Connected!

Before I left home I got my laptop and home PC set up to use Skype Internet telephony, including the (beta) video calling. All it needed was a webcam and microphone for each machine and the (free) Skype software. Well it worked at home between two machines in the same house, each connecting via the Internet. Now to do it for real!

Saturday mornings is Swimming Lesson time for the kids at the Bury St Edmunds pool. So after they came home we had a go at intercontinental video conferencing. And it worked!

Here's what I could see on my laptop.

Up to now the little ones hadn't been told where I was. But I told Little Miss that whilst it was 9:30 am for them it was 6:30 pm with me. And they thought it was amazing that when I pointed my webcam out the window they could see it was dark here in Melbourne. I asked if she could guess where I was, and she guessed Australia straight away! I think maybe the regular not-so-accidental bringing up of facts and stories about Australia in family conversation over the last few weeks has paid off.

One of Big Miss's friends arrived at the door, so she was invited in to see what was going on. "That's scary!", she pronounced.

The latency (delay between things being said at one end and being heard at the other end) will take a little getting used to, but being able to see each othe as well as talk to each other was brilliant! OK, so the sound broke up a bit every now and then, but we talked to each other and saw each other for about an hour just for the cost of the broadband connection.

So we may be, as a family, half a world apart, but it doesn't seem quite so far now.

First Impressions of Melbourne

It was pre-dawn when I was picked up at the airport and driven to my apartment hotel. Even so, there was plenty of traffic as we headed through the suburban sprawl towards the Central Business District (aka CBD). I looked at the road signs, the skyscrapers in the distance. This reminds me of the US, I thought. Except they drive on same side of the road as we do in the UK here.

And then it struck me - when was the last time I had stayed in a city for any length of time? Bury St Edmunds (Suffolk) - 9 years, Binfield Village (Berkshire) - 7 years, Addlestone (Surrey) - 2 years. Yes it 1987 when I moved south from Whitley Bay (Tyne&Wear) that I last lived in a real city. Well I did spend a week in Bern in January this year, I suppose, but this was going to be different.

I set out for the office to meet some people I will be working with. The skies were grey and there was a bit of a chill in the air. People had overcoats on. This was a bit of a shock to the system - I've been wearing shorts virtually all the time for the last 3 months.

I arrived at the office. They weren't expecting me until Monday but I was warmly greeted and people interrupted what they were doing to meet me. Friendly and cheerful, I thought. I'm going to enjoy working with these guys. And sympathetic to the effects of jetlag too. I was definitely beginning to fade! But my driver from the airport had confirmed what I'd heard about how best to beat it - try and keep going until a normal bedtime in the new timezone. "Just Keep Swimming", I thought to myself. And I did have a number of things to sort out....

I needed an Australian bank account, or else I couldn't get paid. At home I bank with Barclays, but they don't operate in Australia. They do have an alliance with Westpac. So I walked into their Collins St branch and said I'd like to open an account. No problem. Within minutes I had a transaction and savings account with Internet banking, courtesy of a friendly young man called Emeka. The sun had come out now and I was beginning to warm to Melbourne.

Armed with my bank account details I set off to meet my contact James at Paxus. They are the agency who are employing me as an independent contractor to work for CSC Australia. We needed to get a contract signed and some forms filled in before I could start work. James is a scotsman who has been in Australia for about 8 years, but he was just like what I was beginning to recognise as characteristically Melburnian - cheerful, helpful and direct. Within an hour we were sorted. My Temporary Business (Long Stay) visa (aka
Type 457)had been approved, so I was free to start work on Monday.

Just Keep Swimming... I needed a new camera, but first, something to eat. I wandered into a shopping mall with some fast food outlets. What a choice! Here was something else I was beginning to recognise - Melbourne is pretty multi-cultural. I settled on a kebab. Yes that was tasty.

Swimming on, I visited camera shops and chose to replace my lost 4-y-o Fuji Finepix 6900Z with another from the current range. I got a Finepix S9500 for $699 (about £280 at current exchange rate). Cool. Some of my first shots are below. I met up with some new workmates for a beer on the South Bank. The place was buzzing. I got a takeaway from a restaurant in Chinatown which I washed down with some lovely Aussie wine. And then I fell asleep before I could get into my pyjamas.

It's Spring! Here are some azaleas.

There's quite a mix of architectures. Here's Flinders St Station.

I rather liked this reflection of skyscraper in skyscraper.

Yet there are old-fashioned horses and carriages.

And there are multiple cultures evident. Here is Little Bourke St.

You can see more of my photos here on Flickr.

But to sum up my first impressions...
Nice people - friendly, direct, helpful and cheerful. A buzzing city with an intriguing blend of old fashioned and modern, ex-colonial british and many other cultures. Great shopping, eating and drinking. And some lovely early spring sunshine.

I think I'm going to like it here.

Interred Down Under - I've arrived!

Gosh it's a long way from Bury St Edmunds to Melbourne.

No pictures yet, I'm afraid. I managed to get my camera stolen on the train to Liverpool St. But apart from that, everything went fine.

Heathrow Terminal 4 is nice enough when you get through check-in and security (which took me 1 1/2 hours) and the Tube station there is due to reopen this Sunday (it's been closed for 20 months). I flew Qantas taking off at about 11:00 pm, via Singapore, where we had about 1 1/2 hour stop. (There wasn't time to do much more than have a walk around the terminal facilities and then check in for the 2nd leg). The first leg takes about 12 hours, during which we gained 7 hours, so it was about 6pm local time that we arrived, having just been served breakfast. Then it was another 7 hours to Melbourne (gaining another 2 hours)and we were served breakfast again just before we arrived. So that was 2 breakfasts in the space of about 8 hours!

I didn't bother watching the films or other entertainment on the screen on the back of the seat in front of me. Instead I kept the display on the changing maps showing where we were, how fast we were going, what height we were at, etc. It brings home what a small place Britain is when it disappears off the map so quickly, but getting across the Ukraine, a corner of Russia, Afghanistan and India takes so long. And then, when we finally crossed the northwest coast of Australia, we still had 2000 miles to go. Wow!

Yes it was a long journey, but it's remarkably quick considering the distances. We had a tail wind from Singapore and got up to 1038 km/hr - that's 645 mph. And, in about 19 hours flying I travelled half as far as the Missus's car has travelled in 4 years!

We arrived at 4:50 am. I was met at the airport and taken to my apartment hotel. These sorts of hotel are a pretty good idea - a serviced flat in a building with all the usual hotel facilities too. I've got a separate bedroom (with en suite) and living and dining area with a kitchen at the end fitted with cooker, fridge, microwave, dishwasher, washing machine and tumble drier. And, of course, a broadband connection, so I was able to draft this post before I set off to find my new job.

My brain knows it is only 6:30 in the morning, but the rest of my body is not so sure. Almost as strange as the time shift is the season shift. It is early spring here and feels chillier than at home.

Well I better go and find my new workmates and get a few things sorted out so I can start work on Monday. More anon.

Interred Down Under - The Journey Begins

So this is it. Off to Melbourne in a few minutes. The hardest bit is going to be being away from the family, I think. The little ones only know that Dad is going back to work and is going to be away.

Big Miss was fine. She has to be "the other adult" while I'm away. "Does that mean I can eat as much chocolate as I like?", she said. Cheek!

Little W was fine too. "I'm not sad", he said cheerfully as he was belted into his car seat to be taken to the child-minder.

But Little Miss doesn't want me to go. She says she needs my hugs.

And as for the missus - well she's not had to put up with me being away all week for several weeks in a row. And I will be half way around the world.

Still, we are all geared up for regular calls on Skype. I hope it works! Time will tell.

Harvest Time

Hmm. This post is appearing out of sequence because I lost some photos I was going to use. Read some later posts and you'll find out why!

Here's something I'm really going to miss while I'm in Australia - it is time to start harvesting our produce.

We have a little apple tree that produces masses of apples. They are only tiny, but really quite sweet. Last year the missus pruned the lower branches and I wondered if we would get bigger fruit this year.

Well the answer is No, but they do look rather pretty.

And then there are the tomatoes. Well we've been eating them until they came out our ears for the last few weeks, but now it is time to start culling the plants. Here is a small section of our tomato forest.

(I would have shown you the wheelbarrow full of fruit that got picked from 1/2 of the plants, but that photograph is I know not where).

We normally harvest the chillis in October or November. But the Medusa chillis are already ripe.

Having tasted a few of the fruits, though, I would have to say that you should only grow these as a decoration rather than for the crop - they have no heat whatsoever.

At the other extreme, though, we have our Habanero Orange chillis. Here we kept a couple of plants over winter and they have come again really beautifully.

They are dynamite!

And we also have, as described previously, masses of (mildish) Guajillo, loads of Fiestas, Black Pearl and Chinese 5 colour, and plenty of Fatalli, Tokyo Hot and Caribbean mixed hot peppers.

But what is going on here?

It is the missus's fault. She lured the little ones under the tree and then shook it to bomb them with apples! Now Little Miss is trying to bomb her brother. I only picked up all the windfall the day before and now look at it!

The Four Roberts

I mentioned Gran and Grandpa are visiting. That's my Mum and Dad. And they brought Robbie the dog with them. Now Dad, myself and Little W all share a common middle name (as did my grandfather before us) - Robert. So I thought we ought to have a commemorative photograph of the 4 Roberts together.

The picture was taken at what has become a favourite place to visit this summer - Wyken Hall. I must upload some pics to Flickr some time. But meanwhile here are a couple.

There is a regular reader who might like to know what they have all along the wall of the shop/restaurant...

It's figs! I don't know if they sell them or just use them in the Leaping Hare restaurant. Maybe somebody will know.

As well as exotic fruit they have exotic animals. Llamas, guinea fowl and peacocks. The peacocks were running about when we were there this time.


A couple of my favourite bits of the garden - here's the hot border...


And here's the pond...


And then there's the rose garden, dell, maze and millenium leap. Idyllic! Yes I must upload more to Flickr.

Artworks Annual Exhibition

I noticed that there was another Art exhibition on at Blackthorpe Barn. As we had Gran and Grandpa staying, I thought I would take them to see. This is the 7th year of the annual Artworks show. It features 30 East Anglian based professional artists and is on from Saturday 9th September to Sunday 1st October. It is open 11am - 6pm, daily. They also have a music evening on Saturday 23rd September at 7pm - "Mr Handel and friends".

The barn is a brilliant setting and there are some intriguing, clever and beautiful pieces of work on display (and for sale).

Although great for adults, the missus got a bit nervous about the little ones knocking over and smashing something glass and expensive, so they got taken outside after a bit. Here the girls found something to do...

Whatever are the looking at?

Yes, you've guessed it, they had found some blackberries. Rather more got eaten than collected, but we collected enough to stew up with Aunty Maureen's apples and have as a dessert with the meringue nests Gran had brought.

But where was Little W? Well someone took no notice of the sign "CAUTION Uneven surfaces" and this was the result...

"I'm not going back there again", he says.

Back to Work

The Missus has started her new job. The kids are back at school. So it's time for me to earn some more money. And it's all happening at once....

OK I've been having a few interviews over the last few weeks. Indeed I had one scheduled for today. But I've cancelled that because I'm sorted. There I was on the Home Office phone agreeing terms for my preferred option, when the mobile phone rang to offer me my second option!

So what am I going to be doing? No not interim head of Technical Architecture for Boots in Nottingham. (That was my second option). Instead, you can look forward to reading a new strand of the Interred Blog - Interred Down Under!

I think I mentioned before that when I left some ex-colleagues said that if ever I wanted a job...

Well I've been offered a contract in Melbourne until the end of November to dip my toe in and see if I want a permanent job with, yes, you've guessed it, CSC Australia! Ha, ha, ha!

My flight is booked and I'm off next Wednesday. Now this could be really interesting. Whooooo! More anon!

Birthdays and New Beginnings

There's a lot happening on the home front this week. Firstly, it's the missus's birthday.

It is also Little W's first day at Sebert Wood. He is in the Nursery section there for one term before joining Reception in January.

Here he is in his school clothes. I'm not sure why mummy has him in that pose.

And then it is also Little Miss's birthday.

Yes and it is more chocolate cake.

But there has also been a birth this week. I've created a new company!


It is called ECEA Consulting. (There are one or two who might be reading this who can guess where the acronym comes from). It was dead easy. I used the online limited company formation agent from the Contractor UK portal. £75 + VAT, it cost me. (You can do it even cheaper, but I preferred to stick with a site that is related to IT Contracting, which is what I'm going to be doing).

I also have my own .co.uk domain (from Low Cost Names @ £7.50 + VAT) and a year's web hosting/email hosting (from Centrica Hosting, bought on eBay @ £5.99).

OK my website doesn't yet have anything more than an email link, but the capability is in place, and I was amazed at how cheap it was. Now all I need is some work!

Fungus Foray

About 3 years ago we went on a guided walk from the Ranger Service in Nowton Park looking for mushrooms. Ever since then, when it gets to autumn, we start mushroom hunting. With August being so Wet, wet, wet, we are expecting this to be a bumper year. Now the best place we have found for both quantity and variety, is Brandon Country Park, so we thought we would go there and see what we could find. We were not disappointed.

Since the last time we were there, the new bigger and better visitor centre has opened.

Inside there is a new tea room and displays of the history of the park. This includes a panel with holes you can put your hands in to feel "Who lives here now". The little ones loved that!

Anyway, we went on the orange walk, which goes through varied types of habitat. It was slow going. Every few feet came the shout of "Mushrooooom!" from somebody. Here is a small sample of what we saw.

I think this is sulphur tuft, but we forgot to bring our basket to collect samples to take home for proper identification.

This may be a chanterelle...

...but I suspect it to be a false chanterelle as it is more orange than yellow.

There are numerous old tree stumps in the woods, which are great sites for colonies to grow. Here is one of sulphur tuft.

It wasn't really night time - I just had to use flash because it was a little gloomy.

We also saw many other species including (probably) Tree Ear, Red-cracked Boletus, Puff-balls, Amethyst Deceivers, Slippery Jacks and Russulas.

Oh, and by the way, in the open heathland areas of the park the heather is fully out and smelling beautiful.

Went-N-Saur-Em

The missus started her new job at Thurston Community College today, but our kids are not back to school until Tuesday. So I took them for a last, end-of-holiday treat.

"It's time you Came-N-Saur-Us" says their adverts. The Dinosaur Adventure Park is just over an hour's drive from Bury St Edmunds. It's at Weston Park, about 9 miles from Norwich and signposted from the A47 and A1067. As you drive up to the car park there are signs like these beside the road and dinosaurs lurking in the trees.

Armed with our Adventurer's guides, we set off to explore. The Dinosaur Trail is fun. You have to help the ranger track T-rex and find lots of other dinosaurs along the way. Don't forget to look up - there are pteranodons in the trees. There are little plaques by each one explain what they are. Here's one of my favourites - the Struthiomimus.

As you go around the park, you collect stamps in your adventurer's guide. This stamping station is beside the huge Iguanadon on the Dinosaur Trail. There are seven others to find.

We then explored the Secret Animal Garden, where they had, not just goats, pigs, cows, donkeys, rabbits and guinea pigs, but wallabies and some reptiles (snakes and, of course, lizards).

The Jurassic Putt crazy golf is a bit hard, but we managed to get around the 8 holes without losing any balls. Then Little Miss and Little W both had a go on the Raptor Racers.

The rear-wheel steering took a bit of getting used to!

In the Lost World A-Mazing Adventure there are more dinosaurs to find and a hut full of bongos to beat. In Xtinction you can dig up dinosaur fossils or climb the climbing wall. But, favourite of all, was the Adventure Play Area. Big Miss liked the Assault-o-Saurus, and the little ones just loved the Climb-a-Saurus.

You have to climb around inside it to get to the head holes at the top. Then you can come out the head or tail via the slides.

Yes, it was an excellent day out for the kids (and me too). You can see why it was voted Norfolk's best family attraction in both 2000 and 2004. Highly recommended!

Windy Family

Cousin Katrina last year set the precendent - you will all remember the hurricane of the same name and the devastation it wrought. Now I've just seen on the National Hurricane Centre website that my generation are featuring this year. Hurricanes John (me) and Kirsty (my sister and Katrina's mum) are currently active in the East Pacific off the coast of Mexico! I wonder who will be next?

Woolpit Children

On my Mid-Suffolk Villages cycle ride a couple of months ago I passed through Woolpit. The village sign, as you might just be able to make out in my picture of the information board in the centre of the village, depicts two children. This is because of the legend, from the 12th century of two 'green' children who were found nearby. I recently accidentally came across this account on a site about UFOs, Aliens and the paranormal - here.

Sometime during the 12 century, a monastic chronicler in England by the name of "Gervase of Tilbury" recorded a strange account of two "children" who suddenly appeared near a small town near Bury St. Edmunds, England. The account was also recorded in the writings of several other chroniclers who lived at the time or sometime afterwards. These include: William of Newbury -- HISTORIA RERUM ANGLICARUM, written in Yorkshire, England (1136-1198?); Abbot Ralph of Coggeshall -- CHRONICON ANGLICARUM; and also the chroniclers Giraldus Cambrensis and Walsingham. The account was more recently related in FLYING SAUCERS UNCENSORED, by Harold T. Wilkins (Citadel Press., New York, N.Y. 1955., pp. 97-98). From their combined accounts we can piece together the following bizarre story which the chroniclers swore to be true: One warm, sunny day in the 12th century some farmers and other residents of the small town of Wolfpittes, England (some seven miles distant from the larger village of Burry St. Edmunds) were startled to see two young children wandering around, as if disoriented, in some ancient 'pits' or 'trenches' known to the locals as the 'Wolf-Pitts' -- after which the small village had taken it's name. These excavations were ancient, but no one seemed to know when or by whom they were dug, but the consensus was that they were at least partly artificial, and very ancient. The most shocking thing about the children, which the residents of Wolfpittes encountered, was that they had skin which was olive-green in colour, yet the rest of their features were as human as the average Englishman.

The villagers attempted to communicate with the children but were unsuccessful, as they soon discovered that the young boy and girl spoke a language which was completely unfamiliar to the villagers. The townspeople had compassion on the children and took them to the village and offered them various different kinds of food, all of which they seemed unfamiliar with and which they refused. However, when they were shown some beanstalks, they took them greedily, but instead of opening the bean-pods, the children attempted to open the stalks themselves, as if they had been accustomed to opening stalks in this way (apparently a practice they had learned in the land from which they emerged). Upon finding nothing in the stalks, the children began to weep. Unfortunately, the shock of entering our world was too much for the young boy, and even though he became partly acclimated to other forms of food, he nevertheless became weaker and weaker and finally died as few years afterwards. The young girl, however, adjusted quite well to her new surroundings. In fact she eventually grew into a mature, beautiful woman, and later married a gentleman from the nearby town of Kings Lynn. As time passed, her husband patiently instructed her in the complexities of the English language, and soon she was able to communicate fairly well, and the story she told of where she had come from and how she had arrived in our 'world' with her brother was even more incredible.

She told her husband that her people all had skin similar to hers, or rather similar to what her skin had once been like, as over a period of years and exposure to the outer elements the greenish tinge had left her. She described her world as a cavernous, subterranean country of enormous size, a country which went by the name of "St. Martin's Land." The land in which she lived was described as 'twilight' in nature, yet there was a large underground river, on the other side of which there was another land more brightly lit. One day, she and her brother were herding some type of underground animal when they heard something like the sound of 'bells' emerging from one of the cave passages or tunnels which lined the perimeter of this underground land. Out of extreme curiosity, they entered this tunnel and followed the passage upwards for what could have been a few days, although in their underground land it is probable that they did not have any concept of what 'day' or 'night' was. After their long and weary journey up the steep incline they suddenly emerged into the brilliant sunlight of the British countryside. The change from their twilight world was dramatic, and the children walked around in the pits or trenches starved, half-blinded and disoriented. They shortly afterwards attempted to re-locate the small opening through which they had emerged, but were unable to do so, because of the blinding light. At about this point the farmers found the children and took them to the village.

I hate to be a party pooper, but I'm afraid I don't believe in all that twaddle. As feralchildren.com says in their comment on the story, the children were probably victims of civil strife, suffering from anaemia. But it's an interesting legend, nonetheless.

Natterer's Wood

Natterer's wood, as the sign says, is a site maintained by Woodland Ways, the Moreton Hall wildlife group of volunteers. It is literally just down the road from us, running alongside Mount Rd on the way into Bury St Edmunds. Until a couple of years ago it was just a bare field, but the group have been creating a new woodland.

The street lights along the Mount Rd cycle path beside the site are a curious design.

They were modified a couple of years ago to reduce light spillage away from the road, footpath and cycle path so as not to disturb the bats living the other side of the field. The colony includes Natterer's Bats - hence the name of the site.

In the new design for the site there is a wild flower meadow. It contains this peculiar ditch.

It isn't all straight. Here's a funny little corner...

Have you guessed yet what it is? There is a clue in the placename. And if you go to the Woodland Ways website, all is revealed...

Yes it is a giant bat! With a wingspan of about 200m! Here is the story in the Bury Free Press at its opening in March.

And now, according to last week's BFP, it has been nominated as 'wackiest project' in a national competition - The Environment Agency Action Earth Awards. It is on the shortlist and the winner will be announced on September 13th. I hope they win. It looks wacky enough to me.

Street Crime

Suffolk has one of the lowest crime rates in the country. But, here is a Street Crime reported in last week's Bury Free Press...

A bag of plums were the downfall of a pedestrian as he was standing on the side of the road in Coney Weston last Tuesday. The 65-year-old pedestrian was floored after the plums were thrown from a passing vehicle. Police are on the lookout for a silver car with a rear spoiler. The unfortunate victim suffered a bruised knee.

Monstrous!