Land Down Under

An Englishmans Reflections of Australia

I thought to myself, that since I'm not really travelling so much these days, I'd take an irregular diversion on my bloggings. Here's my little look at some Aussie culture, I hope you enjoy some of the stuff that's made me smile in discovering it this last year.

Through my travels, I've found that adopting local colloquialisms is key to forging good relationships and to being understood. This could be some polite phrases in Thai, a custom of removing your footwear on entering someone's home or a change in many of the way you say things. My native accent traditionally blunts the letter T, drops H's and turns a 'th' into an almost embarrassing 'f' sound. I quickly had to rectify this and really emphasise T's in order to be understood by most foreigners.

However in Australia, without really making any effort, I've now lost count of the amount of times English and Australians have mistaken me for an Aussie when they've first met me. However even with this initial confusion, there's still a whole sub-language here that I've been learning over these last 300 or so moons. There's the obvious shortening of a tin of beer to 'tinny', flip-flops become 'thongs' , a cool box becomes 'eski', although I still don't recall an actual Australian referring to the toilet as 'the dunny'.

My favourite by far though is the all too common shortening of words that may only be two or three syllables in the first place - to 'first syllable + 'o'. My case in point:

Bottle Shop (AKA Off License) - Bottle-O
Service Station - Serve-O
A Musician becomes - A Muse-O
Ambulance Driver - Amb-O
and my favourite, though I'm not sure it's that common - Hungry Jacks (Burger King to the rest of the world) - Hungo Jacko's

It was a week ago when I found myself cutting my adopted hometowns name of Randwick, down to Rando... it's rubbing off on me.

On from the language, to the fashion differences. On my first take, people dress kinda similar to the UK or even the US, but as time ticked by, more and more things became apparent. For me personally, I'd wear a casual shirt with the very top button undone. Here, I've had the 2nd one whipped off too, and told only dags do that button up. In contrast when I returned back to the UK, I kept that 2nd button undone, and was told to put 'it' (in reference to my rug) away. It's also pretty regular to see people wandering around with no footwear, a lot of singlets (vests) and corked hats (I'm joking of course). In the formal world, it also seems perfectly acceptable to wear the dodgiest tie and shirt combinations under the sun... something I've not moved over to just yet ;)

Don't get me started on the sunglasses that most of the young girls have been wearing this last year...

I'm nearly done, but I'll just take a moment to mention one of my favourite unique Australian snacks.

When I first scanned the ice cream refrigerator, I clocked a lot of the usuals - Cornettos (Drumsticks), Calypo's & Magnums. But one day, I spotted the Golden Gaytime. I nearly died laughing. Imagine asking for a "Golden Gaytime"! or "Let's you and me go and have a Golden Gaytime"... I'm not sure that name would cut it back home... although I've since learned that they've been around for forever and a day... dating back to when gay meant happy and innocent.

It was my duty to try it at least it once. With the wrapper off, it's biscuit crumb, followed by chocolate coated ice cream kinda looked a little alien to me. My first few bites were uncomfortable. I didn't know if it was right that I could be enjoying something with that name. Though you have to try all things once, right? I soon became comfortable with my Ice-Creamiality. Now, I'm completely unafraid to simply walk into a shop and in front of a line of people, look the shopkeeper in the eye and demand a Golden Gaytime. He may give me a strange look but I've even given my mates a Golden Gaytime, and they're always grateful for it too.

Break the Night With Colour

Christmas break: Pool Party Thursday

Aaron and I took advantage of the days off between Christmas and New Year as best we could. Thursday morning, we took a shopping trip to buy some supplies for what was to be a real highlight of the break - a long overdue pool party.

During the preparations, I managed to walk into a table – head first. No, I wasn’t already crawling, but a mis-hap as we raised a picnic table up high meant I would get to spend the afternoon with a ridiculous red graze smack in the middle of my forehead. That’ll be the Christmas/New Year bad luck kicking in then…

I’m pretty sure Az has done this before, preparing blank canvasses with poster paints for all attendees to sign in on, play-dough and a pool full with inflatable toys. The guests drank, shot hoops and fuusball, swam, bounced the trampoline and munched on BBQ – in-between basking in the sun.

Unfortunately, a number of our male guests didn’t make it along and so sadly we had to endure a 2:1 female to male ratio. Bummer. Really.
As night fall fell, the party looked to be gearing down, before everyone was once again back in the water – along with a bunch of glow sticks to provide one of the best party props I’ve seen in a while. A great way to spend one of those Christmas in-between days.

Moruya Friday & Saturday

The fallout from the pool party felt very much to me like it might last an awful long time. With some persuasion however, Az got me in the car for a road trip down to visit one of his old uni mates in a town around 5 hours South of Sydney - Moruya. He promised, peace, quiet, the possibility of surfing, golf, fishing and more importantly - an alcohol free environment. Golf & fishing were the two here that didn't happen...

We took what must have been the most segmented drive down, with many a stop off at McDonalds, greasy spoon kebab parlours and Servo's. Somehow we made it before nightfall.

Up early-ish the next day, Evo took us down to the beach for a surf. I was honestly quite dubious about trying what has in the past yielded the most injuries per hour of any sport I ever tried. The rocks visible around the beach and break compounded this further, but with a bit of a "whatever" attitude I made it down to the water.

I managed to surprise myself. After barely getting my feet on the surface of a buoyant surf board during my whole time in Australia, I nailed around 4 out of 5 waves that came my way. Factors contributing to this: shallow water- I could literally walk to the waves, no rip, reasonable size waves rather than killer Luke-flipping big mama's. This was enjoyable surfing as I remember it back in the UK and Thailand. (Although I have some shots of me cutting back into some huge 6ft barrels, I figured you'd sooner see me fall over than show off...)

An afternoon in the pub gave more surprises and another first for me - except this time not the variety I really like. I took a break at the pool table, and didn't get another shot all game. Evo cleared up on me and it was time to drop trou and do a lap of the table as forfeit for being on the wrong end of pools most impressive feat.

After all this excitement, the 3 of us wandered back for a BBQ and general chill out session culminating, not necessarily at the same time, in the 3 of us passing out in front of the telly.

The final day of the year dawned, and we took an early exit to get back to Sydney in good time for an evening of more celebrations.

There's a few more pictures on my photo site from the Moruya trip. (www.fonfara.blogspot.com)

New Years Eve

The last day of the year, again. I've become a grumpy old man when it comes to New Years. Bad stuff seems to happen to me around this time of the year traditionally (I get the Flu, I fall off a motorbike or the night just ends up being such a big let down due to the nature of an over-hyped event). Today I tried my hardest to forget it was new years and to just pretend I was just going along to any old barbeque/pool party at a luxury house on the North Shore of Sydneys harbour.

From 2 or 3 o clock in the afternoon the final big drink of the year got underway, everyone in attendance in high spirits. After that initial period of meeting a bunch of new people, we were soon messing about and playing drinking games. Though as more and more people (also read - girls) left the playing area, we knocked it on the head for some grub.

9 o clock ticked up and with this came the family fireworks display - or practice run for the main event. Far too soon we’d been back to the house and were back out looking over the harbour toward the Opera House and bridge awaiting the countdown. 7 years ago I’d climbed a tree and watched the millennium fireworks over Big Ben, this year I scaled a wall and sat on the front of someone’s balcony, lucky the party didn’t mind so Az & Moretti followed me up plus some randoms - everyone loves a random afterall.

A little hazily I recollect nothing of a countdown before the fireworks were unleashed. A pretty great show, which I did absolutely nothing for in the shaky photographs that I took. I've thrown a couple on here for token representation... just don't look too closesly!

3hours later, we finally made it back to Manly where we crashed out during those first hours of 2007. Finally a succesful New Years Eve, I even managed to wake up with a smile on my face.

Happy New Year!! Have a great 2007.

A Spaceman Came Travelling

The Christmas bumper issue,

Twas the Thursday before Christmas and all most of us were thinking about was knocking off from work for the weekend... even though Friday was still to be worked. You see, work shouted a full lunch in honour of a guy leaving our department for one of the English offices, so with a few beers already inside us, you could understand the mentality there.

I finished up and went to meet some friends from back home visiting Sydney for the first time - Hev and Sarah. After dinner at Five-O's, we headed into the palace where we kinda got Christmas off and running early, Az, Jazz and their folks showed up later in the evening and somehow I found myself out a bit too late on a school night.

Despite only being a 5hour day, Friday dragged beyond belief... I did however manage to make it an AFD (Alcohol Free Day); oh, aside from 2 beers after work. Must try harder.

Saturday had been planned for a few weeks, and a bunch of us met at Dirty Nelly's Irish pub in Paddington for the first leg of our "12 days of Christmas" pub crawl. After meeting our fellow crawlers, we headed onward down Oxford Street to pubs 2, 3, 4 and so on... Christmas hats were purchased, pool & pokies were played, many a joke told. By pubs 7, 8 & 9 in the city we could see the end in sight, but still realised just how far we had to go. Eyes got tired, the conversation degraded and some people started downing pints - a great idea only at pub 8 and beyond!? Nightfall and we hit the double figures for drinks and pubs in close quarters to my old job Macquarie Place... my memory of what happened from here is probably a little too hazy to try to recall... but I remember making into those final doors and slowly making my way through my final Tooheys New of the day. Taxi for Fonfara...

Christmas Eve, some Christmas shopping, some chilling out, a nice BBQ dinner in the evening and again a very low alcoholic content - no wonder after the previous days epic.

Shrimp on the Barby!


I started my Christmas in a very untraditonal way. I went for a run about town and the local park - almost an attempt at 'pre-burning' some of the culinary delights I was about to assault my body with later in the day.

Without any breakfast I met up with Aaron & Jarrads family and we headed off in a taxi to the Carlton Crest Hotel for our all-you-can-eat Christmas dinner buffet.

The forecast had been bleak, but with a weather forecast that makes the Blighty one look 100% accurate, anything was possible, and as the afternoon started, the sun was out and made for a nice temperature. Meanwhile, the seafood was being devoured. Prawns, Crab, Oysters, Yabbies, Salmon to name a few... I was nearly full when I finished my seafood - but then moved on to some more traditional Coq Au Vin - well, traditonal in France maybe! The afternoon drew on with wine & beer and finally a huge swoop to the dessert section. When we made it home, with bellys full of food making us feel like whales as we plunged the pool and basked in the afternoon Christmas sunshine.

A Racing Song n Dance


Eversince I knew that the Southern Hemisphere had hot Christmases, I'd always wanted to experience one on the beach in Australia. On Boxing Day I finally got to fulfil this desire. The sun was shining, though the wind was up so after a kick around on the Randwick oval, 30minutes sunbaking and a quick swim we were done.


I then headed back home to get changed, walked a out of my front door and around the corner at met some friends at the Randwick racecourse - free to internationals today!.

The earlier winds had died off and the weather had turned into an absolutely gorgeous day. The whole gang ended up drinking Champagne to celebrate.

After the races we headed into the city for a good ol' knees up at the Lowenbrau beer cafe where as well as food & beer (yes, beer after champagne - never a great idea!), the hosts belted out some sing/shout/clap along numbers and everyone had a ball.

Then some bright spark suggested we go karaoke (can you guess?), 2minutes later and one of the guys; Brian, had phoned ahead and booked us in!

Sometime around the turn of midnight, Christmas was over for another year and I was sleeping off a heck of a good party.

Happy Christmas

"So this is Christmas, and what have we done? Another year over, a new one just begun..."

So in reply to the opener of Lennons 'Merry Christmas, War is Over' I could recap unquestionably the most eventful year of my life. One that started on cruches back on the Thai island of Koh Phangan, saw me learn to Scuba dive on Koh Tao, relax like there was no issues left to be dealt with left on earth in Koh Lanta. February saw an emotional fairwell to South East Asia and my Australian epic began in Perth (where England just gave up the Ashes). A little livin, a little workin, then a move on to Melbourne, a holiday on holiday if you will. The atmosphere was electric for the Commonwealth Games and I saw some great scenery before heading back for some more back packing in Thailand and Brunei.

On to Sydney where I would gain some employment and exploit living in New South Wales as much as possible; galleries, horse riding, beach days, bike riding and snowboarding to name a few. After my birthday in August I made my way North for the Winter, taking in the gems of the East Coast, diving from an aeroplane and a live-aboard boat on the Great Barrier Reef. Homeward bound through Auckland, finding something like paradise in the Cook Islands and then an amazing trip around California in my adopted V6 Mustang before enjoying my final days away from home in Manhattan.

That short break at home was almost enough to catch up with everyone before I headed back to Sydney via Dubai where I've been working, living and partying for the last 2 months... but anyone who reads regularly will know all that already. So a big thanks if you are one of those people, it means a lot whenever I get any feedback for what I've done, written or photographed.

I can't believe I'm sat here writing another Christmas blog entry already - I could say the year has flown by, but the blog at least serves to remind how much I packed into 2006.

So for 2007! I know I won't ever get a year as eventful as this last one, and if I get one half as so, then I'll be very lucky. I have a million and one ideas of what I'd like to achieve, but for now, I'm enjoying soaking up a little reality whilst I'm back in the working world.

Thanks again, best wishes for the festive season and the coming new year, may it be lucky and prosperous.

Yer old buddy, Luke

Black & White

Party Season,

After the amount of abuse self-served up last weekend, my intention for the week was to lay low. A task I think managed remarkebly well. A few nights in with a book, a night out at the IMAX with a great meal at Wildfire overlooking the Opera House and a long hard Friday where I managed to cull my usual Friday night habbit and instead take a night off the big time to play some 360... yeah, that's right - video games on a Friday night!

There was a deeper reason for all this other than just wussing out, the works Christmas party.


So after a morning shopping trip to Bondi Junction, we were ready get dressed up in monotone for the evenings procedings. You can guess the theme of the party from the pictures I'm sure, but then venue was filled with colour, as well as dozens of pool, fussball, pinball and air hockey tables for free-play. Wine, Champagne and several beers were freely available along with canopes and side-show style food stalls.

A live band played out some hits, while some Cirque-Du Soleil dancers took centre point in the pavillion twirling up and down their ribbons in sync.

After much smoozing, boozin and eatin the food, all was left to do was dance the night away...

A quick trip into Kings Cross capped off a great fun night for all, though with that much bubbly consumed, I'm pretty sure there were to be some headaches the next morning.

After sleeping out most of the AM part of Sunday, I spoke to a mate on the phone who informed of how great the weather outside was - sure enough I had a peek and the Blue sky contracted my pupils quicker than a typical English Ashes innings (which is pretty quick).

Out of bed like a kid at Christmas, I headed down to Coogee beach for a sun bake and dip. Az, Jazz and Vards were all down there so we had some time to reflect on a great night out at the Hordern.

Righ after that, myself and Aaron headed off for some Lawn Bowls to see out the sunny afternoon in possibly the most relaxing sporting style. There we met a whole bunch of other friends where we ate BBQ snacks, and sipped down on some $9 jugs of beer.

Another Sunday dinner session at the palace put the curtains down on another great weekend.

Buy it in Bottles

House Warmer, Sydney

In a single week I managed to partake in three sporting passtimes. Sunday Squash, Wednesday Tennis followed by another first for me; Thursday Netball. A sport I'd always known was predominantly played by girls and non-contact at that... I still managed to give myself mild concussion when I collided with some dudes shoulder in the 1st half of the 1st game. I soldiered on, but 5minutes later I could see nothing but a yellow blur in my left eye so decided that without depth perception, I was probably no good to anybody. I saw out the rest of the game from the sidelines, but was back for game no.2 where I ran myself ragged in the Centre position. Game No.3 and my week of sports was taking it's toll, though I just about managed to see it through till full time. Blistered and without so much of an arch under my feet, I heavy footed it home with my partner in sporting crime, Azz.

So came the weekend, a slightly spontaneous Friday night with work mate Paul followed by my house warming party on Saturday.


A great little turnout made it considering how short a time I've been here, the songs played out as the mid afternoon sun warmed us, Decca made his way in to town too. I showed the Ozzies how to do a real BBQ (ie. coals rather than gas) English style... snags with one side blackened for effect ;) Later on the party left and carried on at the Coogee Beach Hotel in to the early hours. A Sunday of sore heads and sizzlin' sunshine followed. Not a highly productive day other than the hosing down of the appartment - looking a little worse for wear before the cleaning began.


The weekend played out with a Christmas dinner at Aarons place, with a few Poms in the house, we had a pretty traditional meal courtesy of Mick and Chris cooking up all the usual meats, stuffing, veg and of course Xmas pudding and mince pies for dessert. Note: Due to my over relaxed mood, my camera recieved very little use... though I will try and source some more pics from other people for this post.

Why Does It Always Rain On Me?

Homebake, Sydney

Another weekend rapidly fell upon me, and with it the associated celebratory Friday night drinks that drifted from the relatively upper class ECQ bar (not far from the Opera House) to the other end of the slider - at the Coogee Beach Hotel, a haunt as old as my time in Sydney. I did however register a personal first, in managing to get thrown out of the said establishment for being too drunk. I still to this minute have no idea how the door monkeys worked this out (I'd not even had that much to drink), since I'd been sitting down chatting for the majority of the evening, and had strolled up to the mensroom, before emerging back out into the bar to be greeted with my marching orders.

So Saturday was all set to be a better day than Friday. I managed to get a last minute ticket to Homebake, a 1 day music festival that dedicates its time slots to, as you can kinda guess from the name, home made acts (Australian & Kiwi). Myself and Aaron rolled up and met up with some friends before settling into a rambunctuous afternoon/evening routine. Though the heavens opened and gave the crowd the best of an English festival, we still partied on through to some great acts.

It was quite a different festival for me in that I'd never seen a single act before and was generally able to judge each act on their own merits rather than pre-told media plauditry. A hip-hop kiwi outfit called Scribe sounded great, Butterfly Effect gave me a good taste of Queensland rock before we made it to see a band I was more than familiar with. Loving a couple of their albums though, I thought the Vines sounded a little off, and the set-list didn't seem to do too much to get the crowd pumped. That said, the big-top tent they played in did offer us shelter as heavy rains bore down again on The Domain.

With the outlook a little clearer, we plodded on to see the climax of the evening; Eskimo Joe and Silverchair. Both of which delivering high quality live performances before the night was capped off with some low quality culinary McDelights.

With the weather really not doing it for us this weekend, all was left to do was have a good old fashioned English Sunday... Xbox 360, some great pizzas in Randwick followed by Borat at the movies.

Nine2Five

Sydney, Australia

To my relief, I started my new contract last Wednesday. The first day couldn’t have been a fresher breath of air. Some great little touches to make working more of a pleasure than a chore, there’s unlimited soft drinks, fruity & biscuity snacks and on a Friday night or special occasion – the magic fridge loaded with beers, wines and girls fizz. Not to mention a great team atmosphere and an ethos that encourages imaginative ideas.

The building itself is pretty amazing, it won some kind of Green award for it’s innovative design; solar responsive blinds that block rays entering the building at key times of the day, a worm farm on the roof so the buildings organic waste never leaves the area and a funky water cooling system that negates the need for Air Conditioning throughout the entire building; with exception of the IT data room, which itself is show-cased to visitors with glass walls surrounding a series of LED ridden black server racks. The office is in Sydneys 'Rocks' area which sits on the South side of the Harbour bridge, a nice spot with water views and the open top tourist buses humming by every hour or so.

So with a first day ending in a meal out on Darling Harbour with the team, I was comfortable I was going to enjoy my stay here. The week was bettered even more with the copany quarterly party - a warehouse across the street hired out with bands playing while employees drink yet more free drinks!

That evening set the tone for a weekend of ease... a BBQ on Saturday out in the lovely suburbian part of Paddington, another BBQ and beach day at Bronte for Sunday, before an evening session at the Coogee Beach Palace capped off the weekend.

Call the Police

Sydney, Australia

Thankfully, the inevitable was confirmed on Tuesday when I got the call offering me the new position. Just a little pleased with myself I handed in my 7days notice and went back to work.

A working week followed of catching up with sleep, making preparations for moving into my new place and a pretty random night in the Cooge; dinner followed by several beers and the most dismal performance in a quiz I think I've ever managed. 8 out of 30! But a laugh it was. After that the CBH was playing host to a swimsuit show, which we figured since we were locals and all, we should support this sort of event. We rolled up as the show was about to begin only to find out that it had been postponed, they were kind enough to pour us a free drink for the inconvenience!

With Friday night, came cause for celebration. As well as Aarons birthday, it was my final day at my short-lived employment with the State Government Department. A shame really as with this session, I found I was starting to get to know some of the people I had been working with.

I ran over the 7pm deadline for meeting with my room mates so found myself burning the pavement as I made a cross city dash to a Teppenyaki restaurant.

I arrived at the restaurant as everyone else did, so all that was left to do, was relax with an Asahi and get my catching arm ready for some projectile food throwing. The chefs emerged with hungry audience before them. There were around 18 of us eating the Jap-style banquet.

Some huge prawns kicked off the meal, and after the first taste, we knew the evening was going to be a success. Though as the delicious foods were served, they eventually made way for the flying food varieties; mainly egg and rice. Pretty soon after the chef had thrown some cooked egg, Jarrad (Aarons bro) decided start picking people off with raw eggs, and so began the food fight…

Aaron copped the overwhelming majority of the missiles, and struggled to make many return hits through the convulsions of laughter that had infected him...

Some of the party left as we headed off for a few more drinks, (though after smelling my clothes the morning after, I’m surprised we got in anywhere!) which got progressively more, err, well progressive I guess. The core party whittled down to just two in the end, with Aaron putting out his best moves on a dance floor who’s only other dancer was a 70yr old dude that seemed to be going a bit mental to a Stones cover of ‘Satisfaction’… some headaches were to follow the next day.

Indeed they did, just when the Summer seemed to be showing up. I technically had to move out that Saturday, and though I made some effort, I only managed to get half my stuff to my new residence before it was time to party the night through all over again. This time, in 70’s attire. After some diversions, we arrived at the party in full swing (swingin’ 70’s style that is).

A psychedelic night followed. The guys shirts and ladies attire were truly amazing (if that’s the word?!) and of course, I could wear ‘the rug’ out with pride!

Stumbling in at some unearthly hour, we had partied hard this weekend – more an accomplishment for Aaron whom also just made it into the exclusive ‘Club 27’; he had to go to work on Monday, where, for me, I would just get to laze in the sun… or at least as much as I could in between running around getting the final things ready for my new room.

I did however get to the beach on Tuesday afternoon to soak up some D, before going home, only to look forward to a life of work once more…

Come Back Brighter

Another New Job, Sydney

Late last week, after a couple of days settling into my new job, I got a few calls from various recruitment people that I'd either dealt with the previous week or some of the stragglers a little too late to help. Except one. Jordan called me to ask if I was interested in a roll at a well known contruction firms flagship office in Sydney. Having heard about the company before, I was interested in knowing some more about the role and so went on with the conversation.

3days fast forward, and I'm running from my office near Town Hall to the underground train at 11.35am. Out at Wynyard station I carried on into the Rocks and onto the road the company is based on. My brief map research however had only showed me one side of the crescent shaped road which loops from one side of the harbour bridge to the other. I was walking for 25minutes, around 12more than I actually had to play with before the start of my big interview. I made an advanced call to apologise and things seemed okay once I met with the gents conducting the interview.

Over tea & coffee overlooking the harbour, they fired questions, and I answered them. It all seemed to go very well. Then it was time to make the dash back downtown from my "lunch with friends". I guess I should have tried harder to uphold the lie, but I couldn't resist walking back into the office with a fruit smoothie and slice of cake - which incidentally, no-one clocked considering they all knew where I'd "been". Several hours later, I received a call to tell me that the feedback from the interview had been "very good". My weekend was set to be a good one, with just my final offer to come through before I could throw in the towel early at my tedious role in State Government.

A typical Sydney Summer weekend followed; well, to be honest it started on Thursday night, carried on Friday through till Tuesday after the U2 gig.

Saturday was absolutely stunning though, and with the Sun, I helped Aaron with the pool maintenance in the morning before heading down to Coogee Beach at lunch time for a beachside BBQ and Frisbee-fest.

We tried to do the same on Sunday, but at Bronte beach. The weather was not as good and cloud cover kept things cooler than we’d wished. We did however make it to "Go-Low"! No, not a limbo institution, but a cheap shop selling all kinds of magical stuff. We picked up some inflatables for the pool, a hand saw, some chocolates and a santa hat. All for pennies! Random stuff you may think, and I'd have to agree, but the hand saw did help us massacre the neighbours tree overhanging the pool (it'd been dropping blossom and leaves in the pool clogging the filter, not just cos we were in a destructive mood!). When we were done, things were much better, and of course we got to feel like real men for all that sawing we'd done!

Help the Aged

Telstra Olympic Stadium, Sydney

A day waiting – First thing in the morning, I got to wait for 40minutes for a bus that never showed up, I had to walk into the nearest town to catch a trip to work making me an hour late – something about a union dispute with the buses. Despite being an hour shorter than most other days, work ticked by at it’s usual slow pace, though I was anticipating the U2 show that evening at one of the main sites I’d yet to get to in Sydney.

At 5 o clock I made my way to Central to catch a train to Olympic Park. I was made to wait again as the ATMs had huge queues - I got sick of the waiting and walked around to the Olympic Aquatic centre where I got cash instantly. Then it was time to play drinking catch up with Decca and his friends in the short time left before entering the gig.

Down at pitch level, I walked in to the arena with Kanye West bangin’ out some tunes, he was pretty good in fairness – mixing his rap hits with some dance mixes to keep the performance flowing with flare.

A drinks break between West and the main feature, and then the ageing rockers finally made it from the retirement home to the stage. Hyper on Jack and Coke, the first few numbers were up tempo and got the best response from the crowd all night. A little way in they slowed the show to their own comfortable pace which was nice while they performed classics like “With or Without You” & “One” but with the show lasting 2½ hours, this neutral fan was getting a bit bored. The band made several 3 song encores before finally leaving the Sydney Stage for the final time of the weekend.

It was a good show, don’t get me wrong, but compared to the last time I saw the band 10 years ago at Wembley, they just didn’t have enough mojo to keep me interested in the stage… though maybe because this time they didn’t have a huge lemon on stage – aside from Bono – just jokin’ of course. Thank goodness for Pies, Jack Daniels and Kanye West – and good company more over…


All was left was to stand behind about 45,000 people lining up to get into the train station… Home at 1.30am on a school night… I could see work being a bag of fun the following day.

Real Life

Melbourne Cup Day, Sydney

For my regular blog readers, you might recall my last view from my desk was of the Opera House; this time is not quite so glamorous in that I can see Woolworths (and also, the Town Hall Clock)! So, a little further South in the central business district of Sydney, I’ll get to learn about all of the culture and history (also read “restaurants and bars”) of a new area.

My 2nd day was also Melbourne Cup day, “The Race that Halts the Nation”. A new projector had been installed to coincidentally be ready for the big race as the majority of the department crowded the board room to watch the grand 3200m horse race. I had a few bucks placed on a couple of nags in the company sweepstake and as luck would have it, one of mine – Pop Rock came in 2nd place earning me an 8-1 return on my $2! Sweet.

After the food and drinks in the afternoon, work was pretty laid back throughout the afternoon as most of Australia stayed in party mode. It’s quite a strange atmosphere seeing so many people in a city where the event isn’t even staged, dressed up to the nines in suits, dresses and hats.

Synaesthesia

Sydney, Australia

Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to arrive in Sydney 3months and 1week prior to the day you must cease work in Australia, find a 3month contract and begin working to start funding the rest of your life.

Failure to do so, will result in, well, a good old fashioned loss of earnings I suppose. Best of luck old bean…

So after dropping my things off, I headed into the city to begin the search. A quick visit to my old employer, and then applying for anything vaguely suitable I could on the internet job search engines.

My first day or two were fairly fruitless, except for finding a few hours each afternoon to fall asleep as the jetlag tried to haul me back to Europe. Then, some phone calls started coming in, and then an interview for the Monday, however – most jobs were of a much shorter period than I really required – but anything’s better than nothing I reckon.

An easy weekend followed; a Halloween party at my old friends Julian & Dave’s place, a trip back to Copacabana to visit Decca, to enjoy his housemate’s birthday party and bring my old belongings back to Sydney. Sunday saw the welcome return of the Sun, by lunch time we were sat out on the deck sunning ourselves.

Monday, and my first interview – a long and stifling journey out West suited and booted – not much fun, I managed to choke on one of the questions leaving me pretty frustrated and downtrodden for the rest of the day. A couple of other meetings followed in the week though if anything, the market seemed to be getting more stagnant.

Luckily the 1st November rolled round, and everyone decided to start recruiting! I had a barrage of calls, and arranged a few meetings and interviews – one of which while I was taking a rare couple of hours out to get sunned on Bondi beach!

Thursday the 2nd November – exactly 3months until my VISA runs out, I had all but dismissed the idea of getting a 3month contract, and instead was thinking I’d be getting several shorter term contracts. At 10am I sat an interview, it went well and within an hour I was working! Mainly just induction stuff, but I got paid for the interview, and got all that dull stuff outta the way so I could hit the ground running on Monday morning. The best news, was that my Australian job hunting is now over with and I have employment until my last workable day here! Lucky!

My final weekend, and days off of an epic year rolled around. Still not the richest guy on the planet, I managed to end up in an old favourite; the Slipp Inn, that was serving FREE beer till 9pm as part of it’s annual Summer party, where fire dancers performed in the beer garden, where, ironically enough, it rained too.

Pain

As the blog takes a kind of seasonal sabaticle, I have wandered to myself (whilst lying on the beach) what I might write in each new post. I guess this could have been just asking for fate to intervene with some interesting stuff for you to have a read of!

I travelled the 20 metre journey down to the beach with my feet still raw from the football the day before. I hadn't done enough however. The group of us decided to take kayaks around to the next beach along. It was a pretty warm day, the water was especially clear which made for some cool viewing.

After arriving back on our beach (pictured above), I dried off for a while before venturing out with my snorkel and mask. I'm just starting to get to grips with the whole thing, and even spotted a stingray, some crabs and a fish - yes, one fish. Rubbish! The little fella was darting in and out behind some coral as I tried my best to catch a half decent picture. After that adventure, it was time to get in some Frisbee. Anyone that thinks I may be wasting time with this whole travel thing, will eat their words when they find out how good my forehand frisbee throwing has progressed in the last week!

New Years eve was creeping up and we'd still not really seen any of Koh Pha-Ngan. So on the eve itself, a few of us decided to rent motorbikes to help us go check out the islands waterfalls, and also Haad Rin (The location of the islands Full Moon & New Years Parties). After fueling the hogs, we set off on some of the most dubious roads I've ever ridden on - let alone driven. It was not far that we met our first steep incline. The road had lots of washed sand across it as well as large cracks in what once may have been tarmac. I had to slip the bike down through the gears as two of us were on it. As I hit first, the gearbox must've caught hard as I felt the back wheel travel under me and the horizon disappeared and was quickly replaced with a set of motorcycle handlebars. My mate fell off the back and in doing so let the front fall toward the ground again - though the bike had spun 180 degrees. I held on like an Ewok (hmm, those who know me well will know this isn't the first time!) and battled the bike away from the road and toward some shrubbery. I slipped and gave some unneeded gas which sent me off the back being dragged by the kneecaps.

Whoops.

With claret running down my shins I pulled the bike back up and zipped back to the bungalow for my medical supplies.

Strapped up, we headed toward the waterfalls. By the time of arrival, my joints were pretty well seizing up so I didn't have much of an appetite to clamber over the falls. We carried on in to the afternoon and made it to Haad Rin. I had the Schitzel and recommend it! (As far as the beach goes, there were a couple of thousand bodies on it - we were happy to turn back and spend new years in our chilled little village and on a beach where we wouldn't be fighting youngens for space!

New Years Eve was happening. A group of 10(ish) got together and after dinner, we headed on our secluded beachside village bar crawl. As midnight struck, fireworks were let off all around the bay throwing awesome reflections across the calm low tide.
Maybe after the days earlier trauma I was in mood for some food - somehow I managed to eat a Bombay bagguette, several cookies and 3 banana and chocolate pancakes. Well fed, I boogied the new year in, in style (legs not moving on the dance floor style). HAPPY NEW YEAR! (200 litres???)

New Years day I awoke in slightly more pain than I fell asleep with. So I thought it wise to go to the hospital to get me left knee checked out properly. I took great delight getting carted around in a wheel chair for a while. I got an X-Ray and awaited the doctors inspection...

It isn't broken!!!

24hours on, the pain and swelling has reduced considerably, so hopefully I should be back on my feet and ready to contest some more beach soccer by the weekend.