Cake

In the past week, I have realised that one of the biggest parts of my life in the UK has been cake. My life has always involved a fair amount of cake, e.g. the delicious vegan cakes cooked by my colleague at Macmillan (those lime and coconut vegan cupcakes have never been forgotten) and the various banana/pear/raspberry/strawberry breads that seemed to always appear at Glover St were amazing. But my consumption of cake has increased exponentially since moving, and I personally have only baked once. Here are the different places where cake is found:

- Work: every time there is a birthday, anniversary, leaving, new arrival, pregnancy, marriage, or someone coming back from holidays, there is cake. Also when people's gardens overflow with fruits that could be used to make cake. So yes. There is ALWAYS cake at work. The best example of this was the spectacular array of cake that we had for a recent charity cake morning. See below - I think the picture says it all. Because that is a cake. And all of it is edible.

- Choir: every week, a section bakes for everyone else. Deliciousness ensues.
- Bible study: last week, we all chose a cake that we would like to see at some point during the term. It was my one year-a-versary last week, so mine was first (see below) and it was certainly delicious.

- Home: there's no specific system for cake, but there always seems to be something around. There was a point when we first moved in that I think we had banana bread, chocolate cake, a different other cake and a fourth kind of cake sitting around the house and we had to have a house moratorium on buying new cake until all the old cake was gone. On Friday I saw one housemate for only 10 minutes, during which time she handed me a cupcake before leaving for the next 2 days.
- Out: one of the highlights of Cambridge is Fitzbillies, which has delicious cakes in it. When I don't know what to give someone, I go there and buy cake. It's always a winner.

I don't really have much else to say on this subject, so to sum up: there is a lot of cake, everywhere; it is all delicious and amazing; thank goodness I ride my bike everywhere when there is so much cake around.

ONE YEAR

One year ago exactly, I got on a plane at Sydney Airport and headed over to the UK. It's simultaneously hard to believe that it's already been a year, and that it's only been a year.

It feels like no time at all since I stepped off that plane and started my new life here - I feel like there's so much I haven't yet done, so many adventures still to be had, that it can't possibly have been a year.

At the same time, I can't believe that I have only lived here a year - I have made friends that I know I'll keep for the rest of my life; I've learned to love a new city; I've settled into work; I've lived in three different houses. I've also seen four completely distinct seasons, which is something you don't get back home. It's now changing into autumn, and I'm back where I started. In the past year I have:

- Travelled to London, Edinburgh, Derbyshire, Wales, Prague and Zagreb, often with family or friends from back home
- Swum in the Atlantic
- Coppiced
- Stood in a cathedral listening to a woman whistle 'Jerusalem'
- Climbed Arthur's Seat
- Fought with snow
- Picked apples off a tree and eaten them
- Walked 10 miles, singing
- Made a Christmas dinner
- Moved house a couple of times
- Learned to punt (sort of...)
- Made many many friends

In the next twelve months I will do some or all of these:

- Go to Munich, maybe twice
- Go to Devon
- Celebrate Christmas with some Australians in Cambridge
- Go to Africa
- See the Northern Lights (in Iceland? I hope so...)

And that's just the things I have planned. I'm sad because one year past means only one year left (probably? Possibly. I don't know) and that seems so short - but what a blessing this year has been.