My internet has died, but I'm still alive

Hi to those people who check up on my blog or have an RSS feed going. Yes, I'm still alive, but haven't been able to post anything to my blog as my free internet at home "died". You can still catch me on MSN at work though. Will hopefully have my proper (paid for) internet up and running soon, so will post a huge blog entry with lots of photos hopefully very soon when the cable technican comes back to finish the job. Speak to you all soon.. Manda.

Crazy people, famous people, started work, more site seeing around London, shopping in Oxford Street

General observations - crazy and famous people.

There are lots of crazy people here. The sheer/huge population living here means everything is multiplied. You know when you see someone talking to themselves, but think – oh they might be talking into their hands free. But they’re not. Or then there’s the people having an argument with someone, but clearly, there is no one there – I call it their invisible enemy. Then there’s the crazy yelling religious people. Apparently we’re all sinners and going straight to hell and we all need saving. Needless to say it’s best to stay well clear of these crazy people and let them settle their argument with whoever it is they’re arguing / yelling at (ie themselves, their invisible enemy or God). It’s entertaining to say the least. Best advice is to keep your sunnies on and escape into your world of Ipod. And no one wears sunnies here - which I find really odd too - coz I love my sunnies..

Oh and the crazy NSW weather finally made the real news (on tv) here. Can't believe ships are beaching, flooding, storms etc. Sounds nuts.. Makes the schitzo weather here seem almost normal. Although it's been quite warm here lately! My shorts and miniskirts have *finally* been worn (was very skeptical when I packed them). I still take my umbrella with me everywhere - just in case.

News and celebrities. What an intertwined thing. When you get the tube, there are a number of different newspapers being given away at the entry/exit for free. So I've found myself reading the newspaper quite alot (which I never really used to do unless it was a weekend paper). Needless to say, what makes "news" here is quite questionable. And who is "famous" here is also quite questionable because I don't even understand why half these people are famous or in the news. Eg: Posh Spice aka Victoria Beckham. She recently won the "Woman of the Year" award. For what? As far as I can see, she is a washed up, has been ex Spice Girl, musically talentless, anorexic, boob jobbed, overtanned, married to a famous football player, media whore. And then there's Kate Moss - who I respect as a model who doesn't look like an underfed starving model, who has retained her look and cuteness over the years, but again, anything she does or touches works for her - eg being busted for drugs works for her and others. Same goes for George Michael. It seems the worse these celebrities do, the more attention they get and the more famous and successful they are. It's almost like celebrities are making it "cool" or the "in thing" to drink drive, do drugs etc. Oh and I do think it's quite hilarious that Paris Hilton has been sent back to jail.

Tuesday: back to work

Hi ho, hi ho, it's off to work we go *whistle*.. Ok, so Tuesday I started work at BP. The BP shuttle bus picked me up from the train station and dropped me to the site. They run constantly during peak time in the morning, then every 15 minutes. I had a freshly imaged laptop on my desk. My login had already been created. I logged in straight away. I opened up Outlook. There was no stupid start up wizard to go through - it just WORKED. Anyway, I spent most of my first day in meetings and meeting people and being shown around and how things work. Everybody uses MSN messenger - both internally and externally which is pretty forward thinking for a big organisation. In the many kitchens there's a free coffee machine, tea, hot chocolate, free milk, sugar, juices and fruit.

The "Link Restaurant" ie, the cafeteria is like a food court or sizzler. They cook breakfast and lunch every day. You have a swipe card which gives you a free allowance of 5 pounds per day to spend on food in the cafeteria (or you can top it up with your own money if you spend more). You can choose from the soup stall, traditional foods stall, vegetarian, pasta, pizza, world of flavours, jacket potato stall, sandwich bar, dessert bar, fresh juice and drinks stall - it's nuts! And you get real knives and forks.

After you finish your lunch, you take your lunch tray, plate etc, and there's a conveyor belt which you just dump your tray onto (ie, you don't clean off anything) and then it disappears to be cleaned (I imagine there's cleaning fairies or oompa lumpas on the other side cleaning them). Also, there's an express shop with premade sandwiches etc and also an online service where you can order a custom made sandwich or baguette which gets stored in a special fridge for you to collect at your time of choice. And then there’s the grab and go shop as well. There is a country club, beauty salon, dentist, doctor, physio, osteopath, childcare centre, monthly market stalls and much more.

Anyway, I think I’m settling into the job well. Over the next few weeks, I’ll be embedded in each of the teams, reviewing and improving their Sharepoint sites and giving them further training. It’s also been 2 months since I finished work – so I’ve had the luxury of sleeping in for the last two months. Anyone who knows me well knows I am not a morning person, and I’d even forgotten this myself - so getting up early and back into a routine was challenging – but I’ll get used to it again. Oh and my induction I found out nearly 5000 people work at our site. I haven’t taken any photos of the site, but I did find a few on the internet (above)..

More site seeing around London – my 7km walk

The last 2 Saturdays, I’ve done some huge walks by myself around London. On Saturday, I was supposed to go on a guided walking tour around London. However, some tube lines were cancelled on the weekend, and basically missed the meeting time for the tour. So I did my own walk (click link to see a map) and walked from the Tower of London, along the River Thames, chucked a right at Big Ben, cut across to St James Park, then over to Buckingham Palace and over to Victoria tube station. Took me all afternoon and feet were killing me after that! But yes, there were many other sites along the way on the Thames which I took photos of. I’ve also included photos from last Saturday as well (I walked along the other side of the Thames, along South Bank). So click here to see all the photos…

This weekend has actually been quite warm (and no rain either!), so decided to take advantage of the nice weather and the weekend, and well of London – cos there is SO much to see here.. So on Sunday, I thought I’d check out Oxford Street – ie Shopping Central. So many shops, most of them multi-level. If ever I am in need of clothes, shoes – I now know where to go.

Amazingly I restrained myself (waiting to get paid coz I’ve only just started work and haven't been paid yet) and found a couple of super bargains including my new 13 pound work outfit – plus I think I can wear the jacket for going out clothes as well. The jacket actually has a wide pinstripe and two cute ruffled pockets at the front and the skirt has that “David Jones” style black and white check pattern. Bought some chai chocolate tea, jasmine green tea from this really cool tea shop – so didn’t spend that much at all.

So it’s back to work for me and plan to do more walking around London every Saturday – so stay tuned and don’t forget to check out all the photos: www.amanda.com.au/uk/london/ - Manda :)

Camden Town, British Museum, Windsor Castle, Stonehenge and Bath

Ok, first things first: I have taken SO many photos this week - I've had to upload them to my other website. So if you want to see all my photos, go here: www.amanda.com.au/uk . Otherwise read on to see what's been happening...

Sunday 27th May
The weather had been "demotivating" me, so today I decided, I don’t care how crap the weather is – I’m going out and doing something. So I headed off to the Camden Town markets. Of course the Camden Town tube station was shut, so had to get a bus from Euston tube station. Again, had no idea where I was going, but a lot of people were going the same place as me, so jumped off with them. I’d forgotten how HUGE these markets were. They’re like a living breathing museum with all sorts of knickknacks, clothes galore, jewelry, tv stalls, food stalls – it really just goes on and on.. The whole place is practically markets – I could have spent all day there – there’s just so many alleyways and nooks and crannies crammed with more and more market stalls. I bought a couple of tops, a really cheap black corduroy jacket, postcards etc. Love it there, definitely going back again.

Garden party
Oh the previous Thursday, we had a few people around for dinner and drinks in our back garden. We put some picnic rugs and cushions on the grass, laid out some nibblies and drinks and everyone came over. We played this awesome board game called Articulate – it's like the reverse of Baulderdash - go buy it if you’ve never played it – it’s loads of fun and quick and easy to play. Anyway, cooked up a tonne of spaghetti and potato salad etc.. we all had more drinks. And then Steph and co all decided to go and dress up as Katy – so came back down wearing bright red lip stick and some very interesting outfits. The night ended when our flimsy outdoor table was knocked over and came crashing to the ground along with several glasses and empty bottles (we are never using this table ever again). Fun night though!

Monday 28th May
Today I went to the British museum. I saw the Egyptian, American and Mexican exhibitions. The weather was absolutely horrid. I stepped outside into a cyclonic freezer. My hands were like icebergs, I thought I was going to fly away with my umbrella – it was something like 5 degrees and the weather lady said this is the kind of weather they have in January (ie real British winter). Yikes. Anyway, the museum was packed as it was a public holiday. The place is massive. I think I need to go back and explore more of it by myself.

Tuesday 29th May
Today I got up super early and did a bus tour out to Windsor Castle, Stonehenge and Bath. After the dreadful weather yesterday, today the sun was out - there wasn't a cloud in the Simpson sky - was perfect weather. Anyway, Windsor Castle is huge – there is so much stuff inside there. It’s full of history and beautiful. I bought myself a pair of what I call “Royal Slippers” from a shop inside Windsor Castle – they’re white bath slippers with a gold crest embroidered on them – and they’re comfy and warm but I've already managed to spill red wine on them (but got the stain out right away).

Next we went onto Stonehenge. We spent an hour there. You really only need about half an hour max. For some reason I thought the stones would be bigger (but obviously they weren’t). It’s right next to a main road as well and there sheep in a field next to it – which kind of takes away from any mysteriousness that you might associate with it. So onto Bath.

Bath is where Jane Austin lived and where Pride and Prejudice and all those old timey movies were filmed. I was inlove with this town. Limestone everywhere. Cute little shops. Ahh. I would like to go back there for a weekend. We visited the famous Roman Baths there as well - which were really cool..

Other than that, I have been pottering around organizing myself for starting work next week and taking advantage of the fact that I can sleep in for a few more days yet. We needed some outdoor furniture, and the people down the road had moved out and all their stuff was out front – and low and behold – 3 plastic chairs and a deck chair later, we now have garden furniture. Found some real bargains in the Brixton Markets – bought 4 Espirit dinner plates and some knives and forks. And Katy showed me a few other shops I hadn’t been into yet, including some second hand and charity shops and I picked up THE best pair of jeans ever for 6 pounds 50 pence – total bargain. You can’t have enough jeans here.

For the rest of the week, I’m going to do some walking around in London itself and visit some more museums, galleries, cathedrals etc. I’m evening thinking of doing the London duck tour – which I thought might be a bit different to the normal touristy double decker bus thing. And I think I’m going back to Battersea Park again to see some live bands on Sunday. Anyway, I start work on Tuesday (hoorah!) – which is exactly 2 months to the day of my last day working at Emergency Services. Speak to you all soon! And make sure you check out all the photos at www.amanda.com.au/uk - Manda :)

More interviews, Amanda gets a job, beautiful parks...

What’s interesting living in a new place is getting used to the new sounds around you. I’ve learnt to tune out from the sirens that seem to be constantly screaming. I swear the police and ambulance just put them on for fun sometimes in that they seem to well always be on. And I no longer here the church bells clanging away. I love walking through the park near our house to get home in the day time. Birds will be singing and without fail, I will see two squirrels on the very green grass – it’s just gorgeous... Oh and this photo on the right is of Battersea Park (and there's more further on).

Ok, some new music I’ve discovered while I’ve been here: The Gossip and Patti Smith – two women with amazing voices and they're not even from here. Razorlight is another great band. And there was this huge free festival that went on this weekend called the Radio 1 Big Weekend – insane line up but unfortunately all the tickets were given away months ago – so I’m forced to watch it on digital tv instead. Oh and I found out I that one of my fave bands ..and you will know us by the Trail of Dead is coming to London - yay!!!

Anyway, my bestest news ever is that I’ve scored a job – I start working at BP in 2 weeks time (on Tuesday 5th June) as a Sharepoint Admin – great job, great company, the site is amazing with onsite doctor, dentist, dry cleaner, café, restaurant, country club etc etc. Here’s what I’ve been up to this last week and this coming week – I’m hoping to do some touristy stuff like go on the red double decker open roof buses. And next week I’m heading off on a day tour to Stonehenge, Windsor Castle and Bath. So here’s the week that was:

Tuesday 15th May

Today, I got my hair cut, coloured, highlights etc at Atlantic hair. 85 quid later – it actually looks pretty good – the highlights stand out more now – and my justification – I need to look good for interviews and my fringe was getting in my eyes and driving me nuts. After this I headed to Argos – my new favourite shop and bought an electric blanket. I’m sure the people thought I was nuts – but it’s been really cold and boy it was nice to dive into a warm bed that night.

Today I saw the BP Sharepoint job advertised on one of the job websites. I applied. I rang the agency. I finally got hold of someone. They’d already seen my CV before, but for some reason didn’t think I could get to the job at BP – which as it turns out – it only takes me one tube and one train to get there – about a half hour trip. Anyway, after speaking to them and clarifying that I *can* get there quite easily, they sent my CV off. That’s the thing with the majority of recruiters and agencies here – you have to ring THEM to get the ball rolling to get them to even look at your CV, even if you’ve already sent your CV and applied for the job already etc – it’s the opposite to what I’m used to, but that’s just how it is here generally.

Oh and today I saw the sun! I ran outside into garden to absorb some sunlight like an excited child before it quickly vanished again. That night, me and Steph had some red wine and chocolate and watch some bizarre tv – “How to look good Naked” – a show kind of like Queer Eye, but ends with a semi naked photo shoot, and a previously frumpy and now made over woman doing a strut down a catwalk in her underwear in front of 2000 people.

Strange but fascinating tv here… I’m also enjoying watching music documentaries on digital tv here such as the “The Seven Ages of Rock” series which I watched on Saturday night just gone featured Jimi Hendrix . I never realized Jimi Hendrix made it big here in London first before he went back to America. I’m so going to have to find a copy of his performance at Monterey – it’s a defining moment. Anyway British documentaries are in a class of their own (and no offence, but Australian tv leaves a lot to be desired).

Wednesday 16th May

Today, I had an interview with GTA who are a travel wholesaler. The job was working in their helpdesk maintaining and updating various websites. All was going good – I got up, cooked a big breakfast – didn’t want my tummy rumbling in the interview. Watched the morning news. Went to have a shower. No hot water. Left the tap on. Still no hot water. I couldn’t go to an interview unshowered! Then all of a sudden someone was bashing on my door and it was the electricity reader man.

That’s the other odd thing here – you have to let the gas and electricity people into your house to read the meters. It’s a bit unnerving letting a potential lunatic into your house. Anyway, I said to him – by the way – our hot water isn’t working – and he offered to look at our gas boiler and presto he adjusted some setting and yay hot water. Anyway, I got a tube to Barbican, amazingly got there on time, had the interview – the two guys who interviewed me were really friendly and reminded me a lot of the people I used to work with – but oddly they couldn’t tell me what the salary was?

As it turns out I was actually offered this job the week after, but I’d already accepted the BP job by that point (and the BP job is way better / what I want). That afternoon, I heard back from the agency about the BP job, and they wanted me to have a phone interview with them – so that was lined up for 4pm that day and it went for 20 minutes and I thought it went quite well at the time.

Thursday 17th May

The agency rang me again first thing, and said my phone interview went great and wanted me to come in that day to meet them at the agency. So I was getting ready and literally about to leave the house when the agency rang me again and said change of plans – you’re going straight to BP for your interview instead.

Yay, so I went out to BP and met with them and had my interview chat / in their giant café on the upper floor. I’m going to take some photos of this site once I start work – it’s amazing.. Anyway, caught the train and tube back to Brixton and went to Marks and Spence and picked up some fish, fetta and salad ingredients for dinner (yum). Opened a bottle of wine, Steph got home, we sat down and had dinner together and got ready and headed out to the Dogstar bar and a few other clubs. Big night.

Friday 18th May

Hangover. My head hurt in more ways than one. My phone rang and woke me up. It was the agency. I’d gotten the BP job. The agency wanted to meet me finally. I arranged to go in later that day and went back to bed but was so excited that I couldn’t actually sleep. I got myself together eventually and dragged myself on the tube and headed to Mansion House station. I got some takeaway on the way. I met the lady from the agency, got some paperwork out of the way and was on my way.

Got the tube home and what was really cool is that at Victoria Station there was a busker / guitarist and his sound echoed all the way from the tunnels to the platform – but what really made me listen and enjoy it was that all the songs he was playing were all piano songs, but played on guitar – it was strange, delicate and beautiful. Anyway, dragged myself home. And I have to say all this walking everywhere everyday – it’s good exercise and all my jeans starting to fall down as a result! Who would’ve thought I could survive without a car.

Saturday 19th May

Well, by the time my weekends have been coming around, I’ve been so busy running around during the week that I’m happy to veg out a bit, hang out at home and catch up on washing, housy stuff etc. Tonight I watched some live footage from the Radio 1 Big Weekend festival going on and the Jimi Hendrix doco. I can’t believe he was only 27 when he died. Terrible terrible shame..

Sunday 20th May

Today I went to a charity music gig held in Battersea Park. The Brits love their parks over here – so green, so huge, and so beautiful. I caught the bus there which was interesting because I had absolutely no idea when I was supposed to get off – but I actually got off at the right stop and navigated my way to the park with my A-Z (mini map book). Actually finding the gig was also interesting because the place is so huge, but I eventually found it (I headed toward the music).

I met my new friend Josh there (and his friends), sat in front of a giant pond / lake with people in sailing around in row boats and peddle boats, sat back and enjoyed the music. Really nice day – want to go back there and explore more of the park and have a picnic – but get this – barbeques are banned in most of these parks! Hmph.

That’s one thing I want to buy or build over here is a bloody barbeque, and have one with a real wood and fire and none of this coal burning stuff. And get this – they even have disposable barbeques here - it's an aluminium tray with coles and wire grill section on top.

Anyway, that's the week that was - stay tuned! - Manda :)

Interviews, Soho, Camden Town, live bands and more..

Monday 7/5/07

Monday night I headed out with my housemate Katie and her friend Woody (aka Mark pictured in the photo) into London itself into Soho which I discovered is kind of well – gay central. First of all we went to a bar called Trash Palace, then to a club called the Ghetto (how appropriate). A live band called Language played there who were actually really good – you can listen to their songs on their site. And being in a gay nightclub was somehow strangely comforting because I didn't have to worry about being hit on - I was just there to have a good time!

Anyway, I had a bit of a boogie after the band finished. Songs that got me up and dancing (and jumping around lots) were LCD Soundsystem – North American Scum, Rage Against the Machine – Killing in the Name Of and Muse – Hysteria (god I love the guitar solo toward the end of that song..). Needed a good dance. On the way home, I saw the giant gold Freddy Mercury statue where We Will Rock You is playing, Big Ben, the London Eye and a few other things which got me excited. Didn’t go to sleep until about 3.30/4ish. Yikes.

Tuesday 8/5/07

Today my long awaited second suitcase of stuff from home was arriving by courier. There was no way I was leaving the house until it arrived. When it finally came mid-afternoon – it was like Christmas opening my suitcase –I’d forgotten what’d I’d packed because it seemed so long ago. Of note, I had my big fluffy towels, my warm and daggy tracky dacks, my pink flannelette leopard print pj pants (very attractive), my bathrobe, my duck down doona (yay!), and a picture of Kiddy which I stuck on my wall. I slept very happily that night all rugged up in my doona – was nice to have some things that made me feel “at home” again. Oh if anyone feels like sending me Promite or Aktavite – email me and I’ll give you my address – can’t get either of them over here!

Thursday - Friday 10-11/5/07

Thursday was my “planning” day. I had to figure out how to get from Brixton to Staines for an interview on Friday. The job wasn’t actually in Staines (it's in Feltham where their Data Centre is), but that’s where the interview was. And after finding out it was going to cost 70-80 pounds to get a taxi there, I quickly decided public transportation was my only option. After doing various searches on tube and rail websites, I had to get the tube, 2 trains and a cab from the train station to the interview (whoa). I made it from the tube to Victoria train station where fate was actually working in my favour – it took a good 5 minutes lining up to buy my train tickets – there was a huge queue (I hadn’t put this into my timings), but luckily my train was delayed by 5 or 10 minutes – if it hadn’t have been I would’ve missed it and the connecting train that I had to transfer onto and the cab waiting for me at the other end.

So I made it to the interview and I was actually early. The job was for a Technical Author (it’s a SharePoint related job) working for T-Systems – I think the interview went well – it went for a solid hour - was quite intense and they're a huge company. I’ll find out next week what the outcome is I'd say. I also have another interview for a different job lined up on Wednesday in London itself – so we’ll see what happens. After the interview I made it all the way back to Brixton, went for a chai latte at Cafe Nero, got home and out of my interview clothes and stupid high heels (ow).

I plonked myself on the couch in the living room and listened to Queen – A Night at the Opera – which someone dear to me from home recently recommended that I download and listen to it (I love Queen incase you hadn’t figured out yet). In particular, I was told to listen to “You’re My Best Friend” (and a few other songs) – because they’d been thinking about me on the other side of the world (click the link to read the lyrics). Now I've heard and I'm sure everyone else has heard this song a zillion times before - but I sat there and *really* listened to the lyrics and I cried for the first time since I’ve been here. Music makes me cry sometimes – it’s powerful stuff.. It was a happy and sad moment in one. Beautiful and heart felt words and lyrics..

Oh, I forgot to mention that on Thursday night I ventured out to Camden Town with Josh – a friend of a friend from home to see some live music. I have to say, all this getting around on public transport, catching the tube and trains here and there has really boosted my confidence knowing I can get from A to B (via X, Y and Z). I was kind of mentally “scared” of doing these things initially – but now I know it’s nothing to be scared of at all. I have my tube map, the public tranport websites are great, there’s signs everywhere and having an Oyster card makes things even easier (it’s a swipe card you put credit on instead of buying tickets and you can top it up online). Anyway, Josh’s brother was in a band that was playing at the place where we were going to in Camden Town. The lead singer - her name is Amy and she’s in the photo with Josh – turns out before she was a singer, she was a dancer and was in the Muse – Our Time is Running Out music clip – there you go!

Anyway, that’s all for now, hopefully next time I post another blog entry there’ll be more / good news on the job front. Oh also, I have a really good phone card offer at the moment - I can call Australia for free on Saturdays during May from my midday to midnight - which is Saturday 9pm to Sunday 9am Brisbane/Australia time - so if you have a landline, email me your number so I can call you (I seem to mostly have people's mobiles - doh!) - but it's for May only (and other random months during the year). Speak to you all soon – and someone please send me Promite and Aktavite!! Oh and I saw my first squirrel and fox the other day too! Manda :)

Oh PS: I found out Mogwai (one of my favourite bands) was DJing in a local club here in Brixton – but it turns out it was last weekend – I missed out – damn! I am definitely living in the right place for music though! Bye! And PPS: If you see photos of food / dinnerplates on here - I like taking photos of dinners I cook at home when it looks fab / yummy. AND PPPS: good luck to 2 special people who start new jobs on Monday :)