Farewell Chinese

In just over two weeks my sister and Matt will be setting off on a three month trip around the world. Well, three countries of it anyway: Canada, New Zealand, and Thailand!

It seems like it will be brilliant fun, and an experience of a lifetime. I’ve only ever been to Paris, and only for a weekend so I’ve not got much comparison, but if that is anything to go by it should be a real eye-opener for them. I remember feeling that Paris was different. The culture there was evident and the whole vibe of the place was somehow different from England. I dare say that a sense of self-pride was evident that is (sadly) lacking now in Britain - heck they had gold gilded statues in the streets. I can only imagine what somewhere like Thailand would be like, with it’s eastern values and different climate. I’m quite envious of them both!

Anyway, we had a meal at a Chinese in Leek by way of a fond farewell, which itself was great. I’ve not met Nathan and Jo since the last time we were at the very same Chinese some four or five years ago, which is a shame because they both seem great people. I also met Jody (Jodie?) and Emma, who were a good laugh and also thoroughly nice people smiley icon: smile

Being socially inept, as I sometimes am, I didn’t speak to the other end of the table until after the meal, for which I apologise. For some reason the thought of getting out of my chair and wandering over did not occur to me. Instead I sat there and thought to myself “silly table arrangement!”. What can I say - what comes natural to most people I tend to have to work at when the context is social in nature smiley icon: worry

Much of the meal was spent having a laugh and expressing our amazement at managing to order such a huge volume of food. Other conversation topics included “dog thongs” and “John Craven”. The former coming around because someone stated that “If you google it, it will exist” - it’s a theory we have put to the test at work, and it seems to hold up. By way of a test we had put two random words together - and sure enough, if you Google it, Dog Thongs exist. Yes, thongs. For Dogs. The top results are advertised as odour neutralising. The world is mad.
As for the John Craven - there was a guy on an adjacent table that we swear was the great man himself. I feel a little bad in case it was, as I don’t think some of us contained our excitement too well, and it’s possible the poor guy heard a bunch of twenty-somethings repeatedly saying his name in incredulous tones for a good ten minutes.

There are a couple of photos, but to be honest I wasn’t really bothering with the camera so I didn’t get many, and most of those I did had at least one person caught in a terribly unflattering pose, so most of them I can’t put up in good conscience. Be sure to check out the following video of Kate being adorable while amply demonstrating the trouble with chopsticks.

For those of you that want to keep track, Matt has a travel blog set up which he will be trying to update as often as possible.