Musings and Happenings

Final day in NZ

2011-12-07T20:41:00.001Z

Oh, this is my final day in New Zealand. I catch my plane later today from Christchurch airport, and now I felt compelled to blog about this moment. I have had a fantastic time travelling through a lot of both the North and recently the South Island of New Zealand. I have done lots alone, with friends and strangers but all has been far beyond my expectations! Big kudos to Joe, Mark, Aurile and Loic who invited me to join them on a post-vineyard tour of Abel Tasman National Park (where we went on a three day kayak expedition). We did lots and had a great time across the northern coast, Nelson Lakes and West Coast. Aurile and Loic are French and it was cool learning tons of swear words, new card games and lots more from them. They had the same attitude and spirit for coming to New Zealand as I did. I think it takes particular people to choose to uproot and desire the even experienced a small earthquake

Yesterday's journey across the Southern Alps through Arthur's Pass on the train was one of the top highlights of any travelling I have done. Glacial ice water rivers flowed by dairy farms, steep mountains and plains. There was so much to see I would have to travel it again to fully appreciate it. I would love to return to New Zealand one day as I have not touched the bottom half of the South Island.

For now, I leave with memories of Christchurch. I am now having breakfast metres from the 'red zone' area. This has been totally wrecked by last year's September earthquake and this year's one in February and security and Army personnel roam the checkpoints that were the busy streets. The physical damage is shocking at first - particularly to the old buildings and churches. The Crowne Plaza hotel still has curtains flapping out of empty windows, the Arts Centre has scaffolding and structural support and now only has one exhibition operating out of a shipping container on the street. There is still evidence of liquefaction where you walk. The tram lines are vacant and you can easily believe the statistics that I heard out here that half of the population has left and not (yet) returned.

Despite all that I have seen in a short amount of time, there is a sense and atmosphere that 'the city will get back on its feet' as I just heard someone say. I believe it will, and with the hardened culture of the South Island's populace there is no reason why it will not be overcome. I wish it good luck!

Onwards

2011-11-21T18:56:00.001Z

Hello - this is going to be a very brief blog update.

This is my final day in my lovely house of Tamahere Drive, Windy Ridge on the amazing North Shore. The place and people have been so great. I couldn't have asked for a better time and now I head south for two weeks of travel that will eventually land me at Christchurch. I have planned up until next week and it will mean I undertake a coach to Wellington, a boat to Picton and a campervan to the Abel Tasman National Park. Things will fall into place after that and I know that it should be fantastic by all accounts.

GOODBYE AUCKLAND.

Into November

2011-11-06T11:19:00.001Z

The home straight appears and is imminently going to hit me, although I am not slowing down! My only worries will be not seeing everyone before I leave and I should really make the time and organise some goodbyes to all the great people I have befriended here. If both offices that I have mostly worked for at RH will put on a little goodbye drinks and snacks in the office, then I should get onto the various others who have made my time out here a lot of fun.
;
Otherwise, things have been very good. I went into the lovely old town hall for a concert on Thursday night. It was the entire Mahler's Ninth Symphony, performed by the Auckland Philharmonic Orchestra. I do miss the old student prices for the time when I saw the UK Philharmonia perform the same suite but for a great price of £5, on Thursday night I paid NZ$53 (about £26). It was well worth it anyway.

I have been reading a lot, typically, and picked up the memoirs of Tony Blair and George Bush. They overlap so much but I liked the insight and feel like they were good insights into the way of the UK and US in their time. I won't bore you with it now though. On the subject of politics, New Zealand is going into a general election and referendum vote on their own voting system for future general elections and I am finding it interesting but very low-key compared to say the 2010 UK election build-up. It is more relaxed, tame if you will. On the other hand it is good that politics doesn't need to be so pertinent in the everyday agenda. Ah this is again digressing to the serious and boring. I had best stop right here.

The rugby is over

2011-10-25T06:57:00.001+01:00

The Rugby World Cup was rather grand and now it has all packed up and concluded for another four years. The thing countering this is actually being in New Zealand: they wholly hosted the tournament, fans and the media circus and then their team went on to win the tournament so it still feels like it is an ongoing thing out here!

I spent lots of time watching games at large public screens, at home on the TV and luckily, one live in person. That England-Scotland match was fun. This weekend though, rugby eclipsed everything: even the public holiday of Labour Day, making it a long weekend. Rugby had monopolised it all. The streets of Auckland were packed on Sunday for the event itself and then it was repeated on Monday. Reports of 100,000 people joined myself in seeing the winners parade with the Web Ellis Cup. Funnily, there was no double decker bus or simple route. Between one to five players were standing on the backs of pick-up trucks or in the Kiwi lingo, "utes". Yes to make it a bit less odd they had marching bands performing songs (and also stopping randomly to perform a haka!), bagpipe bands, cheerleaders and a group of costumed Kiwi fruits. It was a bizarre cultural day as I had just been at the free 'Kiwi Day Out' carnival on the playing fields of the Domain park. There was so much going on, and now that summer has arrived it was a great showing of singers, bands, food, arts and entertainment.

Inevitably after such a weekend I was absolutely drained so rested well.

Things that were not so great was my camera's SD card almost falling apart from lots of use in and out of my camera and note book so there are no photos of note of the weekend. I am getting a new one very soon so have no fear!

In better news, I am loving the turn of summer. It's great. Also, I think that my Wellington-based cousin of some sort David is going to meet up with me on Friday -- he is coming to Auckland for work, so this will be nice.

For now, that is all to blog.

Living in a new bubble

2011-10-07T12:01:00.001+01:00

I feel impassioned to write as now what seems like a pivotal point of my time out here. Some things have moved very quickly and there may only be less than six weeks left in Auckland!

Well to put it all simply before I begin my hypothetical blogging directly relating to the title... :--

• There is lots going on with my working time now at Random House. Each day is still different and I do feel quite at home, joining in with verbally adding to the weekly publishing meeting for the first time this week. I feel that always giving it my all and pushing myself to working hard is the best way to tackle the various tasks. I really do feel that it, unlike working hard as I was at university, suits me better and I feel more productive. Talking of uni, the term has begun again for all those lucky friends and siblings of mine back. This meant that I was reminded of my contributing 'testimonial' for how I got into publishing from my degree is going to be published on the School of English website. Keep tabs and eyes peeled on: http://www.le.ac.uk/departments/english in the near future!

• There is a two day in-house conference next week so I have some pretty good levels of optimism, with chances of furthering my knowledge of the real scene and issues inside the local trade. Specifically my aims are to digest some macro developments and changes to publishing, market forces and ripple effects, a marketing buzz and a sense of the true writer-media relationship (with Jaquie Brown joining a seminar) through the power broker of a published book. I have more to say on what I have already learnt and developed since being at Random House but I will save it for other times and would hate this blog to become too over dependent upon that business.

• I am needing to go on more runs and explore lots around this area on the weekend. My cycling has become so speedy, routine and normalised that I need to start taking more of the local area in on foot and taking some photos to show it off.

• The one Rugby World Cup match I attended last weekend was lots of fun. A real spectacle and grand day out. The attendance and passion was very evident from both English and Scottish supporters - probably more than in a local setting because of the keen cultural addiction to big rugby games over here, the majesty of such an occasional fixture of rivals, and the local cultural emphasis on rugby. It was not a place of neutral supporters which was my own preconception for this game - locals and travellers alike had taken sides; it shows how different rugby is viewed out here. You probably know of the close win at 16-12 to England. You probably don't know that I attended it with a farming lad from a farm down near New Plymouth, originally from Lutterworth in Leicestershire.

My new sense of 'living in a bubble' reverts back to my aforementioned reminders of university life. Things are not much different on the surface in that I transplanted myself from one bubble of and into this - it has new features and appearances but lacks real fun in that my community and friends are so different and interactions with the previous sets are via Skype, visually sensed intangibly behind glass and sensed via auditory means through headphones. One will burst and reform exactly similar to its opposite when I return to the UK.

Yes, you are right. All in all, after such a week I am worn out. Writing this has been the final reminder on how, now at midnight, burning the candle at both ends always results in certain darkness. 'See you in the morning...'

Rugby

2011-10-02T12:49:00.000+01:00

Casting my mind back a few weeks to when the Rugby World Cup began here, with a lion's share of the matches, in Auckland I never thought the power of the tournament would last. It has lasted and rumbles on with aplomb judging by last night's match.

That Friday was a special day as I had rushed back to the house earlier than usual and made the bus with my housemates who had also succumbed to the showcase concert, maōri waka flotilla, fireworks and huge screenings of the opening ceremony and match. (I must add that I made it with barely any time to spare and had to throw my bicycle and bag behind the fence and stay in my shirt and trousers due to the imminent bus arriving!)

Group D's meeting of England and Scotland had been the game I had set my sights upon due to the rivalry and ease of just having to cross over town for it. This penultimate match was hyped up all week and the passion was so palpable when I arrived at Eden Park at opening in my white, red rose-embroidered replica shirt. This had to be a win for the English to safely progress into the Quarter Finals without confronting the All Blacks but the Scots too were in a tougher mathematical situation regarding their passage. On the face of it, the media were siding with an English win but I had a hunch that the Scots would upstage it. Compounding factors such as the fickle nature of Kiwis to support an exotic Celtic underdog would influence the probabilities out of England's control. Pondering all this was good but I did relax when watching the Tonga v France game -- if England do stumble through this game, even with a loss of 7 points, the French team they may well face have regressed to pure awfulness! It was good to enjoy Tonga's playmaking and France's weaknesses whilst wandering around, reading the programme and grabbing some food. Dusk turned to darkness and it was down to the actual live game. This would be the first time I had seen England play away from Twickenham and the raw, intense atmosphere of the stadium made me feel intensely alive! The first half was close and Scotland were setting the agenda in the running play and kicking penalties to gain the advantage on the scoreboard. England were not near this state of determination. On kicks, Wilkinson was playing poorly and my head was in my hands when Scotland's drop goal ended the first half with a lead of 9-3. Gradually, England did resolve their penalty kick inefficiencies and invest in playing for tries and not the posts; and this defensive role is where Scotland had finite power. Just as in Scotland's loss to Argentina previous to this game, their defensive barrier was breached at the match's end by a right winger for a try which did seal the win for England. It was pure relief -- some locals went as far as to say 'England were lucky' when the game was over and had returned to the North Shore. Although the experience was different to that opening day a few weeks back, I had an equally great time together with thousands of others who had all come from far and wide yet sharing the same sport, space and ideals together. It was worth so much more than I can write down here, or ever represent for this tournament is wild when you are in its face.

Running

2011-09-26T07:13:00.000+01:00

I went on a good run through the two great reserves around here. It was pretty muddy but very scenic; plus I only passed two other people on the way. I will try using this RunKeeper more as I try to keep active!

2011-09-23T07:03:00.001+01:00

I am up, duly carrying through a promise to my housemates: downloading 'Shooting Stars'. The cool thing is after dinner, they love watching QI. The episodes we watched this evening featured Vic Reeves in, and how funny they are. Personally he's my favourite comedian on QI. As this was happening, I thought, it has to be 'Shooting Stars'! They did enjoy it and liked the two episodes I had for them.

__________________________________________________________--

Well today I awoke with an awful feeling of real illness. I can't describe it apart from I was totally lacking of energy and not feeling like I could move. Paracetamol sent me to sleep. It's funny but one of the Project Managers, Stewart, had it the next day too. Random House said to take care and it paid off as I was back in the next day.
What keeps happening to me is a feeling of freewill and agency that I never really had before. Things have been of my own choice and making. This freewill may not always give me everything I could need or want but it does embolden my mental strength! I am looking forward to the return to the UK in only three months, where I can fit my life and working patterns together more concretely; that is the way I will want to choose.This independent mentality will serve me well as long as I remember all those around me also have a place on my priorities. It is as though different weather comes and goes: sometimes sporadic, sometimes in patterns, sometimes a day is both pleasant and awful. Despite this, you can always see gaps in the clouds on the worst of days.

[the gap in the clouds]

________________________________________________________________________________________

Friday 23rd.

Sarah and Chris' birthdays have come and gone now. I did attempt to send my good wishes both in written form and in gifts as I could not have been around.

The other news I should really put into this is that Euan loved Auckland and the Shore on his visit from Sydney between Saturday and Tuesday. It's such fun to host someone when you hardly know the area after a couple of months but it was a great time. I drew up a range of things to do and the most fun was walking up to the summit of Mount Rangitoto and clambering amongst the volcanic rock and forestry. The Karangahape Road (aka the K' Road) on Monday night was a little disappointing, it must be said but generally the time was just great.

Well of course now it's the weekend again, and my housemates have decided to host our first house party - for a friend of theirs. It's a birthday party for Hannah I am told. We have balloons, beer and food and 'heaps' of people! I hope that today's weather can be just the catalyst for a great weekend. I think the fact that it's a big rugby day with England and the All Blacks playing in succession will be great times. I won't be there but will watch the action from the TV or the massive screens down town. Let's see how it all goes!

Virtual MMS gifts

2011-09-08T11:01:00.002+01:00

I hope that my own mum will not mind my actions here. I love these two pictures that have been sent via text message to me out here. Despite, and also in tacit acknowledgement of the great postcard sent from my mum's birthday weekend away to Dublin, these pictures are virtual presents that I have to log on to the web to view. My cheap Vodafone NZ mobile does not carry MMS capabilities so the URL and access code is a great little game that I have played on two occasions now!

It is lovely that Will is also in New York State, USA whilst the others get a late-summer French holiday!

Busy-ness/Business

2011-08-31T13:00:00.004+01:00

There have been no photographs uploaded online his last week due to being incredibly busy. There has been meetings, work, welcome parties, night buses, 'baching' on the beach, cycling, dodging the rain, early starts, foggy bus journeys, falling asleep accidently for forty five minutes on a park bench, wine, films, libraries and much more. I don't know where to begin but some mountain air in the central North Island location of Mount Ruapehu with a distant relative of my Wellington relatives is going to be immense. Metilda in Wellington (my second cousin's wife) put me in touch with her niece who is a 23 year old professional auditor for PWC in Auckland. She asked me down with a big group of all her mates for the weekend. I feel quite lucky to be offered at a first meeting in eleven years ago (she was a bridesmaid at the wedding of our respective relatives, and I was an alter boy but that was in the year 2000) I hope it clears out the craziness of all the last week and gives a new leaf to my schedule. I am going to be renting a holiday home with twelve others who I do not know but cannot wait to get some ski boots on and get down some pistes in this early September weekend. Let's have a blast and integrate myself into the trip and then back to Auckland for some good work before the first night of the Rugby World Cup on Friday 9th September!

Grey Lynn

2011-08-26T13:40:00.001+01:00

Grey Lynn is an adorable suburb of Auckland. I had the delight in going along there tonight on invitation of the director for a dinner party just for the editorial and design staff. Exclusivity = elité.

Well, all in all I intermingled and held decorum. By arriving at 7:15pm and leaving at 10:00pm it was a perfect balance of time, content and conversation. Not too much or too little of the staff, or the house, or the food, or the wine. Lots of bottles were being consumed and shared across the floor of the house throughout the evening. The starter was cheese and biscuits over a 'Secret Santa' ceremony. One by one we held our own yearning for a gift and gave no information away of whose present was our own purchase. One exception was the person who bought mine, I gave a raised eyebrow and a funny-sounding, "thank you, whoever!" over a faint giggle and rock of the head from this someone opposite! Genuinely, a travel map of New Zealand will be of such purpose and usage. I know the thought was kind and well planned.

The main course was a range of great Malaysian dishes with plain boiled rice. The puddings were two amazing cakes: a chocolate cheesecake and a mixed fruit flan. The black (real bean to cup job) coffee afterwards was amazing.

Anyway, you do have to love some old architecture out here. Grey Lynn is exclusively a district comprising of wooden houses that are so well painted and decorated. On the inside lots of light and views of the CBD and a floodlit rugby field were very impressionable.

All I will say is, don't raise the Scottish question out here. I was heard on every word of my apprehension to self rule. It's something I have been on the fence for but the Shell oil spill (official news updates on it here ). This ongoing action in the Scottish area of the North Sea this week highlights the fragility of the credibility of the SNP's economic plan for independence. Thoughts and views all welcome.

Kia Ora.

A random and fully odd thing to share. . .

2011-08-25T12:39:00.001+01:00

Ever heard of a Googlewhack? If not, this explains the rules and criterion.

I just rediscovered a tweet and screen print of my first ever Google whack. I found it once when in the David Wilson Library in my university days. It's pretty cool!

My first ever #googlewhack on Twitpic

2011-08-23T11:02:00.005+01:00

I decided to get a lift up to the northern-most part of the North Island of New Zealand for a long weekend. It was really great to have experienced everything, met great people and enjoyed myself a lot. I have to select my superlatives here but I did learn about and appreciate this country in lots of new ways because of this weekend.

The first thing to mention is how stunning and enjoyable the scenery is in the Northland area. This photo (above) has to be posted as one of my best achievements with a camera.

Apart from the fun, sights, sea and sand I am going to have to budget and control what I do and when. Lots of tourists and travellers talked lots about their great NZ activities but there are an infinite number of things I could always be doing and not feel guilty that I sacrifice time over these.

The highlights were:--

the uniqueness in in the tour guide at the Treaty of Waitingi grounds being a direct descendant of the first Maori tribal leader to sign the actual Treaty of Waitingi itself on 24th February 1840,
being driven at 110km/hour down the recreational highway on the Ninety Mile Beach,
the kindness of strangers to offer help and advice when I needed a lift after a walk,
seeing amazing wild birds, seals and dolphins,
surprisingly good weather when at the most northerly accessible point of the whole of New Zealand - Cape Rienga. Being at a coastal point for the last three to four days would instil a dread of wet weather but I was so glad that the sun shone and my camera worked to its fullest ability, which was so pleasing with the array of photo opportunities.

Again, more photos will be going up via Facebook very soon and I will now be resting lots around the RHNZ work. I will blog again on the weekend when I have attended the MD's own dinner on Friday night. The Riesling wine of Blenheim, Malborough, (South Island NZ) is bought and ready to be taken along!

The one month milestone

2011-08-17T11:31:00.002+01:00

I have been away from home for four weeks now. They have gone quickly and things are mostly going well still. I keep applying for jobs to fill my time up but nothing has come around except a job that they tried to twist my arm into extending into full-time hours. The RWC stadium work course never happened due to a lack of numbers and it still isn't going ahead in the future. One the other hand I will keep on trying for something else and keep tabs on the book shop offer that may come around at the start of September...

Two good days out this weekend - one to Piha beach over on the west coast (blogged about in my last post) beyond the Waitakere mountains and the other to Mount Albert and Mount Eden. The weather was not great but I still managed to get good photos. Both mountains are dormant volcanos that have grassed over but they both hold historical significance for being the sites of Maori pa [a tribal settlement]. The Maori still hold them to be significant and there were more obvious signs at Mount Eden of the past uses and the eternal sacredness. The obvious lack of this Mount Albert was due to an archery club, football pitch and a levelled summit due to excavation work all impeding upon any space. The NZ$12 train ticket that took me to both mountains was great value (when it's currently about NZ$2 to £1 in the exchange rate).

Random House continues to get more interesting; today there was another publisher's meeting in the morning followed one with the designers and editors all gathering for a Q&A session with the MD and commissioning editors on the subject of the end-comissioning print process. I found it enlightening and interesting compared to the odd things I have read and heard from back home. The relatively small New Zealand market actually works well and moulds the book lists to be unique and free and I was intrested in this relationship. The aspects of a book was described as a true product in its own right, and its place in between its market and editor were compared to the other English speaking (and larger) markets of the world which again deeply interested me.

Lastly, my housemates and I sat down tonight to the last two TV episodes of the current series of Game of Thrones. I have never heard of it before but did enjoy it. I know that an HBO take on an English historical drama full of chivalry, kings and battles does not sound like a high-quality programme but I thought it was well done, entertaining and dramatic. It's funny how most of the knights were all adorned with small furry animals around their necks though.

Please do comment or interact with this blog, I feel that it is just catering to a very small amount of people, and my own sanity and enjoyment! Thanks!

West is Best

2011-08-13T10:03:00.002+01:00

I must apologise. That is an awful blog title. Sometimes though, I cannot seem to conceive anything that can sum up what will follow!

Anyway, today I managed to get out of Auckland and go westwards for a long afternoon with four girls. We headed to Piha, a black-sanded beach that was a great breath of fresh air and a nice way to meet new people. The invitation came from the Aussie, Abby, who I met three weeks ago through an old school friend called Dani. The other three were made up of two American girls and one Kiwi girl. Of course they asked me what I was doing in Auckland, how it is going and what I thought of the week's news of the riots in English cities. Hm. I didn't mind but it was all in friendly terms. I was the only one to get to the water's edge on the beach and took some photos. There were lots of jokes and it was a really worthwhile trip, only 40km away but it felt like a totally different region altogether. The photos can be viewed via clicking this link.

This week has definitely been about more settling in and exploring. I went on two of the public transport system's boats across the harbour. One from Birkenhead to the city and one from the city to Devonport. The first trip was done without a SD card in my camera which was very annoying but it didn't matter too much. My friend Euan has definitely booked his trip over to Auckland for next month which will be a swell time. I cannot wait to be honest. Well that brings me to an end as I don't really have much more news to offer.

Two days at Random

2011-08-04T07:30:00.004+01:00

It's already Thursday night of now my third week out here. My commute to Random House is nice, takes about ten minutes down the hills to the Wairau Valley. The return leg is hard but I did it today quicker and better than yesterday.
Random House is very good, and easy going. I really don't have much to say except it's everything I could have hoped for. I already have attended two meetings, edited an index directly for publication, collated 11 sets of design 'contact sheets' (thumbnails for comparing future images) and learnt lots. The people are really welcoming, proving that it's probably the most friendly industry you could imagine. It's definitely a step up in scope and context of reach but I like how the NZ market is smaller than the UK and the power and influence of literary agents is hardly noticeable. It's the best of both worlds really.

I am wanting to write home and will send some things off on a trip to Birkenhead tomorrow. It'll be a day off to get onto other things but to ultimately relax and enjoy a first weekend with the lads and all. We have a huge lamb shank in the freezer as Connor's mum owns a farm out in the rural countryside west of Auckland. It's still a little too cold and dark past 6pm for anysort of BBQ but that will all come along as the weeks carry on. It's funny that I saw a lovely sunset from my balcony only for it only to take a matter of minutes to fade: that is the only sign of a 'winter' that I know of!

Domestic airporting

2011-07-29T18:20:00.002+01:00

Hello, well with four days to spare and timely contact with David and Metilda down in Wellington, I am catching the 0640 domestic flight from Auckland to, well, Wellington. It will only take 65 minutes but is far cheaper and quicker than a coach or train: trains take 11 hours!Anyway, I don't have long on this free computer. I shall begin properly.

I am really enjoying myself job hunting and hanging out in the evenings at the house. An impromptu visit from two school friends of the guys was good last night. Jenny and Michelle were pretty cool but I could hardly finish a sentence without some comment about my accent being amazing...
We played Go Fish, played some music from my laptop and had some drinks. It was over by 9pm so a nice small soiree before I packed, showered and repacked for Wellington.

Let's see what awaits in 'the windy city' but I think David is taking me out to see the All Blacks play the Springboks (i.e. NZ vs SA) but I am not sure what Metilda and Laura will be up to. The school term is recommencing on Monday so I am sure to be out of the way of the inevitable early mornings and new school tie dressing ceremonies!

Ciao for now.

Kiwi counter-culture

2011-07-25T06:13:00.002+01:00

I have just enticed my good old Aussie mate Euan Brown over for a week in Auckland! He is coming out in the last week of September and I can't wait. I actually jumped around the room and it felt amazing. It's been over three years now and considering we lived together in adjacent rooms as eighteen year olds back in 2008 something has come right again.

Anyway, the substantial and sudden fall of snow in the South Island (and the dusting of the raised areas in the Northland province of the North Island) has made all the headlines. A worker in the bank even told me that tonight will reach -1°Celcius tonight which is 'unheard of for Auckland'. I am bracing myself with a snazzy hot water bottle that is just amazing warming my lap here as I write this blog entry. It is a German-made product...

WÄRME zum WOHLFÜHLEN is the mantra on the attached label. I trust it means it's good against a Kiwi winter. Talking of Kiwis, I am beginning to learn and adapt to my surroundings day by day. I can now start to learn my orientation and how to get very quickly to the beach at Takapuna where I visited again today - and ate sushi for lunch at 2pm over looking the sea. It was flatter and more serene than Saturday's encounter with the surf.

Otherwise I rang up New Holland publishers to get a rebuttal from the head of publishing that they are a tiny company of 7 and are glorified administrators of their company and all the good work is contracted out so there are no open avenues for me. I did get a chat with Sue Lewis from Random House how they have arranged for me to start on Monday 1st August at 9:30am and ending the day at 4pm, for three days a week. The work will be starting with an assistant producer and working around as the time gradually progresses on. I don't need a suit or shirt which is ironic considering I have both suits and shirts. Hey ho, I am looking and applying for paid work to supplement the time and the desire to earn some Kiwi Dollars.

Wednesday's move is coming quickly so I have started to organise my clothes for packing and plan how I will get it to the house. I will start with a small bag on my back and cycle to the house, leaving my bicycle and small bag at the house and my big bags at the motel's reception. From the house I will get a return bus ticket and then collect the last of my bags, hand in my room key and wave goodbye on the bus for the new pad. The buses are extremely cheap and I have only used them a few times due to buying my bicycle on Thursday (or was it Friday, my memory lapses).

Cheers for now.

p.s. I hope your weather is better than the stuff I am getting, the summer cannot come quickly enough.

Day three and the start of the weekend

2011-07-22T20:21:00.004+01:00

Things have been shaping up quite well. I am getting my sleep more in-line with a normal style: first night I was in bed at 6pm and awake at 1am, then it was 9pm until 3am and the same again just last night. Big changes, maybe not but I can tell that the small steps are the plat de jour for this first week in Auckland.

One cool thing that happened was seeing a good hybrid (between a road bicycle and a mountain bicycle) on Gumtree for only $59 or £30. The seller, a Frenchman called Michael (with all probably it was Michel but I stuck with his own Anglisied pronunciation of Michael) brought the bicycle, helmet and lock from the southern suburb of Mount Wellington to my place in a car aswell, for a small charge. It must have been a good 30 minute drive I reckon, and he chose to come just at rush hour of 5pm yesterday.

Otherwise I have spoken to Darren's dad, soon to be my new landlord and all seems great. I will put my traveller's cheques into a local bank account so I can pay him via a standing order-type arrangement. A reasonable thing to suggest aswell as I have spotted a good paying job that part-time and for 5 months from 1st August. I have begun my research and am keen. The other work front, Random House are hopefully arranging my first day and I will get in touch with them again to hear the latest. The bar work at the Rugby World Cup is looking very unlikely as the training scheme is only 4/12 people full. I reckon that paying for the training myself (if the course gets a surge of people in the next 10 days and can go ahead) is a bit odd when I can apply to the aforementioned job and get paid without the small loss from my wallet first. I will keep my options open but am just being realistic.

Allez le bicycle, and let's hope the weather report of just 'showers' is no more than that please Mr Weatherman. That is all and thank you, Tom.

Day two

2011-07-21T16:33:00.006+01:00

I just had my second day out here in the city centre and really enjoyed myself. This link is my main load of photographic cache for you to see but other things were enlightening. I boarded the 0855 bus from Northcote Road (a suburb near to the Random House offices which is on the northern shore-side of Auckland) which was easyNamely, meeting up for lunch with Danielle (an old school friend from Lichfield who has lived and worked out here in Auckland for a year now) was great for hearing about her experiences and even getting an invitation to a Saturday night out with her and her friends. Ironically she is leaving in a week's time to work at a kid's camp in Korea so I will try with all my networking might to establish some new friends!

I left the city on a bus for a pre-arranged house viewing back over the bay with Darren. It was just as described on the website and I liked the green and leafy area and the fact that his dad (an ex-pat Brit too) owns the house and that all bills are included for something around what I was paying for my student house in Leicester. I walked to the local supermarket to find some supper and came back to eat it at their house. The three guys (Wayne, Connner and Darren) are just beginning their degree courses in Engineering, Ancient History and Chemistry with Biology respectively and were cool to talk to. They were quite techy: notably, they were interested in my new netbook and my digital camera as they played games on their laptops over a LAN...

That's all for my recent memory...ciao.

Auckland, baby.

2011-07-20T06:10:00.005+01:00

Myself in Hong Kong International Airport, waiting to go to AucklandMyself in Aucklandt

All I need to do is sort out stuff like my SIM card, work placement and house after some food and an early night. That will all fall into place nicely. I know it will so be confident in my own abilites as that has what has got me here!
This new nifty white Acer netbook is bringing you everything from now on. Goodbye Advent, you are demoted to being my designated DVD player, hard disk storage and Photoshop device!

Oh the summertime

2011-07-08T22:41:00.002+01:00

I have just returned from Wales, a great four-night holiday remote and rural in all its fine glory. It is near Dolgeallau in the county of Gwynedd and although I have been there so many times, I am still learning and discovering new things all the time.

It is a haven away from home, a home away from home you might say, and that brings with it benefits as well as drawbacks. One drawback is the comfort, easy way of life and home luxuries. Other things like a lack of TV, internet, mobile signal and good weather force you to brave it outdoors. I did some white water rafting, mountain biking on new local and distant routes, new walking routes and a serene experience of no news. I got home to really discover what has been going on with the most terrible tabloid press scandal around the News of the World and its practices. I mean it's crossed so many lines and causes further shame upon the Metropolitan Police whom are already investigating and arresting people with this Operation Weeting which has been going on for so long anyway. Now they are underneath the microscope.

Other things I was blissfully unaware of over in Wales was how crazy this next 10 days are going to be before the big flight. More to come soon.

iPhone or iPad, that is the question

2011-05-06T23:09:00.003+01:00

iPhones and iPads are Apple's most popular products. They are continually updated for years after you buy one so they work better and better. The difference is that the people who make these expensive electronic machines are not so enthralled by them, to say the least. They are rural Chinese people who would have to save up around four to five months' pay without spending a penny of it to buy one. That is a long time just to buy one gadget.

However, China Digital Times (an excellent online news source operated by Chinese dissedents living in United States of America) have brought together reports on the state of Foxconn factories and the workers since world attention was brought upon the suicides of employees in 2010.

Please read the article here.

I can't really add more apart from that it is a tragic thing that the employees are quashing worker's rights (I am, weirldly, sounding very communist here but it's true).

Anyway, goodnight.

A different side to the story

2011-05-06T18:17:00.002+01:00

Please watch the above. I do like Amnesty International but feel that they may be treading on eggshells with such calls to the US government. Firstly, it is unacheivable if you believe and have trust in the fact that Osama bin Laden is dead. Secondly even if members of al-Qaeda, the Taliban or the bin-Laden family were brought to justice in the democratic way (i.e. through local or international courts, with the rule of law as the prime judge, and with legal aid and a jury) as a result of bin-Laden's charges against the law (and moral code of Islam), then it will be incredibly unrealistic to expect the UN, US or UK authorities to start condemning and turning their back on a rich, powerful and highly-organised set of organisations that have, frankly, been in cahoots on political and economic deals with the US government, former US presidents and the Carlyle group. Evidence for this has been sourced from BBC news and Michael Moore's brilliant documentary 'Farenheit 9/11'. By the way, do watch that.

I raise this debate because my local Member of Parliament, Michael Fabricant, sympathised with Douglas Murray 's opinion on the military mission and killing of Osama bin Laden. There are plenty of sceptics out there, and I watched the Amnesty International video with great interest and careful attention. I would also like to write here that my girlfriend's opinion if that,

If they didn't kill him [OBL] and had captured him people would have 'gone missing' until he was released.

This certainly has some credible logic behind it, and yet more could have happened as a result. If you are in a bit of a moral maze and like it, then watch and think about this one, I will now leave you pondering and getting down with the AI viewpoint!

Must watch -> WAKE UP

2011-05-03T02:14:00.003+01:00

Please take a few minutes to watch these videos. I cannot blog adequately enough in the medium of English what this political activist says so passionately after a hideous miscarraige of state-sanctioned justice. Please watch these videos in order:

1)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UscFYYCKOxg&feature=youtube_gdata_player.

1b)
http://bit.ly/mversG.

2)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2azI9eUiVrg&feature=youtube_gdata_player.

People must wake up to the one world government agenda! This stuff is so ridiculous that we read about it happening in novels like 'The Trial' by Franz Kafka but do not expect them to happen so close to home, in my case, in Cambridge - a city two hours away from where I live. Scary, illegal, corrupt, wrong, unjust, Stalinistic and authoritarian are the polite adjectives I can struggle to use for the actions and agenda stemming, in both videos' arrests, from the Metropolitan Police. I look forward to living in London one day and changing their minds and trying to wake individual officers up to what makes a 'good cop'. I also have promised myself never to be trained in use of arms, to work for the disgusting statism or lie down and take breaches of human rights ever in my life.

Secretly, I cannot wait to emigrate out of this country for five months as ever since the 24th November student protests, the Police have displayed many violent, illegal and immoral acts of force whether it be at the Stokes Croft riots last week in Bristol, the horse charges near Parliament Square in London in the winter, or these latest arrests of political activists nationwide for the Royal Wedding, I detest violent Police action against the peaceful majority.

Let's wake up, relearn common sense and the values of democracy and attempt to treat others how we would like to be treated ourselves.

Goodness at 2 hours and 10 seconds long

2011-04-03T23:21:00.002+01:00

I love this. A whole gig online in great video quality, just like that!

This is not so simple as Googling and finding a needle in a haystack. It was found through StumbleUpon.com. Using this is an addictive feature of browsing the web so I will log out and disable the toolbar so my work will get done this week!

Facebook's virtual empire?

2010-12-14T18:58:00.003Z

[Image from Facebook's Engineering blog]

This might be the colour scheme of a deep ocean but it's actually a really well done image displaying the links of Facebook users across the earth...big stuff.

One month on, cool things on 'Le Web'

2010-12-14T18:00:00.002Z

I'm ill...crappy day in bed has ensued. I turned to blogging as a way to occupy my time that would have been spent in the library and my tutor's offices today.

The 'Le Web' conference is going on at the moment in Paris. It has not been picked up by a great deal by the media and also by web users much themselves. Fear not, you anti-Francophiles, all talks are conducted in English!

Check out the channel...'Le Web 2010'.

My favourite stuff has been a talk with Mitchell Baker - the chair of the Mozilla foundation. My favourite browser being Firefox, it was really interesting to hear her ideas.

Lastly, a talk about Wikileaks from some good commentators is worth watching for some impartial and apolitical coverage:

As Christmas is very near in the calendar, I have been taking a lot of fun from the parody song that will hopefully get to number one here! This is the music video of the recording. Go to here for the Flickr album and to here for the Facebook webpage with many links. Aside, just enjoy spotting faces in the studio recording.

Ciao for now :-)

Forgetful Friday

2010-11-19T11:52:00.002Z

It's forgetful Friday!

I forgot to post in about three weeks. This is not examplary blogging. Nice to get comments and a ticked box on the last blog post :)

Primarily I am blogging because I should let you know that I won a seat at the Student's Union Parliament. All good! It's been going well, more of a fortnightly update on current debates affecting all parts of student's life, courses, and more.

I can't do a lot of writing here today as my fourth finger along from my thumb (left hand) has become a little bit swollen. This means typing is much harder. Writing with the old pen and paper is much quicker for once! The doctor will see it in a few hours so hopefully I can get rid of it very soon.

Ciao y'all.

Trilogies

2010-10-19T21:31:00.003+01:00

Hello. I am knee deep into university life again. The new: friends, modules, databases, volunteers, books, bills, elections, nightclubs, supermarkets, theories, hair cuts, printers, protests, films and seasons are all together a fast-paced blur at the moment. I couldn't blend them better myself with the help of an electric blender.

October has really felt like a new month, which revisits the shadows of old. The bright eyed and bushy tailed freshers outnumbering you on campus and social nights out highlight a generation gap you have uncontrollably fostered in. This is as well as feeling like a pace of the fewest contact hours ever on a timetable is still a tall order, for the work demands you teaching, organising and applying knowledge and analysis to texts you choose. http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif

This leads me to the blog's title. As always, it has a few connotations and meanings. It firstly reminds me of the three J.G. Ballard novels I am studying for my dissertation (Crash , High-Rise and Concrete Island - that may be an incorrect order). They were all written and published within 1972-74, with one novel per year entering the bookshops. Ballard did not achieve another trilogy of consecutive novels before or after these mid-career titles. They are a trilogy of urbanism, modernism, dystopia, life and relationships. Read them!

Another thing to blog about that is pressing, is the Oxjam Leicester Takeover. I'm volunteering and if you aren't I urge you to come down for some great local music and arts, all for the cause of Oxfam.

I'll blog tomorrow, to broadcast the Student Union Open Seat Election results. Either way, it was good fun working to raise and discuss real concerns for the entire future of British Universities. They certainly will not be the same as today in 10 years' time, but they may not be revolutionised for the better either. If "we're all in this together" (sic. Conservative government's mantra), then we all must shape and compromise it together; and not just one report undoing progress.

September's Saturday gigs

2010-09-28T19:50:00.002+01:00

The above photographs are just two from one of the gigs I recently was a part of. Such fun and all staged completely voluntary.

Another voluntary role I am setting up is with the Leicester Oxjam group (just one of many city music festivals taking place this autumn, raising money for Oxfam. They are a great charity and I am hoping for greater things!

On the eve of X and Y

2010-09-14T01:42:00.001+01:00

Aha a cool, new, free and great little iPhone app to write my blog on. I can't remember its name but taking a chance on an app with no reviews has paid off handsomely.

Enough of that, for now anyway.

On the eve of my departure to my student house for the upcoming third and final year of university, and the eve's eve of the first ever State Visit by the Vatican City to the U.K. I write to you some musings and happenings:

Firstly, I am looking forward to the first two gigs for the covers band I play trombone in since March. Rehearsals have gone well with a new trumpet and a new alto saxophone player in the studio over in Hinckley, the place where the work is done each Wednesday night. I feel that our new pieces are sounding just as good as the old ones which wasn't all that easy. I have actually been practicing at home on the trombone, as though I am back as a schoolchild, getting ready for a graded exam. (That includes a warm up doing all of the major scales and their arpeggios! I must be going nuts!)

So, for the next two Saturdays, I'll be performing at a private party and a fundraising event respectively. Some things always enthuse me, gigs always do.

Otherwise, yes the smallest nation in the world is sending its head of state to the UK for it's first ever State Visit. I think the negativity, pessimism, discrimination and disrespect already evident in all types of media and the wider debate is merely an inevitable side show to the significance of it. I know friends have blogged and aired their views about it but everyone can analyse its significance. Mainly, the unprecedented significance of timing: taking place after such scandalous news of child abuse earlier this year. Conversely, the timing reflects the tolerance an (officially) mainly Anglican population inviting and not shunning the Pope - this was a state that used to institutionally enshrine such a figure and his followers as a 'threat'. The fear has left the popular mindset but secularism's popularity has grown since these 18th century views.

Secularism has become mainstream in the last decade. It has been good for democracy and multi-culturalism in Britain but it has ideological limits, just as theocracy ended after Medieval times. If a moral compass set onto the negativity espousing from groups and sections of the public on Twitter and other social networking: nominally joking, poking fun, complaining and wanting to protest and even perform a citizen's arrest to the Pope, actually are examples of intolerance, disrepect and arguably xenophobia. This is not meant to lecture but simply analyse that for mutual respect and tolerance to exist and make everyone get along cordially, then shouting this out in an uncoordinated way is worthless. Engage and understand the position of the side which you oppose and at least then after such a debate, agree to disagree.

This Parliament of 'new politics'

2010-09-06T17:56:00.008+01:00

I am rather a sceptic on British society these days. My inspiration is taken from this guy, Illuminati causes and the self-supposed 'Truth Movement', which involves the true freedom of speech happening on websites, Twitter and similar. Recently, the infamous Guido Fawkes has unveiled some intimate details about individuals of the Coalition government here.

All in all, on the first day of parliamentary debates since the summer, the politicians line up an afternoon session proposing a bill to alter the unfair and outdated voting system we have for MPs.

Whilst watching about 20 minutes of BBC Parliament this afternoon, Jack Straw, the Shadow Deputy Prime Minister, set out for me what are incredibly complicated yet entirely truthful problems with the Conservative and Liberal Democrats' proposals. In short, he described the movement to create evenly-spread constituencies as highly flawed: particularly when dealing with the Outer Hebrides, northern highlands of Scotland, the Isle of Wight and other islands. Compounding this one issue is the fact that the 2001 census is the only official population movement figures -- how can a United Kingdom of 4 nations be mapped on old figures, until the next census is conducted AFTER the law has been passed. Underneath this is the

No system will be perfect but I would group areas and people by regions and if traditional city, county and region have to go, then so be it.

These teething problems must be overcome whilst the debate after the bill's second reading goes on tonight. I hope it gets voted through as a testament to the Liberal Democrats' hard work.

* MORNING ALL, I HAVE AN UPDATE *

The bill was passed late last night, read this for the full low down that I don't have to repeat; I love professional journalists writing the small facts out for me!

For further reading, from an official source, explore http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ and search out existing voting laws.

----------------
Now playing: David Bowie - "Heroes"
via FoxyTunes

Epic tales from the 'colonies'

2010-08-25T16:42:00.004+01:00

[Firstly, the title this time refers to something my Grandpa used to say: Wales and Scotland are the colonies of England!]

Hello again. I hope you are not reading this in a field, wet, cold and psyched for another day of hardcore mountain biking up incredibly steep hill sides, for you only to throw yourself down them at rapid speeds...well this was my situation approximately one week ago!

I went to Scotland with an old primary school and Scouting friend of mine. We camped out by Loch Maberry on Wednesday night. It was so atmospheric here. We went swimming in the loch, exploring the pine forest and lit a campfire by the shoreline and stayed there until it was dark. It's just what being in the middle of nowhere makes the natural environment come alive! After this great time, we departed and mountain biked some more. Later on, we wild camped in a bivvy bag near Glentress on Thursday night and then made our way to Edinburgh after one last mountain bike trail on the Friday. From Friday to Sunday night we stayed in Edinburgh. It was really great. There was such an atmosphere for all the festivals going on. We managed to see lots of free stand up comedy. My highlights to pick out from all the shows we saw were Israel-Palestine Conflict: A Romantic Comedy and The Pedder's Tale.

All in all I am really glad to have gone. It was a great road trip, experience and to be in the midst of so many other arty students in the great, fun, attractive city of Edinburgh made it all the more worthwhile. You must go up one August to Edinburgh yourself!

I am off to stay in a friend's cottage near Dolgellau in Snowdonia, northern Wales from Saturday to Friday. Yep, you guessed it: more mountain biking is on the agenda!

For lack of guts, a new post.

2010-08-15T20:53:00.004+01:00

On Twitter in just the last few minutes, I got really annoyed with a certain Union President. If you read this, it may not seem like anything controversial or annoying at all. In fact, I was going to reply to him about this Tweet being one in a long line of his very partisan and politically biased style. The link to the New Statesman article may have a valid argument but the principle in his position that I think should come above this is that principle of political neutrality. I will explain why:

I get it that people join political parties but when you are a President of the National Union of Students (NUS) in the UK, I think that you should work towards and promote the universal values and policies in the interest of students, not which executive is mandated to run the state and allowing biased personal opinions be broadcast.

I have followed Aaron Porter (a graduate of English from the University of Leicester -- exactly my degree and university nonetheless) on Twitter since the June Student Union Awards at Leicester University for he gave an excellent speech about the value and benefit of students to society in light of a comment by the government's Cabinet Member for Higher Education that day labeling students as 'leeches on society'. Rightly that generalisation was crass, contradictive, insulting and offensive but I now know that the speech must have been made with the influence of his Labour party background.

I really value neutrality and effective work ethics and if I was a president of a union, I would act in the interests of its members and committee rather than politicising opinions. I am a member, like all students in the UK, of the NUS and so want to be represented at all levels of the union. I feel that the president is pushing his own opinions across too publicly and so this is out of kilter and a difference has been created between me and him. I welcome opinions to argue against me but unless you are dealing directly with politics, there is no need to be politicking yourself. Thank you.

Summertime (a little bit of sunshine) and other happenings

2010-08-12T18:51:00.004+01:00

Yes I actually have experienced not as much sun as I could have this summer break. I am sure of this because since my work experience stint, the weather has not been as good as the constant, reliable and consecutive days of sunny summer weather.

Today was a good example: it rained, thundered and struck lightning for a lot of the day. I luckily managed to catch the one dry spell to walk my dog for around 45 minutes through the local fields. Yesterday was a little better but still unlikely to ever achieve a sun tan or any sort of proof that my body needs any adaptation at all from season to season.

It is all to easy to become accustomed to the normal. I think this is why I always anticipate and look forward to small changes of scenery and environment on the horizon. For example, in one week's time I'll be hopefully enjoying wild camping in Dumfriesshire, Scotland!

Then, further down the line are two concerts with the covers band...and then the old AVS job and the new university term (of my third and final year) begins. Things are moving so quickly, the world sometimes feels like it is spinning faster and faster and the days are getting shorter! Other examples that remind me that time is moving quickly are ages of other people around me. I recently met up with some school friends, one whom is turning 22 on 1st September. That is frightening! Also, my (now officially) half-brother Will is collecting his AS results next week! EEEEKKK

Thanks for reading. Keep it real out there. x

The State of Blacker

2010-07-31T00:17:00.006+01:00

Hello, welcome ~ bon soir, bienvenue...

I feel in a way that I am resetting my blogging experiences. I used to view it in a great, monumental breakthrough in freedom to publish and release my own words upon the world wide web, but since tweeting
I have neglected this lovely blog.

This is going to change. I will restore this blog, and reclaim and reuse it. I promise this time.

Where then to begin upon this new route through blogging. Well to begin at the start is good. This would mean to relaying recent news...this would be doing fairly well in my summer examinations at university, in comparison to my worst fears of getting thirds. I am pleased to say that each and every exam I have done there have been small improvements and considering exams are 50% of my degree assessment, I am encouraged by this fact.

Otherwise, I have had a very good time down in Surrey (aka 'Sur-rah'! My wit extended this far and not any further...) between 21st June - 23rd July of this year. I gave the alias of 'Sur-rah' because it is apparently the richest county in the UK and staying in Esher for 2 weeks was a very comfortable and pleasant part of the world to be in. I was there lodging at a friend's family home because I had chosen to do a work experience placement at a publishers. I did a range of work around much marketing, editorial, website design, pre-contract commissioning observation and a tiny bit of good old fashioned administration and typical office work. What really remains in my mind is the real compassion, time and respect given to me that made me feel like an equal to all the others in the office after a week. Despite being surrounded by experienced people who had spent up to 20 years at the company in some cases, they too were keen and happy for me to be working there. I received great compliments and recommend the publishing industry to anyone out there.

For the rest of this summer, I am flicking around the UK. Notably Bristol, Leicester, Edinburgh and Dolgellau will be visited before returning to my university city of Leicester to prepare and begin my final third year of my English degree. I am staying put in the same house which is a great prospect. Gigging also with the 8-strong covers band is very cool too.

With so much going on and coming through the pipeline, I dare say another blog will cement these happenings right here on this blog.

Keep the faith, cheers all!

Dreamin'

2010-05-23T12:15:00.001+01:00

So I woke up on this first Sunday of turning 21 (an age celebrated a lot because of dead historical laws. It's previous generations that 'turned of age', I was an adult at 18!) and had just left the most amazing dream in a long, long while behind. I wanted to return into the wonderful world I had left: it was as cool as Alice's Wonderland. It was Blacker's Wonderland.

In more detail than my Tweet, I'll describe it in the best way possible even though it was in two stories and is now hazy memories...

The first part was me with my new house mate for next year - Jack and a load of other people in a cottage talking, eating and partying. I was putting on the music but realised it had been left in a house down across the way at another cottage. This other cottage had a straight track across a field to reach it. Inside were my 12" records. I put them on the decks at the party cottage but they would not play. I had to keep the needle down by hand whilst Jack told me how much felt stuff was needed to make it stick to the turntable!

Anyway the better dream involved a classic car just like the ace one Caractacus Potts builds in 'Chitty Chitty Bang Bang'. I was driving it at a coastal town, just cruising. It was a pretty average stereotypical town you can find on the north Devon and Cornish coastlines. I then drove a bit away down the coast and came to a mega metropolis in darkness. It was weird so I drove down to the sandy beach and drove back towards the first town. It was cool as the beach became long, wide and empty. I noticed the tide coming in but there was this arched rock formation in the way. It looked like I could drive through it. I drove this amazing classic car as fast as it would go to beat the incoming tide but the closer I got to the arch in the rock, the more wash was in the way. I had been stopped from carrying on. It was so devastating.

I then decided to drive up the steep beach to the coastal town covering the top of a large hill. It had somehow been a place I had previously visited and so I saw lots of new development in the form of Disney warehouse shops, cinemas, restuarants and more. So odd and saddening. These buildings had cut off the view down to the sea. It was sobering but fascinating in the changes that had incurred in the time between this visit and the previous visit.

And at that, the dream Wonderland faded from my mind and I saw the bright sunlight streaming through into my bedroom. It became a past memory, and which Twitter served as the best place to jot it down. Now, as I have a brunch, I am glad to have shared my fullest possible account of my night's dreams with you. Thanks for reading!

My new favourite band by far

2010-05-02T17:48:00.004+01:00

In advance, this is most definately a return, a renaissance, a 180° turn with some big air (which may overheat to become a figurative load of worthless hot air). I have been listening to Fat Freddy's Drop. They are quite unique, but also quite accessible, musical and very very cool. You would probably find them perpetually chilling out in Antarctica for as long as they wished. It's the type of thing their level of creativity would lead to quite easily. Creativity to blend a contemporary rhythmic groove with soulful brass, guitar solos and a laissez-faire melody from the vocalist.

They really have captured today, with 'Based on a True Story' and 'Dr. Boondigga and The Big BW' being played out of my restored Hi-Fi to make these Journal documents something beyond a typical working day.

Also, two other brilliant factors to their music is that: Alice Russell features on one single and secondly, they are from New Zealand! The land of Flight of the Conchords!

Well, all that aside Gilles Peterson's endorsements of this band prove that my music taste is actually derived from parts GP's very own taste buds and ear drum: epic.

Post-Easter

2010-04-20T20:59:00.004+01:00

Happy Easter!
Happy April!
Happy Holidays!
Happy to see you here!

So, this holidays has been dominated by Easter, the general election and...no blogging but tons and tons of tweeting.

I mean things have been changing quite a lot around me: possessions (losing items); being alone from Will, Lucy and Sarah; studying at home and not at university, and most fundamentally, BLOGGING! (This is a revision of past habits but it still is a relative change compared to my recent activities online!).

Musically, I have explored lots of hip hop, dubstep and skilled solo pianist such as Franz Liszt. He really has some incredible skills that produce awesome melodies and sounds I could only dream of replicating myself. If you have Spotify and want to listen to a very cool playlist: CLICK THIS NOW! and listen away for a good while to a wonderfully crafted playlist.

Hmm now would be a great time to finish off my complex, culturally focused 2000 word essay on a chosen literary theory. I chose Louis Althusser and compared his cultural and literary theories (most notably RSAs, ISAs and the place of the individual) to post-Marxist literature such as 'Quotations from Mao Tse-Tung', '1984' by George Orwell, 'Brave New World' by Aldous Huxley and propagandist artwork from Communist China from the eras of Mao Tse-Tung and Deng Xiao-Ping...

I mean just look how the Repressive State Agencies are promoted and politicized in such a way that breaks down the place of the individual, except for the supposedly 'Communist' leader, for he is the only one who is not equal - he stands out as a shining idol!

And on that, I shall continue.
Continue to keep momentum on my new pace, my new agendas, my constantly changing local structure fraught with fluidity; remembering that, "the only constancy is change itself". Thank you for reading.

This is my blame

2010-02-04T11:47:00.002Z

Please click and read

Yes,

I am on twitter

as a lazy, poor-man of the blogging world.

Sorry all, follow me there, but please stick around here for more insightful, complex and interesting blogs; rather than my day-to-day silly stuff.

Thanks!

2009-11-29T22:24:00.001Z

Hello,

I did not intend for a month-long hiatus but that's the nature of blogging really. This does remind me that real blogging is far superior to micro-blogging; Twitter really is a poor man's version of this!

I am still in Leicester, still living in Clarendon Park (the best suburb of Leicester, and will be next year too, and still looking forward to the times ahead...for things can only get better!

Second year, second thoughts and the second round

2009-10-16T13:04:00.000+01:00

Hello, well, blogging has just become a whole lot easier! All I have to do now is log in on my new iPhone application and voila, the first blog in months! It has been too long since my last one, and since I had planned to keep a regular load penned from Germany, on my summer job for Eurocamp, this is well overdue. The time out there (late July until mid September) was defiantely well spent. Travelling by coach, train and car to Herbolzheim, in the state of Baden-Wuttemburg was great fun, and when there I had an easy job cleaning mobile homes, manning reception when guests would arrive and other easy, enjoyable tasks. It was more like a holiday than a job as I could go swimming and diving, to the gym, cycling around the local area and the Black Forest, or catch the train to Freiburg for a taste of the big city. In my last week, Sarah came out, we hired a car and went camping at a beautiful big lake and then venturing the short distance over the border to enjoy Strasbourg, in France. Such great times. I then flew back with eastjet with Sarah, Eurocamp payed for my flight which was well safe of them!!

Anyway, more recently I've almost finished my second week of this first semester in my second year...time is flying yet again it seems. To be honest, moving into my new rented house with Jon and Natalie, running the fresher's fair stall for band, going to the Heineken Cup 1st round match between Leicester Tigers and Ospreys and other various times eating and socialising out and about have made for a busy but great time. Most evenings, I've been spending the time round at Sarah's place - it's great to still be together now and we really really do know each so well, I know myself inside out and know Sarah just as well.

Also, I have a new part-time job. I am working for the Audio Visual Services at my Uni, involving preparing lecture theatres and some reading rooms each morning. The only things to check are OHPs, lights, the occasional screen, microphone volume and turning on the PC and monitor and takes me about 45mins to 1 hour to complete...only catch is that I have to do the work between 7:45am - 8:45am, Monday to Friday! I must be mad. The money is good at £7.35 for the morning's work so I'm not complaining!

Adios from Leicester, get ready for more blogs, coming soon!

I'm a nomad, a wanderer and a seasonal migrant worker!

2009-07-16T23:52:00.004+01:00

Hello, there's been lots going on since the last post. I've got a confirmed date for my Eurocamp/Keycamp job in France: Sunday 26th July until Tuesday 15th September! Yes, I'll be in France for quite a while, 7 weeks to be more accurate. I'll hopefully get to blog and post photos in between the work. It's all exciting and I've already spoken to one other student meeting at the same train station as myself, through Facebook.

Otherwise, I'm enjoying my iPhone 3G and its varity of applications on offer. My favourite one is called RunKeeper and I use it when out cycling. It tracks your cycling, walking or running route by 3G, pinpoints you on a map and gathers other statistics which can be then uploaded to its website. The other day I ventured on a large road cycle which was just over 14 miles (probably around 20km). I uploaded it to here!

Also, I've realised that Sarah's hometown of Cheltenham really is a proper Regency town with great surrounding countryside. Her friends and old teachers were very kind and friendly when I was down there only two weeks ago. I'll definitely return before the end of the year.

Recently, I've realised how often and how frequently people are always on the move. It's a constantly changing lifestyle: relationships and experiences in motion, an exhibition in 360 degrees taking place over vast geography. The people that really struck me was a friend-of-a-friend at University, Mimi (Michella Irawen) had grown up on Pulau Sulawesi (an Indonesian island), lived and gotten her school education in Singapore, university at Leicester University and frequent holidays to see friends in London. Recently, she managed to visit New York and Paris too before flying back to Singapore and Indonesia before graduation. Amazing...what with studying alongside Italians, Americans and performing with French students at university, migration staggers me.Also, with my sister and mum in Egypt -- this being my sister's second visit to northern Africa, I feel amazed how accessible places are to us all.

This weekend, I'll be seeing a friend from my backpacking trip from Thailand to Singapore last year, Hamish Shah. The name alone states how multicultural the world really can appear sometimes. Maybe that's all it is: an appearance.
Ciao for now.

Belated Father's day Blog

2009-06-22T11:10:00.002+01:00

For Dad!!

(This was taken at Lyme Hall, Cheshire a few years ago...Dad by the lake, in front of Lyme Hall)

The Summer Ball and the summer.

2009-06-22T10:35:00.008+01:00

[Sarah and I, University Summer ball, Saturday 20th June 2009]

Here's a song, 'Sarah' by Bat for Lashes...random!
Sarah!

Good times! Truely excellent :-D

The ball was manic fun. We arrived at around 9.15pm, saw the first band (The Pidgeon Detectives) at 10pm - they were a pretty good opener. I had heard of a few of their songs and were fairly good at what they did.

In between, we socialised, drank and enjoyed the other DJs in the two other rooms. There was also the Redfearn bar which had been converted into a casino for the night, but I ran out of time to visit here before its closing time later on...

So, it came to midnight and all was going well. Then, The Bootleg Beatles arrived on the main stage - to possibly the biggest and hottest crowd ever at the Student Union. With everyone in suits or dresses it was a crazy time: singing, dancing and applauding in generous amounts to this superb tribute band!

From then on, it was all about the DJs -- my favourite had to be the Ministry of Sound event in the Lounge. It was small but uber-cool. Brilliant mixes and mashups in a cool atmosphere that actually did remind me of the Ministry of Sound nightclub in Singapore.

Then, it came to 6am and it all ended. Amazing night, all encapsulated by this photograph of the SURVIVORS!:

Post-exam times

2009-06-04T01:28:00.003+01:00

So, that's it. First year of university: completed.

I could spiel in such convoluted, complicated and crazy as the times I've had....such as those unintended nights out which are just fantastic, or trying out what a new church is like (and returning to find your bicycle stolen when locked to a lamp-post :s ), or bad news from home, or the pomp and circumstance of the Queen opening our brilliant new library, or the large amount of money management I never though I'd have to relearn after my gap year travels...

...but most of all, it's the fun in the sun at the end, when you can really reflect upon the months since you first arrived. Only clicking through photos on facebook reminds me that it's surpassed all my expectations and confirms that it was the best choice I made; [that is completely clichéd but completely true].

___________________________________________________________________________________

Otherwise, I bought the Times today, mainly for the Good University Guide 2010. My course is rated as joint 12th best in the UK with Southampton and my Uni is rated as joint 15th best overall, with Southampton again!

Retourne, au goche ou a doit?

2009-05-06T21:37:00.004+01:00

Le title en langue Français, oui! (Probable) French summer work for 2009, all depends on the allocation after the training days. I passed the single interview up north in Cheshire in mid-April which was great, not so fun drive. I normally am pretty good at finding places first time around, the boy scout in me reveals itself to useful effect. However, Northwich was pretty different to the average: I got very lost and phoned the office I was to be visiting for directions. Quite embarrasing but once there, I was relieved another guy had not arrived. Plus, I was only five minutes late. This summer I had said to myself that a job was really necessary after no luck last summer and if that happened back then...I am sure you picture what three months of no university would be like.

[I forgot to mention this previously on the blog, silly back-track].

Also, 'retourne', because I have returned to Leicester for the first week back after the break. The bank-holiday on Monday means tomorrow is effectively a double-day of work, pretty much 9-5; made up of lectures, seminars, meetings and buying my English Society ball ticket - for us BA students here, my timetable is pretty much unheard of!

Well, and if my sister reads my blog -- a very happy 18th birthday (again). Funny thing is, we'll both be voting in these European elections in early June together for the first time (local elections in 2006 were just before my 18th, typical ay?). It's for the E.U. Parliament, this is the only real detail I know. I don't even know who are the candidates, who runs our seat now, just the date of this election -- they are very much seen as a minor affair here and do not get a great turnout I heard.

Well, that's it until June. This is a mid-week-I'm-not-going-to-the-union-night-because-of-this-long-day affair. Really reminds me of the mindset I had for my last year of A-Levels....ahhh.

Vacation// J.G. Ballard// Spotify

2009-04-25T17:13:00.006+01:00

Hello, sorry to have lapsed into not posting all month - April deserved better than this! This is because I have done many great things: primarily due to the fact that my university gave the whole month for the Easter break!

So far; eight days were spent in Wales, Easter was quite an understated affair save for the gradioso Sunday roast on Easter Sunday, then Colin (a good friend from my block at Beaumont Hall @ uni) stayed for two nights...all great fun. Most of the month has not been spent dodging the typical weather of April showers but catching the many hours of sunny weather! The UK has had great weather that is vastly over-average for April. It also proves how global warming produces crazy events: it was only in February that we had our largest snowfall in 20 years! Both climates have made for much fun :)

Since then, I have been trying to revise for my English Literature and International Relations summer exams, with a little bit of the other work for my courses thrown in with some general lazing.

The saddest news by far was the death of my favourite author: J.G. Ballard. I frequent this great website and it contains some comments from other fans from all over the world. I never expected him to lose his battle with cancer so soon but my Granny often says that life is too short (even though it's the longest thing we'll ever experience....how ironic -- I hope this isn't too confusing a point!!). Anyway, a great literary figure that I'll always hold in great esteem. Requiescat in pace.

Aside from this, one great thing I finally got round to checking out was this software called 'Spotify'. It is basically a huge online free iTunes, except you stream rather than download the music - pretty great whenever I'm on my computer. It was recommended to me by an international student in my residential hall and I finally got down to checking it out. I am pretty impressed apart from the unavoidable money-making advertising in it (for the free download version I chose): adverts will randomly appear in the software for a period of time and then disappear and also when streaming music, radio-style trails will fill in between songs. It is this inconsistent and rare placing of advertising that is its only minor downside. I love the option of it scrobbling to my last.fm page; on that topic, I am approaching the 10,000 songs played milestone (over the last four years mind you, which isn't too much of a sign of addiction to music) which will be ace.

So, until next time....

The last week of term...23rd March - 27th March

2009-03-27T04:34:00.007Z

Well, what a week! I think this will go down as a truly great week for so many reasons:

Firstly, I was home on the weekend. Made it back to Leicester on Sunday night, I just had an early night in preparation for...

...Monday. I made the 9am language lecture...yes I really do love my subject so much! Then, after some reading I made that module's tutorial at midday. If only my entire group had been present to decide on a pilot study project on the new area of sociolinguistics, ah such is life, we pulled off a good explanation of our ideas, methods and areas of study. That afternoon, I prepared and created a presentation for my International Relations module, with Matt (a course mate) at his house. Again, one member of our group was not present but had emailed work, so we just had to do it without her All fine in the end. Later that day, I just slept and spent the night in.
Tuesday brought yet more sleep. I lazily missed my elective module's lecture...this is pretty odd for me as I have made most of them, yet these marks are just a necessary requirement for the first year. (Studying a module outside of your course is compulsory for all 'BA' students here, this is common at UK universities). My choice was International Relations...and yes if you are thinking, most of the lectures are not as inspiring as English!
Tuesday night was a planned social extravaganza with five friends from my course. After drinking (sorry, this was alcohol, I had broken my lent of abstaining from alcohol back at the Music Society ball, like I said it would have been rude to refuse the champagne there...) a bottle of wine at Ellie's flat, we caught the bus into Leicester city. On this ride we founded the 'Unofficial English Society'. Basically just six first year English students who want to have a great time out together. Anyway, this was always going to be a big night so after arriving in Leicester city, we headed for a buffet restaurant. The good quality of food there surprised me, the group then drank two more bottles of wine over this meal. Then, more drinks and shots at the pub near to Mosh

We really were going for it. At this club, 'we danced all night and then we [this other first year English student I bumped into there] kissed' (to use the Mystery Jets' lyric from Diamonds in the Dark. Needless to say, the other 'society' members will now always remember me for this "pulling [like a] stud", when this is very unusual for me now. I suppose it was accepted when I was 16 or 17, it's just not the same at nearly 20. Whatever: looking back, the night rocked.

Wednesday brought lots of sleep. After the drunken escapades of Tuesday night and a timetable-free day for my courses, I again slept lots. Then I read 'The Tempest' for Thursday's seminar. The main event of the day was the second Varsity games. These are the equivalent of derby matches but for local universities. As before, it was in football (I am sure that I blogged about this), this time it was the turn of the rugby teams. The women thrashed DMU (De Montfort University, Leicester University's local rivals!) 63-0. Epic win, and my first full game of viewing a women's rugby game; great game to watch! Whereas, the men played a far superior quality of rugby to the DMU men and deserved the win but narrowly lost 29-28...enough detail of that game for now.

The victorious women's team! :

and the men's team, they were just unlucky on the night:

Thursday brought the weekly round of Renaissance Drama. This is Literature's turn to show her side...then some library time...then an International Relations module...then I went to the last circuit training (intensive fitness training) at the university gym. After this, I swanned down to the hall bar only one hour after where £800 had been put on the bar. It had all gone by one hour and ten minute's time...a sign of how much alcohol is a part of a student's life! Then I followed four other mates from my hall's block out to the Shampoo night...a really great retro night of so many 1960s and 1970s classics! Again, lots of dancing but not any signs of drunkenness this time! Anyway, that concludes my great week at uni!

All in all, I am really looking forward to next term. I just love it. Simple as that.
p.s. (That post was a diary entry basically, I hope you liked that new style of blogging from me, thanks for reading!)

The Witching Hour

2009-03-12T23:46:00.004Z

So, another pretty hectic week is almost over. I returned from London for a great concert in Queens Hall with all the other music groups and was really pleased with how The Mask of Zorro, Schlinder's List and The Magnificent Seven all went! It will be brilliantly complemented by this Saturday's Music Society's ball; also with the theme of 'Stage and Screen'. It will hopefully give me and the band a chance to thank all this year's committee on the Concert Band. It all was a great year and now the responsibility is on me to another successful year as its president for 2009-10!

Well, as usual, I will randomly skip topic. I suppose, in line with my blog's title, the above paragraph was the 'happenings' and now this will be the 'musings'.

After watching documentaries and reading the odd play by Harold Pinter, I stumbled upon a great talk he made in his 2006 Nobel Prize for Literature acceptance speech. This was one fairly small but very poignant point when on the larger area of truth in modern drama, it went something like this (I suppose this is then paraphrasing -- (NOT plagiarizing!):

...in drama and art in general, something both true and false can be of the same thing. They are not separated. Whereas in reality and modern life, we separate and differentiate what is true and what is false...

This struck me as really integral to all arts. The notion of life and interpretation of it in art allows binary opposites to coexist. Contradiction is a fine line that I have not intended to cross in my understanding here.

For example, when many critics evaluate Hamlet and its title character; both intelligence and madness, power and compliance and sexual pleasure and disgust (watch or read the play if you are interested in how these themes interlock simultaneously) all are thrown together in a great Shakespearean clash of philosophy....

...it just is immensely inspiring. Yeah, literature really can turn me on! (Not in that way...OR CAN IT? ha ha!)

Just got to blog...!!!111!

2009-03-02T23:06:00.005Z

Read these three emails bouncing into my inbox tonight from the Law rugby team (they let me in to play even though I am studying English). We were uncertain about a game tonight...the tone of the captain and vice captain sums up the true nature of the English competitive rugby [union, not league] spirit. Here are the three emails:

As you all may know this wednesday is supposed to be the clash of the Law Society and The Medics.

Well, the news is (and at this point any news is good news) that we need to be down at Stoughton playing pitches by 2p.m, warmed up and ready to run through some stuff.

Please make sure you get down there on time, as this match is the one we have been preparing for.

Remember, you need a gum shield, boots and rugby shorts (preferably black or dark blue).

And if any of your friends, family and pets would like to watch tell them to be down there for around 3!

Let us know if you are playing or if you are not. Either way we need to know!

Cheers,

Ben and Mevin
Subject: update

the match is defo on - 2pm wednesday stoughton playing fields

there is a god

mevin x
Anyone who doesnt turn up ready to smash these medics Wednesday had better remember how much they have pissed us around.

Lads, lets make it a cricket score!

see you there

Ben

Ohh I cannot wait, if you're reading this and want to watch, come along!

Wednesday 4th March
Stoughton Road Sports Field
(further down the road and left at the mini-roundabout from the Manor Road gym and sports centre area)
Oadby, Leicester (LE2)
Kick off @ 3pm!

p.s. Click it for the real map, it is in good quality and much larger. Also, sorry for the retarded star to guide you to the place, my mouse could not cope at all!

True thoughts / Random ramblings

2009-03-02T22:27:00.004Z

Hello! Good evening! Well, I was just messaging Will down in Bristol tonight and I start randomly describing everything going on with university and work right now:

My workload is heavy right now, just suddenly it's COMING ATCHA in the face, swerving and diving the books....yeah uni is about books and alcohol (contrary to popular belief it is just about alcohol)...I mean I have been a bit bruised by the bookload in my back and having to finish work at midnight and then get back onto it at 7.30am the next morning but that is because I have this way of leaving reading and essays until they REALLY need to be done. I have even read a whole Shakespeare play in a day, made notes and 'macced' the seminar (as we say in da city of Lichfield, innit)....................
by Friday this work and its deadlines will have subsided and I'm off to see Zoe from my gap year in London, stay in her posh place then head across to west London to see another friend who is studying at Imperial!

Yeahhhhhhhhaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa
aaaaaa LDN! followed by a saturday night concert (posh black tie concert band!) back in Lesta...

Otherwise (to take a further break from my course work) my Granny was hospitalised at her local private clinic with a serious-sounding pain with crushed nerves in her back...it was fairly temporary but will be returning to her home quite soon, this month in fact. Well, I actually really want to get home in around two weeks time to spend time with all my family because I have been in Leicester since mid-January.

OK, just to lighten the mood again, this picture cropped up on the Internet from my gap year. It was taken early one Saturday morning and was a large aerobics warm-up for the school organised fundraiser: the 'Jogathon'. See if you can spot Euan (white guy on the left) and me (white guy to the right of Euan). Our skin looks so pasty! [ORANG PUTIH!]

If you do not laugh at this, please see your doctor.

Celebration / Procrastination

2009-02-26T00:39:00.008Z

TWO COMMENTS! THIS BLOG HAD TWO COMMENTS YESTERDAY!

Thanks guys! Fairly quick response there -- I have actually put my resolution into practice as I was in my hall bar and very nearly ordered a 'snakebite' (Blackcurrent juice, cider and lager in a pint glass) but then changed it to a pint of an apple spritzer with lemonade...

Well, I have spent much too long on the internet in the last few hours, mainly due to there being much facebook activity and the time honoured tradition of leaving reading too late and then being put off by it, I have not turned the page from where the quotation in my last post is. I did read onto the opposite page though...

Oh dear.

Otherwise, Obama has been a dude recently down in Washington D.C., U.S.A.: this is what the world needs! Yo it's all here and here!

Lent

2009-02-25T10:01:00.004Z

So, I begin with a quote from the latest Renaissance play on my reading list ('The Duchess of Malfi' - John Webster). This perfectly summarises my basis for taking lent seriously this year:

'And those joys
Those lustful pleasures, are like heavy sleeps
Which do forerun man's mischief'

In accordance with those words, I have decided to give up alcohol for the whole of lent! OK, the only time I might break this rule is at the upcoming music society ball: refusing the champagne reception could turn a social faux pas.

I will update this blog in the future on the progress because after my friend Rob's blog showed how he really could achieve something he never thought possible before: becoming a vegetarian for a whole twelve months! Also, my other good friend Erik,who has no blog... :(, gave up alcohol for lent last year. If he can do that, I can!

Cheers for now, and good luck if you are doing anything especially for lent!

Actualities / the postmodernists are at the door

2009-02-16T22:48:00.004Z

So after this term being an augmented version in every respect (this list will seem ironically contradicted but please apply an ounce of faith that it is an honest reflection): enlarged time, enlarged marks, enlarged social extravaganzas, enlarged fancy-dress social extravaganzas, enlarged amount of AmericaniZations in everything I write due to lecturer's teaching enlarged amounts of module content set in enlarged time eras sporting enlarged bellies with ever-enlarging children-to-be,...OK!...too much overload!

[No wonder my natural writing can be confusing].

Well, on other issues I discovered a very interesting strand of the British and world economic depressions -- that it lies in the language. If we think, this is not the worst ever in history and governments have never reacted so quickly to these problems (although some were self-inflicted so we would expect them to solve their own problems, right?!?).

Nick Robinson points towards the modern media seizing upon language to dramatise all these brilliant modern-day stories of personality, tragedy, individualism, interaction and the fabled desire to determine the future fashionably.

Just take a listen

On other fronts, there is now three inter-block relationships (that I probably should not be blogging about) which shows how greatly we all get on. The 'domino effect' theory is alive and well here in my eyes but they are all such genuine and great people I am not surprised we're loved up around Saint Valentine's day (ed. did you enjoy Valentine's?).

Other positive news this week is that now 5 out of around a dozen 'Benuldians' (cohabitants of SM La Salle, Borneo from 2008) have joined facebook! Really great to hear reminisce AGAIN and AGAIN!

I am organising a family outing to a Leicester Tigers rugby match for the visiting family and a long summer job, probably in France. I'll be working on lots of odd-jobs on a campsite somewhere from June until September...pretty exciting really. I had to give Glastonbury and a holiday a miss. I will visit London and Manchester for visits to mates, pubs (probably) and an open-air concert (!). This concert involves The Enemy, Kasabian (Leicester's finest) and Oasis!

Tally ho, my 'other' reading beckons at this late hour... :D

'Liability' or 'bad influence'

2009-02-11T11:30:00.003Z

Really, being called 'a liability' or a 'bad influence' by many people seems a rather harsh set of characteristics to judge another by. The words imply that my personality is hedonistic yet composed of mistakes, or maybe that I aim to mar and corrupt the normal course of natural events that make the world go round. I beg to differ (Ed. - why am I writing as though I am speaking like a 1950s BBC news reader?) because my natural personality aims to have fun, laughs, hard work yet my this same personality is bad on logic, the influence of being in different situations (e.g. what not to say at certain events or to certain people) and the fact that I can be lazy and wasteful when I do not concentrate or have care.

That is being brutally honest, and maybe that is a good thing. I truly have got all of that 'off my chest' as the phrase goes. Honesty is a good thing - if we were all honest we would tell each other all their strengths and faults so when I am told I exert a 'bad influence' or pose 'a liablility', I can only improve from understanding those mistakes.

Concluding note - let's all just be honest but deliver it with a great slice of goodness; and a cherry on top, please!

Just a Tipple

2009-02-08T16:37:00.005Z

I sit here a little tired, with a cough and still in a house surrounded by snow on the ground (although it is gradually melting). I enjoyed another gym session after a late-night party on the other side of the city for Rob Whitfield's birthday. Happy 20th again Rob! Rob is a school mate whom I have had great times together at music festivals, a summer holiday to Brighton and now because we are both students in Leicester. He is at DeMontford University, I am at the University of Leicester; a great coincidence.

Well, last night I couldn't turn up and consume all of his alcohol, so I took a Jägermeister bottle and made a few good drinks for myself and others at the party, please do not think they were neat or straight shots! They were all mixed with Diet Coke. I learnt that it works best when frozen, to quote the official website: 'Jägermeister [should] be consumed cold and suggests that it be kept in a freezer at –18°C (0°F) or on tap between –15° and –11°C (5° to 12°F)'. That is rather cold! This may seem ironic but the colder it is consumed at, the thicker the consistency becomes and thus more enjoyable when mixed. I am now keeping the leftovers in the bottle inside the freezer here, in preparation for the next session: Monday evening before an English Society bar-crawl. Yep, students really do party here. I am not one to drink too often or to excess. This term, I have not been out socialising with alcohol more than twice a week. This is good for my finances and time. Studying needs to be done and is my priority, it's just sometimes more enjoyable to have good company, good music and to enact the old prophesy: life is for living!

Any students reading this, always remember Oscar Wilde's take on this matter:

'work is the curse of the drinking classes'

We all work pretty hard and an undergraduate degree is challenging for anyone, the only question in times of needing a release and a good sociable time is: carpe diem, why not?

SNOW, twice in Leicester!

2009-02-05T19:45:00.002Z

Yes, we were fortunate to enjoy two large snowfalls here in the environs of LE2 (Leicester University). Nationally it has been the biggest amount of snow in my lifetime, 18 years according to the media.

I have been in the snow and enjoyed a few snowfights, and also endured jammed roads in a tediously long taxi journey. The buses were cancelled on Monday so we had to plumb for a taxi. I was with three fellow students who were laden-down with shopping. We were not considering walking back around 5 miles in the cold weather. Not at all. I had a great night out actually that day. A local nightclub, Zanzibar, hosts a student-only night -- you have to show a Uni student card to enter the club, not just a 'let's-have-cheap-drinks-to-entice-more-students-here' night. The theme was a UV disco-rave. It was so fun, definately the best night out at university so far.

I hope the weather is as much fun where you are.
____________________________________________________________________________________________________

Did you get to build one of these today?

New favourite website

2009-01-28T10:14:00.003Z

So, how do there?

I've settled into the new term quite well. I think the modules will be more enjoyable and manageable -- nothing on the scale of a novel a week just for one module!

I went to the first Symphony Concert Band (i.e. a wind band) rehersal last night, when I discovered the true intentions of the Vice President talking me into going for a post on next year's committee (the students who run the society)...they want me to go straight into being president! It was a bit scary but also a compliment of my commitment I think. Hmm, 'why not?' comes into my mind. If the other post-graduates remaining into 2010 helped, I assume it is possible!

Yes 2009 will be a great new start albeit I have a feeling of continuity, mostly because I have kept my Wednesday free (like last term!) so I can enjoy a mid-week lie-in: the life of a student has its points of happiness.

Anyway, this blog is meandering as much as the Amazon river...my new favourite website was found by chance from the UN's website -- it is fun and has benefits for the UN World Food Program

CHECK IT OUT!

Cheers, any comments are appreciated: I seem to have had a lack of comments recently. 'Go ahead, make my day'...!

New Year...It seems the same

2009-01-17T17:16:00.003Z

Firstly a very happy new year to you!

With 2009 is upon us, the new University semsester already started and life seems to have continued just as before. I have now completed my only exam of the January period for Uni, it was in my supplementary module (one module of study from outside my degree department): Politics. It is rather like my Philosophy and History A-Levels combined with a lot of focus on two themes: ideas and ideologies in politics. I enjoyed the module but the sense of completion is always one I highly value. It allows your focus to be on life itself, rather than effort and study. That is exactly what I now intend to do; I have an invitation to see DJ Format at the Student Union tonight...I am undecided about going, it is £7...hmm. Most of my Beaumont Hall block intend to go out into Leicester every night from Sunday! Then Zoe (from my gap year travels) vists her first part of the UK north of the Watford Gap (this basically means Zoe has only been around the southern areas of England) for which I am pleased and excited: she is coming to visit me at University. Hopefully, it will remind her of the glory days she now misses as a full-time newly professional teacher in a secondary school in London.

Well, apart from me there's been some cool happenings recently. There was an amazing movie-like story in the news; did you hear about the plane that crash landed into the Hudson River in NYC? All passengers and crew survived...pretty miraculous I think.

Another story that got me thinking was that of Aston Villa's Premiership success. Seriously, will they ever stop losing? At this rate, they stand in line to qualify for the Champions League!!

See... ---->>

It speaks for itself really. One win (3 points) ahead of Arsenal and only one draw (1 point) behind Chelsea. I have not really followed club football in this much detail since my primary school days but 'the Villa' are really having an excellent season -- long may it continue!

Reflective Moods

2008-12-18T23:25:00.002Z

So the end of the year is here, considering I started it somewhere in the Malaysian state of Negeri Sembulan (lit. translation - The Ninth State), I will finish it back home. I suppose this turning of full circle is a good analogy for this year. This is because half was my gap year teaching and travels, half has been about preparing and experiencing university life. The distinctly different uses of the time given has meant it has been a great, great year.
I will remember this year for not being employed with pay for the first time in ages. This may sound stupid but the allure of money disregards human nature and one's own natural priorities. It gave me a lot of freedom to realise many truths, enjoy my home environment and know everything has value within it. As a person, I have become more relaxed, patient and caring. It has been the smallest everyday events that continue to prove these values. Any changes from my travels may be unrecognisables to my friends or family but they do exist, albeit maybe just within myself.

University has been a great experience and challenge so far. Each day is fairly manic, the pace needed most days is massive compared to the fairly easy pace I have been used to for the last eighteen months from leaving sixth form. It's a learning curve that I relish in because English literature and language as a subject never fails to interest me; I suppose that is the only constant for all students everywhere who migrate to universities after school or college -- everything else seems to be different!

Well, otherwise I have loved NERD for a long time and two days ago a great blog threw up this amazing new video from Pharrell Williams and his band on his Star Trak label. I hope you too think it is another great song from NERD. Merry Christmas and a happy new year to all (selamat Hari Krismas dan selamat Tahun Baru)!

Thanks for sticking with this blog, one of my new year's resolutions will definately be to blog a lot more regularly!

When The City changes its view on you

2008-11-20T03:52:00.003Z

So, before I had visited London with an attitude that it was not really that compatible with me: over inflated prices, over populated transportation and an over sized metropolis that makes darting to and from attractions, friend's houses and the train station rather annoying...until this evening.

Yes, I had stayed over in London: notably in N1 (Islington) and SW12 (Streatham Common) and they were cool times. Mostly it had been in the daytime though where most parts of the City take on a rapid pace of life with not a great sense of any community or spirit at street level.

Tonight however, I was with an old mate from high school and new friends from the English Society (as in the subject of English Literature and Language). This made it different, I suppose the late-autumnal atmosphere added wonder when we stepped off the bus at Aldwych and wandered over to the West End 'Theatreland'. We were about to see 'The Woman in Black' in three hours time. So we visited Pizza Hut along during our wanderings. My pan-fried tomato, mozarella cheese, jaleppeno peppers and spicy meat pizza was awesome. Here is a map of my wanderings this evening:

View Larger Map

The show itself was really freaky and scary. Honestly, it was in the smallest West-End theatre I've been into, even the compare introduced it as a 'bijoux theatre' (basically a French phrase to mean a compact and ornate small theatre). Don't go alone to this one!

So, I honestly think that London changes beyond recognition at night. It did for me, I didn't arrive with a changed perception or attitude. Maybe all were in good spirits about the England vs. Germany football match that had begun or maybe its because I was in thee West End rather than near the Financial City that would have investors wandering around contemplating the fact that they are now penniless.

Nice one Westminster, as London technically is only one small city which hosts the major Financial Centre. So, it's all about which city you are in, within the M25 area, not what bad news is eminating from the real city of London.

Uni so far: reality CHECK!

2008-11-10T02:24:00.001Z

Ok, a normal blog. No thoughts about other stuff except me.

University is GREAT, look:

sucks to all facebook friends who have seen these. The above pictures are from some great nights out. I've loved it so far. Great city where my kindest aunt lives and two of my best mates are at DMU Uni. They have cool student houses in a cool part of town. Yeah, come September, I will be in one!
:)

Two months on

2008-11-06T01:39:00.010Z

Ok, firstly a big apology.
Sorry for not updating this in over six weeks. It's too slack for the sonic-speed blogosphere.

First things, university is really really awesome, not quite as easy in the workload but it's easily doable, even after a fantastic gap year.

Now for the stereotypical nerdy blogger bit:

Obama is the new American President-elect. It's pretty amazing. It's a great thing and it came at a turning point in America's internal, external and world affairs. (I had to join the tons of bloggage that is has defined this campaign for me. The internet has actually not only been the fastest, concurrent platform of multimedia to report, analayse and follow this election for over twelve months, it has actually made the material to report and analyse. For instance, the many jibes against Sarah Palin especially came out of blogs and YouTube. I remember Ben Elton in one of his novels noting how television not reports the news but makes the news. Therefore, in my opinion, the function and effect of the news changes dramatically.)

Basically, internally: its economy is the major ill still dragging other economic blocks in a slow or receding fashion. It needs massive overhaul. I mean, wasn't Borat the best example of social ills in the 'US of A'? My reply - JUGESEMESH!
Externally, it is fighting the 'War on Terror' mainly in Iraq and Afghanistan, although in recent weeks has now extended its fronts into Pakistani and Libyian territory. It's a fact that nothing would have changed under McCain for its 'freedom fighting' in the Middle East. It is costing billions each year but now there are there, they have to exit with complete, ready and truely independant state of affairs left. France and Belgium were rather good at doing over their ex-colonies and then leaving vacuums of power and a lasting negative mentality of a methodology for the next local leader. Now with the lefty-lefty Obama as the US Commander in Chief, surely us Brits should also leave at the earliest possible opportunity.
In world affairs she is not the top dog. Her dollar is not always the base rate of comparing the markets now. Asia is catching it up and even outfoxing her like no other. The Euro is getting stronger and stronger too.

I think Obama's popularity will always stay with him for being the next President after George W. Bush and for being so amazingly different in tons of ways. He will be remebered in history already and all he did was convince ordinary people (like me writing this and you (hopefully still) reading this), putting an 'X' in a certain place. That's pretty amazing.

p.s. uber-nerd time; look at Obama's economic plans from Robert Peston's BBC Blog Peston's Picks:

'They include:

a) a windfall tax on the "excess" profits of oil companies;

b) a redistributive tax cut for those on middle and low incomes, funded by a claw back of tax cuts received by the wealthiest 2% during President Bush's two terms;

c) serious public spending on roads, bridges, transport and infrastructure;

d) subventions for renewable energy and for the development of green technologies, especially in the automotive industry;

e) tax penalties on US companies that relocate jobs overseas and tax breaks for companies that create jobs in America;

f) greater rights for trade unions to recruit;

g) curbs on what credit-card companies can charge and increased rights for homeowners struggling to pay their debts.'

Looking Through the Glass

2008-09-27T00:15:00.004+01:00

Well...I'm moving out, on the road (again). Packing my bags and much more for a new start at University. In a way it's a big deal and change, in others it seems tame in comparison to my travelling as the experiences there meant I have become prepared for this new start. The places, people and culture will be familiar - I've been to the university campus three times already...

The only real concern is the academic one. Can one begin to restart and produce degree quality work after 18 months away from studies? This question can only be answered in due course and how the future and fate will coincide, differ and create the uniqueness of unpredictability. Unpredictability will hit me when I have to dress up in a random theme next week; when I first___...et cetera, etc. and etc.

That is the crux of discussing this tangent...pondering and philosophising means you cannot get closer to facts, only closer to a faith and belief system. This is actually what we base thoughts, theories and predictions upon for the future is the only unproved aspect of our lives. Do you not agree?

For example, even a scientist cannot prove that a modelled, tested and theoretically proven drug will work on a real-life case for the first time. The facts lead to one positive outcome. Yet Futurists embraced change and rejected the past. For me, hindsight from history is proven to have happened yet debate rages on factors and spheres of influences for those events. The future is exciting for being the pure absolute paradox of the past, whatever that can be defined in words as.

YOUTUBER! (and thoughts on the summer and China's Olympics)

2008-09-12T15:39:00.000+01:00

Yes, big news.

I have got my own vidoes uploaded, please visit:

YouTube

It has made me happy on this very wet day. Did you know that August 2008 was the wettest EVER August on record for the UK? It's true, our summer was really bad. Whilst I'm on this subject, I'll give you all a bit of an update. Since July, when I had lots of friends round my house and I turned the kitchen into a 'Kedai Kopi China', with a DJ in the living room and Wii Sports in the conservatory; I have been down to London for a protest with MPs about a new town they want next door to our village, Bristol to see my Uncle, Aunt and cousins with my sister, Wales with my step brother for camping and mountain biking in Coed-Y-Brenin forest, Snowdonia and a family holiday boating on the Norfolk Broads. All in all, the Olympics were brilliant entertainment and to see Beijing like 14 months after I visited was pretty weird -- there is so much new stuff! How do they build it in time without cheap Eastern European or Indian labour forces like the developed world does it?!? I'm not meaning to stereotype or be racist but it's my observation for huge buildings like the Beijing authorities construct. It seems a bit more open now from the TV reports and steps of progress will mean the bridge between China and the developed world will be lessened as a result. 2008 was a big year for China and I think it is evolving in the right direction.

Thing is, moving on, I saw a documentary (as you do when at home with no job) on BBC Newsnight that highlighted and showed how China's land borders are becoming more open too. This is a direct consequence of the people's attitudes, hunger for money and opportunism that has meant people can get through and illegally trade people and items such as, in this case, with the border of North Korea. There is a river separating the two Communist countries and people cross it in the dead of night in freezing winters as the river has frozen solid. This means some freeze to death and their bodies remain solidly frozen for up to 3 weeks before it disintegrates and others manage to get across. I thought this was a stupid risk but they do it to leave the starvation and opressive culture in North Korea where there is no hope or opportunity. By passing into China, they can work to get a plane ticket to South Korea (often leaving China on forged and illegal documentation). This is crazy because they have no teaching of any Chinese dialect and then eventually get to Seoul to start a new life. Some of the case studies were appauling.

I just feel lucky for one but sad that Asia is developing so fast yet more and more people are being left behind to risk their lives.

First blog -- Thoughts on Coinage

2008-07-28T15:41:00.001+01:00

From 2008 we will have the above instead of these:

Any thoughts?