And so the journey begins

Well, I'm now sat here in Manchester Airport after a mad few days in the UK.

Firstly I want to say a huuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuge thanks to all those who came to my little leaving BBQ on Saturday, I love you all. It was an amazing night and a perfect sendoff, I had so much fun.

Packing is all fun isn't it. Spent ages getting everything I need together, packed it, weighed it, and you guessed it, I was at 40KG, did I mention my limit was 20KG? So there was some fun this morning. But the biggest fun:



I've spent aaaaaaages putting some great music, games, Nepali language apps and CDs and a host of other stuff on my iPod, but it was no-where to be found last night. Me, my brother, mum and dad were up untill 1:00am looking for it, it was no-where to be found. I was pretty stressed and gutted last night.

Had another search this morning, could we find it? Nope.

Oh well, I gave up, finished everything else, said my goodbyes and was about to get in my car.

"What's that noise?" Said Rob.

"I don't know, sounds like a duck" I said dismissively and walked to the car.

Next thing Rob comes running to me.

"How much do you love me?" he says.

"Why?" I respond as he shows me my iPod.

"That duck sound, it was your alarm on your iPod which was in your dressing gown pocket on the back of your door."

Haha, I love my little brother so much, he's a star and very high in my opinion right now. Thank you so much bhai (little brother), you're a star.

So now I'm here in Manchester airport, typing this quickly because I'm restricted to 30 mins free internet and getting annoyed with the sound of the Britain's Got Talent theme tune in the background on the franchised dance machine in the arcade but I have plenty of time to kill because my flight is delayed nearly two hours. Joy. Which means my transfer in Doha gets missed, which means I have a looooooooooooooooong wait for the next available flight.

के गर्ने? (what do to?)

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Update,

OK, I'm now in a hotel in Doha, half tired half awake but not sure what to do. I have three hours here, including breakfast, so two hours, no point sleeping, but I don't really want to stay awake. What to do? I half wish they'd just left me to pace around Duty Free for a couple of hours. Still, I had a nice ride in the taxi with a Nepali guy from Kathmandu who had been in uni in Yorkshire and a girl from Manchster who is going to work for a month in a Leprosy hospital in the Terrai. And met a great guy in Manchester Airport who is from the UK but now lives in Japan with his Japanese wife and daughter. He started off like me, one way flight to Japan to work as a teacher with no real idea how long he'd stay. Haha, who knows what'll happen to me hey?

The journey here was pleasant enough after the delay. I had a seat on my own so I just sat and read Sky Burial by Xinran, which was AMAZING, probably the most moving thing I've ever read. Thank you so much Rachael Clark for lending it to me. E-mail me your postal address and I'll send it back to you.