"The Curious Case of the Missing Mudguards"

The final piece of the jigsaw, the curious case of the ‘Missing Mudguards’, will perhaps never be solved. One will never quite know where or when the Chinese postal system will see fit to deliver my mudguards. However with the leave date so close now replacements had to be found and were so. In the rainy month of March lets just hope they do what they say on the tin!

It’s now 11 days till set off, 3 of which include work. It’s strange; it’s a real mixture of emotions. In many ways working almost right up until I leave might not be a bad thing. I’m so busy with handing over the responsibilities of my job to others that I’ve been limited to how much I think about the trip each day. Packing up the house, fine tuning the bike, working out how to GPS on my new HTC and paying an unplanned visit to the local dentist, it’s all be go here.

I’m excited there is no doubt about that, my life will go from incredibly busy to the freedom of the open road in such a short space of time. However it’s with a heavy heart I will leave Xiamen and China. Such are the friends I’ve built up here, the love of my job and the bond I have with my students, it certainly won’t be easy to leave.

I suppose I wouldn’t be human if my excitement wasn’t tinged with nervousness and slight worry at what lays ahead. I suppose this nervous excitement is my bodies way of telling me I’m ready.