Chapter 29 - Back in Oz...

Saying goodbye is never easy. There were lots of tears in the days leading up to my departure… at the airport… and after I left Iceland. I have been back in Oz now for a few days… It feels quite strange to be back as I feel like I’ve been away for a very long time. Birna and I made a cosy little home in Teigasel… and it’s hard being away from her, although we both feel good knowing that we have something very special and that we will have a wonderful future together (wherever that may be… destination still unknown).

It has been really nice catching up with my family and friends again. They are all telling me how relaxed and happy I look… and that I now have a funky “European” hairdo, haha. I'm not sure I will find a hairdresser here that will cut my hair the same way, so I’m going to fly back to Iceland once a month to get it done.

The jetlag hasn’t hit me that hard (yet). I was very lucky on the plane trip home… I got 3 seats to myself flying from London to Seoul, and then two seats to myself from Seoul to Brisbane. I used to love flying when I was a kid… How excited I was to see what food they would serve and what movies they would show. I can’t say I’m a big fan of flying these days though. I think the thing I dread most is the airplane toilet!! Yes, some might say that I have a bit of a ‘public toilet phobia’ (for a complete list of my phobias and other quirks, please refer to Appendix A, pages 1 – 10) …but flying from Iceland to Australia kind of makes them a little hard to avoid! So I refer to my “top three rules when using public toilets” to get me through this ordeal…

1. Push/pull the toilet door and taps with any other body part other than hands/fingers. Elbows and feet are preferable where possible, otherwise knuckles and the little pinky finger are acceptable.
2. NEVER sit on the toilet seat. Even when needing to do the unthinkable… A number two! (It’s better to feel like you’ve just run a marathon and have your thighs shake for two hours instead of sitting on the seat!)
3. When ready to flush, grab some more toilet paper and use that to press the flush button, then promptly throw the paper in the toilet as it is flushing.

(A special mention to Heathrow airport… they had automatic sensors for the toilet flush and for the taps at the basins… it was very very exciting!)


By the way... you may be wondering why my blog hasn't been "re-vamped" as promised in my last chapter. Well after some careful thought and deliberation, I decided that I wanted to keep the "icelandic feel" that I first created... as this is something I want to look back on in 10 years and smile about, and show our children where it all started... ;-)