While in Africa I wrote several stories with the intention of creating a book of short stories about my trip. Now eight months since my return little has happened with the word documents on my computer.
Rather than leave it as an unfinished book, here is part one in a blogging mini series…. “Shane’s shorts.” Unedited, unpublished and 70% unblogged.
2 November 2011 : The eve of my departure I wrote the following blog post before going to bed for my last sleepless night.
“Packing is done, goodbyes have been said, time is up, anything not already done isn’t getting done….Just 8 hours until I have a fight with the alarm clock for the last time.
And how do I feel?
I guess I should be feeling happy, sad, nervous, excited or one of the many other emotions one feels on the eve of a new page in life or before a big adventure.
But the truth of it is I’m just tired and worn out. Too many weeks of too much stress getting organised, working and waking up at 4am thinking about all the nonsense that still needs doing.
But that’s all over now, a long day tomorrow watching films, and eating dodgy airline food. When I wake up on Friday morning it will be summer again and I’ll be in Cape Town.
A new adventure, a new life, I’ll be charged up and ready to go in no time, soon I’ll once again be on top of the world, full of energy and ready for action.”
So where did it all start?
November 2009 : The last two weeks of my ten week coast to coast trip across America had been miserable and cold and I only pushed myself to finish so that I wouldn’t regret it for the rest of my life. I figured two more weeks of pain and misery would eventually be forgotten but the guilt and self loathing of yet again not finishing something I started could last a lifetime. I decided in this period that I would never go on a long distance cycling trip again, ever!
December 2009 : Though happy to be back home the reception from my girlfriend had been far from warm, she was in the middle of changing jobs and therefore too busy and pre-occupied to have any time for me. My first days back at work had been fine, friends and colleagues interested in hearing about my trip, but this soon wore off and work was as tedious as ever. Worst of all after almost three months of total autonomy over what I did each day, being told what to do, when and where was annoying to say the least.
Within a week of being back at work I decided I needed to quit this life and do a big trip. A quick survey of my financial situation showed that a big trip would have to wait. I was broke from ten weeks in America and the two months unpaid leave I’d taken. Much to my frustration and disappointment the plan would have to go onto the back burner until I had more savings. I would have to continue plodding on in the tedious life that irritated me more and more.
Two months on I got the opportunity to go on a course through work, a rather expensive course and would therefore have to sign a contract to stay with the company at least two years. Normally the idea of a two year contract would not go well with my itchy feet but this seemed ideal. For once I wouldn’t be able to do anything crazy for a while and would have to be patient. This gave me the ideal time frame to plan something big and enough time to save the money for it. It was decided, spring 2012 I would hit the road. The decision process as to where that trip would be was easy. ‘Which continent am I most scared of?……. that’s where I’m going!’
I would like to say it had always been a big dream to cycle in Africa but the truth is, Africa is the one continent I never saw myself going to. I too had been brainwashed by scenes murder, rape, famine, plague and poverty so thought it best to give it a wide birth and enjoy travelling elsewhere. But through years of travelling and cycling I’d learned that these preconceptions portrayed in western media are often wrong. So I chose to tackle my fear of Africa and planned my trip there.
April 2010 (D minus 24 months) : I ordered my new custom bike which would be hand build by Martin Gerritson of M-gineering. The man is a genius, maybe even a nutty professor when it comes to bicycle building and all there is to know about bikes. I chose to go down the custom road because a bike is for life and not just for Christmas. I had many specific wishes for this bike which an off the shelf bike just wouldn’t provide. The price of such genius, quality and craftsmanship was two month’s salary.
September 2010 (D minus 19 months) : I came clean with my girlfriend Linda, telling her that my planned trip to Uganda in January was in fact a shakedown ride to test my new bike, gear and myself to see if I actually liked Africa. I naturally had financial responsibilities at home as we shared a house among other things. I needed her support if I was to do a big trip, she had the option to veto the whole thing. I needed her support more then than ever before.
We talked for days, she confessed that she knew something like this had to come along, she knows me as no other and knows how discontent I’d been with life and work since my coast to coast trip. I felt blessed with a girlfriend that understood me and my needs. She accepted that it was only a matter of time before something like this happened. Linda ultimately summed up her love for me with a classic one liner “If you love someone set them free…”
November 2010 : My new bike arrived after a long wait. During the first test rides to work it felt heavy and sluggish but during the first weekend away fully loaded and cycling dirt roads through the forest the bike came to life. It was as if a beast has been awoken, I christened the bike Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. Jekyll being the sluggish commuter Hyde the beast that loves being fully loaded and storming down rough paths.
February 2011 (D minus 14 months) : The trip to Uganda was hard work but rewarding, Africa is tough but well worth the effort. The peaks and troughs compared to a normal trip are higher, deeper and closer together, therefore much more intense though tiring. I experienced cycling in Uganda as cycle touring in its purest form. The hardship, the stress, the joys, beautiful scenery, kindness of strangers and the relief of finding food and accommodation after along hot day, often all experienced in one day rather than spread out of days. Decision time was approaching.
March 2011 : Sleepless nights, waking in cold sweats. I often asked myself ”Do I really want to leave Linda, my job, my house and this life I’ve work so hard to built?” “What happens if I get seriously sick during the trip?” “What happens if I get cancer or become disabled because of an accident?” I worried that I would have nowhere to turn if I left my life behind in the Netherlands. I hadn’t lived in the UK for ten years so had nothing there for me either.
During these months I took refuge in the words of Mark Twain and Helen Keller
“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbour. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.”
“Life is either a daring adventure or it is nothing at all.”
I created and “inspiration spiral” around me telling more and more people what I was thinking of doing. Their reactions of “That’s crazy.” “That’s impossible.” “You are nuts!”only inspired me more and helped me realise I was making the right choice, the spiral slowly created a self fulfilling story which rapidly reinforces itself. Life is too short to live the standard mundane life of the people around me.
I created my own mantra to help drive out my doubts “Adventure is turning fears and dreams into (happy) memories.”
August 2011 ( D minus eight months) : Despite all the doubts and sleepless nights my decision was made. The last months of selling my possessions and saving as much money as possible had gone well, better than expected even, cutting out dinning out each week and malt whiskey had given a drastic cash input, as had other sacrifices. I already had the planned budget in the bank and I was growing impatient with waiting. I yearned to be on the road instead of stuck in the mundane life I hated. I nervously handed in my letter of resignation, accepting I’d have to pay a fine for not completing my two year contract. I no longer cared, life is too short, a large part of my last salary would not be paid out but that was fine, I had my target budget.
I left work feeling relieved, there was no turning back now, my new nomad life would start in November, D minus eight became D minus three. Internal company politics, fights with my alarm clock and nightshifts would soon be a distant memory.
September – October 2011 : These months raced by. Working full time and preparing for the trip can only be described as two of the most stressful months of my life. Also trying to see family and friends for the last time. All of a sudden everyone wanted to see me before I left, as if they didn’t expect me to return. Some goodbyes were worse than others, many were just a formality on my part, my heart was already in Africa. My life at home was already history in my mind. I no longer wanted to hear about others people’s problems, or about the mundane lives of my complaining colleagues. So many people stuck in a rut and unable or unwilling to do something about it often just annoyed me. If you’re not happy with your situation change yourself or your situation was the only advise I could give to these people banging their head against a brick wall they’d built themselves.
Some goodbyes were weird or painful. My relationship with my parents always just carries on where if left off, whether I came back from shopping or a year on the road. Despite that my mother was unusually worried this time round, apparently Africa is dangerous?
Linda’s father, now a good friend also had prostate cancer and was going downhill quick, the chances of him being around on my return were almost zero. This made for a very emotional evening for everyone.
2 November 2011 : The eve of departure, game over insert new life : Before writing my blog post I wrote a letter to Linda which she would find once she returned from the airport. In the letter I expressed my thanks to her for her love, her patience with me and the freedom she had given me. I wished her well on her journey in life and expressed my hope that she one day would find the man she deserves, a man that would choose her over adventure.
You sum it up perfectly and I share many of the same thoughts and experiences.