My Mecca - Boots!

Hi all. It's 4pm and i'm in the sparkly new Bangkok airport.

Journey went well - I was very impressed with the leg room on Thai airways...and the food. I was sat next to a couple called Liz and Rob - they were about my parents' age and were travelling to Bangkok to grab a cruise around the coast to China and Hong Kong. Dead friendly and well travelled peeps!

I've blanked out the two hour wait to check in and go through security at Heathrow and the bitter disappointment at discovering that Terminal Two departures lounge only caters for the rich and famous, which scuppered my plans to purchase a much needed bikini. Managed to bore a woman in the sunglasses shop for about an hour though, whilst she tried to find me a pair that didn't make me look like a wonky android (my ears are definitly wonky Vix!!)Found a pair in the end!

Managed a short amount of Nitol-induced sleep on the plane and arrived in Bangkok 11 hours later feeling rather like the back end of a mangey dog. I'm here until midnight for the second 11 hour leg of my journey (is the world really that big??).Had a wander around the shops - they're as useful as those in terminal two - and was getting desperate at the prospect of not finding toothpaste when, out of nowhere, I see the glorious sign of Boots. I've never been so happy to see Boots! After brushing my teeth and changing clothes I now feel like the better half of said mangey dog!

Going to finish this blog and find somewhere to fester with my new found Bible - The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins. Saw an interview with Dawkins about his book and it sounded like just my cup of tea - i know my brother has read it too. It is the Bible for atheists and it is the first book i've read about religion that actually makes sense. As Dawkins quite rightly says we should be proud to be atheists. It is the first time i have read something that fits my beliefs and it's quite comforting to know that I am not alone in my view of the world!

Anyhoo, going to have to head off to find food and coffee. More news when I get to Brisbane.

The marathon

Well what a day! Had to be at the bus for 5.15am to catch a lift to the start. 37,000 bleary eyed runners were sheperded military style onto buses for the 30min bus ride. I arrived at the start at 6am. Everything was outdoors so it was a long four hour wait in the cold. Thankfully it wasn't as bitterly cold as the day before but still nippy. I had two pairs of trackies on three tops, a thermal coat, hat scarf and gloves and still had to keep moving to stay warm.

Met Raf at the start so I at least had someone to chat to whilst standing in portaloo queues. We also had laugh at some of the sporting attire about; masses of lycra, shellsuits and the odd person in fancy dress. I had to divert my eyes on numerous occasions as men lunged in tight lycra in front of me and I had an unfortunate full frontal experience with a portaloo as I opened the door on an unsuspecting young man!

There was masses of lycra as far as the eye could see, the overwhelming stench of Deep Heat (and portaloos as the hours went on) and various stretching implements. The atmosphere was buzzing though and there were bands for entertainment, free breakfast and tents to huddle in.

I started on the blue start which is for mid speed. Raf started in green for the speedy ones and Kate (who I met the day before) was starting in orange so unfortunately I didn't have anyone to run with. When the race kicked off there was a military fly over and we hit the longest suspension bridge in the world with a steep incline. The first seven miles were fine but at mile 7 i started having problems with my knee. It kept locking up and getting more and more painful so i had to stop and stretch it out.

The race took us through Brooklyn, Queens, The Bronx and Manhatten. Hills were everywhere and were extremely unforgiving. I hit the wall at mile 17 just after coming across a bridge famed for being the wall zone. It was a mile of uphill in pitch black and it was seriously tough. After mile 17 I struggled. My knee was giving me more and more gip and the hills were unrelenting. Even the last 200 yards were uphill! The crowds were fabulous which really helped. There were thousands of people supporting over the last few miles in Central Park. I finished in a time of 04:45:53. Much slower than my time of 04:31 in the London Marathon but this one was much harder! Anyhoo my comp is about to die so better go!

lunges, the scent

New York, men and me!

After a great night's kip and brekkie of bagal, smoked salmon and cream cheese in a 'typical' New Yorkan deli, I decided to face my fear of heights and head to the Empire State building. Everything - as you would expect in America - was extremely well organised,the queues moved and for $53 I bought a City Pass which gives you access to all the main tourist attractions for 9 days.

The views from the top were amazing. I could just about see the longest suspension bridge in the world on the horizon - the distance was slightly disturbing as the bridge is the start point for the marathon eeeek! What I didn't realise is that the Empire State Building is only a measly 80m taller than the Eiffel Tower - for some reason it felt much higher!

Whilst taking photos of the vista, I was asked by an Italian if I would take a photos of him at the top. He returned the favour, and that's how I met Mauro - a slightly short, Italian captain in the Italian paras. We got chatting and it turned out he was pretty friendly so we ended up spending the rest of the day sightseeing together. First up, we headed down to the famous Flatiron building seen in practically every film or TV show featuring NY. We then walked almost the entire length of 5th Ave taking in the Rockerfeller Centre, St Patrick's Cathedral and ending up at the Museum of Modern Art. St Patrick's Cathedral is gothic in style and resembles Notre Dame but looks rather lost tucked in amongst the skyscrapers that surround it. The museum was fab with the likes of Picasso, Matisse, Cezanne, Dali and Van Gogh on show.

Some of the more unusual sights I saw were a skyscraper with trees growing on it and THE most bizarre shop I've ever come across. It was a grotto filled with fairies, clowns and all sorts of other magical creations in every shape and size - we got chased out by an extremely gay 'artiste'when we took a photo of it!

In the avo we trekked to eastside Manhatten through some of the seedier districts of NY to the marathon expo where I had to register and collect my number and timing chip. Something that does differ from the movies is the ease of getting a taxi - unlike Sex in the City no amount of elegant waving and shouting of 'taxi' will get one to stop. Hence we ended up trekking all the way back to Times Square.

I said my goodbyes to Mauro (although I may catch up with him today) then contacted Raf and went out for a dinner of - guess what? - pasta. Considering i'm travelling on my own, I haven't actually spent any real time on my own. Has been great!

Today, I'm going for a 2 hour boat cruise to see the Statue of Liberty, heading to Ground Zero, meeting up with my fiend Rob's friends for lunch, meeting Mauro to go to the Guggenheim Museum and probably meeting Raf for dinner.

Tomorrow, I've got an early morning awakening at 5am to get ready for the marathon. Tis all very nerve wracking! I've realised that with the time difference I'll actually be running between 3pm and 8pm UK time. I will have my phone on me so any texts of support during that time would be absolutely fab. My biggest worry is not having people watching to keep me running - If I stop even once it's all over!

Watch this space for my results! Fingers crossed!

New York New York!

I'm addicted to Virgin Atlantic! Their entertainment system is second to none. Everyone has their own handset and can choose the films they want to watch from a choice of 50. Watched more films yesterday than I have in years! Had a pretty uneventful trip although the plane was filled to the brim with marathon runners and their supporters so there was a pretty good 'camaraderie' atmos going on.

It took me three hours to get from JFK airport to my hostel though. After navigating customs which took about an hour, I then spent an hour in New York traffic. I met a guy called Raf who's also running on Sunday and we shared a taxi which made the laborious journey, less so! Our taxi got stopped by a miniature policewoman with attitude who gave our taxi driver a fine for turning badly - I didn't even notice that he'd done anything wrong!

Next up, I somehow managed to walk 6 blocks in the wrong direction from where I got out of the taxi. I didn't realised that there was a West and East 45th Street ooops! Anyhoo I made it to the hostel and it's fab. Bit tatty as hostels tend to be but immaculately clean.

Last night I met Raf at Times Square and we went for dinner in a small Japanese place. It's always great to find someone to hook up with when you're travelling on your own.

First impressions of New York are that people are super-friendly - even the customs officer had a laugh and a joke with me. And there are yellow cabs and steaming sewers everywhere just like in the movies!

Today I'm off to wait in more queues to go to the Empire State Building / cruise - I haven't decided which yet - will decide over brekkie!

Best dash.

3d 3hrs 46m 21s

The trainers are packed. I have warm gear, wet gear, shorts, trackies, sweaters, silver-lined socks, hats, gloves, 2 litres of Lucosade and half a kilo of pasta - what more could a girl want? Forget elegant eveningwear - this trip is all about the comfiest, warmest clothing I can get my hands on.

Those of you who've been around me recently will know that running hasn't been at the forefront of my mind these last few weeks. This trip has creeped eerily upon me and I don't feel psyched at all. Fingers crossed the nerves will kick in on Sunday!

I am pleased to say that I've patched things up with my dad. Three days in Jersey last week was one of my better decisions in life. Facing dad made things far easier to deal with. Better than sat in my room stewing over events a few hundred miles away for sure!

Unfortunately, as most of you know, my dad was diagnosed with cancer this week. Thankfully the prognosis is excellent so we can just keep our fingers crossed that after a few months of upset things will get back to normal. Running for Cancer Research UK is now all the more poignant. It'll be tough and i'll have to focus on not getting upset when I see people with 'in memory of' t-shirts run past - it's always at the back of your mind despite a great prognosis!

Well here's to what I hope will be a good weekend. Cheers guys (you know who you are) for all your support these last few weeks - you've been great!

P.S. For anyone who hasn't quite got round to sponsoring me it's not too late : http://www.justgiving.com/nyjellylegs

Death to all semi-colons !

Semi-colons are unloved creatures at the best of times. Most people don't have a clue what to do with them and feel slightly uncomfortable at the thought of introducing them into, what is otherwise, a grammatically correct sentence. To be honest, my use of semi-colons is experimental at the best of times, so I shall refrain from using them in this entry to avoid looking like a grammatical slob (more so than usual at any rate).

Anyway, I am losing track of my original point. They are unloved creatures, and whilst I may have trouble placing them correctly, I don't despise them to the extent that I avoid using them altogether. That is, until today.

I suppose it is not really the semi-colon's fault; Adobe is really the prime suspect. My CDROMs, yesterday on the verge of completion, were suddenly swallowed up in a mire of confusion.

I had tenderly, for an obscene number of man hours, compiled extensive metadata (title, author, subject, keywords, description, date of publication e.t.c) for over 500 documents. This enabled me to develop search indexes so that people can search the contents of the CD ROM. We go to test it and what happens? The author search doesn't work!!

Two hours of frantic testing later and we discover the culprit. Yes, the dear old semi-colon. Now, whilst Adobe allow keywords to be separated by semi-colons, when it comes to authors it is a different matter entirely. For some reason Adobe believes that there can only ever be one author to a document, and therefore the services of a semi-colon are unrequired.

Well Adobe, may I advise you that in research papers you can have up to 10 authors(if not more) and therefore it would be logical that the semi-colon separation principle would apply here too. And if it doesn't, it would be nice if you could mention it in your 'Help' function.

Unfortunately, logic and computer software don't tend to mix. I therefore spent a frantic morning removing in the region of 5,000 unloved and dejected semi-colons from my metadata. Happily, I can say it is now done and, fingers crossed, I'll be able to get on the plane on Saturday safe in the knowledge that my CD ROMs are complete and void of all semi-colons.

Torn

The countdown is on till I touchdown in terminal 3 and crash headlong into the gritty reality of the polluted metropolis of London. The title of this entry 'Torn' is not quite exact. I can't say I'm exactly torn between here and London; it is an unfortunate necessity that I board the plane on Saturday. Dissertation and credit card bills being the main reasons for my return home but also the need, after 6 weeks, for a decent cup of coffee. Oh and of course to see the folks and my young man which go without saying.

So what's wrong with London? Well where do I start. Smiles. An extinct phenomenon in our dear capital. One journey on board our misery-infested tube system is enough, if you let it, to depress you for a week. In Laos people smile. They have nothing, but they are grateful for what little they have. People feed entire families on 25p a day and still they smile.

In London, people have everything and yet they constantly moan because everything is never quite enough. They moan when they haven't got the latest mobile phone; they sulk at their overflowing yet 'empty' wardrobes, muttering about their need to go shopping; if their job doesn't pay 40 grand they whinge. I'm not saying I'm any better, I do exactly the same when I'm in that environment. What a breath of fresh air though, to discover that there is more than one way to live. Where quality of life and happiness are not necessarily proportional to your monthly salary.

I'm also going to miss the accepting nature of Lao culture. You can be the queen of queens and no one bats an eyelid; homosexuality, at least for men, is totally acceptable. There are no looks, no sniggers, no beatings, nothing. Gay men are seen as equals. Although London is probably the most accepting area of England, it still has its share of prejudice and beating up gay men remains the sick past-time of some.

The same goes for religion. Everyone and anyone is accepted into their Buddhist culture. Anyone can sit in a temple and everyone can take part in Buddhist ceremonies. There are a lot of religions that could learn from these examples.

Somehow, in our progress from the developing to the developed world, we appear to have lost our acceptance for fellow humans. We have become narrow minded, prejudiced, competitive and greedy. There is a lot to be learned from our lesser developed neighbours.

I shall also miss the weather. My jumper has remained scrunched up at the bottom of my rucksack waiting for its inevitable emergence on my return home. I even enjoyed the frequent encounters I had with red mud. At least when it rains here it does a decent job of it. None of that hair-frizzing drizzle we get on a daily basis in the UK.

I wont miss witnessing horrific bike accidents.

Well enough of all that. It's back to the 4 quid tasteless sandwiches, the 5 quid glasses of wine, the ineloquent grunts of retail staff and the opportunity to rub shoulders with suicide bombers on the underground!