Big Sweden

Sorry for the ä's throughout the text, itäs just lazy me using the keyboard the way I am used to and the ä is in the place the ' normally is...
Sweden is great, I arrived on Thursday morning at the smallest international airport in europe - it only services the one flight from the cheaparse RyanAir plane company per day, so doenät have to be too big. Karin, a really good friend who worked with me in Australia for 6 months or so picked me up and dropped me at her place where her boyfriend Iain (who I also know) looked after me until he had to start work as a chef at 2.
I wandered around älittle londonä as it is known here and really liked the feel - a really positive, energetic vibe, but without the millions of people that there are in London. (BTW I am in Gothenburg).
On Friday I did a little washing and then headed out to meet Karsten a friend of Iains who designs museum exhibits - he showed me around one that he made which was really interesting - hearing about the exibit from the other side as it where. It was quite inspiring, and reminded me a lot of the process that my parents go through when creating a piece of theatre - lots of highly creative professional people bringing their different skills, and perspectives, together to create a new installation.
I then spent another 2 hours or so wandering around that museum finding out all about vikings and gothenburg and so on.Then Karin and I went to dinner at Iainäs restaurant at 9pm which was excellent. I had swordfish for the first time and while the dish was excellent, I donät really like the fish too much... Karin had lamb with red wine sauce and garlic yogurt that was fantastic. The restaurant is a greek one, owned by an Iranian guy and managed by an Aussie (Iain) in the middle of Sweden...
Afterwards we went down to a converted warehouse thing that reminded me a lot of the Powerhouse in Brisbane. Iain left work early and Karsten came too. We saw a couple of bands there, the first being a fairly run of the mill bjork sounding kind of thing, all synthed up. The second was a hate band, with 7 musicians who didnät really like much of anything. Karin got really pissed off as they sung about how bad their society is because she (quite rightly from what I can tell) didnät agree with them at all. I didnät understand what they were saying at all, so I just mildly enjoyed their wall of noise industrial sound.
This morning we went on a cruise to Elfsborg to see a fort with some guides dressed up to talk all about the living conditions there in the past - and it was quite well done, sometiimes they can be a little embaressing to be a part of. We tried to get to a little island called Virga but the boat doesnät run there after the middle of August :(
Next we went to the latest önatural historyä museum, really a small zoo thing meant for education rather than rejuvination. We wandered around that for a very long time and got really sore feet before deciding to come home - and here I am!
So far itäs been wonderful and Iain and Karin have really gone beyond the call of duty, their excuse is that itäs good to have a distraction from the mundane, everyday. Well Iäm trying to distract as much as I can!!

In Sweden

HAving a great time with the overly generous Iain and Karin...more news tomorrow

quick one

Woo hoo!
Got back from wonderful London and got my bike (CB TwoFifty) yesterday and am going for a big ride today with Mum and Grandma today.
Also, I am off to Sweden next Thursday for a week, staying with Karin and Iain which will be fun.

a few more details

Bused down on Sunday, which ended up being quicker that the train because there was very little traffic. Caught up with Jo (where I am staying) and we chatted until after 12 that night (7 hours later....)
Monday I picked up my bank account which ended up being really easy, thank god, and then went and checked out the big toy store on Regent street, and then all the book sho[s on Charing Cross - none of which had the motorcycle books I want. Afterwards went to the Astoria with Jo for the Blood hound gang (preceeded by the Electric Ell Shock who rocked!!!)
Tuesday I bought some shoes in the morning and then, after stubbornly refusing to go on a particular tour bus, walked half an hour before finally getting on said tour bus. Went around and saw lots (even though the battery in my camera died) before getting off at the Natural History Museum which also rocks :).
Then last night went to a puub in Camden Town with Jo to saygoodbye to Karen with Jenny, Virginia and Sam.
This morningn I fisnished the bus trip with battery and film, and then had lunch with Jenn which was great- she had a great time in the US and is spending all her time here catching up with people before heading off to Namibia.
And now I'm here.

email to greg

Anyway, I am in London!! About to go back to Birmingham, but I have fallen in love.This is a truley awesome town, so alive, so easy to get places, so many shops, just so incredibly cool.
While I am sure this will change when a) I move here, and b) winter comes, at this stage I am going to enjoy it :)I am staying in Notting Hill, and that's great because Queensway is Brazillian - right up my alley :) I went to Camden Town last night which was cool, seems to be where all the alternate types hang out, so I am going to have to check it out a bit more. The night before I saw Bloodhound Gang at the Astoria which rocked (even if they had horrendous technical problems) and tonight I am going to the globe.

Getting a motorbike

So I thought I'd get myself a motorbike. That way I can go do sightseeing stuff at my leisure, and look cool wearing all the stuff.
So I started looking into it, and the first thing I found was that - to get a bike you need third party insurance, but to get TPI you need to get a bike. This is quite a conundrum, until I struck on the idea of pretending I had the bike I wanted before actually getting it.
Then I had to ring around and convince the insurers that a guy from NZ with only 1 years worth of licence is an adequet risk... 2 days and £250 later and I finally have insurance for a CB TwoFifty yeah!!!
So I ring up the place where the bike I have found is and low and behold the guy has to service it before selling it to me. Great, I thought when he said that he was implying that he'd already done it, but no he has yet to do it.
So no bike until Next Week
BTW a CBTwoFifty is only a 234cc bike, but it does go 80mph and about 70mpg. This is _just_ good enough for me (actually the mileage is pretty good...), and is costing £895
I have also bought all my gear for £350 - including a really good jacket, yellow helmet and cheap everything else :)
And I got all my gear

Grandma

Ok, so I've been hanging with Grandma for a week and a bit now, and here's the low down.
She was really quite frazzeled last week - leading up to her 90th birthday she had too much on her mind and wasn't sleeping properly and couldn't get the party off her mind. Mum also recons that because she hadn't had any real stimulation for a while she'd slowed down a bit. So I won't make comments about her last week, because of the circumstances. And I won't comment about the last two days either because we really pushed her hard, taking her to stratford and then to martins this morning - she needs a rest!!!
First off she is 90. And incredibly healthy for that - her two siblings are both in homes at the moment for various reasons, and all of their husbands/wives have passed away so we are talking some hardy people here! So she does forget stuff, and she is slow, and has some minor health problems.
She's also stubborn :) in fact we have a little competition to see who goes to bed last each night, which I didn't win until last Tuesday - a full week after we'd arrived! And by god she'll have her egg and cress sandwiches for the party (even though she doesn't like them) and her scones with cream (even though she's just said that there's already too much food on the table!!)
She's also tactless. Totally. She'll eat spaghetti with us for 3 meals (not in a row). It's not until the day after that she mentions that she 'really doesn't like the spaghetti' we were eating! Or she'll start talking about how bad Nan is looking with Nan/s boyfriend sitting right next to her!
And finally, she acts simple. She'll often react by going "oooh" in a high pitched way to whatever you are saying, implying that she doesn't actually comprehend what you are saying, but she does. I know she does :) She does the "oooh" thing for a lot of reasons actually, but ultimately I think it's to piss me off, and it works!!!
But she is very sweet, and it's probably these little quirks that make her endearing.

Big Storm

There was a huge storm last night here in Birmingham (not as big as the one in London on Tuesday but still big). The garage and verandah thing gotflooded so we all cleared it out this morning and swet out the muck and moved the carpet to make a little river for the water to flow down next time it floods.
Jen and John came last night, they seem really nice. They brought some flowers from them and Martin and Geoff because none of them can (probably) make it on Sunday for the 90th.
Martin had 'a fall' on Monday or Tuesday so is in hospital. The doctor isn't going to let him go home, instead insisting he go to a nursing home or whatever. This is why he can\'t make it, and Geoff has taken time off work to see him so won't be able to get off Sunday(probably).
Jan is also working really hard (when it rains it pours in the costume industry) so she will only be able to pop in for a bit as well. Adam and I are going to put together something, Mum suggested poetry but I don't know what to put in. We'll work somehting out...

25 Hours later...

...and I've arrived in Birmingham. Total travel time from my place in Brisbane to Grandmas - 29 hours. Mum managed to sleep quite a bit, and I got in a bit but not too much.
Our saving grace is that we forced ourselves to stay up until 10pm last night, getting us immediately into the flow of the day here. So apart from feeling a little tired, I am coping quite well.
The temperature is OK, incredibly muggy (I don't remember it being this bad in Brisbane, but I guess you have a gradual build up to that). I am sitting here in a muscle shirt typing away.
Caught up with Jan and Adam last night, am at their place now typing this. It was good to see them, Jan is working vbery hard at the moment while Adam is on holidays!!
Finally, I am trying to get my Right of Abode transferred over to my passport so I can work here - but it looks like it might be a little hairy because my passport is for Tiest Vilee, while my right of abode is for Maarten Kenneth Dan'kano Vile!!!
We'll work it out, I just hope it doesn't take too long...