Forgive me

Forgive me. It has been a month since my last confession.

Forgive me for not changing anything on my blog. I know some people got upset about a few things I said, but I decided to sleep on it (for a whole month, you say?) and will definitely not alter a word. Why? Because my blog reflects exactly what I felt at that point in time (pardon cliche) and I think that's the whole point. It's not meant to be rational or thought-through or kind or pink or fluffy and if I upset anybody it's because I was tired and weary and I think it's the perfect example of how, under certain circumstances, the tiniest of things can suddenly turn into molehills.

Far from deleting anything, therefore, I leave it as testament to my own pathetic weaknesses. I mean - honestly! When I look back and see I was having a tantrum because I didn't get to sit where I wanted to at the dinner - HOW RIDICULOUS IS THAT!!!!! It's not upsetting. It's just plain funny! So there!


On to another question which I promised to answer recently. At a party not so very long ago one lovely gentleman who'd been kind enough to have a read-through of my blog wanted to know why or how padded knickers could be regarded as a contraceptive. I've mulled over this for quite some time, trying to find the right answer and I've come up with the following: It's impossible to explain to somebody who is unfamiliar with padded knickers quite what effect they can have on your whole persona, so Mr X (who shall remain nameless LOL) - the only solution to your question is for you to borrow a pair, wear them, and then tell me just how damned sexy you feel in them!!!!!!!!!!! (or not - as you will surely find out)

(you can, of course, borrow mine if you like. In fact, you can HAVE them!!!)


Lastly, somebody asked me how I had raised my money. Very briefly:
(a) sponsorship from friends
(b) sponsorship from ladies' groups in return for a presentation afterwards
(c) car boot sales
(d) virtual coffee mornings (amazingly successful)
(e) knitting lessons for children
(f) collection at school
(g) cake sales

That's it for now. Without further ado, Goodnight!

And may I once again say an enormous THANK YOU to everybody who sponsored me and made this all possible. It was tough, enlightening and bloody brilliant!!!

Things I forgot to say ...

Things I forgot (subject to change/additions):

You know the piles of sticks these beautiful little women carry on their heads? I asked one lady if I could carry and bundle and get a photo but she said No. The caretaker of the palace where I was standing came running up and explained that it would be too dangerous – each bundles weights up to 40 kg!!! And they make it look so easy …

Monkeys are really bad-tempered!

Accidents. People keep asking me about accidents. There was only one serious accident – on the very last day. One lovely lady caught the edge of a stone with her bike, fell awkwardly and smashed her elbow. She was flown home straight after being x-rayed. I think she needs a pin in her shoulder but I don’t know the facts. Either way, I wish you all the best, Andrea. Really, really bad luck.

Vimal – you’re a star! What would we have done without you?

Jane - many, many thanks for putting up with me throughout.

Terry, Dawn and Alison - thanks for the hysterical conversations - the laughter kept me warm (and, I was going to say, sane, but I'm sure there are some who'd dispute that!)

MY FAVOURITE QUOTES FROM THE TRIP:

"Look's just like Rutland!" (??)

"It's just like Lanzarote!" (love that)

and my personal favourite:

"Can't wait to get back to the UK for a proper curry!" (Jane - that made me laugh loads)

Oh and - as promised ...

187 ALTERNATIVE USES FOR PADDED KNICKERS

Oh, all right then – I promise not to post all 187, but here are a few of them:

· Fancy head dress for a camel

· Pillow for camel cart driver

· Bust expansion

· Bullet-proof vest

· Handbag

· Toilet seat cover

· Hanging basket

· Udder protection

· Door mat

· Padding for cage on top of elephant to stop chafing

· Emergency sanitary towel

· Post-coital knickers for extra absorption

· Collection for IVF

· Ear muffs

· Draught excluder

· Frost protection for plants

· Crash helmet for rabbit

· Over-door baby bouncer/sling

· Incontinence knickers for elderly relative

· Incontinence knickers for incontinent relative!

· Sledge

· Dog chew

· Parachute

· Contraceptive

· Life raft

· Shoulder pads

· Nose bag

· Cot bumper

· Emergency airplane slide

· Firelighter

· Rice strainer

· Flag

· Sporran

· Catapult

· Bagpipes

Get the idea? Yep! That’s about as sophisticated as our entertainment got …

DAY TEN - HOME AT LAST

An early start to the airport. A lengthy morning and endless queues later we boarded. Another comfortable flight home (apart from having to fight for my duty free, but that’s another story). Anyway, I got it. I also landed safely. And my trip home was uneventful apart from realising that the air hostess had failed to give me back my credit card (I knew she didn’t like me LOL). All that aside, I was home around 11 p.m. and I couldn’t wait! It was wonderful walking in the door to warmth, comfort, familiarity, family and – let’s be honest - A FLUSHING TOILET – Hip, Hip, Hooray! And I can think of no better way to end this journey than with that image! Thank you for reading.

Thanks also to my wonderful husband, who's supported me all the way (you can hear the Oscar speech coming on, can't you?). Thanks to my fantastic children, who wrote lovely messages for me on my tee-shirt. And thank you THANK YOU to all my friends and sponsors because I literally would never have got there without you.

And thank you to Ali for getting me up that hill.

DAY NINE - DELHI

There was an option to go shopping or sight-seeing. I was tired and ready to go home. I could have done without today – it was unnecessary, really. I didn’t come to shop – I came to do a challenge. I completed it and wanted out. Exhausted.

But I certainly wasn’t going to come all this way just to go shopping, either, so I opted for the sight-seeing, although I will admit to this being on condition that there weren’t any more forts on the agenda. I’d had it with forts.

The TOWER was great. I really enjoyed that visit. I don’t know what it was called (I’ll look it up). It is five storeys high – currently. It was seven storeys high originally but two were destroyed by lightning. Wotzisface built it to channel his prayers up to heaven – or something to that effect. No disrespect or anything but I swear I just could not tune in to some of these guides and they might as well have been talking in Hindi. So I filled in a lot of stuff myself.

On that subject – a little aside. Somebody asked me yesterday if I’d done a lot of soul-searching while I was away. The answer is no. I’m far too shallow for that. I did, however, discover that I’m frighteningly scary at bull-shitting. You know, I found myself answering people’s questions sometimes and giving these lengthy informative answers and I HONESTLY DIDN’T HAVE A BLOODY CLUE WHAT I WAS TALKING ABOUT. Really! It was amazing. After about two days, I found myself qualifying everything I said with ‘But I could have just made that all up, so if I were you I’d probably check with someone else …’ It was funny, actually, but yes, scary. I think it’s probably a question of control. I need to know stuff. Out of my comfort zone I still needed to feel in control, so if there were gaps I filled them in – all by myself! Christ, I think it’s the beginnings of dementia – fabricating my own little world! *cue screaming*

Anyway – where were we? Ah yes – the tower. So it’s built in ‘ridges’ – 24 of them – which amazingly act as … you guessed it … a SUNDIAL! Inside is just one spiral staircase leading to a balcony on every storey. Up to 1981 visitors could climb the staircase. Unfortunately, a tragic accident on a school trip resulted in the death of several children on that same staircase and since then nobody is allowed in (cheery bit of info for you!). The only other lovely thing about this tower is that from a helicopter (no, no chance to confirm, I'm afraid!) I'm told it looks like a lotus flower (national flower!).

On the same site as the tower is the remains of a very beautiful Hindu Temple. I won’t describe the temple but on the grounds there remains a single solid iron flagpost. It used to be good luck to stand with your back to this flagpost and link your arms behind it. Due to the hazards of iron deposits, etc. nobody is allowed to do that now but the more interesting fact here is that analysis of the iron used to construct this flagpost has revealed an ‘iron’ that is undocumented and seemingly still impossible to replicate with all of today’s scientific knowledge.

Cool, eh?

From there we went to the Dilli Haat (or something like that) – basically, an outdoor shopping mall. Stress!

Sing with me now … Show me the way to go home, I’m tired and I wanna go to bed …

Before I forget, Professor Lord Winston (is that the right way round?) was scheduled to join us at some point during the trip but sadly his mum died and he was unable to meet us.

LAST NIGHT: Gala dinner. Due to be a lovely evening but sadly not quite what it should have been. It’s the little things, isn’t it? But I suppose it’s also because we were exhausted. Still – if I’d been sitting at the table I KNOW I would have kept seats for the rest of my ‘team’. So it was a bit sad that nobody bothered for us. I guess we just weren't a team after all. Or maybe team spirit didn’t matter any more. Either way, it was a disppointing glimpse of human nature at its 'best' (?). Friendship can be so badly misconceived, can't it? You'd think we'd learn as we get older but ... well, I obviously haven't. Anyway - an eye-opener, to say the least.

But luckily this journey wasn’t about friends and friendships – although I think we all found new friends along the way. The gala dinner was a bit of a mess, to be honest. On the up side, I ended up sitting with people I’d barely met and had a super time exchanging new stories and experiences. The entertainment was great, too. Lisa read her poem brilliantly and there were certainly a few people around me who were discreetly trying to wipe tears from their eyes unnoticed. Kate’s song was beautiful and I can’t remember the lady’s name who did the Heaven and Hell clip with the paper, but it was lots of fun.

And then came the ‘prize-giving’. Groan, groan, groan. It was misplaced and extremely inappropriate – embarrassing, humiliating and I doubt there was anyone in the room who didn’t cringe. How dare they attempt to measure people’s grief or personal battles? How dare they attempt to measure the ‘most adversity’ – and/or, worse, to give prizes reflecting the personal lives of the half dozen people out of the 84 that the tour organiser deigned to speak to when there were doubtless many people in that room who had suffered untold grievances which had driven them to be there in the first place.

In short, it was a disgrace! A poor end to a wonderful challenge. I KNEW I should have gone home yesterday lol

DAY EIGHT - JAIPUR AND TRANSFER TO DELHI

No time to dream … things to do, places to see. Up early and back on the road to drive through the Pink City (the colour hospitality) and visit the most amazing observatory. The sun dials stand at 27 degrees (position of Jaipur in relation to the equator) and can tell the time to within exactly 20 seconds! (and yes – it was absolutely spot on!). I won’t (not to say ‘can’t’) explain the intricacies of the rest but there is a whole ‘system with a purpose’ built here by some very sad and super-intelligent man who had nothing better to do than work out a way to tell the signs of the Zodiac. It’s just beyond me. Having said that – he was a bloody genius. And this is how it works (kind of):

You give birth and race to the observatory to find out exactly what time your child was born. From the time you go to the next ‘dial’ to determine the zodiac sign. From there you go to the specific dial built for your child’s zodiac sign (different sundial for each one) and there you can find out the degrees of … wait for it … something or other (‘cause I’m getting lost now!). HOWEVER … with that information, you then trot across to the other strange hanging objects and with all the information gathered you can calculate whatever it is you need to calculate before looking through a tiny telescope-like object to find – (drum roll and big TA-DA) – your child’s CONSTELLATION!!! And – whoopee-doo, with that, you can find out whether the poor sod is going to have a life worth living or not (I mean – would you REALLY want to know?)

So – now you have all the technical information you’ll ever need to know about sundials and observatories …

Let me introduce you to the Amber Fort. Now, to me ‘a fort is a fort is a fort’ (how many can you see and still be fascinated?) so I’ll just tell you the bits that I found interesting:

The Maharaja had 12 ‘official’ wives (those who lived in the fort and who were allowed to sit on the carpet with him in public – Yippee!). Part of the fort was a square of twelve rooms, each with a private entrance so ‘your man’ could sneak into each one privately. The architecture was such that the rooms were all perfectly ventilated – this was amazing. As soon as you stepped into one of the bedrooms you could feel a breeze. In the official court, the walls and ceiling are mirrored, but not simply for decoration. In winter they would light candles here; the candlelight reflected off the mirrors, absorbed the light and generated heat. Pretty amazing, really. Anything else was just … well … ‘fort’ stuff.

That was it for the morning in Jaipur. After that was a 6-hour bus ride to Delhi. Ours was DEFINITELY the bus to be on. We laughed loads. I swear I lost weight trying to teach Alison how to do Sudoku, following which we did several quizzes from Ali’s puzzle book – losing billions of points if you didn’t ‘buzz’ to her satisfaction. We had singing – and we even came up with 117 ALTERNATIVE USES FOR PADDED KNICKERS. Yep! The scenery was that interesting!

DAY SEVEN - TO THE FINISH LINE

This was a surprisingly tough day, too. I don’t know why. Perhaps because I expected to be bursting with energy and sparkle as it was the last day – and it was going to be a short one, too. It didn’t work out like that. Unsurprisingly, I suppose, I was just exhausted – and with the end in sight I started giving in to it instead of (what I should have done and what I’ve learned from kickboxing) adding on an extra day and focussing ‘beyond’ the final target.

To be honest, I can’t remember much of the cycle today. I was struggling again and just waiting for every corner to be the last. It came – eventually. The big ‘re-grouping’. It was nicely done but an odd moment – a lot of mixed emotions. Do I want it to end? Do I not want it to end? What now? What’s next? A void ahead – new plans in mind but not yet taking form … Wanting to go home and dying to share the experience but not sure how … the end of months of training, fund-raising, excitement, trepidation, hard work …

Hard to describe the thoughts going through my mind – and everybody was reacting differently. For some it was truly momentous, for others more like a dream.

We regrouped, then cycled the final half-kilometre all together, turned in and cycled under the banner. It was over in a split second. It was very strange. I think I’m still waiting for it to sink in. As soon as it was over it seemed that it had never happened.

Totally weird.

Off the bikes and a lot of tears and celebrations. More bindis, more flowers (which I had to take off immediately – a gesture not really in the spirit of things, but they started to make me sneeze!!!), and champagne. Very nice champagne it was, too.

The only pity was that the group who had trained together didn’t finish as a group. There was certainly a divide over the cycling days – understandably. People were cycling at different speeds, people were making news friends (and perhaps even losing others) – it was all very normal and very human (have to say I LOVED the dynamics of what was going on) – but it was a shame not to finish as we started. A little thing – but a pity nonetheless.

Me? I sat for some time on my own, ate on my own and … well … eventually headed for the bar and a celebratory gin and tonic and went in search of laughter, which was never far away with the likes of Terri, Dawn or Ali around. Oh – don’t get me wrong. I said I was on my own – but I wasn’t alone! I think that no matter how many people were around, at that moment every single one of us was on her own, celebrating her own private victory with her own thoughts. And many, perhaps, grieving for reasons that had brought them here in the first place. The team of 84 cyclists had reached the winning post together – but a team of 84 ‘individuals’ were celebrating. The ‘together’ bit would come later. That’s how I saw it, anyway.

Either way, mission complete.

Two hours later we were on the bus to our hotel in Jaipur. What can I say? A toilet that flushed (sort of). A bath with hot water. I could ask for no more. I’d found Heaven.