$$$ BLING BLING BLING

Also, here is Andrew's thought of the, uh, what's it been, 4 months? Thought of the Quarter!

Americans are crazy about money. And it's a little disturbing - I think it's because there's a general lack of depth in people here. Not, I should hasten to add, anyone I work/spend time with, because, quite frankly, I wouldn't if they were like that - but the general atmos here? It's ... hmmm, it's not the same as in Sydney, or Thailand, or even Greece!

All the songs are about making money. All the books are about making money. The people who are famous here? They are often famous SIMPLY FOR MAKING MONEY. What do the bums on the street here ask for? Education? Equality? Medical? No - money!
Call me stir-crazy (although I do prefer 'Andrew', maybe with the appellation 'Sri Sri'), but that's, well, stir-crazy!

Confessions of a taxi taker

Hi blog people!

There are rarely any people who read this blog - so I'll let you in on a secret! I'm a tad ill now (the flu, or something disturbingly alike to it), but I'm better (or my back is - thanks to Thai massage!) but, assuming I feel in tip top shape tomorrow (which in yankee land is a Wednesday -and hey, it's new Comic Book Day on Wednesdays, so of *course* I'll be better) I'm going to go and book some sky-diving. I'll even add photos of it!

In the meantime, here is a story I call: "The stupid idiot who answers phones at the taxi company here in San Fran"
It's nighttime, and I need a cab. So, oddly enough, I call the cab people up - *** Cabs - and ask them to pick me up.
"What's the address?" asks an intimidatingly confident deep voice - the kind of voice that Darth Vader only wishes he had - only I'm not intimidated. Not because I'm the balls, or whatever stupid term is hip on the hop these days, but because I've long since learnt that people who emply Deep Voice are trying to impress people, mostly because they aren't that impressive otherwise.
Obviously, I give the address - "1324 BayView" I respond, and then, after a reassuringly deep and intimidating:
"Cab'll be there in 5 to 15" I hang up. I might have added a tired "ok" but I can't recall.

5 minutes later, I get a call, it's a lady cab driver, she's right outside. Only, as I venture down, I discover she isn't, in fact, right outside. She's on Billy St. I don't know *why* she's on Billy, but I'm endeavouring to find a cab at 1am on this cold (and yet, somehow, safe-feeling) street to take me to Billy St so she can take me back to the Hostel when she chirpily tells me she'll contact base station, to find out what's up.

I call the base station anyway - I know what's up. Someone, somewhere, has stuffed up. I'm pretty sure it's not me, and I'm also sure I don't care, because it's late, and I just want a cab! Lo and behold, I get Dr Deep Voice:
"*** Cabs" (maybe he's called *** Cabs? I've heard stupider names here, like, f'r instance, Lacey ["just like the lingere"]).
"Hey, I just made a booking with you, only the cab isn't here - can I get the cab to..."
"What's the address?" booms a defiant, cool, intimidatingly deep voice.
"1324 BayView"
"And where did the cab end up?"
"I don't know - look, can we just send a cab to 1324 Bayv.."
"I need to know where the cab went - ahhh"
"Really, I don'..."
"Andrew, right? You used the automated voice system, you made a mistake, you shouldn't have done that, that's why the cab went to Billy. You need to tell us where you want to be picked up from"
"but I didn't... I talked to you - "
"No sir, you didn't"
"You're an idiot"

Now, the rest of the conversation can go like this:
Deep Voice talks to me for about 20 seconds on about something, and THEN realises I called him an idiot. He tells me (in a deep and authoritative voice) that I'm so clever to be using the word idiot, did I go to school to learn that, etc etc.
I inform Deep Voice that I may well not be super smart, but at least I'm not a chump working at 1am answering phones for a taxi company.
Deep Voice tells me to use another cab company, because no *** Cab is coming tonight.
I tell Deep Voice to attempt an anatomical impossibility, and then book with another cab company.

It's not much of a story, but there you are!

I'm a dirty liar!

Sorry, but I'm trying to get my stupid camera to actually upload the pictures!

Well, I came in yesterday *just* to do that, and guess what? There was no internet access in the offices! There were other madcap hijinks that occurred yesterday too, involving me, a date, and a movie - but they're just... too... bizarre. Really.

Ok, so, what is in store today for people who read my blog?

A CONSPIRACY... REVEALED!

that's right. I was watching the 6th Day, a great film with Arnie (the Governor!) in it, where there's genetic cloning and evil afoot, and Arnie solves these problems by killing everyone. It was totally refreshing and unexpected.

Here, though, is the kicker -

ladies & gentlemen, I present Steve Jobs, architect of Apple and high fashion everywhere, a man to not be trifled with!

Actually, wait, no, no I don't.
Sorry gang, Jobs really does look like the villain in the 6th day. But there's no way in heck I'm, oh, whatever, I'll give it a shot.




No, wait, that's not Steve... but THIS is!




And they look totally similar. Shut up, it's my blog.

Oh! A photo of the hoover dam!

Dave & I went Kayaking down the Colorado river, which is where the Hoover Dam begins, or something. It was really nice, and a good call by Dave (which made up for other lunacy that followed & pre-uh-followed the kayaking).




Actually, I'm not sure if that's the best pic I have, but eh! It's 6:20pm and I have to do something with my days. Like, I don't know, eat?

Another photo. I love how they have the little man falling into the oblivion, and that they repeat the sign to make sure you don't hurtle into the void. In the lower photo, our man seems to have become unstuck by a stray punctuation mark. Grammar - it hits you hardest when you aren't looking, eh?




Just a nice scenic river photo.




Ok! Tomorrow - the people we partied with! $1000 dinner! Limos! No, I am NOT KIDDING! It was so crazy, they, uh, did something crazy? Well, we did anyway, and that's What Counts.

Tomorrow, ok?

I'll put up the vegas pics tomorrow.

Because you KNOW you want to see what Vegas is...

To Jude

Hi Jude,

you're the only person reading this blog now, so I might as well wrtie to you on it. Tell Mikey I can't pay him the money I owe him, but that I'll get it to him soon - wouldn't want to end up like li'l Paulie!
And Jasmine has shingels, which is a shame, because she just won't go down that ...

Nope, not funny. I don't know where I was going with that one, I'm a tad hungover. Oh! I was going to do a Fox News! exerpt.

So, today, I'm watching Fox News! and the reporter says this:
"Well Eadie, only 40% of schools have been rebuilt since Hurricane Katrina, that's less than half."

Fox News! Helping the children suffering from the disasters of inept administration with impromtu maths lessons! Is there nothing they can't fix?

Planning for this weekend!

Hi blog-reader, who really isn't expecting much here - maybe I should check my read-levels?

Ok, I will!

...

Ok, 0. That's... that's pretty low. I don't know, maybe if I owed people visits it could be lower, but still. So, in an effort to improve this, I'm going to, well, I'm going to post more.

But not this week. Because nothing is happening this week! But this weekend? Whoa NELLIE! I'm hitting vegas!
I'm going gambling!
I'm, um, getting a camera! People can check it out! Whoa! Yeah!

But until then, faitthful (or, let's face it, faithless, since NO ONE READS THIS) blog reader, umm, yeah!

So, I'm going to make this thing a bit more... organised.

What a time it has been!

So, blog-reading person who has probably stumbled across this site, because, well, I don't know who reads a site regularly when NOTHING has happened on the site for a while, yes, so, blog-reading person, how are you?

Good? Excellent!

In the time sincemy last post, I have seen a few apartments, found none of them to be useful, and really just lived in a hostel. Which is fun, and cheap, but not my style. Well, it's totally free-style, which is my style, and oh sod it, I'm a little hungover so I'm not writing any more.

But I have plans! Romantic ones, with table-top dinners and roses and maybe even the beach!

Pew pew pew!

Ok, I'm going apartment hunting. And then I'm going to go and, uh, do crazy cool stuff?

I don't know. But I'll find out!

FOX NEWS!

Delivering punches to the IQ for 10 years!!!

Yeah! That's it, FOX NEWS (Because we can), you entertain me all night long!!

So, all I can really comment on here is the zany crazyness of FOX NEWS, because I ain't doin' that much. The occasional osteo appointment, some IT, blah blah. But FOX? FOX NEWS keeps me warm at night.

Right now they're trying to work out how Bush can raise himself to the pantheon of "Great American Presidents." And who are the examples of "Great American Presidents"? The founding father? Honest Abe? Wilson? Roosevelt?

Hah. Gentle reader, you haven't obviously had the refreshing kick to the IQ that is FOX NEWS. The answer is simple - there's just one - Ronald Reagan.

That's right, the inventor of Reaganomics and the man who out-spent communism, apparently tops the list of "Great American Presidents"

Ahhhhh FOX NEWS, is there anything a swift blow to the IQ can't solve?

PS Reaganomics is a portmantou, which is itself a portmantou! It's like an endless recursion that might well end in a stack overflow, which is funny because that's exactly what my code did today!

Ok, so no exciting story

The story? Well, the plan WAS to go to the airport, and check in my luggage. Seeing as I only had a coupl'a tees and some jeans, and they were in a plastic bag, there really wouldn't appear to be a need to. But, oh, there was.

See, in the oosa, the airports have this quaint law about not carrying more than 3oz (whatever THAT is. Whenever I see oz, I think of the lamentable teenage mutant ninja turtles movie: "The Secret of the Ooze" (or maybe it was a game)) of liquid... and yep, you gueesed, I am packin' more than that.
"How?" You ask, oh so helpfully? No, really, do you? Oh! You do! Good!

Well, because I carry contact-lens fluid on me. Going TO NYC, the delights at customs not only insisted I throw away my 4oz container, but ALSO that I throw away my mostly-used toothpaste. Why I'd brought it, I don't know, I hadn't brought the brush. There are 2 ways to carry these deadly liquids through the oosa airspace, by the way. One is by putting it in a clear, quart-sized zip-locked bag zzzz-zzzzzzz-zzzzz.

The other is to check it in! Obvious.

So, the plan was, on the way back from NYC to SFO (I don't know what the 'O' means, the airport is called San Fran International...), to check in my contact lense fluid. Think of the hilarity at 1am when I toddle off the plane, only to have to go to the rotating thinggummy whatsit to wait for my contact lens bottle, that would dutifully trundle off the conveyor belt, alongside the other bags.

Ok, it's a pretty funny image, except that had I done it, it would have been 1am and I wouldn't have bothered. As it happens, though, I didn't do it. And NOT because I wasn't allowed to... but because I didn't need to. Yep, they just let me carry my contact-lens fluid RIGHT ONTO THAT PLANE. God knows what the "evil forces" that threaten this fine nation (oosa) will do with that info now it's on the internet, but I'm not flying here again!

Oh, and Fox News? I watched one of your shows tonight - it's called the "Bill O'Reilly Show". Just thought I should let you know, after watching it? My IQ dropped... that darn thing isn't high to start with, and your show's simplistic grammar and easy-to-reuse point of view (the world is, apparantly, full of "good guys" and "bad guys") has lowered it more. It took my a full ten minutes to open the fridge door after watching your show, and it was only later that I realised that I'd really wanted to go out and get some milk. I was wondering why it was so dark outside. And cold. And small.

I'll sue! That's what I'll do!

New York, New Yooooork

Which is where I am... of course, I'm blowing outta here in a few hours, but it's been pretty fun!

I visited my good friend Dave, who owns a collection of the largest screens in the world in his apartment, and got up to, well, not alot. I saw a thai masseuse here, and that was actually very good.
I also was chatted up by a gay businessman here, who gave me his card - I don't know, I don't think he was a keeper.
Oh! And I had a california roll. Yes, that's right - I come FROM San Fran, TO NYC, and do all the traditional san fran things in nyc (hippy massage, gay chat up, california roll... oh, wait, you readers aren't stupid. Sorry...). Anyhoo, a tad hung over right now, on account of not having drunk any beer at all at any time whilst in nyc. Nope, not me.

Things I saw: that statue (of liberty!) (from a distance!), the wtc site, central park, time's square (very bright), and etc.

Ok, that's all now... but after the flight back home (to san fran), I think there might be a pretty cool sotry in the telling. It just hasn't happened... yet.

Just going swimming!

And that's a blog entry to blow ANYONE away.

I am going to ny!

Tomorrow, actually. Only I get there on saturday morning. Who knows what madcap hijinks I will get up to?

In other news:
I'm seriously thinking of becoming an osteopath. There are many reasons for this, including:
1. they earn good money
2. it seems like a fun enough job
3. 90% of the current practitioners are ape-shit stupid incompetents. Like, quite frankly, most of the medical field... but let's not go down THAT path. My rant here is on the ridiculously low quality of osteopathy in the states and london! And it's over now, because it's a boring rant. But next week? When I meet (another) osteopath? I'm laying the smackdown hard on this poor fool, and if he's another weak wristed, "oooh, I don't want to apply pressure on you" (I mean, dude, you're an OSTEOPATH. That is your JOB, to apply pressure. So it HURTS. I'm in IT, do I go around saying "yeah, I can fix your problem, and I won't even use a compuer? No, I don't. Because that is plain stupid)

So! People are wanting the story of how I nearly killed myself. It's pretty simple, and for the benefit of all our readers, I'm going to give it to you in easy, fool-proof (and believe me, mostly fools will be doing this) steps! Now fun for everyone!

1. imbibe your favourite beverage, unless it's not beer. In that case, imbibe beer.
2. imbibe more, because you are in a yankee pub for the first time ever, and that's how you roll.
3. repeat steps 1 & 2.
4. And 3.
5. start again.
6. and one for the road! Only throw this one away - you know your limits!
7. go home, cook pasta.
8. keep cooking.
9. god, pasta takes a long time to cook. Why not have a nap?
10. Wake up. Think: "whoo! Tired, ... stupid alarm-clock going off at 6:19am. Gee, that pub must have been smoky, the room is full of smoke."
11. swear. Realise pasta has cooked for 4 hours, and will probably be soggy and revolting. Go and clean up pot.
12. swear some more, pasta is carbonated. Check out smoke alarm, and find it chillaxin' on the wall, looking at proceedings with a mirthful grin.
13. stay in room for another night, and wonder why you are having difficulty sleeping. Don't think about the smoke, and the health hazard it is.
14. try to sleep the following night. Have an epiphany! Put off joining scientology for another day, and try to go back to bed.
15. Have ANOTHER epiphany, and realise should probably leave smoky, cancer-hazardous room.
16. sleep in lobby.
17. next day complain, and get moved to new, nicer room, bigger, and get clothes washed on the house.
18. write up on blog, so others can try this out too! One has to share!

Yes! Only 18 steps! And the price? It's only free! Where else can you get such a dealeeo?

Ok, so, tomorrow:
- kick ass in IT some more.
- go to nyc
- maybe book a chiropractor? Because, y'know, good osteos are rare.

Oh, and I'm seeing another osteo-type tomorrow

Because, gosh and darn it, a tight whatever muscle it is, is not fun at all. Yeah, I know, how do I come up with such riveting topics on this blog?

Well, would you rather read about IT stuff? Oh, really? Well, too bad. I'm hoping that yank osteos are better than, let's face it, the incredibly piss-weak osteos that live in the UK. Will my sacro-iliac muscle be un-tensed (maybe)? Will I spend a fortune (yes, actually)? Will I, once again healthy, have totally crazy stories to tell you (yep)?

PS Everyone! When staying at a serviced apartment, it is considered BAD FORM to try and burn the place down. I'm just sayin', that's all. Unlikely that I nearly did. No siree, nothing crazy like that happened. Nope.
Move along, people...

I see... naked people

Also, I'm worried I have PAD. What is PAD? Who does it target? I don't know, but I just saw a TOTALLY REALLY REAL advert ON TV that told me that PAD has "no symptoms" and that you shouldn't wait UNTIL the symptoms begin, because then it's too late.

Which means that, well, everyone should be treating themselves for PAD. That means YOU faithful blog-reader! Yes, you must be careful, lest you DIE of PAD. Order a brochure today, and be safe!

What crap. Aaah, fear mongering, can it EVER go wrong?

Also, the naked people? The San Fran equivalent of the city to surf. Think the Sydney version, now add alcohol, and more drunk people than you can possibly poke a stick at. I mean, really super drunk people. They get naked, they pass out on the sidewalk, it was a freaking zoo!
I saw the snuffulufagus, for pete's sake!
From Seasame Street, that's not American lingo. Word.

Anyway, met up with Erin (from Greece!) again, and she showed me the sights of San Fran (and, as you may be gathering, these are quite the sights, these sights), which was very nice of her! Thanks, Erin!

Anyway, I was totally knackered, so after the crazyness of the san fran city2surf, I headed back home, went to work today, went to the gym (i know! I am so proud!) and then wrote on my blog.

And got worried about PAD!

Do YOU have PAD?

Ok, so I went swimming today!

It was initially going to cost just $20usd to use the pool all day at the local gym, but then they explained that, really, I should get a $95/month membership to use the pool all the time, and THEN after chatting to them, they gave me a 3 day pass for free.
I'm going to try this one at all the local gyms and maybe not pay for gym use for a month?

PS If you are Emma and reading this, I *know* I wrote this to you, but I thought I'd write it again. I mean, c'mon, it's not like I have a plethora of jokes here.

Oh! My first week at work was fine, actually, nice team, place is nearby, happy memories.

Tomorrow is the San Fran equivalent of the "city to surf" which I'm going to go to - I'll just make it a giant pub crawl, I suppose, seeing as I'm not about to do the whole marathon thing. I figure, that's ONE way to meet people here!

Ohmigod! Have I written about the spaniard-ish people here? It's so cool! It's similar to those american movies with the spanish/latino guy:
"Aye see you wan a sweem, eh homes? You wanna paey fo' wan day, or you wanna membersheep?"
Totally like that. Actually, I have a phone here that doesn't work, because, well, it's a long story but I'll tell you because, HEY, if you're reading this, you probably aren't finding a cure for cancer or anything important, right?
Pretty much, my battery is dieing, and I don't have an adaptor. So I need one. But, in the meantime, I have a yankee sim card, which I need to "activate" to use the phone. So, using the dregs of my battery, I call the number to activate it... and it's not a "press this number for this service thing", it's an automated "speak into the phone telling me the service you want, and we send you there."

Great idea, except I DON'T speak "american". So I'm all "activate my sim card" and the voice says
"You want to run for president. If this is correct, say yes. If not, say no"
and I say "no"
Then I say a number, just for fun - "123456789"
And she says:
"You said 5874256874" - no kidding! Aside from the president thing, I was joking there. But the numbers? It was whack! So I put on a latino/yankee accent and positively DRAWL into the phone, in the way I would when I'm mocking the "american" language and trying to be cletus, the slack jawed local?
The automated system TOTALLY work out what I said. I think my american is comign along pretty good!

Working again!

So! After my time being an unemployed Indian Actor, whose last gig was a major Bollywood film starring the luminaries of indian film like, umm, I forget, I've just done a full days work here in san fran! Fun!

I don't want to kill people with excitement, so I'll skip what I did at work today, and discuss: Butter. Or rather, butter as in, I can't seem to find any here in the oosa! They have margarine, sure, and they have "cream filled butter" that comes in a paper box and looks, well, weird. But where is the butter with the olive oil and the reduction in cholesterol? Huh? Where?

Also - today, I got my sink unplugged by a li'l old spanish guy, who kept on leaving the room to "get tools" and then coming back, without tools, but smelling of smoke. The big question is: "how much do I tip him?" He was there for, what, an hour? With a drill and a plunger and other stuff, and then he fixed my toilet too, which was apparantly broken. I gave him a tenner in the end - is this too much? Too little? I don't know!
And what happens if I don't tip enough? Do they refuse service? Spit in my food? Clog my sink?

Also, police in Australia will be monitoring a nude car wash for "x-rated illegal activities"... how are they proposing to monitor this?

Also: Fox News. Because They Can.

I was watching some presidential debate yesterday - between republican guys wanting to be presidential candidates. They went into super-crazy overdrive, among the better (verbatim) quotes are:

On american culture:
"America is the last bastion of Western Civilisation" (and that's with an "s" oosa!) [republican guy #1]

On torture:
"I would tell the interrogators to use every measure they could think of" [Giuliani]

"Some people have said we ought to close Guantanamo. My view is, we ought to double Guantanamo," (Or maybe triple it!) [Romney]

On combating terrorism:
"I would be looking for Jack Bauer" (Goal oriented leadership!) [republican guy #2]

On 9/11:
"They attack us because we've been over there. We've been bombing Iraq for 10 years. ... Right now, we're building an embassy in Iraq that is bigger than the Vatican. We're building 14 permanent bases. What would we say here if China was doing this in our country or in the Gulf of Mexico? We would be objecting.
(I think this particular Republican forgot he was a Republican on the day) [Ron Paul]
--In response:
--"I don't think I have ever heard that before and I have heard some pretty absurd explanations for Sept. 11" (I don't know, because you only watch Fox? It's not THAT uncommon a viewpoint...) [Giuliani]

And of course, today on Fox News (Because They Can), a look at how REPUBLICAN debates are different from DEMOCRAT debates. Conclusion: REPUBLICAN ones are better, because they have REPUBLICANS, and also ask tougher questions, like "What would you do if you were the president and had a situation like the ones that come up on 24 all the time?" (where the answer, or course, is to torture people and get Jack Bauer).

And look at this poll!
"Should Congress change the law that allows its members to trade stocks on non-public information?"
56% - yes
44% - no
What sort of crazy country IS the oosa? And how do I get into Congress?

Yo! S'up HOME BoyZ? Yo talkin' toe me?

Ok, so I'm in The United States of America, also known as The Oosa! It's apparently a country of some importance near Canada, although seeing as most people in Australia don't know much about the war-like Oosa people (except that they are war-like. And near Canada), I have had to do a lot of research for this trip.

The first is learning the local lingo, which in this case is called "American". It appears to be a derivation of English, but is spoken with a slur and has a hearty helping of the letter 'z' put everywhere imaginable. They also like to drop off letters - for example, the title of this blog actually reads (in english)
"Hello! How are you, friend? Did you say something earlier?"
I've been trying my "american" out with people here, with some limited successes, I suppose I'll have to keep studying those notes!

Kidding aside (most Australians know The Oosa is also near Mexico) I'm in San Fran right now. I've returned to the mundane world of working, which, after kicking around London for a while, figured that the oosa would be a nicer place to check out. So I am back to IT (again) working for another large bank (this one's British!) and am, well, going to work tomorrow. For the first time in, what? More than a year? Unless you count my time working in India as a poorly paid actor for a day, in which case I've only been out of work for a few months.

What else? Well, I've been put up in a suite here in "The Financial Sector" with, ummm, a distinctly 80's decor? It's serviced, it just doesn't have any cutlery, which was a nice touch, and made eating ice cream impossible last night. I also don't know about tipping! This morning, at the breakfast area, there's a woman whose sole job is to
put bread on my plate and I think I maybe should have tipped her. Because she had a plate full of money next to her.

And I can watch tv again! Very exciting - I have 60+ channels, all of them full of crap. And medical drug ads. In the UK, all the drug ads are trying to get you to be a guinea pig. In america, they are for you to buy pharmaceuticals - anything from the pill (the disclaimer went on for 30 seconds, and explained that the pill did not stop hiv) to "natural male enhancement drugs". From the ad, I couldn't work if it was for viagra or hair enhancement, it was just a bunch of men wandering around waving their arms every so often.

Finally, a big big thanks to Emma, from Melbourne, who SAVED MY LIFE whilst I was in London by giving me a floor to sleep on, a room to lock us both out of, an oven to ignite the occasional cookie in, and person to talk to lots, to stave off the madness. Thanks again Emma, you're as beautiful as you are kind (and you are very kind!)

News!

Ok, so, roughly, I have no news. But I might!

In the meantime, I'm going to stop adding things to this blog, until I get news to tell you.

I mean, aside from the fact that I met a policeman in London who sang me the nursery rhyme "Muffin Man" when I asked him to.

But that's the kind of news that doesn't make the front page of the new york times, and if it doesn't even make THEIR shoddy standards, then no way is it going to be considered news at the MOART. Because we have real news. The news that other people don't have, because they just can't cut the mustard.

Probably. Maybe because they spend all their time trying to cut the mustard? Instead of getting news? I don't know.

Excelsior!

PS Oh! I saw Spiderman 3, and it was very good.

A half pint of shandy

Is just what the doctor ordered after a tough week of trudging the mean streets of London!

There is, of course, precious little to celebrate (gosh knows WHY the pound is so strong when the London job market is so obviously incredibly weak if they can't find ME a job already), but I think I'm worth it.

Oh no, wait, that's the excuse I used to buy all my Max Factor makeup today. Or whichever woman's thing has that logo. I don't know! Maybe its Laureal?

And lo! There came a man in a pink tee

So, I might just write about my most recent job-hunting adventure. Only I won't mention names or anything, because stuff like that can have all sorts of consequences.

Only, admittedly, the last two posts probably aren't that interesting. Or the second one. Or even the first one, depends on what you find interesting, really. I didn't even READ those pages I linked to, I just wanted to do something cool with a few links on a relevant subject.
All for you! The reader!

Ok, so all my story is (and after buildup like the above, well, it's going to disappoint) is that I went to one job interview, only I didn't quite realise it *was* a job interview - I thought it was a meeting with a recruiter. Hence a pink tee shirt and a growing confusion as to:
a) why I was being shown around a recruitment company's offices, when I CLEARLY wanted an IT job
b) why everyone in the recruitment company were all busy coding
c) why I was being given the (very non-recruitment company-ish) origin story OF the recruitment company.

Anyway, it all turned out well in the end, and I saved the world* which is always nice.

To turn this blog on it's head and cause blood to rush up places that it normally doesn't, I'm going to have a quick swingin GRIPE at the confusion mill that is the J2EE/Struts/Spring/Hibernate/Widget/Yet-Another-Open-Source-Add-On industry. There are too many things doing just plain old too many things that really, honestly, should be able to be simplified.
Only every company in the world seems to have jumped on all these things, and so like a giant, bloated legacy system it is all looking very much like its here to stay. I'm not even aware if there are standard standards that everyone is adhering to when making apps with the above (and other) technologies.
In an effort to become more one with other solutions, tomorrow (or the day after, or maybe next week), I'm going to go and look at Ruby on Rails, which claim(s/ed) to be the magic bullet when I first read about it a year or so ago. But that's going to be AFTER I toil through a few more bloody hibernate/struts/widget tutorials.

Oh! And I'm taking the SJCP Developer exam... soon. As soon as I work out how to sign up for the exam, I'll book it and give myself a week to finish up the book. Rushed? Crazy? Maybe, reader, maybe, but that's how we fly here at MOART - we wing it better than Icarus ever did, anyway. And that's saying something - heck, we can even SWIM should the need arise.

Because, y'know, we are flying over a sea?

Ok, that's me done with a day's blogging!

Ciao!

*But no one will ever know, because THAT'S the kind of hero I am.

Crazy times

Ok, so, right now my fingers are FREEZING cold, and I am cold, but all is otherwise well!

I turned up to a job interview in a pink tee not realising it even WAS a job interview, but I'll expand on THAT later, when I actually have some non-blue fingers to write with!

Just a quick "let-you-know", that, in case you are someone who has written me emails asking, say, WHY I haven't contacted them (no, mum, not you! But I'll contact you soon too!) well, I have been trying - it would seem whatever fancy british system you have is totally just rejecting my emails as out-of-hand rubbish!

And if that doesn't clear things up, nothing will! And I'll call you soon (And you too, mum!)

Andrew!!

Quick and short update, because my life is now boring

So, google mail has died tonight. Or today, or tomorrow, depending on wherever you are, dear reader.

That's a bit of a shame, because I quite like checking my mail, oh, I don't know, when I WANT to. Anyway, seeing as I can't waste valuable time that I'd ear-marked for j2ee and servlet learning (yes, I even learn stuff sometimes!) on emails, I thought I'd waste it on posting to this blog.

Which is, of course, not the ideal solution. But it IS a solution, which is, of course, me just rambling because I've pretty much written about everything I've done whilst in London. Oh, sure, I saw London Bridge (or a bridge, in London, that was NEAR the london bridge train station) but it wasn't falling down, which the people on is were quite grateful for, I'd suppose.

And I'm reading some Ben Elton - Chart Throb, a humourous take on pop-idol-like shows, I suppose. I don't know, I've never really WATCHED a whole episode of one. Oh! And I have my own pad in swinging Notting Hill for the next 9 days! I know, excitement much.

Now all I need is
1. money to do something
2. a job to get money
3. money, because I really don't want to work anymore.

The pad is nice, it's small, and has been donated by a v.cool aussie girl I met at the hostel who has gone to Italy for a trip to spain with her mum. In fact, let's face it, anyone who lets me have their flat whilst they are gone aren't just very cool, they are incredibly cool, super nice and must, by the laws of the MOART blog, be very clever too. However, Emma (as that is her name) easily outstrips even THESE lofty accolades, gentle reader, and is super-incredibly cool, fantastically intelligent AND in a hitherto unforseen twist, also quite gorgeous!

So, thanks Emma for saving me the ignomity of living it rough on the mean streets of London (and I'd thank Dave here too, but he just doesn't read my blog, so I won't).

Maybe I will do something exciting tomorrow? I remember when I was doing exciting things ALL the time. No more, eh?

Nandos and the SOUL MATE Calculator

So, I'm still hunting for jobs here. It's kind fun, doing the whole job thing again!




...




Not.

So, today, and any other days I have, were spent looking for jobs. BUT, the big news now is that, in the UK, Nando's is OUT OF CONTROL. It's like, well, a posh swanky place with fantastic chandelabras, or however you spell them, and wine, and mood lighting.
It's certainly not the Nandos' we have back in Oz, which is more a slightly-higher quality maccas. Anyway, I was thinking about what if Maccas sold wine (which they'd probably call McWine), and what THAT would taste like. I'm imagining it would not taste good at all.
Maybe really sweet, with some bubbles? Like that freaky cheapo champagne stuff?

Who knows! Except the secret lab-people who make up the maccas menu. And they must be on some serious acid - I mean, a McFlurry? Crazy.

Ok, and I was GOING to find out the exact name of my soul mate using this internet thinggummy, but it wants to send that name to my mobile phone, and charge me 9 pounds a week until I tell it to stop, so I'm not going to do that.

Also, there have been a regular plethora (ok, 2) of people who have written me emails asking me where I am, and what am I doing. And then saying "I should probably read your blog...". Now, I've just realised that these people won't actually get this message - but that is just crazy!

Ok, see how much I can write when I have nothing to note? Fantastic, isn't it? Maybe I should start wondering about other things. Like what to have tomorrow... a cheap falafel, a cheap yeeros, or maybe some cheap pasta?

London Post #2

Hi kids!

So, here's my London post number two, as readily visible by the title of this blog.

1. London is just expensive. I mean, it's more than just being expensive... it's stupidly expensive. When the wage for bartenders is 5 pounds an hour, and you can only buy 2 beers with that at your average local, you KNOW that something that isn't fly is going down. And damned if it's not up to me to sort this city out.
But more on that later, ie when I actually do something to shake thm to their senses.

2. London has lots of... stuff. I mean, big ol' monuments, and big ol' buildings, and all their art galleries are free (which is good. I saw a da vinci! Me! Yeah, that's right. My art teachers would be soooo jealous. But they don't know, because I doubt they are reading this).

3. I walked around hyde park, and kensington gardens, and it was all very very green. And nice. Londoners, truely living in an expensive city, do get some nice deals out of it.

4. Everyone here drives really nice cars - like a ferrari, or a porsche, or a lotus, or if they are really on struggle street, a beemer. Speaking of which, I saw one which had rather dramatically crashed and apparantly exploded, but that's just by the by.

Ok! When I get photos (well, I have them, but when I get around to putting them up), I'll, ummm, put them up. And then you can view them.

Fancy a cup'o tea, Guv'nor?

Coz I sure do! I'm in sunny (or, well, not-so-sunny) London, really.

Went around the ... oh sod it! I'm in a bit of a rush, meeting up with Dave (met Haran last night, and aside from a grouchy much german co-worker, it was a really fun night. Actually, the grouchy-much german made the night better, he was hilarious!) so I can't do an uber post.

But I will, one day!

Iccy sal schene fur beurn ascott*

Which is a norweigen saying. I know, in MOART, you actually LEARN. THINGS. That might just SAVE YOUR LIFE. You also can see that I am growing an unhealthy prediliction to capitalising every gosh darned thing I write. But more on that later. That's a lie though, I won't write more on that later. Well, I might. Either way, there's a lie in this paragraph.

Sorry.

Ok! So, there's a bit to cover here, and let's start at the beginning - Santorini is really nice. Very much, it has been so beautiful I didn't want to leave. I had a plane to catch so I had to, but I didn't want to. I have photos that I can't seem to upload without a fancy card reading thing, which is a shame, because I really can't describe how cool shafts of light falling on a city by the ocean, when viewed from a mountiain nearing sunset are. It's quite a, well, it's almost a religious experience - in that, I feel that this is what religious experiences would look like, if I were to see them.
And of coourse, there are stories of little lanes, and dancing, and even learning! Me, learning!

So, to begin - I get off the ferry from Athens to Santorini with two great Swedish girls, and an agreement that we'll rent a car together and check out the island. So, we rent a car - a manual car. Now, I can't drive manual, so the first day was pretty much:

"Andrew Iyer gets driven around by attractive scandinavian girls"

And yes, I am your god. Anyway, we were all pretty tired, so after getting to Fira and getting some accomodation, the girls retire to their room (ok, just a demi-god) and I head out for a night on the town. A wild night, a night with... Plato. Yeah, I've got The Republic, and figured I could churn through it a bit in Greece. I hit a pub called Murphy's and read it there, I suspect to the amusement of all around me. After a bit, I head back, ready and refreshed for the next day.

The next morning, after seeing a town called Oia (prounounced ia, a little like ear), we decide that driving lessons are the GO. As Trina (one of the norweigens) put it:
"Andrew, you are a worse driver than I was when I started learning to drive. And I am scared."
But really, she was over reacting. Sure, I drove on the wrong side of the road once or twice. And, yeah, the car would stall on occaision (mostly on hills), but otherwise... kind of, anyway.
Oia was great, there are stray dogs everywhere there, and then after seeing a beach with black sand, and carving my name in a mountain, we head back to Fira for a night on the town. So I meet up with the local Aussie Greek population there, and get taught Greek Dancing (because:
a) they knew I was aussie and
b) they initially thought I was Greek
Also, where else do you see bullet-letters in brackets?)

I learn to drink a shot, from the floor, without using my hands... crazy most. But fun! And the next day, sadly, the norweigens left to another island, and I had to head back to Athens. But I had the manual car for the rest of the day (they left early), and I can proudly say that, aside from reversing the damn thing anywhere at all, I can pretty competently drive a manual now!

Oh, and on the off chance they read this, my very best wishes to Trina, who is engaged, and getting married next year (congrats again!), and her younger sister Theresa, who is going to the Dominican Republic to, well, do sporting stuff for a year. Which sounds very fun!

So! After driving the car around for a bit, I get on the ferry back to Athens, and who should I meet but two very nice, attractive yankee girls, Erin & Kim, who were in Santorini at the same time I was! We later discoevered that they even saw me at the bar reading Plato ("who is that weirdo" was the then response, apparantly). I explained to them the standard global insight into Americans and had a nice chat until about 1am with Erin ('twas a night ferry) about stuff. Because Stuff is Awesome.
The next day, in Athens, after going our seperate ways, who do I bump into but the girls... again! So this time I meet Erin's mum (who is also travelling around Europe), have some tea with them, and get taken to this totally funky shop which sold some nice things - but my parents will discover that later.

So thanks, really cool americans (who are flying in the face of American stereotypes) for making the last day in Greece pretty cool!

So I've had a pretty fun, cool last few days with some incredibly wonderful people - the entire Greek trip has been meeting really nice people, actually, and I think that's why Greece is running high on my "Cool Places I've Been".

Ok! I have a plane to catch! And good friends to meet in London! Dave, Haran & Andrew, united again - is there madcap zanyness? Can I even AFFORD madcap zanyness (no, seriously, I can't) - read this blog and find out! Because, well, what else are you going to do at work?

* Norweigen saying: don't sell the fur before you've shot the bear.
Others include: "cest pu di (or du, or alla) cactu-sannah" and "yay ach fra norgen".
And everyone's favourite - "Ach du farade?" I'll leave it to you and google to translate them!

Oh, and the third post

But a short one - because minds really shouldn't be blown - is just to note that the ever-kind Sylvia (the girl who helped me out in Hampi) is not, as I noted, Austrian, but actually Dutch. So there you are!

Ok! I must go and eat the souvlaki!

Andrew
(who doesn't know why he is signing off on his own blog...)

2 posts in one day!

Only the earlier one was written whilst in incredible !ndia. Which is cheating, I suppose.

Also, people who are excited about Haran and Camboooodia will have to wait, as I don't have anything to offer you right now.

BUT I LOVE ATHENS!!!

It is super really wonderful. Honest. So! What can I tell you about Athens? First, paved stones, chilly weather (ok, not sooo much on the chilly), and beautiful monuments, marble and really really incredibly friendly people make this city really very nice. So nice, I FELL IN LOVE WITH IT.

But! I digress - so, I've spent the last few days rambling about with a superb pom called Sonia (I know, who would ever have thought you could have pom and very nice in THE SAME SENTENCE?) - with whom I saw the parthenon, the acropolis (well, they are all the same, really, but still), and an island (brifly. Very very briefly), and the back streets of Athens (NOT so super fun, but still).
Actually, I'm note really sure if that is Sonia with a "y" or an "i", so I might have to give differing versions (I know, what a champ I am for doing that. Still, such are the extents I go for gorgeous travelling companions) - you know, calling her Sonja, say. I couldn't actually work out how to put her name in again (and by "her" I mean Sonia. Or Sonja... you NEVER KNOW), which is why I had to add it so obviously (and by "it" I mean the attractive Sonia. Or maybe, just maaaybe, the also-attractive Sonja).
Anyway, the backpackers I'm in is really really great - plenty of cool people, lots of laughs etc - and I'm here for one more day before I go to santorini island for a night or three (or two!) and then onto the uk!

I know, action should really be some part of my name. But it's not. So we'll just have to live with Ganapathy (and seeing as my namesake got his head shorn off, and an elephant head put on, and hangs out with a rat familiar, really, let's face it, it's not too far from "action", eh?).

Ok, I'd write more about Athens (and it is a really nice city. I like it very much - just that wanky feeling of being one with the socrates & the plato is enough for me), but I have OODLES of catching up to do. Like, emails, and news, and comics, and even, well, blog writing. But I'm pretty done with that... NOW!

I'm listening to the macarena!

Also, it is 5am here in !ndia. And I can't get to sleep. So that means that, for the readers of the blog, there is now Andrew! all day round! That's right, this is the earliest post yet!

Ok, so, I've been throwing around this idea of buying and selling jewellery (buy in !ndia, sell in London) for a while now... and honestly, I can't get the numbers to work. Much.

I mean, sheah, I end up making a bit of money from it, but it's honestly not enough money, right now, to justify the bother. About, what, 800 aussie dollars? And god knows how long i'd have to sell for it to work. Plus, I'd have to sit and haggle around with the delhi locals here, and I hate doing that.
Actually, it's incredibly good practice, and I'm glad I took the time to do it. Today, for instance, I was quoted a 'fair price, meester, you come back for more! You see, I give you price, and you come back, and we all make money'

Long boring story short, he was wrong, his price was too high, and I dropped it by 25%. Then I had to leave because he dropped down too quick, so I knew I could'a dropped it by about 50%. I much like my other dealer friend Anita better, who talks all the time and then charges 5 times what anyone else does, because she thinks I don't know anything.

So, the new plan is to see the goddamn himalayas instead. I think we can all agree that it is better to see mountains than buy jewellery. And I can always buy jewels in the mountains.

Oh. Wait, all the flights there are gone. Damn. Ok, ummm.... help?

Oh, and another thing:
all of my earlier pictures are gone. I don't know how, or why, but they are. Including me with that dude, Govindaaaah. There's only one thing to do, and that is to put up the photos I took of camboooodia, and Haran, because pictures with either of those two in it can only rock.

Ok, so I got stuff to write

I know I said I'd update today... and I am, see? But not only am i uaing this crazy french computer, but I'm also still a wuss and not up for more earnest writing.

I don't even know what to do with é,ö and ä.

So, back to the last few days. Well, let's jump back in time to Hampi, which I should cover briefly thusly:

I saw stones and old towers and a market place (ancient) that looked straight out of rome, spent large portions of 2 days on my back resting from back pain, argued furiously with cheating indians who claimed that they could add extra money to the PRINTED MAXIMUM RETAIL ORICE OF DRINKS because of 'cooling charges' (ie, refrigeration, in case some idiot savant just... sorry, idiot savànt [they are smart like that] just wandered here). Best 'cooling charge' scam? The one where they argued that the refrigeration of ICE CREAM had a COOLING CHARGE. Say what?

And super thanks to a really nice Austrian called Sylvia who made sure I was ok most times during this... no, I don't yet know how to exclaim on this thing. But I would have, just then.

Tomorrow, dear readers, I'll give you an insight into an ashram, what appears to be very much a personality cult, a hypocritical teacher, and how I planned to Escape(exclamation mark) from the ashram... up until I realised I could just, y'know, walk out of the damn place. They don't make these places like they used to.

Actually, tomorrow is today (i mean, it always is, in a weird philosophical way, but right now it's more that i wrote the above yesterday):

So, taken with the eagerness of a kid doing a 'what i did on my holidays' report, here is my 'what i did with monks' report:

Arrived at 5am. Yep, the bus from Hampi (which was NOT comfy) drops me in B'lore at 5 in the morning, and after a LONG tuk tuk ride, I get to the foundation HQ at 6 or so. Did I say this place was big? Because it is MAMMOTH. It is something like 260 acres, this yogi man is not suffering for a cause here. Anyway, I register, am given my own room (shower, toilet, beds, its ok) and then go and get some food.
The canteen hall is pretty busy, as it is brekkie time, and there are all sorts of devotees wanting food for their meditational powers. Food is a mix of yellow and, umm, other colors that don't lend well to eating, and it tastes like it was cooked in a giant pot by a large indian who doesn't care how long carrots, broccoli, rice or water take to cook. He just cooks them.
I look forward to meeting that indian, we both have similar cooking styles.

So - i go to class. The meditational class is all about a few things:
1. The bleeding obvious, such as
a) you are responsible for all your actions (AND your inactions, but I thought better of pointing out to the teacher that my inactions were really actions anyway. She's not the intellect-discourse type)
2. Breathing to cure back pain, hepatitis, madness and other which
a) didn't help my backpain.
3. Live for... the moment(em)
a) which I already know as I have seen Antony Robbins on T.V. But it's not a bad message.

So it was a good start. The teacher we had used a mixture of intimidation, bullying and lying to get people to do things and make us all comply, which was a nice touch, i thought. She looked like she was going to have an egg (as in, lay one, not casually order one. Because you can't, as the place is vegan) everytime anyone did anything that wasn't 100% part of the plan. Turning up 5 minutes late would get you a stern rebuking, not performing 'sabbaddy blabbady' (whatever) (it's when you clean up the pans, or sweep the floor, pretty much work as a paying servant... sorry, when you become 'responsible' for the centre, and so learn more from it) would get a sterner one, and not turning up to the weird cult-following sing-along at the end of the night would get you totally blasted by our teacher (exclamation mark).
Christ, how do french type passionately without an exclamation mark key?

The thing was, she never did ANY of these herself. When she was late we were just meant to take it, and she had the GALL to get angry at one poor girl (who later quit) for not going to the sing along when teacher herself hadn't gone to it(em). Normally I would have pointed this one out to her, but seeing as *I* hadn't gone along, I didn't know. I just wasn't so crazy as to honestly tell a sincerely deranged woman I hadn't spent 2 hours singing the previous night.

Aside from my teacher, the rest of the class were really really nice people, who were just trying to get by with their lives. I talked to most of them and, well, they were by and large just wanting to get a calmer life and enjoy themselves more. Other people I met at the centre seemed, generally, sane, and one was even a trained osteopath who took the time to give me a great 40 min massage, free(em)

OH HOLY MOOMOO THANK GOD I FOUND THE EXCLAMATION MARK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Ok, let's start cooking with a little something I call... gasoleeeeeeeene, eh?

So! (feels so so good) first up - typing? With no '!'? It's pretty hard. Secondly, I totally took the teacher to task a few times (when she answered her mobile phone in class, for exsample, when before she would confiscate a student's mobile if it went off), and BOY! She was not one with the world, or ether, or whatever.
I believe the term is minging, manky, or maybe even snarky... in oz, we'd say bonzo (I think. I don't know, I never said it, but maybe YOU have). Whatever it was, our teacher needed anger management therapy.

Anyway, the exciting things that happened were me making elaborate plans to flee only to
a) be offered a free massage, so decided to stay one more day for it and
b) realising I just could walk away. No laser beams, no nothing. Pffft.

Ummmm, and today? Well! There are plans to buy some indian jewellery, but i'm finding that indians think i'm a goon and want to charge me lots for their b-grade stuff. Also, they lie CONSTANTLY to me about caring about quality, and how much they want me to be happy, all the while charging 3, 4, 5 times more!
Which I know, because I am not a total goon. But more on that later!

God, I've missed you mr exclamation mark! Don't leave me again.

Escape! From the clutches of castle Sri Sri

or,
"Tinkle, tinkle: how I found a new appellation for immigration forms"

The new appellation being, of course, "sri sri", which is seemingly one that is self-applied, and not really honorific at all. I'm sure the greeks will totally love Sri Sri Andrew Iyer when he burns the house down in Greece. Metaphorically. I won't literally burn houses down, because that is ILLEGAL, and people just shouldn't do that sort of thing.

Unless it is this man's house, and you are in !ndia, in which case it is a-ok.

So, really, there are a few things I should clear up.

The first is, after all that galavanting around? Being tougher than all the men out there? Riding on an indian train in general class for 12 hours (ok, I'm pretty proud of that, but anyway)? Yeah, well, after all that my body decided that I was a complete lunatic and decided to:
a) have back spasms that were a real pain... in the... back.
b) get the 'flu

At which point I discovered that the only men I was tougher than were men made of klee-nex. Not the real men. The men who do the nations of the world proud be reading this blog. Because those men? They are real men. Men like you, reader. Unless you are a woman. Then they aren't men like you at all. Because they are MANLY men, and you are womanly women. If you're a woman. I could go on like this for a while, but I don't think that really gets anyone anywhere, does it?

So! I checked into the meditation centre of a Sri-sri here in incredible !ndia, to learn... well, stuff. I really didn't know much about the course, except it was meant to be good. And the pamphlet at the centre said it could, well, do lots.

Umm, ok, so the internet cafe is closing. so i'll actually WRITE something that I DID tomorrow. Maybe.

I am a harder man than you

Ok, so to cover what has occurred in the last few days REALLY quickly:

I slept for 4 hours over the last, what, 48 hours? Yeah, that's about right.

I travelled for 30 of those 48 hours.

I visited the hindu-only temple of Sri Krishna, in Guruvayoor. "How did you get in, whitefellah?" you ask? By doing it how James Bond would. I flicked open my passport and said "Iyer. Ganapathy Iyer." Hot diggity-damn if that didn't get me into that temple pronto!
Really a very nice temple, said a quick prayer for my family here, slept under a god's statue, and then went on my way. Again, more details when I have slept.

Travelled "general class" on an indian train for 12 hours. Yes, I am that bad. I shared a little bunk with an Indian (who kept on wanting my luggage "on floor! You put on floor!", but then I'd never see it again, so it stayed on the bunk with me). Me and the luggage at one end, him at the other. No one slept. Well, the people on the floor slept well, but I din't.

Travelled on public bus for another 11 hours to get to Hampi, which is where I now am. THAT was fun. And sleepless.

Sat and talked to some nice people. Alot. Seeing as I haven't talked to anyone really for a few days.

And typed on this blog. If I put everything I did down, well, people might just plain old explode from the excitement! I don't like that, so I won't.

Tomorrow: to do stuff in Hampi, or to sleep? I don't know! But you will, come night-time!

Franz

Do you like this name better?

THREE POSTS IN ONE DAY!

Who else does that? And where do they do it? That's right, only at MOART do we PUSH THE BOUNDARIES OF BLOGGING to give you, the reader, the unparalleled blogging experience that YOU deserve.

And you DO deserve it. Because you are worth it.

It is photo time, and so here are photos - of triva night at Inn on the Green.



I really only ever thought of Tetley's as a tea. How wrong I have been...



Yep, that's it. The call has been made - el prezidentay is on the move. Operation:Mac-Attack is go! Close, I repeat, Close All Pub Doors. Close them HARD.



Steve, Paul (who looks like he was really struggling there. Like the British Cricket Team, I think) and me. We got people to think Paul was Paul Collingwood at the Aussie high comm, and a girl wanted his autograph!



Even the camera had a few. Feel it for the camera... he's been having a Bad Night.



I don't know... can YOU think of a smoking-er photo to end a day's bloggin with? Because I can't. Oh! The rocking guy on the left is Navim! Then me! Then Steve!

Ohshit. After putting that photo up, it got so hot the monitor melted... I've got to run now!

Hot Diggity-Damn!

2 posts in one day

And this is the second one. Because BOTH POSTS TOGETHER ARE TOO BIG FOR THIS BLOG. That's right. And this blog is big, so these are some pretty big posts we're talking.

Ok, so I should probably just add a quick post about Navim, a TOTALLY TOP GUY who runs a Warhammer painting website here. I don't think that my vast readership includes people who will want to use his service - but if you are wanting to paint your figurines, I really recommend him.

Not only because the quality is a-grade, but because Navim is an excellent guy and dammit, there aren't enough of them around anymore. We should run breeding programs or something. Like Hitler did, only better.
Because we won't be breeding Nazis... we'll be breeding Decent Men! For use in my new Decent Men Clinic in England, which I will run. And make money with. Hot Diggity Damn! I am just BUILT for making money with ideas this smoking, hey?

But wait! How great a guy is Navim? You ask? Really? Cool.
He's this great. Now, I can't actually SEE this video I'm linking to, I'm just relying on Navim here. But YOU should watch this video. It will blow your mind*

There is also this pic, which may or may not blow your mind. It might even be a movie! I don't know! I can't see any of these from this internet cafe. The suspense! WHO KNOWS WHAT IT COULD BE??

Hot Diggitty-Damn!

Also, these videos were made on a trivia night when, again, we didn't win. But we drank alcohol, and even made funny remarks, and that's what matters, At The End Of The Day. As well as having your name in His book, but that's really the REAL end of the days, and Arnie will save us all anyway.
Yeah - so we were in the pub, and they LOCK US IN. Because the "President" of Sri Lanka is driving his car around outside. I don't know this guy at all. But that's the prez. Anyway, any prez who drives his car around at closing time so that pub patrons get locked in the pub? He's a-ok in my book.
This other chap (who I have called Paul, as that is his name) (and who is also a top bloke... honestly, Steve, Navim, Paul, ME, ..."Sri Lanka, where all the top blokes party" should totally be the new tourist campaign by the Sri-Lankan, ummm, tourist board.) - Paul! Yeah, Paul was once walking down the street when el-prez decided to drive out for a take-away maccas (man, he guzzles that stuff hard - that was also the real reason for his pub-closing-time driving shennanigans) and the security people MADE HIM FACE THE WALL.
Like he'd been a Bad Boy in school. Apparantly he was close to tears - that naughty corner stuff really screws with your mind.

So, Sri Lanka? Friendly people, good night life, Western style city with Asian-style prices, a prez who gets a mac-attack and drives his car around so you get locked in the pub, great beaches and the bad-assest mountain I've ever climbed - it's !ndia to the power of INFINITY+ ONE.

Ok, I'm gonna go watch some cricket!

* Please only watch this video if you want to blow your mind. I won't be responsible for any unforeseen mind blowing-ness.

Yo Yo Yo YO

I know, my post names are lame. Fine, next time I'll call one "Billy" or maybe "Phillip". Would that please you? Brutes.

So! The Aussie embassy was quite fun - I went swimming in their pool (why does the Aussie embassy have a pool? - I was JUST about to do one of those "you ask" things, and then wax lyrical about the asking, but I'm not - it also has a nice pub area, a gorgeous verandah/terracey thinggummy, and other. Small pool, but nice), and partook of their alcoholic beverages.

The plan now is to go to Guruvayoor, then Hampi, THEN meditate in Bangalore, THEN to Delhi, THEN to Leh (to see the himalayas) and FINALLY fly off to Greece. I was thinking of going back down to the beach with Steve, who will be the KING of the beach when he gets there. No kidding, it will be Steve and some 25 women. I don't know why he came up, but I think it might have been for me! I know, anxious much.

JOKE!

Actually, on the safe side, from now on, whenever I make a joke, I will write "JOKE" after it. Just so you know.

Now onto religion - actually, no. No, nope, nada. I was going to comment on one of those church saying things that I saw on the way here - it confused me no end, more befitting the Riddler than anything else. But it is also a direct quote from the Bible, and that's just something I'm not going to go into here. Which is a shame that I can make gay reference, jump into high comm pools and build sand castles, but I can't comment on the bible. It makes you think, you know?
Sex.
Whoops! 3 second rule.

*ahem*

Ok, so I have some flights to book, and then carry on dating destiny. She's a fickle one, Destiny, but well worth it.

Oh! And that whole bible quote thing - there is an Online Bible! I know, I can now read up on ALL my favourite bible quotes, and share them with friends and family. Join me here!

And Steve's blog is also pretty cool. Just thought I'd add that, y'know?

General Thoughts

Ok! That out of the way, let's get down with some indian/sri-lankan thoughts I've been having. This was all borne from three things
1. I met up with "mr guide" - the man with whom I described an account a few posts back. AGAIN he says hello, where are you from... as though he doesn't remember our mad cap antics! Although, in truth, they weren't really that mad cap. Or maybe they were? It depends on your mad cap definition.
Only this time... well, last time he was a gardener, who worked at gardens and was going home, his family lived in Kandi etc etc. But this time (the conversation wasn't as long, as I was bored of him) we were chatting at a time when he should have been working! Call me suspicious sally, but I think he really makes his living by waiting at the same spot, to walk besides tourists & give sad stories to them!!

2. Back when I was in Una Watuna, I was accessing the internet, and could overhear a woman bargaining with a tourist agent. She was trying to get the price of a trip to some wildlife reserve down... and he wasn't budging. Eventually, he asks her where she is from - and she says the UK.

3. Tanya (from Goa) pretty much summerised to me why they keep on asking where you are from:
"It's because then they can work out how much money they can get from you." which, while flabbergasting in it's simplicity & duplicity, is also pretty accurate. IF you are a UK-type, AND you are reading this blog (why, by the way?) AND you go to india/sri-lanka... don't bargain if you are going to say you are from the UK. EVERYbody knows that the UK pound is stronger than superman right now... you won't get very far. Try Uzbekistani... they don't know WHERE the hell that is.

Ummm... I totally forgot where I was going with this one. Ok! Off to the aussie embassy for drinks tonight.

Cheers!

Clearing stuff up

Ok, just a small clarifying post here:

When I sigh after writing Steve's name? - I'm not actually really sighing. I am, how would you say it, pretending to sigh. For comedic effect. I know, I know, that kind of comedy wasn't hip in the, say, 60s and 70s, but hopefully we've all grown past that.

So, for the record, I did not have relations with that man.

Now it's off for a tasty quiche for lunch, and then, oooh! Theres a "Sex & the City" Marathon on tonight!

JOKING! JOKING!

Hung out to dry by the meditating people

Ok, so here WAS my plan, m'peeps:

Leave the fun of Unawatuna beach, head to !ndia, and do some serious meditating there. There was no problem with this plan... it was a good one. Heck, I even left the beach a day early to make sure I had time enough to get to Delhi and meditate. Yep, nothing could stop me...

except...

(tension x 100! Whoa!)

...the fact that the meditating people decided that, well, answering emails or requests to go meditating was a WASTE OF TIME. Thanks, guru-guys. You could have at least told me one way or the other what the deal was. But no. I guess I expected too much from some "tinkle-tinkle types" in !ndia.
Oh, and "tinkle tinkle?" I have a key chain, with keys. Whenever people I meet get a bit too much "my reiki can cure cancer" or "I meditated to the astral plane last night" I pull it out, jingle it about (so it goes "tinkle tinkle") and let them know that I meditate to that.
Word.
Ok, so I'm going to do some meditating in sri lanka instead. Maybe.

Unawatuna Beach! Crazy fun! I swung from rafters! I swam out to a boat at night, and tried to zoom off into the night with Steve.
Steve... *sigh*
Ahem. Anyway, we couldn't start it, because the hyperdrive shaft was missing. But we sure did try to start that puppy up. What else happened there?
There was a beach fight! Not involving me, and I didn't even see it, but it happened. Crazy. Oh, and I got NO SLEEP at all there.

"But Andrew, why?" you inquire? Well, do you? I hope so. I hope you didn't just ask me for money, or where the love is, or anything like that, because I'm answering the "why?" question.
Because, the place I was at had the wonderful idea that, hey, at 9am, let's build furniture. Really loudly. Outside this aussie guy's room. I know, I really appreciated it too.
And then, the second night? I get back at 4am... and a, whatsis, a cockle-doodle-doo thing starts going off. A rooster! That's the one. Keeps on going and going, until, well, 9am. Which is when his shift ends, and the furniture guys start up.

BUT, otherwise, it was pretty good fun there. I re-met up with some loverly pommie girl's I'd met up with at the !ndian Embassy, and also re-met up with some more great British girls from Kandi. And, of course, I met up again with super-Steve. *sigh*

Oh, and to all the Women of the World out there... one of the girls (called Libby) was seeing a dude who wold apparnatly engage in fisticuffs with any guy she'd meet when they went out. Thankfully, boxing-man wasn't with us, but really... girls! Women! Why do you go out with crazy-men?
I think when I get to the uk I'm going to run a clinic for women to find nice, decent guys who do not relate driectly back to the stone age. Sounds like I might be on a winner for this one.

Alright, now it's to work out if I meditate in sri lanka, or pay m'mate the Dalai a visit.

"tinkle tinkle!"

Beaches! Uzbekistanis! Only 99 cents!

Ok, so I'm at a beach in sri lanka - oona watoona. I know, straight from Jungle Book, or maybe The Lion King. Anyway, it's super nice here, as all beaches tend to be. People are friendly, water is lapping, and I'm in an internet cafe! I know, I am so having ace programmer genes in me.

Ok, but what did I do yesterday? Why ask that... I sat around colombo, worked my plans for Europe (it's too cold for a blitzkrieg) and then did, well, not much else.

"But what about the day before, Andrew, what did yuo do then" I hear you ask. Well, first, you TOTALLY mis-pronounced "you" and said "yuo" which is weird. But I'll let it slide and answer "yuor" question. "Yuo" idiot.

I pretended to be from Uzbekistan, and know no english. I know, a hoot and a half! So this local guy, he decides that, well, "here's an uzbek who speaks no english. I'm going to rip him off" - but as we all know, I have the last laugh! Generally as I don't get the joke. but otherwise...
So first, he jumps in a tuk tuk and takes me to a buddhist temple. To see elephants. Which aren't there. And then, after me pretending to not know what a king is ("ooooh! Is czar! Czar!") he takes me to the "super secret gem museum, Mr Andrew. You will like this place, it is only open once a year, Mr Andrew. And that day is today!"
Yeah, right, like all us uzbeks were born yesterday. Honestly, dude.

So I go in there, still not speaking english. Now, just a word to all you people out there who think that I was Dicing With Death here. I was meeting a delightful girl who works at the british High Commission (called Jude - Hey Jude! How are things. Sorry, I can't help myself sometimes)in 30 mins. And she knew where I was, and what my mob number was.
Anyway, after mistaking a tunnel for a toilet ("is toilet?" "no! No! Is tunnel!" "Oh, is toilet! We no toilet in uzbek! Is hotel, yes?") and bargaining a ring from 80 to 50 us dollars (it was a mix of white gold and silver... bollocks) I leave the gem place. The owner, incidentally, while I was chatting to a flunky, counted the NUMBER OF VERBS I USED and worked out I knew english. I denied it, of course... but that was pretty sharp. So after some joking around with english, arabic and singhalese we parted ways... and I met up with my tuk tuk driver, and my "friendly guide."

It got economical pretty quickly. "Cost is 1200 RS" the driver tells me.
"No! You get me! I no pay" I say.
My guide is looking assured "no no, mr andrew, you pay for tuk tuk, I no want money"
(Of course he doesn't, that ride did not cost more than 150 Rs, they are splitting it). ANYway, after calling him a "not good man!" I decide that, enough is enough. It's time to TOTALLY bail on this crazy ride.
So I start to jump out the tuk tuk. The driver slows down... will this crazy uzbek jump? Damn straight, dude. It's one thing to rip off a stupid english person... another to rort a TOTALLY nice uzbek guy. So out I leap, running off screaming "you not good people!"

I get another tuk tuk on to meet Jude, (Hey Jude! Sorry, sorry...) and as we drive down, at an intersection, my "friendly guide" appears, and asks for money!
"Driver!" I bellow, "Driver, I insist you drive past this miscreant." Old "friendly guide" looks baffled... and we drive off, into a sunset, if the sun was setting at this time. A good drive. Fast, sexy, and tuk-tuky. But now I'm just being poetical.

Anyway, after a drink and a meal with Jude and her friends, I head on back to my room, ready for a day of beaching. Which was half of today!

And a quick write up about Jude (Hey!) - it was a real pleasure to meet a pom with a sense of humour and fun! Quite looking forward to sunny Blighty now, eh, wot?

NB: Parts of this story are totally false. And parts are true (Hey Jude!), so don't worry. Be happy.

Boy, are my legs tired

As in, this morning, when i woke up and rolled out of bed? I tried to stand up, and ended up falling on the floor. Now, granted, I'd been out to a trivia night at the local pub the night previous (amazingly fun - but more on that later), but that really wasn't the issue. My legs (quads specifically) were out of it. Very muchly.

2 things before I wax lyrical about the mountain climb:
1 - why do mosquitos make that annoying buzzing sound? If you are going to bite me, fine. But why do they need to wake you up to do it? Surely buzzing isn't a super useful skill to have from an evolutionary perspective, right?
2 - this blog is really good.
3 - I can't count.
4 - the big question time. Gentlemen, look at your hands. That's right, your hands. Girly style, like you are checking out your nails. Yeah, you like that, don't you?
Anyway, your fingers can be viewed in three segments (which I will call "bits"), the nail bit, and middle bit, and the bit that connects to your hand, and that rings generally... ring. Around. The posie.
the nail bits don't have any hair on them - but all the other bits do. EXCEPT that on my (more hirstute than average) bits, the right index finger middle bit? One hair. On the left hand - nada. And I've never met a guy who has hair there.
I'm seriously asking guys about their bits... I'm about to go to the local gay club (well, not here in SL, they don't have them) and start asking guys about their bits. I already freaked out one super-hairy dude I met by asking him. If anyone can find a study that explains why the bits all have hair except the middle index bit? I'd love to know!

Ok! Onto more travel stuff...

There's a nice photo of the mountiain on this page which is, really and truly, what I climbed. Hectic, much! Ok, so let me describe the climb.
Awoke at 2:30 am (or, I rolled out of bed at 2:30am, because I'd had no real sleep - the place we were at DID have a mosquito net, but it was more based on the "lobster pot" concept - they got in, and couldn't get out) - and left the guesthouse at about 2:50 in the morning.
Wandered up with Steve, past the sellers of a-grade rubbish, and onto the steps! They start out like a, uh, set of easy steps, that lull you into false security by getting VERY steep a good 30 mins into it. 5000 steps? That's alot gang, and the dude who cut them decided that:
a) quantity is better than quality
b) size doesn't really matter
c) nor does width

Steve is alot fitter than me, so as we are going up I get the distinct feeling that I am going to die. We stop intermittently - say, everytime I run out of breath - say every 4 mins - and then, to inspire me, Steve decides we RUN up one section, and then have a 10 min break.
Ok, now all this time, I've been keeping up with Steve's pace as best I can. Even as we run up 100m or pure step, I'm right behind him. ....and then my quads decide to take a vacation.
After nearly falling all the bloody way back down, and with Steve (aka Rocky) throwing his hands in the air at the top of the little section, we part ways for the time being. He heads on up, and I do it... at a more Andrew pace. I'm counting from 10 as I go up, ANYTHING to keep on going.
But I get to the top. View is nice - I have some photos, and I prayed at a buddhist thingy at the top. The top is kind of disappointing - in the West, we'd have, say, a revolving restaurant, a maccas, a view deck, and whatnot. Here, we have about 100 pilgrims, a loudspeaker that blares our religious mantras, and a wall that tries to block the view.
Oh, but I totally climbed it in approx 2-2.5 hours. From 3am until 5am (roughly).

Ok, get some photos, head back down, and head on - to Colombo! And back to a trivia night that I was at a week back. Good night - out team, the "Vestigial Women" (don't ask. Just don't) was Steve (ever ready), Paul (a britisher who buys and sells companies), Navim (a sri-lankan who owns a company that paints warhammer models for rich americans), Fiona (a sydney-sider [hooray!] poet-cum journalist), and me (the Greatest Man Alive). We're obviously the pick for the competition, but somehow we totally blow out chances by, well, not knowing a damn thing. Except I totally knew that a photo of Pol-Pot was, um, Pol Pot. Only we put down chairman mao because I was at the toilets at the time, and didn't see the photo until later.

Today I am either - going to a beach, or going to India, or not doing anything. It's a tough life here, but someone has to do it.

And that someone is me.

Have I mentioned how wonderful sri-lanka, and sri-lankans generally are yet? Well, let me mention that now - sri-lanka, and sri-lankans generally, are super wonderful. It's a great place to visit!

Ok, slow computer

That is also expensive. 4 rupees an hour! Sri lankan, but anyway.

So this will be a quick post. I've checked out an elephant orphanage, seene elepahnts bathe, swim, and charge the concrete barrier behind which all the tourists were at. The damn barrier buckled too...

In 3 or so hours, I begin the climb to Adam's Peak, which is where either:
Adam first stood after being booted from the garden of eden
OR
Vishnu hung out for reasons unknown
OR
Buddha stood for the sunrise. Maybe.

Ib any event, it's meant to be quite spectacular at dawn, so I head up there at 2:30am. 5000 steps? Easy... and my travel companion (the ever-present Steve) has a camera! And I have a camera-memory card! It's like, photos a gogo. We checked out the path up earlier tonight, and found it to be surrounded by the most incredible amount of crap in the world. I'm talking fair-ground crap here... dolls, hats, glass things, I don't know, they make it, so we can throw it away?
It also has alot of Sri Lankan "toughs" - the young kids wandering around looking, well, tough. I don't know, kids these days. They warm up to you with a friendly "ayobovan" (hello in singalese) though.

And now, something for the Women of the World.

Women of the World! I've been watching tv, and have seen the power of the things you call "pads". Please, for the sake of the world, DO NOT LET THESE THINGS DROP INTO THE OCEAN! We need that water, ladies, and according to my research, your "pads" can soak up gallons at a time. It's crazy...
On a more serious not, I don't normally let people into my "billionaire in an arvo" ideas, but here it is: I'm going to make ships with an inside lining that is pure "pads". These puppies will be unsinkable! I know, the lives that could have been saved on the titanic if someone had had one back then.
Also, as a quick question to the Women of the World: when you and your girl friends gather round to discuss "pads" (I'm not going to ask WHY you do that, it sounds boring, but here I am writing about it, so there you go), why is one of you (the clumsy, stupid one) ALWAYS drinking a weird blue drink? Don't give her that blue drink, she just throws it all over the pad. And what is the blue drink anyway?

Surely a cranberry juice would be more appropriate?

Ok! Onwards to the top!

Piranhas

Aok the spacebar hereisboroke.Soi s the keyboard. I hate this cafr.

I saw piranhs today,they werereallycool. But i can't write any more as it is badbad internetonnection.

blahj!

Alive and well in Colombo.

Although, between just the two of us, there's not a great deal to do here. I met an aussie at the airport, and so he and i went down to the city, and later on went out at night. The reason I am here is to get a tourist visa for india, which is all well and good, but takes a long time.
Not just the week of waiting, mind. I'm talking the time just SITTING in the embassy - a solid 4 hours of fun. Meditation? For 10 days? Easy after this!

So, last night I go out with Steve (that's his name - the aussie). We first get some beers at a local, and meet up with some journalists. The are telling us that Jafna is "safe", but that some other place on the east isn't. This really isn't very interesting to me (and probably to you too) because I'm not heading anywhere like that. Just down south to the beaches. The weird thing was when they heard my full name - the Ganapathy totally blew their minds.
And when I told them about the tusk that wrote the mahabarata? Whoa. They stopped calling Steve "Steve" and referred to him as "your friend", and offered to buy ALL our drinks. Which Steve didn't take them on... I don't know, but when people just HEAR my name and offer to buy drinks, I like to accept!
After that we:
* went to a casino where I was sized up like a piece of meat by ageing, ugly asian pros.
* left that Casino after being directed to the "special bar", which I really didn't like.
* pretended to be big wigs and wandered into the "Bellagio" Casino VIP room. Worked, because we are White, and All White People Have Money - so we ate a great dinner, drank beer (all free), and then explained we were leaving to get to an atm. Then we just left.

I'm going to Sri Lanka

And I'm talking to a girl who is trying to make a chocolate rose kettle cake. I think she is craZY though. I can hear her discussing the need to have "rose petals infused in the chocolate sponge." As everyone knows, when you make a chocolate rose kettle cake, you infuse the SPONGE in the rose petals. Geeze.

But I've decided! Finally! To go to Sri Lanka, extend the old indian visa, and then come back to india for more! Meditation! Going to an old religious site to send some blessings! Other!
Yup, the new revised plan is to be here for about 2-3 more weeks. THEN go to Greece.

As for what I've been doing - not a great deal. I'm currently staying with this a nice couple - I met the girl in Jaisalmer, and went on a camel trek with her, and her boyfriend is here for an IT project. They've been nice enough to let me use the flat, so I've been nice enough to, ummm, use it.

Bangalore was still boring today, I'd have thought that my stunning riposte on their culture would have shocked them from their apathy, but apparantly not.
I don't really know what riposte means either, let's find out! That's right, Andrew's Blog, where people LEARN. And learn well.
"A quick thrust given after parrying an opponent's lunge in fencing."
Well, there you are. Take THAT Bangalore. I totally outfenced you.

Oh, and last night I had a small amount of sheep/cow brain. It was... different in taste. Quite nice, actually, but I totally freaked out about getting mad cow disease, so didn't eat any moooo!

*ahem*

As for where I'll go in Sri Lanka, I don't know. Yet. But hopefully something good will turn up en-route to the airport/after flying there. Flying by the seat of your pants! I wish there were frequent air-miles for that.

Hmmm... I might put up a post detailing my adventures in Vietnam with Haran soon...

Bangalore. It's B for Boring

And it's a tragic shame. Went out last night, hoping for... well, anything, really. I'd already had a nice lunch - I'd met a Canadian insurance dude 3 months from retiring, had a good chat about jewellery prices and things like that, and then he buys me the drinks! What a champ! Props to Canadian Dave, (distinct from IT-Dave, Heli-man-Dave, and Crocket-Dave) for that, although he won't ever read about it. Well, he might. But I doubt it.

And I digress!

SO, I go out to the "in" bar. It's called Spinn... I have a look around, and it's all lounges. What the hell? Look, I *like* lounge bars, they are great for a lazy sunday, with a nice burger, some beers... is anyone who runs a place in Darling Harbour reading this? But this is the "in" bar. It's where you meet people, and party - it would be like going to the meat market that is Establishment and seeing rows of lounge seats.
Ok, that might work, but anyway...
And the music? I think it was a Cat Stevens Appreciation Night. I hope it was, but you never know.
And the dancing? Well, let's just say that they don't call it "dancing" here. They say "our bar has a discotheque. A discotheque. It's very sad.
Anyway, so, with expensive drinks, no dancing, ridiculous lounge settings I had a great night out.
Oh! Oh oh Oh! Gues when bars open! 8pm! Guess when they close! 11:30pm!! IT DOESN'T MAKE SENSE.
Bangalore. Once again, IT people come together to give industry practitioners a Bad Name.

I know I've discussed computers here previously, but let me do it again:
when I go into the internet cafe and see the computers are all in their own little room, invisible to the rest of the world, I begin to panic. It's a well-placed panic, as the drop down on my internet explorer is showing.
That and the fact that ie has been so hopelessly hacked that google links go to porn sites? Fantastic.

Ok! Going to book flights! Fight demons! Maybe, just maybe, meet a mystic martial arts teacher... but that last one is doubtful.

Here are some totally cool photos that a very nice canadian (god, what is with Canada? I'm totally going to go there), called Alicia, has taken the time to send me. Seeing as *I* don't have a camera, I'm going to put these ones up. I don't know where these photos were taken though, so you can guess! Ok, yes, they were taken in India.



This photo is quite cool, and mystic. I don't really know where Alicia is in it though... it looks like something out of that Indian Jones film - the one with the still-beating heart?



I want a waterfall! It also looks like Alicia is in a Bollywood film here, if you've seen a Bollywood film you'll work out why.
Alicia is a nice Canadian (yeah, tautology, I know) I met (and clicked with) oh-so briefly in Goa, who is a yoga-teaching, archaeologist waitress. I suppose that meant the Indian Jones thing isn't too far off - good luck with those Nazis, Alicia!
She's off back to Canada, and I'm here in a girl I travelled with's boyfriend's apartment.
All to myself!
Gosh, I should go out and party hard... oh wait, it's Bangalore.

Attempts at poetry #1

The room she lives in is small, spartan.
It's littered with holy books - yogis & gurus;
a portrait of Gandhi rests on the wall.
There's a small and gentle stove on one side, and a soft bed waits
in the center of the room.
A radio stretches out on the bed, she listens to it every night.

We crash through the trees
Past the watchful eyes of the mountains,
And under a sky scratched with red,
weighed down by a pregnant dark eternity.
We are heading home,
find out about where to head next
see the roots from which we've grown,
and grow some more with that knowledge.

Home.
I have never lived there.

He searches for peace and meaning, here in his hometown
but he does not know what that means, or where it leads;
ducks under a fan that wants to trim his hair.
Her life is happy, great peace in being there
in the ancestral house, looking for ...
she feeds him, they talk, he learns of a life without fortune.
Of days talking to children, of helping in schools

He nearly cries.
But I don't.

We see the serene street, where our forefathers ran as children.
Touch a tree so giant, so massive,
that surely they would also have known it?
Wander through an old house, where they would have grown,
eat simple food cooked by a relative
breath part of a life that might long be lost;
a life that they might have lived.
He feels calm in the presence of this area.

Calm.
But I know nothing will change.

Visiting a house, a street, a town
seeing a woman whose life is different from mine,
feeling calm for a day or two -
there is no change inside.
I still want more
than the calm life that they might have lived;
seeing the calm, living the area
will only be a memory.

I fly out today.

A train ride

Today I had lunch with Granny, very nice. It is super hot here in Palghaat/Vatakaandthra. An update on my camera - all is Not Good. A stupid cog fell out of it, and the camera just won't work without it. So I don't have any photos, no mountains draped in sunset, no trees racing behind me, nothing. And no granny.

I was going to write a short story here, maybe even one without a recurring theme, but I think i'd better find out about the train before I do that! Might make life easier for me.

Mystic moments a go-go

Ok, before I ramble on in my own unstoppable style about the beaches of Goa (and man, can you ramble on when you were acompanied by cool canadians, germans who secretly wanted to be Italian, and generic resort staff) i'm going to ramble on in my own unstoppable style about my totally mystic moment today.

Yes, today's blog is actually about today, I know, crazy. I flew from mumbai to Coimbatur on a lovely flight that had a valentine's day, umm, air-auction. I slept right through the thing, but you apparantly bid against fellow passengers for loverly jewellery and memory sticks and stuff. I then get the rickety clickety train from Coimbatur to Palakkad, or Palghat, depending on who is spelling it.
It was really very magical. The mountains to one side spouted out, we steamrolled into the setting sun, the sky was red... and I was on my way home. In that weird spiritual sense. Because, as we all know, I'm half indian, and the indian half comes from, as far as I can gather, this one little village in Palakkad called Vatakkanthran. And in this one little village lived my grandfather's brother's wife, and she is a really wonderful woman.

The sheer level of positive energy (yes, I spent a while in Goan beaches talking to yogi-types) and enthusiasm just bursting from her was... it made me beam. She is 84, and so of course I was "just a baby" to her. We chatted for a good long while, and the entire time I had the most wonderful feeling of having struck off one of those "to dos" that i made when heading out on this trip. Heading into the middle of Kerala to meet my ... I'm going to call her a granny ... granny has been one of the highlights of this trip. A key note, or centre piece, if you will.
It was very emotional, and I was very close to happy tears when I completed one part of my odyssey, wearily adventuring into the ancestral village, to found such a lovely person living there.

Ok, so i've done gone written a little poem about the experience... only it isn't quite finished!
Those of you who like poetic stuff should be constantly visiting this site, and telling all their friends about it, and sending me money. That last one is really important.

Happy Valentine's Day Gang!!!

* * * ** * * ** * * *

On a sadder note, my condolences to Tanya and her family. I've just read that her father passed away recently, and she has rushed back to Canada. As i've already written, Tanya is a wonderful person, and her father must have been a remarkable man to bring such a woman into the world.

Buonos sares, buonos sares senorita!

I don't know what that means, but it's mangled Spanish, in case you are wondering. Andrew-style mangled spanish. And, as ever, intrepid readers of my most innermost thoughts, there is a story to tell. About a palm-fringed beach, curdled love, yoga, a poet, and, of course, ze germans. And alcohol. That last one is a given though, right? Alcohol, not ze germans.

Where to begin? Well, as I always say, when you don't know where to begin, start at the end. The end.

Ummm, and seeing as that didn't work, let's push onto the beginning! So, I left Delhi, leaving behind many unread books and a cold climate, greedy auto-rickshaw (aka tuk tuk) drivers and business opportunities to go to the beach. And I do it in style - I'm sick and tired of Indian trains. They are C-O-L-D. And it would be a long journey too - so I fly down with Spice-Jet, a low cost carrier.
"How low cost, Andrew?" you ask.
"So low cost they don't have life-jackets. You take the cushion of the seat and try and float with it." Really. They also offer sweeties on the plane - I ate the butterscotch ones, yum yum!

Now, I no longer have a book on India. The pixies took it one day, and they never gave it back. I still think of those pixies, frolicking in the best places of Kerala, checking out the Taj, hanging with the monks in, um, monk-y-land, that kind of thing. All because they swiped my book.
Be that as it may, I end up in the Goa airport with an idea that I want to go to the nice beach that begins with a 'P' and with a feeling that I don't know what it is called, where I am in relation to it, or how to get there. Fortunately, I meet up with three nice girls (two Germans and a Canuke) who are also going there. Palolem beach.
We rent a car and head on down - and man, does our driver drive. He thinks he's Speed Racer, or something. He's turning from motorbikes, and avoiding trucks, and I'm sitting in the back seat while we are all discussing india, being a woman in india, and crazy drivers in india. Most of the time my eyes are closed (except when they are open), which made things better. I can still remember the classic moment when Tanya (Canuk) politely asks the driver:
"Do you want to die? Because I don't" - nothing stopped Speed Racer though, until we got to the beach.

Beach was fine, very beachy, the water was lovely, and the pam fringed-ness? Crazy. I was getting mini-scegasms (which is my New Word for the day, meaning a "non-sexual orgasm caused by seeing preety scenery") everytime I turned my head to them. On the first day I swam in the sea, and for the next two days my body muscles decided to spasm and contract in incredibly painful formation. So two days was spent wandering the beach looking for someone to fix me up - and aside from swarthy indian chaps who rub oil on your naked buttock (I'm not sure if I should pay them for this, or vice versa), there isn't much to be had.

Ok, so, scenery and my pains aside, let's look at the action and fun that occured at "The Found Things", which is where I stayed. First up, let's throw in the standard helpful, manuel-like, young indiginous waiter dude, this time called Sing. He's as nice as any of the other generic waiter dude's I've come across at beach resorts throughout this trip. Friendly, affable, basic english, helpful, I liked Sing.
He is, as all the generic waiter dudes are, after the ladies (in their own little way. Sing is a billion times nicer than the rogues that populate Jaisalmer, Udaipur and the rest of northern India though, because, being a generic beach waiter, he's laid back and cool, not a pushy arrogant money/sex-hound). And look, before I get anyone upset about my treatment of Sing - Sing was a really nice guy. I liked him, and got along well with him. But he's ALSO just like the standard waiter-dudes in all the resort-places I've been to. It's a pleasure to meet them though.
Sing has, I think, his eyes mostly set on Anya, who was one of ze germans (the other being Kathleen). Both Germans are, incidentally, generic Germans. Their humour is there (I think, it was in German most of the time) - but they are strong-willed, cautious, quiet (ok, so they spoke passing english), y'know, Germanic. Anya is a policewoman, which made me feel safe at night, and Kathleen is a physio, which had no affect on my sleeping habits at all.
Sing thought that Anya was... "dangerous", and that Tanya was "sometimes dangerous." I assume that meant that he was attracted to them??

Through the girls (who I was toying with hitting on, but then, as I might have mentioned previously, my powers of seduction hover around the zero mark, and Sing was working on them better than I could. And he could barely speak english) I meet Frankee, who is also a German.
He's a different German, he's tanned, toned, tattooed (yeah, I had a crush on him) and a really sweet guy. He was like some crazy amalgamation of some of the Wizard-of-Oz characters, but damn he had heart.
Frankee and I went out several nights to see if we could find "The Booby" which is what one of us referred to as the sum aim of all life. I won't embarrass that person by naming him (or her) though. Surprisingly enough, we never were, but we had perfected the art of being Italian troubadors (hence the title of this entry), with my name being Mario. I have a mafioso brother who is languishing in jail right now, but I'm clean. I don't know what women are looking for, but it certainly wasn't the two hottest imitation italian troubadors on the beach, I tell you.

Tanya introduced me to Johnnie, whose blog is linked on my page in a new effort to make this blog more, um, I don't know, blogger-riffic? Johnnie is a really cool guy - he's got a crazy beard that he puts lip balm on, but I won't hold that against him. Or anywhere, that beard must have been freaky with the lip balm. He's a canadian poet, and was sharp, clever and good looking. Fortunately, he never came with Frankee or I or we would have had real troubles! I think his major inspirations are Dr Seuss, but I never asked him so I don't know.

Finally, to round of my most recent travel companions, Tanya was another (And I've got to say, sadly, generic, Canadian) who was good looking, clever, witty and plain good old fun to spend time with. I don't know how much she appreciated my knocking on her door at 9am every day though. She teaches english in Taiwan, and also speaks Mandarin! Much mandarin fun ensued, until like Will she told me my Mandarin wasn't up to par. She and Johnnie are old friends, and there is a chance I might meet up with them sooner or later in Kerala.

But to destiny! Wait, let me take a check on my stories. It's a lot of blogging a man has to do, and I have a busy day tomorrow.

Ciao!