Four months after my Australia trip, Guy rang me and announced he was in Europe and wanted to see me. We had spoken a few times on the phone and online in those four months, but nothing serious had happened, and I certainly did not know he had any plans to come to Europe. As you can imagine, I was very shocked when he asked me if he could stay with me. What a strange boy, I thought, but how in the hell could I say no after I had had such an amazing time in Sydney? I later found out that I had said to him, in a very ‘British way,’ ‘When are you coming to visit?’ I don’t even remember saying it. Of course, in Britain, we say stuff like that all the time out of politeness, but we don’t actually mean it. In Australia (and maybe the rest of the world), of course, that is an open invitation to turn up at someone’s house any time you want. During our five-year relationship, I had a number of similar experiences, which, if nothing else, has taught me that British people are far too polite.
As I picked him up from our local train station (when I say local, it was an hour’s drive from my parent’s house in very rural Britain), we instantly rekindled our friendship. Although I did still find him a little annoying, I also found him to be a great friend. We spent two weeks together, and I showed him around the UK, much like my family had showed me around Sydney. At the time, I was on my gap year before University and had three jobs. By the time he left, and after a lot of late nights, weekend adventures and numerous trips to here, there and everywhere, I had zero jobs. I was having a great time!
However, after a number of small arguments and some bickering, he left and carried on his backpacking around Europe. At the time, I was sad that he left and even more upset when we lost touch for four years.
During that time, I went to University. That was probably one of the best times of my life. I was single and spent my days and nights socialising and enjoying my freedom. After University, much to my parent’s horror, I decided not to settle down and get a job but to go travelling again, like I had promised myself. My first stop was Hong Kong, and I spent a week there by myself. Of course, being alone, I was extremely homesick at first and felt terribly lonely (something I am now all too familiar with), but the feeling soon passed, and I began to appreciate how huge, diverse and beautiful the world truly was.
After Hong Kong, I travelled Thailand, Malaysia and Singapore with a tour group for a month. It was so lovely to have some company with likeminded people. I can honestly say the trip was amazing, I loved everything about it and the people. After South East Asia, I flew to Cairns in Australia and met up with a very good friend that I had gone to school with. We spent five amazing months travelling down the coast to Sydney together.
Once we got to Sydney, my lovely friend left for Perth, but I decided to stay. I was supposed to stay for two weeks, but in a standard backpacker way, I loved Sydney so much I ended up staying for twelve months. I moved into a share apartment with four of the nicest men you could ever wish to meet and a very lovely girl. After a few months, I was supposed to meet up with my extended Australian family that I had met years before for lunch one Sunday. On the Saturday night, I did what you should never do when going out with your family the next day; I went out and got very drunk with a girl who I worked with.
My family were due to pick me up at midday on the Sunday for our lunch date. At 11.30am that Sunday morning, I rolled over with completely no memory past 11pm. To my horror, I was not at home but in bed with a man whom I had never met before—in his bed, God knows where. As I woke up with an almighty headache, I remember thinking, ‘God, I hope I’m in Sydney.’ Looking back, I think the man may have been married. As soon as I woke up, and we had had sex (I assume for the second time, but I couldn’t be sure), he couldn’t wait to get rid of me. He was either married, or I was very bad in bed.
Although I was stressed out to the max that morning, I did take just twenty seconds in the bathroom to smile to myself and mentally tick off ‘one-night stand’ from my ‘50 ways to be a Backpacker’ list that I had created in my head. After rushing around and feeling like I was going to vomit at any moment, I could not find my shoes anywhere, so I decided to abandon them in the hope that the man would take pity on me and drive me home so that I could still make my lunch date. I had this image in my head of my extended family phoning my mum and dad in the UK and announcing that I had stood them up, presumably because I was a slutty little backpacker who couldn’t keep her legs together. I had to make that lunch date!
Of course, the man did offer me a lift, but only as far as the city. I must have been really bad in bed, I thought to myself! I had to do the walk of shame barefoot, in a very short tight black dress, for five whole blocks. I still, to this day, have no idea where my shoes went that night. The looks I got from the Sydney-siders I passed that morning were of disgust and pity. I can imagine I looked like a homeless prostitute striding through the streets of Sydney that morning, like I hadn’t a shower in weeks and hadn’t slept in my own bed for a very long time. What is more, to be perfectly honest, that’s a bit how I felt. Also, bear in mind that I had been backpacking for over six months already and had put on twenty lbs, so I was a little, if not a lot, overweight. As my phone beeped, my heart sank, and I knew I would never make lunch. My family lived an hour away, so it was way too late to cancel or postpone the lunch.
But luck was on my side; they were lost. I thought quickly and texted them back with directions, which may have been slightly incorrect. That would hopefully buy me some time, I thought to myself. When I finally arrived home, I got the Spanish inquisition from my housemates, but I really just didn’t have the time. They were all so shocked that one, I had stayed out all night and two, had had a one-night stand! I wish I had had time to stand there and soak in their shock and admiration, but I definitely did not. At 12.25pm, I stepped outside my apartment block, looking surprisingly acceptable, and had a lovely lunch that ultimately changed my life. Sometimes I wonder what would have happened if I had woken up an hour earlier and cancelled lunch that day, and then just gone to bed like my whole body begged me to.
‘Never regret anything because at one time it was exactly what you wanted.’ — Unknown