Sydney update: garagesale

Hi everyone! What's up? Here everything seems fine. I have got a cold that won't go away, I think it is due to excessive rowing at intolerable hours. So I have decided to take a few days off and have been spending the time on some shopping. I now have two new pairs of shorts. Pairs , yes. And a very nice Nintendo tshirt with a Super Mario cartridge on it.


Today I have been to two garage sales, which were nice with lots of junk. Not nice enough to buy though. I was hoping to find a nice lamp for my room. Now I only have a TLlamp which is very domination when on. On the walk to the garage sales I had a very nice view of the CBD, see above. Below you can the street corner I pass most and where I spend ridiculous amounts of time waiting for traffic lights. Below that is a palm tree with electricity wire which I also like. Partly due to the minimalistic cloud free sky. Hope you like it to.

That is about it. Do not forget to watch the boatrace (17.15u?). I have not yet figured out how I am to watch it as it does not seem to be on TV and it will be in the middle of the night. Tomorrow evening my parents will arrive to see what I am doing. I will try to pick them up at the airport. Houdoe!

1668575834,20 cm

Aloha! I have just calculated that I am now 1668575834,20 cm away from home using Google earth. Quite amazing. It is quite some distance and quite impresive that I now know how many cm's (cm's!) + 2 decimals (2!) I am away my house in the Netherlands. Door to door even. I used to think is was further, 20000 km, so I just received a 3300 km discount.
This morning I have been rowing in a boat, at LRC (Leichhardt Rowing Club). I was nice to be out there again and a lot better than the rowing machine I used yesterday. I am happy that I did not see any sharks, but I did see some jelly fish, which I also do not like. After that I have been to school and when that was done I took a look at Glebe.
Glebe is a nice and green neighbourhood which I pass everyday going to uni. Today a took some time to ride down Glebe point road to the waterside. There are a lot of tearooms and organic food stores it seems, and the mood was nice. The waterside had a nice park and a great view. Only too bad that it was raining, but the rain does make me feel more at home somehow.
I also dropped by my favorite motorbike and bicycle store: Deus ex Machina. They've got a very cool collection on classic and custom build motorbikes and do some extremely nice custom bicycles as well. Check m out: here.

LRC

Hi, I decided that I would try to write a little more often and a little shorter. So here is an update. Generally I am still fine, but I have seem to have caught a cold Easter was a bit slow, now the house is getting full again as everyone returns from their parents, which is nice.
To battle the cold I have some throaties. See also the picture below.



The packaging looks awesome, as you can see. Al least I think so. But the taste, is a bit awkward. The butter menthol ones are pretty okay, in awkward, slightly addictive way, but the throaties are bad. But luckily you are only allowed three boxes (!) a day. Also interesting to note is the -ies extension, which is an Australian way of shortening words. This can be used in several ways such as sunnies (sunglasses) or shorties (shorts, although it is not shorter).

Besides al this I have been rowing on the ergometer for the first time today. 2 x 20 minutes. It was not easy, but I made it. I hope to start working out on a daily basis from now. I will try to get some pictures of the club soon and I will upload them, as well as some other pictures, as soon as I can presuade flickr to give me a pro account.

Happy Easter!

Yes, easter! The feast with the eggs and rabbits. And a happy one to all. This morning I found a chocolate egg on my door, for which I am very thankful. It was nice, and very tasty. After that I had breakfast and I tried to explain easter to the Indian from across the hall. "You celebrate Christ?" Yes. We celebrate the resurrection of Jesus, who was hanged from the cross three days ago. "And what do the rabbit and the eggs have to do with it?"
It is strange to explain a feast if that you have always taken for granted. The rabbits and eggs are old pagan fertility symbols. And apparently the eggs symbolizes the spark of new life that Jesus got today. The rabbits got into easter thanks to their prolific breeding habbits. It am not entirely sure what this has to do with Jesus.
Below are my eggs, that I decorated for the occasion, to make sure that Y could eat them.


Besides that nothing much is going on. I was hoping that I might go on a nice trip, but apparently I didn't. Most people in my house are visiting their parents, so its a bit quiet. I am trying to get my portfolio together, which is something long overdue. And I have been looking at graduation projects. The portfolio is a bit difficult because I seem to have very few images of my work, so I am working on that. I hope it will become very nice, ill show you when it is done.

Now I will go and bake an easter pizza. Should you happen to run into good graduation projects, do let me know.

Easter Update

Hi to all! This week has been ranging from really busy, to really slow. I haven't had the time to do anymore surfing, maybe next week again. I had "heaps" of homework. Heaps is the local word to express "a lot", it can also be used for "very much" by making it "heaps and heaps" and for very very much, the correct sentence would be "heaps and heaps and heaps". Etc. So I spend most of the previous weekend on assignments that were due on Monday and Wednesday.

On Monday I had my architecture course again, it is still a lot of fun. We started out drawing an animals movement on A2 and I am making a frog. Jumping. This week we had to try and capture that movement in 3 dimensions using wires. I think it turned out pretty well, it is only too bad that I do not (yet) have any good pictures of the stuff I am doing here. For next week we will have to get the movement into a 3D solid model. Only after that we might need to turn into anything that anything to do with architecture.

On Tuesday I went to the Maya animation course. This one is going pretty fast, and I am going to have to put in some extra time to get better at Maya. The course is only 3 hrs and not so much homework but it is racing through all Maya's applications, so I will have to do a little extra practice. I am also making a scenario for my short movie. Not yet really sure what it is going to be a about.

On Wednesday my first assignment for the Human Environment was due. It was a small ergonomics project which I did on record store displays. Because I wanted to drop this subject and had not put in much effort before, so that meant heaps of work in the weekend and on Tuesday. But I think it turned out pretty well.

After handing in the project I went to a journalism masterclass by two Dutch reporters: Robert Knoth and Antoinette de Jong. They did some very impressive photography and interviewing on a few nuclear disaster areas in Russia. The work was very impressive, but the motivation was a bit strange. They presented themselves as objective reporters, but their work carries a huge anti-nuclear bias and was paid for by Greenpeace. For journalists they did not seem very objective, and I found that odd. As artists they were very good.
Next I went to take a look at a exhibition in the library of 10 UTS Architecture students. This was cool, but the exposition a bit short. So I walked along Circular Quay to the Museum of Contemporary Art. The MCA was hosting a very nice exhibition of Fiona Hall 's work. She has been exploring the intersection between nature and culture for the past 4 decades and uses a wide variety of media. Very nice. The top floor of the museum hosted an Aboriginal Bark Painting expostion, showing the Arnott's (see TimTams) Collection. Bark Paintings are drawings made on pieces of bark, depicting all kinds of Aboriginal themes, such as kangaroos. I am not really into this, but if you like kangaroos: check 'm out.


As you might gather from the story above I have been doing a lot of walking, during which I tried to take pictures of the biggest and ugliest buildings I could find. These pictures are now on Flickr and you can check m out by clicking here. To finish this very culturally productive day I went to have s few beers at the Abercrombie Hotel. The bar smelled almost as bad as Wolbodo at home, and they were have a small art exhibition where the hotel used to be. Nice.

As the story I already very long, I will not bother much longer. But, should you be in Holland and if you happen to be going to Motel Mozaique (11 april?), go and see Pivot. I saw them yesterday at the Oxford Art Factory and it was good.

Today I have been relaxing. It is a bit quiet now, as most of my housemates have gone to their parents for easter. So, I am not really sure what I am going to do now. Bye!

Pi day & Surf Succes!

Hi! and a happy Pi day to all! Today has been a very nice Pi day for me with two joyfull occasions: 1: I had the privilige to surf on a very yellow board today - nice - and 2: I managed to stand up on my board for distances up to 30 meters. So, a good day it was.

Due to some technical dificulties with the ridiculously bad internet I will have keep this post a bit short. Even here at the university pub, the internetspeed and quality is ridiculous. The good news is that all Australians apologize for it when you mention it and Australia is constructing a new cable to Guam (?!), which will, in the future, connect Australia to America which will make life better. So, untill next time!

Surf!

Aloha! As promised I have been surfing this morning and it was fun. I tried to get up at a quarter past six this morning to meet Maarten at the Sydney Central bus stop at seven, but failed. This meant that we missed the bus and had to wait 15 mins for the next bus that took an agonizing long time to get us to Maroubra.

We arrived only just in time to sign the paper saying the surf school in not responsible in the case that we: would be bitten by sea creatures, would be poisoned by sea creatures, would be dragged into the sea by the rip currents, would brake bones or get hurt otherwise by being thrown on the beach by the surf, would get hurt by surfboards smashing into us, would get sick from pollution or any other nasty things. Then we had to write down who to contact in case we would get hurt and sign that we were a) able to swim at least 50 meters and b) were fit enough for at least 2 hours of surfing.


After all that was done Luke handed us our wetsuits. After we got changed we went to sit in a circle with the other 3 novice surfers. We did some introductions: who we were, where we were from, what we did, what our goals for the day were and what we could learn the other people. After that we needed to do some stretching and finally we were handed the boards. We dragged them to the sea where Luke explained the basics: get into the water, wait for the wave, paddle, stand.

We got into the water, which was nice, warm and blue. The surfing was not the grand success I had been hoping for, but still a lot of fun. Sadly I did not yet manage to stand up on the board. Every time I tried to get more than halfway up I fell off. I am gonna try again tomorrow.

Maroubra is a very nice beach. It's a long way from the city but there are also not that many people there. Especially at eight in the morning. I have told that trying to surf there is much better for my surf cred than going to Bondi, where we were last week. There were a lot of people out there doing some pretty nice surfing, while at Bondi I did not see anyone who was able to do more than just standing up and gliding for about 25 mtrs. Maroubra: surfers, Bondi: backpackers.

I have no pictures of my and the board as the camera was in the locker, but I did take some pictures afterwards, see them by clicking here.

This week...

Hi! How are you? I am quite fine. Having a bit of bad luck lately it seems, but applying the "no worries" mentality and solving the problems later, seems to be working fine. My third e-request to change my course got denied, so I have decided to stick with the courses I have got. Then I got an email that my application for a travel scholarship has gotten lost, so I will have to apply again for that. This is not so nice, as it involves quite sum of money. I hope. Also the the rear wheel of my bike broke some spokes. But I got that fixed quite nicely, as the shop where I got it decided to replace the entire wheel. While waiting I saw the nice big spider below.



So the wheel got fixed and the boring course seems to be getting better. Now just to get the money sorted and start looking for a graduation project. If you have a nice one, let me know!

I also went rowing yesterday. This was quite an experience as the rowing took place at 5.15. In the morning, that is before the suns comes up. It was pretty cool: rowing in the dark with lights on the boat, into the sunrise. Maybe I will pick it up again. When I got back some told me that boats on the river occasionally get attacked by sharks. And I will have to consider the time.

Tomorrow I will try surfing, so stay tuned and I'll let you know how that works out!

Whats going on in Sydney?

Aloha! Sorry about the lack of posts lately. If you were wondering: I am still alive, posting just was not on my mind. Just did not feel like it. The previous weekend it was a bit down, because everything here in Australia just seems too go so slow. Long waits for reply’s, long waits at traffic lights, long waits for trains, long waits in the supermarket, long waits for everything. Aaaargh. Also, UTS rowing club told me after three weeks of trying to reach them that there was no rowing for me, school was still boring and I got an email from university the course I wanted to change could not be changed. Crap.

But I have been feeling a lot better since Monday morning. As the introductions for everything are over University seems to be getting more interesting, I contacted another rowing club and have put in a new e-request to change my course. Things seem to be going somewhere again and I have found some peace with the laid-back Australian attitude. It takes some getting used to. Long waits at traffic lights, long waits for trains, long waits, long waits; No worries mate.

The weather has been great. The Monday (Architecture) and Tuesday (Maya) classes were good, and I tried an extra course, Design for Theatre, which seems nice. And on Wednesday the class I wanted to change got a little better, which was good because on Thursday my e-request got rejected again. We also tried to go surfing on Thursday, but because the surf school was fully booked, we have to wait, yet again, until next Thursday. So we spend the day on the beach and going to a party.

On Saturday I went to take a look at the Australian National Rowing Championships on the Sydney 2000 Olympic race course. The race course is really cool with 9 lines, and lies sheltered against the mountains. Next to the race course is a warm up lake. Nice. The Nationals are a bit different then in the Netherlands, because they’re spread out over the entire week so athletes can compete in all boat types. What was also very cool was that every club had brought their own tent, which gave the spectator area a cheerful look. Today I had an appointment at Leichhardt Rowing Club to see what they are doing. It is a civilian club, it is not so big but it seemed nice. Maybe a bit expdensive. I am going to give it a try next Tuesday. At 5.15 am.

Pictures will follow when internet is a little faster then today. Cheers!

TimTam: the Australian Cookie

Today I would like to tell you something about the TimTams. The TimTams are apparently THE cookie of Australia. First only the backpackers told me, but now also the Australians are telling me so. “You should try some, they’re yummy good.” And as I see them everywhere, I wondered what are they all about?

To find out, I have just been to the supermarket, where I bought the largest pack that they had. I am now the proud owner of 200 grammes of Arnott’s TimTam original: The most irresistible chocolate biscuit. 200 grammes comes down to 11 TimTams and will set you back about 3 Dollars. Ingredients: Sugar, Wheat flour, Vegetable oil, Milk solids, Cocoa butter, Cocoa mass, Golden Syrup and some blahblahblah. Do not purchase if packet is open or torn.

The cookie is made out of 2 layers of chocolate biscuit with chocolate cream in between and covered in chocolate. Just the thing you need if you’re in the mood for some chocolate cookies. I think they are quite tasty, but maybe a bit too much of chocolate in one cookie for my taste. Just 5 TimTams left.

Arnott’s TM – Made in Australia, exporting to the world.