What exactly am I doing?

Ok so. I’ve decided to start a bit of a blog because last time I travelled I had a whole lot of interesting thoughts in my head, and none of them actually made it out of there (my head, that is). Also, when travelling on your own, it’s especially good to have somewhere to deposit such thoughts.

So what’s with the blog name? Well. I’m reading Eat Pray Love at the moment. Of course I am, I’m a single 30-something woman about to head off on a solo journey of self-discovery. If you pronounce the words in French, they actually (kinda) rhyme with Eat Pray Love. (Yeah ok, I’m trying to be clever. And to brush up on my French whilst blogging. Two birds, one stone right? Or should I say, deux oiseaux, une… what’s the French word for stone? Ok, I digress…).

Vite, allez and brave translate as “quick, go and brave”. I’m going to take some liberties here and paraphrase this into something slightly more meaningful. I’ve always liked the word “vite,” (veet) ever since Miss Smith used to yell it at us in class when we were dawdling. It’s snappy and crisp and conveys urgency. 

“Allez” (al-lay) is equally upbeat and forward-moving (plus it totally rhymes with ‘pray’). “Brave,” (braaaa-ve) of course, simply means “brave”. Courage is one of my values and also something that’s required for solo voyages. So my (somewhat loose) interpretation of this phrase is to say, go forth bravely, and do it now! There’s no time like the present.

Where am I going?

I am going to Japan and France. Japan is a ‘maybe’ though, for obvious and very sad reasons. I am hoping that I can go over there still and spend some yen as at least it's some sort of contribution. I am supposed to stay in Tokyo for five nights. 

Then it’s off to Paris for seven nights. After this, I am to meet with the lovely Dale and Daniel, and head south to the Loire Valley. This is a land of castles and wine. Once the boys head back to London, I shall board an early morning train to Lyon, followed by Avignon, Aix-en-Provence and Nice. I have two nights in each of these places.

I chose France as my first major solo journey as it has the benefit of being not-too-scary (I’ve been there before, I speak some of the language and it’s a safe country) yet still offers lots of new adventures and unexplored territory. It’s also rather exciting as I happened to adore Paris when I was there ten years ago. There is very little pressure to visit major tourist attractions, other than Musee d’Orsay and Versailles, which I missed last time.

I chose to go via Japan for something new and different. I’ve always wanted to go, and having been to Singapore and Hong Kong before, I thought it would make a more interesting stopover. I did Japanese for about four years at school as well, not that you’d know it by my very limited vocabulary right now.

Where have I been?

I had a bit of a trial-run at travelling solo back in January. I learnt a lot on that trip so I think now would be a good time to review some of these points (and finally get them out of my head). Prior to this, I had not travelled on my own, and had not, in fact, travelled for a couple of years so the lessons learned were rather vital. Here we go:

1) It’s hard to pee when you have your luggage with you

Urination must be carefully planned at the best of times when travelling. When you’re on your own and burdened with half your bodyweight in luggage, it’s virtually impossible. Just something to factor in before airport stops. And when you’re slurping away at that seemingly innocuous looking bottle of water.

2) You need a pen to fill in those green card thingies

Seems obvious, doesn’t it? But there I was in the Air Pacific line sans stylo. Quel dommage! Not one of my brighter moments but quickly amended thanks to the Newsagency nearby. C’est facile.

3) It is excessively boring waiting in line for customs on your own but you can’t use that as an excuse for using your phone as it’s banned and you should actually pay attention to the signs on the walls because nobody else is going to do that for you

Patience is a virtue. One that I’m still cultivating. I’d forgotten quite how onerous the travel part of travelling actually is. For my next trip, I really need to be prepared to approach these arduous times with calm resolve. Perhaps I can meditate my way through various borders? 

Or perhaps not. My tendency to tune out is why I got told off for using my phone in the first place. Well, what on earth am I supposed to do mister? This line is going to take at least fifteen minutes. Dear god. The Gen Y in me recoils in horror at the notion of such stretches of unoccupied time.

4) Everyone wants what they can’t have

I met this one family at the resort, the mother of which saw me as some sort of reincarnation of her own past life. She wistfully told me how she too once travelled alone, but now her husband “won’t let her”. I’m sure she didn’t really want to trade in her kids and spouse so that she could go tearing off on her own to tropical islands, but it did make me think. I may envy some people their family life (probably not actually anyone in that resort though as they were a rather uninspiring lot), but they in turn may envy my freedom. Whatever your situation, it’s important to make the most of things.

5) Groups of Australians from cruise ships are an army of bogans
There were about nine million or so Australians who’d docked in Port Vila the day I went into town. OMG. The hair plaits. The pink lycra. The ill-fitting footwear. I’ve never seen anything like this sprout-headed, be-spandexed, ill-shod lot. And then they opened their mouths. Egads!

It was even worse than the time when I stood in the middle of Tiananmen Square ten years ago and heard an Australian tourist yell, “move your head, you drongo,” so that she could include Chairman Mao’s venerable visage in her frame. And that was certainly cause enough for alarm. I’m sorry to say that in Port Vila, I switched from English into French. And no, I am absolutely not from the cruise ship, thank you very much.

6) You can do anything and everything on your own

I had a bit of a rocky start in Vanuatu, whereby I was greeted upon my arrival at the resort by a paunchy, middle aged Caucasian male in full native attire. The tittering crowd of onlookers did nothing to reduce my embarrassment and confusion. Nor did the ominously enthusiastic greeting he offered (aimed somewhere at my chest); “WELCOME to le Lagoon resort”. Hmph. It really was not my intention to stand out. I just wanted to blend in and do my own thing.

Which I did. By the end of my trip I was eating, snorkelling, swimming, taking photos and generally doing exactly what I liked, on my own. I never saw my grass-clad friend again either, although I was informed by a reliable source that he was part of a group of bored guests who’d decided to form a somewhat alarming sort of impromptu greeting party. Good for him. It’s funny now.

So that’s where I’m up to at the moment. I’ll update this once I’m a bit closer to actually leaving (I still have a month). My train tickets arrived in the mail yesterday and my hotels are all booked so things are finally starting to feel real. Hooray.