Monday, April 30, 2007

Bank Weekend

Jade and I were planning on doing a horse-riding trip through Wales this weekend but turns out that it is fully booked due to it being a bank weekend (long weekend!). We are trying to think of other places we can go but because it's a bank weekend, everything is costing more money.

So much has been happening in London lately and it's making me question why I want to be here. I'm loving being here but I haven't yet found my place. It seems no matter where I go I never seem to have a place to fit into. But then again that could also just be my perception of things.

I'm excited because Kelly and I are going to Amsterdam for 5 days at the end of May which kind of makes me think I should save my money now rather than go away this weekend but I really think it would be nice to get away from London for a few days.

Oh and Bianca - awesome news about your countdown! I tried to leave a myspace message but myspace has been playing up lately. I'm going to be getting back to Melbourne and you're going to leave! London is awesome though and you'll have a ball... xx

Simone

Wednesday, April 25, 2007

Kids sure do say the funniest things!

I have been working for Sanza for the past 2 days and they have sent me to the loveliest schools (even though they might not be the closest schools to where I live!)

I had a Year 3 class today and they were absolute angels for the morning... but my goodness... they all turned into little monsters after lunch! No matter what school I go to, it seems that lunch time turns all the kids into monsters. I reckon that their lunch time is way too long - they usually have at least an hour which gives them more than enough time to plot how to give the supply a massive headache!

Back to the Year 3 class I had today... We had science after lunch and I was introducing the topic of 'Why do we need plants to grow?' and I asked the children what plants need in order to grow... one of the children looked up at me and said 'Miss, I know plants need water to grow.. but do plants also need love?' I didn't know whether to laugh or not but looking at the deadly serious expression on this kids face I decided to save my laughter for later.

In the same class I also had one kid who came up to me about 15 minutes before the end of the day and he apologized for his behavior (he was a little turd all afternoon, would not sit still and disrupted all the other kids when they were trying to work). He's like 'I'm sorry that I wasn't behaving properly today'. I didn't know what to say!!

Now that I look back on today a lot of craziness occurred in this classroom but all in the afternoon. Must be monster syndrome coming out in full force. I gotta work out how to put a stop to that!

I did get the most beautiful compliment from the Teaching Assistant though who said that I did a brilliant job teaching the class today and that I kept them under control wonderfully for a supply.

Oh I live for the days when supply teachers are appreciated and treated with respect!

Saturday, April 21, 2007

What a wonderful day!

Ah the London weather has been so perfect lately - so nice and sunny! And who says that London is just a cold and miserable place! It's gorgeous when the weather warms up. Anthony and I went to Green Park the other day and just laid in the sun for hours - bliss!

I am definitely looking forward to summer.

Not much has been happening lately. I haven't been working this week so I've been sightseeing. Because Anthony didn't work much this week either we went on a sightseeing spree and managed to take some decent photos of London Bridge, Tower Bridge and a few other places.

I went out with Jade and Anthony and some of their house mates last night to watch the cricket (I only found out Australia won this morning!) Jade and I managed to get quite drunk thanks to me smuggling in vodka disguised as a water bottle! Of course, I didn't realise how drunk I actually was until this morning when I woke up and looked at some of the photos from last night... Oops! I'm headed back to theirs tonight for a house party so that will be a lot of fun. We'll be finishing the rest of the vodka and cracking open the schnapps!

Kelly and I are going to Hyde Park for a picnic today. I'm so excited because I love picnics. We're planning on getting a bottle of wine - oh man there is way too much alcohol this weekend! You know I'm not really complaining :)

Anyways, not sure if any of you guys know who Jade is - she is a friend of Anthony's from back home but not sure if you've met her so I'm gonna post a photo of her...

Jade and I

Tuesday, April 17, 2007

Egypt Photos

As promised here are some Egypt photos - still don't have access to the net at home and am currently stealing the internet off someone else - but... shhhhhh!

Me @ the Pyramids!


Me @ Philae Temple
(well, I think! they all started to look the same after a while)



Selling fruit from his donkey cart in Cairo

Me @ Pyramids

Camels on beach in Dahab

Smoking Shesha @ a cafe in Dahab

Main stretch in Dahab
There are heaps more but I don't look the most flattering in half the photos so enjoy these ones guys :) I will try and post some more of me scuba diving but we'll see how I go!

Monday, April 16, 2007

Good Old London

Well I'm back in London after two weeks of Egypt! It was an amazing holiday and I'm so glad I went. Apart from men hassling you to buy things and come look at their shops (and the boob grabbing incident) I actually felt quite safe.

It was so much fun going to the markets and haggling - the men were saying stuff like 'come look in my shop - I will give you a 500% discount' and 'you are SO beautiful, come buy something from me'... the thing that made me laugh the most though was when they asked where I was from.. I'd reply with Australia and keep walking and they'd run after me shouting 'HEY, AUSTRALIA... HEY... AUSTRALIA come back'.. definately loads of fun.

I still can't upload photos because while I was gone we had our internet turned off and didn't get a new connection so I won't be back online at home for a while but I have discovered the public library where internet is free!

Monday, April 9, 2007

Ultimate Egypt

Oh my goodness, I'm not sure I like Egypt! I've had so many accidents here that it's just not funny! There was the falling over in the shower and banging my head on the toilet incident, dropping my phone into the Nile and then a few nights ago I was walking along the street close to the hotel when this fat Egyptian guy comes and walks beside me. I ignored him but he still pestered me and then all of a sudden he grabs one of my boobs - I freaked out and I yelled at him to F-off... He ran away so I thought I was ok - I was close to the hotel, about a minute away so I started to walk faster. Anyway he comes running after me again - it was a dark street so I started running towards the hotel as fast as I could... Not a happy experience! So, now I refuse to walk anywhere alone which makes for long, boring stays at the hotel cos if people don't want to go out then I'm stuck. Hopefully though, that is the end of my bad luck!

I did my tour through Travel Talk and to be honest, I'm not too sure what I think of the company. I did the Ultimate Egypt Nile River Cruise - 15 days - and there were alot of couples and people traveling with friends so I kind of felt a bit left out because I was traveling alone. Everyone was older too - the next age up from me was 28. I have enjoyed Egypt heaps but the whole meeting people aspect to it wasn't so great.

Egypt is such a poor country. There are people everywhere trying to sell you things that they've made. It's amazing because they are literally everywhere trying to sell stuff... We went on a motorboat cruise to go for a camel ride through the desert and we got off the boat to find that in this isolated area there was a bazaar where they were selling their handmade items. Even in restaurants, children come up to you and hassle you to buy things. You can't escape it! They follow you and ask you to look in their shops, they say 'oh I do a special price for you because you're beautiful'. It's a crazy place but absolutely amazing.

Last night I climbed Mt Sinai - ok, ok so my camel climbed Mt Sinai and I sat on top of this poor camel. I actually didn't like Mt Sinai for various reasons. Firstly, I was the last person to get on a camel and my tour guide left me behind with this scary Bedouin person who wouldn't stop touching my ankles.. it was pitch black and I couldn't see anyone from my tour and that scared me, being in a foreign country and all! Then when I finally caught up to my group we had to climb 750 stairs which weren't even stairs, more like randomly placed blocks. We reached the top of the mountain and snuggled under our sleeping bags. That was fine until I needed to go to the toilet - so I went in search of a toilet and as I was searching, I fell off a set of stairs and ended up with scratches on my legs! Guess my bad luck hasn't run out yet after all.. :( The sunrise wasn't even that great either so I was quite disappointed in the whole experience. I took forever to climb down because I was scared of slipping down the steep hills so I was last one down too! I have since decided that I am NOT an outdoorsy kind of a person at all! At least, not the climbing mountains kind of person!!!

I do however like snorkelling - I went snorkelling yesterday and was so scared until one of the girls on my tour gave me some tips on how to snorkel properly and I loved it in the end. I am going to try Scuba Diving tomorrow so I will let you know how that goes!

Saturday, April 7, 2007

Quick Egypt Post

Well guys I'm in Egypt and it's amazing! I have to share with you two crazy things that have happened thus far - and hopefully the last crazy things to happen! When I get back I will write more about actual Egypt!

I arrived at the airport in Egypt which was fine - only to find that I was one of the few people on that flight to actually have their bags - so many people lost their bags (but ended up getting them the next day! Lucky!) so I was feeling quite lucky... Anyway, I get to the hotel and am thinking it looks pretty nice. I jump in the shower to freshen up and I somehow managed to slip out of the shower (it's one of those showers in a bath)... I grabbed a hold of the shower curtain and then I fell backwards out of the bath and ended up whacking my head real good against the toilet bowl... I wasn't liking the hotel so much after that. It was painful. If you guys are laughing right now I'll be really cross, it hurt like hell!

I thought that had to be the end of my bad luck, but no... cruising down the Nile on our last night of the cruise and I was carrying my mobile so I could keep an eye on the time for dinner... Yup, you guessed it - my phone went for a dive into the Nile and is swimming at the bottom of the Nile forever... So if any of my UK friends are reading this I won't be able to contact you for a while once I'm back in London cos I need to sort out a new phone! I was devastated cos now I have to find all my UK friends numbers. Other than that guys, you'd be so proud of how I handled the fact that my phone went overboard :) So calm! I'm serious :)

Apart from those two things, Egypt has been great but I've got to meet my tour group so I shall write more once I'm back in London!