It’s a pretty big day for me today – in 1997, a brave kid headed out into the unknown and landed on the other side of the world. I left on 6 September, and arrived twenty years ago today with 91kg of luggage and a plan to do a PhD. It’s been a huge and eventful couple of decades and I had no idea of any of it back then!
Thinking back my main memories are people: my friends all gathered in Auckland airport singing “The Lord bless you and keep you” to send me off, my distant relative who helped me with my luggage and found a train that went direct from Haywards Heath to Glasgow without a change in London, my flatmates in Glasgow who knocked off my rough corners and taught me to be a better person. And of course everyone on both sides of the world and in between who has loved me and looked after me and helped me grow over the years. He tangata, he tangata, he tangata.
I found some embarrassing pictures in the attic which you might enjoy. If you want to know how different I was back then (hint: not very!), read my “blog” KeithNet (they hadn’t been named back then, but it was) http://www.lochan.org/2005/keith-cl/news/index.html. And if you’d rather remember other things, there’s always Diana, Mother Teresa, and Cassini.
Thank you so much to all of you!
(originally posted on Facebook – now shared here)
“The Lord bless you and keep you…” Friends farewelling me at Auckland Airport.
Me with mum, dad, and Heather just before I left.
Me with Heather before I left.
Too much luggage! 91kg, if I recall rightly. It was quite a challenge lugging it on my own.
Me in my room in Glasgow (a few weeks later, after my shipping cartons had arrived).