Getting Out of the Bubble

So, as it turns out a lot of people don't actually know my plans for the next year of my life; and I'm talking about people I consider important! Somehow with travelling and general life my communication with the West has become appalling over the last two months while big changes have been happening in the planning of the next year my life. As most of you know, my original plan was to come to China for six months then travel until the money ran out. Pretty early on in my placement it became more and more obvious that this wasn't what I wanted to do anymore. Yes, I want to travel but I also don't want to give up teaching just yet. I loved (most of) my students and teaching is one of the most fun and rewarding things that I have done. I can completely see how people get sucked into the TEFL world for years and years longer than they ever intended. After realizing that I just wasn't ready to go home to England and an office job I made the decision to commit to more

So we've finally left China, after an amazing first 6 months of our Oriental adventure, and have ventured South to Vietnam until our visa documents are ready. As we don't know how long our documents will take, we're unsure how long we have in Vietnam and our plans are a little sketchy for the moment; but for now we're starting in Hanoi.  First impressions of Vietnam reveal that, although it looks pretty similar to parts of China, it feels very different. But although I can say it feels different I can't quite put my finger on how  it feels different. Maybe it's the traffic, equally crazy but almost entirely motorbikes. Or maybe it's the people, they don't stare or act particularly interested in us at all. But whatever it is, it is a good different. I love China but after 6 months without leaving the country it's nice to experience a different atmosphere.  Our time in Hanoi has been fairly laid back so far, days spend wandering the old quarter - wher

So...someone has been very bad with blogging recently! To all family members and those who care, I am alive! I've just been busy seeing so many amazing things and places. It doesn't help that Chinese internet is, on average, rubbish and that I need good internet to get onto my VPN to post (complicated). But really it's all just excuses, forgive me readers for I have sinned. Since I last posted we've raced up the country and now I'm sitting in the courtyard of my hostel in Beijing. We did it, we made it full circle. At some point I may go back a post properly about each place we visited, but for now I think it's better to give a summary of the highlights.  ❗️ WARNING: This is going to be a long one. ❗️ Kunming 昆明  We came for the dwarf village, we saw the dwarf village (actually known as dwarf kingdom).  It didn't quite live up to the hype. The story is that the dwarfs now live in this idealistic dwarf community after persecution in their own