Where's the chicken?

Athlete


On Friday night I went to a gig with my flatmate Gerard, at the Gaelic Club in Surry Hills, which I once heard referred to as Sydney's 'Bohemian Quarter'. The band playing were Athlete, a UK band I'd heard in passing but decided to see them live. Gerard has what can only be described as an eclectic musical taste, favouring acts that fall into the category of performance art. So I decided that it was my duty to indoctrinate him into the world of generic musical four-pieces and we both went along.

Athlete came on at about 10:30 and played for just over an hour, and I thought they were brilliant. Maybe it's partly due to the length of time it's been since I saw a 'proper' gig (no offence there, Benihana) but I really enjoyed it, despite the heat. Music nights in small venues are always going to be hot, but host one in a muggy Australian night and it's even worse. But we got through it, and at the end I asked Gerard what he thought. His verdict? 'It could have used a trombone-playing chicken to liven things up'. I ask you...

Extra Time

The world game


The Champions League football has restarted in Europe after a break for winter, and there are some potentially classic matchups. Being starved of the beautiful game over here, I was pleased to see that SBS were showing one of the games (SBS is by far the best Australian TV station - their news has news from other countries). Of course because it's in Europe the game was in the early hours over here, kicking off at 6:35am. That's about the time I usually get up anyway, so I figured I'd get up a bit earlier and at least be able to watch the first half of Manchester United against AC Milan. But for some reason despite setting my alarm, it didn't go off, and I was late for work. This is why people hate Manchester United. But there was no real harm done as thankfully I woke at 8am, instead of noon - which would have been interesting. So I legged it down Oxford Street and walked straight onto a train, getting to work at 9am. So if I stay late tonight I'll not have lost any time - or more importantly, money. So things worked out - and Man Utd lost as well, so it's all good...

An LOTR frenzy

My precioussss....


Why would people brave pouring rain to stand in line outside a museum at 9:30am on a Sunday? Why, the global phenomenon that is the Lord of the Rings, of course. The LOTR exhibition has been on for a few months, so foolishly I thought it would be quiet - but of course not, it was crowded. Being the canny sort, I went to the end of the exhibition first and managed to see most of it before the crowds caught up. It was good, too - which I'm glad it was for the $20 entrance fee. They had all the costumes, artwork, a 'life-size' cave troll model, weapons etc. I got to see in close-up the handiwork of my namesake and multiple-Oscar winner Richard Taylor. What that man can do with latex. Did you know that they made over 2000 pairs of feet for just the four main Hobbit characters? That a six-foot long model of a ruined mill that took three months to build was in the film for two seconds? No wonder films cost so much money. Of course they make a lot of that back through merchadising, and naturally there was a special LOTR giftshop you had to walk through to leave, which had everything from copies of the book to LOTR trivial pursuit (I admit to being tempted by the LOTR Top Trumps, but only out of nostalgia). George Lucas has a lot to answer for...

Life in the office

Let's hear it for the Neon Tetra!


So I'm back in the swing of working in an office again, and even though it's physically a long way from where I'm used to working, I'm learning that offices are the same everywhere. The same types of characters seem to exist in every workplace. An odd one I've noticed is the person you vaguely know, and only ever talk to about one subject. All your conversations are somehow limited to one thing you've got in common, and never seem to alter - so much so that you notice that person coming your way and immediately start thinking of that topic to prepare yourself.

In this office, that person is another Brit, and our subject (predictably) is sport. He came up to me this morning and said 'So I see England lost in the rugby again'. I completely threw him by replying that I don't like rugby, and it didn't matter to me if England lose (sorry Dad). But we rallied by talking about cricket and Rovers somehow scoring three goals in a game on Saturday. After that, he left.

It's a strange way to talk with someone - I remember when I used to work in a food distribution warehouse and the man in charge of where the deliveries had to be left was a real angry type - especially with us students. He used to moan at us for leaving anything in the wrong place, until one day he suddenly mentioned that his hobby was keeping tropical fish. I told him about my fishkeeping background, and he never shouted at me again - from then on all we talked about was fish.

The other new year

Two Chinese dragons share a joke at the parade

Kung Hei Fat Choy one and all, as it's the Chinese New Year once again. In the UK it's not really a big thing amongst the general public - but over here there are lots more Asian influences, so more celebrations. I've just come back from the annual parade to celebrate the start of the new year - 2005 is the year of the Rooster. It was a great spectacle - lots of drums and shouting, firecrackers and dancing dragons. Check out the pictures on my photo website...

My last friend from my hostel days moved on this weekend - that's what happens when you make friends with fellow travellers, of course. My plans are coming together for the trip to New Zealand in May, so I'll be moving on soon too (although I'll be coming back of course). It struck me the other day how great this position is - I can basically plan to go anywhere I want, the only limit I have is how much money I can scrape together. I'm so glad I decided to come out here - it's one of the best things I ever did, and I'm enjoying every rooster-filled minute...

More plans afoot...

Next on the list...


At work I've now progressed onto different types of forms and different spreadsheets, but still with the same opening, sorting and entering of data. But it's still easy work, the kind you can switch off and coast through - well, not entirely switch off obviously. They seem to like what I do, as my contract has been extended here for the full three months allowed under my visa constraints, so I'm guaranteed here until the end of April, which is good.

By that time I'll need to get away again I'm sure (I can start to feel that need now), and of course the money I'll have earned from the paper-sorting business should give me some travel fundage. The fairly obvious location to visit is New Zealand, as it's nearby, cheap and can be done in a few weeks. Every traveller I've met here has gone from Australia across the Tasman - there's really no avoiding it. So in May I'll be doing the same, and I'm looking forward to it already...

Working for the man

The fairies are out there...


I've been at the pensions place for just over a week now, and things have settled down into the daily routine. Open letters...sort into piles...enter onto spreadsheet...repeat. But as I said before, I don't mind this particularly as the money is good for a temp job (I got paid for the first time on Thursday) and as you can imagine, it has a stress level of zero. And there's the walking of course. I also quite like the commuting on the train. I sympathise with people who have to go across London on the Tube twice a day, as compared to them my daily commute is dead easy. Sydneysiders are always having a go at the train system (as most train users do), but I've always found them to be good. My daily journey takes about 9 minutes, and trains run every four minutes - so what have I got to complain about?

The other temp in the office is a middle-aged woman from New Zealand called Laurie. When I told her one of the prime motivations for me working was to earn the money necessary to go to New Zealand, she started telling me places worth visiting. By a co-incidence she's always wanted to visit Scotland, as she has distant relatives in the Shetlands (which are as different from Sydney as I can imagine). I found a map of Scotland, and started pointing out highlights - Dundee, Livingston, Stranraer - that kind of thing. She pointed at the Western Isles and said 'They have fairies out there', which was news to me. 'Fairies?' I asked. 'Yes - you can ketch a fairy to the islinds' she replied. You've got to love that Kiwi accent...

Wet and wild

I didn't take this...


There was some staggering weather here yesterday - people who think Australia is sunny and warm every day (and I was certainly in that group before I came here) can get very surprised sometimes. It started off with a thunderstorm in the early morning, so I woke to blinding flashes from outside - five, six at least per rumble of thunder. After walking to the station in the rain it cleared up, and apparently reached 30C - but of course I was inside an air-conditioned office all day.

About half an hour before I left, the sky went grey, and the building got suddenly thrashed by heavy rain and gales - what the TV weathermen here call a storm cell. So I got wet again - this time very wet, as the downpour turned into a deluge that caused flash flooding in the CBD streets. My half-hour walk from Town Hall station (I didn't go over the bridge) got me as wet as I've ever been - and I had an umbrella. Although it could have been worse, I saw two Chinese girls get drenched by a taxi driving through a flooded gutter. I was going to a basketball game, but I was so wet at this point I didn't fancy sitting in a cold sports hall for a couple of hours in a wet shirt, so I went home. As I was arriving in Paddington, the rain stopped and the storm carried itself out into the Pacific. This morning, it's all sweetness in the city, and I heard on the radio that dust storms had been reported in Northern NSW. It's not all sunny and 25C every day here...