This month has been another fun and busy month!Once I said goodbye to my parents at the start of my month my friend from school, Lindsey, came over to visit me. We had a Fantastic time!!!! For the first few days the people I live with were away so we had the house to ourselves! I’m glad to say we managed not to burn down the house – only melt a bowl and sieve!! Whilst Lindsey was here we did a mix of sunbathing, swimming and tourist things too. We spent many hours lying in the sun and playing on a lilo entertaining th
e whole beach and bar staff as we later discovered! The tourist things we did included a harbour cruise, going round the cathedral in Valletta, walking along the front etc. We also went on a cruise round the 3 islands – it was a fab day although we did go through a storm that lasted about 1 hour. We were part of the crazy few that insisted on staying on the roof wrapped in towels whilst going through it. However, the sun was on our side and when we made it to Comino (the island where you swim) the sun came out and we spent every last minute in the water. I also educated Lindsey to some local culture – eating a local fruit called Bambinella and we also went to a water polo game. On the island water polo is very big (like football in England), it happened to be the final of the knock out so things were even more heated than normal.Training started back this month but only lightly – a pre preseason! I have been training everyday but not to the extent of death!! It has involved lots of lunges and long jogs. I would here like to congratulate Lindsey for completing all the sessions including having a good bash at the “jumpy things” as she called them despite being a rower and not an athlete!! It was good to be back with the group and back onto the track! We are already looking forward to the season and talking times/distances.
On the 18th it was the big boxing promo night with the main fight being “Super Scott” vs. “Too Cute”. Lindsey and I were on the “door” (or ramp as the case maybe!) sorting tickets and wrist bands etc – I’m glad to say we had a rather large security guard with us too! It was a good night and an interesting intro into the competitive boxing world for me. It was a shame however, that the main fight ended in round 2 due to an accidental head clash – so it was classed as a technical draw. I didn’t even know there could be a draw in boxing!! After they were patched them up we headed out on a good Maltese party – again a lot of fun!! In December there is to be a rematch between Marc and Scott – we are all looking forward to it!
I had my first Maltese petrol experience last week. On the island most of the petrol stations are self service and there are machines where you put in the money and then you have a short time to fill up your car. I went relatively late one night after training put in my last 10euro and no petrol came!!! So I had to drive home and go back the next day to reclaim my petrol! I’m glad to say I had enough petrol to do this! Apparently this is very common and I’m lucky not to have had it happen before!
I often spend my Sundays at a traditional farm house with a pool and lots of land – it’s lovely!!! They grow a huge variety of fruit and veg and I have thoroughly enjoyed learning more about them. Last week the olives were ready so I went olive picking – it was actually rather pleasant! As I’m the tallest so was in charge of the high up ones and given the rake to rake them down from the top branches. After a couple of hours I defiantly had neck ache from looking up all the time!
This month the start of the rains and storms began. They are very impressive! Added to this is the fact that the island is not designed for rain!! After only 5 minutes all the roads have turned to rivers and the roads by the front have the sea coming up onto them as well! The road that the gym is on is especially bad and you can’t go on it when it rains! In between the rains we still have some sunshine between the clouds so I have made the best of my last few days sunbathing. As the island is so small and affected by so many different weather systems you can get all sorts of weather within hours: the locals say: “All the seasons in one day”.
