In an effort

To put more effort into my blog I am attempting to do dailyish updates. One brief look at a friend's blog convinced me I could definitely be doing better at this and as the saying goes the more you put in the more you get out. I may have just made that up though!
Last night I received an email from Charity Challenge with the invoice for the trek which was very exciting and it started to dawn on me that I am actually going to China in 3 months time. Lynsey and I decided at the very beginning that we would self fund the trip which I am really happy about as it means all of the money we raise through sponsorship and events go directly to our chosen charity. It also means that nobody is contributing any money towards our "holiday" rather than donating to the charity. Perhaps I should consider contributing before the end of the month so I can actually leave on that jet plane...
I feel slightly better today after the immunisations yesterday. My left arm which was attacked with Hep A and Typhoid combo is far worse than my right arm which was attacked with Rabies although both are quite swollen. The positive thing is that the Rabies arm isn't actually sore so that bodes well for doses two and three in the coming weeks. I spent most of my day at work looking like a complete idiot as I prised open doors with my feet and kicked then shut to avoid using my arms as much as possible. Due to Health and Safety regulations I cannot pipette by mouth so I had to use my arms for that, a bit unfortunate really.
I also put Easy Learning Mandarin onto my ipod in an effort to learn some key phrases for the trip. I soon found out that Mandarin will never be easy to learn and is actually extremely complex! Not only is there the script to deal with, there are several ways of pronouncing the same words which all have different meanings depending on how you say them and also lots of ups and downs involved in the pronunciation. I am hoping that on my many walks into and home from work this will gradually be drummed into my head and stay there!
Tomorrow I am meeting Lynsey for a China chat, it will only be 11 weeks until the trek tomorrow. In fact it is 11 weeks today until we fly to Beijing, I can hardly believe it.