Oh Hello!

I’M HOME! Guys, I’m finally back in beautiful, gloriously cold England for Christmas and I couldn’t be more excited. I spent much of my 13-hour flight and the 3-hour bus journeys either side joyously brainstorming blog post ideas and shoot plans for my return, and after a morning and afternoon full of post-holiday admin, here we are.

In case you hadn’t noticed, I’ve been in Malaysia, Dad’s home country, for the past three weeks. It’s been a bit of a blur as the entire duration of our trip was packed with family gatherings and plenty of travel.

I’m planning to share a few travel guides (at last! Nearly 9 years of blogging and I’ve not yet blogged about Malaysia?! Not sure how that happened…) in due course, but to sum up, I had a great time. I cuddled my niece and nephew, watched my cousin marry his love, had a massage at my auntie’s wellness centre, listened eagerly to Dad tell stories about his childhood, visited temples galore, had several chinwags with my wonderful Granny, flew to Langkawi for the first time… And that’s just the tip of the iceberg! As I’ve visited Malaysia countless times already, I’d love to hear what YOU want to know about the country, should you want to visit. Drop me your suggestions below.

With just two weeks until Christmas, I’m yet to feel festive and there isn’t a single present wrapped or a decoration hung in the Chai household. The house is littered with suitcases and bags of duty-free shopping, but we’re pretty much hellbent on putting the tree up, belatedly, tonight. I’m also going to amp up the festive playlists on Spotify and whack Elf on: we’re going full steam ahead!!

Aside from that, I wanted to say a huge hello and thank you to new readers around here (I usually post much more often than this!), the wonderful readers who’ve already picked up a copy of my e-book, and to everyone who has followed my trip over on Instagram. I really wanted to post a little more whilst I was away but I ended up using all of my spare time adventuring with my cousins (how can all my baby cousins drive?!), eating roti canai, sweating profusely or asking my Granny endless questions about her life and Dad’s childhood. I’ll be back to normal blog proceedings tomorrow, see you then!