Musings of a man more adept at designing than writing..

A little story about Singapore

2011-03-28T23:53:00.002+11:00

Originally Posted with images on Deus Bali Blog...

Two days ago if you had of asked me about today (Saturday) your would have found out I was pretty bummed about it. Circumstances arose mid week resulting on the need to make a milk run to Singapore. Heading up first thing in the morning and last thing at night. Saturday, supposedly a day spent doing stuff with family and friends. Not sitting in planes for five hours and wandering around the land of the skyscraper for another 9.

Then yesterday it changed while checking FB, I had some down time... and I found out that TR Bikes in Block 7 Jalan Batu Singapore, in case you were wondering their address, were having their "March oh March" a Fixed Geared bicycle event. Now that was bound to be something to do. With a starting time of 2pm I could see that it would slip in perfectly after that business I had to do and before that plane I had to catch. While leaving me time to see if I could find a certain Beyblade for my son.

Friday night late I was busy FBing Bumbumbum Ariffin, lets just call him Bum from now on so I don't get RSI, he's the guy that seemed to be at the centre of event things, doing it on behalf of the three owners of TR Bikes; Henry, I remember him as the bald dude. Lynten, hhmm I met him for about 3 minutes as I was leaving last time in town, so lets call him the long haired dude and Chris, the one on crutches... Crutch dude sounded a little derogatory. Oops I said it. Bugger!

Bum happened to be in Bali about two weeks ago but fate dealt us a hand that didn't allow our paths to cross. When I told him I was coming he seemed genuinely surprised, although pleased, that I was making the journey. Perhaps he just though I was crazy, has to be one of the two.

Three o clock Saturday rolled around and life found me in the back of a cab in the nether region of ECP with one of the more elusive and oft talked about Beyblades on my boys wish list in my possession, I took this as a good omen. Which was something I needed right then as TR Bikes was proving hard to find for the uninitiated, which perfectly described me and my faithful sidekick, "taxi man". Omen number two came when I spotted a young hipster on a fixie whipping through traffic speed checking moments before he might possibly become one with a car fender several vehicles up. With words dripping in cliche I told Taxi Man to "follow that bike!" and not for the first time today a big smile crossed my dial and as I reclined back into the generously upholster diesel Merc which was Taxi Mans ride.

Located under one of the old government housing blocks this unassuming shop, it’s a double actually, is sandwiched between a Chinese herbal medicine shop and a 7eleven. The later proved invaluable when beer o clock rolled round. The former probably has its uses but that will have to wait until another visit.

Right here I have to stop the narrative (?) and spend a sec and describe this kampung. Picture an area that is delineated by three 80 meter long 5 story high housing blocks. They form the sides of a triangular with access to the inside only at the points and you have it. The shops sit under the buildings and a paved road ran around the inside with a little park and tiered pond amphitheater type arrangement in the middle. It was all very pretty. But that's not what I saw when I arrived. I saw the crew already hard at it.

The high jump event was well under way when I dropped my bags, greeted a couple of guys, grabbed my camera and started clicking away. Now I am no Red so I have to take a different approach to this photography business, I was going to work the percentages. In my pea brain I figured that if I shot 400 photos, at least 6 would (I hoped!) make it past the sensor and be suitable for your viewing. With hunteresque skill I nuzzled my way to the front of the throng of 100 hipsters from around Singapore, Malaysia and, as I was happy to find out later, some crew from Bandung. The bar was set about 40cm and the round I missed had brought the number of competitors to two. Problem was neither of them made it any higher. Bum had the perfect tie breaker. Chance in the form of a quick round of paper, scissors, rock. Lovely bit of improvisation I thought.

Winners named noted and we were onto the longest skid. Up until this point I had thought our kids were pretty damn good at this. Had to reevaluate that idea when this event was taken out by a skinny kid on an old converted ten speed who left rubber on the tiles for a good 80 meters! 20 meters more than second place. Mighty job!

The crowd were getting restless and the owners had set up another round of Sapporo beers at the table that permanently resides in front of there shop by the time Bum had the first group of guys on the line ready to ride the sprint. Now there are two things here. Remember my description of of the place? A triangle right, well they have corners that are more than 90 degrees and that other salient fact is a fixie can not lay over that low as the peddle will hit the ground while in the bend. I set myself up at the start only to miss a three bike pile up round one, on bend one, in lap two. That wasn't going to happen again and I moved to sit myself on the Kerb on the second straight looking back to that first corner. Riders not making the bend can't brake, they don't have any brakes, so they either end up crashing sideways, straight into one of the big green hedges or as one guy did it, in the shops. The crowd ate it up. Three rounds later and a final of the heat winners we found out who was the fastest on the day.

Like a well oiled crank we moved to the sunken amphitheater for the track stand comp. At least thirty riders started out. 3 minutes later at least two thirds of them were still in contention, Bum raised the stakes. One arm. This did wonders to cull the pack by 50% almost immediately but there were some real stayers, pun intended, in Sing. No hands came the cry! Another ten dropped off but 6 persisted. By now, these guys had been balancing on two thin tires for about 7 or 8 minutes. The degree of difficulty got a rocket when Bum told them to take their shirts off. Amongst the hilarity this request generated in the crowd who watched now blind, no hand track standers crashing to the ground it did have the desired result and left us with one bare chested winner. There was much rejoice.

Moving into the final event of the day, the No Foot Down, kind of like our Sumo but with a pond in the middle, the atmosphere in this strange cultural courtyard in what would have been one of the more dodgy areas of Singapore in it's day was effervescent. Laughter poured freely forth and not just from the fixed afficiandos but from the upper balconies where some of the older occupants had come out of their houses to see what these kids were up to and got swept up the wash. Others had taken places on the park benches and amongst us in the amphitheater. It must have taken a good fifteen minutes but finally a winner was delivered down and I saw my chance to duck into the 7Eleven for some light refreshments. Not that I need to justify my actions I do want to say for the record that it was close to 5 pm.

It must have taken at least thirty minutes to give out the winners prizes. There was frames, wheel and crank sets for the first, second and thirds in each event. And a mammoth raffle with 18 prizes. It really showed me the generosity of the owners of TR Bikes. It's all well and good to sell the crew bikes, it's business but they were cultivating a lifestyle and putting something back. Good joss guys! Looking at my phone I saw I had nearly over stayed my welcome. After a couple of goodbyes and congratulating Bum on a well run, not to mention, very fun, awesome afternoon I moseyed out of this cultural cul de sac to go looking for a car to whisk me back to the airport and home. I'm on the plane now. The smile hasn't left me. Thanks for the great arvo.

Ano

Just when you thought it was a goon night...

2010-08-28T10:06:00.001+10:00

Tonight we had a lovely evening at Metis. Fantastic food, great deserts, fantastic cocktails and expensive wine, well hey this is Bali, not their fault. As I said a great night.

We had just said goodnight to our friends and were making our way back to the motorbike when I noticed my helmet wasn't there.

I made some noise to rustle up some Sampat, thats local for security guys, and we all had a search of the area. Not a biggie, a helmet like the one I lost costs around fifty bucks. I wasn't going to make too big of a deal about it. That is until this guy, not in security outfit but with radio makes his way over to me, he glares at mr and speaks, well it was more like a snarl. Words spill out in which he tells me it's my fault. I should have locked the helmet away, I should have made sure it wasn't able to be stolen. In seconds it went from hero night to zero night. This guy really pissed me off! Have you been to Metis? This is a compound where you are screened at entering, this is one of Bali's best restaurants, right now there are 8 security standing around me. This guy was aggressive, his people skills sucked, he was right up there in my face. I was livid.

I demanded to see the manager. We stormed back to the restaurant I was shown to some guy still in uniform. I started to explain what had happened. A bule, a foreigner, approached rapidly, I was loud. I was upset. Not good for a restaurant to have someone like that in the entrance. What to do with a scene in the entrance of the restaurant? Take it outside. They were in damage control, the polite Frenchman asked the specifics while urging me to move towards the door. I met him halfway by lowering my tone. My beef wasn't about the loss of the helmet, it was about being treated as guilty by their, what seemed to me "head" of security. Funnily enough the Frenchman lowered his gaze, looked about and then he conceded that he had no control over them, that they needed to use externals to look after their security and there was no recompense, but what stuck me as odd, they were not allowed to comment on performance! Now what is that all about? I wanted an apology from this arrogant dude and the manager, well he couldn't deliver it to me. Money for replacement, from the restaurants point of view that was no problem. I should have said that the helmet was worth more. But that's not me.

I was unable to get my ounce of flesh. I took what little was on offer, I took the money, finally, after multiple refusals as I knew I had hit a stump. They gave me, what I now can sit and work out to be 5% of our bill. Not even worthy of a voucher is it?

Both the manager and I could not bring this prick to pay so we both sought the low road. Sometimes in Bali there is no justice. My only Hope is that karma will prevail and strike.

In respect to this I tell you friends just do not leave your helmet on your bike at Metis for the moment.

Rules and regs...

2010-08-06T20:10:00.000+10:00

I have a friend and his daughter coming to stay and I have to go away. Now like all good homes I have a couple of idiosyncracies that people should know about so I wrote him a list. I thought it worthy of a blog post...

My home - The quirks and works.
Where to begin? Safety I suppose is a very good place. Power is the dodgiest thing here so lets forge into that. It’s 240 volts, though this isn’t always the case and can fluctuate a lot. If you have sensitive items, don’t use them without a power conditioner. They are expensive so no spares, I only have them for my appliances. Laptop power supplies are not super sensitive. In fact they are a great power conditioner and regardless of the input voltage should only deliver 12 volts to the computer. Having said that, I issue no guarantee or warranty. You stay and play on your own cogency.
My landlord, guru, smiley fella and otherwise all round tight bottom, reference to spending not sexuality, in his infinite wisdom and frugality, decided he only needed to run two wires throughout the house, not three thereby immediately saving 30% on his wiring bill. At this point I should probably qualify this as just my speculation but after 3 years, you could say I have a feel for it. So metal objects, like the cases to computers, my aluminium laptop, the aluminium keyboard, hard drives and even the case of my iPhone, when plugged into the mains tend to deliver a small buzz, which although not entirely unpleasant, are a little disheartening. Best to avoid these by not grounding yourself. Mats and chairs are good!
Should there be a black out, we haven’t had one in a while, you will find tea candles under the sink, left hand side and there is a rechargeable torch on charge in the lounge room. I tend to just go out if the power drops out early evening. Don’t forget if the power is off here it is probably out across the whole suburb. So you cant go local. If the neighbours are still lit up then it might be just a breaker. Check them in the kitchen. If that is all good go out the kitchen door, left and left again towards the laundry area, just after the water heater is the Mains. There is a breaker in there for the entire supply. I find Echo beach is good,!
I leave a couple of lights on downstairs at night, usually just the one set, switch is the right one of the set of three beside the lounge door. I also leave the lights on to the Garage and the outside wall. The switch for this is located outside the kitchen on the right when you head to the garage.
Lastly on the power, there isn’t enough of it! The island doesn’t have enough and neither do I. My poorly allocation of only 4400 watts isn’t enough to even run the George Foreman Grill & BBQ so don’t think you can run 3 aircons, lights, TV’s and have a hot shower at the same time, because you cant! Two aircons only at any given time or otherwise the kitchen will pop.
My computers are off. You have to understand that these are how I make my living and I have to protect that, so when I am not here they are off and password protected. Sorry about that!
The Internet is on and the wireless, anomac is the name of the network, is easy enough to get onto. Famous last words. I do not offer tech support while out of Indonesia, and while in the country you will be billed at RP250,000 per ten minute block. The password is (do you think I would put that here???) case sensitive. And before you ask, it’s a zero not an O. While it isn’t as fast as Oz it is a very reasonable connection and unlimited downloads. Knock yourself out. Up on Jalan Kerobokan is Global Extreme. About 1.3km from here. They have a very good connection as well as computers that you can hire, if you didn’t bring your own.
The lounge Audio Visual System has a number of offerings. DVD, Wii and on the DVD player in the lounge is a little box hooked up to a red hard drive. It is a media player and storage. The smallest remote operates it. It’s got some old movies, surfing movies, TV series etc.. some real gems here. The big silver remote operates the amp. For DVD set to DVD/VCR, for Media Player and Wii it should be on TV/Sat setting. I am referring to the line of buttons just under the LCD screen on that silver remote. The volume control is the only other thing you need to worry about on this one. Watch out it can go very loud! The black remote runs the TV. The main button on this is the little one above the Green MENU one called SOURCE. This switches from the three different input devices I have hooked up. Do not use this volume control; I have it set to zero. Don’t fiddle! DVD, well it’s a bloody DVD player. If you cannot use this then you are all out of luck.
We have about 1000 DVD’s floating around. Please use them carefully but put them back where you found then so that my kids and I can have the pleasure to lose them another day.
Chucky and Sputnik are my kids. Especially while my boys are not here in Bali. Pat them all you like, they love it and will fight each other for your affection. Do not lay a heavy hand on them!! Just as you do not hit a child you do not hit my dogs. I definitely do not like that. They bark. I just tell them to shut up. Live with it. It’s part of having dogs. So it is part and parcel of staying here. That said I want them to bark and more should someone come over the wall at night. There are plenty of thieves in Bali and lets not become victims. Sputnik is allowed out into the street during the day. Chucky is not, he would end up as kebabs in twenty minutes. Made will take Chucky for a walk each day. You can too. On a leash please. Both the dogs are very affectionate, they do like to jump up on people, even little people, forewarned is forearmed. Be aware of it and it will not be an issue.
Lastly look after Komang and Made and they will look after you. They are our Balinese family. They have been with us for nearly 4 years. They love to have a chat. They both laugh very freely. They will want to know where you have been and where you are going. You’re on holidays; slow down, take the time to tell them. It is not being nosey it is the way that Balinese are. They are trying to know your place in the universe. It is very sweet. Perhaps you ask them where they have been, where they are going and how their spouses and children are. Scratch the surface and be very surprised by what you find.
Have an ace time here. Yeah the chooks are loud as are my dogs, the neighbours are inquisitive and the next door neighbours are building. But all in all it is a great place. A place I feel at ease 24/7. I hope you do too.

The lengths some go to to advertise a product.

2010-08-05T01:16:00.001+10:00

Ok I get it. I understand that these guys would want to drink something after what they do, but what they do is pretty out there. To launch V Isokinetic Colenso BBDO, Auckland created an extreme urban sport called Pomparkour. Pomparkour has elements of Parkour, Free Running, Pompier, and ‘Hakenleitersteigen’, a European event started by fireman who climb building faces with ladders at speed. Those that practice Pomparkour (Loonies) use a ladder specially designed and constructed with a large hook at one end. This allows them to grip rails, windows and ledges as they traverse and scale high buildings through the city. Thank god I have the cheat sheets, because there is nowhere in the ad that you see this. It's mad. Love it. You guys rock!

Don't try this at home kid

2010-05-04T18:59:00.000+10:00

This is an amazing video of what is fast becoming a lost art. These guys are true craftsmen.
Inspirational. You guys rock!!

UP THERE from Jon on Vimeo.
I wrote this documentary along with my friends Malcolm and Christine, as part of The Ritual Project sponsored by Stella Artois (more at uptherefilm.com). So proud to help these painters tell their story.

Concept: Mother NY; Production Co: Mekanism; Director/DP/Editor: Malcolm Murray; Music by The Album Leaf; Painters: Colossal Media/Sky High Murals/Bob Middleton; Presented by Stella Artois

Semantics...

2010-03-19T12:59:00.001+11:00

"You feel today sir?" I look around accepting the proffered towel. The words bounce around in my heat dazed head. Who said them? Where did they come from? What do they mean?

I blink to try and arrange my thoughts, I hope this action at least buys me some time. The lights are on but nobody is at home just yet, the aircon in the foyer assaults me like a tsunami would if i stood before it along the shore. Without moving a hair on my head it's bashing the last bit of life out of me. The same life force that got me back here.

I have been on remote the past half an hour. My mind had shut down, overheated. My body was left out along the pavement somewhere. Somehow, something took control and through the maze of wrong side driving, bizarre traffic rules and the furnace that is day time in Siem Reap I got back to my hotel, my oasis.

I had been perched on the back of a small motorbike, my knees were up around my ears, thank goodness they can still go that far. This cool damp towel feels good on the back on my neck. What was it the girl had said? It didn't sound right, or did it. I rubbed the cool damp towel along the length of one arm and back down the other.

"Yes" It crocked out. Immediately I hated the way that sounded. Was it a question she asked or a statement? I wasn't sure. I rubbed my neck again with the towel using it to bide more time while life seeped back in through the cracks. I was aware of the staff looking at me there in the hotels entrance. The door men, the concierge, the receptionist, the two musicians across the expanse of the foyer who played music by rote and let their eyes dance around the foyer for amusement and especially the girl with the silver tray full of the cool damp towel. I didn't care, nothing mattered anymore I was back and I was just wallowing in the cool hotel foyer.

"Yes" I repeated, though this time with timbre and direction, "I feel everything today, thanks for asking" I hand back the towel. I glance around the expanse of the foyer, I look at the girl with the silver tray of hand towels, I smile and move deeper into the hotel.

Cambodia is outside and I, for the moment, am safe in here.

Adding fuel to the fire.

2010-03-02T20:27:00.000+11:00

So I am sitting here working away when the phone rings. Jakarta number I can tell by the 021 prefix. Low and behold it is a friendly person from AirAsia. After some pleasantries where, lets call her Anita, establishes my credentials I am informed that someone in KL has used my credit card details to book a ticket on tomorrows flight from KL to China twenty minutes ago. Was it me? Why are I laughing she asked. I gathered my composure and told her a funny thing happened in front of me at home, what else could I say?

I told her that I had not booked any flights today, although I had tried several times yesterday though. If she only knew!

She told me I had to ring the call centre and tell them that I hadn't purchased the ticket. I love the fact that I was talking to a woman in AirAisia and then I had to ring AirAsia. So I did. Then the girl I was speaking to, again that incredibly bad telephone line because they are trying to use Internet telephony in a country that has incredibly bad internet services. Argh! The irony really came home when the call centre girl put me on hold to talk to the Accounts girl, couldn't they have done this without me? I had already told the Accounts girl it wasn't me who booked anything. The call centre girl told me I should cancel my credit card because someone had all my details. I thanked her for that pertinent info and signed off.

Now is it me or is it slightly suspicious that the only time I have used my credit card in the past week was yesterday when I was trying to book a ticket on AirAsia and then today it's used to buy a ticket on their site. I want to know how come this other person was actually able to book, given my wasted hours yesterday. Lucky bugger.

The sad thing here is that my credit card is cancelled and I am now not able to book the tickets to Perth for my mom's birthday unless I get someone else to whack it on their credit card. Not happy!!

Just in finishing I rang my bank in Australia to cancel my card and I was put through to their call centre, in the Philippines, I surmise from the girls accent. Internet telephony, though reasonable quality. She told me that was the only transaction that they had used my card for... go figure.

Here are a couple of images I thought I should share...

Peace.

Knock, knock? Oh that's my head against the wall!

2010-03-01T20:21:00.002+11:00

http://picasaweb.google.com/anomac/AirAsia02?pli=1#Good Afternoon,
I do not seem to be having much luck with your website. It use to be fantastic, never had an issue but this time, whew. Just wont work. Let me say here first that I have been a fan. Flown with you guys many times; to Siem Reap, Bangkok, Chiang Mai, KL, and a couple of weeks ago Perth. All good. You get what you pay for. I like it. The booking process has been mostly painless but then you go and unveil this "New & Improved" (your words,) website. Between you and me. I think that the site could have done with some Beta testing on the Mac platform.
FYI. I am using Mac OS 10.5.8 Firefox 3.5.8 and also Safari 4.0.4. As you can see, all up to date!

On the 27th Feb at around 4pm local time I tried to book a flight from Bali to Perth return for myself and my two kids. I went through all the different fields, chose meals, purchased the expensive seats in the front, Go insurance? Yeah why not. The works! It takes awhile getting all the info together and at last I entered in all my credit card details and hit submit... The processing image comes up. I am told not to hit the back button. I have e-purchased enough to know what to do. I sit and wait... ERROR!

Not what I was expecting, but no worries I can deal with that, it happens. The biggie here is that the error message told me NOT to rebook as I might end up with two bookings. eg two charges on my credit card. It told me to go to Check N Change. Which I did. However once the page finished loading I couldn't for the life of me navigate to check my booking. Seems that the buttons didn't load. I looked at the HTML Source and the code is there it's just not showing. I tried the same URL in Safari. Wouldn't load in there either. After some looking at this code and trial and error I found the link to the Booking Status Enquiry page clicked it and... that page doesn't load it's graphics either. So I am trying to see if I have been charged already and i have no way of doing it...

I fill out a contact form just like this one, enter in the Case No. as I have done here, all my other details and wrote a succinct run of events so as to help the programmers isolate the issues hit submit and went back to my life thinking that someone would get back to me Monday with an idea of what is going on.

Monday morning and I really do need to book these tickets. My two sons and I have to attend my moms 90th Birthday. This is the biggie. The whole family, I am one of 7 kids and we all have our own children, are all flying to Perth for it. I can not afford to miss it.

So even though i haven't heard from your company I bite the bullet and book online again today. I enter my details, I enter my two sons details, I choose seats, food, insurance and then all my credit card details again. I hit send and... ERROR. 12:40pm.

Hmm ok, I will ring customer service in Indonesia. I ring and its a real bad line. I have to go outside onto the upstairs balcony but I realize it's not with me. It is the internet telephony. We take ten minutes to go through my name by Phonetic Alphabet and my credit card number and we find there has been no charges against it today. Great. Or so I thought.Would I mind trying the internet booking again, sure I said.

We hang up and I go through the motions again. First the details of the 3 flying, the passport numbers, the expiry dates, the food, the seats, the insurance and then the credit card details. I hit submit, you know where this is going don't you? ERROR, 12:59pm.

I phone again and if I thought the first line was bad this one is a doozy. She keeps telling me she cant understand me. I put on a headset as i am using a mobile. Again we go through the phonetic alphabet that is my name. Again we go through the 16 digits of my credit card and again she confirms that no charge has been made against it. Would I care to try again to book it online? I am a sucker for punishment and say sure.

So off I go. I input the names, the passport numbers, the food requests, the seat requests, which are slowly diminishing as the ones I have chosen the last two times are no longer available!! I enter the credit card details, hover above the submit button and actually cross my fingers before depressing it. A dialogue box tells me it might take a minute or two and to not hit the back button. I remain well away from the keyboard as I have all day. I wait and pray... ERROR 1:20pm.

I phone for a third time and get a double header. My first male for the day and a reasonably good line. I explain to Alex, it doesn't sound all that Indonesian but that is how he identified himself when I asked. I explained all that had happened. He checked the card and no there was no recent activity. He offered to do the booking over the phone so we went through all the details verbally. Now I thought this was a long winded process online, but on the phone, this took ages. We get to the end and he says the price. It is over US$300 more than the online. He tells me that he can only do the Standard price not the discounted price. I had been suffering under the delusion that the price was the price with AirAsia. Apparently that is not the case. I ask him what I should do in this conundrum. He told me to book again after 3pm. That the problem would be fixed by then. I assumed that i am not the only one who is effected this way so thought fine I can do that.

At 4pm this afternoon I tried once more. Yes I gave it that extra hour. Sometimes that is the all important hour. Details entered thrice, food, insurance and the seating chosen, the seats that I had been reserving in my previous bookings had reappeared as being vacant again, I was buoyed by this information. I entered the rest of my details for me and my credit card. Once again crossed my fingers and hit submit.

I really shouldn't be so trusting should I. That's right I got ERROR once again, 4:06pm.

So now I am here filling out this contact email again. The Case Number above is the most recent one. I hope that someone will actually contact me. You know, actually let me know that the problem is being looked into.

I tried to see how I might book online using my smart phone. I clicked on The How To Book button on your front page. The link that opened was "Oops! The Page has taken flight" So when I say I am not having much luck with your website you can see it is an understatement.

I have posted the screen shots of the errors, the Manage My Booking page without navigation buttons and the Booking Status Enquiry page on Picasa Web Albums for you to view. Here is the URL

FYI I have also added this to my blog as a post. I thought some people out there might want to read it as well.

Please let me know.

Touchy feely. With the sound thrown in free.

2010-01-30T19:55:00.002+11:00

I have been interested in this band out of Bandung for a while. I have brought a couple of their albums, oops I think I meant to say all (read both) of them! They are easy to find up here in the jungle. If I had to say who they remind me of it's a bit of a toughy. Lovely haunting girls vocals, sort of a Bjork (Had to throw that in given the band name) meets New order type of keyboard with a Durutti column production and most of lyrics in Bahasa Indonesia. When listening to vocals that you don't understand they become another layer of instrumental. Risa's voice is quite angelic. As I said interesting stuff.

Sad to hear that the two girls, Dina keyboards and Risa vocals, that started the band have ended it, artist differences apparently. Risa has left and taken a lot of the magic that is Homogenic with her. I do understand when two people want to grow in difference directions, We grow apart. Still doesn't mean we have to like it.

Thought I would post a link to a video of theirs as they don't get a huge amount of western exposure and I thing they rock.

Lets see what they come back as... Oh 1207 views now. Lets see how much traffic I can send their way.

One mans left overs is another mans jewels...

2010-01-29T01:26:00.001+11:00

SLAB from CIRCULATE on Vimeo.

Just spotted this chunk of "left over" footage on Drift. As they said and I quote

"That’s why I was particularly stoked to get an update from Matt this week with a couple of “leftover” (yeah right!) clips in it. In the first one, two of the best, most stylish Aussie rippers (by our humble assessment) out there, Josh Kerr and Asher Pacey, find shelter at a below sea-level slab. You can tell these guys really only feel at home with a nice thick roof over their heads. Good music+tube time=us chomping at the bit to see this one."

I agree. I will be checking out Way of the Ocean as soon as I can.

Laugh.... I almost wet myself.

2010-01-27T12:35:00.002+11:00

I missed the Golden Globes but I just caught this video or Ricky Gervais in his opening. And I pissed myself, not literally, though almost. He has great comedic timing.
His material is exceptional and he is not above some self deprecation. Actually they are the best bits!

Now I wish I had of watched the lot. Thank god for the internet

Love ya work.

Peace

What's in a name?

2010-01-10T14:29:00.006+11:00

I have been playing around with a Beta version of an image based web group called the Cargo Collective. It's a whole lot of designers, photographers, artists and other visually interested people. Good fun. Clean too mum!
Well the free ride is over, we can't expect them to do this for love forever, and it has migrated from Beta to the pay version. I have been enjoying making images that have nothing to do with events, logos and such forth, so took the lovely discount offered to us Beta users and have subscribed for a year.

Had this URL, 4to6foot.com parked for the past 6 months or so. Bit of an impulse buy. So I thought I should use it for my art, images, visual ramblings and the fact i love surfing images, old mags, movies and what have yous. Why did I buy it I hear you ask, well if you didn't you will. I brought it when working on the interior of a friends surf store here in Bali. He needed a new name for the retail end of his business and I thought it was a great name and just grabbed it when I was on Godaddy seeing what was and wasn't available. He wasn't totally chuffed with it as he liked the name but wanted to go for all numerals, 426foot wasn't available and so he ended up going with 526foot.com He is not as slack as me and has the whole site up. Check it out.

So mine is now alive. And the beast needs to be fed. I will add to it daily, weekly or monthly. You will have to follow it to know. If you have been liking what has spilled from my mouth onto these virtual pages over the past 4 years, then let it be known that I still tend to write a few words, probably too many, about life's little inspirations and irritations.

Hope you like my visuals.

Peace!

Long time to string a few words together

2009-11-20T02:10:00.002+11:00

I think I will hang my Blogger hat up for a while. Nothing to report here. My musings go unnoticed and are washed up in the the plethora of would be triers I think it high time I go back to what I know. So if there are any of you that stumble upon these precocious musings and that they in themselves amuse you then perhaps you would look at some of my digital art.

I have started a visual blog and am trying to add something to it everyday. Don't expect the diatribes that I have here. I am spending my time in other places. Art, Photos and hopefully a sense of humour.
http://cargocollective.com/bluesky

See you there.

Peace

Ano.

PS I may have to come back from time to time to drop some verbal bomb, so watch this space!

Not an important post but a blast from the past.

2009-08-01T15:29:00.003+10:00

It's been a week or two of rediscovery for me. Most importantly my kids got back from 6 weeks in Germany with their mum. Other items came in dribs and drabs. An old friend from school on Facebook here then another one there. Became a bit of a flood there for a moment three sisters, Jo, Chris and Michelle, then Karine, Jess and I see Michael there who I will have to catch up with, Edmund who worked for Concept Com and has now moved over to my friends company, Radius. Well he contacted me after about a two years so good to chat to him and hopefully we will get to work together again soon and then I happened upon this.

Like a lot of things from our youth that laid the foundation stones of who we are, how we act and when we laugh. The lesson once taught had been discarded and I had all but lost this skit in the back of my mind. So what joy it was to stumble upon this relic while researching old rugby images for a project next April, I like to get in early.

Hope You laugh, I did.

Enjoy

Peace!

Back to Work

2009-07-10T15:38:00.005+10:00

Well the two week holiday to Thailand is over unfortunately. Far too quick! I have a couple of little stories that I am working on from my travel, just to let you know, and I will post them here, sorry about breaking the chronological order, but get over it already!

More pressing is a question I have for you all. Why is it that when you have a holiday, yeah yeah I hear you all saying but you live in Bali, your whole life's a holiday, for the records, it ain't so! Anyway, when you go away for a holiday then things happen. In my case after a couple of months of only dribs and drabs in the work department I go away and two good size, one is big, jobs confirm meaning that upon my return I not only have something to do, I have a heap of it! Murphy is often attributed to this type of phenomenon.
This week I jumped into it. The first few nights burnt the midnight oil getting the first one out the door (Part One of it) only for another to land in my lap. Of course this one was a rush rush as well. Such is my holiday guys. I was up until 2.30 this morning setting a scene up so that it would render while I was asleep. Of course unattended it ran awry and the results were less than satisfactory. It is now under control and I have sent the last files out.

I look at my inbox and the mass of stuff that has gone unchecked for the last week. I sift through it and a couple of gems appear. A friend of ours' Kris-Z, Gab's originally but I have known him for 20 years now so a friend of mine as well has a new album coming out. That is him on the cover, no not the black dude. They are called Brixton Boogie. A fusion of Funk, R&B, and pop. In the words of the immoral Molley Meldrum, Do yourself a favour and check them out. You can listen to them through their Myspace Page, Click Here!

So that is all I have time for now. May you all have a great weekend, think of me as I have to work on the job I pushed sideways this week to get the rush one out.

Peace.

A matter of taste

2009-06-24T20:02:00.004+10:00

From Blogger Pictures

The other night we convened for what is fast becoming one of the
fixtures on the underground Bali social scene, a movie night. Subject matter is always around surfing and the night draws out an eclectic bunch or long boarders, fish riders, single fin aficionados and generally below the radar technicians of the fine sport of surfing.

It was after the movies and when some of the Europeans had bid their leave that someone around the table noticed that none of us were inked. Not a tattoo between the ten or so left sitting around the table. A glance around the table has us all pitted in the age group from 38-46. Sorry Dave & Made, I know you two are the exceptions.

To understand why this is really peculiar you have to look at our social ties. Well there are none. Sure we are all in Bali but that is what has drawn is together here in the now not during those formative years where the application of tattoos is done during the weekend night rituals fueled by a proportionate mix of alcohol and youthful abandon.

Today I sit on a plane flying from Bali to Bangkok and it isn't the case. A small gecko is climbing up in behind the ear of the girl next to me, a lass ahead has her hair parted into pig tails giving vent for a dragonfly on her upper spine, the guys arm in front of her sports tribal markings that do not correspond to the colour of his skin and would upset any self respecting anthropologist. What is with head and
neck tatts on women? Three that I can see. The third, a buxom blond further down the front has a bow tie at the back of her neck, is that tribal? I don't think so! Her man has flames streaming from his left wrist up his arm, which, when mingled with his freckles, kind of creeps across his whole body in little spot fies. Another twenty something couple is branded, he with his full arm in colours so bright that the ink still looks wet and I worry about brushing up next to him and smudging it. She has a little flower popping out where her harem pants do not quite meet her t'shirt. The lone lower looks lost on this side of the line. I wonder briefly about it's root system and smile.

They all have something in common as well. They are all under thirty five. Perhaps younger but I have been known to be wrong. Why is it these younger generations feel compelled to feel the needle? Really I want to know.

Landed - Bangkok is hot and steamy! I know, I'm not telling you something
you don't already know.

Lots of computer work this week...

2009-06-03T17:39:00.003+10:00

Well I have been bolted to the computer finishing some renders, playing with the vids from the new camera and making a play list for Paul's 40th at Mano Beachside Cafe this coming Sat night. Ando, as he is otherwise known, is up here for a number of celebrations, one of them his own 40th. The other major one is Pip Leary's wedding to Bruce Lee. Ok That name is no joke but people I heard he is an amazingly genuine and nice guy and I for one wish her and him of course, all the luck in the world to making it in this new partnership. If I have time I might even gatecrash the wedding and party. We shall see. It's on the beach, how hard is it to just wander in...

Can you imagine the conversation it would be like this...
Ano! What are you doing here?
Oh I was just wandering along the beach Pip, gosh you look lovely in that white gown.
Ano how come you are in white linen slacks, ironed shirt, combed hair and goatee and have that lovely Mandarin Tea aftershave from Shanghai Tang on?
You never know who or what you might run into out along the beach Pip...

Yeah right!

So that is my lot. Here is the new video I put together of Maxi and I surfing. Little longer but a whole lot more interesting. Later

peace

The state of play

2009-05-27T14:36:00.007+10:00

Well partners there is a new toy on the block and I thought that you all will need to see it. Actually thinking about this, you don't get to see it, it's a camera, I am not going to film it! It's a GoPro Surf camera. Click on the link if you want to see the camera.

All starts with a big plastic patch stuck on the nose of my board with bulletproof 3M tape. Love your work 3M. Anyway, that provides a mount onto which the camera is either able to be faced forward in the direction one is going or back at the rider. Which in this case, would be me, your pilot! A friend called it this morning 'My Coach' because in his view it made me slow down my movements and turns making me surf better. Mind you it also made me prance about a bit more. I call it showing off in front of the camera myself. Bound to happen on day one. Geez, I think you will always see a bit of it. But between, you me and a lamp post, that is not a bad thing if at the end of the day I surf better.

So with no further a due, here is a wave I got this morning. It is a single wave, the ride out at Canggu is long, it's great as it gives you time to think, to turn. I could have gone for another 10-20 seconds if I didn't act as a kook and move to much weight back. Oops slight giveaway there, sorry! Oh well you get that.

Let me know what you think as I am keen to publish some more videos if you all like them. Bugger it I might just publish them regardless.

Now sit back and enjoy the show...

Peace.

Up, up and away

2009-05-15T12:53:00.008+10:00

My week is broken into two very distinct sections, actually there are three but I will keep it simple for the sake of the blog. Don't want you readers glazing over while I set the parameters of my little story now do we?

I have the a "without kids" section which is from Sunday arvo to wed arvo. and the "with kids" part that takes the rest. So today, being Friday is a with kids. My surfing is curtailed as I have to do kid run in the morning and afternoon. Editors Note:Please do not get me wrong, I want to. When I say have to, I do not say that I am doing it under pressure, duress or threat of bodily harm. If that were the case, and given where I live, I could quite easily hire a driver or maid to look after the delivery and pick up of my charges. No sir-ey Bob!

So anyway where were we, yes. The surfing part of the weekend therefore doesn't include Thursday or Friday mornings unless I go for a late one. Now I have been very lucky or karma has been smiling on me but up until late I hadn't missed too many of the swells that came through. But that all changed in April. Waves after waves would come through and each would arrive when I was unavailable due to local commitments or when I was out of the country. Why is that?

Today I missed out on surfing. The school drop off, heavy traffic and we arrived laste to school as well. Do not do that of a rule! Also had some errands to run. Gabi needed the car, she had a big drop off for her company, Bali Baby. Check it out it is going great guns! After that I had to go to Andrews to drop off a photo of me and some details, he is off overseas today for a couple of weeks of fun in Bangkok and Vietnam. Half his luck i say. Emily was there buying a painting. This great print of Andrew's nephew with a facemask and snorkle and a paragraph of text lifted from a 70's surf book. Very nice piece. Emily has a blog and that can be seen in my NEW IMROVED links section. She is here from New York and will fly home in a week when her 4 months runs out.

Then it was home to redo a floorplan for a shop. A couple of phone calls. An email or twenty, some work on the shop 3D, that I had to hold off on as I am downloading images from my camera I took of the existing shop yesterday at present so I can use them in the 3D. Gives me a chance to write some dribble here. Soon to pick up the kids.

Just emptied the iPhone as well. So here is a little cross section of images I have taken of late. Again using the great slideshow feature.

Tomorrow, Saturday, we will be back to the beach at dawn. Starters are Maxi and I at present, may be a couple of other candidates have been known to arrive late. Andre, one of Max's friends is a bit of a fixture.

So until then I have to go. Lots to do and never enough time.

Someone more famous said to me yesterday that to get one thing done a day in Bali is and achievement.

Given the above I have done well.

Peace

When it rains, I get wet

2009-05-05T19:25:00.004+10:00

This past week has been one of mixed blessings. Computer trouble, big surf, small surf and movie nights. Maybe that depends on whether I can get the disk to burn. It's 5.30 and we kick off in an hour. The burn meter is still only half way across the bar, argh! My afternoon has been spent burning DVD's fast but wrong format on main computer with spiffy new motherboard, switch to laptop and Ano gets the right format but incredibly slow. Why is that?

On Saturday afternoon I took Maxi and his friend Andre on a white knuckle ride to Medewi. I should post some photos, I will but for now go to my Facebook page and look there as they are on the laptop and that is not going to do anything else at present other than finish burning that DVD. I have added the photos in a slideshow ~ Thanks David for showing me that one!

We had a great time there. The ride up took an hour and forty. Which is about standard. You zig zag in and out of this line of trucks and buses on roads that twist and turn through hills and dales. It really doesn't compare to driving in the real world. It's more like those Daytona machines in the amusement arcades that you race your friends on. Speaking of which, Maxi and I had a big session on some Japanese Hi-tech ones on our recent roadtrip through Java. It was in Jogjakarta and we were waiting for the movie to start. But that is a whole other post and a long one at that.

We arrived at 5 ish booked into the room, unpacked grabbed the boards from the roof and made it out into the water. The waves were around 4' but the wind had gotten to it. I sat out the back and the boys sat further inside. We spend the next hour and forty out there. Nice balance to the drive up.

Showers, simple meal at the warung on the beach and half an hour of throwing rocks, the boys not me, at other rocks because they sparked. Funny that! I tired of that and made my way to bed at 8.30 ish. I was asleep before they came in some 30 minutes later, according to them.

Why is is kids do not understand how to either whisper properly, they speak at the same volume as normal just change the tone, nor can they move around quietly without bumping into things which just happen to make the most noise out of all the furniture in the room. It's a skill. Just not sure what for. I was good at that I am sure! So at 5.15 ish they started their cacophony and wandered out into the morning. They returned some 15 minutes later and I inquired what the surf was like. They told me it's too dark to see the waves and proceeded to get ready to go surfing. Ha

So we were in the water at dawn and the funny thing was someone had beaten us out. We surfed until just before 9. Or as I like to put it just before my shoulder seized up. I had a knot the size of a footy under the right shoulder blade made from the drive and exacerbated by the paddling. I was ripe. We went in.

We breakfast not at the warung where we ate dinner but the little kiosk there in the front. It was a little different for Maxi, a lover of all things sweet. He ate mie (noodles) Well done that son of mine. Check out the funky old dude in the slideshow photos. The old girl is even funnier pinching the lads, slapping them lightly and jovially and generally running about creating mayhem. In my humble opinion it would have to be one of the best beaches, for the vibe, in all of Bali. Perhaps Indonesia. Big call I know. Love it though!

It is somewhere in here that the boys went back out for second surf but not before arming me at the little cafe with the camera and a second coffee. They are the shots you see of them. I am conspicuously absent from the shots because boys would never think of sitting out for a session so as to take photos of dad. Heaven forbid!

Andre's mum, Sabine, had tuned us to this guy who sells seafood along the foreshore. Morino or something his name is. Well we found him and orgaqnised for 2 kilos of crabs to be cook at that warung, the bigger one. Not the little one with funky old dude and grand ma!

But before we could partake we had to clear out of the room as it was a twelve check out. I made the two of them shower. Even though I knew full well that they would get a late session after the crab. Sometimes you just have to use soap! And no boys, salt water is not the same as fresh!

This big plate with 7 big blue swimmers was brought out. As kids we would measure a crab with a coke can across the top of its shell to know whether it was size or not. These were all well over size. Plates of nasi putih ( white rice) were placed in front of each of us and a dark red sauce in a bowl was added to the table. I gave the boys there first lesson in how to take a crab shell apart. Gave myself a couple of nasty cuts in the process. Furtive glances from other tables indicated that we were not only the centre of attention but also a certain amount of envy. 30 minutes later we headed out for the third and final session in the surf leaving only a pile of crunched shell in our wake. One great idea they had was to use a big flat river stone, which makes up the entire Medewi Beach, and lay a claw on it bringing another smaller river stone down to crack the thick shell of the crabs. Clever simple and easy to maintain. I will be getting a set of stones for home.

The afternoon session was once again corrupted by the wind and compounded by our aching bodies. There is only so much surfing one can do. But there are ways to save some labour. For instance we would paddle out into the lineup from the keyhole on the point going deep outside. Wait for one of the biggies to come rolling through, catching that for 100-150 metres or so. There you could just paddle to the side and catch another wave a further 100 metres and finally a little wave right to in front of the the boats that sit above the high tide line along the beach. There you stumble out and walk back around to the point to do it all again. Beats the hell out of paddling let me tell you.

We called it a day. we showered, packed the boards high on the roof of the car. I drank the first Coke (without alcohol) I have drunk in ten years as I figured I needed the rush to get me home in one piece. Belted up and entered the chaotic stream of vehicles heading back to Denpasar.

The trip was great the drive crap. Next time we go for two nights to make it worth it me thinks.

Peace.

When is a play on a world stage but the men aren’t acting?

2009-04-21T11:56:00.007+10:00

When it’s the Hong Kong Sevens of course. Once a year teams from 24 countries come to Hong Kong to do 15-minute battles of endurance and speed, not to mention knock the be-jesus out of each other, in this stripped back version of Rugby.

Me I go there to hang out, take photos, shop and where possible drink some beer. Oh, and to work of course! Lets not lose sight of that now!

For the past 5 or 6 years I have designed corporate suites for a couple of companies. Over time the companies have changed but I still have the two suites to mould and make my own.

But we are ahead of ourselves. The place, people and games are but a vague blur from the starting point. They are important; they are the carrot for me. They are the main reason to apply myself all that time ago in front of my computer.

Briefly the process, I come up with a couple of different graphic approaches for each of the suites and send them off to get feedback, critique, abuse (rarely though it has been known to happen) direction and/or style tips. We short list them between our selves, or even lock in one approach but extrapolate it across the various areas and items that will be branded. Some work, others less well. Refine, design, submit. Finally the resulting art is satisfactory and the design is sent through to the client with a rational. A flurry of emails follow in its wake.

Slowly bits are designed and sent off for production other new bits are added to the list of things to produce and changes are a daily event all the while we watch the calendar, waiting for the day where we get to jet off to see our handy work. To fly there to immerse into Hong Kong, and of course, to drink some beers at the Sevens!

The big news is Cold Play were on my flight from Singapore to Hong Kong, sorry I know, I should have mentioned it before but I am now watered and fed and a lot more subdued. Sort of slipped my mind to this point. They travel with a lot of people. Oh and lots of stuff. Nothing else about them, didn’t chat, didn’t stop only realised when I was standing at the carousel waiting for my bag and LCD TV to come out. I saw them there with a huge entourage and about two tonne of bags some of which bore logos for the tour. I need a visual prompt sometimes. Cant always be quick.

Bugger, jackhammer! Urgh! I am in this room for 6 days and I have a jackhammer that starts at 8am. Hong Kong it truly the armpit of Asia, from a sensory perspective. The overload of smells, sights and even the tactile bits.

I had the morning to tour about. I looked in shops, went to H&M brought some new boxers and two jumpers because it is cold here, went to Shanghai Tang (one of my favourite stores here in HK) tried on some expensive jackets, sprayed myself with expensive after shave and exited to wander about some more, wished I HAD OF BROUGHT MY CAMERA, EVEN MY LITTLE HANDY ONE(oops cap lock).

There was this wild lady taxi driver, she had stuff all through her cab, above the speedo there would have been 5 or 6 phones, not sure why, books, animals, flowers, it looked like a lounge room in there. No one would get in, Hell, I didn’t either. I know I should have, but she really was weird and I was most worried about her ability to navigate the cab safely without being distracted by the myriad of shiny things in front of her. I wouldn’t have been surprised if there was a mirror ball hanging from the ceiling. Across the road were signs in Chinese and English calling Citibank to give compensation for losing peoples life savings, the cold hard light of the economic downturn. Is very evident here in Hong Kong. Have to get some technology while in Hong Kong. It is a prerequisite. No trip here can be concluded with out new Tech Gadgets and a foot massage.

Went to the box in the afternoon and finished off the graphics, ordered a couple of oversights and changes and padded about the place which in a few days would have 50 000 people wandering about through it. For now, there were just other teams of workers finishing off their own bits and pieces.

Went for dinner at American Peking for Tija’s birthday. I drank a lot of beer, more than I have drunk in a long time. Luckily it isn’t overly strong or my head would hurt more than it does. We even found the Kebab shop in Wan Chai on the way home. Every city has its kebab shop. Of course as one does in these fine establishments, we ran into an old friend from previous years Rugby. A Texan from Europe. I know it’s a great sentence, very visual isn’t it. Like us he too had had a couple of drinks and was partaking in the absorbing qualities that is this collection of chicken smothered with garlic sauce, laying in a bed of lettuce and tomatoes all wound up in a pita roll. I wonder if they taste any good in the daytime? Best not check!

Woke late, didn’t hear the Jack Hammer start this morning though it was there when I came too at 9.25am. Welcome to another wet and cold day in Hong Kong, well it’s not overly wet, showers, overcast at present. I hope the rain stays off for the rugby. Doesn’t help if it is raining. But first breakfast. Omelette, Canadian bacon, coffee, juice, ahhhhh.

Now I am stretching and getting ready to go to work. Will leave here just after 10. Have to be at the hotel before 11 to set up for the lunch then from there I have to go to the stadium and set up the AV in the suite. Stay there for 3 hours on my own and then everyone will arrive at around 4pm. Tonight I will finish at around 9pm. Urgh! For my amusement this afternoon I have several episodes of Flight of the Conchords to watch so I am not worried about being bored at the suite. My job is to just make sure it is already for when the client arrives with all of the guests. I also have a 32 LCD with me to play them on, everyone should travel with such a monitor, so I will be big screen entertained.

Just spent the last 15 minutes looking at iPhones, they want HK$4850 for one, is that good? I don’t know. Should I? Do I need it? Another toy, hmmm. I will think about it.

They came, they drank and ate and then left. We served them beers and wine. I took photos and chatted. Tired, but the really good thing is I’m not drunk, which is usually the scenario at 11.30pm on the 7’s Friday in HK . Bad news is I have put on about 2 kilos from eating and drinking this week; Well it’s Hong Kong for god sake and I would have done more damage had I been drinking!

Saturday is the real first day of the Sevens though the first 12 games are played on Friday afternoon.

Walked to the stadium, the good thing about staying in Causeway Bay. Sulked in the sprinkling rain up the hill. Actually walking around the city on the way from the hotel to the stadium is great, its a procession of weirdly dressed people all making their way up the hill, all trying to get there early enough to secure a spot, a good spot in the famous South Stand, it’s not every day that you see a collection of Smurfs, vicars, prostitutes (Usually boys dressed as girls), sheriffs, Indians (both sorts), the Gendarme about 20 of them too, some guys in fat suits, cowgirls, about 50 Steve Irwins, Hulks, hedonists, Cops, Generals, Mao’s and more.. That is the real Sevens. We are living a more sanitised version up in this corporate suite with free booze, though I am serving it not consuming it, free food and lots of great giveaways, hats, shirts, bags etc…

Come 6.30pm Sunday arvo and the Sevens had ground to a halt for another year. Fiji cemented their dominance by beating South Africa in a nail biting final. We cleaned up. I packed my 32” Hi Def LCD, looks great now in my lounge and headed back to the hotel. A quick clean up and then we went out and had pizza for dinner, Scott, Tija and myself. Quiet evening followed by an earlyish night. The morning came quickly to find myself standing at my window watching my little corner of Hong Kong waking. The view of the apartment block, across from my room, is slowly illuminating square by square, like a game show when you get the questions right. The sky is grey and promises another overcast and somewhat bleak final day for me. Bed is out of the question so I shower and disappear to the restaurant for breakfast. An omelet later finds me back in my room, I pack, I brush teeth, I spray aftershave on and then I peer yet again at the apartment building across the square. Before it was the tell tale signs of it coming alive, now the whole building has signs of life. I glance at the digital clock beside my bed. I have 8 minutes before the jack hammer starts and I can hear what city sound there are; cars and trucks and a general city din are the morning sounds that are reaching up the 14 floors to my room. I drift. It will be nice to get home to the frogs, birds and the 100 cc motorbikes again. I have had my hit of the city. I am ready for Bali. Oops out of time. Jack hammer has signaled this post must go.

And before I go, that iPhone. The Ayes have it. Boy gets new toy.

Peace.

Mad House Down at the Beach

2009-04-20T17:03:00.005+10:00

This was some stuff I wrote on Nyepi Eve. I then went off to Hong Kong for the Sevens, expect an entry soon came home for two days and drove to Java with Maxi for two weeks. Expect another entry when I write it. This one is a day in the life. Shouldn't be too bad a read! Enjoy!

This morning was a mad house down at the beach.

It took 30 minutes to drive in; normally a 3 minute drive. You should have seen it.There were trucks full of people, cars, and families shoe horned onto the world’s smallest motorbikes. A cacophony of sounds, smells and sights. People, sirens, gamelan music, hawkers selling everything from plastic toys and food to Red Bull and watermelon, the odd chook and a sorry rooster was also to be heard letting fly with it’s announcement of morning. Smoke from small fires hung about the carpark- not sure if it was from the fires or if all the men had fired up their Garam Garams (clove ciggies) at the same time.

There were waves of people. They arrived as a village enmass descending on the area in and around the temple and overran it for their allotted time. Then they packed up- clambered aboard the various modes of transport and skedaddled just in time for the next wave of attendees. The event was like a finely tuned machine.

The trucks were used to transport the family relatives, dead and living. Each huge extended family stand in the back and get driven from one ceremony to another. Their ancestors are carried about in paladin-like structures with these little rooves, gold and finely carved. Truly lovely.

As for the Gods throwing water at the believers it was there in all of its glory. Just as I predicted but even better as the tide came in. Most of the time they sat in an orderly fashion along the shore but eventually they wandered down to make their offerings. There was people dodging in and out of the shore dump as it snatched at their feet seeming to want to drag them into the sea. Mocking, teasing.

Some people climbed on top of a rock right in the middle of this shore dump. It seemed as if Neptune was playing with the climbers making it more difficult for them to negotiate the sharp outcrops on their way up and down.

I shot this panoramic view that needed to be stitched together, not a bad job if I say so myself: I stood in the carpark and spun. Lovely pirouette it was too. You will see praying, trucks, hawkers and people. I chose a lull to shoot it as I didn’t want to upset anyone. What do you think?

In a moment not long after I took these photos I made my escape. Only took 10 minutes to get back to the main road. At one point I had to slow down as I met another wave of revelers head on, pulling over to let their parade pass.

So that was my morning, oh the waves were not as big as the hype but I did get some lovely ones. Had a bad hold down where I was inside and the white water sort of landed right on top of me but instead of pushing me forward in it’s wake, like they normally do this one pushed me down and pinned me to the reef. I fought it and just before my air expired it released me. I scrambled to the surface and gasped for air. My arms and legs fatigued form the fight and lack of oxygen. I paddled hard to the channel so I wouldn’t be caught by the next one. It’s times like that that I wonder why I surf. The feeling doesn’t last though and the rush you get falling down the face of the next wave neatly erases the thought from your memory.

Didn’t wear a sarong this morning, I felt very disheveled, but in true Aussie style I wrapped a towel around my waist and wet boardies to somehow emulate these immaculately dressed people around me.

Peace.

The swells roll in and me with it...

2009-03-18T19:23:00.009+11:00

I'm Back! Typing stuff to FB seems to take a lot of any free time. Time that I might have to add my ramblings here. Big Col told me last week that he missed my little stories and so it is with that spirit that I plunge back in.

The work year will be somewhat slower than the last couple for me. All the big corporates have curtailed spending in the event and exhibit areas and I am left somewhat high and dry. Not to worry as i am sure things will come my way, always have so i can not see why they would stop now.

What is interesting is that I am diversifying. I laid out the interior of a shop for a mate. Designed a villa for another friend and I am doing a lot of Graphic design, especially PhotoShop work. It's good to get back on the tools, as it were, and ply my craft.

Off to Hong Kong next week for the Sevens. The yearly bash. I have designed the fitout for two corporate suites and have to make sure they hang the graphics in the right spot. For the skeptics there is some work involved here. It isn't all beer and balls. For the rest of you, your right it will be a bludge and I will be having the weekend off and attending the rugby with VIP passes.
Someone has to do it! May as well be me.

Life in Bali is good. I have set up home in Kerobokan and Gabi has the older place in Seminyak. The kids Spend half their time a each. Here is a description of the arrangements that a friend said summed it up well.

"Complicated refers to the lack of interesting options FB gives you to label your relationship. When you have (as I do) kids from Wed arvo to Friday evening, give one back after dinner keep the other so you can go surfing Sat morning then drive him to his acting classes in North Denpasar, grab him (as) he stays again Sat night and then we go surfing Sunday morning early followed, by breaky at Kudeta where we meet as a family. Then all return to our separate corners, complicated was the only option that added enough weight to the situation. It's not hard. I like it. I have all this 'me' time and then I have all this 'them' time. The balance works nicely"

I just realised that I do not have any photos of my house up here. Actually a friend, same one who said I summed up my complicated (FaceBook Term) situation quite well, said I had a lovely house. I do, but the piccies you saw are from Gabi's house in Seminyak. Here are some from Kerobokan. As each one says 1000 words I will leave you with them.

Oh and my puppy is called Sputnik, often referred to as Muttnik when she drags my shoes around the house...

Peace.

I'm Back!

2008-11-20T11:18:00.003+11:00

After 8 months I think it is about time that I write once more about life here in Bali. Just to put it out there. I do not think that this is a good place to go back over why there has been an absence, those who know me know already. I thought it better to actually start the dialogue about life in Bali for an ex-pat Australian. Trials tribulations and best place to get a Nasi Goreng. So that is what I will endeavor to do. Perhaps people who read this will add their comments and it can morph to a point where it is a communal process rather than this dictatorial diatribe which so denotes blogs these days. Though if you want a narrator, I can do that as well.

Peace!

Licking my wounds

2008-03-16T22:20:00.002+11:00

I thought that i should pen a few words here at some stage or another. That is until i saw my stars in this fortnights Bali Advertiser.

SCORPIO : Conceding defeat, is no easy task. Moving on, release and letting go, all a part of the process that follows. Usually, a sense of sadness and loss is inevitable. Feeling failure, is a waste of time. Count your blessings now, and move towards the future. Dwelling on the past will, only serve to lengthen the process and there is no time to be wasted on that. Forge ahead, and allow new inspiration to illuminate your path. What has transpired was a necessary part of your life process. It is over now.<

That has literally lifted the scabs on a couple of wounds let me tell you.

I will stay indoors for the next few days licking them.

Take care in the real world people.

peace

Mojito's away!

2008-02-22T16:39:00.003+11:00

Most here would know of my love of the Cuban drink of choice, The Mojito. Hemingway drank them what more info do you want. I started the FaceBook Group... The Mojito Appreciation Society. For about 3-4 years it has been the drink we have when on tour doing events around Asia. I think the best is in HCM at the Park Hyatt. Served by a guy called Anthony. Genius!

I came across this ad for Bacardi while on Google, I even forgot what I originally was looking for. Go figure. Perhaps I need to get over there and have a look. That could be a lot of fun!

Peace.

More than a mouthful. BigMac!

2008-02-20T11:34:00.001+11:00

I thought that 2 things are needed here. Firstly a post about something other than the rock in the ocean we call our home, but something that is reasonably near and dear to me and mine. The second thing was i wanted to show friends and family that although I may live in a tourist resort I have not hung the back in 5 minutes shingle on the door to my brain.

Entrance MacHEADS the movie. I have happened across the site the other day and was blown away. Friends who know me know of my long standing relationship with the Mac. I had a classic, a Duo, Gosh, I am designer, they were ours. I have argued with friend's about their importance, arguing about their superiority (with that certain smugness that only a MacHEAD has) and I am now realizing that I have been standing up for the Apple brand for over 15 years. Just a note here to any Apple employees. Long service gift?? Do you have my address?? Phone me??

Funny how I have been part of of Brand culture and I wasn't even aware of it when the whole time I have been using them, my miriad of Mac computers, to shore up and emphasis other companies brands using the my Mac and the software within. Nice irony..

On a local note, there is this one coffee shop, the Tuck Shop, over here that wont let you in (I am kidding but it looks that way) if you bring out a PC. Mac has now become the status symbol of the traveler, the world weary. I doubt if it's because the ubiquitous little 13" screens match so nicely with the white laminate tops of the tables, or the porcelain mugs of steaming Latte's, machiato's and ginger tea. No the interesting thing is they have become cool. Once the bastion of geeks and designers Mac has made design theirs and is offering you the rub off if you buy in. But where does that leave us "power users"? the ones that use them because once upon a time you had to and since then it was just too hard to learn how PC's work.

MacHEADS trailer

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So the point of this whole Blog today is to introduce this movie and to take a look at the trailer. I am now with baited breathe waiting for when i can see the thing in it's entirety.

But enough of me and my mac. I have to get back to designing an event for Microsoft....

Peace.

Cock-a- doodle-do I see you!

2008-02-16T14:31:00.002+11:00

We had the house blessed a few weeks back and I started writing to tell you all about it. Not to mention to whack some stuff on the Blog and keep that ill-tempered brother of mine at bay. Just kidding Barry! So today I am finishing those words.

Let’s face it people, I suffer from the myriad of keyboard allergies that are out there or is it that there are so many other things that need to be done at any given point in time that trying to keep up any sort of communication network with friends bows and finally snaps under the weight of the worldly burdens we are meant to bear. Add to that the countless hours that I toil away in front of this electronic alter and I think I have a solid enough case against writing. Or perhaps it is because I am too lazy to write. I will have to ponder these...

Deep enough for you? Wade on in, the waters fine!!!!!

Enough!! Here is something to read which I hope you will enjoy. A brief window in to a world slightly left from our own. Again I have to emphasis that this is chronically out of order and I have taken the liberty of writing the finish in a present tense so it reads as if I wrote it on the day, which I did do for most of it!

Life here is getting pretty standard. I am listening to the cockerels in the lane cockedoodeldooing. The priest who owns all this land owns them. His wife (she would have to be the ex as they can’t keep them once they cross the path to priesthood) and/or sister are setting up at present for the house blessing of this our new home. Tomorrow is Galungan a major Hindu festival; our staff will have two days off. One for the festival and Thursday is apparently the day to visit relatives; last night & tonight is full moon. All in all it is a very good day to have ones house blessed. We don’t want those pesky evil spirits hanging around do we?

Quiet Chucky!! Between the dog barking at the old ladies setting up for the ceremony and the aforesaid roosters the only other noise is the hum of the fans in my Mac. Although we are only a hundred metres from the main road we might as well be a world away. Nothing seems to penetrate. How good is that!

The new house is full of our things and more like a home than next door ever was. We are making our mark, perhaps we are also over the tire kicking phase of our time here making a commitment to live here and immersing in it rather than floating on top akin to a sun pinkened holiday bloated body adrift in the Black Sea. For all the European readers out there, a little eastern block anecdote to make you feel right at home.

Here we cringe when we come across the archetypal Aussie family. Dad and son have Bintang T’shirts or singlets, the wife and daughter have platted hair, painted nails, perhaps they all have fake tattoos. One or more sport a burn from a scooters exhaust pipe. They are all over weight. They are my kinsmen. The great unwashed. To them a trip to Bali is going overseas. Gosh, just writing this makes me proud and humble all at the same time.

Time to pause here and photograph the proceedings outside. More later. 9:50am

Well a couple of photos and much chatter, from the two women who were the advance ceremony team, later we still await the arrival of the priest. He only lives next door. Perhaps he is busy off doing other ceremonies. Special days mean they are in high demand. Waiting is something that the Balinese do very well. They wait for things to happen on an hourly basis not just daily. Explains the whole concept of rubber time, which I read yesterday, is a direct translation of ‘jam karet’, meaning that things in life are supposed to happen in a very relaxed fashion. I suppose that is why to this ‘time is money’ bule (foreigner) the Balinese just seem to cruise along in the day-to-day lives.

I also read that the Indonesians rank as one of the most relaxed countries in the world with regard to time. Second only to Mexico. I know which I prefer to live in at this point though! I must wonder how that correlates to number of heart attacks. I will once again see what is happening on the ceremony front. 10:23am

11:14am well it’s over. Some flowers rice and water. I think there was vinegar in there as well. Still wearing my sarong, it’s comfortable on a warm day like today... Sorry too much information I know. The house is awash with petals and water. Mixed in are scuffmarks from the ladies grubby feet as they went around blessing the various rooms of the house with splashes of water and petals. The down side of walking around bare foot is they do not remain pristine during the day. It was a moving experience. Though again we played the waiting game.

The Priest, Pak Nuymen, who lives next door and is the son of the landlord, Pak Made, came in with his dish full of tools. Two women prior to his arrival set everything up; a third joined them mid ceremony. He took up position and started chanting in a low murmur. The women for their part didn’t let up on the nattering that they had started when they first arrived. There was no quiet reverence. It was a tad weird. On he chanted and on they nattered with our pembantu, Komang, joining in. Made made a little fire in the yard from two bricks and some bamboo. It was this little fire that would transport the evil spirits away after the cleansing. The smoke caught the rays of sunlight penetrating the thick foliage we have on that side of the house and I could almost see them being dragged off. For our part we really weren’t quite sure what to do or even where to sit. Taking signals from Made, our gardener, we waited for the ritual of kowtowing that was the climax of the ceremony. We each drank, ate rice and stuck some to our foreheads. I even got a nice flower behind my ear. And then he was gone. I could almost hear him say, “I came, I prayed, I kicked the spirits butts!” As I said, almost.

So there you have it. Try that at home! Life here is definitely tinged (Ok liberal dash) with the exotic though I have a sneaking suspicion that too much exposure will undoubtedly dilute this and make it the norm. For now I have work that has gathered in my inbox that needs attending to.

I will leave you of some shots of the new home, our Teak bed that rides on these antique feet from an old house, an Ano design of course and complicated as all hell and the refurbished bathrooms that are swimming in terrazzo.

Peace!

Long time no write.

2008-02-01T03:26:00.000+11:00

Salamat hari raya. Today is the last day of Galungan. It is called Kuningan. It is a magical time in Bali. The Balinese seem to wear their traditional dress almost every day and the streets are lined with these amazing bamboo poles with offerings and little woven alters. I will see if I can’t get a photo in here to show you.

The power is off. I was working on a couple of jobs, one for the Hong Kong Sevens, I do a couple of corporate boxes there and my design for one of them came back telling me they wanted something a little ‘lighter’ & ‘more pleasant’, I mean it is Rugby people! But they are the clients and the other is for Amway China. They have an event in Melbourne later in the year. So the outage has forced me to take a break, coupled with the hounding by my brother Michael to get some additions to the blog I will generate some words about what has happened of late.

Gosh, it has been a while. Merry festive season people. May 2008 be more than you want it to be. The first month is already finished. Speaking of months. The fore sworn brother his wife Fluff and their 3 sons, Larry Curly and John were here for a month over the New Year. We took their house in Perth for 10 days of it. We got 40+ degree days and they got tropical rain and hot humid days. Fair swap me thinks. When we got back we drove first up to Ubud for a night, we ate at Naughty Nuri’s. Fantastic. The racks of ribs were unreal, and the cocktails, first class. Very weird sitting in a place no bigger than a warung having one of the worlds best frozen margaritas, next day we drove up to Lovina, Lovely sunsets, Fluff and Maxi swam with dolphins. Maxi thought the dolphin, was it Jack? Or John? Never mind, anyway he asked the guy in the water with him how many fins a dolphin had? He thought he had 4. In fact he had his keel extended. Anyway, both of them got a tad excited with Maxi.

From Lovina we drove east along the coast to Amed. We stayed at new bungalows owned by some Dutch parents from the boy’s school. It was nice and we snorkelled in the afternoon. Not my cup of tea but if you are a diver apparently it is the bees knees.

Started going out to Canggu again in the mornings. The wind blows in from the west during the wet, which is onshore out there. That wind has now started to swing. It also doesn’t blow as early. The swells are the next thing to change. We will see them building from now into April. Also I have to rid myself of the spare tire I built over the festive season and all the beer I drank. Michael, geeze he is getting a good plug here isn’t he? He has put me onto this soup diet, so I am at day 5 of just eating soup. Today I get to eat a piece of chicken, yippee! Looking forward to that. Not sure how much weight is going as we do not have scales but I feel alright. So a couple more days and then I will swing over to a Low GI (Which is the same thing just I get more variation) eating plan. But It is great to get up at 6 and ride the bike out to Canggu every day. So peaceful at that time of the morning. A lot of locals are about but they are going to work or home from work. Good thing about the low GI is I can have a glass of wine. It is also a week without a drink, which for me is a long time. I would have one a night at least. More over the break but I had it back to one since getting back from Thailand.

So the power is up and I think I had better get into it.

The Earth, My Butt, and Other Big Round Things

2007-11-26T11:27:00.000+11:00

..It is an actual book title, I loved it, the title that is. If ever a title has ever prompted me to read a book this one has. I think I will have to buy a copy!

Whew, it's late November already! Can you believe it. Seems only a couple of months ago that we came to Bali, and now our first year is coming to an end. There is nothing like that first year somewhere, I remember my first year in Sydney that was eye opening, then there was my first summer in Greece, and I did my first ski season in Lech, they were the ones that were special for the simple reason that they were so new. The newness of it all. This can't be felt again, we will become more and more comfortable here until familiarity takes over. Good and bad me thinks. I like the exotic, precisely because it is. We will begin to plumb the depths of the culture though and that will take us to different heights. Deep for a Monday morning. Must be the caffeine.

Well the big news this weekend would have to be that it definitely was Kevin 07. Kevin Rudd the Labor leader will be the new Prime Minister of Australia.

I designed several sets for the Labor party over the last couple of months, here is Kevin at one of my lecterns/sets, though you can not see much of that. Though we spent literally hours positioning those little New Leadership. stickers so they would appear exactly as you see it here. The things one does eh?

The other huge piece of news that has crossed our shores that I need to share with you is that Jacqui Gower is now 40. I know, I know, you should never mention a ladies age but she came up here with long time partner (Ain't that the truth) Simon Watts as well as Sydney friends Merrilee Pearce and her partner Grant Markert, taking residence in an exclusive villa in the quiet fishing village of Seseh. The trip wasn't without any hitches. Simon found out very last minute that he had less than 6 months to go on his passport and that the Indonesians were not happy about such things. That was a Saturday. He made time stand still extricating a new one out of the English consulate on the Monday and joined us here on the Tuesday afternoon heading directly from the airport to Jac's party. I thought it might be nice to meet him so together with their villa driver I went to the airport. He made customs very quickly and after the normal greetings I handed him an ice cold Bintang. Bali style and welcomed him to Bali. The villa was a good 50 minute drive at 4pm in the afternoon so we sat in the back of the car, supped our beers and caught up.

The night was amazing, it started off down on the beach watching the sunset from in between fishing boats on the sand. There was a very special bottle of champagne to be drunk, though the time and temperature weren't quite right. Back in the villa and after immersion in ice the time was right and we had a bottle of 1990 Bolly. Mango Daqueries followed and the Binnies were always within arms reach. We had our own private Gamelan playing beside the pool who were joined soon after by ladies from the local village who were our private dancers. Kitted our in full traditional garb. Even some of the local kids came in to watch and through some gentle coaxing by us had a dance. I think we all got up at one stage or another and waddled around, some more. Actually we all had a dance.

We ate like kings at this feast of seafood, curries, sates and even a roast duck. To say it was bliss would be an understatement. The night seemed to stand still from then on. Later the men adjourned to the beach to let off fireworks while the ladies lounged around the ample soft furniture of the villa. Gabi and I had to drive home at 11ish which was a small mission just there. Though we made it, obviously!

Merrilee and Grant left the following day, though we had time for one more sunset at Kudeta. This photo was slightly contentious. Grant was busily snapping away and Merrilee wasn't having a bar of it. I commented that it would be a great shot. And low and behold, it is. Well done that man, isn't that a great shot? Speaking of which, all the Bali images in todays post are from Grants personal website, I thank him for letting me use them to add some colour to these otherwise drab pages. It is so much easier for me to link than upload my own. Blogger has a bad tendency to 'timeout' when i try to upload images. Sometimes I can spend literally hours trying to get them from my desktop to your screen. I am trying to upload a photo of Rudd, see above, as I type this. I am on my 5th try. Really I have enough to do and don't need the frustration of... oops that one timed out as well. Lets have another go!

ED. I got to eight trys and got it up there! Yippee!!!!!!

Oh here is one more shot i wanted to nab. A great one with me and the two boys snapped at, would you believe it, a Moroccan restaurant up on Jalan Kunti in Oberoi. We have everything here don't we?

Take care.

Peace.

Just playing catchup...

2007-11-12T15:41:00.000+11:00

Well it has been a couple of weeks since I wrote so here are some words to bring you all up to speed.

Firstly, it is with great sadness to tell you all that this morning I snapped my McTavish Liberator To make matters worst. It was for a second time. It all happened when I was out in the water there in front of Kudeta. It was getting on, the tide was getting pretty high so I caught what I thought to be my last wave. Whizzing along on this hump of a thing. Made fat by the high tide, I thought what the hell I will ride it to the shore and tucked in for the cover-up as it shore dumped. Well It came out in two! Duh! What a stupid thing to do! Rule one: Do not ride 9'1" surfboards in shore dumps, they snap! Argh!

Lombok was, in a word, amazing. We flew there last Thursday afternoon, collecting the kids from school on the way. A combined birthday and getaway. We stayed in the south. A place called Kuta at the Novotel which was more than comfortable and our friends, Lorraine and her daughter Ally even managed to have a chocolate cake presented in the arvo on Friday with tunes sung by the staff. T'was a Touching moment!I was kind of distracted the entire time thinking about how good a place it would be to invest. The time is ripe for it. They are building an international airport there and when that is complete in 2010 (I would think more like 2014!!) it will become the new 2 week haven. Though it lacks a lot of Bali's 'mystical' charm it does more than make up for it in great surf spots, fantastic dive places and breath taking scenery. We shall see.

Speaking of moments here are an assortment of photos for your viewing pleasure.

The cake of course. Chock full of chocolate on Chocolate. The cake kept our kids company and fed for two days more. They would snack on it. The brown smears across the white bed sheets led me to believe they were also sleeping with it.
With icing that was about 1cm thick pure chocolate it was no wonder really! Oscar finished off the last bit on Sunday mid morning before we left the hotel. The cake that kept on keeping on!!

Here is the team that brought it to us, Lorraine and her daughter Ally. Ally is at AIS but in the high school. Her mum runs a wedding planners business up here. They have been to Lombok only about 30 odd times. Lorraine has actually brought a block in Kuta township.

Here is a bad montage of this beautiful bay that L&A took us to. They told us of days when they had come here to be the first people to put footprints in the sand. The day we were there it was a veritable highway of people coming and going. Someone is building a restaurant out there so in the words of a great sage... "There goes the neighbourhood!" But I have to add, what a picturesque place though!

After the beach we went to this restaurant on the side of the hill overlooking Kuta. The place is run by an Australian couple who have been there a long time, by the looks of the place. Great food but most of all, this amazing view of the bays heading east.

At the bay Maxi went body surfing with Lau. They paddled right out the back. Good work boys!! Here is a photo of the two of them the following day out at Grupuk. Maxi, Ally, Lau, Joko (He was our driver, see his photo below), and I went there early on Sunday morning. I rented a longboard, as did Ally. We all piled into one of these Indo outriggers and set out across the bay to one of the 5 breaks here. We surfed for the next two hours in small but great fun waves. Sue to my foot I hadn't been able to get it wet prior. As it was I had it bound.

Oscar found some kids to fly around with at the bay. There was about 4 of them that played soccer with the beach ball for about an hour. Oscar did terrorise the others a bit. Little bugger!

Here is that photo of Joko. If you are ever after a driver in Lombok. Give me a shout and I will give you his details. Great guy and a great price. He has an APV which got the 8 of us around very comfortably.

These two signs are one after another along the road from the Novotel into Kuta. I love them the way they are but the first one looks like 'full' might have been 'fuel' for a while which would have been even funnier!

In the heat of the moment

2007-10-30T11:46:00.000+11:00

Yesterday was one of those days you wouldn't wish upon your worst enemy.

Started out alright, quite good actually. One of the mothers from school had her birthday so we went over for coffee and cake. As she is married to a dutch man, the coffee was excellent. I am fussy when it comes to coffee. The cake, a lovely blueberry cheesecake was delicious.

Gabi dropped me home at around 11.45am and she set off for a massage appointment. A present from a friend for her birthday last month. I went down the shed and turned the computer on.

It was about then i started to feel light headed. Weird, sort of spaced out feeling. I was unable to concentrate on the screen, I couldn't hold what I was seeing in my minds eye. I thought I was coming down with the flu and shut down my computer and headed for the house. I lay down in the downstairs room and though I couldn't sleep, all that good coffee me thinks, I was able to just rest. Focusing on the inside of my eyelids was something I could do.

Gabi rang at one and wanted to know if I wanted to do lunch at this lovely little vego place called Colonial that we have found. I told her I was laying down and not feeling too terrific and so she came home.

With no apparent signs of the flu I was now getting worried that I might have dengue fever. A dreaded disease caused by the bite of a smaller variety of mosquito that feeds during the day. There is only 'supportive treatment' available. I drank two liters of Guava Juice, better than water, to maintain a high hydration level. If the platelet in the blood drop too low they will fly you out to Singapore or somewhere to give you a transfusion. This is in extreme cases. People are also known to have died from dengue shock syndrome. All in all, not a good look!

So I am a little worried. Gabi says she will go get the boys and then come back and take me to BIMC. It is a private hospital here in Bali to which we are members. We can go and receive free consultations and just pay for the drugs. Very western, lots of modern gear etc etc..

So by 3.30pm we do get to the doctor and I am feeling more lethargic by now, they take our details and I am taken for a prelim examination by a nurse who registers my vitals and blood pressure. All of which were good I might add.

Back out to the waiting room we sit and are soon ushered into an office with not one but two doctors, I think one was doing his prac here. We run through a verbal and physical examination and the doctor as well has an idea that it could be dengue as all other areas are clean. They are going to take some blood and check. With that done I thought I would kill two birds with one stone and have him look at the sea ulcer on my right big toe which had begun to look a little festered of late.

It is on the top of the knuckle of the big toe and gets bumped almost every time I take off on a wave. He prescribes some cream for it.

We go outside to wait again.

They come back and tell me that the blood they took was 'lazy' seems that the needle was too thin and didn't give them some of the things they were looking for. Sorry to be vague but I was feeling very light headed by now. So they take another sample, this time from the left arm with a needle that you could drive an articulated vehicle through.

We go for one more wait outside. The doctor, the real one, comes over and tells us to ring in about 4 hours to see the results. If the platelet count is below 100 expect to be admitted to hospital.

We go home and I lay on the couch. The boys are watching a Hotwheels cartoon. Soon I start to shiver. Cold flushes run through me top to bottom. It is 28 degrees out and I have two rugs on and still cold flushes wrack my body. This is not fun. I am drinking Guava juice like it is going out of fashion. As suddenly as they started the flushes stop and I start to sweat. Not a little but a lot. I am wet through. I take my temperature it's 39.2! I take two more Panadol and rug up. We eat. At 7.15 I take my temperature again and it has dropped a degree to 38.3 We still have to wait nearly an hour before we can ring them. I am both dreading the call and looking forward to the part where I know for certain. Finally at 8pm Gabi makes the call.

Seems that the abscess on my big toe might have been the culprit. They tell Gabi that it's not dengue but a blood infection, talk about relief! While it is still a bad thing it isn't as bad as i had been thinking.

Hanging on all of this was whether we were going to go to Lombok or not. We have tickets booked to fly on Thursday night. We have the best villa at the Novotel Lombok booked, a friend who goes organised it for us, got a great price. In fact turns out she will also now go over with her daughter. Gabi says she is a little poofed she gave us her villa as she calls it. We know she is joking and besides, it's my birthday on Friday, not hers.

Peace!

An applogy!

2007-10-18T12:19:00.003+10:00

For Gabi's birthday I posted a shot of 'everyone', out at Canggu, Echo Beach. Unfortunately it wasn't everyone, far from it! Most importantly Gabi wasn't in the photo, nor for that matter was Margie or any of the kids.

Sorry my love! It was the opnly photos i took with my phone.

Here instead is a photo from lunchtime taken at Kudeta, again I think I am in the water but you have from L-R, David, Jeremy, Margie, GABI, Oscar and William. Ros must have been taking the photo.

Peace

Pictures speak loudly...

2007-10-18T10:59:00.000+10:00

So that people do not think we spend our lives on a beach here are some more or less normal photos of us and friends. We do work here you know!

This is for Fluff, she loves a good piccy.

Maxi has found a first love. Not that one, not yet I think, hey he has plenty of time for that, what I mean is acting. Just recently he was one of the principals in Seussical Jr. a mish mash of Dr Seuss stories. He was the narrator, the Cat in the Hat. Maxi brought the character alive. His actions and cheekiness were exactly what the part called for. Takes a lot of guts to stand there and sing not only in front of his peers but hundreds of their mums and dads. I was more than proud of him. Well done my son!

He has now joined the local theatrical society and is auditioning for parts in "High School Musical" More on this later.

Oscar and I are showing off for the camera. Nice teeth grit son! 2 weeks ago we took possession of a new bike. A Suzuki Thunder, all rockin 125 cc of it. The Thunder is a motorbike style as opposed to the scooter style which is very prolific here. The scooter makes me slouch and I get a sore lower back. Will get a surf board rack fitted in the next week or so and will then be able to drive out to Canggu without making the family catch public transport.

As I have said in previous entries, we have had a rash of visitors across this last August - October period.
Here is a shot of the kids hamming it up at the shopping centre. The little girl is Lena. We met her when Maxi and her were just babies together in Balmain. Her parents,who are also German (yes the tie!) and were in Australia as her dad was the Manager of Ikea Australia at the time. They came to Bali for a month to hang and do something different to living in Stockholm, where they are living now. Don't you think she could be sister to Max here? Dead ringers!! Yes they are scary hats the kids are wearing, looks like the sugar has already kicked in with Oscar. Free stylin!

Here is another blast from the past. Ros and Gabi. These guys met when we had Maxi, they were in the same Mothers group in Balmain. Now Ros, David her husband, William the son they have 3 days younger than Maxi Oliver and the newish daughter Rose live in Singapore and have been there the last 5 years or so. Was great to catch up, if only for 3-4 days.

Lounging is an art at Kudeta. Here is a piccy of Jeremy and Margie going for the title. I think I could have been in the water with Max when this photo was taken. It was after lunch on Gabi's birthday if i am not mistaken. Can't be late as that drink looks like a juice not something with punch. Speaking of punch! We had a huge night there with Mikey and Em last Saturday night, thanks for dinner guys. You shouldn't have! They left the next day back to Broome. The island life is settling back into routine.

Sally, Tim, Lotte and Ava were here just prior to Jez and Margie. Here is a shot of Maxi who surprised me with being so into babies. She really did have a good time in his arms. There is a stripey shirt in this here photo, someones trademark? hmmmm, must be Tim's, yes?

Maxi isn't the only one around here into babies. The Balinese love babies annd this shot shows it. Here is Ava again stunning and entertaining the crowd, this time it is Komang and Made. Komang, who is heavily pregnant in this photo, left last week for 3 months to have her second child. Our love and well wishes go after her. She will return in the new year to help us with our life when we move out of here and into next door. Currently a friend of hers, Ketut is helping us with the place here.

Here is a photo of Made and his family. He asked Gabi the other day if she could do some prints with our printer and hence we have the digital photo. It is a festival in their village and they all look amazing in their traditional dress. The babie here is also so cute. An interesting thing, they do not put a baby down for the first 6 months of it's life. Someone is always carrying it. They believe that there are bad spirits on the floor and that the baby is susceptible at this age.

Lastly a photo of Gabi and myself. Sorry it is a couple of months old, but Gabi sent it to me with all of these others so I will whack it in there. Gosh we are looking a tad black here aren't we? I am sporting some facial fuzz too.

Right here is another photo. That one was too dark. We went to a white wedding the other week, this is a photo of us prior to leaving the house, so now you have some contrast here. Sorry it was evening and Maxi was using my camera, I think perhaps it might have been too heavy for him.

Well that is our lot. So much has happened and will continue to do so. Can not believe that we have been living here for ten months now. Our lives move on like the water in a stream never stopping mixing, mingling, taking different paths and to tell all about such a life would in itself rob us of the life we are yet to live.

Hope you enjoy these snapshots and know that not all is a holiday when you live in paradise.

Peace

Something blue....

2007-10-13T13:05:00.000+10:00

eM&M are still here until tomorrow. But I can say, normality is finally coming home to roost. What a big August/September. Even my work flow, which is pretty hectic at this time of the year anyway, has been out of control. Even went to Singapore last week! Staying all of one night, hehe! Quick in and out.
I had meetings both days. Got a new 300mm lens for my camera, perhaps now we can start to take surfing shots again and a porta cot. More on that later! And no we are not up the duff!

Got my new surfboard last Wednesday night, you know the one I won in the GSI tell us in 500 words or less how Surfing has changed your life. As you can imagine, was more than a little excited. Funnily enough I forgot about the time and it wasn’t until I received a text from Dan at 11.45pm, GSI’s international courier (Actually he is the Intl. Business Development Manger, and because he was coming up here to see the local wholesaler he got the job to drag the board with him) Anyway, his text said "are you still coming?"
BUGGER! So I immediately replied, "in car about 10 minutes off" and belted for the car. Made Jalan Sunset in about a minute and a half and for the first time since we got the Blue beast I opened it up on the near deserted dual lane carriageway. I am happy to report it will do the tonne sitting on it’s head. Got to that big statue in the centre of the round about right in front of the Planet Hollywood/ Galleria and swung the jeep around it pointing down Jalan Bypass, direction Nusa Dua and once again floored it. Off she when. Next thing I knew the right hand to swing towards the airport was approaching so I slowed a tad but with a clear oncoming lane I didn't have to stop, rather I slid it around the corner at about 70. Handled beautifully, there was a fair bit of body roll but you expect that from Yank tanks. Accelerated and staying in the left lane zoomed through the next lights onward.

Made the airport in under 10 minutes from home. Not bad I reckon! Thank god there isn’t a speed camera in Bali. And if there is, thank god they lost the instruction booklet.

Anyway, Maxi and I have been down the beach paddling the last two mornings. The waves are small which normally would be bad, but the SuperFish seems to just grab onto them and gives me this stable yet maneuverable work platform so that I am able to in turn ride it. Amazing in fact. I hope that it only preforms as good or better in larger surf. I might be one of these born again surfers who go out and preach the word according to Global Surf Industries. Actual now that I mention this their logo does look like some 70’s roman catholic graphic the Jesuits use to come at us with in my youth. Perhaps I have uncovered something here?

Time will tell.

Hey the printer has just spat the GW's Samari Suduko out, Jeremy, bless his polyester socks, scanned and sent me todays from the Good Weekend, which is the magazine lift out in the Saturday edition of the Sydney Morning Herald.

So rather than continue this dribble I am going to get into it while Gabi and boys are out.

Peace

The end is neigh! or not!

2007-10-09T12:14:00.000+10:00

The last of the visitors for this couple of months have left. Mikey & Em are still up the road at the Sofitel, but I have retaken the shed as my base of operations. The computers are all set up and I am back in business.
Margie and Jeremy were up here last week for a wedding over at Kudeta, Sally, Tim, Lottie and Ava were here two weeks prior for a 40th, Ros, David, William, Oliver and Rose left this morning back to Singapore.

A good time was had by all. But it doesn't stop there, though we thought it would.

Gus will be here at the end of the month, he is driving some boat up this way and he emailed that his contract ends here in Bali's Benoa Harbour, handy! Jackie and Simon are coming through for 2 days mid November to celebrate Jackie's 40th up here. Oops, I suppose I shouldn't mention ages eh? Too late! So there is still a trickle.

Speaking of birthdays Gabi had hers on Sunday. Not going to make the same mistake twice in one post though. No ages! We had breakfast at Kudeta which drifted towards lunchtime. Then about 4pm we drove to Canggu, Echo Beach and had dinner a couple of Bintangs and a nice sunset. Drove Margie and Jez to the airport and an early night. Photos of sunset and the gang!

Jeremy brought the Saturday Sydney Morning Herald up and I am happy to say that I was able to work out the Samuri Suduko while I was in the thinking room. Yeah, yeah, I know I hear enough feedback from my wife about that. But it is therapeutic, ok? Hey can someone in Sydney please check my answers?

So that is it for another couple. Off to Singapore in a matter of hours. Just an overnighter to freshen my visa and see the client about some different works.

Take care.
Peace

Simpson me off

2007-09-11T20:10:00.000+10:00

It take the money of the multinationals to sometimes unearth a quirky toy. Or pay for some soda drinking snack bar devouring Flash developers to come up with one!

Simpsonizeme.com is one such Site. With the bucks form the King of Burgers, work it out! The site lets you upload your photo and presto, a yellow faced version of yourself.

I might shave next time! Oh and take off my reading glasses!

You can even tour springfield and take some virtual holiday snaps. For those of us who work at these machines a nice distraction from the daily grind of email, accounts and what we each call work!

It is fun and I am recommending to my kids to give it a whirl.

Why don't you?

Peace

What time has done to Bali!

2007-09-05T10:27:00.000+10:00

How much has Bali changed in nearly 30 years I hear you ask? Some people will never know but through the power of popular culture we can turn back the hands of father time and show you a quick glimpse.

Well some of us will remember the Redgum song "I've been to Bali too" I found it on YouTube and thought I would link it here. I was blown away by the shots of Kuta. Looks like Canggu or Tanah Lot now!

It's a fun song either way.Enjoy!

Peace

He's a horror movie character

2007-09-04T16:05:00.000+10:00

And with that I would like to introduce, Chucky.

Our new guard dog. Urm, he is asleep in the corner as i type this. The guy tends to sleep about 3-4 hours during the day. Must be because he is up all night guarding us mustn't it?

Sick em Chucky!

Peace!

Must have done something right!

2007-08-28T13:28:00.000+10:00

This morning started like most. Got up, had a coffee went to the loo and took the kids to school. After dropping them off at 7:50 I kept driving out of town towards Cangu and my favorite surf spot. I hadn't been there in about 3 weeks so it would be good to catch up with the guys whether there was surf or not.
As luck would have it there was a 5-6 set coming through and I had a great surf and catchup. Left the beach, knowing I had a lot of work ahead today. I was burning the candle at both ends. Stopped off for croissants came home made another soya latte and with breakfast in hand headed to the guest house, the shed, to start work.
Went through all my emails and was just about to get into it when I noticed one in the Junk mail folder.
An advert for longer penises, bigger breasts or more money was sure to be there. But to 'unhighlight' the whole inbox I would have to delete it.
The subject was "congratulations" I thought I had won yet another one of the European lotteries and would only have to send them my bank details to get it. I clicked on it and in the second I had before my finger hit the delete key I noticed it was from Global Surf Industries.
I had entered their competition the other day. I wrote 500 words about how surfing changed my life in an effort to win a surfboard a year for the next ten years. Not a bad first prize eh?
Well I wasn't quite that lucky but I was one of the 25 runners up who has gone and won themselves a new surfboard.
Now I just have to figure out which one! And I have so much other stuff to do today!
Check out my submission here!
Click on the Yellow box on the bottom and scroll until you see my name. Oh, I am the only winner living in Bali which is kind of cool!

Carpe diem

2007-08-25T12:27:00.000+10:00

Why is it that all of my little discourses come with some sort of pre curser?

Well this one should be no different. With that sorted I would like to move on to go over the little business trip that I made to Thailand a couple of weeks ago.

I do this for a couple of reasons. Firstly I want to silence my critics who think that it was nothing more than a junket and that no actual work was preformed. Well you know who you are people. Yes you, the one who thinks I just get my holidays paid for. The second and probably better reason is to show the lengths that we go to make sure that our customers are well serviced. I am a pro! That’s it. I know you do not get to see it very often but I am living and breathing. A walking talking Pro! Bask in my glow. Or not, your call. We did a lot, so I am not going to get out of this with a few words. Best get comfortable and read on…

So after the little episode of the disappearing camera, see below, I left home in the back of a taxi. I do not think I said a word to the driver. My thoughts were chaotic. Seemingly in the blink of an eye we were at the airport. I bundled out, checked in, checked out of the country and sat down at the café/bar where one can enjoy a beer and a ciggie in quiet comfort. It took two of each before they called our flight. I waited for the crowd to disappear and be lined through and onto the plane. The trip was uneventful. I sulked and dozed. On getting to Singapore I made my way to the Skytrain that joins terminal 1 with 2 and went to terminal two. I checked in at the transit hotel and bid a pretty average day goodnight.
Woke at 6 and showered, made my way downstairs, collected a coffee and headed for the camera shop. Good thing about airports, they are wide-awake at 7am. So it was at an hour where most of Singapore still slept that I purchased a new Nikon Digital SLR. The D80.

Met up with the Techmexicans, Scott, Domino and Shirley then the 4 of us flew to Bangkok to start our MS OEM tour.

We arrived and headed to the Bangkok Hilton, I think there is a song about that. Though this Hilton is a brand new glassy structure with the full groovy interior. Was awarded an executive suite for my troubles and after I checked the toilet, bath and view, not in that order I don’t think. I scooted downstairs to have lunch with the others. We buffeted for an hour or so catching up with John then site inspected the Hilton. We looked at a couple of their restaurants, their meeting facilities and a couple of their rooms. We looked at their executive level, their pool area (worked out how to have a great cocktail reception their) and then their spa. We finished around 3.20pm and the hotel arranged a boat for us across the river to look at the Shangri-La. Actually we were to look at a mock-up room for the Shangri_la in Chiang Mai. In all my years of inspecting hotels I have never been taken to the carpark, walked down a level taken over to some timber walls and then asked to remove me shoes before proceeding into this complete hall mock-up of the hotel they are building in Chiang Mai. It was weird and interesting all at the same time. Very Shang! The style of the room, not being led through a car park.

I had a bit of time so I made a Be line for the Apple Store where I needed an Apple power point, I had put mine in the front of my camera bag and now someone else owned it! A$25 later I owned one that I can only ever use in Thailand, handy! I was a little depressed; I had some time so I thought I would window shop some. Ambling along gazing around this glass edifice I wandered past a Ripcurl shop to find that they had a sale on. There was obviously something in there I needed, though I just didn’t know what. I am thinking Retail Therapy here. I mumbled hi as I passed the threshold. I thought the girl behind the counter was sitting down then she came round my side and I saw she was only 4’ something. Amazing, she was perfectly proportioned.
I was standing by the watch cabinet when she came up beside me and told me they were all reduced 30%. Really! I replied looking down at her. I oogled the tide predicting watches that could tell you when were and how big the tide was at 1000 pre-programmed beaches for the next 99 years, handy! Hmm handn’t I just had a similar thought?
I then asked for a look and this petite Thai lady again amazed me as she dragged the solid Titanium watch from the case. She used both hands to carry it. The therapy was going well until I caught view of the price tag, Geez! I could get someone to text me the tide everyday for the rest of my life for less than that!
I gave it back telling her how fab it would look on her arm, better yet, she could wear it on her upper arm. She wasn’t amused. To dodge the dagger eyes she was sending I shifted my gaze back to the cabinet and it shifted down a shelf and then another. There on the 3rd shelf was a similar, though this time a stainless behemoth. The real difference, not only the steel, was the workings. This one just told you when high and low tide were. The price was a lot easier to swallow and I told her that she was an amazing salesperson and if it weren’t for her incredible personality I wouldn’t have brought it. Penny dropped around then and she smiled. She realised that I needed to purchase this as part of my therapy. We parted, we had to. It would never have worked out. I was married she was very tiny.
I joined the parades of people and made my way towards the taxi stand. The therapy had worked a treat and I was heading back to the hotel. It was getting late and we were looking at a offsite dinner venue called Dome.
Back in the hotel I showered, shaved and put on glad rags. I tried to wear shoes but my left foot was still a mass of scratches from the surf trip. This would prove a problem later on…
We went to Dome. It is on top of the State tower, about 55 floors I think. You get out of the lift in a Bar called Distil. You can go upstairs to their ‘fine dining’ experience, catch the lift to the Dome their function room or out onto the balcony to Sirocco, the highest outdoor restaurant in the world. If you get a chance to eat there do! It is a lovely experience and though not everyone raved about their meals, the scallops were lovely! Day 2 and breakfast in the executive lounge, The view out the window was amazing. About 270 degrees of the skyline is visible up here. It is a city that stretches from horizon to horizon, even this high in the sky. We viewed a couple more of the rooms that were not available to us the day before, checked out and headed to the airport. Flight TG 1213 arrived in Phuket at 15:25 we were met with a van and we checked into the JW Marriot. We had the obligatory cool towel and juice (one of the better juices on the whole trip). We dropped our bags grabbed our bits and commenced the site visit. We looked at a number of room types, conference facilities and their spa. We also wandered the extensive grounds looking at areas suitable to have dinners for the 150 people that will attend our event. John had a massage booked for him at 5pm and the rest of us met in the coffee shop. Scott and I had a beer while the ladies had softies. It was Domino’s birthday and I ordered a chocolate tart with a candle in it for her. Ulterior motives, I wanted to try the tart! We retired to our rooms, showered cleaned up and met transport in the lobby to take us the nearly hour drive into Phuket town. We were booked for dinner in at Baan Rim Pa. Our table was a cantilevered section of the veranda hanging out of the rocks. Waves crashed on them below us and a constant 10 knot breeze that made both brushing your hair and mozzie spray redundant.
We went into Pantang after dinner. Again I oogled and after one beer we were on the road heading back to the hotel. I was in bed before midnight.
Woke, went back to sleep and didn’t wake again. I then woke at 9am right when we were suppose to be checked out and heading to site recce the Sheraton. I dove through the shower, threw everything in my bag and off we headed to the Sheraton over at Lagoona Bay. Oops!
We wandered around there with the event Manager Gordon. He knew his stuff and even though the place is massive by 11am we were back in the mini bus for the short hop to the Banyan Tree. This place is lovely. The group that is renown for their spas has some lovely accommodation as well./ All of it is villa style. It ranges from very expensive to astronomical. We were driven, golf cart is de rigueur, from villa to villa being more and more amazed. There are a couple though that have a view across some water at a building site (They are building new villas) you would be unhappy if you paid your US$2.5k a night and got those ones! The villas either look over the lagoons or the golf course. We were then taken into the spa, which is where it all began for Banyan tree, we viewed a couple of consultation rooms and lunched around the pool. Yummy! We had to eat quickly as our van departed for the airport at 2.40pm. We scoffed it and ran. The plane was late. We sat bellies bulging back to Bangkok airport. Now this is weird. You pull up at an umbilical come out of the plane, are led down the stairs to a bus, driven over to domestic arrivals, go up transfer to Chiang Mai, go to a gate down to a bus, driven to another umbilical walk up the stairs through the tunnel and onto the aircraft! What the &^%#!
So we flew off to Chiang Mai. We arrived and were driven to the Mandarin Oriental (MO) Dhara Devi. This was the bit of the trip I had been looking forward to., I had done a gig at this place in April, but had not stayed there. This was 6 star. I wanted to see what gave it that one star difference.
The place is beautiful. The rooms, we were in Colonial Suites, John had a villa. They are finished to a level of detail rarely found at peoples homes, let alone a hotel. I logged on and did some mail, washed and made my way to the Akaligo, which is the Italian restaurant they have inhouse. We had to go to the horn bar afterwards for Mojitos and some banter. We breakfasted and started the site inspection at 9. This place sits on 68 acres and it was raining at different points during the day. It took awhile. We finished off the site inspection with Lunch at the Chinese Restaurant there, the Fujian. Impeccable, Peking Duck is not to missed. A highlight for any trip for me! From there we were going to the Shangri-La, remember the car park in Bangkok? To do a Hard Hat inspection. Weird going into a hotel when it is 5 months away from being finished. But looking at even the unfinished shell one is immediately impressed with it’s conference facilities, it’s number of room styles and the sheer size of the place. It’s big!
We returned to the MO and for the first time in a coupe of days actually had an hour to myself. I made he most of it and went for a swim. As I dove in and did a slow breaststroke along the bottom of the pool towards the distant end I suddenly realised that the pool had speakers in it. Aqua speakers, man it is cool to swim under water and listen to vibes. Pity they do not do diving courses in there.
That night we ate Thai at their Thai restaurant, Le Grand Lhanna and afterwards let off a number of hot air balloons. This is great fun and can be done by anyone at the tourist destinations in Chiang Mai. We want John to experience it as it is very different. These things are big! After that we retired to the Horn Bar and stepped up the pace from the night before. I remember wrestling Scott to throw him the pool but I do not know the time. It was early!
We left the hotel at 9, I was not at all well. We headed up into the mountains for Elephant Trekking. It is pretty cool, but when you are dehydrated and nursing a head ache well lets just say I wanted to click my heels together, say there is no place like home and Puff, be gone.
Wasn’t to be and I suffered silently through the 2 or so hours atop the wilderbeast.
I drifted off to sleep in the back seat of the mini bus as we drove to the MO. We lunched, collected our bags and made our way to the 4 Seasons. Funnily enough we had just driven past it coming in from the Elephant ride. Duh!
We checked in, quickly and begun our recce of the establishment.
Love a good buggy ride, round and round we went. The 4 Seasons is a lovely 5 star place and we all had our own separate villas. Again built on a sprawling block of land and catering for rich to richer it somehow still wasn’t enough to spark my interest after having stayed at the MO for the last two days. Funny how we become immunised to this stuff. But, reality check we were there to do this very job. We looked, sampled, and photographed all of them to be in a position to make an educated decision.
We finished the tour at about 5.30pm and John once again made his way to the spa and the massage. One of us had to try them all, hard job. Hey if I was the client I would have made it my task as well. The rest of us got freshened up, changed clothes and made our way to the Elephant Bar for sevensies. We were invited by the manager to the cooking school with some other guests to watch the chef make some tidbits while we sipped wines or cocktails. Once he finished we ate the canapé type offerings. I thought it was a wonderful idea and will use it for an event one day. We made our way to the restaurant overlooking the rice paddies for dinner. I had a lovely risotto with wild mushrooms. Yum! We retired back to the Elephant bar where I set up my laptop and we watched South Park on the deck there until we one by one drifted off to bed.
Morning saw me heading to the Spa at 8.30am for an hours massage, ahhhh, ooooo, eeeee. I had been waiting for my turn. Though the hour could have been better.
We met in the breakfast room and began the digging through of places. Dissecting one resort after the other. Fitting the 4 events John had to run n the space of a week into each city and then into each hotel.
Finally an order of events was confirmed and the hotels came after that. While I would love to tell you which ones we chose I think it prudent to keep the information confidential for the time being.
That afternoon we boarded our last mini bus for the airport. We flew to Bangkok. There the ladies left us and kept on heading to Singapore. John, Scott and I got off at Bangkok.
John was to fly out at 6am the following morning so Scott and I thought we should at least keep him company. The MO Bangkok, had kindly provided two rooms for us, I shared with Scott, they were completely full otherwise. We just had to do one more recce of the hotel. Sort of paying for it in kind. The Oriental is the O in MO. The Mandarin part was the Hotel in Hong Kong. They joined forces and the Mandarin Oriental group was born. The manger of the Oriental is this amazing 70-year-old bloke who had been there for the last 40 years! Imagine that. Working and living in the same hotel for so long! I had never heard of it.
We met some friends of Scott’s for dinner atop the Banyan Tree Hotel, which was the highest outdoor restaurant until Sirocco was opened up the road. Bugger eh?
The food is better and it isn’t so full on. Lovely meal, nice wine good night. We then took John to Patpong Road. Something one should always do once in their life. We went to a bar and funnily were not hassled too much. We drank a beer and then perused the markets. We went home and were off before midnight. Weird!
Next morning we checked out and rode in the back of a seven series to the airport. I read newspapers, Scott mail on his phone. We checked in and lo and behold were upgraded to business to Singapore.
Got on the plane and into the big seat only to have Scott hassle me to help him with some plans he needed for his house reno in Adelaide. Just as I finished said plans, oh and I fitted in a lunch of Beef Cheeks too, yeah I drank a couple of glasses of champagne and a glass of a lovely French Chardonnay, just before I was about to do something fun, then the seatbelt sign came on and we got ready for landing in Singapore. Drat, drat and double drat!

So we pulled into Singapore. We went through customs and then I had to go back to Terminal One and go back through. Jetstar/ValueJet are low cost carriers and will not pay the money to have your bags forwarded by other airlines, hence I had to clear customs! No biggie, I had time to kill. Perused the shops for a while, grabbed the obligatory bottle and boarded what would be the last leg of this whirlwind trip.
I arrived home almost exactly 7 days after I left. I had stayed in 5 hotels and seen another 6. Caught 8 planes had 14 meals in restaurants and probably drank about 40 mojitos.
Not for the faint hearted this is hard work people!

Peace!

Another Lost Soul!

2007-08-24T16:51:00.000+10:00

Here are the Photos of that Premier I knew I had on the computer somewhere. Maxi skillfully snapped this baby as I drove past. I looked across as we past them and saw that there was no dash at all! Looks like a work in progress or perhaps something they deemed not particularly necessary???

Old Holderns do not die, they sea change to Bali

2007-08-24T12:00:00.001+10:00

Spotted this the other day while we were over at Ace Hardware. So far I have seen another EK red one down at the airport end of Jl. Raya Kuta, a HR Ute which someone has monster trucked, must get a photo of that one, an EH convertible which is in the Surf shop on your right as you head down towards Nusa Dua. The place with the statue of the god on a surfboard! Ok, ok I will photograph that one as well. And the other week we spotted a premier that I have a photo of somewhere, Max took it.

Enough Holdern talk, I have to get back to work.

Peace!

Sporadic Scribbles. The Surf-ari!

2007-08-13T13:34:00.000+10:00

This is going to read quite strange for I wrote this about 10 days ago while still on the boat. Unfortunately I never finished it then we had the little problem with the Mr Stealth, read below after that it was off to Thailand, where I had originally thought I would find those few minutes I needed to finish crafting this story for you only to find those in-between time taken up with flat laptop batteries, meetings about run orders, doing a friends bathroom floorplan adjustments and simply relaxing.

But I am going through my laptop and rather than let the words go to waste and another day slip by without filling the ether that is my Blog I thought I would whack this into shape and get it up there.

It will also give me an opportunity to put some surf photos up there. Hehe! So here is the story of my first SURFari…

Here is a shot of me slotted at the place I am not allowed to talk about.

Again sporadic scribbles from yours truly. I know, I know there is no need to chastise me for I am a slack bugger. I seem to only write in the off times. The down times between sets one could say. Did I? Here is something that I wrote the other day while I had some downtime but alas no Internet connection…

I am on deck, it’s warm, a breeze is blowing in onto my back and the music from my laptop breaks the otherwise stillness of the lagoon in which we are moored. the other guys are either on the left out at the point, the inside left or in their cabins. The right-hander in this aptly named Bay of Plenty is alas too shallow but I will grace its shoulders for one last surf this afternoon. For I am writing this in-between the morning surf session and the afternoon one. The off time.

We are on a surf safari, a 110’ boat called the Indo Jiwa. Unfortunately our time here is nearly at an end and the six of us will drift back to our own little worlds. The list is Simon Leary, Paul Anderson, Greg, These guys are all from Sydney then there is Channas mate Mill-Dog he is a 55 Californian that was living in Hawai and now seems to call Uluwatu home, and Channa, the owner of the boat oh and finally yours trully. There are 7 crew, Indonesians, who are the men in the background. They make this whole ship work and cook the amazing meals which are placed in front of us at least 4 times a day.

Ten days ago we set out from Gunung Sitoli, which is the airport on Nias. A little island off the coast of Sumartra. Overland for 2 hours in a bump ride that left Soimon high and dry for the next two days down to a spot called Teluk Delam which is a little harbour in the south of the Island. It was here we boarded the boat and overnight sailed around the southern tip past the famous Lagundri Beach (which had a reported 50-70 guys in the water!) up to another even smaller group of islands off the West Coast .
We moored at about 2am near a break called Bawa that is intimidating at the best of times let alone the first day of our surf tour. It rumbled through in the morning and I wondered what I had let myself into.

Good thing was I was not the only one who had second thoughts about this huge bone-snapping wave and we sailed on to the tiny island of Asu. It is here that Channa, our skipper, his wife Ruby and their 3 kids live. It is early and we are on a surf safari so after the crew, has the boat moored out the front of Ruby and Channa’s place, we all bundle into the tender for an hour drive up the coast to this amazing right hander. It doesn’t have a name and we have all been threatened with black magic curses if we ever divulge it’s where about. Suffice to say that we spent the next 4 days going back to the same spot honing our skills and then dragging ourselves spent from the water after 3 hour sessions and eating second breakfasts prepared earlier by the amazing cook on board the Indo Jiwa, Yanko. Guys a genius! I must go sideways a tad here to say that I originally thought I might lose some weight in the 10 days aboard the boat, but I think I have put on about 2 kilos even though I am surfing a minimum of 3 hours a day! We ate so well. BBQ fish in banana leaves, Pasta’s even pizzas one night. Fantastic food and though I hadn’t thought so before, a very important aspect to any trip like this.

So where were we, ah yes the trip to the spot we ended up calling “The left hander” was great for all but Simon who was a goofy footer, a left hander. The fifth morning we set out for a place also north of Asu called Afulu. We rounded the headland and there were already 4 guys in the water. It was the left Simon had been holding out for.

Turned out Channa knew a couple of them. One is the ex-head of Surf-Aid for Nias. So we surfed this great left that left scars I am still smarting over. After a big hold down during which time I tried to surface using my arms only I kicked out and I kicked the reef.

Nias reefs were raised about a metre in the 2005 earthquake. So the breaks are now in different spots. Where we are surfing the waves wouldn’t have broken before and even at high tide dead coral sticks out of the water. It was some of this shallow inside reef that I kicked. The outer section, though it was fast and hollow, was deep enough so that one didn’t need booties. Gosh, that was a trap for young players!

The next day we revisited the same break and guess what. I didn’t wear booties again, I got caught inside again and I kicked the reef one more. Hhmmm. Thick as two short planks I am.

Suffice to say that although it now hurt when I put them, due to cuts on top of my left foot, I wore booties for the rest of the trip! You never know!

The day before we had finished our Holiday With Purpose. Finished what I hear you say? Let me explain. Ruby & Channa run this Holiday with Purpose out of Asu. In exchange for a few hours a day you get a cheaper trip. The work you do is for the local community. He runs fibreglass boat building, she does community gardens, and they also look at community buildings. A school I hear is in the offing!. So it was a great add on for us. At first I had thought we might build canoes or buildings. You know big butch stuff. Though in the end we put in about 4 vegie patchs for different folk. These were more than equally important. Read here what I wrote about it on their site.

So we had actually sailed to Afulu in the Indo Jiwa. After that second surf there and a spot of lunch we upped anchor saying goodbye to Nias and steaming north for 12 hours to the Banyaks. A couple of islands that sit off the coast of North Sumatra. Actually I am looking at a map in Mappoint and they are off the southern tip of Aceh.
Sometime after midnight we had pulled into a cove and awoke to an aptly named wind blown out Treasure Island. So it was in the light of dawn that we headed east to the larger of the two islands and another Aptly named harbour, the Bay of Plenty.

The Bay of Plenty consists of a Left Point Break, a Right Point Break and a Left that breaks in the bay itself. Add to that a fresh water spring Channa showed me while the boys were netting bait fish for the afternoons fishing expedition, the tribe of monkeys that were making a cacophony of noise as we sheltered waters from a storm and you have exactly that, A Bay of Plenty.

We spent the next 4 days here surfing lefts, rights, some more rights, snorkeling and fishing. I could come to this one place! What a fantastic spot. In the evenings fishermen would come into the bay. There boats are no wider than a canoe, though they are about 40’ long. Not even an outrigger! These guys are in the middle of the ocean! Respect!

We would sit on the deck of our behemoth enjoying BBQ wrapped fish, drinking ice cold Bintangs daily feats or surf-ploits filled the darkness of the night, the rock of the ship on the ocean set the beat, laughter at the incidents were the punctuation. The waves got big and scarier with each telling.

Then it was over. Like that. 6am one morning we are being shuttled off the boat to the mainland. 10 days had left us with sea legs so we swayed like drunks on the dock. It would continue all day and into the next. A lovely reminder of the journey we had shared.

So that was the holiday of a lifetime, though I am seriously thinking about going back next year.

Wonder what my darling wife will have to say about that. “Honey? Can we talk?”

Here are some photos of the events

Enjoy

Peace!

Here is one of me blasting along at the bay of plenty

Ando in the barrel, if you look closely at his face you will see it split with the biggest grin. Loving life, go son!

Grego Bouncing off the lip. What can I say that this image doesn't? Genius!

Simon looking relaxed in the barrel. Actually Simon's back had pinged as he stood up on this wave and he was in a lot of pain when this was taken. He makes it and the last photo in this sequence he is standing on his board holding his back. Ouch!

Again the place sorted out the players, Grego with a big cutback at the right hander, Bay of Plenty.

Ando looking like he has an afro. He borrowed Mill-dog's surf hat.

Doesn't show the nice re-entry that he pulled off but he's still having fun!

Warnings from Paradise

2007-08-09T11:46:00.000+10:00

So anyway it is last Sunday evening and we are all at home. I had packed my bags as I had a 10.15pm flight to Singapore where I would stay overnoght and then fly early the following morning up to Bangkok.I would have to leave the house just after 8pm to get to the airport.

I had packed everything and we were having a quiet beer with the "Vons" our South African neighbours Michele and Louie, and another couple Arienne & Toby who are marring in Jan next year, she is half American and French. He is Australian and about 10 years her junior. Perfect match! But I digress. We are sitting laughing and carrying on. At 7.50pm I went upstairs and said night to the boys, they were watching a DVD in my bedroom. I came down again and right on the left of the door, where the telephone table is I notice that my 3 bags were now 2. Of course I went straight into panic mode, where was my camera bag. I use the NikonD70 with a 25-80 and a 80-300. Couple of batteries, filters blah blah, so quite a little investment in one bag. I went to the office to see if I had left it in there as I had stuck the power cables for my laptop in the front of the camera bag. Nope not there either. I am really panicking now. I was about to fly overseas on a recce of 3 hotels in Bangkok, 3 in Phuket and 3 in Chiang Mai. I take on average 100 photos while in a hotel. Some of these resorts I take as many as 200 and then there is all the mood images I take which I then try to work into the event theme thereby saving on image purchase fees. It is an important tool for me, one that I can not go to work without.

I tell the 5 adults there what has transpired and ask them all to help with the search. Of course they all thought I was bullshitting and laugh nervously. When they see that I am earnest they reluctantly jump up to help. The very idea that it had been stolen was scoffed at. We were all sitting there, no one could have come in and out without someone seeing what had happened. Surely I had just left it somewhere. The 6 of us went through the house over the next 10 minutes and it didn’t turn up!
In the end I had to grab a taxi or miss the flight. That wasn't an option.

What I think transpired is a thief slunk in across the front lawn and up to the edge of the house. Besides the pile of shoes there on the step the first thing you come to is the telephone table on which I remember as the spot I left my camera bag. So this guiltless fiend must have slipped to within 5 metres of us lifted the bag and made away into the darkness of the night.

So the domino effect was unleashed, it went like this. I went and brought the D80 kit the very next morning. I brought it at Changi airport for S$2200. I had no options and in my heart of hearts know that if I was in Singapore over at Sim Lim square I could have knocked that price down to about S$1700-1900 or so. Bugger!

Back home another set of events was off and running. Gabi had to call the police, we are trying to see if I can claim something on the insurance. But in Bali the police are just a hassle one has to go through. You have to speak to the Bunga, or local council, of which there is a group who are the heavies. They are the protection one needs in this set of circumstances. They consoled her and offered one of their own, who needed some work, as a night watchman. Oh his name is Agus, Looks like a nice chap. I suppose I meet him next Sunday night when I get home!

Gabi told Stephano one of her gay friends who has a shop there and he took her to see his shaman. Bali is renown for it’s black magic So his paranormal priest to find out more about the thieves. He said after his praying that he saw three guys from Lombok, one in the house two outside watching. They used black magic so we wouldn’t notice the guy. He then told Gabi I had to pray, burn 11 of his incense sticks every day and use his holy water. Then they wouldn’t be able to use their magic anymore.

And the last tumbling tile in this story I want to tell you about is the new addition to our house. Chucky I believe his name is and while Gabi has been hassling to get a dog for the kids for some time it was the ideal time to relent and we are the proud owners of a little black, Labrador I think, puppy. I also get to meet him on Sunday night when I get home.

I very different way to head out of the house to the airport and a big wake up call. For although we may call Bali home we are still Strangers in a strange land. Caution has to be a catchcry if we are to endure and enjoy the island of the gods.

This sums up the real world

2007-07-05T20:19:00.000+10:00

I have been doing some research today and I happened onto someones blog that had this embedded in it.

Laugh! Laugh! I almost cried!

Get that business plan sorted out, eh?

Later.

About time...

2007-07-05T19:00:00.000+10:00

The funny thing about time is my total lack of it. Where does it go? I mean, I work and surf, play with the kids all the things we use to do back in Australia but everything seems to take twice as long here. Have we slowed down to the point that simple tasks take twice as long to preform or is this what they call " Bali rubber time"

Sorry to get so deep.

Big announcement today must got to Miranda and Tim Coleman-Doscas as they had a little boy called Felix at 9.58 am this morning, 5th July 2007. He was a wee lad, unlike dad, weighing in at only 2.89kgs.

Salamat Datang Felix!

Speaking of kids, ours are on holiday at the moment, their school, while it follows the Australian school year, it also has a month break in the middle of the year to at least half align with the local and European schools who are in the middle of their "Summer" break.

The weather is fantastic, mild days int he high 20's or low 30's with low humidity make it a pleasure to be here. We do not run air conditioning and the afternoon breeze at present makes the ceiling fan redundant as well.

Working on some interesting projects one of them will be in Bali in April so I am getting the camera out to take some piccies. Do I get photo Credits as well?

Here are a couple of "Textural shots" that I am using. They are for Fluff of coarse!

This one has been PhotoShop-ed. I was going for the warm feeling. Yummy!

Here is one where I had Oscar holding an Orchid up so I could get the sun and Gabi's flags in the background.
Staged, you bet!

The blog wouldn't be right without the obligatory surf shot.
Here is one Maxi took. We went to the peninsular the other day, Balangan. We got there at 4pm, dead low tide. There was this fast little left running over a coral bottom, my first outing down the Bukit, for surfing at least. Image is a bit dull the sun was behind me setting. Had a great afternoon. Thanks to Toby who showed us how to drive there. And thanks to Maxi of this great shot of dear old dad.

So that is my lot, we have Simon and Bella coming in next week so I will post some photos of our outings with them.

Keep well, we all are.

Peace.

The photos that time forgot! This one is for you Fluff!

2007-06-07T17:06:00.000+10:00

As promised, a blog entry sans words. Well not totally only a couple. Just enough to tell you what is going on, ok?

PS What with the $%#@ internet here in Bali these entries are harder than the normal ones! This has taken nearly an hour to upload each image one by one! Argh!

In order of appearance you have.
•Brunnie, Made & Gabi standing near the front door of our house
•Students in my Indonesian Class. Our final day a coffee down by the beach, L-R Hiroco, Dirk, Dominique & Our teacher Arta. Or I should say, Guru!
•Brunnie and I saw this very strange looking bike while out driving.
•We also stopped and photographed some men planing rice. Here are two of the photos.
•Out in Canggu, on the road to my favorite surfing spot we pulled over to photograph the rice terraces, here are 3 of the photographs.
•This one is for you Barry, This is a piccy of the front of our house. At least in my photo you can see our flags and umbrellas. Your photos don't show jack! Shape up bro!
•Lastly, here is Brunnie after breakfasting at Cafe Moka she was curious as to the reason there was a temple on the roof of the house across the road. Me too!

Enjoy!

Mr Mum for a week! Tough act!

2007-06-06T18:02:00.001+10:00

I do hope that this message finds you all well. Quicly I have to put a small note here to one of my Sister in-laws who I will continue to refer to as Fluff in an effort to maintain her secret Identity, "sorry about the fact that there is not a single photo with this post. Perhaps I will do a photo only one next time...." hmm now there is a thought. Listern to the wheels talking...

The reason I hadn’t entertained you with further installments in the life of the Glib and flatulent is that it was Istri Sayas turn to go to Singapore (Istri Saya, Literally means Wife mine) She went there to see if she was able to sell some bags for these gay friends of hers.

Oops I suppose they are friends of mine as well though she made their acquaintance. They do make very lovely bags, I have a black one with a little skull on a chain. I have done some adverts for them for local magazines as well as a quick website. Check out their wares http://www.sabbathabali.com/ Anyway she went there with a dozen bags, belts and other trinkets. She knuckled down and arranged some really strong meetings. So ended up seeing a lot of people and may have some good leads which she is now following up. Then on Sunday night she flew home. But the real reason for the whole thing was that her mother was on that flight as well. Her mother came in at 5.30pm from Germany and they caught the plane together from Singapore to here. It was the first time Gabi had ever been to Singapore, sure like everyone she had been through the airport a hundred times but she had never seen the place. She had a ball and stayed at a hotel for the first couple of days and then with some old friends from Australia who moved up there about 6 years ago. She loved the whole thing and even made noises about going back. I told her she would have to sell a lot of bags to do that. But really it is a good thing that she had a ball. She doesn't get holidays that often! I have been there so many times over the years that I am a little non-plus about the place. I know I could never live there, especially now that I have found a true passion in surfing. For someone lie me, the most non sporty person I know besides my friends this is a bit of a feat! Speaking of which, righthander out at Tugu this morning, going off!!!

So net result of all of that is our bank balance is slightly lower and we have Oma here. Actually she is having a little lay down at the moment I think the whole thing has been a little too much for her. Although it's Wed afternoon at 4pm. And she has had a full 3 days to acclimatise I am thinking that she may need the full week to get right into the swing of things. Ultimately she is having the time of her life I just think Gabi has to slow down with the tour de force.

Well life in the islands is trundling along smoothly. Tomorrow is the last of my Indonesian classes, whew 5 weeks whizzes past doesn’t it? And while I do not think I speak Bahasa Indonesia very well I can understand stuff. Which isn’t bad for a guy who knew used tear-up-my-car-seat to remember how to say thank you! A couple of others in the class are really talking, that would be the women. While a couple of us are able to understand but come discussion time give little or no input to the conversation Arta sets up, that would be the men. As sad as it seems us men are the stragglers. Seeing as the class is 5 and there are 3 women, two of whom have been here for over a year, and the men, we are just 2, both of us having arrived in the past 6 months, I do not feel too bad. It will come I am sure.

Maxi and Oscar are great. They both received far too much stuff from Gabi and Oma on Sunday & Monday night. From Gabi Maxi got a diving watch, iPod shuffle, 1 gig USB stick and of course the legendary Oma gift pack while Oscar got his first Gameboy also a watch, but his was PowerRangers and an Oma gift pack. Sniff Sniff! All I got was a tee shirt from Oma! Lol! Actually I got Gabi to buy me a pad to go under my laptop. It allows air to circulate and there is this cushion thing in the front to rest your wrists on. My brother Damien had one up here and after my battery literally fried I thought I needed one too. BTW I am thinking those children of mine are a tad spoilt, what do you think? Thought I should let you know that the T shirt is cool. Nice colour and a very simple clean print. Sort of a stylised elevation or silhouette of Muenster, my mother in-laws town.

So that is my lot for today. I thought I should get something up there to plug the hole in the silence. Feel free to write to me and tell me what little quirks life is throwing about in your part of the world. Or not!

...more rumblings from the mind.

2007-05-27T14:56:00.000+10:00

My Aunty Mary, that would be my dads sister, past away last Wednesday evening. I first heard about it in the departure hall at Bali airport. Mum had rung our house and Gabi rang me. Bugger! She was 88 or 89. A good innings but the selfish side of me was looking forward to seeing her again. So it was that I spent a couple of days in Singapore with time to reflect on the old girl. She was hilarious. She had a lot of quirks did our Aunty Mary. Darling whereever you are we love and cherish you and through us you are imortalised.
May the bar in heaven have your favourite tipple and a taxi to get you home. Now where did i hear that before??

Many thoughts have brushed past my synapses in the last few days but i think the one that I cherish the most from her is when my dad would give her that deadly second glass of wine at Christmas and other family functions, this pushed her over the edge and was enough to make her tipsy and she would let fly with the funniest things. Her laugh at these times I can hear in my head. She really was amazing. The funeral is tomorrow in Perth. At first I thought I would get a flight down there over the weekend and fly back Tuesday, but Gabi flies to Singapore herself on Tuesday which would mean I would have to get back no later than Tuesday afternoon. In the end I thought better of it. I am already planning a trip home in July for a wedding of a mate. Also the birth of his first child the week before, it will be his partners 4th. She has 3 girls from her first marriage. Would be his luck to get another girl and then he would be totally surrounded, hehe!

Snapped one of my surfboards this morning. It was the yellow mal I always ride, my favourite. A McTavish Liberator 9'1"! You can see Max putting his board in it's bag. Echo beach is the white caps you can see in the distance on the right and the white caps on the left is old mans. Where i did this.

Will drive up to Poppies in an hour or so and drop it off at one of the surf shops to have it repaired. I have the name of a good shop. 3 different people said they were the ones for snapped boards, so it must be the place. Doubt if I will ride it much from here on out but it will be a good board for visitors. I have another yellow, I brought two of their demos which are this special yellow all over. That board a 9'1" McTavish HP. It isn't as full bodied as the liberator but almost identical in silhouette. Plus I have been using my McTavish 7'4" in the huge swells that we have received of late. Perhaps i will stick with the short boards a while longer. We will see.

We went for a drive down the Bukit Peninsula the other weekend and rather than bore you with more words I will do as asked by my sister inlaw, Fluff, and put some more photos in. They are...

View of the beach Nusa Dua; I like this one as later the beach got incredibly crowded with locals but in the heat of the middle of the day this child was the only one that braved it. Well done i say!

Photo of Gabi, Maxi & Oscar. This is along one end of the Nusa Dua beaches. The place is beautiful over there. The white beaches are very different from where we surf at Canggu where the sands are volcanic therefore very dark.

Here we have a photo Oscar took of Gabi, Maxi & Myself. I am running because Oscar sat there with his finger on the button so we ended up with 30 photos of the 3 of us. Most were a bit blurred like this one but everyone is having such a great time that it makes it special.

Next is the temple on the hill at Uluwatu. Very cheeky monkeys live along these cliffs and one had a go at my camera bag. They are spoiled by tourists always feeding them and now they are sulky if you have nothing for them.

If you turn around 180 degrees then your looking down onto the surf from the cliff also down at Uluwatu. The sun starting to sink in the ocean it was a beautiful spot. We need to go there again. With our boards next time. The actual surfing spot is even further around the corner.

Lastly is a photo of me on my shortboard, we had a huge swell come through a week ago and I dropped down onto the shortboard. Waves at Padang Padang got to a reported 3 storeys high. Photos on Balisurf.com showed guys standing in the barrel with enough room above them for someone else to stand on there shoulders.

Even Canggu where I surf was so big that most people sat in the carpark. Oh and I suppose you will see me on that more and more now my favorite is broken.

More soon, promise!

Peace!

It is all quiet in the house, nothing stirred not even a SNAKE!

2007-05-06T23:43:00.000+10:00

A couple of weeks ago, while I was overseas, Gabi sent me an email entitled, What a surprise! Well here are the photos of that little surprise. A 3' python had found his way into the pool. Made, our gardener rendered it suitable for a belt with a belt. Gabi quickly asked him not to hack the head off as it would leave the spirit of the snake here and she didn't want to be haunted by such a beasty!

So I left this tit-bit so long, I had sort of forgotten about it up until I was on that same bit of lawn as I made my way to the guest house and my computer, you get that Hmmm. Would be interesting to step on one of those at night! NOT!

So Today we drove down the Bukit to Nusa Dua. In amongst all the resorts there is a little carpark and a tiny beach where it is not Private Property. The beach along the front of the resorts is for hotel guests only, can you believe that! How can someone own a beach! The bit left over was nice so we strolled around there. Oscar was heating up and had tannie after tannie in the park.

Later we drove to Ulluwatu, well the temple down there. We watched the sun set from the cliffs. The monkeys tried in vain to steal my camera bag and Maxi spotted a group of dolphins out to see.

From there we drove back towards home but threw a left at Jimbaran Beach. Where down on the sand is the seafood markets. The restaurant I wanted to sit in was full so we had to settle for next door. We had a fish, a half kilo of prawns, Sate Chicken, Indonesian Spinach and rice. The boys had red Fanta's and Gabi and I had Mixed juices. I had 2 in fact. The whole lot was RP 200 000. (A$27.10) Which i thought a little expensive. But it was good. Damn tasty! We played Uno and Gabi won. The tables are right down on the beach sand and you watch the planes line up and come in. The only problem is the smoke. I can smell it on my clothes even now. Gabi and Max both complained that it hurt their eyes. Oscar and I didn't seem to get it. It was a nice way to finish the weekend.

The rest of the weekend consisted of rising early and going surfing. I haven't gotten the photos off the camera of today so I may have to post them later or let them slide. I do have some shots of Maxi and his friend Mian surfing out at Tugu.

Mian's dad, Louie who is our resident photographer was with us both mornings. Today he had to seek shelter in the rocks while the heavens opened up. Imagine, it's 7.30am still as, a grey hue to everything, the sea isn't water it's like oil and then these big tropical droplets of water come splashing down, they explode everywhere. A swell rises out the back and peaks then breaks. the only sound is the massive droplets drumming out their tune on the deck of my surfboard. Twas magic!

The boys surfing is coming up a treat! But do not take my word for it. Have a look yourself! Fluff these added photos are for you!

Anyway here is a summary of todays action. Maxi is sporting a white rashy and long hair. Mian is in a bright orange rashy. And if you look closely in one of the shots you can see the professor on a wave out behind the boys!

Until next time.

Peace.

Salamat Malam

We're back!

2007-04-30T09:56:00.000+10:00

All is good here. But much time and waters have past since I wrote of our little adventure.
Like anywhere life gets busy and the first things to suffer are these little chores, like maintaining a blog!
Not trying to create an excuse but of late I have been out of the country more than I have been in it.
So sit back, relax and be prepared for a whirlwind tour of our life in the past 2 months.

Where do I start?

My brother Michael, I had better change the names to protect the innocent, namely me! So lets call him 'Barry' and his wife Jane, lets for the sake of argument, which is what I will get after this post, lets call her 'Fluff' Anyway our intrepid explorers came up to visit for a week in early March. Neither had been out of Australia since their wedding back in 1986 (I think it was then?)

At first they were going to have a holiday in Melbourne and Sydney but once they heard we were moving here they, well I think Barry was the lubricant, they changed their minds and so we had them for a week. It was great and i know they both had a ball.

They arrived in on Saturday morning. I had just gotten back from Vietnam on the Friday evening. Nice timing I thought. And timing was indeed the theme.

For on the Monday was Nyepi Day, the Balinese new years day. However before we get there the day before Nyepi, all villages in Bali hold a large exorcism ceremony at the main village cross road, the meeting place of demons. They usually make Ogoh-ogoh (the fantastic monsters or evil spirits or the Butha Kala made of bamboo) for carnival purposes. The Ogoh-ogoh monsters symbolize the evil spirits surrounding our environment which have to be got rid of from our lives . The carnivals themselves are held all over Bali following sunset. Bleganjur, a Balinese gamelan music accompanies the procession. Some are giants taken from classical Balinese lore. All have fangs, bulging eyes and scary hair and are illuminated by torches.The procession is usually organised by the Seka Teruna, the youth organisation of Banjar. We went to the cross roads in Kuta which was hot an crowded. Oscar and I went home early. All a bit much for the short bloke!

On Nyepi day itself, every street is quiet - there are nobody doing their normal daily activities. There is usually Pecalangs (traditional Balinese security man) who controls and checks for street security. Pecalang wear a black uniform and a Udeng or Destar (a Balinese traditional "hat" that is usually used in ceremony). The Pecalangs main task is not only to control the security of the street but also to stop any activities that disturb Nyepi. No traffic is allowed, not only cars but also people, who have to stay in their own houses. Light is kept to a minimum or not at all, the radio or TV is turned down and, of course, no one works. Even love making, this ultimate activity of all leisure times, is not supposed to take place, nor even attempted. The whole day is simply filled with the barking of a few dogs, the shrill of insect and is a simple long quiet day in the calendar of this otherwise hectic island. Rather than get 'Villa Fever' we moved into the Dynasty Resort in Kuta and spent the day having massages, wallowing in the waters of the pool and partaking in the odd Bintang.

Barry has emailed me to say his bags are still packed and waiting by the front door to come up again. Hope that means that they enjoyed the hospitality.

Actually they are coming again. They will be here in December with two of the boys, David & Andrew. In keeping with the vain of this post lets call them Davros and Handy Andy. Their eldest son, John, So lets call him John! He will be in Europe. So no fun in the sun for you sport. Do not forget the Thermals at that time over there.

We will fly to Perth for Christmas on the 23rd and take up residence at their house for a week before returning here and into our new house. I think they are here for a month, so they arrive before we leave and are here when we get back.

Families, there is no getting away from them is there?

Lets go forward to Easter. The boys had 2 weeks off, unfortunately I had to go to HK for 5 days before the weekend before easter. If that makes sense. I also had to fly back there for another gig on Easter Monday. In between, I was here for a week. After the second HK gig I got home late on the Saturday and left again for Chiang Mai in the evening of the Monday. Time to get fresh laundry but not much else. The big downer was that this was right across the school holidays.

Maxi and I did have a week, the week prior to Easter, where we went surfing every day. Mostly in the mornings. He has a friend called Mian from School, his parents, Michelle and Louie have become our friends. Mian Surfs, actually taking out 2nd place in the under 12's in the Quicksilver Interschool Competition at Double 6. But I digress. We would all go surfing everyday. Louie, who doesn't surf became our cameraman and photos like the one of me here are credited to him.

Last Saturday, the 28th April was'Tumpek Landep' which is an important day to make offerings here in Bali. This is devoted to Sang Hyang Pasupati, Lord of heirlooms, weapons and metal tools for proper function and magical power. With offerings, special prayers are said to pray to God so that these material things as Kris daggers, motorcycles, cars and other metal objects continue to be strong and bring good fortune to their owners. Cars and motorcycles are all properly cleaned before being decorated with offerings and ornaments and this can clearly be seen in the streets on this day.

So Made cleaned our car, then adorned it with offerings. We all donned our sarongs and had the ceremony in the car port. And thus the car was blessed.

That night we went out for a talk on Global warming out at the Canggu Club. Afterwards we headed down to Double 6 area for some dinner and low and behold we get our first flat tire. Typical eh!

It kind of screwed Sunday up as we had a lot of things planned that hinged around using the car. In the end we laid around the house, I did some work on a couple of projects I needed to have ready for today and after lunch we caught a taxi to WaterBom. The big pool and slide park down in Kuta.

I am now home for a while. Little bits of work trickling through but nothing major. Our big news is that Gabi has rented the house next door for 4 years. It is about a quarter the size in terms of land but then again it is a fifth of the yearly rent. Do the math!

It is free from the 11th of May, actually it is free now! But we will just do some minor works on the entrance and render ne wall. Michelle, Louie and Mian will rent it from us until end December when we take it over. Gabi is signing all the papers today and will finally have her Bali house, at least until May 2011.

Me I am still looking for my chunk of land in the country to build my little dream house not far from the coast so i can wander down for morning surfs. Must get my lotto ticket in today to!

Gabi has signed me up for Indonesian lessons which start on Thursday morning. 4 days a week. I think there will be 3 others in the class with me. I am going to Sabatha's shop today to pick up a bag he has especially made for me. It will take my laptop and my books so I have a school bag. I have done a couple of advertisements for him now. Gabi loves his stuff so much she wants to become their business development manager and take it overseas. At the moment they sell to people who come here and take it home themselves. She would like them to step up to the next level. Would be good for all of them I am sure.

So there we are. All alive, all healthy. A lot more relaxed than we were in Sydney. Life is very good. We hope the worlld is good for you in and around your areas.

Apologies for not writing more and sooner but I shall try to do this at least once a month.

Happy Chinese New Year

2007-02-20T19:19:00.000+11:00

The fact that the Chinese New Year is here has meant my IM has been quiet the last couple of days. Gong Xi Fa Cai!

Year of the pig. Hmm I like it already, yum yum!

The weekend was a bit of a surffest here in Bali.

First Sanur on Saturday, We drove through Denpasar looking at car yards, we are looking to buy a car instead of paying someone a couple of million a month, as we do now. It was hot and we had the boards on the roof so it made damn good sense to slide through Sanur and see what's what.

Tide was low getting lower so we parked and made our way to a warung on the beach. We sat and ate. Then off we went. Damien and Maxi headed for this left and right peak just off shore and I went out to the reef in front of the Grand Hyatt. Ok I cut the hell out of the bottom of my feet but to tell you the truth, it was worth every slice. This would have to rank in my top 5 surfs of all time. I read yesterday that Indo Surf rate it as one of the top 10 right handers in the world.

So here I am, it's a slight breeze across the wave, the sneakers are 5-6' and there is me and a kiwi out there! Go figure. I stayed for about 2 hours, actually I paddled in when we were joined by a third. I was spent. I had caught about 20 waves in the two hours. The adrenalin high is still with me and today is Tuesday!

So on Sunday we got in the car and headed to Medewi. Well looking at the map one can be fooled to think it's a short drive but you get stuck int behind trucks and cars that should have been relegated to the scape heap eons ago and well you have to just wait to get around them. The road is like all Bali roads, insufficient. The amount of traffic is huge. All containers etc have to come down this road from the ferry port. In fact everything from Java that is shipped in and out would come along here.

Anyway 3 hours later, just when people in the car were starting to get edgy we arrived. We drove down to the beach some 100m from the main road and feasted our eyes on this amazing left hnder that just seemed to never end. It ran along the point and down into the bay. I was drooling, especially since I was still on the high from Sanur. We decided once again to have lunch. This strategy had served us well the day before and we headed into the restaurant right on the point. The food was good and the hotel we were in would let the kids swim in their pool for 20 000 a piece so it looked like we were all sorted for post eating excursions.

The entry into the water is over millions of stones, round like river stones. Except they had barnacles and sea sludge which meant your foot sort of slid in between until it got caught. On already sore pins I endured the walk out (Just so you do not fret, I bought Reef Booties yesterday!) So I slip past two guys in wellies fishing and finally start paddling out through the white water.

Did I tell you that there was no one out there at this point? Sorry i should have. I paddled out to where the take off spot was and rested, it was a hard slog just getting this far!. After about 3 or 4 minutes a set came in, I wasn't quite out far enough so I paddled over the first and heading out into the slot for the second. Whoosh! This wave was an easy ride. Damn shame it was on my back hand.

I started paddling out and having missed paddling onto another wave got caught inside. And guess what happened? My leg rope snapped! How different! That is 3 in 2 months. Argh! One wave. That was all I had caught. Here is a guy I snapped a little later on to show you what I missed out on. Urmm... Bugger?

The other shots above is of Gabi the boys and their uncle Damien at the drink stall right on Medewi point. The shot from the point back across the bay at the village itself. It is what one thinks of when you think of Bali. Boats, terraced rice fields, mountains and as the grey clouds were soon to show, rain.

Anyway there is a nice swell running at the moment. This morning I dropped the boys at school and headed down to Canggu for another session. Perfect lefts and these sneaky rights that only Andrew and I had spotted were coming in. What more could you want?

To say my surfing has improved a hundred fold since coming up here is a slight understatement. But I am loving it and seems to balance the workload.

So I will upload this, which is a long winded process in it's self and write again soon.

Take care and thanks for taking the time to read this.

Peace!

The rains have arrived.

2007-02-16T19:30:00.001+11:00

Although Jakarta has suffered from flooding etc in the past week we have been left to bake under the unforgiving tropical sun like some forgotten sausage on a BBQ. Not today. It is dark like dusk and the rain has been teeming for the past hour. I was beginning to htink the movies were all wrong. Wasn't it Forrest Gump, while he was in Vietnam that had the scene where it started to rain one day and just kept raining for 3 months and then stopped. Perhaps I shouldn't use films for educational content.

I started a blog the other morning so here it is, no use wasting these words. Seeing as I hardly write anymore. I know, I know, slack bugger aren't I.

Been researching the fesability of getting a tad greener. It troubles me sitting in paradise that we are still part of the problem.

Just been looking at a friends website, lets call him John and for the sake of this post lets call his wife Sussy.

So John and Sussy have started up a permaculture farm in teh south west of West Australia. It is there aim to become a repository oif information on it as well as a training centre. I know John has already undertaken serveral (being more than one) courses on the subject as far a field as Holland.

I Love the idea of a permaculture farm and if indeed they become the font of all things in this area, which I have no doubt of course, we will visit their site often to see if we can not take up some of these practises.

For the last two days I have been researching solar panels to at least take my office off the grid. Electricity is one of the big expenses here and if I could half the bill, so save 500 000RP a month which is 6 mill a year or a couple of hundred shy of a grand. I am certain I could pay for siad panels in about 3 years. Thats a plan isn't it!

What is aparent to me, whether it be permaculture or solar power, thermal aircon etc.. all of these are the type of things that needs to be taught to the people here.Hell we should all be learning to tred a little lighter on this fragile orb.

We were in discussions with this guy who has a solar water purifier from SA that we are looking at bringing up here. If we could cure a few cases of Bali Belly a lot of people would be happier. I for one, and Maxi, when he wakes would surely second it. Gabi and Damien, although I am not so sure it was that what they had, would welcome anything that helped in them not spending the last 3 days in bed.

Maxi is laying on the couch opposite me, his belly has had him dancing from the bed to the bowl all night and he is listing in an uneasy slumber. I am on the other couch, one foot on the coffee table, laptop splayed across my lap drinking my morning coffee to the sounds of the cockerels which seem to be completely surrounding the house and thereby giving us this weird THX surround sound. The only other noise is the rumble of the waves as they crash in the shore dump at our local beach. There are punctuations of low CC motorbikes every now and then but not many, it’s still early.

Gabi & Oscar have just left. Oscar starts school at 8 and Gabi starts her school at 8.30.

Although she only complains about the amount of vocab she has to learn, I know she is enjoying her time at the school and the whole process of learning Indonesian. I am unable to dedicate the time needed to make a go of it, due to my work commitments but I am thinking of doing it in April or May. Plenty of time. The good thing I am absorbing a lot ot the words now from Gabi, although I do not know how to use them they will make the process easier later I am sure. She has met some people which is a very good thing, from them I hope she finds a friend. One good friend would be great as we all know they are as rare as hens teeth.

So it is time to wander down the yard and into the shed (AKA Guest house) where I have my computers set up. My brother is in there and needs to be awakened. I need to get some work out, as does he!

Funnily enough just after I wrote this The pool down the yard erupted as he dove in. He’s up! Which is good, his turn to make the Latte’s.

Our one month aniversary

2007-02-06T19:49:00.000+11:00

While it is one of my elders birthday today, good on ya Pedro, it is a more important date tomorrow with the big hurdle of one month here in our oasis.

We must be settled as Max wanted to fain sick this morning and lay in, just like he would in Oz.

But things haven't been without the learning curve. I am sitting here on the road to recovery of an incapacitating lergie know the world over simply as Bali Belly.

You wouldn't want to wish it on your worst enemy. Especially when it always seems to hit in the middle of the night and make you go to the little room which one shares with 50 billion mozzies at this time of the day. Ouch!

Also there is the electricity. Last Tuesday I was flying to Sing in the evening, Well the power in the whole of Seminyak went out at about 10am. Right when I was doing something for someone. Not to mention all the work I still had to drag off my desktop for the meetings in Singapore. Argh! I paced around the house. I walked over to the language school where Gabi is studying Indonesian, came home fretted. Finally Gabi said go surfing! Why hadn't I thought of that. There was nothing I could do.

So I disappeared off for a couple of hours and it was fantastic. Not the surf, that was average, but I would have just worn the tiles waiting for it to come back on. About 3pm it did. I was home by then and able to suck everything I needed off. Looks like we have to buy a UPS and a small generator.

My younger brother Damien is here to help do some work. I didn't get him to get into it until yesterday, he actually arrived an hour after I got back from Singapore last Thursday. I waited out at the airport and we shared a car home.

He's spent today working on images for an event in Vietnam next month. The mock-ups of what the dinner will look like. Looking good to. They can get sent out tonight.

Tomorrow I will get him to start on signage for an event in Chiang Mai in April. We have a wide and varied assortment of work to get through.

It has freed me up to get on with some design work for the Vietnam job as well as some conceptual imagery work for two suites (boxes) we do for the HK 7's.

So we are in no need of more in that department. In actual fact I have to get a more ordered life and to stop working on weekends. I have a bad habit of doing it.

I'll work on that!

So that is enough from me but it was a week ago that i last wrote and i know how eager you all are to read these musings.

Take care.

Peace.

Time flies at paradise central

2007-01-30T01:50:00.000+11:00

So today is week three. I only feel like I have just set foot here. Not in a hurry to leave, I don't think any of us are.

Was working a lot these past weeks. So much work to get through and only this one set of hands to do it. Seem to be making progress. Damien arrives on Friday and while here will be putting in a couple of weeks work.

Off to Singapore tomorrow for a couple of days. Have to get out before my visa runs out. So got meetings at Techmex, got to get a printer from Simlim and some Nutrigrain for the boys as it's nearly A$10 a box up here. That and Weetbix. The local cereal seems to all be totally sugared or chocked out.

Had a great couple of nights with Warren & his son Luke. They are friends of Tim Colemans who he got to courier in some Aeroguard for us. They came round Sat arvo and 10 minutes later Luke is in the pool. They came over with another couple, Tania & Michael who they met at their hotel. They also had boys, 3 of them under 5, who they had left with the kids club. We had a coffee and water then wandered down to the local Circle K and got some long necks. We chatted til 5 and then they went to collect their kids. Later on, about 7 we all went to KuDeTa for sunset cocktails. There was 6 boys and 5 adults. The idea was to go to Gado Gado for dinner but somehow Trattoria and their pizzas seemed more appropriate.

Gabi and our boys went to their hotel most of yesterday which was great as it gave me the whole day to knock over work. We again met to watch the sunset, this time at Echo beach. Drank beers and ate seafood. Tania, Michael and their 3 left from their straight to the airport.

Warren and Luke left this afternoon, will still be in the air I would think.

This afternoon Maxi and I went to Tugu for a surf and got out just before the sun disappeared. I took this photo from the beach side car park. Just Maxi ,me, a guy spinning fairy floss and another guy selling sweet rolls. Oh and about 20 villages flying around.

They seem to like coming down to watch the sunsets, and why wouldn't you. Sydney siders don't get to see this very often and in Perth you get a little to use to it.

Week three and the kids go to school

2007-01-26T00:31:00.001+11:00

We are settling in and the kids are off to school. If Oscar had his way he would have started two weeks ago. Here is a photo in there Batik (sic) shirts and green trousers. Maxi doesn't have any trousers yet, they are coming.

As is the German tradition, Oscar received a cone of sweets on his first day in the big school. He is liking having deep pockets in his shorts too!

Oscar has two lovely ladies looking after him, Tamara is Australian but is either half Indonesia or half Malay, I will have to ask. Then there is Miss Agung, she is 100% Balinese. The kindergarten is called Prep, but functions as the first year of school much as it does in Sydney where they call it Kindergarten. He has about 15 other kids in there with him. He tells me he hasn't made any 'solid' relationships and one kid wouldn't sit with him today when they ate lunches. On the whole he is enjoying it and he will find his place in the coming weeks I am sure.

Maxi has a mixed grade 5-6 class of about the same number. He's in grade 5. The origins of the kids is a veritable smorgasbord. There is a Polish kid, a Russian, South African, Malaysian, Singaporean, American and a couple of token Aussies. Well it is the Australian International School. His teacher is a bloke called Mr Dean, no not Mr Bean. Jeez! He seems a lot of fun and is very enthusiastic about the kids, their outcomes and making the whole proces enjoyable. Where was this bloke when I went to school? He's also the basketball coach, to which Max has signed up. It is THE sport up here. I think soccer is in there as well, but this is where it is at.

Before you ask, No he hasn't cut his hair off! Maxi has taken to wearing a pony tail, something he never did in Oz. Must be the heat. Humidity is very high and if there is no breeze then you just sweat! It's a good look. Much tidier this way

Maxi and I went to the beach this afternoon. He had done all of his homework and I was able to shove off what I was doing as I have to have it done by Monday, it is only Thursday for Pete's sake! We both had a ball. He was on the inside section with about 6 local kids that were surfing some boards that had seen much better days. But these kids threw them around. These guys will be world champs if they get the chance.

When we were leaving at sunset they came up and asked if we had any wax. I gave them the block I have in the car and they devoured it like ants, actually Maxi & I had to get in there and help as they really had no idea on how to wax a board. We drank a fruit smoothie each and watched the sun setting behind the waves before bundling into the car for the drive home. This is the bit that cements the idea of being here. What a fantastic way to spend the arvo. All good!

On the drive home Max said it was the best surf he had ever had. I think the local kids had pushed him a bit, which is never a bad thing. I saw him get a couple of waves and he is getting better. Mix that with the fact that I think he just liked having other kids in the surf with him and you have a winning combination.

It is late so I will sign off.

More later.

Peace

Pinch me. The reality sets in.

2007-01-20T23:23:00.000+11:00

So we are at day 13 of 365 and it is still hard to believe that we are living here. We have however started to develop a routine, well at least I have.

Wake around 6.30-6.45 head to the small room for some meditation before grabbing a board from the shed and driving the 10km's or so to the beach. Usually against the morning traffic. Bikes head in, buzzing me like a locust plague as I head out. Many are trying to overtake and I drive with one hand on the horn giving the overachievers a blast to send them back in the ranks and to make way for the tank.

This morning the surf was funny. You would sit out there on a completely flat ocean and then every 10 minutes two or three sets of 4 footers would role through. It was decidedly crowded out there as well, perhaps being a Saturday.

We would all paddle for what we could get and then the wait would begin again. But it's not boring, moreover it's a little like a coffee shop where there is several conversations going on. Each time you paddle out you sort of join another. I tell you it must be one of the friendliest breaks in the world.

Got a couple of nice rides and then it's time to get out. Up to the warung where I park and I order a Mixed juice while I go round back and shower under their water tower. I come through, get changed and put my board in it's bag. My juice comes about then and I drink it. The first sustenance of the day, yummy! I don't linger, I down it and start the drive home.

The traffic has petered off and I cruise home. I get there and everyone is up and Komang and Made have arrived and are into it. I greet everyone and head to the kitchen firing up the espresso machine and making a Soya latte.

Coffee in hand I head down to the guest house which is also my office. Hit the go button on the front of the box and bask in the radiation as the computer does it's morning exercises.

Once on I am off and that is where I spend the day.

The morning is definitely the high point. The bit right up to sitting in front of the computer. Work is the same where ever you park your but. Mind you I do have a great view of a nice garden though. Beats Marrickville, sorry guys!

Lunch is something Komang whips up. A gado gado, Nasi Goreng, Omelettes, so far it's all been good. Then again back to the coal mine for more of the same. About 6 I knock off, around the time the boys are getting out of the pool, herded by Gabi as they would never leave on their own accord. Jack lives here and I drown him with some Diet Coke and a couple of blocks from the arctic.

Nights are easy, we might watch a movie on my laptop, we do not have a TV, play scrabble or the boys might go online and play some games on a laptop.

Speaking of which I might mossy up to the main house now. Also mix it up and have a beer tonight, Gabi brought me down a JD earlier. Nothing left except for a ring of water on the timber top of my work surface but I feel like a cleansing ale, even if it is Bintang!

The image is of a red dragonfly I shot on a leaf at the back of the front pond today. I was testing the new lens. Pretty happy with it, colours are ok and for a handheld shot it is pretty crisp.

Peace!

Sunday drive

2007-01-15T10:52:00.000+11:00

Yesterday I drove to the beach like I do early every morning, except I cant today but you will understand more about that in a minute, the surf wasn’t looking that good so I decided not to go out but instead drove home stopping at Café Mocca on the way and getting some croissants, a bit of a treat, something from our life in Sydney that no one had had in a while. Went down a treat, as I knew it would. Then some Balinese friends dropped over. Her name is Dewi and her husband is Endi. They had their two boys, 4.5 & 1.8 with them. I met her online, no it isn’t like that, when I was looking to book some places for our anniversary last May. Even though Gabi was in Germany at the time with the kids, she left them with the Oma and flew to Bali and met me for a week. Dewi booked our places arranged transport and we chatted online. Then each time we come up we get her to organise some other things, she is good like that. So when Gabi came in Nov last she left a big bag with her. They dropped it off and brought the whole family for cake and drinks.

After that we went for a drive to Sanur, there was a house sale on but by the time we got there everything was sold, can you believe it? I think we needed to be there at 8am. We drove down to Sanur beach and had a look, very beautiful we will definitely be going back there one weekend. From there drove into town, right through the centre, being a Sunday drive and all, then came home got our swimming togs, well I got mine Maxi can’t swim for a week as he fell in the pond which is at the back of the house and subsequently got a really bad ear infection and the doctor said not water for a week, bugger eh? So I grabbed mine and my board, a long board as our freight arrived on Friday, another story just there. And we headed out to Echo Beach, yes just like the song, and it is. So we had some late lunch at the Beach House there and then about 4 I paddled out into this lumpy surf with these wickedly pitching lefts coming through. Only problem was the moving peek I soon found out. There were two guys in the water so it was definitely not crowded. The first wave I took I was deep inside managed to get my nose around and shoot across the face but was smacked by the wall as it collapsed in a heap, I was thrown, board and I akimbo and banger my bicep on the edge of the board, the rail it is called. I think I have a really deep bruise from that. Sore as hell.

Then I was a little more reserved and I stated to enjoy myself. Over the next hour I got about 6 waves and they were all good. I was having fun.
Then paddling out from this great wave, what made it even better was Maxi and Oscar sitting up on the break water watching me waving as they saw their dad out there, so anyway I am paddling out and the other two surfers are further out than me but I am gaining when all of a sudden the wave of the day comes through. Face about 2.5m high and it is sucking the water from the reef on which I am paddling. I could tell that I was going to be about 5 metres in front of where it broke and when it did it would be a washing machine. Best place for me was well under it, so I jumped off and swam for the bottom. I felt it go over, I felt my legrope strain then ‘twang’ my legrope went slack. Shit!

I thought I had broken my board. I surfaced and my board was no where to be seen, cursing again I struck off for the shore some 100 metres away through more breaking waves and the two other surfers. As I swam in I could see the boys and some other people looking down at the base of the breakwater where I knew my board to be, more swearing as it was being bashed on the rocks. Then one Balinese guy scrambles down the breakwater and comes back with my board, I could see as I swam that it was still in one piece. I swam in and found it with the boys but with dings, gouges and scratches all over it. I have circled the big ones and in obne phot you can see where the plastic of the legrope 'sheared' off at the connecter right behind the swivel. Bugger!!

The guy was Agung and I brought him a beer. We chatted a while and about then the Beach House (as it is called) started to really fill up with expats all coming down for Sunday arvo seafood BBQ. Maxi met another kid called, wait for it... Maxi and they played together. Oscar tagged along, they all had a ball. Playing with little rock crabs and looking at what the fishermen were catching and the great thing is, that they can do it all under your watchful eye while you sit back, relax and have a beer, coffee or as one table were doing it, Martinis at sunset. Respect!

We will definately be going back there for the Sunday arvo BBQ again.

Peace.

Day three: Got the car and the bike.

2007-01-11T00:49:00.000+11:00

A morning filled with filling out paperwork for the Immigration, something we need to do as we have to have Gabi on KITAS (Indonesian residency) to allow our kids to go to the school, and then an afternoon hiring a ten year old Kagang. at first they brought around a car that had tires like racing slicks. Viva la Tokyo Drift!

Whats worst me headset is dead and I can't use Skype. Do you think I could buy a new USB headset anywhere without someone trying to charge me an arm and a leg?

The ability to be able to do things really quickly and efficiently, because you know where to go an you know the langugae are being replaced by the foreignness of Bali.

They aren't in a hurry and they do not always speak English, a bad habit us English speakers get into.

But it hasn't replaced any of the euphoria we are all, as a family and individually, are feeling, rather it is heightening the experience.

You have to think. And I mean really think. For every action there is a reaction someone very wise once wrote. I am feeling it and while frustration is the first emotion to rise I am also having to rely on my family and wits more. It's good.

Boys only spent about 3 hours in the pool today.

Komang (I got the right spelling now, made a delicious Chicken curry which even the kids liked. Another good thing will be watching their pallet develop.

It is late (10pm) and the others are in bed. The night is quiet, the drone from the neighbours aircon is a pain as is the "doof, doof, doof" from the disco up the block. You can hear the surf rolling onto the beach up the road but you can not hear a car or motorbike.

More again later.

Peace!

Better than a punch in the face... Only just!

2007-01-09T17:59:00.000+11:00

...well Maxi and I went for our first surf today. Just down the road, sorry Jalan, where the Sofitel is we went out into the slops. Max took his NSP which is about 5'6". I took my short board as well. All the long boards are part of a freight consignment that we have coming in on Friday.

Been a while since I rode anything but a 9' + and here I was on a 6'4" Fish. Very different let me tell you.

However, had a ball. It was 3-4' slops and the fish was a nice fast manoeuvrable board. I had a great time.

We both did. I saw Max getting out, he was further down the beach, just then a set came through, I took the first wave, a right, dropped down dug in at the bottom and headed back on up, snap! Off the lip and down into a cutback, back around and they one quick up the face before the whole lot came down with me in the white water, perfect wave to finish the session on.

But enough about me.

Wandering up onto the shore I could see Maxi approaching. I then figured out he was crying. I ran to him. While wrapping his leg rope around his board a wave had come in and given his board a shove which must have flicked around and given him a smack on the right cheek. Split the skin and bruised the whole socket.

Nasty little sucker! The eye, not Maxi. Should be an interesting black eye though. This photo was taken after bathing, oh of course then Kumang had made us some Nasi Goreng for lunch which we sat down to eat, delicious (She made so much I am having it again tonight for dinner, yum!) then I got around to taking the photo.

If he can just keep that shiner until the 22nd Jan when he starts school he could get some instant cred.

We also met an English bloke in the surf called Nick. Lives in the Gang behind us somewhere. Seems a friendly sort. I am sure we will see more of him.

Anyway, I have work to do. It isn't all just holidays here. More from us later

Peace!

..So this is it! Day One! Bali

2007-01-08T21:59:00.000+11:00

The eagles have landed!. I sit here in a bath of my own perspiration. It's 7pm Monday the 8th Jan and we are finally on Bali. Wow!

Still can not really believe that we are actually here.

Maxi & Oscar have spent the day in the pool. They are besotted. They are also having the time of their lives.

The one thing we thought we would have issues with, having people around all the time, isn't an issue at all.

We have two staff here, Kermung and Made. (Hope I spelt their names right.)

Kerming (she) looks after the house and Made (he) the Gardens.

She made us this wonderful omlette for lunch and he played with the kids, cut a bit of lawn and prooned the odd shrub. They are fantastic and I think that we will have no problems in that department. The boys love them. They both thought Maxi was a girl, we told them it is a common occurance. What with all the hair and all.

Took a while to get all my computers set up and then even longer to get the internet sorted. Some techies arrived and after 15 minutes we had the router all sorted and things were whistling along.

Tonight we are off to Trattoria for dinner. Gabi & I know it from past visits. Great Italian place down the street.

Oh before I forget. Maxi and I went out and hired the obligatory motorbike. Just for a week while I sort out a car and motorbike deal from one of the local transport people. The boys were blown away that dad knew how to ride a bike. I took them both, at different times, for a spin. I got some brownie points there!

A nice feature of our bike is that it has a side board rack. Very cool, very Bali! So in the interim I can ride the 800m to the beach with a couple of boards and we can go for a surf.

Anyway, time to go out into the night.

We are in heaven.

Peace.

Click, clack and we are just about Packed!

2007-01-04T13:33:00.000+11:00

Whew! Nearly there and still 3 sleeps. As you can see from this trite morsel I haven't boxed up the computers yet.

Actually I am render a job and thought I would show you my new 70-300mm lens in comparison to the....
18-70mm that came with the camera. Both shots are from the same spot both at full zoom. Cool eh?

Will now be able to get some surfing shots from shore. As you can see of the ones of me that Gabi took (below) I had to crop them and in doing so they became quite pixelated. The best thing about this lens was the price, $150 only! It's plastic and you can feel it, lack of weight etc etc. But I can take it to the beach and I am not going to get overly worried by splashes etc.

But back to the move. Gabi has stripped all our posesions and they have gone into one of 3 piles. First pile is the stuff that is being shipped. Or should I say has been shipped. We sent off 117 kilos yesterday. The next is the stuff that stays, the bulk of it. We are loading up the garage with everything we are not leaveing in the flat. As it's a friend that's renting all the main furniture stays but all our nick nacks are going. Gosh we have some crap!

And third is our baggage allowance, we each get 30kg plus cabin, say another 12, when you factor in computers, cameras etc. So that is a total of 168kg.

It is hard to distill ones life into a quarter of a ton. And it's not just me but Gabi & the boys as well so really we all have less. Much less.

I think one should do it every couple of years. I noticed Whitney Houston doing it today. She selling off all her old frocks to pay the storage company for all the stuff they have been storing for her.

Anyway, I am drifting so will post this and get back to work.

Peace.

One of the cool new toys we are taking to Bali

2006-12-27T14:28:00.000+11:00

I thought I would just whack a couple of photos from our new Olympus iu725 camera up here. This one is of Max. I got him to jump off his board and go underwater. So I could see the results. Not bad eh?

Here is one shot across the water at Max sitting on his board. Great angle. Gabi made a wrist band from an old legrope and an old camera strap I had laying around. The camera sits in the palm of your hand and you can just swim with it. Or paddle. Will have to experiment with it on the board.

More of these later, especially from bali.

But first here is one more shot of me in the turn, shot from a different camera. Gabi was on shore with my Nikon D70.
The wind had come in and was getting a tad lumpy but a lot of fun was had by one and all.

The time is right. For all good children to have an adventure. And me too!!

2006-12-27T13:19:00.000+11:00

Had a happy festive season so far?, Our's was quiet. Surfing after breakfast, that's me on Xmas day out at Maroubra our local beach for two more weeks. As you can see with the wetsuit it has been a mild summer til now. Although the weather did clear up later on to a beautiful 26 degree day and plenty of sunshine.

Boxing day was very literal for us this year as the shelves were fitted into cartons in readiness for our move to the Indo ilse of Bali. With less than two weeks to go, it's all getting a little exciting.

One of the hardest things is to distil ones life down to a 30kg luggage allowance. Luck for me there are 4 of us! My computers and monitors eat one allowance then and there. Our surfboards (I am having to ship some of them) eat half of another, the Espresso machine the other half. Some where in there we have to take clothes, shoes, medicines and other essential items. We box and weigh everything.

We are shipping another 100+ kilos but this is stuff we will not need straight away. Things we can get by for a week without. Pity I cant ship the boys! Only joking!

So the next time I update this blog we will be EXPATS. Might get some shirts made.

We have a house all rented, lovely place with a guest house in the bottom of the yard. We needed something to entice family
and friends to come and visit. It's working! 4 bookings so far.

On the right is a calender for the bookings we have taken for the guest house. So if your going to come up to visit email us with your dates, or ring.

To have a look at the house go to the site we set up
http://web.mac.com/anomac

More soon.

Peace!

Bali or bust.

2006-09-24T22:57:00.000+10:00

Tis the season to pack up the family and move.

Too much time and tide has been settling over us and I feel that the family as a unit needs and adventure, a task to trully align ourselves. We are four souls who swim in the one fish bowl but are more often than not at battle with each other over purely egoistic items. I think a splattering of 'out of country' quandries will sort that out and have us acting as a proper family unit. One with a singulaity of purpose and function.

I am hoping that a move to bali will stimulate and gel the attention of the boys, Max (Now 10) an Oscar (5 in Dec) Not to mention Gabi and myself.

Working as an event designer who delivers everything digitally through the mediums of 2D & 3D programs allows me a certain freedom in respect to workplace location. 2007 is the year we are taking the full advantage of this.

I am ramping up my hardware and my software to offset the geographical issues some of my clients may have with the move.

Mind you most who I have spoken to are in awe of the project. Am starting to realise that we may have to have 'workshops' up there for them.

So you can expect this blog to liven up in the coming months as we start to sell all the crap that inhabits our lives and we make way for the bare necessities. Such as my quiver of surfboards.

Why is it my wife doesn't understand that this is so? I suppose it's the same as me not understanding why she wants to take a sewing machine with her up there.

Anyway it should be different and I will try to be slightly more diligent in keeping a proper record of it here.

Off we go... Yipee!

peace

So we are now a nation of Soccer fans!

2006-05-26T17:32:00.000+10:00

Since Australia won a place in this years World cup we are seeing some strange rumblings back home.

SBS one of the 5 national TV stations it's the multicultural channel and has long enjoyed an association with the leather But it gets a pittance from the government so it's the most budget conscious. Well they must have spent half their yearly operating budget to secure the rights for the World Cup, Then you have to have a brand new groovy set, I pitched on the design & production of it but lost (Bugger!) and a plethora of hosts. There is about 6 of them.

Now don't get me wrong, i love the game, in fact I will drive my son MAx to soccer in the morning tomorrow and then again over to the club rooms in the afternoon for the team photos. No i am not one to be jumping on the band wagon at this late date, I had already added our game dates to all my calendars.

But the win in the friendly against Greece last night has sent a wave of Ozzie-ness through the community. People are driving around with the tacky little flags the Sun Herald gave out with last Sundays newspaper. Once staunch rugby fans are softening their stance on 'other' codes of football. The wave has hit but the tide is still low. It will be an interesting one to watch in the coming months.

Go Ozzie go. Oy oy oy

peace.

One door closes and another opens. Oh look, It's a nice wood one this time!

2006-05-20T12:43:00.000+10:00

Been a while and a billion gallons of water has passed under my personal bridge. That's a happy (sic) snap of me on the left outside the Summer Palace in Beijing, mind you it's the middle of winter!

10 years ago I started an Exhibit Design company with an old friend, TV. On May 1 this year I sold my shares in the companies and have just started my new vehicle, Blue Sky Design Australia Pty Ltd. I am now an event designer. The difference may seem subtle to the untrained observer. Let me tell you without the long winded explanation that nothing is further from the truth.

Gone are the 12 full time employees, now it's just my wife Gabi & I. Millions of dollars turnover also go to be replaced with (hopefully) hundreds of thousands. The weight that seems to have lifted from my shoulders, although I had partners I tended to take on the overall burden, is amazing, mind you I am already finding that I am overworked now I have to do all the designing myself.

The release from the burden has given us a broader horizon. We're starting to look at the world differently. More importantly how why and where we live differently. At this point in our lives, (we have two boys in primary school) we have a window of opportunity where we can get out there. Where we can experience another culture, maybe even learn part of another language. So we are now planning the sabbatical for a year or so at the end of the year (End of the Australian school year)

Bali seems to be the go even though I receive peoples misgivings everytime i mention it. Perhaps the perceived danger of terrorism makes it a new frontier. Personally I think we have more to worry about with Bird Flu. Either way we are all excited about the idea. The ability to live amongst a beautiful race, learn there customs, go surfing, learn Bahasa, go surfing, and generally travel around the region makes it a wonderful base.

At the risk of sounding repetitive, did I mention going surfing?

Anyway, watch this space for news and updates as we make the SEA change.

Peace

HiJacked! Comments that link to some damn Loan & Pay site.

2005-11-27T17:38:00.000+11:00

I have had to start to moderate my Blog. Hmm, I don;'t get enough time to write anything here, now I have to find time to moderate it from Comments posted by robots. Argh! The cycle spins out of contol yet again.

Well we are now living metres away from Maroubraq beach, I went surfing twice yesterday, it was fantastic, although my body is feeling it today. 42 isn't the age to start surfing at that sort of level. But it was fantastic. 4 foot and glassy. A light offshore breeze, blue skys and aqua water.

I will get some photos tied to the site somehow, must speak to my brother how he does it. Check out his hole int he ground, see link to his blog at right. Tis almost a pool!

Will have to come west to try it out.

Peace.

Broom broom!

2005-08-22T21:04:00.000+10:00

Well it's that time of the year again. Silly season for us as we ramp up for the big annual Microsoft Event, Tech·Ed.

One of the things that will keep delegates amused this year during the breaks is racing 1/10 scale cars around a track. Doesn't sound that different does it, however if you look at Chuck's blog, clicking the heading will take you there, the cars are controlled by BlueTooth iPaqs.

Should prove an interesting interface.

We were called upon to brand the cars as well as the area and design the track. We left the hard stuff up to Chuck.

Tech·Ed is the largest single event we design from the ground up.

We do the sets, the booths for exhibition, the signage and the look and feel around the venue.

It is exhausting when you think that there is over a kilometre of system walls, more than 150 pieces of signage, 700 powerpoints that need to be run and over 7km's of cat 5 cable that goes into it.

Can't wait for it to be over again for another year.

Moving on. The selling of 42 Amy St Erskineville.

2005-08-21T18:32:00.000+10:00

The times are a changing. This week saw us sell our house, nay, it is our home.

For the last 7 years we have nurtured a once haven for hippies into an open light domain of laughter and leisure. But we were obviously getting bored and needed to go off and sharpen our teeth, so just before we put the finishing touches to it, someone made us an offer to good to refuse and thus have been cast into no mans land.

Gabi, my wife, and I do have strong ideas though and a definate direction, the fact that we don't agree on the finer points though is neither here or there. Or is it.

We both agree on the basics, we need a City pad, albeit down near the beach and a country pad. Acreage in the Byron hinterland. What more could a couple with two young boys want or need. A foot in both camps. The idea is so exhilarating I can't wait to embark on the next chapter of our lives. Anyway now the papers are signed we have decided to take the easy option first. The city pad.

Easy, did I say easy. Firstly the two camps. There's me in one corner and I want to to invest more time and less money by building, or should I say rebuilding a flat near the beach. In the other corner is darling wife and she would like one finished with a ribbon on it. Nothing to do but move in.

Me, I like the idea of putting our touches on something as well as being the ones that will reap the gains of the value adding. Essentially Gabi is over the whole renovation gig, especially after 42 Amy St, so I can't blame her but I want to make something, even though I hardly have the time to do so.

We shall see what happens on that front. Stay turned.

The most exciting and harder aspect of all this I feel is the move north. Every year we bundle our boys in into the car and embark on the drive to Mullum, Byron, Bangalow etc. We drive the area, surf the beaches, drink at the pub and basically have the best time. Each year the drive around involves looking at properties that are ont he market, each time we see more of what we like and it gets us that bit closer to taking our boys, and ourselves out of the rat race and into an area that has the most amazing mix or rural and urban. A place where you can get a soya latte and 5 minutes later be riding horses or surfing in some of the most beautiful waters in the world.

The temrate climate is neither to hot nor to cold. Tis the stuff of dreams and what a childhood it would give the two devils we call our sons. Motorbikes, horses, surfing, skating, nearly every possible distraction. Why wouldn't you.

Me, I get to have a second childhood. What better way to stave off mid life crisis.

Speaking of crisis, Heckle and Jeckle have returned. To work. Peace.

The New Pool

2005-08-21T17:18:00.000+10:00

Just been peruseing my brothers Blog. Check out the hole in the ground, if he posts it here

741 North

2005-03-04T16:15:00.000+11:00

741 North
Friends have poped one out and it does stir the ol' soul when you see these things happening to others, my time is past, with two sons that have now entered the Child worlld from the baby one.

Good to see and I wish them well.

smh.com.au - The Sydney Morning Herald

2004-10-08T10:17:00.000+10:00

smh.com.au - The Sydney Morning Herald

Every day my when I launch my browser, Safari, it loads and I am faced with the Sydney Newspaper homepage. Today I am faced with 35 Egyptians dead in a resort blast and the countries treasurer is being asked to table an apology by the opposition party.I really have to find a much better home page me thinks.

Maybe it should be Jib Jab!

My country is one day away from the federal election which could see the horrible little lying man once more elected into the top seat and the only opposition we can muster is a bloke from Sydneys western suburbs who looks like he only started wearing long trousers last week. To paraphrase Doctor Smith...."Oh the pain, the pain.."

I think it is time we stopped thinking about what the parties can do for us, personally and start to think with a little more longevity. What can the parties do for the earth. As we see ice shelves disappearing in the antartic we need to think about the glaciers melting and the eventual rise of the sea. (My suggestion is not to buy water front property!) The little man is more worried about a couple of hundred jobs that saving the old growth forrests of Tasmania. The entire Murray basin is stuffed through land mismanagement as farmers take as much as they can from the earth and they are now wondering why it's dying on them.

We are a country that lives on our agricultural products yet we are unable to treat the source of these products with the care and respect that it needs.

We can't even ratify the Kyoto accord. The shame, the shame!

Anyway, going against the grain I will not be voting for either of the major parties. I will be differing to the Greens in the hope that we may be able to shift the balance of power their way in the senate.

I hope all out there do the same and that we think about the planet for a change and not about our selves.

Come on people it's for our kids!

Peace.

Back to the grindstone

2004-09-25T16:17:00.000+10:00

Some time has past since I had the time or inclination to sprout on about things that happen in my little corner of the universe. Work has been pretty heavy. What we thought would be a nice slow run down towards Christmas has turned into a frantic race as companies throw last minute jobs at us. It’s not that I’m complaining about the work, I get to do a lot of the things I love, it would just be a lot easier if we had the info further out so as to negate this panic like frenzy to design projects which really deserve more time and thought.

Not all are rushed, I was briefed on a job in Macau next June. So that one has more than enough time for research and the odd moment of ponder.

On top of this we are moving our office to where we have our factory so we don’t keep losing people in the black hole that is the streets between the two. I am not overly happy, as I like them separate but I also do believe the move has to happen. But with all such moves there is a plethora of items that must be done. We have taken the opportunity to freshen up our corporate look and when I finish this little ramble I will back up to my ears in website.

Have a look at the old site and look. I will post again when the new site goes live and those who read this can sit as judge,

www.proj-x.com.au

Well I should either do so work or take the boys up the park for a run. This is fun but time is scarce. Take care all you ether readers and stay tuned for more exciting mumbles.

Live long and prosper.

Back from the edge

2004-08-27T23:57:00.000+10:00

Sunshine Coast Hotels: Hyatt Regency Coolum, Sunshine Coast, Australia
It's not a bad place to slum it for a week or so.

We were up there doing a gig for MS. Their ANZ Partner Conference.

We built an exhibition and branded the entire place. We also got to ride around in stretch golf carts, ride bycyles through the dark and drink a little more than we needed or as sense should have told us. But it had to be done and we stepped up to the plate.

We were put up in an unassuming little place that we liked to refer to as the 'rock n roll suite' We gave the room(sic) it's name after finding out that Mick Jagger stayed there, if your more than a little curious it's number is 711.

Now the term 'room' is used very losely and only in a hotle sence. For you see it was actually it's own free standing villa placed at the other end of the 18th fairway from the club house of this internationally reknown golf course. Swaddled in the exclusive little area called the Ambassadors Club, it was actually a 2 storey, three bedroom, 3 bathroom, 5 toilet palace. The entrance hall was complete with chandelier and curved staircase. Which I now know one needs for the all important entrance.

The roof boasted it's own kitchenette, and of course the obligatory spa! we filled it one night/morning. But I think I put a few drops too many of bubble bath and we were waste deep in bubbles. They detached themselves from the main body when the win blew and launch high into the sky creating multiple avaiation hazards.

But enough of the accommodation though, as I will put you to sleep. We've all stayed in places with their own tennis courts and pools. Suffice to say it was comfortable.

Tomorrow 12 of my family arrive and we will make a pilgrimage on Sunday up to the snow. These guys have never seen it before. My other Brother Damien and I have seen a fair bit in our lives so it should be pretty funny seeing them slip and slide for the first few days.

My main man Max (my eldest son) will be coming along. The little guy Oscar is not quite three so he is staying in Sydney with his mother this time. Next year mate.

So I am thinking the plan of attack is thus. Day one, going mad, perhaps even Day two. I will book him into the explorers club for that day /thise days and then when my legs go I will slow down and the two of us can have some time to bond. Should be great.

So don't expect any updates this week but do wait for the tall tales of adventure I come back with. Hope to upload some fotos and give your eyes a rest from the dribble here.

Mum is also coming over from Perth with the tribe. She won't come to the snow either, opting to stay with yet another brother (I come from a big family) and his wife and kids. He has 5 of them!!

Ok, time for bed, could be a big one tommorrow night.

Now where did I leave my beany and goggles!

OH, that little chestnut

2004-08-18T23:30:00.000+10:00

A mate of mine, lets call him Bob, is opening a bar in Japan. The last few days we have been chatting about names for the bar and I thought I would throw it up here in the vain attempt that someone will happen past and give me that Gem of the idea, that name that evades us. I have already supplied a smorgasborg of names. A veritable plethora of groovy names yet I don't seem to have moved my friend, his girlfriend Yuki yes, but Bob is unfased, see his latest mail to me.

Thanks for the names mate. Yuki really liked them.

We expect that many of our customers will be English speakers, and their
Japanese English students...Japs who are interested in learning English, or
who want to bonk a foreigner to see what that Gaijin sausage is really like.
We hope to sell a little Australian wine there.

We have a couple of hukahs, an oxygen bar, a couple of internet hookups
etc...

If you think of any other names let me know. Short is good. Imagine people
saying "I'm going to the .......," or "I'll meet you at the ......."

See what I mean! Bastard!

What names I hear you ask, well I should include my original mail to him so you can follow this thread in true style.

>What’s in a name eh?
>
>Alright, I agree, Babel is a bit to esoteric, even for English speakers, to
>elaborate I think you would be dating yourself. Old farts like us do not go
>out. We have kids and stuff. It’s the youth market that you want to
>attract,
>the ones with the disposable income. Add to the fact that it is a non
>English speaking country then I think you should go for words they might
>know. Here is my short list of names which could be used.
>
>* Home
>* Frame
>* Couch
>* Elements
>* Disc
>* Studio
>* Etc
>* Spinifex
>* Think out side the square
>* Hole, Box & Dice
>* Roo Bar
>* Billabong
>* Tsunami
>* Kasbah
>* The Orient
>* Taxi or Taxxi
>* Oxygen
>* Tonic
>* Baja
>
>Now you may think I’m on drugs but hey, I’m still at work so there isn’t
>any
>chance of that, maybe later.
>
>Let me know what you think or maybe these spur the ol’ grey mater into
>activity and you come up with the one you like.
>
>A good thing to do is give people the names and ask them which one they
>like, the cream should rise to the top.

Gems! Pearls! Everyone of them.

Some times I think that my friends lack any foresight.

Anyway, I am calling upon you, the maddening crowd to deposit at my doorstep the name that will stun my friend, Bob.

Take me to the highs I use to go to before i had kids.

Peace.

Made me wanna laugh

2004-08-16T22:40:00.000+10:00

The funniest Take I've seen on the games so far!

What the animation lacks in caricature style is made up ten fold in wit. I had several hearty chuckles while viewing this and am bound to go back again for second helping.

After a day full of trials and tribulations, from working on 2D graphics through to building 3D models,not to forget the ever necessary chatting to clients and staff it's great to be introduced (thanks Mike) to an oasis on the web, a corner of unassuming humour. Boy this is great.

I feel I am ready for another 10 hours.

Thanks Marco. You made my evening.

Thorpe and Hackett go gold, silver in brilliant first day

2004-08-15T12:05:00.000+10:00

Thorpe and Hackett go gold, silver in brilliant first day - Swimming -
So they did it. Managed to pull off the old one two in the pool.

It always surprises me how well the Aussies do in these games. The medal tally at the moment has Australia in second place behind China, America is 4th. Not that I am overly competitive but I will stand and bask in the glow of the reflected glory of these modern day olympians.

I met my wife in the Greek Isles. It was one of those typical tales of romace. An Aussie boy and his back pack. A young German Fraulein and her...well her blonde hair. Short version is I chased her and she ran away.

Now according to her, she even hid. The audacity of it!

Then I got bored with this fruitless chase, bit like the dog who has sucked out all the marobone jelly out of his bone, you turn you attention to tastier morsels and wander off.

She felt the hole it had left. She had survived on running and hiding. Just like those old American nuclear bomb adverts, Duck and Cover, it had kept her going. Without her knowing I had become important to her. Geez there mustn't have been a lot to do on the islands back then and she soon changed her coarse and persued me.

Needless to say she got me. Now 15 years later we are seeing travelogues, interdispersed with snippets of sport, from the once centre of the then known universe and it does bring back more than a small pang of nostalgia.

To be young and fit again and running around in Greece. What a life!

Yasou!

To sleep: perchance to dream: ay, there's the rub....

2004-08-15T00:29:00.000+10:00

Now wouldn't that be nice. A house in the country. Who would like to make the run from the city to a place, not to far from civilisation. Somewhere where you still get broadband and cable. A couple of miles away they have cafe lattes and news from the big city with coloured liftout.

Yes if you are going to move you have to take some of it with you. But fret not, baristas, telecom technicians, hair stylists and even people like me, designers are weighing up the cost of commute. Paring down their exposure in the city with a quick flight home to huddle for a week before making the pilgrimage again.

Why not when you see houses with whole suburbs of lush tropical forest attached for the same price as a semi in the inner suburbs.

My latest yearning.

Our Property Pages :: RURAL: "Designated high conservation value, this 10 acre rainforest property boasts absolute peace, only 7 mins from Mullumbimby. The 4 separate s/c dwellings are a duplex-style family home - 2 adjacent pavilion-style dwellings, each with 2 bedrooms & 1 bathroom; plus 2 completely separate income-generating cabins. Private swimming hole in Wilsons River.

Changed: 07/14/04.
Contains: 8 items.
Viewed: 166 times"

When you see something like that you wonder what draws us to and traps us within the deadly jaws of the city.

Time to bust down the gates.

Enjoy!

ano

2004-08-14T21:34:00.000+10:00

ano,
originally uploaded by anomac.

Ok, here is a photo firstly of me. This should make it's way onto my Blog. I have far too much time invested in this now. After that I am going to pen the help section of Flickr. While they have the information, I need a couple more depths to make things clear. Actually I should be thanking them for hosting my photos, bnot bagging them out.

Peace

oNe day I will connect the dots

2004-08-14T20:56:00.000+10:00

Still trying to get photos shown on my blog. I really should forget about it. The real reason I start this whole thing was to write, not create a slide show, besides I do enough of that type of thing at work. I will not be beat though. Mark my words.

Well the opening of yet another Olympics has come and gone. I would have loved to have seen the actual ceremony, but as it was at 3AM in the morning and the only repeat of it was at 11AM this morning, and I was at work, there seems little or no chance to do this. I cant keep thinking how pathetic it is. Anyway, I will just wait until it comes out on DVD.

Life is frantic at the moment. We have shows for MS, HP, Lexmark, Aristocrat and a couple of others all happening in the next week or so. August is always like this. I see my family in photos and would be better off if I checked into a hotel so as to avoid the embarrassing moments when a two and a half year old has you in a full nelson as you drag his little body towards the door in a vain effort to just slip out the back quietly on a Saturday or Sunday morning without them noticing.

Well off to find out how to attach the now uploaded photo onto the site.

Ano

Too Hard

2004-08-14T00:39:00.000+10:00

I have now spent the best part of a hour trying to get a free hosting for some images I wanted to add to theis blog. Do you think I could?

Well it's time to go to bed. Tomorrow holds a pandoras box of meetings. From dire ones in the morning to creative ones in the afternoon (around Wine-O-Clock) good thing the weekend is here, bring it on!

First Post

2004-08-13T16:28:00.000+10:00

I had resisted the urge to publish a blog for a long time. The funny thing is my first website, hard coded, was your version ol’ 1.0 blog. It was a snapshot taken at the time of creation. It was 7 years ago that I built that site. I know it well, my son Max, was then a baby and now an 8 year old who wrestles me both physically and metaphysically. Might try to auction him here later.

The old site is still out there, check it out. www.ozemail.com.au/~ano

Anyway's the idea of an online journal is one both daunting, I cant think that I will be able to keep the maintenance and the entertainment up and exciting, as it gives me a forum to vent my spleen. Not to mention big noting myself and belittling others, just kidding.

If you like what you read, tell me. It might be the catalyst I need to continue doing it. Same can be said for the negative. If you judge my musings to be verbal diarrhoea, don’t hold back. (but I reserve the right for redress)

Anyway, that's all your going to get this first night. Wouldn’t want to spoil things.

Cheers,

Ano
Erskineville, Sydney