WANDERWORLDLUST

2020 has been a challenging and unique year for all of us. I must say that whilst there have been significant hurdles and difficulties, 2020 has been one of the best years of my life. It was on 29th December 2019 that I legally married the man of my dreams. We had a beautiful wedding in Istanbul, Turkey. But then, it was 15th February 2020 that we finalised our marriage with a fun celebration wedding party with our loved ones in England. So, these past two years, for me signify love, unity, celebration, marriage, weddings, happiness and cultural dialogue.  My husband is of Turkish origin and we met in China. We have a diverse array of friends from across the world and we thankfully had so many of them join us for one, or even all, of our weddings. When I think of 2019/2020, I think of love. This is mainly due to the fact that in my own personal life love prevailed . We did face lots of cultural difficulties in regards to our marriage. But ultimately, our love won and everything was...

If you wanna hear more about why I stopped getting drunk and basically drinking alcohol keep reading.  I'm gonna split my writing and reflections up into sections/themes. The themes are health, productivity, negative effects, upbringing, faith and lifestyle (social and economic).  Health I mean it doesn't take a genius to realise that alcohol is bad for your health. Not only can you feel the crappiness when you drink it (will elaborate in next section) but it physically does you no good. It is a widely written about, researched and understood topic that there are significant long-term health risks from alcohol. If you drink for a long time and excessively, alcohol can lead to the development of chronic (long-lasting) diseases and other serious problems such as high blood pressure, heart disease, stroke, liver disease, digestive problems, cancer of the breast, mouth, throat, etc. These are just the long-term health risks. I haven't even mentioned the short-term psychological...

This life is tough. Every day, month, year (even second for some people) we face challenges and hardships. These challenges and hardships can overwhelm us with emotions such as anger, sadness, frustration, grief, sorrow, and the like. Why do we get hardships we might ask. We might even compare to somebody who we feel never gets any hardships in his or her life. But how can we really ever know?  I will share my analyses and beliefs with regard to why we have hardships and challenges, as well as the meaning behind them in more detail, in a future post.  In a nutshell, we need to embrace the hard times and challenges. Embracing and seeing the positive side of hardships, as well as taking risks and challenges face on, will always make us grow. Just think about all the stuff you have been through in the past and/or any risks you might have taken on. Don't you feel so much more developed now having gotten through it? Do you feel you have grown as a person? Do you feel a sense of exp...

I believe that writing is so good for your soul, health, and well-being. I posted just over a year ago about using this space to analyse, reflect, and write. I admittedly neglected to do that. However, in my defence it has been a busy and eventful year. I was in my journey of love and marrying my soul mate. I was also finishing my NQT year and travelling. Then, of course, I have been enjoying marriage, family, and God's gift of lockdown to us.  Gift? Yeah I said gift. I believe everything happens for a reason. It has been so tragic and horrible to see all the death across the world to COVID-19. That aside, seeing the world shut down, planes stop running, clubs, pubs, spas, hairdressers, restaurants - everything close has actually been so liberating. I think God wanted us to switch off from all of that stuff and just focus on family, love, our soul, and simpler aspects of life.  Hasn't it made people be more creative in activities, art, gardening, worship, love, reading, singin...

Sunrise in Xghajra Why do I love travelling - especially SOLO? 1) Making friends out of strangers. I don't know why. But rarely do I ever naturally (+ soberly) speak to people that I don't know in England. Perhaps thats just me but the second I get to an airport and beyond, I meet and talk to different people naturally! They often tend to be like-minded people; travellers. For example, on Sunday, a beautiful elderly couple had a chat with me as we waited to board the flight from Birmingham to Malta. They were lovely, we spoke about our travels and the beautiful parts of the world that we have visited, and experiences we had. We bid farewell as we embarked on our adventures. I love those moments. A beautiful exchange of positive and uplifting energy.  2) World therapy . World counselling. Worldly CBT. Humanity. What to call it - I don't know? But, when travelling, I find that you talk to people about deep things. People you don't really know and maybe w...

As I've grown, explored, travelled, experienced, discovered and developed as a person, in the journey of life, I am becoming more and more my own person. It's just what I wanted when I set out to China in 2015. To discover myself. That I did. I went through an amazing period of self discovery - which highly contributed to why I decided to stay in China for another year. Through discovering who I am, and what I actually like/dislike - not what society and those around made me feel like I had to like/dislike/do etc, I have increasingly learned that lot's of my choices were largely influenced by society, "culture" and expectations. I am still learning and elevating myself away from these influences. It's not easy.  In this sense, I am actively choosing not to be a slave to society. In fact, every part of the world has a different expectation. It was through traveling that I realised that what is normal in one place, isn't in another. What is acceptable ...

You've just got to flow with life haven't you? Ever since my own history teacher at school inspired me; I always wanted to teach. I wanted to inspire individuals the way she inspired me. I wanted to show passion for my subject the way she did.  I think more than anything, I've realised that I highly value education, and genuinely love learning. This is why I love teaching - especially as a history teacher. You are constantly learning. There are different periods of history to learn, general knowledge that you require, the diversity of your school will also influence you to learn more worldwide history and keeping up with general world topics is so important when you are a teacher. I love learning with the students! I have already set up a Turkish, Chinese, Debate & Arabic Club at my new NQT school; based on my own language abilities, language interests, the diversity and abilities of the school. The girls' I teach are passionate, fiery, hard-working, enthusiastic...

Your cool mixed with warm breeze. Daunting but inviting buildings. High into the blue sky and narrow enough to squeeze through. Colourful. Pebbled. Cobbled but neat streets. Fresh air. Crisp. Bitter coffee mornings. Sun shining. Clean bright blue sky. Waves crippling. Homemade bakery smell. Quirky architecture.  Warm greetings of bonjour from all. Getting lost and found in the narrow streets of the old town. Melting sunsets. Roman ruins. Ships and yachts sailing by. Peace. Calm. Nature. Palm trees. Church bells in the morning. Peaceful and exquisite Catholic Cathedral.   Art. Smell of fresh flowers. Friendship. Seagulls. A warm Christmas spirit. Nutella.   Merci. Nice 💛

Too often we are so focused on the end goal that we forget to appreciate the beauty of the journey. Too often we are so focused on the end goal that we forget to enjoy and appreciate the beauty of the journey. This can be related to many different situations; large and small, minor and significant. For example, I have not long arrived to Nice and have been exploring. I was recommended by the hostel to go up some hills, that there is a  beautiful, 360 view of Nice at the top; that there was. However, as wonderful as it was to see Nice from the top, it was all the wonderful nature, pathways, ancient ruins and the views along the way that I loved the most. Do you ever find that you are on a hike, trek or hill walk... and you are so determined to get to the top you sort of forget to endure the journey along the way? And then in some, but not all, cases the top wasn’t even that amazing anyway. I’ve learned to take my time. Find a nice spot on the floor, a bench, a rock... and just take ...