So long, farewell...

What a great trip to Spain that was. From the moment we landed there was a strong feeling of being home at last, probably because we were there en famille, mixed with an awareness of it being the last time for a long time. It was a bit harder for Elly, as she's old enough to remember but too young to make sense of it, so she was a bit freaked out at first. The little 'un just dived on in, chatted away in Oggis-speak and cavorted about with his toy cars. They both ended up having a lovely time, staying up dead late, running wild and terrorising the high seas.

Whenever we've popped over during the last six months it's been without them, a solo mission for one thing or another so it felt very temporary; this time there was a curious permanence about everything, almost as if we were staying, alongside the fact that we're about to leave for NZ, as if it was for ever. Getting together with friends felt like we'd never been away, it was like putting on a favourite pair of jeans that fit so snug and comfortable, you quickly forget you're wearing them. It made the farewells more bearable, as I just told myself and anyone who'd listen that we'd be back again soon, but to finally leave is to step into a pair of cold, unworn, starched pants of our own design.

The mission this time was to ship our stuff from Maria's garage; to cut a long story short, it was accomplished with unnerving ease. We returned to the UK on Tuesday at almost the exact same time as my dad was allowed to go home (yay!), shipped the contents of the flat on the Wednesday, spent Thursday having medical checks and other wallet-slimming activities, we left the kids with Nik's mam & dad and spent a lovely, relaxed couple of nights in a nice sea-front hotel (Anne's treat, a real godsend..) and even found time today to get Nik a new passport. It's finally all organised, just the journey itself remains. Ok, we still need to sell the car (a very nice 8-year-old Megane Scenic Monaco 2.0 16v... anyone..?) and make a few things (a couple of phone calls, some sandwiches, the last of the goodbyes..) but for days we've been cases packed ready for the off, apart from a few pairs of shoes and the odd Disney-related pantomime outfit.

The truth is, we're both way more overwhelmed with the goodbyes than the packing and sorting. Logistics can be worked out beforehand and help drafted in easily enough, but you simply can't factor in the emotional energy you need to meet almost every one of your friends and family over the course a a few days, and bid them farewell. On the face of it, it's a great chance to catch up and we're so lucky to have had the time and opportunity to do it; really sad to have missed out a few buddies both here and in Spain, but really blown away by the realisation that so many people mean so much to us. Thanks, everyone, for all your support and love and encouragement; armed with that, we really are prepared for anything.

"We're not buying chutney..."

I suppose it must be about time to panic now. Everyone else is. We're just about to shoot off to Spain for a few days, then we're back for a few days, then we'll be on a few planes for a few days and then we'll be in New Zealand. On paper, we're ready, which is to say everything's booked, we have (or can be fairly confident of soon having) all the certificates, med checks, shipping, insurance, flight, immigration, hotel and hire car documentation in order. Writing this instead of doing something more constructive is typical of me in these circumstances, ie in times of high stress, I invariably find something utterly frivolous to do. I've been pointlessly surfing things to do on a stopover in Los Angeles, for example (even though we're going via Singapore) seeing as the area's been in the news so much. An opportune time to visit, I'd say, spend some pocket money, maybe buy a couple of investment banks ;)

Mostly though, I've found it expedient to swot up on stuff worth checking out in NZ. A number of other visitors there seem to use the same stress-aversion technique I do, either that or they're incurable nerds. It's a very outdoorsy place and there's plenty of sport goes on beyond the obvious rugby-and-cricket. This is after all the home of falling off bridges for fun, having the world's first permanent bungee jumping site, and continues to innovate in the more bizarre thrill-seeking sports, including ball games. Cycling is very popular and seemingly infected with the "extreme sport" ethos; where I'd maybe have expected to see a decent turnout for a nice organised ride round a lake, they have 5,000 riders registered for a 160km mountainous course, with some of them putting their names down for the four-lap 640km "maxi-enduro"... there'll probably be someone doing it in a large inflatable ball, just to go one better.

Otherwise, the drawbacks are still sinking in. I mentioned the Ikea thing a few posts ago, and it seems we may have to re-think our TV strategy as well as home decor choices, as it turns out the BBC iPlayer feeds aren't (legally) available there. Nor are NZ offerings likely to provide much incentive to buy a TV, having as it does the worst TV programmes ever. Oz TV wasn't that much better when we were there, although ABC1's Gruen Transfer show recently came up with some pretty interesting ideas for alternative forms of entertainment for both countries. The spot was based on the news that NZ basically has no fully-funtional armed forces. I'm not sure if that's good news or bad, frankly. It should probably be filed under "drawbacks: inconsequential".

Of course we're almost deliriously excited about living there & Nik in particular is prone to sudden explosive bouts of uncontrollable frenzy at the thought. But we're already missing some things, mostly food-related, due to the double whammy of running down the pantry and the absolute ban on bringing food through NZ customs. They have highly-trained dogs at the airport, sniffing out not drugs or guns, but ham sandwiches. There's no shortage of poorly-trained dogs that could do the same job, but you have to admire their zeal. We certainly won't be risking it, even though the temptation to bring a year's supply of chorizo picante over from Spain is nigh-on overwhelming. There is hope for all things South East Asian of course and I don't mind leaving behind all my spices and stuff, but it really is almost impossible to force down a ploughman's without some Branston or something to help it on its way. Low-turnover condiments that won't get used up have been stricken from the shopping list until we get there. On the bright side, chutney looks big in NZ, so there's that at least to look forward to, and there's bound to be something resembling a cheese and pickle sarnie at the airport to ease the craving.

Right, I really must get on with the panicking... er, packing... next blog from Spain!

A blessing

As mentioned last post, my dad's not been at all well recently. He fell victim to an extremely nasty NHS superbug which no-one seemed to have heard of until it finally hit the news last week.

Clostridium dificile (aka C.diff) has been approaching epidemic proportions here for some time, largely because it wasn't getting properly reported or even diagnosed. The recorded survival rate among people Sid's age is frighteningly low, mostly as a result of secondary and tertiary complications. In his case, it destroyed the wall of his bowel; the resulting peritonitis caused respiratory and renal failure, which was bad enough, but it also meant 90% of his large intestine had to be removed. Colectomy is a seriously risky procedure but, like the C.diff, thanks to timely intervention and an amazing resilience he's shown in the past, he's survived it.

He spent five days out cold in the Critical Care Unit and took a further week to re-orient himself and recover to the point of being able to communicate normally, and although he's still too weak to stand on his own two feet he's just about able to feed himself and slowly understand what's happened to him. This week, as the tubes and drips have been gradually withdrawn, he's started to show definite progress. A major turning point was Wednesday's request for a sausage... a sure sign the old Sid is re-emerging at last :)

It's hard to believe this all started with a completely unrelated bladder complaint, which now seems utterly trivial in comparison, just over six weeks ago. That was yet another complication of an earlier surgery, the whole saga going back to his cancer treatment of several years ago. Just before the C.diff took him off the radar he told me some stuff about all this trauma which has changed my perception of medical intervention for ever. I'm still digesting it, maybe I'll write it down one day but I'm already way too far down the page today to start elaborating it now. Suffice to say, life's too short.

Sometimes things coincide in a very pertinent way, and it was during the darkest hours of this whole nightmare that our inchoate relocation efforts (finding shippers and insurers and airlines and accommodation and god knows what else) all started to deliver results. One after the other, things have just fallen into place with barely any effort at all. We're now all booked up onto a flight to Singapore on the 30th – just over 3 weeks time –arriving in Auckland around midnight on the 2nd October. We have a trip to Barcelona organised in the meantime, the shipping company have been very reassuring, we have a lovely place to stay when we get to NZ, it's all, suddenly, sorted.

A few weeks ago, Dad got to his feet as I made to leave the cubicle, grabbed my arm and said, "for god's sake, don't let all this crap get in the way". At the time, I didn't know what to say. As I traversed the warren of corridors back to the car park, I started to realise how lucky we were to be here for all this crap; we could so easily have still been stuck in Spain. I'm just thankful we were around for him and me Mam, who has been amazingly strong through even the most desperate times. We're not out of the woods yet and life is clearly going to be a bit of a struggle for a while after he gets home, but it's important that life goes on with the same determination as before, for everyone concerned. The resilience I've seen this last few weeks will always be an inspiration.

Get well soon, mate.