Day 2 - I think I am starving...

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Let me explain - I am not starving. I just think that I am starving. Too much thinking about whether this is enough or not. It is indeed. It must be the lack of coffee...

The day does not start well. It is the first time I cook porridge, and I choose to microwave it... so half of it blows off. The rest was not too bad.

First lesson - no room for mistakes. You mess up your food, you don´t eat (unless you lick it from the microwaves). Unfortunately mornings are complex enough and didn't get a chance to get a picture.

So that was double espresso and porridge to start the day.

... and it is lunch time. I decided to keep me going with that breakfast coffee, and as a result lunch time seems to never come. But here we are, pasta again, yum! (Well, this is half of it now)

And I keep on thinking about food. Not good. I can't be hungry, honestly. But I can't stop thinking about it. On top of it no coffee.

So it is officially cold turkey - lack of caffeine = head aches...

Lesson 2 - I can live with less caffeine, but it is getting on my nerves!

First thing I do when I get home is getting a double espresso. I need to deal with the rest of the evening, and there is lots to do...

... and dinner, at last!!

That rice is smiling, or is it my imagination?? :) And two pieces of chicken! I must admit that this frozen chicken is not too bad at all!! I can only afford a piece and a half a day, but yesterday my stomach was still in Hastings running. So today I binge on chicken, hiii hiiiiiiiiiii! Like Michael Jackson would say :)

Oh, and it only a slice and a half of bread a day. Yesterday I over indulged in bread ;)

On another note, wow, what can I say... £840 plus £70 in gift aid. You are all so awesome, really... How come there are still so many things to sort out when we are all so incredibly awesome!?

Good night everyone and thanks!

https://www.justgiving.com/marcoshungergames

Under the Iron Bridge We Kissed...

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"Still Ill" - Possibly the best Smiths songs ever. You'll find all sorts of explanations on what people think about the intended meaning of a song, but the reality seems to be that it will have as many meanings as people listen to it. Songs travel with us through life and define our coordinates in space, time and emotions, they tell our stories of struggle and joy.

I am just a recent fun of The Smiths. They were really at their peak when I was not even a teenager, and well before I could make sense of English lyrics. However they seemed to be big back in the days in Spain. It has always amazed me that concerts of English bands in Spain seem to drive people mad at the stadiums while here in the UK people seem to be more apathetic about them. Maybe if most Spaniards could understand the lyrics they wouldn't be so enthusiastic in some cases (ha, ha :))

There are lots of flashes on this song that suggest to me our lives in my dear cities. "Under the Iron Bridge we kissed..." and although it was bloody freezing I'd go back under that Iron Bridge :) Who needs the mountains if I could go back under that Iron Bridge on a cold and wet winter in the grey darkness of the city night!

My running is by definition in a city, going past the grey buildings, loads of random people, the landmarks. It is embedded within its concrete foundations. It couldn't be any other way.

"Does the body rule the mind 

Or does the mind rule the body? 

I dunno..."

Isn't that one of the unanswered dilemmas of humankind? So thrilling to hear the question in that sad, nostalgic voice. And then that kiss under the Iron Bridge... Our eternal love/hatred relationship with society's rules and ethics. And, from another angle, how the mind can guide the body conquer the next frontier.

In My Hunger Games  it is definitively the mind ruling over the body. Or is it the body ruling the mind to rule about what it needs to? I dunno...

Bye bye Double Espresso :,(

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Awesome run today :) ! - getting closer to run consistently under 4min per Km. It looks like the return after Xmas has not been as dramatic as the last year when a mixture of awful viruses and the typical Xmas laziness made me crawl well into spring to recover all the hard work in late 2012.

What helps me go running in winter well into the dark, after a long day when I have not even had the time to sit in my desk for more than 10 mins in a row? Yes, the same one that helps go through my day: coffee!

Just a couple of days ago talking about Living below the line a friend mention to me that most possibly the thing I will be missing the most is my double espresso... Well, not just the one... all the four I will be missing. Each of them for its own particular reason...

Since a double espresso is somewhere between 1 and 2 pounds (or free if the office coffee counts), let's say that three days worth of coffee would eat my whole budget for My Hunger Games pretty much.

It is curious that just the drug we need to keep us switched on is more expensive than the food others can afford for a day. Just the one.

Having said that I think that I will be saying good bye to my favourite coffee shop for a couple of weeks and say hello to my thermo flask :) I am hoping that with a packet of 227g of ground coffee (cheapest around 2 pounds) I can make myself coffee for the duration of My Hunger Games :)

And may the odds be ever in our favour! ;)

Living below the line with a Twist.

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I have been wanting to run my first Ultramarathon for the last couple of years but I can't really find the space for that in my life right now. I envy these crazy seekers of the human-self limits but running almost every single day of the week, including a couple of almost full marathons is something I'd love but there is just no way. Not saying it is still not happening sometime soon :)

So there needed to be something I could do in the meantime which wasn't just boring everyone with another marathon. It is just so yesterday :)

At some point last year I got an email from Unicef which was organizing an interesting campaign to bring awareness on the lives of all of those living below the poverty line. This has been defined somehow as living below £1 a day, which varies depending on the country for various reasons.

According to Unicef over 1,200 people across the UK took on the 2013 Live Below the Line challenge for UNICEF. They decided to live on £1 a day for a week to gain first-hand insight into the lives of people living below the poverty line. In the 2013 Campaign an amazing £153,170 was raised to make a lasting difference to the lives of children.

So you can see where I am going, can't you? :)

My Hunger Games will consist of 2 weeks living below the line, on a £1 a day ration, during which I will race a total of 84Km (or around 52 miles) divided into two half marathons and the Brighton marathon to finish this journey.

I am pretty sure this is going to be an interesting experience which I will be sharing with you, starting now which is when my after-Xmas training starts!!

Oh, and this is a picture of one my heroes this year, Valenti SanJuan, right after he finished his Cavalls del Vent 100Km across unforgiving mountains! I am sure I'll have the chance to introduce you to this inspiration of mine during this journey :)

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