Story Telling Sunday - The One About The Cow(s)

My precious for this month's Story Telling Sunday is not an object, unless you count the photograph, but a memory.  Sian suggested something with a bit of mystery, so here you are... what's going on here?

Did you spot the calf making its first appearance there?  I can tell you that the head and hooves were out for about half an hour before the cow finally managed to birth him and we were all a little bit worried that he had got stuck!  Out of the 7 of us watching, 3 of us were mummies and we winced every time she had a strong contraction.  The cow kept sitting down but never sat on the calf at all and ended up actually birthed him to the side of her while laying down.  He didn't move at all for a while and she didn't seem interested but eventually started the licking process and before too long we heard his first little moo!  We kept checking on them both while the light was okay but we didn't seem him up and about until the next morning.  It was wonderful to see him make his way up the hill on his wobbly little legs, looking all white and dark brown like a proper Fresian calf.  

Obviously this wasn't in our back garden... We spent a rather lovely weekend at a Featherdown Farm in Dorset called Knaveswell for a stew pot weekend.  It was cheaper than a normal weekend price and included two wonderful stews with local ingredients and I can tell you that they were absolutely delicious.  It was rather strange to be in one of the tents that we know so well now but at a different time of year.  At the beginning of June, the days were so long and light that the children thought it was time to get up at 5.30!  This weekend though, the shorter days and the canopy of trees at Knaveswell meant that it still felt pitch black at 8am and that us adults were in bed, asleep at 9.30pm!  Considering it is October, we were actually quite warm in our beds too which was a relief.  The children always have such a wonderful time on these trips and never want to go home and I hope that when they look back in years to come, they will realise what a fantastic experience they had and what amazing things they saw.

Bye for now

xx

Storytelling Sunday (Pick Your Precious) - A Talisman

Today is the first Sunday of September and that means that it is time for another Story Telling Sunday with Sian at High In The Sky.  Sian suggested the idea of something we think about when we are far from home, a talisman or a lucky charm for this months' theme, but it's not something I really have.  It made me wonder what I think about to give me courage when I am nervous about something.  And then I promptly forgot about it.

A few days later I was trying to muster the energy to go for a run when I was already feeling sore from a Combat class the day before.  Management pulled a phrase out of the archives to give me a boost... "You can do it Duffy Moon, just puff your cheeks out and blow!"

You might wonder what on earth he was talking about and the first time I heard him say this, oooh about 20 years ago, I wondered too.  It turns out that way back when he was young he had seen a film about a boy called Duffy Moon.  Whenever he was nervous about something, Duffy used to say to himself "You can do it Duffy Moon, just puff your cheeks out and blow!"  In the last 20 years, when we've had to go through hard times, Management has reminded me to puff my cheeks out.  Sometimes he has sent me a text with it on, sometimes he has just puffed his own cheeks out to remind me.

A couple of years ago I tried to find the film but it doesn't appear to exist anywhere.  The closest thing I could find was this book, which I bought from an American E-Bay seller in fairly poor condition for more than I would usually spend on a book!  We have yet to read it but I hope to get to the bottom of the mystery of just who Duffy Moon was and why he had to puff his cheeks out and blow.  I have just started to be able to carve out some reading time in my day so I have put it by my bedside to finally get around to it.  

I had forgotten all about this book until now so as always with Story Telling Sunday I note down another little random tale in our lives but it always brings about so much more than just that.  And for this Sian, I thank you!

Bye for now
xx

Pick your Precious - Story Telling Sunday

I was rather caught on the hop today.  We have just returned from a weekend of camping to find that it is of course the first Sunday of the month, which means it is Story Telling Sunday.  My camera was busy downloading the photos from the weekend so I had to think fast about pictures I had of something precious that fitted with this month's theme of being given with love.  

My mind immediately turned to obvious things like my rings - engagement, wedding and eternity, but I didn't have pictures of those.  Then I remembered a very special piece of jewellery that is tucked away somewhere safe (i.e. now I come to think of it, I can't recall where it is...)  

I remember the day that we went out to choose this; myself, my fiancé at the time (now my husband of almost 15 years, otherwise known as Management) and my dear old Dad.  We went out specifically to find something suitable for a girl turning 21.  A girl who wanted the world but had it right there in front of her and didn't know it.  We went into various jewellery shops in Portsmouth because my Dad really wanted to get me a locket, something I could keep and wear forever regardless of fashions and sizes.  In the end, we chose this ensemble with my Dad buying the locket (as he wished) and Management purchasing the chain to accompany it.  

In the years gone by I have had periods of wearing it everyday and other times (when the children were little and "grabby") when I didn't wear it for months.  I wore it once while holding a baby around 9 months old and he put it in his mouth revealing a little tooth mark in the back of the locket.  You can see that many of the links have been stretched over time through being pulled too.  This locket has seen a lot of action in the last 18 years...

People often ask me what I have in it, expecting photos of loved ones or a lock of hair, but I always answer the same thing - kisses.  It used to be Management's job to fill it up with kisses in the morning before we went to work and then I would have enough to last me through the day.  At one time it became Louis's job to fill it up.  There was also a time that Bella would "steal" the kisses inside that were meant for Mummy whenever she needed them.  With her starting school in September, I think I need to find that locket and have it filled up with kisses from all three of them before they leave for their respective activities in the morning so that when I am home alone, working on something and thinking of them, I can have a little bit of them to last me until they get home.

Have you got a story to share about something precious?

Bye for now
xx

STS - Pick Your Precious - Miss Sparks

Welcome to another Story Telling Sunday hosted by Sian at High In The Sky.  I've not been able to join in as much as I would have liked for this year's story idea of Pick Your Precious, but something on Sian's blog earlier in the week reminded me of this little lady and I felt compelled to post.

Allow me to introduce Miss Sparks (geddit?) who represents teachers in a little dragon world invented by an old colleague of mine.  Kay was a SENCO (Special Needs Coordinator) in the primary school that I worked at as a Teaching Assistant but she also wrote books about dragons for children and made models of her characters and created other crafts to sell alongside them.  I lost touch with her many years ago so I have no idea if she is still teaching or writing but I happen to know that she is still creating these lovely dragons.

I came by Miss Sparks when I left the school to return to full time parenting.  I had gone back to work after having Louis but I hadn't really settled.  After a few months my child minder decided to have her own family and we had the potential hassle of finding someone else to cover me for a job I no longer felt comfortable in.  It was never a financial decision; the way TAs are paid mean't that I was actually paying more for childcare than I was earning, so it was a bit of a no brainer really and I decided to leave.  Kay had been really supportive since I went back and was disappointed to lose me from the team as I had been excited about training to become a Higher Level TA and one day get my PGCE and become a teacher.  When she gave me Miss Sparks, she said it was to remind me of my promise to her to return to teaching in some form in the future.

Nearly 6 years on and with my second child, my baby girl, about to start school in September, I have thought a lot about my future and what I want to do.  Everyone expects people to go back to work once their children are in school full time.  Education has changed so much since I last worked though and there are rumblings of phasing out TAs.  The economic situation means the market for primary teachers has been flooded even more than before and competition for training places is intense.  I still want to be around for my children if they are ill or on holidays or inset days and I want to be involved in their school lives.  I've recently become a Parent Governor and I like to attend any events at the school such as sports days and concerts etc.  I'm hoping to help out come October too.  As for what I do at home, well there is still my writing which I hope to devote more time to and perhaps start to put feelers out to get published and of course there is my crafting which keeps me busy but obviously doesn't make me much money!

I am of course teaching my own children every day and Louis is now on the Gifted and Talented register for Science and Literacy and received straight 3s in his Key Stage 1 SATS, so I'm rather proud of that!  So we shall see how things go, but in the meantime I can look at Miss Sparks and I am reminded of my desire to encourage learning in children, perhaps to teach, and hope that Kay understands.  It is a reminder of a really challenging and changing time in my life and I love her even though one of the children broke her tail years ago...

Have you got something precious that has a story attached?  Share it with others across the world in Story Telling Sunday.

Bye for now
xx

Pick your precious - Trainers

This post is brought to you by Story Telling Sunday with Sian from High in the Sky.

Its been a frantic but wonderful bank holiday weekend here.  I've just realised that it is Monday and not Sunday so I am a day late with this post, THAT'S how lovely this weekend has been.  The sun was shining which always makes me happy and we had our first BBQ of the year.  We put our sun shade up for the season and even purchased some new garden furniture that we have been discussing for about 4 years now. There was a little bit of time for crafting, a day out at a country fair, a brief visit to Beaulieu to see Management at work, and I still managed to find time to put my trainers on.  These are my "precious" for this Sunday (Monday!)

Now many of you might think, well I know she is mad, but trainers?  Really?  Has she totally lost the plot?  Well yes, I am crackers and I make no apologies for that and I shall be honest and say that the last 2 weeks have been some of the lowest ever in my life but thanks to my trainers, I am pulling myself out of it again.

I am mid assignment for my writing course and my story is all about things that happen at the gym.  It was while working on that that I realised just how much my trainers have come to mean to me.  I bought them in September 2011 when I first considered needing some proper running shoes but they still look fantastic because I train on a treadmill.  Ordinarily I hate spending more than about £15-20 on shoes but these were £95!!!  I went to a specialist running shop for gait analysis and I was videoed running in different trainers to find the best support possible.  Knowing how much they cost means I don't wear them to walk to school or to go to the shops etc.  When I put these on, I mean business.  I know that when I wear these, I am doing something really good for myself.  As a bare minimum, we should all be doing 3x30mins per week for general health but yet it still feels a bit frivolous to spend that time on myself but it's becoming much more of a habit for me now.  Aside from the weight loss (I've lost a stone so far this year), the benefits to my mental health are better than any pill or therapy I have ever tried.  When I put my trainers on it's like taking a happy pill because I know that the endorphins are just there waiting for me to let them out.

I have a couple of set routines during the week and then I fit in other things around those.  On Wednesdays I do Combat training which is a mixed martial arts inspired cardio work out.  It feels like I am literally kicking and punching my demons away.  I'm working on my technique to get more out of the class but oh boy do I get sweaty or do I get sweaty?!  On Sunday afternoons I go to the gym to use the treadmill.  I do a combination of running and walking and I am working up to doing more and more of my time as running but it is hard on my shins.  I've got dodgy knees which is why I run on the treadmill rather than outside on hard pavements.  We live in an area with lots of slopes and I'm fine on the uphill but my knees just can't take the down.  I hope to rectify this as I get fitter and my legs get stronger but for now I am content with brisk walking in the local area.

Any time I am walking or running I use an app on my phone called Zombies, Run!  It's basically a story that plays clips in between your chosen running songs, all about the zombie apocalypse.  You are a runner helping to rescue people, retrieve medical supplies and technological equipment, find information about a vaccine etc to help build a base and rebuild a healthy population.  It uses GPS / pedometer to track your progress and rewards you with materials and unlocking extra missions.  If you are really crazy then you can enable the zombies to chase you and you have to speed up by 10% for one minute or risk being caught and you can hear them coughing and groaning and getting closer by the second.  Seriously, I've never been into zombies or anything but I can't wait to get my trainers on and find out what the next part of the story is - it has totally transformed my training.  They have just released Season 2 and have included missions written by a fan who had written some fan fiction about the characters in the story.  If ever there was a reason to praise fan fiction, this is it!  Can you imagine getting that call from the game you love asking for you to write some stuff for them?!

I'm really enjoying getting fit and even loving the ache in my muscles the next day (or two or three!) because I know it is because I am doing something really good for myself.  I have to continue to make time for this because the hard work reaps so many benefits.  I am looking forward to putting my trainers on again very soon.  And of course, at the end of the day, I am worth it :-)

Bye for now
xx

Pick Your Precious

This year, Sian's Story Telling Sundays is taking the form of "Pick You Precious".  This is my first story of the year so I had to think hard about what my first "precious" would be.  These items would be the things that we might rush to save from a fire and I think that my instinct would be to grab my lap top!  It contains my photos, my coursework, my friends, my life!  I can find all those things elsewhere in the house of course but if the house went then I would definitely want my lap top to be saved.

But that's a bit naff really isn't it?

So I had another think.  Maybe I would go room by room and find something in each place that ideally I would love to save above almost everything else.  Yes, that's it, I decided.  But where to start?

Well, after all the small scale upheaval over the last few months, I thought I might as well start in the bathroom which is finished aside from my pebble pictures.   I know, I know, you are wondering what on earth I might want to save from our bathroom.  Well have a look-see here at my little display of bits and bobs.

So many little bits and so many memories attached.  The vase is filled with shiny pebbles from an old arrangement of some sort, then a layer of shells from various beaches including Newport in Pembrokeshire and Lee-On-Solent in Hampshire.  The next layer is driftwood lovingly collected by the children from Newport, then a few tiny bits of sponge from Kos, then black slate from Newport, lovely shells from all over and topped with a lobster claw from a meal in Newport.

Further along you can see an arrangement on the window ledge and this little grouping is like a potted history of our lives together.

The brown shell and the corals were from Fiji which was one of the stops on our Round The World trip.  We were young and married but otherwise free to travel and explore and talk about what the future might bring.

The large sponge is from Kos like the little bits in the vase.  That was our last foreign holiday before we had the children and it was a last minute thing as it was just after we lost our first baby.  Some Greek women helped me to perform a ritual around an allegedly sacred fountain to ensure save passage for our next babies and we visited the Asklepieion, the healing temple of Hippocrates, to feel the power of the great doctors, basically anything to help us move towards our dreams of a family - dreams which had seemed so easy and straightforward from a bar in Cambodia.

The driftwood from the beach at our family holiday home in Wales was again collected by the children.  That beach has been such a constant through most of our lives together.  We visited Wales as our first weekend away together and so we were really happy when the In-Laws bought the cottage a few years later.  It was where we decided to go backpacking, where we decided to change careers, where I did lots of my study for my first degree, where we planned for the future and where we ran to when it all collapsed and where we've taken our children every year since they were born.

The fossils came from our most recent family holiday, from a beach that was new to the 4 of us, that we explored together, the 4 of us.  We've had our ups and downs when it has come to the challenge of parenting but I'm really proud of where we are right now.

Bye for now
xx

It was a dark and stormy night...

This post is brought to you by Story Telling Sunday at High In the Sky.

This month, Sian gave us the prompt of "It was a dark and stormy night" which got me thinking about how much I love a good storm.  We're lucky that we live in a part of the world where they are not that frequent, dramatic or devastating but it does mean a lack of available material!

I wondered, should I tell you about my first big storm, the Great Storm of October 1987 that everyone remembers because of poor old Michael Fish, but actually not much happened to us.  Or the January storm 2 years later where my old moped couldn't cope and I had to push it home against the wind, but that all happened in the daytime.  How about that fabulous night 20 years ago on the balcony in Gibraltar with Management, with lightning illuminating the entire sea in front of us?  Er.. no, its not THAT sort of blog.

In the end I asked Management "Can you think of a dark and stormy night?"  His eyes glazed over and a smile twitched at his lips "Gibraltar."  "No, not that one, its for my blog."  "Ah, I see, no not that one then. Erm... the Outback?"  "YES!"

As part of our Round The World Trip, we had to coincide several parts of the world in the 'wrong' season.  One of those parts was Australia, particularly the outback and Northern Territory.  They have a wet season there which runs from December to May but it is also incredibly hot so the climate when we were travelling there was humid, so humid in fact that it melted my nail varnish off!  We travelled around Alice Springs on a tour bus visiting Uluru and Kata Juta and most of the time we slept under the stars in swag bags.  At least some people did, I don't think I slept at all.

Desperately trying to sleep on the first night of our trip to Uluru.

We headed north from Alice Springs to Darwin making stops in various sparsely populated, widely spaced places heading for Katherine Gorge so we could do some kayaking.  We saw many amazing things along the way including this termite mound.  This is the last photo we took with our old 35mm camera which finally died after a rather fun bus journey but that's another story.

That night was the first night that retreated inside the tents which were really just canvas huts with 4 racks for sleeping on.  There is such a lack of civilisation in that part of Australia that at night it really is pitch black because there is no haze of light from local towns and obviously no street lights etc.  It really is rather surreal.  There was a terrific lightning storm that night but it was far enough away that we could just sit and watch like fireworks.  One guy played guitar and another played the didgeridoo and we sat on little stools with a stubby beer watching the storm circling around us and literally feeling like it was lighting up the world.  It was one of those nights that you don't want to end yet it wasn't full of expense or crazy partying.  I often wonder if the other people on the trip think back to that night and how beautiful it was in its natural wildness.  We didn't escape the rain that night and it came down so hard that it flooded the ground within seconds and came in through the sides of the tent which was not so beautiful.

Obviously this is not my picture, see the credits below, and we were not anywhere near Uluru when we saw our storm but this fantastic shot gives you an idea of the sort of stunning show we were treated to.

http://blog.smallworldjourneys.com.au/uluru-storm/

I don't expect to ever again experience a storm like I did that night.  Now its back to my usual storms which normally involve heavy rain on the school run!

If you've got a scary or stormy story, or any story really, please do link up and share it with others, we love to read.

Bye for now
xx

First Halloween

This post is brought to you as part of Story Telling Sunday with Sian at High in The Sky.

Being a slightly quirky sort, I love Halloween, or Samhain as it's also known.  The veil between the two worlds is at its thinnest so you feel closer to those you have lost at this time of year.  Of course, with the veil being thin, our lost loved ones can pass through but so can those whom we would really rather didn't, hence why we dress up and make lanterns and try to be scary.  I love that it is becoming more popular here in the UK to have fun with the Halloween theme - any excuse to dress up the children is fine by me!

We used to live in a very rural area, a couple of doors away from the retained fire station.  Every Halloween they would have a sort of open house and the local children could come along and get a few sweets, have a sit in the fire engine and have a go at squirting the hoses etc.  Really it was about bonfire and firework safety as much as anything.  We were really excited to take Louis on his first Halloween (second really, but he was only 5 months old the first time).  It was one of those little milestones that seemed really important while we were dreaming of what being a parent would be like.  He thought it was great fun to go out in the dark when he should have been in bed and obviously didn't have a clue what we were doing there or why but it was new and therefore exciting.

For some reason I was thinking just now about how great that little ghost costume was that he wore that first visit and then realising that he was actually wearing the monster costume in these photos which he wore the year after.  This means that although the layout says "1st Halloween", it is actually not.  Now I have a dilemma which will take a lot of tea and cake to solve.

As a slight aside from the costume conundrum, I've just spotted the gorgeous polished wood floor in the photos.  Our old house was a 3 storey Victorian terrace that used to serve as a staff house for the big Union work house at the end of the road.  We loved our little house but it was just too little once we had 2 children.  We miss the village so much and never more so than this week when a chance conversation has led us to believe that Louis's asthma may actually be because of the pollution here, even though it doesn't seem polluted (we are close to the M3, M27 and Southampton Airport).  We now face another conundrum of what to do about this potential new information as nothing is concrete yet.  Of course, I will need a fair bit of tea and cake while we process this.

Switch the kettle on would you?

Bye for now
xx

You Are Lovely

Firstly I wanted to say thank you to everyone who has been in touch recently both in the comments, and by private e-mail.  My Story Telling Sunday post which featured the loss of our first baby, and my WOYWW post about being at my Great Nephew's birth that morning prompted some amazing messages of support and love from people across the world, most of whom I have never met.  I feel very privileged to be part of such a wonderful on-line community that takes the time to show complete strangers that they care.  You are all lovely!  

And with that in mind, I realised that I had one more layout to share from the Scrapbook Getaways retreat in the spring!

Oh ho!  What's this?  Another 6x6 inspired layout?  (Don't forget that the 6x6 Celebration challenge is still open at S J Crafts for a few more days if you fancy being in with a chance of a prize!)

How cute is Miss Bella standing by the... erm... pink flowers at Beaulieu?  I seem to be doing more and more double layouts at the moment and the 6x6 pads are cracking for this.

I used My Mind's Eye Lime Twist here which isn't available now but they have just released their new 6x6 collections called The Sweetest Thing.

Once again I used my bunting punch by Stampin Up and changed the look a bit by stitching through it.  I also borrowed someone else's teeny Stampin Up punch for the little flowers on it.  If you are interested in any Stampin Up stuff then I do know a lovely person (Fiona) who can give you further information.

I used up some random bits from my stash (I am REALLY trying to use up odds and ends) including this cute but very cheap umbrella charm and some but expensive shiny brads.

I'm particularly fond of that folding ribbon embellishment there.  Layouts often don't feel finished to me without ribbon.  I went to the Artful Angels crop yesterday and a wonderful little shop called Handmade Treasures visited us with the most delicious collection of ribbons and buttons.  I...ahem.. may have purchased an item or two so expect to see some glorious and more unusual pretty ribbons coming up here soon.

Bye for now
xx

Story Telling Sunday - The Constant Learner

"Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire." ~William Yeats


I left school at 16 without a full bucket or even a fire lit.  And yet.  And yet.  There simply must have been a spark there somewhere.  I had intentions of university but I left college only 3 weeks into my A levels.  Boy trouble.  I come from a very working class family so any qualifications were not really expected of me anyway.

Several years later, a chance comment by a fellow chalet-mate on a ski-ing trip, turned my life around entirely. I don't know how it came up but we got chatting about dropping oranges on Brighton sea front and researching who would help her to pick them up.  I remembered her fondly when I found myself doing similar research on Brighton sea front a couple of years later.  She'd been at a summer school as part of her psychology degree with the Open University and I was eager to know more about it.  Within hours of arriving home from the holiday, I was signed up for my first course.  Over the next 8 years, Management and I got married, moved house, we took a year out to go backpacking and then both changed jobs when we returned.  During that time I studied for approximately 14 hours a week, in my lounge, on the beach, in our spare room, in Wales, in Northamptonshire, in Hampshire and in France, on trains, on planes, on buses, in the garden, even in the loo.  At times it made me tear my hair out.  At times I was bored beyond belief.  Sometimes I was inspired and excited.  I lost sleep through stress and I lost sleep through thinking about things I had learned.  At the end of every module I felt relief.  Within a week I was itching to get a new set of course materials through the post.  I discovered a thirst for knowledge and a desire to write again that looks like it's never going to go away.  I met so many inspirational people and I am lucky enough to have found some great friends through my studies too.  Without meeting the people I did, I would never have made it past 24 hours of breastfeeding, let alone over 5 years in total.  I would never have had a home birth.  I wouldn't have had the support through my first miscarriage and the many years of depression.  Of course I met some very unpleasant people too or just plain weird but mostly they are my kind of weird.  

Getting the books out and setting myself up for an evening of study after a full day at work was mighty hard at times.  I hated spending hours at the word processor while other people were sunbathing in the garden or shopping for new shoes.  Some people were clubbing all night while I was revising into the early hours.  So many times I wanted to give up.  But I didn't.  After 8 long years, I passed my final module and gained a Bsc Hons in Psychology.  At last I was going to wear that gown and actually graduate.  But there was still one more hurdle to overcome.
We had decided to really make a celebration of my graduation, no bubbly though, I was 4 months pregnant by then.  Unlike with a bricks and mortar uni, you can choose your venue for your ceremony.  We chose The Barbican and we were all really looking forward to it - my Mum and Dad, my step-dad and step-mum, my Mother and Father in law.  My Father in law being there was important to me, he had never thought me worthy of his son and I had wanted to show him I was.  Of course it was nothing to do with my education, or lack of, but it brought us closer together and I have a lot to thank him for.  

8 days before the graduation, Management and I went for a routine scan and our whole world collapsed.  Our precious baby girl's heart had stopped.  I gave "birth", had several operations for retained placenta and I was, of course, a mess.  I didn't know if I was physically up to the graduation, let alone mentally.  With special dispensation though, I was able to sit near an exit, near the front, so I could escape if I needed to.  I managed that walk across the stage, wobbly legged and feeling sick, with my family cheering, my scan pictures tucked up my sleeve, one step at a time.  In the whole 8 years, those final few steps were by far the hardest.  But I did it.  I was a graduate.

Since then, I have continued to study with the OU just for fun.  I love to learn new things and get new books through the post.  I want to inspire my children to want to learn too.  I've taken classes in scrapbooking, writing, photography, nutrition, child care, anything and everything, I want to learn about it all.  My next OU course starts this month so expect more creative writing here very soon.  I can't wait.  

That chance conversation about oranges lit my educational fire.  And I'm so glad it did.

This post is brought to you by Sian's Story Telling Sunday over at High In the Sky.

Bye for now
xx

Meeting the Neighbours - Story Telling Sunday

We're having a very floppy day here - Management's back is playing up (probably due to humping the large tent around), Louis is having an asthma flare which is very unusual, and I am still not firing as I would like to after my bug.  We are chilling out and watching the Olympics and loving it all and it gives me a wonderful excuse to join in with Sian's Story Telling Sunday.  

We have so many stories from our Round The World trip but this particular tale is one that I think about every week day when I watch my Aussie soaps.  I popped back to our old Travelpod blog to see what we had written but actually it was unusual that Management wrote this one.  Over to him...

OH MY GOD!

Now, when I was told I was going to a Neighbours trivia evening I thought this would be a sedate affair with a quick pickie with some semi-celebrity. Not a chance! 

We got picked up from the hostel in the most disgusting coach ever with the coach driver doing a very good impression of Les Patterson. After picking up numerous amounts of scantily dressed girlies on the way, we arrived at the Elephant and Wheelbarrow pub in St. Kilder. There was already a large queue. After about 15 minutes we eventually got in and you were seated at specific tables so that they could sqeeze in as many people as possible. Then the drinking began. After quite a lot of the drinking the mc eventually said the stars were on their way and one by one in walked Toadie, Connor and Harold. The noise was deafening as 300 plus drunk Brits screamed and chanted the star's names. The celebs were then asked questions that the crowd had put forward. Many of these were directed towards Toadie asking about rumours that he had been caught in the toilets with various female backpackers on previous evenings and had been banned. The best question though was put to Harold - "Why do you have such a jelly belly?" His answer - "Because every time I slept with your mother she gave me a biscuit!" What a star.

The quiz then started and the stars went round the tables to meet everyone and get photos with them. Harold had a bad leg so he remained on stage and you went up to see him. Most of the questions were about anything but neighbours and our team managed a creditable 7th out of 35. The quiz rounds were interspersed with a number of dodgy 18-30 type games to win trips etc. The most amazing thing about the whole evening was seeing all these young girls wearing a couple of hankerchiefs tied together throwing themselves at the stars in particular Harold! I have to say he wasn't complaining.

At this point I have to say a small word about my wife. Seeing her little face after having her picture taken with Toady was like a small child on christmas morning. She even said "this is the best day of the trip so far" - how sad is that?

Anyway after quite a bit more drinking we splashed out on a taxi back to the hostel (a whole 5 pounds).

After the excesses of the night before we decided on a quiet inexpensive day. We had to be out of the hostel for 4 hours as it was being fumigated! I tried to explain that LJ's socks always smelt but they must have suspected something even worse. In the morning we went swimming at the public swimming pool which was free via the hostel. Now, at home I consider myself not a bad swimmer but here I was put to shame with all the locals bombing up and down the lanes. There was even a man with one leg who was twice as fast as me. The pool was 30 metres and LJ managed 20 lengths!

After swimming we had lunch in chinatown - 3 dishes with rice for $6 (about 2 squid) and then went to the market and bought our tea. We splashed out and got a huge piece of rump steak for just over a quid.

This morning we did the other neighbours tour which was a bit disappointing. The tour takes you to the road that is Ramsey Street (real name Pin Oak). This is an actual street where poor people actually live. Well not so poor as it happens cos they get paid $50,000 a year to let the TV company film there. It seemed very small in real life and not at all how we remembered it from the telly. We then passed the studios and the driver pointed out the actors cars and told us what the ex stars are doing. Rik Alessi is now a tour guide for the outback so we may see him later in our travels.

Neighbours trivia - Erinsborough is made from an anagram of Neighbours. Erinsborough High is a school in real life. When Harold "disappeared" a few years back he was actually sacked and only came back when the producers changed.

Future plots - Kylie returns as a stripper and gets it on with pom newcomer (Management apparently!).

So that was our Neighbours experience as told at the time by Management.  Its really funny looking back at what we wrote about things back then and what we remember now, or the style we wrote in and how we might write it now.  It was 10 years ago now and so much has changed for us since then.  I'm looking forward to scrapping all about our strange experiences!

Bye for now
xx

Story Telling Sunday - The One About The Tigers.

I've had this story scrapped since the retreat and when I popped in to see Sian at High in The Sky, I was reminded that I had intended to share it by joining in with Story Telling Sunday.  This event happens on the first Sunday of every month and hence, I share it with you now.

I've mentioned before about Management and I taking a round the world trip about 10 years ago.  In all we spent about 7 months travelling around South East Asia and in that time we saw a LOT of temples of various  denominations.  Whilst in Thailand, we wanted to visit Kanchanaburi to see the Death Railway and the Bridge Over the River Kwai.  Unfortunately as we were pushed for time by this point it mean't we had to take an organised trip and this included, oh no, another temple.  And it wasn't even in the Lonely Planet.

During the journey though we found out a little more about Tiger Temple and discovered that it was newly opened to the visiting public and wasn't much of a temple at all.  The big draw here was the fact that the monks had taken in some orphaned tiger cubs and raised them to be calm enough to interact with humans.  They were very clear that these were not trained tigers, just calm, well fed, happy animals.

On arrival, we had to walk through the forest for a bit and we could hear the odd roar now and then.  Our pulses were racing slightly already by this time and we hadn't even come face to face with these big cats!  We were introduced to some 4 month old tigers which was an incredible experience.  The boy tiger had to stay in his cage as the males are already bigger and more boisterous but the little female cub ran around us and we could stroke and play with her. There were other random animals around too like a strange goat called Bin Laden and a gibbon who came up for a cuddle.  Gibbons are incredibly strong and the keepers in our local zoo don't even get in the cage to feed them because they can turn so easily and yet here we were with one wrapped around us.

If that felt unreal, we were going to be blown away by what happened next.

We were led to the small cages that the tigers are kept in for the vast majority of the day.  The monks calmly got 3 tigers out on leads and started walking them down the lane.  Then they handed us the leads.  These are fully grown tigers weighing up to 300kg on the end of a thin bit of leather with only a wrinkled monk for protection.  I don't know if I was more scared or excited.  After a short walk, the tigers were let off their leads to play in the quarry area.  They were about 20 metres away and so when they had a bit of a roar and a tussle over a tyre, the sound went right through your chest.  It was incredible.

These monks are not trained tiger tamers and yet they were all that stood between a handful of tourists and 3 stripy killer cats.  The phrase "Health and Safety" just had not been invented here.  Strangely we always felt safe though.  We were assured that tigers are naturally lazy animals and they will only attack if hungry or threatened, neither of which they were in danger of here.  These awesome animals really felt like giant house cats that day.

I wish I could say that that was the end of the story, well it was until I came to do this layout.

This was the layout that won me a runner up prize at the crop but I had to wait to do the journalling until I got home.

I couldn't remember the name of the area so I had to look it up on our Travelpod blog.  When I tried to search Google I saw that there were hundreds of links about Tiger Temple and so I had a little read around.

I had noticed that a few friends had recently had their photos taken sat with a lazy looking tiger while on holiday in plush resorts in Thailand.  It appears that this temple started a trend and when they appeared on Animal Planet things really took off.  Visitor numbers increased to up to 300 a day and over time the tourists had to be kept further and further away from the tigers at the temple although the resorts had caught on to this idea by then.  The temple itself and the head Buddhist there (seen in the photo) were investigated by a wildlife organisation and found to be in breach of several laws.  The tigers were sometimes abused, kept in inappropriate cages, they were illegally traded and bred.  Although no proof has ever been found, many people believed that the "tourist tigers" are drugged.  Although Buddhists are not supposed to have any money for themselves, there are "irregularities" surrounding the funding and finances for the temple.  The suspicions are that what started as an innocent way of helping a few orphaned tigers, quickly developed into a incredible cash machine. I'm glad we were there in the early days but I'm really sad that it has evolved into such a controversial tourist attraction which has led to the probability of resorts drugging tigers too.


In a way I'd like to go back and see how it has changed but for now I am happy to remember the amazing experience we had back in the times when there wasn't such controversy and when we were able to get up close and personal with one of my favourite animals.