BORING!!!

i meant to get out to the coast for the remainder of my days in france but apparently the public transportation staff would rather spend the last three days of my trip marching through the streets of paris, hanging off each other while yelling vive la france and drinking one and a half times their body weight in expensive french booze. however, because of the strike i was able to spend some actually time around the great monuments i had rushed over the past few days. and instead of viewing paris through the lense of my camera, i enjoyed them the way most of the people around me weren't ... sober.

that image is the arc de triumph. i didn't take it, but it is pretty much the same image that i would have taken a picture of. i found this image through a search engine. i took a lot of pictures, or at least i started to take a lot of pictures of buildings. However pictures of buildings are boring and I quickly stopped. i realized that i could do exactly what i just did, that is search online, and i'll come up with enough pictures to create a 3d model of most monuments in paris.

of course, i don't know what most of that last sentence means either, nor do i have the time to learn what it means, explain it and then carry out the task that it likely instructs me to do. instead, we can discuss how many pictures exist of any given tourist attraction.

take Notre Dame for example. as i walked around the building i admired every bit of it, and took a few pictures too. it has flying buttruses, which is both cool and complicated and explaining either would take up too much time and use too much of your valuble attention. instead, watch disney's hunchback and search flying buttruses on your favourite search engine or encylopedia series for the proper spelling and meaning. it'll save us all a lot of time.

as i took my pictures i came to the realization that i wasn't alone. a quick count told me fifteen others were doing the same. then i looked back at the shot i had composed and wondered ... why? what makes this shot i'm taking so much more interesting? why am i bothering to take it. it is hardly worth €0.25 in developing to see a picture a few clicks can find for me. so i took a picture of another person taking the same picture and put my camera down. i could have run through eight rolls in an hour with all the action around the cathedral. so i started to wonder ... is it possible to know how many pictures of Notre Damn there are?

i got bored and didn't want to finish this thought. paris was great. and i can't wait to go back because then i'll get to see the coast.

and now for something work related

waiting on an employer to get their schedule together so that i can know if they want me to trial is currently the biggest annoyance known to this man.

in other news, i revieved a phone call from another company who is interested in an interview. i had applied online just this morning and the call came this afternoon via my new mobile phone (they call them mobiles ... that is mo-bye-ul ... not cell's) through the head set i was listening to irish radio on. what a concept eh!: make the phone a radio.

none of them are job offers yet, but they are a start.

... in other news i'm back on face book. please forgive me.

Disney will bring us together

the one thing that all the travellers around the pub table had last night was their memory of childhood cartoon movies, and the ability to regurgitate mass amounts of useless knowledge that can only be used in situations like the one we all found ourselves in last night.

i didn't notice when it began but once it got going it was hard not to. we were in the pub that i'll be trialing (having a try out) at next monday, enjoying a pint of Beamish (a knock-off version of Guinness that the locals drink because it's cheap and brewed in the city) when i heard a familiar tune. i put my conversation on hold and turned my attention to the rest of the party. there were two girls singing a song that i had heard before ... in french ... ... or at least i thought it was french. as it turns out one was singing in french and the other was in spanish.

the german girl i was speaking with before the musical number broke out joined in ... in german. the three of them were singing as much as they could between laughs ... ...

and then it hit me. the tune that was so familiar was originally performed by Baloo the Bear in The Jungle Book. So matty and i joined in too. we only knew the chorus so we kept singing that over and over again. after it was all said and done there were five languages layered together one of which i knew was a language and no bit of the song could anyone not at the table make out. french, spanish, german, english and swedish. all together. all singing our hearts out and laughing our throats dry.

love, and now disney, will bring us together.

landed

we've arrived in Cork after a grueling four and a half hour ride from Dublin, we enjoyed a pint of Murphy's stout (b/c the locals don't drink the Guinness) and shared a pint with a new friend from BC. Angie, our new friend, is the first Canadian we've met who speaks more than English. in fact she speaks Spanish and Japanese too! our party grew as the night wore and soon included a few Swed's, Spaniards, French and I think an Auzzie, but I never got talking to him.

today is the first day of job hunting, and that means getting together a CV, or resume as we call it at home.

wish me luck,

cheers,

godfather me

the weekend before i departed my parents and sisters and i visited my dad's brothers house, mark, and his family ... as well as gran and pop murray, aunt mary, aunt marilyn and cousin devin (dad's brother allen's son) and we had one of the first murray family jamm sessions. i was quite proud to be able to teach my cousin carolyn the first few notes of John Lennon's Blackbird (the only song i know completely) but proceeded to be humiliated by my goddaughter, and cousin (showed in the image to the right) Josie, who turn six that weekend, on the drums. t'was all in good fun and proved to be a wonderful warmup to my trip to come. we may have to look into getting that kickdrum loaded ... into the backseat folded down.

the pub crawl i spoke of earlier showcased the type of jam sessions, simly called sessions, that can be found in small pubs around ireland. i haven't found one yet that did appear to be packaged for the tourist gaze, (i'll explain the significance of the bolded words in a later post if i can remember it ... thanks prof hennebry and cs 403), perhaps Cork will have more to share.

matt and i head for Cork City this afternoon.

there are a few pictures up on my flicker (link found in the side bar), they come care of Nat, my french friend, and aunt mary from the north.

cheers,

--(bb)b

serendipitous

last night we went on a musical pub crawl, which was awesome, and we found out a bout it from two girls from ten minutes outside paris, which is also awesome because not only will we have a place to stay in paris when we go we might also have some visitors to ontario too. they are pretty excited to speak to my four sisters who are fluent(ish) in french!

but enough about the girls, back to the story of the pub crawl. the group, about 40 tourists, gathered at a pub called oliver st johns something something, met our guides, a fiddler and guitar/drum/singer player, and set out around the city stopping at traditional irish pubs. well, we learned that the second pub we stopped at, and the pubs that followed, were traditional and the first one, olivanders (or whatever), was not at all. it is the kind of pub we (the tourist group) would find in our home countries. it seems that "traditional" irish pubs do not have fiddles on the walls, guinness posters on the walls or sells shirts that say the leprechauns made me do it.

at oliver's we got to chatting with a few of the folks with us, a couple from texas who wanted their picture taken and i was happy to oblige. another girl, who i was happy to realize soon into our conversation that she was from Mississauga and we had a common acquaintance from laurier brantford, a couple from a little town outside new mexico called Los Alamos of which he said, and i kid you not, "you might know us from when we bombed japan".

matt and i laughed for a good fifteen minutes about that. "who says that?" was all matty could say.

the crawl came to a close around 10:30 and then headed to another pub where some real trad music session was happening. it was great fun, grand as they say here.

today we had lunch with matt's dads bishop connection who paid for it all too. it was nice to speak with irish natives, and what's more he gave us some connections in Cork to call when we get there (which is set for monday). and of course, being as this is dublin, pop. 1.5 million, who shows up at the same second story restaurant at the same time as us?... but the texan couple from the night before! i went to their table, they hadn't seen us yet, and started speaking ... she looked up with the expression of a woman who was getting prepared to speak to a waiter ... i told her i'd be happy to take their picture again if they'd like.

we had a good chuckle over the whole situation, and then i wished them a happy lunch.

matt's party for tomorrow night is growing in numbers. the two kiwi's i met a day ago are coming, norm from edmonton, and jaka from italy ... the two french girls can't make it cause they travel tomorrow morning which is especially disappointing seeing as the one has the exact same birthday as matty - day and year!.

that's all for now, cheers!

--b

kiwi and other fruit

matty and i meant to get to the guinness brewery today, but we slept to late and as it turns out they don't let people through the doors past 5 pm. we had our orientation in the morning (wihch we did make it to, but only b/c our american friend woke us up). i lost matty last night, but as luck would have it he found some locals irish and they took care of him. he turned the wrong way coming out of the bar and walked the distance to the hostel we were staying at, ... just in the wrong way. luckily at the spot he expected the hostel to be there was a mcdonalds, and where his bed was to be there was a bathroom. all ended up well!

tonight we're going for a few pints with a couple of girls from seattle, matty is packing a map to ensure he gets home.

matty made dinner tonight, and it was grand. our first home cooked meal since we got here - that is, the closest we can get. we cooked beside a Kiwi who was really full of energy and gave me hell for giving her cooking secretes away to a bunch of other girls. (you may have noticed by now that there are very few boys in my stories .. but that's just cause there are very few boys here!) The Kiwi's buddy, Tresa (TREES-ARE-GREEN ... but leave off the RE-GREEN) offered us some of the cheese because, and i quote, "we have a f*** load of it".

oh, and i lost my voice last night singing at the pub. it's back just in time to be lost again.

cheers,

--b

day one

matt sleeps like a bear. he doesn't move. and just sleeps there. i can move the metal drawer from under our bunk, of which he has the lower bunk, which lifts the bunk considerably, without him so much as moving.

this does allow me to leave a beer cradled in his arms for when he wakes up.

in other news, dublin is grand. everyone walks fast. very fast. and there are pubs everywhere. apparently, a radio station was giving €100 to anyone who could plot a path that avoided passing by a pub. the winner said that any path would do, simply enter everyone along the way.

we had a pint of stout this morning at some pub, i don't remember the name but that hardly matters, we had our pint anyways. our new american friend, TJ, whom we met in the terminal at Newark, who heading off to Belfast tomorrow to coach basketball, enjoyed a pint with us. we were all very tired after that, and rightly so ... stout is heavy on a tired stomach.

that was three hours ago. matt is still napping with his beer.

oh, and we're in a 16 bed dorm room tonight. HA. and better yet, in three days we'll be in a 24 bed dorm room. anything to save a buck.

cheers,

--b

t minus five days

over the past week i have been forced to arrive at a startling reality: everything in the world does not revolve around me.

let me explain.

I leave on the seventeenth, only five days, 23 hrs, 34 mins, 33 seconds ... approximately. Yet despite this fact, which is common knowledge to everyone everywhere, some of these people still find need in scheduling events that will occur after my departure. Until recently I had thought that I was somehow being unclear to the rest of Ontario that they needn't worry about things like that becuase i wasn't going to be here.

then it hit me. even after i am gone the rest of you will continue to function quite normally, barely pausing while i fly overhead. this is a very tough idea to grasp. i wish it was easier for me.

i was just called for supper. i'd better go. because there is only five more like these left for me until a year from now. tonight will be the best supper i've ever had ... until tomorrow.

and introducing ...

... brad.

Hi Mom and Dad! and thank you mandy for letting me share this space with you. i don't know if i'll be able to be as witty with my writing as you are ... you're one heck of an act to follow: like hearing John Lennon sing Imagine followed by a live performance from Art Alexikas of Everclear.

perhaps that is a little esoteric. so, onward and upward.

Irlenad is quickly approaching, nearing the one week count down. Matt and I depart on Sept 17th to arrive in Dublin the morning of the 18th. I beleive our first act of buisness will be to find where in the world it is five o'clock and toast a Guinness to them.

Matt is the brains behind this opperation, has been a friend of mine for over four years and a roommate for three. I jokingly made a remark about my wanting to go to ireland after school back in Dec of '06, and when we came back from Christmas Holidays in January he asked how serious I was. Matty has been the one to get the ball rolling with the trip with his constant badgering (that I beleive has been fueled by his mother's constant badgering) and unrelenting drive to get to ireland to celebrate his birthday (on sept 21st). Thank you Matty, we'd still be in the planning stage if you didn't step up.

The realization hasn't completely set in that we are going to be in Dublin, Ireland within a fortnight, and I am told that it won't until the plane is in the air, but what has set in is excitment and fear, occasionally knocking me over for the dog to pee on me.

Unregardless, thanks for tuning in.

cheers,

--b