Christmas

We have had a lovely Christmas. Andrew and Maree flew up from Hawkes Bay for the day. We started off at Mum and Dad's for breakfast which was really nice. Christmas lunch was at about 2:30 and I was actually quite chuffed at how well it went especially considering how badly Tai's illness threw me and my timings. We had ham, lamb, roast potatoes, kumara, parsnip and chicken. There was asparagus and for dessert we had chocolate pav drowned in berries.

Spyke went to the forest again on Saturday with Kristina (Oscar) and Nic from 'The Board' (Jake). We had a nice ride although Spyke did have a fairly decent strop at one point which involved running backwards and doing spinny half rears. I wasn't very impressed. The good thing was he walked nicely once he got over it. Spyke also had his grazing muzzle on for 24 hours last night, he was not very impressed and sneezed a lot. I have taken it off tonight but it will go back on tomorrow after our next forest ride.

The dogs have also been to the forest for a swim and a walk, they could do with more though.

Next on my agenda is a very casual barbecue for New Years Eve.

It is fabulous to be on holiday!!!!!

Touch Wood

Things seem to have settled down in my equine world, thank goodness. Tai seems to be fully recovered. He had a hacking cough at the end of last week and I thought we were in for another vet visit but I wormed him and he seems to have come right. Spyke seems to have settled completely after being off grass for a week. We had our second registered dressage competition in the weekend and I was quite worried about how he would behave as he has been SO awful when out recently.

I took him to the forest on the day before as I really don't like schooling the day before a dressage competition. I went with Kristina on her LOVELY little 5 year old Oscar and we had a really, really lovely ride. We trotted and cantered and everyone was sane and sensible. I gave Spyke a bath afterwards (in the rain) and then drove him home. In between me dropping him off and going to pick up my car the wee 'treasure' rolled in the muddiest hole he could find so when I plaited him up his mane was full of mud. Grrrr.

On the day of the dressage I was in complete agony. I had fallen off the three foot high brick wall at mum and dad's on the Thursday night (was helping with Christmas decorations) and I landed on my elbow. It turns out that I think I have torn a muscle in my chest and it is VERY painful. Poor Kristina turned up to help me on sunday morning and got sent home for Voltaren (which helped a LOT).

We arrived at the dressage about 30 minutes later than I had planned and, since we were third on, had very little warm up time. Fortunately, Spyke was his normal laid back self at Woodhill so he only needed a bit of trot and canter work before going in to the ring. He did quite a nice test but needed a lot of pushing on and he was very on the forehand (which crops up every time. I need to pay off some vet bills so I can get some lessons). I was thrilled with how cool he was.

We had almost an hour between tests but when we arrived back down by the ring to warm up 25 minutes before our scheduled time the horse two before us had just come out of the ring. Yikes!!!! Poor Spyke trotted and cantered once on each rein and then had to go straight in the ring. Well he was COMPETELY asleep!!! He tripped at E and didn't strike off on one canter when I asked him. Fortunately the judge didn't hear me shout "Bollocks" at the top of my lungs when I got that all wrong. LOL. It was a very laboured test but once again, as he was quiet I was pretty happy. The next dressage I do I will be rarking him up a bit to see if we can get him more forward (it won't be hard to get him more forward than he was that dayLOL). He got good marks, 63.5% for the first test and 61.5% for the second so he has qualified for HOY but I doubt we will be going.

The dogs are very well. Sammie is just full of beans after her operation and was full on playing with Brina up at the paddock last night. I love seeing them so happy. Brina is in dire need of a really good makeover which I will hopefully manage after Christmas. She was decidedly stinky last night when we got back from the paddock so a bath might be required before Christmas day.

Dramas

My word it has been a week!!!! My last post was about my fights with Spyke. Well that paled into insignificance very quickly!! On Wednesday evening Sarah and Kristina brought their boys down to practice for the dressage day. As they were coming down the hill I noticed that Tai didn't look quite right. I tied him up and we all watched him for a while. After a few minutes he started showing all the early signs of colic!!! NOT a good thing for a 27 year old. We got the vet down straight away and he diagnosed very mild colic and gave him a pain killer. I was quite surprised that he didn't give him some Buscopan to get things moving.

I asked Tina to count legs on the way past in the morning and did a quick check on Wednesday night at about 11 (he looked fine).

The next morning Tina left a message to say that she couldn't see him in the paddock and had I put him in the stable. Instant panic stations hit!!! I rang Kristina who a) lives just around the corner and b) is a vet nurse. While I was waiting to hear from her I had another message from Christine, a horsey lady that lives around the corner the other way, to say that Tai wasn't looking so good. Kristina tried to ring me but the reception is really bad down at the paddock so we had to resort to texting. Anyway, she felt he looked very uncomfortable do I called the vet straight away.

To cut a long story short (too late I hear you cry!!) Tai had an impaction colic. He spent 48 hours on pain killers, had multiple vet visits, got a bleeding nose when the vets tried (and failed) to intubate him to get paraffin down him (Tai was not having a BAR of it even with sedation). The blood was terrible!!! There seemed to be litres of it!!!

Tai spent two days and nights in the stable, I spent two days and nights in the car next to the stable. We knew he was beginning to feel better on Saturday when he busted down the stable door and buggered off down the drive way.

Tonight he has gone back into the paddock and I am keeping everything crossed that the drama are over. It has been a VERY worrying and exhausting few days.

On a good note I had a FABULOUS ride on Spyke tonight, he did some really nice work but also did some tanking and leaning. Oh well, you can't have everything. :-) He is back in the good books for now. I hope he stays there on Sunday at the big dressage competition!!!!

By the way, I'm afraid there won't be any pics for a while as none of the three digital cameras I have are working now. :-(

Ashamed :-(

I have had a very mixed time with Spyke, he is very unreliable at the moment. In the weekend we went to the forest twice. On Saturday we went with Bert and Sarah and did a good 2 hours up and down hills. He was pretty good but for the first half he was spooky and refused to go out in front. At about half way he relaxed and went out happily in front. We had a FABULOUS canter along one of the tracks but then a spooky one along the next. When he got home and was eating his dinner he was spooking at traffic...sigh!!!

On Sunday we went to the forest with a group from the horse forum that I frequent. There were 9 of us all together and Spyke refused to go through a gate so I got off him and lead him through and then carried on to the locked gate. After I had opened it we stood aside to let everyone through so that we could shut it behind them. Well Spyke pulled back AND bucked...Grrrrr. We set off on our ride and he was very good in a crowd but once again refused to go in front. About half way through the ride we had to go up a steep bank and the two horses in front trotted up. Well Spyke let rip with a couple of decent bucks and got really wound up. Fortunately, because he was on a steep slope he couldn't do much. It took him a good 10 minutes to settle again and then he was lovely.

When we got home I lead him off the truck and he suddenly spooked at a recycling bin that he has walked past MANY times before and jumped on top of me. I confess that I completely lost it at that point and hit him repeatedly with the end of the lead rope. :-( (It is a soft lead rope but that was no excuse). However, he should never, EVER trample me. I was pretty upset about the whole thing really as he is just not my Spyke at the moment. My friend Kristina has taken a blood sample and we have sent that off to be analysed to see if there is a lack of selenium or a magnesium imbalance.

I rode yesterday and schooled him very hard. I worked him for over an hour and we were pretty mad at each other by the end. I felt like our 'relationship' had been damaged and that I am a 'bad mother' :-( However, tonight I went up and apologised to him and had a very gentle ride in the paddock. The plan now is to take things quietly until I have the blood results back and then decide what to do from there. We have the WRC dressage this weekend and I am VERY nervous about how he is going to cope with that. We will work through it though and hopefully rebuild our trust in each other. I am absolutely gutted to be suffering from this set back as I was so looking forward to this summer. I felt that we were going to really achieve things this year. :-(

On a nice note, I caught up with Richard, Heather and Dibley in the weekend and have now got a fabulous new cart for the girls. I just need a harness now and we will be able to go carting. Yay!!!!

Mad Mad Mad

Spyke is still in the bad books. The boy is just not behaving!!!! I think we have way too much good grass. I took him to club tonight and he was AWFUL again. I started off lunging him for ages and he still didn't quieten. I was going to get on him but he pulled back, ripped free and bolted down the paddock bucking. Grrrrrr. Eventually I did get on but I just walked and trotted in a very small circle. It is just not like him to be this wired. I am going to get some bloods done to see if he is out of balance somewhere. It is just so disappointing when I had so many plans. I am pretty gutted by it all really. :-(

A Very Busy Week

Yes it has been a VERY busy week. Sammie was speyed yesterday :-(. She was feeling VERY sorry for herself last night and this morning. She couldn't manage any dinner last night and then this morning she felt that breakfast was just not possible for a girl that was feeling miserable. I think her thoughts were along these lines. "No, I couldn't possibly manage breakfast. Can't you see how unhappy I am? A girl can't possibly eat........Oh........is that chicken in my breakfast? Well I might just manage some chicken (nom nom nom). A few biscuits won't hurt. (nom nom nom). Oi!!! Where are you going with that bowl? There's still a biscuit in there. (nom)". Needless to say she is feeling much better. :-)

It has been an interesting week with Spyke. He has done some really, really nice work at home. He has even manged a couple of really nice lengthens, which is quite exciting. I took him to adult ride on Wednesday. I was quite hopeful of popping over a couple of cross country jumps. He was really good when we got there. His eyes were on stalks a bit but he did some lovely soft trot work. As the evening went on though he began to get tense and then he just got worse and worse until I decided that discretion is the better part of valour and I exited the saddle, stage left. I put him on the lunge and he impressed everyone with his 'airs above ground'. Little toad. When I got him home we did some serious work (and it was lovely too).

His reaction to club was a bit of a worry as today we had to do a show hunter clinic and I was no longer confident that he would behave. I jumped him at home last night and he was really nice. I only have one jump though and I really need several so that we can do grids etc.

The show hunter today was excellent. We did theory in the morning and then rode two rounds each in the afternoon. I had elected to do one of the 'higher' heights as height doesn't worry me with Spyke, he has plenty of scope.........and he soooo proved that today!!!!!

All the horses before us did really lovely show hunter rounds, calm and kind. Spyke, when I was warming up, was nice and quiet and sensible. He is still very stiff on the left rein and he was also a bit stiff after his efforts at club. He was a MONSTER. He charged every jump, he stopped at one (he NEVER stops????!!!!!) he put in some e-nor-mous jumps and was by far and away the worst behaved horse there. It's very frustrating as I KNOW he can do nice show hunter. I guess this is the down side of trying to bring him into work at this time of year, when there is a lot of spring grass around. Grrrrr for missing that 6 weeks as he was going really well before I had to go to Manila. Dangly front legs.

I learnt a LOT today and Tracy has given me some things to work on that make a big difference and, in fact, I would really like to book some lessons with Tracey but I'm a bit embarrassed to after today's performance.

Lovin' Bein' Home

It's true!! I am just loving being back in NZ. I had a lovely weekend. It started with our work Christmas do on Friday night. It was a really good evening topped off by Opshop playing...good band!!!! On Saturday I spent most of the morning running around trying to find a feather boa for the Hen Night I had been invited to. I couldn't find one anywhere!!!! The really annoying thing is I had one up until a few months ago when I had a clean out and threw it away. I never did find one. The Hen Night started off a Honey's Champagne Bar.....Niiiiiiice!!!! They have a FABULOUS range of cocktails and it was very difficult to choose. I did, of course, end up going for a creamy, chocolatey one. :-) After Honey's we headed to Squid Row for dinner. I had a steak which was just delicious and then we went to one of the girl's places for tiramisu and more cocktails (I was driving though so, apart from the one cocktail, I was on Diet Coke for the evening). It was a really nice evening and it was great to catch up with people and meet some new people.

Sunday was forecast to be wet later on and I had arranged with Kristina to take Oscar for his first truck ride and ride in the forest. So first thing I took the girls up for a walk in the forest. Sammie was really funny, she is usually the sedate one but yesterday she was having a ball. She ran the legs off Brina, rolled, swam, played, ate cow poo and just generally had a marvellous time. It was great to see. Brina is a bit overweight at the moment (her and I are on a diet) so she was not quite as lively as usual. The bad news was that we found out that they are going to log our dog walk. :-( It had to happen eventually but it will be sad to see it all gone. I'll just have to make the most of while we can.

Just as I was about to leave to pick up Spyke, Kristina and Oscar, Stu and Mark (who is currently living in Kuwait and hasn't been back to NZ for 3 years) popped by. Weddings are great!!! You get to catch up with all sorts of people. They stayed for coffee and had a bit of a catchup and a chin wag which was really nice.

I finally left to get the truck at about 2 pm. When I stopped to get Spyke the little toad took one look at the truck and buggered off to the top of the hill. Naturally, sinceI was running late!! GRRRR!!! Then he dragged his feet all the way down the hill and when I waved the rope at him to get him walking faster ha bucked. It was not a auspicious beginning. I threw him on the truck, rug and all and headed up to get Kristina and Oscar.

As far as we know it was Oscar's first ever trip on a truck. I was pretty confident that we would be able to load him as he is a very obliging little fellow. Sure enough he walked straight up the ramp, swung his butt around and parked perfectly.

At the forest after we had tacked up Oscar was so 'wound up' that he stood with his nose resting on the hitching rail and his eyes shut. I swear he would have been snoring if he could.

Little Oscar never put a foot wrong on the entire forest ride. He strode along with his ears pricked having a fabulous time. My horse however, decided that the forest was just full of boogey monsters and was a bit of a pillock. It was a bit embarrassing to have the the baby horse on his first forest outing take the lead past the scary things. LOL Silly Spyke. It's just as well I luff him.

It was a lovely weekend......busy........ but lovely. And, at the risk of repeating myself, I just LOVE being back home!!!!!

Home At Last!!!!

I am SOOOOO happy to be home!!!!! The air smells amazing, the birds sound beautiful and the weather is luverly!!!!

I got home at lunch time on Saturday and got a huge welcome from the dogs. Sammie 'yipped' for five minutes straight and Brina became my shadow. I have missed them so much. My friend Gill came over with her lovely dalmation Storm and we took the dogs to the forest for a walk. We had an ice cream on the way up from the forest and then headed to the paddock. The horses look GREAT and I actually think they were pleased to see me!!!!

We tacked the boys up and I went to lunge Tai but he was a bit lame (his feet were quite long) so he got the day off. Spyke was lunged for a few minutes and then I jumped on. He was lovely!!! Really, really lovely (even though he had 3 loose and 1 missing shoe). Gill had a wee ride too and he went beautifully for her too. I was very proud of him. That evening a few friends came over and we had takeaways. It was the perfect homecoming (except Tina was MIA LOL).

On Sunday I rode Jessie a fabulous coloured horse that is baby sitting Java. She was fabulous!!! A real ATV of the horse world. We rode for about and hour and a half in the forest. However, I need to have a chat to Martina about the saddle as my butt HURT a LOT after that ride!!! In the evening Kristina and Sarah came down to the paddock with their boys and we all rode. Spyke was STUNNING!!! He was soft and was listening and carrying himself. I think Gill should ride him more often!!

Today I have had a hair cut, had a hair colour (at a different place), bought a rug to replace the one Spyke trashed, had the boys' feet done and lunged Spyke on the flat and over a jump. Another great day!!!!

Tomorrow it's back to work.

I am so happy to be home.

Leaving!!!!

I have never been so pleased to be home!!!! Gettin out of Manila proved to be trickier than I thought. To start with my 8am pickup time was apparently 9am. I saw Mike, the driver, at 8am and he told me I was going to be picked up at 9. He still had to do a run out to site. I wondered how he was going to manage Nova and back in one hour as it usually took us half an hour at 3:30am when there is NO traffic but at peak hour on a Friday I figured it would take at least an hour each way but then Mike does the route every single day so he would know better than I.

Sure enough though, 9am came and went. As did 9:10am, and 9:20am (my flight was at 12:30 and it can take up to an hour and a half to get to the airport) at 9:30 I got a call from Mike to say that he was held up in traffic (BIG surprise) and that Si was 10 minutes away.

Si got there at about 9:40 and was a bit worried when he heard what time my flight was. Poor Si had been working since he had picked us up at 3:30am on THURSDAY morning!!!!!!! Anyway, good old Si managed to get me to the airport at about 10:30 (we were lucky with the traffic) and I got checked in and breathed a huge sigh of relief. BUT when I went to immigration it turned out that my visa had run out 2 weeks before and I was now an 'overstayer' (blinkin' work had said I didn't have to extend my visa even when I asked them about several times). Fortunately, all I had to do was pay 2520 pesos. Unfortunately, they don't take credit card and I had no cash as I had made sure I had none left before leaving the country. The immigration lady was really, really rude (bit of a shock from a Filipino) and didn't give a rats. She sent me back to the airline counter who had no idea why she sent me there and what they could to. Fortunatley, they found me the only ATM in the airport. Unfortunately, it said 'We are unable to process your request at this time'. The airline person started talking about changing my flights and I had a melt down. I was so tired and sooooo wanted to get home, so I cried. The poor airline man didn't know what to do. I stopped him from changing my flights and said I would have one more go at the ATM. Well, I managed to get my PIN wrong, didn't I???? Idiot!!! One more try and out popped some cash. The airline guy was jumping up and down cheering (bless him) and I managed to pay the waiver.

THEN I got my bag searched on my way through the final security gate. I think my favourite Manila Moment was the moment the plane's wheels left the runway.

Last Day

This time tomorrow I will be on my way home. Yay!!!!!!

Having a REALLY bad last day, hopefully it will improve.

This is me.....signing off ........from Manila.

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......as you were. :-)

4

Yay, only 4 days till I am home!!!

Had a really pleasant weekend. We all had a very quiet Saturday morning and then headed to the 1st birthday party. It was a really big affair. It was held a restaurant and there was a huge cake and decorations. There were about 50 guests that were all fed at the buffet. The kids were all in costume and there was a clown that entertained them the whole time. The little guest of honour was looking gorgeous and was looked after by her ya-ya. We felt really quite privileged to be invited.

We were supposed to go bowling afterwards but when we got to the bowling alley there was a tournament on so we weren't able to. I was quite disappointed really. We are now going to go on Thursday instead at the bowling alley across the road from work so that everyone can come and it an be my final fling before I COME HOME!!!!!!!

Yesterday afternoon Anthony and I went to the movies to see Quantum of Solace. It is seriously cheap to go to the movies here.

This evening after dinner we all shot up to level 41 to get some piikkies of the sunset and surrounding area. And here they are:

They aren't brilliant pikkies, my camera is a bit overworked and the windows were not very clean. :-)

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I survived the clubbing. I even enjoyed it for the first couple of hours and then my batteries went flat! We went to a club called the Embassy Club at The Fort which is apparently 'the' place to go. All the celebs etc go there. It was pretty amazing. We had to go through three lots of security and had to have our names on the guest list in order to get in. The place was beautifully decorated with huge crystal chandeliers and gilt. It was quite empty when we got there (at 10:30 pm) but was REALLY heaving by midnight. I ran out of steam at about 1am so I headed out to the top of the stairs to people watch which was FASCINATING!!! We went there with Emile and Mike from work and some of Emile's friends. SUCH lovely people!!!!! I just can't say enough about how lovely the Filipinos are. We got home at about 2:30 am (23 hours after we left for work) and I think I was asleep by 2:32am.

Bowling this afternoon but first......more sleep!!!!

This time next week I'll be at home!!!!! YAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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This time next week I will be on a plane on the way home. Yay!!!

Tonight we are going clubbing. It is now 8:45 and I have been up since 3am and I am KNACKERED!!! The clubbing was organised just for me ('cos I am obviously such a 'clubby' type of person *snort*) so I really have to go but I would have to say it is the LAST thing I feel like. On the flipside I really, really appreciate the trouble one of the guys has gone to.

Tomorrow we are going to a first brithday for the daughter of one of the trainees, then we are going bowling and ice skating. None of it starts until 2:30pm ....yay!!!! I am quite looking forward to it. And on Sunday we have no plans at this stage, for which I am truly grateful. LOL

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Not that I'm counting!!!

By the way, I'm a cousin/auntie to little teeny tiny twin girls!!! Welcome to the world little munchkins!!!! Big hugs to Cuzzy Lorna and Chris!!!!

9 Days to Go!!

I heard from a friend this morning that her maiden mare has had her foal. Yay!!! A lovely little filly apparently, just as she had ordered. Hanging out for pikkies now.

11 Days to Go

And look!!!! More animal pics!!! My bud Kristina lunged a somewhat 'chipper' Spyke today. Apparently it was not boring!!! But doesn't he look FABULOUS!!!! Look at the dapples!!!

12 Days to Go!!!!

Yay!!!! Animal pics, received today!!!!

Spot da doggy!!!!!

Handsome boys and a Sammie that CAN do stay (unlike the 'missing one').

As you can see from the size of the grins, the girls are REALLY missing me........NOT!!!!!

2nd to Last Saturday

Today we had our big trip to the Mall of Asia, the third largest mall in the world. It was actually disappointingly small. There is a big hypermarket which if you live locally must be just great as it seems to sell everything and there is a big SM department store (we have one across the road at Mega Mall) so the actual mall itself is very ordinary in size.

However, we did have a ball as we got to see the sea!!! Yay!!! After 4 weeks the Bay of Manila looked fabulous and the sea breeze was very welcome. We had a bit of a wander around the mall and then debated about whether we would stay on for the fireworks at 7 (it was about 4pm). We decided to have an early dinner and watch the sunset (which is supposed to be lovely from MOA) and then head home. By the time we had wandered to Italiannis and had dinner (the sunset WAS lovely - my pics don't do it justice) it was about 5:45 so we decided that by the time we had been back to the stand where Anthony wanted to buy a watch and then wandered back to the waterfront we might as well stay for the fireworks. We did and it was GREAT!!! It was only abotu 5 minutes but the fireworks were fab and ther were thousands of people down on the waterfront to see them. It was a good day!!!!






Vid of fireworks can be seen here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4fAnZELG-hQ

Week 4

Week 4 is over. Only two to go!!!!

We had a good but very tiring week this week. I have not been sleeping well (still!!!) and have suffered for that during the day.

Today one of the trainees was late because he was held up at gunpoint on his way to work!!!! Yikes!!! He was on an FX. Apparently he had his phone in his sock (they don't look there) and it rang while he was being robbed (Mitch was ringing to see were he was) Fortunately he had it on vibrate so the theives didn't hear it. He was really blase about it when he got in, he just got on with his work and cracked a couple of jokes. I do worry about them all. :-( Here is Lester:


We had a bit of a 'do' for Anthony's birthday.Yesterday I asked Caryll if it was Ok for us to bring in a cake and the next thing I know a huge cake, burgers, hot dogs and soft drinks were organised. These guys are sooo ready to party :-). They are SUCH nice people!!!!







Of course, I joined Weight Watchers last night and have blown it on the very first day. I figure the next to weeks will be no good for WW anyway but when I get home I will get stuck in.

More Pikkies

Moving house Filipino style.

My room.

Real wildlife!!!!!!

Sunset from the room.

3 Weeks In

We have now completed our frst week of 4am starts and I have not adjusted as well I thought. I am completely knackered!!!! I haven't been able to get to sleep early enough so my nights have been quite short and I am really feeling it. I had a minor melt down on Thursday morning as the laundry had wrecked some of my clothes so I was REALLY grumpy first thing.It was also 'Thursday' and I hadn't slept much. I got over it though and now invested in some washing powder and have decided to hand wash everything in my room. The first load is now hanging over the bath, dripping happily.

We had a great day yesterday!!! For starters it was Friday (Yay) and then after work we had 'Team Building' 'Filipino' style and that meant................karaoke!!! Yes, my first ever karaoke!!! To start with we caught an 'FX' to the mall (OMG ANOTHER mall). An FX is a Toyota vehicle kitted out as a mini bus that acts a bus. It goes on a set route and doesn't stop to pick people up, it just goes from a to b. It is amazing how many people you can get in one!!!! LOL. Trinoma is yet another fabulous mall. Tom had booked us a room in a karaoke bar. It is soooo weird!!! You go into a booth (see photos) and there is a flat screen and microphones. You have staff coming around taking orders for drinks and food and you sit in there for four hours and eat and sing. It was HILARIOUS!!!!! We had such fun.

After the karaoke we were pretty tired so some of the guys escorted us on the infamous 'MRT' light rail. We had to keep our bags in front of us, tucked close to our bodies so we didn't get pickpocketed. The train was air conditioned (I love air con!!!!!) and we survived the experience unscathed (it was a lot like the undergound in London).

It was a great night but I was completely shattered by the end and when I looked in the mirror back in my room I looked TERRIBLE!!!!! 12 hours sleep followed and I am feeling little better today.