'Goodbye champagne and the caviar set, I wanna slum and drink all of the rum I can get'

Just under a year ago I packed up a suitcase (two actually – the first one split!) and started a 30-something hour journey down to London and then across several oceans, finally landing in Bangkok, Thailand. I was travelling alone for the first time about to try my hand at teaching English to students in a primary school. It was amazing and unsurprising that they taught me much more valuable lessons than how to shout out a favourite fruit, give (admittedly limited) directions and, as with most young TEFL teachers, the lyrics AND dances to at least 3 ridiculously cheesy songs.

I got home in September, days before starting a PGCE course in Nottingham, and all the while it’s definitely the small memories that have stayed the most vivid. It’s those little memories that fuelled me to book a return trip. In 3 weeks I’ll make the same journey, down to Heathrow and across the globe. This time with plans to explore a bit more of Thailand and to venture into Laos, Vietnam, Cambodia and possibly more of Asia depending on how far my pennies/baht take me!

Over the next few weeks this is the place I’ll indulge in a little nostalgia and share the difficulties of trying to squish the contents of my ridiculously overstuffed wardrobe into a 45 litre rucksack!

Here's a photo from a truly weird but completely amazing night I had last year, just outside Papa 2000 in Chumphon, and one of Laura (one of my favourite people in the whole wide world - she'll be joining me for the first part of the trip!) and myself getting Oriental in Nottingham's best Japanese restaurant : )