Hey guys,

Now I know in my last blog entry I said that the next time I wrote would be the day before I left, but I feel that it's been such a long time since I wrote, so I thought I would give you an update

It has been 5 weeks since I came back from Training, and life has been hectic!!

I can't believe I managed to actually reach my £5600 target, it's such an achievement. With that out of the way, I can finally focus on all the other bits that I need to do before leaving for China.

1. Sort My Visa - this took longer than planned, but now I have sent away my passport and hopefully will be receiving my visa at the end of this week. So I'll actually be allowed into China!

2. Visit All My Family - This is now complete, I have spent the last 2 weeks down visiting all my family in Somerset and Cardiff. It was lovely to see everybody, especially those who I haven't seen in quite a long time. It was hard saying goodbye, but I know that it was not really 'goodbye' but 'see you later.'

3. Sort My Packing - I think this could almost be the hardest thing in this list :P. Having to narrow down my belongings to 20kg for a whole year seemed daunting at first - now it seems almost impossible!! I have been shopping with my friends, and then my parents, and I have ticked off all the necessities on the kit list that PT sent us, so now I have multiple carrier bags lying in my room (my dad is not best pleased...) but trying to get it all to fit into my bag is quite tricky. So I keep avoiding it...not advisable considering I have just over 2 weeks to go, but I think my dad and I are going to tackle this task possibly this weekend...I hope.

So with all this to do, and so little time, I should probably get cracking! However, I will still find the time to spend with my friends, and I'm meeting up with fellow China volunteer, Reece, this weekend as he is visiting some of his family in my area - so I'm really looking forward to that

Until next time,

Zàijiàn x