Jul 16, 2008 in Travel
Hoorah - I’m off to see A Dark Knight at the Imax in Sydney - this is the new Batman film and the first ever mainstreem film to be filmed in Imax (in parts).
I’m rather excited, especially after reading this review. It should be good! I’ll let you know, and you know the nice part? As I’m living in the future, I get to see it before it’s released in Europe or even the USA!
Woohoo!
Jun 15, 2008 in Travel
That will do for now!
Apr 03, 2008 in Travel
Hello to all/both of my regular readers!
I’ve no doubt you’re literally bursting with excitement to here how I’m getting on in Sunny Sydney™! Well, I arrived here about, 2 weeks ago, and it’s going pretty damn well to be honest. The weather’s great, the job’s fab and the city is just as good as I thought it would be. It’s not a permanent holiday place, but as a big city to live and work in my first impressions couldn’t be much more favourable.
For those of you that didn’t know, I’ve taken up a position with dgmAustralia and I’m enjoying it all immensely. They seem to be a company who are real market leaders out here and helping to grow the market as a whole too, with an enormous amount of experience between them. I thought I’d been in this online game a while, with 4 years, but there’s one guy who has been working in online since 1996 and the days of UseNet! Green writing on black screens I think… Out here dgm work in affiliates, media, search, SEO and all aspects of online, such as leveraging the social media for their clients – there’s plenty of scope even in the market of Australia where the population is relatively low, broadband penetration isn’t great and customers really don’t tend to buy online that much… yet! It’s all changing, but certainly the growth curve is a couple of years behind the UK in terms of customer behaviour, and even the rules that good old Google apply out here, so UK affiliates can make a bit of a killing if they want to operate out here (if you do, give me a shout!).
Out of work, I’ve been keeping pretty busy – I’m living in the YHA at the moment, which is all well and good, but not the best place to hang around in the evenings, and so leads me to go out a bit more than perhaps I should!
Due to a slight budgeting error, I’m a bit short on the old readies until I get paid, so any donations are much appreciated – in particular the Percy Pigs that Jenny sent out have gone down a treat!
Last weekend I had a proper Aussie weekend. On Friday we had a huge BBQ at work, which was both tasty and great fun – a real meat-fest! Then on Friday night, through the magic of Facebook I met up with a guy who used to go to my school, Matt, who I hadn’t seen for 11 years! We went to watch the Waratahs rugby team in the Super 14’s competition. Matt’s a bit of a local celebrity at the rugby, he’s Club Captain of Mosman Rugby Club (with 9 teams!), and also a teacher and coach at a secondary school in Bondi. As a result about 50% of the stadium seemed to know him which was quite funny, especially when the kids got quite excited about seeing their teacher with a tray full of beers! He got free tickets, so that freed up some beer money. Then Saturday was Coogee beach (like Bondi only a bit less tacky, 20 mins on a bus from the city centre). Sunday was my first trip to the “footy”, or Aussie Rules Football as you might call it! The Sydney Swans thrashed the Port Adelaide Power by 141 to 70, a proper drubbing – particularly as the Power finished 2nd overall last year! I really enjoyed the game, but perhaps more as a consequence of going with about 80 other hostel residents (resplendent in our matching caps) and the fact that I basically got to sit in the burning sunshine for 2 and a half hours and watch sport! Great stuff! It seems like a good game, but how much I’d like to watch it in the winter, I don’t know… To round off the 3 code weekend, on Monday I went to an NRL game (Rugby League to you and me!) with Robbie from my new work. We went to watch his local team, the Manly Sea Eagles Vs the New Zealand Warriors. The atmosphere was great and the Sea Eagles (or the Seagulls as I dubbed them!) thrashed NZ by 52 points to 6. Three good games and three wins for Hudson! If only Hyde and City benefited from my support so much when I was back home! I’ve realised that I can afford all this sport if I cut out the beer at the games – not drinking 4 beers pays for the cost of another ticket. The logic works in my head anyway, even if I miss the alcohol!
In-between all this I’ve been furiously hunting for a flat, ideally in a house share type scenario. To say it’s been difficult would be an understatement – there’s an incredible scarcity of rental accommodation at the moment in Australia in general, and Sydney in particular. For my £110 a week, I’m hopeful of getting a room in a 3 bed apartment in Pyrmont, near work, near the City Centre and near Darling Harbour. However, there seem to be about 10 applicants for every room! As a bloody Pom, I seem to be on the back foot; however I’m sure my natural charm (and access to rental income and the deposit) will win through in the end! I’ve been subjected to the rather galling process of a full interview with the householders and open house scenarios where you all have to wait outside until you’re called in for an interview – all very scary! The questions you get asked are daft, and I’ve not been successful so far, so I’ve put together what I believe the perfect answers should be in a flat hunting interview, all questions I’ve been asked!
Q: Are you a tidy person?
A: Yes – I’m really tidy; I love cleaning and always do my dishes. However, I don’t get uptight at all if you’re not tidy, I don’t mind what you do, so don’t go thinking I’m a neat freak. Indeed I’m quite likely just to do your cleaning for you!
Q: Do you like music?
A: Oh yes, I love music, I like [Insert name of band that is similar but a bit cooler than the posters you’ve seen around the house, or just guess. Not heavy metal or Drum n’ Bass]. However I only ever tend to listen to it very quietly or generally through headphones. Actually, the only time I will turn my $5000 stereo above volume number 1 is when we have a house party, and it’s then loud enough to make your ears bleed when you turn it up to 11.
Q: Do you like going out?
A: Oh yes, I love going out as well as staying in with my flatmates and cooking. I go out all the time ‘cos I’m great fun me, and I’d probably invite you. However I rarely get in after 11pm and am very very quiet when I do get in.
Q: Do you drive?
A: I’ve got a nice car, but I rarely use it. Due to this I’m more than happy for people to borrow it and indeed would relish the opportunity to drive people places at the weekend as I don’t drive much in the week.
Q: Do you have many friends in Sydney?
A: Yes, I’ve got exactly the right amount of friends to make you think that I’m popular, but not so many that would make you think that I don’t want to be your mate too.
Q: So this is Bruno who you would be sharing the room with…
A: Er… TAXI!!!
Q: Do you have a telly or anything we can use in the lounge?
A: Actually I was thinking my Harry Potter sized room was a bit small for my plasma screen and projector – I’d probably put them in the lounge. Also I’ve got a PS3 and an Xbox360 for you all to use, I never play them because I’m not a geek.
Q: How much do you earn?
A: Enough to make you think I can comfortably pay the rent and get the odd round in, but not so much to make you feel inferior. Definitely a salary and not commission that could make you think I’d struggle with rent some months, oh no.
Q: How do you feel about vegetarians?
A: Meat is murder/they’re fucking wimps and deserve to be shot (Requires a big judgement call).
Q: What about having guests over?
A: Well, so long as you keep the noise down and wear a cond… Oh, er, yes, I’m cool with that, but I rarely if ever bring friends back as I tend to stay at theirs.
Q: So, if we were to select you, would you want to move in?
A: Yes, definitely, but I’m not desperate or owt, honest. Please take me. Please.
Q: Do you like Celine Dion?
A: Fuck off and die. Painfully.
Right, I’ll find somewhere I’m sure – it’s just that when I see an advert with “Looking 4 1 person share flat with. im tidy an honest 4 mins chinatown and share 2 ppl” a little bit of me dies inside. Everything else is going fine and dandy, and the hostel is cheap enough and good really (free brekko!) so I shouldn’t complain!
Ok, that’s enough for now folks – ta ta!
PS I can highly recommend the new Will Farrell flick – “Semi-Pro”, made me really chuckle!
Hi all!
Thanks to popular demand screaming out for a new blog post* here I am again! I’ve been slowly travelling my way down from Hamilton with the Kiwi Experience bus. It’s a real blast on that bus, you can’t fail to enjoy it if you’re that sort of person - even when you get a bit of a grumpy driver! 
I stopped at Rotorua (Hot thermal spa pools), Waitomo (Black water rafting - really nice, a float through a river in a cave where the only light is the gloworms in the ceiling!), Lake Taupo (Good for skydiving, but I’d done that already, so went playing golf instead, got really rather very drunk, but all mended now, and off the alcohol. Not), and finally to the rather picturesque river valley where we went whitewater rafting and generally lazed around in hammocks and swam in the river. All good! Have a look at the photos on the right hand side here, as always!
Now I’m in the capital of NZ - Wellington. (You thought it was Auckland, didn’t you?) And it’s 41 degrees** The cricket today was a proper test cricket - I really enjoyed it. There’s a nice little article here (www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/tms/2008/03/skulking_into_wellington.shtml) on the last match at Hamilton, and the move over to Wellington. It’s fair to say a few people got burnt at the first match! We won the first session, the Kiwis won the second after lunch (in no small part to us batting like a cunch of bunts, and a great performance from Jacob Oram) but the final session belonged to England with a fantastic partnership between Tim Ambrose (We’ve got Tim Ambrose, Sounds like Ambrosia, they make good custard, it comes in tins, they make nice rice too, that’s not important, just so long as England win!) and everyone’s favourite Ginger Mackem - Paul Collingwood. It’s all really nicely balanced going into tomorrow with a theoretical two scoring strokes we could have England on 300, Tim Ambrose on his maiden test century and Collingwood bringing up his 50.
The crowd today was really busy, watching cricket from the banks here is great fun - I can highly recommend it.
Right, I’d best dash - this beer won’t drink itself and it’s student night tonight!
*One person
**Latitude
Well, I’ve got to say I was pretty gutted to leave Queenstown behind. The South Island of New Zealand has to be one of the most stunning things I’ve ever seen. You almost don’t bother taking photos of breathtaking views, because you just know that around the next corner awaits something even better. You can see how Peter Jackson had no problem filming Lord Of the Rings here; everything just screams drama at you. I’ve been to a couple of places where LOTR was filmed around Queenstown, but they could have easily been anywhere in the country.
My words and photos can’t really do it justice, but I think this video might give you an idea - it’s not often that I’m lost for words! I can only say that you HAVE to come out here and see this for yourself.
So to catch up, what I’ve done so far is to land in Christchurch, on the East of the South Island, cross over to Greymouth, and travel down the spectacular West coast. Then onto Wanaka (tee hee!) and Queenstown, which is a great little city with views to die for and plenty to do in both summer and winter. Activities done so far include; Drinking, swimming, stone skipping (record = 9) cavorting, glacier climbing, cricket watching, skydiving (my favourite, definitely - even the plane journey was great with the views over Mount Cook and the Fox Glacier, as well as out over the sea - see my vids of these, they’re on Facebook, and should be on YouTube at some point), lots of sightseeing, Fergburger eating, walking, Frisbee golfing, golfing, motorbike driving (don’t tell Mum!), and the biggest bungee jump in New Zealand. Not bad for two weeks, eh?
Now I’m up on the North Island where 75% of the 4 million population lives. I flew into Auckland on Tuesday 4th March where Andy picked me up from the Airport and showed me the sights. I’ll be back in Auckland at some point so will leave my thoughts on that until then. Then it was the 2 hours down to Hamilton and the cricket! I managed to blag the last room in town at the YWCA! It might not be that fun to stay at the YWCA (e.g. $10 if you want to bring a visitor back to your room, *apparently*) but it was cheap at £10 per night for your own room. Hamilton is a nice little student city of and was certainly rocking on a Thursday night. They say the Kiwi bird is an endangered species and difficult to spot in the wild. Well, there were a fair few out in Hamilton last night, and they didn’t seem as shy and retiring as the ornithologists would tell you! After seeing Brendon McCullam out with his Doris, I see why his confidence at the crease is so high when she’s watching from the pavilion.
The cricket was great fun - it’s not been the most thrilling of test matches, but the atmosphere on the grassy banks is superb, with people from all over the UK coming to watch. Everyone seems to have their cricket club and football shirts everywhere, which lead to plenty of talking points. Quite a few people had a few facts to tell me about Hyde United as it happened! I had my Hyde flag out, and it was certainly seen on telly, as was I a few times. Thanks for the person who texted me today to tell me to put some sun cream on my belly as I was looking a bit burnt! You’ll be glad to know it’s now going nicely brown. He says.
Anyway, the cricket has varied from intriguing to skilful, and down to tepid. The first day finished about honours even, with NZ on 265-7, after a great knock from McCullam and decent contributions from Fleming and How. Day 2 belonged to the Blackcaps as they piled on the runs from the start, and Ross Taylor (who the day before had been introduced to the crowd as “With a top test match score of 17, please welcome Ross Taylor”!) getting his maiden test ton. With a couple of wickets off England at the end of the day it wasn’t a good day for us. Today’s days play was just turgid, with only about 180 runs being added for the loss of 4 wickets - Strauss and Vaughan seemed to be going well (albeit at a slow run rate) but after that even the irrepressible KP seemed to just dig in. This has draw written all over it! At one point the run rate dipped to 1.99 runs per over, something even Sir Geoffrey of Boycott would’ve raised an eyebrow at. I even caught David “Bumble” Lloyd having a nap out the back of the Sky box. I had a chat with him later, and he agreed it was down to the really placid pitch. *OBVIOUS COMMENT ALERT* Bumble is a really nice bloke in real life, as well as when he’s on the telly. I think we all reluctantly agreed that England took the right approach to the game, as they were never going to win it, but it’s not great to watch. At one point I nipped off to get my hair cut, get some cash out and buy some ice creams for the troops, and missed a grand total of 4 runs. Regardless of this, due to the great sunshine (all cricket should be watched with a beer in hand, in the sun from grassy banks!) I had a pretty good day really and can’t think of anything else I’d rather be doing. The fans are a real good bunch - it’s not all about the actual Barmy Army, though. There’s plenty more of us, and pleasantly, most of them seem to be good gravy-loving Northern lads who all play cricket. Not too much Landaaaaan, which is nice! I’ve met a good bunch, and we’re all meeting up again in Wellington.
If you’ve made it this far, give yourself a pat on the back, you’re nearly there!
I’m now in Rotorua, and have just been for a soak in the geothermal pools at my hostel, as you do! It’s a geothermal spa town, which is all very nice, but the whole town smells a bit of rotten eggs and sulphur! Tomorrow I’m back on the Kiwi Experience bus heading over to Waitamo (possible black water rafting) then onto Taupo for lots more outdoorsy stuff and making my way down to the capital, Wellington, for the 12th March in time for the second test which starts on the 13th - I can’t wait!
I’m sat in the bar at the moment on my laptop watching a really good game of Super-14’s rugby, I’m hoping to get to a game while I’m over here. OK, well thanks for reading, and as always, let me know what you’re up to or if you’re interested in anything in particular about my travels. Loads of photos on the right there!
Mar 01, 2008 in Travel
Hello all!
I’m in the adventure capital of New Zealand - if not the world - Queenstown., Otago.
It’s great here, really buzzing, loads of booze, bungy and bir… er… other stuff. I’m going on the Nevis Highwire Bungy tomorrow. I’m absolutely crapping myself. By posting it here, I HAVE to go I suppose!
Been up to all sorts of fun - a Glacier walk the other day, and that was great, and nice to have a bit of excercise! The Franz Josef glacier (note to self, not Franz Ferdinand as I keep calling it!) is really active, and for a geography geek, really interesting. Aside from that, it was really beautiful, check out the photos!
OK, wish me luck with the bungy jump - I *probably* won’t die.
Feb 27, 2008 in Travel
Yes, just like Tom Petty (and the Heartbreakers) today I was free falling!I’m in Franz Josef, on the beautiful West Coast of New Zealand. It’s truly, truly gob-smackingly beautiful here.
The internet connection here is a bit rubbish to say the least, so I can’t upload all me photos, but here’s a couple to keep you going.
I will say that Sky diving was worth every bit of the $299 Kiwi dollars (about £130) that I paid for it. I’m built for free fall, so I managed to build up some head of speed to say the least. Really awesome.
Got loads to say, but my head is just buzzing with adrenaline, so I’ll type it all up later. I’m off to do a glacier hike tomorrow (as you do) and then I’m down to Queenstown where I’m really cacking it about having to do a bungee jump!
Take care for now
Hello keen readers!
Well, it’s not without a tinge of regret that I’ve now left Australia, but with some optimism for New Zealand!
I’m here in Christchurch, and very quaint it is too. Lots to see and do here, I’m especially keen to go to the Dyslexia Museum here, to see if it does indeed “celebrate the gift of dyslexia” as it claims to!
Today was fun, and went to the cricket - to see England lose, obviously. Great day out though, we were all dressed as babies, as you do. Photos edited out for reasons of decency, but you should get the idea in the Flickr photos!
OK, hope you are all well! Take care.
Feb 18, 2008 in Travel
Hey up,
Just a quick update (rather than sending emails out!). I’m now at the rather swanky Base Backpackers hostel in St Kilda and very nice it is too. I’ve stayed at two nice and clean hostels so far, and two nice and fun hostels - I recommend the latter, although this one seems to be both - VERY trendy.
At the one I just checked out of, I had to use the line “Look, I can live without $35, but either you refund it [for the night I wasn't staying as the staff were irredeemably grumpy bastards], or I tell everyone I meet from Adelaide to Sydney NOT to stay here. That’ll cost you more than $35.” Got my money back. Oh - and the hostel was called “Urban Central” in Melbourne - don’t stay there, it’s nice and posh, but has the atmosphere of an intensive care ward. Melbourne seems nice - really quite different from Sydney, but I’ve only been here a few hours, so I suppose I’ll find out.
Right - plans are more subnbathing (just hiding out of the midday sun at the moment), and then onto the MCG for a tour and a trip up the Great Ocean Road here. I’ve also got a BBQ to go to at Nina’s tomorrow night, which should be nice. Then on Friday I fly to Christchurch on the South Island of New Zealand to get to the England cricket ODI on Saturday. This means I miss Australia vs Sri Lanka at the MCG on Friday, but there was just no way I could fit them both in 
OK, well hope you’re all having a nice week at work, MUWUHAHAHAHA.
Gav
Hey everyone, thanks for all the emails and the St. Valentine’s Day greetings, very nice (Yes Jon, I still love you pet, don’t worry!) and always nice to hear about what you’re up to back home. I’m still having a great time in Sydney; I’ve moved hostels from the very clean and nice YHA (but a bit dull) to the Wake Up! Which comes highly recommended - both near central station in Sydney. Aaanyway.
Sydney’s a really good city, lots and lots of English around, but still plenty of places to go and meet locals, and the natives seem pretty friendly towards us residents of the mother country and not at all fed up with the amount of us over here. I suppose it’s a bit of a swap from them coming over to London - and yes, you do see plenty of Pommies behind bars here! Seriously though, people just seem dead friendly and happy - it’s like all the nice people from England with few of the idiots and a lot less of the aggression. People chat to you in bars, and introduce themselves rather than that awkward English thing of never asking anyone’s name. Everyone here seems to be on a working holiday visa, and few people seem to have any problem finding all sorts of work, as well as getting apartments, it just seems that sort of place where you take someone’s word that they’re clean or good at working, rather than spending 3 weeks checking out references when you could all have been doing something more useful!
On Thursday we went to Manly (We being me and a couple of Norwegian guys, Jørgen and Henrik) by taking the 45 minute ferry ride across from Sydney harbour. 
The ferry journey itself was great and value for money at £6 return. Manly is a really nice little town with a surfy vibe, and feels a bit like how I’d imagine 1960’s California to feel, with its wide central street, old looking art-deco houses and shops and a fantastic beach. It’s a popular place for ex-pats to stay, and I can see why.
Thursday night there was a big party – it was all good fun, but not really for public consumption! Highlights included bumping into my sister Vicky’s best friend from 8 years ago, who I probably hadn’t seen for about the same time, and another of the girls, Christina wearing a matching shirt to mine, which made me feel a bit special at the time. 
It was a 60’s free love party, if you’re wondering, and whilst the love wasn’t free as such, there seemed to be plenty going around and there was also a free barbeque, so everyone was happy!
Yesterday (Friday 15th Feb) I went to one of the worlds’ great cricket grounds, the SCG (Sydney Cricket Ground) to watch New South Wales against Victoria in the Sheffield Shield/Pura Cup competition. This is the premier domestic competition in the world in the long form of the game, between the two best teams, and I’d say there were less than 300 people there, all told at the SCG! It’s the same everywhere where people just seem to want to watch the crash bang wallop* of one day cricket, but it seems a real shame, especially as it was only £3 to get in, and the cricket was some real top quality stuff on a nice sunny day for working on that tan! It was a great days play and I saw Brad Hodge get a fantastic 118 for Victoria, only ended by what can best be described as a shocker of an umpiring decision when he looked well set for a double ton, ably supported by David Hussey at the other end who got 87 in a 190 run partnership for the 3rd wicket. All in all a great day, helped by a few beers and also by watching England beat the Kiwi’s and Australia beat Sri Lanka, including a very emotional ton by Adam Gilchrist at his last ever game at his home ground. He’s got to be just about the greatest wicket keeper to play the game, and a true gent too – always walking when he was out rather than waiting for an umpire to make a decision. He’ll be missed and even this bloody Pom was glad to see him get his hundred.
Tonight I’ve got a rather intriguing party to go to – we’ll see how that works out! – And then tomorrow (Sunday) I’m off to Melbourne for a few days before I head over to New Zealand. I booked my flights only yesterday, and to save the 12 hour bus journey the flight only cost about £55, which is less than a late booking on a train down to London from Manchester would cost! I don’t know an awful lot about Melbourne, except that it’s where Neighbours is filmed and that it’s supposed to be a nice City – I’ll tell you in a few days I suppose!
Right, take care – as always it’s good to hear from you, so keep the emails coming, and have a look at the photos on the side there. TTFN!
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