Welcome to Australia

So after two months of life down under, I have finally found time and inspiration to open up my laptop and capture some of the emotional whirlwind that this has been so far. Travel blog? Somewhat… Capturing all my emotional break downs and epiphanies along the way? Possibly… The only thing I can guarantee is that this is going to be all real and all me. This is new for me – I’d normally just stick to the travelling part, the funny stories. Those will come too! But I feel like this is such a rollercoaster and there are things I want to capture that fall outside of what I’d normally comfortably publish for all. For those of you who know me and don’t get to see this side of me for whatever reason, may I respectfully ask you keep all judgement to yourself :) We all make mistakes and I told you so or you’re a mug comments help no one and neither does unrequited advice ;) God it’s ridiculous that I even have to write that but here we go then:

I arrived in Gold Coast after 3 weeks in Singapore, 6 days before my birthday, ready to start my one year working holiday in Australia - the trip I’ve been dreaming about for years! The sun, the beaches, the cities, the partying, the Aussie hunks… All of it. The reason I’ve saved so hard and been religiously watching Home and Away and Bondi Rescue… and how did it feel? Euphoric? Too good to be true?

Nope it felt wrong. I was in the wrong place. I should be somewhere else... Okay, so perhaps I should rewind a little and fill in some more info for you guys.

I’d spent the previous 3 weeks in Singapore, where my Dad and his family lives, seeing a boy there who I’d met 6 months previously on a diving trip and had been talking to on a daily basis since. The last few weeks before leaving the UK, I’d barely even thought about Australia because of my apprehension and uncertainty about seeing him. But it was great! We went on a diving trip together (which he got me through… stupid seasickness..), we ate together, we stayed in fancy hotels together, we drank together. All seemed to be great until one day he just dropped off. He wasn’t interested in answering my messages or seeing me, despite knowing we had limited opportunity to actually spend time together. You have no idea how frustrating that is – I was infuriated! It’s one thing to ignore me when I’m halfway across the world, but when I’m literally 20mins away from your front door? Are you serious?

Now, I’m sure you’re thinking, great just move on. He’s clearly not serious? And yes you’re right I probably should have moved on. But I was invested and genuinely thought we had a shot at something… so eventually he met with me and we had the conversation that needed to happen about the future and how hard it was going to be. And don’t get me wrong, it would have been hard. His job would have meant he would be at sea maybe 6 months at a time with 1 month on land between. Add to that, the cultural differences: a Singaporean Malay muslim boy and an English Buddhist girl – doesn’t take a genius to spot where the difficulties could have arisen. That’s how I saw them though – difficulties. Not roadblocks, but difficulties. Turns out I was alone in this thinking – but we agreed to a little more time. Everything was about to change, I was moving to Aus, close enough for weekend visits, we had til December when he’d be gone with work to figure out if it was worth the heartache. So that was agreed upon after a long night talking and lots of chicken nuggets and cigarettes.

And now we are back up to speed as about a week after this, I flew out to the Gold Coast. The first few nights were difficult. There was nothing stopping me being with him, in the same country as him, before his job made that impossible, yet here I was in Australia? The guilt was real. The feeling that I was just in the wrong place was crushing at night as I try to sleep.

And as you may have detected by the underlying bitterness in some of my writing - after less than two weeks in Australia, yet again, he drops off the edge of the world. Things became difficult after my request for a Skype call on or around my birthday (I mean gee.. how unreasonable...) until one day just no replies - even to this day may I add. Should I have seen it coming? Yes! Would I change a thing I did? Well, maybe I wouldn't be so wounded a second time around, but that's what experience teaches you I guess. I wouldn't change a thing I did, but my emotional reactions will be different in similar situations in the future.

So my feelings of guilt and being in the wrong place were completely misspent. I feel like I robbed myself of that glorious 'finally' feeling I should have had, by investing too deeply in someone who didn't invest half as much. But this is what I realised: it doesn’t matter how beautiful the surroundings, how hard you work to get there or how privileged you are to be there, if you’re not living in the here and now, the present moment, you can always find misery.

Lesson number one: try not to concern yourself with where else you could or should be, but make the most of where you find yourself. I’m not saying not to dream of better places, but don’t dwell on places that you can’t get to right now. You do nothing but rob yourself of happiness this way.