Thoughts on a Japanese Wedding Trip 2011

random thoughts

1. when you take pots of vegemite for others to take home - remember to at least take a small tube for ones own use

2. encourage Ian to do his pdf travel plan - print it out and have a copy on your ipad and a paper copy in your backpack

3. hotels will use the wotif booking from your ipad when you cant find the paper copy quickly enough

4. it is difficult to collate photos and videos from about 1/2 dozen people, many hours later i think i have most peoples - still need to collect ants, christians and judy's

5. you need an engineering degree to work out how to flush japanese toilets - just when you think you have them sorted another method comes along

6. some members of the group wont eat raw meats and fish - wouldnt try the cured chicken and others were reluctant to eat raw fish

7.  if you can construct ikea furniture you can manage to find your way around the tokyo subway - reading the maps is similar to reading ikea instructions

8. tokyo subways do have a daily ticket and it is cheaper to buy one than buy multiple tickets

9. it isnt easy to find a restaurant that will take 15 people without a booking but we managed it

10. some members of the travelling party are more apt to wander than others

11. it is fun travelling with a large group that will split up and regather later in the day to compare notes

12. japanese cafes and restaurants are happy to look after non japanese speaking people - we ate lots of different foods and had fun trying out different plates

Ok its a Turkish Japanese restaurant

13. happy hour cocktails arent good for weight loss

14. walking 6-8 hours a day negates the weight gaining effects of happy hours

15. judy and i can both drink blue cocktails at 68% and continue drinking

Lindsey enjoying her blue cocktail

theo and judy enjoying happy hour

16. the group enjoys edamane beans - better to eat than chips with cocktails

17. travelling on the shinkansen from tokyo to nagoya puts the ballarat "fast" train to shame

18. electronics are cheap in nagoya - an ipad 2 cover was 1/2 the price of melbourne or the tokyo mac store

19. USB sticks are also cheap in nagoya

20. it is bloody hot and humid in august in japan and hong kong

Lindsey in the heat at miyajima

21. weddings are enjoyable where ever you are

jess, ant, em, kaori, austin, lindsey and ian

22. it is fun to skype the grandparents to the japanese wedding

23. the japanese play cute music at weddings

24. the japanese know how to prepare wonderful food for weddings

beef cheek

25. it is fun to travel on the train to get to a wedding

26. if you are travelling on a train to a wedding you are apt to be picked up by other people travelling to the wedding - " do you happen to be going to a wedding. is it austins. good then i will travel with you"

27. travelling back to the hotel after the wedding on a bus is also fun

28. wedding after parties are fun

29. i am too old to go to after the after party - i piked on the karaoke - the young ones didnt pike

30. when travelling the day before the wedding make sure you have a change of underwear in you hand luggage so that when your luggage gets lost you still have clean underwear - you still have to buy a suit however

zoy in his new suit

31. make sure that you have a spare battery to the video camera - i had spares for the still camera - luckily it also takes video

32. carry multiple universal power adapters - others like to borrow them

33. organising an internet dongle from narita airport was worth every cent it cost

34. people travelling on public transport will indicate how you have to pay when you cant work it out

35. japanese train workers are universally friendly and helpful - they could upskill a few of the melb transport workers

36. i wake with sunrise - ian doesnt like to

37. nara local deer bite you if you dont feed them - deer from miyajime dont

if these deer want food dont try and stop them

38. hiroshima is overwhelming

A bomb dome

39. hong kong disneyland as per austin is underwhelming

40. the big buddha at ngong ping is worth the scary cable car trip

big buddha

41. the cable car to victoria peak hong kong has long waiting times

it took 45 minutes to get onto the tram

42. the food at the top of the peak is fun

43. taxis in hong kong are fairly cheap

44. alcohol and food in hong kong are cheap - austin says 2 maccas meals were the cheapest he has had

45. if you go looking down dark and dingy lanes in hong kong austin can find cheap wii games and hard discs with many wii games on them

46. if after 10 years of contemplation you decide to plant daffodils bulbs, they will, without question flower when you are away on holidays

47. ian obviously looks more dodgy than i do at security checks - was checked out for cigarettes coming back into japan from hong kong and has his carry on baggage pulled apart before allowing him through narita airport security coming home

48. ian might look dodgy but his gold card status on frequent flyer points gave us an upgrade to first class when coming home - way to go

49. suitcases are never big enough - but it is better to travel to a warm destination as summer clothes weigh less
and as a group we had lots of suitcases

waiting for a train at shinagawa station

50. ipads are wonderful to travel with but writing up blogs are better done on a proper computer

51. dont annoy the japanese fish - they are huge

big fish

52. japanese food is colourful and tasty or is just rice and seaweed - both types wonderful

food platter - nara

bento box - ginza - Tokyo

53. Japaneses outdoor air conditioning is different from ours

Em cooling off in the mist after a hard hot days walking

54. if you take a photo of the food photo outside the restaurant you can indicate what you want for lunch when there aren't any english menus

55. it is nice to get home to a washing machine and somewhere to dry the washing

56. japan is busy and quiet, hong kong is busy and noisy

ian and austin hong kong - looking for wii games

57. night lights look good

hong kong

58. things get lost when travelling - including train tickets, phone chargers, socks, bandaids, people - most things eventually turn up

59. we say hello to new friends and goodbye to old ones

judy and frannie

jim and theo

austin says goodbye at nagoya

bye austin bye freyja

bye frannie and jim

bye bye kids - hope you had fun

60. you learn to hate blogger as you and it cant agree on how to upload photos and it crashes multiple times as you try to do so!

61. the boys scrub up well

christian zoy ant

62. the family looks good as well

except we lost jim's head

63. austin got to collect flowers and give one to Kaori at the wedding

 64  it is easier to upload photos at the flat where the internet connection is much faster and so i will continue to up load when i get to Melbourne

Austin and kaori

65. brides look beautiful



















66. grooms look handsome

Ross

67. family loves survives distance and times

Austin and Frannie

 















68. We had all had a good time and came home with lots of good memories, lots of photos and lots of videos to edit! 

Lazy sunday ballarat winter mornings

What to do on a lazy ballarat winter's morning

update your blog - obviously


Sit in front of the open fire

enjoying baroque music with Lucy

remembering recent holidays

pine cove - FNQ

The Kuranda Railway

the ducks and geese are enjoying the drizzle - we have had to put some scoria in their yard to reduce the amount of mud that they are enjoying creating

Alma and fudd the geese

with the ducks in the background - note the scoria

we also recently enjoyed attending Emily's graduation - well done em!!

em and her friend Carissa

em and the proud parents

congratulations em!

our view on a drizzly Sunday Ballarat winters morning

 this is what the view should be

Publish Post

what i should be doing

having my shower
moving scoria
practicing piano
writing my talk which i am doing on tuesday night for my local gp division
writing up scripts and work letters

but i am not - i am blogging :->

unexpected events

Thursday evening was pleasant - emily and her friend Zoe came around for their usual Thursday tea- eye fillet roast with veggies. Lucy and I organised ourselves for bed.

At 1:43am Lucy started barking - and she wouldn't settled even after I had got up - mind you she continued to remain on the couch. Then I heard a male voice from outside the house - this isn't good for either my or Lucy's blood pressures or heart rates.

I wondered if it was the digital radio which sometimes turns on automatically overnight - but no it wasn't and the male voice from outside continued intermittantly.

Lucy continued sitting on the couch barking.

I bravely went to the end of the corridor - and asked " who is it"

"me" was the response - not particularly helpful i thought!!

"who's me?"

"Anthony"

I had forgotten that Ant had rung about a week previously and told me that he was coming up home on the Thursday night to catch up with friends and would bunk down here!!

Luckily he didnt have a key with him or otherwise I would have woken to a male wandering into the house at 2am

We all eventually settled and went back to sleep but our excitement hadn't finished

In the morning I let Lucy out for her breakfast - She flew down the other end of her garden in hot pursuit of a fox which was ambling in LUCY's garden. The fox u turned - as did Lucy. They both flew down to the other end of the garden where the fox went through the grill in the gate - Lucy was slightly too big to follow. The fox was last seen hot tailing down the drive.

Yesterday I went to pick up Sage and William so that we can attend the Blackwood Easter parade today. We were all sitting waiting for tea when Ian came up and said that there was a black cat sitting in the front garden - Sage and I went out to investigate - and yes there was a black cat - it appeared hungry so we found some of Lucy's food and fed it - yes I know that you shouldn't feed strays but it was quite friendly and obviously lost. It has disappeared this morning and all poultry have been accounted for.

Ian and Christian are hopefully finishing the poultry fencing today so that they can free range during the week when people are at work although Ross should be back soon and can play with them during the day. We are fed up with the fox selectively picking them off for its lunch

frannie and jim

frannie and jim have been and gone - it was a busy two and 1/2 weeks

we walked and travelled and partied

i managed to get frannie back into the walking pattern with my early morning walks around melbourne although unfortunately the ballarat lake walk didnt happen.
one morning as we walked past Fed square we were offered free plants for our trouble - f and j went back latter and got another 2 and so my offices now have 4 free plants - 3 maidenhair ferns and a baby bamboo shoot

we walked around melbourne zoo and inspected the baby tigers and elephants which i hadnt seen and looked at the new seal enclosure - although the sydney zoo has its views i still think the melbourne zoo is much better -easier to walk around - both kid and elderly friendly - lots of flowers and the lovely butterfly house


















we dined - carlton, the prince patrick in east melbourne, monday nights steak nights at simons and the flat,and in darling habour in sydney, and oh i forgot my home made chicken apple and white wine sausages and i forgot our visit to matt and belindas to eat and drink.

belinda,matt,sage, jim, frannie and william











sydney hadnt been on the original adgenda but ian was working up there for a couple of days and i had enough frequent flyer points to take f j and i there with only paying taxes. ian found us a nice apartment overlooking the harbour and we saw the queen elizabeth liner berthed in the harbour and the queen mary in the next - oh yes that was another walk - to see the queen mary and then an amble into the sydney city centre via an exhibition of the chinese terracotta warriers.
we caught the ferry across to manly to have fish and chips - a custom for sydney trips - i think at the end of sydney frannie had decided it wasnt too bad a city to visit.

frannie and jim - contemplating their next travel mode - hello the queen elizabeth liner

we celebrated tony's 80th with a party at the mornington golf club - we had food, alcohol, balloons , a party hat and lots of frannie made cupcakes















and then they went again - a whirlwind visit - i waved goodbye at melbourne airport and headed home for normality to start again - as if!

i have am now recovering from a mild episode of shingles - the stress of looking after my overseas guests i say. frannie says BS except that she doesnt cos she doesnt use such words

we have ant christian ( congrats on getting your PhD) and john C up to visit this weekend to put up a fence for my recently acquired geese ducks and hens - we have got fed up of supplying fox feed.

these birds want to free range boys so it is time to get up and moving!!

and tabitha - where is this baby??