Departure Day.

So today is the day. 2^nd January 2012. The day that my life changes. The day where I leave the UK and start my trip to Malawi.

To start with, let’s fill you up on the facts and stuff! I leave the Isle of Wight on the 14:30 ferry heading towards Heathrow Airport. My flight is at 20:25 to Addis Ababa (Ethiopia), after a short stop in the airport I arrive in Lilongwe, Malawi at 12:20 (as yet I am not sure if this is GMT or local time).  Once I get to Lilongwe we will be met by our Country Manager, Matt and he will take us to Mabuya Camp which is a tourist camp area (Google it!). The place looks lovely with a swimming pool and Wi-Fi! We will stay here for 1 week whilst we learn how to teach and then we will split up into our pairs and head off to our placement locations (Nkhata Bay).

The past month has been quite strange for me as I have been saying goodbye to my colleagues, school-children, friends and family. I thought this would be easy as I was keen to get off the island and start my new adventure; however this couldn’t be further from the truth. First of all I would like to say a massive thank you to Oakfield Primary School who employed me as a Teaching Assistant one day a week. I was only there for 3 months or so but I quickly started to love the job. The kids were so great to work with and I hope I helped out the school as much as I could. I was given lots of nice gifts and cards from my class when I left and I would love to go back after I return from Malawi.

I also finished my job at Tesco in December, this I won’t miss as much. I was there nearly 6 months and I never want to hear the words “I only came in for a few things.” again! Customers are so annoying!! I moan but in truth I have to thank Tesco as they have been great employees, very flexible and I have met some lovely people.

But saying goodbye to friends and family is the worst. I am only going for 6 months but I am going to miss everyone here dearly, however I am sure I will be able to keep in touch with everyone and within a flash I will be back on the island. I had a New Year’s party with my friends and then I'm going to Thorntons with my closest friends in a short while which will be a nice send off. I will miss them to pieces… no more Wetherspoons on a weekend or business chats with Tyler!

Everyone keeps on asking me whether I’m nervous or excited and to be perfectly honest I have never come across this emotion before. The words, “Oh gosh what on earth am I doing!” are going round in my mind, over and over again (obviously the choice of wording is slightly different but this is a family blog!). I am worrying over the silliest things such as the probable lack of cow’s milk! This got me thinking, what will I miss and what will I enjoy being 5,000 miles away from? I will miss so much but peanut butter is high on the list, along with our weekly Wetherspoons trip, Football Manager, my comfy bed, my cat and of course my laptop. At the moment the only thing that I am looking forward to spending 6 months without is the Go Compare advert. I really do hate that man!

Anyway I could ramble on for pages, just talking about what I am feeling but I have to go now. I wish all my readers a happy new year (and for those who don’t read this, I wish you a terrible 2012!). See you in Malawi!