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Morocco it's where it all started for me. It was a rough start. First my parents separated, then my mother took her life, and then two years later my sister drowned in front of me. Collapsing in grief my father ran away from the country and in the process I were to lose the only protector I had left: my dog Sam. Yet, in hindsight two things remain as powerful positive affects, my relationships with nature, and my baby-sitter, whom I was to be reunited with 37 years later.  

Italy is where my father and I moved to after we lost my mother and sister. It was a difficult time of my life. My father was re-marrying and would soon emotionally abandon me to the cares of an abusive partner. Moving house and city and school and changing friends and ways of speaking on average every two years left profound weknesses in my soul. Each time, I felt ripped our like forests are ripped from their soils.

Bulgaria is where it finally all came to an end and where it all begins anew. The end of trauma therapy, the graduating from the final year in psychology, and the realisation of a two decades dream, becoming a professional counsellor. As unknown to many as this country may be, in spring it is nothing far from a little Switzerland.

In Sweden I would have graduated in Environmental Science and then returned to my Japanese farm. Things did not quite go that way. Within three months I had finished all my savings, found it impossible to find a little job to support myself, and faced increasing university pressures...boy wasn't this when I met some of the most special people in my life and got to know all about Dumpster diving's benefits to all!  

I fell in love with Copenhagen and would have stayed there for life. As someone who gave up on driving at 25 Copenhagen was paradise. Stunningly architectured, organised, cosmopolitan, dynamic I never felt so at home. I was off-grid for the first time in my life, and lived with no electricity for more than six months. I commuted to the library each day to do my work, and made fires each night. Washing time got me practicing ice-water buckets!!

Belgium was a hard country to go back to for me. My mother had ended her life there, and I did not even know where she was buried. Family secrets, buried memories and lies told were all waiting for me at the door. To this day Belgium remains a hard country to visit, but in honour of my mother, it was also the beginning of the final chapter of a life lived with trauma.

Vietnam was another difficult time of my life. At 26, after 4 years of a challenging university period I had been kicked out of Australia for visa issues I was not aware of and given two weeks to leave! "Pack your bags!" they said. "Where to?" I answered! But Vietnam it was. Upon arrival boiled frogs and deep fried larvae did not go down very well, but a year in, much of that had changed. I had made a friend for life, and found Vietnamese raw cousine an unforgettable experience!

Learned to adapt to very exotic things

& Learned several languages

I arrived in Australia when I was 20. Right out of compulsory military service, with barely enough English to ask for directions, no connections whatsoever, and only a couple thousand dollars in my pockets, I threw myself into this faraway land adventure. If you get to know me you you'll certainly hear more about it, but for now let me mention that after being expelled from the country for visa issues 4 years later, I came back to it an Australian citizen and married to a friend.

Went to the other side of the world