1 month... that's when I last wrote something on here.
What a lazy hostie I am.

An what a month it's been.

Better to start off from the 'beginning', ie. where I left off last time.

As I remember meself writing Almaty was indeed a break in a pattern of trips that took me around only 3 countries... Syria, Jordan and my beloved Islamic Republic.

Oh, and in case you 'groundlings' were wondering what the term "trip" refers to, it is simply put: When I go to work, I don't go to 'work' as in starting at 8 or 9 AM then finishing off at around 5 PM.
No, when I go to work, I might start the day at around 11:50 AM (yep, our flights have luvly departure times!) and get home something like 3 or even 5 days later!
That, my dears, is a "trip", simply put, a hostie's Work'day'. Allright?

Anyhow, I digress.
Yes, Almaty was nice. Far away, as the flight was only a total of about 9 and a half hours (via Ekaterinburg in the middle of the Russian Ural Mountains), but nice.
Shame I didn't get to see more of the place than I did considering I had loads of time there (it was a 5 day Almaty)...
However that time was 'wisely' spent socialising with the rest of the crew, long nights in the hotel bar, and, a room-party at a Lufthansa crew member's room which went into the early (or late hours depending how you look at it) of the morning.
Fun.

Then was an early X-mas in Moscow after I returned from Kazakhstan, and although I only spent 2 proper days in Mother Russia, it was absolutely worth it, being able to see them (my family) and being able to have a little (although) early Xmas celebration.
I seem to have a nag of spending that Christmas day in countries that "haven't accepted Christ into their hearts and aren't able to join in on the fun"!
2003: Jeddah, Saudi;
2004: Damascus, Syria.

Tehran between Xmas and New Year then... a fun trip with my eccentric coursemate Étáin, a Swedish-speaking Irish girl.

TIP: In Iran it takes approximately 40mins to change a few Euros at a bank.
Lesson learned: Use the little changeshops.

Had a very quiet New Year's 'celebration' with Joona and Matthew in London. Needed that especially since a flight back from Tehran isn't especially easy.

First trip of the new year was then Almaty... this time with my home-girl Miriam, a gorgeous Lebanese girl off my course, and an absolutely brilliant crew.
Actually, that was my first trip as the only male crew-member on-board!
Hey, this definitely isn't Icelandair... where you could probably count the number of male hosties in the company off a single hand!

And that brings us up to today... the day I came back from a 4-day Addis Ababa.
Yes, Ethiopia.
A wonderful place actually. I'm rather ashamed that I didn't even go out and do something 'native'.
Well, if sitting by the pool at the Hilton, sunbathing and having dinner with the crew counts as going 'native', then I'm definitely getting an A for that part of the trip! I guess it doesn't count though.
Well, I had a fantastic time there though.
The crew was absolutely brilliant, 5 of us this time. 3 guys and 2 girls.
And we had a mad time.

The flight back to London was one of the most difficult I've worked on though.
It took us 2 and a half hours to do the lunch service... lets just leave it at that.

Wow, looking back over this it seems my life revolves around 'trips' and flights. Well, fair enough then, as it's true, and to be honest, I don't mind for the time being.
I absolutely love what I'm doing now.

There's a new FotoGallerie on the link-bar which will link you to my "at work" album... to give you an idea what I've been doing over the last few months!




-"Would you like something to drink sir?"
-"No, just water!"