It's good to be a kiwi.


Well we've had a really good time in Vienna, but looks like we will be on our way out at some time this year. As for Jordan, she will be leaving earlier. Now that she is not enrolled in a school, her visa has expired.

She was in and out of the MA35 almost everyday a week, looking for ways to stay. The first lady suggested that Jordan could find a nice young Austrian and marry him. We all laughed, and then she looked a little panicked and said, "But don't do that."

Then the question became(on our next visit), "Well, when my visa runs out, how long can I stay?Or do I have to leave straight away?"

The MA35 man started asking us lots of questions but when he found out we were from NZ, he gave a gallic shrug and said, "Oh you are from NZ. You can stay for 3 months."

At first Jordan really wanted to stay in Austria, but now she is quite looking forward to going back home. Home means learning how to drive, beaches, bbq's, picnics, Oporto's, spicy food, and no more MA35.

New Beginnings

Jordan's baptism was a few days after the official day for swimming was over. Although it had been quite warm on the last official day, the very next day it was freezing. As you can see from Jordan and Ira's body language. it really wasn't warm.

We were pleased to see so many people come out for this special occasion. Welcome to the kingdom Jordan sweetheart.

Baby girl has spread her wings

Despite all the grief, hair-pulling and the turning gray of the hair, when your child finally grows old enough to move out, even nonmaternal me was unable to let my baby girl leave without a few tears.

My mother sent me a mother's day card with a photo of Jordan when she was a baby. I remember taking that photo as if it was just yesterday. The first night I watched my child run off to spend her first night in her very own apartment, I watched her till I could see her no more.

She never turned for a last wave good-bye. She was too excited. I was excited for her too, but I missed her already. And inevitably, I think back to when I moved out of home. I don't remember if I turned back, but I think not.

This now is one of these times when we really think of our mums, and wonder, "Have I told her often enough that I love her?",appreciate her? like her as a person not just because she's my mum?

"Aww mum, I'm only 10 minutes away."

She is looking forward to a new future full of new beginnings, and adventures. Whereas I am looking back, and recounting every step that lead to this and I thank God for this blessing.
Love you always baby girl.

Cirque du Soleil, Wa-hey!

So, G. often talks about opportunity and especially making the most of the opportunities we have while we are in Europe. For him one of those things is skiing, for me, it's the Cirque du Soleil. Yes, the tickets are expensive, but this may well be our last year here, and I thought it would be well worth it.

Well, I was doing the hard sell, and G. kept resisting. So, when he came back from the post office with a present for me I was completely surprised to open it and find 2 tickets to the Cirque du Soleil. Thank-you, thank-you, thank-you.

Jordan very sweetly declined this opportunity so that we could spend the extra money on getting good seats. 4th row from the front, bang in the middle, and on her birthday too. Awww.

The tent was quite a bit smaller than what we had in NZ, so I think any one of those seats would have been good ones. No pics allowed of course, but we were all so engrossed, I'm glad. It would have detracted from the atmosphere.

By the time we got there, I was almost worn out with excitement. G. was worried during some of the acts that I would pass out from all my gasping, and maybe even distract the performers cause I was so loud. I don't remember gasping, but I do remember being very tense during some of the heart stopping moves, when I wasn't being delighted and wanting to do that cos it looks a lot of fun.

Unfortunately there weren't any bungees, or chandeliers on a wire, for sale. I'm eyeing our disco ball but somehow, I don't think those 3 eensy weensy wires are going to hold my weight. Sigh.

In the words of Tinky Winky, "Again, again."

Sunday and what the?

People surprise me. Tickets were 125 euros. Many like us would have had to fork out another 100 or more euros to fly to Germany, or drive, or train etc...For the sole express purpose of spending 3 days listening to, dancing to, some of the top heavy rock/metal bands in the world and you know what people started lining up for from early in the day? The soccer.

A couple of hours were set aside to air the soccer. Unbelievable.

What smell is missing?

For anyone who has attended several concerts in NZ, and it doesn't seem to matter which music genre, you too would've wondered why the concert and campgrounds smelt .....unexpected. It took us a little while to realise that a smell was missing. Which is a sad comment on NZ I think. Yes, the odiferous Mary Jane was missing.

We witnessed the "drug" police in action and were very impressed. A group of very ordinary "participants" descended on a young gent and started going through his belongings-bag, shoes, empty out pockets, sniff all the cigarettes in the ciggie packet etc...A fine was written up, and then the group just melted back into the crowd. Smooth.

I want to know how much the young man was fined.

Rock am Ring-the music.

Again I have forgotten who all performed. I was surprised which bands were a great and enjoyable performance and which ones sucked. Sadly, whoever did the sound for the main stage did a poor job. I couldn't sing along with Tank Serjian cos I couldn't hear him. The Nightwish group ended up leaving the stage for a short time until the sound could be fixed....or rather patched up.

Simple Plan were on the main stage for the first time and they were so pleased about this, it was embarrassing. They also lost quite a few brownie points for making the moshpit do the stupid "Rings of Fire". The numbers are kept so low, that 2 of these rings were able to be done. Of course, we ended up with our own ring of fire in front of us, beside us, behind us.....sigh.

Kid Rock gave a stellar performance and finished it with a ballad. lol.Offspring, Jimmy Eat World, Disturbed, Aler Bridge, Seether, all performed well and professionally.

Metallica were their usual. We didn't even stay for the whole set. We impressed that despite the sound difficulties, the unbelievable number of people present, and how much alcohol was being consumed, that everyone was still very well-behaved.

Rock am Ring- the food

We didn't take much food with us. The food at Rock-am-Ring was the only thing that was better than that at the Frequency. Plus, they sold crepes, so that's pretty much what we lived on for the next 4 or 5 days.

They were also food stalls on the road home. I have no idea when or if they got any sleep. The same people were serving no matter what time of the day or night we went past, 4am, 8am, 2pm, 11pm etc...

Quarter of a chicken and fries was going for 4/5 euros. It was a while ago so I forget. Jordan and Sarah pretty much did their own thing which made it cheaper for us, but hungrier for them.

Rock am Ring - Day 1

First act was at 4pm, so we had a nice lie in, enjoyed the sun, had a few beers(not me, bleugh) and familiarised ourselves with the campgrounds.

You can imagine our excitement and pride to find that the opening act was not only a kiwi band, but also one of our favourites-Steriogram! Score!

There weren't many of us around, but I think that was more to do with the "early" hour. Not that we cared. There was a young man there waving a NZ flag. He was so in love with NZ, and he had only been there for 2 weeks! We met another kiwi there too(spot the Sounds t-shirt) who was as rapt as us, with Steriogram.

Steriogram asked the standard, "Is there anyone out there from New Zealand?" but they weren't actually expecting to hear a yes. So when we were all jumping up and down, and screaming yes, Tyson Kennedy didn't believe us til he spotted my Taranki t-shirt.

Jordan and Sara talked to them after the show, and apparently the band were stoked to see some kiwis in the audience. Some may think that I am a biased, but I still think that Steriogram gave the best performance out of all the bands we saw that weekend.

Good on yer mates.

Rock am Ring- The Journey Begins

After the Frequency Festival and how noisy it was, I had no desire to experience another 3 day rock concert event. However, after weeks of listening to Jordan and Greg talking about Rock am Ring, and Jordan's friend was going too, I started to feel like if I stayed behind, I would be missing out on a lot of fun. So, I changed my mind.

Rock am Ring was a lot further away than Frequency, so we had to catch a plane, then a train, and then finally a bus. Frequency was so well organised that we were very surprised when we arrived at the train station to see no signs whatsoever about the concert. There was a stream of people heading in the same direction so we figured they were a good bet, and trailed after them.

After talking to several people, we were happy to discover that yes we were in the right place but we still had a lot of head scratching ahead of us. There were still no signs about Rock-am-Ring, and the bus schedule said that the last bus was at 9pm. Eh? It was now 9.30pm. Hmmm.

There were lots of us there, and there were 2 buses in the lot which we were hoping like hell were for us. Finally, one of the buses rumbled over about 10pm. No-one was allowed to stand on the bus, which made me wonder why, considering the large number of people still left on the footpath, people's bags were allowed a seat, but we humans weren't.

As you can imagine, we were starting to get rather annoyed. Especially when that bus left, and the next bus didn't roll up until more than an hour later. There was no sign of another bus in the offing so we were a tad worried that after all this mucking around, we'd still be out in the cold, after midnight, in a strange city.

Well, the powers that be, decided they didn't want to have to run another bus so they crammed the rest of us on the bus. So much for the regulations. We were lucky to get a seat. We didn't realise how lucky until we got on the road, and were held up in traffic, and the trip took 2 to 3 hours!?! Who's running this monkey outfit?

Our final thrill was trying to squeeze ourselves into what little space remained on the tiny campgrounds available. Our tent ended up a little lopsided, but at 3am in the morning we didn't have enough energy left to care. The girls ended up with a nice place.

Lucky everyone was so well-behaved and understanding. We thought we had encroached on our neighbours space and you couldn't possibly fit a fly in the area left, so it was funny to unzip our tent, and see another tent 2 inches from ours.

What on earth were the organisers thinking?headscratch, headscratch.