Works Weekly Fashion

Hello all my blogging friends!! 

Thank you all so much for your lovely comments to my previous travel post on Tanzania! It's good to be properly back in the blogging world. 

I am currently crammed in my parents little office perfectly situated across the road from the Fine Arts Gallery that I now work at. 

I have had the most divine time working there so far! This is the first job I've walked into without feeling completely overwhelmed and nervous. I feel so comfortable and happy there - like I just slot right in! 

I started on a Wednesday as I still had to finalize some things with the Real Estate agency. So it isn't a full weeks worth of fashion unfortunately but these were my little ensembles for this week:

Wednesday: 

Day one I must admit I had an absolutely masssssssssive hangover. Not great for the first day at what is literally a Dream Job to me!!! But I had gone out for lunch with my friend Patrick and lunch turned into some serious Gin and Tonics, followed by a bottle of Shiraz, followed by beer.... followed by a car filled with empty bottles and two wine glasses stolen from the restaurant (which I will be returning at some point or another!). I finally collapsed into my bed at about 2am, carting around my two cats and forcing love out of them until I fell asleep curled around my hot water bottle and tubby sausage dog. Good times. 

Thursday:

Friday: 

Today was a particularly sad day for me. At 2am I woke up feeling really restless and uneasy, but I stayed in bed and cuddled closely to my sausage dog conveniently snuggled under the duvet with me as well as my ginormously tubby cat, India. 

By 3am I still hadn't been able to drift back off and I started hearing noises downstairs. I plodded down my staircase to investigate and found my mother holding one of our four furry feline friends in her arms, wrapped in a towel. 

I asked her what was wrong and she looked up at me with devastated eyes before whispering, "Mini Minx... he's dead." 

I thought it must have been a dream. He was only nine years old. Definitely not old enough for his time to be up. Although he had already exceeded far more than their given nine lives. 

He was the worlds most awesome cat. When we got him I had named him Sprite and by the time it came to neuter him we discovered he was in fact a girl. This news was given to us on April Fools day and so we renamed him or 'her' April. 

That lasted all of two weeks until somehow to vet told us that he had somehow managed to miraculously grow male genitals once more and we finally got him neutered! That is how he was dubbed: Mini Minx. 

About a year ago Mini Minx was attacked by a dog and bitten through the head. He suffered severe brain damage but he eventually recovered. My family had wanted to put him down as he as unable to close his mouth, making it impossible for him to eat or drink. I refused and took the responsibility of forcing a syringe down his throat until he was able to use his tongue and jaw again. 

The brain damage only made him more affection towards us. I think it was because he realized how much he needed us and how much we truly cared for him. 

Finding him sprawled out on the floor at 3am with no life in him was the biggest shock I've had to face in a long time. He had no wounds, no illness, no bumps... he was just gone. 

The only thing we can think of is a heart attack. 

Anyway... so we buried him in the garden at 8am this morning and planted some seeds there to grow into beautiful flowers - something we'll look at and always remember our beautiful boy. 

He really was the most awesome cat with more character and spunk than all the cats in the world combined together. He'd make us laugh daily with his quirky little ways. 

Trust Mini Minx to leave this world on Friday the 13th - cool cat that he is!

I'll love you forever Minxie-Man... here's a tribute to you:

Rest in Peace my boy.

It's my lunch break at work right now and I think that it is finally hitting me. It all felt like a bad dream at first.. but now I just keep replaying it in my head and remembering our good times. Is it lame that I feel this way about a cat? I don't think so. I'm an animal fanatic and all of my animals are literally like my four legged children.

Wishing everyone an absolutely gorgeous weekend filled with infinite love and happiness.

Let's end this working week off with a great tune! Hope you enjoy it! It's called La La La by Moll Flanders:

Remembrance

It's weird how things change... how in just one measly year your entire life has become what you least expected it to be. Lately I've been thinking about how different my life is now compared to last year this time. 

This was me back in October 2011:

On Monday this week I went back to do the same hike:

To you, you might not be able to see the world of change or feel it... but take a recent photo of yourself and compare it to one you took a couple of years back and I swear it's one of the weirdest feelings I've ever had. 

2011:

2013:

In my soul, I always have been and always will be a free loving surfer girl. I'll always be a free-spirit for a passion for adventure and new things. 

But back to the point.... 

This time last year things couldn't be more different to now. 

2013... I now reside back with my parents. Don't know how long that it going to last!! 

I also work at an arts gallery whereas last year I was up at the spa. 

I have travelled Europe and been to Tanzania now - whereas last year my DREAM was to just walk through Rome. Now I've done so much its incredible. 

What else? There's so much and I'm running out of time. My lunch break is nearly over. 

In September 2012 I had recently moved into a cottage with my ex boyfriend of almost three years. I'd just adopted two beautiful little kittens, India and Guru. When my relationship turned sour I fell hopelessly and irrevocably in love with someone. I truly thought he would be the love of my life... there was just one major hiccup. We couldn't be together and in his eyes we never could... because little did I know when we met and he stole my heart, he was married. 

Anyway.... since then, it has been a huge battle for me to open up my heart again. It is so hard to let people in and become vulnerable. 

That is twice... maybe three times that I have been seriously hurt in love. 

The first was a stupid internet boyfriend thing... he went to school with my cousin overseas so it's not like he could have been some forty-year-old plumber was God-Knows-Where... I knew he existed. Back in those days we'd MSN chat and email back and forth day after day for about three years. I used to believe I loved him but that changed... 

My good friend Michael was next. We're still good friends to this day but we also had a Romeo and Juliet type of story. I adored him... with my heart and soul I knew he was the one I wanted to end up with. BUT (there's always a but isn't there???), I had dated his brother in law when I was 16 years old and when my ex found out about us he freaked out. He told Michael that if he continued to see me he would be disowned as family. 

Me being me, I told Michael to choose family. As much as it hurt, I knew it was the right thing to do.  

Now, Michael has a beautiful foreign girlfriend and they are about to have a baby. 

After Michael there was Eddie. Eddie was married man. The one that has pretty much annihilated my heart and has made it pretty much the scariest thing in the world to love again. 

How do you know you love someone? 

I don't know... there are some people I should be able to say I was in love with after years of dating them.... but my heart now knows what love truly is and what I felt for those three just doesn't compare to what I've felt for anyone else. 

I made a promise to myself that I wouldn't blog about current / future boyfriends. I don't want to not be able to look back in my blogs history because I'm not ready to remember relationships I've written about. It's private anyway. So I try not to type things out that are happening in my life right now. Instead I write out the past... a journal of remembrance. I don't think before I write these things out. I just let my fingertips hit the keyboard and it pours. I don't really expect many people to read posts such as these... these are pretty personal and long... 

But if you do have a moment - define love for me. In your own words. Tell me what you think it is. Tell me about your heartbreaks and how you overcame them. My heart is battered and bruised and it really shouldn't be now. It's been a year since that heartbreak and it needs to go away now. I want to move on. 

2012:

2013:

Zanzibar - Tanzania

I took so many photographs in Zanzibar it is impossible to put them all on here! So... sadly.. I have decided to put the photographs into small sections to sum up my beautiful week long trip there. I hope you enjoy them! 

The Sunsets

They say a picture is worth a thousand words... well here are five to show you just how absolutely phenomenal the sunsets are over there. It's breathtaking. Surreal. A dream that you just don't want to wake from. 

The Spice Farms

An absolute MUST if you ever go to Zanzibar... going on a local spice tour. It may seem a bit intimidating at first but it is so fascinating and you learn so much not only about spices and taste but also about the culture of the local muslims here and their way of life. What a treat! 

If you're ever there and your local guide asks you if you want to see Butterfly Man ( a man that climbs up a palm tree and sings to you), please don't say no like we were tempted to. We thought it would be a silly tourist gimmick but I am so glad that we decided to experience it. Yes. It is a man climbing up a palm tree and singing to you... but the palm tree is like......... forty feet high! Higher!!! He collects coconuts from the top (with no harness or safety provided for him) and he scales his way back down, dancing as he does so.. adding in the odd trick here and there showing his super-human strength balancing with one hand off of the side of the tree still way too high up for it to be safe!

He then cuts up the coconuts of different ages and explains the difference in each one. 

As it is a muslim community I must warn you to please show respect and cover up the shoulders, tummy and legs. While we were there (not on the spice farm, but in the country), two British girls were attacked with acid. Another was attached with a machete knife.  On that note....

The Locals

Barring what I just said... the locals are probably some of the friendliest people that I have ever met. 

Every person greets you and smiles and is so ready and willing to help. They remember your names and genuinely want to know how you are and what you have planned for the day. Their English is broken but you understand exactly what they mean by the way they communicate with their eyes and hands. They are just lovely. Warm and welcoming and protective of you! 

I went on three boat cruises in Zanzibar, all with the same captain. Captain Marco Polo. He is amazing!!!! Every day he'd have fresh lobster, King Fish, Calamari, Squid, Coconut Rice... it was all there for us every day and he'd cook it all up while we snorkled and swam around the area looking at the most beautiful coral that I have ever seen.  

If I can offer some advice here, just listen to the locals. They know what they are talking about. When they tell you that you need a guide to walk along the beach, listen to them. There are people called Beach Boys who will try and sell you things on the beach and can get quite aggressive if you keep refusing them or choose someone else over them. 

Barter with the locals. Half the price of whatever they are trying to sell you and go from there. It's a bit like Thailand in that respect and luckily I had experience with bartering in Thailand when I was 16 so it wasn't a completely new concept to me. 

The Ocean and it's Sea-Life 

It wouldn't be a lie if I told you I swam every single day that I was there. Sunset to sunrise, my hair was crispy with sea-salt and I had sand underneath my toes. It is how life should be - is it not? 

I was lucky enough to visit the Zanzibar Aquarium whilst there, where I saw such a gorgeous turtle environment and even got to hold a baby turtle that was barely 4 months old! I got to feed to bigger turtles too and stroke their beautiful shell homes. 

When we went out on the boats we saw dozens of dolphins swimming around our boat, playing with us in the lapping water. 

The ocean was a photoshopped kind of blue. It feels like a dream when you're looking out onto the horizon, a dream you really never want to wake up from. 

We snorkled with such beautiful fish, over the most beautiful coral. We fed the fish little bits of banana under the water (believe it or not, they love it!). It was all just too incredible for words.  

The Company 

When you travel it is absolutely essential to go with people that you can be yourself around, have fun with... people who bring the best out in you and are ready to embrace all that they country has to offer with you. If you have that - you are sure to have the absolute best time travelling. 

Zanzibar was AWESOME!!!!!! After one week it felt as though we had done two weeks there.. that is how much we fitted in with such a small amount of time to play with. 

We visited Stone Town but unfortunately it was Ramadaan so everything was closed. We had really wanted to get to the Freddy Mercury bar but alas.... we still had such a fantastic time! 

Cocktails and food were all inclusive so we literally just drank ourselves into a coma, ate until we very nearly popped and almost turned into wrinkly, dried up hobo's by the time we had to leave.