Knightsbridge, London, Jan 2006
We've gone and made the big move from London back to Oz. It was extremely difficult to leave all of our friends in London, the full-on London lifestyle and all of the travelling in Europe. Had to come back eventually though.
We crammed in a few trips before we left, including Morocco and a snow trip to France, so if we can get our act together we'll post some photos from those trips soon (maybe if the surf goes flat and we've had our fill of the sun).
We're basing ourselves on the Sunshine Coast for a while to thaw out. Will try to post a few photos of local life and wildlife as a taste for those back in London.
On the August Bank Holiday long weekend we took a train to Scotland with our friends Nick and Katrina. We hired a car and toured Scotland's beautiful south west. We stayed in Glasgow (rainy late night Glasgow is like Gotham city), stayed in the pretty coastal town of Oban, visited the Isle of Mull (spectacular even in the pouring rain) and took a stroll in the awesome highlands near Glencoe.
Highlands near Glencoe
Loch Lomond
A Castle on the Isle of Mull
So the Ashes series is over now and we had the displeasure of being here while Australia lost the urn for the first time in 18 years. The whole country went cricket mad, enthralled by a combination of painfully close matches, and England winning something. Football even got knocked off front and back pages for a few weeks (which was nice). The real indicator of how popular cricket had become was when the boys who play football in our street every evening without fail, actually started playing cricket in the street instead. Although it was clear from the way they bowled and wielded the bat that they weren't accustomed to a sport where you need to use your hands.
This is a look back at the One Day final at Lords - which was a tie.
Simon Jones.
Englishman with a good Aussie beer.
Taking ball, going home. Maybe we should have.
We've got it surrounded, boys.
Pimms during the lunchbreak.
Catching practice.
Dizzy.
Our nearby neighbours, Chelsea Football Club, just picked up their first Premiership in 50 years. These photos are of some of their jubilant fans outside the ground in Fulham Broadway and surrounds, after their last home match of the season, having already secured the cup.
These are some shots we took when celebrating Aimee's birthday. We went ice skating at the outdoor rink at Somerset House on The Strand in London. We both got the hang of it pretty quickly so we had a ball, and no, we didn't fall over.
It was bizarre for Aimee to celebrate her birthday ice skating; she's more accustomed to spending the day at the beach.
Merry Christmas to everybody, wherever in the world you are, and have an awesome New Year.
After work on the 27th August I took a stroll around High Street Kensington and surrounds.
This is close to where we used to live and 'High St Ken' is still one of our favourite shopping places.
It's got all the stores Oxford St has, but a fraction of the crowds. I'm also a fan of the architecture.
We hired a car for the bank holiday weekend and made the five hour, peak holiday traffic, trip over to St David's on the west coast of Wales. One of the first things that struck us was the vibrant colour of the lush green grass. We weren't sure if it was particularly green in this corner of the world or whether we had just been surrounded by the grey-scales of London for too long.
The town of St David's comprised of steep, windy cobbled streets leading down to a magnificent medieval cathedral. From our base at a B&B we did day walks along the coastal National Park Trail. The trail works it way right along the edge of the cliffs offering stunning views across the ocean on one side and fields on the other. We also explored some of the other tiny coastal villages accessable only by either walking or on impossibly narrow roads, literally "hedged" in on either side.
It was a fantasic weekend getaway.
Rolling home
B&B Breakfast
Port town with tide out.
St. Davids. The yellow building was our B&B.
Hello to anybody we went to High School with, who might be looking at the site. We're sorry to have missed our 10 Year Reunion. It would have been fun to see what people are doing now.
Unfortunately we couldn't be there because we are living in London... and it's a bit far to commute. We lived in London for a a while when we took a year off to backpack around the world in 2001/02 and we came back in May this year to hangout, work and travel around for another year or so. There is so much to see and do here. Last weekend we took a long weekend in Wales; next weekend we are doing a 4 day weekend in Cinque Terre, Italy, for our 3 year wedding anniversary.
I'm working for MYOB, where I've mostly been since doing a uni work placement there (in Oz). I'm currently working as an IT Analyst on a merger with Solution6 (who we recently acquired).
Aimee is a Social Worker and is currently working at a Family Court Assessment Service for Social Services. There is a huge demand for locum Social Workers in the UK so it has been fairly easy for her to find work over here.
Aimee did a Bachelor of Social Work / Bachelor of Arts double degree at Melbourne Uni. I did a Bachelor of Business / Bachelor of Arts (Japanese) at Swinburne.
We are living in South West London, which is a pretty fun place to live.
Trent is also in London. We caught up recently for a reminisce about school days over a pint. We've also caught up with Chad in London last time and we are organising a trip to see him and Chris in Denmark soon.
It would be good to catch up with guys from school, so send us an email or post a comment to the site (below) and say hi.
Shane and Aimee
We've been enjoying watching the olympics from a different point of view
over here in England. Understandably, there is not a whole lot of coverage
of the Aussies in action so we've found ourselves peering into the
background of the footage to see how our country men and women are doing.
We've also been scouring The Age on-line. Fortunately for us the English
seem to have adopted Thorpe as one of their own so we at least get to watch
his races.
We were getting a bit worried at the beginning of the Olympics that the only
interviews we were going to hear would be with English competitors who had
failed to score a place, going something along the lines, "...so you didn't
really achieve what you'd hoped for out there...what happened...?". But
since the athletics and rowing have started Great Britian have been steadily
moving up the medals tally. So we've been able to see a few more positive
interviews, which always makes the olympics more fun to watch.
Henley-on-Thames is an old town situated, you guessed it, on the Thames, north west of London, near Oxford. It is the home of the Henley Regatta where Oxford and Cambridge still do their darndest to out-row each other. We didn't see the Regatta, but Henley is still a nice spot to pass an English summers day, chilling out at one of the old pubs and strolling by the Thames out into the country-side.
Aimee and a Guiness Pie.
Country wedding.
chairs in pebbles
We did a trip down to Brighton, Londoners' traditional seaside summer playground.
seaside diners
merry go round
Saturday afternoon fever
Rollercoaster on the pier
Helter Skelter - inspiration for a Beatle
Pier
Brighton pavilion
Venus rising
We went to the first day of Wimbledon. Got there at 7:30 am to queue for ground passes. You have to sleep out overnight to get some of the tickets left for court 1 or centre court (all other tickets are balloted out earlier in the year) so we had no chance of getting these. Got into the ground at 11:30 am.
Watched Nicole Pratt fall to the British number 1 girl on an outside court. Wandering around later we were stunned when an older couple walked up to us and handed us their Court 1 tickets. We went in and found oursleves in the 2nd row! Watched Venus Williams win her match, then we watched 3rd seed Coria of Argentina Vs Wes Moody of South Africa.
Play stopped at 20:45 when the light started to fail, so we retired to a pub for some grub and to watch England beat Switzerland at UEFA Euro 04. A nice day really.
Coria's party trick
Court 1, Wimbledon
Grass court
Strawberries and Cream
Outside courts
We arrived in London safely last Sunday. Flight from Koh Samui to Bangkok was interesting. Our Bangkok Airways flight was held above Bangkok for 30 mins waiting for a localised thunder storm to pass. Eventually we landed in the middle of the storm with lightening flashing all around the plane (litterally). Probably our most scary landing ever. Stepped onto the tarmac into 15 cm of water.
We have spent all week treading the streets of London looking for somewhere to rent. Put in an offer last night for a small 1-bedroom place in Fulham, SW London and looks like we have been approved today. So we should be able to move in tomorrow which is good, as even half price budget hotels (thanks to wotif.com) and hostels erode the funds very fast. Obtaining a lease here is a nightmare; mountains of paperwork and reference checks. We have also renewed our uneasy relationship with the archaic, beaurocratic London banks.
The weather is nice. Yesterday was 32 deg C. It was forecast to be 30 deg and the news bulletins were carrying stories about "how very hot" it was going to be at a "sweltering 30 degrees" and how to deal with the heat by staying out of the sun, wearing suncrean, carrying water etc - like we would do for a 43 c day in Melbourne. Seems cool to us after the heat and humidity of Thailand...
Photos from Thailand (from our new digi SLR) and site redesign coming soon...
Spring is sprang... sprunged. London's cold, grey, damp winter has dissipated and there is a spring freshness in the air.
The skies are blue, the sun has a hint of warmth and the days are getting longer (beyond 4pm now). The temperature now soars into double figures during the day.
The flowers are blooming the trees are blossoming and the pigeons are mating. People are returning to the streets (as if they weren't crowded enough) and you can sit at an outside table without gloves, beanie and scarf.
And we are leaving...
Our fleeting seven month sojourn in London is coming to an end. Last weekend we moved out of our 'cosy' studio apartment in West London. Somehow we found that we had much more junk than just the 2 packs we arrived with last August.
This week we are staying with Olivia and John in Balham, South London. They kindly offered us use of a spare room they had so we could save a week's rent and store some gear. Aimee works with Olivia and they get on really well, but I'm still struggling with her thick Irish accent. John is from Bolton, near Manchester in the Midlands and I can't understand him any more than I can Liv!
This week we are finishing up and work and getting our stuff organised for the next leg of our trip. On Monday next week we fly out of Heathrow for Athens, Greece. We'll spend a couple of weeks visiting ancient sites and hopefully chilling on a beach in the Greek Isles (and we could sure use that after a damp London winter!) and munching on Souvalakis.
After Greece we head to Madrid, Spain via a couple of hours in Heathrow airport. We will then take about 6 weeks to make our way through Spain, wander across the south of France, check-out the pasta in Italy and fly out of Rome.
After Italy we will chill-out in London for a couple of nights, before heading the USA. We will be in the USA for about a week, stopping in New York and LA.
With about 10 mins to spare on the last day of our 12-month round-the-world ticket we will board a plane home to Aus.
We'll try and do regular posts while on the road, hopefully they will be short but interesting. I don't think we will be able to get photos up very often, but keep an eye on the site anyway.
A couple of Saturdays ago we hopped a train out to Reading to visit Theresa and her boyfriend Luke. Theresa (who is a real live English person) met Aimee when they were both trying to find their way on the tube, both in their first week at work. It turned out they work near each other.
Theresa and Luke took us on an excellent driving tour of the Buckinghamshire countryside north of Reading. We had lunch at a pub in a tiny village called Skermit. The pub was cosy with a nice roaring fire, local pints and hearty food (I had that English favourite - ham off the bone with egg and chips).
We went toured through Marlow and Henley on Thames and enjoyed a pleasant afternoon in the English countryside.
Luke, Theresa and Aimee at the pub in Skermit.
Wandering through Skermit.
The Thames at Marlow. Complete Angler Hotel on the other side of the river.
Last weekend we hired a car and did a 4 day road trip to the south west of England, visiting the counties of Wiltshire, Bath, Somerset, Devon and Dorset. We saw some cool stuff and enjoyed driving for the first time since we left Aus 9 months ago.
First stop was Bath, England's 'grandest town', full of excellent Georgian architecture from the 18th century when the town was the fashionable place for English Aristocracy. The Romans first established the town when they built their extensive bath complex over the warm springs in AD 43. Our travel tip for Bath would be to try and catch one of the excellent free walking tours run by the Mayor's Guides daily. Also try the hearty beef stew served at the Jazz Cafe. Don't try the egg flavoured spa water in The Pump Room.
We made use of our car and headed up onto one of hills lined with honey-coloured stone terraces from the 1860s and discovered a park on the crown of the hill overlooking Bath.
This is the B&B we stayed at in Bath. We enjoyed the full, greasy, fried English Breakfast these establishments are famous for. There is our rental car, still in good nick.
The Royal Crescent, Bath.
Roman Baths, Bath Cathedral in the background.
The Circus, Bath.
After Bath we headed into Somerset and visited Wells, a medieval cathedral city. Wells Cathedral.
Near Glastonbury we climbed the Tor, which has the remains of the medieval tower of St Michael at the top. Legend has Glastonbury the burial place of King Arthur and the Tor the Isle of Avalon. Here is Aimee near the top.
Eventually we reached Torquay on the coast in Devon. The surf shops we expected to see on the way into town weren't there, nor was the surf. The town is covered in white 19th century hotels, just like in Fawlty Towers. We selected the Torquay Backpackers instead. Torquay is one of those English towns where all of the streets are one way, designed to lead you away from where you want to go and funnel you out of town. If you make a wrong turn you have to head out to the highway and start over...
On Monday we visited the cute coastal town of Lyme Regis. The driving rain didn't keep us from checking out the pebble beach, but it did keep us off the Cobb.
We drove through the hedge-maze that is the Dorset countryside. Every 5 miles nestled in the rolling green hills is a little old stone village where even 2 small cars can't pass in the main street.
Stone Henge has an eeriness about it in the rain. It was the poor weather and not the Henge itself that caused Aimee to exclaim way too loudly that "This place should be called crap-henge!".
Windsor castle is 'grand'; it makes Buckingham Palace look like the town-house that it is. Windsor Castle was first built in 1165 an has been the home of the British royalty for over 900 years. The Queen still hangs out there most weekends.
You get to look through the State Apartments which includes sumptuous Ball Rooms, Sitting rooms, drawing rooms, dining rooms, bed rooms, etc. Go during winter if you can; there are none of the infamous crowds and there are State Apartment rooms open to the public which are closed during busier times.
The Queen's private rooms are on the far side of the courtyard.
Gothic St. Gorge's Castle, on the grounds of the Castle. It contains the tombs of lots of royals, including Henry VIII and Kings George III - VI.
The Long Walk.
The 'village' of Windsor nestles around the bottom of the castle.
A builing in Eton, over the Thames from Windsor.
Greenwich is a historical maritime area south east of central London, down the river Thames. We spend a serene frosty day checking out some of the highlights, which included the Cutty Sark, the Old Royal Naval College, the Royal Observatory and the National Maritime Museum.
Royal Observatory on a frosty hill.
In 1675 Charles II had Christopher Wren build the Royal Observatory on the hill in Greenwich Park. The idea was for the Royal Astronomer to study the stars and use astronomy to solve the problem of how to measure Longitude (allowing the British fleets to sale the world without crashing into continents and islands in the dark...). It is detailed in the museum at the observatory that the problem was eventually solved using time when accurate sea-going clocks were finally perfected.
The meridian line runs next to the Observatory.
The clipper the Cutty Sark. The Cutty Sark was the fastest ship to sail the seven seas when launched in 1869. One of my fore-fathers sailed on her.
Looking back up the Thames towards central London.
Last night I went down to my local (pub) to watch Australia play England in the football (soccer to those of us who know that real football is Aussie Rules) in East London. I found out too late to get tickets, but it would have been fantastic to be there (was it Mark?) as Australia won the 'friendly' match 3-1.
The crowd in front of the big screen at the pub was divided into 2 camps; the English fanatics and the Aussie fans, led by a brown-skinned Aussie in board shorts, a Rip Curl tank top and a blond wig. They traded insults, jeers and chants all night. The songs Waltzing Matilda and Royal Britannia both got a run too.
The Aussies were in the minority, but had greater volume thanks to the scoreline, though we knew we were outnumbered when England scored their goal. Some of the English fans were taking it way too seriously.
The back pages of the paper are fantastic today. The Sun has a picture of a frustrated David Beckham with the headline 'Kanga Poo'. After we recently thrashed them in the Ashes cricket, and the Tennis, this was the sport they were going to get back at us through. They threw 2 teams at us, and we still won. We aren't supposed to be able to play football!
Now we just have to take the English on at their other national sports; darts and snooker...
On a Sunday over Christmas we went up to Hampstead Heath, in London's north. Hampstead Heath is 800 acres of heath, grassland and forests and is a popular recreational destination for Londoners. At the foot of Hampstead Heath is the 'village' of Hampstead, a popular address for celebs and the upper-class.
A scary pond.
We walked all around the park, exploring the woods and grasslands and enjoying the excellent views over London from the top of a windy and chilly Parliament Hill.
During the walk we stopped of for lunch at the Spaniards Inn, built in 1585 (so the Spanish Ambassador could avoid the Great Plague in London). Notorious highwayman Dick Turpin lived at the Inn as a boy. Later Byron hung out there and Keats wrote 'Ode to a Nightingale' in the garden. Charles Dickens mentioned the pub in Pickwick Papers.
A scary person.
The Spaniard's Inn
Central London from Parliament Hill, Hampstead Heath.
It was chilly up there...
We're in london still and lately we've been trying to do a few of the touristy things. I'll try and put up some posts, with photos, soon.
I was browsing through the TripleJ hottest 100 list the other day, marvelling at the mix of bands on there. Same bands, new songs, mostly. We've been away from home since May last year, so most of those songs are unfamiliar to me. It reminded me how many great bands and there are back in Oz. I'm always surprised when I play popular Aussie music in the office and find that nobody else knows it.
Thanks to the wonders of the internet I've been able to listen to a few of the listed tracks. The song at number 3 on the list, London Still by The Waifs, is probably very familiar to everyone at home but I'd never heard it before. It couldn't be more apt for us at the moment. I think I'll have it on high repeat for a while...
I left something out of my tube rant yesterday; 'adverse' weather conditions, as they call it, closes down the tube too. Snow seems to have the worst impact.
Yesterday London got a heap more snow. It snowed on and off all day in a blizzard like fashion, then more again overnight with temperatures down to -6c (wind-chill -16c). London can not cope with a couple of inches* of snow and life is bought to a crawl.
Last night the tube was severely effected (it took Aimee 2 hours to go 8 stations), and today it was barely running at all. The Circle line was about the only one with trains on it this morning, even then they were sparse and so full that at most stations no body else could board. At one point the train Aimee and I were on had to wait before approaching a platform as overcrowding on that platform made it worse. The buses were so full that some people opted to walk for an hour or mile on the iced-up footpaths to get to work.
The motorways around London were worse, with the most sever peak hour traffic problems in 7 years. This morning people were still heading home from work last night, sitting in their cars on the motorways. I heard a report of one guy moving 2 miles in 8 hours.
* OK, up to 6 inches in some parts of the country.
Holland Park
When I was younger we had to walk through snow to get to work...
The snowy view from our window this morning.
Beware, pure ice.
Workmates Chris and Jarratt discussing how to get back to the office.
Waiting for the tube at High Street Kensington station this morning.
Now is a good time to let you know about life on the tube in London. This week life on 'the Tube', the London Underground, particularly sucks. As you may have heard, last weekend a motor fell off of a tube train on the Central line at the Chancery Lane station (near where I work, and I sometimes catch this train at this station). It made quite a mess and caused a big controversy. The Central line runs right through the middle of London and is one of the busiest lines there is.
I don't like the Central line anyway. The trains have tiny carriages, like metal tubes, which they have to be to fit into the ancient tunnels, built in the olden days when people were shorter. In it's stations, like in all the old underground stations, the ventilation is poor and the air is thick and hazy with pollution.
The Central line is closed for at least all this week, and the other lines aren't coping too well. Aimee and I catch the Circle Line to work and it is now more chockas than ever. You are crammed in like sardines all of the time (sometimes you can't even unfurl the free Metro newspaper), and often people get left on the platform to wait for another train because they can't get into the carriages.
You can add to this another 48 hour London Firefighters' strike (they've been striking on and off since we've been here over a pay dispute). When this happens all of the 'deep' tube stations get closed, due to safety concerns (ie. the Army, who stand in while the Firefighters are striking, aren't keen on or good at fighting fires 10 floors below ground).
Last night 2 of the busiest tube stations on the Circle line, Euston and Kings Cross, were closed due to overcrowding.
The tube is notorious for delays and breakdowns. They normally blame 'signal faults' at some station for closing down a whole line. When you get to that station via a different line you will find the announcers there are blaming signal faults at some other station, probably where you've just come from. Regularly they cancel whole lines for now apparent reason.
Generally on most trips at some point your train will stop and sit in a dark tube somewhere for 5 minutes or more while the driver waits for another train to clear the platform. You don't want to catch the tube if you are claustrophobic...
Having said all this, the tube does move an amazingly large quantity of people everyday; many more than it was built to handle. You can get to pretty much everywhere you might want to go in London via the tube, and normally you only have to wait a few minutes at the most for the next one to turn up.
A rare empty tube station.
Mind the gap...
We had a busy Australia Day weekend in London. It's amazing how big Oz Day is in London. Ausie pubs, such as the Walkabout chain, all put on big events, and there are probably a few dozen pubs and bars in London who all put on something over the weekend, catering for the large Aussie population here.
I think I saw more Aussie flags and patriotism on the weekend than I did at the Sydney Olympics. Lots of VB, meat pies and BBQ'd snags were consumed by people wearing tank tops, Aussie flag tattos and hats made out of VB cartons. Pubs were even selling Cherry Ripes and Twisties.
You really realise how good Australia is when you leave to live somewhere else. Australia Day here is a celebration of that.
This morning as I waited on the tube platform it began to snow. Now I'm at work and the snow is coming down in big fat, fluffy flakes and everything outside is getting well covered. Our office has a glass ceiling, which is great for snow gazing, though the accumulation is starting to obscure the view.
Aimee and friends, Regents Park.
Yesterday was the first snowfall for London this winter, which some areas getting a good couple of inches. We got a dusting in Kensington.
One of the locals who works here just said that it is the best snow in London for a few years. London is already an attractive city, but everything being covered in snow makes it look fantastic. Snow certainly makes the cold worthwile.
Berries, Regents Park.
Regents Park
Aimee in High St, Kensington
We would like to wish all our friends and family a Merry Christmas. We hope you have a fantastic day where ever you are.
Aimee and I are looking forward to our first Christmas together by ourselves. It is a bit sad to be away from home, but we are loking forward to cooking up a Christmas feast in our cosy London flat.
It doesn't look like being a White Christmas though, the forecast is for 13c and rain.
Christmas in Oxford Street, London.
The sun came out today! I'm so excited I thought I'd share the news with everyone. It has been ages since we've seen the sun or any blue sky here in London, literally weeks. It has just been gray, drizzly and cold.
Yesterday's paper (the Metro, the free paper from the train) reported that this month we have had a total of 18 hours of sun in London, an average of just 1 hour 11 minutes each day. I think most of that 18 hours must have been at the start of the month, because I don't remember seeing any sun recently.
Even when the sun is out, it isn't very strong. It moves 'around' the horizon in a very shallow arc, just above the horizon. The effect of this is that you get long, cold shadows all day (on days when the sun appears). It is like a quick transition from dawn to dusk at around 9am. Dusk then persists all day until about 4pm when it gets dark. On gray days it never really gets very light.
We often end up looking for dinner really early because it feels much later than it actually is; 5:30pm feels more like 8pm because it has been dark for so long.
Ok, enough about the weather.
Farringdon, 1:34 pm, Friday 20th Dec, 2002.
Farringdon Tube Station and St. Pauls Cathedral.
Lovely shades of gray...
I finally got a job. I'm now working in Technical Support for Easily.co.uk, an ISP and Domain name registration company in London. Easily provides Internet access / hosting and email services for personal and corporate users, as well as internet domain name registration services. If you contact Easily for help, you might get me.
The company is small (about 25 staff) and the very relaxed support desk is a team of just 5, including me. Chris Seedy (who I worked with at MYOB) is here too. Thanks for putting in the good word for me Chris.
Easily is in Farringdon, a cool old part of London, which I'll have fun exloring. There is even a Magma bookshop (web & graphic design, art, photography, etc) just around the corner.
Working here should be fun, but I've got a fair bit to learn.
Back on October 4th I foolishly posted an entry on how nice the weather had been here in London. Well, very soon after this in a flurry of storms that removed most of the leaves from the trees (and some of the trees too) in one go, the temperature dropped about 10 degrees. Now it has dropped another notch, and winter is here.
(if you are living in frozen Berlin, don't bother reading on. Hi Jaz!)
November was coolish. The max temps were around 8 to 12 deg C. It rained hard and cold almost everyday, in fact it was the wettest November for more than 30 years in southern England (the proof is here). If I could send some rain home to dry Oz, I would. Apparently they had a 46c day on the Sunshine Coast, Qld, last week!?!
Late last week the temperature here took another sharp decline. Easterly winds arrived, which they say are coming in from Moscow, bringing icy air and a cold start to Winter. This week they are predicting some snow and frosts for London and southern England. Here's hoping for a White Christmas...
Last weekend we spent in the seaside town of Bornemouth (boor-mth to the locals) in Dorset on England's south coast. We went down there to visit my relatives; Uncle Gary, Aunty Anne, my cousins (some of who I've never met before) and my cousin Cheryl's two cute kids.
Despite the continuing bad weather which bought torrential rain and hail, we scored an insider's scenic tour of the area.
We headed out into the green Dorset countryside where we saw the cottage and farm where my Dad lived as a boy. We had lunch in the cozy country pub next door, on the banks of the flooding Avon river.
We drove through New Forrest (an old forrest) to the town of Christchurch where we saw 900 year old Saxon ruins and visited the ornate Saxon Priory (old church/monastery). We had a look around Bournemouth and nearly got blown off the pier, where surfers in thick wet suits were tackling the windswell. After being in London for a while it was invigorating to breath some nice salty ocean air.
Maybe the best part was the family roast lunch on Sunday. Maybe we'll go back next weekend...
Hail on the pier at Bournemouth. The weather is cold so it melts very slowly.
Surfing at Bournemouth.
The Priory at Christchurch.
With the release here today of the new James Bond film, Die Another Day, I thought I'd post a comment about the 007 hype here in London. I guess really it is quite understandable because, DangerMouse aside, James Bond is really the only British super-hero (and really, even DangerMouse is a Bond spoof!).
James Bond is everywhere.
The Queen was guest of honor at the movie's flashy London premiere last night.
You can go along to the Science Museum and view all sorts of Bond movies' objects, images, concept drawings etc. in the 'Bond, James Bond' exhibition. It' on for 6 months, but don't expect to just pop in and have a look; you have to ring and book a time to visit, and even then you'll have to queue up. While you are there you can buy all sorts of cool 007 stuff, like Spy Sunglasses, Walkie Talkie Watches, a Radio-Controlled Aston Martin Vanquish from the new movie, and even a Waterproof Night Vision Monocular for just £299 (and at that price, who doesn't need one of those?). I haven't been yet, but I'll post something when I do.
He has been all over the newspapers. All of the papers' Weekend Magazines are running stories on the new movie, as well as the history of Bond, how he still appeals to today's audience, the Bond cars, the Bond girls, the Bond actors and how bad George Lazenby was, Ian Flemming, etc.
The motoring TV shows, like Driven and Top Gear, have all been doing specials on all the Bond Vehicles and the Aston Martin from the new movie.
Possibly the strangest of all was on TV last Saturday night 8:30pm. It was the 'Songs of Bond' special, with various musicians, such as Atomic Kitten, Lulu and a whole lot I've never heard of, all backed by the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, performing the favorite Bond theme songs from the last 40 years.
It's hard to meet english people in London, so we've been catching up with Aussie expat friends we haven't seen for a while. This is causing us to see the inside of a great many pubs.
Last week Trent Collins came to visit and we did a lot of reminiscing about high school days over some food and a few pints at our local. Trent and a friend have been touring Europe in a 2nd hand Golf and causing havoc all over.
Aimee's friend from DHS, Kelly S, was recently in town accompanying the band Ninetynine on a world tour. She got us into the gig at the Metro in Oxford St. We got to see Kelly and enjoy the energetic sounds off Ninetynine, and accompanying local band The Lollypops, who were also cool.
Recently we caught up with Alison Mac and Kym D (MYOB Sydney and ex-MYOB) at a pub in Hammersmith, along with the usual suspects, John W, Suzie and Mark. I've also bumped into ex-MYOB fella Chris Seedy.
Also a big 'hi' to Amanda, a friend from uni, who showed us how cozy a nice posh Chelsea pub can be on a cold, wet and dreary London Sunday arvo.
London pubs are famous, and we are starting to see why. I'll post some thoughts on this soon.
One of the great things about being in London is the huge array of theatre plays and musicals on at any given time. We have already gone to see Phantom of the Opera and have had our eye on another play, 'On an Average Day', starring Woody Harrelson and Kyle MacLachlan. We thought it would be great to see two big Hollywood stars in action on the stage but a limited season and financial constraints seemed to be working against us.
Fortunately for us there is a wonderful invention called the Half Price Tickets window. Last Friday night Shane went into Leicester Square early and managed to secure us two very cheap, very half price, tickets to "On an Average Day". I caught the train in and met Shane after work.
We weren't sure what our seats would be like as they were extra cheap due to being 'limited viewing' tickets. It turned out to be a pole in between us and the stage. However, the pole was quite narrow and was about six rows in front of us so barely made a difference at all. Even better was that our seats were in the Stalls, some of the better seats in the theatre. We both had an excellent view of the stage.
The play was fantastic! Made all the more enjoyable due to our extra cheap tickets. A fact I'm sure the people next to us (who probaly paid full price having narrowly avoided the offending pole) got sick of hearing before and after the show and during the interval!
Speaking of footy, our first trip to the infamaous Aussie pub, The Walkabout in Sheperdsbush, was to watch the AFL Grand Final. We didn't make it to the 4:30am beer and breakfast live session, but we did get to the 1pm replay session.
It was wall-to-wall with Aussies so you couldn't move - not that you could have if you wanted to, the floor was so sticky!
It was a fantastic game to watch, even better because we didn't know who had won. We were baracking for the Pies, for the sake of Aimee's Dad mostly. Watching the game at the Walkabout was a bit like watching the game from 'the Outer'.
I have some photos, which may appear here later...
Last weekend (not the one just gone) we went along to The Oval to watch the AFL's London Exhibition match between Essendon and Richmond. It was a wintry Melbourne day and a full capacity 12,000 Aussies (and about 12 locals) turned up for the festivities. Someone in our group commented "Last one out of Earls Court, turn off the lights", which was pretty accurate I think.
There was lots of VB consumed, along with Tim Tams, Violet Crumbles, Cherry Ripes and other delights from the Australia Shop stand. The highlights of the day were the ground invaders. One male Aussie streaker put on a fantastic run, which was appreciated by the ladies. He reappeared, still naked, at a nearby rooftop party after being chucked out (see photos).
My play of the day went to one guy who ran who out to the centre square at 3/4 time to retrieve his footy. On the way back to the fence he held out the ball and 'sold the dummy' to the two local security guards running out to grab him. They'd obviously never seen this maneuver before; they slipped over in unison and the invader made it safely to the fence.
As for the game, Captain Richo probably had the best game of his season, kicking 5 goals. The Tigers won easily. It was great to watch some real footy for a change.
Afterwards the players mingled on the ground with friends from home they hadn't seen in ages, as the traditional 'kick to kick' erupted. I even bumped into Matty Stewart, ex MYOB Melb. John W was delighted to get a few photos with Dean Rioli and even got his autograph on the back of a Boots* receipt.
* Boots is a chain of Pharmacies.
Footy comes to The Oval, London
Rushed through for a (bare) behind.
Click on the image to see a bigger version.
The back of John's Boots receipt, including Dean Rioli signature
This is my 5th week of being a house-husband. I've been looking for work, but unfortunately web development work has dried up in London. From everything I've heard and read the whole industry has been struggling since the dotcom bubble burst a more than a year ago. People aren't spending money on web sites anymore.
I applied for one particular job a few weeks ago. They had received over 200 applications in the first 3 days. They still haven't gotten around to interviewing.
I got my first interview last week. I didn't get it, but we weren't really suited to each other. They said they had received a large volume of extremely high caliber applicants, considering it was a pretty lowly position, and had therefore decided to offer the lowest amount in the band of pay they had advertised (unrelated to why I didn't get it). Everybody is applying for whatever they can.
I've been spending lots of time in this net cafe (I have a weekly pass) searching for jobs at sites like Jobserve.co.uk. Unlike Social Work or Teaching, if you are in IT or Accounting the recruitment agencies don't chase you; you have to chase them. My neighbour is here too; he has been looking for an accounting position for 7 weeks now.
What makes it worse is that I went to the Digital Arts World expo at Olympia (around the corner from where we live) last week. Now I'm charged up with 'new media' enthusiasm and inspiration after listening to talks by legends like Hillman Curtis and seeing lots of Adobe 'how to' presentations.
On the plus side, I've discovered that Magnum P.I. is on Channel 5 at 11am so I've rediscovered the joys of the 80's best detective!
So if you're in London, and you need some web work done, and you have some £pounds you don't need...
Congratulations to my little sister, Sarah, who recently got engaged to Corey. Corey is excellent, and he surfs, so Aimee and I wish them every happiness together.
Now both of my sisters have rung me while I've been over-seas to tell me they are engaged. Maybe the two boys were waiting for me to leave first...
Sarah and Corey
For those viewing from home (Geelong that is), you might be interested to know that we caught up with Chad and Christine last week. It's been a quite a while, so it was great to see them again.
We were to meet them at Picadilly Circus, for dinner in Soho, but when we arrived Chad decided we should go on a 'Ghosts by Gaslight' walking tour / pub crawl. So we did.
The tour took us down some ye olde London town's spooky back alleys, leading us to places that were supposedly haunted, such as where Benjamin Franklin died, where Scrooge lived on Fleet Street, and where one of Henry VIII's wives lost her head, and a few other morbidly historical sites. We also visited some nice pubs, including London's oldest; the Blackfriars Pub.
Afterwards we visited Chad's favourite Soho Japanese restaurant, Wagamama.
St Paul's Cathedral, from Fleet St, during the ghost walk (between pubs...).
Christine and Chadwick
Wagamama.
The weather really is the most popular topic of conversation over here, and everybody at home has been interested to here what the London weather is like, so I'll tell you. So far, it has been pretty good. In fact, they say that September was abnormally fine and warm. It has only rained 2 or 3 times since we arrived, around 6 weeks ago. Most days are either sunny or a little hazy, some are coolish, but mostly still high teens or low 20s. Today it's sunny and 20.
The Meteorologists here aren't willing to believe though, and always hedge their bets. Most days the weather forecast is really helpful and goes something like "Mostly fine and warm, with a chance of cooler periods and showers".
Starting last December in Oz we enjoyed summer at home, and not long after that ended we took off to Asia, where we enjoyed 3 months of nice humidity, before arriving in London, to catch the last rays of summery goodness. I expect that soon the weather will dissolve into the cold, damp, drizzly mess we have been expecting, but so far, this Indian Summer is keeping our Endless Summer alive.
Holland Park
Welcome to our new address - krusty.rantspace.org*. Thanks to Decay for finding us a new home online when it looked like we would become destitute. In light of our new address I might even have a bit of a rant soon about some of the strange things Londoners do.
I finished up a couple of weeks work in MYOB's tiny UK outpost. Thanks to Suzie and Simon for the opportunity. As yet the work is unpublished, but it was fun working there. Suz runs a tight ship, but Jay is quick with a quip, Pete doubles as the office tea lady** and makes a mean (half full) cup and ex MYOB Oz team leader John Wilson keeps the customers entertained, as usual.
Last week Aimee started her new job. It is a plum position at the Family Alchohol Service in Camden near central London, but I'll let her tell you all about it.
As for me, as of last week I am job hunting. I'm hoping for a job with a nice little web development firm, but so far the going is slow. Hopefully I'll have something soon and you guys will be the (almost) first to know.
* For those who don't know, 'Krusty' was my nick-name at work at MYOB Oz.
**I'm still a little upset that he beat me so badly at Unreal Tournament.
MYOB is in there, somewhere...
Suzie.
John, working hard.
Airport interrogation
When we reached the front of the line at Heathrow customs Shane flashed his UK passport and was waved through with the full blessing of the mother land. I, on the otherhand, was subjected to a first class interrogation and health check. Not only did I have to answer numerous questions about how long we have been married and why it took us so long to make it over to England, I was also sent through to the health check area, asked more questions, made to strip off, put on a white gown (which didn't leave much to the imagination at the back!) and have a chest x-ray. This was apparently to check that I didn't have TB after travelling in Asia for so long. How Shane managed to escape this process since we had been travelling TOGETHER, I don't know. Anyway, slightly shaken, I was finally let into the country.
We changed some left over Yen and a few American Dollar traveller's cheques at the airport and to our horror recieved only a few pounds in exchange. Suzie (ex-MYOB) and her husband Mark picked us up from the airport which was great, as for once we didn't have to try and negotiate another strange public transport system. Suzie and Mark had generously offered for us to stay with them until we found somewhere of our own, so we gladly took up the offer.
House hunting
We spent the first few days sleeping and revelling in the luxury surroundings - that is, comfy bed, clean bathroom, TV etc... We then started the process of house hunting. At first it was really hard as we didn't know any of the surburb names and were still trying to grasp the absolutely ridiculous prices of living in London. After much trial and error we stumbled across a service called interlet.com and they were fabulous. It is service that is free to private landlords who register their properties with interlet. Then customers (like us) go to interlet and get given a whole list of available properties in the area. We were given about seven propeties to look at in one afternoon! We ended up finding one that we loved after looking at about five so we cancelled the last two and agreed to move in in two days time.
It is a little studio flat in a newly renovated building so everything is brand new, which is really exciting as some of the places we looked at were pretty scummy. It is also in a great area, Kensington Olympia. Which is kind of a posh area, with lots of trendy shops, a great park (Holland Park), right near three train stations and within walking distance to Hyde Park. We are really happy with it.
Work
Shane has started working at MYOB UK for a few weeks to get us on our feet a bit. It has been a bit of a rude shock for him going to work all day after travelling for so long. Having to travel two hours on the train each way doesn't help much either. After that he will look for some other work, hopefully a bit closer to home.
I have been doing lots of interviews for social work jobs and have had quite a few offers but I've been really picky about what I take as I want a really good job that I will enjoy. So still looking at this stage. Will keep you updated.
Adjusting to London Life!
We've had some pretty funny experiences whilst trying to adjust to a similar, but still very different, culture. You would not believe that some people over here are actually speaking in English, their accents are so hard to understand. And whoever would have thought that a zuccinni could be called a 'courgette'?? (After baffling several supermarket staff asking for zuccinni, Shane decided we would be having broccolli that night). We realised just how bad our travelling clothes really looked when we suddenly hit civilisation so we spent a few days bargain hunting for new clothes. Here's another tip, you know how we call those long garments you wear on your legs 'pants'. Well, don't say that here, beacuse that's what they call their underwear...hhmmm. We are learning.
So, things are working our well for us and we are starting to get into the swing of things. We are looking forward to earning some decent pounds soon so that we can start to really enjoy the exciting London lifestyle!
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Shane searching for somewhere to live, A-Z Street Directory in hand, Earl's Court area. |
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Aimee, searching the notice boards for accomodation, Earl's Court. |
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After the search, relaxing in a cafe. |
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Our building in Kensington Olympia. Our flat is on the other side at the top. It has a window jutting out similar to the one on the front, at the top. |
