Internet Explorer Issue

Apparently there is an issue with internet explorer being able to view the blog. I believe the cause is the playlist on the blog. I have removed it for now and will see if that clears it up.

Otherwise, just get mozilla firefox people. It is much more secure/faster and when you install ad blocker plus add-on, you never have to see another internet ad again. Oh glorious day.


Cheese

My Boxing Day Haul

Wow, I actually went shopping for clothes yesterday for 5 hours!. My wardrobe needed a bit of an update and it got it. Check out my haul.

Note how I can easily go from looking sexy to looking retarded in the pictures.

Me showing off 2 new ties and white work shirt, looking retarded.

Me looking sexy showing off my new Billabong shirt.

This dress shirt is by a brand called David and Goliath. Never heard of it before but it is vintage inspired and I look sexulant in it.

RIP CURL!!!! I bought this kickass black dress shirt and sweet shorts from Australia's surfing brand Rip Curl. I'm jealous that all the ladies get to look at me in this get-up.

Do I look sexy or retarded?

Anyways, I think my roommates and I are headed out tonight. Ill try some new clothes and let you know how impressed everyone at the club is.

Cheers,

Australia's Next Top Sexy Guy Model That's Straight

Christmas Day

Here are some pictures from my Christmas. Hope you enjoy.

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Just a quick post to wish you all the Merriest of Christmases. Except it cannot possibly be the merriest simply because I am not there for it heheheh. But yes, I hope all goes well. I will be celebrating tonight with some friends we have met down here with a Christmas dinner. It shall be quite fun.

So have a good one. Will Skype soon. And yes, I am dreaming of a white Christmas.

From,

Santa Andrew

Day 26 - Time off from work...

Ahh. I woke up this morning at 10:30 and it felt good. Finally a chance to sleep in; a morning where I was not in a rush to get my suit on, have breakfast, and rush to work. To be honest to you, it was starting to feel like I was back home in the sense that I'd get up and go to work everyday. But hey, it is needed, and so it is done. Thankfully, I do not have to work for any of the holidays. I have the 23rd to 26th off and the 30th to the 2nd off. That is AWESOME.

During this time, I am going to work on my blog, travel some places I have yet to be, relax and enjoy the holidays. It is going to be strange celebrating Christmas with the family confined to the little viewing area of a laptop or tv screen, but at least this technology is available, which is better than the alternative.

There are Christmas trees all throughout Sydney. A notable one is located in Darling Harbour, which is composed of hundreds of strings of lights and has a Kangaroo which hops all the way up to the top.

A way cool sight. Still the lack of snow is quite strange I'd say.

Onward. I am currently trying to upload some videos to my new youtube account. It is taking forever, I am not sure whether it is not working or that it is just a slow process. I will give it more time and see. But nonetheless, some videos of sharks and the aquarium are on the way, so heads up.

Mike, Henrik and I went to Pizza Hut again today. We have lots of food now. On the way we came across this awesome bull statue.

The statue is anatomically correct.

And I tamed this mighty beast FYI.

So hopefully you will have some new videos soon. But for now I need to get some groceries. I'll keep in touch, but from outside your touchable distance.

Anne Drew

*Success. Check out these videos from the aquarium.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m-Sa3KX4UXo

And this one of my favourite animal so far.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vSXhhXmn7zw

YES!!!

Finally. After 3 weeks of frustration, anxiety, failure, and small successes. I now have internet that is uninhibited by a slow speed. All the ideas of stuff that I want to put up on the blog can now happen.

So sit back, click, and enjoy, because from now on it gets better. :)

Signed

leet h4x0r

Friday Dec. 19th - Uhh about those daily posts...

Yeah.... sorry. Wed all I did was work and then work on cracking WEP. Really not much to report about.

Thursdays I have to work late because it is the shopping night in Sydney. All shops are open late thursdays so I worked 10 to 8. Immediately after that, IEP was hosting its Chrissy(aus for chirstmas) party, so I went to that. It was fun. Mike and I met some new people. Guess where they were all from. Yup, Canada. But it was still a fun night. I tried this drink called Snakebite, it is basically beer with grinadine in it. I couldn't decide if I like it or not to be honest, at times it was a little too fruity and then at others it was ok.

And today. I worked!!!!111!1oneoneone Earning the moula. Uhh. As I was walking to work I saw what I thought was a crazy old lady, holding an apple poked on the end of a stick up to a tree. Only then did I realize that she was not crazy, but was feeding a possum family up in the tree. Check her out.
I honestly thought she was bat crazy. Old people eh?


She was just feeding this little mummy. :-)

For dinner I have a coupon to the japanese place across the street. I get a free upgrade to a large beef bowl. Mmmm.

So, peace for now, I'll make sure I do something a little more interesting for the next post. Probably toss em up with the hobo that plays the recorder down the street. We'll see.

That guy.

Dec. 16th 2008 - Another day at the beach

I have just returned home from doing groceries and figured I should do a quick blog post about my day.

I went to the beach. It was nice and sunny, and I am finally starting to get a tan now. Mike and I went to Bondi again. Umm we kinda never took any pictures today seeing as I was surfing the entire time and Mike was body boarding. Oh well. But seriously though, that beach is awesome. There are always thousands of people there on a nice sunny day. As for surfing...

I got my ass kicked lol. The waves were about 1.5 meters, which is about 5 to 6 feet, and way to big for a beginner surfer. But that didn't stop me from trying. I got up on some whitewash from the waves a few times and I had a kickass ride lying down on my board where I actually cut across the wave. I really need to strengthen my swimming skills though, my arms got so tired by the end that I couldn't even lift my body up off the board to stand up. Also, at one point too I must of got caught in a riptide when not paying attention because I ended up way out past all the surfers. It was alright though, even though I was tired, I just slowly caught the waves back to shore.

The lifeguards at the beach do an awesome job as well. They are everywhere. Even patrolling on seadoo's waiting for a surfer that doesn't come up. On a particularly bad fall of mine where I got nailed by a couple huge waves and the board flew up into the air, the lifeguard on the seadoo came over to where he had seen me fall looking if I needed any help. But I was already back on my board going for some more hehehe. Also, the others surfers around look out for people needing help, so even if you are as inexperienced as I was it is still a pretty safe place to surf.

I want to try one of the surfing schools though because I need to work on the fundamentals of surfing that I lack, like duckdiving underneath the wave, and also picking a good wave to try and ride. All in all though... awesome day.

Now I am going to go and catch some ZzzzZzz's

Goodnight all.

A.

Day 19 - I posted!

My apologies for the lack of posts, I have just been busy lately with work and getting organized I haven't had time to sit down and write.

So what is new. I have a job!!! Nothing too exciting though. I am a door man at Cartier, the jewelery store. The job entails pretty much what you think it would; I stand there and let people into the store, and am polite about it. The first couple days were tiring, having to get used to standing for 8 hours and all, but now that I am used to it, it's not bad. It is a job, and it pays well enough that I can afford to stay down here ($19/h!) hehehe. Right now I am working Wed-Sun usually from 10am to 6pm. Ill get around 38 hours a week which is great, and I won't have to work major holidays!!

What else is new. Mike and I received our single beds last night so we no longer have to share a double. Nice.
I am mere millimeters away from being able to get high speed internet. I imagine sometime today I will get it to work. Actually, I think we are going to the beach, so tomorrow it will be.

PICTURES. I will try and upload all the pictures I have that you have been waiting for.

I will do that now. And from now on - daily posts. No more long gaps between them (sorry mum).

I hope you are all well,

Signed,

Me.

Day 13 - I lied about the internet

Hey

The move went great.  Mike and I are sharing a queen bed for now till my landlord gets 2 singles later this week.  The internet sucks at the place right now, I don't know if that is because one of our roommates is uploading tons of stuff, or if it is just bad in general.  But I am working on borrowing the neighbours internets which I hear is quite high speed.  I was in the middle of doing that when I accidentally deleted the drivers for my wireless card, but I shall fix that later today and then its Skype calls for everyone.  I also plan on dropping off tons of resume's everywhere today too because I need a job badly.  Anyways, I hope things are going well for everyone and as soon as I get everything figured out I will post tons and tons of pictures.

But now I am off to pizza hut lunch buffet to chow down. Mmmm

Cheers mates,

This guy

Day 12- My new place

I have moved in. I have proper internet. Oh glorious day :)

Day 6,7,8 – The searching, the stress, and the most famous beach in the world

**** Fail again. I went to Mcdonalds to try and upload 4 pictures to the blog and the internet is so slow that my battery has died before it can finish...****


Tomorrow I will spend the day at the beach and relax. The last three days have been filled with too much stress. Finding a place to live has been the leading cause, it is hard but we will find one, of that I am sure. Most of the places we have seen were too sketchy, too small, and too much money.

Throughout the last 3 days I have:

Visited Bondi

Visted Sydney University

Ate at deep fried mars bar.... mmm soo bad but soo good

Ate at an all you can eat Japanese lunch bar.... tried sushi... still not the biggest fan.

Tomorrow I will relax. Spend a day at the beach here in Bondi. Surf. We still have to travel back into Sydney to view a place at 5. Hopefully it is nice. It better be a nice day tomorrow. The last two have been crappy, but we have been too busy to notice to be honest. Mike and I have still managed to walk around Bondi a fair bit. Here are some pics others I will post when I have access to my phone cord:

Anyways, I am going to try and go to bed now. I need rest. I hope everything is well at home for all of you. And that snow. Tee hee hee

** Side note, I am getting ever closer to finding out how to 'borrow' peoples internets. That will be a glorious day when I manage to do that.

Also, it has taken me 20 minutes of just waiting for these pics to upload. And now it has decieded not to work....grrr....

Day 3,4,5 - Damn you internets

Howdy all,

sorry for the delay of posties but I have been quite busy lately just living it up in Sydney. The job and accommodation search has begun. There is a lot of competition here in Sydney and it'll be interesting to see how long it takes for me to find a job.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY CHRISTINE.

Also, I will upload all of my pictures as soon as I can find better internet. Without proper internet I feel so cut-off. I tried for a bit today to learn how to hack into the networks near the hostel with no avail. It might have to wait till I get a place because they usually come with free high speed internet.

As for my new friends. I have met Damien from France and today a girl named Jill from Windsor. Yup definitely come to Australia to meet other Canadians lol. Mike has gotten his bag back from the airline so that was a bonus for him. We can now go to the beach sometime soon. I'm thinking Wed or Thurs. We are also going to head to the Sydney aquarium possibly tomorrow.

Anyways, sorry again for the crappy post qualities but that is only until I have the full internet unleashed at my fingertips. Then you will be oh so envious that you are not here.

http://sydney.gumtree.com.au

Thats the website we are looking for a place from. We want a place around Paddington, Darlinghurst, Surry Hills, Taylor Square. Anywhere not directly in the central business disctrict but not too far from the city as well. A 25 min walk max. It will be Mike and I, so either 2 rooms or a double room for around 170-200 a week. If anyone just happens to hop on that site and see anything good do message me.


I'm off to the dunny (toilet), the pics I tried to upload haven't worked so F it. Wait! there they are...

There is no way for you to understand how massive the harbour bridge is unless you see it yourself. But as a reference, the little tiny specs at the top of the bridge are people. Uh huh.

Me in standing on the opera house with the city at my back. And yeah, thats palm trees in the park to the left. Meow

It is awesome here.

Signed,

#1

Day 2 - Orientation

Yesterday I had my orientation with International Exchange Program (IEP). Wow I am really glad that I registered with SWAP, just for the help that IEP gives you its completely worth it. Not only did I learn lots about Australia and Sydney (Oz is the only country that eats both its national animals, the emu and kangaroo) but I can use IEP to help me find a job and accomdation. During the summer months here in Sydney its tough to find anything available just due to the large amount of people who come here. But yeah, as soon as I get a job it'll be great so I can start spending more freely.

IEP also hosts events, and I plan on going to one on Dec. 5. Its a bar on top of a hotel that appearently has an amazing view. I'll let you know. That is also

I got drunk with some German buddies last night. Christoph, Chirstofer, and Robin. It was my first international drinking experience! It was fun to exchange drinking stories with someone from a different country. I am jealous of the Germans though, they order their beers by the half liter. I learnt that the dialects between provinces are so different that east, west, north, south and central germans have a hard time understanding each other. Unfortunately they have to leave today, but that is the life of a traveller. Meet someone one day, gone the next.

I have also met Mike, my SWAP buddy also from Toronto so I have someone to travel with which is good. He is just trying to see if the airport can find his luggage since they managed to lose it on his way here. Brutal.

Last night we all ended up at Kings Cross which is the red light district here in Sydney. They seems to have all their sketchy shops and bars on the one street, but we managed to find a nice one there.

Anyways, I'm off now. Not sure what I am doing yet but I will find something I assure you. Wait now I know, its find free internets. Yum.

Day 1 - Here.

There aren't many words in the English language that can describe this; at least not many words that I know. I am here. Australia. I have talked and dreamed about it, worked months for it, and near my departure, even had nightmares about it. And as I sit here and write this, sleep deprived and exhausted as I may be, I still cannot believe it.* It is the most surreal experience. There is nothing in my life that has come close. Even heading off to university, I was only ever an hour away. Now, I am halfway around the world. 15,000 kilometers. It is a distance hard to grasp unless one has had the displeasure of spending a long time aboard a plane. That I will explain more about later.

Now here though, this question resonates in my head: What next? There's no work tomorrow for me, no school assignments, no exams. I am just here. Living. Breathing. Other than some basic to dos, I have no real plan. I like it. This is something I could get used to.

The one real challenge I have ahead of me is to make some friends. Socialize. Before, I found myself being anti-social at times and I hated that. Now, I have no choice but to be social. I engineered it this way. This predicament was set-up to help better myself. Make me care about people I don't know. Make me want to know who they are. Make me want to know their names. And I will. I can already feel it.

So much has changed. And I shall do my best to let you know what to expect if(when) you venture down here. But I am off now to go and eat a crocodile kangaroo burger. Till the next time. Cheers.

Andrew

*Sidenote. I have just been invited to a porno party at Scubar, the bar underneath the hostel. Interesting.

Farewell

This is just a quick post to say farewell. I want to thank everyone who has helped me so that I can take this journey. Thank you Mum especially, I know you were sad to see me off today. This is something I have to do and I thank you for all the support you have given me. Thank you to the rest of my family as well, I hope some of you can come and visit once I get set up down under. As well to all my friends, thank you for all the fun times. I encourage everyone to come and visit when and if they can.

This trip has been 8 months in the making. I have talked the talk, and now it is time for me to walk the walk. I look forward now to new friends, and new adventures, to new places, and new experiences. I am doing this to learn a bit more about myself, and I hope that the next time you see me, I will have changed, but for the better. I will share with you all the ups and downs of my travels, and I hope that you laugh, maybe even cry a little along with me. I hope to that you might be inspired as well, inspired to take greater chances. To shake up things once and awhile, and get out and try something new.

But for now I am off...to a new country, and a new chapter in my life. But remember though, this is not a goodbye, but a see you later. I love you all :)

Yours truly,

Andrew Hamilton Meades

Tomorrow...

Much effort was put into this banner.

I am really hungover as I write this so bear with me if this doesn't make much sense. But to the point at hand - TEN MORE SLEEPS and then I'm on my way there. I cannot believe how fast the time is going by. I have done everything I needed to do me thinks. Everyday till I leave I am going to post one thing that I am going to miss while I am gone. Here it goes...

10. Shoveling snow. Now I know that might sound weird but there is a certain satisfaction one gets after finishing shoveling the driveway, looking back at the cleared snow and thinking 'Damn, it looks good'; that feeling of accomplishment is what I shall miss.

9. My car/driving on the right hand-side. I shall have to rely on public transportation while I am down there, will probably even give hitchhiking a try. But I shall miss my sexy blue sunfire, that is unless I somehow manage to get enough money to buy a motorcycle down there. Doubtful though. And the whole driving on the left-handed side is going to be different cool.

8. My dog Abbey. Going away for such a long time has its downsides and I have to acknowledge that there is a chance that she might not be around when I get back. She is 12 13? 14? now and very much a part of the family. I do not like thinking that she might pass away but I tend to cover all my bases just in case. I am going to go and give her an extra cookie tonight :)

And yes mum I might even miss Maive (our cat) a bit even though we tend to have a love/hate (mostly hate) relationship.

7. Canadian Beer. Mmmm beer. But yeah I mean the actual brand Canadian, but I am sure I will enjoy drinking all new kinds down under. I'll also be on a mission to find a bar down there thats serves Canadian too.

6. COD 4. Sadly I am addicted. But I think I can live with a trade of that for surfing.

5. Snowboarding. I shall miss it dearly. But again, that can truly be traded off for surfing. I shall try and trade someone snowboarding lessons if they teach me how to surf.

4. Hockey. I most likely wont be able to play down there because getting another set of equipment will be tough. Low and behold, any chance I get to play is a chance that will not be wasted. I will however brag about how damn good I am to anyone that will listen hehehe.

3. To be determined...

2. My friends. See Farewell post.

1. My family. See Farewell post.

** Note. Today I helped my dad shovel off his rink for about an hour and you know what, I think I've gotten my fill of shoveling snow for the year. So #10 is a stupid one.

A walk with Sadie

On Sunday I took Sadie, my cousins' dog, for an adventure up her backyard to the farmers field. Halfway through this journey I decided to take some pictures so that I may begin getting used to cataloging my trips around. Here is what Sadie and I saw. Actually just I, Sadie mostly wanted to chase sticks.

Near the top of the hill we saw a couple large fungi growing out of the bottom of a tree trunk. They had an interesting underside.

We continued.

I then decided to try and take some scenery shots with Sadie. As you can see she wasn't the easiest to shoot but I did manage to get some good ones. Here are 2 of my favourites:


She is a cute puppy, and not surprisingly quite hyper as well. Looking at them now I'll probably work on getting a better background next time, but I still like the pictures. They are amazing quality for a cell phone camera that's for damn sure.

Anyways we continued down the farmers property towards a field of corn that had not been cleared yet. Um, what would you call it? Dead corn? Sure why not. So we headed towards the dead corn field...

Sadie had a blast running around the field and nearby path and throughly enjoyed collecting loads of burrs on her fur. Luckily they were easy for me to remove from her coat as she is still young. Can you spot Sadie running towards me?

Ahh, there she is :)


I spotted this flower on a tree nearby. My aunt has informed me that the deer eat these, though I forget what they are called.


Then on the way back home I took a panoramic shot of the hill down to my cousin's house. This was mostly to test the phone out, and partly because I like the paintball memories.


And that was that. Took me about 20 minutes to get all the burrs out of Sadies fur but overall it was a worthwhile little hike. Only 22 more days until I go on more exciting ones hehehe.

Surfcams

I have found a website which you can view the live surf on a lot of beaches in Australia.


http://www.swellnet.com.au/

Check it out! It is really neat. I am going to try and be on one of these so I have added it to a list of my things to do.

This is why I want a pet octopus...

check out this link.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/howaboutthat/3328480/Otto-the-octopus-wrecks-havoc.html

Wouldn't an octopus be the coolest pet. I'd probably give mine a camera and teach it how to take awesome pictures for me.

One month to go!

So, today I officially leave in a month. As I prepare I have been coming up with a list of things that I want to get done while I am down there.

1. Own my own surfboard and know how to use it. I plan on surfing and visiting the beach as much as possible.
   
2. Go scuba diving in the Great Barrier Reef. It is likely I will move somewhere near Carins to get this done. I will need to learn how to scuba dive properly and if a license is needed I shall obtain one.
3. Work on a ranch for awhile. I want to know what life is like in the Outback; maybe fight off some Dingos and get some Crocodile Dundee in me.
4. Visit Ayers Rock. Not really sure why, but apparently everybody does it so I shall too.
5. Be on one of Swellnet.com.au's live surfcam and wave to everybody.
   
6. Go surfing on Christmas day. Just wow that would be an experience...

I shall come up with more in due time.

Wtf is Wollongong?

I have a tentative plan! It is tentative because I realize when traveling things can change on a whim, you meet someone who says 'hey lets go here and do this' and then you're gone. But nevertheless, my plan is as such.


View Larger Map

I am going to head to Wollongong. It is a town about and hour's drive south of Sydney. This is where I plan to go shortly after arriving and get set up there with a place to stay and a job.

Why Wollongong?

I chose it because it met the following criteria.

1. A university town
2. Neer da beach
3. Cheaper living

I am afraid that it might be too expensive to stay in Sydney when I first get there so I looked around and found Wollongong. It has a freaking mountain in the town, for serious. Check out this view of Mt. Keira from the town.



Basically: Guelph + Beaches + Surfing + Mountain + Summertime = Awesome Win

So that's my plan for now. Once I get there, chill in Sydney for a few nights and orient myself. Then take the train to Wollongong and set up shop there for a few months. After that... who knows...

I do. It's called going to Carins and scuba diving in the Great Barrier Reef. Or to the Northwest provinces and working on a ranch. I shall make a mighty to do list for while I am there.

Anyways, peace for now.

Skype, a webcam and a tentative plan.

I have found the answer to communicating with everyone whilst I am down in Australia. There is this program called Skype (http://www.skype.com/) which you can download and use to call people around the world. Any Skype to Skype call is free and you can use it to call regular phones cheaply. I plan on using this while I am down there and encourage all of you to download it, add me, and give me a call whenever you desire. You can even have a voice mail so if you are away people can leave you messages.

Add me: Andrew Meades, skype name = ameades

I have also purchased a webcam as can be seen in the above banner. It's the Logitech Quickcam Pro 9000 which I got from bestbuy on sale for $79 bucks. It is kickass. It has Carl Zeiss Optics. I don't have a clue what that is, but I am sure Wikipedia could tell me though (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carl_Zeiss_Optics)? Why don't you do that and give me a call and let me know.

Anyways, just to show you the webcam quality and because I know you want it, here are some pictures of me.

















Me eating a popart and waving.



Me with da guns drawn.



I have a bunch of cool special effects as well. This is the speedy blurry one. Macs ain't got nothing on me.



This is just a funny picture I saw on reddit the other day.


On to bigger news. Hmm. I think I am going to make a separate post for this actually...

The birth of a travel blog.

Today is the day it all starts. This blog is intended to help keep family and friends updated on my adventure down under. I shall keep this blog up to date and will do my best to take and post plenty of pictures. I hope you enjoy :)

So today it is official. I have received an electronic copy of my plane ticket. There is no turning back now, fortunately hehe. I will be flying on Qantas airline which I found out today is an Australian airline. I fly from Toronto to LAX, and then from LAX to Sydney. Total travel time is estimated to be about 24 hours. Toronto to LAX = 5 hours 30 mins, 2 and a half hour layover, and then a 15 and a half hour flight to Sydney. I leave Toronto at 6:50pm on the 25th and I shall arrive in Sydney at 9:20am on the 27th. Thats the flight I have booked right now. I shall write another post when I actually take it :)