The journey to the north

A while back I went to my home town. A road trip with a full car to help my friend settle into a new town. Being there really brought back memories, and unlike being in Melbourne, which is beautiful, cosmopolitan, and bustling, I really felt peaceful, a calmness that I hadn't felt since being in Long Xuyen.

Along the way I managed to shoot some photos and videos. On Sunday, I decided it was time to get cracking on one of my projects I had thought about for a while - Showing the world how different Australia is. And a journey from the bottom to the central eastern coast has a lot of variation. Unfortunately when we got to the mountains it was dark and raining so I didn't get any pictures of this variation in landscape. Just imagine mountains with rain forest and lots of steep winding roads.

This is my first decent project with the Premier Video editing software. I am pretty impressed with the way it turned out, yet couldn't find the Star Wars transitions, although some karaoke regulars might notice some of the karaoke transitions present. I wanted to do the Indiana Jones type maps where the map scrolls in the background over the foreground, yet I didn't have the patience to find out how to do it. I did a quick variation which I think does the job.

I opened the soundbooth program for the first time and found it a bit ordinary. I quickly reverted back to soundforge yet found that I forgot what i was looking to do and went back to the open soundbooth program. After a short look I found an icon which looked like what I wanted to do and by trial and error I got the basic results I was after. I have to say with all the functions in soundforge it was overwhelming, and soundforge still looks more versatile than soundbooth.

Also with this project I have worked out how to encode the final vidoes better and keep the quality a little higher than the first attempt at making a video. Well here it is a video diary of the journey north.

Enjoy!

Well duh!

I can not believe that this made the news.

Absent-minded drivers to

blame for crashes

More revelations can be found here.

Oh man! It's Oman

My friend, Said, told me that this headline has already been used by a travel writer who reported what it was like travelling to Oman. Oman is a small country on the Arabian Peninsular bordered by Saudi Arabia, Yemen and the Indian Ocean and is not far from Iran and India. When Said told me that they had monsoons there I laughed and thought he was joking. Ha ha, egg on my face, I was surprised that in the south the monsoons cross Oman on their way to India and the far east.

With this information I was curious to find out more about Oman and Said showed me pictures of his homeland. I was amazed at how beautiful the land is. The seas are azure with white sand and palm trees, with fish and turtles in plenty supply. Travelling a few clicks inland I saw pictures of sunsets on the dunes and reflections of the moon on the sand that just took my breath away. Also, forests, oases, and mountains that are full of life. Cities that are modern with skyscrapers and villages that have houses made of clay bricks and look as thought they have seen sands of time.

An Omani student group held a day to promote Oman to Australia and share their culture. The senses were on overload as I found the music peaceful, smoothing my soul in deep rhythmic waves. The air was full of incense and the fragrance of roses was abundant as well. I met another friend and we went to explore the tents. I felt like a crusader or Alexandra the Great the first time they set eyes upon the exotic goods of the Middle East. In one tent they had the fabric which was brightly dyed with what appeared to be gold fabric. Outside, children were laughing and joking while getting their arms done. Two tents were designated as tourist tents where the main focus seemed to be to promote tourism. I saw many more photos of exotic locations just wanting me to go and visit them.

I tried Omani coffee and a snack at the next tent. Both had rose flavours in them and the snack had an unusual texture which might have been ground almonds. The last tent contained traditional artefacts used in everyday life? I really liked the swords. I actually forget what they were made of, yet I do remember that it wasn’t steel. There were many different varieties, all of them ornamental.

Some goods in the tents

I finished the day off by watching a video showing how the money from oil was helping Oman’s citizens, and the vision the Sultan has for his people. I was impressed with the effort the organisers and left delighted for having seen a glimpse of a culture which was mysterious to me.

The Sweet Escape

Over the holiday break I made an escape up north to my hometown of Brisbane. I had felt that I had suffered the cold enough, well my thinking of cold at least, in the last 6 months that I was entitled to some days were moving was energy sapping and a shower required every other minute. To my amazement the opposite happened, I packed the miserable weather into my luggage and brought it with me while someone packed the furnace like weather and took it with them to Melbourne (30 plus temperatures). Such is life. Anyway, even though the weather was miserable, 20 degrees in my hometown was still a lot warmer than 20, maybe even 25, in Melbourne, when you include the humidity. I was happy that I brought the rain with me as most of the people I met enjoyed the fact that it was raining and windy as it was something that had been missing in the last couple of years.

Before Christmas I caught up with one of my closest friends and traded war stories from SEA as he had just returned from a trip to Malaysia. The way he described it made me want to visit there next time I go to SEA. Later we met some other friends and I realised that over the years I had drifted apart as the guys were just talking about their investments. I am happy for them, yet I was really bored listening to them.

For Christmas I met my (just about) in-laws for the first time, brother and his girlfriend, my parents, and their new kittens. I was taken aback by how small they were, thinking back to a picture of Buong sitting peacefully in Eric’s hand (before terrorist training), who is now a couple of kilos. The kittens were a real show stealer and I felt like it was not Christmas but the welcoming of a new family member. For lunch I tried a type of lobster called a Moreton Bay Bug. It kind of reminded me of crab with out the claws. Definitely would be good in a tamarind sauce.

Between Christmas and the New Year I tried to catch up with as many friends I could contact. As I was hinting at before, time apart does change things notably phone numbers. I had all sorts of trouble trying to “find” people and only resulted in catching up with a few. I was impressed that my friends and I got on just like we never separated, even though there were definite changes in their situations like kids and mortgages.

For New Year’s Eve, I went and did the traditional thing of going to South Bank to watch the fireworks. I was surprised to meet an old friend there and halfway through our catch up the countdown started. The fireworks went off with what I though was an amazing dazzling of colour and precision. The fireworks were tuned into music and even with all the speakers around you couldn’t really hear anything except the ooohhhs and aaaahhhhs as people, including myself, were mesmerised by the fireworks. Next time I will make sure that I remember my camera.

The tropical low off the coast decided that wind and rain should also be used in the celebration as a couple of minutes after the fireworks were over it started to rain. The next few days were rather lazy just helping out around the house by keeping the TV on as the people I had managed to contact were back at the grind. I returned to Melbourne without incident and prepared myself get back into the swing of things.

I am realising getting back into the swing of things is harder than I thought.

Retired

After watching some videos on You Tube using Adobe Illustrator, I have been playing around with my copy. The videos made it look so easy, and at times manipulating the artwork was quite frustrating. Other times I was inspired.

Since I was no longer far from the Great Southern Land, I thought it might be good to update the logo. I had a discussion with Tyler for some names and the best we came up with was Standing on the Great Southern Land. I didn’t think that was that good so I let the unconscious run wild and came up with Under the Southern Cross. I know you can be under the Southern Cross (Crux if you’re an astrologist) on many continents, yet is has quite a symbolic meaning in Australia, check the flag.

I had this picture of Melbourne looking westwards from the Rialto Tower at night and thought that would make a good backdrop for my new logo. I sat at home and designed a little sketch of what I wanted on paper and then tried to illustrate it. As I was working through on the computer I could see what I wanted was not going to work out so I changed it midway through and came upon the design that you now see.

I had a bit of luck though. With the font I used a brush tool write the characters and then accidentally clicked another button and saw that the font turned out better that way. I was impressed so I left it that way and added it the backdrop. After lots of messing around I finished and it is time to hang up the old logo and add the new.

Officially out of service for a while

Welcome to the team

What the?

I was going to a job interview sometime in July and I came across this picture in the toilet at Victoria University. I was quite amused by this photo and thought I might share it with the world. You will find this helpful if you ever come to Australia as you know we are different down here, so this will help you feel like like a local. You will be surpised to find that there are not some made for late night etiquette, especially for kebab shops and taxi ranks. With those then you too could say you come from the land down under.

Bass Strait Tour

A few weeks ago, I travelled around Bass Strait. This trip required me to travel through the hills between where I live in Rosedale and the coast. Lots of fog was hiding in the mountains.

Monash University, Churchill in Gippsland covered in fog

Of course there was not a straight road anywhere to be seen, and street signs with directions left me lost.

The road winding around the hills past the university

the hills with their farms

Philip Island was the first destination I visited. It is an island famous for having the motorcycle grand prix each year. I felt excited to see the track and you could feel that the electricity of the park. I went into the gift shop and saw that they would let you ride in the car around the track. I inquired about the price and found out that it was about $200 for 9 minutes. Now that does not sound like value for money, yet an exciting proposition all the same. When I have some spare money I might just give it a try.

Phillip Island racetrack

From there I went to a place called pyramid rocks. Here I saw some whales breach out at sea, rabbits, and some wallabies. From here I moved along the coast pretty much going all the way to Wilson’s Prom, the most southern part of the main land.

I heard that the road pretty much ended beyond the gates and a 4WD (SUV) was needed to reach the exact point. As I looked at the map I had accomplished something by reaching the most southern sealed road on the mainland. With that I started to go home by the coast road past the lifeless wind farm on the cliffs and through some back streets to Rosedale.

The scenery on the way back

Two weeks later I wanted to complete the trip so I visited Lakes Entrance. It was recently under water from the floods (just before I arrived) however you could not tell when I was there. I noticed that the wind and rain made it a bitterly cold place. For all the hype I had heard about this place I thought it was pretty average. It was quiet, wet, and cold. On the way back though as we climbed the hills that separate this town from the main road to Melbourne and Sydney we stopped at some of the outlooks and got to see why it was called the lakes district. It was quite breathtaking yet the rain was forcing us on our way.

didn't get this photo just right, the street is actually straight

Why they call them the lakes

The way back we stopped at the last town on the rail line passing through Rosedale, Bairnsdale. Bairnsdale is a bigish country town, with wide streets and enough modern entertainment to keep everyone happy. From there I returned to Rosedale and was relieved to have seen the Gippsland’s Bass Coast. My next journey I was hoping would be the mountain region, maybe next year, since the snow seems to have finished for this year.

The last moments in Vietnam

Here they are the photos I promised from the I would have written earlier post. The last night in Vn was a special occasion. I spent it with the person I knew most in Vietnam, Eric. We met up with some friends at O’brien’s and then went on to Sheridan’s (17/13 Le Thanh Ton St District 1). It is the best bar in HCMC I think as you are free from distractions you find in other places. The music is good and the owner, Michael, is a good host. We met Duc and Sabrina that night and we stayed there until after closing time. It was a great time and I am sure all had a great time. The next day I caught up with some friends that I will miss.

I went to Diamond Plaza, a Korean style department store which appears to sell everything. It was a good idea as it would prepare me for the commercialisation I faced when I arrived in Australia (it was weird to be so confronted with so much advertising).

After a long chat with my friend I headed to the airport. And of course I had problems at the airport. First it was too much luggage, so I had to split it and pay extra weight. Went through and waited for the Visa stuff then it was something you can’t take on the plane. Went down to the check-in and took it out of the suitcase. Next, I walked through the metal detector and then another trip to luggage check-in room, this time behind the scenes. Here I had too many DVDs and the customs guy wanted to check them all out before I jumped on the plane. I was pretty surprised as this what you would think they would do when you arrived to keep out socially evil ideas. Well I was polite and explained my purpose for being in Vietnam and he decided to let it go.

By the time I got to the gate it was time to board. On the flight I sat next to this idiot he knew everything about Vietnamese and wanted to show off to everyone. After that short 2 minute conversation and a promise to keep my mouth shut, I waited to feel the forces of the plane elevate into the air. As we got in the air I looked at the mess of lights outside the window and it finally hit me. This was it, I am leaving Vietnam for a while. The emotional toll and no audio (once again on Vietnam air), let me drift into a deep slumber. I awoke and was practically in Melbourne. As I got off the plane I started to realise that I was in a different place, with different customs, a familiar language, and I am not the unusual person any more. I had reverted back to the mean (average).