Obsessed with the Ministry

Australian TV is no better than Canadian TV. We don't have cable, so we get 5 channels, which mainly consist of mediocre American tv shows mixed in with reality Australian tv (like Bondi Rescue about lifeguards at Bondi beach saving children and hot chicks and Border Security about border guards keeping illegal immigrants, foods and animals out of Australia). But the one show I do enjoy is Jaime Oliver's The Ministry of Food. Just in case you haven't seen it, it's about Jaime's efforts to make the city of Rotherham cook and eat better. The way he's trying to do this is by teaching a small group of 8 people to cook different recipes, then get them to teach the recipes to two people each, then ask those people to teach two people each, and so on. So, for the first few episodes, I would yell at Jaime: It's not going to work Jaime, think of something else. Think about it, the whole town is not going to be all socially networked together (this is a byproduct of doing my thesis on chain referral sampling). I'm a little obsessed with the show. This week is the final show, and I just don't think he's going to pull it off. But, in the spirit of 'pass it on', Vic made this recipe the other day, and it was quick, easy and delish. Try it.

For some reason, it's felt like a long week, followed by a very short weekend! On Saturday, we did what we always do: I wake up early, bring the laundry to the laundromat (no we don't have a washing machine yet), pick up the Sydney Morning Herald and some croissants for Gus and I and sausage roll for Vic from the pies and cakes shop. yummmm.

With a strawberry perched on top, Gus thinks the croissant looks like the sphinx.


Gus and Vic tried out their new body boards at the beach, but the waves were right out of a surfing movie, huge! We watched Elf last night and ate moroccan chicken flavoured chips (all the chips here are flavoured after meals rather than condiments). Pretty crazy to be watching a Christmas movie in October, but I guess with no thanksgiving or halloween to stand in the way, they start thinking about Christmas early. And, we went to pick up a Halloween costume for Gus, which was not easy. There seems to be a weak attempt to celebrate Halloween, but there's a bit of a backlash because the Australians regard it as an American holiday. Check out some of these mean responses about whether Australians go trick or treating. After much web searching for some way to celebrate halloween in Sydney, the only thing we found was a Children's Halloween Party being hosted by the American Society. The Canadian club on the other hand is having a Halloween pub crawl, which sounds better but probably not suitable for Gus!

For some reason, in a moment of boredom, Vic showed Gus youtube videos of how you can launch a rocket from a bottle of coke and mentos, so tonight they tried it out.

After much preparation...

...the explosion was pretty disappointing. But, Vic and Gus decided they will re-group and try again another time, next time with a bigger bottle of coke and more mentos. Oh it makes a mother proud, aim high boys! aim high.


C'est tout for this week. bye-bye

A week of firsts

This past week, I swam in the ocean for the first time in Australia (brrrr), drove for the first time (Vic put it well when he said driving on the left side of the street goes against every fibre of your being!), and Gus and I started swimming lessons. They take their swimming seriously here. In Gus' first class, he started right into learning the front crawl. This is after many Canadian swimming lessons in which they played games, blew bubbles under the water and did a lot of jumping into the water (?!?).

I feel as though we're finally starting to settle in. Vic found a job as a 'construction all-arounder' with a landscaping company. He's liking the work and the people he's working for. And I've finally banged out a draft thesis proposal, so next steps are getting it approved and then starting the actual research. I can't wait! Since we've gotten here, Gus has had good days and bad. You know it's a bad day when he rants about how Canada is much better than Australia. These rants are getting fewer, which is a good sign.

Yesterday we had the most perfect day. We went to see the Sculptures by the Sea. We started at Bondi and did the coastal walk to Tamarama. When we got to Tamarama, we stopped for a swim and lunch before turning around and making the walk back to Bondi. The sculptures were beautiful, some were whimsical, and all were impressive next to the natural beauty of the ocean. To make it even more amazing, on the way back, a whale and a group of dolphins were hanging out in the ocean right in between these two beaches. As if they knew there was a huge crowd watching them, the whale was flipping around and the dolphins were jumping out of the water! Below are some pictures of some of the sculptures. The pictures don't do them justice and I ran out of batteries and missed some of my favorites. But, it'll give you a taste. If you'd like to see more, go see Gus' faves.

I want to be Elizabeth Pisani when I grow up

I'm reading 'The Wisdom of Whores' right now, by Elizabeth Pisani. It's quite good. She's an epidemiologist who spent some time doing behavioural HIV surveillance in Indonesia. (Mom and Dad: if you want to know what I do, read the book). It makes me want to live in an Asian country and work with the sex workers to battle HIV. Of course I also wanted to sell pot when I was watching 'Weeds', but I think this might be a more realistic and satisfying goal.

We had a good week. It was the first week of Gus' spring break and so I signed him up for a few days of day care and took a couple of days off. On our days together, we went to see Beverly Hills Chihuahua and checked out the Sydney Aquarium at Darling Harbour. We really enjoyed the aquarium. They had one section where you walk through glass tunnels underneath a tank of sharks and sting rays....very cool. Darling Harbour was alot of fun too. It was another sweltering day (30+C), and all the kids were stripped down to their underwear and playing in the fountains. Yesterday (Saturday), we all went for a drive to the Koala Park Sanctuary to pet the koalas and feed the kangaroos. Gus declared koalas to be the cutest animals on earth. Check out the pics and see if you agree.

I'm back!

Well, we moved into our new place, waited a while to get our phone line installed, then waited some more to get our ADSL installed. We were finally connected to the internet last week after a long absence. It was hell without the internet at home!

A lot has happened over the past month. In a nutshell, the place we were originally going to rent fell through, and we found a new place, quick. We moved into a 2-bdrm apartment a few blocks from the beach and very close to Gus' new school. Gus started school and is enjoying it. Gus had his 7th birthday and we had a little party for him at the beach. Vic started a new job with a contractor who does residential building. But, the guy is a jerk so Vic is still looking around for something new. Our most recent big news is that this weekend Vic got us some wheels (a mitsubishi magna wagon).

I'm plugging away at my thesis proposal, and it goes in fits and spurts. It's been a harder transition than I thought. I went from working in the govt where I was kept busy with e-mails, meetings and a lot of other non-epidemiology related tasks. Now, I spend my days reading, thinking and writing, trying to meet my own self-imposed deadlines. Some days, I feel so lucky to have such an amazing 'job'. And, other days, I feel completely lost, craving the structure that I used to have in my old life in Ottawa.

Today, we checked out the 'Powerhouse Museum'. Gus has been missing all the old museums we used to go to in Ottawa, and we thought this might be a good replacement for the Science and Tech museum. Unfortunately, except for an appearance from R2D2 and a storm trooper, it was not a hit. It was a little on the boring side and not very interactive. We spent just a couple of hours there, then went to Paddy's Markets - an indoor market where you can get anything, cheap, from electronics, fruits and veggies to t-shirts, sunglasses and purses.

It's 29C today, so Vic and Gus have now gone to the beach for a quick dip to cool off. Here's some pics of our day:

Vic and Gus are Here!!!

Yay! Vic and Gus made it to Sydney safe and sound and really, really tired! The first day here, I showed Gus the wonder of Tim Tams, he tried out vegemite (thought it was salty but not too bad) and we walked down to the beach. By 5:30pm, Gus was out cold, we could barely keep him awake to get some pjs on and get a few bites into him. By 7:30pm, Vic was out too.

Today, we visited Gus' new school. Before we got there, Gus was pretty worried about the fact that the school requires uniforms (he thought there might a tie involved), but once he saw them he was happy again. He especially likes the hat, which he's showing off in the pic above.

The Scoop on Tim Tams

OK, so Tim Tams are these rectangle-shaped biscuits (they don't call them cookies here) that are covered in chocolate. Right now, they're my favourite thing about this move to Australia. They're pretty good just on their own, but they're even better when you bite the ends off, then use it like a straw to drink your coffee, then throw it in your mouth before it completely falls apart. mmmmm, like a little slice of heaven right here in Sydney.

Here's a little aussie video to demonstrate the whole thing:

Gus' New School

On Thursday, I visited Gus' new school. I was reassured by what I learned about the school. I think Gus will really enjoy it. It's a small school, with all kinds of special learning activities, like Maori culture classes once a week, Spanish lessons and a Dance/Song/Drama program. I think Gus will especially like the drama program. He's a creative kid with a flair for drama! That's him in a picture my sister took last Christmas (I'm still without a camera, so I stole it from her blog!).

I spent this past week ramping up to full-time studies. I'm trying to focus my research aims and key questions, so I spent a lot of time reading other people's research to find out where the gaps are. It felt positively decadent having the time to read through journal articles!

Today (Saturday), I checked out Paddington Markets. Paddington is a swish suburb of Sydney, sorta like the Glebe in Ottawa but fancier. The Markets were full of tempting, nice things that I had to refrain from, now that I no longer have a cush govt job! Instead, I picked up some Tim Tams on my way home and I'm nibbling on them now. mmmm, tim tams.