Life in the southern hemisphere

I got back to NZ two weeks ago and this is my first attempt to update the blog, bad I know.

The flight home was long (as usual) and a bit tiring (also usual), it was made challenging by the fact that I had 5 large pieces of baggage and I couldn’t lift a single one of them… the saddest part of this story is that I couldn’t buy any duty free alcohol as I was carted around on a golf cart!

I acquired a walking stick which I used to my advantage, it makes a big difference with injuries like mine when there is something physical for people to see… otherwise they push you around like normal. I got special treatment by the airhostess – they were great! I was also upgraded to business class (which is the only way to travel long distance I am telling you!!!).

It took a few days to recover from that trip when I got home. My energy leaves have been very low and I haven’t been keeping up with communication.

I am definitely improving on the energy front, I am managing to last some days without nana naps most days now and I am definitely more active. I am going to physio. I had my first 10 minute session on an exercycle yesterday and will be doing more today and after New Year I start a rehab programme in the local pool which will help fitness.

Yesterday I went 24 hours without taking any strong pain killers, it wasn't particularly comfortable. The one good thing to come from this accident is that I am lighter than I have been since I was a teenager; I am down to 66kg which means I have lost about 8kg over the last couple of months. Only problem with that is that I will have to carry ballast on my paraglider as I will be too light now.

I have sent my glider away to get fixed, it will still be a few weeks before it is all together and flyable and I am thinking I will be ready for it then. Grant took me for a tandem flight a few days ago. I was a little nervous in the air but that is to be expected. I think I have a healthy regard for the ground at the moment!!!

It is funny being a minor celebrity in the paragliding world, everyone has heard or wants to hear about my crash… shame the celebrity status isn’t for something a bit more impressive or skill related!

More Lucy Happenings

Another week or so has passed and i am still on a rather too slow for my liking recovery (but at least there is progress). I have got to the point where i can walk/sit/hang out for several hours at a time which is nice.
I went for a check up at the hospital on Thursday and got the all clear. My back is healing well, my ribs etc are on target and i am going to have problems in my shoulder/collarbone area for a while yet. I also got the go ahead to fly to Armenia. I had to wait to do so as i had to allow my burst lung to recover fully.

I managed to get through Heathrow airport on Friday and travel to Armenia, where i am now. It is SO nice to be back in Kapan where i have so many friends pleased to see me. I am really glad that i came back. I had a hassle with returning after my accident as the General Manager didn't want me to come back (he made me redundant a month ago...). He wanted my posessions packed up and sent surface to NZ which would have taken 3-4 months.

Anyway after some discussion which didn't go very far (it wasn't actually a discussion if we are honest) he allowed me to return at my own expense and pack up. So, here i am.

I am packing and hanging out with people and convincing them that i am not half dead (i dont know what the rumours were around here but there were obviously poorly informed!). It is the first time in a really long time i have been in Kapan and not been stressed. Work had become extremely stressful over the last few months and i am rather grateful that i dont have to return to that environment.

I am flying back to London on Thursday then flying to NZ on Sunday the 14th Dec.

I am organising dinner on the 12th in London for anyone who is arround and wants to come - so if it isn't too late and you are in london keep the date free!

Take care all
Lucy

Home, Sweet Home

Almost anyway - i am staying at my mum and sister's bedsit in London. It is another good milestone to leave hospital. Another of my sisters is also here, she is helping me out and waiting for her new job to start next week.

I am walking every day but not that far yet, it is improving everyday. On Saturday we walked to the new Westfield mall in Sheppard’s bush. It was a little further than we realized and when I arrived I was pretty sore. Even getting into the building was a problem – we had to walk another block to find an entrance with a manageable number of stairs … It was once I got home I realized how much I had overdone it…I couldn’t even reach for the loo paper I had stiffened up so much!

I am constantly having to be more realistic with my goals... But everyday i am improving. This part of the journey isn't particularly fun or exciting... I am aiming to be on a plane home to NZ by mid December (Already pushed out later than i orginally planned, hopefully this is a realistic timeframe this time...)

Life in Wellington Hospital, St Johns Wood, London

So now I have access to facebook but not to my blog… these things are sent to try us. (Kris has posted this for me....)

I arrived in London last Tuesday, the trip went well. I loved flying business class on the seats the lie flat and the good food, service and entertainment… I was taken by ambulance to Wellington Hospital in St Johns Wood where I have been ever since.

Wednesday I had more x-rays which showed that I had broken my transverse process, a little sticky out piece of vertebrae (L2) in my back. This wasn’t completely surprising as I have had a lot of pain there.

I didn’t sleep well and woke in the night feeling sick – nausea. I had taken some laxative the night before which the nurses thought may have caused this. To cut a long story short I started vomiting and didn’t stop until I had a stomach tube inserted through my nose and down my throat to remove the contents of my stomach manually. It isn’t nice vomiting with broken ribs.

X ray showed an obstruction in my small bowel so I was started on IV fluids and not allowed to eat or drink anything at all. I spent a couple of days like this with just a little ice to relieve the pain in my throat where the tube was rubbing. On Saturday afternoon I was allowed a glass of water and some clear soup. I have started to have a low residue diet and will slowly work up to normal meals as my tummy allows.

Problems with bowels are common after spinal injuries and this is just a little strange that it took so long to develop. …

So, it has been a bit longer in hospital than I thought I would be… I am just relieved that the hospital identified the problem quickly and did the right thing as the nausea was horrendous. Now I am slowly coming right and starting to think about getting out of here- before the end of the week!

I'm Leaving Delhi!!

I am off to London in the morning!!! i assume i passed my x-ray this morning cos no one said i didn't and i am now packing up (read: i am sitting in bed directing and managing while poor Kris is busy packing up). We are moving stuff around cos i am worried the airline might damage my glider - kind of ironic isn't it??

So i am up to walking about 50m now, the sacro-illiac (sp??) joints in my back are still causing grief but i am going to survive. I I was pushing a little hard to get active in the last day or so and have had higher levels of pain and exhaustion as my companion as a result. Today i slept most of the morning and this afternoon i had two sessions of physiotherapy.

We had a dinner party in Austalian Chris' room tonight. We managed to get my dinner sent down to his room. The food and beverage manager loves Australians(his son lives in Canberra) and thinks that Kiwi Kris and I are both australian so he keeps sending complimentary meals up to Kris... we stopped trying to correct his mistake after a while. It is funny. The only thing missing was the kingfisher beer.

Quick update on my status

I am feeling better everyday, my improvement is really quite remarkable. My lung has re inflated, and now i am doing exercises to make it stronger. The pain in my lower back is slowly reducing, although i do have problems with the joints between my back and pelvis. The rib is bearable except when Chris makes terrible jokes. Chris is an Australian i was flying with in Bir, three days after my accident he had a bad landing and managed to break his back... Funny how his accident was so much less impressive but worse damage. He is in a room two floors down so i spend much of my day scheming on how to convince the nurses to wheel me down there to say hi. They wheel my bed into his room and so we can lie together like two munted peas in a pod.

Today i got out of bed and had a shower, walked about 50m, sat in a chair for 40min and did 5 sessions of physiotherapy for my chest, neck lower back and legs! I managed to walk to the toilet a couple of times too - such an improvement from a bedpan! The other day i had a bad day when i missed the bedpan twice - i have to say i was a very small child last time i wet the bed and it isn't a nice feeling! Now if i can find someone to help me i can get to the toilet!

So, i am on track to be capable of leaving India on Tuesday - to leave i must pass one last chest xray on Monday and be able to sit in a wheelchair for about 90 min and sit upright on the aeroplane for landing and take off. i have to be able to move between chairs and fly for 8 hrs and make my way to the loo if i have to go. I hope it is all achievable as i am pretty keen on a change of scenery.

Old Delhi and markets

The streets are heaving with people. There is so much work being done. people are carting stuff everywhere. Looking down at part of teh Spice market where people are busy buying presents for Dwali


Autorickshaws can fit four tourists plus driver - as long as everyone keeps their fingers and toes inside!


When it all gets too tough for the rickshaw riders they just jump off and push.. We were pedalled around the old city for an afternoon and just had to place our full trust in our driver.

Delh in pictures

I think you have to be born in Delhi to love it. The smells, sounds, sights are pretty overwhelming.


The parliment and presidental buildings are large and rather impressive - very British. We are looking at various ministries in the photo.

I visited a Sikh temple which was beautiful i was shown around by a sikh teacher who went to great lenghts to explain the persecution they have endured from muslims. There were many graphic pictures showing sikhs with their heads cut off.


Kris got close and cuddly with some vipers... makes me shiver.


This is a great indicator of the state of energy in Delhi, the lines make great gyms for the monkeys... not sure about supplying poewr to the masses though!

Crash photos

The dark ridge in the foreground is where I crashed - where it is "flat" in the middle, and just on the other side. Photo taken just before the rescue team left the Police Station to start the climb up to rescue me!

If you want to see more than to to this Album http://picasaweb.google.com/kiwilucy/DharamsalaCrash#

I should probably mention that there are actually photos of both my and Chris 's crashes. He had a bad landing two days after my accident and ended up compressing his spine so we both visited the same hospital. He was also airlifted to Delhi and is lying in a bed a couple of floors down. We occassionally get orderlies to push beds to go and visit each other!

Faces of Himachal Pradesh

Cleaning a pot in a flooded rice paddy



This lady has three children and she is 30 yrs old


My troup of children followed me giggling and skipping down to the road after i landed in their village.

A part of an Indian wedding was held at the resort we were at. A huge outdoor kitchen was set up and these guys were the chefs, the cooked for 400 people and served excepional food. We snuck out into the kitchen and they started to cook and feed us everything there. I am sure the food tasted better when we watched it cooked! The only strange thing about this wedding was that there were NO WOMEN present. They were having their own party up the road. Kris E said that the night reminded him of a Gay Disco -and he would know!

Crash

I crashed my paraglider in the Himalayan mts on the 31 October and end up lying on my back in a hospital in Delhi, India ever since.

I am fine, it was a close call, but i will fully recover. In the meantime i have spent the last week being happily drugged. Now they have reduced the pain medication to sensible levels, and i am becoming coherent again.

I will leave the story of the accident to another day when i am up for writing it (hopefully i will have some cool pics too) in the meantime i can post some pictures of flying and travelling in India before my accident.



Launch on a beautiful day.


This is the closest picture i got of a Himalayan Griffon Vulture. These guys love to thermal and they also love to come pretty close to paragliders as we all share the sky. They may look a little scruffy on the ground but they a so beautiful in the air. One came so close to me at one point he flew straight over me and i could see his shaggy cuddly looking underbelly...


On glide with friends, it is so nice to just hang out in smooth air with friends, we are all just cruising here.


This was my longest flight ever, about 40km and i landed in a rice paddy near a village, in microseconds i had lots and lots of kids coming to watch. They were adorable children and i felt like the pided piper leading them all away from the village back t the road.

I made it to Delhi

I arrived in Delhi after a rather disorientating 14 hr stop in Munich (which i managed to fill effectively with some shopping- a beautiful pair of black leather boots - and a trip to a concentration camp).

Delhi is an assault on the senses. There are a hundred different smells, sounds, sights at every turn of the head. I saw an elephant yesterday, and cows with big humps on their backs - ox i think, and so many people. Some in rags and others in riches - and they are all going in some direction (which probably isn't the direction the traffic is going in).

He-who-does-not-wish-to-be-named (but i am sure some peoples can figure out the paragliding pilot i am travelling with) arrived today, a day late (after he forgot which day he was supposed to be on the aeroplane). He was lucky - he managed to have his ticket reissued and left me to it yesterday to get acquainted with the madness that is Delhi. Tomorrow more paragliding people will arrive and we will all head to Dharamasala (in the north) on Saturday.

I will try to post some of the millions of pictures i have now taken as soon as i find some wireless Internet!

The Good and the Bad

So, the good news - I bought a house - it all went proper on Tuesday.

My Mum and I have been working on buying for a long time, and my friends were looking to sell. It just worked out that Mum and I managed to buy their house and they have got something else now too. It is in Lake Hawea and is a lovely wee place, not big but definitely cosy and a good location.

The bad - the whole worlds economy is taking a turn for the worse. The financial news keeps getting worse. We are protected from the day to day and I have only read things on the internet and watched CNN but it is not good reading!

Tomorrow they are laying off more people from work. At the moment it has just been one or two here and there; a couple of obsolete departments. Now we are going to see some large cuts and it is going to hurt. Out of our 1500 employees we could easily lose 300 or more. I don’t know how well the town is going to cope with this. There are definitely going to be expats going. All I hope this is enough to keep the place floating while the world goes mad.

Curiosity the cat (and me) PART TWO

So by the way, what ever eventuated from my sister's request for my friend and blogger Karen's address? I know this happened ages ago but i never did get to the bottom of it...

What did she send you???

High risk adventures in kapan

This is probably the most dangerous thing i have done in a long time, and i do like to do the odd 'extreme' sport in my spare time. I was having a couple of beers at one of the lovely summer cafes in town with a couple of the lads when they decided that we needed to move cafes. Apparently there were not enough pretty girls walking past our location.

I mentioned that i had considered risking my life by having a ride on the old, rusty ferris wheel in the park. Peter gallantly offered to come with me and even paid the 100AMD (30 cents) entrance fee. He and i jumped onto this ancient soviet beast and secured the rather ineffective seat belts. Calling this ferris wheel old is like saying that the US financial markets are in a spot of bother.



The whole ferris wheel had that unmaintained, broken down kinda feel. It was surprising how it still operated!


We got surprisingly high, and had a great view over the tops of the four storey buildings around us. We could see the lights of kapan running down the valley. Actually, we are getting close to the local governement elections and so the street lights really are being installed and turned on at night. There are actually quite a number of lights visible now!


So, Peter didn't actually hold my hand, but i am sure i wouldn't have got on the thing without his company. Afterwards we adjourned to another cafe in town where we sat and drank more beer while the boys 'bird watched'.

Summer weddings

Well, i am back at work and there isn't much exciting happening in my life. It is raining, and has been now for almost a week. The only excitment i have had is going to Liana and Matthews wedding and trying to drive up slippery muddy roads without sliding back to the bottom.

So, since there are no nice photos of driving up muddy hills i thought i would share some nice pictures of Liana and Matthew's wedding.

Liana and Matthew got married in a 6th Century church just out of Kapan. It is a beautiful old place where the doorways are only 5 foot tall! Liana is Armenian and Matthew English, so there was a fusion of traditions happening though out the day. Matthew's parents and sister had just arrived from the UK and were still looking like stunned mullets. No amount of prior warning can really prepare you for this place! Liana wanted everyone in the church when she arrived, which is a little unusual in Armenia, but we all managed to do as asked! The ceremony was conducted in Old Armenian, so no one understood it, there was singing, chanting, waving a bible around while circling the pulpit and sticking some funny look crowns on and facing each other... fairly standard really!


The wedding photos didn't quite happen as planned, the usually beautiful sunny weather dissappeared, but i like the misty look inthe photo below!


There was no dancing at the reception for the first hour, this was very strange for the Armenian contingent (normally you start dancing even before eating at an Armenian wedding) and the Tamada (toastmaker) compared the wedding to the 1 year anniversary of a death he had attended earlier that day- saying that the anniversary was more lively than the wedding! Still once Liana and Matthew had completed the first dance together there was plenty of dancing to keep everyone happy.

The last few days

Village life in St Andre and the kids play while we drink beer... waiting for the wind to drop.


So flying out the next morning i headed to Antibes to see my friend Brian before heading back to the airport.

So, now i have swum the mediterranian sea from Turkey, Greece, Italy and France. Its a good life!

St Hilaire and Laragne

I got a train to Grenoble and was met by two good friends from home, Kat and Bryan at the train station... We made our way back to their campsite and woke in the morning to more good weather. A strong southerly was predicted so we got up Allevard for a short flight. Still no southerly so we went to St Hilaire where I got to fly the famous site for the first time (the southerly never arrived). It was traffic mayhem and it felt like 400 people were all flying in same place. In reality it was about 40 people flying a site not much bigger than Barnicoat. Still as soon as you got away to the next ridge it became very enjoyable.


We made tracks to another little camp site in the hills and got to Laragne to fly the next day. This was another nice site but we had a very crossed wind (straight down the ridge) and had to take off in thermal... the 300m cliff edge added some excitment to the launch. It was a nice flight but with a thunderstorm happening behind us and big sink zones I ended up on the ground after an hour of blatting around. Bryan on the other hand went for a nice tikitour to Briancon, over 100km away. It was a nice drive through scenic France to pick him up!



The weather finally packed in for flying - so we spent a day rockclimbing at a nearby village. The village had decided to become a rock climbing destination about 10 years ago - so they paid some climbers to come and set up some routes. Word got around and 10 years on the town is full of rockclimbers spending money.


I waved goodbye to Kat and Bryan at the medieval town of Sisteron before getting a bus and train to St Andre...

And then a Swiss wedding

So i used Priscilles rather vague (but useful) instructions to drive to Bagnes then follow the signs to... And arrived at a paddock that was filled with cars. We sat on haybales in a paddock while she arrived on horseback and then Priscille and Luc-oliver sat in paragliding harnesses for their service... I have to mention the bells - even though it was outside and nowhere near a church some of the boys were ringing bells - like giant cow bells before the service to tell everyone to sit and after they rode in on a tractor ringing lots of bells it was good fun! The service was in french but it still made me cry. A huge convoy of cars (around 400 people!!) made our way over the country roads to a lovely garden where there was a festival/picnic atmosphere.

We drank wine, ate icecream, wood fired pizza, cheese and olives, chocolate fondue and little pastries... The kids had pony rides and a bouncy castle. There was a game with a cow - where people bought a small square of ground and then the person 'owning' the peice that the cow pooed on won a tandem paragliding trip, it was very amusing.

An unexpected bonus was that i met two kiwis at the reception. One girl is the girlfriend of the Groom's brother and she had studied at T-col when i was at uni and we lived in hall-of-residence across the road from each other in our first year!

The best bit of the whole day - it was super stable day so no real flying could be had i didn't feel at all hard done by being there... ahhh perfect!

Straight to France

So i arrived back in London early afternoon - and got myself to Stanstead airport (via a quick stop to see Jenn and her little triple babies she was working with). I arrived at Geneva late at night and jumped into the rental car. I drove the non-motorway route that TomTom thought was good and found myself at a locked gate across the road. It appears that this may be a 'border'. So i turned around and found a nice peice of quite farm road to stop and sleep. The veiw was pretty nice when i woke up and the smell of freshly cut grass was overwhelming!

In the morning i wasn't sure if i had crossed the border or not, but as i entered the little coffee shop (at about 9am) and i saw the two old guys drinking their little glasses of vino i guessed France. I pulled out Euros and this was the right move!

Igot to annecy in the morning and spent the next few days flying. I went on a tiki-tour with a couple of guys to this random site in a valley somewhere... we struggled to stay up (my top landing was a bit unspectacular!) but late afternoon we got some good valley thermals and great flying.


Nice clear skys with some dissappointingly stable weather...


Flying in Annecy is really nice, but it is one of the busier sites i have ever flown, so that can make it a little stressful. Here i am ridgesoaring with about 30 other pilots on a very small area. It is like a 3D motorway! I can count 8 other people in this photo!!

Lakes District weekend

I have finally downloaded my camera.. the first adventure of my time off -


First step: Get supplies. We stocked up on essentials, wine, cheese, crackers, chocolate, lollies.... it was a big shock to my system after all the healthy food in Armenia!

Step 2: Drive to the Lakes district. This took a while. I managed to drive around a round about the wrong way and probably worry everyone a lot.

Champagne before, during and after dinner...hmmm... life is good!

Of course, we saw some pretty nice scenery and did some nice walking (all be it in the rain). The region is pretty spectacular - despite the compactness of the area it really is gorgeous.

The last couple of weeks

Have been great! No photos yet but they are coming. I went to the Lakes District with some good friends and then crossed the ditch to France and flew around Annecy for a few days before a quick drive into Switzerland to go to Priscilles wedding. Now i have made my way south to the Provence region of france and i am enjoying the hot days, cooler evenings and and good wine and food... The paragliding has been pretty good, but i have finally had a couple of days off as the wind and rain has caught up with me.

It has all been fun, but i haven't had much time to play on the computer - definitely a good thing! I will be heading back to work in a couple of days, three weeks passes fast when you are having fun.

Rally taxi driving

Ok, so this is a little late - i wrote this a couple of weeks back while still working in Yerevan.

I thought I was going to die. The majority of the day was enjoyable and passed without incident. But then we needed to go to a meeting and called a taxi. A silver lada turned up. I should have known that a lada painted silver and working for a company (aptly) named Rally would be bad.

We hurled through the streets of Yervan. Me clinging to the front seat and the door hold, bracing with my legs (they were splayed in a most unlady like manner) and maintaining an attention distracting one way dialogue with Vahe assessing the probabilities and the chances of survival (him: front seat, no belt = no chance, me: back seat, no belt but Vahe between me and the window = limited chance).

We took a wrong turn which meant that we effectively had a scenic tour of Yerevan, we drove up steep streets barely managing the make the corners and we drove down cobbled streets not slowing for anyone or any minor inconvenience like 2m deep holes dug into our side of the road.

As scary as it was (undertaking with millimeters to spare at intersections) he showed remarkable ability to approach hazardous situations at a million miles an hour and not crash.

Vahe asked the guy to slow down – twice – this is also a first – even Vahe was slightly shocked by his driving! But alas, our taxi driver seems to be genetically programmed to have a short life. I just hope that he doesn’t take too many people with him when it happens.

Oh yeah, I did an unofficial survey earlier in Yerevan. I counted 42 cars before seeing one person using a seatbelt. This is despite the fact that half of these cars had belts installed.

Blackberries and ice cream..

Fresh blackberries with icecream, sitting in my comfortable lounge (complete with computer and stuffed tiger) with the air conditioning on while it is 37 degrees outside after a hard days work... can it get much better??




I love it in the summer whent there actually is some fresh fruit and vegetables around!

Things in Georgia seem to be settling down. there is talk that the border will open again soon and the russian blockage to the ports will be moved so that shipments might start arriving.

I hope so as we dont have much diesel left in the country at the moment. There have been rumours floating around that the airport has no aviation gas left too - these are only rumours our travel coordinator tells me!

Developments in Georgia

The last day has seen terrible escalation with the problems in Georgia. Now there are bombs being dropped on towns outside of the disputed area - including the capital Tblisi and the main port Poti.

It is a little scary as there are so many Armenians on holiday around the black sea and close to Poti, the main port. To think that i was going there in 10 days time. I hope the guys i know get back to Armenia where it is safe soon!!

There are some pretty serious repercussions for our business too. The main fibre optic cable has been cut to Armenia as it runs through Georgia - meaning most people have no Internet access in the country (we run on satellite so are ok). Almost all supplies come into Georgia and all our export leaves via Poti. It wont take us long to run out of stock required for work and we wont be selling anything either.

The only way out of Armenia (assuming that it is unsafe to travel in Georgia and the airport is closed for some reason) is via Iran... talk about feeling isolated right now!!

Its all about me

You could say i don't have very good luck...
First Mt Ararat is a no go. Then i decide to go to Georgia and finally see the Black Sea from a position other than 35oooft above, but it is not to be.

Heavy fighting in South Ossetia (northern part of Georgia) has meant that it probably isn't a great idea to be a tourist in Georgia this week. ttp://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7546639.stm

So, i have decide. I am going to London. I will cross my fingers and hope that there are no terrorists or wars started before, during or after my visit. I will head to France and Switzerland and keep my fingers crossed for their security also. After all - it must be me - right??

Curiosity the cat (and me)

My sister (who blogs here) has messaged my friend (who blogs here) to ask for her mailing address. My only role in this transaction is to pass the address on (which i have now done!) I feel like a middleman in a drug heist here, and now i am curious- Why??

What is my sister sending my friend??? Now i am living with the curiosity until one of these guys fills me in!!!

What to do now?

Well, there is no trip to climb Mt Ararat these holidays. Now i am trying to decide what to do instead.... I have a couple of days less than three weeks, and a wedding in the middle in Switzerland. Decisions to be made!

I might not be walking up Mt Ararat this summer but the almost-trip has meant that i have started walking and riding my bike around town. It was hard to start - there are lots of reasons not too - its hard to get out of bed early, its dirty and stinky in the heat with all the rubbish lying around, i am tired at the end of the day. Then there are also staring locals and lots of stray dogs. Admitedly not as many as there were since someone has been going around in the evening and shooting them. We saw the results lying on the side of the road walking to work the other day.

But - I cant believe how good it feels to ride a bike again!!!

Mulberry vodka making time

I was walking through some gardens and came across this old lady and her distillery. The old lady let me take her picture and was even prepared to let me try the rough vodka (she was only on her first distill of the mulberries). I declined as i am sure it would have made me blind!