Joram was in Australia

Groundhogs can climb trees

2009-05-24T10:34:00.005+10:00

Today as I was cleaning up my dad's office, bringing stuff to our house, I spotted a groundhog in the parking lot close to the car. So, I did the sensible thing and chased it away... as I was gaining on the fat little rodent, it scampered up a tree! I was so surprised because I had no idea they can do this. So I thought it was funny and took a picture.

So after this I decide to go back in and pack some more stuff. About 15-20 minutes pass, and out of curiousity, I went back to the tree. Sure enough, it's still there, scared out of its wits! So I proceeded to throw pine cones at it to make it feel more scared, and took some more pictures.
All in all it was a very productive day and I've very proud of myself. Yet, I still don't have a job or any prospects. Yay me.

later

_Joram

Back to the life I wanted

2009-03-06T05:26:00.002+11:00

Well as you can probably tell I am back to Canada now. My last week in Australia was fun though, and I will forever cherish it. I met my cousin Sam and his wife & kids, and he let me stay in his apartment for a few days. But unlike the visit at Dave's place, I actually went out. In fact, I rented a car, and drove on the wrong side of the road! It was a pretty freaky experience, and I rented a GPS unit as well, which ended up being a real blessing.

I met a nice lady on the plane to Sunshine Coast airport, and she shared some of her life with me and I did mine. Usually people sitting next to me don't talk to me, but this was one of those odd times when it did happen. The 1-and-a-bit hour flight seemed much shorter. She seemed to know everything that was happening, from the wings to the undercarriage and the wheels. Of course she ordered a lot of drinks as well, and got really happy towards the end. She gave me one of her friends' phone numbers, which I never ended up calling. Oh well. I guess I'm not that adventurous.

I immediately recognized my cousin, although he didn't me. He said he thought I was a bit taller! So it was sort of funny. The car rental was a nice Toyota sedan, but I can't remember the make anymore. I tried to follow him in the dark but I was still getting used to driving on the left side. Good thing for the GPS! We had programmed his house in before I left, so it was all good. He passed me on the highway and I knew all was well. Driving in the passenger seat was so odd to me, I will probably never get over it. I met his wife and she was lovely. I think I even got some leftover dinner, some nice spaghetti and meatballs. And so I slept on the extended sofa. It was sort of humid out and I couldn't really fall asleep. In the middle of the night his young daughter walked out of her room and said hi to me, although I pretended to be sleeping.

The next day I went to Rainbow Beach. I had booked a Fraser Island tour for that day, and left 3 hours in advance to make sure I got there in time. The roads were so well paved it was a dream to drive on them. Even the expressways here only go up to 2 lanes, because 3 aren't necessary. Guess the population isn't that big yet to warrant that. I got to the place about 1 hour early, but I was still happy I left early. I parked my car and waited for the tourbus, and it came at exactly 7:40am. It turns out there were only 10 guests that day in a 40-seater bus, so we sat up front. I didn't really talk to anyone there, but it was a nice mix of people. Australians, 1 Danish guy, 2 Irish people, and 1 from New Zealand. Good times! The tour guide was a nice chap named Mark, and the company was Fraser Island Explorer Tours. It was great fun and it would take too long to talk about all of it here, but it was just awesome and I recommend it to everyone. The day was cloudy and overcast and it was still great. The island itself is a national park and it's protected, so no actual roads are on it. Instead, you can only drive there on 4WD buses/trucks. Our tourbus was awesome though, we passed all the amateur drivers doing self tours easily. The highlights were a walk through a small rainforest, sand dunes, freshwater streams, Lake MacKenzie, a shipwreck, and a blowfish washed up on shore, believe it or not. We also saw some wild dingoes!

That evening I got back and actually got to meet my cousin's kids. Typical kids, playing and having fun. He actually made a new house though and next time I come visit I'll probably go there. The next day I went to Australia Zoo, and that was cool. Steve Irwin's presence is still strong there. Lots of memorials set up for him. Almost made me choke up. The park is really heavy on the crocodiles, which take up a large portion of it. But they are expanding to more things now, they even had a tiger which you could see up close and some elephants that I got to feed.

The last day there, I just drove around randomly. I went to a small aquarium, but it was nothing special really. I also went to a cool lookout point on something called 'wild horse mountain' or similar. Very neat-o. I also had some Mackers with my cousin and we said our goodbyes after he showed me around his work place. He is a surveyor and a civil engineer, works on bridges a lot.

So then I flew back to Sydney, and the next day I finally went up the tower there. It's not as high as CN Tower, of course, but it's not too bad. Nice 360° views. I was feeling sad because I had to leave this warm weather behind. I knew that coming up next would be some snow and cold times!

On Saturday, February 7th, I left back to Canada. This was a mostly uneventful trip. The 15-hour flight to San Francisco was much shorter because I had my PSP, DS, and some movies to watch. I sadly only caught a small glimps of the Golden Gate Bridge because the airport is a fair distance from that portion of the city. The US Customs guy gave me a bit of a hassle, because these days you have to do an electronic registration over the internet if you want to travel through the states! Lame as! So he said this was still a grace period, and to tell my friends to sign up if they intend to travel through the U.S. Cool. My next two flights, from San Fran to Washington, and from Washington to Buffalo, didn't really matter as much. I was back in North America! The coolest part was landing in Buffalo, and my former roommates were all waiting for me, with a picture of Little Joramee. Very cute. So we caught up with each other, had some Wendy's (which they don't have in Aussie), and stopped at the duty free. No border problems either, good thing I had recieved my travel papers at the Canadian Embassy in Sydney! We got home at around 3AM, I even drove the last bit myself cause all my friends were way too tired.

So it's been a month now, and I'm reflecting on things. I have been half-heartedly applying for jobs here and there, but so far no real interest. Got a lot of rejections, but mostly there's just no reply. No interviews. But I am enjoying downloading non-stop again, and playing all the games I missed out on. It makes the time go by very quickly. I like watching Lost again and Battlestar Galactica, both of which are excellent shows and I recommend to everyone (not just sci-fi geeks like me).

So is this the life I wanted? Living with my parents for free while freeloading off them while I pretend to look for work? I don't know how long it can last, to be honest. I may have to find a job in retail or something else that isn't related to engineering. Who knows. One more month maybe is all I can take of this, then I will have to get desperate.

Anyway, thanks again to those people that read this thing. I know I tend to ramble on a lot and don't show a lot of photos. But I did on Facebook, so look there if you want to see some. It's not and evil place, as a lot of you think it is. Through facebook I have reconnected to so many people I thought I had lost forever. And I used it to communicate with my cousins as well. So I can't hate on it. Give it a try!

Later!!

_Joramee

Strange Dreams...

2009-01-27T12:44:00.001+11:00

Ok so I'm not ready yet to stop blogging in Australia... I just needed to write these dreams down before I forget them.

The first dream happened when I was Esther and Mark's house. I couldn't sleep because I had a bad stomach ache (which I had on and off the whole 2 weeks I was in Adelaide). I was tossing and turning in the bed and finally found a position to sleep in. But then the dream occured. Basically these tentacle-like metalic arms started to spring forth from beneath the bed. There were maybe ten to fifteen arms, all different lengths, sort of robotic arms. Instead of arms at the end, they had saucers with coffee in them. All of them were slowly whirling and extending and retracting around me, offering me the coffee. But I had had so much coffee in Adelaide that I was sick of it. I screamed and flailed pushing the arms and cups away from me, and so the cups and saucers smashed as they hit the floor. But the arms kept persisting, producing forth new coffee with new saucers and cups. "NO MORE NO MORE" I yelled, and then I woke up.

The second dream I had a few days ago. This one was a bit gruesome. It is twilight. I am out in a farmer's field, playing my PSP. The farmer's son keeps being distracted from this work to come watch me play. It is nearing the end of the workday so he instists he wants to watch me, but his father keeps pulling him back. They are working on skinning a cow. The odd thing is though that it is still alive. It has no head, and the legs are shopped off. So it looks like a big hunk of meat, but it is still alive because it is breathing. The meat on the bones heaves up and down and a weird sound is coming from the skinned animal. Suddenly it runs towards me. They are about 200 meters away but this hunk of meat is running at me. So the farmer and his son shoot it full of arrows right before it gets to me. The bloodied pulp has stopped advancing but it it's still breathing somehow. I beat it to submission with a large club until it stops moving entirely, all the while it's making these awful noises, like a strange mooing sound. I awoke from this dream at this point at about 3am.

The last dream I had was last night. I am back in Waterloo near my dad's work. It's sort of rainy and foggy out. I am circling around outside Conestoga Mall, near King Street. I have two large wagon wheels from an old Conestoga Wagon slung around one shoulder. The other shoulder I have nothing on. No idea why I'm not spreading the weight out, but I digress. People make fun of me for this strange, random task I am performing. I am also crossing the street from one end to the other and cars pass by me and honk their horns. On one of these rounds I pass a man that looks vaguelly familiar. He speaks Czech to me, so he must know that I can understand the language a bit. Perhaps he is an associate of my father's. He tells me that he'll see me soon and that him and my father are going to have steak at the restaurant in the mall. This is all I can remember from this dream, but I'm pretty sure I didn't know the man at all.

So that's basically all I have to write this time. I am slowly starting to come to grips with the fact I am only at this job for 3 more days. I am starting to think of places to go at the Sunshine Coast. Perhaps Frasier Island.

So it keep it REALS ya'lls, and maybe lay down some interpretations or suggestions.

Ciao

_J

Jobless, carless, homeless, loveless, careless, brainless, christless...

2009-01-22T12:32:00.002+11:00

Well it's over. Last night I got the call that they wouldn't be needing me here anymore. It's kind of fitting though because I was getting frustrated here. The warm weather and beaches and so on is nice and all, but it means nothing to me if I can't come home to something good. Of course the argument can be made that I should just be outside all the time and only come home to eat and sleep. But I'm just not that sort of person.

Next week will be my last week here, and it's a shortened week as well, since it's Australia Day on Monday. I am also going to start doing some touristy things now, starting off with a Harbour Bridge Climb on Saturday. I might go visit some people too but not sure anymore if I want to travel too far anymore. I've had it up to here with it. I just need my movies and videogames and mass-downloading back. 4 months without them is just too long. Deja-vu is setting in now too because this is how I was feeling in my last week in Germany 5+ years ago. Basically what I'm saying is that I'm a computer geek for life, and going to another country isn't going to change anything about me.

Other than that I don't have much else to say. They actually gave me a lot of work to do now but what's the point, right at the end? What's funny is they did this to me in Germany as well, giving me heaps of work in my last 2 weeks there. Funny how the situation just mirrors itself so well. Also, having to take public transport. Even though my car is finished I will get a new one soon and be on my feet (or wheels) before you know it.

The only thing I'm dreading is the knee-high snow and the -20° weather. That will not be fun. Hopefully my friends picking me up at the airport will bring me some proper winter clothing or else it will be quite interesting.

This may be my last post from Australia because I don't have much access to the internet outside of work. But anyway thanks to those that listened and responded and I suppose I'll see you all again soon.

Cheers

_Joram

soldergast

2009-01-14T12:18:00.000+11:00

we always had work
but the hours were long
and the pay was low
looking back we had it good
Oh to be in that wonderful
place again where life had
M E A N I N G and everything
had its place

Home and without a computer

2009-01-08T08:45:00.002+11:00

Ach du lieber! That's pretty much how I can sum everything up right now. December 30th I went up to Mt. Barker in the Adelaide hills region. My cousin Esther lives there with her husband Mark. This was the first time I met her since she was a child. Now they have a child of their own that is about the age that I last saw her at... between 1 and 2 years old. She is a pretty exploratory child, and babbles to herself a lot. She will go up to random people and just want to meet them. Pretty funny to see.

I finally got to go to a wildlife park after all this time in Australia, the next day. I was pretty amazed to be so up close to koalas and kangaroos, and I finally got to see wombats. It was a much more intimate experience than the Sydney Wildlife World. I actually got to touch the koala and get my picture taken. Esther had a camera with her and they burned me a CD after I left, so I have at least that.

The next day was New Years and I went to the church there the first time. It wasn't so bad, it reminded me of the church I grew up in in Kitchener. Very similar conservative sort of church. The only difference is that there are a lot more young people and children here, instead of just senior citizens. After that we went to a barbecue at Ruth (cousin) & Albert's house. They have 5 kids, and then my cousin Miriam lives close by and she has 3 kids. So a lot of kids all over the place again like last month, only in a different house. We had some schnitzel and good times. My uncle also had a heart to heart talk with me and he told me about his testimony, how he was saved, and also about the dangers of the Internet. He also told me to stop being addicted to the computer. I wonder who told him about that.

The next day we went to Port Adelaide for a dolphin adventure cruise. It only cost $4 so I had a feeling there were no guaranteed sightings. And there weren't... except at the very end when we came back to port we saw a baby dolphin going out to see. Oh well.

All this time though ever since I came to Mt. Barker, I realized my computer had broken down. The LCD screen just didn't come up, and it rebooted itself after a while. Now I've been in touch with HP support via email but it's such a slow process I want to just call them instead. I'm not even sure this thing is covered under warranty anymore, since it was purchased in April 2007.

Also, when I got home on Saturday, my landlord was renovating my room. So I had to move out to another suburb until he finishes it up, which will be about mid-February. The new place is actually not so bad, but the shopping centre was burned down by hooligans in August so it is currently undergoing renovations. So I have to find other places with supermarkets. There is one 20 minutes down the road though, but I'm not sure I want to walk so far with heavy bags.

And when I got back to work naturally there was no work for me to do. So I'm just busying myself with made-up tasks. I did manage to get a bit of work to do but it's not looking so great. What was once a promise of 'heaps of work to do' is now looking like nothing at all! So I should either find new work or get out of Australia back into the cold winters of Canada. We'll see.

Anyway, that's my story so far. Hope you enjoy.

Later

_J

Adelaide again

2008-12-30T15:18:00.000+11:00

Well I'm here again and I'm so damn bored. Dave and Jodie are nice enough people, there just isn't enough for a bloke like me to do around here! One of Dave's friends is offering to take me out one night to a club but that isn't just my scene at all. I will try to avoid it. I have mostly been sitting at home while Dave's at work, surfing the internet. Unfortunately I sucked all his bandwidth dry by downloading an hd version of Tropic Thunder. The movie's not so great and I fell asleep while watching it, so it wasn't really worth the download. Argh! Shoulda done my research a bit before I got it. Hopefully Dave won't be upset that he can only download at 64kbps now. Good thing it's near the end of the month now, and he should be up to his 1.2Mbps in January.

I am trying not to take advantage of the situation and just freeload here, but I keep getting offered candy and coffee and all sorts of snacks so who am I to refuse it? And when we go out Dave always pays for me, so I say hey why not. Today though i'm going to my other cousin's. My aunt & uncle will pick me up around 7pm tonight and then I will stay there for the remaining time. It shouldn't be too bad. They're nice people I'm told. It will be nice to have a change of environment. This hills of Adelaide are pretty nice, they remind me of the hills in Germany a bit. Twisty roads galore!

Christmas was ok here as well. The kids got a trambopoline and inspired me to download the trampoline episode of Simpsons. Back when it was a good show. His son got a Simpsons game too, and we played it and I knew none of the answers to the trivia questions because they were being pulled from mostly newer episodes. I haven't really been following Simpsons for the 20th century at all. When will someone finally pull the plug on it??? Seriously!

I was almost tempted to buy some $100 headphones. The current ones I have are pretty tinny and i want to hear the bass when I'm listening to my chunes. It's just the only way! My sister may be coming here soon, as she is running out of money in Sydney. It's too bad we weren't together here at once.

On Sunday we went to the River Murray about an hour from Adelaide. There I tried some kneeboarding and it was epic fail!! I fell so many times and I've been sore the past two days after. This is the river where Adelaide gets all its drinking water from. The whole road leading up to it has a big pipeline going along it. We had to get to the other side of the river and there is a free ferry that does that for you. Apparently it's cheaper for them to do that than to build a bridge.

Anyway that's my boring life so far. I spent the entire day importing my 2003 and 2007 blogs into blogspot. It was heaps fun! I just want to have a centralized place where I can find everything. I just hope I don't have another EMO moment and erase it all again, because I don't have anymore backups and I enjoy reading through old posts sometimes to see home much I have or haven't learned over the years.

Well that's it.

_Joram

Australia isn't for me

2008-12-17T13:47:00.000+11:00

I know I've established this in previous blog posts, but this place just isn't for me. Namely, because I am a mass-downloader and a videogamer. Australia just doesn't cater to these demographics. Games are outrageously expensive and so is bandwidth. I read a great article on the bandwidth issue:

http://forums.mactalk.com.au/20/32769-reason-australia-lacks-unlimited-internet-plans.html

Very interesting read if you have 10-15 minutes to spare. Basically the long and short of it is that I'm screwed if I want to find some place with unlimited downloading. I will basically just have to pay for bandwidth from now on, there is no way around it. So I will either have to curb my habits or start buying things legit if I want to stay in this country. Sad thing is that other countries may follow suit sooner or later. Imagine paying for bandwidth like paying for gas or hydro... a travesty!

So don't worry all those who care: I will be back. Of course, my beloved eggplant probably won't be there to meet me, but I had a feeling I would be seeing her for the last time. May she rest in pieces.

Just trying to count down the days until I go to Adelaide again. 'Twill be soon. I have to eat all the perishables in my fridge before I go, that will be a laugh and a half.

_St. Joram

All alone

2008-12-15T22:48:00.000+11:00

I was thinking today... why am I so alone. Why do I not to invite anyone into my life, yet I blog so open and free inviting complete strangers (sometimes) into my life. The people I should let into my life I keep away, and the ones that should have no business with my life I let in. It makes absolutely no sense. That is why I have come to the conclusion that I am an anomaly. I am enjoying watching the show "Big Bang Theory". It somehow hits close to home.

The stores in Australia usually close at around 5pm. It's ridiculous! I can't go and buy things at the huge mall at the Parramatta train station because people want to go home by 5. It's only on Thursdays that stores are open 'late', till around 8. So funny! When will the Aussies learn and have retail stores open until late every day. Only now, during Chrissy, they will have the stores open to reasonable hours when us working stiffs can actually take advantage.

Well this is the last week I am working in 2008. Good times! Fair Dinkum! Good on ya matey! Tomorrow is Tuesday and hopefully my noisy neighbour/flatmate will move out. He drinks like no tomorrow and then complains to me that he has health problems! I have to wear headphones so that I don't hear his noisy rants into the wee hours of the morning. Him and his brother sit outside and drink drink drink as many Australians do. But this is too much for me. I need my beauty sleep.

I am slowly starting to recover my missing collection of goodies. Of course my connection is only 256kbps so it will take a while, but I already managed to grab all the Office episodes I missed, some H264 movies, and lots and lots of mp3s. Life is starting to go back to normal. Friends? I have none here. They have all left already. And going to church well... that has almost died completely within me. I just don't want to hear about it anymore. I have become cold to the whole thing. Even though I live closer to Hillsong I don't want anything to do with it. I really have no idea what's wrong with me. Why can't I be like everyone else and be a normal social functioning adult human being?

Next week I am going to Adelaide again. It will hopefully be fun times again. Dave is a cool guy and very hospitable. I hope I can return the favour when he comes to visit me in Canada someday. I will also hopefully spend time with his siblings, my other cousins, up in the hills of Adelaide. There is a bakery there where I just have to try the German Pretzels. Oh yes I went there and CAPITALIZED that word, lulz.

Well sorry to all those that were following the blog, I promise to keep it up now. I will just have to avoid being so personal and be more general. That way I can avoid being outed by my next potential employer as a loser whom they would never want to hire.

Later all, thanks for listening to my rants.

Joramininee

Blog is gooooooooooonzo

2008-12-15T10:10:00.000+11:00

Well in an EMO-moment I erased my blog. What can I say. It was silly. Hopefully things will be back to normal from now on.

-j

Last days in Adelaide

2008-11-25T06:23:00.000+11:00

On Saturday we went down south a bit to some beach. There's an area nearby where all the 'schoolies' go, that is, high school teenagers, to party. There was a bandstand there and an open area and a lot of cabins too. Some teens were up but most were probably partied out from the night before. I saw some guy giving motorists the thumbs up and holding a beer, while his buddies behind him drank out of a funnel. It was really windy that day so when we got to the beach we didn't stay too long. The waves were humongous and I couldn't help but think how it would be like to surf on them, but they were just too broken to really get a good ride anyway. Either way though they probably could have killed me if I had tried because my skill level is just way too low. Dave's little baby 2-year-old boy didn't like not being in his baby seat so he made a big fuss pretty much the entire time we were in the car, for an hour or so. I don't know how parents get through this stage it's just so hard on the ears. We also went to Mackies and Pizza Hut that day, so some great nutritious meals were had not. Turns out Pizza Hut is on the outs here in Aussie, there are only a handful left running. Overall it was a pretty good day and in the evening I tried out the Vespa finally and we went to Blockbuster to rent a movie. Here they have to type in their phone number and then a 6-digit pass code before you can rent a movie, and they call it 'hiring', not 'renting'. So Dave gave me the pin # and I rented Get Smart and watched that later on. I also had a chance to listen to the Killers CD which I had bought the day before and I must say I haven't really warmed up to it yet. Just not as many catchy songs. But I may like it more if I listen to it with some decent headphones.

The next day we went to 'big generic box church' in the morning and it wasn't a lot of fun. The message was about God's presence, but I didn't feel it at all. Almost all the talk was laced with business overtones, buy our album, apply to this club, put money in our baskets. I don't think I've ever felt that a church was a business more than I had that moment. Almost a bit sickening. Nobody knows anyone, and it's just such a big show that it doesn't feel real to me. Later on that day we went to see my Aunt & Uncle and the rest of my cousins.

But before that he took his youngest son on a mini-motocross bike, and me on the Vespa, and we did some offroading. It was fun times! I fell once though because we were going up a slippery hay-filled hill and the Vespa just isn't designed for that terrain. We also checked out the women's prison from behind a fence and waved hello to some ladies who didn't seem all too amused. I'm just surprised he is so fearless, riding that little thing with his young son holding on to the handlebars, and without a helmet too. Pretty frightening to think what could happen in a wipe out situation.

Lobethal where the rest of my cousins live is up in the hills, so we took a lot of winding roads to get there. In about 45 minutes we got there, and there they were. I don't have any memories of my uncle, so it was like we were meeting for the first time. We were led to the back where we had the table all set up in a sort of gazebo attached to the house. The food was delicious and reminded me of my mom's cooking, good old-fashioned Czech dumplings with roast beef, vegetables and red cabbage. The Real Stuff™! Dessert was good too, some chocolate lava cakes and ice cream. And boy were there kids there! I met my three cousins' husbands and their kids, and amongst themselves they have about 10 kids. It's quite insane. They are all pretty young too, so lots of babies everywhere and I had to be careful not to step on one while moving throughout the house.

Later on my uncle took me aside and told me the story of how they came to Australia, and he gave me some advices. He was upset that we thought of them as weird people, because they are just really loving and live life to the fullest. It's just their church has some strange customs when it comes to marriage and how boys and girls are allowed to interact. Just some old-fashioned rules that don't work in today's world anymore. Then my one cousin's husband took us out to the bakery and he proudly showed me all his bakery toys and machines, and even a new gelato machine that he recently got. Too bad we didn't' get to eat any though, it looked quite good.

So that was an interesting time for sure. Me and my sister are invited again for Christmas to celebrate it with them. Today though I head back to Sydney and into the real world. I'm just hoping I have my job still, since I took 3 days off and I am easily replaceable to be quite honest.

_J

First couple days in Adelaide

2008-11-23T05:40:00.000+11:00

I woke up on Thursday morning at 4:00AM ready to go. I had all my clothing set up so I could just put them on without looking for them, and I had taken a shower the day before. As I was getting dressed I got a text message that the taxi I had ordered was approaching its destination. So when I had my two bags ready I exited out of my place and the taxi was ready to pick me up. We drove silently to the airport and the total cost was about $25 AUD, just about $10 more than if I had taken the train. But my colleagues at work had advised me not to take the train, for it was too unreliable. I don't know if that's completely true as it has never let me down so far in these 2 months in Sydney. The one guy told me that the extra fee for the airport station was too much and that taking a taxi was a better choice. But as I waited in the airport for nearly 2 hours I noticed a whole throng of people came in at the same time; obviously the train had not let them down, and they were all in time to check their baggage in as well. So next time I may do that so I can sleep in a little longer.

The JetStar plane I took was brand new, so it had that 'new airplane smell', you know what I'm talking about. Flying was smooth and I played my new Trackmania DS game trying to beat the fastest times. As we landed I turned my cellphone on again and there was a message from my cousin that he was coming to pick me up in his shiny black Mercedes Benz. He did get stuck in some traffic was he was a bit late but I told him 'no worries mate'. And when he got there he looked just as I remembered him from 5 years ago.

We first went to his office, and I met his attractive PA who had set up my flight. I couldn't believe how good-looking this girl was, just unreal. Someone who should be modeling or on TV. I can't believe my cousin works with her and doesn't get distracted. But his wife is also good-looking so anyway... he had some business deals to take care of but before that we went for a coffee and he shared some things about his life, how he had pretty much been disowned by his father for marrying a girl from a different church. His wife met up with us later and we had lunch. She wasn't supposed to know about Friday night, which was a surprise 10th Anniversary gift to her. The story was that it was to be a function for clients.

Their home is pretty nice too. Just one level because they don't have basements in Australia, but still very spacious. He has a hot tub from a Canadian company too, because he likes how they manufacture them. I feel so at home here, I can do whatever I want within reason. I almost feel like I should be paying to stay here. I asked my boss that day to extend my stay here and he said it was fine, so I am coming back Monday evening instead of Sunday morning. It's great to be a contractor and not be locked into working all the time. His kids are all pretty fun too, his oldest son and I played Zelda VS mode on our DSs. In the evening Dave and I went to the pier and marina area and he talked more about his life. It's very interesting and it would take too long too regurgitate it all here, but I think it would make a good book someday. It's a story of the human spirit breaking free from oppression, very inspiring. We then went and had some delicious greek yiros, but it proved to be too much for us and we both left half our plates full of food. That night I slept pretty well except my pillow had a funny smell to it and their cat was trapped in my room, so I woke up at 2am to let it out of my room.

Friday was hectic because we had to prepare for the party still. His wife was onto him though towards the end and he couldn't hide it anymore. I went into the city a bit and bought all The Killers CDs. One shop had the new one out a day early so I was happy to grab it. I haven't had much of a chance to listen to it, except in his Suzuki offroader which he built a dvd player into (touchscreen operated, pretty sweet). I'm sure I'll have the opportunity in the near future though. I also went into a collectibles shop and was tempted to buy a $300 Balrog figure from LOTR, but I decided against it, even though it looks sweet as.

That evening two of Dave's friends came over, one guy a Russion from Gold Coast who really likes to party. Dave's wife wasn't too surprised at the event but we had a fun time anyway. I even went alone into the dance floor and did my bad dancing moves. The DJ was pretty decent and the beats were grooving, so I had a good time. A lot of nice girls but of course being me and not having that much to drink I was too afraid to approach any of them. Free drinks too, so I had plenty of rum&cokes, and even an Adelaide drink called the swampy, which I had tried a little of in Sydney, but this was the real deal. A full glass, not just a shot glass. When we went home I was a bit afraid that Dave had had too much to drink, but he told us that he was fine. His Mercedes has proximity detectors anyway so they beep if he's too close to anything. Alex the Russian spoke a lot of Russian to us and a lot of dirty talk on the way home. He even went out afterwards with the other guy, after we went home, to a casino, and won himself 1000 on Roulette. Good on him!

Well today is another day and hopefully it will be fun times.

That's it for now.

JAN

New place & trip

2008-11-20T07:00:00.000+11:00

So I moved into a new place on Monday. The guy told me I needed to move in right away because there was a queue of people waiting to get it and he chose me over all of them! Well that's a good feeling... i guess. It is about 30-40 minutes closer to work than my previous place so I am glad for that, even though the cost is a bit higher. I also don't have TV here but I may remedy that. Only thing is, if I'm going to buy a TV, I will buy an HDTV, not some crummy analog piece of crap. That's just how I am, I either go big or nothing! In fact as I was leaving the apartment with my stuff I lent my movies to another housemate, and she offered me some divx episodes of Dexter. I had to decline because they just weren't up to my quality standards. I have really become a big eh-hole snob with my HD requirements, haven't I? It's quite sick really.

They are a lovely Chinese couple who have lived in Australia for about 20 years now. When I agreed to take the place on Sunday he invited me to bring my suitcase with me on the train and drive me the rest of the way to the house to sign the lease agreement and all that. Also to have lunch with him and his wife. So I did, and we had chinese food at a restaurant/club. I came in my thongs and they are strict about dress code there, so I had to rummage through my suitcase and put on my dress shoes. I looked pretty silly with dress shoes and shorts on. The food was pretty good but I am generally not a fan of chinese food. Not sure why, just not my thing. But it was nice of him to buy my lunch, most landlords don't do that. We talked a lot about the differences between Australia and Canada and things of that nature. After that we went and I signed a 3-Month lease, so I guess I made my decision and am STAYING HERE for a little bit longer. A lot of my friends predicted this already so it shouldn't come as a big surprise. I emailed Canada Customs and they told me I can extend my Permanent Resident with some paperwork so I should be fine in that area. I can even send them the paperwork in the mail and don't have to take a day off to do any of it, which is nice. I figured a job like this doesn't come around often and I can really save up some money here to invest in the future.

Anyway this new place is about 3 minutes walk from a fresh produce place, the train station, and a regular grocery store. How sweet is that? It is SUPER SWEET, that's how it is. I am living with about 3-4 people, the guy actually made up little sheds in his backyard for people to rent from him. He must make a ton of cash! Just set up a few shacks and you're golden. Me and a Chilean dude are closer to the house though, on a higher level. I had to buy all my own utensils too and I forgot to buy a glass. As I went to the kitchen at night and turned the light on there were two cockroaches sipping up the leftover Pepsi I had poured into the sink. So I gotta be careful and clean up after myself really well in this place. Those bugs just give me the CREEPS big time!

So on Thursday morning I am heading over to Adelaide to visit my cousin and his family. As far as I know his siblings and parents live in a town about 45mins east from there called Lobethal, but I will probably not go visit them unless something is arranged. I might later on in late 2008 or 2009. The plane ticket cost me $314 AUD return from Jetstar, which I think is decent enough. It turns out though I had thought my flight was at 6:15pm, because they weren't clear on the itinerary. But when I checked this morning on Sydney's Departure Schedule (pronounced SH not SK), I discovered it was in the morning! So I will have to head back to my old place in Ultimo so I can make my flight in time, since trains don't leave early enough where I live now to make it.

So basically I am in Adelaide until Sunday morning, and then I will go back to Sydney. I know it's only 3 days but I figured WHY NOT. My sister was originally going to come but she backed out because of work commitments. It will be very interesting living in my new place with my own room (finally). My snoring was keeping my sister up and the mosquitos were keeping me up, so in the end nobody got any sleep. I just have to buy a quilt or some kind of blanket because it is pretty cold at nights and I fear my month-long cold will return if I'm not too careful.

Anyway I think that's about it for now. I'm still wondering if I should buy a camera so I can document my journey visually, but if I'm going to buy one I want it to be really good quality. Same issues as with the TV/Movies. If I'm going to entertain myself it should be to the high possible standard I can have.

So long ya'll and thanks for reading!

Are we Human or are we Dancer?

2008-11-16T03:08:00.000+11:00

That is the question. I would say I'm more human than dancer, as I feel rather awkward and weird when I'm dancing. It's a good feeling to acknowledge that. I'm a little upset that The Killers will release this song on Guitar Hero World Tour and not on Rock Band (yet?), but that's fine... I plan to enjoy it regardless. These guys never cease to amaze me with their talent.

So last week I got my mail and discovered a huge amount of bills.... what else is new? $1800 CAD on the credit card and rising! Woohoo! I also got my contract I signed (apparently), that says I will be working at this company until April. Now here is the dilemma: my return ticket to Canada is for February 7th. Here is the other dilemma: my Permanent Resident status expires on February 5th. So I will have some fun with the Canadian Embassy, Bon Voyage Insurance, United Airlines, and others in the next little while sorting all these little details out.

I figure these are my choices:

1) Stay here until the end of May.

This gives me the option of traveling around in May after my job ends in April using some of the money I saved up during said job. The problem lies in the fact that I will still have to pay car insurance, Rogers phone, and my storage space where I have all my stuff for 4 extra months, which wasn't in the original plan. Of course I will have money to cover these things but they are expenses I don't necessarily want to be paying. Also my beloved USENET account is being used by my brother and I'm sure he doesn't even use it for half of the things I used it for

2) Change my ticket to the end of January.

This would be my easiest option. It's around $150 CAD to do this thru United Airlines. It will also be the most hassle-free option, because I won't need to get my permanent resident card extended and will avoid all the necessary paperwork. I will also get to see my friends and family back home much sooner, and use all the aforementioned expenses appropriately. The disadvantage is of course I will come home to piles of snow and with less money in pocket. I will probably quit the job at the end of December for the holidays, travel to my cousins and aunt/uncle's place in Adelaide for a couple weeks, and then high-tail it back out of here in time for LOST to begin, which I'm eagerly anticipating.

So both options have good and bad sides to them, and I'm really stuck in the middle. If anyone could give me suggestions that would be appreciated.

Also my 'cousin' back home just had her first baby, Lydia! Congrats Esther & Chris! I have to admit I didn't even see her while she was pregnant because I had moved out of Toronto by then, and missed all the dramas with her and her sister-in-law and such, who's house I was living in the basement of.... which is now Esther's house... I think? I'm so confused since I'm so out of touch. Well that is cool when friends have kids, repopulating our empty planet.

So I also have been looking at new places to live, and did on Wednesday. The place is too far though, it's the same distance as this one (1 1/2 hours to work), but from the other direction. So I think I'll pass on it even though the girl is super nice and the place looks really good. She was concerned as well that I'd be too isolated and away from all the city fun. She may be right.

Well that's it for me for this entry... see you all next time!

Joram "Not Jerome" Nowak

Jeff Martin in Concert

2008-11-11T09:48:00.000+11:00

Well yesterday was the day I had been waiting for. My idol, Jeff Martin, formerly of The Tea Party, was up on stage doing his thang. It was awesome to see his versatility with his instruments. He played a lot of Tea Party, some solo stuff, and a lot from his new album with his new band, The Armada. The place was rockin and people were getting into it. There was a bar in the back so people were drinking it up and having a blast. I was completely sober though, maybe to my disadvantage. Ha no I'm just kidding, he was amazing! Almost always on pitch and just a really great voice, belting out the tunes straight to the end with no sign of degradation. He looked in good form too, maybe a little older but definitely not fat, as some say he was a few years ago (chunky was what they were saying on the blogs). One of his songs he pulled out the cello bow and played his guitar Jimmy Page style, pretty awesome. In another song he doubled his voice in lower registered so he sounded like he was singing possessed!

I have missed out on The Tea Party while they were still in their heyday, so this was sort of like making up for it. Stuart Chatwood and Jeff Burrows weren't there, but it was almost like being at a concert of the former band. He really loves to dig into his back catalog and the audience was singing along to all the old favourites. He even somehow mixed John Lennon's Imagine, The Doors Five to One, and Paint it Black in there. I'm sure there were some other references as well but I think I forgot them.

The opening act would JUST NOT GO AWAY and people were getting restless. He kept repeating his name to us, but I've forgotten it by now. He was a guy from Melbourne and his style was a strange morbid country rock. Unique, I'll give him that, but after 3 songs I had had enough. Unfortunately he went on way over his welcome. He doesn't have a bad voice or anything it's just not my style, and neither was it anyone else's. The mid-act was a belly dancer girl dancing to some flute music, she was pretty good, but by that time everyone already wanted to see Jeff Martin and we couldn't really wait much longer. The doors opened at 8pm but Jeff Martin and The Armada didn't start until around 10. And I had to be up the next day at 6!

So My ears were ringing on the way home but I did manage to buy his cd and listened to it. Surprisingly most of the songs sounded better on stage than on the cd. It feels a bit rushed and in one song he even misses his lyrics only to try again in the next bar (or stanza, whatever I didn't study music). It's a solid album but I do miss The Tea Party. Even though they were getting stale towards the end the eastern-twinged sounds melded with rock&roll were just something that really spoke to me and was the soundtrack of my life for a good couple years.

I will always remember that night and I look forward to what The Aramada has in store next. Hope all ya'll had a good weekend as well! Oh yeah my cousin didn't show up but... there'll be another time, he must have been busy.

Later!

_joe RAM inator

I don't have a good title

2008-11-08T07:49:00.000+11:00

Well the last few days have been interesting. I finally got together with the friend I promised to meet a few weeks back, and we had a good time seeing Burn After Reading and then had some coffee afterwards. The only thing is we sat outside beside some garbage bins and people were walking around us a lot. This had been the only time I've gone out in like 2 or 3 weeks, so it was refreshing. I still have something in my throat leftover from the sickness I've had for a month, but hopefully it is the last remnant of it. I don't ever remember being so sick for so long. This weekend my cousin Dave and his family are coming to Sydney, so we will get together and catch up and maybe discuss when I can come visit him in Adelaide. I'm thinking sometime in December or January, but that will be arranged I'm sure. It will definitely require me buying plane tickets because I don't want to take the bus or train there... I take those every day! I will also go to a Jeff Martin concert on Sunday, that should be interesting. I'm hoping it's more of a Tea Party sound than the bluesy, experimental thing I've heard him doing recently. I like those eastern instruments that he plays it's amazing to hear them synthesized with rock music so well.

Yesterday instead of going home the regular way I decided to venture out and explore the neighbourhood a bit. Little did I know I would end up getting lost in suburbia! There is a long path that leads out of the industrial section to a nice park where the nieghbourhood kids can play some cricket. It wasn't very inviting, this path. I think people do drugs here at night. There were some magpies too in a tree nearby making lots of fuss. I hear they dive down at people during the mating season; good thing to look forward to in the future. So I kept walking deeper and deeper into the neighbourhood, and I soon lost track of which streets I had been on. After about an hour I realized I would never find the bus stop so I turn back and just kept turning left the whole time. That is apparently a good way to get out of a maze. And it worked! I found my way back and got home around 7:30 that night instead of at 6:30. So not a bad difference, I thought I'd be a lot later than that. When I got home and checked the internet, I realized that if I had walked just a bit further, I could have got to the next bus stop!

And it made me think... I go through life trying to get towards a particular goal and sort of have a vague idea of where it is, but I always end up treading the path up to a particular point and then get scared and turn back to where I started. If only I could muster up just a bit more courage I could reach my goal because it could likely end up being just around the corner! So this getting lost sort of mirrored how my life is going now. Aimlessly walking towards a goal but when there is any sign of doubt I go back on what I know best, my downloading and videogames and movies and entertainment. How appropriate.

Anyway hopefully I'll have some fun this weekend and you should too! Go Adama! Obama! Osama!

_Jornow

What has been happening lately

2008-11-04T06:57:00.000+11:00

Well I have to say life has just become more of the same lately. I am in almost the same kind of job as I was back home. It's just that everything else is different. The fact that I have no car is really bad, taking the bus and train back and forth is not as fun as it used to be back in the old days. I had to do that for my summer 2001, 2002, 2003 jobs, and it was not fun at all. At work I have a pile of stuff to do so at least I'm not tempted to check what's new on the internet all the time.

Yesterday I went whale watching for $70. I think it was worth the money. We saw some humpbacks up close and got some good pictures, of which I still have to upload. I'm not sleeping a lot lately because there are always mosquitos that come up close to my ear and swatting at the empty sky yields no results. I may have to move soon if they want me to stay at this job for longer, which it seems like but I haven't really spoken up letting them know that is what I desire.

I am making my lunch now every day too because I don't have a car to drive to McDonalds or similar fine establishments. I really miss the daily dose of fast food, but my body doesn't, because I have to wear a belt now to keep my pants up. Australia is nice with weather and stuff but I really miss home a lot these days. I don't know why I said I want to stay forever, that is probably a bad idea.

So next weekend I'm seeing my cousin who lives in Adelaide. He is coming to Sydney for some reason that hasn't been disclosed. I doubt it's only because it's to see me. He is a business entrepreneur and probably has some sort of prospect here, that is my guess. But it will be good to see him I haven't seen him since 2003 in Germany. I will also see Jeff Martin next weekend at the Metro Theatre in Sydney. He has a new band and I hope I can forgive him for disbanding the Tea Party. Well I have already paid for the tickets so I think I already have.

Other than that there is not really much to report. I don't really go out a lot, my month-long sickness is finally coming to an end, some house mates moved out and new ones moved in, and I haven't gone back to Hillsong even though I should. I am playing a lot of games on my sister's laptop as well, my gaming habit will never die I guess.

Later, all

_JackaRomi

Kangaroo tastes good

2008-10-22T14:35:00.000+11:00

Well today was my third day at work and it went by rather quickly, because I had a lot to do. I am settling in now and it would suck to be fired. When I got home, I made up a little kangaroo steak stir fry, with mushrooms, capsicum, green beans, and onion. Everything was perfect, except I put a little bit too much oil in the pan. I've never tasted kangaroo before so it was quite interesting. It has a very strong smell to it, and the taste is similar to a deer. That is the closest approximation I could think of. It's a very dark meat. I also bought tickets for the train and bus I will take every day, and it turns out it's nearly $70 AUD per week. I think that's a bit ridiculous, so I will try to find another way to get to work. I don't ever remember paying so much for transportation in the past. I might be doing something wrong if I have to pay so much. I have been watching cooking-related shows and it looks quite interesting what they're doing. I always get a huge appetite too, but that should be expected. I really am tired of microwave meals and fastfood all the time, and I really enjoy cooking. It's strange working now because I have so little free time. I am out of the house from 6:30am to 6:30pm, and have to go to sleep around 10 so that I can wake up at 6 the next day. I wonder if I'll ever get out of Sydney. This company says that if I perform well enough they will keep me on for longer... longer than I had planned on staying in Australia. That should be interesting once it plays out. My sister is gone this week doing fund raising in Canberra. She says she can't even do any sightseeing because she has to work so much. But I'm sure she will eke out some fun from her trip.

Well I hope you enjoyed the run-on paragraph.

_Joram

I am still a failure but a little less of one

2008-10-20T09:21:00.000+11:00

So Friday was my first day of working in Australia. It was just as I had imagined it, so no complaints there. The drawings system at this company is not really organized, so I will have to talk to my supervisor on Monday to sort things out. I just hate waking up at 5:30 in the morning to get to this place... it's not fun at all, especially when the walls are so thin in my room and I have no earplugs. But I will keep at it and try my best, I am on a 2 week trial period so we shall see what happens.

Today I actually managed to get to Hillsong Church, like I had tried last week. The bus was pretty packed and there were even some Canadian backpackers on the bus. Of course I didn't talk to them cause again I was too scared. The bus ride took half an hour and I looked outside at the upscale houses... this was just suburbia like nobody's business. When we got to the church I was a bit disappointed; it was much smaller than I had imagined. I'm sure it seats a lot of people but it was just so compact. It had some nice digital equipment though, and 3 big screens at the front of the podium. They had some pretty cool effects happening during the worship service, and yes they had HD cameras. Nice to see a church so up to speed in technology. They even have their service linked via satellite to other ones in the vicinity. It reminded me a bit of Meeting House, except the witty & charming Bruxy Cavey was nowhere to be seen! Anyway, I went out of there talking to nobody, cause that is my style, and went back home on the train.

I don't know about church anymore if I'm going to go regularly or not. There is one closer to me in the city, I will try it out next week. Because this particular one is way out in the suburbs and takes me forever to get there. The main purpose is because I want to meet some people... the whole God/Jesus thing will sort itself out afterwards. I'm still struggling to understand how religion fits into my life, if it should at all. I often stand in church wondering why everyone is raising their hands and getting all into it when I just stand there feeling all empty, lonely, and depressed. Anyway, I will probably write another blog once something else interesting happens.

_J

Two jobs

2008-10-17T13:55:00.000+11:00

Yes, today I got up really early and went out to two job interviews. Long story short, I was a little too technically deficient for one job so they passed on me, and the second one they told me I could start tomorrow.

So I put on my fancy suit in the morning, and put on my dress shoes... which immediately began to bite into open-wound blisters I received from the very same shoes a week before. No matter, I had to endure it for the day, smile through the pain! I had my map routed out (even though the route mapping system of Sydney is in major need of an overhaul), I had everything planned in my head what I was going to say, and I had just a few dabs of hair gel left. As I got on the train I realized I was really going to cut it close to make it to this interview on time, and boy was I right about that! But more on that later.

My recruiter called me up a while later while I was still waiting for the train to leave (It was 8:45 and I had to be there by 10:00). We went over some things we had talked about the day before, and she wish me good luck and I was on my way. I arrived at the station and got on a bus, but it turned out I had to PRE PAY for this one. AH! So I quickly went to the ticket station across the street to pick up a ticket, but by the time I got back to the stop it had left. No worries, the next bus would come soon. But when it did come it said 'Macquarie University' on it, not 'Macquarie Centre' as I was hoping. Still, I thought better this bus than none, and got on anyway. That was a bit of an error. I figured the bus would go on to the centre after the univirsity, but I that was not the case. The university was the last stop... all the students got off and I was there alone, so I felt stupid and followed the last student out. Here I was, lost in a foreign university campus, with 10 minutes to spare until 10:00am. Sweat was rolling down my forehead and down from under my armpits. In a panic I ran towards where I thought the shopping centre was (where I originally wanted to go). Luckily, it was where I thought it was. Saved!

But I still had to quicken my pace because I was pretty late. As I got closer to my destination I remembered that these guys are pretty secretive (it's a research lab), and that it would be hard to find the entrance. Luckily, I found the right entrance right on the dot 10:00am. A guy opened the door and looked at my quizzically, when I said my name is Joram and I'm here for an interview with John... D'OH I had forgotten his last name. We got that sorted out pretty quick though and before I knew it I was in a room with 3 guys asking me all kinds of questions... that had to be answered immediately! The interview went well and I had to sign an NDA, so can't really talk about what the company does. All I can say is, what they do will REVOLUTIONIZE the industry they are targeting... just you wait. The main guy interviewing me turned out to look like my old boss Joe from my Niscon days, so it was very peculiar hearing a Joe-copy talking Australian. The interview went well, I answered all questions quickly without hesitation, remembered to laugh and smile at the right times and not slouch or put my hand over my face. They even showed me their testing rigs at the end and the main guy drove me to the bus station after; my first time in an Australian car!

After the interview I called the recruiter and we talked about how the interview went, and she even asked me some tough questions during the call, as if I was still in the interview! Crazy! In fact what she had prepped me for was something much harder than what it actually was, so it was good she did that because it prepared me for the worst. She kind of laughed how I took a big bow around Sydney to get to where I was going, since there were much more direct paths.

So I took the bus back to the main CBD (central business district) Sydney, and got another lovely look at the Sydney Opera House from the Harbour Bridge. I really gotta do the Harbour Bridge Climb one day, that will be amazing. I always see tourists on there. Anyway, I got to the train station and trained to West Sydney area, which took a bit of time. Good thing the 2nd interview was more of an open time frame that I was allowed to be at the interview, so no pressures if I got lost. When I got to the final train station and was about to get on a bus, I was stopped by a girl wanting donations for a charity. She immediately realized I wasn't an Aussie and we had a pleasant conversation instead of her begging me for money! Turns out she is from the UK and also working abroad just like me, and she told me I MUST go to the Max Brenner Chocolate Cafe when in Australia, or else my trip was for nothing! I should have got her number now that I think about it... she said if I get my job please think of the charity, and wished me good luck and I was on my way.

Now this bus I was on was amazing: it actually had a recorded voice say the name of the next station! You didn't have to look at a map and out the window frantically hoping you're matching up the stops. Very clear and non-complicated. Also, this particular bus line had a road specially designed for it; it wasnt' just the very far lane, there was an actual TRANSITWAY built for the purpose of a bus! To top that off there were even special 'B' lights inserted into the traffic lights so that only a bus could be in the intersection. Very impressive. So when my stop came I heard the voice say it and I pressed the button: no worries! 15 minute walk later and I was at the company.

I didn't sign an NDA with these guys so I can say the company is called Liquip, and Steve the guy who interviewed me was sooooooooooo laid back! In fact after explaining everything to me he was already setting up a computer for me and an account and told me be here by 8AM tomorrow! I was pretty amazed. Of course, now I will have to show these guys I can actually do mechanical drafting without my daddy helping me out all the time... should be interesting! Tolerances on dimensions isn't a walk in the park let me tell you! Lots of experience and you just have to 'get it', which I haven't completely. That's why I'm a bit worried. So I got that job, and as i walked back to the bus stop I treated myself to a 15-Dollar lunch, nice tuna sandwich with a fruit salad on the side and a nice cold bottle of Pepsi. While I was eating the recruiter for THIS job (another girl), called me and told me if I wanted to work tomorrow I had to kick it into high gear over to her office (again the other side of Sydney, North Sydney). I said NO PROBS and finished my lunch (it was 3:50, late lunch), and took the same way back.

I arrived at the recruitment office at about 5:30pm, and realized the 2 recruiters who had 'found' me were staying overtime just to set me up with the paperwork! I felt a bit bad I made them wait too long, but they were all like 'no worries' and really cool about it. So I got a nice pen and mug out of the deal, and some time sheets, I am ready for this thing! 8 to 5pm! Yikes! I will have to wake up SUPER EARLY to get there, it takes about 1 1/2 hours at least. But it's ok since I'm not too into night life, as you all already probably know, so turning in at 10, 10:30ish won't be such a big deal for me. I just have to buy earplugs because sometimes the neighbours can be really noisy at night.

On the way back the FIRST RECRUITER called me and said I didn't get the job because another candidate they had interviewed had more experience + skills than me. Oh well. The silver lining of the cloud is that they liked me, I am a 'good bloke' as it were, and they will try to find another position for me within the company. So that will be pretty sweet if it happens, I really want to be part of their operation, like I said earlier they will revolutionize their industry once the prototype becomes a product and goes into mass-production to be sold to vendors. Cool stuff.

So now I'm here waiting around writing the longest blog ever and hopefully not boring you, the reader. I will appreciate TL;DR comments. Those ones are the best. And I know they mean that you love me but I am too long-winded and should get to the point already. Oh btw crows and seagulls have really strange calls here in Australia. They sound like they are poor imitations of their much superior North-American cousins. But they make up for it for having way more exotic birds here.

Thanks for reading all, hope to hear from you soon.

_Joram

I am a complete failure

2008-10-13T07:15:00.000+11:00

Well today I wanted to go to Hillsong Church. I got up at about 8am, sat in bed until 8:45, then got ready in the bathroom. I left the house at 9:00am exactly. As I walked to Central Station I was worried I wouldn't make it in time for my 9:21 departure time. Luckily I got there by 9:15 and bought my ticket for $6.80 (round trip). They offer free bus trips from two different stations. Unfortunately, the ticket i bought didn't say which platform it took off from, so I was searching around frantically for 10 minutes trying to find the right train. I missed my train by 5 minutes, and the next one left at 9:35. So I took that one anyway. When I got to Parrammeta station, I debated getting out because one of the buses leaves from there. But I didn't get out. To my dismay I saw the bus was still waiting there (I knew it was the bus because it had some slogan written on the side, something about God wanting to get to know you). So I stayed in the train until Black Town Station, where the other bus had left already at 10:00am. When I got there I realized there were buses and taxis there that could potentially take me to Hillsong, but I was too scared to talk to people and ask them, and instead wandered into the mall and bought me some Hungry Jacks (Burger King).

After that I just went back home.

So that is my story of how I failed to go to church.

I will try again next week, this time I know where the train takes off and maybe I'll go earlier as well.

_J

So THAT'S what salt water tastes like!

2008-10-11T04:11:00.000+11:00

Yeah so I went to Surf Camp Australia this week. It was quite a lot of work, but also (thankfully), a lot of fun as well! This was a strange thing for me to do because I am not a big fan of water in general, I don't go swimming unless I am forced by friends. I signed up for the camp after one of the head coaches gave a talk about it and told us it was for everyone and after showing some pictures of the place and explaining how it works. Also, it only cost me about $425 Canadian, so since meals are included and I haven't had anything decent to eat for a while, why not?

So I woke up on Monday October 6 really early to walk to the hostel for the bus to pick us up. Everytime a nice Greyhound bus passed us by I was wondering what sort of a bus would take us there... eventually I found out, it was a small Toyota bus that seats about 25 people. It was obvious that it was our bus because it had 'Surf Camp Australia' written on it.

We drove through some hilly countryside for about 2 hours south of Sydney to get to the beach. Pretty nice scenery all around. There were a lot of Germans at the camp, some Swedes, some Danes, some Dutchies as well. Canadians, Americans, and UK folk were in a small minority. And there was one French and one Italian guy. So a pretty good mix of people, but pretty much all white people. One hour after we arrived we got into our wetsuits and went to the beach to start our first lesson! The first thing we learned was where we need to position ourselves on the board, and how to push up on it. The standing didn't come until the second lesson.

I though it would be similar to snowboafding but the only thing that's similar is the stance. Front foot at 45 degrees, back foot at 90 degrees. Keep your body straight. Of course since I'm a weak-sauce computer nerd I stuck out like a sore thumb amongst the more built peers, but I got over it after I saw them wipe out as much as me.

Over the days I got better and better and my coach even told me he was happy to see me get better. I could probably do this if I could somehow live close enough to a beach and fit it into my schedule. It really is a good feeling when you 'get it', and get a good ride out to the beach. Of course we didn't do anything near to what they have in their posters, riding through tunnel/barrel waves. That is for the professionals. But the important thing is I had fun and met a bunch of people.

Now reality will set in and I'll have to find a job! Or else I will not have as much fun. There are still a bunch of things I want to do like some cruises, skydiving, and some outback adventures. I have an interview 4 hours from now and I'm pretty stoked for it.

If you want to see pictures, go to www.nowak-designs.com/fotos, or check my facebook page.

Thanks again for reading, hope to hear from you soon!

_Jori

Settling in... or not?

2008-10-03T11:04:00.000+10:00

Well a couple days have gone by and I am still sending my resume and cover letter to companies all over the place. I am still too proud to take a restaurant job or something like that but as I said in the past, I may have to put that pride aside (hey that rhymes), and start making some dough soon or else things will be bad!

Last night I went to the Sidebar, which is another backpacker bar. There are a lot of them around here, so you meet all kinds of internationals in them. Of course, I just grabbed a Toohey's beer and sat around not talking to anyone, which is my typical style. I did meet up with a girl I had met last week, and we talked for a while about our lives. That was interesting because we had to talk over the loud music (which was live and pretty darn good, I must say). When it came to around 12am I had to say my goodbyes as I was looking for my sister.

I found her with her friends playing pool, and she told me our cousin Dave had messaged her. I thought it was strange this time of night for a family man of 3 kids to be messaging people, but he's a different bloke he is. SOoooo I messaged him too and we soon got into an interesting conversation. He told me to stay away from 'fat Kiwi chicks', and to try a swampie. So I went up to the bar and asked for one, but the bartender didn't know what it was. So I had to explain to him what it was. Kinda funny.

So again after like 5 bears, a rum&coke, and this swampie thing, I went home with my sister this time, not alone. I hope I didn't say anything stupid. I'm not really the type of person that goes to bars a lot, so i'm a bit out of my element. I don't know how to aproach girls and start making out with them or anything like that, so I will never fit in in that sense. Maybe I'm just too old.

Either way, I'm still stressed about not having a job but I gotta say it's my own fault for not trying hard enough and limiting my options like I am. Tomorrow I have a meeting at a recruitment agency so hopefully something will come of that.

I also went shopping already, and discovered a huge mall. It's pretty much the same as our malls but it is taller than it is wider, with about 5 or 6 floors. And instead of escalators to go up they have slanted walkways, like the kinds they have at airports. So less chances of your shoelaces getting stuck. I also noticed ATM machines here are WAY FASTER than ours back home. Instant access to my ever-shrinking bank account: great success!

I'm not sure what I'll do for the rest of the day, as it's only about 5PM here, but I may just chillax, even though I can't afford to sit idly by as my money is being used up. I just hope things will get better soon, because it's hard to enjoy this city without a solid income to back you up. It's an expensive tourist town, so I shouldn't have expected any less.

Well see ya'll later, and thanks for reading.

Out and About
_joRAM

Pictures?

2008-10-01T08:24:00.000+10:00

Well I guess I spazzed out yesterday. I haven't really started looking for jobs in full force yet, as i am going to surf camp next week I don't want jobs to get in the way. I will just have to learn to relax a bit. I just moved into a flat with my sister and we are starting to get settled in here. I have also uploaded all the pictures to the PC. I think I will put some on my facebook page. Most of these are from Darling Harbour and some from the Sydney Aquarium and Wildlife World. Wow i hate the blogger.com uploading thing it's not very friendly for pictures, so I'll avoid using it.

Weekend stuff

2008-09-30T11:23:00.000+10:00

Nothing much happened on the weekend. I went to Bondi again and got majorly sunburned cause my sunscreen sucks. It's sort of a gel instead of a cream and all the blowing stand stuck to me. I still have sand on me from that day. And because of the wind, everyone left the beach and I had to stand at the very front of a packed bus. This working holiday is seriously starting to get me down. I'm almost tempting to just stop it now and go back home to mommy and daddy.

Friday Adventures

2008-09-28T04:52:00.000+10:00

Well it seems my sister is collecting a bunch of friends. I feel silly now with no friends of my own and tagging along with her. I feel vibes of being an unwanted party member. Friday I went to Manly Beach with my sister and her friends. We took a city train to Circular Quay and then bought tickets for the Ferry. The big one wasn't in service, so we took a smaller boat over there. The Sydney Opera House is really beautiful. I've only obviously ever seen it on pictures, but it seems a lot more symmetrical in real life. The white tiles that make up the large triangular sections are actually more apparent up close.

When we got to Manly we had to walk a bit to the beach. Everyone who was young was wearing swimmers and thongs, that's just how it is here! Turns out the high school kids' last day before a 2-week break was that day, so they were out in full force. The young kids hair styles are very interesting around here, they're big on the rat tails and spiky hair dos. Kids were playing rugby on the beach and a lot of them were a couple hundred feet out in the water letting huge waves hit them. The sky was blue as blue gets and so was the water. Just a really beautiful day and a nice breeze as well. Some lifeguards whistled a bit because they were afraid some people were getting too far out. You're only supposed to swim between red and yellow striped flags.

We went back to Sydney around 2pm. While my sister and her friend were getting some groceries, I waited outside on a bench. Two guys sitting next to me started to talk to me, asking me if you think they're going to win. I was confused and then they mentioned my shirt. It turns out my American Eagle shirt was very similar to the Manly-Warrinagh Sea Eagles shirt. So it was a bit of a funny convo because I know nothing about sports. Turns out they are from 'all over the place', and not Australia at all. They warned me of Australian women. Three will approach you on a night out; one will wrap herself around you and start to flirt, another one will embrace and kiss you and make you feel special, while the third one will take your wallet. Very interesting advice.

So we got on a bigger boat on the way back, and we sat on the top deck outside. Lots of tourists obviously, and once we got around the bend and saw the Sydney Harbour Bridge and the Opera House, they all crowded up on the deck and started taking photographs, blocking my spectacular view. Oh well, I figure I'm here long enough so I can experience this all again, potentially.

Today I also realized my Canadian Permanent Resident card runs out BEFORE I am scheduled to leave the country. Very very interesting. I'm not sure what I will do about that.

See ya'll later and thanks for reading.

Thursday Night

2008-09-27T03:15:00.000+10:00

Well that was fun. The event held by IEP actually ended up being in a different bar than I though, about a 35 minute walk away from the hostel. So I googled up the walking instructions and wrote them down in a message on my mobile. As I was leaving the hostel I thought to myself, maybe I should have gone with some people. But since I don't really know anyone yet, I ventured out alone. As I got closer and closer to the bar I realized that walking instructions generally give the shortest routes, not the safest ones. I should have stayed on the main streets. Once I saw a past-her-prime prostitute and an old man with a big black dog, I started to feel a bit scared. Thankfully by then I was already pretty close to the bar, and just quickened my step a bit.

The bar is called The World Bar. Some IEP coordinators were there already, at 8pm. I was actually the only one that came there early. I now realize it's not cool to leave so early. Next time I'll remember to show up late like everyone else! The beer I tried was not Fosters, like many people outside Australia think Australians drink. It's actually made largely for export. The beer I drank was Coopers and Carlton Draught. Pretty good stuff. After a while I started to lose count of how many I had had! I had some good conversations with other international students/travelers, but had to shout really loud over the music. They also passed around 'tea pots', with I don't know what was inside, but you basically pour them into shot glasses. At 12 I left and stumbled on home. It had been a pretty great night.

So today I guess I'm going to Manly. I'm not sure how we're getting there but we should figure it out. Again I don't have the camera with me so I don't have any pictures to post yet, but I will as soon as I can.

_J

Thursday so far

2008-09-26T13:47:00.000+10:00

Well today was interesting. My sister's two friends and I went to Bondi Beach. This beach is quite amazing. The sand is this crazy yellow colour, and so soft and smooth. Pretty much all I did was watch the surfers and sift my hands through the sand over and over. I also listened to some of the girls' stories and it was interesting. We had to take a half-hour bus ride there, and I still can't get over how everything drives on the other side of the road. I hope I don't accidentally look the wrong way some day and get hit by someone. I didn't go in the water because my sister said it was cold, but I figure there will be plenty of time to go again. Also I didn't have any sunscreen so I pretty much curled up into a ball the whole time avoiding the sun as best as possible.

The next half of the day was also pretty cool. We met up with a Scottish guy Ian, and he showed us two possible apartments we could live in. One was $160/week and the other was $120/week. Of course the more expensive one was much nicer, sort of like a dorm room in university. The other one was a bit more quaint, in fact some rooms are separated by the open sky, the whole apartment doesn't even have a roof over the whole of it! But apparently Aussies don't care about this sort of details. In fact I might just want to live there, since it's available. I might do the 4-day surf camp next week, but not 100% sure about it.

After this, around 4:30pm I finally went down to the 'GoodGames' store, take a few steps and you miss it. It is wedged between some Asian store and a McDonalds. I took the long steps up and lo-and-behold, it was a typical gaming store. Kids were playing MAGIC and other card games and just being nerdy, cool stuff. The arcade machines there were Japanese style, so you sit down to play and your opponent is on the other side. I asked the clerk for change for $5 and started to play Street Fighter IV for the first time! I was so excited. But my excitement dulled over time as I realized it didn't really have the same feel of the classic 2D games. It's an OK game but nowhere near as good as I imagined it would be. Graphics are fantastic but that's about it. I miss the 3rd Strike characters and the good feel of the game, it's just missing now.

After that I went to McDonalds for supper. They have a pretty good selection, in fact there are two different panels, one for beef-based burgers and the other one for chicken-based burgers. The important thing is that they had an equivalent of the long-lost Big Xtra burger from back home, called the McFeast Deluxe! I was in heaven! Unfortunately, they have this strange option for ordering: namely, you have to select if you want the regular, medium, or large size menu. Their large is our medium! I guess it's no wonder people are getting fat in North America when they have different concepts of what is medium and what is large. Also, Burger King is called Hungry Jacks here, but I haven't tried any yet. Oh yeah, and Coca Cola tastes terrrrrrrrrrrrrrribbbbbbbb

bbbble here! It's the worst stuff ever! Tastes fake or something. My favourite drink of Coke on the Rocks™ has been desecrated. Oh well, it'll be something to look forward to when I get home.

So now I am headed to a bar for the first time to try some Aussie-beer. Should be heaps interesting.

Outtie.

_Joram

Wednesday in Sydney

2008-09-26T02:57:00.000+10:00

Well Wednesday was a bit of an overwhelming day for me so I basically went to sleep afterwards. Basically we had an orientation session that lasted for about 3 hours. We learned about Australia and what kind of things there are to do here. We learned about housing, jobs, social events, not to touch box jellyfish, and about a surf camp. The surf camp is what I really remember from it, because I really want to do it! It sounds like a lot of fun. I have to pay around $500 for a week of lessons, but that's the fixed rate. Everything along with housing and food is provided for. So I am definitely considering it. Some people back home told me that I should learn to surf, so I might as well use that opportunity!

So afterwards I spent nearly 2 hours on the fancy iMacs they have at the IEP office, just browsing around and looking for a job and fixing my resume up. During this time my sister left to get her bank card, but when I went back to the hostel to meet her she wasn't there yet. So I waited for a long time (until about 8pm) and she finally showed up and said she met some friends and had dinner with them. It's amazing how fast this girl can make friends... so far I haven't made any yet. My withdrawn and introverted nature prevents me from reaching out. Hopefully that will change once I am forced to meet people, because tonight is the SCUBAR event with IEP so I may have to force myself to talk to people.

So I had another 12-hour sleep, I think I have no excuses about jetlag anymore. And oh yeah I missed out on my chance to see Street Fighter IV, but I'm hoping that will come up soon enough.

So long then, I'll keep reporting as long as internet is available to me.

2nd Day is done

2008-09-25T04:05:00.000+10:00

Well today was an interesting day of walking around Sydney. We walked to the harbor called Darling and went to the Aquarium and the Wildlife World. It was like a typical zoo, but more open. The sharks were pretty immense and it was cool to see them from underneath in the glass tunnels. It was pretty sweet seeing all the marsupials and animals only known to live in Australia as well. The Koalas like to sleep, so they just pretty much sit in trees and take it easy, sleeping and eating. That is the life I would like to have. We weren't allowed to touch them though because somehow there is some protection on them. Lots of interesting spiders too and some animals I have never heard about, like the Bilby, for instance.

Still haven't been to the Bondi Beach yet though, but maybe today. If I won't go there I'll probably go to the Taronga Zoo. More animals than the other place. And I may even upload photos if I remember to bring my USB cable.

As for place to stay and job, I don't have that settled yet, so I have extended the stay at the hostel. I am also excited because there is a Street Fighter IV machine near my place, I may go check it out soon. I have to make my pilgrimage to it. I just wish I had some more security and an idea of what will come next, instead of this drifting about, it's not a good feeling.

Well, later all.

Here I Am!

2008-09-24T04:38:00.000+10:00

So after about 20 hours in the air, I am finally in Sydney, Australia. So far I've just got a room and walked around the city a bit. It's awesome hearing all the crazy accents. I only have a small amount of computer time so I try to make the best of it. It's on a mac too, so I have to learn some new commands.

The worst part of the trip was the 14 hours from LA to Sydney. It was just dark outside the whole time, with the sun behind us. It finally caught up to us when we were about to land, so we got to see the Sydney Opera House and some of the other famous landmarks from the sky. It's too bad I didn't take any pictures, but I promise I will make some as soon as possible.

I met some Norwegians in my hostel room. They are backpacking for real across Eastern Australia, and were headed to Brisbane to try out surfing. The Norwegian language is very interesting, sort of sing-songy German or something, very hard to describe. I didn't understand anything so it's safe to say the language is pretty far from German. I was talking to the guy and drifting in and out of consciousness the whole time, so it was sort of interesting. I fell asleep for real about 3pm and woke up at 5am, so 14 hours of quality sleep time!

Now I have to start getting into high gear and looking for a spot to stay. Hostel will only last me so long before I get tired of sharing a room with others. Job might be fun if I'm looking for something substantial, so I might end up just taking a typical backpacker job like harvesting or something.

Basically everything looks like a big city here, nothing too interesting to report on that front. It's a combination of European and American styles, and of course the cars drive on the wrong side of the street. It's unfortunate I didn't get an international driving license, cause then I'd be able to drive around with more freedom than taking a train or bus or plane somewhere.
Next update I'll try to put some pics up hopefully.

Until then, goodbye.

1 and a bit weeks to go!!!

2008-09-13T00:24:00.000+10:00

Well I guess everything has culminated down to this. Something that was just an idea of my sister's has become a reality. I am heading to Australia for a 4-month(+?) stay and things are starting to happen. I've opened up a bank account, filed for a tax number, and I'm starting to see what kind of jobs and apartments there are to look at. This blogger format was the easiest option, so I chose it. Hopefully it'll last too.

My plans are to have fun, and to worry less. I also plan to play less games and seek out new interests, but there are no guarantees with that. I've always said in the past, and my friends and siblings can attest to this, that I wanted to give up videogames and find a new hobby, but to this day it hasn't happened yet. So I suppose I am bound to them for life. But I do appreciate nature and beautiful sites and sounds, so I'm hoping to have my eyes and ears opened to what's out there in the land down under.

I will try to update as much as I can, so that I don't fill up 4 pages with text. And I will try to put pictures in as well, even though I don't own a camera.

_Joram

New dream for 2008

2008-01-06T02:20:00.000+11:00

Last night I had a strange dream.

The dream begins in a familiar classroom. It reminds me of high school, but the people I am with don't have distinct enough faces for them to be recognizable. But we aren't facing the front of the classroom sitting in desks, instead we are all sitting facing each other, because the tables are arranged in a rectangular pattern. There are about 30 of us, and we are divided into groups of 4 by the teacher. Each group is given a large jar, a diamond-shaped die, and a stencil plate of different sized circles. Although I can't remember what the assignment is, we only have half an hour to complete it.

As we exit the classroom to begin our assignment, I realize that the classroom isn't inside a school. It is actually in the middle of a bustling town in the winter time. The classroom is basically a large box building without a roof, with windows looking inside of it. Yet we manage to find another classroom to do our assignment in close by. It turns out the jar is full of little play figures, and we have to find pairs of them to match together. All I remember is one of the pairs looks like a bee man, with a spear. So one bee-man is dressed up with lots of colours and accessories, while the other one is really plain. As we are doing our work another student walks by our table and holds up a huge list that he flashes to us quickly then hides again as he laughs. He says he has all the answers but won't give us the list. So we are frustrated at this but keep on with the assignment, trying to find matching figures. The figures have now become drawings instead of actual 3d tangible figures for some reason. I now hear commotion coming from our original classroom, and I realize we have gone over our time limit to complete the assignment.

We run towards the classroom but the doors are locked, and the windows are closed. But there is one window that is slightly open, and we pear inside to a strange spectacle. Students are running around the table in circles. They are so fast that objects situated around the classroom are being flung into the air, and a sound like a roaring wind is heard. They are all happy and laughing, playing some kind of game. I want what they have, and bang on the window but nobody hears me. It is cold outside and there is snow everywhere, I want to be in the warm classroom. Finally the teacher opens the door and asks me if I have the stencil and the diamond-shaped die with me. I do and she reluctantly lets me in.

When I enter the classroom it has become something completely different. The whole area is filled to the brim with water, and it has become a large labyrinth. I swim about frantically looking for my friends, but there is nobody around. The area is really well lit with neon greens and pinks, and I am somehow able to breathe in the water. I finally do find one of my fellow students, but he is engrossed in some kind of game that no amount of yelling or gesturing works to get his attention. After some more swimming around, I find a girl that is about to be eaten by a large pink beast with one eye and a lot of tentacles. But she is stuck in one place, spinning her diamond-shaped die over and over again thinking it will somehow save her from the creature. I try to rescue her and pull her away but a large stone door crashes down in front of me, separating us.

I wake up at this moment and realize it is 8:30, and I am late for work.

Christmas Dream

2007-12-26T20:48:00.000+11:00

Now I lay me down to sleep,
I pray the Lord my soul to keep;
And if I die before I wake,
I pray the Lord my soul to take.

Ah yes.... dreams. I love it when they come to me and they are wacky. This particular one I unfortunately forgot the ending to, but the middle parts are interesting as well.

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Me and some friends are heading to an amusement park. It isn't Canada's Wonderland because as we arrive the layout is way different and there are different rides. I'm not sure what it is though, but there is a parking garage at this park instead of a large area parking lot. So we drive up in a spiral to find our spot, park and then head into the park.

As we get through the entrance, a sinister fellow grabs me and leads me away from my friends to an amusement that he runs. My friends just keep walking and don't notice I've been taken away. This particular amusement is very curious... basically I have to stand in a circle on a grassy knoll and swing a large model airplane on a chain and let it go so that it can hit a target on the ground ahead of me. The targets look like a children's hopscotch game, with numbers inside squares. So I agree to the game, but unfortunately the guy running it tells me it costs something extra (outside of the park entrance fee). Curiously, he doesn't tell me the exact price. I panic and fumble through my pockets, but all I can produce is a 5-dollar bill. The man is really upset and angry, and tells me it costs $30 to swing the large model airplanes into the targets. Just as he is doing all this, I remember I forgot my parents' dog in the car! The scene ends.

I am now standing in front of a parking garage stairwell entrance. As I enter it, I realize it isn't a stairwell after all. It is a small bathroom! But there is no toilet or sink, just a bathtub with a shower and curtain. My dog is in the bathroom as well, and instead of being a mixed-breed beagle like he is supposed to be, he has become a small black terrier dog! "Bandit!" I say to him, and pet him. I decide to take a shower, and I remember it takes me a long time to finish. But as I finish, I look down in horror to see a black furry splotch down at my feet... it seems the dog has melted in front of me while I was in the shower. I panic again and look around, yelling his name. I then notice out of the corner of my eye that he has run out of the bathroom and is running away in the parking garage.

I chase after him yelling his name but to no avail. Then I remember a trick that always makes him come to me. I yell, "Bandit, come eat it!". This make him run to me hoping for food, but as he gets close I grab him and throw him into the bathroom to lock him up. This is when something odd happens: suddenly my kid brother is standing in front of me. He says he wants to join me and my friends in the park. But I tell him no, you are too young, and I lock him up in the bathroom. As I turn around and leave I hear him yelling and banging on the door, begging me to take him with us. But I am stubborn and refuse to look back.

When I am with my friends again - I don't remember this part of my dream vividly - they question why I did such a cruel thing, and that him being 12 years old, he could have joined us no problems. I ponder what they said for a while, but soon ignore it as we have fun on the rides.

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So that was my dream, well, what I can remember of it. I have no clue what th interpretation could be, but I'm sure it's something interesting. I really should start to have a notepad beside my bed so I can remember all the key details of my dreams, cause there is some wacky stuff that goes on in them. But sometimes I wonder why can't I just dream of beautiful women like normal guys do? Oh well that's life, can't control what I dream about. Hope everyone has a good Christmas break!

-JoRAM

Dream Last Night

2007-08-27T07:53:00.000+10:00

I always love it when I have dreams and I can remember most of the details within the dream after I wake up. Mostly the contents of the dream slip away as I slowly gain consciousness. But this one I had last night is as vivid as a real memory. And here it is.

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Me and about 10-15 friends are on a bus ride to a destination known to us. We know what the destination is but I'm the only one that has been there before. I describe this place to my friends and they look on in interest as I list all of it qualities. We are going there for a seminar. We want to learn about Yoga and mystic beliefs, and this seminar will enlighten us all.

As we arrive and get out of the bus, I realize we are in the Czech Republic, in Prague. I don't know what language my friends are speaking but I know I can understand them. It is night time and the building we have arrived at overlooks the old city and it looks beautiful from up there. All the centuries-old buildings are illuminated with various colours and it is something out of a dream. All my friends are ecstatic and note that we will all have a great time.

The actual building is square and painted white. Even though it is late evening, I can see it being lit by coloured lights and there are magnificent gardens surrounding it that we are currently walking through. All kinds of different flowers and plants are arranged together in intricate patterns. We descend some stairs and turn the corner and enter the building. There are lots of other students everywhere as well, chatting it up and busy running around finding their classrooms. It seems like this weekend there are students from all over the place wanting to learn about various subjects.

As we enter the classroom, the room is small and there are chairs arranged in a circle. The teacher introduces herself and we begin to learn. This is where I forget some details, but I just remember lots of 'red flags' going up as I learn this teaching. The next part I remember is I am sitting in another chair in the room. It's almost as if I dozed off and someone transported me to another chair. But as I'm waking up, I feel someone nudging my shoulder. It is Mariusz, a guy I used to live with a few years ago. He is a really spiritual guy, and always really gets into it in church services. Anyway, he hands me a 345mL bottle that says 'Jäger' on it. It take it from him and leave the classroom.

I turn left out of the classroom door and make my way out of the building. There are still throngs of students outside the classrooms being noisy and sociable. 'Shouldn't they be in their classrooms?', I wonder. One of the rooms I walk by, I peer inside and see mathematical formulas on the blackboard. 'Now there is a learning that is based on science and fundamental logic', I muse to myself. Who needs this hocus-pocus mystical learning, right?

The whole time I am walking I sip on my drink, dunking it back to get a good swig of it. The bottle never seems to go empty. It tastes like carbonated apple juice. I finally make it out of the building on the opposite side we entered. There are many smaller buildings on the property that I walk by. It is a busy place, many people walking about, and there are merchants trying to sell their goods to people. They are yelling out to everyone about their good deals, since it's almost closing time. As I'm walking I realize I am heading towards a large church.

As I enter the church I realize it is on top of a hill sloping down. So the main sanctuary goes along with the natural formation of the hill that I am on, descending down very steeply. It looks like one of my old lecture halls in Guelph university. Only the front podium is lit up. I walk slower and slower, so slow that people behind me have to pass me by. To my far left I see some students I used to go to Guelph with that I never assumed were Christians. 'Why are they here?', I wonder. But the closer I get to the altar, the more scared I get. I realize this isn't a place for me and I turn around and head back up. As I'm leaving, I think about two 'demons' that I have. The first one is Unbelief, and the second one is Lust. These are 2 things that I struggle with the most in my life, and even though I need them exorcised from me, I still leave the church with a guilty conscience.

As I'm heading back to my classroom, all the buildings I passed before are different. One is now an expensive restaurant, and I see all the tables set up with their fancy tableware and waiters rushing about. Rich patrons chat their idle chatter and drink their expensive wines. I realize that my drink is almost empty now. I quicken my step, hopefully I'm not missing too much of the class that I was supposed to be in. But as I get closer and closer to my classroom again, I become more and more afraid. What awaits me in the classroom? I can't just sneak in the back, because my chair is right in the front. I am so scared of the teacher making a comment that I wake up from my dream.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

That is the dream. I don't know what I means right now, I'm still trying to sort it out. And I think I forgot some details of it, which sucks. Hopefully one day humankind will invent devices that record our dreams, but until then, we will have to rely on memory alone.

I think a lot of things in the dream are manifestations of my real life. I was in Prague, and I have been questioning my Faith the last few years. I am leaning more towards Atheism as I listen to lecturers such as Richard Dawkins and Sam Harris. I have read websites that try to prove that Jesus never existed, particularly by Earl Doherty, who makes a good case. I am starting to lose my Faith very slowly, but I don't want to turn to mysticism either. That sort of thing is even more bogus than Christianity. Either way, I hate thinking that we all evolved, since our minds are so complex and full of imagination, everything in our universe has such perfect constants that allow us to live here, nature has such a divine aesthetic to it that I can't help but think there was a Creator that imagined it for His pleasure and to ours.

End of the summer

2007-08-15T08:08:00.000+10:00

ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

h

Well it has been a decent summer. It started in May when I quit my job (one of the stupidest things I have ever done, why didn't anyone try to stop me??), and it's just kind of slowing down now as we head into September. I know we still have some weeks left, but give me my moment here, ok? 'End of Summer' sounded like a good title that sort of jumps out at you amidst all the silly applications that facebook has been offering us recently.

So in May I went to an intense bible study thing at York University for about a week. We went thru the first half of the Gospel of Mark, doing a 'manuscript style' study that really opened up the whole world of Jesus life to me like I've never seen it before. The miracles of healing and everything that I have known Jesus for all my life sort of fell into second place after discovering what a great humanitarian he was and how radical his ideas and parables were. Although I didn't make any real new friends, it was nice to be in a place where people were focused on one thing and we had no distractions.

Moving back with the parents was a big nightmare for me though. After living semi-independently for about 2 and a half years, living with them was not fun. Everything came back, the having to do chores and getting nagged by mom almost every week got on my nerves. And I'm sure I got on my parents' nerves as well. My brother Tommy enjoyed the new 42" plasma HDTV with the xbox360 and wii, but I kept getting the vibes that I should move out of there.

I met some new people playing volleyball at Ash Bridges Bay. That was fun, and through it I got to go to one of the guy's cottage one weekend. What a great time! Although I didn't enjoy the fact that everyone now knows I snore like a MOTHER. Curse my bent nose of shame! It was up in Muskoka Lakes area, and I got to ride on a very sweet motor boat and jump off a boathouse into the water. The food was great too that we had. Some things going on that I didn't participate in but only observed included: drinking games, poker playing, swimming, wakeboarding. So I missed out on a lot of fun, but I'm a big BAWK BAK BAK BAK BAAAAAAAK, so no surprise there really.

In June I got to go to a dance club for the first time ever. I was a bit freaked out by the experience, and probably will need to get forced into one again. Lots of nice girls but once again just sort of danced on my own trying not to make body contact with anyone. The music for the most part was decent, not too much hip-hop and rap, but lots of remixed top-40s hits. I don't think I drank enough to have a good time though, because everyone I was with seemed to be enjoying themselves a lot. I guess I'm just a stick in the mud. But it's amazing how girls you see every day who look so plain almost look like models when they get all dressed up and make-up, why can't they look so good all the time? Does it take that much work to look beautiful? For me I just wake up and I look like a million bucks, as you can see in my current profile photo.

Then I went out for coffee with someone that shall remain nameless, but knows who they are. It was a giant hour-long awkward moment for me, and I hope it doesn't happen again. I wish I was more of a sociable person than I am, I hate the long pauses where nothing is said for what seems like minutes at a time. That just led me to believe the coffee is from the devil himself, and I will just drink tea for the rest of my days.

At the end of June my previous company that I quit from called me back to do work for them again that I hadn't finished when I was there (d'oh!). I reluctantly agreed and made the stupid decision to help them out. And that's where I am now, 1 month of doing hardly anything and wasting time with work that I thought I'd never do again. They pay me the same as before too, and to top it off I have to drive back and forth to Mississauga from Waterloo every day which adds to the annoyance. It's like I never quit, and my dad whom I'm supposed to be working for now instead is getting upset that I am back at my old company again. Why didn't they hire a replacement for me I shall never know... after all I gave them a 6-WEEK NOTICE FOR CRYING OUT LOUD!! Maybe there's nobody stupid enough to do my job for such low pay.

My Europe trip was just so-so. My dad drove us around for like 2500 km all across Europe in 10 days. All I remember from the trip now is the boring driving bits. Even though it was nice to see the different landscapes and road signs, those got tired after about 2 hours. What else can be said than, don't go on vacation with an irate sibling and a father who is completely opposite from you in every possible way. 3 incompatible people does not a happy vacation make! Even though we all share some similarities, there are key differences that make us all annoyed with each other. I'm a big whiner and don't want to walk a lot, therefore hiking sucked when I was with them. My sister is very no-nonsense and just wants to see the sights and leave, while my dad wants to take it slow and go about things in a more relaxed style. Plus visiting his (our) relatives in Czech Republic was the most excruciating experience for her, since she understands none of the language and my dad would go on for hours speaking it with relatives I didn't even know existed. I understand it a bit, but not enough to really keep a decent conversation going. So I was always stuck in the middle.

This summer was also a pretty decent summer for movies. Although Spider-Man 3 and Pirates 3 were a bit disappointing, I loved Bournce Ultimatum, Knocked Up, and Superbad. Great movies that just made me fall in love with movies all over again. Simpsons was ok, and Ocean's 13 I didn't see. Transformers was just a big spectacle of computer graphics plus some good old fashioned charm, and the girl was pretty hot too (looked like a younger Jennifer Connoly). I saw Mr. Bean and that sucked hard, way too kiddy and not enough of the annoying Bean that pisses people off for me to like it.

So that was the summer pretty much in a nutshell. I'm sure I left some things out, but I don't want to bore people anymore. I applaud anyone that has read through this lengthy note, and I hope it doesn't get lost in the shuffle of application notices and advertisements have have recently clogged up our favourite addiction.

Peace out, and enjoy the rest of the summer everyone!

-Joramee

Europe Trip 2007

2007-06-29T07:50:00.000+10:00

June 21-22: We left on the plane and got to Vienna in 9 hours or so. We got the rental car and visited the town of Mikulov before heading to my uncle's wedding hotel, the Hotel Moravia

June 23: This was the wedding of my Uncle Paul to our new Aunt Marcella. I gotta say she is the nicest girl I've ever seen him with and I hope it lasts!

June 24: Today we went to the most famous caves in Moravia, Punkva Caves. This is where a famous Abyss resides called the Macocha (=Step Mother in Czech). It looks nice but the picture my sister took sucks, sorry :-(

June 25: This was Prague Day. We visited the city and took lots of pictures. It was a cool city to visit, I recommend it to everyone.

June 26: This was Dresden day. We visited the museums there and saw Raffael's Cistine Madonna (the one with those little angels in the bottom).

June 27: Today we went to Karlovy Vary, the famous spa city of Czech. Some nice sights as always, the Europeans really know how to do fine architecture.

June 28: It was time to leave Czech Republic behind and go to Germany. We had lunch with dad's old college buddy and headed to the grandparents. We probably did something else today besides that but I've forgotten already :-(

June 29: We went to Stuttgart in the morning and to some relatives in the afternoon. Also saw my grandpa's gardens.

June 30: We headed down south-east to view the Neuschwanstein Castle and Hohenschwangau. At the end of the day we rested at a bed & breakfast in Berchtesgaden.

July 1: We went up to Hitler's old house, the Eagle's Nest, and saw a great view of some of the Alps. Then in the afternoon we visited the Salt Mines, which was pretty cool.

July 2: We took the long trip from Salzburg to Vienna. This took roughly 3 hours by car. By the end of this week my dad was tired from driving so many kms. The plane trip lasted long too, about 10 hours or so in total and by the time I got home I was dead tired.

hopefully I'll post more pictures of my trip once Anna lets me have them.

-j

to Europe again...

2007-06-07T07:16:00.000+10:00

Ah man.

I don't know what I was thinking paying over $1000 to go to Europe. But it's my Uncle's wedding and he's turning 50 the next day, so it's a special occasion. The last time I was in Germany I really screwed it up. I was there for 4 months and didn't even go travelling. I just sat glued to a computer screen all day and then went and hung out with my grandparents afterwards. It was the worst 4 months of my life and it was also the hottest summer Germany has seen in a long time, or the whole of Europe for that matter.

I got angrier and angrier, and wrote a blog every once in a while. I let some friends view it as well, and they wrote me words of encouragement from time to time. But I fear I went insane during that time, and I don't want to repeat it. This time I want to take pictures, make friends, enjoy life a bit more. I will be going with my sister Anna and my dad, so it will be an interesting mix.

Our trip will take us to Prague, Vienna, Dresden, Munich, and Stuttgart. It will be amazing landscapes and centuries old architecture, it's just so refreshing seeing such a rich culture after living in such a new country like Canada for a long time. It will also be nice to get away from the games and movies that I seem to be addicted to.

I was also made to practice some piano songs to play at the wedding. I haven't played piano in ages so I hope I will have enough time to practice and put out a half-decent performance. I definitely don't want to screw it up, even though it will only be about 40 people or so.

A bad thing happened though once I came back to Canada in September 2003, after my trip: I accidentally gave someone I met a link to my web space where I was complaining about my trip to Germany! SO I really got in trouble for that and he shared it with other friends I met and they kept bugging me about it on ICQ for a while after that. But I haven't spoken them in years since I gave up using ICQ. So it will be interesting to meet those people again, albeit briefly, to see what they have to say to me face-to-face.

Also I'd like everyone to get into a big circle, hold hands, and just pray for me. Do it now. Get up from whatever you are doing and just join hands. Pray to whichever god you pray to. Or if you're not religious look into your inner-self and pray to it. Just send me your good vibes... yes, I'm feeling them. Thank you, thank you.

I have finally gone mentally insane right now. Anyone know of any good Insane Assylums in the area? Drop me a line!

-jorameeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee

LOST - Through the Looking Glass

2007-05-26T18:52:00.000+10:00

Wow.

That's all I can say about this 2-hour long season finale. Definitely the best episode this season. Everything came together, there were massive twists, and I was left thinking about the episode for a long time. Even now! For those who haven't seen LOST yet, don't read on because there are spoilers coming up!

----SPOILER ALERT---

This episode had it all: moments of great emotion, explosions, guns, character development, questions answered, new mysteries to solve, surprises, FLASH_FORWARDS!!

The only clue I had for Jack's flash-forward was that he was using a RAZR phone at one point, which wasn't out during the time of the crash or before. And who is in the casket? Why is Jack all depressed and drinking like his dad was? Is his dad still alive? Why did nobody come to this particular person's viewing? There's just so many questions now and I think it was bold of the producers to show us that at least two of the castaways made it back to civilization. It was unprecedented and just took a lot of balls to do it, so I applaud them for it.

I also love how the line between good guy/bad guy is blurred in this show. Now I'm not so sure if Ben is the enemy or not. He obviously knew that Naomi meant trouble, and so did Locke. I was almost yelling at the screen, Jack don't be so stubborn, just listen to your people for once! If John has a suspicion just listen to him!

I was a bit saddened to see Charlie kick the bucket, but who knows... they might bring him back somehow. His purpose was fulfilled though, and he made the sacrifice... but was it the correct thing to do? Jack in the future wants to go back to the island because he is tired of lying, about what? Did they have to cover something up when they were rescued?

ARRHGHGHHGHGH

I can't wait 3 more years for this show to end, I must have the answers NOW!!

--- END SPOILERS ---

HA HA oh well, I guess I'll have to wait until February 2008 to find out what happens next, just like everyone else. I'm just glad they dug themselves out of a hole with bad stories and apparent filler episodes. I am definitely with this show for the long run, and all you out there who haven't seen it yet, WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR IT'S AWESOME!!

I have all the shows on DVD so drop me a line and I'll hook you up.

-j

Life is good once again... ?

2003-09-17T11:48:00.000+10:00

Well yes and no.

It's a strange thing, really. I came back to Canada with a lot of fun things waiting for me... but my life is empty once again. I have it all, I am back in my comfortable setting, but I am still depressed. So it doesn't make sense... why was I depressed in Germany without my computer, and am still the same now that I am back to normal? The answer is not obvious to me at all. Everything is supposed to be better here... I love eating my bacon and eggs in the morning, or just downloading movies and not worry about an internet firewall blocking my every move. I prefer my mother's cooking to my grandmother's, although it's not much of an improvement. I've just gotten so used to it that it has become mundane and boring. I crave the excitement of being independent, and not having to worry about what my parents think.

I knew that when I came back life would be different, but not so soon... my parents are already talking about me having to get a car and find a job. That's because I only have 1 class in school which isn't even every week, so I sit at home a lot and carve a niche into my computer chair. I've started organizing all my movies and games into big black folders, and that takes up some time as well, as well as making an Excel list of every video I have. But the fact that my parents want me out soon is a scary thought... I don't like that Real Life Syndrome is catching up with me... that I'm getting fat from all this non-exercise when I've been depending on my fast metabolism until now. I hate growing old... I try to slow it down by buying lots of video games, but there is no joy in it for me anymore.

At school I am with a bunch of guys working for the Department of Agriculture Canada. We are working on interfacing an RF Heater with some form of controller in order to maintain its temperature and flow rate. That's the basic idea for the project, and we have to start working on it right away. But I'm still in my lazy summer mode and don't want to do any work yet. This week we will get security passes to the facility so that we can have access any time we want. It was funny showing the authority my papers because they are all German... everyone wonders why I haven't become a Canadian citizen yet after 21 years living here. I tell them it's laziness, but is it really that, or is there something else behind it?

Yeah there just might be something that is pulling me back over there. I am used to my life here, but all my relatives live over there. Sometimes I'm confused over why my parents decided to leave the country at all... we could have lived a nice life over there I think. Now I face the dilemma of being torn between two countries... and it really hurts me on the inside. Every day I walk around with an empty feeling inside of me, as if something I need desperately is missing. I have been so deep in my computer world that I haven't realized that there are people out there trying to 'interface' with me so to speak, to try and communicate with me and get to know me. I don't know why people care about me at all, I'm kind of a loser.

My attitude going to Germany was that I would talk to nobody, make no friends, make no business connections, work only the bare minumum at work, and just get out with no loose ends. But there is an invisible rope that was tied to me over there, and it is still around my waste and I can feel the tugging of it sometimes... I'm trying to get over it but no matter how much I try I still think about my time there. I remember all the good things... the bad things have been erased from my memory. I remember the nice people, the close relatives I haven't had contact with for years, the amazing landscape, the nice clean european cars, the beautiful architecture in the old parts of cities, the greatest train system in the world, the tasty bretzels (only in Schwabenland), the sweet smell of the Döner (which I never tasted), the funky Euro-Pop on the radio (of which I have downloaded many songs and videos in the last couple of weeks), the strange 220V plugs with the humongous prongs, the cool currency EUROS, the interesting dialects of German heard everywhere, and yes I even miss the cigarette vending machines of all things. It's not fair... no matter how much I try to forget about it, I still remember them and I hear that little voice that beckons me to come back. HOW DID THIS HAPPEN? HOW DID I GET THE GERMANY VIRUS?

Anyway, now that I am stuck between two great countries, it's hard for me to decide where I want my life to go. Something that would really pull me back for good would naturally be a nice girl, but unfortunately nothing in that area happened over there. Strike 1. I screwed up at my job and didn't try hard, so they won't want me back. Strike 2. The German road system scares the living daylights out of me. Strike 3. So you see, I'm not cut out to be there... it is not my place. And no country is perfect and everyone has its own problems. I might as well deal with the problems here around me than over there. That empty space in my life will get filled up soon enough, it's just taking its sweet time, that's all. I just have to be patient and keep living my life the way I'm used to.

I think I will leave this journal up for all to see it. I know by mistake I accidentally told somebody from Germany about it, and he told one person and then he told the next, so in a chain reaction everyone at least from the youth group at the church there knows about this site. I had written some stuff here before about how good the girls looked and then erased it after, because I was too embarassed to leave it up there. It was written in the wrong frame of mind anyway, so it's better not to be left there. But I will probably not add any more information after today. I will continue to write a journal though as gay as it sounds, because it helps me sort out my thoughts and is just something cool to do to spend the time.

The other day I looked at the journal I had started when I was going out with a girl, and it was neat to see what I was thinking back then in 1998-1999. But that was all written by hand, not over the internet for the public to see. I might make a new website though, I have plenty of time and I finally have a little drive to do it... although ultimately I have no motivation for life. The weird bumps on my neck are still there but I am too afraid to tell anyone about it, but as long as I don't experience pain everything's ok. Now that I have a gameboy advance SP I play games on the way too... I was thinking of buying a notebook computer but some friends told me that was a stupid thing to do, so I'll just buy a regular desktop PC worth around $2000. That will make me happier I think...

So that was the last 4 and a bit months of my summer in Germany. It was good and bad, that's what I tell people. But it's time to move on and open up a new leaf in my book, because I can't stand it anymore with my old routines... it's almost as if I am moving backwards in life, always going back and reminiscing the good old days. I had been stubborn before and not wanted a girlfriend, but now more than ever I really feel that is what I'm missing. But the most important thing is my walk with God... I have neglected that portion of my life in a very big way. My Bible sits dust-covered under my bed, just begging to be opened. Perhaps I shall delve into it again. Yes I am a Christian, or at least I'm supposed to be one. I haven't exactly lived the perfect example, but I know what's right and wrong, and being a fence sitter isn't going to get me anywhere. I know The Truth, but I have never embraced it.

So long, farewell, aufwiedersehen, goodnight.

-j

I'M BACK IN CANADA!!!

2003-09-07T10:39:00.000+10:00

Wow that was quite a ride. 4 months alone (almost) in the strangest, most wonderful land I have ever experienced. As I look back at my previous entries, I am a little worried about how strong I expressed myself in various instances. But I think it's wrong to just go back and start editing and sensoring everything. In real life you can't change the past, so I will leave it the way it is. I did change some stuff though, here and there, usually to protect people's identities or to soften up some harsh criticism. I have no idea if I will continue this journal now that I am back in my domain (by the computer, with games and videos to keep me busy), but it all depends on my free time (which as it turns out I have a lot of this semester), or my general passion for it.

Well the last couple of weeks in Germany were actually pretty good. I was going to go visit that family again, but I was too afraid to set up a train ride to go there and so forth. I hate how I am such a scared little person, afraid of making steps forward in life. I am happy in my comfort zone and never venture forth into the unknown. That is why I'm afraid I will probably never get a girl, because I will never even have the courage to ask her out! Yeah that is pretty sad indeed... some say my immersion into the computer culture has destroyed me as a living functioning human being. I hope that is not the case, because I would hate to let go of this little 'hobby' of mine.

I finished my work without a hitch, saying goodbye to everyone in my section and so forth. That was pretty uneventful to say the least, some workers didn't even know it was my last day! That's how separated I was from the other employees during my work term there. I will probably never get hired by them again, but all is my fault for sure. I'm just a little man afraid of communicating via voice with people. Scary fact.

So I basically sat around doing nothing the second last weekend in Germany. I did take the train all the way to the Stuttgart Airport though, that was a bit of an event. The Stuttgart Airport is really neatly laid out in several levels, sort of like concentric circles if you view it from the top. It has a very nice design and is also very small. I had to pay 2 Euros to go onto the observation deck, which I thought was rather appalling. And once I was there, 2 meter high railing that looks pretty much like a jail cell obstructed my view of the planes. But I guess they gotta be careful that nobody falls down from there, so that kind of precaution is necessary. Going home I witnessed a funny scene in the S-Bahn: a lady with a walker came into the train and wanted to sit down. So the gentleman sitting in the seat next to the door made room for her. But it turns out he made room for her on the wrong seat, because she couldn't set her walker in the right position! So she started cursing and complaining really loudly and everyone looked towards the scene to see what was happening. Eventually the man was fed up with her and went to sit in a different area! A girl sitting in front of me started to crack up, and I almost laughed too at the humourous situation unfolding before me. The icing on the cake though came when she wanted to get out... the man actually got up off his seat and opened up the door for her! I couldn't believe it, this guy who had been totally razzed by the lady turned the other cheek and gave helpfulness in return for rudeness. So the lady suddenly changed her attitude and made some friendly chit-chat with him while he helped her outside the train. It was a very interesting comedy routine for me.

So now comes all the good stuff. On Tuesday, right before lunchtime, me and my grandparents headed out to the waiting bus that would take us to the camp. It was a sad time for us when we said our goodbyes, because I had the feeling I would never see them again. They are already well over their 70s, and it's a good chance I will see them the next time in another place besides this earth. My gramma especially had been really nice to me those 4 months, and I was glad she washed my clothes and made me dinner every day. Although I didn't like her cooking especially, I got used to it and even liked some of the stuff. That day I also had my last German Pretzel, with butter smeared in the inside... mmmmmmm I can taste it right now how good it was. Just one of the many things I will miss from Germany, the Schwäbisch Bretzel.

The Freizeit (camp in German) is located in Bad Endbach, a little town about 30km from Marburg, which in turn is about 100km away from Frankfurt. It is a nice little place where you can relax and enjoy your time there. Basically I paid around 200 Euro for about a week, which includes food and bedding and so forth. There are lots of nice places to take hikes and the actual house has a volleyball court outside, along with some hilarious copies of basketball nets that look nothing like real North American ones. When we got there we bumped the ball around without the net. But I am getting ahead of myself here.

Although the church that I attended was boring for me, this place was always interesting every day. I thought I would hate the camp but I really liked it, and it was a nice conclusion to my rather disappointing visit to Deutschland. I actually found out a lot about myself and got to know some of the young people there and their stories. It turns out the church services are boring because all the elders are too bent on their traditionalistic ways, but the younger generation that will lead the church eventually are completely cool. They have a vision to break down the rituals and laws set by the older generation, which is very promising. Although they are really good Christians, they want to move forward and let go of some of the old ways; for example: the girls are expected to wear a head shawl when they pray, wear long skirts all the time, keep their hair at least past shoulder length in a braid or pony tail (no flowing hair that's a no-no) and wear no make-up or jewelry!! That's insane I think, and thank goodness none of the girls were too bent on those rules when I was there. But they didn't go completely opposite by wearing piercings everywhere or wearing tight revealing clothes or anything.

The entire youth group was actually really cool. They seemed to get along really well and they always did activities at night when I was trying to sleep. I would always go to sleep at 9:00pm sharp, and they would come back around midnight to 1:00am and wake me up! So eventually I just gave up and stayed awake listening to loud music while I waited for them to get back. I was in a room with 3 other guys, like any typical camp girls and guys are separated which makes sense of course. Anyway the one guy let me use his laptop and play games on it, that was nice of him, and his brother helped me out with the German train system and set up my complete train route and connections so I could get to the airport! So they are a really nice bunch of people and I always felt good and accepted amongst them... the last day I was actually forced to come see what they did at nights, and we played some games where I had to act out a scene in pantomime where someone has to guess what I'm trying to do. That was fun for me, and once they saw I did some funny acting they kept asking me to perform for them! Eventually I got tired of that though, and was totally drained out at the end. When I left the room where they had met, I put on my PJs and wanted to go to sleep. But they surprised me by showing up outside my bedroom door and personally saying goodbye to me every one of them. They even gave me a goodbye card because I was leaving early in the morning the next day... it was happy times for me, and I *almost* forgot all the pain and suffering I had gone through this summer.

The older ones in the youth even did some presentations during our evening services, which were always interesting to see. They were pretty much based on the theme of how amazing God has created the animals of the earth... one particular 2-part presentation talked about the box jellyfish from Australia and how a guy had been killed by one and come back to life! No joke! His name is Ian McCormack. We watched a video of his testimony (he is a Kiwi, so I understood what he was saying, and the translator in the video actually mistranslated some things) of how he died from the jellyfish stings and saw hell and heaven and then came back! It was pretty bizarre, but I believe it is true because of how sincere he gave his personal story, and how he came to Christ after he was brought back to life.

As for the dreaded sports, they ended up being not too bad. Volleyball on hard asphalt was the main sport played, and even I can play that to some degree. So it was not bad. Other events we did together was taking a trip to Marburg and climbing to the castle there on top of the hill... hundreds upon hundreds of steep steps with no elevator in sight! I wish I had pictures, oh well... maybe next time eh.

The church services in the mornings were interesting too. There was a pastor there from Slovakia named Alexander Barkóci that needed to be translated while he preached, and he talked about things like driving demons out of people in the name of Jesus, which is always interesting to hear. He spoke on the theme of putting on the Armour of God, from the 6th chapter of Ephesians. And lo and behold, none of the services were boring for me! And since I understand some Czech, which is the sister language to Slovakian, I even understood some of the things he said right when he said them without having to wait for the translation. His family was there with him too, and his oldest son especially, he was like a prodigy and could play the piano by ear completely. Some girls from the youth performed a small ensemble piece with him, playing their flutes and violins and guitar, it sounded pretty sweet.

As a whole church community (including the middle-aged parents and the older folks as well), we didn't do that many things together. The only one I can remember is taking a walk on an old railroad line that included marching through a 700m long tunnel completely in the dark. The good news about the whole camp experience is that is was captured by several digital cameras, and eventually I might even post some pics here if they send me the picture compilation CD. Yeah so all in all, the camp was one of the many highlights of my time in Germany, and I will miss the youth from there especially all the pretty girls, but my place is here in Canada and I gotta do what I can with what I got here. Yes there are nice babes in my area too, but I will always compare them to those German gals. Heh heh I am so pathetic, I'm trying very hard NOT to come across like a perverted old man when I say these things, but I can assure you that I am completely pure in mind about this matter, so think what you will, Jesus knows my true thoughts. I almost cried when I had to say goodbye to all of them.

The last day in Germany was interesting for me, because I had to take a train (InterCity) for the first time and it was LATE by 10 minutes!! The whole time I was on it I was shaking all afraid that I would miss my connection to the Frankfurt Airport, because this particular train only went to the main Station instead of the airport. I accidentally sat in the SMOKING car of the train, but since I had my suitcase and bags and I was tired, I didn't bother changing cars. I endured the clouds of smoke with much determination. Oh yeah an interesting thing about Germany: lots of people actually ROLL THEIR OWN CIGARETTES!! It's funny to observe them doing this, it almost looks illegal to me but it's probably not. Anyway the train was a nice smooth ride, better than the regular trains, I could barely hear the wheels grinding on the track. There are different levels of trains, this one wasn't even the best one. The best train is the ICE(InterCityExpress), which goes really fast up to 250km/h I think. I never got to ride one of those but maybe next time... they also look really sexy, especially the new aerodynamic model ICE-3, I have never seen such a nice design for a train, not even the ones from Japan. So I arrived late in the main station and didn't even get to look around, I had to RUN with a heavy suitcase past 6 tracks, and when I got there one of the train personel said no worries, they are not leaving yet! So all that running for nothing. When I got on the train I discovered I was in the car with reserved seating, so I just went to one of the doors and stood there with my baggage for about 10 minutes to the airport station. At the airport I headed towards Terminal 1, being stupid and not taking one of those luggage waggons. It was a long walk indeed, and I had to stop several times to collect myself... not only was my bag-suitcase-thingy-hybrid

ripped in one area, one of the wheels was busted and it was exteremly awkward to pull it along. My flight ticket said that Air Transat was in Terminal 1, but it turns out it was in Terminal 2!!! So I had to take an airport shuttel to that terminal. Once I got there I had to walk all the way to the other end of it to get to the check-in area, only to have to wait behind about 30 people or so. That took a good hour checking in the baggage. But it was nice hearing people speak English again, at least the ones standing in line. At the Frankfurt airport they actually check your luggage for illegal materials right in front of you... I got to see the monitor and was amazed how sophisticated the x-ray machine was, it could see everything!! As I waited for my plane to board, I went to a German McDonalds for the FIRST TIME!! Yes I had to do that at least once. McDonalds' current slogan in Germany is 'Ich Liebe Es' (I love it). The menu is based upon the American one I think, so there was no Big Xtra (my fave) in sight. Therefore I picked what looked the closest, a burger called the 'Hamburger Royal TS'. It tasted close enough, but I didn't like the fries too much. After that I found a Samsung Internet Station (free, for reasons following), and checked out all the emulation news I had missed out on. As it turned out, not much... MAME v. 0.73b had been released, other than that nothing. I tried to send an email to my brother via Hotmail, but it was strange: the mouse pointer periodically became an hourglass while I was typing... it was almost as if I was being spied by the STASI or something, making sure I wasn't writing some bad stuff!! And the A and P keys didn't work to well, along with the spacebar, so it took a good 15 minutes to write a short 1-paragraph message! Then after my fun I headed thru customs and waited for the plane boarding to begin.

The plane flight was pretty uneventful. No delays, no turbulence, smooth sailing through the clouds. The inflight food looked terrible so I always refused it when they tried to force it upon me. Only at the end I took some NASTY pretzels that stuck in my teeth, and a mint and water on the rocks. Inflight movies were Bringing Down the House (which sucked really bad unfortunately), The Italian Job (which I slept through, unfortunately, because I was dead tired at that point), and get this: FINDING NEMO!!! As soon as the PIXAR logo showed up I frantically unravelled my headphones and was actually expecting an old classic, not this completely new film. I liked the film, but I felt I lost something from it because it was in full-screen format presented on a wide screen, so major stretchy issues, and the sound was mono (booo), and the colours washed-up, and I had to stretch my neck to see it because of bad line of vision. So I will see the DivX of it which my sister thankfully downloaded while I was away. Our intermediate stop was in Halifax, and more than half the people left. That was cool because we could all choose window seats, and I picked the seat right by the left wing emergency exit. We were flying an Airbus A310 I think, with a 3-3-3 seat configuration. This family of three actually wanted to sit where I was, but the girl was too young to sit there because that particular area has huge leg room because the door is between the seats. It was amazing seeing all the cloud formations from above, and it took F-O-R-E-V-E-R to get to Toronto. It seriously seemed to take forever, I was so anxious to get home. Another highlight from the flight was catching a nice long glimps of the NIAGARA FALLS, which I recognized almost immediatelly. They looked so small and unsignificant from roughly 20,000 feet in the air. Especially the American side, heh heh (burn). I had to fill out some customs stuff on the plane, typical Canadian Protocol BS, that was not fun. "What is the net worth of items brought in from international..." BLA BLA SARS BLA ETC. I also had to wait for my busted up bag-suitcase for almost an hour because of an unexplainable delay, and then I walked out... walked out into my country, the place I call home.

Once I got home I finally got to see all the presents I had ordered for myself while in Germany... lots of games, dvds, game books, Lego, etc. And yes it was a tearful reunion with my PC. Tearful because she was hurt by nasty worms and virii, something which I got to fixing straight away. Now she is back in nice running condition, it's just my internet was supposed to have been upgraded over the summer and it is still the same speed!! So I gotta deal with that issue still. Other than that, I am happy to be back in familiar territory, and if I could do it all again? I would have bought a digital camera, maybe at least talk to one nice girl, and maybe get out more among people instead of sitting at home doing nothing..

whew that was long. I should get a t-shirt that says "I SURVIVED DEUTSCHLAND"

Well that's all for now.

-joRAM

The last message from Germany

2003-08-21T09:25:00.000+10:00

Well this is my last journal entry for this month, as well as the last one from good old Deutschland. That is because the last few days will be hectic, finishing all the things I left for the last minute! I guess I will always be a last-minute-type-person for the rest of my life, if things keep going the way they are.

I finally got some new stuff to do, but it's not "new" per se, it's just that the program I was writing a help file for got a major overhaul, which means taking new screenshots, adding new HTML directories, and basically shuffling a lot of things around. It's definetely busy work, and I technically shouldn't be even writing this update because I need to get to work!

My manager left yesterday for his holidays, so I won't see him anymore. He was an ok person, just too busy most of the time and really awkward to talk to. Things just didn't gel very well between us it seemed. But the Germans are really careful when it comes to criticizing somebody's work, so he never actually told that I was doing a lousy job, he just kinda gave me a vibe like that. He said maybe we'll see each other again sometime in the future (ie. when/if I get a position in the company), but he didn't sound too confident in that.

The head boss guy gave me a job this week for the first time, it was just translating a document into English. Problem was, that it was edit-protected, so I couldn't change any of the writing. So we had to call up some lady and make her take off the protection. Wow how boring can life get... but I don't understand why I'm getting all the busy work AT THE END, why couldn't they find stuff for me BEFORE??? That irks me just a little bit.

I did not go see Terminator 3 and probably won't. Even though Arnie is speaking his native German in it, it's not actually him. They got some other actor to dub the voice of Arnie who can speak German very well! I don't get it, but it must be some licensing issues. Or money issues. I know this because I saw commercials for it when I was at my uncle's, and that was definetely not his voice.

I have looked at my bank records for the last 2 months and about $2000 has left my bank account in that period of time. Yikes. That's all I have to say about that. I know I spent a lot but I wish the summaries were more verbose, so that I could tell exactly what I bought with the money, instead of just telling me the store name. I thought banks were supposed to be cutting-edge these days.

I have really lost my sense of humour these last few days. I can't really laugh anymore, I'm starting to get the shakes. Why? Well I'm afraid I'm going to die... for real this time. It all started last week when I noticed some odd bumps on the back of my neck. Every day there were more bumps, now there are like 7 there. I have no clue what they are and I asked some people, who told me I should have a doctor check it. Unfortunately, health care is not free over here so I can't just do that without shelling out huge coin. Anyway, the bumps seem to go along a major artery on the left and right side of my head, and they are evenly spaced from my colar bone to the middle of my head. I'm really scared about this, I hope it's not an incurable desease or something, that would truly suck. And the last few days they have started to hurt a little as well, when I move my head around a lot. So that is why I can't come up with funny things to say anymore, because I am afraid I am living the last few moments of my life!!

Well that's it. I just have to wait about 2 weeks from now until I'm on my way home, back to reality I guess I could say. In school I have a huge design project to look forward to, with a bunch of people who I don't really know their work ethic... so it could be interesting. Also the Christian camp next week will probably suck, because they do things like sports there.

If this turns out to be my last message ever, I just wanted to say thanks to the peeps who emailed and messaged me over ICQ over the summer, you really kept me on the sane end of the spectrum. I'm glad we had the contact, it's something you take for granted until you are far away and alone. Yeah that sounds so cheesy I know... also my sister told me my computer's broken, another thing I get to look forward to when I come home. Weeeeeeeee.

see ya'll LATA (or in the afterlife?)

-Joram Andreas Nowak

Another good weekend behind me

2003-08-05T06:19:00.000+10:00

Well the message pretty much says it all. It's a good thing I have my Aunt and Uncle around, or else Germany would have been an utterly dull experience for me. During the last week I mostly just hung around at home watching TV or playing on Pascal's computer. I installed Grand Theft Auto Vice City on his comp and played it a bit. It's an amazing game and deserves all the high praise and grades it has received from the press. But Pascal plays it even more than I do, he's on it all the time. I also downloaded around 400MB worth of Capcom games (cps1 and cps2), as well as some others, and played those too while I was bored. But nothing will ever "top" this weekend, and that pun doesn't become one until the following paragraphs.

Last week my hosts were debating about where to go for the weekend. They just kept making suggestions and I kept on agreeing with everything! I am a very indecisive person, so they were a little annoyed about that. But when my Aunt started to steer towards a shopping day in Munich, I had to voice my opinion: I wanted to see nature! I mean, at home in Waterloo we've got some of the most boringly flat landscape I've ever scene, and I am so close to the Alps that going shopping in a big city somewhere would seem like a waste. So my Uncle suggested why not go to Bavaria and some of Austria to the highest point in Germany, the Zugspitze. And what a great suggestion it was indeed, because 7:00am Saturday morning, that is where we went.

The drive was pretty uneventful. Of course there were some nice scenery here and there, and we also drove through a little village called "Wank", which I thought was pretty funny, although the germans didn't get it. We also took my aunt's mom, so we were 4 in the car. Pascal didn't want to come. We kept driving south and suddenly the landscape began to get more hilly and some hills looked like mini-mountains. Most of them were green though, with huge pine trees growing all over them. There were some pretty cool long tunnels under the mountains as well. After one such long tunnel, we suddenly ended up in Austria.

Austria is very similar to Germany. The only difference I noticed were slightly different licence plates, and the road markers were opposite colours. Also gas was cheaper so we gassed up, but not until the end of the day. When we finally got to the highest mountain in Germany (which is Austria on one side and Germany (Bavaria) on the other), we were dismayed to find out the cable car (gondola thingy) was in repairs and wouldn't be fixed until mid-August. This brought my Aunt to high heights of anger, and she stormed out of the car and demanded from one of the construction workers (amidst signs of "Danger: explosives"), how we could get up to the top. Luckily she came back all happy, saying that on Germany's side there was also a way up. So we had to drive around the mountain to Germany again so we could get up.

The town at the bottom of the mountain, Grainau, had two options to go up: cable car or cogwheel train. We thought the cogwheel train was a cool thing, so we decided upon that. Also, my aunt's mom was a little afraid she would get all dizzy by the speed the cable car would go up. Now the kicker: €43 for a return-trip ticket to the top. My Uncle practically exploded in anger and disagreement, refusing to go up. Even my Aunt and her mom said it was way too much. But I didn't want to give up that fast: I told them that it was worth the price for me, because I have never even seen mountains, and to come this close to going to the top and not going, I wasn't going to do that. They were actually all surprised that I was so pationate about it, and that I didn't care about the price, being a "poor student", so they agreed to go up, as they wouldn't let me go by myself. Unfortunately my Uncle was still mad, so he decided to stay on the bottom while we had our fun.

This whole debating while we should go up or not and the eventual buying of the expensive tickets all happened while the train was getting filled up and ready to go. So we naturally assumed the train would leave without us and frantically rushed to get through the turnstiles to get in. I put my ticket in quickly and the lights flashed green and red. I pushed the bar but it wouldn't budge! So I kept trying and kept getting the flashing lights, so thinking the train was about to leave pushed the bar forward, and with some force applied the bar turned slowly and I got through. Later I found out I had put my ticket in the wrong way, and had not noticed the arrow.

The train actually ended up leaving 10 minutes after we got in, probably to wait for more customers (or suckers I guess). The cogwheel train has several cogged gear thingies running through the middle of it that grip on a special rail in the middle of the track so it can do practically 45° climbing with no issues. It felt pretty much like a roller coaster when it climbs to the highest point of the track, and probably uses the same system, only it takes 35 minutes. As we kept climbing higher and higher we saw a nice lake on the bottom, the Eibsee, which looked pretty nice. One time we had to wait for a train that was coming down, because it is mostly only one track the whole way up, except in certain sections where it splits into 2 to allow trains to pass. About 1/3 through the ride we came to a long tunnel. You could almost go insane in the tunnel, it is about 20 minutes in there and it's dark, with only dim lights in the train to see things. So naturally when we got out of the tunnel, the light at the top was blinding.

Once we got out of the train I put on long pants and a jacket, but that ended up being too much so I put the jacket away and left the pants. The air was so amazing near the top. I was surprised to see only rock, and hardly any snow at all. I guess the warm summer here even took it's toll on the highest point in Germany. There was a restaurant chalet type house there, where I could smell tasty fries, and basically you could walk around anywhere. There was even a small chapel that you could walk over to, and also an 8-seater ski lift seat, that was put out of commision and just there to show how it was before. Or something. But the view was not so good, because we were not at the complete top yet. The only way up was a gondola on a cable, and my Aunt's mom did not want to go on that. So just the two of us went up and from the bottom you couldn't even see the top because there was a cloud in the way!

The gondola ride was really smooth and only took about 3 minutes. Once we got to the very top the air was even better and the view was spectacular once the clouds moved out of the way. There was also an observation deck and restaurants up there, with people everywhere. The cool thing about this though, and the highlight of my trip, was an offshoot area where you could climb and the authorities held no responsibilities if you fell. It was pretty much ladder rungs and a steel cable that helped you get up. There is a cool cross that stands on top of the highest rock there, it is painted gold and has lines coming out the top that make it look like the sun is shining behind it, and that's where I was going. I made my way up carefully, and ended up being in a traffic jam with people wanting to get down! Once I finally made it to the cross, my Aunt took several pictures of me so that I had some proof I was up there. Maybe I will post them on this site one day. That was the coolest experience ever though, being at the very top of Germany.

When we drove home that day, we stopped at a restaurant and wanted to eat outside. But there were so many wasps that we started to complain, except for my Uncle who kept calm and laughed at how we were afraid of little things like that. I ordered water and naturally got carbonated mineral water, and some schnitzels with fries. It was pretty good. Later that night (it was about 10:00pm), we made a short - unnessesary might I add - stop at the Bodensee, the largest lake in Germany. It was useless because we only stayed for a few minutes and then left for home. The only other notable thing that night was stopping at Burger King. What is so strange about that? Well there were huge tvs showing music videos in the corners, people were allowed to smoke in there, and there was an Internet Machine too (a box with a coin-operated computer that lets you surf the net for an hour), which I had never seen before. I also tried their really cheap slurpee-wannabes, which were horrible compared to the Real Deal at 7-11.

So that was my weekend. Well Saturday only but Sunday was so boring it's not worth mentioning. I hope that I get to experience more fun times again this summer. My boss gave me some new work to do so I should be (semi)busy until the end, which is August 22. Woohoo only 3 weeks of work left, and then the last week is at a Christian camp. That should be, um, interesting I assume. No more video games though as far as I can tell, in Germany at least, so I'll miss that. Today it's back to gramma and grampas place, with an overstuffed backpack full of dirty laundry.

-Joranium

Good thing the emailing has stopped...

2003-07-24T03:16:00.000+10:00

...because there is nothing really new to report. I am bored as always, taking it easy at work every day. But this week has been different. My bosses have been starting to pay attention to me, realizing that I have been without work for a long time now, and tomorrow I will have a discussion with one of them concerning this fact. At least I think that's why... there might be some other things that might be addressed, such as my anti-socialite behaviour, and my general disconcern for everything around me. But we'll see, it should definetely be an eye-opening experience for me. Either the Germans completely retaliate once they realize their employees are doing no work for money, or they work out an agreement that benefits for all. Either way I'm really nervous about tomorrow, because I really have no excuses why I've been doing nothing but surfing the Internet for the last couple of weeks.

The worst part about work is seeing all my colleagues doing important work around me while I do nothing. I could really be helpful in many situations, but they somehow don't want to include me in their projects. It is also my fault for not talking to anyone, but I can't put the blame squarely on myself. There needs to be some communication to move things forward, IMO.

My family as of today is gone on vacation. They were staying with my grandparents the last 2 weeks but now they are headed to Austria and the Czech Republic, to visit friends and family and also to just relax. That's just my parents and my little brother, who I'm sure will be a lot of fun to have around. 8-year-olds can get on ones nerves and I'm glad he'll be gone the next 2 weeks. They will come back again during the first week of August with my sister, who has been singing in a choir for the last week. Some people get all the fun... but at least I'm making some money out of doing nothing all day.

I have started to get addicted to Internet purchases. I throw my Credit Card number around like it's a frisbee. I have spent upwards of $1000 already on all sorts of crap, ranging from DVDs to games to LEGO, of all things. Yes, the childhood plaything that I so loved back then, it has come back with a vengeance in the form of a cool Lego Racers F1-racecar. It is modelled after the Williams/BMW F1 car, and at 1483 pieces it costs about $200 CAN!! Calling me stupid and crazy for purchasing it is an understatement. It was an impulse purchase. My main problem with buying stuff online is that I buy from the most obvious choices, instead of looking for deals. This has probably cost me 100s of dollars in the past, and will be my downfall later in life (ie. buying a car or a house). I'm just really terrible with handling money, I guess.

Now that July is almost over, I am afraid of what August will bring. Perhap (gasp!), actual work? I'm keeping my fingers crossed for that possibility, but as I said before, only time will tell what is in store for me. One thing for sure is that if there are no more entries from now on, I am either really busy or have been laid off. Those are the only two options I can see now with my limited vision.

Well I'm sorry this post hasn't been so entertaining, it is mostly for me anyway, being the selfish individual that I am, as a guide post of what the situation was like on this day. All my posts are a sort of mural of my bleak life here in Germany, and my slow progress towards insanity. I wish they never would have given me this stupid documentation-editing job, because what I did with the work I did very poorly. First of all, I don't understand the software that the documention is for. Secondly, my grasp of written technical German is very poor, and the additions I made are embarrassing to read even by me. I can tell when something is written well or not. If you contrast my stuff with what was already there, it is very easy to see what stuff I wrote and what the previous guy wrote. So in short, it's a hack job.

I think that's all I can think of for now. Sometimes I think I'm in the movie Office Space, because I have all these bosses over me I don't even know who to answer to anymore. On a final note I hope that things get better from now on, in the last stretch before I come back home to reality. At least I have unlimited bandwidth and a faster connection to look forward to once I get back, I'm glad Bell changed their ways!

-J.A.N.

Finally something new to report!

2003-07-15T02:13:00.000+10:00

Well today something unexpected happened. I was sitting in the train as usual looking out the window, when in walks this really nice looking chick and sits in the bench across from me! I always dread these moments because then I can't look ahead without making it look like I'm checking them out, so I just kind of take quick glances every now and then. I also use the reflection in the window to my advantage ;-). She was about 160cm or so, sort of red-dyed brown hair tied back behind her, beautiful hazel eyes, full lips, a ring pierced through her cute little nose and yes she also had a nice body to complement her angelic face. She wasn't wearing anything too revealing though, just sort of a grey track suit.

So as I'm checking her out in my non-obvious manner, she proceeds to unzip her top to about mid level, revealing a plunging neckline that gave me a tease peak of her cleavage. That completely took me by surprise, and at first I thought she was trying to seduce me but she didn't really look at me. If only she would smile at least once, I would have melted right there. Of course being me, I didn't try to make eye-contact and just kinda enjoyed the moment, hoping my zipper could withstand the pressure. When we got out in the main train station I was afraid I wouldn't be able to walk without obvious crippling effects, but I think I made it out ok. Wow... I desperately need a girlfriend I think :-\ (or I should buy that digital camera I've been talking about!) ;-) ;-) ;-) ;-)

Well now that I've revealed my desperate side (I am human after all, forgive me), here is the story of what happened on the weekend...

My family took me with them on a trip to the western area of Germany, namely the states of Rheinland-Pfalz and Nordrhein-Westfalen. It was neat seeing the slow progression towards flat-country as we drove along. I also liked the many tall wind turbines, I thought they were kinda neat. They are about 150m high and have rotor blades with a diameter of 70m. Every one of the three blades weighs about 8t and is about 34m long. If you're wondering why I know all this it's because I did research on the internet, www.nordex.de.

The car has no air conditioning, like 90% of all cars in Deutschland, so it was open window times the whole way. Our plan was to go north and visit my dad's cousin's family, then an old school friend, next a missionary who had been in South Africa, and to finish the trip with a visit to a family I had stayed with last time I was here (7 years ago).

My dad's cousin let us sleep over at her townhouse for 2 days (friday & saturday), while we would go home on Sunday. We got there an hour late because of some construction work on the autobahn. Anyway, the house was a virtual junkyard inside. There were so many odds & ends sitting and hanging around everywhere that it was hard to breath. I don't know how these people lived there. All the food we ate was terrible and stale, and I was glad to get out when we did. The only good thing inside that house was an old european SNES, which I played with as much as I could get. The kid didn't play anymore, he is more into skateboarding now. How can somebody just give up games like that?

That day we visited my dad's old school buddy from 30 years ago. He is now one of the big bosses of the WITTE company, which designs, tests, and distributes locks for all the major car manufacturers in the World. It was amazing to see how the people worked there and how much went into designing locks and mechanisms for the automobile industry. The simulation and testing machines were just mind blowing into how much detail they went into testing parts. There was even a cool laser machine that could etch out a super-complicated part in just a few hours, whereas it would take several months to design a machine to build the same piece! They did this because they need prototypes quickly, and what did this machine cost? Oh just €2-million. !!! So this dude (his name is Mr. Rückhert), is now the head guy in this company and is responsible for over 2000 workers! Meanwhile my dad works for himself...wow I feel so proud! Actually my dad's cool, he just hasn't had that much luck. We drove to the production plant too, in his nice Audi, and saw them producing the parts in the assembly line. The factory was HUMONGOUS, but he told us that there is one 8X bigger in the Czech Republic where they do most of the production. My dad's actually going there in the next few weeks, perhaps (?) I will join him. So that was a fun day.

The next day we went to the Rhein River with my family and looked at some of the ships in the harbour. That was ok I guess, the harbourfront had a big water lock that was probably made in the 1700s that showed all the previous highwater levels of the Rhein. Some notable heights were like 9m above regular level! Then after lunch we went to visit the missionary from Africa. We watched a video of his time there, and the african people live so plain but yet they really get into it when it comes to a church service. He has a 16-year-old daughter there that me and my sister talked to for a bit. She knew English (British, nice accent) and German, so we talked to her in english. Yes she was kinda cute and blonde but unfortunately not within my age range, so I didn't make any advances.

Then we went to the city of Wuppertal, which has a really cool suspension railway that runs through the city. It goes mostly over the Wupper river, but also goes over a street a little bit too. There was a huge accident there 4 years ago where some people died, but I felt safe on it. It hung from the rails and only had two small waggons. The first way it was really crowded, but then going back to where we left the car I got to sit right behind the driver. The view was pretty cool hanging over the river, and in the corners it also rocked to the side. It was nowhere near as fast as The Vortex at Canada's Wonderland, but had a similar design. Outside at the last stop I also saw a bakery that was called "Nowak's Bakery", that was pretty sweet. So Saturday was also a fun day, but nothing prepared me for Sunday.

On Sunday it was planned that we would go to this church that the family I stayed with 7 years ago went to, and then afterwards stop by their place. I remember the good times we had with the kids back then. It was only me and my oldest sister, and at the time they had 5 kids. To make a long story short, I kinda fell for the second-oldest girl of the family back then.

She is blonde and sort of green-eyed, with an awesome smile and a really athletic body. The most important thing though, was that she made me feel good back then, building up my pathetically small self-esteem. We used to laugh a lot and have fun, and once we got to know each other more (we stayed there 2 weeks), we started to hug and stuff. Remember I was 16 and she was 12, so I was always too afraid to move forward at such a contraversial time (puberty, heh heh). But it seems girls mature quicker than guys. I felt like we had a spiritual connection, like we were meant to be together or something. Yeah I know that's cheesy. But dammit it was my first infatuation, and I'm not embarrassed about it. When we left for Canada back then, she gave me a really long hug and I remember feeling her long hair on my arms, and feeling like electricity was running through my body.

So you can understand how nervous I was to meet with this family again after 7 years. We lost our way to the church because of some shoddy directions, and had to ask people a lot for the way. When we finally found the church and walked in, I saw HER there. She was playing the bass guitar in the worship band, and she looked exactly like I remembered her. Only now, she is 19 years old, so the situation is different... or so I thought. After the church service all the now-older members of the family greeted me and I recognized them all. The only one that didn't greet me was her... only from far off, she mouthed the word"Joram". That was it!? I was so disappointed, and I had a gut feeling at that moment that would later be confirmed... she was taken. :-( :-( :-(

It turns out the oldest sister was gone that week, so I never got to see her. Other bad news was that the father, who I had looked up to, had died from cancer. As we followed the mother's van to their house, I thought back on the good times we had had, and if they could ever be repeated again. The times were so good that I had actually even temporarily forgotten about (gasp!) computer games!! Of course I got back into video games once I was back in Canada almost instantly, but for those brief weeks of bliss, my mind was free from them.

A new girl had been added to the family, so now there are 6 kids. She and the second-youngest look almost exactly the same exept for the size difference. She is only 6 years old, so it must have been really tragic losing her daddy at only 3 years of age! It almost made me choke back tears thinking about it.

So they still lived in the same place. It is a little village called Guldental near the healing springs city of Bad Kreuznach. Some roads leading up to the house were at 45°, I swear! (and yes that is a degrees symbol, the Germans have it on their keyboard why don't we???) Wine country all over that place, where backyards are full of grapevines. Really scenic! We had a barbecue that afternoon, with some really tasty meat and everything was perfect...except that 'my' girl now had a boyfriend. He came with her, and as it turned out, he was my arch-nemesis from 7 years ago! I remember he was really rude to me back then, making fun and just not being very courtious to the Canadian visitor. So that made me sad... she never really talked to me either as she was too busy with him, putting her arms around him, touching him, letting him put his hand on her leg, etc. She also hardly ever smiled anymore, and I was pretty depressed about it. That's why the whole experience there was bittersweet for me. It was a happy reunion, but with reality-bites-type stuff thrown into the mix. On another note, even if she would have been single I don't think I would have made a move anyway, because well, I'm me after all.

I did talk a lot with the third-oldest sister a lot though. I had been good friends with her back then too, but never was infatuated with her like with the second-oldest. We talked about things like old times, careers, school, life. It was the highlight of my time there. She asked me if I still draw, and I told her yes when I'm super bored or want to show off! She is a brunette and looks like her mom, while the other one is more after her late father. They are both pretty girls IMO, but damn these european chicks need to learn to shave their armpits. I think only like 50% of them do, as far as I've seen. It's just nasty, but I guess I'm just conditioned that way. I felt something between us, but I don't know about these feelings anymore. They betray me more often than not...

The only boy in the family is taller than me now at only 14 years of age. He is into skateboarding too just like all his cousins. He has darker skin that looks like a permanent sun tan, with light patches on his knees and elbows. Maybe it's some kinda weird skin condition. Him and my brother and his cousins played games outside, running around the house with wooden and plastic guns and pistols. I just sat listening to people speak. There were about 5 families there, and we were the only family that wasn't related. One cousin of the family I had stayed with had this really hot blonde girlfriend, but she didn't seem too smart to me. That was just my impression, I could be wrong though she could be a genious for all I know. Blonde is good, but intelligence makes it even better!

So in summary: boyhood crush destroyed! But you know, I think it was never meant to be. Why should I be with a German girl if I'm not going to live there? It doesn't make sense really... to tear a girl out of her homeland and force her to live in North America, no I'm not that cruel! I will try to visit the family again this summer, and hopefully I will mend my relationship with the one that I had liked (who was cold as ice this time round), and maybe develop something stronger with the family that goes beyond a dreamlike fantasy world.

To this day I will never understand how people without a tv and video games (them) can have such an enviable lifestyle, so free and content. I mean, I didn't even notice their father had died by the way they acted. My only explanation is that they got Jesus, and that's all they will ever need to live a rich, fulfilling life.

This has probably been my longest entry yet, but I'm glad I did it because I had to get a lot of things off my chest. I feel like these journal entries are a good way to organize my thoughts and learn about myself (after I read them again), and maybe some people who read them might find them amusing, or if not, well screw you nobody forced you to read it!! HA HA HA just joshin.

-Joram "Keep it Real" Nowak

The hate swells up inside me more every day

2003-07-01T07:11:00.000+10:00

I woke up today wondering what I was going to do at work today. I am now sitting here doing nothing at all, except editing the stupid manual again. The dumb thing is that other people in the department are writing manuals for the same thing I'm doing, but they are way more technical because they understand the software. I don't know how I will get through 2 more months like this, something has to give soon.

On Friday we had a little party to inaugerate the new hall across the street. It's pretty much a big warehouse where they put machines together and test them out. There are also some offices at the top with a nice view into the main area, if that is your definition of a nice view. There was some speeches at the beginning by some of the head people, including the boss of the company. He's not the big boss of teamtechnik, just of this particular location. He showed a bunch of statistics and stuff and how the company's growing. Some other guy also mentioned all the new workers since the last time they had an assembly, and I was mentioned as someone from Canada doing a practical course. WHAT?? They don't even know what I'm doing here, I thought at least somebody knew. Oh well I guess I'm the most expendible person in the company. That just confirmed my usefullness to me, and I felt even worse than usual. He also mentioned that internet use at the company will have to decrease, so we are only allowed to surf during our lunch break now. That's ok I guess, but I think I will die without a constant stream of internet all day. Then we got free beer and food, but I just ate some food and then left. It was raining like crazy, but the rain here in Germany is pretty weak compared to real rain that we know, I barely even felt it!

Gas is so expensive here I noticed the other day. About €1.15 per litre, which is about $1.70. That's crazy, so most people have diesel cars, except even that fuel costs more than our gasoline. Cars also seem weaker here, even though there are steeper and more frequent hills to get over! Sometimes I'm walking and I hear a weeny engine behine me, expecting a Mini or something. But then I turn around and it's a huge van! I don't know how they do it seriously.

The reason why I don't have any work is mostly my fault though, now that I look at it. I'm too afraid to confront my manager about more work, because I like taking it easy. But there is a limit to how easy you can take things, especially if you are milking your work to every last drop. I'm afraid that the new work will be hard stuff, and I will actually have to think about something. I am sort of on vaction from work, and they think I'm doing a practical course here instead of really doing something. I was supposed to prepare a list of problems I found in the program, as well as topics that needed descriptions. That was done more than a month ago, and I still haven't showed it to anyone. I'm too chicken to go out of my little comfort zone, and I think it will cost me big time once my manager finds out I've been doing nothing but generating fake work all over June. I'll just wait and see what happens like always.

Well that's all of my boring life for now. There's really not much more to tell. Life sucks, and will only go downhill from here... now it's back to taking it easy and pretending to be doing something useful! weeeeeeeeeeeee

-Jack 'a' Ninny

Well another week has gone by...

2003-06-24T04:58:00.000+10:00

...And there is seriously nothing interesting to tell. The truth is, there is always less and less to tell in these updates, and I'm getting tired of them. I will probably not buy a digital camera to get pictures, unless there is a good deal somewhere.

If there isn't an update here in a long time it means I either got bored or lost iinternet access. I know it looks really GHETTO right now, but there are links on the left so you can read whatever date you want, and my email's there too.

I wanted to apologize to the readers of my previous entries if they were somewhat exteremely negative or offensive. I just wanted to let out some steam, so I did it. Maybe I regret writing some things down, but the fact remains that I don't like it here very much at all.

Things have improved, though. I took the username/password of the public access internet computer at work, and applied them to the PC I do my work on. Voila! Instant Internet access. And I finally activated MS-OfficeXP, which only had about 10 days left or so. So I've been catching up on my surfing now ;-) Unfortunately, the Network Admin has locked out lots of stuff, namely Kazaa, Emule/Edonkey, mIRC, FTP, etc. It's terrible not having access to stuff, but I got around some things. The FTP issue has been solved by using an HTTP FTP service, which is luckily free.

I am still kind of stretching out my work that I got from the first day! I am adding new stuff to the help file and making sure everything matches up when I compare it to the WordDoc help. So far they are almost exactly the same, except I gotta add some more stuff to the Word Doc. I even wrote a list up of ideas of things to do, and I think the stuff I came up with is good for taking up time. But I will concentrate on getting everything done that's necessary first, and then later on add the extra things if they still haven't found new work for me to do.

As far as non-work stuff goes, my mom and my youngest brother came on saturday and Tommy's been bothering me since he first saw me. It's just like old times, except I'm in no mood for games these days. So I played a little game and locked him in my room. That scared him straight and now he leaves me alone. But he'll be back to torment me again soon, I know it. Soon my dad and my sister will join them and then 5 of us will be here in Germany for a while, at least in July.

I've been able to track down some things that I thought were not in Germany. These include peanut butter, Pringles, Subway (which I mentioned earlier), and water. They are a little hard to track down but they are there. My sister also sent me some tasty toffee treats, that'll last me for a week or so. Thanks for that btw, sissy. The water was actually there the whole time, it's still called "Mineral Water", except the label says "without carbon dioxide". Then it tastes like really good spring water! So now I take 2 water bottles to work every day, and that's GTHBA. So it's not all that bad anymore in the drink aspect of things.

I think I am starting to accept my doom here more than I used to. After reading some emails, I realized my having a job at all makes me fortunate. So I will make the best of the situation and try to find more work to do around here, once I stop being such a pansy.

It has been really hot the last few weeks without hardly any rain at all. I come home sweating like crazy every day. Here is where a shower would come in handy, but no, grandparents only have a bathtub. So it's a little awkward. When I was at my Aunt and Uncle's, I showered twice every day!

Today I met a guy at work who is part american and part german. I have seen him around the office a lot but never actually talked to him. I was shocked when he suddenly spoke perfect English to me with no trace of German accent at all! But he speaks really good American AND German, where I speak good Canadian and passable German. He is from Pennsylvania, but I can't remember his name. :-P There is a guy here from Australia as well, we get along pretty good, and speak English all the time. His name's Kristian. He's a pretty quiet type guy, and I can't understand him sometimes, but it's all cool. I need to keep speaking English or I'll come back to Canada with a screwed up accent.

I enjoy surfing the net and I hope that they won't take it away from me. It's almost like old times of summers gone by, accept for the fact that I can't access mass-downloading software networks. Oh well, I'll be sure to catch up on my DivX, Isos and mp3s when I get back.

Well June is almost over and it seems I've lived through almost 2 months. It's kind of crazy if you think about it. I hope the next two months will prove interesting rather than boring, but at least with Internet I'll be able to live through it no matter how it turns out.

-joramee out

Random musings of the past month or so...

2003-06-17T02:56:00.000+10:00

I've enjoyed typing out these long-winded entries as much as receiving feedback from people. It's nice to know that there are people out there that are interested in what you're doing all the time, even though it's not that exciting. The fact is, I'm a pretty dull boring person, so there's not really that much that goes on in my life. But when there is something, even something small, I must write about it. That's why I like to write these updates.

I know it would be cool if you could reply to the messages inside the actual webpage, but I just don't know my way around those Bulletin Board programs enough to do it. Maybe if I'm really super bored, I will actually learn one of those programs and you might see a surprise one day, but as for now, this page will stay in a simple table format.

I know all this stuff is self-involved, and pretty lame as well, and it might seem I'm thinking highly of myself by assuming somebody actually cares about my entries by posting it on the Internet, but please understand: I am in a land of mineral water here folks. I'm dying slowly every day at my boring job, and I need some kind of an outlet!

I also like the idea that I will be able to read these updates/entries myself after the summer is done, and see my progression. The other thing is that maybe some of you could tell others that I forgot to include in my emails, or people who's email I didn't know. I hope y'all realize if I had my computer and the Internet at home I would never in a million years be doing this btw!

Well this past week was something else, that's for sure. Once again I was reunited with the marvelous inventions of TV and computer (in a games aspect). Video games were played, shows were watched, and good times were had. But that's not all I did... I even did some things I have never done before, ever. Like go on a bike tour in the Rems Valley. Or go to a Biergarten. Or go to a German movie theater. or ride on the backseat of a motorbike to Heidelberg. Or eat pizza with hot peppers on it.

Yes it was definetely good times at my Uncle's place last week. I am still staying for tonight, but then it's off back to the grandparents place, where the boredom never ends. My Aunt and Uncle made a big effort to get me out away from the computer though, and they certainly did a pretty good job of it. I'm glad that I got out, but of course sitting on a bike seat for a long time causes major bruising issues.

I already mentioned last weekend a little bit, but I will expand a little here. We also did some mini-golf on Monday, but that is nothing too interesting. It was really hot the last week, so it was hard to sleep sometimes. The Germans have these weird roll-shutters on all their windows, so in the morning you can hear them rolling up on all the houses. They even have them over glass doors that lead to balconies. Anyway, that day I also had my first water-based popcicle in Germany, except it was nowhere near Rainbow Rocket quality. It was pretty small too, and looked like a hand holding up a finger. I'm not sure which finger... I love chocolate, but I'm not a fan of chocolate popcicles. It's a weird thing really, but that's just it. So at least I can cross one of those missed snacks off the list!

Then on Tuesday I think it was, I sat on a motorcycle for the first time. It was not so bad, but I hung on for dear life 'cause I was a little scared of going down. We went to a nice park where there is a pond beside a mini-palace-thingy. It was pretty cool, and there were ducks there that were fighting each other. Or playing. I couldn't tell. My Aunt and Uncle both ride Suzuki Intruders, the only difference is one has 1400CC and the other has 800CC. It's not bad riding on the back, except I don't really feel comfortable sitting so close to someone stradling their, um, back... but I learned to ignore that little issue after a while. And it gets REALLY uncomfortable after about an hour or so.

Then nothing much happened that week, because we all went to work that week. I tried some Italian pizza, and ordered pepperoni on it. But pepperoni is something else here in Germany, so what I got was hot green peppers (like jalapenos practically) all over the pizza, and it was pretty nasty. They weren't even cut up, they were whole! But I'll remember that for next time. I also want to try a DÖNER some time as well, they are kind of like hamburgers. They look good as well. The only american fast food places they have here are McDonalds and Burger King, and I haven't gone to either yet. It should be interesting... apparently everthing there is 2 or 3 times more expensive than in Canada, but tastes WORSE! We'll see. Also there is apparently a Subway in Stuttgart, I gotta check that out sometime.

Then Saturday came the big bike ride to Heidelberg. I can't remember if it's BERG or BURG, oh well. The difference is 'hill' or 'castle', but it could be both, since the city is in a valley with hills around it, and there are also lots of castles! The ride there was pretty scenic, we went through some nice areas. Another guy came with us, some Czech guy that my Uncle knows. When we got close to Heidelberg, it began to rain, so we stood underneath a bridge until it stopped. But because of the stop, we could only stay in Heidelberg for a little while. There were lots of American and Japanese tourists there, and one little American kid told its mom "I want to go on the canoes!", but they were actually professional rowboats. I thought that was funny..

Heidelberg is a city that's divided by the Neckar River, and both sides have hills on them, so the houses are all on the hills. One side has rich people's villas on it, the other side has the regular houses and tourist places, as well as a cool castle on the hill. I should have picked up some brochures or postcards, but I forgot. Then on the way back we took the Autobahn, and that's where I nearly went insane. My ass started to hurt so much I just started talking crazy things to myself. Nobody could hear me, not even myself, but it was fun. I was so thankful to get off that bike, and it seemed forever that we were on the Autobahn. And we drove so slow too... at least it seemed that way, since everybody passed us. But my uncle told me afterwards that we went 120kph nearly the whole time, in the slow lane! Crazy.

So during the times I was at home I mostly played computer and watched TV. As I reported earlier, Pascal doesn't know anything about computers, he just wants to play games. He's really into Magic: The Gathering cards, he says it's really popular. I don't know if it's so big anymore in Canada, but I'm out of the loop as far as those things go. He's also into DragonballZ, so he has a whole row of German translated comics in a shelf, about 30 of them, like fat graphic novel types. It was nice playing the emulators and roms with no slowdowns, as his compy is slightly faster than mine. I played Super Metroid for him and showed him what it was like in the good old days. He seemed kinda interested in it, or maybe he was just humouring me, but I didn't care. He also has a wireless controller, and I enjoyed using it. I think I will get my own once I get back, it's nice not having the wire limiting you all the time.

As for TV, my uncle has satellite with a lot of locked out channels. In all I'd say about 150/500 channels work, and some of them are just doubles. There are some english stations too, like NBC-Europe, and CNN. I usually watched those because I need the English connection really badly. I hate watching movies in german though, the voice actors do a decent job but their voices all sound the same somehow. Actors have disctinct voices that set them appart, and once they're dubbed over it ruins the movie or show. Yep, no subtitles here except for some rare examples, such as the Ali G show, which was funny. Also the channel surfing was weird, you have to press down to go up a channel, and up to go down a channel. That was odd at first, but it made sense somehow because the list starts with channel 1 on the top and goes down to higher channels, like an ascending sorted list.

Another cool thing was the racing channel. You could actually select different cameras and stuff during a Formula 1 race, which was pretty sweet. We watched Michael Schumacher win a race in Montreal. Here in Germany he is really popular, he's like a big celebrity, and they call him 'Schumi'. Oh yeah, and sensorship is really loose here too. They are allowed to show breasts and even full frontal nudity (quick flashes). Some of the late night callgirl commercials were a little more, er, risque than the ones in Canada, that's for sure. Not that I watch those... all the time. Also it's possible to catch naked breasts even on big ad posters at train stations. Rated R movies can be seen at 16 years already, instead of 18. And I saw an Eminem music video, and no swearing was bleeped out. The Germans use foul language really losely, it's not that offensive to them. They never say 'poo poo' or 'fesces' or 'crap', they say 'shit'. It's simply like that... I was a little taken aback at first, especially by words like that being used in a professional working environment, but I'm getting used to it. Not that I will use those words myself, but I understand now the cultural difference gives them some leeway.

And that was pretty much the whole week. Lots of things happened, and once again I am sorry I don't have a digital camera or something, that's really hurting right now that the only memories I have will be written down. I will remember for next time I guess... or maybe I should just buy a camera. I have the money for it... well we'll see. These wordy updates would certainly be a whole lot more interesting if there was visuals included!

I will try to update every week or so. If by some kind of miracle I actually get real work to do, the updates will be fewer and far between, but I have no fear of that at the present time.

Ciao,

JoWak

So many holidays in June!

2003-06-14T10:55:00.000+10:00

Next week will be the second holiday in June, and May had one in the last week. That's crazy in my opinion, the weeks are just so short these days. But after that there's nothing in July and August, so full 5 week days are ahead of me. I've decided that even though my work sucks, at least I don't have to think while I'm doing it. I'm not big on thinking, so that's a plus point. I will try to see the good side of things from now on, and simply accept my fate of office lackey.

I went motorbiking on Tuesday with my Aunt and Uncle, they have 2 Suzuki Intruders. I think that's what they're called. Or Invaders. Whatever. It was pretty cool as I haven't sat on a motorcycle before. It's like a bicycle but faster, which is pretty much logical. I kept bumping helmets because I was too afraid to fall down. It was nice being cooled off on such a hot day, though. It was super hot this week hopefully it'll cool down soon.

I thought I might make some more observations regarding differences in Germany.

As some of you know already, cars drive pretty fast over here, even though curves and hills outnumber straightaways 100 to 1! Cars speed like crazy, especially in areas where there are no speed limits, like the Autobahn. Cars go 200kph easy on there, even cars that aren't sports cars.

Also, Stop signs are a joke here. They are so rare, and when you do see them they are just there to serve as 4-way stops when the traffic lights malfuncion, so you basically drive through a stop sign when the light is green. It's a weird feeling. The yield signs are in places where there should be stop signs, and places that should have yield signs, have no signs at all! Well some have these signs that are circles with a cross and an arrow pointing right. That means the car on your right goes first. But what if there are four people in the intersection at the same time? Also all the cars are standards, but I think I mentioned that already, and they mostly don't have air conditioning in them.

And some intersections are super complex, every single lane has their own light, so left, straight, right for four directions, that's 12 lights. So you'll never see someone trying to turn left on a green sitting in the middle of the intersection waiting for an opening. The pedestrian signals are a red dude standing and a green dude walking. Makes sense. Except the red dude just appears and stays solid, there's no flashing before hand. And of course no turning right on a red signal, that's obvious. The actual lights are on your side of the road too instead of on the other side, so you gotta duck down and look up to see your light change. Some even change backwards, so they go from red to amber to green, like in a race.

Curbs are made out of small 2-foot sections instead of a long continuous band of concrete. And there are lots of cobblestone driveways and parking lots, not so much ashphalt except on driving roads. The city center in Stuttgart is almost impossible to get through with a car. There is a big street called the "König Strasse" which is there for pedestrians only, so basically imagine downtown Toronto (Yonge Street for example), only instead of cars and people it's only people!

All the houses look the same too, they have one flat colour for the outer wall, and a pretty steep roof covered with rounded brick tiles. So no aluminum panelling or brick layers or sandy roof shingles over here. Windows are funny, you can either open them sideways like a door, or if you turn the handle 90 degrees you can pull them open so they tip towards the inside. I haven't seen one sliding window yet, except on cars. Also all houses have intercoms on them and lots have gates in front, locks all over the place. The Germans are paranoid somebody will get in, or maybe they just like it that way. You don't see lots of tall 13+ story appartments either, instead there's just lots of houses bunched up really tight. They cram them full of people, and the roofs usually don't have an attic so you can see the tip of the roof from the inside if you're on the top floor. Toilets don't have handles to pull down, instead they have buttons built into them, that you depress to start the flushing process. The button is sometimes about as big as my hand, but others are just little buttons. Either way, they are built into the toilet. Refrigerators and stoves are really small, they are even built into the kitchen decor sometimes to make it look like they're not there. For example, you open a random cupboard and whoa! You just opened the fridge door. Or hey! you opened up the stove vent!

I might have mentioned the lax cigarette and alcohol laws here, so you can skip this paragraph if you already know. But it's unbefrickenleavable to tell you the truth. They have cigarette vending machines on every corner. Each pack is 3€, which is about 5$ Canadian I think. So any little kid could buy them, and they are also in the cash checkout line in the grocery stores. Alcohol you can have when you're 16. It's all about the beer here of course, you can even drink it in public areas, like in the train station or bus terminal or anywhere you want. So lots of people drink and smoke here.

The stores that have grocery items also have everything else in them, including motor oil. So imagine Canadian Tire, Chapters, Zehrs, Sears, the LCBO, the Beer Store, and Future Shop all mixed into one. And they call all cereals Corn Flakes! So the original Corn Flakes are called 'Die Originalen'. Most people eat lunch and supper backwards, so for lunch they'll have a huge warm meal while for supper it's just bread with cold cuts and stuff. It screwed up my whole metabolism process, now I'm getting fat because of it. I'm 80kg now and I was 70kg when I came!

Well I've pretty much run out of crap to say now, but I will come up with more sooner or later, that's for sure. These journal entries are simply fuelled by immense boredom and lack of real work, so that's why they are so long and may repeat things now and then. And you don't have to email me about them if you don't want to, just if you got some comments or questions.

well that's all for now

-joramee

Matrix Reloaded thumbs down :(

2003-06-11T03:00:00.000+10:00

Well I caved and went to see the movie in German!!! I just didn't want to miss it, that's all. Unfortunately, the action scenes were ho-hum as far as martial arts goes, and the bullet-time crap got boring really fast. It's not new enough and they didn't introduce anything that really made a big impact on me. Also some parts had lots of confusing talking in it that I didn't understand, and to tell you the truth even in English I don't think I would get it. The stuff about 6 different Neos or something... hopefully all who read this have seen it and and I haven't spoiled anything! The only part I liked was the two semis crashing head-on in slow-motion, that was pretty neat.

I went to see it with my uncle's girlfriend's God-daughter. If you think there are wedding bells in the air you're way off base because she has a boyfriend. She was also a little, um, big. Even my uncle made fun of it when she wasn't in hearing range, and I must admit, I laughed! Other turn-offs were that she was taller than me and smoked a lot. Otherwise she was pretty decent, and it was interesting talking to someone around the same age as me again.

So yeah last weekend was Pentecost weekend, and in Germany it is a big holiday weekend. I am now staying at my Uncle and his girlfriend's house, but I will just call her my Aunt now. They got everything, including a nice satellite setup. But I don't care about TV that much, specially crappy german TV that dubs all the american movies and shows over, that is an unforgiveable offence! Everyone is supposed to speak English, for crying out loud!. Oh well...the TV-commercials are funny too, they have a really over-excessive style to them, and sometime there are 10 minutes of commercials. The Germans are also more loose with naked images so sometimes you see bare-breasted ladies on TV in the middle of the day!

My Aunt has a son from a previous relationship and he is 14. He's already taller than me, which means he will get really tall. He's pretty spoiled since he is an only child, so he has lots of cool toys. He is a Nintendo fan like me so he has Gameboy Advance and Gamecube. It's funny seeing the games in German. Thankfully he is a pretty nice kid and lets me play, and I introduced him to emulation with the few games that I brought with me, and he is pretty interested in it, which surprised me since punk kids these days can't appreciate old classics. His name is Pascal, which would sound pretty weird in English, but apparently it's a common name here. I fixed his computer since it was in a a sad state. He has Windows Millenium, which sucks really bad. His mom was amazed I fixed it (all I did was re-install Windows!), and thanked me for saving her from a costly repair bill. The ONLY bad thing is that he doesn't have Internet access, not even modem!! It's mostly because his mom's afraid he'll download pirated stuff and share it with his buddies and then she'll end up in jail! She should hear my crazy download stories...

We went on a bike tour in the Rems river valley on Sunday, and I must say the scenery was nice. The only bad thing is I didn't buy a camera, so the memories are only inside me. We also had some beers on the way about 3 times because Germans are all about the beer. It wasn't complete beer though, it was mixed with Sprite, and they called it "Radler", which pretty much means "bicyclist". I think it's only a sorry excuse for a bike rider to drink beer! I only drank it once though, afterwards it was only Coke for me. Coke is good stuff but it wasn't on-the-rocks, so that made me a little sad.

I will only stay there at my Uncle's for one week and then go back to boring gramma and grampas house. It is really close to work here, I could even ride my bike here practically. Too bad my ass is all bruised from the weekend. I haven't ridden a bike for that long in a long time, so after a while I was sore and now I got to live with it. It's sort of like when I went snowboarding for the first time and I fell a lot. So it hurts to sit down now, possible need some Preparation-H , but that won't help I don't think. .

I gotta ask for more work soon from my boss or else I will go insane I think. But I'm too much of a wiener to do that, so hopefully he will come to me and give me stuff. The MS-Office XP he gave me will lose its 45-day trial soon. I tried putting in random numbers for the activation but it didn't work, and since I don't have Internet on this computer I can't activate it! I downloaded lots of ROMs and burned them already on the public computer. I had to erase my traces after because it looks pretty bad when all the history links are game-related. Today I wore my cool casino shirt but nobody noticed... but I felt like a star anyway.

Some of my family will be coming here over the next few weeks. I wish they would bring me presents of Gameboy Advance SP and a laptop computer, but I just don't see it happening. I am still sick from hay-fever related symptoms, and my eyes are always red. It looks live I've been doing some hard cocaine or something, not that I know what it looks like, I just heard offhand...

I know this entry is a little early in the coming, but there is finally something more to tell so I gotta let it all out at once. I wish I had some water, mineral water is the Devil's Drink, it's supposed to have healing qualities but I think it's poison swill from beneath the earth where liquid hot mag-ma dwells.

I finished reading Lord of the Rings. It was way better than the movies so far! I wish they wouldn't have made the movies so deviated from the books. But hopefully the third film will wrap things up in a nice way that doesn't skip too many good parts (like Shelob).

-joram

Have you ever seen snails?

2003-06-07T05:00:00.000+10:00

It rained here in a Germany for a few days and I saw snails all over the sidewalks when I was walking to work. It was weird because I've only ever seen them in pictures, not actually in real life. There are more of them here than earthworms. Some are almost 20 cm long, and they leave this long line of ooze behind them as they slither forward. There were some slugs too, but the coolest were the snails with their big shells.

As you can tell I am really bored right now. It's getting worse and worse over here as I slowly lose my mind. I am still working on the same project that I was a month ago, continually adding more and more stuff to a help file. It is as dull as anything, but I'm afraid if I ask for more work they will think I'm ungrateful, or else give me something too hard to do. It's really a strange situation.

The upside of work was that I found out my computer is actually pretty decent. It is a PentiumIII 1.0GHz, but it has a really bad graphics card. It actually does have a soundcard and I managed to find out what make it was and install it, so now I've got Winamp running all day. Some co-workers asked if they could get my songs, but they didn't appreciate my taste in music once they heard the strange mix. One guy invited me to this concert for a german singer (Herbert Grönemeyer), but it sounded like really cheesy music once I heard the mp3s, so I said no. My headphones are too short, so I have to turn my computer box around 90 degrees to have a decent slack on them (it's a desktop). The soundcard is kinda bad though, the bass and treble are horrible, but at least it brings me through the day.

There was a holiday in late May on a Thursday, and everyone worked more that week so they could have Friday off too. But I didn't, and I came on Friday and there was nobody here. It was cool, I downloaded a game and played it all day. I will never get that chance again, because there are no more free days coming up except one on a monday. As I sit here depressed I wonder how things could get worse. I guess I should be grateful that I have a job at all...

Some food/snack items I'm missing here in germany: peanut butter, slurpees, water-based popsicles (like the rainbow rockets, popsicle pete, etc.), water (they mostly only drink mineral water), good pizza (like Pizza Hut, Little Caesars, Pizza Pizza, etc.), KFC, Macintosh's Toffee, any Frito-Lay chips product (Tostitos, Doritoes, Cheetos, Munchies, Lays, etc), Tangy Taffy, concentrated juice cans (the ones you buy frozen and add water), Mr. Christy Cookies (including Oreos and Chunky Chocolate chip), Dentyne Ice gum, Skittles, Tim Hortons Donuts, Krispy Kreme donuts, Taco Bell, Harveys, Subway, AND... the list unfortunately could still go on for quite a bit!

Yes I miss all those things and that's all the more reason not to live here. Of course the Krauts have their own selection of goodies too, like really good freshly baked Pretzels, they taste pretty good they are huge like my hand. Of course all the above items are not necessities of life mind you, but I certainly realize that they aren't there when I want them. The drinking water thing is weird too, people do carry around bottles like in Canada, but it's not spring water but carbonated mineral water sewer backwash. And when you ask for water, that's what they give you. It's frightening. So I have to resort to drinking tap water, but the next day I was sick so I didn't do that any more.

My uncle told me the other day that the birds talk to him. I should have left the room right there but it was funny so I listened to him. He told me he has scitzophrenia, and he told me stories of what it's like, he says it's almost like when you're really drunk. It was a little sad but he was laughing about it, so I laughed with him. I don't know how I could live hearing voices all day, but he's managed to do it thus far. I just wish he would wash himself though because his B.O. sticks to the walls when he walks around the house, and it stays in the room for like 5 minutes before it dies off. If you want to know what he looks like, just imagine Santa Clause but with dark hair, and only half of his teeth. Yeah that's right...it's freaky. My cousin's 3-year-old son calls him 'crazy paul'.

My cousin came from Australia during the last week of May. It was cool talking english again, except sometimes I didn't know what he was saying because of the accent. Also there are different words for things, they mostly use the British terms for things rather than the American ones. He is a business-type person and he has all these big plans with real-estate and stuff, I didn't understand half of it but he is a cool guy. He is married with 2 little kids, and they came too, and sometimes I wonder how someone so much better than me in every way could be related to me.

I still sit at home bored a lot, but last Sunday a family from the church invited me over for the afternoon and there was something to do. I still wish for my computer a lot, and how good of an item it is to have when one is bored. I've started to accept my doomed summer though, and I might as well keep on living. Deathwishes have crossed my mind, but I always overreact like that, I'm like a spoiled child. I have been sick and stuffed nose issues all of May, I don't know why, probably side-effects of my hay fever. Hopefully it will go away soon...

Well I'm going to write these entries at random intervals whenever I can. Some of you haven't even replied to my first entry yet, but that's ok, I'll keep writing them anyway, for myselfI don't think I ever want to live here because things are just worse here in every way, but if things start to look up I might consider it. The way I see things is that if you got a decent computer and a fast internet connection, it doesn't matter where on the globe you are.

-German Joram

Joram's in Germany!!!!!!

2003-05-31T03:50:00.000+10:00

Well I’ve been here in Deutschland for about 4 weeks now and let me tell ya, it’s way different. It’s cool seeing the different landscapes and architecture. Road signs and cars and city planning is completely different, and everyone drives really fast around here. The roads are so narrow too, two German lanes make up one Canadian lane in most places. But the hills and trees and trails where you can go hiking are amazing. There’s just so many of them, and there’s even special lanes just for bikes, so you hardly ever see bicycles on normal roads between cars.

I haven’t really gone out much, but I never used to do that when I was back home, so that's no big change. It will take some time yet to get me out of the house. I’m staying with my grandparents right now, and they’ve got no Internet, no computer, no TV, no stereo, no shower, no concentrated juice, and no air conditioning. I have to take baths, which is not very pleasent. As Kramer would say, "It's like swimming in your own filth!", or something along those lines. So it’s pretty bad staying in that house.

My bedroom is in the storage room, so there’s matresses and food and old clothes and lots of dust all around. Every hour or so the house shakes, because there’s a major rail line a few yards away from the house. I’m also on the third floor, so I gotta walk up these winding stairs every day. It is also super hot up there, compared to the ground floor. When I walk in the house after work, it gradually goes from like 20 degrees to 30 degrees as I walk up the stairs.

So for my free time I do nothing except read a lot. I’m about 2/3 through the Lord of the Rings novels because I haven’t read them completely to the end yet. So far it's interesting to see all the differences and stuff Peter Jackson left out of the movie. All these years I've been playing games and never had time to read, so now when I'm reading a book again it's going pretty slowly! Every Sunday I go to this really boring church where I watch the paint dry. The only good thing is that there’s no preacher, it’s just random elders that go up and talk, so at least there's variety.

I got my job at a company called TeamTechnik through my dad. He designed some stations for one of their machines, and asked them if I could come and work there over the summer and they said sure why not. Because of that, it’s obvious they don’t really need me here. They have problems finding stuff for me to do sometimes. My computer also has no internet access, and it’s slow, and it’s just plain bad with WordXP (which is a major memory hog). What I’m doing is updating a help file for a program they use to control their machines. It’s so boring I sometimes just type one letter per minute to see if anyone will care. Even now as I write this nobody is paying attention to the fact that I’m doing no work, they’re so busy with actual work. Everyone here at work speaks in a weird german dialect (Schwäbisch) instead of real German, so I can only understand about half of what everyone says.

Well May is almost done and I’m missing two cool movies, Matrix Reloaded and X-Men2 because I outright REFUSE to see them in a german theater with all the actors dubbed over in german. I will get the dvd or divx (whatever comes first), that is the only way. At least I only have to work from 8 till 4, so I can be home by 6. Oh yeah, there’s an actual lunch menu that gets passed around each week. We get to choose from about 6 or so different meals for every day. So far all the food I’ve tried is passable at best, and I remember the good old summers of days gone by where I would have delicious Michelina’s microwave food, which is about 10X better than this stuff.

So every day I go home all depressed and hoping a car runs me over as I walk to the train station, because hey it could happen, because the roads are so narrow and I’m a small guy, and there are lots of corners everywhere, so maybe one day I’ll get run down by a typical German driver. The cars here are almost 90% european: VW, Audi, Opel, BMW, Porsche, and Benz represent the Germans, and then Fiat, Renault, Peuogeot and Citroen represent the other European countries. Some Japanese and American cars are here too, about as many as European cars you see in Canada. There’s some pretty ugly cars like the ‘Ford KA’ and the ‘SMART’, check those out on the Internet some time to see how crappy they look. It's funny how they love to drive standard here, even the minivans and family cars like that come with a standard transmission as a default.

Right now I’m copying and pasting crap from a help file into a Word document to pass the time. I wish I had at least a Gameboy Advance SP but I was stupid and didn’t buy one when I had the chance. A laptop would be really sweet right now, maybe that would have been a better investment than a GBA-SP. The Germans run on 220V power and their electrical outlets and plugs are way different, they look really old school, shaped like a circle about 1 inch in diameter. As a result the power bars look pretty funny. They’ve got a crazy keyboard layout too. Everything’s out of whack, mostly the fact that the Z and the Y are switched, which screws me up sometimes. Luckily I can switch keyboard modes through the click of a button, and then my keyboarding skills come in handy because I know by memory where most of the keys on a US keyboard are.

Let’s see what else is different... oh yeah there are no gates that separate the outside from the inside at the train station. You can just walk right in. If you don't have a ticket you have to pay €40 as a fine, but essentially you could ride the train for free if you have the guts. Ticket inspectors dressed in civil clothes get on the trains on random days and check for tickets. The train I take is called the "S-Bahn", which is something between a subway and a real train, because it looks and operates like a subway train, but travels mostly above ground and goes over a larger area than the one in T.O. One time I had to show a guy my drivers's license, because the monthly ticket (145 euros) I bought needs an ID with it to be valid, and he thought I was from the USA!! I was a little insulted at his ignorance, but it's typical to be confused with the Americans over here. There's literally hundreds of graffiti-art along the traintracks on my way to work, it looks really cool. They are mostly just big block words with really undecipherable letters, and lots of colours. The other day I saw grafitti sprayed on the side of a train, coloured in the style of the American flag, that said "Fuck Bush!". It was hilarious!

So yeah it takes me 2 hours one way to get to work and 2 hours back, feeling sorry for me Yet? No? Well ok read on then. It’s so boring that I count the threads in my jeans. The office operations here are so weird too. Every day when a worker enters the office he has to shake hands and say good morning to every single worker in the whole section. It’s so annoying it makes me want to scream... but instead I put on some Rage Against the Machine and that does the trick. Oh but wait I can't even do that, because my computer has no sound card. So basically I get everyone's germs on my hand every day. The situation is actually similar to two years ago, where I took one piece of work and stretched it out over 4 months. But at least then I had high speed Internet and I could download playstation ISOs all day instead of counting the pixels on the screen like I do now!

Well I hope all you who read this are having a better summer than I am. They are paying me €10 per hour to work here and I get to stamp a digital box every day when I come and go to make sure my 8 hours are accounted for. But they take almost 40% off the 10 euros for taxes, so I'm left with about €6 in the end, which is about 10 dollars. In the end if they keep me here till the end of August (!!), I will have made around €4000 . That is about 6400 canadian dollars, which is a little lower compared to the 9000+ I made last year in a smaller company doing MORE work!! So essentially I’ve moved down instead of up.

So my advice is, don't go into something you have no idea about, and do some research before you get trapped in the land of cigarette vending machines.

-Joram

ps they have eliminated Coke cans here. So now you only get Coke in glass bottles.