"Not just Granny, Dad, a few friends and the pets..."

Uber-fantastiche news! We have been chosen to be featured as STA travel “Explorers” (ooh, Columbus!) on their website -
“we'd like to feature you as an 'STA Explorer', so others from all over the web can follow your experiences through blogs, photos, videos, podcasts – the whole shebang. The hope is that by reading your experiences, viewing your photos, and watching your videos, our readers can get a real insight into the places you visit, the way you travel and (hopefully) learn something for their own journey.”

We've already been written about, commenting on STA Travel. I chose to call them STI travel as a joke - a bit cheeky. It wasn't a typo. Look how far away 'I' is from 'A' on the keyboard!

The aforementioned great news has led to my wasting of the entire day drinking too much coffee and going a bit crazy listening to Vampire Weekend and Billy Joel, and doing hamster-in-wheel impressions*. We’ll be linked to from their website, and hopefully earn our 2 minutes of Internet fame. And a few more readers, genuine ones, not just Granny, Dad, a few friends and the pets. Not that we’re doing this for readership – we’d be making this blog if it were only for Jo and I to read once we got back, to laugh/cry/mutter about “the good old days”. If you come here from STA travel, leave us a nice little comment somewhere as proof of your existence (that’ll solve your existential crisis). Plus we’re super celebrities now so, start a blossoming friendship with us now - when you have that financial crisis in 2030 we’ll be more likely to help you out.

In response to Jo’s post this morning, the only big trip I’ve done before was my 4 month Gap Year trip in Thailand last year. I did some teaching in a nice remote village called Mae Meung Noi, then learnt how to scuba dive and travelled around like a lazy gap year bum in Koh Tao and around islands and the coast. Lots of great things happened, and I learnt a lot, in a clichéd life-changing type way. It might be naff, and sound boring, but you do really change when you travel, especially for a longer amount of time. Accosted by bad experiences (having my passport stolen), and overwhelmed by the good (many things, including being made to dress up as a jungle savage and dance with burning torches in front of hundreds of schoolchildren), I learnt how to just go with it and have a good old laugh when before, my response to trouble would have been to throw myself against the nearest brick wall with emphasis.

My feeling is that Jo will overcome many of her perceived “uptight” tendencies, and I might rein myself in a bit and gain some self-control. When left to my own devices I simply slob and have fun. The truth. You should see my room at uni: dire. Having Jo be so organised has been like some kind of manna from heaven – I hope to contribute to the trip ethos by occasionally interjecting with something along the lines of Thailand’s unofficial motto: “mai pen rai", meaning 'never mind', 'don’t worry', “being able to deal with difficult situations, not brooding over material and personal loss and an all-pervading cheerfulness” (Not too cheery, because that's creepy). I assure you it’s a useful attitude in times of stress. However, I'm not some total hippy. I can still panic, scream, and run away flailing limbs in the air.

I think Jo and I will find a happy compromise between seeing all the wonderful European sites we aim to see, chillaxing in café’s, and slobbing (including the occasional lie-in if we feel like it).

I live now and only now, and I will do what I want to do this moment and not what I decided was best for me yesterday.
Hugh Prather (whoever he was he had the right idea)

True happiness is…to enjoy the present, without anxious dependence upon the future.
Seneca

Meg

*consists of screaming “RUN!!!!” in a high-pitched hamstery voice and running on the spot for many minutes