Monday, September 27, 2021

Starting Over

 Hello again!

I've decided to pick up the blog again. It's been a while for sure but then again we've had this Covid time, the various lock downs, restrictions and the rest and well, it was uncomfortable for sure but then again both Viv and I have been OK and despite things remain so. I am aware so many others were not this lucky so didn't really feel I wanted to blog whilst others weren't as lucky as me.

However, after nearly a couple of years we decided to head away from Penang. To start with we couldn't decide whether we would start in England or Bermuda but plumped finally for Bermuda. These are the only two countries we discovered where we had the 'right' to enter but mainly choosing Bermuda was because we felt being smaller, things would be better controlled. And they were.

What a palaver traveling is though.

I find it amazing to think that only two years ago I considered myself a sort of citizen of the world. Travel had become pretty much a right, not a privilege. We could travel practically anywhere in the world at any time without let or hindrance. The internet made it incredibly easy and fast both to plan trips, even extended trips, and pay for them, unlike in the pre internet era which sad to say I only just about remember. In some countries, there may have been some more onerous paperwork to assemble, but that was pretty much it. No longer. Controls the world over came slamming down. Border restrictions that had not been there before appeared with dramatic force. Travel has again become a privilege. Borders are back.

And those PCR tests!

At one point, I had 4 or 5 (my bad memory is trying to help) tests within a 10-day period and even though the kindly people inserting that long Q-Tip and twizzling it around comforted me that I would get used to it so long as I breathed in and flared my nostrils, nothing of the sort happened (even though I did as recommended). It remained consistently invasive and horrible. 

The first was the biggest shock and the most curious as I sat in the front seat of our car and the doctor applied the Q-Tip through the open window (he insisted Viv should sit in the back seat). I didn't realize that twizzly thing had to go quite that far up and I both jumped and yelped quite a bit making the doctor apologize profusely.  

Thankfully all negative though.

To celebrate I bought a new motorcycle!