Finding yourself, the hard way, in Egypt

I AM the great-granddaughter of one of the pioneering families in Kenilworth.

I was born in Cooroy and brought up in Kenilworth. I lived there for the first part of my life, before moving up to Nebo.

Still in Queensland but further north. From Nebo I moved to Mackay and settled there. I raised a family in Mackay, and all seemed great.

But life does tend to shake you up and so it was with me. I won't bore you with the sad details, but with a broken marriage behind me I made the decision to start my life again - in Egypt.

I live now in Hurghada, a tourist resort on the Red Sea.

At first it was a huge culture shock as you would expect. I went from living in a house to an apartment, from a back yard to a balcony.

From tropical heat and grass to dry heat and desert, from taking for granted understanding everything I heard to not understanding a word. But, with time, I adjusted.

Egypt is everything and nothing like the tourist guides say. There is ancient history everywhere, and friendly welcoming people.

There is also heart breaking poverty, rubbish in the streets, and unscrupulous people only too happy to rip you off in order to feed themselves and their families.

It's order and cheerful chaos. It's complete disregard for any and all workplace health and safety standards - if indeed any such thing exists.

Egypt is a country of so many contrasts, and the Egypt one person experiences is not the Egypt of another.

I live at the end of a street close to the main shopping street of Hurghada, called Sheraton Street. There you can buy any souvenir your imagination can conjure up.

It is full of shops, restaurants and cafes. There is a marina where you can book a diving trip, reef watching boat ride or a day trip to an island.

The Red Sea is beautiful, a never ending palate of shades ranging from deep clear blue to the palest turquoise.

Hurghada is in the south of Egypt, in the Sahara. So while on one side you have the Red Sea, on the other there is nothing but the vastness of the desert.

It is possible to take a day trip or even overnight safari into the desert, by quad bike or on horseback.

I haven't done that yet, but when I do it will be during spring or autumn, it would be far too hot in summer and winter here can get very cold.

I came here to change my life, to try to find my purpose, and I did. I am an author and blogger.

I've written several books on cats - specifically the Egyptian Street cats and more specifically my rescued street cat Sabrina.

The Egyptian cats share the same DNA as those which were around in the days of Pharaoh - they are living history.

I've also written two women's fiction novels - Living a Lie and Letters To Myself - and the first in a paranormal series called Zora's Dawn.

My life disintegrated so comprehensively that I was left with nothing but a few clothes and a small box of mementos.

But sometimes you need to lose everything in order to find a better way. I am now living a simple life, I have very few possessions, and nothing of value and I don't miss any of it.

What I have is a job that I love - writing - and a lifestyle that is comfortable and relatively stress free.

While some events of my past were traumatic, all of them went into forming who I am now.

My motto now is simple 'If it doesn't kill you it will make a good book!'