twinkle, twinkle little star (England and sky)

Afternoon,

For those on holiday, enjoy, while the rest of us still have to work, hehe. It has been in and out of England this month for me. Four times to be exact. Oh goodness. Up and down. A bit north, a bit south. A bit of Birmingham, Manchester(2), a bit of Gatwick. Freezing cold. Enjoying the xmas shopping. Lots of people. Lots!! Everywhere in town! English accents. English attitude. Great. Enough.

In between I did go back to Cape Town for another 5 days(since my last letter) and I'm hoping to leave for Joburg for 5 days to spent with Param and family. And I hear you ask, how do I pull this off? The sacrifices for a mending heart, to be with the beloved. I swap a flight for days off..

But actually, my highlight of today's letter, is my travels in the cockpit. I go visit the boys(pilots) often and this month has been mindblowing, something to mention. The pilots are always very willing to share where we are flying over, how fast we're going and what is about to happen next. So I was in the cockpit once when

we flew over Iran, the border of Russia, over Hungary, Prague, Athens, and every sight just took my breath away. We overtook another aircraft once (well, not once, I'm sure this happens all the time, but I was at the right place at the right time to see it for myself) and it was amazing to see how the streak of condensation behind the aircraft swirls anti-clockwise. Then one day I saw an aircraft cross our path from right to left, as I pointed it out, the captain showed me another aircraft coming from left to right, and then another going across it all. Man, this was crazy!! Soooo coool. It was this super dimensional experience, warpzone, space, 3dimensional traffic, something out of the futuristic movies:) When the captain calls you to come look in the cockpit, you know it's going to be good. So, I stepped in (on a night flight) and saw the moon. Right in front of us. Or so it appeared. As if we were flying towards it. And it became bright(the moon). Then it moved to our right. And then we turned, and it moved all the way left (if you can imagine the two windows of the cockpit being a wide screen television). Then the pilot switched all the lights off in the cockpit, and we were just surrounded by all these magical stars. High up in the air, it feels like you can touch them. As if you are part of the sky. Nothing above, nothing below. Below sometimes you can see little blops of light. And those are little parts of towns covered by thick clouds, and we perceive it as dims of light. Talking about dims. Then at that same moment, I saw an aircraft approach us again (me with my super eye sight these days. damn!! the things I've been missing out on, hehe) and the pilot switched our brights on (didn't even know planes have that). The sky illuminated. Then, wait for it, wait for it, the pilot said, a few seconds later, the other airplane flashed his brights back at us!!! WOW!! Haha, they do the same in the sky. I still love my job. I want to be a pilot.

Otherwise, I am fully enjoying the challenges and rewards Business Class offers me. It is a huge difference then the circus in economy. I finally get to use my personality. My skills.

Hope to hear back from you, if not before the end of the year....well Happy new year once again:)

Twinkled eye,
A

Go do gado (Jakarta, Indonesia, etc)

Apa kabar

Allow me to let you in on the 2 actionpacked weeks since my last letter.
So, I went to Jakarta, Indonesia and was quite disappointed that I couldn't get to any islands. They are too far by road (including Bali ofcourse:(
I just took a shuttle to town and spent time in a freakin mall. Indonesia does not seem so traveler's friendly. Traffic is madness, roads are dirty and the place is HEAVILY polluted. Quite the opposite of Malaysia. Something like India and Bangkok. I ate Gado-gado till it came out of my ears, hahaha (a salad style Indonesian dish with cold potato, bean sprouts, egg and LOTS of peanut sauce - i had this for dinner, breakfast, lunch and dinner again)

I held half a million bucks in my hand, lol. Not worth much, coz 11000 rupiah is worth 1 dollar..

The Indonesians on our flight are mostly the maids of the Muslims. They are quite shy, no English and seem to all know each other and they have this funny habit of not finishing whatever liquid they've ordered, be it water or juice.

The hotel we stayed in was next to a lake, it was peaceful and green and I spent some time at the swimming pool. That's it.


Then back home, I stuck my nose into my assignment workbooks to study for my business class upgrade. After a long week of stress, hard work and doing the corporate office hours thing, I received my certificate. We were the 'special guests' at the ceremony hall.

Currently I am in Cape Town, after swapping my last flight for off days and gave Pookie a surprise visit, and the day after my arrival I went for Lasik eye surgery. I have perfect eye sight now;-) What an amazing experience!


Hope you are all doing fantastically.

Lots of love
A

MaLayLekker (Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia)

Selamat Sejahtera

I've just stepped into my apartment a few hours ago from Kuala Lumpur and am jotting this down, as I'm leaving again for Indonesia tonight.
We had 2 days in KL, but I spent one curled up in bed with period pains unfortunately:( In the evening the girls dragged me out for some shopping at an Asian mall and Malaysian food and big coconuts (the coconuts in KL are tasteless, taste like water, although they are huge and full of lots of juice - not recommended)

The Petronas Twin Towers are really spectacular..



The next day, we went on a private tour to Templer Park, which is apparently the oldest rainforest in the world (according to the tour agents). It was a nice drive, the weather was a type of 'perfect' I don't think I've experienced. There were beautiful waterfalls and pools and because it was Sunday, a lot of people were braaiing and swimming. There were monkeys everywhere. (no, real ones), hehe. Then we went to the Batu Caves. These caves are massive and takes you a few hundred steps just to get up there. The inside is filled with Hindu temples. Well, the whole sight is actually a Hindu happening. So, it was busy and buzzing.



The flight was awesome. Malaysians seem well-mannered, not demanding and very friendly. KL is clean, traffic runs smooth and things aren't expensive. A crewmember and I feasted on some streetvendor openfood, supercheap, living in the moment and praying for our health of the next day. That's about the only daring thing I did on this trip - beside walking around at the Batu temples with a big yellow-and-red dot on my forehead from the 'blessings' I got from one of the Indians:). It was overall a good trip, hard flight to get - but I got my London/Gatwick swapped for it, whoohoo! Also, tonight's Indonesia was a swap for Shanghai.

I thought I shall also share that the last few days of my reserve month (which I survived!), I went for a beeeg party - yes, I got also drrrrrunk (for a change), wildly, just to get pulled out for a London/Heathrow flight after 4 hours sleep. I was still spinning and slapping myself in the face. Could've lost my job if they did one of those random drug/alcohol tests on me, heehee. But hey, in these 'grown-up' years, it's nice to be irresponsible once in a whiiiiile (sorrie ma).

Hope you had a laugh
Missing you all, missing home, missing the ones scattered all over the world

Mmmwah
A

standby me (going nowhere slowly)

Hello's

So....ja...
With the ending of the Holy Month of Ramadan (a Muslim thing, where they -even us in public- are not allowed to eat, drink, smoke or swear during hours of sunshine)I thought that finally I could go out for a party (all clubs closed during the month of Ramadan). But no. After my return from New York, for about 11 days I lived like an owl. Slept during the day and stayed up at night. The first few days, I recovered from jetlag and then after that I accustomed my bodyclock for what was to come... standby. I am on reserve this month. Which means, I don't have a roster. But I get rostered for hours of 'standby'. Where I have to be at home and wait for a call if they need me. And seeing that most of my standby was put anything from 10pm-8am, I changed my sleeping patterns. And thus began a vicious cycle. Of either watching the sun go up, or the sun go down, but never seeing a bright day. Headaches. Everyday. Luckily my flatmate was up with me at the same times, and sometimes we'd go to the beach after midnight. I got called out once, for Nagoya (Japan) and got ready excitedly and picked up, to find at arrival that the freakin' bus driver didn't put my suitcase in the bus:( This led to me being offloaded and put on airport standby (you wait at the Crew Center and if anyone fails to pitch for their flight, you go in their place). This standby month happens every 7 months. So every 7th month, I have reason to hate my job. You have no life. You can make no plans. It messes with your psyche.

Some good news is: that I got accepted for an upgrade to Business Class!!:-) My training is next month for 5 days. Also, I got relicensed. I had to pass 2 days of practical and theoretical exams last week in Safety and Emergency Procedures (SEP). Also, have applied for a facilitator's position and have been shortlisted. Emirates runs this award programme, to motivate and inspire people in the company. And I have applied to facilitate this. Wish me good luck. Interviews will be Pop Idol style, haha.

A few days ago, Goldfish (a South African dj band) played in Dubai and Paula and I went to watch. The event was HUGE!! It was truly spectacular. We were up till 5am and the next day I flew to Johannesburg. Goldfish was on that flight, whoohooo!! In fact, they were right in my area. They missed their Cape Town flight. I dragged them to the back, introduced them to the crew and had a photo session.

Haha. Pookie flew up to visit (on very short notice). Au, that was awesome! I feel blessed and fortunate to have a man like him in my life:). Had a wonderful time.

So....ja.. Just thought I'd keep you updated while the cycle continues. Hooohooo!

Toedeldoe
Hugs,
A

a legal alien (New York & Connecticut)

Hey there,
how are you doing?

So, just after I landed in Dubai from Cape Town, I went to New York the next day and stayed there for two and a half days. My flatmate, Paula joined me as a passenger and stayed in my hotelroom. It was RAD, a mini-holiday. This time around, I saw a little bit of nightlife, went to a few pubs and spoke to Americans that always guess us to be British. It rained, and saw the steam come out of drains.

We also went to Connecticut (just outside New York) to go visit a friend of mine (Tony) and experienced the suburbia side of America as seen on movies (man, everything there feels to me like living in a movie). Tony showed us the beach, we drank some beer in a pub (I had the most amazing beer ever - Blue Point. It is an ale and the aftertaste is blueberry), and we had a braai (whoohooo). We did some groceries shopping for this, and it was again such an awesome experience, finding different and interesting things. Then to my amazement, Tony took us to the self-service check-in counter, where we scanned and weighed our own stuff. It was cool! Even experienced the self-service petrol station:).


Back in NYC, walked around for many, many avenues, popped into the Apple store to see what that is all about, went around Time Square again, and ended up in Wholefoods at Columbus Circle where Paula and I went crazy. Everything there is organic, healthy and supercool. We bought bags full of turkey, bacon, chicken (all vegetarian), interesting kombucha drinks, I found Blue Point there and bought a 6-pack, a few organic facial products and some sushi for lunch. It was WONDERFUL!! Paula even took me into Abercrombie & Fitch (the American "lifestyle" clothing shop). What an experience. You walk in, and EVERYONE who works there, is beautiful, happy, dancing to the loud banging music, smells of strong perfume and by the time you exit, you remember that it was sunlight and normal life outside, hehe.

So, new respect to America (I used to be a bit negative towards it)
Best of luck to them in choosing a new president.

Anyways, for now, I'm on standby for the rest of the month - which means I don't know when I'm going and I don't know where I'm going. It's a crazy life:)

Loving it

Toedeldoe,
till next time

A

howzit my bru (Cape Town)

On the 28th of September, I returned from a 9-day holiday in Cape Town. 28th Sept 2007, exactly a year ago, I left South Africa to join Emirates. Can you believe it, a year has gone - my first anniversary. How nice to land and find out your country is without a president, hehe.

Apologies for the people I didn't get to meet. I honestly didn't make an effort, as I wanted to see my Pookie and my mom and just needed a holiday. It was great seeing the ones I did though. So, Pookie and I zipped around town with our bikes (me on the Yammie this time:), ate out a lot, had a fabulous National Braai Day with a whole bunch of people we didn't know, he showed me a few new venues in gorgeous Cape Town (like Juleb), I did my usual shopping (things you don't find anywhere else - like All Gold tomato sauce) and we had the Rubik's Cube party (getting dressed in 3 different colours, then ending up in one colour by swapping with others). It was marvelous fun as usual - Cape Town is just absolutely the best there is out there:) As much as I love it, I'm not sure if I'll go live there again, or at least soon. It is lovely visiting.

That's that.
How are you all doing?

Loving life, grateful for everything and focusing on abundance
Hugs to y'all
A

Ps. no photos, didn't even take camera:)

Hakuna Matata (Dar E Salaam, Tanzania)

Jambo
and karibu my friends

I just returned from a short and very sweet trip - to Dar E Salaam, Tanzania. One of those experiences which showed me once again that you do get what you ask for and guidance is always around. Internet research didn't help me much on what to do there and the hotel concierge said everything is far:( But I was hungry to explore and didn't know where to go. So I just walked out of the hotel, to be swept off my feet by a cheery Rastafarian called Simba (which means Lion in Swahili by the way). He took me to a stinky, dingy fishmarket and I ended up sitting with him sharing dinner in a chaotic place (that they call a restaurant) while learning a bit of Swahili. I greeted everyone staring at me (as I was the only whitie ofcourse, hehe). The food was rather, well, unique. I got on REALLY well with Simba. He caught on to my sense of humour almost instantly and his English was superb!

With an allowance of 78500 shillings, I felt like I hit the jackpot (but just sounds a lot, heehee - although I only paid 100 shillings for a boatride)... Which lead me to the other side of the Peninsula (looked like an island from the view of the hotel) where I went to Sunrise Beach. A jampacked dala dala (minibus taxi as we know it, but this one is African style man) dropped me in the middle of somewhere, and I just followed my nose down to the seaside (1km walk) where I spent a glorious day with Jimmy (another Rasta that I met on the beach). We went for a dip in the gorgeous lukewarm ocean, a long walk along the beach (which we almost had to ourselves), fresh coconuts and playing with (few) days old little baby goats. It was wonderful!

I hope to go there again soon. Dar E Salaam has a lot to offer (apart from Kilimanjaro)... you just have to listen around. And it is really beautiful. Zanzibar is only 2hours away by boat...

I won't have any more news till next month... will be coming down to Cape Town soon..

Asante
You all take care now

Kwaheri,
A