Visiting Home

Well, not quite yet - still a couple of weeks to go, then I'm off back to SA for 2 weeks. I'm looking forward to it, although I'm trying not to think about it too much yet - it seems silly to spend a month waiting for something that's only two weeks long. On the other hand, maybe all that anticipation draws it out into something longer than just two weeks.

I enjoy being in London - I'm certainly glad I came, and I've experienced a ton of stuff that I'd never have done back in Cape Town. But it does get lonely, and I miss my family, especially at times like now when I should be getting to sleep so that I can be all bright-eyed and awake for work tomorrow. Thanks to my T-Mobile flext plan and YourCall, I speak to them pretty much every day (which is almost embarrassing to admit, but hey, why not use the technology we have?), but it's different to being able to visit and see them whenever I like. Particularly my nieces, who have grown such a lot since the last time I saw them. They should invent faster, cheaper planes so that it's easier to go home just for a few days, rather than being a once-a-year event - that would make life much easier!

So I'm looking forward to going home, and I think it will be difficult to come back - although, of course, there are advantages to living in London, and (almost) all of the reasons I came over in the first place are still true.

In a way, though, I don't so much want to go back to a place as to a time... back to when I was working at ATC and everything was fun, or back to when I was at varsity and the future seemed to be all sorted. Or even back to when I was a kid and didn't have any responsibilities - sure, you still worry about stuff when you're a kid, but you get tucked in at night and looked after when you're sick and don't have to do your own washing and ironing :) Obviously that's not going to happen, but the time and the place tend to get mixed up in your mind, and maybe this trip home will help to break that link.

In a way, by moving to London I've set myself up to always be missing somewhere - the plan was to come over for a year, then when I got a really good job, that got extended to 2 or 3 years. I still don't plan to live here the rest of my life, but I know I'll miss it when I go back to SA. But while I'm here, I miss SA. It's odd, thinking back to when I was at varsity and thinking how I thought I had everything planned out and knew how the rest of my life would be - and was happy to know that it was all settled. Since then, I've learned not to count on anything specific happening, and I've actually come to dread the thought of my entire life, settled, stretching out in front of me... not that that's an issue, since I don't have any plans for my life. I know I don't want to stay here for more than a few years; I don't see myself staying in SA for the rest of my life either. Each place has it's advantages and it's disadvantages. I guess the solution is to move back to SA (in time - certainly not yet, I'm not done here yet!), find a great job doing lots of coding, with people I can become friends with (like at ATC, although I suspect that only happens once in a lifetime, if you're lucky), earn a ton of money, with lots of leave, and then travel to the UK and Europe and the US every year on holiday :-) It's still a bit scary, thinking of your whole life stretching out before you... I know, I think too much; I worry too much about the future, and get too nostalgic about the past. But still, it would be nice to have someone to face this stretching-out-before-me future with, someone who would be a part of it. I suspect that's how most people get through it (and not thinking too much, of course). But, there's not much prospect of that, and I've (mostly) learned that I'm (mostly) totally capable of doing it alone.

Anyway, this is turning into a terribly introspective and sad-ish post, and one that's probably a bit too personal for a blog that anyone and everyone can (but doesn't) read, but I feel better for having said it. I blame it on being tired, and a bit lonely, and having been off sick for most of the past week. I don't think it's because winter's starting and the weather's getting miserable - I do miss the sun, and I never thought I'd say this, but I miss getting sunburned! - but the weather can be pretty bad in winter in Cape Town too, and I managed there fine. And most of the time I'm at work, anyway, where you don't even notice whether it's sunny or raining. So while it will be nice to get some sun on my holiday, I don't think winter should be too depressing here.

Hmm, let's end of on a more upbeat note... I'm thinking of going to the MCM Expo next Saturday, which should be fun. And the week after, I'm going to Cadbury World - hmmm, yummy. And I'm doing some shopping, buying presents to take home, which is always fun. Some London-y tourist stuff, just to prove I was here; some London-y goodies, like Green & Blacks (the best chocolate ever!); birthday presents for the two birthdays around the time I'll be there; and of course, Christmas presents for all. And I plan to do some shopping there, since my money will be worth about 14 times it's value here - clothes, goodies (biltong and droewors! and I better not get started on NikNaks); and I want to bring back some stuff that I couldn't fit in my suitcase when I came over - like my buckwheat husk pillow, which is really comfortable and which I really miss! Hmm, maybe even a teddy bear, if I have some spare room... I do miss my Harley Davidson bear :-)