Eat = done. Next up: Pray.

One week today I fly to Delhi to start a 20-day trip round Rajasthan. I'm excited, stressed, apprehensive and happy, all in one. I'll feel slightly better once my visa and passport arrive. And better still once I've figured out what to pack. And once I'm on my way I know I'll put my anxieties behind me and enjoy my next new adventure.

India fascinates me and I've been wanting to go for a few years now. In fact, I was due to go last summer but Italy stole my heart, and my India plans were put on hold while I embraced the Eat phase of my life. Big time. But now the time is right for the Pray phase (- time to pick that book up again, Luke). My (new, thanks Kari!) Lonely Planet book sums up what I'm expecting:

Bamboozling. No other word better captures the enigma that is India. With its ability to inspire, frustrate, thrill and confound all at once, India presents an extraordinary spectrum of encounters for the traveller. From rural serenity to big-city swirls of colour, from dizzyingly intricate carved temples to musicians playing ragas in the desert, from harlequin-bright elephants to gourmet restaurants in stylish cities, India will jostle your entire being, and no matter where you go or what you do, it's a place that fires the imagination and stirs the soul like nowhere else on Earth.

It sounds like it's a country that will test my resolve in more ways than one. But I'm hoping that forewarned is forearmed. Being on an organised group trip will also help. And its good to be challenged and pushed outside your comfort zone once in a while. It's also an opportunity for me to christen the as yet unused Shewee that T, knowing my public toilet phobia, bought me in preparation for a festival we were meant to go to ;)

For those of you who are interested, this is my itinerary. I got the best flavour of the places by Google imaging each one. Some of them look absolutely stunning:

Delhi
Bikaner (where I'll do a camel safari and overnight camp in the desert)
Jaisalmer (I think this is where I'll spend my birthday)
Jodhpur
Udaipur
Pushkar
Jaipur
Agra (home of the beautiful Taj Mahal)
Varanasi

There are several overnight sleeper trains involved, so hopefully it'll be a really authentic experience and another exciting chapter of my life.

But there's lots to do before I go. Aside from some shopping and then packing, I'm also getting the flat ready to rent out while I'm away in Italy for the summer. This weekend I tackled the small but jam-packed cupboard in the spare room. It's been a two-day job and it's still not finished. I've shredded two bin bags worth of old paperwork - bank statements, old payslips and the like. I've half-filled the paper recycling bin with leaflets, brochures, newspapers and envelopes.I've been reminded once again of how amazing my husband was: he had folders for digital photography, running, CISCO, music stuff, motorbike stuff. He was a man with many passions and a real interest in learning and developing (and accumulating the necessary magazines, newspaper articles, website print out etc etc to match!). It's been surprisingly therapeutic and maybe only something that I feel completely ready to do now, after all this time. But the practicalities of moving it all into storage are also helping me to be more ruthless. Half of me wishes I'd done it sooner so I could have enjoyed living in a clutter-free environment these past few months, but I guess that's what I've got to look forward to upon my return.

Don't get me wrong though, it's also been emotional. Today I found an old cheque book that contained stubs for cheques for my hen do accommodation in Barcelona; our wedding venue and catering; and T's funeral. Seeing it all laid out sequentially like that was tough. And thinking of myself writing a cheque to pay for my own husband's funeral less than two weeks after he died was just incomprehensible. God knows how I even functioned at that time, nevermind went through mindless everyday functions like writing a cheque.

Anyway, it's all good. These are all yet more steps on my journey - my journey of recovery and my journey of life. It's an interesting journey and I'm grateful to be on it.

Round the corner of the world I turn,
More and more about the world I learn;
All the new things that I see
You'll be looking at along with me. 
(Sydney Carter)