Top Gear Australia

I like Top Gear, but I'm not supermaniacal about it. When I saw an article about the development of Top Gear Australia, I was sufficiently enamoured with the original series to look at the Aussie hosts and think, "Ha, they're nowhere near as interesting and humourous as Jeremy Clarkson, Richard Hammond and ... the other guy with the funny hair." However, having now seen some footage of the new hosts, I can grudgingly admit that the Aussie version might be as entertaining as the British version.

Photo and video link courtesy of http://news.sbs.com.au/worldnewsaustralia/

Accoutrements

My current arsenal of devices for lightweight packing whilst remaining entertained on a long-term trip:

1. Swiss universal adaptor (image courtesy of http://www.tjproducts.com)


So it doesn't matter where you go with your current electrical goods or where you buy any future electrical goods. Mine is red.

2. Motorola E1000 mbile phone with camera, mp3 player and headphones jack (Image courtesy of http://www.trustedreviews.com)


Entertainment, happy snaps and calls, all in one pocket sized device. It also happens to have a calculator, alarm clock, calendar with annual alerts (great for remembering birthdays and to pay the credit card bill each month), blue tooth and internet capabilities and memory can be augmented with an SD card which happens to be compatible with my laptop. The size and convenience can't be beat when you spend most of your day wandering around a city and its sights. Even if I very rarely use a mobile phone to make calls whilst travelling (international roaming charges are highway robbery in comparison to internet cafes and free email), it's always very reassuring to know that I have something in case of emergency. I love my phone. I've had it since 2005. If I were to upgrade, the only improvements I would be looking at would be mp4 capabilities and a higher resolution camera.

3. BenQ Joybook laptop with DVD burner, bluetooth, wifi, and a stack of music, movies and electronic books (Image courtesy of http://www.itechnews.net)


When you're chilling at the hostel or whoever's couch it is you're surfing, it's nice to have something a bit more substantial. Besides the movies or music, you can download and store your photos, write a cheesy travel blog (case in point right here), surf the internet if there's a network available or read a book. Although I despise reading novels on a screen and would rate the look and feel of a proper book over a laptop any day, there's no arguing with the fact that books are bulky and heavy, whereas a laptop is significantly less so. (The one concession I make about lugging books is my Lonely Planet -- it's worth it to have an easily accessible map of almost wherever I am, or at least a description of where the nearest tourist office [with maps] is.) It could be argued that the Kindle or any other electronic book reader is even lighter than a laptop, but I prefer the versatility of a laptop. Opt for a small and light version that's not too expensive. The latter is important, because it affords a little peace of mind, knowing that travel can be tough on electronic devices in terms of jostling/dropping/theft. You might have to sacrifice processing speed, but then again, you're on holiday! You can afford to wait 5 seconds more whilst Windows is loading up.

So there you have it. Everything I find entertaining in my normal life, reduced to 2 electronic devices and a power charger. I have allowed myself the luxury of bringing a drawing tablet with me, which I haven't used as much I could have, especially since coming to France (what is it about looking after kids that makes you want to sit and stare at a wall when you've got some free time?) but it's nice to know that if I feel artistic that it's there. If I were to expand, the next thing I would go for would be a portable hard drive, but for now I'm content with carrying around a few DVDs and periodically erasing useless stuff (movies I've seen, books I've read, pics that are just ugly) from my laptop.

Big nothing

Image courtesy of http://www.city.kobe.jp

It was to have been some tranquil two or three days in the port city of Marseille...


But with cloudy skies, wind and rain lurking everywhere along the southern coast of France all this week, my little trip was abandoned. Here's what the forecast says at the moment:


By the way, I really like the site that provided this info www.accuweather.com -- even if a week ago, when I first started planning this trip, they were predicting unblemished sunny days. I suspect that part of my ire should really be directed at myself for being so soft as to cancel a trip on account of a bit of bad weather. I suppose that's what comes of being too comfortable in one place, accustomed to such luxuries as umbrellas and dry socks!!

To comfort myself over my abortive trip and being such a wimp I've spent most of the week reading sci fi detective novels: Isaac Asimov and his Robots series save the day(s)!

Cannes Film Festival!

The film festival (it transforms the entire town into a movie foyer). The crowds (all sporting the official festival tote bag, even if they aren’t officially part of the festival). The stars (pretending that they’re utterly normal people, as they walk down the street being followed by adoring fans and hungry paparazzi). The schmoozing (done by earnest film folk who are sufficiently low down on the film food chain that they still have to wear their festival passes and go to screenings).



Even though I’m utterly crap at star spotting, I still managed to get a glimpse of Christian Slater (he was behind me whilst I was retying my ponytail and I didn’t even notice, until the paparazzi swarmed around me – very surreal) and Scott Speedman (coming out of his hotel, he looked vaguely familiar and I spent the rest of the day wondering what his name was and what film he was in). Despite copping an eyeful of both men, I was too slow to get any photos. There was also a girl in a stunning purple gown striding down the street, entourage in tow, but I have to admit I was more interested in the gown than the face, and by the time I got around to realising someone important might have been in the gown, she was long gone. Oh well!

While I was in Cannes, I visited Ile St Marguerite too. Tranquil, foresty, with lots of well laid out walking paths – a welcome respite from the festival if ever one was needed … and after a few hours in Cannes, I definitely needed it!





Found on a beach at Cannes. Pretty cool sand scuplture, eh?

Lisbon

Met up with my mum in Lisbon over the weekend, staying in a place far swankier than my normal hostel digs -- oh the luxury, oh the waste! But it was great to catch up with her and do some sightseeing with her. Here she is trying to work out how to do something on her camera in the Mosteiro dos Jeronimos:





There's a really nice walk you can do from Alacazar to Belém, which takes about a half hour to 45 minutes. The idea is to start off by the docks, where there is a lovely little strip of cafes and restaurants facing the river, have a big lunch and then enjoy the view as you amble between the river and the park. Even though it was quite windy with a bit of rain, there were still a fair amount of people making the most of the intermittent sunshit, including these pretty laid-back fishermen that I saw along the way:



And at the end of the walk, you can rest a while in calm and tranquil centre courtyard of the monastery. The sound of the water trickling from the fountain, the beautifully carved stone walls and the cool marble seats all make for a soothing respite.



However, the thing that interests me most in Belém is the Pasteleria, where you can go nuts on seriously the best custard tarts ever -- creamy, sweet custard that's been baked to a caremlised perfection inside a case of flaky, feather-light pastry!! The place looks tiny from the outside and there's almost always a line of people waiting outside, which is why these guys need to make such big trays of tarts!

V-Day/8 May

Armistice Day, V-Day, whatever you want to call it -- it's a national holiday in France and at around 11am the people of Lorgues gathered in front of the mayoral offices to march down the main street to the town square to hold a ceremony in front of the war memorial, in honour of the unconditional German surrender during WWII and the end of combat in Europe. There were speeches, wreath laying, a brass band, a children's choir, the normal kind of memorial stuff -- though it wasn't nearly so longwinded as some of the ceremonies I've endured in Australia. We don't celebrate the end of WWII, just Remembrance Day and ANZAC Day... I wonder why?

Here's a generic May 8 ceremony photo from http://www.safie.hq.af.mil/photos/ -- it's more or less pretty similar to how things looked this morning only with fewer dignitaries and a smaller war memorial statue.



And here's my explanation to Baptiste of what the ceremony was for, though I doubt he fully understood me. To get the full effect, imagine a tiny blonde boy talking gibberish to himself and walking down the street in the slightly unco-ordinated manner of all toddlers, whilst holding the hand of his also quite tiny nanny, who, using a singsong children's voice, is saying the following:

"Sometimes when lots of people in one country can't resovle their differences with lots of people in another country, they go to war, which is a very big fight. Lots of people die, which isn't really fair because the people dying aren't the ones who decided to go to war in the first place, and the people who make the decisions stay where it's safe. After the fighting has finished, we have ceremonies like this one to help us remind us how brave the soldiers were and how bad war is. This doesn't really help the poor soldiers who died or were injured but it makes us all feel a bit less guilty about sending them off to their deaths. And hopefully it also reminds us to try harder next time to solve our problems without fighting. The End."

Obviously, I should go into children's publishing.

Reversion

Image courtesy of http://www.gosupercool.com/

I find recently I've recently reverted to a childhood habit of beginning a book and reading all day and most of the night until it's finished. Not particularly good for the old circadian rhythms. It helps that I'm rereading Isaac Asimov, one of the science fiction greats. This is the third time I've read his Foundation series and it still pulls me in, even if I know what the ending is.



The Foundation series is more or less about a bunch of scientists sent to the edge of the galaxy during and after the decline and fall of the Galactic Empire. When the worlds around them crumble with the Empire into barbarism, the lone world of scientists, with their superior technology, has the upper hand over the surrounding worlds and become the chosen ones for developing a new Galactic Empire over the next millenium. It's every geek's dream really, isn't it!

The first couple of times I read the series I was in my early and late teens. Being older and more aware of history and current affairs in general this time around, what's really interesting to me is how much the writing typifies the ideologies of its era, especially the references to religion, capitalism and economic sanctions as a means of control.

Where are they now?

It's a game that I like to play, particularly now that I'm on the opposite side of the world to most of the people I know. I pick someone and just ask myself: Where are they now? What are they doing? What are they thinking? How are they feeling? And so on. I often find myself doing this just after lunch, when I'm full of yummy food and content to sit and cogitate whilst digesting.

Problem is, at that time of day in France, most people I know in Perth are in the process of coming home from work. So my answers go something along the lines of: In a bus; On the way home; Wondering what the hold up is on the freeway today; Annoyed at problably missing the first 15 minutes of whatever TV show is currently in vogue because of traffic. But it's worse in winter time, because the time difference is even greater, and my answers are invariably: Bed; Sleeping/dreaming; Unfathomable; Unconscious, if they're lucky and not insomniacidal.

Yeah. I should probably try to pick more exciting times of the Perthian day during which to play this game...