Deepest, darkest Peru

Early last year we decided to spend xmas and new year 08/09 in Peru. A formerly great place that now has the added attraction of my good friend Mr Clarke, a resident of the vibrant city of Lima. We bought our exhorbitant tickets at the beginning of the fuel crisis, wondering whether our holiday insurance covered 'planet going down the drain' before we leave. 8 months of excited expectation were rewarded in a top holiday. However, the necessary 6 flights from Wellington meant that any green conscience we had built up by walking to work was dramatically shattered and probably requires us to sequester tonnes of carbon. I've already started to eat, rather than meticulously scrape, any burnt toast to get a head start.

Paul - erstwhile brother of rock - Clarke chose Lima due to the most common of reasons; a woman. Apart from the attraction of a very lovely lady, it can't have been a difficult choice, especially when compared to the heinously bland South Woodham in deepest darkest Essex (where the three main exciting attractions worth visiting seem to be: a river, a footy pitch and a leisure centre, without graffiti).


The holiday consisted of great food, wonderful company, interesting sights, local customs and plenty of new experiences. The holiday included a first. Lisa and I (with Jen and her mum) entered our first organised tour. The bitter taste soon wore off as we were escourted around with efficiency and soon got used to the luxurious hotels (compared with our usual backpacker hostel choices) and fancy transport. We saw heaps more than would otherwise have had. Left to our own devices the ten days would not have started till midday and we wouldn't have seen at least half the sights we did. You can call me a hypocrytical sonofabitch though, as I still found time to produce a condecending, smug grin at the group of tourists paraded around with military precision by an umbrella waving goon between cheesy photo opp to overpriced restaurant. I have decided to fight mediocrity from within.

Arequipa and Puno were ace, the canyon was dramatic, the ruins were interesting, bartering fun and landscape often breathtakingly beautiful. Lisa and I spent enough time in the uber cool bohemian suburb of Barranco to actually feel like the place could be a potential candidate for a longer stay. Although, even after a year of evening classes, it was a rude awakening that I'd have to put more work in on the lingo. I found pigeon spanish solace in cab drivers, who were happy enough with my business to let me practice my limited vocab out on them.



The next year has been dedicated a year of local exploration but we are already itching to plan another long haul adventure.

(a whole heap of pics in Flickr, however, I have now reached my unpaid limit in financially uncertain times.)

Back again!!

...after a terrible hiatus, a black hole that meant we were unable to access the web, let alone contribute to it. This techno-void was not a result of the large hydrogen collider suddenly creating holes into different dimensions through which our computer lept, but more the result of some bastard who smashed our front door down and nicked our blinking laptop (amongst anything else of value that they could flog down the local boozer). Anyway, you get philosophical about material items and we have moved on.


















On a more positive note; I will tell of a weekend away in the woods:

It was pitched as a 30k walk over three days on maintained tracks, staying in huts and getting back to nature. It turned out to be an extraordinarily grueling tramp that saw us navigate swollen streams, pull ourselves up steep hillsides by tree roots, plod through ankle high mud for hours and not come across any flat land till we reached the end of the route. It snowed, was bloody cold at night, was painful with blisters on feet not used to spending all days in walking boots, was beautiful, was very peaceful, was a real challenge and something I'd do again at the drop of a hat. Lisa turned out to be in her element while the rest of the guys moaned and groaned our way through the bush (no puns intended, it wasn't that kind of weekend).







I'll upload some more pics to the Flickr site

Film Festival '08

I'm not a great cinema goer really. I can't stand the smell of popcorn, most vacuous Hollywood blockbusters, the over use of CGI, crap scripts, talentless thespians, product placement, bums on seats beaus, nationalistic flag waving bollox and all the arseholes that tend to frequent these dens of iniquity, getting excited about all of the above while texting an explanation of the plot to their mate in the next seat because they got bored of speaking over the film.


I'm more of a dvd man myself, who tries to find quality flicks that stimulate the gray matter. I don't mean art for the sake of art and pretentious self indulgent twaddle, but, there are plenty of films that not only provide one with a diversion but also have something to say. It is a world where less can definitely be more.

I don't watch 15 films in a year and probably haven't seen more than 5 per year at a cinema. However this winter, which has been dreadful with over a month of continuous rain, felt like the perfect opportunity to overdose on culture. 15 flicks was probably information overload in a 2 week spell, but I'm glad I did it - saw some great movies and doco's. Check out the overviews for a list of films that might come your way and represent a subject that floats your boat. This is our top 5:

1. Somers Town - coming of age, multi cultural feel good set in grimey old London.
2. Rain of the Children - The history of the Tuhoe tribe through the eyes of a lady who's seen it all.
3. Elite Squad - Brazilian uber violence and police corruption set in Rio.
4. Garbage Warrior - Inspiring doc about building houses that are totally self sufficient and the system that doesn't want them built - yes - we are all doomed.
5. Gomorrah - Italian's getting in on the pervasive gang culture action - yikes!

The following links are for some digital short films that were shown in one presentation but can be found individually online, some really cool stuff:

http://www.codehunters.tv/swfs/main.htm

http://www.glimpsedigital.com/blindmanseye/trailer.html

http://www.thearkfilm.com/

http://www.chrisj.com.au/ called the passenger

http://www.switch-lefilm.com/

http://www.janvannuenen.com/index.php?page=evolizer-info

http://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&VideoID=34921485

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x30dtt_josies-lalaland_shortfilms

The Bigger Beach House Only 2 hours drive from Wellington, over the Rimutaka hills, a sharp right at the vineyards of Martinborough towards the east coast. The location is Tora, a small farming outpost and some holiday homes. We stayed in an secluded, revamped sheep shearers cottage to get away from the hustle and bustle of the working week. No tv or cell phone reception. Plenty of board games, books, obscene amounts of food and the obligatory volume of booze to sink a battle ship. To top it all off, the weather was stunning, especially considering we were 7 days off the winter solstice. Plenty of pics on the usual link.

Vegas

The neon lights serve as a reminder of mankind's cultural zenith, building hedonistic Mecca's in unlikely wastelands, sticking a middle finger up at common sense, human decency and mother nature. I had already spent my formative years frequenting Bas Vegas and have, in recent years, had the opportunity to visit the local equivalent; Roto Vegas. However, nothing quite prepared me for the real thing.

I got an invite to a stag do in Las Vegas earlier this year but instantly discounted the idea as madness. It's tacky, hot, dusty and expensive. I bought a ticket, expecting to have a dreadful time in a hateful place with some very good friends (total of nearly 30 people - a huge effort). With so much weight of malodorous expectation I was quite taken aback that I actually found myself enjoying the place, being wowed by the tacky cheese marble rip-off edifices, the naff, mock, Disney style replicas of Paris, Venice, Egypt and Rome. As the saying goes: 'it's so friggin bad, it’s great!'. The only reason I was keen to leave after the weekend was financial and physical stamina (unlike some that pushed the boundaries of endurance with 60 hour marathon sessions).

No pictures but plenty of memories. A cracking weekend.

Moonride 08

My mum stayed for a couple of weeks after doing a tiki tour of the South Island, ingratiating herself with the locals. We went to a couple of comedy festival gigs, a trip over to the Wairarapa and ate and drank heaps. She had a wicked time and it was fantastic to have her around, seeing what were up to, fulfilling her traveling bug, filling her house with a million more pamphlets and business cards and taking 1500 photos. Whatever floats your boat.

Evie accompanied my mum home and Jen stayed to assist us pickle ourselves even more. It’s a hardship having to support successive people on their holiday binges.

I signed up, with some guys from work, to participate again in the 12 hour team Moonride event. It was great fun last year so I was looking forward to mountain biking round the 30 minute course as many times as we could within 12 hours, a 3rd of the laps being in the dark. The course was shortened at the last minute due to the amount of rain, with 3000 riders churning the course up into a mud bath of epic proportions. Crazy amounts of mud meant it was tough going and very unpredictable – where you pointed your front wheel wasn’t necessarily where the bike, through a quagmire, would decide to take you. I had a heaps of offs, most of them embarrassing rather than painful.

Pic's on the Flickr link on the top right tool bar

The Mothership Connection

With some nerves, trepidation and reluctance I phoned the organisers of the Grape Ride to get a late entrants spot in the 101k bike race. I paid over the odds to punish myself because Jen was coming over from London, with her friend Evie, to compete in the race – and if they made the effort….

The significance of the whole shebang was that the race is on Jen’s parent’s doorstep and it was going to be a huge surprise for them to find that their daughter had turned up out of the blue, without any forewarning. The race was also the same weekend as Jen’s mum’s birthday. What a great surprise! I was looking forward to being involved in the festivities but not a long bike ride – I hadn’t been on a bike since last November when I got wrote off by the car.

We got the ferry over and were picked up by Jen and father – he enthused about the shock and surprise of coming home to his daughter whom he suspected was in the UK. We got to their house and I walked into their kitchen and - lo and behold – my mum was also sitting at the kitchen table with Evie and Jen’s mum. Apparently my face was a complete picture and the blabbered expletives were amusing. My mum’s not been on a plane before and if I was a betting man, I would not put money on her randomly turning up on the other side of the world for her first trip. So double bubble surprises all round! Much mirth and merriment ensued and Lisa felt like the second coming of Cilla Black for keeping all the details of the Mothership landing quiet for a couple of months.

Jen, Evie and Myself set of for the ride the next morning, me on her dad’s mountain bike with full off road tires. We all got plenty of strange looks from the lycra clad, road bike, carbon frame brigade. The course goes through the vineyards of Marlborough and then heads out to the very windy and extremely hilly Queen Charlotte drive. I was struggling away at the back of the race, battling gravity and friction while the bike chewed up tarmac. The last 3^rd of the race was truly painful and a real test of spirit to actually finish, rather than throw bike into the bushes and thumb a lift back to finish line. It took 5 hours to complete and I immediately vowed that, should I do it again, I’d make sure to do some practice and get some slick tires on the bike.

That evening I deserved the wine, inhaled loads of food and nursed my saddle sore posterior.

Chelifer (the book scorpion)

We often get plenty of bugs in the flat due to the fact that we are the same level as the tree canopy and are surrounded by bush. We lead a harmonious existence with many of them, including some cheerful spiders, nervous winged bugs and a plethora of moths that get dazzled by our lights. A few weeks ago we noticed this crazy little creature that looked like a large mite with huge (relative to its body size) crab-like pincers, scuttling across the bathroom floor.

It was so cool that we left it to its own devices, and nothing to do with quasi buddhistic sentiment. Today we found another on the ceiling of the lounge and this time gone the extra courteous step of christening him/her Chelifer. A crap name but a given after we looked up what species of bug it actually was on the web. It is in fact a Pseudo Scorpion (kind of spider). Apt as both Lisa and I share that meaningless astrological sign and also like reading books. It has even increased in coolness after we learnt that it uses its pincers to catch lifts with flying insects by grabbing hold of their ankles whilst unaware. Maybe they have the courtesy to ask!? Who knows?

..Been a while!

Things started to seem circular. Should I post repetitive annual activities? Maybe a theme is required to keep it fresh? This blogging business is more difficult than it seems. Anyway - I had a couple of good excuses: it took a couple of months to get over the broken collar bone. I can't type with one hand (it's difficult enough with two). The painkillers weren't conducive to clarity of thought or applying myself to writing a 'diary'. It was also a good excuse.

Secondly, and only one day after getting the all clear from the hospital about the shoulder (I was keen to start physio), I was diagnosed with appendicitis, was sent directly back the hospital (didn't pass go) and immediately had an internal organ whipped out. Another convalescence, a bucket load more pills, more time at home and another good reason not to report anything.

During this time Jeremy paid a very welcome visit, as did uncle Jim (another accident waiting - oh there it goes - to happen), Dan and Yusoff (but could have warned me!). We had a great xmas. New year was great fun at Takaka. This years Womad was equally cool, and binding it all together was the usual nine to five.

It's all good!

More pictures loaded at flickr (link on the right).