It Must've Been the Terrorists

Today, London was brought to an almost complete standstill. What caused this catastrophic catastrophe? Some sort of terrorist organisation such Al Qaeda, the Taliban or Scientology?

Unfortunately, no.

It was this:



So we went to the park during lunch and did this:

Separation of Concerns

I've decided to create a second blog to keep my non-travel related posts in. Don't know (and don't really care, to be honest) whether anyone who reads this actually cares about my thoughts on politics, music or other such nonsense, but from now on you can read about them at poppiestar.blogspot.com.

Back to the regularly scheduled travel commentaries... of which, at the moment, there are none.

I've Changed My Mind

You know what? Yesterday I said I wouldn't start on that Simpsons cartoon thing. Forget it, I'm going to mention it anyway because someone far more eloquent, intelligent and with a lot more personal experience in these matters has commented on it.

You can read his entire blog post about it, but if you don't have the patience (or you're sick enough in the fucking head to actually agree with this idiotic judgment), I'll quote my favourite part:

"The ability to distinguish between fiction and reality is, I think, an important indicator of sanity, perhaps the most important. And it looks like the Australian legal system has failed on that score." - Neil Gaiman

This judgment needs to be struck down. It needs wiping out. It needs eradicating and the fools who upheld it need to be thrown away and disposed of. These people are beyond being out of touch with reality, they appear to be living in some dangerous and crazy fantasy land - and these are the people responsible for our laws!?!

Once again, I'm red-faced with embarrassment for the stupidity that keeps coming from my home. I want it to stop, desperately.

Please. Please. Please. Australia. Stop being so fucking stupid. PLEASE!!

Dear Australian Government

Hi guys.

I know I'm an ex-pat and all, but I still consider myself an Aussie down to the core. Just ask all my friends over here, they won't stop giving me shit about it for a minute - but don't worry, in time honored tradition I do everything in my power to give it back to them.

Here's a tip: if they ever mention the rugby or the Olympic scores, just sit back and say two words. Five. Nil. Then giggle as the excuses start to flow about how the cricket doesn't really matter.

I was really glad to see John go last year. To be fair, he was a bit of a cock and, quite often, he made me feel terribly embarrassed to be Australian. I was in Berlin the night I heard he was voted out and, to celebrate, myself and a bunch of other likeminded Aussies hit the city to celebrate.

We had a great time, by the way.

It wasn't just the news that the sickening old coot had gone, it was also the promise that future news emanating from my country might not cause me to hang my head and cringe - and often apologise for the sickening display of racism, bigotry or other glossed over hate speech that has plagued us over the past couple of decades.

You know how America is currently glowing over its recent election results? I kinda had the same feeling.

The thing is, lately I've been hearing some pretty disturbing stories coming from back home and, to tell you the truth, I'm not sure much has really changed.

Now, I work in the IT industry so I may have a bit of a vested interest, but... c'mon, just give up on the filtering thing. Censorship in any form doesn't work: it hasn't worked in the past, it won't work in the future - stop chasing after the god squad senators you need to pander to in order to pass legislation. Besides, isn't blackmail a criminal offence?

Don't you remember those days when, thanks to the inane, clueless and entirely out of touch actions of Richard Alston, Australia was declared the Global Village Idiot? Isn't it enough to be finally rid of this fool who, as Technology Minister, so breathtakingly misunderstood the Internet that he merely brushed it aside as a breeding ground for terrorists and paedophiles? Remember, this was our Minister for Communications and Information Technology.

And you want to go and do it all again?!?

I thought those days were behind me, but I once again had to hang my head in embarrassment when I heard about this. Oh, don't worry, the UK has had its own little brush with nonsensical censorship in the past couple of days, but that's a drop in the ocean compared to what you're trying to do.

Right now, I'm feeling pretty happy I'm not donating my tax dollars toward your latest waste of government funds and, if things keep going this way, I might just have to stick around over here until you finally come to your senses. Here's hoping the rest of the country will have something to say about it, too (but I'm not holding my breath).

Oh, and don't get me started on the news I heard today about that Simpsons drawing.

Are you deliberately trying to make us look like a bunch of backward hicks in the eyes of the world? Seriously? I mean, you were doing a pretty damn fine job of it while John was in power, but from everything I've heard so far nothing has actually changed a bit. If anything, it's getting worse!

Please. Please. Please. Dear Australian Government. Stop being so fucking stupid. Please.

Yours sincerely,
A concerned citizen

Everything Hurts - But I Wouldn't Change A Thing

Last night was the best gig I've seen all year. For the first time in almost 15 years, the original lineup of Ned's Atomic Dustbin reformed and played for 90 amazing minutes - and I was there, front and centre as another screaming voice in the 1600-strong pogoing army.

It was a bit weird at first, to be honest. Since they reformed in 2000, two of the original members declined to take part so a new guitarist and bass player were recruited. This was the lineup I saw twice last year, so seeing two different guys up on stage this time almost felt wrong. This didn't last long: within moments of the first notes you could see the special bond these five guys had all those years ago and were reliving again, making the entire night all that more special.

Even better, I got to see vile evils again before and, once again, they refused to disappoint. More focused, tighter and with a far, far better sound (and a more active crowed helped), this is easily the best I've seen these guys play. Next year they're releasing their debut album and embarking on their own UK tour, so I'm eager to catch a full length show.

As wonderful as the gig was, it was made even better by the multitude of friends I was able to catch up with there. When I arrived here just over a year and a half ago I left behind my family, my friends, my cat - an entire life I'd built up over 30 years. Thankfully, I still had some friends over here to help me get on my feet, but it was still an uphill struggle to find where I fit in this new life.

Basically, what I'm trying to say is thank you to everyone I've met since I arrived and have welcomed me into their lives so generously - I appreciate it more than I can possibly articulate!

What Do You Do?

I have good and bad news.

The bad news is my pants (or trousers, as the natives insist I call them) no longer fit me.

The good news is that the reason they no longer fit me is because I've lost around 5kgs in the last month and a half - and that included my trip to Italy!

Part of it is from improving my nutrition, I've been pretty good lately about saying no to bad things, but the biggest change has come from the regular visits to the gym. Five times a week, in fact! Most of that time has just been undirected cardio work, but last week I was introduced to interval training which, I'm assured, will make a massive difference in a far shorter time. We'll see...

That's not all I've been doing, of course. Since arriving back a couple of weeks ago I've been to Birmingham for a fantastic night of music, courtesy of vile evils, EMF and Carter USM - followed by another night of EMF and Carter USM in Brixton the next night. This coming weekend is the final gig of the year, this time featuring a fully reunited Ned's Atomic Dustbin and vile evils again.

I also went to see Avenue Q with Lee, Margaret, Ben and a handful of other people. If you can imagine Sesame Street grown up, you can picture what it was like - and I enjoyed it immensely. Although the sex scene between the puppets was funny as hell, it wasn't quite a shock after seeing something similar in Team America. The songs were hilarious and quite catchy, the best one probably being 'The Internet Is For Porn', which I've added below:



Beyond that, life has gone back to normal. Not for long, though - David and I have decided we're going to find a new place to live. I'm a little tired of being stuck in a tiny single bedroom, where you can't even let a pin drop lest the woman who lives downstairs comes banging on the door to yell at us to keep the noise down. This makes it especially difficult when I want to play my guitars.

Until then, it's back to work...

Rome in Record Time

Rushing out the door as quickly as possible, I stopped by the train station to store my bags before jumping on the Metro again for the Colosseum. Despite having arrived early, I was advised not to go straight in and instead head to the Forum first. With barely a soul in sight, I was able to walk right in and, better yet, buying a ticket here allowed me to walk right into the Colosseum afterward.

Having thought about it for a while, it seems almost daft to try to explain what these places are like to visit. They're experiences, and I'm afraid I'm not a capable enough communicator to be able to adequately express what it was like to walk through these ancient areas. I'll see what I can do.

Part of it is humbling, realising that what used to be just plain life for the people who used to live here has now become a historic attraction for myself and the many others. It's easy to let your imagination take you away and see how life might have been back then, but then again I never took ancient history in high school so my frame of reference tends to be movies - which are always horrendously historically inaccurate.

Having seen the Colosseum the night before, it wasn't as big a moment to walk out and have it there in front of me. Not to distill its impressiveness, but it looked very cool with the lights on it. As I only had a short amount of time before having to leave to get my flight, I opted for a guided tour which showed off the highlights as well as giving a very interesting history lesson.

Although I still felt as though I could have twice as long at both places I'd been, my watch reminded me I had a plane to catch and I reluctantly made my way back to the train station. I'm pleased to say there were no incidents on the way to my flight, arriving in plenty of time to check in and, with no delays, touching down in London at 6.15pm.

Looking back, I regret trying to cram too much into such a short amount of time. I made this mistake in Japan, but at the time I didn't really know better – this time, I realised it would've been too much but did it anyway! Despite this, I thoroughly enjoyed the entire trip (well, except for the train strike – but what can you do?) and feel as though I've been given a good taste of Italy. Next time, I won't make the same mistakes!