Mummy, can I have my injections too please?

Not something I thought I would hear Isobel ever say! But say it she did.

Yesterday was the first of the injection fests for the kids.  Oh, yes.  As the nurse at the travel clinic said 'Bangladesh, you can get lots of nasty things there.  Got to have them all'.

And on that optimistic note we booked in for our second go round in a months time.

The day started with excitement 'We're going to London, can we see the Queen'.  Arty was beside himself as he got on the lovely white and yellow southeastern train.  It was sooooo exciting to be on a 'choo choo train'.

Did we feel bad not telling them that they were going to have needles stuck in their arms? Erm, maybe a little bit.  But it was all for the greater good we convinced ourselves.  Peter did point out that in the book he is reading (Second World War by Antony Beevor) the author talks about how during the Holocaust they used the art of deception - telling people that they were off somewhere nice rather than the truth.....

Anyway, that's a completely different scale of deception.  Ours was only very very very small.  And we did bribe them with an ice cream!

There were many forms of transport involved - obviously there was the train.  Then we walked along the South Bank - together with about 100,000 other people (mainly Bayer Munich and Dortmond Fans from what I could see!).  I did ponder why we were moving to one of the most heavily populated places in the world when I can't bear to walk along the South Bank when it's that busy.  Mmmh.

Then it was the big red bus and trying to stop Arty pressing the disabled 'stop' button.  And finally we arrived at the travel clinic.   Who to start with?  Arty was first off the blocks.  Two jabs later (Hepatitis A and B and typhoid) and the nurse was slightly concerned about how we might be able to give him a BCG (for TB) given that he has to apparently stay very very still.  Ha ha.  Unlikely.

What other jabs do they need?  Well apparently, another round of Hep A and Hep B, then the BCG and Rabies (mmmh, nasty.  I had the rabies jab many years ago and thought it would be a good idea to go disco dancing that night....until someone bumped hard into my arm!).  And cholera.  But that's an oral vaccine apparently.  Luckily Dhaka doesn't have Malaria.  Only dengue.  Which you can die from and there is no treatment. 

So moving on, the bribery worked.  Ice creams with flakes in Green Park all round.  It was lovely to be in the sunshine.  The kids were happy and they momentarily forgot the pain of the needle.  However, I'm not sure how easy it will be to get them back there again for the next set!

Fresh bagels for breakfast this morning to try to make up for the pain we inflicted on them.  Only slightly not quite right - I might have mixed up the chinese five spice for the cinnamon!  Oh well.  Bit of jam and we were none the wiser!