Jet-setting and Jetlag

Pania Elmsley lives in the South Gippsland region of Australia, which is Boonwurrung country. She grew up in Melbourne, she belongs to the Maori people of New Zealand, and she travelled the world as a flight attendant. She teaches the Maori language online, and in this conversation, which we recorded in-person onsite in Wonthaggi, Victoria, she shares her insights into meeting our physical and emotional needs while travelling and encountering new cultures with confidence. 

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Transcript

[00:17] Greer: 
Hi, this is Greer, your host for Femammal, the podcast that holds space for women to explore what it means to live well in our bodies and celebrates moving through this world as female mammals. Pania Elmsley lives in the South Gippsland region of Australia, which is Boonwurrung country. She grew up in Melbourne, she belongs to the Maori people of New Zealand, and she travelled the world as a flight attendant. She teaches the Maori language online, and in this conversation, which we recorded in-person onsite in Wonthaggi, Victoria, she shares her insights into meeting our physical and emotional needs while travelling and encountering new cultures with confidence. 

[01:24] Greer: 
Welcome, Pania. Thanks for being on the podcast.

[01:26] Pania: 
Thank you very much for inviting me.

[01:28] Greer: 
So I met you on my Australian travels and I was really fascinated to learn that you have a history of being a flight attendant for about three years in your 20s, is that right?

[01:40] Pania: 
Yeah, that's correct. I was just looking at the date now. So 2011 is when I moved to the Middle East to be a flight attendant.

[01:48] Greer: 
Neat. And when I'm sitting on, especially an international flight, I kind of fantasize about the life that flight attendants might be living because they're jetting between all these different countries all the days of the week. And it's just really wild to me to think about constantly waking up in one country and going to sleep in another country or whatever. But then I also kind of have in the back of my mind, I don't think I could survive the physicality of that life. So I was interested in talking to you about what was involved because it seems like there's the aspect where it's shift work, there's the aspect where it's perpetual jet lag, there's a food aspect that is not negligible. So maybe we could delve into some of these things.

[02:37] Pania: 
Definitely, yeah. They're all things that I went through when being a flight attendant and probably things I didn't think about when applying for the job also.

[02:47] Greer: 
Well, it helps when you're in your early 20s, you do a lot of things that you haven't fully thought through and sometimes they're great decisions and maybe you wouldn't have done it if you had fully thought through, but you still had an amazing experience.

[02:59] Pania: 
Yeah, I really did, like it's something I don't regret. Also something I probably wouldn't go back to, but I had a lot of fun. I was in my early 20s, as you said.

[03:08] Greer: 
Cool. So could you kind of give us an overview because it is shift work. So was there such a thing as a normal week or a normal month and what did that look like?

[03:20] Pania: 
I guess the easy answer is no. Every month we got a new roster and we had no idea what it was going to be. If it was going to include long haul flights, short haul flights, flights which would include, like, being away from base or Dubai for six days or three days, or just there and back again. So every month was unknown. And even in that, we could potentially swap flights with other flight attendants as well so that it could change again, and at the same time, flights could be canceled or you might have to stay in a location overnight, so then that would change your roster. So you had to be very adaptable with that job.

[04:00] Greer: 
Were you already a mentally adaptable person going in, or did this job kind of teach you to be pretty open handed about your schedule?

[04:09] Pania: 
That's a good question. I haven't thought about it, but I do think I'm quite adaptable. I know in most jobs that I've done leading up to now, I've had to be very adaptable. I think it is a part of my personality.

[04:24] Greer: 
Yeah. So you'd have kind of a rough outline for the month, and then all kinds of things would change in the interim. Was there some kind of preparation process that you went through when you got that roster and you thought, okay, well, I've got these long haul flights and these short haul flights. How should I structure my time to be well during that month?

[04:47] Pania: 
I think in a way, you can't really have a routine when you do that. But I had small routines, like, I've always, going back to food, I've always eaten very well, so making sure I had enough food in my fridge so that if I did come back at silly hours of the night, like, I could have access to that. But otherwise the structure, you kind of just had to go with the flow. I think when I looked at my roster, it was good to see, what new country am I going to? What new food will I be able to eat? What new languages can I learn? But also looking at the days off around that, I played a bit of sports when I was living in Dubai as well, so I was like, oh, will I be able to make my touch rugby trading sessions? Will I be able to see friends? And then if I had enough days off, will I be able to fly to Prague for the weekend? Could I go to Sri Lanka for the weekend? So, yeah, it was always exciting to see your roster come out just to figure out what you're going to do for the month.

[05:52] Greer: 
Yeah. You mentioned touch rugby, so something that really gets to me when I'm traveling is I might want to be keeping up some kind of running distance. I'm a runner, so I get quite antsy if I'm traveling, and I'm like, oh, well, what if I can't run for a whole week? Will I not be able to do the same mileage that I was doing before? So as far as something like touch rugby, how were you able to maintain enough of a training routine that you weren't just totally winded every time you got back to it after doing maybe a week of long haul flights?

[06:26] Pania: 
I think being in my early 20s definitely helped with that. Like, my stamina was pretty high growing up. I always played sports. I was very fit, so it was normal to be active for me, I guess when you're traveling and you're in those new countries, you don't have access to a car, so you are walking around to lots of different places, and because you want to sightsee and see everything, you do a lot of walking. So that was probably a part of it. But I guess coming back to the routine, stretching was a big thing for me. So doing stretches in the morning so that I could feel good if I was ever feeling tight or tired, I knew that would help me as well. But the touch rugby was definitely good. And swimming, I love being in the ocean, so going to the ocean and just mucking around and having a swim was always good for me.

[07:17] Greer: 
So would you look for the ocean anytime you were flying anywhere coastal and get in? I mean, have you been in lots of different oceans as a result?

[07:24] Pania: 
Yeah, I have, actually. I think it was really surreal to me that I've been able to swim in the Atlantic. It was just a touch of the Atlantic or a touch of the Indian Ocean, which are places I hadn't been before. So, yeah, that was something great.

[07:40] Greer: 
And are there physically demanding aspects to the role of a flight attendant that maybe we're not noticing?

[07:48] Pania: 
I would say yes. I actually saw a meme recently that a friend shared about how flight attendants always come home with random bruises everywhere. And it's just from knocking into seats as you're walking down aisles, when you're in the galley and you're lifting containers and pulling trolleys out, like, you're just getting all these knocks and bumps that you don't even realize. So, yeah, some of those containers can get up to like, 10-15 kilos, and they're usually overhead. The trolleys that we push around are really heavy. And I remember one of the flights which would have been only like an hour long, we still had to do kind of a full service. And so you're pushing trolleys up aisles while we're still ascending. And so, yeah, there's a lot of work in it. You have to be pretty fit, I would say, to be a flight attendant just so that you're healthy within your body, to be able to do the long hours every day. Yeah, sure.

[08:43] Greer: 
And you're very intentional about what you eat and where it comes from, and you care deeply about the conditions in which the food you're eating were raised. Do flight attendants just eat the same meals that we're eating? Can you bring your own lunch? How does that work?

[09:03] Pania: 
Well, that's a good question. I obviously didn't always have that way of thinking, or maybe I did have in the background, but when I was younger, I just wanted to try all the good foods, and I did. But yeah, when it comes to airplane food, most flight attendants probably eat airplane food. There weren't always staff meals. It was more so just extra of what the customers would receive as well. And I probably did eat that food for the first six months of my flying. And at the end of it, I'm just like, there's no nutrition in it. There's nothing giving me any goodness. And even though it fills a small spot in my belly, I was like, no, I want something better for myself. And so, yeah, I started, leaving Dubai, I would be able to make my own pasta salads of some sort or something with lots of veg and carbs to give me energy. And generally on the way back, depending where I was coming from, I'd be able to get, like, a good takeaway meal and not, as in takeaway, not as in fast food. So Bangkok, for example, I would always get this delicious papaya salad and, like, Pad Thai from this small little restaurant across from the hotel, and I was able to heat that up in the airplane as well. So small things like that brought me a lot of joy. And I know I remember the crew getting always just a little bit jealous of the food that I was eating, but I would share. I think the first time I didn't bring enough for everyone, but because I knew people wanted it, I was like, okay, I've got to buy double so I can share with people.

[10:37] Greer: 
So then your colleagues are excited when they see that you're on their flight from Bangkok.

[10:41] Pania: 
Yeah. Interesting you say that. It didn't happen often that I flew with the same person. We had 20,000 crew members, so to fly with the same person twice was a rarity.

[10:51] Greer: 
Oh, wow. Yeah. And there must be a big difference between the short haul flights and the long haul flights. So with the short haul flights, are you basically leaving your home at a reasonably early time and then you're kind of back by the end of the evening? Is that how that works or? 

[11:12] Pania: 
No. Okay. You could be leaving at 02:00 A.M. in the morning. You could be leaving at 04:00 P.M. and arriving back at 04:00 A.M. Yeah, it was all hours.

[11:20] Greer: 
Okay. So even with the short haul flights, just really random scheduling.

[11:25] Greer: 
Wow. And then what counts as a long haul flight? Like, how many hours?

[11:30] Pania: 
Yeah, I'm not sure on the answer to that. It was more if we had turnarounds or layover. So turnaround is you go there and come back. Layovers, you go there, you stay there, and then you come back the next day on the flight that brings the next crew over the next day. So that's how I kind of looked at the flights. Yeah, sure. But then again, so short haul would probably be 5-7 hours, whereas your long haul was like ten to 15 hours. 16, I think might have been our longest.

[12:02] Greer: 
If it was really short, would you do a couple of trips back to back or it would just be one?

Pania: 
One.

[12:10] Greer: 
So you might just be working like 5 or 6 hours in one day for a flight that was only in the air for less than 2 hours.

[12:17] Pania: 
Or something like that. You'd be on the job for longer than you were in the air.

[12:21] Greer: 
Interesting.

[12:22] Pania: 
Yeah.

[12:22] Greer: 
Okay. That's super interesting. So now what I'm really keenly interested in for on the really long flights, you're needing to take sleep breaks, I assume. So as far as long haul flights, and presumably--It was like a 16 hour flight for me to get from, I flew from Houston, Texas to Sydney. And then I flew on to Melbourne. It was a really long flight. So if you had a really long flight like that, presumably flight attendants get breaks in there. Do you sleep in there? How does that work?

[13:00] Pania: 
So depending which aircraft we had, we would have, I guess, bunks or sleeping spaces for flight attendants. So if they were the Boeings, they were upstairs. If they were the smaller Airbuses, they were downstairs. And the big A 380s, if you've heard of them, they were kind of in the economy level, so you don't usually see them. They're quite well hidden. They probably even look like a laboratory door. That's where we usually stayed. But again, depending on how long, the flight would be dependent on how much rest you get.

[13:32] Greer: 
This is so sneaky. I have never seen a flight attendant sneaking off like that, that I've noticed. I've never seen a flight attendant sneaking off to go sleep in some little cubby. So if I'm just sitting in a normal basic economy seat, there's maybe a flight attendant sleeping above my head somewhere. Most likely, like, entirely on a different level.

[13:55] Pania: 
Yes.

[13:56] Greer: 
Okay, so not in the way that you drop the luggage storage and there'll be one hiding inside?

[14:01] Pania:  
No.

Greer: 
That's what I'm picturing. 

Pania: 
No.

[14:04] Greer: 
So there's some sneaky staircase somewhere that you only have access to. Like, I couldn't accidentally wander into this staircase.

[14:12] Pania: 
No, you couldn't because there is like a passcode that you have to put in to be able to get up there as well.

[14:17] Greer: 
Okay, so when I fly back to Kentucky, I'm going to be just having my eyes open for some sneaky little door somewhere with a passcode keypad that you can see and I'll know that that's where the flight attendants are sleeping. Like, what does it look like? It must be tiny because there's no space.

[14:33] Pania: 
I guess it's tiny. The sleeping space is small. It's enough for you to lie down like you can just sit up if you needed to, but when you go, like, up the stairs, I only ever went into one with an upstairs one rather than the downstairs or on the same level. You can kind of be up in the main space, like hunching, but then once you're in the little cubicles yeah, you're lying down.

[14:57] Greer: 
Is it bring your own sleeping bag? How does that work?

[15:00] Pania: 
There's already blankets on the beds ready for us to go and pillows and things like that.

[15:05] Greer: 
But if you're taking turns, do you have to make the bed for the next person?

[15:08] Pania: 
Yeah, it's generally good practice to make the bed for the next person. So there's some blankets in bags on the side. And so you put your dirty bag, your dirty blankets in one bag and then the fresh ones on the bed again. 

[15:21] Greer: 
Oh, cool. And how long of a sleep like, if it was my 16 hour flight, how long of a sleep break would you get?

[15:27] Pania: 
For a 16 hours flight? We'd probably get probably up to four and a half hour break. It all depends on the services that are given. So generally on the flights that I did that were about 14 to 15 hours, you do a service pretty much as soon as you take off. You do a middle service, and then just before you land service. So those would be two chunks of rest time. And then that's when you'd have half the crew go up and the other half attend the call bells and things like that, come down, do the full service again, and then swap.

[16:03] Greer: 
That's so interesting. And did you find that you actually could fall asleep pretty quickly up there? Or were you just tossing and turning like, oh, I'm stuck in this tiny little box for four and a half hours?

[16:13] Pania: 
I think because I knew if I didn't sleep, I'd just be grumpy or I'd be so tired that I probably wouldn't be safe to fly. I force myself to sleep. But also I again realized after finishing as a flight attendant, I was just perpetually jet lagged anyway, so anytime I could rest, I would.

[16:32] Greer: 
Yeah, that's my next question, because jet lag, I mean, some people it hits them really hard. Some people it's not as bad. But if you're on a daily basis in different time zones in different countries, what is that experience like? Or how did you manage that experience so that you weren't just tired and cranky all the time?

[16:52] Pania: 
So at the time, I didn't think I ever experienced jet lag. I was just like, you just sleep when you can, and then you're awake when you're awake, and you just accept that as what it is. So being in Dubai and having mainly friends that were flight attendants as well worked well, because if you're awake, there's most likely somebody else awake with you as well, so it didn't affect you too much. Having been awake at silly hours of the night. The way to manage it, though, I think the main reason I was able to manage it was because of the food that I ate and the exercise that I did, which just kept my body happy. Yeah.

[17:34] Greer: 
One thing when I jump in time zones on a long flight is I intentionally try not to think about what time it is back home or whatever place I just left. Because to me, that kind of causes the leg to catch up with me mentally, whereas if I can just try to exist in the moment, I do better.

[17:56] Pania: 
Yeah. And that's what I did for a lot of things, maybe more when I was a passenger. Like, if I knew I was going to arrive at a certain time in a different country, like say at 08:00 a.m., then I would more likely try to fall asleep near the end of the flight, so at least I'm a little bit rested. And then when I wake up, I can spend a full day in the place that I am and then hopefully sleep by night. But again, as a flight attendant, you don't have that luxury. You have to be awake when you work. So yeah, you just went with it and didn't fight it.

[18:26] Greer: 
And there's some regulations around how many hours you're allowed to be working or can you explain that kind of thing of timing out if you've been working too long?

[18:40] Pania: 
Yeah, I'm trying to remember. It's been so long ago. I know with the license that we held, the rules and regulations of flying around the world, we could only fly for 120 hours. Now, when we say flying hours, that's like chocks on, chocks off. So those big blocks that you remove from the wheels is when the flying hours start. So 120 hours, which meant we had to be at our job 2 hours before that and most likely be at the job 2 hours after that, just depending where we're landing. So ensuring that we were within that time limit, I don't think I ever had a 120 hour month, and I think scheduling tried to make sure they kept it low just so they wouldn't push people past their limits. In regards to being on the job and timing out, I never experienced it myself, where we were told we had to leave the plane because we'd been delayed for too long or we'd been on the tarmac for too long. I also know in that part of the world, there's not that many unions and things like that. So it's kind of like you have a job, do the job, and then you can go home. Yeah, I don't really know how to answer the question about timing out, only because I didn't experience it very often.

[20:07] Greer: 
Yeah, fair enough. So it was many years ago now that you were a flight attendant, and since then, have you kind of gotten back in touch with what is your circadian rhythm or what is your chronotype? Do you know now, all these years later like, oh, I do best in the mornings, or what have you discovered?

[20:32] Pania: 
I think I always knew I was a morning person. I always knew I needed 8 hours sleep as well. But as I said, when you're 20, you just enjoy and you don't think about those kinds of things. Now I know I'm going to be grumpy if I don't get my 8 hours or I try really hard to make sure I get my rest. Sleep is such an important thing to me, which I find so funny. I'm like, am I getting old now? That that's one of my priorities. But I just know I'm happier if I have a good sleep. I know I can surf better. I know I can speak language better. So yeah, it's really important for me.

[21:13] Greer: 
I think there's a lot of misperception about the role of a flight attendant. What we see mostly is, oh, it's the person who brings us food or blankets or tells us to buckle our seatbelts when we don't necessarily want to or whatever. But then there's a whole component of de-escalating conflicts, keeping people safe, being an emergency responder, essentially even there's kind of low level emergencies that must happen pretty commonly on flights. And then there's the kind of ultimate emergency that you have to be prepared to lead everyone through if something horrific happens and the plane is going down. So can you speak to some of the mental and emotional capacities that you had to develop or had to strengthen when you were in that role?

[22:08] Pania: 
That's a really good question because I remember while you were asking that question, I was mainly thinking about training college. Again, when I got the job, I didn't know what I was going into. I also looked at flight attendants and thought their life was glamorous. I'm sure I knew with any job there would be some hard parts as well. But yeah, it wasn't until I got to training college I was like, I have to be all these roles with a smile on my face. So it would get me at times when people would be quite demanding on the flights and I would kind of be like, look, my main goal is to get you from A to B safely. Everything in between is a bonus, okay? So as long as you listen to me in that regard, then we're going to have a good time. But if you push my buttons in any other way, then that's when things get a little bit difficult. But managing the mentality of that, again, I was young. I think I didn't realize the seriousness of it. Even when we went through training college and we learned how to pull the slides that blow up if you had to evacuate, learning how to slide down properly so you don't break ankles and things like that. I think it still didn't hit me. That would be a possibility, yeah.

[23:35] Greer: 
Did you learn conflict de-escalation skills in training college?

[23:40] Pania: 
We did, to be honest, I think we could have learned a little bit more, especially with people coming from all around the world and having different backgrounds and different cultures, different ways of interacting with people. That was something that I learned in Australia. In Australian culture, it's very laid back. Everybody is kind of on the same level. When you talk down to someone, it's not because you think you're upper class or it's a very different culture here in Australia. So when I would have people speaking to me as if I was a piece of crap, I was like, I'm confused. Like, we're both human, aren't we? And we're both like, yes, I'm here to serve you a drink and serve you food, but that doesn't make me any less, and that doesn't mean you can treat me terribly. So that was probably the thing that opened my eyes a lot because I'd never been treated in such a way, anything less than human. And so that was a big thing. I remember somebody telling me he's like, you have to learn about other cultures. I'm like, yeah, I can learn about other cultures, but we can still have respect for each other. So that was probably the biggest thing for me. And as I was saying yeah, I think there could have been a little bit more cultural training, but I know that's very difficult considering we were servicing the world.

[25:04] Greer: 
Sure. Yeah. Because you're encountering almost every culture in the course of your travels. I'm also struck by you were a very young adult when you were doing this, and you have to kind of project an air of confidence and authority. And where did you find that within yourself?

[25:24] Pania: 
So a little secret that I don't like to let out all the time was that I did martial arts all growing up. And I definitely think that's where my confidence came from. I've never had to use it, thank goodness, but I think it's because I was very good at reading situations, knowing how to get myself out of sticky situations, and also not pushing the subject because it probably would escalate. So I definitely think my confidence came from there.

[25:53] Greer: 
Yeah. It's always struck me how people who really know their own strengths and abilities don't need to be overbearing about it because it's just internal there and they know it is there, and then everything can kind of be calmer as a result. I'm also struck by the gender dynamics both of where you were living and where you were working and some of the passengers you would have served. And you mentioned the intercultural experiences. Women are put into boxes in a lot of cultures. And did that come up for you? Did you have any example you might share of a specific situation where it was something you had to navigate in your job?

[26:41] Pania: 
I'm trying to think of a specific time because a lot of the times I didn't see it as because I was a woman. More so because I was the service person and my gender didn't matter. But I know that's a little bit naive to say as well, because I know gender does matter. Being specifically female, I think actually when it comes to being a flight attendant and I don't know if it's just when people fly, they lose their manners or they forget their common sense. And again, maybe it's because we're in small tube flying through the air. The touching really got to me, like pulling on my waistcoat to get attention or like grabbing on my shoulder to get attention and things like that. That was really different for me because I just wasn't used to random people touching me at random.

[27:37] Greer: 
I would never touch a flight attendant. It would never occur to me to touch a flight attendant.

[27:41] Pania:  
While some cultures thought that was quite a normal thing. And yeah, that was a very big eye opener for me and I got shocked at the same time. I guess maybe I had an understanding that people do do that, but I was also quite clear with people, you don't need to do that. I have my name on my name badge, which you can choose to use, or you can just say, excuse me. Yeah. I was probably a little bit outspoken as a flight attendant in the Middle East, and I had heard that people from this side of the world so Australia, New Zealanders, were quite vocal about standing up for themselves and therefore mightn't have done very well in the industry. But yeah, I wasn't going to back down on something that made me feel uncomfortable.

[28:31] Greer: 
Yeah. Way to set boundaries. Was there anything specific about attire that you had to observe?

[28:39] Pania: 
So we had our uniforms with the airline that I was working for. There was one country, so Saudi Arabia, where we specifically had to wear pants or just not go to the door so that we weren't seen.

[28:55] Greer: 
Is that because your skirt was shorter than would have been acceptable?

[28:58] Pania: 
Our skirt was knee length, yeah.

[29:00] Greer: 
Okay, so showing off your calf was going to be a problem there, okay.

[29:03] Pania: 
Exactly. And because Saudi Arabia was just there and back, we never stayed and there was no need for us to go near the door or anything. So we would just sit in the cabin, wait for it to be cleaned and get ready for the passengers to come back on again.

[29:19] Greer: 
And if you had like a 24 hour layover in some country, there's a lot of countries where women are expected to wear head coverings. Is that something that you routinely did or made your own goals around that?

[29:32] Pania: 
No. So there wasn't any country that we would have gone to that expected you to dress a certain way, mainly because I guess those main countries were close by, therefore there was never a need to stay there. We did fly to other strictly Muslim countries like Indonesia and things like that, but they don't have rules where foreign women must wear a certain attire. So yeah, it wasn't really something I thought about in regards to headwear, but I was very aware about wearing something that didn't draw too much attention, I think, especially with the way I look. I know I'm quite ambiguous, so I liked being able to blend in if I could. Again, not to draw a lot of attention. So yeah, you just kind of know where you're going and pack suitably.

[30:23] Greer: 
Yeah. I feel like that's a whole topic unto itself. Traveling as a woman alone, did you try to always have a traveling buddy or were you happy to go out and explore places on your own?

[30:35] Pania: 
I loved going by myself. Yeah. I love going by myself, especially because in the first few months of being a flight attendant, you'd always go out with crew and everything, and that was fun, but I kind of got to a point where I was like, but I want to do my own thing. And when you go out with a group of like twelve people, there's not that much give into changing up the plans and things like that. The most fun times I had was going off the beaten track and finding a bookstore that maybe nobody wanted to stop at, or going into a cheese shop that you really wanted to taste test all the cheeses. Everyone's like, no, we have to get to the pub. I was like, I'm just going to do my own thing now.

[31:19] Greer: 
Stop for the cheese. Yes. So when you were traveling around, being a lone woman traveling is a whole topic unto itself, were there specific things you tried to do to be mindful of your own safety and to reassure people who cared about you, like your family back home?

[31:41] Pania: 
So I think definitely the confidence that I had with my martial arts helped me with being able to walk around by myself and do things by myself. But no, I wasn't very good at calling home and having them check in with me. I think as well, by the time I'd moved to Dubai, I'd already been living out of home for three years. So it was a normal thing to not hear from me for a little while.

[32:09] Greer: 
And you just didn't let it stop you from having the adventures you wanted to have?

[32:13] Pania: 
Not at all. Yeah.

[32:16] Greer: 
So I hear a lot of joy in this experience. Was there something specific that you reflect back on that makes you feel like even though it's not something you would do again at this phase in your life, that it's an experience that you're really grateful to have had?

[32:36] Pania: 
That one's hard as well. The first thing that popped into my mind as you was asking the question was mainly the people that I met along the way. Like, I have friends that I know I'll have until I die. I have a friend, they live, or friends, multiple friends that live in Anguila at the moment. And she named her second child after me.

[32:58] Greer: 
Oh, my goodness.

[32:59] Pania: 
Yeah, I've made some really great connections and friendships and that's the people that I know, I'll see as often as I can or I talk to often. But also just like the small interactions that I had with people I know. People always ask me, what was my favorite trip? Which is always such a difficult answer, a difficult question to answer because, yeah, there was so many intricacies to what makes a good trip, but it definitely would have been, number one, the people and number two, the food. Like, trying all the different food. I tried everything at least once. I generally liked everything. Yeah. They were the main things that brought me joy.

[33:44] Greer: 
I love that. And the last question that I always ask everyone who's a guest on this podcast is, what have you learned about listening well to your body that you'd like to share with us?

[33:57] Pania: 
My body just got chills listening to that question because listening to my body is still like an ongoing thing for me. In the more recent years, I've been listening to her a lot more than I did when I was in my, when I was younger. I've just learned to slow down and be patient. I think I was highly energetic when I was younger and doing lots of things without thinking or doing things, knowing that my body probably could handle it, but we'll just go along with it anyway. So, yeah, now I've slowed all the way down. I'm very, not very, but made just a little bit more precious with my energy, knowing that it isn't unlimited and there are times where I need to crash and sleep. So, yeah, I listen to my body a lot now. And her voice is louder.

[34:59] Greer: 
I love that perspective. Thank you for sharing that. It has been so delightful to meet you here in Australia and so cool to get to record this in person here in Wonthaggi. So thanks for coming onto the podcast.

[35:16] Pania: 
Thank you so much for having me. It's been lovely to meet you too, and just makes me feel more part of the family seeing all the extensions of Wonthaggi and the Wisharts.

[35:28] Greer: 
Thanks for being a new friend here, and if your travels take you to the US, please come our way.

[35:37] Pania: 
I would love that. Thank you so much.

[35:46] Greer: 
If today's episode resonated with you, I'd love to hear from you. You can email me at femammalpodcast@gmail.com. That's femammalpodcast@gmail.com. You can also follow this podcast on Facebook. Just search for Femammal Podcast and you will find a community of people who are interested in living well in our bodies. And, of course, I'd love for you to rate this podcast and leave a review wherever you download your podcasts. Until next time, be well.