so, loading over 10 hours of sound clips and 700+ photos onto your computer affirms that you really had been to china. the state your brain is in, you could be persuaded of pretty much anything right now. the computer asks if you want to ‘remove redeye?’. you wish you could do it in life as well as on-screen. feeling the need for righteousness, you were up at seven this morning and in work not long after. you even managed to successfully pretend you had come in especially for the meeting you stumbled across at 8.10, even though it had slipped your mind (along with pretty much everything else). you sit at the table and everyone just laughs at your expression of weariness. walking down the corridor you see some of your students – they laugh too. so, like i say, i wish red-eye was removable.
you feel, overwhelmingly, that it was excellent to get back home yesterday. after such an inspiring trip, getting back is all-the-sweeter. as a reporter famously commented on harriers leaving an aircraft carrier during the falklands ‘conflict’: “i counted them all out and i counted them all back in again”. you feel the same about successfully returning your intrepid young companions to their families, intact, healthy and as you borrowed them. it was also lovely for you to see lara, who was due to come on the trip but destined to pursue an altogether different adventure. her efforts were crucial to the success of the trip, it is important to tell her.
you go for breakfast with your family, even managing to stay awake until 4.30 that afternoon (aka half past midnight, guangzhou time). you think a half hour doze will do the trick. terrible mistake. a beer or two later and it’s an early night, no question. you manage to flick through a book you picked up that afternoon after walking on the downs – ‘chinese art’. you wonder whether that or the ‘little red book’ you so carefully bartered for will get read first. they provide a neat echo to an earlier entry so you post a snap of weary you holding them. 
so, there’s much to come back ‘here’ to add but, for now, you decide to finish your travel diary instead before memories melt away from your ageing brain like butter in a pan. life will kick in again all too soon so it’s important to chart these things quickly.
to all i travelled with, it was a pleasure and an adventure and a great experience to share it with you. to those that did the organising – thank you – it was seamless. to those still out there, i hope to see you soon (and i’ll email this weekend, i promise). and to amanda, hope aall is going well, travel back safe and sound.
i look forward to our reunion already. x
