Saturday, 10 December 2011

At least we have the flask...

20 days to go until the kick off of the big race… It was over a year ago we applied for the mighty task of taking on the Indian sub-continent in a tuk-tuk, that’s 347 days to read up on what it takes to drive the equivalent of a lawn mower 2,500km over sand, city and desert… it’s 49 weekend’s worth of time to sit around and figure out the where and how of avoiding India’s ugly little cousins malaria and dysentery.. and 8,328 hours to consider the disclaimer we are required to sign which mentions fun consequences such as death, paralysis, loss, missing, prison..

Bearing this amount of time in mind, and I don’t think I’ve ever had this much time to prepare for anything in my life – one would think that team ‘Real Republicans’ would be a well oiled-engine-knowledge machine, vaccinated to the hilt and sporting fancy gadgets such as GPS’s and smart phones… one would think…

Somehow with all this time on our hands and months and months worth of banter we seem to have been as effective as moths drawn to a light bulb..  in fact our 1st team skype-off only actually took place last night (note: 20 days before kickoff) where Shad announced excitedly that although he had no idea where in Europe his passport currently is, nor has he looked at how to get an Indian visa – but he has bought a fancy hip flask intended to carry copious amounts of whisky to keep us warm at night!

Although last nights skype conference was a real reality check bringing to the fore the awareness that we’ve missed the boat for the vaccinations (a list as long as my arm) advised for travel to India, and other areas we may have completely overlooked… such as how on earth we are actually arriving in Jaisalmer after landing in Delhi – as apparently the airport has decided to close for a few months.. I feel this has not waived our (still) somewhat naïve excitement!

On a very positive note, in the short amount of time our donation website’s have been open our charities have already received collectively over R 15,000 (ZAR) – already above what the target was! So a mention and BIG thank you to all our friends, family and colleagues! Really really awesome to have had such a great response and we are hoping to keep it going and growing!

I hear too that there are waivers and bets (and a photo diary) for Shad and Ped’s weight loss over the course of the trip.. I will be happy to post these pics for anyone keen to wager.. I think the person to be in touch with on this is Jazz.. So get your bets in before Day 1 (January 1st!).

This weekend will be dedicate to getting ourselves together – noses in lonely planets, bums in decathlon trying out sleeping bags, and fingers on keys boards booking internal flights! Wish us luck…as these are the intentions… as they have been for the past umpteen months…

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