Finally!

Just in case for some absurd reason ya'll don't know..

I progressed into my 3rd and final year today!

It took me 2 more months, 100 more tears, and a lot more studying than I first anticipated, but I have finally done it!

And God, it feels GREAT.

So in 2 more days, I pack my bags and head back off for a year of intense studying, intense training and a whole magnitude of fun...

... Wish me luck!!

2 down, 1 to go.

Revise.

Sleep.

Wake up.

Finish Exam.

Smile.

Gin Party.

The end.

See you on the flip sideeeeee!!!

My summer in a soft and not very detailed nutshell...

This summer has been filled with life changing realizations, some amazing experiences and a couple of shitty bits like having to retake my exams at uni  but i'll probably brush over that...

So it all started the day my last exam finished...

We packed up the car and headed to WestWard Ho! where we enjoyed a weekend of questionable hair styles, gin parties...

having the time of our lives at the arcades and...

 riding stationary motorbikes... 

Next off, I spent a wonderful 2 weeks at home... 

In which I spent a lovely few days with Dids and Paton...
 (Unfortunately this is the only picture I have... but think it sums up the trip perfectly...)

 ...Got to catch up with my beautiful friends from home

...And of course we celebrated the Queens Birthday in style...

Next up, I jumped on a plane with my darling friend Livvy and flew over to Rwanda for 2 months...

Where I got to see all these amazing kids again...

(There were hundreds of photos...these are but a few)

My lovely little man...

Met this guy and his incredible t-shirt

Usually the smiliest little baby!

:)

Darling Mutoni...

Rode about a hundred motos...

Went swimming more than a couple of times...

Painted a two of the older toddlers dorms...

Learnt to (sort of ) drive a moving motorbike..

Visited the hot springs...

Lived with 4 other AMAZING people...

Fearless Elise...

This is darling Allypoos...

And lovely Lacey

And of course, This is the wonderful Tara...

And I don't know if i hadn't already mentioned the lil' trip to Uganda?

Ya' know, the one where I CHUCKED MYSELF HEAD FIRST TO MY DEATH WITH ONLY A TOWEL WRAPPED ROUND MY FEET?!

Oh... and if that wasn't extreme enough, I then decided it would be a fabulous idea to sit in an INFLATABLE RAFT AND SAIL DOWN GRADE 5 RAPIDS....

... And then I had to say goodbye to this little man and my heart shattered into a million pieces.

After two long months away I arrived home for the night and swiftly the next morning went to South Devon with Mumma, Phil, Andy, Soph and Nathan for a week, where believe me I was extreme...

I go-karted countless times and flew down the longest zip line in England, drank some proper ale and dug monstrous holes on the beach.

After a wonderful week on the English coast I ventured home and slept for a few days and then...

I spent the day with Papa, Andy and Soph in London watching the Olympics...

And ventured to wales, for an hilariously devastating couple of days away...

... with Dids and Paton; we had a marvelous time doing lots of fun things... including canoeing.

BUT...

...Listen to me when I tell you to never ever canoe.

...Listen to when I tell you that shorts and a t-shirt are not a good idea in torrential rain.

...Listen to me when I tell you that capsizing from a canoe and spending 40 minutes being pulled down a fast flowing river in the freezing cold is not fun and will make you ill.

...Listen to me when i tell you climbing up a muddy bank with no shoes on will only result with you landing on your face and sliding back down to the river. 

...Listen to me when I tell you that despite all that we had a cracking time and even managed to sneak a few cheeky beers in too!

And now...

Now I'm revising my arse off in the hope I pass these exams and ultimately my degree next May with the knowledge that I have had an incredible summer and that I have an equally as insane summer planned next year!

Over and Out.

Team Extreme goes Bungee Jumping and White Water Rafting... (Pictures to follow)

Here goes...

We set off at the crack of dawn early one morning, on a horrifically extremely long coach (i use the term coach lightly) ride to Uganda...

13 hours, several stops and a marriage proposal later we arrived at the coach park where we met our wonderful driver Fred! We (Tara, Elise, Livvy, Allison and I) clambered in to his wonderful red van ready for what was described as a 'dangerous' journey to Jinja. As we gradually neared Jinja the panick began to set in. I kid you not, I asked Fred every question about the risks of bungee jumping, has he ever seen anyone die? Has anyone gone blind? Has anyone broken their hip? Has the rope ever snapped? Has a crocodile ever snapped the head off a jumper? This list of irrational questions continues...

After we all applied our 'natural' looking make up and I had finished my letter to my parents 'just incase' we arrived at the base camp. We were sadly informed that we wouldn't be able to jump until the morning as it was 'too late'. Engulfed with rage and maybe very slightly relieved I would have a few more hours alive we went for a little walk around to check the place out. I swear the 44 meter platfrom I was going to be recklessly chucking myself off in the morning looked more like a few hundred meters high. Safe so say, I was feeling anything but extreme...

Anyone that knows me at all will know I am anything but a morning person. So when the alarm call echoed around our dorm room I was not happy. As everyone else jumped out of bed and began to get ready for our action packed day, I laid in bed making the most of my last ever nights sleep. I reluctantly wandered down to the base camp where i had the delight of signing my life away and meeting the men who would have my life in their hands. Half an hour and a lot of moaning and 'i'm too young to die' scpeel we made our way towards the bungee tower, climbed the stairs and then REALLY began to panick. There was one other idiot who was jumping with us, he seemed pretty fly and insanely extreme, so we all decided he should have the pleasure of jumping first. The order in which we were jumping was strategically planned, Mr. Extreme* was to jump first, be calm and give us (me) reassurance that I wasn't jumping to my death, I was to jump next so I didn't have time to chicken out/think things through too much, next was Livvy, then Elise and lastly Tara as she is super cool and wasnt phased by her impending death.

Mr. Extreme jumped no problem, so next up was me. I sat in the chair whilst they tied a towel and rope (harcly seems sufficent to keep me from plopping into the Nile and being devoured by crocs, right?!) round my feet and attached me to the bungee cord. The thoughts running through my head were horrific, I was not prepared to die or go blind, and I began to cry and cry and cry. Sobbing I hopped to the edge of the platform, my toes were dangling over the edge and the only thing stopping me from falling was my SOLID grip onto the bar above my head. In those few moment before my jump I was a shaking quivering mess. This is probably a good time to mention the amazing instructor Jacque. At this point Jacque is standing behind me holding my shoulders and just generally being the coolest man in the world.

Whilst crying I turn to Tara, Elise and Livvy and give them a thumbs up and wave at Allison and the photographer who are smuggly standing in the safety of the bar.

The next few minutes are a complete blur, I rememeber trying to convince myself I was just jumping onto my bed at home (likely story when I'm 44 meters above the Nile with nothing but a cord around my legs), hearing 3,2,1,BUNGEEEEEEEEEEEE, i don't really recall jumping but then thinking FUCK I'm going to die, and split seconds later THISSS ISSS FRICKINNNNN AMAZINGGGGGGGGGGGG.

I don't know how I found the courage to jump, but I am so glad I did it was out of this world! While hanging upside down I had some sort of verbal diarrohea, I was screaming and shouting and everything inbetween...

Two lovely men lowered my down into their boat and rowed me to the shore, where I just had time to run back up to watch everyone else jump.

We'd all jumped and returned to safety by half 9... one of the most insane moments of my life happened before 9 O'Clock...

I am now a convert, I LOVE mornings!

Me, my new extreme outlook on life and the girls all embarked on a half an hour bus journey to the start of our white water rafting adventure where we met our instructors (Duncan and Godfrey), had breakfast and got kitted up for an EXTREME day rafting the Nile!

We started off running through some basic drills, paddle forward , paddle back, paddle like your life depends on it... Then we moved on to something a little more taxing, climbing into the boat. I don't know if it's because we're all girls or if we are just out right pathetic, but we all had some serious issues getting in the boat. At this point I'm still feeling pretty extreme, but worry is starting to set in... If I can't get into the frickin' boat on flat water, how the hell am I suppossed to climb back in after I've been chucked around by a rapid? For the second time I am beginning to contemplate my impending death.

After learning a few more fancy tricks imperative to our survivial we head towards our first rapid... a waterfall. We're told this really isn't a good place to be falling out, so listen hard and paddle harder. We flew down that waterfall, all stayed in the boat and it was AMAZING. Next up, a slightly longer rapid, with a high chance of us falling out... If we fall out and are trapped under the water we are told to curl up in a ball and slowly count, 1 thousand and 1, 1 thousand and 2... and wait till out life jackets pull us to the surface, if we keep above water, we should attempt to hold onto the boat and our paddle and wait for further instructions...

So the second rapid approaches, we're crouched in the boat paddling hard, and low and behold, the boat flips. In those couple of seconds, everything we've been instructed seems irrelevant... You best know I am launching myself as far away from the giant blue thing flying towards my head (the boat...) as physically possible... I get ripped under the water, and immediatiatly I am counting 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12, SHIT I'VE BEEN UNDER THE WATER FOR 12 SECONDS I'M GOING TO DIE. Finally I pop to the surface, everyone looks PANICKED, Allison is hyperventalating, Livvy is nowhere to be seen and Elise and Tara, well they're pretty chilled...
It was extreme, and as soon as I realised I was alive, I felt invicable!

The next 4 rapids followed the same sort of protical, boat flipping, us screaming , being stuck under the water , coming to the surface, realising we're alive, IT'S INSANE. By now, I am the definition of extreme, I LOVE the rapids and am just about to chuck uni in, and become a rafting instructor... That is until we see rapid number 6.

Excuse my french but SHIT ME. It was HUGE. So huge infact we had to climb out of the water and walk around the first half of it as it's deemed 'unraftable'... Initially, I'm playing it cool, meh, doesn't look to bad, could probably raft that with my eyes shut...but, with every step closer to being back in that boat I am pooping my pants a little bit more. The rapid we're now sat half way through is called 'Bad Place'. Going against everything my head is telling me not to do, we began rowing hard towards this 'Bad Place', the trick is that the current 'apparently' spins the boat around and we safely raft down the side of the rapid, still extreme, just not, if we fall out we're all going to die, extreme.
There was not a single smile on our boat as we were paddling hard towards 'Bad Place', we were all serious, serious and fearing for our lives.

Thanks to our extremely amazing instructors, we stayed in the boat... and survived.

Inbetween most of the rapids there were looooong flat pieces of water; we had the chance to swim (I mastered back flipping from the boat... and what?!), chat, and flip out about the previous rapid we had just survived.

Too soon for my liking we approcahed our last rapid...
I am ready for the boat to flip...
I am ready to be ripped and held under the water...
I am ready to become an extreme sports instructor...

We flew down the rapids towards a rather large wave, our boat got held momentarily by the current so we could really get a look at the wave that was about to destroy us, the wave crushed down on us, the boat back flipped and we are all under the water. It.was.insane.
We come to the surface just in time to be pummelled by another wave; I am floating about under the water in a tight ball, counting 1 thousand and 1, 1 thousand and 2... and I was in a HAPPY place.

We all popped up at various times at various places down the Nile, and peacefully floated to the boat.  Gutted that we had finished rafting and maybe a little battered and bruised, we left the Nile for a nice BBQ, beer and an EXTREME 13 hour bus journey home.

No longer am I scared, I am extreme.

I feel like I could conquer the world right now.

Set me a challenge? I'll do it.

A crocodile? I'll wrestle it.

A dolphin? I'll eat it.

BRING.IT.ON.

A day at a Rwandan music festival...

Today on a whim we decided to tag along with Clever down to a GumaGuma Superstar 2... We really weren't expecting much, and with that mind set we were pleasantly surprised!
We arrived to find maybe 1000 people all congregated near the front of a relatively small stage, 10's of Primus flags scattered round and 4 Primus bars offering ridiculously cheap beer!
The festival was set to start at 2, but being Africa it finally kicked off at about half 3...
In the mean time we bumped into a few of the older kids from the Orphanage and once the locals had finally stopped staring they chatted to us too; it was all a very friendly affair!
The music kicked off and the crowd went wild! Hours of singing and dancing and chanting, it was incredible! At about 6pm after excitedly awaiting his arrival JAY POLLY come onto the stage and suddenly grown men turned into 12 year old girls screaming, shouting and jumping, make shift banners appeared and the whole thing got a little emotional...
Unfortunately we had to leave after a couple of songs to make sure we could get onto a moto before dark, but it was a cracking day...
I know the flights are a little expensive, but if you're thinking of a music festival next year, i'd highly recommend this one!

Over and out.

What a cracking journey...

So, from the top...

Being over prepared and a little excitable we arrived at the airport a good 4 hours early, which at the time didn't seem to much of a big deal, better to be early than late and all that... But 47 hours later when we were still travelling, I couldn't of wished harder that I'd spent those precious 4 hours in bed!

After a relatively straight forward flight to Amsterdam, we embarked on the longest and most horrendous leg of the journey.. to the pit that is Nairobi airport. The flight got off to an initially good start, we had a spare seat next to us so we could spreeeead out and there were no annoying babies in our carriage, everything was going good, until take off. We're cruising at an altitude of, i'd guess at 3732 feet, and everyone's entertainment systems all pop up with an array of interesting films and music on the screens, well everyone's accept mine.. Cracking. 

Half an hour away from Nairobi, we're both pretty happy we've survived the flight, and that the worst was nearly over, until the Captain informs us that due to something or another we had to redirect to Entebbe, Uganda. We were a bit peeved but really weren't too bothered; we came to the conclusion that as long as we were there in time for our connecting flight there really wasn't much to worry about. 

So we land in Uganda and sit on the runway for;

...10 minutes (not too bad)... 

...20 minutes (enough time to eat a packet of polo's)

...1 hour (being reassured by the pilot we'll be off soon)

...1.5 hours (The pilot is a liar)

...2 HOURS (The pilot is slowly becoming my least favourite man, where are the scorpions?!), 

and just when we thought we would finally be on our way, the pilot pipes up again...

we are moving into an airport lounge... 

Cracking.

In comparison to half our flight we're still relatively calm, our connecting flight hasn't left and we've still got some Maome left... A pack of lies, numerous arguments and 10 HOURS later we are finally being ushered back onto the plane... Cracking.

Still calm, laughing and joking and making the most of a bad situation we arrive in Nairobi, queue for 3 hours to get a new boarding pass for our last flight, endure a power cut,sweat uncontrollably as there's no air conditioning and FINALLY board our final flight to Kigali! 

The flight was perfect, we took off and landed fine and filled out our visa fine. After laughing and joking about how our luggage wasn't going to arrive, we stood in tears dismay as my luggage didn't appear on the conveyor... CRACKING. 

Welcome to Kenya Airways- The pride of Africa my arse.

After a minor emotional breakdown we slept in the airport coffee shop for 4 hours and awaited daylight! Patrick arrived, we jumped in the car, had a bite to eat and started making our way to Nyundo... 

40 minutes in, I woke up to mountains of steam coming out of the left wheel... FRICKIN' CRACKING.

3 hours and a change of car later, we FINALLLLLY got to Nyundo... 

I think it's safe to say after seeing all the smiling faces at Noel we would maybe of traveled for another 48 hours to be here!

Tu-za-wa-na-na-ejo!

Megan

I like...

• I like having no life during exam run up.
• I like clicky pens.
• I like that my laptop has now decided it likes overheating.
• I like that the tumble dryer doesn't work properly.
• I really like that I'm 6000 miles from Noel.
  
  
  
  
  
  

The end.