August and September last year were emotional months indeed. At the end of August, I lost my dad unexpectedly and out of the blue. It took me a while to actually process what happened and even now there are occasions when it doesn’t seem to have actually happened, and I’m just expectedly our weekly phone call.

That same week I got a huge and significant promotion at work which further added to the mess of emotions that my head and heart were in at the time.  Dealing with death is always going to be difficult, but it seemed exacerbated more so being on the other side of the world.

Having to make all the numerous phone calls to the U.K. to various people, organisations and often having to explain the situation of my whereabouts over and over again and trying to fathom as to what I could do before I came home for the funeral... it all got a bit too much.

In hindsight as I’m writing this, I’m eternally grateful to Candy, my family and my friends both here in Chengdu and on the other side of the world. An extra big thanks to my mum though for helping me out. She had no reason to at all, but she went out of her way and did. Mums are amazing aren’t they?

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The trip back home was much-needed (it had been over two years since I’d last set foot on British soil) and however fantastic it was seeing both family and friends after such a long time, anyone would have wished it had been under better circumstances.

I wasn’t as close to my dad as some people are to theirs and he wasn’t the most perfect man, far from it. But at the end of the day he was still my dad. It is a shame he never got to see me out here in China - although I doubt he’d have coped well with the language and cultural barrier – I do miss him, even his nagging phone calls.