Friday, May 10, 2013





Friday, May 3, 2013

Sometimes you just have to slog through





Wednesday, April 24, 2013







Saturday, April 13, 2013

Broke, but not broken




Thursday, March 28, 2013

Ups and Downs





Wednesday, March 20, 2013







Friday, March 15, 2013




Tuesday, March 12, 2013

Going well

Well, I made it through the week sticking to my budget. It was actually fine, and I underspent which was nice. I sent home all my money but what was in my budget, so it's important I stick to it. It's a little unfortunate that I realised right after sending it that I actually have to pay my internet and cable for the next year tomorrow, but I had completely forgotten about it! I think it's about 2,000 kwai, so I'm hoping I can still pay it and manage on what is left in my account, but things will be pretty lean at the end of this month! I figure if it gets terrible I can also get some money out of my home bank (my card from the UK is accepted in most cash machines here) but I'd rather not if I can manage at all!

A fortunate side affect of cutting down the money I spend is that I've been sticking to eating mostly home food, which means I lost 5lbs last week. That's great for me! I've joined a weight loss challenge on SparkPeople that ends right before my birthday, so I'm going to try and keep it up without overwhelming myself.

Gotta go, I'm late!

Wednesday, March 6, 2013


(I've had this sitting in Drafts for a while, sorry)

Turns out when using an automatic, driving is kind of awesome. I had a small heart attack when I merged on to the motorway for the first time, and then again when I had to do my first big island solo, but after that things were sort of great. Every time I overtook a lorry I started humming the Indiana Jones theme tune. Not having to worry about stalling the car was really nice.

I can't believe I'm actually saying this, but I've had to sit and think about my 5 year plan just recently (which makes me feel about 50 years old) I want to go back to university and become qualified as a teacher. That means (somehow) getting on a program (my biggest worry) and then supporting myself through the time I'm studying. This in turn means saving enough money in my time left in China to do all this.

(end of draft)

I'm trying to look upon the budgeting as an opportunity. In order to make my budget I'm going to be doing a few things, and those things usually directly correlate with me losing weight, so everything should hopefully start to fall into place. I want to save at least 5000 kwai (£500/$800) a month, something that's actually completely doable in China. In order to do this I've been looking at my basic income and come up with this:

Salary: 12,450 (after tax)

-5,000 savings
-3,000 rent and bills/month

4,450/31 (max days in a month) x7 (days in a week) = 1004.84

I'm rounding that down to an even 1,000 (£100, $160) a week for simplicity's sake.

Every Monday I go to the ATM and get the thousand out, then I live from the cash in my wallet until the next Monday. This helps me keep track of what I'm spending and what I have left. No visits to the ATM in-between or paying for stuff on cards! I walk to work so commuting coasts aren't an issue, but anything else (taxis, groceries, any eating out/fun things I do) will come out of that money. If I use up that money by Wednesday, I'd better be ready to scavenge meals from what's left in my apartment and freezer until next Monday.

When Monday arrives, if I have any money left from the week, I will top it up to 1,000 so that I'm starting with the same all the time. Anything I don't spend can be extra savings.

Even though I budget for my rent/bills every month, I only pay them every three months (in a lump sum, very common here in China). I just did my most recent payment this week, so after every rent payment from now I will go to the bank and send what savings I have home. I find this a lot easier than having the money in China, as once it's in my home savings account the money doesn't exist for me in the same way it does in my Chinese bank. I'm much more likely to chip away at it here.

I'm at the end of the first week now and things went great this week. A big part of keeping to this is not eating out at work so much! It's all we go right now and it siphons away your money fast! Not to mention that eating at MacDonald's every day loses its appeal rather quickly and is really bad for you. I brought meals in 4 days this week and ate out of the 5th, which is about where I want to be. I'm not banning it, I just want it to be an occasional thing instead of everyday. This, in turn, is meaning I finally lost a little weight this week (1.5kg) so I'm hoping to keep this going.

There aren't 31 days every month, and 3,000 is the top estimate fore my bills, so it's entirely possible I will save more than I am planning. Also, 1,000 a week is quite generous if I keep to my plan of making my own food. I'm going to keep on the 1,000 a week for the next month while I try things out, and if I find I have quite a bit left over at the end of the week (as I did this week), I may lower my weekly budget and try and save 7,000 a month instead. I don't want to budget myself into the ground though, to the point where I feel like I can't do anything so I say forget it and blow a load of money on something, so the next month should show me what a comfortable compromise is.

Sorry if this post got a bit boring! I'm trying to keep things laid out and straight in my head to keep it going.

Wednesday, February 6, 2013

The bosom of my homeland

Well, I'm back home now and am pleased to report that I didn't have major problems on the flight. I filled my seat but I did fit, so that was good. I was lucky in the fact that on both planes I didn't have anyone sitting next to me, so even when the arm rest did dig in slightly (only very slightly, I could have dealt with it if I'd been sitting by someone) I was able to just raise it up and have two seats anyway. I'm now very glad I didn't spend all that money upgrading to business class. My dad mentioned something worth checking on though (that I forgot about when I was checking in), that I should ask how much an upgrade is on the day as they'd rather sell it cheaper then to fill the seat than have it wasted. I'll possibly look into it when I go back. If it were the case of a few hundred I would probably pay that.

I met my baby brother and sister for the first time yesterday! There were adorable, but then I knew they would be. I bought them ALL THE OUTFITS from China so they're going to be the best dressed babies in the village for a while.

I'm going up to my mum's at the weekend, and I'm really nervous because I'll probably be driving. I passed my test about three weeks before I went to China and haven't driven since, making the longest journey I've ever taken outside of the safe haven of the dual control instructor car about 5 minutes. Mum lives in East Anglia, which (for someone who knows what they're doing) is about 2 and a quarter/2 and a half hours away. For someone who knows what they're doing. It also involves driving on BIG ROADS instead of the usually back streets I'm used to. I believe the phrase to best describe me right now would be shitting brick. I called my old driving instructor and asked him to give me a top up lesson or two, which I have booked for tomorrow and Thursday. I called my mum to finalise details, and though I think she meant well, she actually made me feel a lot worse about it, so I've gone from 'This is awful but I can do it' to 'crap'. Fingers crossed anyway.

Tuesday, January 15, 2013

Unpretty truths

One unfortunate part of my job is the fact that we have to take a minimum of 4 pictures per class that we put up on the class page each week that the parents can see. It leads to some really cute pictures of my kids (I teach 2-10 year old Chinese kids, cute is kind of what they do), but the unfortunate part for me is that it's a weekly endurance test over 7 classes of catching shots of myself and going 'Oh God, that's unfortunate'. I'm very fat anyway, but my tan pants and compulsory tucked in shirt does no favours for my pear shaped body. It doesn't seem to have done enough to, I don't know, make me do something about it, but it is a fairly regular reminder.

About 2 weeks ago I had to book a flight home. It's a long flight (18 hours or so all told) and I'm worried about fitting in the seat. Worried enough that with the memory of all horror stories I've heard about other people being stopped and humiliated while checking in, I was actually contemplating paying to upgrade to business class. I agonized over this for a while. The price difference WAS HUGE. The economy seat is costing me £745 (and that was a good deal!), whereas the equivalent business class  seat was somewhere in the range of £2500. That's right, it was over 3 times the price. The premium economy seats aren't really worth the bother (unless maybe you need the exit row because you're very tall, but for width concerns they are the same seat) and would have cost £1500. In the end I checked the flight I wanted to take on and found out the seat width. I love that site so much! Then I measured my own width sitting down in my chair. The width of the seat is a scant half inch bigger than the width of my arse. 'Okay' I said, 'This is doable. I've got a month, as long as I don't gain any weight (and if I can lose some it would be a bonus) I might be OK with this'. So, unable to justify how much more money it would cost versus how long it took me to save said money, I booked the economy seat.

And of course, haven't been able to stop eating since. Genius!

The crazy thing is, I have a gym membership to the gym that is 15 minutes walk from my house. There is no reason not to go! I've been going around and around this fact while sitting at work or at home eating junk, saying 'OK, tomorrow is the day!'and not doing it. I read a few other blogs today about people who feel like they're spiralling and even though it's hard for them I'm glad they're sharing their stories. Because people like me are sitting here feeling like it's just our fault for being such losers. To every one of those blogs all I can think to say is I'm so sorry you feel like this, I know the misery, but You. Can Do .It. Even if 'it' is only one step. Even if you haven't succeeded before. No matter how many times you've tried this. If I can offer this to other people why can't I have it myself? Know, you people that post your slip ups online, that you are inspirational. Even when you are at the bottom of your personal barrels, you are inspiring me to say 'hey, I know that feeling, it's not hopeless it just feels that way right now' Too late is for when you're dead, everything else is negotiable, so maybe I can do this again?

Take care of myself. Clean my apartment. Walk to the gym (no matter how many times you say it you won't do your exercise videos at home, that's why you joined the gym). Accept that some things work for me and some things don't, and I don't always know which is which so try more! Accept that it's easy to say 'that doesn't work for me' when I actually mean 'I don't like/want to do that'. Be kinder to and about my self.

The only thing I'm sure I can do out of any of those is clean, but I can try. And even if I try and fail, the attempt is more than I'm doing now.