Travel jags!

"To travel is to discover that everyone is wrong about other countries.”  - Aldous Huxley

I have travelled to many countries, from England down south to the very far away New Zealand. However, I never really felt I had experienced the real culture of these countries. We went, we stayed with relatives or in hotels or in hostels, we went and saw touristy things, the sights, you know, the Eiffel Tower and such. But I never stayed longer than a few weeks, at most. I never really felt I was experiencing the true culture of the country - I was just a visitor, was going to leave in a few days or weeks, and so there was no opportunity to become immersed in the culture. Now, a full year is a long time. 12 months, 52 weeks, 365 days, whatever. I have that long to get completely immersed in the country, its culture, customs, traditions, weird and wonderful bits of knowledge that I can get from nowhere other than the country itself. It's strange thinking that a large percentage of all the people in the world will never have the chance to travel far from their own country, compared to me, anyway. And I'm only 17! 

Urgh, jags. This has become a definite reality the past few days. I hadn't really thought about it much until my Mum asked me about them and I was just like oh yeah... I have to get, like, the rabies jag and stuff. Eww. Now I don't actually mind getting injections - don't get me wrong, it is not my favourite way to spend an afternoon - but I'm not scared of needles, even though I do prefer to look away. I need to get:

Polio
Tetanus/diptheria
Typhoid
Hep A
Hep B
Rabies

(Although I already have Polio and Tetanus/diptheria so it's not quite as long a list as it looks)

And I will also need to get country - specific ones when I find out where I am definitely going in May. Whoopee. So, much fun to be awaited there. I might also have to take Malaria tablets whilst I'm out there - they're daily, which would be a huge effort I can't be bothered with. Why can't they just make huge tablets that you only have to take once a week? Would be SO much easier.

Oh and also it's muy estresante at the moment because of my ceilidh...which is a week tomorrow. Eeeek. Lots of planning which we should have finalised much earlier than this, but couldn't because getting the date wasn't definite until just before Christmas-ish, has all just accumulated, along with a big huge wodge of schoolwork to do - my favourite. So there is a general feeling of there not being enough hours in the day to get stuff done and blogging is probably not helping. Although at least it does get stuff out of my head.

AHH JUST 174 DAYS TO GO! According to the calendar on my Virgin MoneyGiving page, anyway. Take a look, if you want. You could even donate!

Heather <3