vickygoestravelling

my journey to health and well being via exotic destinations

Category Archives: Cancer


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Cupping – no pain, no gain!

 

It's Chinese New Year next week - these jolly mandarins are everywhere; a taxi driver gave me teh big one!

It’s Chinese New Year next week – these jolly mandarins are everywhere; a taxi driver gave me the big one!

Have spent the past few days making the long-awaited photo book for Louise. I felt compelled after reading my friend Sarah Helm’s harrowing account of the Ravensbrück women’s death camp, If This Is a Woman. It’s one of the real horror stories of the Second World War and was buried behind the Iron Curtain, with the Communists only commemorating their own, and not the thousands – maybe as many as 60,000 (not only Jews, but French, Czechs, Germans -asocials – Poles, English and American SOE agents) – who were murdered there. There was a strong link  between the two camps to Auschwitz where all my Czech family, apart from my father, his mother, two uncles and two cousins (who were kindertransport) perished. I will never buy a Siemens product again. You’ll have to read the book to find out why. Continue reading →


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#Bereavement and the suppression of #immunity

I thought this post from my healthylivingwithcancer.co site should reach a wider audience….

vickyunwin's avatarhealthy living with cancer

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I was visiting a dear friend who has just been diagnosed with leukaemia and was chatting to him about why some people get cancer and some don’t. I expounded my theory that I am convinced that both Ross and I both became ill after the great grief we experienced when we lost our darling Louise. My friend was also trying to make sense of his illness, coming hot on the heels of his wife’s breast cancer (as couples we are members of our special cancer couples club, but we won’t invite you to join it, it’s terribly exclusive) and was able to contextualise their respective illnesses within a bereavement framework. It was he who pointed me in the direction of Prof Janet Lord’s research on how age alters our immune response to bereavement.

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Settling in to Singapore again

Ju Ming sculpture in the Botanic garden

Ju Ming sculpture in the Botanic garden

The change of pace has been noticeable. Whisked away from London in some style on BA ( a windfall trip first class), I find Singapore surprisingly cool and pleasant. There’s a stiff breeze on our 11th floor balcony, and my plants are swishing and swooshing while the sunbirds chirp a merry greeting several times a day. The  orchids have sprouted great long flower stems and I can admire them as I sit on my chaise longue, reading my friend Sarah Helm’s harrowing story of Ravensbruck death camp, If This Is A Woman. At times I weep from the gratuitous cruelty of this untold story. Continue reading →


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Some fresh mountain air in Switzerland

 

Snow-covered trees in the village

Snow-covered trees in the village

After my accidents over the Christmas period which resulted in me getting whiplash and damage to the sacro-iliac area of the back, I was looking forward to a long weekend with Ross’s Queens boys (as in old college mates, for the avoidance of doubt) in our chalet in Champery. Continue reading →


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My year 2014 in review – the ups and downs of living with cancer

Another fabulous sunset, Ngapali beach, Myanmar Another fabulous sunset, Ngapali beach, Myanmar

WordPress.com prepared a 2014 annual report for my blog. In sheer size of viewing numbers they surmise that the concert hall at the Sydney Opera House holds 2,700 people; vickygoestravelling was viewed about 18,000 times in 2014. If it were a concert at Sydney Opera House, it would take about 7 sold-out performances for that many people to see it. That’s quite a good feeling! Keep clicking please…

Here are the most viewed blogs, illustrating the ups and downs of the year – which has ended nevertheless on a high! Clear health, on my skis again, despite being taken out TWICE in one week by beginners, and now having a duvet day to try and rest my poor old back, bum and shoulder, which are all covered in bruises! But I will not be deterred and will venture out when it’s quieter tomorrow, New Year’s Day, when everyone is hung-over! Continue reading →


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A year of living with cancer: travelling hopefully

The birthday couple!

The birthday couple! November

On Monday 15 December I had my check up with the Prof. I had flown in the day before and had spent the day with Tommy, first at the Bench, with a late birthday tribute to Louise (always in our thoughts),  and then in the pub with some of Louise’s friends watching the football. Consequently felt not only anxious about Monday’s appointment but also rather hung-over! Continue reading →


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Burmese Days 6 – relaxing on Ngapali beach

Myanmar blog322We spend our last few days in Myanmar on the magnificent Ngapali beach. We are right up one end, staying in the Bayview Hotel, supposedly a boutique hotel, but like the majority the hotels on this beach it caters for mass tourism, with nice rooms all cheek by jowl, on a small plot. Worst of all, it suffers from sunbed–towels-at-dawn syndrome, trade-mark of the German tourist, the majority of the guests here. Continue reading →


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Burmese days 5 – Inle Lake, home to one-legged poling fishermen

The classic shot - fishermen at Inle Lake

The classic shot – fishermen at Inle Lake

Inle Lake is home to the unique one-legged rowers and a tourist destination like Bagan. It’s a peaceful sight, watching the fishermen cast their nets deftly, one leg wrapped round a pole. The water is calm, the air fresh but broken by the sound of the two stroke engines in full throttle as boat loads of people speed up and down – monks and school children, ladies sporting umbrellas to keep the sun off, vendors carrying their tomatoes and other crops to market and, of course, the ubiquitous tourists. Strangely we see similar birds that are common to Southern Africa, like fork-tailed drongos and squacco herons! Continue reading →


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Burmese days 4 – ballooning over Bagan

Pagodas at dawn

Pagodas at dawn

And so we arrive at Bagan, the centre of tourism in Myanmar, for this is Pagoda Central. From the 11 – 13th centuries, Bagan was a huge city dedicated by its various rulers to Theravada Buddhism, which was celebrated by the building of over 13,000 pagodas, monasteries and stupas. Amazingly, 2200 survive today, despite the sacking of the city by Kublai Khan – he of the stately pleasure dome – and innumerable earthquakes, natural erosion and decay. Continue reading →