Snap and Scribble

It’s hard to believe, but yesterday it was a year since i left Afghanistan! As usual, that year’s flown by.

The last year and a half has been one of the weirder periods of my life. Admittedly, most of my life has been fairly weird, but this last eighteen months or so wins the prize, i think.

Perhaps the strangest part of it is that i’ve only worked for four months out of that last year – and i still seem to have enough savings to get by on for another few months if necessary. I’m obviously much better at saving money than i am at spending it! I’m not paying rent, of course – which makes a massive difference – and i don’t actually do anything, apart from sit at this stupid computer for hours on end and walk along seawalls for hours on end…

It’s not that i’ve chosen to only work for four months since i left Afghanistan – that’s really not what i wanted at all. But circumstances have conspired to make it that way. I probably could find work around here – if i didn’t mind doing a really crap job and get paid an insultingly small amount for the privilege. And, until i’m really desperate, i don’t want to resort to that – it would be a real backward step for me, and i hope it doesn’t come to that. But it really is virtually impossible to get a decent job in this part of England.

But out of those circumstances, i’ve moved into working towards starting my own web design and publishing business. I haven’t got to the stage where i’ve started looking for clients yet – because i’m still teaching myself how to do it really well. But i’m just about getting the hang of it now and i’m hopeful i should be able to start earning money from it before long.

So the appalling state of the job market around here might actually be doing me a favour really – as, hopefully, i’ll end up with a job that i can do pretty much anywhere in the world where there’s broadband internet!

Looking back at leaving Afghanistan, though, is weird. That all seemed to be over in a flash. It was nearly eight months from when i started there till when i left, but time flew by for most of that. I was so busy at work mostly, and what i was doing was sufficiently challenging and interesting, that time passed really quickly.

I still wonder if i made a serious mistake leaving Kabul when i did though. It was a good job and the money was reasonable (although not that reasonable for working in a war zone!) and if i’d stayed till the end of last year, like i’d intended to, it would have set me up for the future much better.

But, on the other hand, i’ve always believed in following my intuition and doing what feels like the right thing to do at the time – and there’s no knowing what might have happened if i had stayed longer in Kabul. I could be dead now, for all i know. After all, i did walk around the streets of Kabul a bit more than some people would think was “sensible”. Of course, most people probably wouldn’t think it was sensible to walk around the streets of Kabul at all!

And if i hadn’t left Kabul when i did, i would never have got to work in Maningrida. But, i must say, i still don’t really know what that period in Arnhem Land was all about! That was very weird. It was a massive amount of hassle for only four and a half months employment! But, of course, Maningrida was somewhere else i intended to stay for a lot longer than i did!

Anyway, that’s another year of my life gone by in a flash! It was at least as interesting as it was weird, though. And i think i’m in a better position now than i was a year ago – in a way. Although i’m in exactly the same place, geographically! This time last year, i was sitting at my laptop in the lounge room of my mum’s tiny little flat writing a blog. That blog was on myspace though, and this one is on my own web site – which is probably a step in the right direction. And i had a different laptop then – this one’s much better! Apart from that, i’m not sure very much has changed!

This time last year, my stuff was in a storage shed in Byron Bay. Now it’s in a storage shed in Darwin. I’m not sure if that’s better or worse! This time last year, though, i had a car sitting in that storage shed, costing money for rego and insurance. That car’s long gone, i’m pleased to say – which is definitely an improvement! However, i think the small shed in Darwin costs about as much as the big shed in Byron Bay!

What else has changed in the last year? Not all that much really, as far as i can see. I seem to have just gone round in circles…

By the way, i’ve improved (in my opinion) the layout of Travelling By The Moon. If you’d like to have a look and tell me what they think, i’d be grateful. And, of course, the blog i wrote while i was working In Afghanistan is available by clicking on that link, if you want to read about what my life there (if you haven’t read it already, that is…)

Tags: Travel and Places // Add Comment »