It's all a memory now...

I am back from a magical time in Thailand and it's all a memory now.

Good,soul fulfilling memories.

Feeling deeply grateful for the experience.

Back to work tomorrow and fingers crossed the chiseling of a new and more fulfilling chapter starts.

I love piña coladas

Backpack packed,new passport in hand,work out of office message is on and it's time to head out to the airport. Contiki-Thailand here I come!!!!!!

I envision me being a "smiley adventurous happy traveller" discovering beautiful shores, meeting fun crazy people,trying out new culinary delights,swimming,swimming,more swimming and drinking copious amounts of cocktails while basking in the Thai sun.

I've got a feeling....

I can't get no sleep

This morning was a crazy day for me. I had to really dig deep to get up and get going for the last day of the course. I barely slept last night due to one of my neighbors watching tv loudly from 11pm-3am. On top of that I picked up some flu germs in the training room on Sunday so as you can imagine I was not feeling my best prior to the attempts at sleeping.I want to just cry when I think of my two nights of poor poor attempts at sleep!Been trying my utmost to get the vitamin c and medication dosage up.

Today I felt so overwhelmed and hazy the entire day! Hoping to get a decent nights sleep in tonight and hopefully will be tons better in the morning.

Fuchsia tutu on?

I have my fuchsia tutu on and am ready to take Friday on!!!!

Happy Friday peeps.

Keep calm...

The awaited post about my run

I had had a very poor nights sleep the night before the event and
tried my very very best to push through mentally and physically and
not allow the fear and mindtalk of "How will I manage....all my
training will go down the drain due to my poor nights sleep!"

I got to the staff bus stop at 04:50am for the 5am departure to the
event and the roadside was buzzing with eager runners. Thankfully I
found my SA buddy Alida and we kept each other company till the start.
(Alida is the lady on the left in the pic). We were at the start two
hours before the start!!!!Guess this couldn't be avoided due to road
closures and getting 900 odd staff members to the race. It was
freezing and behind where we stationed ourselves for the long wait was
this inviting looking tent which housed organizers in their smart
attire all having breakfast peering out at us freezing souls!!!
Despite the cold I loved being in the atmosphere of this event. You
know these type of events ignite my fire.

All sorts of people arrived and I was entertained by observing the
different types of interesting running kits,photo taking mania and I
was in hysterics at a man attempting to ask us for safety pins through
hand signals due to a lack of being able to speak English. I soon
labelled him a "Drill-Sargent" as this guy was rallying up his guys,
making them do warm up drills and chanting things in a foreign
language. He was a fun "Drill-Sargent" and yes this guy mirrored what
I think Aroon would have been doing if he was there with "Team
Jellies."

Eventually the sun started to rise and the orange tinge in the sky
against the Dubai skyscrapers made that wait worth it. Shortly after
the race began I had an all round boost of adrenalin gushing through
me just at the sheer thought that I was doing the event and that I was
representing Team Jellies and wanted to make them proud. This kept me
on an absolute high.

I kept a good stride through the event and was able to keep a track of
my progress on my pink sports watch (thanks Adhil).

It was a great route through the area around "Dubai mall down to
Business Bay and back" (I overheard a gent saying to his partner "No
running to the mall now...stay on the route).

All in all a great atmosphere... with people along the roadside
cheering us on however I did miss the masses we would have back home
supporting these type of events.

I managed to exceed my goal of 60-75 minutes and finished in 57:40 minutes.
I really surprised myself and as you can imagine I was smiling inside
all the way home. In fact I'm still smiling about it!!!!

"Yes you can"

Hope this message can resonate with you in some way today....