2011

After a rather interesting Christmas, I'm would like to take a few minutes to write my very own 'New Year' letter. You know the ones folded up in the Christmas cards and no-one is quite sure if its self-indulgence or a genuine desire to fill you in?  Yeh, one of them, and this one's fairly self-indulgent. But hopefully there are a few of you involved in making my year another grand one who may enjoy the read.

The start of 2011 couldn't really feel any different to the end. It came in with a bang at our flat party in Edinburgh. 80 or so guests crowded into our scruffy little over-priced flat spilling punch, eating curry and weeing in my sink. Christmas jumpers, spangly shorts and coats bought in midnight which passed in style with a thousand and more faces flashing blue, green, pink watching the fireworks above Edinburgh castle. This, the culmination of four years of friendship, has to be the best way to see in a new year?!

Now, I will try and keep uni nostalgia to a minimum, but this really filled up the first half of the year as, after Hogmanay, it was a one way road to graduation. Standing in the way was a dissertation on stem cells, no less [sorry about the patronising link, I know you all know what they are but its a different type of stem cell I was looking at so for the geeks amongst you, you may like a read]. This passed remarkably painlessly and I resurfaced to a good deal of celebration with the freshly formed neuroscience crew. A weekend trip to the Edinburgh uni outdoor activity centre, firbush, was probably one of the most amazing of the year for me. If anyone hasn't visited the Scottish highlands and fancies a cheap holiday with enjoyable excerise, good food and fresh air, do it.

Firbush with the neuroscience crew

After all the hard work was done, my thoughts timidly turned to what was next on the agenda for life. A small, insignifiicant question, but one that needed some contemplation. Luckily my dissertation had provided me with a lot of time for procrastination, and so I was led to the Red Cross website and, more specifically, to a perfect-looking project set in a small village in the east of Paris. So, after getting rejected from the Heineken grad scheme (no idea what I was thinking), I decided to apply. Luckily I got an interview which plonked itself right at the beginning of a fairly memorable week in June.

After the interview, to which I turned up wearing a rucksack, red dress and boots, I was due to go to Glastonbury. This was much to my embarrassment when nearly everyone else was in suits. Again, luck would have it that it went smoothly and so I set off to the adult funfair (a mild description) that was Glasto. The next four days passed in a flurry with my favourite night of the year being marked by a haul up onto a friend's shoulders to watch Coldplay finish with 'Fix you', all in the company of a good few of my favourite people. And so I woke up with a headache, to a journey of epic proportions under a tight time constraint to get back to Edinburgh in time for my graduation. Luckily I made it, only to be greeted by a mother armed with perfume, which she was not afraid to use. And use it, she did. The day following graduation bought with it the tear-enducing news that I had properly done something right and got the job in France. All-in-all, not a bad week.

Before and after: glasto to graduation in less than 24 hours (lots of pictures of me. yay)

It was not long after this momentous week that I found myself co-leading a team of 10 through Moldova to an orphanage for boys with disabilities. After having endured it the year before, I had managed to wipe the memory of the 24 hour journey to the Capital, Chisinau; foolish. Moldova isn't strong on fast trains, or much for that matter, except erratic taxi drivers, fried potatoes and placinta (a local pastry) not to be mistaken for placenta.  Despite that, I have developed a firm fondness for the country, with its quirks such as switching off the street lights at 2 a.m. on the capital's main street to save electricity. In the three and a half weeks we spent there, 'wave three' formed a strong teamly bond, with activities such as a 10 hour taxi ride (without suspension) to a place in the Ukraine. 'A place' not being intentionally undescriptive, as we just didn't know what it was, due to the aforementioned erratic taxi drivers. The place turned out to be 'Zagota' (I think); a surreal, post-communist-but-not-by-far, tourist sea-side village. For example, we were encouraged to eat our meals at set places in a big hall, with all the other guests from the hotel.  Making it back to Moldova safely bought us all closer and we worked hard to do our best for the SKIP Edinburgh project  , our ultimate reason for being there. I will talk about this at some other point as I tend to get quite bogged down in frustration and detail when I do.

Wave three visiting Orhei Vechi in Moldova

And so passed my final month in Edinburgh for the fringe festival, which was spent dodging idiots in costumes and being forced to give money to watch shows which I would have paid only not to have seen. And, after touching base for just a week to remind the parents that I was in fact still alive, I set off to France, to work in a school for chidren with motor disabilities, where I find myself now.

It has without a doubt been one of the biggest challenges of my life so far, surprisingly harder than the dissertation or Moldova, for the simple fact that it's the start of what we always used to describe as 'the big bad world'. Mind you, I love the work, and the rest, I'm sure, will follow. I'll keep you posted.

Anyway, that's it from me, a happy twentytwelve to you all.