Money, money, money.

"You're restless" - Two words, from the mouth of one of my closest friends, that completely depict my behaviour since I came home for the summer: the obsession with planning my post-university travels, the fact that I've been filling every waking moment with work, research or desperately needed pub sessions (resulting in being quite run down, with the worst cold known to man) and the reason I can't even sit down to watch T.V without fidgeting. I feel like I'm relentlessly wishing time away until I finally have the financial means and the freedom to fulfill my plans. That itself seems like a complete contradiction - the inevitable and unfortunate partnership of 'financial means' and 'freedom'. It's a sad world when the two have to go hand in hand. The fact is, I only truly have the freedom to fulfill my plans when I've earned money. But true freedom, surely, is a life totally emancipated from money? Or maybe that's just idealism and Henry Thoreau getting to me.

The reason I'm so frustrated is because, at the moment, there are so many obstacles preventing me from just going. And besides having to actually finish my degree, they mainly revolve around money, which fundamentally defeats the whole theory of why I'm going away. Going to somewhere as rural and basic as Vanuatu gives me the luxury of getting away from money, Western consumerism and material wealth. Clearly, money is still going to be a hugely important element of Vanuatu life, but they appreciate it ten times more than we do; they are careful with it; they have limited amounts of it; it's a means of survival and not something to whittle away on comforts.  But for me, having to fill up a large hole in my savings account is a very real obstacle before I can even think about actually going to Vanuatu. Essentially, for the next year and a half, I will be revolving my life around money in order to get away from it for six months. When it's spelled out like that, it all seems pretty ridiculous.