AUSTRALIA DAY!!

Hooked up with Naomi, Fiona and Mel for a night at the Temple St 'Walkabout' it was soo packed and people had been there since lunch time that it took s 3 hrs in the line to actually get in...it didn't seem that long though, Drinking on the streets in public is allowed in London so we made the most of it while we waited.

Of all people and places to bump into at the walkie was Paul Everson...a friend from school who was in Linda's year. so that was pretty cool.

Next day i went and picked up 2 pairs of glasses i'd ordered(see next pic for a look at one of them) from Hounslow and then met up with two Welsh blokes who i think Mel and i will be flatsharing with in about 2 weeks around the Clapham area.

then Mel and i went to a brithday party for one of her english mates she met in her travels at Kingston...which is close to where i currently live...the club was huge and had themed rooms but had an overall 'Retro - Bristol arms' feel about it...still had a good time though!

(Mel did have agood time...i swear)

Sunday i headed off on an orienteering day with the Duke of Ed kids to a lovely little place called 'Brocketts Farm'. I had a great day out in the English countryside, which is a lot different to Astralian Bush

How cool is this...not only did i discover a really awesome comicbook and cult stuff store called 'Forbidden Planet' that is like two storeys ...but what did i find in there but HIGHLANDER COMICS!!!!




Ben...you would love this place!













I also finally got an Oystercard, which every real Londoner has, all it is, is a travel pass for the bus and tube that you scan instead of paying...but everyone has one...now i do too!...i don't look like such a tourist anymore :) plus you can see my school ID card too.

OH MY GOD....IT'S SNOWING!!!

this is outside the design studio

And outside my bedroom window

how cool is this hey!!!

Manchester, Manchester, Manchester


The Hatter Hostel where we stayed













Well we caught a 'Megabus' there and back... which cost a whole £3.50 each way...bargain!


we were a group of 11 which grew in size during the evening.

Melissa befriended tho girls at the hostel who came out with us, one was from Finland the other from France...there was also a group of Italian guys that joined us too and then some locals who were friends with one of ou group...so it was a pretty full on, people meeting experience.

The pic with the two blokes is of Yarik (one of Nick's previous housemates) who is an Aussie and Ally (boyfriend of someone the group knew) who is a local.

Manchester is the coldest place i've been so far... miserable weather and as we waited to get into a niteclub a taxi drove through a big puddle infront of us...we got wet!...wetter

the pics are from our night out on the town

wandered 'round Manchester during the afternoon...it's just like London without the masses of people always heading straight at you...thats a good thing.

Happy Birthday Naomi

Visited Naomi in Clapham South for her birthday, met all 9 of the people she lives with in her sharehouse and some of her work mates etc...had a pretty kewl time. she even had caromello koala's from home to share. 7 of the people she lives with are Aussies, one is a New Zealander and they have a token brit from Wales.
Intend to catch up with her and her mates with mel and co. on Australia day at the Shepherds Bush 'Walkabout' (Aussie themed pub chain) for some serious celebrating :)

Time to look around the place where i work

This is the 'Design Studio' where i spend most of my time.

it's pretty cool inside, heaps of kids work on display and a lot of it's quite impressive.

they do some great projects...and of course one of them is the 'steady eddy, skill tester'...i think it's a world wide crowd pleaser, that one!

other projects i'm doing are

Yr 5: model glider

Yr 6: rubberband powered car

Yr 7: Nets/developments and then Robolab with lego dacta

Yr 8: Steady hand game (steady eddy)...get to use a vacuum former

Yr 9: a clock in the memphis style ...get to use prodesktop and hook it up to a CNC lathe for this one!!!

Yr 10: good ol' metal candle stick holder.

all high school years require a nice little folio of their project too...which they do on their cute little laptops.

Rooms are quite small but then so are the class sizes :)

this is also my pastoral class...they call it tutor group room.

i have year 10 tutor group, though age wise they are like our yr 9's

i hook my laptop up to the projector in this room and teach from that...it's awesome.

Graphics is probably the most popular subject TAS offers at the school, the quality and standards are really high. they produce some real professional looking stuff, hand drawn and computer (primarily photoshop and they are getting into ProD

Forgot to say that I went out for my first authenitic Indian Curry in my first week at Claremont…I was taken out to Hampton Court with my room mate Leah and Dave the Physics teachers. I didn’t go for anything too hot, I got something with prawns in it…it was funny cause the prawns were the small ones you usually find in fried rice. It was still yummy tho and after dinner we went to Hampton Court Castle (King Henry VIII lived there once)it was all pretty and lit up and had ice skating in the grounds…we just watched…I’m an expert at watching people ice skating, hey Kelly :)

Went into Various parts of Clapham last thursday nite with mel...we had Thai food...mmmm... we ordered pad thai noodles and it was seriously in front of us in 3 min...i guess it's a popular dish...it had BIG prawns in it too!

Went out for drinks with Leah and Dave last night at a real swish pub somewhere in Surrey…it wasn’t Esher so I don’t know where we actually were, it was all very nice.

I should probably let everyone know I’ve joined the Duke of Edinburgh Crew here at the school….they have heaps of support…school supplies tents and cookers cause they do loads of other outdoor adventure type stuff through out the year which is awesome and I intend to get into them too.
One of the Dtech teachers organises a bike ride from Esher to France for the yr 9 and 10’s once a year in July so I might put my name down for that too...
I can only hope the tents are a little more water tight then my one at home...and to think i spent a good $24 on it at Big W too!

here are some pictures of the mansion and where i work










the mansion has something like 44 rooms in total...it's like a rabbit warren if you are trying to find someone. One of the important office ladies works in the 'bathroom' which is actually in the basement part and has a huge inground marble bath at one end of her office...it's not in use tho









i don't teach in the mansion but geography, history, maths and english get taught in there ...and if you want the library, staff room, or anyone's office, you'll find it in there somewhere too.




they have staff meetings in the 'Drawing Room'






This is the JGC (the initials stand for something or someone but basically i only know it as the JGC) the DTech studio is in here and it's where i spend most of my time. We are on the top level, below us is drama and under them is ICT (computers) i think they put the IT dept. on the manky dark bottom floor for obvious reasons (i believe they don't like getting too much sun)
if you look at the pic you can hardlt even make out the bottom floor windows.


The best thing about working in this building is that it is also part of the assembly hall and kitchens...so i don't even have to leave the warm to go get my hot lunch! Major Bonus!!









Now this lovely little shack you may be able to spy through the tree...or not... used to be where they generated the power for the mansion but now days it's our workshop...for those of you at Freeman it's about the size of the cage area...but thats ok cause i only have to ever take about 8 kids in there at any one time...hehe...i'll take a better pic soon.












And this is food Tech where we hang out at recess and have tea and bickies every day!

And now for an update 03.01.07 – 09.01.07

Well Claremont Fan Court School is awesome and living on site has its benefits, like getting outta bed at 8am to get into morning briefing at 8.15am. My classes are all fantastic…I love my yr 5 and 6’s, they’re lots of fun. And all the staff are really nice.
The school has introduced a ticket system for lunch meals cause they were 100 meals a day over apparently…I don’t know how that happens but the whole ticket thing was quite a sore point with the staff…I was told later that there have been strikes over that sort of thing in the past…apparently meal tickets are a job for ‘facilities’ not ‘teachers’ given all we’ve been asked to do is hand the tickets out in morning pastoral…perhaps I just don’t quite understand it all yet, though it is sort of funny to watch and listen to them all squabble over something I see as so insignificant.
I guess when you work in such a tops school where we’re all spoilt, you have to find something to complain about.
On the weekend I headed into London and did a bit of shopping with Melissa…we went to Harrods…they sell Krispy Kremes (fresh) so of course I had to get some!
We then went looking for a shop that Melissa wanted to do some research on cause she was going to go for an interview for the company…it turns out that it is the same cool coffee machines that Kelly has (the ones that use the pods) after that we met up with Nick and I was taken to my first London house party in Paddington….lots of Aussie’s present in a tiny tiny apartment…all in all a good weekend.
By Monday I started to come down with the same cold Melissa had the week before and on Tuesday had to take my second sickie ever…Two of the teachers in my department came over at lunch with a whole range of goodies…fruit, soup, juice, chocolate…to make sure I was OK. So my mum has nothing to worry about, I have people looking after me here too.

This building used to be the stable area for the mansion, it's now the upper junior school and on the right of the first pic is where i live (grey rooves) the other pic is just the next shot over (more of the junior playground)

Where I live

this is my little place...well in comparrison to some other places it's actually not that little.

my bedroom overlooks the front drive of the school, so when the head lights start shining in through the window at 7 am i know it's time to start getting up...and yes mum it is still clean...ish

My bedroom

The Kitchen

we have a great kitchen...it has a dishwasher and microwave and a washer dryer...now thats a piece of equipment that blows me away...it washes and then it dries. You just set it and go...what a fabulous idea.

The Living room

Living room is cool, it has a TV and DVD player so i'm pretty well sorted there...whats on TV is another story :)

Day 6 at Claremont Fan Court School

Met my house mate Leah, she seems like she knows how to party, she’s a bubble personality, very friendly and accommodating. She is a Lacrosse coach at the school. I have a year 10 tutor group which is like our yr 9’s. They tell me I have a great group…only about 15 in the group. My department has 5 people in it, three in resistant materials (that’s me) and 2 in food tech.
My classes have about 11 or 12 students in them, except for yr 10 which only has 3. Claremont is what they call a ‘Laptop school’ so every student and teacher works on cute little laptops. No kids today so I spent most of the day looking around the place and figuring out stuff. We get free hot meals every lunch too which is awesome!

The pic here is my view of the mansion when i stand out front the DT studio...it is the side of the 'mansion'

Day 5 in Glasgow, returning to London 01.01.07

Slept till late, flew outta Glasgow at about 4, got into London just past 5 and made my way to Claremont Fan Court so I’d be ready to start the next day. Paid £18 for a cab cause it was a public holiday, but it was worth every bit cause I didn’t have to walk.

Day 4 in Glasgow 31.12.06

Amanda’s Birthday (but she had to work till 1pm) we had a sleep in and chatted with Andrew about silvercair (one of his fave bands) and began the new years eve warm up at 10.30am when we started the drinking. Visited the Glasgow ‘Walkabout’ for lunch and headed back to Ibrox to get ready for Hogmanay in George Square (the Proclaimers were performing). Unfortunatly the weather, wind particularly, was really bad and they cancelled all the Hogmanay celebrations in both Glasgow and Edinburgh…that didn’t stop us having a tops time though…I still got to hear the lone piper and the ringing of the bells, Old Lang Signe, do the hand holding thing and sing along to the Proclaimers ‘….1000 miles…. Da dada da…. All I all a tops start to the new year regardless of the weather.

Day 3 in Glasgow 30.12.06
We caught the train to Edinburgh to see the sites, it was all set up for the massive Hogmanay street party (new years) celebrations. Lots of rides and lights. Strolled up and down the Royal Mile and ate Haggis for lunch.
We looked in at a tartan weaving display, had a look at the castle from the carpark and waited for the one o’clock cannon, which even though we were waiting for it, still scared the crap outta us. Made our way to Prince St on the otherside, and looked at the shops then headed home.

Day 2 in London 29.12.06
I head off to Claremont Fan Court School where I am to live on site. Easy enough to get to…the area is super classy…the school is at the end of a long private driveway of an estate. I walked past a 9 hole golf course on the way, which I’m told residents pay £400 (approx $1000) per annum for the pleasure of being a member.
I was let in and set up with my passcard and keys by Robert the caretaker. I dumped all my stuff in my room and got myself a little more organised then headed back into London to have lunch with Mel. Paul H txtd me while I was heading back in on the Overland (train), he was in London as well, so he came to lunch with Mel and me. When Mel went back to work, Paul and I went hunting for new sim cards…I’m glad he was there cause he saved me a fortune by searching for the best deal. It was good to catch up with him and see some of the sights on the way.
That night Mel and I headed into Luton Airport to catch an easyjet to Glasgow. We were both so tired we slept most of the way which was good cause it only felt like a 10 min trip. We stayed with Amanda, a tops girl Mel met on her travels, she’s originally from Blackheath in the Blue Mountains.
Amanda lived in Ibrox, just down the road from the Rangers football stadium, with Andrew, a great local bloke.

Day 1 in London 28.12.06
Went into London with Mel…she went to work (near London Wall and St Pauls Cathedral) and I went off in search of my teaching agency in Covent Garden. Walked around there while all the stores set up for the morning and then walked to Piccadilly Circus and down Regent Street. I went into Hamley’s for a browse (it’s a huge 5 level toy shop) and then visited the Trocadaro…a shopping complex and huge Timezone type place familiar to my family, since Ben and I would frequent the 2p machines on a regular basis when we were there. Had my meeting with Smart Teachers and then set up a bank account. By 4pm it was getting dark, I headed over to Lillywhites (huge 5 level sports store) and bought a backpack for my weekend adventures to come and then met up with
Mel. She had to work in the evening at ‘The Park Inn’. It’s a beautiful old pub, great atmosphere and tops food.

Arriving in London
Easy run through Heathrow, Met Melissa with no problems (at my end anyway) Mel took me to a ‘Walkabout’ pub in Putney…they’re very a popular pub chain that are all about London…we even went to one in Glasgow. They are however ‘Australian Themed’ it’s the place to go to watch Aussie sport and stuff like that when it’s on. Melissa was a little ashamed of herself for making my first stop in London a Walkabout Pub, they’re very kitsch. We then went to a little bar and drank a jug of cocktails …I slept well that night on the couch at Melissa’s place in Barnes…she tells me that the tradition of staying at a friend house till you’re settled in is called ‘Dossing’ and that everyone who’s anyone has Dossed…so I guess I’ve done that now.

The Flight Over
Well the movies were pretty poor…who shows ‘World Trade Centre’ on a plane anyway! And Miami Vice ‘crappyest film of the century’. Food was ok and I nearly threw up on the Tokyo to London leg because it was so rough…I never thought I was one to suffer motion sickness but even on take off it was mighty bumpy …must have had a flat spot. I played Tetris most of the way and didn’t manage to progress much. Japanese stop over was cool, I got a sticker in my passport, though didn’t see much of the place. Had a steak (Japanese style) cut into little strips and had to east it with chopsticks. Every television show is like Takeshi’s Castle or has Japanese people being super fake and crazy…it’s kinda weird.