In Hong Kong!!!

Wow - feeling quite amazed by the whole place!

Mind only arrive this afternoon - but I've walked miles - through markets, streets and to the waterfront - I've been measured for a top and skirt and go for a fitting tomorrow for delivery on Monday, bought a camera from a funny little back street shop, taken some pretty awful picture, been absolutely bowled over by the view from the waterfront of Hong Kong island - at night - wow - amazing - had prawn dumplings and am now drinking Belgium beer - given to me by my two companions of last night - who made a long flight a lot of fun - I also managed to get put in the best seat in the plane - and we talked, drank wine, laughed and slept and had a great flight! Staying in a completely bizarre hotel and having a ball - ought to feel sleepy as it's nearly midnight here but my body clock is several hours behind!

So nothing new then - bufff - I am such an amazingly blessed person - to be here - to be making connections all the time - Friday morning before I left was also full of very strong Australian connections - and now when I see them - I do just go straight into connect mode and go pretty deep, very quickly - only way to be!

So hope the Belgium beer makes sleepy - but actually feeling very buzzy and happy - wow wow wow!!!!!!!!!!!

new bed and table

Three lovely firsts!!

First first! - am writing this sitting at my beautiful new table - made for me out of 150 year old oak - recycled beams! It is just stunningly beautiful - circular but with the two sides dropping down - really wonderful!

Second first - just been camping at Amanda and Gareth's - in my new bell tent - which is just amazing - I can stand up in it - and it even has a candelabra of different coloured glasses for tea lights - it also really easy to erect and get down and is slightly pink in colour - and I have fallen in love with it.

.... and third first - tonight I sleep in my new amazing bed - which also arrived on Friday - it is made from recycled wood - but only 100 year old oak! They were made in Yorkshire by a guy called Stuart and it is very special to have new furniture - that has been made exactly to my specifications and just for me - so very very pleased with this.

The weekend has been lovely - not sure quite how to describe it - but a weekend of friendship, feasting and joy - sort of sums it up!! All new friends in the sense that they are part of my new life - but feel very close to many of them and really value their presence in my life - they are just wonderful people - open, non judgemental and great fun - with a passion for dressing up!!! I wore some of my Indian clothes - have decided to take them to wear in China.

Wow - I'm going to Hong Kong on Friday - and then will be in China for a couple of weeks - buffff - another first - so many beautiful firsts and another euphoric blogg!!

hard evening.........

........sometimes life is hard ... even when you are a wonderfully blessed, happy and open person - aka transformed Tricia (Alegra) .... sometimes it is still very hard.

Had a really hard night ... not sure why.. probably the move and being the other side of so much change - finally hitting home - also reflected tonight on the night Chris died - triggered by something - and recalling and remembering that night ....and then talking that through with a lovely person - thank you...

Bufff - lots of stuff there!!

Okay - recognition of the fact that I am a wonderfully blessed, happy and open person - is just amazing - cos I haven't always been that person - bufff!!

Also am proud of the way we - as a family - me and the boys - how we were there for Chris's death - I'm proud of the way we did that - we were there - wonderfully there - for that last awful night, as he breathed his last - before dying......... bufff I am so proud of us - we did that so well!!

Then where am I now? - last night an unknown dancer asked me if something had happened to me yesterday - because I had danced so full of happiness - but I had just danced!! .........and intrigued by his question I asked other dancers - and apparently I dance with 'childlike happiness' - another big bufff here - cos I know I am myself when I dance - and I know I am very free and open when I dance - and I think they may be right- but I just dance!!!!!

OK so I recognise that I can be so happy - for example when I'm dancing - but also can go where I've been tonight which was pretty hard ...but I suppose that's what life is all about and the wonderful resistance of us - human beings - aren't we just amazing!!!!!!!!!!

back home...

... and it's feeling like home..... arrived lateish last evening after a lovely day in Vienna with Chris, Karoline and Deonne and then uncomplicated travel - though my suitcase has yet to arrive - but hopefully later today - which of course has within in a very large jar of honey - which I bought off a woman in the street in the middle of Friday night - it was one of those nights!!! It was one of those few days - magic!!!!!!

Talking to Karoline yesterday - about how we will be working/being together for at least the next 4 and a half years - friendship of course - but in many ways beyond that - my Viennese family - and it goes well beyond me - seeing Deonne in Vienna - watching her join - and I connected very strongly with Sonia and re-connected with others. We share a passion - I think that what connects us - and those who don't - who stand and watch us - can see our shared passion - as it whirls and twirls around us - the energy and joy of being together - whoooooo!

It was also amazing to be part of KinderUni 2010 - I learnt so much from doing that - I would have done my powerpoint completely differently - but that's good cos I now know what to do. What I can see clearly is that I really really want to do that again - with bigger groups of children. I have agreed to do it in Poland and again to a bigger group in Vienna - need to think through language - but I think with lots of pictures and key aspects translated and with someone to translate questions - it can be done with children who only have 2/3 years of English - wow aren't children just absolutely amazing.

The opportunity to spend time - like that with children - was just so good for me - and the whole big project - which of course is called 'Children as Change Agents' - this has yet to find a good German translation - but a child somewhere will come up with a good one soon!

Wonderful trip has filled me with energy - and this week my bed and table will arrive - made especially for me by Stuart - in an old mill in Yorkshire - the table has been made out of 140 year old wood - I'm so excited to see it - but hey I'm just so excited about life!!!!!!!!!!!

Being in Vienna

Just arrived after a long day of delayed and missed flights - but actually it worked well as I sorted out my presentation - which I have had translated into German and then, helped by Deonne, really thought through one of the last big questions I needed to answer re the EU project. I think so much better when I'm talking - well I can think on my own - but I really get so much out of having someone to bounce ideas off.

I was thinking about this on the second flight - about having a 'shared task' - it links back to connections.

A connection is just that a connection - BUT when a connection is joined by a 'shared task'/working together - it becomes an amazing opportuntity for creativity - (if it is allowed to) - BUT creativity itself doesn't go anywhere - but when ideas/creativity get put into action/motion they then become innovation - and that does change the world!!!!

I was also reading Paulo Coelho on the plane and in particular one thing that struck me: Seize every opportunity that life offers you because, when opportunities go, they take a long time to come back. Struck home to me that I have been living by this for quite a few years - probably consciously from 2000 - and that it is really important - not just for me the individual - but for the bigger plan of things - and that I have been seizing every opportunity that I am given - even tough ones like losing Chris - but seizing all opportunities with two hands, love and an open heart - and the more that I do this - the more opportunities I get offered!!!

Am excited about being in Vienna - because have had some of my best thinking with the Viennese recently - I just love it when I'm buzzing with ideas - and I am so privaleged to be me - surrounded by wonderful people - making connections both with work and friends - and seeing those connections bear fruit as creative ideas which then make things happen - like Hector going to India!!

It's quite late here - but not so late in UK and I'm wide awake - but how lucky am I am to be here - or to put it in another way to have been creative and made the most of the chance connections that I've made!!! Way to live!!

First full weekend in new flat.....

Could not have been better - 2 parties and a day of dancing!!

Feels like a bit of an oasis from work - which is very full on at the moment - the combination of launching the new Centre in Shanghai and negotiating a massive European project - crazy - but wonderfully crazy - but I can only do my best - so that's I am doing that - my best!

So first full weekend in new flat - was lovely - I am beginning to love this flat - went back to the house yesterday - which I was actually not looking forward to - but once there it was good - the house is a bit lonely cos it's not got tenants - but they will come.

But lovely weekend full of people - special people, some in my life - all their lifetimes like Sam and Jess - wonderful to see them - and also some new people - Hector's party and dancers.

Dancing all day - has left me wonderfully joyful. Andrew Holmes is an amazing teacher - and to dance deep, with like minded people - is just a room alive with dancers - energy and connections!!!!

Thinking a lot about connections at the moment - because they are very strong for me - have decided that all the connections - I have both old and new - have two important aspects - complete lack of expectations and absolutely no obligation.

Love this - I am increasingly connecting with more and more people - and I just do that - but I have no expectation that they will 'do'/'bring' anything into my life - they have to just be cherished for what they are - a connection.

The second aspect is a complete lack of obligation - people are not in my life because of what I will do for them - or what they will do for me - they are in my life because they are........ a connection.

....... and I just love them all - the ones that have been in my life for years and the new ones!!!!

Happy day today...... also used the name Alegra first time in public!!

buzzing!!!

It's late but I'm no where near sleeping - even though I have to be up early tomorrow - because I am just buzzing with energy!!

Just been out with this year's TRiO students - I was full of what my boys would call 'old hippy stuff' but got a real buzz from it! Tonight I also had a lovely long conversation - thanks to my free 300 minutes a month anywhere around the world phone deal! - with Bobbye in Houston - she was one of the very first group of Black Roots students - in 1998 and we have become good friends over the years.

Making and treasuring connections - which of course is what it is all about! Some individuals are wonderfully open and I got so much from talking with them - others more hesitant and though they seek - are locked in their own cage of thoughts unable to really engage with me - especially when I'm happily serene and more than a bit bonkers - but I also got so much from those conversations too! Had a bit of a dance and some excellent spicy chicken - so a really lovely night out - lots and lots of work tomorrow - starting with a very early call to Shanghai - ok - time for bed!

Wonderful sons!

Rob came round for tea tonight - and we talked about his future plans - which was great - and after he left I thought about how the changes I have been going through must have had an impact on my boys - and how brilliant they have been!!

If Chris hadn't of died - I would probably have been very similar to what I was 4 years ago - sensible married woman, wife and mother - not the very different woman that is their mother today.

This thinner, blonder, wilder woman, lives the life of a single woman, a dancer with different friends, more spiritually aware and much more open to everything - including seizing every wonderful new opportunity that passes her way - etc - wow way to live and loving it!!!

But from my sons point of view this really cannot have been easy for them - mothers are just not supposed to have so much fun!!! But they have just been so wonderful coping with me - really supporting me - for example when I decided to move out of the house - they never once said 'Are you sure about this Mum?' They just said 'If it's what you want - we'll help you do it.' And they have - every step of the way.

Just had an email from Jim - he's in Ljubljana - one of my favourite cities with some mates - going onto Varazdin - which will be great - amazing how that city is part of my life - Alex is in Cambridge - moved in with Lara - his plan to move back to Liverpool being thwarted by the fact that there was no house to move back too! And Rob leaving his job in 11 days time and then a whole new life to lead - my three boys are also going through big changes.

But I think we all are - our world is changing so fast - and we must all embrace changes or be suffocated by them - I increasingly think that most important thing we can teach our children is how to embrace and love change - they will be the survivors.....

in my new home....

... is still a bit strange - I suppose because I've moved but not actually lived here for the majority of time I've moved out of Cheltenham Avenue - and then there is just so much happening in my life!!!

I also don't feel that I've actually left Cheltenham Avenue - I suppose that will grow on me as I come back here - from work - nights out - being away - the shops - just normal stuff - living - so I guess when it hits me that I actually live here - I will realise that I no longer live there!!! Well it makes sense to me.....

Still so much stuff to do - the 21st century slug trail of addresses and links which need to be moved and tidied - how many things have my address on them - passport, driving licence etc etc.....

My old email address was also closed today - just stuff - but stuff that needs to be sorted!!

Got my Internet working - achievement - hence blogg - which is good - not yet sorted out the washing machine - though a trip to Tescos has meant that I have food in the house - and great new phone package means I can talk to people around the world - 300 free minutes a month - just talked to Rene - so have started!!!!