Jump for Joy!

WE DID IT!!!

2007-07-04T20:02:00.000Z

WOW it’s nearly been a year! Looking back the past years’ entry and a lot has happened, not all good but I do hope we have all matured (in mind only though!) and I hope we have entertained you somewhat ;-)

I am so sorry it took so long to write up the final entry, so in my way of apology, I’ll try and give you a detailed rendition of our 10,000 (puh, a mere 10,000 and not the 15,000 I did before!) feet plummet to the Earth’s crust!

The jump was scheduled for 17th June, Father’s Day but the weather the week leading up to the jump was quite temperamental and we weren’t sure if the jump was going to go ahead until 9pm Saturday evening when we made a call up to the jump site in Oxfordshire.

One of my colleagues from my office asked me what it was like actually doing the jump and I gave her 3 advice: 1) do not chew gum during freefall (I nearly choked on mine on my first jump); 2) get plenty of sleep; and 3) just enjoy yourself and scream like mad!

Well… I don’t actually practice what I preach…! Not sure if we were going to do our jump until the day before meant I was pretty unprepared – had to look for my BHF t-shirt (it shouldn’t be that hard to locate as it was bright red… it was neatly folded away at the bottom of my wardrobe), dig out some baggy jeans, bright red ski socks for my plaster cast, pack food supply (consists of chocolates and fruit juices) for our 2 hour car journey up north.

I was tucked up in bed by 11pm on Saturday but of course when you really want to sleep, your mind just goes into overdrive and I didn’t manage to fall asleep until 2ish and had to get up again at 4am!!! We had to get to the jump site by 9 which meant I needed to meet Shirin at North Greenwich station around 7ish. I wasn’t the only one sleep deprived, Shirin barely slept the night before too and managed to wake up late so when I saw her, her hair was still damp from her morning shower.

Throughout the drive Shirin and I couldn’t believe how nice the weather was, the sun was shining, barely any clouds in the sky, not a drop of rain in sight… this was all to the dismay of Shirin! She kept chanting, ‘we are going to die, we are going to die…’ every so often! LOL

The drive besides from Shirin’s chanting was pretty uneventful, we only managed to get ‘lost’ twice… took the wrong turning off the big roundabout near Heathrow Airport and not being able to find the jump site so we picked up a fellow para jumper down the ‘Vicar of Dibley’ esque lane! That’s another thing we can both tick off our list of stupid things to do before we are 50… jump to our death and pick up a hitch hiker (of sorts)!

Drove down a narrow, muddy lane, strolled/rolled along damp grass to sign away our life with the parachute school and then basically lay about watching the professionals enjoy a few jumps themselves whilst we waited for more people to turn up. One of the ‘professionals’ managed to go off course and landed in an adjacent field! Hehehe

Thinking we shouldn’t eat before our jump in case the altitude and sleep deprivation didn’t agree with our tummy we held out until 11ish until the smell of fried burgers and sausages drew us in! Which tasted fabulous, may not make have made it as something I would request for my final meal but just for a normal day out in an open field with the sun shining, children and dog running about, it was perfect ;-)

In this picture it looks like Shirin was really concentrating on the training given by Dan here with the parachute… personally I think she was just concentrating on his nice perk bum! Hahaha

We got chatting to the guy frying up our food, he told us he had done about 50 jumps himself, and our instructor had amazingly done over thousands of jumps! Shirin’s guy (and what a ‘guy’ he was, ex-RAF and muscles all in the right places ;-)), Ian was half naked when we were first told who we were going to jump with by one of the girls handling our forms and payments. My guy, Ralph had done over 3,000 jumps and only slightly saner than all the other instructors/staff working there! Whilst they (3 strong men, one on each side lifting me up whilst the third was trying to try a ribbon between my legs!) were helping to get me geared up, we had the normal conversation: What am I feeling? Why I am doing the jump? And so on. This gave me the chance to flash them my BHF t-shirt and somehow lead to the conversation to computer games… this was were I disclosed I am hooked on ‘Final Fantasy III’ on the DS Lite – things got decidedly rude from then on, by the time Shirin joined us to get geared up (she was changing into her jogging pants in the car), she was thrown into the deep end of the conversation about role playing games! LOL

This is my favourite photo of Shirin getting very close to Ian ;-)

Shirin was saying, if she sat down on the ground, she wouldn’t be able to stand back up again as it was quite heavy – this was nothing compared to the parachute packs which weighed in excess of 20kilos which the instructors had to carry. All geared up and nowhere to go but up, up and away!

Our light aircraft for the day was called, Islander. She is only a small aircraft, the inside of the cabin was held together mainly by duct tape! Confined space with 8 jumpers (3 novices, 3 instructors and 2 video guys), pilot and co-pilot. Throughout our ascend the video guys were doing acrobatics trying to excite/scare us into pulling silly faces into the camera… we were even offered to join the mile high club! Hahaha

I was the first to jump out of the plane with Ralph once we arrived at our location and got the go ahead from air traffic control that the area was free from other aircrafts. We wiggled our way to the door (did I forget to mention, I have been strapped to Ralph and was basically laying on top of him during the ascend?!), dangled our legs out… the first thing I noticed wasn’t the lovely white clouds but the wheel of the aircraft just feets away from us! My mind was definitely working over time – I am going to hit my head on the wheel, pass out from the impact, fall to the ground and miss the whole experience! In reality that didn’t happen – as I was strapped to the front of my instructor, all he had to do was lean forward and we are off… freefall was exactly the same as I remembered, can’t make out Heaven and Earth, wind rushing by and time doesn’t mean anything (freefall with the speed of 120mph was due to last 30 seconds but even though I dislike it, it did not feel that long), you just try to remember your training and not grab your instructor in your panic! I wisely got rid of my gum when I was eating my sausage burger so I only had to contend with my dribbling when Ralph deployed our parachute! This is definitely not a sport trying to impress guys – dribbling during freefall, stupid leather hats that give you hat hair, bubble bee goggles which leaves marks on your face and then the straps all tightly bounded in all the wrong places! Hahaha

I believe Shirin and Ian was the next to jump with their camera guy. Shirin and Ian were showing off, doing all these turns in the sky and reaching the ground long before us – we just gently floated down and enjoyed the beautiful view beneath us, we saw a few Red Kites (the bird variety) which Ralph pointed out as I had no idea!

We were coming up to landing after about 5 minutes descending (it felt so much longer though), there was another member of staff on the ground waiting to catch me but we ended up landing on our bums instead, as my instructor leaned backwards, I was still strapped to him so again I was laying literally on top of him when the camera guy and the member of staff who were suppose to catch me came running up and unhooked us and help me out of the straps and into my chair again! Phew! That’s it, all done, got our certificate and back to normal speed and life!

That’s it, that was our jump and this is the final entry but the donations doesn’t stop, the sponsor page is still up so please feel free to donate to a fabulous charity – thank you for reading ;-)

Lots and lots of love Helen & Shirin xxx

A giant leap... out of a plane from us soon!

2007-06-12T20:30:00.000Z

Wednesday 16th May
Attended Charlton Athletic ground for my first of 6 weeks lesson in relation to the Olympic course… my cute instructor won't be taking any of the course :-(

Anyway, coming up to the end of the course now and have enjoyed each and every lesson – fire safety was the most informative as I am now confident on which fire extinguisher to use in each different type of fire situation, customer relations was fun as the instructor was very charismatic, and the instructor on becoming a volunteer was extremely friendly… I could go on and on!

Sunday 27th
Long weekend and what could be better than a BBQ with friends and family? Well… a BBQ in the summer is what! LOL

Kim drove all the way down from Leicester just for Trees BBQ and even the rain didn’t stop it from happening! Sent Duong out in the rain armed with an umbrella and tongs to grill our sausages and burgers whilst we stayed indoors, in the warmth! Between us, we have had a BBQ nearly in all weather conditions – rain of course, midnight, on the beach, snow… what’s left is probably in a typhoon/hurricane!

Friday 1st June
Went to the hospital to change my cast for my foot that day. I am the type of girl who doesn’t get scared that easily in films or real life (I am at your mercy when faced with slugs/snails/worms though!) but seeing the nurse come at me with an electric saw was pretty frightening! I mean, the cast was only a thin thing, I was afraid she would go too deep and I would see blood gushing out everywhere! She was handling a saw and chatting to me… I know women are suppose to be good at multi-tasking but I would very much preferred she just concentrated at the task in hand – literally! LOL

Anyway, I live to tell the tale and will have to do it again in a few weeks time – the cast I have on now is even thinner… argh!!!

Saturday 2nd
It was Caf’s birthday on the 5th June so I took her out for a pre-birthday treat to the theatre… it was more my treat as I got to see ‘Equus’! For all those out there who have not heard about this play, the hype around the play was Daniel Radcliffe (Harry Potter) appears naked in it for a substantial length... of time!!! Hahaha

I was totally prepared to see young Harry parade around naked, stimulated sex scenes on a horse, what I wasn’t prepared for, was him smoking! The lawyer in me was thinking, that particular scene will need changing when the smoking ban comes in on the 1st July and the layperson in me was sitting there watching the scene open mouthed and trying to work out if he was really ‘smoking’!

Peter Shaffer wrote the play as well as ‘Amadeus’, which I saw a while back in the Wilton’s Music Hall. Both play dwells into the mind of the character’s dark side, a ‘narrator’ talking to the audience – inviting them into their life, thoughts and reasons. I did enjoy both plays but for different reasons, ‘Amadeus’ for the amazing actors being able to transform in front of your very eyes, the music, the story/history of a real artist, Mozart. ‘Equus’ was different, there were so much hype around the play, so I went to see it expecting it was just sensationalism and not much substance – I was pleased that the play was more than the hype. Radcliffe was great, portraying a troubled teenager, I was sitting in the balcony and could see the emotions he was emitting through his expressive features, especially the eyes. The uses of the limited props were well used, the horse masks were beautiful and simplex and the humour was just right to lighten the mood of the play when you least expect it.

Thursday 7th
Went to the award ceremony for the Olympic course to collect my certificate when I haven’t even completed my course! All I have been doing the past few week was work and study so I took the opportunity to get dolled up and meet a local MP as an excuse from sitting at home avoiding ‘Big Brother’ and ‘Eastenders’!

Sunday 10th
It was Lee’s birthday and he turns 23! I gave him 23 beats and one for good luck like all good sisters do for their younger brothers ;-)

Ok, down to business. The parachute jump is going to be this coming Sunday we still need donations, this is me begging… please, please, please give generously to a very worthy cause. You don’t need to give a lot, give what you can and forward our sponsor page to your friends/families – a little goes a long way, which means a lot of ‘littles’ can go even further!

Helen

Birthday, Olympic and Surgery

2007-05-13T19:53:00.000Z

Tuesday 8th
Went up to Northampton after work to celebrate my granddad’s birthday. Immediate family alone required at least 3 tables (10 to each table and then a small table for the young ones), numerous courses starting with soft crab, lobster and shark fin soup followed by roast duck, pork and various vegetable. Desserts was of course, birthday cake and jelly ;)

Thursday 10th
Took the day off work to attend a volunteer meeting for the 2012 Olympic. I will be attending a course for the next 6 weeks (twice a week) to train me for helping out the Olympics when it arrives. I am looking forward to the training – the main reason could be because, one of the people running the course is rather cute ;)

Friday 11th
Went into hospital to have a bunionectomy (there is a much fancier name but it was too long and I forgot it!)... Felt quite sorry for myself as no one was available to drive me to hospital and had to take a taxi... am I getting the sympathy vote here?! LOL

No, its ok – it’s only a small operation. The operation was so minor that I was awake during all the cutting and sawing of bones... even got bored after only 15 minutes in and was thinking I should have brought my DS Lite into theatre! I was surprised that there was no music playing in theatre – in all the TV shows, the surgeons always had special music playing whilst they were operating. It was so quiet in theatre that I was afraid to fall asleep from boredom and start snoring! Hahaha

Told Trees I was in Ward 16 on the first floor and she mistakenly went to Ward 16 on the ground floor... it was the morgue! Hahaha

I now have a big plaster cast on my left foot – never been in a cast before and the novelties haven’t warned off yet... give me a week before I start getting annoyed with the extra weight.

I love ‘Grey’s Anatomy’ (season finale tonight - cried a lot. You can catch the repeat on Saturday night) on FIVE and real life hospital is nothing like it! There was no Dr. McDreamy, there was no major incidents (good job too), no relationship dramas (none that I could see anyway) etc. I did check out their operation schedule board which only contained minor surgery like mine. I was kept waiting around the next day (Saturday 12th) to check out longer than my operation itself – the highlight for the long delay of checking out was the young, blonde, blue eyed doctor (not my usual type at all normally!).

Been home all day yesterday and today recuperating and didn’t even go to the Art Deco Fair up the road as I really need to ‘recover’ before work tomorrow – yes I have to go into work tomorrow bright and early as I need to talk to my manager about changing my work timetable to allow me to fit in my Olympic training course with my cute instructor!

Helen

Lights, Camera, Action!

2007-05-07T14:14:00.000Z

Wednesday 2nd May
Went to Sally’s ‘parent/teachers’ evening on Wednesday – everyone thought I was her mother! Better start using that oil of Olay and plenty of sunscreen! LOL

I must say, there were plenty of young, and pretty cute teachers at the school – my school days were never like that, I remember my male teachers were either fat, balding, bearded or old enough to be my granddad... I will definitely be going to all the parent/teaches evening from now on ;)

Friday 4th
Met Shirin up for a spot of cream tea in Greenwich – she was studying too hard and needed a bit off distraction. I love scones and have tried making then a few times... turned out to be more like ‘rock cakes’ than scones though! Hehehe

We went our separate ways around 7ish – I was slightly tipsy after one Smirnoff Ice... Lee kept joking I was drunk when I kept complaining I was tired and needed a nap before going to see ‘Spider-Man 3’ at the 23:45 showing. The earlier showings were all sold out. I love Spider-Man, he’s not like the other superheroes that does no wrong, Spider-Man makes mistakes and learns from them – much more believable?! The movie was 140 minutes long so I didn’t get home until 3 in the morning... zzz

Saturday 5th
It was my mom’s Chinese birthday today so had to go home for dinner as it was a last minute gathering. I keep forgetting this month is the month of over eating in our family – my mum’s birthday kick starts the birthday celebrations, then it’s my granddads next Tuesday, my dad’s sometime in the following week before my grandmas at the end of the month!

There goes my diet for this month! Hehehe

Sunday 6th
Took my mum to a photography studio – my mum loves getting dressed up and taking photos, thought this would be a great treat for her to get inspirations for the up coming wedding. This was right up her alley... me on the other hand, only went because I needed advice on hair and make-up for Trees wedding! Asked the make-up artist (and I mean ‘artist’ to cover up all my flaws and imperfections!) for hints and tips for stay put make-up along with on how to style my wayward hair. I was really shocked when I saw myself halfway through my transformation as I really thought I looked like a drag queen! LOL

The finished product, hair and make-up all in place took about half an hour and at the end I did look like a different person... I really could not wear half amount of the product the lady put on my face in a whole week let alone for a day! The whole photo shoot took over 4 hours and we won’t get the photos for another 6 weeks or so. Sally had heavily suggested we could book her an appointment for her as a birthday treat... her birthday isn’t until next January so I can ‘forget’ about it for now!

Helen

Run for love, pride and whatever you fancy!

2007-05-02T20:57:00.000Z

‘Cancer Research’ sent me an email today as I participated in their ‘Race for Life’ last year. The email contained a little quiz asking, ‘Who would you race to? Find your celebrity dream date’ (http://www.whowouldyouraceto.com/default.asp?quiz=true) – I answered the questions and the result is a ‘man who’s nice to his mum and will treat you with respect. A lad who always takes care of you and walks you home after the disco’... the celebrity dream date for me is apparently, Mark Owen! LOL

I was never a ‘Take That’ fan...

Coincidently, I also received an email from ‘209 Events’ because of the Santa race I did in December. Anyway, the email was inviting me to join the ‘Norwich Union City V City 10km run’ (http://www.cityvcity.com/)... this sounds like a proper race which would be fun to partake, but it’s about the pride of London! I would love to take part but don’t want to drag the city down, therefore I am declining to join... for all those out there who take pride to be a Londoner, join the race and I will be there to cheer you on at the start line as its only a few minutes drive away! LOL

Helen

Dinner Dates

2007-05-01T20:57:00.000Z

My new nickname from Trees is ‘Scavenger’! This is because I am always there when there is food! LOL

Went out on Saturday and wasn’t remotely hungry when my dad called me up around 9ish asking me to join them for a late dinner because we had a relative who came to visit us from Spain... the late dinner lasted well past midnight – I was falling asleep as I ate my shish kebab at the Turkish restaurant in Lewisham!

Didn’t manage to go to bed until 4am and had to get up again at 9am to get ready for a long car journey to Leicester to help celebrate Kim’s birthday at a very nice Indian restaurant. It seems I wasn’t the only one who was sleep deprived – Trees and Duong got woken up around 6am by the police as someone reported a disturbance at their place. Duong answered the doors to a male and female police officer who ‘forcibly’ allowed themselves inside and upstairs to check that Trees was ok... Trees answered the bedroom door without her glasses so was squinting and hair all over the place... not a pretty picture! LOL

Back to the main event – Kim’s birthday, again, we had a £10 budget on presents so there were quite a few creative presents...

Ping: a parsley plant in a real egg along with a bottle of self tanning lotion – Kim has the palest leg you have ever seen!
Lin: a chocolate birthday cake and some pretty stationary clips
Trees: face massage kit, face mask and a little USB fan shaped like a computer mouse
Me: a kebab from the infamous kebab shop at the junction of Greenwich/Lewisham/Blackheath/Deptford and an eyebrow kit with stencils!

Had a brilliant night, sat in the restaurant for over 4 hours and didn’t managed to get home until 1:30am... only got a few hours sleep as I didn’t fall into bed until 3am before getting up for work at 7:30.

Turned up at work literally half asleep but thankfully I had plenty of work to do and even managed to stay longer to complete my work and as soon as I got home I slept the sleep of the dead!

Today I was full of energy when I arrived into work and had a productive day which is always good ;)

Helen

Pretty Animal Pictures

2007-04-27T23:48:00.000Z

Hello again folks. Been very good the past few days and updated the blog – tonight’s’ entry is about the ‘Shell Wildlife Photographer of the Year’ exhibition at the ‘Natural History Museum’ that I visited today/yesterday. I went to the exhibition last year and as it was so good I went again this year, here is a selected few photos that I particularly liked: ‘Human Encounter’ (http://www.nhm.ac.uk/visit-us/whats-on/temporary-exhibitions/wpy/OnlineGallery/Photo.jsp?photo=2151); ‘Coconut Crab Going Up’ (http://www.nhm.ac.uk/visit-us/whats-on/temporary-exhibitions/wpy/OnlineGallery/Photo.jsp?photo=2155); ‘Turtle Grooming’ (http://www.nhm.ac.uk/visit-us/whats-on/temporary-exhibitions/wpy/OnlineGallery/Photo.jsp?photo=2174); and my favourite is the ‘Rival Kings’ (http://www.nhm.ac.uk/visit-us/whats-on/temporary-exhibitions/wpy/OnlineGallery/Photo.jsp?photo=2169), the photographer, Andy Rouse also did the ‘Surfing Gentoo’ (http://www.nhm.ac.uk/about-us/news/2005/sept/news_6624.html) in last years’ exhibition, which I also liked very much.

Before arriving at the museum, I had managed to get myself lost in Baker Street as I took the right bus but going in the wrong direction! Hehehe

Luckily I was early so could afford losing half an hour to find the same bus route but going the right direction this time – even got there early! Getting lost once a day is not bad, but I managed to get myself lost behind Leicester Square when I was trying to get home... I blame all those tourists getting in my way and distracting me!

That’s all folks.

Helen

#Neighbours, everybody needs good Neighbours...#

2007-04-26T22:36:00.000Z

News bulletin: (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/6595591.stm) The BBC wants to axe ‘Neighbours’ from their schedule! Speaking as a long devoted fan (cried when Dee died, shouted at Karl for cheating on Susan with Issy, and not to mention all those talented stars who launched their careers because of the show), it is wrong to axe the show :’(

Moving it to another channel is just not the same, I used to watch ‘Home & Away’ on ITV but once it moved to FIVE, it somehow just didn’t bode well with me and haven’t watched a single episode since.

‘Neighbours’ was like my personal alarm clock when I was a student – wake up just in time to sing along to the theme in the afternoon and getting out of bed once its finished! As you may know, I am planning to return to college in September, I was relying on some stability and ‘Neighbours’ was just that!

When Caf was in Australia last year, she visited the Melbourne Museum which was allowed to have the kitchen from 26 Ramsey Street as this particular set was destroyed in a fire in a 1999 storyline. She has kindly allowed me to publish them here, ‘Thank you Caf’ mwah!

Please BBC don’t take away ‘Neighbours’ away from all the students across the land!

Helen

No rest for the wicked ;)

2007-04-25T20:40:00.000Z

Tuesday 6th March
Let’s start the blog with talks about my baby cousin, Daniel’s first birthday party right at the beginning of March up in Northampton.

Daniel looks like he will grow up into quite a heart breaker if the picture is anything to go by! Sleeves rolled up, wind in his (baby) hair… very cool indeed. Please don’t get me wrong, I am in no way getting broody but spending a whole afternoon babysitting the little tyke was quite fun – well watching Lee and Steven playing with him was rather entertaining for me and Ping. LOL

Had a gorgeous meal and Kripsy Kreme (it’s a traditional now) to follow brought by Trees this time, as I was too lazy to pop over to Canary Wharf before meeting Ping up for the long car ride up.

My uncle, Martin was proudly showing everyone his golf (silver) trophy even though we all took the mick out of him – it was ‘only’ a silver trophy and it didn’t even have his name engraved on it...

Monday 12th
Started my first proper day at work and managed to break a photo frame whilst framing over 50 certificates to long services of staff! Oops

Have been quite busy with work and even had to go in on my days off to help – all work and no play was making me quite lethargic but once I got used to it and plan myself properly to balance it all out... I think I have got it sorted now, as you will see in the following entries ;)

Friday 16 th
On to more exciting update – I had to go up to Reading to do some filming for the National Rail Network for their promotional video… spent most of the day drinking tea and eating sandwiches whilst I waited for my turn in front on the cameras! LOL

The presenter was Andrea Oliver who is currently presenting the new BBC2 show on Wednesday nights with Neneh Cherry about food.

I managed to get home to catch the ‘Vicar of Dibley’ sketch for Comic Relief… Richard Armitage only appeared briefly at the start and the end but it was worth the wait! Still gorgeous, mwah!!!

Saturday 17 th
Saint Patrick’s Day! Went to see a mini Banksy (http://www.banksy.co.uk/) exhibition in South Kensington – I have heard of the artist and seen a few of his artwork but not actually ‘looked’ at them. At the exhibition, there were only a selected few pieces and they were all quite amusing, a few of my favourites were the ones with the smiley faces, e.g. instead of the Grim Reaper, it was the Grin Reaper.

After a bit of culture it was off to Convent Garden for a bit of food! As it was St Patrick’s Day there were stalls set up around selling products mainly cheese and bread. I was very surprised that there was no Guinness stalls. I have only ever tried Guinness a few years ago in the Guinness factory in Ireland and I do recall I only managed a sip. I was determined to have another go at the black stuff – I’ll try something at least twice before dismissing it completely! Anyway no Guinness at Covent Garden but later that night I went out for a family meal as everyone (Trees and Duong, my folks along with Sally, and then there is me and Lee) was too lazy to cook. I got my Guinness at last but not being a drinker I could only managed to drink half of my half pint!

Slightly tipsy and stuffed with food, I went straight home to bed.

Sunday 18 th
Hope everyone treated their mothers the way they deserved to be treated! I got my mother into the kitchen to clean razor clams before getting her to thinly slice all the meat for our open hot pot at Trees and Duongs! LOL

At first we wanted to take our mum out for dim sum but Lee had to work and it’s always so busy at our local restaurant that we decided to eat at home instead. It was a dreary day and the thought of a family all eating over a hot pot laughing and singing on the karaoke sounded much better than spending an hour or two in a place where you can’t take your time to enjoy the company as well as your food.

Tuesday 20 th
I had to work late as the company I work for was taking on new clients and wants us lowly employees to try out their pilot scheme… I was sent all the way to Gillingham and didn’t get to go home until after 8pm!

I didn’t mind if Gillingham had been wheelchair friendly but it wasn’t! The only place that was accessible to eat was MacDonald’s! I had a cold so was told to stay clear of poultry so I had to order the filet o fish as there was nothing else available for me to eat. I was so busy that I had to do my paperwork whilst trying to eat my burger :(

Friday 23 th
It was my dear friend, Hiro’s birth on Sunday but her generous mum whisked her away for the weekend to Paris so I only got to meet her up that night for a late birthday dinner. Shirin arranged the night but got sick so she had to cancel at the last minute. So there I was running 30 minutes late to the restaurant (‘Black & Blue’ behind Selfridges) leaving Hiro on her own and when I arrived there was a bottle of champagne on ice waiting for us courteous of the owner who is a family friend of Hiro. Both of us don’t really drink and it took us all night (over 4 hours) and we still didn’t manage to finish the bottle off! I still had a cold and surprisingly this cold, my appetite didn’t increase ten-fold as it usually does! I had problem eating my 3 course meal even though everything was lovely – especially the foia grai with toast and jam… I am salivating as I write this up! LOL

Saturday 24 th
I had to work throughout the weekend trying to meet my company’s new client’s pilot scheme quota… I was sent to Chelmsford where again I had to work throughout my lunch doing more paperwork… the weather was so dreary that it depressed me even more! Hahaha

Luckily I managed to finish everything and was back home by early evening.

Sunday 25 th
Did anyone over slept and forgot that the time goes forward after midnight? I was really good and changed all my clocks around 10pm before I forgot!

This time I found myself working in Windsor… the sun was out and the place was gorgeous. I didn’t mind working through lunch and even managed to check out some shops and treated myself to a nice shirt! I really hope my company sends me there again as I would definitely like to go back there and walk around the castle and try out all the tea shops – did order a ‘Windsor Cream Tea’ at the ‘Chocolate Theatre Coffee Shop’ but they forgot my scones and only had a cup of tea :(

Tuesday 27 th
It has been a while since I went to the theatre. That night I attended the Wilton’s Music Hall to watch the ‘Taming of the Shrew’ by Shakespeare and who should turn up to watch the same performance?! Ben Mills from X-Factor! I wanted to get my photo taken but was too self-conscience and let it past… hehehe

It transpired that he knew someone from the cast so I don’t think he would have appreciated being harassed when he was out enjoying him self. It is hard to judge when you should or shouldn’t approach someone…

Wednesday 28th
I was just about to dash out my place when the post woman arrived with my letter from the College of Law… I got my place! Yay!!! LOL

The day just got better and better – after my morning meeting I met up with Trees to go to Lakeside to try out more bridesmaid dresses and found 2… one was a short bandue which looked sweet and the other was a halter neck which was very nice but it showed a bit too much cleavage which I was not keen on for a family event like this! LOL

Trees was planning to drag me along to a bridal shop in Ashford, or was the shop called Ashford?! Well, I don’t have to go anymore so I get the whole weekend off! It has been so long since I get a lie in…

Going back to last night, it was Lee’s turn to treat dinner and we (Trees, Duong, lee and me) went to ‘Frankie’s and Benny’s’ somewhere near the North Circular roundabout. Having not really eaten all day I devoured my lamb shank which amazed everyone, would have ordered dessert too but was getting really tired (it was coming up to 10pm) so I opted to go home instead… with Lee’s direction and the Blackwall Tunnel it could take us up to an hour to get home.

Tuesday 3rd April
Was making my home from work and got a call from my parents about free food in Northampton, Martin’s restaurant... not a girl to turn down free food, I made the hour and a bit car journey to the restaurant.

Turned up for dinner with no idea why Martin invited us all to come up, it could be a mixture of reasons I have concluded – 1) for Martin to show off another silver golf trophy, 2) a chance to meet a girl my grandparents want to set up with my cousin, Phoon, 3) because of Ching Ming (a Chinese festival on the 5th). There take your pick as no one has made it clear for me?! Hahaha

Saturday 7th
Wanted to go along to see the Cambridge-v-Oxford Boat Race but no one wants to go with me so I took myself to the National Gallery and saw the Renoir Landscape exhibition instead! I really enjoyed it – wondered around the gallery with the audio guide. I love galleries, I can happily spend the whole afternoon there myself and take my time in front of pieces I like (‘The Jardin d’Essai, Algiers 1881’ and ‘Garden in the rue Cortot, Montmartre 1876’) without being rushed.

Monday 9th
Bank Holiday/Easter Monday. Was planning to work that day, but the day was too nice so I accepted a friend’s invitation to Churchill’s resident, Chartwell. It’s a National Trust property so the disability access was limited – had to roll down a particular steep grass hill squealing like a girl which amused the spectators as well as my friend I am sure ;)

Coincidently, my mum was visiting a similar landscape in Oxford that day so I met her up for dinner along with Lee and Sally as we were all too hungry to go home to cook.

Friday 13th
I used to love Friday the 13th, love sitting in front of the TV watching horror movies with the lights off and no one at home... unfortunately I had to work and this time I was sent to Harpenden. Spent most of the day travelling and waiting around trains stations and didn’t get home until late in the evening... zzz

Oh, and I almost missed my deadline for sending off my acceptance letter to the College of Law! Had to send it by special delivery on Wednesday to make sure it arrived on Friday!

Sunday 15th
The guys had to go to Bluewater for their morning suit fitting – they need to watch their waistline as the suits just fit! Hehehe

Monday 16th
Was just leaving work, about a metre away from the front door before I got roped into translating for a friend of the family about her son’s secondary school placement for September... that’s not all, just as we all sat down to discuss the matter with the school admission officer the fire alarm went off! I really do not think you can make things up like this – I am always found to be in the wrong place at the wrong time, don’t think so?! Ok, the next day (Tuesday 17th) I was making my way into work this time and a fight between 2 female motorists broke out behind me and when a passer-by comes to drag one of the ladies away, he backs me into the wall and nearly tripped over me! Made it into work to only to be sent downstairs (from the 3rd floor) onto the ground floor (work on my own in a large room with no reception so I cant even phone people up to chat :( ) as the fire drill the day before highlighted the fact that no one is trained to help me evacuate if a real fire broke out!

Sunday 22nd
Nearly got suffocated on the Jubilee line with all the people trying to get to the starting line of the Marathon! I was meeting Caf at London Bridge, as we were going to the Shakespeare’s masked procession from Southwark Cathedral to The Globe.

It was a beautiful day and everyone made an effort with their masks (picture of Venetian ladies by Caf). The route we took was quite scenic too... but those cobbles were a nightmare! I had to place the mask on the top of my head just so I can see the cobbles and try to dodge them! I was a fair few meters behind the whole procession – told Caf, if we were to do this again next year, I will just meet her at The Globe!

Ok, that’s it, that’s what I have been up to the last few weeks... need a rest now... zzz

Helen

#Happy Birthday to you, Happy Birthday...#

2007-03-02T01:29:00.000Z

It was so windy today (Thursday) – there was no point in brushing my hair this morning! My hair kept getting plastered on my lips because of the lip gloss too! Anyway, as predicted, I didn’t go bridesmaid dress shopping after my meeting, met up with Shirin and Hiro for a good old chat (Hiro was suppose to be working at the time!) and then we went to KFC for lunch/dinner as Hiro only had an hour lunch break. This was the first time we have visited a fast food place together before... ‘Shirin, are you sure you are a student?’ She was having a hard time figuring out how to order her food! In the end she had the same as Hiro (I suspect she choose that because she had no idea what’s what!)! Hehehe

It is also my baby cousin, Daniel’s first birthday today – ‘Happy Birthday DumDum!’ Chatted to his dad, my uncle, Sanh on MSN and found out DumDum can now walk forward unaided – when I saw him over Chinese New Year he could only walk sideways by holding onto furniture. He is such a smart baby! It’s in the genes ;-)

Helen

New Year, New Beginnings!

2007-02-28T20:23:00.000Z

Too much food, not enough sleep, which pretty sums up Chinese New Year celebration for me!

Whenever anyone visits my grandparents’ place, they never go away less than bursting round the waistband. I brought 2 dozens Krispy Kreme doughnuts especially for my cousins Lin and her young brother, Ming but the greedy car companion ate half a dozen on the drive up already! I had to literally hide the remaining doughnuts in the pantry when we arrived! I had already supplied them with an assortment of chocolate treats, drinks and fruits for the car journey!

After a long drive (being an entertaining passenger is hard work too...) one would expect a long sleep... oh no. Being Chinese New Year my uncle, Sung wanted to welcome the year by taking money from his nieces and nephews... and the easiest way he knows how is over the mah-jong table! We played until 5am that first night! I won’t even say how much I ended losing during my time up there! LOL

There are quite a few superstitious rules we try to follow for the New Year – one must not shower the day after New Year as it is believed to wash away all the luck (?), not to cook/use knives, sweep/throw rubbish out, swear... that’s all I know and *try* to abide by.

Saturday 24th
When I graduated in 2005 I was so glad that I am no longer a student – that was until Shirin (and the constant nagging from my parents) talked me round into joining her at the College of Law to do the Legal Practice Course commencing this year. I went along to the Open Day on Saturday afternoon... I had a few errands to run in the morning so I had to forgo food and drink just to make it on time! I missed the ‘meet and greet’ refreshments at the start, so when the current students were giving us the tour round the campus, I was busy eyeing up the vending machine!

The Open Day lasted longer than I thought it would, and by the time we got to Ten Ten Tei, I had lost my appetite! I didn’t manage to finish my chirashi (shock)!

Tuesday 27th
Trees and Duong arrived back from their ‘wedding dress, bridesmaid dress, and photo shoot buying trip’ on Sunday. Lee and I was suppose to pop round that night to check out what hideous bridesmaid dress Trees is subjecting Lin and me to (to be honest, I just wanted to see what souvenirs I got – was hoping she got me my favourite perfume, Miracle by Lancôme, instead I got 3 little cute perfume bottle filled with an indescribable scent!) but Lee had plans so was postponed to Monday instead... that idea got postponed again and we didn’t manage to meet up until last night.

Right, I knew the bridesmaid dresses were going to be mint green (when she called me on Monday she told me and coincidently at the time I had on a mint green pashmina (a birthday present from Rani, ‘thank you’) – it’s a nice colour for accessories but as a dress, I was not convinced), and I emailed her my measurements... the dress turned out to be pretty nice but it doesn’t fit!!! No amount of dieting I do from now until September, I am not going to fit into the dress! My skeletal structure does not come that small! Hahaha

I have a meeting up town tomorrow, hopefully afterwards I can make use of late night shopping and check out a few department stores for ideas on possible bridesmaid dresses. But then again, I am planning to meet up with Shirin, we might just sit round drinking coffee/tea and eat cakes (yay, no diet regime for me)! LOL

Wednesday 28th
Oh, I had a lot of time in between meetings today and forgot to bring a book out with me (spent a lot of time in coffee shops trying to avoid drowning in the rain!) so on an off chance I brought a chicklit from WH Smith. I brought Chris Manby’s ‘Girl Meets Ape’, so far so good – the start of the book sees the girl attending a hen party she ‘organised’ for her best friend, starting a new job and finding out one of the employees working with her was the stripper from that night...

Helen

Happy Chinese New Years!

2007-02-18T01:02:00.000Z

Welcome to the year of the boar/pig! The nature of people born under this sign tends to be: ‘knowledgeable in organizing times for works and leisure. Fond of enjoying life and forgetting any targets in life. Should learn to work harder.’ I myself was born under the sign of the horse: ‘cheerful, quick witted and popular. Be regulated to her paces may have the chance to see things clearer.’ Sounds pretty good to me! LOL

This leads nicely on to the subject of my birthday! Only found out recently that my birthday falls on the same day as Ground Hog Day! That should make remembering a bit easier... my parents on the other hand some how forgot completely, using the excuse that my ‘actual’ birthday wasn’t until later as they go by the Chinese calendar... if that is the case, my ‘actual’ birthday this year was on Valentines Day!!! So depressing :(

This now naturally leads onto Valentines Day... the company I work for was having trouble meeting its quarterly quota so I had to work over time all of last week – didn’t get home until 8pm one night! Worked through Valentines Day and even forgot to go past the Krispy Kreme store to grab the limited edition doughnut – I did the same thing last year and missed out on the limited edition doughnut.

Besides from working all hours of the day and then coming home writing up reports, I was also busy house hunting for my parents! You may recall I mentioned in passing that my mum and my younger sister, Sally went to Hong Kong/China – well I spoke to them a few days after they landed to make sure they have arrived safely and enjoying their time there and one of the first thing they told me was they have managed to lose a brand new camcorder (which my dad only brought just before Christmas) and Sally’s DS Lite (which was a present from Duong to Sally for passing her exams) along with a dozen games! They managed this feat in the space of a few hours after landing in Hong Kong airport waiting for their transfer flight to China! LOL

Anyway, whilst my mum was in Hong Kong/China, my dad gave me the mission to find a few properties that they might like... I received no less than 20 emails a day and 5 phone calls – I had to silence my phone during the day as the noise was driving me mad!

The past month have not all been work – I did manage to squeeze in some culture and great nights out with my dear friends and family... went to see the David Hockney exhibition held at the National Portrait Gallery with Caf. I can’t say I am now a fan of his work, but I did like the ‘multi-point perspective’ work he achieved with a normal Polaroid camera. I am not going to waffle on about ‘pastiche neo-cubist paintings’ and the influence Picasso had over his work because I do not understand all that – I just liked how each Polaroid can be appreciated as a single captured moment in time, and then pieced together to make a picture as a whole... The rest of Hockneys’ work did not interest me as much as it did Caf... he did appear to be a very good artist but it was too real for me, it was portrait of real people in the artist’s life...

My parents may have forgotten my birthday but my dear friends and family helped me celebrate on 2 separate occasions... first a few of my dearest friends treated me out to sushi at Ten Ten Tei (organised by Shirin) where they lavished me with some of the most thoughtful gifts – including a pendent with my birthstone, a fabulous chocolate cook book and starter kit and chocolate fondue set, pashmina, bracelets and hat! They then finished the meal off with a loud rendition of ‘Happy Birthday’ where a few others customers joined in and clapped – I turned quite red and couldn’t leave the restaurant fast enough! To follow we went to Covent Garden for a few rounds...

The following day Trees, Kim, Ping and Lin treated me to tapas at Canary Wharf, La Tasca. We stayed for hours, 3 course meal with plenty of English tea (!). At one point I was bridesmaid to 2 weddings this year but now I am only bridesmaid to Trees’ wedding, so whilst devouring the tapas, the main conversation of the night was wedding! Trees have agreed not to put Lin and me in pink/peach frilly things and I have been told to grow my hair or get extensions!

Oh, I nearly forgot the girls have again gone out and brought gifts for me with a budget of £10...

Trees: Hand warmers which look like leg warmers (!), a black clutch bag and a Lawyers calendar block full of lawyer antidotes

Kim: Pink thermal PJs (I thought they was the funniest thing I have every received!)

Ping: She checked out the blog and found out my latest celebrity crush was Richard Armitage and made a collage and then she found a picture of the cast of the Vicar of Dibley and framed the picture for me (she obviously didn’t read the blog properly... I only mentioned the show because Richard starred in the Christmas and New Year special – Ping and Kim was trying to figure out who in the cast I liked... it was either Hugo Horton (James Fleet) or Owen Newitt (Roger Lloyd-Pack), they never understood my taste in men so I wasn’t surprised (amused though) when they asked me after I opened the gift)

Lin: A mug with the word ‘neurotic’ on the side (I laughed out loud when I saw that!), a Momiji (http://www.momijishop.com/ – I have 2 of the dolls now, might need to start collecting them so I have a full set...!) entitled ‘Missy Flake’ who apparently likes: log fires, chocolate money and adrenalin sports.

I just love my friends and families so much! They just know me so well and can always make me smile :)

Another thing I want to add before I finish this entry is: I went home to my folks last night where my dad challenged us to beat his high score of 91% on the karaoke machine with a prize of £100 on whoever can beat his score... spent all night singing and only managed 84%, the prize eventually went to Sally who got 92%!!! There is always tomorrow ;)

Happy Chinese New Years

Helen x

This one is for the ladies, or for those who love period dramas ;-)

2007-01-04T00:04:00.000Z

I think I am in love! LOL

Let’s start at the beginning...
During Christmas day I made sure to watch the Christmas Special of the ‘Vicar of Dibley’ (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0108981/) and fell for the charms of Mr Richard Armitage (http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0035514/) which kept me on cloud nine right up til New Years day when I watched the concluding episode of ‘Vicar’ and fell hopelessly in love – being the Google geek that I am, I Googled him a few days after I got back into London, and came across the BBC drama adaptation of Elizabeth Gaskell’s ‘North and South’ (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0417349/) ... I went out this morning with only one mission in mind (well, besides from work), to find a copy on DVD! Hahaha

As soon as I got home, I took my phone off the hook, made myself a large mug (given to me from Trees and Lee) of green tea (too much rich food the last couple weeks) and settled down to an evening of bliss... I have fallen under the spell of Richard’s ‘John Thornton’ at first sight and by the end of the second episode I was almost in tears... I was however, definitely in tears by the end of episode three, and then I was both crying and smiling by the end! I confess, I love all those clichés of misunderstood situations where the main couple find themselves in, but then fall madly in love with each other... I might receive some disapproval from a few friends with what I am about to say... I much prefer ‘Mr Thornton’ over ‘Mr Darcy’ (hiding behind my copy of ‘North and South’ DVD now)!

Next on my list of happy viewing will definitely be ‘Robin Hood’ (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0787985/) ... Richard playing a greasy haired baddy, ‘Guy of Gisbourne’! If I drop enough hints, I might even get the whole DVD set for my birthday! If I don’t decide I can’t wait a whole month, I might wake up tomorrow morning and go get it myself, like this morning! Hahaha

Helen

Festive Activities

2006-12-31T01:08:00.000Z

Monday 25th December – Christmas Day
The present’s one receives can tell what other thinks of you… this year I spent Christmas Day at my grandparents along with all my aunts and uncles from my dad’s side of the family including all my cousins. So save the trouble of us all trying to sit down to a have our meal together, we had a sort of hot pot were people just came and went whilst they are gambling! LOL

The men in the family were either playing cards or mah-jong all day and the women all sort of congregated near the kitchen, dining or living room – I of course sat right next to the food ;-)

The eating session lasted all night but after 3 hours and a small sip of champagne I made my exit towards all the little kids to help them open their presents! I have this little cousin, Sylvia who is only 7 and she looks so cute in her skirt, t-shirt and spy gadget belt! Yep, she looks so girly but is a real tomboy at heart! I must say, the spy gadgets really do work – there was an infra red pen which she used on to pass on secret messages and the hearing aide receiver was brilliant… I am thinking of getting myself one of those belts now! Hahaha

The younger kids all enjoyed the wrapping paper more than the presents we got them! By this time the men was quite hungry but refused to move from the card game so as soon as Trees brought out the Krispy Kreme (which I brought from London) to them and they devoured it! We didn’t expect them to eat any as they are not known for their sweet tooth

Ok, now for the presents we got for each other (Kim, Ping, Lin, Trees and me – remember we only had a £10 budget for each person) – we stood in a circle in the kitchen, as that was the only room vacant at the time.

First we opened the presents we got from Kim:
Trees – a Yorkie chocolate bar, horoscope book, a little purse and an exercise ball
Me – a marshmallow shaped like a hotdog, a ‘Little Book of Geeks’ (I loved that by the way – it was very fitting), a pack full of PC games along with a toy car full of sweets
Lin – another marshmallow hotdog, chocolates, a ‘Grow Your Own Credit Card’ kit and a scarf
Ping – constipation pills (!), hand cream, a tin of sweets which you can use as a money bank afterwards and a box of 3 photo albums

Second we opened Ping’s:
Kim – hanging mobile and hanging candle
Trees – loads of sweets and kitchen utensils
Me – a pair of mittens and a book entitled ‘Ugly’ (!)
Lin – a clutch bag, and candle holder

Thirdly Tree’s:
Ping – Russian dolls
Kim – hanging mobile
Me – a tea light spinning lantern
Lin – a decorated glass ball hanging from a glass rack

Fourthly Lin’s:
Trees – a clutch bag and a box of Ferrero Roche
Me – an Aveda travel bag full of shampoo and conditioner and a pair of earrings
Ping – a pair of earrings and lacy thong
Kim – scarf and a big mug and saucer

At last it was my turn:
Lin – I made a personalised apron with ‘Donut Princess Lin’ and the recipe of Krispy Kreme donuts on it
Ping – an embossed passport cover with her initials
Kim – I made her a calendar of a Chinese artist, Ron Ng and a small iron for her to take on holiday as she always complain about her clothes being wrinkly
Trees – a desktop calendar with new insults for everyday of the year

So to summarise, the girls sees me as a geek who likes PC games, sweets, girly if the earring, mittens and tea light ornaments are anything to go by… I was reassured that the title of that other book was not ‘personal’! Hahaha

That was Christmas Day! Phew!

Tuesday 26th December – Boxing Day aka St Stephen’s Day
A quick ‘geeky’ fact: Boxing Day originated in the mid-nineteenth century under Queen Victoria – the upper classes would give money/gifts to lower classes in boxes, the day after Christmas to thank them for smooth running of things, and the churches would also open their alms boxes to the poor on that day too.

Ok, my Boxing Day was relatively quite as we didn’t get out of bed until noon, had a long lunch and slowly cooked the turkey to be taken over to Lin’s place where we were planning to have our full turkey and all the trimming dinner!

But before that, a few of the guys (Lee and Pings’ boyfriend, Stephen tag teamed, Trees’ fiancé, Duong and uncle Sung) entertained my granddad on the mah-jong table.

Lin was already cooking up a storm when we got to her place and the sight/smell of food was putting me off… well until it was all laid out in front of me that is! Ate everything on my plate and had room to have two servings of cake and custard! LOL

Saturday 30th December
The Royal Academy of Arts is showing some of Rodin's work up until the 1st January and I have wanted to go ever since it opened back in September – well as today was my only free day off since coming back from visiting family, I took myself up town and braved the threat of wind and rain to attend the exhibition.

I thought I was very well prepared with my printed map from the Transport of London website… it took me onto a major detour through Regent Street and onto Old Bond Street when I could have just gone through Piccadilly! I came across the Royal Academy of Arts’ Garden venue which was closed – I went up the ramp to the disabled entrance and to save me from coming down to wave down a member of staff, I waved down a passer-by instead (I felt like Repunzel… if only I had long hair!) to help me attract the attention of the staff… well the Garden venue was closed so I had to go right round the Burlington Arcade to get to the open part of the Academy! So glad the rain hadn’t arrived yet or I would have gone shopping instead! Hehehe

At the entrance of the Academy was Rodin's ‘Gates of Hell’. The ‘Gates’ is full of figures Rodin have put together from many smaller pieces of work he have made over the years – there of course is ‘The Thinker’ sitting on top of the doors, ‘Shades’, ‘Fugit Amor’, ‘Damned Women’ etc but I must say, the piece most intrigued me on the ‘Gates’ (besides from ‘The Thinker’) was ‘Ugolino’ – he was locked in a cell along with his children and nephew, and he was so hungry that he ate his children. Rodin had sculptured ‘Ugolino’ crouching over a child with his mouth open, ready to devour him…

‘The Kiss’ represented the tragic story of Paolo and Francesca, it was initially going to be in the ‘Gates’ but Rodin decided against it in the end – the piece have become a symbol of erotic art ever since. Some of the pieces are so life like that I just sat there staring, willing it to come to life… Many years ago, I was in Florence and saw Michelangelo’s ‘David’ but was too young to appreciate the amount of effect had gone into the piece, but today I can see that Rodin had taken inspiration from past masters, and as I was using the audio guide I had professional explaining to me some of the key facts/ideas with some of the pieces which I would not have known if I had only went around looking and reading the short inscription of the pieces.

Its New Years Eve tomorrow (today) and I will be spending it all alone… my Mum and Sally went to Hong Kong today and will not be back until the end of January, my Dad is most likely busy, Trees and Duong will have their own party and not sure about Lee… I guess it’s another night spent in front of the TV :-(

I hope everyone have a safe and enjoyable New Year Eve, see you all in the New Year!

Helen X

#I'm Dreaming of a White Christmas...#

2006-12-23T23:29:00.000Z

Hello folks! Its Christmas again and yet again I am all tired out from all those present buying – this year I had the added mission to buy personalised presents for Kim, Ping, Lin and Trees which can not exceed our set budget of £10 each! I soon found out that it’s not as easy as it sounds... well, I have managed to accomplish this task by making some of the presents myself! I will disclose what I got them, after I get back from visiting my family in Leicester.

Now for an emotional time... I attended my younger sister, Sally’s Christmas Concert on the 14th, held in a local church and was overcome with tears when Sally got up and did her solo for ‘Winter Wonderland’! She told me she had a solo but as the concert was almost over and her solo had not risen, I assumed that she got cut from the performance... I am biased but I truly think she was fantastic – she was confident, clear and truly belonged up there singing in front of a church full of people! I was quite surprised that I had tears in my eyes and a silly grin on my face throughout the whole song! I didn’t have my camera on me but the school had reassured us that they will publish photos and clips on their website... I have been checking up daily but no luck yet.

No Christmas is complete without a bit of Panto – this year I went to see ‘Dick Whittington’ (http://www.barbican.org.uk/panto/cast-and-team) at the Barbican. Two years ago I saw ‘Aladdin’ at the Old Vic starring Sir Ian McKellen as Widow Twanky and this year, Sir McKellen was sitting in the audience of Whittington. Roger Lloyd Pack who played Sarah the Cook, joking said during the closing credit: ‘If you enjoyed the show, tell your friends, but if you didn’t, then I am Sir Ian McKellen and this is the Old Vic’! LOL

Yesterday I was ‘suppose’ to have met up with Shirin and Hiro to exchange our Christmas presents, but there was a breakdown in communication and I only managed to meet up Hiro. We visited ‘Ten Ten Tei’ which satisfied my sushi cravings for the moment... we had just stepped out of the restaurant and thought about getting a coffee when I bumped into my old friend, Abu who I haven’t seen in years! It was quite strange as I was only telling Hiro, that I was invited up to Nottingham to see another old friend of mine, Isabella who was holding a charity/Christmas party over the last weekend but I was too busy to attend but Abu had, when the next thing I know I bump into him! Very spooky ;) Abu is now an architect (he also attended Greenwich University which I never knew!), and his friend, Yoshi is a professional cake decorator – the cheeky guy said he will put me on the waiting list for my sister, Trees wedding cake!

That’s it for now folks, need to start thinking about what to pack for my stay in Leicester and hopefully I will get a lie in tomorrow before over indulging myself at my grandparents ;)

Have a Merry Christmas and a Prosperous New Year folks!

Helen X

My Great Egypt Experience/Adventure and Ping's pre-birthday dinner!

2006-12-11T21:54:00.000Z

Got home really late last night (and only managed to write up my Santa race entry) from a very enjoyable dinner at Big Easy in Chelsea for my darling aunt, Ping’s pre-birthday celebration as she will be away to Frankfurt on her actual birthday next week.

Service was very slow as the restaurant was so busy – whilst we waited for our food, we got Ping’s boyfriend, Steven to pick us up some take away from China town for our car ride home! LOL

Anyway, managed to get a copy of all our photos and holiday clips from Egypt so here is the long awaited blog entries from my week away...

Monday 27th November
The holiday started very early in the morning with a 9am flight from East Midlands Airport to Sharm El Sheikh. The flight was nearly 6 hours and Egypt being 2 hours ahead, we arrived around 5ish Egyptian time.

Was very hungry and tired when we landed... and then we found out we had a 7 hour coach ride to Cairo at 1am! We had just enough time to check into our hotel and pack some clothes and essentials for our 2 day stay in Cairo before venturing out to find a place to have dinner! Oh but before that, we encountered a curious fat kitty... we saw the kitty outside, besides the pool and when we got to our room the kitty followed us in!

We ate alfresco facing the Red Sea before walking to Naama Bay shopping district where we tried out their bubble pipe smoke, shisha. We even managed to do a quick souvenir shopping at a stall before they had a power outage! But just before that, we were gullibly taken in by the vendor that the white milky substance he was using to seal in the sand display he was making, was chicken milk... the 4 of us spent ages debating if chicken could produce milk or not – the vendor even said Egyptian chicken is different to the chickens we were used to! Ok, it sounds stupid to you now but in our defence we were all very tired...! Anyway, the vendor finally disclosed that the white substance was in fact glue! LOL

After we all made our way back to our hotel to wait for our coach ride. On the way back, we walked along the main road – we couldn’t understand why all these taxis were beeping at us but later found out this were their way of notifying people that they are available for hire.

Ok, back to our coach ride – the coach were suppose to come pick us up around 1am but by 1:30am we got a call saying the coach had come and left after waiting for 15 minutes! The coach had gone to the Marriot Beach Resort across the road instead of the Marriot Mountain which we were staying at! So the 4 of us had to tow our back packs (Kim and Liz couldn’t be bothered to unpack with the excuse that they didn’t have a back pack, so they just towed their suit case along) and catch our own cab to meet the coach at the pick up point! The taxi driver couldn’t understand us and had to stop off to ask his friend where we wanted to go! The fun didn’t stop there... the taxi driver then proceeded along the way into an almost deserted highway, the girls got a bit worried, whereas I just kept thinking if the driver tried anything funny, we would have been able to take him on! LOL

Managed to meet up with all the other travellers going to Cairo at the pick up point and fell to sleep uncomfortably. The Scot, Jason who sat in front of us was very nice and even gave Lin an extra pillow which she hugged like a teddy bear?!

Tuesday 28th November
Arrived in Cairo thinking we would have time to go to our hotel and freshen up and maybe have something to eat... wrong! We all got dropped off at the Egyptian Museum where we were then all divided into our tour groups! This is where we first met our private tour guide, Anz who would become our personal Manny (or Scivvy according to Kim!)!

Anz guided us through the museum giving us detailed facts, explanations and opinions of well known pieces in the museum. I was surprised that the real Rosetta Stone is in the British Museum and not in Egypt. I only visited the British Museum earlier on this year and only rolled past the Egyptian display on my way to the Photography Exhibition – I will definitely make a trip to the museum again with my new found interest in Egyptian artefact.

The tour in the museum took about 2 hours before lunch at the Hard Rock Café. Did I mention, as well as having our own tour guide we had our own vehicle and driver?!

After lunch we were driven to a papyrus paper making shop. We were given a brief history of papyrus paper and its significance and we were all allowed to make a wish on how long we want to live for on the papyrus plant – Kim was the greediest and wished for 400 years, Lin and Liz went for 100 each and I wished for an extra 200!

Then afterwards we made our way to Giza to see the Pyramids (Greek word meaning ‘piece of cake’) and Sphinx (derived from the name of a Greek Goddess), the only remaining 7 Wonders of the Ancient World! Anz told us it took 23 years to build as the builders only worked on it during the flood seasons which was approximately 4 months in the year. We had to be ushered along as some President was also in the vicinity viewing the Pyramids. There was so much I wanted to write about the Pyramids as Anz were so passionate and full of information – like how the only remaining Pyramid with its outer layer still remaining was built by Khafref, how advanced in astrology they were as the faces of the Pyramid faces the compass point exactly, legends and facts... A truly enjoyable history lesson – even though we were more than half dead ourselves!

After the tours, Lin and Liz wanted to go camel riding! Kim and I sat out this little venture and happily watched the other 2 squeal! Kim had managed to video caption some of the squealing so it will forever be in our mind!

As we were about to leave and head towards our hotel for the day, we were brought to the reality on how fortunate we are. As we were getting into our vehicle, a couple of children came towards us trying to sell us their goods, but the driver and Anz sort of made a barrier between us and the children and ushered us into the vehicle and told the children to leave us alone... It did feel quite harsh when we had to drive off.

This is going to sound even more inconsiderate, as we were then got dropped off at our hotel... the Ramsas Hilton Hotel were we then had our dinner there overlooking the River Nile!

When I was all tucked up in bed Kim answered the door to a delivery... the delivery was a single rose and an envelope... It was addressed to me... it turned out to be from the hotel saying thanks for using their room service! For a second I thought I had a secret admirer! Hahaha

Wednesday 29th November
Another early morning start as we had to meet Anz at the lobby at 7:05. Being girls, we had to visit the ladies before we set off (even though we just came down from our hotel rooms!) and I think Anz wasn’t best pleased! Hehehe

It was another packed day – first there was a 3 ½ hour drive to Alexandria. We were all well rested but having our own vehicle again, the big leg room, warmth of the morning sun soon sent us to sleep! Anz soon followed suit and went to sleep too. But before we all fell to sleep, we witnessed our driver, Ismal masterful driving skills! The driving in Cairo is manic to put it mildly! A 4 lane road with no traffic lights will turn into 8 lanes in a blink of an eye, public transport will pick up and drop off passengers in the middle of the road, constant beeping to ‘warn’ other drivers... Driving in Cairo is scary! Ismal was more than capable of driving in such conditions as well as keep up an animated conversation with Anz!

Well anyway, we finally arrived at our destination, an open museum displaying Greek artefacts inspired by the Egyptians. The artefacts are not as well preserved as those in the Egyptian Museum as they were extracted from under the Mediterranean Sea. To be honest I was not impressed at all with what was on display – the rest of my party had the opportunity to go underground to see the catatomb which I was told to be more fascinating.

After the open museum we made our way to see Pompeius’ column. From the barricaded fencing, I decided not to visit the column as it looked more like a construction site more than any historical site. The girls on the other hand climbed the rumbles and posed for photos. The stop at the column only lasted a few minutes before heading off to a library?! Yes, we toured a library! We toured the, Bibliotheca Alexandrina Library – at first I couldn’t see why this would be part of our tour but once we got in and paid attention to the tour guide, and then having free time to look around some of the costume drawings for director, Shadi Abdel Salam movie, Al Mummia (aka The Night of Counting the Years), I honestly enjoyed the visit to the library.

Lunch was at the fish market restaurant located besides the Mediterranean Sea. We all had lunch over looking the sea – well we tried inviting Ismal to join us but he refused and ate at the back of the restaurant by himself. We were unsure whether by asking Ismal to join us would cause him problems or not, we just felt that he was part of our group now and should all sit together...

After lunch we descended the steep flight of stairs and popped into the pastries before our long ride back. Again we felt the poor and fortunate divide – we saw these cute little cakes and wanted a selection but they only sold them by the kilo. Anz ‘argued’ on our behalf with the owner and managed to get exactly the amount we wanted (200grams of small cakes and a few larger pieces); we even managed to treat Ismal to a piece of cake!

The sun was still quite high when we decided to head back to Cairo, but we were caught up in some major delays. The drive back should have taken 3 ½ hours but ended up being around 5 hours! So glad we never travel without food and drink – our only concern was toilet facilities! LOL

Anz have a brilliant memory. Early in the morning we casually asked about bazaars. We were all very tired from sitting in the traffic jam (there were drivers driving on dirt roads and even a minor road rage incident because a driver was over zealous with the flashing of head lights!) but when it comes to shopping we all perked up! It was getting quite late but Anz and Ismal was trying really hard to find any bazaar which were still open in Giza... we only managed to visit a perfume shop were Lin and Kim spent almost a quarter of their money! They were so gullible to believe a few drops of perfume would entice the men! Hahaha

Originally Anz agreed to join us for dinner but as soon as he realised we might be heading back to our hotel for dinner he made excuses about having to go home... We were quite sad to say ‘goodbye’ to Anz as we now saw him as one of the girls (!). We exchanged emails and he invited us to stay at his house if we come to Cairo again. Kim even managed to smoothly slip Ismal and Anz their tip! LOL

At the end of our stay in Cairo, we saw Anz as a friend and even nick named him ‘McMuffin’!

Thursday 30th November
One of the last things Anz asked us before we departed last night was when we would like to set off for Sharm. We did not think anything of it and prepared ourselves to go by coach... then Ismal emerged with his mini bus to take us personally to Sharm! We were so grateful that we were grinning from ear to ear! Ismal brought along another driver (can’t recall his name) who spoke English which allowed us to communicate through him. Ismal was very nice and offered to take us to the bazaars that we didn’t manage to visit the night before. We declined his offer as we knew how long the journey to Sharm would take and wanted to get there as soon as possible.

We set off around 9:30am and were driving through the desert in the hottest times and we kept drifting off to sleep. Ismal stopped off just before we got to the desert to buy us some water, oranges and seeds! Whenever we woke up we see sand, sand and more sand... the scenery looked very much like the setting for the movie, The Hills Have Eyes! Gory movie and if you have seen it you will know what I mean! Anyway, every so often we would see toll booths with half a dozen soldiers, road spikes on the roadside and I even spotted some soldiers on the hillside with machine guns at the ready!

We stopped off half way for toilet break and of course food! Again we invited Ismal and the other driver to join us but they refused. The luxury may not seem much, but initially we were only suppose to stay for 45 minutes but ended up staying over an hour as our food took so long to come out from the kitchen - if we travelled with a coach party, I think the coach would have left without us! Hahaha

When we got back to our hotel in Sharm we tipped Ismal again (Lin did it this time not so smoothly though!) and went back to our room to refresh ourselves before heading into Naama Bay shopping district for dinner. We decided on a Thai and Chinese restaurant on the top floor of the shopping centre – no lift access so we managed to get a few strong men to help me up! The Egyptian is very helpful in that way.

Friday 1st December
This was the very first morning that we got to lie in! We took that opportunity by getting up just before breakfast serving ended and then made our way to sunbath on the Red Sea.

Lin, Liz and I booked in to do some parasailing whilst Kim remained on the beach to sunbath. First up were 2 guys and when we saw them plunged into the sea we were a bit concerned about it being cold... Liz and I went up first – Liz gave me instructions on not to talk to her whilst up there... of course if you tell me not to do something I end up doing the exact opposite! I started talking and swinging up there! Hahaha

When we came down we got dipped into the sea on purpose before being towed back on board the boat. Once we got back onto the boat, the crew said they are giving me a free ride so I remained hooked up and went up again with Lin this time. Lin was more relaxed with me swinging and when we got dipped into the sea again we even had a bit of a splash around! The sea was very, very salty!

After all that frolicking in the sea we dried ourselves off by more sunbathing. I got bored after half an hour and very hungry so Kim accompanied me to some lunch at the Marriot Beach Restaurant where Lin and Liz joined us afterwards.

To help us relax from our strenuous activities (!) we all went for a facial (Lin and Liz went for an extra massage). The facial started off with cleansing of the face and then threading! I have never tried threading before and it is an experience that I am not rushing out to try again! The salon wasn’t what you would call a reputable place but they were amusing – they played some Chinese music just for us... its ashame that the songs were from the 60s/70s, before we were born! Lin and Liz massage finished before Kim and my facial was completed! As the salon was fairly small, I went back to the hotel and Kim ran some errands for us whilst the other 2 had their facials.

Dinner was at the in-house restaurant at the Marriot Beach, we ate at Kona Koi, a Japanese restaurant where the art of cooking was part of a show.

We were supposed to have an early nights rest as we had an action packed day… Kim and I ended up staying up chatting about all the things we got up to instead. We talked about how trusting we were to jump into Ismal’s mini bus without checking properly if he were sent by the agent to pick us up or not, what would happen if we had broken down in the middle of the desert, would Anz come and rescue us, would we have turned into dried black beans when Anz arrived! Very silly talk which had us in stitches, I even started snorting which I have never done before! Well, Kim tired herself out with all the laughing and went to bed whereas I was wide awake! I only managed to have an hour sleep before getting up again at 6am!

Saturday 2nd December
With only an hour sleep I got up, changed into my swimsuit under my clothes and had breakfast in my zombie state. We were to meet up with our transfer from the Camel Dive Club outside the reception for our scuba diving excursion at 8:50am.

Lin and Liz went ahead to get us some beach towels, Kim and I lagged behind so when we got to the hotel entrance everyone was already there waiting for us. We were greeted by Erich our instructor for the day. Erich helped me into the mini bus, enquired about our shoe size for flippers and shoes – he knew our dress size just by glancing at us (to all those men out there, this is a good talent to possess ;-)).

Lin and I walked to the boat along side Erich – let me paint you a picture of our dive instructor… he is half Brazilian and Japanese, early 20s, cute (swoon) and seem slightly intimidated by us noisy group which makes it all the more endearing for me ;-)

Erich had initially tried to help me onto the top deck by passing me up to another instructor mid way on the steps but ended up taking me the whole way as the steps were so narrow and steep – I felt like I was on the monkey bars as I tried to help out by pulling myself up on the railings! Once up there I made my way towards the mats with the others to take photos. Once we started sailing off, Erich came up to give us a run through on the basic procedures, hand signals and told us in which order we were suppose to dive. Liz was first as she has done it before, and then Lin followed by me last.

When it was time to get into our wet suit, I lowered myself down the steps (monkey bar style) where Erich would ‘catch’ me downstairs! The wet suits were still damp from previous dives so it was difficult to get into and then the goggles just made us look like ducks because of the nose guard!

I felt like a rag doll when the other instructors helped me into the sea where Erich was waiting for me with my dive cylinder. I geared up and practiced to use my breathing apparatus but kept getting salt water into my mouth – started spitting the salt water out and then my goggles fogged up so had to redo the whole spitting in the goggles procedure (mascara was running by this stage)! I was hanging onto Erich for dear life and even asked him which part of his gear that I must not touch whilst he fixed my goggles and try to help me stay afloat! I was quite frustrated with myself by this stage, give be flying in the air any time but put me in water and I am at your mercy! It took me a while to get the hang of everything but once I was underwater I remained there throughout my 20 minutes dive! Saw a lot of fishes and corals, the ones I can only remember were the clown fish (Nemo), blue spotted stingray (got within about 2 metres) and the bearded scorpionfish! The Egyptian are very strict with preserving the corals so we had to be very careful in not to touch them. There was this little fish down there that was quite taken in by us and didn’t move when I stretched out my hand to touch him until the very last minute.

The whole resurfacing and exiting the sea and boarding the boat and extracting me from the wet suit happened so fast that I was in a bit of a daze until I was wrapped in my beach towel! That was when the cold, damp temperature hit me. I was freezing and when they started to serve lunch, I was too cold to even eat!

Once I had some food in me, I felt much better and even started to think about getting out of my swimsuit and into my dry clothes. Erich carried me into the crew bathroom at the back of the boat and sat me onto the table beside the sink (this would be a very romantic scenario if only I was dry and warm!), he then proceeded to get my wheelchair and helped me transfer over.

For the rest of the excursion I sat curled up in the cabin. Lin was the only one in our group to do a second dive. We all had a fantastic time even though I was freezing and the other 3 all got sea sick! LOL

When we all got back into the dive club headquarter, we were well and truly knackered! Erich was busy running around tidying up so we didn’t get time to take a photo with him :-(

Dinner was a buffet at our hotel which we devoured – have to replenish all the energy we used up from diving!

Sunday 3rd December
Another relaxing day sunbathing besides our hotel pool this time, Kim even managed to take a dip!

Lunch was once again at the Marriot Beach restaurant – unfortunately we had a very tight schedule to keep and the service was extra slow so we didn’t enjoy our meal as much as we intended to.

Quad bike riding through the desert whilst the sun is setting sounds so magical but in reality it is awfully painful! I was riding on the back of Lin’s bike and I felt every bump which was not only painful on my bum but also caused me to have a splitting headache! Driving over hills and on road was good but going over those small little bumps was just nightmarish! There were a camera man following us round the course filming us, he kept telling us to wave and high five him but I was just hanging onto Lin (sorry for giving you all those wedges!) for dear life! Originally the order of the ride in our group was Liz at the front then Kim followed by Lin and me, but Liz was so slow Kim overtook her right from the start and then Lin and I overtook her too, and if that wasn't enough, Lin then bumped into Kim as a joke but got told off from the instructors. Hehehe

We all purchased a head scarf at headquarter as the sand gets everywhere. The vendor helped wrapped our head in the scarf – we looked like ninjas! Instinctly, we all smiled under our disguise when we posed for the camera even though you can’t see it. Well, my scarf didn't stay long on my head and I only had Lin as my shield to protect me from the sand whilst riding through the desert! Hehehe

At the camel ride pit stop I had to wave a white flag and asked the camera crew if I could ride with them the rest of the excursion as I was in so much pain. The young, cute, nice smelling instructor, Yassma carried me over to the truck where I happily made myself comfortable. Once settled I dug into my bag for some tissues to wipe the sand from my face when I was greeted by a very squished banana! Ewww

After cleaning out my bag at the camel pit stop, the whole group proceeded onto the tea stop where Yassma drove his quad bike to pick me up and rode very slowly over the bumps and right up to our table. Yassma did exactly the same thing again when we arrived back at headquarters; he rode out to where the truck was parked and picked me up with his quad bike and rode to the transfer mini bus back to our hotel!

As we didn’t have a chance to go to any bazaars in Cairo the next best thing we were told was the Old Market… this wasn’t far from Naama Bay but the atmosphere was noticeably different. We had our first marriage proposal for a start – well Kim did anyway! At first they offered her 15 camels but then it went down to 15 chickens! This was our cue to leave and head back into Naama Bay for some food.

We decided on Lebanese food for our last dinner in Egypt as none of us have tried it before. Again the restaurant was upstairs and there were no lift access so the waiters had to help me up.

At this stage I was panicking as I haven’t done much souvenir shopping. I was dashing in and out of shops until I came across a t-shirt shop where the vendor kept joking with us about pricing – every time one of us comes in he would say 45 Egyptian pounds for a t-shirt and we would each in turn have to haggle. It was all in good fun and we all came away happy... especially Kim as she returned back into the shop only after leaving a few minutes ago! I personally think she likes the vendor ;-)

Monday 4th December
Woke up pretty early even though I had done most of my packing the night before. Again had a late breakfast at the hotel before venturing off to Naama Bay shopping centre as I haven’t done all my souvenir shopping! I was panic buying like mad as soon as I got out of the taxi! Went into one of the shops the girls went into the night before and basically brought whatever I thought was cute – didn’t even bother to haggle as I was in such a rush!

Haven’t been into the centre during the day before – the place was like a ghost town as all the blinds were down to block out the sun and inside were very stuffy as they didn’t turn on the air con. Note to self: if you are in a hurry, don’t go shopping with Kim as she kept flirting with the vendors and they wouldn’t let us just pay and go! LOL

Lunch were at MacDonald’s (it is sort of a tradition of ours, we try to sample Chinese restaurants and MacDonald’s whenever we go abroad and compare it with the UK – my McChicken Sandwich was ok even though it was a bit too bland), but whilst we were waiting for them to cook it from fresh (!) I made another mad dash to a nearby shop and purchased 7 t-shirts in less than 10 minutes! That was a record for me, and I wasn’t even accompanied by the girls as they were all so tired out! Hehehe

Back at the hotel I was treated like Queen Nefertiti for the last time by the concierge... a girl could get used to this life style ;-)

A very short transfer coach ride to the airport and some very, very last minute duty free shopping and we were on board heading for the cold, wet and miserable weather that UK has to offer :-(

Well that was my week away to a place I have always wanted to go and the experience have exceeded all my expectations... I so didn’t want to leave and would definitely go back there again!

Helen

Santa Clauses came to town!

2006-12-11T01:05:00.000Z

# You better watch out,
You better not cry,
Better not pout,
I'm telling you why:
Santa Claus is coming to town.
He's making a list,
And checking it twice;
Gonna find out
Who's naughty and nice.
Santa Claus is coming to town... #

Saturday started with my alarm going off at 5am! I dragged myself out of bed, had a really quick shower and then forced some food down my throat to help wake myself up a bit more before going off to the train station where assistance was arranged to help me on and off the train... yep, no assistance so I had to ask other passengers to help me.

Caught a cab from London Bridge to Battersea Park. Once there we drove around trying to figure out where all the nutters were gathering! Followed a group of ladies as they appeared to know where they were going. Met some of the runners from the forum, took photos and basically admiring each others costumes! LOL

We all took a leisurely stroll to the starting line - saw 2 very brave men who only donned their Santa hat and a very fetching pair of red thongs with fur trim!

I got separated from everyone from the forum as I stayed behind in the slowest starting area... sub 10 mins wasn’t slow enough for me because as soon as we got off the starting line, everyone in my area over took me! Hahaha

I was only about half way through the course when the fast runners overlapped me! When I went past the mobile café, I was so tempted to stop off and have a hotdog to replenish my energy! By the time I got onto my second lap, I really took my time and even stopped off to take a picture of the gold Buddha and raced a little kid on his tricycle!

At the very last half km, I sort of tagged along some of the ladies from GMTV’s, ‘This Morning’ team who are training for the London Marathon next April... will need to get up early on Monday to see if I will appear on their video clip ;-)

Bumped into one of my ski instructors, Gules when I was picking up my belongings after the race and had a good old chin wag and I took the opportunity to promote this blog and its cause! Just in case anyone who have forgotten why I am writing this blog, it’s to raise funds for the British Heart Foundation! So give generously!

After saying goodbye to everyone I took a taxi to Waterloo as I wasn’t too keen on getting lost on the buses in my Santa suit... the driver was very generous and didn’t charge me for my taxi ride! I think he felt sorry that I had to wear the suit all the way home on the Jubilee line! That’s not all, silly me I forgot my house keys when I left in the morning so I had to visit my brother at his work place to pick up his keys... he was less than amused when I greeted him and all his customers with a golly ‘Hohoho’!

Helen

Hi folks!

2006-12-08T18:38:00.000Z

Got back from Egypt a few days ago – been home recovering from a very exhausting holiday! Had a fantastic time and I will upload blog entries from my holiday hopefully next week as I don’t have any holiday photos at hand.

Going to have an early night tonight as I need to get up bright and early for my Santa race tomorrow morning! Hohoho

Helen

Not long to go now!

2006-11-25T23:26:00.000Z

Another 34 hours before I board my flight for Egypt... got my swimsuit, packed my suitcase and have even managed to catch a cold! Argh!!!

My plan of action is to medicate myself with all the over the counter cold & flu remedies! Luckily the first two days, we will be spending it in Cairo so no water activities. Hopefully by the time we arrive at Sharma el Sheikh my cold will have gone to allow me to do some scuba diving! Yay!

Helen

Master Classes

2006-11-20T23:45:00.000Z

Sorry for the long absence – I was busy tying up lose ends before my holiday next week! Hopefully this time next week, I would have just landed in Egypt and getting settled in to the hotel room. I am going away with my girlfriends for our annually get away – in the past we have been to places both near and far, including Hong Kong (last year), Ibiza (first holiday without parental control!), Ireland, Italy and Prague.

As well as tying up those lose ends, I was busy swimsuit hunting! For all those girls out there, you know how hard it is to find a great swimsuit at the best of times, but with all the shops taking everything summer related back into the stockroom to make room for all the Christmas items, the task has become almost impossible! I have given up in finding one in the shops and ordered a few (one-pieces and tankinis in different sizes and colours!)... Now I am patiently waiting for them to arrive before I fly off! Argh, fingers crossed!

Ok, a couple of weeks back I went to see the original and classic, ‘Italian Job’ on the big screen for the very first time... I probably will get lynched for saying this, but I actually liked the remake more (goes and hide behind a pillow)! Hehehe

Don’t get me wrong, the original was a great movie – maybe it’s because I saw the remake first, or it’s glossier, or even just because the cast were so easy on the eye, especially Charlize Theron, who is gorgeous ;-)

I have liked the new Mini Cooper even before watching either of the ‘Italian Job’ but now I want it even more! Hopefully, by the time I finally get my driving licence they still produce the car! Hahaha

Now for some classical music – my dear friend, Caf (aka Pink Hat) invited me along to her choir, Eclectic Voices (www.eclecticvoices.org.uk) performance of their Mozart Requiem rendition, conducted by the talented Scott Stroman. I had a wonderful time even though being the novice that I am in classical music, I did not recognise the pieces of music played! LOL

I really needed you Caf by my side explaining all the different pieces as they were being played! I took your advice, and waited until Scott raised his arms up high to signal the end of a long piece of music before I began my applause with enthusiasm! It would have been very embarrassing if I started to clap in all the wrong places! Hahaha

Helen

Lighting up the night skies ;-)

2006-11-06T23:40:00.000Z

The firework displays on Blackheath were brilliant. Most of the main roads were cordoned off which was great as there were many people just standing around the fields waving sparklers. I was prepared and brought some sparklers myself at the local shop. I did have a bit of a problem lighting the sparklers though... nearly set my own gloves on fire as the stubborn sparklers refused to light up until you hold the flame under it for a good 10 seconds which is not an easy feat as we were out in the open field without any building to block any sudden gust of winds!

I had a great time nevertheless. Ate hotdogs with plenty of onions (a bit too undercook for my liking), drank hot (lumpy) chocolates whilst dodging little children! Hehehe

Still not getting used to my short hair yet... each time I put my coat on or whatever I would reach round my neck to ‘free’ my hair but now its not there any more! I might need to dig out my long wig if I miss my hair too much!

Helen

Sparklers at the ready!

2006-11-04T16:56:00.000Z

How was everyone’s Halloween? Anything spooky to share? Nothing out of the ordinary happened to me – not even a trick or treater visited me :-(

The previous 2 years when I completely forgotten about Halloween I had a few trick or treaters and I had no sweets in the place so this year I was prepared and stocked up on a selection... I guess it’s more for me then ;-)

I was watching ‘Ghosts on the Underground’ a few nights ago on Five, and was quite amazed that it never occurred to me that the Underground might be haunted! The show started off with Bank Station, which I have only used a handful of times and have always gotten lost – both above and under ground! LOL

Trees (Terresa, my sister) uses that station on a daily basis for work... well being the horrid sister that I am, I wanted to share my ‘knowledge’ but thought better of it... will save it until she annoys me next time! Hahaha

I went for my first proper job interview yesterday... not sure how it went – to ‘celebrate’ not making a fool of myself, I went and got my hair cut on the way home! I chopped a good 5 inches off, which in retrospect not a wise thing to do as my neck is not protected from the draft anymore :-( LOL

Now for tonight, I am just getting ready to go out to enjoy the fireworks on top of Blackheath village. I haven’t been to a firework display for many years – it has always been cold and wet which is not a good combination especially at night, I don’t know what I might roll over in the dark. The weather forecast has guaranteed a dry night so I am off to enjoy myself! Will give a report on the nights event later...

Helen

Warning to those who dislike anything scary!

2006-10-31T22:33:00.000Z

I love ghost stories, and as its Halloween I thought I would tell you one of mine...

My dad had a restaurant in Clacton a few years ago and there was this guy, Mark who used to work for my dad so this is his story...

He was driving home alone one night along a long strip of road out in the middle of no where with hardly any street lamps. It was quite foggy and cold so he had his headlights and heaters on, but suddenly his car started to make funny sounds like it was choking so he slowed down to about 10mph and was about to stop to check it out but then it started to run smoothly again but the temperature stayed quite cold still. He thought nothing of it and got home safely...

For the next couple of days, every time he got into the car it would become quite cold and the front mirror would automatically turn to a specific position in the back seat, no matter how many times he adjusted it...

After a few days he was starting to get quite afraid to say the least. Then a few more days later, he had to drive through the same strip of road, when the same thing happened, the road was covered in fogs, temperature dropped and car started choking... however, like before, once he got through that part of the road, the fog cleared and the car returned back to its original temperature...

Afterwards he told my parents about the experience and my mum told him that he must have 'picked up' the ghost on his first journey, and had it with him until he drove through that strip of road again and 'dropped' it off again...

Apparently Clacton is quite a haunted place, there was another story I heard about a man being hung on a giant tree for his crimes, there have been sightings of a black mass ‘hanging’ round that tree late at night ever since...

Happy Halloween ;-)

*Cackles*

Helen

Warm up your vocal cords!

2006-10-29T21:01:00.000Z

Hello everyone! Sorry for the lack of blog entries... many excuses but lets not waste time and let’s just dive straight in! LOL

Did anyone wake up today and forgot the clocks go back and arrive early (or on time!) for everything?! My internal body clock has been waking me up 9am every morning the past week and this morning I woke up at 8am! Which was lucky as my mum had forgot the clocks go back and decided to come visit me and drag me off to go horse chestnut picking! I think she is approaching her mid-life crisis or menopause, she have taken up ballroom dancing and joined a female only society/group which takes her all over the place trying out foods of the World! She has a much more active social life than I!

Ok back to me (hehehe)... the thought of chestnuts made me think of the Christmas Carole:

# Chestnut's roasting on an open fire
Jack Frost nipping at your nose
Yule tide carols being sung by a choir
And folks dressed up like Eskimos
Everybody knows
A turkey and some mistletoe
Can help to make the season bright
Tiny tots with their eyes all aglow
Will find it hard to sleep tonight #

This is not the only song which I had running through my head all day... with the clocks going back, summer is definitely coming to an end for this year (you wouldn’t believe it by the looks of the pictures above). Well anyway the song which was running through my head all day was:

# Summertime and the living is easy
Fish are jumping, the cotton is high
Your daddy's rich and your mother's good lookin'
So hush, little baby, don't you cry? #

The sky was clear and bright but the temperature was notably cooler – haven’t got my thermal underwear out yet (hehehe) but have just dug out my bright red ski socks!

Oh, I nearly forgot (nothing unusal there!) – I was out with my family on Friday night for dinner at a local Thai restaurant when 2 children TV presenters came in and sat behind me... Lee (my brother) who sat in front of me pointed them out and for the rest of the meal we were all trying to think of what their names were. All I remembered was “swing your pants”... do you know who I am on about yet?! Well to put you out or your misery (?!) they were Trevor Neal and Simon Hickson! Oh, how I miss Saturday morning TV and laughing at silly pants!

Helen

Humour is a very sexy quality to have ;-)

2006-10-12T22:24:00.000Z

I saw ‘The Great Escape’ on the big screen last night thinking it would be a very intense, serious movie about prisoners trying to escape from a Nazi concentration camp... I was very pleasantly surprised to find it humorous and seeing the magnetism of the late Steve McQueen.

I went to see ‘The Thomas Crown Affair’ about a month ago at the same venue and did not think too much of McQueen but at last nights viewing I have come to realise that humour is very attractive quality to possess – the little glint in ones eye and the smirk from someone who does not take themselves too seriously...

For those of you have not seen the movie you can find out more about it via this link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0057115 and for those who appreciate the simple but ingenious work of Mr Elmer Bernstein for the soundtrack you can have a taster from here: http://www.moviegrooves.com/shop/thegreatescape.htm
(I was whistling this tune in my head throughout the train journey home afterwards!).

I am not doing the film any justice merely by going on about McQueen as the rest of the cast were excellent. I was surprised that I recognised quite a few of the main cast but not recalling their names until the credits came up. There were even a (solo) standing ovation from a gentleman sitting at the front of the screen.

I have not seen an entire episode of ‘Ello Ello’ or sat through ‘Chicken Run’ but I can see that they took inspiration from ‘The Great Escape’.

Prior to the movie, I had to make a very mad dash to Waitrose on the other side of the venue as they did not serve any hot food! I fully expected hot food to be served, as last time they offered this service – I had 25 minutes to get to Waitrose, queue up, place my order of pilau rice with chicken korma, samosa and onion bhaji for my friend and then a roast chicken and potato wedges for myself, queue up to pay and then rush back just as the lights dimmed!

Helen

Santa Clauses will be coming to Battersea Park on Saturday 9th December!

2006-10-10T14:42:00.000Z

You may remember I got my new wheelchair a few months ago and have not had a chance to take it onto any race event... well, I have entered myself into a ‘Santa race’! LOL

The race is to help raise funds for ‘Disability Snowsport’. The race will be held at Battersea Park on Saturday 9th December. The event is looking for 2500 runners to dress up as Santa and run/jog/walk/roll 6km! To find out more please visit: www.runnersworld.co.uk/santarun

Whats great about the race (besides from raising funds and awareness of snow sports for the disabled) is the entrance fee will include a Santa suit which we get to wear and keep... if anyone out there who needs a Santa suit, sign up for the event, come enjoy yourself and take away the Santa suit as a souvenir (plus a medal at the end of the race as well) which you can use over and over again.

I should enter myself into some ‘training’ but the last time I did anything exercise wise I came down with a cold which lasted close to a fortnight! I will ease myself into a fitness routine slowly... first I will start with getting the right training outfit as I think my baby pink tracksuit from the Cancer Research ‘Race for Life’ 5km run is a bit chilly for the autumn weather. Next, it should be my diet... less kebab and more fresh/raw fruit and vegetables. And after all that, not to strain myself too much in my everyday life as I don’t want to pull a muscle (which I did just before the ‘Race for Life’)!

Helen

Lost in ye ol London Town

2006-10-09T20:34:00.000Z

On Saturday I visited the World’s oldest surviving grand music hall... the Wilton’s Music Hall (http://www.wiltons.org.uk/). They are currently putting on ‘Amadeus’ by Peter Shaffer. The music hall was so secluded that even local proprietors had no idea where it was or even heard of it!

First, I must say something about the play, Amadeus itself. Matthew Kelly headed the cast as Antonio Salieri with Jonathan Broadbent as Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. I thoroughly enjoyed the whole performance – I am proud to say I even recognised a few (well known) pieces of Mozart e.g. ‘The Marriage of Figaro’. But I have to confess, I had not heard of Salieri before the play... Kelly’s performance was mesmerising, I was transfixed to see how a simple item like a shawl could transform Kelly from a man in his peak to a withering old, slowly going insane with jealousy man, who one feels both sorry for and loathed. The whole production was a great joy to watch – the stage may not be as impressive as those in the West End but the performance by everyone and the musical arrangement was brilliant. I will now have to go watch the film version...

Ok, secondly I need to talk about the music hall itself... it certainly did not look very impressive from the outside – in fact it looked very much like a run down, old building housing ghouls and goblins than highly praised actors of such calibre. The interior of the music hall had obviously undergone some restoration – the fresh coat of paint on the ceiling, fitted disabled toilets and adequate ramp access. I did take a few photos of the auditorium and luckily tucked away my camera before I got told off by the usher, unlike the unlucky lady behind me!

This was a well spent day, I was entertained, educated and to follow had a lovely 3 course meal with fantastic company ;-)

Helen

bums awaaaaaay

2006-10-05T20:28:00.000Z

well hello there...

sorry tis been a while since i have written, just started the College of Law and I am already inundated with work..booo hooo... i want a 9-5 job!!!!

Well after a sudden turn of ill health Helen, my doc and family wanted me to postpone the jump. So after careful consideration - the London Parachute School has re-booked us for 17/6/07...

SEVENTEENTH JUNE TWO-THOUSAND AND SEVEN!!!!

We are still collecting sponsorship money so dont you run away just yet!

Shirin x

Oversea visitors and free meals ;)

2006-10-05T12:14:00.000Z

More donation updates... went for a family meal last night as some of my parents old neighbour (from 30 years ago in Vietnam) came over to visit us from Germany. After much consumption of alcohol I hit them with the BHF jump! LOL

The owner of the restaurant, ‘Hap Lee’ in Norbury, Mr Vong is of course one of my dad’s friend and he generously donated £50, and Ms Lau (from Germany) also donated £20 which I added to the official sponsor page as soon as I got home last night – which were well after 1am... I was starving around 5ish but thought we were going to eat in about another 2 hours so I only snacked on a pecan nut croissant, a packet of cheddar and onion crisps and a few Rolos... well I was so glad I did as we didn’t mange to settle down for dinner until 10pm! The first few dishes served up were lobster and crabs which I don’t eat so I had to wait until they finished all that before I got the type of food I eat! The clams, fish and vegetables were well worth the wait.

Oh I nearly forgot, I tried durian for the first time last night... the smell is quite overpowering and somewhat off putting and the taste... well it tasted like a raw spring onions to me! Hahaha

Helen

'Strange Chocolate'

2006-10-03T19:57:00.000Z

Woohoo! Had a brilliant time last night at our friend, Harriet’s gig... Harriet is the ‘Mistress of the skins & metals’ – Daryl, her brother and lead singer’s word not mine! The band, ‘Strange Chocolate’ consists of Harriet, Daryl, Jason (bassist) and Shane (lead guitarist). They have their own myspace, you can find out more about them on: http://www.myspace.com/strangechocolate

They are available for birthdays, bar mitzvahs, weddings...!

Just wanted to say ‘thank you’ to the band inviting Shirin and I along last night, also thank you to Steven for getting us on the guest list so we didn’t have to pay for the entrance fee ;)

It was my first ever live gig and I enjoyed the whole experience – even the sound checks... actually thought it was a private gig just for Shirin and me!!! LOL

‘Strange Chocolate’ is featured on the ‘Replugged in New Cross’ album, so support them and go out and buy their album.

Helen

We have reached our first milestone!

2006-09-29T19:16:00.000Z

Visited the bank and counted up all the money we managed to raise from both Canary Wharf and Sainsbury today. I managed to raise £106.23 and Shirin raised £98 exactly with a few added Euros, US cents and Nigerian dollars! I was amazed when I was counting all the donations – the tin was very heavy but we both thought most of the donations were small change and it wouldn’t mount to that much. Needless to say we were both pleasantly surprised.

The original £133.18 added to the collection tins amount, we have a grand total of £337.41!!! The blog were created in mind to raise £320 to cover the parachute school’s fees, so the extra £17.41 will be added to my official BHF fundraising page.

We have raised the amount to cover the parachute school but we are still in need of funds for our official BHF fundraising page so our plight does not end here.

Helen

Thank you J Sainsbury and their customers!

2006-09-27T21:48:00.000Z

Shirin and I had quite a fruitful time (6 hours) at Sainsbury in Greenwich today. We have managed to come away with 2 heavy money filled collection tins – we met quite a few generous people and one of them even tried to give us money to allow ourselves to buy our own refreshments, but we had to decline his generous offer.

So tonight, we would like to say a big ‘THANK YOU’ to Sainsbury for accommodating us today for a very special charitable cause.

Our next fundraising ‘event’ will be next Monday, when we head off to Tottenham Court Road to see our friend, Harriet perform with her band… I haven’t been to an independent gig before so I am not too sure what to expect – might become too involved in the music/atmosphere to actually raise any money! Also, what do one wear?! I sound like such a girl saying that!

Well that’s all for tonight, I am still nursing a cold and today was surprisingly tiring even though all we did was stand around and smiling at all the customers like crazed individuals! LOL

Helen

Special Celebrations Day!

2006-09-24T21:11:00.000Z

It is a very special day today, it is Shirin’s birthday so happy birthday girl! It is also the start of Ramadan so poor Shirin is fasting for the next month – luckily we managed to catch up on Friday for a pre-birthday celebration and I promise after your fasting (24th October), we will go out and celebrate properly… any excuse for a girly night out ;)

Me on the other hand am struck down with a full-blown cold. That’s what we will talk about today… The great east and west divide of how to nurse a cold – I have always got confused whether its feed a cold or starve it, and it doesn’t help that my appetite increases about ten-folds whenever I get sick! Also in Chinese tradition we are supposed to avoid dairy products, poultry, eggs and oranges! Now the English, you are suppose to stock up on vitamins C and chicken soup. As you can see I am quite mixed up on what I am suppose to eat/drink and what not to. So, I have made myself a very strong ginger and rice wine chicken soup and hope that will do the trick. One thing both traditions have in common is fluid, so I am drowning myself in hot tea with fresh lemons and a big dollop of honey.

You know what?! I really want some chocolates now, especially now that Bromley has opened up a Hotel Chocolat last Thursday! To help take my mind off chocolate and any other ‘forbidden’ food I have been vegging out watching some ‘quality’ telly… first there were T4 with their regular programme like Friends, Smallville and Charmed, and after all those US imports I then induced myself with some British programmes like Casualty (not sure whether if the cold is playing havoc with my immune system but I was crying throughout the episode!) and Jane Eyre. Being a fan of Colin Firth’s, Mr Darcy I hope that Mr Rochester will provide Toby Stephens will gain some level of success like Colin did.

Helen

Apologies, Condolences & Well Wishes

2006-09-23T21:59:00.000Z

Apologies
So sorry for not updating the blog. I have been very preoccupied with personal matters, I will try to write more regularly from now on as there is less than a month until the big jump.

Condolences
This of course goes out to 'Crocodile Hunter' Steve Irvin’s family and friends. I saw the speech given by Steve’s daughter, and was very touched. She was such a brave little girl.

Well Wishes
To the ‘Hamster’ Richard Hammond. I am in no way knowledgeable about cars but I found ‘Top Gear’ to be a great show. I was very surprised when I heard what had happened to my favourite ‘Top Gear’ presenter. It appears his condition is improving – I really wish him and his family all the best.

I would also like to wish all my family and friends’ good health.

Fundraising updates – Shirin and I will be doing more collection tin rattling this coming Wednesday at the big Sainsbury supermarket in Greenwich… hope the weather holds out for us.

Helen

Support British Talent!

2006-09-08T22:42:00.000Z

Support British Talent and support the British Heart Foundation!

Welcome back Wossy! I was so looking forward to the new series of Jonathan Ross, and tonight’s episode was full of British talents, but why did they have to have those BB contestants on?! No, I shouldn’t be horrible – they might be genuinely nice people…

Julie Walter’s new movie, ‘Driving Lessons’ did not appeal to me at first but I am warming to it – of course being a big ‘Harry Potter’ fan might have something to do with it.

I have never seen an episode of ‘The Office’ or ‘Extras’ but as the gorgeous Orlando Bloom is going to star in an episode I will be making sure I tune in! I think I will put my name down on Amazon for series two of ‘Extras’ just to see all those out takes! God, I am really showing my geeky side here tonight!

Helen

unemployment!!!

2006-09-06T22:40:00.000Z

hurrah hurrah hurrah - i'm unemployed since 4th september!!!! hurrah hurrah hurrah - now there is no reason not to sponsor an unemployed lawyer!!!

done pretty well in Canary Wharf apart from the london underground saying that we need to book a slot for charity work one year in advance... we did pretty well seein that we need the Met Police authority to roam the streets with our lil buckets and the next available slot was 23/10/06.... ahhhh well.... deadline soon approaching - a month from today our sponsorship money needs to be in! ARGH

ARGGGGGH

ARRRRGGGHHHHH

ARGH

Canary Wharf be warned ;)

2006-09-05T22:23:00.000Z

I am meeting up with Shirin tomorrow to do our bit of harassing the general public at Canary Wharf with our BHF tins! Shirin has been brilliant, she has contacted the BHF to get our t-shirts, the tins themselves and tens/hundreds of balloons! I have told her I am allergic to the powdery substance in the balloons so I will leave all the hot air blowing to her ;)

There have been so much going on lately which I want to write about but due to my own laziness I am going to just write the bare essentials… first, Ken Livingstone – was watching the news and heard he wanted to ‘control’ all the trains in London, well as my all time favourite board game is Monopoly I had the image of Ken here dressed up like the ‘short, fat guy with the moustache’! Then there is the ‘Crocodile Hunter’, Steve Irwin – I must admit his enthusiasm especially on a boring, cold, wet Sunday afternoon and all you had to choose from was those antique/auction, courtroom dramas, or worse of all… Channel 4 horse racing, Steve was a great pick me up! The old cliché, life is too short, so get your credit cards out and donate your ‘hard earned’ cash to our very good cause!

My chain of thoughts are quite random, so now away from headline hitting news I have a bit of foodie news to chat about – I went shopping with my sisters on Saturday to Lakeside and discovered ‘Hotel Chocolat’ (pronounced ‘ho-tel shok-o-LA’). The chocolates where divine, they wasn’t too sweet and it did not leave a sickly feeling even after eating over 200g in one go! It’s a shame the closes store to where I live is in Lakeside… but they have announced that they will soon be opening one in Bromley! Yippee!

After a ‘stressful’ time at Lakeside I went back to Trees for dinner where she later thought she would poison us dinner guests with her baking… all I got to do (besides from all the washing up!) was decorate one cake with chocolate chips. Can anyone make out what I was trying to do with the chocolate chips there?! Give up?! Ok, I will put you out of your misery (!), it was suppose to be a heart but the chips started to melt in my hands so I sort of gave up in the end! LOL

Now for more donation updates: sold a few more items on eBay and raised a further £12.18 (thanks to Simon, Susan and Richard). This brings us to a new total of £133.18!

Right, need to go to bed now if I want to harass those men (and women) in suits at Canary Wharf tomorrow!

Helen

Updates, updates, updates!

2006-08-31T20:26:00.000Z

If anyone is interested at all, last Thursday I did manage to avoid getting rained on whilst I was working… it was a completely different story on Tuesday though, I got soaked right through to the bones!

More donation news… my parents’ surrogate son (!), Lihui have generously sponsored me £10 but was too camera shy to appear on the blog. Also the neighbours (Gabriela, Hilda, Deborah, Mr Buckingham and Mrs Range) near my parents’ have in total sponsored £21 and I finally cornered my dad who dug deep in his very fetching shorts (!) and donated £10 too (no photos though)… this gave a total of £41 the last few days. I have also began selling some items on eBay… it has been quite slow and so far have only ‘sold’ one book to a very generous gentleman, Mark who purchased it for his niece for the sum of £16… added to the £41 and the previous £64 we have a new total of £121!!!

Due to the lack of photos lately, I have taken a few pictures of the piggy bank, which I am using for the donations for you to enjoy… LOL

Hopefully some time in September, Shirin and I will pull out all the stops and start some on street tin rattling whilst wearing our lovely BHF t-shirts and plastic money slot thingy!

Oh, I also met up with my World travelling friend, Caf yesterday and she has lovingly got me a booklet on how to throw boomerangs. Another friend of mine had sent me a boomerang all the way from Australia last year, which I experimented with during the summer at Greenwich Park (nearly beheading a good dozen people who foolishly got in my way!) but failed miserably. Caf obviously remembered this and got me the book… Greenwich Park goers beware… Hahaha

Helen

I'm singing in the rain...

2006-08-23T21:03:00.000Z

I know it’s a bit late but Monday was ‘Bus Day of Action’, which invited disabled people to use the buses to bring awareness to the general public as well as test out facilities and driver attitudes. You can still check them out on: http://www.daii.org/news/bus_action_day/

Ok, onto excuses on why I am destined not to work!!! Here are the evidences: I was on a training course sort of thing last Friday for the whole day, and from staying indoors for a good 7 hours, as soon as I stepped outside it started to pour down with rain! Forgot to mention I broke the number 12 bus running from Westminster to Oxford Circus during morning rush hour!

Now for Monday, I did not do anything work related, only ran a few errands and the sun was out, the birds were out singing etc

Tuesday, again nothing too strenuous – yes, nothing work related…

Now for today, Wednesday… as soon as I stepped out the car to start some proper work I get rained on! After 2 hours of work and dripping wet I decided to go home for the day… yep, you guessed it, it stopped raining! To comfort myself, I went and got my hair cut instead! LOL

I am determining not to give in so easily – I am going to try again tomorrow, but this time I am going out with my waterproof gear… waterproof mascara in one hand and hairbrush in the other! Hahaha

I’m only joking, I will be decked out in my winter coat, gloves (need to buy one of those microwave heated pads soon), scarf/pashima and at least two layers of clothing. Wish me luck ;-)

Helen

sun, sea....Heathrow??!

2006-08-18T00:10:00.000Z

a relaxing week away in with dear pauly, my other half.. malta so rich in history, culture and food. we had an amazin time there and would advise peeps to visit. have to admit that the maltese lira is stronger than the pound ( Â£1 = 0.60 cents)..

paul and i done everything we wanted, from bein lazy in the sun, to jumpin around on a bouncy castle on the sea, riding the scrammbler on really choppy salty sea water, eating out, hirin a boat and visitin Gozo and snorkling and swimming with the fishes in the Blue Lagoon, Comino -- the clearest blue waters of the Med, dancin the Macarena in the sea and pauly getting stung by the naughty jelly fish, visiting the Pirate's Cave and seeing dolphins as we flew over the Med!

then the horror story began, we kipped on a couple of benches in Roma Airport for almost 12 Hours until our next flight out to heathrow. It iwas cold, cold and ver cold - daamn air condition! Once we were on the plane to London, relief hit us and off to sleep we went. At heathrow I was questionned by Immigration as to where I was travelling from - was this because of my skin colour, my name or was it because i was sporting a red and white scarf (ya know the ones similar to the arabs). There was obvious prejudice as pauly (tall, blonde blue eyed sex bomb) was not asked a single question!

Was a little frizzled and frazzled by that but the next bit too the bullet. Our luggage was lost - somewhere in Rome! Poor Pauly who moved all his belongings up North (Co Durham) for the summer while he looked for a place in London and at the moment is house sitting for his sister while she is on honeymoon, pauly is left to wear odd pair of socks, one pair of underpants, one t-shirt and shorts - since Tuesday!!!!!!
think i need to start fund raisin for some new clothes for paul!!! (shhhhh, dont tell him that I told you!)

anyway wanted to let you all know that helen and i are doin the sky dive for the BHF on 15/10/2006!!!!!

THATS THE DEADLINE!!!!

FIFTEENTH OF OCTOBER 2006

shirin

The Countdown to the return of 'The Pink Hat'... oh, and it's travelling human, Caf!

2006-08-16T22:09:00.000Z

Tonight’s blog is dedicated to my dear friend, Caf (and her infamous ‘Pink Hat’) who will arrive back to Good Ol' Blighty from her month long (so missed you) Down Under around 15:30 this coming Friday… hope she has been keeping up with the news about the problems at Heathrow!

Caf: I am sure we will meet up pretty soon – I’ll give you a week to get over your jet lag and develop your photos… have been scanning your blog to see if you managed to upload any photos of your adventures – Jonathan should have given you more lessons!

Helen

Still Here!

2006-08-15T22:10:00.000Z

The days are definitely considerably getting colder and wetter… need to go shopping for a winter coat soon – any excuse for shopping ;-)

Ok, first I am counting the days left until ‘Big Brother’ is over for another year – 3 more days to go. I have never been a fan and as the series continue I have found it more irritating.

On the plus side, I am also counting down the days to when 'The X-Factor’ comes back on! Just another 4 days to go – great Saturday night viewing, especially when it’s cold and wet outside.

All this talk about the change of climate, its time for hot custard puddings and out with the ice creams – went out for a Sunday roast dinner with my family (on Sunday!) and for desert I had a giant ice cream sundae to share with Sally, this may very well be my last ice cream treat this year.

Helen

Come on, take the test ;-)

2006-08-09T22:57:00.000Z

To those who are my closest and dearest, knows that I have the memory like a sieve. Well, tonight I watched the BBC’s ‘How to Improve Your Memory’, hosted by Professor Robert Winston and found out my memory isn’t as bad as I thought… To be truthful, I am quite competitive when it comes to shows like this, so I paid extra attention trying my hardest ;-)

Check out the website to test your own memory, and pick up some tips on how to improve it: http://www.bbc.co.uk/sn/tvradio/programmes/memory/programme.shtml

Helen

Not so 'Grumpy Old Men'!

2006-08-08T00:19:00.000Z

Saturday 5th August – Went along to a singles event… the tin said 20-50 year olds but it turned out to be more of an OAP weekly get together instead! Hahaha

Surprisingly, I had a great time – it was definitely an experience (ok, one which I am not considering to repeat again any time soon… hope you noticed, I never said ‘never’)!

Sunday 6th August – What else is better than having a lazy BBQ amongst family on a lazy, warm, dry Sunday afternoon. That’s exactly what I did – word of advice, do not go food shopping when you are hungry! I was left to do the food shopping for 6 people including myself, but ended up buying food enough to feed 60! Ok, that’s an exaggeration, I did however buy enough food to feed a good dozen for sure ;)

Helen

Gullible Relatives! Hehehe

2006-08-02T21:44:00.000Z

Managed to rope my Uncle, Sung to donate a £1 last night when he dropped round unexpectedly – I don’t think he has any idea what he has actually donated it to though… LOL This brings us to £64!

Today I went to a fruit & veg farm where I tasted the produce before buying them! The pears were too small and had no juices so didn’t pick those, the plums were very sour and not at all crunchy, couldn’t find the strawberries and I only jealousy looked on when a family came by with their load of sweetcorn :(

The ‘roads’ where a nightmare for me, I needed a 4x4 wheelchair, especially when the sky started to threaten us with rain! Luckily the storm held out until we got back into our car.

Helen

The Long Weekend...

2006-07-31T20:37:00.000Z

Friday 28th July – I was going through the routine of opening my post and was surprised to find a letter from Virgin Credit Cards saying I could transfer my balance interest free... this may not be much of a surprise if I owned a Virgin card but I don’t! I got worried that someone might have ‘stolen’ my identity. It turns out that MBNA used the wrong letter heads or something!

Saturday 29th July – You may recall my run in with my mobile network recently... well, this is part 2: I got an invoice from them charging me over £400 for an ‘early termination penalty’! I couldn’t believe them! They first got my cancellation mixed up and I even specified that I don’t want to see an invoice a few weeks time showing their errors, and what happens?! I was initially quite annoyed with them and wanted to give them a piece of my mind... but when I actually got through to talk to an operator I sort of became all meek again... I am no good with expressing my annoyance – should have got Trees to do it for me. LOL

Sunday 30th July – Woke up early for my first ever (and maybe last) car boot sale at my local park. I took all my unwanted law books and 30 odd mangas along with any other junk I could find at my place and headed for the car boot sale. First off, I must say I am hopeless at haggling and it appears I am hopeless at selling too... or the buyers were pros and knew how to work the seller, me! It was not really what I would call a successful day as I ended up taking all my law books home again! Hahaha The mangas were the first to go then followed by toys and my Harry Potter premiere posters. In the end I made dead on £40 profit so the new total is £63! Woohoo

The end of an era – Top Of The Pops’ final episode. It has been years since I watched TOTP, I believe I stopped watching when it moved from BBC1 to BBC2, and the move from a weekday (I think it was initially aired on Thursday nights but I could be wrong...) to a Sunday added to its downfall. Well, I made sure I caught this last ever episode – the various clips throughout the years have been nostalgic, I remembered those Kylie and Jason days, who could forget Bros,?! Goodbye, farewell TOTP!

Helen

"Offside Rule" Explained for Women!

2006-07-27T19:58:00.000Z

What is it with candyfloss, which makes you feel like a child again? I know it is nothing but spun sugar but I just love watching it melt when it comes into contact with liquid! The tingle on the tongue when it melts is like no other…! Hahaha

Ok, I know this is a bit late with the World Cup long over, but I found this and it was too amusing to not share with you guys… "offside rule" explained for women:

You're in a shoe shop, second in the queue for the till. Behind the shop assistant on the till is a pair of shoes which you have seen and which you must have.

The female shopper in front of you has seen them also and is eyeing them with desire. Both of you have forgotten your purses.

It would be rude to push in front of the first woman if you had no money to pay for the shoes.

The shop assistant remains at the till waiting.Your friend is trying on another pair of shoes at the back of the shop and sees your dilemma.

She prepares to throw her purse to you. If she does so, you can catch the purse, then walk round the other shopper and buy the shoes!

At a pinch she could throw the purse ahead of the other shopper and "whilst it is in flight" you could nip around the other shopper, catch the purse and buy the shoes!

BUT, you must always remember that until the purse has "actually been thrown", it would be plain wrong for you to be in front of the other shopper and you would be OFFSIDE!

I hope this is all clear for all you ladies out there ;-)

Helen

Bam!

2006-07-25T22:20:00.000Z

You know sometimes you think you are going to have an ordinary, boring day when bam! You witness an accident – not to worry, it wasn’t anything serious, and no one got hurt. I was on the bus minding my own business, with only about another 5 stops until I get off to continue my journey when all of a sudden, the bus runs into a small hatchback and everyone have to evacuate the bus and catch another one.

Helen

All that way for curry!

2006-07-24T19:59:00.000Z

Sunday 23rd - I was up in Leicester attending my cousin, Lin’s early birthday dinner. We had a great authentic Indian, which didn’t break the bank, which is all-good for the unemployed (me!).

Got home after 1a.m. and was again too tired to do anything else besides from crash into bed and sleep the sleep of the dead… of course that didn’t happen! I got home and realised I had to run a few morning errands, so last night I only had about 3 hours sleep… mixed with the heat I was a grumpy bunny all day :-(

Donations update: All these lovely people have all donated a £1 – Lin (and her man, Tony not pictured), Ping, Terresa (Trees my sister) and Kim. An extra £5 so the latest total is £23!

Helen

Capital Radio's 'Help a London Child'

2006-07-22T18:46:00.000Z

Friday 21st - I went to pick up my charity bucket and t-shirt from the ‘Capital Radio’ studio in Leicester Square, and got to meet Chris Brooks the DJ and here are the evidence: http://www.capitalradio.com/photoWallPhoto.asp?title=Help+A+London+Child+Weekend+2006&WallID=23389&photoID=1543863 I also did some free plugging whilst I was there and even managed to take a photo of just the 2 of us!

Bucket rattling is a fine art, which I will never sniff at again! My throat was quite sore from shouting non-stop for over 2 hours – I thought I was going to lose my voice the next day! Well, I used that as an excuse for indulging in a well deserve ice cream sundae ;-)

As for today, I was planning to go to Greenwich Park for the open air cinema experience organised by 'Studio Artois', but I was too lazy and quite thankful that I didn’t go as the long awaited thunder storm hit London at long last!

I am going to have a little bit of a moan now: I had 2 phones and wanted to cancel one of them. Well, last month I made sure they cancelled the right one, as I upgraded the other one which I use normally… well the second phone was to be disconnected today… yes you guessed correctly – they went and cancelled the one I wanted to keep instead! They very quickly rectified it and offered a year free line rental for the second phone if I wanted to keep that line open. My point of cancelling that second phone is because I don’t want it anymore, somehow it doesn’t seem to get through to them! Ok, you can come back out now, my rant is over… for now! LOL

Helen

PS. I got my new charger (yippee!) so here are some of the photos from the 'Acoustic Magic Band Night'.

Waltzing Matilda

2006-07-20T20:55:00.000Z

My dear friend, Caf is flying off to Oz for a month tomorrow – what will I do without her?! She is my walking, talking encyclopaedia/Agony Aunt! Have a fantastic trip and I will be looking forward in reading your ‘Travel Blog’!

Bon voyage!

Helen

Melting roads?!

2006-07-19T21:21:00.000Z

Sorry for not writing yesterday (Tuesday 18th) – will get to it after a short (ish) message first... I got my new wheelchair yesterday! The wheelchair have travelled more than I have in the last few months – it was made to order (back in March) in the States and they dispatched it to Holland (please insert your own jokes about the States and their competency!) before delivering it correctly to me, in good old London town!

It’s a shame I don’t have any races to try out my new chair :-(

Anyway, my 'excuse' for not writing yesterday was because I took the chair to Canada Square for the free ‘Acoustic Magic Band Night’. Great entertainment showcasing of the ‘next big thing’ and did I mention it was absolutely free?!

Had an interesting night of varied talents out there – David Sneddon (‘Fame Academy’ winner) was one of the acts. Other acts included Tony Moore, Lee Rogers, Riccardi, Beth Rowley and John Allen. I particularly liked Riccardi and for those who wish to check them out: http://www.riccardirock.co.uk/

All the other acts have their own website if you just typed their names in Google or whatever search engine you prefer.

The concert went on past 10p.m., and then I had to make an hours journey to get home so by the time I got in, I was too tired to even turn on the PC (laptop is still out of action)... zzz

Now for today... record breaking temperature! Woohoo!!! I think there maybe something wrong with me (slightly more than usual anyway), I didn’t find it that hot and I absolutely love this weather – the only down side is, I keep getting funny tan marks! I never knew I was so pale... well compared to my tan now anyway! Hehehe

Got an email to confirm my ‘Help a London Child’ bucket rattling time slot today... will be stationed at Canary Wharf Station this coming Friday between 4-7. I have never done any bucket rattling before... I guess it will be good practice for when Shirin and I have to do it for the British Heart Foundation!

Helen

PS. I did take a few photos of the concert, but as my laptop is 'out of service' and Lee isn't in to let me use his PC I can't upload the photos... will upload them as soon as I can!

Hot hot hot!

2006-07-17T21:02:00.000Z

Great excuse for indulging in all the new ice coffees/smoothies :-)

For anyone who knows me, they know that I am quite a klutz... well, I sort of ran over my laptop charger plug and broke it this morning whilst rushing to get out of my flat! LOL So I am using my old, slow PC to write today’s blog entry – hopefully I will get a new charger plug tomorrow...!

More donations update: Thank you to Ben Kennor and Kerris Deko who both work with Lee, donated a £1 each - new total is £18!

Helen

G’Day Mate ;-)

2006-07-16T20:41:00.000Z

Toast Festival food fair day... I am so stuffed! The day was gorgeous and the food was fantastic.

Sally there with a giant kangaroo and koala bear – those poor guys in those suits!

Plenty of BBQ and alcohol stands – exactly what you would expect from the Aussies!

Kantan: ‘8 assorted pieces of the fish pack sushi’ (go to an Oz food fair and the first thing I go for is Sushi... hehehe) & the ‘Wild berry with green tea and ginseng extract’ (sorry forgot to take the photo but you all know what smoothies looks like) was gorgeously refreshing
Suze in Mayfair: ‘Pacific oysters in the ½ shell with lemon wedges’

Blistering Barbecues: ‘Spit roast lamb in fresh white bread’
‘Smiths’ of Smithfield: ‘Hokey Okey ice cream in a sugar cone’

Truc Vert: ‘Pavlova roulade with strawberries’ & 'Hog spit roast in bread with condiments’
The Modern Pantry: ‘BBQ’d sweet corn rolled in mayonnaise and cheddar, with shichimi and a wedge of lime’

Would have loved to try out more food... maybe next year ;-)

Helen

The day of the BIG run! Hahaha

2006-07-15T19:35:00.000Z

The day started out quite cold but that soon changed… As soon as the saxon went off Sally left me behinds and raced off ahead! Some sister! Anyway, the most noticeable costumes that I would like to mention are a pair of young kids dressed as the ‘118 118’ guys – they had the wig, moustache, headband, vest, shorts and the badminton racket! They kept pointing at people with their racket and saying, ‘Got your number’. There were a family of pirates, parrots and all! Of course a few Superman’s, a Gladiator, Ghostbuster and a very hairy gorilla!

I told myself to finish the ‘race’ (the term is used very loosely here!) in under 20 minutes… I did it in 19 mins! Hahaha

My hands were filthy afterwards – have blisters on top of blisters!

More donations update: My mum donated a £1, along with two fabulous guys (Deputy Manager, Andy Walker and Senior Sales, Robert Jopp) who work with my brother, Lee who donated a £1 each.

Latest total is £16!

I am so tired – only had 2 hours sleep last night and I need to get up early (ish) tomorrow for the Toast thing so a few more hours of BBC’s Sports Relief and I’ll be off to bed… I can’t wait for tomorrows food fair! Woohoo!

Helen

2006-07-14T21:20:00.000Z

I took my 11-year-old sister, Sally to watch ‘Superman Returns’ with my friend Caf today. I won’t ruin it for anyone, but just words of advice… go to the toilet beforehand, as it’s a long movie!

Sally and I are doing the ‘Sports Relief – Run a Mile’ in Central London tomorrow morning (10:45 start time), come along, cheer for everyone and donate ;-)

http://www.sportrelief.com/

Two more donations today: Duong (my sister, Terresa’s fiancé - he was playing the DS Lite so he wasn't really paying any attention when I snapped him) and Sally both gave me a £1 each. I guess my family are a bunch of posers – they will not allow me to take their photos until they are happy with the way they look that day… will have a long time to wait for them to look good! LOL

This takes us up to £13!!!

Helen

Ouch!!

2006-07-14T06:49:00.000Z

Boy oh boy oh boy.. what a night. No sushi, lots of stars and lots of yap yap yap at the College of Law. Totally knackered.

hows does one get rid of a migraine?????????? blasted head of mine - shoot me please! FiVe days in a row with a throbbin head, thats not right, is it????

Ah well all is not lost, as Helen mentioned, we raised £11 in donations already whooo hooo hooo ANNNNNNNND I was so close to Kevin Spacey. I swear I saw him having a drink or two in the upstairs foyer: i just couldnt remember his name Kevin Bacon, Michael Spacey.... arggggh AND trust Helen to look at me and say "wish Hiro was here"!!! cheers doll! [I did have a continual migraine from Monday after rowing a boat on the Thames and star spotting is not my forte]

Anyhooo, gonna head off to work and catch up on Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursdays and todays work - blasted migraine and blasted course days - i know, someone, please sponsor me to do some work???

WOOOOO WOOOOO OWWOWOWOWO

£11

Shirin

p.s for British Sign Language for sushi is erm difficult for a novice like me, think you'd have to either finger spell sushi (i dont have the technical wizardry like Helen, so im gonna describe how one ought to finger spell "SUSHI") - trying me head to remember how we did this in british sign language class!!!!

Right, Ready boys and girls???....

S - get your little finger from your right hand and your little finger from your left hand. place all your other fingers down s that the two little fingers are prominent. then create two hook with them (each little finger) - and lock them together as if you were creating a chain...erm... tis so easier to show you rather than describe

U - take your right index finger and touch your left little finger

S - see above "S"

H - make your left hand flat - palm face up. Take your right hand and stoke the whole of the left hand once from wrist to finger tips

I - take you right index finger and touch your left middle finger

Now that you have finger spelt sushi, you'd have to say whether you are having Sushi for lunch or dinner.
Lunch is a simple gesture in BSL - image you are having a sandwich or burger and taking a bite out of it.
Dinner is also simple - take your index finger and middle finger of both hands (the rest of your fingers are down) - this leaves you with something that a child would do if he wanted to use his fingers as guns. Right, now you would alternately take your right hand up to your mouth (finger tips pointing to your mouth) then down again. you then take your left hand up to your mouth (finger tips pointin to your mouth) then down again. you would do this gesture a few times and speedin up the motion

arghht 0837 and im not in the office - better dash, hope you enjoyed the sign lesson.

bye bye bye

Shirin

'Superman Returns' Premiere!

2006-07-13T23:08:00.000Z

Today was suppose to be a relaxing, none exciting day… that was until I got into Leicester Square and got lost in the middle of the ‘Superman Returns’ premiere! Initially I just planned to meet up Shirin to talk about how we will sort out the finer details about our campaign.

The sun was out, loads of nutters surrounded us so we entered into the spirit of things and cheekily asked one of the Police Officers (Graham) whether there is a place reserved for wheelchair users. Graham took a leisurely strolled along the barriers towards his Sergeant… ok, we weren’t expecting anything, in fact we thought we might be told to get on our bikes, but what happened was, we were escorted through the barriers and onto the red carpet!!! We stood outside the entrance of the Odeon between the paparazzi and the big stars themselves! Shirin and I were laughing that the paparazzi must have been cursing us, standing there blocking their view.

Must say, Shirin and I was a bit overwhelmed as we only came out for sushi (yes we can’t get enough of the stuff!) and was not ready for all the stars walking by… saying that after the whole ordeal we bumped into a very lovely lady, Rhoda who has promised to email the photos she took of the stars. I will post them up as soon as she emails them to me – so fingers cross everyone ;-)

We managed to get 2 posters (one was about A1 size and the other was over 5 foot!) from the premiere, and was given permission to sell the posters on eBay to raise funds for our jump… however, the posters were so big and heavy we thought we will try to sell them right there outside Leicester Square! Our first buyer was a really friendly guy called Danny, and this is him with his friend, Abby. Our big poster was then sold to a bunch of guys (Stephen, Garry, Lily, Owen, Perry, Tak, Stephanie and Annie) from Birmingham… not sure how they will take it all the way back home – good luck guys and get in touch to tell us about it! Oh yes, the posters went for £5 each!

Have to mention Sarah who is also a fellow BHF member who donated a £1.

Thank you everyone for taking the heavy posters off our hand and donating to a worthy cause!

Helen

PS. miss maco this is just for you: ‘ice cream’, ‘cake’ and ‘fish’ (because there was no sign for ‘sushi’ or ‘raw’ in my book)

Food for thought...

2006-07-12T15:13:00.000Z

I attended the 'Taste of London 2006' food fair held at Regents Park a few weeks ago for the first time, and came across a very good cause - 'Restaurants Against Hunger', check out their website: http://www.restaurantsagainsthunger.org/ for details... basically, during October at participating restaurants you can enjoy your meal whilst knowing that you are helping in a campaign to help feed hungry children in some of the poorest countries. As I attended the 'TOL 2006' they have offered me a discount for this coming weekends Australian/New Zealand Food Fair (Toast Festivals: http://www.toastfestivals.co.uk/) which of course I will be attending - all in the name or research ;-)

Come along and seek me out to donate!

Helen

PS. Coincidently, I am trying (the operative word here!) to teach myself sign language – brought the book… had to sit in the aisle of a busy WH Smith trying out all these sign language to myself! Any way, this is the sign for toast…

Donations

2006-07-12T10:57:00.000Z

Our sponsorship pages on the www.bhf.org.uk will soon be up and running!

Donating through this site is simple, fast and totally secure. It is also the most efficient way to donate: the British Heart Foundation will receive your money electronically and if you are a UK taxpayer, an extra 28p for every £1 donated in Gift Aid will be added to your donation at no cost to you.

N.B donations made on this site will go straight to the BHF

Shirin

is it a bird? Is it a plane? it's SuperShirinandHelen

2006-07-11T20:34:00.000Z

well hello there!!

Sorry it's taken me a while to get me arse on this page - bloody restrictions in bloody work and no bloody internet at home....bloody, bloody, bloody...

Talking about blood, Helen and I have decided to JUMP FROM A PLANE for fun... and for a bit of money £800. Know it sounds like a hellava lot of coppers, but a one-off £1 donation from you could help the British Heart Foundation. Tell me about it - i'm palpitating at the thought of it!!!!!!!!!!! Do I know eight hundred peeps?? ARRRGH

I was actually inspired to jump outta a plane by Paul (men cant have all the fun, can they?!) and Helen mentioning the BHF was organising a sky dive event while dining at Ten Ten Tei (by the way - Tekka Don - absolutely delicious, cant beat some cold raw tuna in ya mouth!!!).
So why am I doing this you ask....? Weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeell, I found out when I was 20 years old that I had a heart murmur and largish shaped heart. Nowt to worry about just have a noisy heart... just likes ta sing like Aretha Frankin, Nina Simone..Shirely Bassey.
And I'm doing the sky dive becausue I feel i'm one of the lucky ones.. AF, NS and SB sing your heart out!

Now this is where you lovely people come in - please spread the word about Helen's and my plight to raise money for the British Heart Foundation and get your face/pic plastered on our blog - just post a picture of you and your donation and we'll put it up (just as long as its not toooooo explicit!)

see ya later alligator!!!

Shirin x

National Transplant Week 9th - 15th July 2006

2006-07-11T11:21:00.000Z

This week is the National Transplant Week, a week to raise awareness of NHS need for people to join the Organ Donor Register. Visit: http://www.bbc.co.uk/health/awareness_campaigns/jul_transplant.shtml for more details.

Law related news: The removal of secrecy over family court system. I did not study Family Law whilst at University, but it amazes me that there is so much secrecy surrounding the Family Courts system. The legal system should be understood and accountable to the public – justice should be done as well as seen to be done.

Helen

More sushi!

2006-07-10T20:50:00.000Z

After creating the initial intro with all the talk about sushi... I had to satisfy my craving, so I made the hour-long journey into Central just for my Chirashi (rice with a selection of raw fish) and Kaki Age (fried oysters)! I have a funny feeling that this blog is going to be half about raising funds for the jump as well as my food diary!

Helen

Brain-storming over sushi...

2006-07-10T11:31:00.000Z

Hello everyone and welcome to our (there’s me, Helen and my dear friend, Shirin) blog. We have created this blog to help raise funds for our charity parachute jump for the British Heart Foundation. We need to raise at least £800… all we ask is £1 from you and nothing more… well, you can help us on our pledge and spread the word loud and wide!

The whole idea of creating a blog to record our progress was over a fabulous sushi dinner up in Brewer Street (shameless plugging of 'Ten Ten Tei'). I mentioned that I read that a guy created a blog to raise funds asking people to donate 50p towards his iPod… well, the idea was a success for him and as this is for charity, we hope that you good people out there will be more generous and donate a mere £1 for a very good cause!

We haven’t got all the mechanics sorted yet on how you can donate, so please check back on us in a few days time when we have sorted out all the technical stuff… in the mean time you can help by doing some advertising on our behalf ;-)

Thank you in advance and hope to see you all again soon,

Helen & Shirin