China never really was home. China never really was my friend. I often talked about leaving after 3 months, 6 months and 12 months but after 2 years I was still using chopsticks and drinking Tsingdao. The 20th March 2013 circled with a thick red marker on my calendar, I thought the date would never come around, yet as the weeks became days, I felt sad.
The sun shone and the cherry blossom opened as lessons, bike rides, shopping trips, coffee dates became my 'lasts' "Goodbye and thank you!" I didn't comprehend how hard this sentence would be. The connection I developed with my students, the relationship I established with local shop keepers and the close bond with my wise friends, left me with precious, long lasting memories. Only when something is gone, then you realise how special it was.

"oh a million faces pass my way, oh but they´re all the same, nothing seems to change anytime I look around. oh who knows what the future holds…"

"Are you excited?" Obviously I was excited, it just didn't feel real, I didn't know how to reply. I'd just said goodbye to all things that I'd known for the last two years, I flew back to England very briefly surprising my mum and then I was catching a flight to the unknown in Colombia. My emotions were sky high and I didn't know which tears belonged to what story. I felt ready yet very unprepared.

Driving as if we were in Grand Theft Auto, I sat back watching graffiti covered buildings fly by me. I can't believe I'm in Colombia! I could have laughed out loud. This feels too easy. Why wasn't I panicky when my arranged taxi from the youth hostel hadn't shown up at the airport? Why had I casually stepped into a yellow taxi at night and not felt nervous?

"you crashed into the city with a smile upon your face and a body charged with music from the earphones in your case…"

The morning bus followed the natural curves of the towering, green hills, occasionally making refuge from the cloud engulfed road inside long, twisting tunnels bringing us back out to lush mountain ranges.
The 8 hour bus journey from Bogota brought us to the hot and humid town of Yopal.

His hand placed on the tip of his cowboy hat, pulling it down over his eyes as the sun broke through the rainy season clouds. With his radiant Yopal skin and storytelling smile, Santiago a founder of the school 15 years ago, walked amongst everyone with a plastic shot glass pouring Aguadiente, a popular aniseed spirit of Colombia. "Salud" and down the hatch it goes as this Good Friday party began to kick off, at 11am!
How beautiful it must be to not have a front door to your own home. Sitting in your open living room watching the chickens roam by the mango trees. 6 hours of slow roasting around a fire, the juicy pork was served with homemade guacamole, potatoes and plantain, much to the delight of us all who´d become quite tipsy with lentil and pea blood sausages not being sufficient enough for the amount of Poker beer and Aguadiente consumed.
A baby crocodile swam amongst the dozens of turtles as I looked out at the endless rolling hills stacked on top of each other. As the sun set we moved our chairs to the porch. A small guitar was passed around as the men roared lines from various songs and the woman clapped. Comfortable hammocks gave a strong reminder of beds back home and so came the ´ciaos´ and kisses. I knew no-one at the Finca and all that anyone knew of me was that I am the schools newbie who spoke no Spanish. Yet what is thought to be a useful skill having the same language to interact was far from wrong today when all these strangers were never strangers at all, friends readily awaiting my arrival.

"suddenly the air smells much greener now. life is good and the sun is shining…"

The pot holed roads of Yopal work on a one way system, frequently 'running out' of tarmac. Literally as if the road workers went for a coffee break and well, never came back!
Roads aren't named; they're numbered through a grid system, what number road meets another number road. I have no idea. Pot luck if through memory I make it anywhere.
I haven't seen much, quite literally as I've been looking at my feet most of the time. No not because I enjoy gazing down at my flip flop tan line but in the fear I might actually fall off the pavement. Just like walking the Great Wall, one little step is accompanied by a large step, then a giant leap back to a normal step. Instead of just making a long strip of pavement, each shopkeeper gets to decide how he or she wants their tiny patch of land to be. Therefore as I walk past the fruit shop I drop down and walk by an internet café as I step back up past a bar. If I'm not falling down then I'm being hit by tree branches. Seriously, everyone seems of an average height yet low trees have been potted on every path way. Up, down, up, down.
There are no bins to be seen on the streets of Yopal, instead the middle of the road is used as rubbish pit. Between rows of trees and flourishing flowers lie bags of garbage and the occasional scavenging dog.

Scanning a notice board outside a burger joint which displayed short advertisements for rooms to rent, we put on our helmets, hopped on Rachel's motorbike as the sun beat down upon us, causing my first Colombian sunburn within few hours.
I stayed in a hill side home for my first few nights in Yopal, with a family who knew the school Principal. Each morning we'd share breakfast together and in the evening sit under the trees playing the guitar. This little fantasy idea was what I had in mind when looking for somewhere to rent. Quaint and quite with a loving family yet I found myself looking at empty boxed rooms, cockroach infested kitchens and potentially living next to a brothel. As long as it has four walls and a door then it's viable to rent as a 'bedroom' even if it is a laundry area or next to a hotel reception desk. It seems a bedroom window isn't necessary here. Really no matter how bright a light bulb can be, you can't take away natural light.
5 rooms later I was coming to the unfortunate realisation I'd being staying in the centre of town, with two women, using a dirty kitchen and spending the majority of my time in my windowless room as the living room only had a fridge in it. But then we found a house situated on the edge of town, in an area slowly being built up. A real bedroom was for rent with a private bathroom. It even came with not only a window but sliding doors that lead out onto a small, triangle balcony. I could have hugged Nancy and her 5 year daughter, my saving grace! Simple and small but comfortable. A real home. My first home in Colombia.

"Are you sure this is okay?" asked Rachel, as we found out half an hour to class time that the teacher whom I was supposed to be observing had called in sick and I was needed to teach on my first day. I darted around all the classrooms grabbing things I thought necessary and what felt like only a few minutes to write up a rough lesson plan for the day, I was stood singing the 'hello, hello' song to 3-5 year olds and then saying goodbye 50 minutes later.
Gimnasio de la llanos is ranked 400 (ish) out of 12,000 private schools in Colombia. From pre-kindergarten to grade 11, the school has over 500 students, 42 Colombian teachers, English Rachel, Scottish David and their latest arrival, English Emma.
Each morning with much strength not to throw my alarm out the window, I get up at 5am ready to be picked up at 6. Other buses travel around Yopal picking up students directly from their homes arriving at school shortly after we do at 6:30am. Sweet coffee is served at 7 to give everyone that almighty morning kick. Break follows after two classes, with fresh juice and some kind of snack. Another two classes later, lunch is dished up with a well deserved sit down. The final kindergarten class after lunch rounds up my day just after 2pm. Older classes continue to study hard and we're all herded back onto buses at 3:15 to be dropped off at home. This is now my Monday to Friday routine.

"and I say no, no, no we may never know, there´s enough surprises here to keep is going… yeah, yeah, yeah, here´s another day we´re gonna step outside and take it all in"

First styling my hair into a mohawk and then chatting away to his pal, not concentrating on how much he'd chopped off my already short hair, I finally got his attention gesturing 'alright alright that'll do' and somehow walked out with hair. It looks, okay.
I realised after perhaps why he was trying to make my hair 'funky' I have yet to see even one female with short hair, maybe he only knows how to cut guy hair styles? My 4/5 year old students with their red lipstick on, nails painted a bright shade of pink or orange, walk into the classroom already learning to sway their hips back and forth, and the teenagers never not walk or sit without their shoulders being straight back. To have short hair is seen as not being womanly enough. To not wear tight clothing to show off your curves is seen as not being womanly enough. To not have curves is seen as not being womanly enough. To not have a manicure is seen as not being womaly enough. Yeah, get used to it Colombia, Emma is never going to be seen as being womanly enough. Woops.

As I write my first blog I ask myself, where are those darn butterflies that keep me on my toes? I speak zilch Espanola, I don't know much about Colombia and even less about my new hometown, Yopal, however I feel like I've been here before!

P.S.
In true Emma style, I have already been to the local clinic. Not even a week in and I managed to get bitten by a large dog on my hand which led onto an infection. Already, an ´hola´ to my universal friend, the doctor.

Ciao x