Farmers' Markets and Liberty Ships - another week in California

Hey all - sorry it's taken me longer than I expected to get onto this post - been busy busy busy this last week.

So, picking up where I left off last time - last Saturday had been planned as a trip to SF to go and visit Alcatraz - I've been once before, and it's incredible - you can get a great sense of the history of the place by just wandering through the ruined and disused buildings which represent all the different uses the island has had over its long history. Even from afar, you can get a sense of the isolation of this island in the middle of one of America's biggest cities.

Unfortunately, this particular Saturday, Alcatraz was not to be - as it was a sunny and pleasant weekend, there were literally thousands of tourists (such as myself, it must be said) out and about, and all of the alcatraz tickets for the day were already taken. Anyway, I decided I wouldn't let such a thing stop me from heading out for the day, so I made my way into San Francisco.

One thing worth knowing about this town is that it's right at the forefront of all sorts of eco-friendly and sustainable measures and practices. A good example of this is the weekly farmer's market, which I came across outside the Ferry Terminal in downtown San Franscisco. Every Saturday, there's a whole bunch of stalls set up on the sidewalk for visitors to browse through. But these aren't your ordinary fruit stalls - instead, it's a proper foodies' market - all organic, and with a huge range of different and unusual species and varieties. Below, for example, you can see a few of the different types of tomatoes - this stall alone had at least a dozen different kinds of tomato - like I said, a real connoisseur's selection.

The next stop on my trip was the famous tourist spot pier 39 - however, getting there turned out to be somewhat more difficult than I imagined it would - because there were so many people around, I waited at the streetcar stop for almost half an hour while tram after tram went past, packed to the gills. Luckily, I had taken some reading material with me, so no great loss.

When I got to Pier 39, I poked around for a little bit at the knick-knack and tourist shops, before stopping for a highly recommended SF eating experience - clam chowder in a sourdough bread bowl - I wish I had a picture, but I was too busy enjoying my lunch to break out the camera.

Last stop for the day was a visit to a WWII era Liberty Ship, built to transfer vital supplies across the Atlantic Ocean - there were over 1100 of these 400 foot long ships built in just a few years, but there are only 2 which still work. This particular ship is thrown open to the public when it's not steaming around the bay for fundraising. I really enjoyed poking around the place, which is made possible by the fact that essentially the entire ship, from the bridge to the decks to the engine room are opened up, and you are free to explore at your own pace.

The rest of this week has been largely confined to preparing for classes - some more orientations (I'm feeling somewhat over-oriented at the moment), another trip into SF to pick up some bits and pieces, and a bunch of stationary shopping etc etc.

Today, however, was my first day of classes, and I'm glad to report that everything went well - my classes seem to be super interesting, and it looks like I'm likely to get into the field-trip class I've been so keen on.

Anyway, that's about all for today - if you wanna catch up with the rest of the photos (including a whole bunch from the amazing liberty ship), then check out the newest Flickr set.

'til next time,

Jono

update from Cal

Hey there all - long time no blog, hey?

Well, just wanted to bring y'all up to date with what's going on over here at Berkeley.

It's been an eventful week for me - getting moved into my new accommodation, exploring Berkeley, paying a couple of visits to San Francisco to get my bearings over there - and continuing to encounter the wonderful wierdness that is UCB.

So, this week was international student orientation - so the first couple of days of the week, all the international students trekked down to the Berkeley International house to listen to people talk at us about Immigration, Campus safety, Academic success etc etc. For the most part, that stuff was pretty boring (I'd heard most of it at my check-in session a few days before.) On the up side, I did win a membership to the YWCA (erm.... I guess I'll just give that away to someone slightly more female than I am), but more importantly, I had the chance to meet a whole bunch of other international students. Amongst the international students, there are a bunch of different categories - there are older students here to do graduate studies, there are new students here to do their whole undergraduate degree at Berkeley (lucky people!), and then there are EAP students like myself. Overall, I figure EAP students probably make up about 20% of the international student group - but we've tended to bunch together so far. Point being, I've met a bunch of awesome people here, and it's good to be able to hang out with people who are having the same kind of experience as you are. Lots of Brits amongst them, a decent number of Aussies, a few Mexicans and Brazillians, and a couple of NZers and South Africans - a fun group, all up.

Also this week, I moved into my permanent accommodation for the semester, the Sigma Pi frat house. All in all, I'm happy with what I've got here - while the house as a whole is exactly what you'd expect from a house full of unsupervised 18-21 year old college students, everyone around here is real friendly, and I have a good spot here. The room itself is big enough for a bed, a desk and a couch - in fact it's about the size of some of the double rooms I've seen elsewhere. There was a microwave and a fridge here when I arrived, which means I can keep my breakfast stuff right here in my room, and I could even heat up meals if I felt the need. There's a couple of windows, and one of them looks out onto the bay and the San Francisco skyline (though it is quite far away, and, as is San Francisco's wont, often fogged over) - the picture here might be too small to see it properly - if that's the case, check out the full size original (In this pic, you can see the student residences in Berkeley in the foreground, then the Bay and the Bay Bridge, Yerba Buena Island and, in the far background, the Transamerica Pyramid, Bank of America building and the rest of the SF downtown skyline). Additionally, this place is only a couple of blocks down the road from I-House, where about half of the international students are staying.

At any rate, I've made it a task to become more familiar with the shape and layout of San Francisco proper. Unfortunately, getting around in SF is not cheap - the BART subway system is convenient (there's a stop at the bottom of campus, a 10 minute walk or short bus ride down the hill from here), but expensive - to get from Berkeley to San Francisco and back costs US$ 6.80, and they don't have student discounts or daily unlimited ride tickets like we do in Melbourne. Luckily, there is a way around this expense. With my Cal student ID card, I get a sticker which gives me a free ride on any AC Transit bus, which services most of the East Bay. AC Transit also has a bus which passes outside I-House, and goes all the way across the Bay Bridge to downtown San Francisco. Anyway, long story short, the Bus is free, but takes about twice as long as the BART, so I think visiting SF will depend largely on how much of a hurry I'm in - cost VS convenience and all that. still, it's an amazing city, and I'll definitely continue to make the trip across the bay, especially when there are views like this to be had:

So, one thing that continues to impress me about Berkeley is the extent to which its residences are active and engaged in their littel piece of the world.

Case in point: The tree sitters I think I mentioned these guys in an earlier post - they've occupied a tree in an Oak Grove which the University want to knock down in order to build a High Performance Sports Centre. Well, the other day, we had a bit of a Hippy VS UC skirmish. Basically, I was walking down the street to I-House (which is right next to the Oak Grove in question), and saw that the police had blocked off the roadleading up to the hippy's roadside encampment.

So I go to check things out, and am confronted by the sight of a man, sitting at the top of a tree, yelling at a crane which appears to be hovering dangerously close to a dude whose perch hardly looks stable to start with.

Anyway, turns out the whole thing wasn't as major as it initially appeared - the university was in fact just cutting out some dead branches from the other trees, but even that was enough to attract local news crews, a healthy band of hippies and hippy-sympathisers and about a dozen cops.

   Note: The Hippy shown here is Zachary Runningwolf - reportedly the original treesitter, and currently a candidate for Mayor of Berkeley.

Note: The cops shown here are probably there because, last time the University sent arborists into the oak grove, the tree sitters started throwing human waste. I am totally serious. Only in Berkeley.

Anyway, after that little bit of excitement, I went for a walk down to the Berkeley Marina - the fishing pier there stretches way, way out into the water, and you can get awesome views of Downtown SF and, in fact, most of the San Francisco bay.

Also, I encountered an enormous, wierd looking bird (points for anyone who can identify what it is) which didn't seem to mind when I got ridiculously close to it - so lots of birdface closeups, as below.

So, that more or less sums up my week in Berkeley. This coming week is 'welcome week', and on Thursday my first classes, so I will be sure to keep y'all updated on how things go.

'til then,

Jono.

PS. As per usual, all my photos from the last week are up on Flickr - so if you're after more shots of hippies, Cops or wierd looking seabirds, why not pay a visit?

The last few days in Berkeley, CA

Hey there y'all - another update from my time here at Berkeley.
Another eventful few days here on campus - I'm beginning to get a hang of the layout of this campus, and it's just amazing.
Possibly my favourite part of it all (apart from the awesome buildings) are the ways in which the campus is integrated with its environment. Two branches of strawberry creek run right through the campus, and are built into the structure of the university. So you might be walking from one side of campus to another, when you come across a glade of redwood trees, with a stream running through the middle. you'll walk across a bridge, and you might even stumble upon a log cabin (a genuine, no fooling log cabin) - all of this in the middle of campus - and because there are two branches of the creek, there are several such oases around campus.

The other thing I've noticed recently is what an interesting place this is on the weekends. Of course, classes haven't started yet, but I figure that during the week, it'll be pretty much like any other university - people rushing back and forth between classes etc. But on the weekend, it's unlike anything we have at universities back home.
I guess because so many people live on campus, there's a lot going on here on the weekends. On Saturday night, there was a big concert in the Greek Theatre next door to where I'm staying. On Sunday, I went for a walk up in the hills around 6 O'clock, and was amazed by everything that was going on. Simultaneously, I could hear the Carillion (61 bell organ at the top of the clock tower) being played, the footballers and cheerleaders practicing in the California Memorial stadium, and the marching band practicing on the soccer field. The whole place feels so alive, nothing like uni on the weekend back home.

In addition, my Sunday afternoon walk was -incredible-. I went up into the hills behind where I'm staying (still part of the campus, it extends right back into the hills). First of all the view from up there is -amazing-! You can see right down and across campus, then all the way to the Golden Gate, Alcatraz, San Francisco - almost the whole bay. From there, I climbed up to the big, yellow, concrete 'C' (for Cal, a moniker for U Berkeley) in the side of the hill (Incidentally, the giant C was laid out on that hill in 1905 - it's now 103 years old). I met a couple of international graduate students from Pakistan on the way up (they're here studying Public Policy - you meet all sorts of interesting people around campus here), and saw some big, flightless turkey-like birds (not turkeys, but you get the idea) and a freaking deer. Which was amazing, to see it wandering around so close to the built-up campus.
No photos of all that excitement, unfortunately - I had left my memory card inside my laptop - but I'm gonna be sure to go back up there for some photography, probably later this week.

Today (Monday) was the first orientation day, which was fairly dry, but tomorrow promises to be more exciting - I'm moving into the fraternity house which is to be my permanent accomodation, as well as going on a short hike with the International Student program.
Will report back soon,

'til then,
Jono

PS. New Flickr set up (including a couple photos of me, just to prove that I am really here). Also, any of y'all who were having trouble commenting before, I've changed the settings so that you don't have to register or type out random letters before you can post comments. Hopefully that makes things a little more straightforward.

First Days @ Berkeley

So here I am, a few days into my visit to Berkeley, and enjoying myself enormously.

First thing's first - the campus here is -amazing-. Most of the buildings are from the early parts of the 20th century - a kind of Neo-Classical Greek style, complete with columns and giant stone facades etc. My favourite building so far is definitely the campanile - a hundred metre tall clock tower, complete with a Carillion (36 bells attached to a keyboard) which chimes on the hour - I love the idea of always being able to see what the time is from almost anywhere on campus - and what a spectacular building!








The other thing worth knowing about Berkeley is that it has a long history of liberalism and political activism. This was the site of a whole lot of key civil rights and free speech debates during the 50s and 60s, and continues to be a place where people aren't afraid to voice their opinions.
The current cause rousing the rabble is a stand of Oak trees near the University's California Memorial Stadium (which, incidentally, was built in the 1920 and holds up to 85,000 people - that's almost as many people as the MCG). The University wants to knock over these trees to build a new athletics centre. But, in a place like Berkeley, cutting down trees is never going to be an easy proposition. Suffice to say that today, almost a year after the whole thing started, we have several tree-sitters, living up in the canopy complete with flag and solar panels (goodness knows the damage they're doing to the oaks - maybe UC is just waiting from the protesters to kill off the trees for them). The tree sitters are accompanied by a ragtage band of sidewalk-sleepers and their colourful, earnest, handpainted signs. Only in Berkeley.

The other incredible thing about this campus is that it's also full of life - there are a number of incredible pine groves with the local waterway (strawberry creek) running through - it adds greatly to the beauty of the campus, and I could imagine that it could be the perfect peaceful spot to sit and study during semester. Plus, they have wildlife! I saw squirrels! I love squirrels.
Today, I made my first trip across the bay to San Francisco proper.
As is my wont, I spent most of the afternoon wandering the streets taking pictures of tall buildings. Starting in the Financial District, I made my way to through Chinatown, past the Trans-America tower (the iconic pyramid of all those photos, postcard, movies etc) and back the the waterfront and the Ferry Building. All in all, while SF is hardly the equal of Manhattan or Chicago in terms of impressive, spectacular skyscrapers, it beats just about any other city in the US for the density, variety and style of its tall buildings.



























Well, that's more or less all for this entry in the 'ole blog.
I will keep adding things here as interesting stuff happens, though probably not with the same frequency as I was when I was travelling around - if any of y'all want to ask anything in particular or get in contact, leave a message here, or send an email to cursaeed@gmail.com.

'til next time!

Jono

PS. More photos of squirrels, plus many more photos of tall buildings, can be found in the latest Flickr Gallery

SLO -> Berkeley

Just a brief entry today, as there's not that much to say, and I'm uber-ready for bed.
got up early this morning in order to catch my 8:15 bus from San Luis Obispo to San Jose, from which I would transfer to a train to Berkeley.

Unfortunately, on arriving at the station and waiting around for a bit, myself and my fellow passenger were informed that the bus to San Jose had been cancelled due to a mechanical problem. myself and the half dozen other passengers had to wait around until 12:50 to hop on the next bus to San Jose.
In the end, that wasn't so terrible - San Luis Obispo is a nice, pretty town, so spending an extra morning there was hardly a tragedy. I took a walk around town, saw my first Frank Lloyd Wright building, and paid a visit to the library to catch up on the news (thankyou, New York Times. I love you.).

Eventually, I made my way back to the train station, and hopped on the bus to San Jose. Going up the middle of California's agricutural heartland, through places like Pasa Robles, King City and Salinas, it was a pleasant uneventful trip (and I got a lot of reading done).

From San Jose I ran to catch the Sacramento train, which passes through Berkeley. Past the huge salt flats at the southern end of the San Francisco bay, we made our way up it's east side, under one end of the Bay Bridge and wound up in Berkeley.

Unfortunately, my journey didn't end there - I was still a long way from campus, so I took a 10 minute bus ride up University Avenue to the bottom of the campus, then hauled myself way up into the foothills to Stern Hall, my on-campus accomodation until August 19.

So, first impression of Berkeley are very, very good.

It's a -huge- campus (even bigger than Monash, I reckon, and more densely populated with buildings). It's incredibly pretty - the 'theme' seems to be early 20th century neo-classical architecture, so we end up with suitably grand libraries, lecture theatres and academic halls, complete with grey stone and roman-style columns.

Plus, they have their very own clock tower, the campanille, which marks very hour of the day - I feel like now I understand the difference between what we call 'University' and what is known over here as 'College' - the feel and atmosphere of the two, while both focused on learning - is very different here to an ordinary uni.

No Flickr today, I'm afraid - I didn't get a chance to get the camera out the entire day.

All the best,

Jono

Day 5 – LA -> San Louis Obispo

So today, I started my trip up the coast from Los Angeles to San Francisco.

Up at 4:30 this morning was a right pain, but I managed it, and from there proceeded via subway to Union Station. My Amtrak train departed on time at 7:30AM, and we were off through the suburbs of Los Angeles, then out via Ventura, Oxnard and up the Pacific coast. I must admit that, after my first experience with the subject, I have nothing but good things to say about long-distance train travel. The seats are bigge and more comfortable than a plane, there are fewer people and more room in the aisles and, most importantly, you can spend hours on end just taking in the scenery, which is always changing.

And man, was there ever scenery. The Pacific Coast between LA and SF is spectacular, and I reckon it looks even better from a train than a car – in the train, there's not all that tarmac, all those petrol stations or all those road signs to distract you. In addition, I came across what appeared to be a huge military base (or something similar). Basically, I was staring out the window at the scenery, and I see this big geodesic dome on top of a hill. I reckon it's gotta be some kind of telescope or signal relay station, and as we get closer, I see more and more on the hills by the coast. Then I start seeing warehouses, transmission towers, radio towers, outhouse, even bunkers!

I didn't know it at the time, but it turns out that the railway passes through Vandenberg Air Base, which is where the government (and its contractors) launch their satellites. some of structures I was seeing were full-blown rocket launch towers. So that was awesome.

This afternoon, I arrived in San Luis Obispo - an old Spanish town near the coast, about halfway between LA and SF. When I decided I wanted to stop on the way up to San Francisco, I looked into things to do in the area. And I found a mountain. So I decided I would climb it.

In fact, there are what they call the 7 sisters in the area, old volcanic formations in a long chain projecting inland South-East from the sea. directly above the town, however, about 300 metres high, is Cerro San Luis. So I came into town with a mission - to climb up this hill.
So I arrived in town, dropped off my stuff at the hostel (couldn't check in until 4:30), and began preparing myself. I got supplies (lots of water, a sandwich) and bought some shorts (I've been needing these for the last few days, and I didn't want to go hiking in jeans or my heavy cargoes), then went back to the hostel, checked in and slathered myself with sunscreen and was off.


Unfortunately, it didn't go entirely smoothly - I got a bus across town, but came upon a seemingly impassable obstacle - the National 110 Freeway. I walked and walked and walked and was beginning to wonder if I would even reach the bottom of the mountain before it got too dark. But all of a sudden, I found an underpass, and was on my way. I found the steep, steep trail to the top (popular with mountain bikers, apparently), and made my assault on the summit. Now, all of this may sound terribly melodramatic, but this was a battle of wills - me against the mountain. And I won!


I summited the peak, took in the amazing views, and felt the need to show my disrespect for the mountain by shaking my fist at it.



Tomorrow, I'm finally heading up to San Francisco - very much looking forward to that.

All the best, talk soon.
Jono.

PS. Pictures from today are now up

PPS. One extra special photo, just for Adel. Hope you appreciate that I came all the way out here just to get you this picture, mate.

The Getty Institute: charitable foundation or evil super-corporation

So, I went to the Getty Institute yesterday, and I really enjoyed it - they've got an incredible collection of artworks, spanning from Ancient Egyptian times to today - I really enjoyed the visit, and it's an amazing place, but, over the course of my visit to the Getty Museum yesterday, I became convinced that there was something more sinister going in at the Getty.
So, without further ado, I present the reasons that the Getty Institute is a cover organisation for an evil super-corporation.

1. The Getty is too rich.
According to the world bank, the Getty Foundation, which runs the museum and the Getty Institute is worth approximately 10 Billion dollars. Think about that. 10 billion dollars - it is the 3rd richest charitable foundaton in the world, and we're supposed to believe that all that cash iss going into art collecting and conservancy. If the Getty wanted, for example, to take a billion or so from the vaults to conduct research on next generation biological warfare, no-one would even miss the money.

2. The Getty Centre is like an iceberg
Thelady taking the architectual tour I went on mentioned that, in addition to the the 4 or so level above ground, there are at least 5 storeys of this thing -below- the ground. She claimed it was for parking, conservancy work etc, but it sounds like the perfect place for a secret death laboratory. indeed, if you're attentive enough, you can sometimes get a glimpse behind the Wizard's Curtain to what goes on below ground.

3. Too much security
The Getty Centre is a museum. and I understand the value of the works they're holding, but these guys are way overzealous for a museum.
Not only are there cameras in all the galleries, hallways and outside, but there are also some hanging in random stairwells, and perched unsubtly on the sides of hills. When it's closing time, all the security guards come out. and there are -heaps- of them. Possibly genetically modified super-soldiers.

4. Ridiculously advanced technology.
Seriously. These guys have their own driverless, automatic, air-cushioned railway system. It's exactly like that scene in The Incredibles.

5. A Freaking Helipad.

It's a Helipad. Disguised as a lawn. I rest my case.

Anyway, that's all for this post, a bit more on today's travels coming up shortly.

just briefly... LA day 4

Hey there guys - I have an uber early start tomorrow, so I can't be too thorough about today's trip to the Getty Museum - rest assured that I will get to it in further detail ASAP. short story is that, after a looong series of bus trips, I eventually got to the wonderful Getty Museum, greatly enjoyed the art and architecture, then became convinced that the whole Getty foundation was a cover organisation for a vast, conspiratorial supervillain organisation.
so with that just let hanging, I'll say goodnight to y'all.
'til then!

Jono

PS. today's photos are up - and there a couple of clues to my discovery in there :P

LA day three - downtown

So day 3 in Los Angeles was all about the downtown.
In Los Angeles, there's not nearly as big a focus on the CBD area as we have in, say, Melbourne. Sure, there are big 'ole office towers in the Downtown district which you wouldn't find anywhere else, but in LA, there are a lot of business district scattered around the place - Westwood, Century City, Universal City, Long Beach etc etc. That said, Downtown is still numero uno, and has, in recent years, improved siginificantly over the kinda questionable place it used to be. (it's stil questionable in some parts, but I managed to steer well clear of them in my travels).

After spending the morning chasing around to pick up my wallet (big shout out to Eric, the guy who found my wallet and reported it to the card company, btw), I managed to hop on a train (eventually - my impression of getting around LA are another blog entirely)
and headed downtown. passed by the ever impressive, Frank Gehry designed Disney Concert Hall (on the left there), and headed to the rather good Museum of Contemporary Art. After a visit to the museum, I headed out to the famous 1920s Bradbury building (think of the last scenes of Blade Runner, in the darkened apartment building, that was filmed here, at right). After that, I mostly walked around and indulged in one of my favourite extracurricular activities -
taking photos of tall buildings - there are a cople of particularly interesting skyscrapers downtown, and was to to be able to see them up close and in person (Incidentally, however, I found out that the Library Tower (Below) looks better the further away from it you get - standing at its base, its fairly generic, and not nearly as impressive as it appear from afar.

So, after a lot of walking and snapping photos, I made my way slowly back to the hostel for a nap (I can't even guess how many kilometers I've walked in the last couple of days), and then headed into the hostel lounge for the Saturday night, hawaiian themed luau party. Later in the evening, I also took a walk down to Hollywood and Highland, where there were a bunch of cars coming in from a big rally they're holding (the Gumball 3000 or something - I'm just jealous because their next stop is Pyongyang - what kind of a car rally gets to go to North Korea?!?!)

Anyway, that's about all from me today - for those of you interested in dozens of pictures of tall buildings, all of today's photos are up on Flickr. Hope your enjoying my reportage, look forward to hearing from y'all.

PS. the day after tomorrow is a transit day from me - heading from LA very early in the morning, and stopping for 1 night in a town halfway up the coast, San Luis Obispo - not sure when I'll be able
to blog tomorrow's adventures (I'm headed out to the Getty Museum), but I'll make sure I get to everything in the end.

Jono

LA day two

Hey there all,
Wanted to fill you in on all the info from my first full day in Los Angeles.

Got up in the morning (somewhat late, after the late arrival the night before), and hopped on a bus. It's not until you start travelling around this city that you realise just how massive it is - when you can take a bus for an hour and only be a fraction of the way across the city, that ought to give you some indication. Bus service is reasonable here, as far as buses go - they're frequent, cheap (5 bucks for an all day pass, which also works on the subway), and clean, which is all you can ask of public transport.

Ended up at UCLA (it's amazing how, no matter how different a city is, Universities always have a certain feel to them). In fact, I was there for the Hmmer Gallery of art - I'd recently read a review by the New York Times, and figured hey, as long as I was in town, I might as well pay a visit. In the end, I spent a couple hours down there, at the very interesting exhibit and in the uber-bookshop there (it has a whole section on architecture, including such gems as 'The Architecture of Parking', and another one called 'On Weathering'. So pretty much a whole bunch of awesome books which would be of greatest interest to absolutely everyone :P :P

After the Hammer Gallery, I hopped on a series of buses and (eventually) got to Santa Monica (like I said, it's a freaking huge city). The pier at Santa Monica has a Funfair on the end, plus it gives you and awesome view all the way back down the coast (there's a continuous, wide beach along the Los Angeles/Pacific shore for miles and miles) and north, up the coast towards Malibu and the mountains.

Coming home from Santa Monica again took an age (especially in the tail end of rush hour), and included a stop at the quality fast-food joint In-N-Out Burgers (est. 1948, best burgers on the West Coast, apparently) (Note for my Mum: I swear I'm not eating fast-food at every meal - breakfast and lunch yesterday were both healthy).

Eventually I got back to the hostel, and ruined the whole day... long story short, I went down to get some stuff for breakfast, dropped my wallet somewhere, then spent a panicked couple of hours before finding out that someone had picked it up and reported it to the card company. Thank God. Gotta get in contact with the dude and collect it today, which is a great relief.

Anyway. that's about all I got for today - one last note though - I'm currently experiment about how I'm gonna deal with photos over here, so as a test, I've uploaded all of the photos from yesterday to Flickr - here's the link in case you're interested in having a flick through.

Well, seey'all later, hope all is well on the other side of the Pacific.

Jono

Back in LA

Well, here I am, arrived safe and sound in Los Angeles.
The final leg of my flight was mostly uneventful (just long, and with the same movies as the leg before - the dude in front of me watched Ironman no less than 3 times over the course of 3 hours).
I had forgotten how different new places are, when you hop off the lane. on stepping out of the airport (immigration took some time, but was no hassle), I remembered the smell of the city - how the places had its own unique sound, look and smell (which is a kind of wet, stuffy odour). Got to my hostel safely, and got set up in a dorm room. My lock didn't fit the locker provided, so I had to make a midnight trip out to the local all-night pharmacy for some supplies. This is a funny city, though - even though it was after midnight, there were a great number of people, not just in clubs and bars, but simply walking around like it was the middle of the day.
Like I said, this is a wierd place, and one I hope to get to know a little better over the next few days.
Today, the plan is to pay a visit to a Gallery that's got an interesting exhibit down at UCLA, then head along to check out Santa Monica, the pier and the beach.
Good to hear from some of y'all, will report back again soon.

Greetings from Taipei

Well, step one and two of the long journey to San Francisco are officially complete - so let me give y'all a run down.

After getting up at around 5 this morning, the whole family hopped in the car (it's been a while since we've had all 5 of us in 1 car - talk about squish!), we made our way down to Tullamarine airport. Step one of my itinerary today was a short QANTAS hop from Melbourne to Sydney. Coincidentally, Mum was travelling to Canberra this morning at the same time, so we all went through security and everyone saw me off as I hopped on the plane.

Melbourne -> Sydney was entirely uneventful, and after just over an hour onboard, I hopped off and transferred to my China Air flight for Taipei.

Now, China Air is hardly QANTAS as far as service + in flight entertainment goes (smaller, less frequent and less appetising meals and snacks, but well within the range of what you expect from airplane food), but it was a novelty to travel on a different type of plane than the ordinary Boeing 747 (we were in an Airbus A330). Additionally, while their movie and television offerings aren't as strong (only about a dozen in total - I watched Ironman and Son of Rambow), they have some cool features. first and foremost, every seat has access to a live feed from cameras on the front and below the aircraft, so you can look out ahead or underneath the plane at any time. They also have a dynamic satellite plane tracking software, where you can not just see information and a map of the route, but also zoom in and out on your route or any other part of the world - it's kinda like some sort of primitive version of Google Earth. Finally, and this is how I spent much of my Sydney to Taipei flight, they also have some rather cool games onboard - primarily Luxor, the ball-shooting puzzle/reflex game. And while it runs at about two frames per second, it's still a welcome distraction. Even if I can't get more than about 6 levels in :(

Anyway, I've arrived safely now at Taipei International Airport, and am just awaiting the arrival of the plane to take me on the 12 hour trip to Los Angeles. That's not due for about two hours, but between the free wireless internet (I love free wireless) and a whole bunch of Duty Free shops to window-browse, I think I can kill the time.

Talk to y'all later!

Jono

PS. No photos yet, btw - thy don't like cameras very much in airports, so I'm not gonna push my luck.

First post!

So, my first post on the new blog - well here's the long and short of it. As a way of keeping up with y'all in a timely and convenient fashion, I've set up this here space. Basically, I'm hoping to add to it regularly over the course of the next 6 months, with photos, stiroes and interesting tidbits about my experience overseas.

First thing's first, though - an itinerary. Note that some of the later dates here are not tied down just yet (with the exception of the return date, which is set in stone). So, without any further ado -

Itinerary:

August 7: Fly out of Melbourne Airport, 8:30AM - via Sydney and Taipei, arriving in Los Angeles at approx 9PM

August 7 - 10: Staying USA Hostel, West Hollywood

August 11: Train from Los Angeles -> San Luis Obispo (halfway between LA and San Francisco) - Overnight in San Luis Obispo

August 12: Bus & Train for San Luis Obispo -> Berkeley, San Francisco

August 12 - 19: Staying in temporary summer housing, Stern House, Berkeley

August 19 - December 20: Staying at Sigma Pi house, Berkeley

December 20 - January 1, 2009: New York City

January 1 - January 14: Boston, Chicago, Seattle, Los Angeles

January 14: Leave Los Angeles, return to Melbourne via Taipei, Brisbane

January 16: Arrive Melbourne