Please stand back. We've got a little issue here.

Hi guys. Yeah, I'm still here. Sorry I've been a bit quiet lately. It's just that I'm currently in the process of getting pretty freaking emotional about leaving Australia.

Right now, I'm really enjoying just randomly bursting into tears. I've done it twice now in the last ten days or so and it's really growing on me. Both times I was with my boyfriend, the poor dear, who was really a bit perplexed and somewhat unsure about what to do the first time. Which is absolutely fair enough, as I usually tend to have my emotions a bit better under control. I think the second time he got the hang of it and hopefully he is now preparing for further random moments of inexplicable distress on my behalf. I haven't tried it in public yet, but I'm still saving this for later.

And just for the record- I am actually very happy and excited about going to Switzerland. I'm just not excited about leaving Australia.

I'm leaving. On a jet plane.

I booked my ticket to Switzerland last Tuesday. I leave on the 21st of April, stop by in Laos for three weeks on the way and get to Switzerland in mid May. It's a one way ticket. I put down the deposit on Wednesday and paid off the balance today. There is no turning back now.

It's funny how I started to feel emotional almost instantly after I booked the ticket. I stood at the bus stop afterwards half in shock and stared into nothing with big suprised eyes. I went for a walk in the evening, the same way I take when I go for runs, along the river towards the city. The sun set behind the bridge and shed a golden light over it. The water was deep blue like velvet and a million of city lights looked like every building had been covered in fairy lights. It was all a lot more beautiful than it usually is, and it usually is beautiful. It was only a couple of hours after I booked my ticket and already I looked at everything with sentimental good-bye eyes.

Awwwww......

When I walked up to my bus stop this morning, a middle aged rather large lady with a happy face gave me a big smile and said, "Good morning!" I smiled back. "Morning." I appreciated the fact that she acknowledged me, as most mornings there is about the same group of people waiting for the 7.25am bus, but although that makes us almost something like a team, most of them just ignore each other. I'm fairly new to the 7.25 team, so it was nice to get a welcome.

The big lady looked at me and said, "You always look so lovely."

"Oh, thank you!" I smiled again. I was quite surprised.

"Every morning you wear something different and it always matches and is all beautiful and perfect", the lady said.

I laughed. "Some of my friends give me a hard time because I've got a bit of an obsession with colour cordination."

"Oh no no no", the lady said, "it's just so delightful to see you in the morning. I always look at you and think, I wish I had such good taste."

Inside the bus, I looked at my chocolate brown high heels with the beige stripe which exactely matched the colour of my belt, which in turn was a shade lighter than my jacket. The singlet underneath my jacket was the same colour as the other stripe on my heels and the bag was pretty much the same beige as my jacket. It goes without saying that of course the earrings matched the colour scheme as well as my ring.

I really am a bit of freak with my obsessive colour cordinating. But it's nice to see that some obviously don't hold that against me and in fact even make the effort to tell me I look nice. Awww... random acts of kindness. They are the best. Especially if they are directed at me.

Tonight at 6.05pm, this is what my world looked like.

Bettina's Wonderful Tips of the Day

If you would like to impress your girlfriend, don't take her to this restaurant:

Take her at least to The Amazing Restaurant. If not to The Bloody Fantastic Restaurant.

This could come in handy:

... and they will unsteal you immediately.

The police are generally pretty friendly chaps. As long as you make sure you inconvenience those around you:

So don't even think about helping the old man over there. The police won't like it.

And if you value your life, you might want to stop goofing around straight away: