through a new lens

Well, I went and did it--bought myself a new camera. Everyone please say hello to my brand new, Pentax Optio E40, 8.1 megapixels, which works beautifully and almost exactly the same as my old Pentax, just better. It was relatively cheap, too--$172 AUD, which transfers over to a slim $153 CAD. Exchange rates are my friend--and it's rather nice that the American dollar is about on par (or less than!) the Canadian. Or at least, it was on Saturday.

October has been a lovely month so far, with beautiful weather and plenty of opportunities for getting out and about in Sydney. Between Thanksgiving, the Red Kite evening, and some beach days, I'm a happy and relaxed girl. Yet again I was talking with Alaina and Ashton on Skype last night, and they've been dealing with all sorts of annoying French debacles; Alaina's trying to get her paperwork sorted out (between visas and citizenship and the French loving their procedures, she's not a happy girl), their power has been off for the last 12 days and it's 10 C and autumn there, and Ashton sounds like he's still learning the language and trying to find a job that he likes. They sound busy, stressed, and a bit defeated--but then again, they've got rail passes for all of Europe and holidays coming up, so they'll pull out of it soon, and it helps that they're newlyweds and living together for the first time. Anyway--in comparison, I'm wonderfully relaxed and at peace with the world. Have I ever mentioned that I <3 Sydney?

Another thing that makes Sydney special is that the people here are here because they want to be, and they wouldn't want to be anywhere else. (Exceptions for folks retiring to Brisbane or Gold Coast or something, but no one in Sydney really wishes that they were in Melbourne or Perth, because really... Melbourne? Perth? Yeah...) This might be a city of 4 million people, but it's all within reach--or not, if you don't want it to be. Most of downtown Sydney is within walking distance of itself, but the suburbs are spread out and separated by so many little national parks that finding a place of one's own isn't difficult at all.

It sounds like I'm convincing myself to live here. I might be--this is a wonderful country. But we'll leave these decisions for later... for now, some photos, some stories. :)

the first photo on my new camera!


Julian, Anne, and Sarah outside at the Ranch


Sarah and Andres had a bet based around a swimming race--Andres lost, Sarah got to shave his head... hehe


Luke and I went on an adventure to the northern beaches, and took a ferry out to the Central Coast--what a beautiful, beautiful area! there aren't any more pictures from the rest of the day simply because I was too entranced to remember to take them. aw.


the beginning of the Red Kite Fundraiser--Jessie (Jeremy's neighbour, coworker, and school friend) and I were Jeremy's entourage, as Phoebe was too pregnant to come...


the ladies!


Jem and I


inside at the fundraiser--this is at the Sydney Convention Centre (aka a 2 minute walk from Jeremy's), and was also where APEC was held. I had to look at the carpet and go, "OMG Stephen Harper was here!" and then remind myself that I have, in fact, been to the Canadian Parliament, and that plenty of interesting people have been there, too.


Jessie and I inside...


the trio! our table was right at the very front--we were the "High Flyers" for quiz night


Merrick and Craig, asking the first round of quiz questions--Merrick is a well-known radio personality, and Craig is on a popular ABC TV show, "The Chaser," which is the Aussie equivalent of the Royal Canadian Air Farce... only funnier. =D they were the ones that made that fake motorcade to get into APEC, actually.


I was overwhelmed by trying to imagine what kind of planning and fundraising it took just to get the gala to this scale. providing dinner for 700 of Sydney's top corporate representatives? whoo...


Jeremy, giving his speech! he told his story about having cancer, and how Red Kite helped him and his family through it--I was so impressed! he's developed some wonderful public speaking skills, that boy. :)


I had to sneak around and get some cool angles...


Jem with Merrick and Craig... who were really very friendly. we (he) made lots of connections!


I was really there, I swear...


us with Craig...


demonstrating Alan's "LA Red Carpet" smile--don't we look like we're having the time of our lives? LOL


dead tired after a good 5 hours of schmoozing... but we met some newscasters and producers from the top media stations in Sydney (hea-ven for a media student like me), invites for rides in traffic helicopters (note the dark haired guy in the photo above, he's the traffic reporter for Channel 10), promises for tickets to see the Chaser in studio and maybe get backstage, and an invitation to go backstage at Channel 10 when they're doing the news... repeat after me: HECK. YES. the fundraiser was a complete success, too: Red Kite raised $360,000 to support families and children going through cancer.


the next day, Tsehaye and Ola came downtown and we meandered about and took some random photos. fun fun. ;)

100!

Put up the balloons and streamers, light some sparklers, and bust out the bubbly--we're at post 100! Whodathunk this little photo blog of mine would last so long... and oh, the places we've been, the things we've seen! This may in fact mark the end of an era, however; tomorrow I'm going to go take a look at new digital cameras at the shopping centre, as my poor Pentax Optio30 is... well, dead. And after 6276 photos and nearly three years (having received in Christmas '04), it may very well deserve its rest. However, the camera I spotted to replace it is simply the newer Pentax Optio model that still takes AA batteries and SD memory cards--hey, old habits die hard, okay? Plus, I have all these snazzy battery chargers for various continents that I might as well keep using.

Post 100 also marks a curious rite of passage for the North American woman; namely, cooking your first turkey dinner. I seem to be making a bit of a fuss over this 'rite of passage' thing, but when religious customs and cultural traditions are few and far between (if they exist at all in any moderately uncommodified fashion), the few that do surface must be recognized and appreciated accordingly. I also suspect that this is a bit of a throwback to the domestic woman, the Angel of the House, the 'can she bake a cherry pie' expectation--but you know what? 1) Screw you feminist theory, I like turkey. 2) I can vote. I can express my opinion in any form I like. I am free to do and choose what I like... and I chose to cook a dinner for my friends! 3) I've seen more cooking initiative in my male friends over the past five or so years than in my female friends, and we ought to keep the scales balanced. (Couldn't decide which direction to take that argument, so you get all three.) Or maybe I'm just a traditionalist enough to care about these things--and to insist that the men carve the turkey? Hmm. This all brings back memories of the long table in Aaron's dining room with the high school crew carving up turkey and stuffing and mashed potatoes. Yum!

I digress. Moral of the story: Cooking a turkey and providing the staples for a 14 person Thanksgiving dinner isn't lacking in stress, and Katie and I had a magnificent day drinking wine and doing our best to interpret and do justice to our family recipes.

Katie and I had the turkey roasting in the oven by 2:30, just on schedule. three hours later it was juicy and ready to be carved up--Luke obliged by doing the honours. :)


at last--candles lit, glass of Yellow Tail Merlot in hand, other peoples' contributions unveiled, and Thanksgiving dinner was ready to go!


to make this pumpkin pie, we had to roast our own freakin' pumpkin... ye gods. at least we didn't end up using pumpkin baby food as we feared we may have to. I guess I'm a little ridiculously proud of my pumpkin pies, but then again, pumpkin pie alone makes me waaaaay too excited. ;)


with full stomachs, we retire to the roof to enjoy the Sydney lights--moi, Luke, & Katie


some of us spent the night, and the next day we three (and Jeremy) went over to Paddy's Markets in Darling Harbour... it was a beautiful, sunny day and the perfect relaxing end to our Thanksgiving extravaganza!

the last of our fijian fantasy

Post number 99... exciting!

This is my final installment of Fiji photos... for this year, anyway. ;) And for the next little while it's going to be others' photos again, as my camera is still out of commission. I'm going to have to dismantle the thing and see what I can do to get it going again--and failing that, I may have to actually get a new camera. Grr. Fortunately though, I saw the "next generation" of my Pentax on sale in the mall for $180--and if I can make a 3.2 megapixel camera do what I need it to, I'm sure that a 7.0 will do just as fine. So... here's hoping!

hermit crab races!


aww...


the ladies on our last night on Mana Island




we had quite the dance party!


I noticed this poster on the wall by reception... the same poster that Mrs. MacLean, my high school social studies teacher, had on her wall... and it was always the one I zoned out at when Canadian history got too exciting. and then to see it in Fiji? craaaaaaazy.


our last morning, waiting for the boat...


Sarah and some of our hostesses!


farewell Ratu Kini and Mana Island... :(


Ola's photo looking over at Adam and I in the other boat on our way back to Nadi--check out the choppy water that made a 45 minute ride into 2.5 hours...


downtown Nadi


so sad to be leaving Fiji! not fun...




on the other hand, we're happy because we're going back to Sydney--yes, our lives are just so horrible!

paradisal afternoons

It's actually a cool, cloudy afternoon here in Sydney... which means I can concentrate on paper writing. Thank goodness.

As a small break, here are a couple more photos from Fiji! They're all from Ola's camera, though I did take some of them...

I just <3 this photo... we're all so cute! moi, Jonas, Ola, and Sarah


hot, guys... just hot. Adam, Neela (I think?), and Pierre. despite being British, I think Adam's life hero is Don Cherry. they get Hockey Night in Canada in Britain but we don't get the Rugby World Cup in Canada... go figure!


can anyone say: "paradise"?






the view from one of Mana's hills


looking back at our beach--Ratu Kini is just in that bit of beach you can't quite see


Sarah needed a good stretch


you can't see them, but our bare feet are there!


some tea and biscuits on a rainy afternoon

more excellent fijian scenery

In the spirit of procrastination, I feel like putting up a couple photos... Ola's transferring them to me in thirds, so here's a handful from the first third of her photos! More to be found in the Google Album too.

mm, hammocks!


also on the boat going over to Mana Island... I swear, we are NOT twins...


one of the fire dancers (aka one of the guys that worked at the hostel, fire dancer by night)... pretty good scenery at Ratu Kini, eh?




an evening view from the deck... looking over at the pier (which was lots of fun to jump off of!)


the deck, where we spent copious amounts of time ;)


a flip cup competition--apparently this is an American drinking game, and is in essence a relay race; everyone has a shot of beer in their cup, and has to drink their beer and flip their cup upside down from the edge of the table before the next person can go... it gets pretty intense!


some of our new friends... Oliver, Pierre, and Jonas (all British or Scandinavian, figures)


two of our new Canadian friends, Tristan and Ginny from New Brunswick--they're in New Zealand for a year and might pop over to Sydney to say hi!


greenie, being green!