Well it has been a long time between drinks.

Sydney has been treating us well.

Actually part of the delay between posts has been due to the fact that we are essentially locals now. Which is a testament to how usual it is to have some kiwis settle here.

I have heard word from back home and it is good to hear, there is certainly some goings on that we are keen to catch up with when we get back.

As for stories... I am in no state to write them now, surfice to say that they are many and varied.

Just remember that if you ever take the piss out of a tiny irish girl she is likely to turn around (and in a thick irish accent) say to you " Ah, you're just like a little piece of fruit.... with a spoon!!" - I think that about says it all really... don't you?

WEEKEND UPDATE -(Sorry it has taken so long, but as you will see I spent sometime on it. This only covers Sat night - The rest is a completely different story)

A great novel starts “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times…” it is considered such an incredible opening line because in an apparent oxymoron it captures the celebration and frustration of an ambiguous time. Tonight I understood what that meant.

You may be thinking that, that is quite an impressive setup, and that this is going to be quite an impressive entry for my internet log. Well can I just temper that by saying that this is actually being written at four O’clock in the morning, and that I am trying desperately to remain coherent, but as U2 sings in my ear, there is “nothing left to lose,”

May I start at the end. As it is probably the most confusing place to start and why spoil a perfect evening? And also it is most fresh in my memory (it happened just minutes ago).

John and I, even in our amplified state, scaled a security fence by complete stealth( yeah right) As our feet momentarily touched the ground beyond the fence, John rushed off to, scout around the west side of the building to check for unlocked doors/windows. I took one step forward and noticed that the first window was open and unlocked. As John came rushing back with a worried look on his face I quickly did the SAS style hand signal to indicate that the left full size window was unlocked and that I had already checked that we could open it further (looks like the hitchhiker signal in NZ). We had already gone over the various possible scenarios and so both knew that that room should be empty. We started to open the window carefully, so as to avoid detection.

“WHO IS THAT, AND WHAT ARE YOU DOING!!!!!!” Johns sister (who was supposed to be at a house party somewhere) ended up letting us in (after she had recovered from a heart attack(I’m not surprised, I scare myself sometimes)).

Actually I now believe that Tony Robbins is the patron saint of going out for a night on the town in Manly. Firstly, everyone starts by talking about how incredibly great it is. Then once you are actually there you need to believe in yourself more than the mirror will usually allow, because it is one of the hangouts for the ‘beautiful people’ of Sydney, and lastly you will pay a lot of money ($17 door charge!) for something that you will ultimately look back on and say “I didn’t really need to go to all that trouble, I could have got that much easier/cheaper….”

This may all sound quite dramatic, but in fact Sydney has up to this point been an experience of extremes. From utter drudgery (waking, working, have dinner, sleep, repeat) to evenings that I feel compelled to document as vividly as possible on this page.

To understand our Manly experience you must understand the motivations of our tour guide, Chris. A concern that I had, but didn’t act on, was that Chris was all too attached to an American girl that we had met the night before. Somehow the fact that she had a boyfriend ‘backhome’ had made her more appealing to Chris. This in itself, while reprehensible, should not have turned up as a warning on our radar, except for the fact that Sam (surprise! I did remember her name) had two friends who went everywhere with her. The plan that we should have seen forming in Chris’s head, was that John and I would act as wingmen, distracting the friends while Chris attempted the impossible (I thought it was anyway). A slight further complication was that Chris had broken the screen on his cellphone, so he could call out, but only if he knew the number, and if he missed your call, he would never know.

He spent the afternoon engineering; no it was more like shuffling (there was certainly no technical proficiency about it), the American girls and us in accordance with his slowly unfolding plan.

The fact that John and I were dead set on going to Manly, and that a top ‘undiscovered’ band was playing a gig there, are probably the only things that saved us.

We met Chris at the local bus stop, he had been traveling for 1.5 hours to get there. Once on the bus I could see that Manly was already living up to it’s reputation. The only person on that bus over 30, didn’t realize that they were over 30. I didn’t actually note how long the trip took, but it took us through terrain that would have proven the undoing of any New Zealand bus. On one particularly precarious winding incline, I gingerly asked if this was the main road to Manly. “Nah mate, the bus wouldn’t have made it up that.”

Although I haven’t yet mentioned it here, John and I have developed the rule of 4. If you need to get an idea of what something is like in Sydney, just think of the equivalent in Auckland and times it by 4. Here are a few examples.

Darling Harbour is four times cooler than the viaduct basin
The exchange rate, lack of quality and inflated prices make everything seem four times more expensive than Auckland
Public transport is four times more useful
Taxi drivers are four times more useless
And manly is four times more of a party place than Orewa.

This may seem like mockery through faint praise, I certainly have never associated Orewa with anything but old people. But there is a certain spiritual parallel between Manly and Orewa that is undeniable. Manly is the promise that, one day many years hence, something good could come out of Orewa.

At this point I will prioritize the details. I could go into great depth describing how the pedestrian boulevards thronged with young hip people dressed with a hint of beach style. I could also talk about how the traditional 80’s style pub is still a heavy influence on every single pub/bar and how only actually being in Sydney could let you believe that 27% of the worlds pokie machines are in NSW. But I just did, so lets skip to the good stuff.

Loydo, Chris’s friend drove the six of us along to the local fishermans club (called Fishios) in his holden. It wasn’t a squeeze. NSW has peculiar rules about drinking. There are many ‘clubs’ like fishermans clubs, boat clubs, sport clubs, where people go to drink. But you can only drink there if you’re a ‘member’. As long as you can say that you live outside a 3 mile radius of the club, you can become a member by signing a little card. If you live inside the radius, you are either smart enough to make up an address on the other side of Sydney or you go through an initiation style thing. It is a way to dodge a crazy law, everyone does it, everyone knows that it’s done but it’s still a ‘wink, wink’ style thing. Most clubs have very carefully worded ‘information’ cards on their walls to ‘help’ people when they are filling out their declaration cards. One club even had a map on the wall with a big ring to indicate the 3 mile radius (it was actually there so you could pick a good street and suburb to say you live in). It really is quite incredible. Remember back to the days when you weren’t quite old enough to get into bars, so there was always a little excitement trying to con your way in. This is the same experience, but this version can be enjoyed by everyone.

There was a $17 cover charge, but you were paying it for the band, not entry to the pub. John, who has a talent for cutting to the essence of something without the puffery that I usually throw in, summed up the venue as “shit”, the band was anything but.

iOTA (intentional capitalization) is the name of the lead singer and of the band. The lead singer cultivates a ben harper look with a little bit of the young Dave Grohl look from when he was the drummer for Nirvana. A description of their music is a little more illusive. To be honest none of their music was that memorable apart from the reaction it drew from the crowd. Being a three piece band they had a predictable rock sound that iOTA tempered with a heavily influenced Ben Harper style of singing and the lead guitar was always an acoustic. The music was the kind that you listen to on cd five times end to end and become a groupie. On first listening it sounded like background music. They lacked any really catchy distinctive songs to pull them into the big time, unlike those seasoned hits S.H.A.G. and Wayno by Millhouse. In fact the highlight for me was when they did a Janet Jackson cover. As I write it I realize what a strange idea it is for a fairly rocky band to cover Janet, but it just made perfect sense last night. With iOTA singing falsetto and shaking a tambourine while the drummer showed his prowess on the acoustic, they played their own very cool take on ‘Till it’s gone’. Look out for iOTA they have released two cd’s and two ep’s and if they can get away with charging $17 for gigs in run down pubs then their loyal fans will ensure they go places. Apparently they are signed with a local record label but they need a hit before we will all get to appreciate them.

At the next pub we sat in a little alcove upstairs and watched the goings on down stairs. Two girls sat behind us with black marks all over their face. We asked them about it and they told us the terrible tale of how they had lost too many rounds of a vicious drinking game called Iggle Biggle.

It is a variation on a traditional drinking game theme. Here is how it works.

Take 1 cork preferably from a sparkling wine bottle but it could be just from a wine bottle. Burn the end. Number people off around the group (1,2,3 etc) Now the game runs by each person saying a phrase.
e.g. “I Iggle biggle one with two iggle biggles call iggle biggle 5 with 12 iggle biggles”
Every time someone makes a mistake they have to drink a full vessel and they get an iggle biggle on their face, which is done by ‘stamping’ the iggle biggle stick on them. Play continues until you can’t fit anymore iggle biggles on someone’s face. Of course the game gets interesting when people can’t remember how many iggle biggles are on their own face etc… Ah yes, through all our differences and peculiarities there is always the international traditional of acting stupid while drinking.

During the whole evening we didn’t get a chance to stay anywhere long because Chris was so determined to try and get back to down town Sydney to meet the Americans. We didn’t. After waiting for an hour to get a bus (3 in the morning) we ended up going home. As neither of us had our keys (there was a valid reason for this, but I won’t go into it), we decided to try and find an unlocked door/window. You know how it is, after a few drinks you think of something like that and you’re usual rational decision making process is replaced with “I can do that!”

We scaled the wall and that takes us back to where all this started, some 2000 words ago.

OE DAY 12

As those of you who know me well, (and from our stats I would say there are a fair few reading this who don't - Welcome to you all!) You will know that I try to be as professional as possible at work. Today, I snapped.

I was feeling a little sick today, and as the day dragged on I was finding it really hard to concentrate. I heard the customer answer the phone, "Good evening, ANZ customer service calling, may I please speak to..." I turned to the screen to read out the customer's name and this is what it said

"Mr Fuk-Ng Chang"

I tried to pronounce the first name with a long vowel sound but Mr Chang corrected me and it all went down hill from there...


Our plans for the long weekend are slowly coming together, A guy from work Chris,(if you read one of my previous entries you can see which one he is) is going to show us the night life in Manly beach, apparently it is reffered to as Kiwi Beach by some. Should be good for a laugh. Chris is constantly going on about knowing this person, and this 'hottie'(his favorite term) and lots of people on tv, (apparently gypsy from Home and Away will be there); will be interesting even if half his stories turn out to be true.

As if that was not enough, tomorrow is casual day at work AND all our team is going for a few drinks after work AND we are finishing at the earlier time of 7:30 pm AND (and this is a big AND) the four 'hotties' that we have identified who work on other projects around the floor all finish at about this time.

(Note* It is a logistical issue when the lovely ladies finish work many hours before you usually do.)

Most likely tomorrow will be when we find out they are all married to 150kg body builders with insecurites and anger management 'issues'

If nothing else it will be nice to have a conversation with someone outside our team. Because it is almost completely guys, the conversations are predicatble and repetitive, Chris's big stories (they really are entertaining), Josh's wise cracks, Taking the piss out of Keegan and his Ultra Happy Camp selling technique and Kiwi v. Aussie banter.

Hope you are all doing well.

What do you guys think of the new look?

VOTE NOW ON THE OELOCATOR
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OE DAY 10

Well, these mad dashes from work to the Ferry are starting to take there toll. John and I have been very quiet tonight because we are absolutely stuffed. As things go on, I'm sure we will get used to a daily run, but at this point it is still a shock to the system.

Two things happened today of note.

Firstly John decided to take his lunch (we have a perfectly good mini supermarket AND Subway around the corner yet ...) part of the large pack that he brought was an 'Up and Go' milk drink. As the packets say "Best served chilled" John put it in the Freezer at work. Four hours later when we were having our 'lunch' (at 4:30pm) he pulls it out and notices it is frozen solid. (Picture the same shocked look as when the security officer at the airport asked him why he had a pocket knife in his bag) - The cunning John decides that a quick way to defrost his frozen liquid meal, would be to place it in the microwave. Trouble is the packaging for 'Up and Go' has a tin foil lining....

Even though it was a little burnt, John insisted on trying to eat his 'Up and Go' like an ice cream. He spent the rest of his break cleaning up.

The second thing that happened was that we got to meet the other team that is selling life insurance. There are alot of teams on our floor, but only one other sells the same (or very similar) product.

We all sit together and there are 23 of us total. There are a few characters to point out.

John and I are the "crazy kiwi's"
Josh is a 'gentle giant' kiwi
Keegan is the ultra out there gay 18 yr old - making his way in the big city. He is unbelievably successful selling to house wives.
Adrian and Debbie the asian Uni students who just don't turn up when they have classes
Andrew our 1st team leader is about as Average Inner City Australian as you can imagine. Picture the stereo type and you're there.
Kristen is our other team leader, another kiwi (there are alot around) she has literally worked all over the world, and considers Australia a 'temporary stop' (she's been here two years so far)
There is Chantel (Who I met today) who is a 22 yr old Sydneyite (is that a word?) - She moved into an appartment by herself two months ago and was proud that last night she cooked her first meal. (Hmmm?!?)
Chrissy is a 19 yr old , and from what I can pick up, she is from a 'rough' part of Sydney. Can't tell if she is going for a gothesque look or if it is accidental. She sells alot, haven't worked out why yet.
There is an old greek guy called matt who is about as gay as I think it is possible to be
There is Daniel who is so ultra casual and joking when talking to customers that he does actually laugh sometimes when saying what we are selling (we do sell accidental death insurance you know??!!!)
There is Chris who is another true occa australian. The other day he told the most racist joke I've heard in a while, during a team meeting (one day a Zebra asks god if he is white with black stripes or black with white stripes....) I think Josh (who is Samoan) was struggling not to snap him in half (he's also tall and lanky)

The other's I either haven't met or haven't learnt enough about to write something interesting.

Hope everyone is doing well, Mike suggested that kiwi's still in the land of the long white cloud, set up a website so we can see what you are upto. Good suggestion Mike, and thanks for offering, all enquiries to Lynchie.

Just to let you know, our work schedules are going to rotate between one day weekends and three day weekends. So look out for some big tales after this weekend.

Catch you all later

OE DAY 9

Today was our first full day selling Accidental Life Insurance. We thought that we started at 12 but in actual fact our start time was 12:30 and we weren't allowed to actually try calling people till 1pm. As if this wasn't enough of a delay, the system went down for 15 minutes. It turned out that we finally started making calls at about 1:20pm, and the two kiwi boys went at it like a bull at a gate. Our team of 8 made 25 sales in the day and John and I made 6 sales a piece! We would have been very proud of our selves but our ferry was leaving in 15min (about 20minutes away).

Off streaked two incredibly well dressed lads (we went to a factory outlet centre yesterday) out across hyde park. This park is generally considered a bad place to be at night but when the clock is ticking at 9:02:30pm and the ferry leaves at 9:15 you always take the most direct route. Have no fear we were not assaulted or violated in any way, and managed to make the ferry with about 20 seconds to spare. Spent the whole of the 8 minute ferry ride trying to regain the ability to speak.

Keep the emails coming people, you all see what we're upto but we are missing out on information from back home. Just drop us a line!

Talk to you all soon.

OE DAY 8

Well happy Mardi Gras to you all. Last night I had my education in the festival (not parade) that is this Sydney institution. Firstly may I say that in my Auckland, sheltered, straight life, I had not experienced anything that I could have used as a reference to predict what it would be like. So I went armed only with the advice of a particularly camp work colleague and a few comments from others.

Forget what you’re thinking, because unless you know, you’re not even close.

The parade it’s self is far less ornate and spectacular than I was thinking. It works on the quantity not quality principal. The floats are trucks with generators and huge sound systems disguised under often simple paper mache. As for the gay hordes (and the parade was nothing if not proof that there are a lot of gay and lesbian people out there), most were dressed up in simple but colorful costumes. The general rule for Mardi Gras parade people is; the more time you have spent in the gym, the smaller your hot pants should be. There we’re literally armies of guys that I was grateful were gay, simply because they would be such completely irresistible competition on the ladies stakes, if they were straight. I had a woman standing next to me who was literally moaning at various points as she imagined the possibilities if some of the guys had different partner preferences.

The Mardi Gras parade is certainly a chance to show off the creativity of the gay and lesbian community. Each 100 or so people would march/dance/prance/gyrate etc behind a float that represented a different part of the gay and lesbian community, and they are as obscure as they are diverse. There was the lesbian scuba diving club, gay political candidates, gay preschoolers (adopted children of gay couples), the gay Olympics (to be held in Sydney later this year) or the (apparently) famous ‘dykes on bikes’. It was as I have said quite an education. The most ground shaking lesson I learnt is that Bob the Builder is a gay icon, and I mean BIG TIME!! It was all in good humor and the crowds were exceptionally well behaved but you either need to be tall, get there really early or know someone with an apartment balcony nearby to see anything. There were opportunist people selling milk cartons for $5 and one very drunk man who offered to let me stand on his upturned rubbish bin at a rate of $5 for 5min. I decided he needed that rubbish bin for vertical support more than I needed it to see.

The Mardi Gras is a celebration by the Gay and Lesbian community of the acceptance they have gained in society (and a chance to campaign for some more). Well, that is the official explanation of it. In actual fact it is simply an excuse for the whole of Sydney to have a party – and believe me – they require little prompting. In truth, while Oxford street became gay ground zero; a few blocks over, George St became a heterosexual hotbed.

We found ourselves in Scruffy Murphy’s; a bar that I feel certain will become our local. The bar is brilliantly set up with a classyish bar upstairs, the traditional irish pub on the ground floor with a massive dance area and live covers band playing almost all week , and a modern dance grotto down stairs.

If you’re after a night on the prowl don’t bother even approaching downtown Sydney before 11 and even then walk slowly.

We went to check out the grotto because the covers band was still getting setup on the ground floor. In this ultra trendy subterranean Mecca for the dance set we fit right in (six drinks later). The music was surprisingly good considering they had the classic ‘I think I’m the best trance heavy hardhouse beats per minute DJ’ on the decks. To give you just a small idea of how Australians look a lot like us but are completely different; I watched as a Lebanese looking guy elbowed a woman in the face, started to yell at her as the bouncer rushed over. After a quick conversation with the two of them, I think I overheard the guy say “she was being a silly bitch”, and then the woman and her friend were asked to leave. And don’t even get them started on Unions or illegal immigrants!!!!

All and all the night had endless possibilities. Unfortunately with the time zone here being so close to back home, you don’t really adjust, and you just always feel like it is two hours later than it really is. A combination of this and the fact that we had started drinking straight after we finished work at 4 o’clock meant that by midnight we were catatonic and stumbling home.

Only 14 days to go until Saint Patricks day!!

This is a general thank you to you all. For the last few days the website has received unbeleivable traffic. We are averaging about 400 hits a day - just remember that there is also globaljohnny.tk AND 0061 405 219 908 if you want to txt us (still only 20c from NZ).

We are making a comitment to try and answer all emails within 24hours. We are averaging two emails a day from our website. Please continue with the word of mouth people, we have received emails from friends of friends and people we haven't talked to in years! Just a note to 'oeadrianismysexualdeviantlovegod@shaft.com' - thanks for the email, we always appreciate fanmail.

Have a pleasant and eventful weekend.

A

OE DAY 6

PUBLIC RETRACTION!!!!

Two days ago I said that there was a "desperate lake of females in the class" that John and I were in. I am deeply sorry for this, because this simple mis-type has given completely the wrong impression. What it should have said was that there was a "desperate lack of females in the class"!!!!!! Don't always believe what you read, because we all have contend with qwerty and our own freudian slips.

As for all that, we have just finished another day of training. At the that moment when they thought we had learnt enough and were ready to make 'fake calls'; IT stuffed up and gave us real calls. Not a single person made a sale, but we all feel better now after completely meat-axing a possible commision! Had a drink (or five) with some of the people in our training class tonight, interesting to get to know some of them. 100% Australia has a completely different way of looking at things and it seems to affect people in relation to how long they are here!

The other day we saw the girl from Shortland street who played the short nurse a few years ago, called Jo. It seems that Sydney is a haven for actors who can't make a living in NZ. I just asked John if I was making a fair commentary on the NZ acting scene and noticed that he was struggling to align the remote with the TV (too many guiness'es from the Guiness Girls at Scruffy Murphys). Now, Chicargo have just come on TV and John has turned it right up.

Look out for a special report about our weekend. Sure, we have gone pretty easy tonight but tomorrrow we have to work, AND!. When we finish work, we will walk out of our building into the lagest celebration of homosexual lifestyles in the southern hemisphere. Look out it could get messy. John is keen to see what the Mardi Gras looks like, I'm a little more NZ intollerant (well not in a pauline hanson kind of way) I would just rather go somewhere and exercise my skills as a young hetrosexual male.

We'll see how things go, but you'll see the whole shocking truth right here online!

See Ya'll on the flip side!