Welcome to the Wonderful World of Steph

Soundtrack: "The Cat Empire" by The Cat Empire. Contains "The Wine Song."

Good evening this evening for the last time tonight.

When I've told people how long I've been in Adelaide, they've always asked whether I'd been up to the Barossa. And I hadn't until today. Aunty Wendy took the day off work and we drove up to the Barossa Valley, where they grow all the nice wines. It being winter here, everything was brown and dead-looking, but that's okay - it's still pretty there. One vineyard's very much like the next, though.

I made Aunty Wendy take us to Jacob's Creek, though, just to say that I'd been there. I had a lovely steak lunch with their cab sav, which I thoroughly enjoyed. And then I thought of Father Jack, and laughed a little. And looked at the vines. And didn't do any wine tasting, because it would be wasted on me, really. And that was it, and we headed for the Whispering Wall.

The Whispering Wall is the dry side of the dam holding all the water into the Barossa Reservoir. I stood at one end and Aunty Wendy stood at the other, and when you whisper, the other person can hear everything clear as a bell. It's something to do with the crazy acoustics of the place, and very good fun. I think that it would be more fun with other people there, though, so you could just spout random nonsense and confuse the hell out of them.

Soundtrack: "All About Chemistry" by Semisonic

Good evening this evening again.

So, yesterday was pretty weird. Elaine used to work full-time at this designed boutique in town called Miss Gladys Sym Choon, and they had their VIP winter sale last night, so they drafted her in as extra help. She asked me to come along in case I picked up any decent bargains, and I did. I got myself a designed dress for $20, reduced from over $100 or something absurd like that, and a pair of plastic shoes, $39 reduced from $109. 16 quid for Italian shoes ain't bad. I turned up at 6.10pm, ten minutes after the doors opened, and that place was completely packed: shopping war. Scary stuff.

I met up with Blake afterwards. He was in the menswear department next door, and he took a bloody age to decide what to get, and he even took my notoriously dodgy fashion advice. Admittedly, it was that he should give the cargo pants a miss, but then I would say that, because I like Franz Ferdinand, and therefore, I like pinstripe skinny trousers. Blake WAS going to give me a lift home (on the motorbike, because he couldn't be arsed to look for a park for the Shitmobile), but we spotted something going on at the shop across the road.

The shop's name is Naked, and we soon realised this when we walked in, noticed a distinct lack of women, apart from the topless waitress handing out free Coronas. [Bytheway, I've only just found out that you take Coronas with lime because the lime's meant to keep the flies away.] We were just harmlessly looking at some clothes when the topless waitress walked past us, and said to Blake: "Can I help you with anything?"

"Er, no," he stuttered.

"He was just looking at your breasts," I said cheerfully. They were rather large breats, after all.

"Are you his girlfriend?" she asked me.

"No!" I exclaimed, disgusted.

She grabbed Blake's hand and shoved it onto her left breast. He stood around grinning and telling random guys who he'd never met about what had just happened. This was until the manageress cleared the shop floor and everybody stood around the side to wait for the stripper. Apparently, she's Miss World Nude. I saw her advertised outside a club down Hindley Street, so I sort-of believe the surfer dude who told Blake and I this little snippet of information. And she really did take everything off, apart from her thigh-high white boots with see-through plastic platform heels. I've seen far too many vaginas to be impressed, though.

After the strip show, we got talking to the topless waitress again, and somehow got onto the subject of her riding her Harley naked. And then she declared that she never wore underwear?

"Really?" said Blake, incredulous.

She lifted up her miniskirt to show us. Urgh. I wish I'd drunk some of those free Coronas now.

Apparently, this was all a sales ploy, but I'm damned if I saw any of the guys who took advantage of the free booze and sleaze buy any overpriced designer clothes.

Soundtrack: “Different Class” by Pulp

It’s funny, being back in Adelaide. I’ve just spent the past few days bumming around town and doing nothing and everything. Just little things, like shopping in the sales in Rundle Mall and reading Q in the State Library. Walking around, giving tourists extremely accurate direction to the train station, and then smiling and laughing to myself afterwards while people walking in the opposite direction look at me as if I’m crazy. And I probably am, because I think that I really genuinely love this town. No matter how much people diss this place, or how much I diss it, for that matter, it’s just going to be another one of those places, like Wiltshire, that I just can’t help liking for being itself. Coming back to Adelaide felt like returning home. I even have to use my own set of keys to open the door when we get home. Aunty Wendy and Blake have already told me that they don’t know how they’re going to cope when I’m gone for good on Saturday. Elaine doesn’t mind, because she’s actually got a life and spends her days being extremely busy. But I’ll be sad to leave this little country town, because it’s a haven from the fakes and try-hards that plague me elsewhere.

Soundtrack: “The Cat Empire” by The Cat Empire. It has a song called “Beani” about a guy who wears beanies all the time

After bloody 10am checkout and being laughed at by Stefan in reception, I set off down Larapinta Drive to search for the Araluen Gallery, where the Beanie Festival was being held. The mind boggles. Beanies everywhere, of every size, shape and colour. There was one with a palm tree and deck chairs beside a paddling pool on top of it, another with a big eff-off snake wound round it. I, myself, bought one of Penny’s creations: a fuchsia-and-purple beanie with flower-petal style edging around the top. I caught up with her, and she showed me how to finish off the beanies that I had started crocheting on the train.

I got on the Ghan back down to Adelaide at 2pm. It was a much quieter journey, as the train was half-empty and everybody had a row to themselves, which was lovely. I crocheted until I ran out of wool, and I read “A Town Like Alice.” I had dinner, and I got smashed on vodka-and-coke and watched “School Of Rock.” Then I watched “Spider-Man 2,” and managed to zonk out from sheer tiredness for the film’s major climactic scenes. When I came to, Kirsten Dunst was just leaving Tobey Maguire’s editor’s son at the altar. Ah well. I still managed to get six or seven hours’ sleep after that anyway. Yay for vodka.

Soundtrack: “Greatest Hits” by Queen

Friday 24th June. Our final 5am start, though strictly, it was a 5.30am start. Ooh, half-hour lie-in. Vic drove us out to King’s Canyon, and announced that the first part of the walk was an incline named Heart-attack Hill. Screw it, I thought, bit the bullet, and dragged myself up. It was a very hard walk indeed, but even so, it was the one that I enjoyed the most, because King’s Canyon is just such an amazing place to be. The rocks look fantastic, and in some places you can see fossilised beetle footprints and ripples made by the Great Inland Sea. There’s an oasis in the middle, a reservoir of clear, fresh water surrounded by trees, ferns and palms where the duckies and froggies live – they call it Garden of Eden. It’s so lovely and peaceful there: perfectly delightful. Then there’s the Valley of the Beanies (that’s my own name – you can tell), where there are piles upon piles of rocks that looks like beanies stacked one upon the other. Marvellous stuff.

After striking camp for the final time, we made out way back up to Alice Springs. We had a quick look at Rainbow Valley – Vic didn’t leave us much time for it as she said that it wasn’t really that great. I’m inclined to agree with her. Normally, we’re meant to walk all the way into the valley, but instead we stood and looked at it from a distance for a few minutes, then went back to the bus. I’m still not sure how red rocks and blue sky and water can constitute a rainbow, though.

A couple of hours of recuperation in Alice, then dinner at Bojangles, a hideous Western-themed saloon with (literally) roadkill stuck to the walls. I just couldn’t be arsed – all I wanted to do was crash. Idiot that I was, I hung around until the DJ played “Take Me Out” (I’ve got it on CD, for wank’s sake!) for me. The fool forgot, and didn’t play it until I reminded him at 1.30am. My final goodbyes said, I fell into bed at 2.20am. And bloody Melanka’s were hosting Ministry of Sound on tour. At least I was the only person in my room.

Soundtrack: “The Magic Treehouse” by Ooberman

Thursday 23rd June. Up at 5am again, so that we could go and watch sunrise at Kata Tjuta and beat the crowds. We reached the rocks just as the Sun was coming up above the land, and we got to see the “opera house” effect, as the Sun lit up the different rocks consecutively the higher that it rose. Majestic. Then, we walked around the rocks and through the Valley of the Winds. It was a fairly difficult walk, and we were all thoroughly exhausted by the end of it, but it was worth it. I was also quite pleased that I wasn’t the last person to come in. Past experience (Duke of Edinburgh’s Award, climbing that mountain in Bergen) has taught me not to expect too much of myself, and I was pleasantly surprised.

After Kata Tjuta, we went back to the campsite to strike out tents and have some lunch. With the bus and trailer safely packed, we drove north to King’s Creek Station, stopping on the way for a bumper firewood collection session. By then, we’d become particularly adept at finding small trees (though I myself couldn’t be arsed and always brought back an armful of crappy branches), and Sam and I dragged back a rather sizeable trunk that Marsha had found. At Kind’s Creek, we set up camp, this time with much greater ease as a) it was daylight and b) we knew how the tents worked now.

We then found that we had some dead hours on our hands, that Vic had wisely given us for relaxation. There’s plenty to do at Kind’s Creek, though. You can go on tours of the area, either by quad bike, Harley, or helicopter. Or, you can use the cheapest transportation method of the lot, and go on a camel ride, which is what Andy, Helen, Judith, Jeff, Sam, Julie and I decided to do. $7 for 5 minutes, but I wasn’t complaining. Before we got on, we had to sign a form saying that it wasn’t the camel company’s fault if we fell off and died, and then we had to strap on hefty safety helmets, which made me slightly worried, but it was unfounded in the end. I’ve never ridden a horse, pony or donkey (Mum was always worried about me, and very rightly so), and so I enjoyed myself immensely. The movement takes some getting used to, and I still hadn’t accustomed myself to it when my 5 minutes on Kenya the Camel were up. Camels are bloody great.

Soundtrack: “Just Like Blood” by Tom McRae

Wednesday 22nd June. We were up at 5am so that we could get to Uluru in sufficient time to watch sunrise. The colourplay through the sky was breathtaking, as was the way the Rock changed colour as the Sun gradually rose above the horizon. It was pretty bloody cold, though, and it didn’t help that I was surrounded by idiot tourists and disenchanted twentysomethings born under the constellation of Sky satellites. Therefore, there wasn’t any spiritual feeling or anything, but what would I expect? I’m not an Aborigine, and anyhow, an Aborigine wouldn’t be moved in the way that I am if they took a trip to Liverpool Cathedral.

Vic took us to the cultural center after that, and we all ended up deciding that we didn’t really give a shit about what the Aborigines thought, and we were going to climb the Rock. Then we got to the foot of it, saw the steep, gripless incline, and decided that a walk around the base was a much better idea if we didn’t want to die. We did see a lot more than if we’d climbed it, though. Julie, Stefan and I managed to get separated from everybody, and we got really worried because we thought that everybody had finished before us and that they’d be sending out a search party. As we walked along, I thoroughly enjoyed the amazing rock formations, making Stefan laugh at the eccentricities of my character, and getting Julie worked up because she couldn’t take photos of yet another sacred place at the foot of the Rock. Incidentally, we were third back, behind Jeff and Meredith, and then Keiko and Haruka.

A relaxed lunch, then a trip into the town (it’s just like the centre of Erinsborough), firewood collection, then back to the Rock. Vic told us a little bit of the history and folklore, then we drove out to sunset viewing spot. It was basically sunrise in reverse, but I preferred it for a few reasons. Firstly, it was warmer. Secondly, from where we were, you could see the Sun setting beside Kata Tjuta as well, which was lovely. Finally, there were less people, which somehow made things seem a lot more special. The reason for this was because everybody stayed down in the carpark either for barbecues, or in the case of the more upmarket tours, for Champers mit Lachsfisch or whatever.

Soundtrack: “Songs About Jane” by Maroon 5. As if I’d own it. It was our guide Vic’s CD

Both of the girls in my room had to get up for 5.30am tours. The ugly Italian girl, however, hadn’t changed her watch properly, and woke us up at 4am, and I never recovered, which I was not pleased about after my sleepless night on the train. The morning was spent wandering aimlessly around Alice for a bit, and then my Wayward Tour Bus (driven by Vic) picked me up from bloody Melanka’s to go out to the outback. Also getting on at Alice were: Julie from Amersham; Judith from Somewhere In London; Jess from Manchester; Sam from Scarborough; Joss and Clemence from France; Stefan from Germany; Helen and Andy from Somewhere In London; Keiko from Japan; Marsha and Lisbeth from Holland; Haruka from Japan; and Monika from German Switzerland. From Alice Springs Airport, we picked up Monja and Jenny, who came from Italian Switzerland.

The drive down to Uluru was long, but full of landscape like I’d never seen in real life before. The earth is so red and the sky is so blue, and the light is so intense because there’s no industry there, and therefore no pollution to block out the sun. The land is very arid, but it manages to yield lots and lots of hardy trees and bushes. There’s roadkill all the way: dead kangaroos, dead wallabies, even dead cows. As a result, there are also a fair few rather large birds, like wedge-tailed eagles (which Alice locals call “wedgies”) and evil-looking buzzards. Scary creatures. Just before we got to camp, we also picked up Jenny and Monja’s friend Matheo from the airport, as well as some Americans called Jeff and Meredith.

We arrived at out campsite, around 20km from Uluru itself, as the Sun had nearly finished setting. The colours blending into one another above the Rock were beautiful, and I immediately felt a sense of calm and well-being having come into the desert. Julie and I struggled to set up out tent in the dark, but fortunately, Sam had spent the past few months camping on the west coast, and she helped us out. Andy and Joss did the whole alpha male thing and got the fire started, then we all sat around it drinking. Though it was cold, I slept very well as I had two sleeping bags and a swag (some kind of crazy Australian sleeping sack thinger), and of course, very little sleep from the previous two nights to go with it.

Soundtrack: “Parts Of The Process” by Morcheeba

Monday 20th June. In the morning, Penny taught me how to crochet beanies. Go me. The landscape on the journey was awesome: the sunrise was gorgeous, the land was a deep red, the sky was a deep blue. I did, however, feel a little queasy, as I hadn’t had anywhere near enough sleep. On arriving in Alice, I got chatting with Richard, and we spent the afternoon walking around town. There isn’t really much to do in Alice. We climbed Anzac Hill, as that was recommended to me by Penny, and you could see all the fantastic hills and rocks for miles around, coupled with the setting sun. Both of us hadn’t slept at all on the train, so after a cheap dinner at bloody Melanka Backpackers (it’s Alice Party Central, so there’s always noise noise noise), we tried to get an early night.

Soundtrack: “Up All Night” by Razorlight

Rest assured, if I hadn’t met Penny, this post would’ve been called “The legendary Ghan.” The Gahn is short for Afghan, and it’s the name of the train that runs all the way from Adelaide to Darwin, stopping at Alice Springs in the middle. It’s named after the Afghans who led the camels between Adelaide and Alice in order to carry supplies to build the railway, allegedly. There are loads of crazy stories about it, which is why it’s legendary. For example, once the train got mired in the outback for three weeks because of flooding during the wet season, and the driver kept everybody alive by shooting wild goat for them to eat.

I took the train up on Sunday 19th June. The trip from Adelaide up to Alice lasts nineteen hours, and I spent all of them (plus an extra hour because there was a delay while they changed drivers) sitting next to Penny. Let me tell you some stuff about Penny. This is a novel in itself, so I’ll try to summarise a little. Her father was a commando in the British Army, so she grew up in loads of different countries, most of them war zones. She married a German count when she was 19, and because her son was the only male child, he’s going to be a count when his father dies, even thought he count divorced Penny for his mistress and had children with her. Penny’s youngest daughter is a tattoo artist in Melbourne, and she’ tattooed Heath Ledger. Russell Crowe now lives on the farm that her mother used to own. She’s currently a professional crotcheter-or-whatever (but she’s done loads of other crazy jobs), and she broke the world record for the fastest crocheted jumper on Rove Live (which is the Australian equivalent of Friday Night With Jonathan Ross, but more spontaneous and funnier). She’s now in Alice to teach Aboriginal women how to do freestyle crochet, and she was also organising the Beanie Festival. I’ve missed out loads because it’s impossible to remember all in one go. What an extraordinary life.

Penny got completely smashed on red wine (she kept on trying to pour glasses for me and forgetting to take off the lid). I didn’t. Both of us didn’t sleep. There was a wonderful moment at around 3am when the Aussie guy sitting behind us suddenly exclaimed: “Bloody Poms beat us.” He’d been listening to England v Australia on his personal radio. Richard, the Geordie guy behind me and myself were rather happy at this, and he told me the next day that the Aussie guy had only been announcing when Australia had been hitting boundaries etc, so it came as rather a surprise when we won. Yay for Kevin Pietersen.

Soundtrack: Australian Big Brother theme. Aunty Wendy’s watching it in the other room.

Good evening this evening.

Time I caught up on my outback adventure, eh? I’m assuming most people looked at all the NZ stuff and couldn’t be arsed to read it, which is fine, when St Pehen’s blog is so much more interesting than mine. But no worries, I’m going to update last week’s stuff anyway, because if I don’t then I won’t be able to force myself to skip it and get on with current happenings in my travels, and then I’ll stop writing altogether, which would be bad, because then I’d lose my grasp of the English language and end up talking like some sort of bogan or something.

Oh dear.

Best get going, then.

Soundtrack: “Employment” by Kaiser Chiefs

17th June. I was sharing a room with two quiet, polite French guys, and another boy on the bunk on top of me who hadn’t materialized. He turned up pissed at 4am. Then his Kiwi Experience tour leader turned up at 6.30am to kick him out of bed. I BLOODY HATE KIWI EXPERIENCE, MAGIC BUS AND STRAY. Let me expand. These three companies ask people to pay money for transportation, and they drive you around all the major stuff in NZ. You still have to arrange and pay for your own accommodation, though. I was traveling by supersaver coach pass or whatever it was called, so I was doing the exact same thing as them, but paying $200 less and not rolling in drunk every night because all I wanted to do by then was sleep. And I did not take well to being deprived of rest by these idiots jumping on “shag buses.” I mean, they weren’t even appreciating the country properly. They were just getting drunk and trying to get laid at night, and then sleeping it off on the bus the next day and not even seeing anything.

Later, I managed to lift myself from bed 30 minutes before checkout and met up with Fiona. We wandered around the center of Chch for a bit, which exposed it as being a rather dull and expressionless little city. Getting fed up pretty quickly, we ended up taking the bus to the airport stupidly early. Fiona and I sat around for hours playing shithead and reading gossip mags, and then it was time for me to get on my plane back to Melbourne.

I finished reading “Anna Karenina” during the flight, which is an achievement, considering I’d been spinning the monster out for over a month. #For those of you who haven’t read it and are considering to do so, look away now.# I was really disappointed with the ending, as after Anna’s wonderfully dramatic suicide, it cuts straight to Levin’s thoroughly dull story two months later. Most infuriatingly, Tolstoy barely touches on how Vronsky and Karenin felt after her death, and for me, there was this vast potential for some really powerful, emotive writing.

On the rest of the journey, I refused to watch the romcom that they were showing, and sat gazing at the clouds out of the window and singing along to “X & Y” and “Employment,” as I was the only person in my row. Then followed three hours in Tullamarine Airport, which I managed to pass without any reading material. The first couple of hours were okay, because it was still fairly early and therefore not very busy. However, the weekend rush soon kicked in, and I was very glad that I had had ages to reclaim my baggage and re-check it (which I had to do because I was using two different airlines). [Bytheway, Virgin Blue self-checking is soooooooo cool. You can chose your own seat and everything. All you have to do is scan in the barcode on your itinerary, and then drop off your baggage, and everything’s sorted.] By the time I had to make my way to the gate, though, the place was full of people going home or on holiday for the weekend, and it was impossible to move very quickly at all. Half the flights were delayed, and so there were lots and lots of angry/frustrated people wandering around as well. I was an island of calm in a sea of madness, and I sat in the waiting lounge eating my ice smoothie, even though it was cold outside.

I arrived back in Adelaide shattered, but relieved that I’d have a good bed where the mattress didn’t sink in in the middle and where I wouldn’t get woken up in the middle of the night by some smelly roommate who’d been unsuccessfully on the pull. I’m really glad I went out to NZ and it’s an experience I’ll always hold dearly, but by God, I needed some rest when I got back.

Soundtrack: “Batman Begins OST” by dint of watching the film. I keep all my cinema ticket stubs to remind myself that I go far too much, but then I think, ooh, must go more, must get more. How do half the things I do work out so conversely?

Thursday 16th June. I had been going to have a walk around Queenstown that morning, but in the end, I just could not be arsed. I got on the coach as the sun was rising over the Remarkables, and again, they looked fantastic. Going to Queenstown was definitely worth it.

The journey once again took in some wonderful wonderful scenery. The water in the lakes and rivers is so very blue. The hills and vegetation and willow trees on the river banks were covered in hoar frost for the first part of the journey, and the landscape looked simply magical. Lots of the scenery was a lot like either Scotland or Germany as well. Coming into Christchurch, I watched my final sunset over the grandiose peaks of the Southern Alps, which will be a sight that I’ll keep in my pockets with me.

On arriving in Chch, I checked into my backpackers with Fiona, a girl I met on the coach. She said that she wanted to go and see “Batman Begins” as it was opening night, so we went to check out the times. Lo and behold, there was a showing right there and then. It was a good film, but by no means excellent. I was also slightly worried at the start, because we know from “Elektra” that comicbook superheroes with ninja training do not necessarily make good movies. However, I did enjoy myself, though Christian Bale, the hot version of Michael Vaughan, was a strong contributing factor. When the film was over, we ended up in an Irish pub which had Irish dancers, followed by a generic pub band with receding hairlines. But anyway, this begs the question: am I a magnet to Irish people, or are Irish people a magnet to me? Ho-hum.

Soundtrack: “Dizzy Heights” by The Lightning Seeds

Wednesday 15th June. I left Franz Josef as the sun was rising. The coach journey covered some amazing scenery: rainforests; glacier-formed lakes; bright-blue flowing rivers; land eroded away by gold mining. The coach driver took great delight in telling us when we were crossing the 35th Parallel some kms north of Queenstown, which meant that we were now closer to the South Pole than the equator. You could tell. Out trip was frustratingly long, though, as borth of the drivers insisted on stopping every half-hour, either for refreshments, photos, or both. Never mind. I still enjoyed myself.

The coach arrived in Queenstown as the sun was setting, giving the Remarkables a golden brown as we drove into town. It’s very beautiful round there, but I did feel as if I wasn’t taking full advantage of the place because I’m not into skiing. Everybody in my hostel was proper posh (i.e. they were pretending to be common, but you can’t hide those public school accents). I suppose that you have to be in order to have been on as many skiing trips as these kids have. I was such an imposter, and was found out on numerous occasions because: a) I don’t have one of those Arctic fleece thingers and b) I sat at the dining table to compose my journal.

There was nothing to do in Queenstown at that time of day apart from go up the gondola, which was fun. I do enjoy the sensation of rising up above the minuscule world thoroughly. However, once I was at the top, the viewing deck was absolutely bloody freezing. I only lasted around 5-10 minutes, then I had to go back inside again. I was damn well getting my money’s worth, though, so I sat drinking beer (so so bad for me, but cheap) and watching the Lions play Wellington (a little dull). Then, once my beer allergy had kicked in and I was feeling slightly tipsy due to only having free (watery) soup for dinner, I went and stood on the viewing deck for ages, singing to the mountains, the valley and the lake.

Soundtrack: “O” by Damien Rice

Tuesday 14th June. Because of Melissa’s return at 3am, it made waking up at 4.15am to watch the cricket so much easier. Come on. I’m on holiday! I figured, since my hostel had Sky, I may as well watch the England v Australia Twenty20 match. And it was so so worth it. On a beautiful summer evening at the Rose Bowl, England proceeded to make 179 from their allotted overs. Marcus Trescothick and Kevin Pietersen were very good and played their required roles, but for me, the star of the show was Paul Collingwood. Come on, The Quiet Ginger One! He made a wonderfully rapid 46 when everybody thought that we were screwed. And it wasn’t old KP who hit the most sixes, but Colly. This was followed up by a disastrous Aussie reply, and we won by 100 runs. I wouldn’t have missed it for the world.

I went back to bed afterwards, because it was all over and done with by 7.30am. Presentations and all. [Incidentally, I was really rather angry that the dumbarse Sky viewers back home voted KP MOTM, when Colly clearly had the better match than him, and he said so himself.] Later in the morning, I took the shuttle bus up to the glacier car park, and I walked up to its face through bizarre temperate rainforest. Rainforest – glacier, glacier – rainforest. Very very weird, but very very cool as well. Walking along the valley to get to the glacier’s terminal face, I did manage to fall into the freezing river an inordinate number of times, so I’m glad that I didn’t fork out $130 to climb the thing properly. The view was amazing, though, and I’m really glad that I went to that sleepy little village. Even though I had buggerall to do in the afternoon, and just randomly wandered around for a few hours. [I was right, bytheway. Franz Josef is just a bunch of motels, some shops, and a glacier.] It was so peaceful that it was just wonderfully calming to be there.

Sat reading “Anna Karenina” in the dining room, I met a wonderful Danish girl called Annette. I came out of the conversation having resolved to marry a Danish man. According to Annette, they’re all tall and blonde, and the Christmases there sound delightful. If you’ve read the script for the panto, then you’ll know all about the fire hazards of their Christmas trees, but there’s also all this other good stuff. They sing carols round the tree on Christmas Eve, then they sit around eating and opening presents for hours on end. It sounds so good.

Soundtrack: “Franz Ferdinand” by Franz Ferdinand

Monday 13th June. Ten hours on the coach – hardcore! There was glorious sunshine all day long, and barely any mist, so the drive down the west coast of South Island took in some utterly spectacular views, and the journey alone was totally totally worth it.

Arriving late in the day again, as far as I could tell, Franz Josef was basically a bunch of motels, some shops, and a glacier. I was going to go and look at glow-worms, but the path was pitch dark and I was shit scared of falling over a tree root and breaking an ankle and being stuck in the woods all night, so I chickened out. The walk alone was worth it, though. It’s a peaceful, sleepy little village, and the night was crisp and fresh. The sky was perfectly clear, and the crescent moon and multitudes of heavenly stars looked down on me. You can see so many more stars down here in the Southern Hemisphere, which I will never stop appreciating.

For those of you who don’t possess a working knowledge of FF folklore, here is a quick snippet of their history. The band were looking for somewhere to rehearse when Alex Kapranos and Nick McCarthy were walking along the disused railway line in Glasgow. However, it turned out not to be so disused, and after diving out of the way of a train, they came across a large old warehouse that had been empty for years. Apart from pigeons. They moved in, used it to hold art shows and illegal gigs, and christened it The Chateau.

When I was in Wellington, I had been flicking through my backpackers guide, and listed under backpackers in Franz Josef was a certain little place called Chateau Franz. I had to stay there, so I did.

By this time, all I wanted to do was sleep sleep sleep, so fortunately, I had a room full of nice, quiet girls. Apart from Melissa (another Irish girl – magnet for the Irish, me), who came in at 3am after a night on the piss, which was slightly vexing. Two of the girls were Korean, friends travelling together whilst learning English in Australia. They explained to me what their names meant. Sujin’s name means “shining truth,” which I thought was wonderfully poetic. Even better though, was Yongjoo’s name, which means “dragon flying through the air eating bees.” I just can’t beat that, can I?

Soundtrack: "Bentley's Gonna Get You" by Bentley Rhythm Ace. Elaine was listening to it just now on one of those terrible dance compilation CDs

Good evening this evening.

So so so. I'm back in Adelaide again, and now, here is the conclusion of Steph's Kiwi Adventure. Finally. I haven't even updated my own journal for all that stuff in the outback, though, so give it a few days before that materialises.

Well, enjoy. And I'm not going to tell you where the boring bits are so that you can skip them. So ha.

Soundtrack: "Rock 'n' Roll Knees Up" by Chas And Dave

Damn! I have no time left! I need to go and pack and get on the train in a minute. My NZ stuff will be continued when I get back from Alice Springs/Uluru in a week's time.

And go Bangladesh and England! I wish I'd had the stamina to stay up till 3am watching the match last night. England for the Ashes! And see you all next week.

Soundtrack: “Kingdom Of Heaven OST” by dint of watching the film on the boat

Sunday 12th June. I checked out at 9am so that I could see a little of Wellington before I had to cross to South Island. On a glorious morning, my first stop was the NZ Houses of Parliament. The library and the original house are fine old buildings, but the 1992 extension is typically hideous. Next stop was a trip to the top of the hill via the cable car. On traveling to the summit, and, indeed on arriving there, I was greatly reminded of HK. The layout of Wellington is similar and there are white-painted blocks of flats everywhere, as if for an oriental hot country. It’s like a mini-HK with a British climate, and to me, it just felt so so right. I walked around the botanic gardens for a couple of hours in the cool, fresh morning, enjoying the views of the city and the native NZ vegetation immensely.

Before I had to go and get the ferry, I decided to try and have a look at the Westpac Stadium. Is Twickenham called Fortress England or something? If so, then the Westpac Stadium should be called… just plain Fortress. I just could not find a way. This was then followed by an infuriating series of events. Whilst riding the shuttle bus to the ferry, I saw a sign directing pedestrians into the stadium hiding behind a pillar. And then I remembered that the Test ground in Wellington isn’t even the Westpac Stadium – it’s the bloody Basin Reserve. The Westpac Ground is the Test ground in Hamilton. Gah!

It was raining by the time I had to go and get the ferry. [It hadn’t rained north of Wellington, and apparently it hadn’t been raining south of the place either. It’s just one big hole in the centre of the country, so it turns out that the midlands suck no matter what country you’re in.] Because I couldn’t really see much, I decided to go and watch “Kingdom Of Heaven.” I got very excited in the first few minutes when I realized that Kevin McKidd was in it, as he is a supremely talented actor, and a far more intriguing proposition than boring boring Orlando Bloom. Much to my annoyance, though, he dies in a shipwreck before he gets to do any decent acting, and things went downhill from there. It wasn’t a bad film, really, but nowhere near as good as “Gladiator.”

Once the film was finished, I spent the last half-hour of the journey on the freezing deck. The sunset behind the mountains echoed in the water below and the low clouds and mist above was spectacular. I really love being around water. I’m clearly going to be one of those evil mothers whose children bed her to take them to Disneyland, but instead get taken to the Lake District, or on a canal holiday.

I stayed the night in Nelson, after a bus journey in the dark from Picton. The place reminded me of Devizes, and though it’s a city, it’s completely dead on a Sunday night.
Here are some statistics about NZ: it has a population of 4 million, and a quarter of those are concentrated in Auckland. It’s been predicted that in the next few years, 80% of the population will be on the North Island. There are 40 million sheep and God knows how many cows, and I have seen a very very very goodly proportion of them on my coach travels.

Soundtrack: “B-Sides And Rarities (Volumes I-III)” by Nick Cave And The Bad Seeds

Saturday 11th June. Wellington, which not many people realise is the capitol of NZ until they get to it. It’s one of those places like Canberra and Pretoria, really, except it’s probably (I can’t say for sure as I haven’t visited the other two) much prettier, being in NZ and all.
The Rotorua to Taupo leg of my coach journey started off bright and sunny, but soon became mist-enshrouded once more, and because I couldn’t see the fine details, the land reminded me of home. Taupo was very fine, though, and the lake looked lovely. It was very serene, very placid… heavenly, almost. I was also impressed greatly as Lake Taupo in the largest lake in the country. After transferring coaches in Taupo, the next leg was continuous to Wellington. It was rather long and the last hour-and-a-half was in the dark, which was a shame. Other wise, it was a really cool drive, through ethereal valleys and a high-up desert road.

Soundtrack: “Here Be Monsters” by Ed Harcourt

Friday 10th June. Everything ran perfectly to plan: I even got to the bus terminus 30 minutes early. Then I realised that I’d accidentally binned my bus pass the night before, thinking that it was yet another leaflet telling me how much there was to do in Auckland. Not good. I legged it back to the Camel and disturbed Simon and KT having sex to rummage through the dustbin. Out on the street, I realised that I had 15 minutes to run back up the hill and I knew that I was spent, so fortunately a taxi appeared across the street and I made the bus.

The drive to Rotorua was shrouded in mist, so I couldn’t see much of the scenery, which was a shame. The town (apparently it’s a city) itself looks fantastic, which makes up for the sulphur. The hot springs mean that there’s steam shooting out of the ground in all sorts of places, and there are also verdant green hills and a glistening blue lake.

Arriving early in the afternoon, I had time to go up to Te Puia, which houses the thermal reserve (where all the hot springs and mud pools are) and a Maori marae. I had a good look around, and I really enjoyed myself. Even though there were a whole bunch of idiot ignorant spoilt rich American schoolkids on my tour of the place. For example, we were just coming to the kiwi reserve, so our guide was giving us a little background on the odd little creatures.

“How are they related to the fruit?” asked one of the schoolgirls.

“They look the same,” replied the guide.

“You mean they’re green?”

Back at Hot Rock Hostel, I swam 100 lengths of the teeny tiny pool that was ridiculously to swim in. The hostel management had decided to utilise the town’s hot springs to provide a heated outdoor pool, and it was really cool, swimming in the dark. I liked that backpackers, basically because I managed to get a room to myself and I could have an okay sleep that night.

Soundtrack: “Holes In The Wall” by The Electric Soft Parade

Thursday 9th June. I went on a free Kiwi Experience tour around the area surrounding Auckland, basically, because it was free. Kiwi Experience is one of the tour companies operating around NZ catering for the 18-25 party market, colloquially known as Shag Buses. The other main companies are Magic Bus and Stray, and I’ve come to hate them all with a vengeance. More of that later.

So, this free tour, then. We went to see the marae (Maori village type thing) at Auckland Uni, to see the views from the hills out of Auckland, to see a 900-year-old tree, and to have a free barbecue at the hotel across the road from the Lions’ training ground. We then went to Shelley Beach beside Auckland Harbour Bridge, and to dockside. There is a crazy amount of boats in that city – it isn’t called City of Sails for nothing.
Sean and Rich were working in Fox’s that night, so we all went down for the pub quiz, which we managed to miss by an hour. Martin and I worked out that Regis the Crazy Maori Bartender had been giving me a) double shots and b) a $1.50 discount on top of it. Yay for good old Steph charm. I had an earlier night as I had to get up very early the next day. I said my goodbyes, packed, and went to bed.

Soundtrack: “X & Y” by the Smurfs. Only joking. “X & Y” by Coldplay, as ever. Well, I say as ever, but I haven’t even had that album two weeks and I can sing loads of the lyrics. It’s not as bad as with “Employment” where I could sing every single lyric within a week, but then it does have the words included in the sleeve, and I remember things that have been written down much easier.

Wednesday 8th June. I had had the room to myself that night, but then a couple called Simon and KT turned up at 8am. Argh! They had flown in from Santiago at 4am, so it was a blessing that the hostel didn’t have a 24-hour reception. I went down for breakfast at 10.30am, unable to sleep, and ended up staying for two-and-a-half hours listening to another American, Jon, air his grievances and disenchantments about the state of his country. I’ve become quite the expert on American politics. Jon was actually a pretty cool guy, though. Because he was so fed up with the US, he’d quite his job as a programmer, sold all his stuff, and got a work permit for NZ. Then he just turned up in Auckland two weeks later and was going jobhunting that morning.

After the rant, I went for a walk around Queen Street and went to find out what the best way of getting around NZ would be. I was recommended a whistlestop tour by coach. I spent the afternoon sitting in an Irish pub with Ben, Dark-Haired Mark, Rosie and Louise. The Irish girls recounted in great detail how Louise had been kayaking in the sea in Fiji and had been hit by a jet ski. Scary stuff, and the bruise was pretty damn impressive.

I was running out of film, so I went into a chemist’s to stock up. When the cashier heard my English accent, she asked me: “Are you here for the Lions tour?”

“Huh?” I asked.

“Not a rugby follower, then?”

“Not quite.”

I then took the Explorer bus around the city so that I could take in the sights of Auckland in an hour. It was a good time of day to go, as the sun was just starting to set, giving the ocean and the shiny tall buildings a majestic glow. Once the bus trip was over, I went up the Sky Tower, which is the tallest building in the Southern Hemisphere. This was so that I could see the lights of Auckland – fabulous stuff. I rather liked Auckland: a clean, modern, safe city, but more organic than Melbourne. Then again, it was just like any other city. They all seem to get a bit generic after a while.
One free dinner with the Irish girls later and I found myself down at Fox’s on the waterfront with them, Irish Simon and the Welsh boys, as the Two Marks were working there as glassies that night. We watched the Lions play Taranaki, and the Welsh boys very patiently explained to me the concept of a) a Lions tour and b) why the players were doing what they were doing. I don’t think that rugby is my game.

Soundtrack: “Final Straw” by Snow Patrol. An album that I don’t actually own and keep on meaning to get, but it was being played that night. More of that later.

Tuesday 7th June. I woke dauntingly early to catch the plane first to Melbourne on Virgin Blue (an airline I’d never heard of until I came down here. It’s the most efficient and reliable Australasian budget airline). From Melbourne, I connected to Auckland via Air New Zealand. On this flight, I was sat next to an ageing Thai couple, which I found to be a thoroughly disagreeable experience. Not because of the couple themselves, but because of the way that the flight attendants behaved. They all just assumed that I was with the couple because the three of us were Asian, and they couldn’t tell the difference. The couple barely spoke any English and kept on refusing the tea and accidentally pressing the call button and stuff, so I didn’t get any tea unless I yelled after the flight attendant in a plummy English accent, and they got really annoyed with me because they thought that it was me who kept on pressing the button.

I think that the thing that annoyed me the most was that they just assumed. Lots of people that I’ve met have said that they really loved Melbourne. I enjoyed myself there, and it’s a pretty cool city, but I wouldn’t say that I loved it. Now, I really hate to say this, because a) it shouldn’t be true and b) I’m going to sound as if I want to be persecuted to make white people feel guilty, but: it’s a very different place to be if you’re white. Because there are so many Asian people in Melbourne, and many of them haven’t got a very good grasp of English and the white Australians perceive them to be flooding their schools and stealing their jobs, lots of people looked down on me and patronised the hell out of me when I was in Melbourne. My accent just got posher and posher when I was there. The same thing happened when I was in Auckland, another city full of Asian people. For example, I wasn’t paying much attention to the direction in which I was going, so I nearly walked into an old lady. As I apologised to her, I heard her mutter: “Another f*cking Asian.” It shouldn’t make me angry, but it does. Nobody tell the Boy, or he’ll go ape-shit. Rant over.

I arrived at the Fat Camel Hostel at around 7pm. Dinner was being served, so I went to claim my free meal, and ended up sitting with these two American women called Joanne and Nahpi who had just quite their jobs with Air Alaska. Joanne was there to work in Christchurch for a year, and Nahpi was just visiting. We sat there for five hours whilst they aired their grievances and disenchantments about the state of the country.

I thought I’d better go to bed then, but there was a party in full swing in the lounge on my floor, so I figured I’d join in because I wouldn’t be able to sleep anyway. Consequently, I met a whole bunch of drunken people. There was Simon, a very funny Irishman who is just like Dylan Moran, who’d been traveling for 21 months and was going home for the summer after Auckland. Martin had been working in Sydney for 6 months, and kept his pink-haired head in “How To Be Good” by Nick Hornby for most of the night, occasionally saying something in an odd Cardiff-Sydney accent. Four Irish girls (I’m a magnet for Irish people), Trish, Rosie, Kate and Louise, had just come from Fiji. A goodly proportion of people in Auckland have either come from Fiji, or are on their way there. I can’t see the attraction, myself. Then there were three Welsh with mystifying Cheshire accents who were living in Auckland for a month and trying to find a place: Ben, Rich and Sean. Their mates, the two Marks, were already in bed.

By the time I got to them, they were all already drunk, so we’d got to the talking-about-random-nonsense stage (similar to Mo’s birthday when Big Chris kept on going on and on about all those times he nearly got killed in Middlesborough mosh pits). And then we got onto the crap jokes.

“Did you hear the one about the magic tractor?!” piped up Simon from the hole in the sofa.

We were laughing for ages before we even heard the punchline – that line is absolutely hilarious when delivered in an Irish accent.
Incidentally, the punchline is: “It went down the road and turned into a field.”

Soundtrack: “Brushfire Fairytales” by Jack Johnson. Aunty Wendy has the CD on right now. Another guitarist singer/songerwriter.

Good arvo this arvo.

So so so. I got back from NZ last night. I’ve been putting off updating this blog for the past couple of hours because I’m an obsessively thorough person, and I’m going to be working on this for bloody ages now. Fortunately, I have my very detailed journal entries to help me out, but this account isn’t going to be a direct transcript because a) my journal entries are rarely coherent and b) I’m probably going to end up writing lots of irrelevant crap because I think that it’ll amuse people, and it won’t.

Ah well. No worries, eh?

I’m going to pre-write all of this on Word, and then copy and paste it into Blogger, just like half of my HK and Melbourne entries. There’s a time limit on this, though. I’m headed up to Alice Springs on Sunday afternoon, so I’m really going to have to get this all done before then.
Best get going, then.

Soundtrack: "X & Y" by Coldplay

Soaring, sweeping, glorious... Totally totally ace. Love it to bits.

Three years was far too long to wait. Bring on FF2 in September!

I'm off to NZ for ten days tomorrow, so I shan't be posting while I'm away, unless I manage to find some free Internet access somewhere, because could you imagine me paying? Everybody who isn't Jack, have fun partying due to lack of exams. Jack, have fun partying.

Soundtrack: "X & Y" by Coldplay

Well, I'm on my second listen right now, which means I've only listened to the whole thing once. I have a ritual for every time I listen to a new CD or record. I put the CD/record into the player and put on the music with the balance neutral - no bass turned up, the left and right speakers equal. I make sure nobody's going to disturb me. [This time I ensured it by listening on my discman. Plus, the sound has a better quality through the earphones. For example, I didn't even notice the synth part to "Matinee" by FF until I listened to it for the first time through earphones. I digress.] I read the sleevenotes as I listen, and I hold the case up to the light to check there aren't any secret oddities hidden behind the CD. That's why I'm not really into downloading music - I like something tangible as evidence, and I love sleevenotes.

Onto the album itself, then. Overall, it's a lot airier than the previous two albums, and there's a lot more space. A lot like "Heaven Up Here" by the Bunnymen, in fact, and a lot of the rhythm parts are inspired by that album. This is most evident in the bass and drum parts, but also in some of the guitar parts. Lots of the guitar parts are reminiscent of "The Bends" album by Radiohead. The record is a lot more synth driven, with lots of Pink Floyd soundscapes, but they don't get out of control, which is a relief. There is more use of vocal harmony, which sounds wonderful on the hymnal songs. And I think that the band have moved on a fair bit - they've got rid of all the overly twee and cutesy stuff that used to plague them, basically because they've practically phased out those acoustic ballads like "Sparks" and "Green Eyes."

Track-by-track breakdown:

• "Square One" begins with a worrying aforementioned Pink Floyd soundscape, but things pick up quickly and the song actually gets good.
• "What If" starts like "Imagine," which got me worried, because most of the time these existential musing songs fall flat. However, after the first two lines, Chris Martin starts wondering what life would be like if his wife left him, and we're back to classic Coldplay material. Martin's at his best when he's doing self-doubt.
• "White Shadows" has a powerful, driving Will Champion drum beat. With the echoing guitar part, the combined effect is similar to that of "Show Of Strength" by the Bunnymen.
• "Fix You" is gorgeous. This album's "Everything's Not Lost." It opens with a hymnal organ figure, which works really well. Oh dear. Of course I'm going to say it's gorgeous - this is the girl who's been going to 11am Mass at the Cathedral just because she wants to listen to the choir.
• "Talk" samples "Computer Love" by Kraftwerk, and it sounds great. But even though it contains a sample of electronic dance music, the overall vibe is "Bends"-era Radiohead, interestingly.
• The title track is heavily Beatles-influenced. This is especially apparent in the string figure right at the end of the song. Talking about the string parts in this song, they are much like Shankar's arrangements from the Bunnymen's "Porcupine" album.
• I really love "Speed Of Sound." Listening to it on the car radio just doesn't do it justice. However, when I first heard it, I just thought that it was an okay song. It's only after multiple listens that I've developed affection for it, which pretty much sums up how I feel about Coldplay. It took me ages to fall in love with "Parachutes," and when I first heard "Rush Of Blood," the only song that I liked was "The Scientist."
• "A Message" is my favourite song on the album right now. The first line is stolen from the hymn "My Song Is Love Unknown." Say no more. Primiarily acoustic-guitar driven, it also has some wonderful soaring electric guitar parts by Jonny Buckland. Trademark Coldplay, huh?
• "Low" is a song that probably works really well live, because it's the rockiest song on the album. I know that this is my stock argument as to why I like Coldplay live, but they have a much rockier sound when they perform live, with heavier guitars and bass and angrier drums. This song is a mixture of "Spitting Games" by Snow Patrol, "Ocean Spray" by Manic Street Preachers and "The Bends" by Radiohead, with added synths, strings and milk bottle percussion. Converse to its title, it's actually a highlight of the album.
• "The Hardest Part" is the Coldplay version of a Country song, which bodes well for me, a fan of Bob Harris Country on Radio 2. A good driving song. If I could drive. It has a typical Buckland clean-tone lead guitar part to counterpoint the melody and piano part, which then leads into a simple-yet-effective dirty-tone guitar break.
• Some of the rhyming schemes on "Swallowed In The Sea" are a bit contrived, but Martin gets away with it because the tune's lovely. Innit always that way? Once the drums kick in, it turns into quite a folksy track, but the lead guitar part lends it a widescreen atmosphere.
• "Twisted Logic" is heavily influenced by Radiohead - Buckland's lead guitar part could be lifted straight from a track from "The Bends." And the chord sequence in the verse is tonic, subdominant minor, repeated over and over - the chord sequence from the intro of "No Surprises." That compound time-signature isn't fooling me. Probably has the best lyrics out of any song on the record.
• The extra track, "Till Kingdom Come," is a low-key acoustic Country number, originally written for Johnny Cash, but he died before he could record it. It works well because it's so simple, and the words are deeply, beautifully resonant. Sadly devoid of slidy steel-guitar, though.

Final verdict: Unknown. I really really like this album, but I need a few more listens to figure out whether it's actually any good or not. Some of the lyrics are a bit dodgy, but aren't they always with Chris Martin? I'm a big fan of the instrumentation, though, and though there aren't any stonking great choruses on this album, and there aren't any "Yellow"s or "The Scientist"s, melodically it's very much up to scratch.

Soundtrack: "X & Y" by Coldplay

Good arvo this arvo.

I'm posting this first so that the Coldplay review is at the top of the page.

Just adding the next chapter to the bird saga. Those birds are scarily punctual (like fish at feeding time). They only ever attack the window at half-past the hour. That I've remembered, they've attacked at 8.30am, 9.30am, 10.30am and 1.30pm. It's a worry.

And for the benefit of non-Elgarites, here is an analysis of the birds' behaviour by the one and only Stephen "Gorgeous" Maloney:

Steph, with reference to your birds attacking windows (I just got round to skimming some of your blog, but I can't be bothered / don't want to post comment there), it is indeed plausible that a bird could take its reflection for a conspecific and attack. Kusuyama et al. (2000) found that jungle crows do just that, and male pigeons do the same, whilst female pigeons display their own appropriate meeting-a-conspecific behaviour, viz. preening.

Clayton and colleagues, however, found that Western scrub jays (Aphelocoma californica) will cache food in the presence of a mirror in the same way as they would cache food in private, rather than the way in which they cache when observed by a conspecific. There is as yet no clear evidence of a bird passing Gallup's (1970) 'mark test', taken as suggesting some kind of self-recognition. Parrots, although failing the mark test, can use mirrors to locate hidden food, suggesting some appreciation of the properties of the mirror, or maybe just instrumental conditioning.

Finally, horizontal reflective surfaces may be more naturalistic (e.g. pools of water) than the vertical ones (e.g. windows), and thus less likely to elicit the aggressive conspecific-directed behaviour; Kusuyama et al. found that the crows behaved less aggressively to a horizontal than to a vertical mirror.

... furthermore your scepticism of the group-selection / altruism explanation is of course completely justified (did you do A level biology? I didn't so forgive me if I'm wrongly assuming ignorance of evolutionary theories), and your idea that they're trying to get at food behind the glass is perhaps the most plausible of the three...

So that's clear, isn't it?

Soundtrack: "Two Shoes" by The Cat Empire

Good evening this evening.

Blake took Elaine and I to the shooting range yesterday. His father is the president of Adelaide Rich Bloodthirsty Psychos Association i.e. the gun club. I really really object to that shit, but I went along because it's another life experience, and I wanted to see if they really were rich bloodthirsty psychos. They did spend the whole time trying to prove to me that they weren't. Blake's father, Mr Wadlow, kept on going on and on about how safety was paramount. Some random French guy called Fabian who turned up on a motorbike kept on going on about how gun clubs taught people how to be responsible with the bastard machines, and just proved how lunatics shouldn't be allowed near the things. "That's Simon Ridgeway," said Blake. "He's the head of a company who makes submarines, an engineer."

Yeah right.

Nothing can detract from the looks of determination and grim satisfaction every time one of those men pulls a trigger, hits a metal rabbit target, blows up some rocks with his brand new big eff-off police rifle.

I battled long and hard with myself, and I did actually have a go. It felt horrible. Every time I pulled the trigger, an unpleasant movement of revulsion squirmed inside me. I'm disgusted with myself now, but at least I've done it now. So now I've not just shot a gun, I've shot a big eff-off police rifle, a smaller rifle which is much quieter and has hardly any recoil, and a revolver. Those men totally get off on the whole gunfire thing, but it just made me feel ugly and depressed and reminded me just how fragile everything is.

The firing range itself made me feel really edgy, mostly due to the fact that it emcompassed two of my three fundamental fears: dying and sudden loud noises. To hold that power in my hands... Urgh. It didn't help that I had plugs embedded deep into my ear canals, thus blocking out normal background noises, like the birdies singing and the wind blowing through the trees and the grass. It was eery - feeling the breeze but not being able to hear its effects.

I needed some serious grease afterwards. Just as well Aunty Wendy came back from some protest march in Sydney with Krispie Kreme doughnuts - so so good.

Today is the 59th anniversary of the Italian Republic, so there was a whole bunch of Italian people at Mass this morning, many of them in national dress or old-timers in their old army uniforms. Half the service was in Italian, which was quite cool, and they got all these cute little Italian kids to do the readings. Aw.

Aunty Wendy, Elaine, Blake and I had dim sum for lunch today. "Chicken feet?" asked the waitress. "Yes please!" I said. She came to plonk a basket of the things on the table, and somehow spilt the whole tray of the boiling things on my feet. Argh! Pain! Fortunately, I wasn't burnt, but it did hurt. The poor waitress was so upset, she gave me a whole lot of ice and serviettes to clean up, and then we got the chicken feet on the house, some egg tarts on the house (which were gorgeous), and some coconut jelly on the house. So it seems that the pain paid off.

Hoggard's just got Tapash out. One more wicket for victory. Poor old Bangladesh.

Soundtrack: "Two Shoes" by The Cat Empire

God, they're great.

Right, time for some Test Match Special.

Soundtrack: "The Cat Empire" by The Cat Empire

This band is pretty bloody immense. Check out their site here.

In the liner notes, it says: "Ryan Monro: Upright and downright bass." Groove on...

Soundtrack: "Jollification" by the Lightning Seeds

The handle

The handle is a special part of a teapot that makes it easier to hold and pout tea from. On most teapots, the handle lies on the same axis as the spout, that is the handle and spout are in line with each other. Some teapots have a side handle located at a right angle to the spout, while others feature an overhead hangle placed above the shoulder of the teapot. Here are some essential reference points for making a practical handle:

- Both ends of the handle should lie on the same axis.
- The dimensions of the handle, including the space inside it, should be meticulously arranged in proportion to those of the spout for a single teapot. This is to achieve a balance of form along the central axis of the teapot.
- A smooth, rounded handle designed with a thumb grip makes it easier and more comfortable to hold the teapot.
- An overhead handle should not be so high that the user has to bend his or her hang at a large angle to pour the tea.
- The space enclosed by the handle and the body should be adjusted in line with the size of the teapot. However, sufficient space should be allowed to avoid direct contact between the user’s hand and the body of the teapot when it is filled with hot tea.

The spout

The spout is a device that allows the tea to flow out smoothly from the teapot. It is generally located along the same axis as the handle of the teapot etc. Here are some essential points for making a well-functioning spout:

- The highest points of the spout and the handle should ideally lie in the same horizontal plane as the mouth of the teapot. If the spout is placed at a much higher level than the mouth, tea will leak from the lid when it is poured. On the other hand, if the spout is located at a much lower level, tea will gush out from the spout while the teapot is still being filled with water.
- Hints for making a drip-free spout:
-The length of the spout should be approximately one half the diameter of the body of the teapot.
-The tip of the spout should be roughly parallel to the base of the teapot.
-The tip of the spout can point slightly downward, as this is better for preventing the tea from dripping and dust from collecting.
-The wettability of the glazed surface of the spout should be low, that is the surface should not absorb any liquid, but let it flow smoothly.
- With a sharp-edged lip and a smooth interior, the spout will allow the tea to flow straight, swift and strong.
- The shape of the spout should gradually narrow to prevent tea gurgling down the tip.
- The small holes drilled at the base of the spout function like a strainer. Their total area should be larger than the outlet of the spout. An appropriate number of correctly dimensioned holes can effectively reduce tealeaves from either blocking the flow or rushing out through the spout.

The lid

Located on the top of the teapot, the lid helps to retain the heat inside the pot an keep dust out of the tea. There are three main types of lid:
1. The recessed lid, set into the mouth of the teapot.
2. The pressed lid, placed onto the mouth of a teapot. The diameter of the lid can be equal to or slightly larger than the rim of the mouth.
3. The truncated lid, forming an integral part of the teapot. The curved or straight lines of the lid should merge into the form of the body.

Here are some essential reference points for making a lid of a teapot:

- Whatever type of lid it is, the design should complement the form of the neck, shoulder and belly as well as the contours of the teapot to give a sense of unity.
- Some extra parts for the lid and mouth of the teapot help make them function better:
- A gallery – a recessed strip built along the mouth to support the lid.
- A flange – a strip that protrudes from the base of the lid to help keep it securely in the mouth of the teapot.
- The lid and the body of the teapot should be made at the same time and placed together when they are fired. Since they will then shrink and expand at the same rate, a lid that fits well into the mouth will thus be produced.
- The knob, located in the center of the lid, should be:
1. Convenient so that the user can place his or her fingers on it to prevent the lid from galling off when pouring the tea and also to prevent direct contact with the heated lid.
2. Made in an appropriate size to make it easy to hold the lid.
3. Drilled with a tiny hole in the center to allow ventilation inside the teapot, which helps produce a steady flow and makes it easy to pour the tea.


And not forgetting

The body

The body of the teapot is an essential part for holding and steeping the tealeaves. It is also the main part to which the other sections, such as the spout, the handle and the lid, are attached. Here are some essential reference points for making the body of a teapot:

- The mouth should not be too small, otherwise it will be difficult to clear the tealeaves after steeping.
- The body should be free from cracks to avoid leaks.
- The foot at the base of the body should rest in a horizontal plane on the table. A well-polished foot will protect the table from abrasion.
- The thickness of the clay body is closely associated with its ability to keep the tea warm for a long time. In general, a thin clay body facilitates heat dissipation while a thick clay one helps retain the heat.
- The body should not be too large or too heavy, otherwise it will be difficult to handle and may also results in the over-steeping of the team leaves by the excess infusion, which will then give the tea a bitter taste.

Next time, different teapots for different teas...

Soundtrack: "Parts of the Process" by Morcheeba

Good evening this evening.

I've been trying to get through to England tonight, but the cheapy phonecard network is jammed for overseas calls, which is a pain. As long as I get through before midday back home: I want to pinch-punch her over the phone, which she's done to me before. My mother was introduced to the game very late on in the game, so she has much catching up to do, and she gets really competitive. It will be the ultimate win if I get her from Australia.

I really didn't do much yesterday, apart from watch "Breakfast At Tiffany's" and make arrangements to go and see Episode III again with Antoinette. And I went into town and discovered a new Australian ska band whilst sitting in a cafe drinking a chili mocha (bloody amazing drink - really gives you a kick). I really need to go and look for their albums, because they sounded really good. There'll be an update if I manage to get hold of some of their stuff - I had time to go into one record store, who didn't have their first album (which apparently is better) before getting picked up to go home. Ah well.

Aunty Wendy is on a few days' holiday starting from today, so this morning I went to University of Adelaide with her, as she and her friend Margaret were giving a talk on the hippy cult. I thought I'd go along a) to win brownie points with Aunty Wendy and b) so that I didn't have to read the arsing great book she gave me. After sitting there for around fifteen minutes, though, I was bored out of my mind, and thoroughly unconvinced. The one important thing that I learnt was that I'm definitely not going to read the book now.

Afterwards, we drove down south to Victor Harbor, mysteriously spelt without the 'u.' The scenery was fantastic - more like the real Australia than Adelaide, which is very European. The earth was red, the grass was brown, the sky was low... All very moody and dramatic. We didn't actually spend any time in Victor Harbor itself - the place is a ghost town. Instead, we walked out to Granite Island, and had an amazing amazing lunch: oysters for entrees, then an octupus salad for my main course. I'm still full, and wonderfully contented thinking about it.

We drove back to town along the coast. Because of the cloud cover, it was all angry skies and purple water, and it looked fantastic.