. Discover the wonders of Tramadol. Signed off for a week. Perfect timing to spend quality time with Grandparents for their DIAMOND wedding anniversary - wonderful family event with much joy and laughter.
Back to work only to collapse days later with Biliary Colic and be rushed by some nice 'paramedic' Jaguar Engineers to the occupational health dept at Land Rover to partake of yet more medical wonders - gas and air... Taken to A&E again and this time they make me wait 4 hours before deciding I have to be admitted. Thankful to see some friendly faces working there!
Spend 6 days in hospital with many phones calls, visits and lots of sleep. Realise that I shouldn't take too much oromorph - it's very effective and rather addictive.
After 4 days the Drs say they want to put something down my throat to see if there's a gallstone blocking a bile duct, because I'm rather yellow and jaundiced. Not happy. Get everyone to pray (thank you if you did) and in the end I just got to that point of being fed up and so I went into the bathroom on the ward and systematically claimed my healing over all the wrong bits in that area of my body and declared myself to wake up well the next day.
Which I did.
Result.
Thank you Jesus, another miracle.
Didn't have to have the nasty procedure and given 2 weeks to rest at home.
And that is where I am today. Back with my parents for a little while. I've come to the end of my contract with Aston Martin and as of Thursday 3rd I'm officially out of work. I'm awaiting a date to have my gallbladder removed by keyhole surgery, hopefully fairly soon. Then it'll be another recovery time.
In the meantime the price of everything in this country is soaring and my funds are going down... fast. And so I think it must be time for another miracle...
Wednesday, 12 March 2008
Tractors
I've just remembered how much I dislike tractors.
Yesterday I took the back way down to Oxford (and it appears to have been the right choice, given that the M40 was dealing with invasion of cows and diesel). This would have been fine, except for the tractor. There's always one.
It's bad enough that there are variable speed limits to slow me down. 50, 30, 50, 30, 30, speed cameras here there and everywhere... This tractor was particularly annoying because it was being followed by a car transporter and several other vehicles, and then in front of me was a car who seemed incapable of making up the 50m gap between itself and the car in front. To top it all I was being followed by a dark green Ford Focus driven by what looked like Cruella de Vil herself, complete with black driving gloves (only minus the fur!).
Cruella was possibly more irritated than I was at the hold up and moved menacingly towards me at certain points on the road. I did expect her to overtake me dangerously on the road out of Woodstock (a place my Father chooses to forget owing to an incident with an overzealous speed camera many years ago), and I almost willed her to risk her life and get out of mine. See, even Christians have bad thoughts sometimes... ;-) However, she may have looked evil, but was in fact patient enough to wait until the duel carriageway before zooming past...
And then the relief of finally making it the Oxford Park and Ride, and a short trip in to meet Nats, who had made the most of my delays by eyeing up most of Debenhams home dept. I would have been quicker to meet her had I not got confused when I got off the bus and marched half-way across Oxford to meet her only to discover that where I thought Debenhams was, it was in fact BHS.
Gutted.
But I refused to look like a tourist so I had to run around looking for a map in order to educate myself as to the real whereabouts of Debenhams.
It was, as predicted, opposite the bus stop where I had previously alighted...
Yesterday I took the back way down to Oxford (and it appears to have been the right choice, given that the M40 was dealing with invasion of cows and diesel). This would have been fine, except for the tractor. There's always one.
It's bad enough that there are variable speed limits to slow me down. 50, 30, 50, 30, 30, speed cameras here there and everywhere... This tractor was particularly annoying because it was being followed by a car transporter and several other vehicles, and then in front of me was a car who seemed incapable of making up the 50m gap between itself and the car in front. To top it all I was being followed by a dark green Ford Focus driven by what looked like Cruella de Vil herself, complete with black driving gloves (only minus the fur!).
Cruella was possibly more irritated than I was at the hold up and moved menacingly towards me at certain points on the road. I did expect her to overtake me dangerously on the road out of Woodstock (a place my Father chooses to forget owing to an incident with an overzealous speed camera many years ago), and I almost willed her to risk her life and get out of mine. See, even Christians have bad thoughts sometimes... ;-) However, she may have looked evil, but was in fact patient enough to wait until the duel carriageway before zooming past...
And then the relief of finally making it the Oxford Park and Ride, and a short trip in to meet Nats, who had made the most of my delays by eyeing up most of Debenhams home dept. I would have been quicker to meet her had I not got confused when I got off the bus and marched half-way across Oxford to meet her only to discover that where I thought Debenhams was, it was in fact BHS.
Gutted.
But I refused to look like a tourist so I had to run around looking for a map in order to educate myself as to the real whereabouts of Debenhams.
It was, as predicted, opposite the bus stop where I had previously alighted...
Reverse Culture shock
You can only truly appreciate the weirdness of 'reverse culture shock' (hereafter referred to as RCS) when you go through it. For me, this is possibly my 4th time of having the 'temporary disease' having already moved back here from France (twice), Italy and now South Africa.
For some reason one of my major triggers is Tesco. Just walking into my (formerly) local tesco in Warwick on Saturday afternoon gave me a shock. RCS is weird because it's not uniform, you just react strangely to things or feel weird. For me, wearing my snuggly furry jacket, not real, which reminded me of the Zulu traditional skins (which are real fur), wandering into Tesco to buy some food for dinner became suddenly unpleasant when I realised that in the 18 months when my life was being transformed, NOTHING HAD CHANGED AT ALL in Tesco. I tested it and everything was indeed in exactly the same place... It shouldn't depress me but it did.
See, I told you RCS was weird. What do I care about shelving and food rotation?
But it's not really that, that is the trigger for then a whole process of thinking about the fact that Tesco hasn't changed and what else hasn't changed in life around me? And then my brain started aching and I had to sit down for a while.
A long while, in fact most of Sunday.
But I feel better now.
The main thing is to remember that the feelings are usually irrational, temporary and will pass. It takes half as long to get over being in a country so I'm on track for being 'normal' in about October time.
In the meantime, expect weirdness...
For some reason one of my major triggers is Tesco. Just walking into my (formerly) local tesco in Warwick on Saturday afternoon gave me a shock. RCS is weird because it's not uniform, you just react strangely to things or feel weird. For me, wearing my snuggly furry jacket, not real, which reminded me of the Zulu traditional skins (which are real fur), wandering into Tesco to buy some food for dinner became suddenly unpleasant when I realised that in the 18 months when my life was being transformed, NOTHING HAD CHANGED AT ALL in Tesco. I tested it and everything was indeed in exactly the same place... It shouldn't depress me but it did.
See, I told you RCS was weird. What do I care about shelving and food rotation?
But it's not really that, that is the trigger for then a whole process of thinking about the fact that Tesco hasn't changed and what else hasn't changed in life around me? And then my brain started aching and I had to sit down for a while.
A long while, in fact most of Sunday.
But I feel better now.
The main thing is to remember that the feelings are usually irrational, temporary and will pass. It takes half as long to get over being in a country so I'm on track for being 'normal' in about October time.
In the meantime, expect weirdness...
Monday, 10 March 2008
And we're back...
So a month ago I left South Africa and moved back to live in the United Kingdom, which was good.
And then I finished off my 'adventures in South Africa' blog. But I still want to write. I know that 'blogging' has kind of fallen from fashion and most people have moved to facebook or the like, but seriously, facebook leaves no room for personal creative expression and I want to write...
So I'm back.
Follow my stories of re-adapting back to life in the Northern Hemisphere if you like, or don't. It's a free country and I'm going to use this as a means of self-expression and modern-day social commentary. You might not agree with everything, you might think it's wonderful and urge me to publish my memoirs...
In any case, I'm editing the other blog in preparation for possible publishing, so if you were a fan of that stay tuned!
And then I finished off my 'adventures in South Africa' blog. But I still want to write. I know that 'blogging' has kind of fallen from fashion and most people have moved to facebook or the like, but seriously, facebook leaves no room for personal creative expression and I want to write...
So I'm back.
Follow my stories of re-adapting back to life in the Northern Hemisphere if you like, or don't. It's a free country and I'm going to use this as a means of self-expression and modern-day social commentary. You might not agree with everything, you might think it's wonderful and urge me to publish my memoirs...
In any case, I'm editing the other blog in preparation for possible publishing, so if you were a fan of that stay tuned!
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