Must ALL men be uncertain?

So even ERNIE is unsure of exactly when he is going to arrive. I marched up to the AVI office today to hand in my passport (gulp! no escaping now!), visa application and other assorted paper paraphernalia that needed filling out. Afterwards I spoke to the person who does all the "mobilising" and apparently the federal police check can take anywhere between 2 and 6 weeks! So Ernie might arrive a bit late, which is sort of disappointing but this kind of "liquid time" seems to be the way that the aid world works in general. I'd better adapt.

Ate the best char kway teow in Melbourne today with Don and gasbagged for a while. Had a very varied and leisurely coffee with Marz later in the afternoon. I got kissed twice (on the cheek! on the cheek!) by a cheerful middle-aged guy who may be very good friends with the bottle, claimed to have been a champion boxer, saying "Stan the Man and Terry Austin are my family" (who are they? we didn't know) and tried very hard to show Marz how to start a fight and kill a person with one's elbow. "Just nudge them...and then go, 'Ya wanna fight?'" (imagine this in very slurred tones). He also showed us two very nice holes in the armpits of his t-shirt.

Earlier in the day I went to the travel clinic and got two more needles. I found out that I don't have latent TB (ok; so tell me something I didn't know already) and thankfully that I do not need even more needles apart from the two I have next week. I've got just those jabs to go, need to take my trial of doxy (malaria) and pick up a travel kit (I'm planning to wander around Thailand in a fog of DEET and permethrin...mmmm. Appealing! I also found these weird, almost whole-body mosquito nets on Ebay, sort of like an apiarist's suit but possibly even stranger - I'm thinking these might alienate me from the locals somewhat though). Then it's just a matter of going to the pre-departure briefing and then waiting for Ernie to grace me with his presence.

Ernie being indecisive also has the flow-on effect of delaying the duty-free shopping, much to my chagrin. I spent some time today looking at digital cameras before my buying aspirations went up in a puff of federal police smoke. Bloody men.

I have started a new book today about a journalist who spent 20 years in Zimbabwe, from the time of independence (1980) until a few years ago. Now that I'm going somewhere I am obsessed with reading books about people who have gone overseas to work in aid or journalism or development - I want to say, "I do that too!", only I don't yet. Bummer. Anyway, the book is called Where We Have Hope and it's buy a guy called Andrew Meldrum who writes for The Guardian. I'm only about 30 pages in but it's looking like a great read. If anyone else has other suggestions for me to read, pop it in a comment after this post.

Edit:

Since this entry mentions "bloody men", I thought it was apt to insert this here:



How does the man look at himself in the mirror in the mornings?? What I like best (more than the video itself, because I can't watch it, too cringe-inducing!) is the tags on this clip - George bush Malaria dance africa fool idiot stupid president united states America usa us.

That just about sums it up, really.

The carriage turned into a pumpkin

I'm back from Perth - had such a good time, it was so sunny and relaxing, and I ate so much food and drank heaps of amazing wine. Must be abstemious for the rest of the week now. Chris and Aggie were the perfect hosts with the perfect cats (Hello Lola! Hello Louis!) and it was wonderful to be away from Melbourne for a few days again. I have always loved Melbourne and have never really wanted to live anywhere else, but currently I am finding that I'm better away from home than at home; I'm very easily swayed into fanciful ideas about moving cities at the moment. I suppose I will be moving cities soon enough. 4 weeks today.









(from left: caught off-guard looking quite interleckshual; the illusion of sobriety is shattered; gorgeous Aggie gets festive! Pics courtesy of the lovely Kym.)

I can't quite believe that I'm back already and that those 4 days of fun and frivolity actually happened. A bit Cinderella, I suppose - only more middle-aged and haggard. Had a fantastic (and glam) girls' night out last night and this morning I didn't have a hangover, but my muscles and joints were really stiff! Old old, so old.

Anyway - so I am beginning to think that I won't really get properly back on track until I've left already. That's not very far off any more, so the idea of treading water a little longer is tolerable. In the meantime I just want to see as many people as possible, not go shopping, read some books, get myself organised. In different circumstances I think I'd be trying to soak up as much of Melbourne as possible but hmmm. Not this time. Melbs and I can resume our love affair when I get home. That is if I haven't fulfilled Orange Nat's prophecy that I will meet a UN humanitarian type with an itinerant, humanitarian lifestyle, and that we will have a blissfully humanitarian whirlwind love affair and then travel the world humanitarianly adopting random children of similar ages from developing countries with complete disregard for the cultural appropriateness thereof, a la Angelina et Brad.

Tragically, I think this latter scenario is Unlikely.

Gosh I am tired. It's only 7pm in Perth, but fortunately it's almost a respectable bedtime here.

I am going to get a cat when I get back from Thailand. Louis and Lola have inspired me; so much joy in two little furry silky bundles!

Rich hippies and the plural of "papoose"

I spent the day in Fremantle today. It struck me as ironic that I was walking around Freo just a few months after Karina left, when I never came west whilst she was living here - such is life, I guess!

Freo is a weird mix of rich hippies, bona fide bohos and just plain rich people. Some guy wearing striped pants, dreadlocks and an Akubra cycled past me in the mall and said, "Noice boots!". I was sitting near the town hall at the "village market" and there were a whole heap of well-off young mothers with their faux-boho babies and papooses (papeese?) - including one woman who had her baby in the papoose with his face squished up against her bare breast while she walked around and talked to someone about auras and aromatherapy. I guess it was about ease of access.

I am eating enormous - and I mean enormous - amounts here. Must be the clean Perth air (and being away from Melbourne!). I had two lunches today; that's probably a bit excessive, really.

Tomorrow evening is a big night out with the girls - bubbles, dresses, gossip and heels. Should be fun. Aggie is worried she'll have to stay back late at work so we have been hatching schemes to avoid this possibility!

Amanda Vanstone has been appointed the new ambassador to Italy. Don't think there's any danger of her behaving in a culturally appropriate manner. No matter how much life changes, some things stay the same - I reckon the 'Stone's ahem, tact-challenged approach might be one of those things. On the subject of talentless/tactless/painful politicians, how about Dubya's truly cringeworthy dancing and African drum-beating today? Malaria Awareness Day? What's malaria, George?

One month exactly until Ernie. Bring on the duty free shopping.

The importance of shoes

I'm in Perth - so spent some more time on planes and at airports for good measure. The lovely Aggie and equally lovely Chris met me at the airport and I'm reclining on my bed in their spare room with wireless internet and a warm, curled up black cat (Louis) at my feet. It feels good.

Little practicalities about Ernie are slowly creeping into my mind. Things like - what shoes will I wear in Thailand? (always the essential question in any situation!) - should I buy a double or single mosquito net? - do they wear masks and gloves like they do in Vietnam? So if my mind is being distracted occasionally by those thoughts, there must be a part of my brain that is registering it somewhere.

We had a lovely boozy lunch today. Perth is pretty much as I remember it - laid back, sunny and clean. It was particularly laid back today, being a public holiday. Being in a new place again, away from home with different people reminds me - and I need frequent reminders of this - that the world is much bigger than my little Melbourne bubble and the problems contained therein, and as such it exists to be entered and discovered. So many people to meet, so little time.

On a lighter note - I packed quite excessively for this little sojourn. 4 days, 3 nights, 5 pairs of shoes, 6 dresses and so on. To optimise use of this travel wardrobe I think I'd have to change outfits 3 times a day. Old habits die hard.

I forgot to mention Daniel Kitson in yesterday's post. I went to see him on Monday night with Mon and Naomi; I expected (and was hoping for) the usual mix of cynicism, morose self-deprecation, amazing vocabulary, bittersweet reflections, whimsy and a lot of laughs. In fact this year's show was much less cynical (could even describe past shows as a bit nihilist, really) and to be honest I was a little disappointed by that at first. Partly because that old dark mix would have been perfect for my general state of mind at the moment. In the end it was still a great evening. He was still very, very funny. He still said some achingly sad and funny things about love and loss. He is still my favourite comedian.

The Pies beat Essendon in the Anzac Day stoush today. Must be the start of a new era.

I like grainy bread

Today I'm sore everywhere. Damn immunity. I also went out wearing particularly stupid heels for daytime (why? who needs a reason?) and they rubbed my feet. I'm thinking this is not what Monsieur France had in mind when talking about dying in one life to enter the next. My feet are certainly sore, though.

Apart from that, not much to report; I'm going to Perth tomorrow and listening to a lot of Keith Jarrett. That probably about sums it up. I feel like I'm spending most of my time at the moment trying to run away from myself. It'll be good when Ernie arrives and I run towards something.

I've been reading some of the pre-departure reading that AVI sent out, a lot of it is reiterating stuff that was covered in the refugee health course I did earlier in the year but it will be good to have it reinforced. Somehow I think it'll have much more immediacy this time, it will feel more relevant and close to home. (Der). On their website they have photos up of all the volunteers they've briefed over the last 6 months - they look like a mixed, happy, relaxed bunch. I looked at those pictures and wondered what those people are like, what they think of what they do and how they felt before they went. I wonder if in 6 months' time someone will look at my pre-departure brief photo and wonder the same thing about me?

Yeah, yeah. Probably not.

I wonder if I'll have a moment of terror when I think, "What am I leaving behind?"? Maybe not. What am I leaving behind? A job that I know I love, great friends, great family, a personal life in disarray, a city I love sullied by memories I don't want, everything that I know. What am I heading towards? A big fat load of I-don't-know, but what I do know is that it will be different, challenging and new. Why do I keep wondering about this bollocks? The fact is that I'm going, and I'll find out what it is when I get there. Toughen up, sweetie. Off with Bic Runga, on with Supergrass.

I had a particularly good toasted sandwich on extremely grainy bread for lunch (which I had with the lovely Bess). There's a positive thing about recent changes in my life - grainy bread is back in, baby.

Volunteer voodoo

I had my pre-departure medical today. I tried very hard to be a good patient and did everything I was told. Apparently I seem completely physically well. Which I kind of knew, but it's nice to be told by someone else who has lots more letters after their name than I do.

Afterwards I got to have 4 vaccinations and a blood test, so it was all fun in Camp Quynh today. Hopefully my immune system is busily making antibodies to the following as I type;

• Japanese encephalitis
  
• Rabies
• Flu
• Typhoid

The travel doc and I were talking about how much I get bitten by mosquitoes and about all the lovely things I'll catch because of that. Basically, it looks like I'll get malaria and die.

Reminder to self: buy vats of permethrin. And steroids.

I've got two more lots of jabs to go and then I should basically become a walking repository of humoral immunity. Yeah, baby. Although apparently the occasional unfortunate person has the JE vaccine and then keels over and dies of anaphylaxis like, a week later. They gave me a red piece of paper that explains this to whoever is around to give me medical attention if this happens. You'd kind of hope they'd just work out that I needed adrenaline and not fuss too much with the reason why, right? "Oh hello, look at this puffy, red, swollen person who can't breathe - ooooooh, Japanese encephalitis vaccine. Isn't that interesting?"

Anyway. Gee my arms are sore. Typical sooky doctor, that's me.

I'm beginning to think that Ernie is not really going to sink in before he arrives. I think in the end he will probably just gallop up and knock me almost unconscious with shock and terror and OHMYGODWHATAMIDOING??? at the airport.

More importantly, though - I need to work out where to have my farewell drinks bash. Ideas, anyone?

Oh - one more thing. I found this Anatole France quote on another aid worker's blog today and quite liked it:

"Tous les changements, même les plus souhaités, ont leur mélancolie, car ce que nous quittons, c'est une partie de nous-mêmes; il faut mourir à une vie pour entrer dans une autre."

("All changes, even the most longed-for, have their melancholy, for what we leave behind is a part of ourselves; one has to die in one life to enter another." Goodness my French is rusty.)

Beaker sings 'Feelings'

I've been looking for this for a long time.

I'm not sure why I love it so much, but I do.

My life according to the Dandy Warhols

A long time ago we used to be friends, but I
Haven't thought of you lately at all...

I am on a catching up with old friends rampage. Partly because my ego needs to be reminded that yes, once upon a time I did actually make friends, but mostly because these are friends and contacts who fell by the wayside largely because I was preoccupied with my Relayshunship. All these people probably think I'm weird and a bit desperate, but that's okay. I just want to see them and talk about music and life and whatnot. Yep, that old whatnot.

So a couple of them have already been texted/spoken to/emailed. I still have a little list up my sleeve - nobody is safe.

I know that I must be generally feeling better because I have put some weight back on and also because I am wishing I had stayed thinner. Damn. Damn Orange and food and wine and company and emotional recovery. Damn them all.

I now have 1 month and 4 days until Departure Day. Let's call it Ernie. 1 month and 4 days until Ernie. I hope I get excited about Ernie sometime soon. Everyone else is - even George is excited so this must be serious. I'll just wait for it to happen.

Stuck in the middle

I’m spending a lot of time on planes and at airports at the moment. I’ve never particularly enjoyed flying – not because it freaks me out or anything, more just that I hate being between places; I want to be somewhere, not en route. And I hate waiting. But in some ways I guess that being “in between” is kind of fitting at the moment. I was reading a friend of a friend’s blog, a girl my age who moved to Laos over a year ago for an AYAD fellowship. I’ve been reading the entries she wrote in the weeks before she left – I guess because that’s where I am at the moment - and in many ways they kind of mirror my feelings about my own imminent departure.

She described wanting to stay behind, of wanting to be overseas already, of feeling like she was slowly and inexorably leaving her old life without any control over the process. I’m beginning to feel a bit like this. I’m not sure what I’ll do in Melbourne; things are in flux at the moment, neither here nor there. I’m not desperately despairingly wishing I was still in my old relationship – mind you, there is the odd evening here and there when I do still – but I’m not "properly" single. I’m not working any more, but I have a job to go to in 6 weeks. I’m not living in my own place but I don’t really have space to call my own at my parents’. This is as literally and figuratively itinerant as I have ever been.

I was having one of my “terrified” moments last week – about this upcoming move, that is – and a woman I know was telling me what her psychologist had told her about new and scary situations. She said that this new situation is neutral; because it hasn’t arrived yet it has not had the chance to be detrimental or be beneficial, it is absolutely neutral. It seems pretty logical, doesn’t it? My protective mechanisms must be on overdrive because when I think about It in terms of the “everyday” things – where will I live? what will I eat? who will I talk to? what will I do in my spare time? – it does sometimes feel a bit catastrophic. I guess in my heart of hearts I know that I’ll be all right but wow, that panic spiral comes on quickly!

But panic aside, it boils down to this: now that I know that I have a new life to go to, I'm just impatient for it to start.

What this is all about

I suppose I should set the scene a little to cover the miniscule possibility that I haven't already spoken to you (whoever you are) and burst out with, "OH MY GOD GUESS WHAT I AM DOING THIS YEAR?" etc.

I've been offered - and accepted - a job as a medical trainer on the Thai-Burmese border, teaching new community health workers from two refugee camps. I'm not sure exactly what this will involve yet, but it sounds like it's going to be quite busy, and then I'm hoping to pick up some clinical work as well, either in the camp health centres or in one of the centres in town. We'll see; my medical defence organisation is happy to cover me for that clinical work but I'm waiting to hear from my employer. The photo on the right is of the region where I'll be living and working. One of the camps is mostly Karen, the other is mostly Karenni. For those of you unfamiliar with Burma/Myanmar, it's one of the most ethnically diverse (and sociopolitically corrupt) countries in Asia, with over 100 ethnic groups recognised. Have a look at Wikipedia's Myanmar page for a bit of a general overview.

It all starts with 5 weeks of learning Thai in Chiang Mai (I've never been to Thailand but everyone I know who has, loves Chiang Mai) before I head off to the border. I think I might take another course whilst I'm there, maybe meditation or relaxation or something (whoops; when typing "meditation" just then, I typed "medication" instead!). Hopefully I'll also meet some interesting people, eat great food, have a bit of a look around, shake off some of my general apprehension.

At the moment life is in a bit of upheaval, so this all seems a bit distant and crazy still. I'm not leaving (or being "dispatched", as they say) until the end of May, so there's a while for it to sink in there and even if it hasn't hit me by the time I leave, well - I have 7 months to process it all.

I'm not sure what to do with my last month in Melbourne. I'm still torn between spending as little time in Melbourne as possible (due to other - ahem - issews) and trying to see my friends and family as much as possible. I've got loads of things to organise, which I think is a good thing as I need something to focus on. I'm locuming in central NSW at the moment but I don't plan to work again after this week. I'm thinking that I'll have enough to fill my time. I hope.

Who said Friday the 13th was unlucky?

Dear Dr Nguyen,

RE: INCLUSION TO AVI PROGRAMS

I write to confirm your inclusion to the AVI volunteer position of Medical Trainer with Committee for Coordination of Services to Displaced Persons Thailand.

As discussed, your final participation in the Volunteer Program is dependent upon the following conditions:

· Acceptance of your nomination by the overseas employer
· Procurement of your visa and work permits
· A satisfactory health report and criminal history check
· Satisfactory completion of the AVI pre-departure briefing

At this time, your departure has been scheduled for the month of May, 2007. The final departure date will be confirmed after completion of pre-departure requirements. We suggest that you do not end your current employment or make any irreversible decisions until you receive written confirmation of your assignment from AVI.

This pack contains several documents to assist you with your pre-departure requirements. The following page of this letter contains a checklist and guidelines for the use of each document. Please follow the checklist carefully and complete and return all necessary documentation to AVI as soon as possible.

A staff member from AVI will also contact you shortly to organise your attendance at the compulsory pre-departure briefing. Please advise if your contact details change or if any matters arise that may affect your participation in the program.

Congratulations on making it this far and good luck with your preparation!

Yours sincerely,

AUSTRALIAN VOLUNTEERS INTERNATIONAL