CUTE!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A3oIiH7BLmg

Ella on Wednesday

Latest work of Art meets Commerce

September 19 is International Talk like a Pirate Day, so in anticipation I have been doing some research:

My pirate name is:

Mad Tom Rackham

Every pirate is a little bit crazy. You, though, are more than just a little bit. You have the good fortune of having a good name, since Rackham (pronounced RACKem, not rack-ham) is one of the coolest sounding surnames for a pirate. Arr!

Get your own pirate name from piratequiz.com.
part of the fidius.org network

However, in order to post this entry I had to reset the account password. If someone can remember the old password and email me denuto1atfastmaildotfm I will reset i back to the original. (If anyone still reads it!)

Japan

Ella, Alesh (aka Seikan) and I went for a fantastic trip to Japan. We flew the glorious jetstar to gold coast then Tokyo. We spent three nights in Tokyo. I went to Dentsu, the biggest advertising agency in the world (5000 employees)and had a very convoluted translated meeting where they asked me how the heck to get kids to do as you wish on a shoot."Hire me" was my reply.Things are quiet over there too.The economic melt down is creeping up on them all , even Dentsu.
We caught the train across the country to Nosawa Onsen.On my birthday we skied on 10km runs, it was beautiful and strange, highly recommended!. As predicted by, 11am Ella was crying"I wish we'd never come to this place" and by 3pm it was "more more more, again, another one! ".
She was very brave.
The natural spring waters in the onsen were 42 degrees, glory after a day in the snow.

More long train journeys to Osaka where we spent four days walking the streets. We did nothing touristic, just wandered around the streets.During the day it was about 9 degrees, perfect weather for travelling.

It was interesting as we were staying in the part of town where many people live on the street. In the mornings they put out bits and pieces to sell.
On our last day we went to an enormous flea market in Kyoto with an abundance of treasures.We managed to spend every last yen before heading back to Osaka, to the airport and home.
Ella wrote in her book every day, took photos, spoke and wrote some japanese, glared at those who stared and was generally a courageous and adaptable traveller.

More pics to follow

chip

party pics

If anyone has pictures from the weekend in August could you please email them to me. I didin't have a camera that weekend and I am trying to put an album together, muchos gracias.Gobx

A night of Wonder!

Just to let you know...

STEVIE WONDER WAS UNREAL.

Mum & I saw Stevie last weekend. Bit of a slow start (> 30 mins late starting) but he undoubtedly compensated for it with a fantastic set. Lots of fun, he got the crowd chanting bits and pieces a lot. As soon as we were immersed in whatever round he had started, he would launch(with gusto) into some absolute classic and everyone went bezerk. I can't remember the set list, but he covered a lot of ground with all the classics(superstition, higher ground, master blaster, living for the city, sir duke, isn't she lovely, you get the idea) a cover of Marvin Gaye and another artist I didn't know. Chopping and changing was no problem, even when he stopped midway in a song, the energy in the crowd simply propelled the tune along.

I don't think the acoustics of the Brisbane entertainment centre did him justice, but it was still an unbelievable experience! I didn't quite realise the superhuman extent of his vocal ability before the concert either! He readily jumped from one tune to the next, spontaneously added little rhythms here and there and generally surprised the crowd. I don't know if he expended more energy on the songs, or on keeping control of himself. Otherwise I'm sure the phrase "out of his skin" was written specifically about the guy.




Check out the video so you know what you missed out on!

Thanks Nicola!

Ps: You've converted mum.








(Of course dodgy little videos are nothing exiting but it's nice proof that it wasn't just a dream...)