Tuesday 8 July 2008

First and last


Today I went to my first press briefing since arriving. I’ve been putting it off because I wanted to get the lie of the land but it was time to get into the swing of things and put myself out there.

Sadly it was a breakfast event. I’m not a morning person but this wasn’t so bad, but it was odd. I’m used to being one of the oldest hacks in a group and I was by far the youngest. It’s a very different market over here – people stay in jobs a lot longer.

While the topics were fairly dull I made some good contacts, picked up an interesting story and then headed back to the office. Thanks to the decision of IT to give me a laptop I could play pool on I was taking notes on dead tree (paper) so there was a round of work to get done on my return.

Plus the route back took me past Tu Lan, a stunningly good Vietnamese greasy spoon café. So I picked up some spicy beef noodle soup and settled in for a long afternoon. Thick noodles, well cooked beef and a hot chilli soup that'll put hairs on your chest, and stains on your shirt if you're not careful.

In the evening it was S’s last night, so we all went out for drinks at the Mad Dog. A very bittersweet occasion, but last night’s blues seemed to have been banished and we all had a good laugh.

T, one of the bar staff, is driving her to the airport tomorrow so when midnight tolled we said our goodbyes with reasonably happy hearts and promised to stay in touch. I’ll miss her a lot. It’s a bugger to say goodbye to someone you get on with well this early.

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