Travel show was great I ATE INSECTS
OMG.
Crickets were nice- tasted like Wotsits lol! Sort of a poofy crunch and the taste was OK too. Giant ants however were DISGUSTING! So strong tasting, EURGH! I felt ill!
I also had some really REALLY nasty cheese (worst I've ever had!) which tasted like farm smell- like manure!! I felt so ill after that and the taste didn't go away for AGES! I tried to wash it down with this huge oreo muffin/cupcake sort of thing but it didn't really work and I wasted the cake/calories
didn't have the whole thing, probably just over half (it was MASSIVE though) but that was my syns for the day already wiped!
For lunch I had an asian salad though; it was done badly and tasted crap, really not great :/ only ate half and it was £6 too! The food options for non taster places at the travel show sucked! But at least I got something syn free (didn't seem to even have dressing!) and stuck to a red day.
The travel show itself was really good- we spoke to loads of tourism reps and stuff, got information about certain places, where they recommended, how easy it was to get about, what trains needed planning and which we could just hop on, prices of places, etc. Really useful!!
We went to a couple of photography talks too- one on photographing festivals (hated the guy speaking, everything he said was SO basic as if the audience hadn't picked up a camera before, and he seemed pretty douchey generally) then the second was that guy again (argh!) saying all the same stuff, plus another guy talking about wildlife photography- he was awesome! He showed some really useful comparisons between his successful and not successful photographs, he was really funny too! He'd be like "See this picture of the lepoard cubs?" Crowd: "Aww...!" Speaker: "it's CRAP!" LOL. But he'd explain why it was boring and then show another version that was better composed, more interesting, explaining why... it was useful! The other speaker just showed loads of mediocre pictures but this guy had AMAZING ones! So that was really cool
Every 15 mins they had a different taster at a different part of the exhibition, so I managed to get a few freebies in and did eqt about 6 tortilla chips with guac and some beany sauce and cheesy sauce
naughty...
Going back on Sunday to this travel show I think as there are three interesting sounding talks ('underwater realm' so diving and stuff, one wildlife photography talk and one on interesting things to do in Japan) plus a couple of the girls I'm going to India with have expressed interest and we can ask guides and stuff for info and tips and hopefully get some better ideas that way. I've got 4 more complimentary tickets that we found there (seems like pretty much no-one is actually paying to go there haha) so all free which is good!
When we got home I was debating going out as it was my friend's bday and she invited me clubbing (but I'd thought it was the next day!) but I was knackered from a crap night's sleep and waking up early (and being on my feet all day at the exhibition), also the thought of drinking lots when I knew I'd oversynned AND had Sat drinking plans looked bad... So I decided to stay in instead and we spent hours looking up getting between places we're traveling to; wether it was worth stopping at South Korea for a day or two or if it would cost an extra fortune (turns out it's CHEAPER to do that then fly from Japan to Beijing!!) and comparing other trains vs flights in China. Was really cool to get some progress there, as we realise the efforts for some places aren't really worth it (if it's costing loads especially) but then finding other places along the way that are nearby and worth seeing... Trying to work things out in order so we can figure what sort of date we'll be getting to each country. We're looking at leaving on maybe the 25th of March now! As that's when the Cherry Blossom in Japan starts! OMG so soon!! And we're also looking at maybe spending some time in Indonesia after where it's super cheap (like £4 MAX a night for a room) so we could stay in the jungle and explore wildlife and take it easy there without masses of costs by the sounds of it! Would be so cool
especially if so many places we're sort of breezing through to try and get lots in, will be nice at the end to have a base and just explore more leisurely without time pressure or nasty train journeys! Hoping to get a few days of nice beach relax time at some point in Thailand too
to recuperate after 2 months on the road! The trip is looking like probably 3 months now- yikes!
my friend said she's up for staying at ours to cat sit, will see her tonight and ask if 3 months+ would be pushing it, but sounds like she's really grateful to have the place rent free and it coincides with her getting home from her 'emotional rehab' place.
So tonight is her bday and we're getting together for lots of drinks, pizza (will try and resist!), games and general fun... then might go out after if she feels like it, but probably just watch movies and play wii games really.
I just looked up calorie info for the white wine I nabbed on the flights to/from Dubai recently- have so many mini bottles now! Turns out Sauvignon blanc is one of the lowest calorie wines going- score! So apparently for a mini 187ml bottle (1.8 glasses of wine) it's 150 cal = 7.5 syns! Cool
on the flights I have about FOUR of these to get really drunk though, so that would be 60cal/30 syns - still much less than the 50syns I'd flexi this time last year for all the vodka I'd need to get drunk... though altitude helps get drunk quicker so 4 bottles might not be enough
but anyway, I'm going to take that rather than drinking vodka as LAST TIME I ended up doing SO many shots and it was not fun cleaning up the vomit the next day lol! This way I can keep track a bit better, even if I have 5 mini bottles (37.5 syns).
I'm going to have home made burgers again for lunch and then no dinner, and will avoid the sloppy munching on stuff there as I never really enjoy eating when drinking, makes my teeth hurt (odd!) and unsettles my stomach.
