Swiss miss?

Wow Gonkalo - thanks so much for your comment wondering what's happening - very happy someone cares :-) I have been pretty tardy lately...so here come the reasons/excuses...

* Pretty busy away from the computer - doing craft workshops with my Mum, going to theatre and comedy shows with friends and siblings, spending 4 days down in Melbourne catching up with a cousin and bunch of friends who are part of the AIESEC Alumni club, catching some rays at the beach with another cousin, studying German, going to Latin dance night at the casino (& being left in the middle of the dance floor!!), compiling a bit of a photo scrapbook of last 7 years in AIESEC, watching Australia kick Kiwi butt in the cricket, preparing to be the Master of Ceremonies for a cool event called "Global Change Fiesta" for an organisation called International Young Professionals (should be very cool, happening tomorrow night)....

but also in the last week I got some bad news about my work permit application to Switzerland for my traineeship - it has been rejected...

this was not something I was expecting so it has been stressing me out a bit (as Brenda would know from all my frantic texting!!)...so I have been going back and forth with the university to try to get more documentation to help with my application being approved...it has been submitted now so all I can do is wait...

it's been a challenging lesson so far in controlling your worry and focusing it on energy to change the things you can control and truly let go of the rest of the things that you can't....

it has really made me re-appreciate how much I really want this experience to happen, which is a good thing...and focus on the goals I have for the experience as it might work out that I need to achieve them in a different country, different traineeship...but fingers, toes and everything else crossed that I will still be able to take up this opportunity at UBS in Switzerland!

But whatever happens I will still be coming to London in December and Portugal for Christmas so look out Europe - here I come, with plenty of festive bells on!!

Hugs
x Zoe

Dad's girl

Dads day 2004
Originally uploaded by Zozo.

Great part of being home is spending time with my family...including my dad :-)

"Thank you" in photos - online :-)

I put together a ppt with some photos from my travels in the AP over the last couple of years to help say thank you.

And a big thank you to Connie from Hong Kong who uploaded it onto FTP so you can download it, since it was too big to email to everyone.

THANKS CONNIE!!!

Just copy this ftp address into your browser and follow the prompts. ENJOY

ftp://158.182.17.146
the login:@zoe
password:aiesec

Thank you AIESEC in the AP

I went "surfing" with one of my brothers a couple of weeks ago...IE we all woke up at 4am but my brother, Sean, and his mate, Micko, were surfing and I was lying on the beach :-)

Was a beautiful setting for a bit of reflection...as you can see from these photos...and I wrote down some thoughts about what I had learnt from working in the most diverse region of AIESEC...the Asia Pacific. And there were soooooooo many things that I learnt from this experience that I wanted to somehow thank the people that helped me to grow so much...so I tried to put these thoughts and feelings together in a poem...

The result is the following poem, which is based on the lyrics to "Thank U", by Alanis Morrisette. Feel free to sing along to the tune if you have it, otherwise it still reads nicely :-) I made a version with photos but it's too big to upload online, so I am sending copies to AP MCPs as long as they send me their postal addresses...Vega, Cheryl, Sharon, Alice, Pui, Weaw & Chris your copies are on the way....anyways...here it is....THANK YOU AP.

How bout learning line dances day & night
How bout giving me gifts & words of thanks
How bout teaching me real communication
How bout yum cha, sate, dosa, sushi

Thank you India
Thank you Japan
Thank you Indonesia
Thank you Thailand
Thank you NZ & UAE
Thank you thank you AP

How bout singing with me karaoke
How bout caring & giving PI PA KOA
How bout me failing & us trying again
How bout fortune telling & ancient cities

Thank you Korea
Thank you China
Thank you Australia
Thank you Hong Kong
Thank you Malaysia
Thank you thank you AP

the moments I embraced your diversity
were the moments I represented your unity
the moments you knew I cared
you cared what I knew

How bout “ah shok”, “ming mang mong”, “bitches bitches”
How bout living with a sense of wonder
How bout sharing your reality & dreams with me
How bout tuk-tuks, trains, becaks & autos

Thank you Taiwan
Thank you Bangladesh
Thank you Philippines
Thank you Singapore
Thank you Sri Lanka
Thank you thank you AP

Thank you AP,
Thank you

Back to the future

Even though it is dated November 2002, today I made my first posting, "Chinese take-aways", in my AIESEC adventure journal...recapping on some of my most memorable and meaningful experiences from the last few years, before I forget and to help me to remember as my journey continues ahead....hope you might enjoy reading them too.

Virgin blogger no more!

Well after months of procrastination I'm finally making my first blog post - yay for me :-) Thanks to all my blog-savvy friends who have answered my inane blogging questions with love, patience & good humour over the preceeding weeks.

I was initially planning to get this up and running once I had finished putting together my journal of nomadic adventures from the last couple of years..but putting these "memoirs" (as my Dad calls them) together is taking a bit longer than I thought...and so many great moments were passing by in the meantime, that I decided to "carpe diem" & do them at the same time.

I'm hoping my contributions to this blog will help me to learn more on my journey through life and share my observations, thoughts, questions, frustrations, fun and special moments with special people I meet along the way.

Hopefully my IT skills will improve along the way also...they have a while to go, as you can tell, since that photo was meant to be in my profile, not a posting on its own!!