One Year...And Change...

15 Feb 2009 marked one year since I moved to the Sunshine Coast, and in that time, a lot of things have happened, good things, bad things, strange things, funny things......

Azheel, my housemate since May 2008, moved back to the Maldives on 12 February; got a new housemate now, Luk, who's also another security guard (used to go to uni with his mum); my house back in Brunei got flooded numerous times in January while I was back home; I met a girl that I though I could and would love till the end, and to an extent, I still pine for her when it's dark and lonely at night; I tried to move on with someone else that I knew, and with some help from another female friend, sent a unresponded-to-as-yet message, detailing how I felt (that didn't work out, from the looks of things, but being optimistic "no news is good news"); was privilaged to have been able to take part in World Youth Day in Sydney last year, meeting fellow St Johnnies from all over the world, and still keeping in contact with them; caught up with numerous old friends too from Bintulu, Singapore and Brunei, plus of course Bathurst (got to love Facebook); managed to be part of the group that assisted the Australian Federal Police protect the Prime Minister Kevin Rudd when he visited Nambour in July 2008; spent a night in Caboolture Hospital following a bar fight in Narangba; met with the member of the Hoodoo Gurus and GANGgajang through work, plus British India, Chin, and numerous other bands...and so many other things, but I cannot remember them at this time...

Looking back like that, I've been privilaged in being able to have been exposed to so many different opportunities and experiences...regrets, I've had a few, memories, a lot more...

Today also marks the first day of uni again, and having to buy $610 worth of textbooks...which I'm not looking forward to doing in the next week...:(

I've also found out that my unit has been sold, so I have to move out in April...which is a shame, I've finally been able to organise the place just the way I want to...but hey, such is life, move on and with, or be stagnant and die...kinda like what I used to do...it's just going to be messy, again...

I better finish up here, and give a sort of indication that I'll try to keep updating this blog again when I can, and not leave it for a year or two like I did last time...

Hope this finds you well.......

Be safe.

N

TL:DR

So, one month in a shorty...

Two weeks in Bathurst, didn't pack up the house, got locked out, watched alot of Stargate SG-1. Stayed with Craig for two days then Lena and the boys for the remainder. Attended Dave's bucks party (paintball) and wedding to Glenda.

Family came to Bathurst to pick me up, then we went to Kiama to drop mum off while sis, Mike, Steven and Jo and I went to Canberra for Days in the Diocese.

Danced in Civic, met up with Summa, danced more at EPIC, and celebrated a French Mass that was televised straight to France. Made new friends.

Monday 14 July 2008 went from Canberra to Sydney to start World Youth Day duties with St John Ambulance. Met Ricky at the Welcome Dinner at the Roundhouse...friend ever since.

Tuesday and Friday at Barangaroo (after a double at Darling Harbour Friday morning where there was a Hit-and-Run), Wednesday and Thursday at the Domain, Saturday night at Randwick Racecourse...and Saturday touring around Sydney with Ricky and Hywel...

Flew back Monday 21 July 2008 to Maroochydore, went to Brisbane to spend quality time with family from Tuesday until Thursday. Went to Warner Brothers Movieworld on the Gold Coast.

Friday, did my induction and got new uniform items for work, and that nigt was at Narangba Tavern; three fights, one ambulance call out.

Saturday morning was helping to protect the Prime Minister while he was at Nambour RSL to dedicate a new Wall of Rememberance and acknowledge Nambour RSL's 90 years of operation. Saturday night was at Redcliffe and having numerous escorts, especially of two older idiots towards the end of the night...

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Got drunk last night after talking to Grace (found a bag of my stuff finally under the TV that's been sitting there since Wed), she's now going out with Damien, who she met while I was there, before we went out...but she was quite friendly with him already since, so it was kinda inevitable...so much for her high horse stance about not going out with any guy because she doesn't trust them...and she made it clear she didn't want anything to do with me again...oh well, screw it...

Had a chat with Viviana, and things got interesting...

Also called Ricky in South Africa, and had a chat to his mum for a little while (she broke some ribs a few days ago, so she's recouperating at home....hope she heals well...)

Apart from that, just been typing up the past few posts most of the afternoon, and now about to organise some grub and write a letter I promised to Viv earlier in the morning...

Right, last time I'm going to mention Grace....period.

Be safe.

N

"Due To Technical Difficulties, The Ride Will Restart Momentarily..." Part 3

So, on the Tuesday after I got back from Sydney, my family's flown up to Brisbane in preparation for their flight back to Brunei...I decided that I'll take a few days off uni to spend some time with them...

After having a dash to the uni to find out what classes I needed to take this semester, and running into Grace momentarily, I managed to just pack a quick bag and run to the bus...then took another bus....then a train, finally arriving into Brisbane to catch dinner at Jo Jo's...nice place...good sized portions and food...

Slept the next few nights at Cloud 9 Backpackers in upper Roma St, near the Fire and Ambulance station...so there was a bit of noise through the night...which happens...

On Wed we went to Warner Brother's Movie World down on the Gold Coast...and had quite a fun time there, a touch of rain, a bit of wind...and a roller coaster that jammed up with us inside it...and it went backwards too, which was a bitch...

Mike actually took a picture of me standing at the Wild West show thingy, and there was one of the actors that was supposed to be playing the bad guy...apparently I looked scarier than he did...

Apart from that, it was mostly family time, and so, this one's a shorty...

No Rest For The Wicked...Part 2

Monday, 14 July 2008

It's hard to imagine that two weeks ago, I was in a train from Canberra to Sydney to start what would be the biggest event I have ever involved myself with...

World Youth Day.

I managed to secure the last seat on the train to Sydney, cost me a good $56, but it was in First Class, so reclined seat all the way, thank you very much...

Made it in, checked into Kensington for the next week, and tried to find out where the heck I was going for dinner (it was at the Roundhouse, but I didn't know where the hell it was; nearly walked off the side of a hill, didn't I?!).

The Welcome Dinner was fantastic, catching up with old friends, and making new ones, none more so than Ricky...it's not everyday a Private can get sloshed with a Commissioner...plus, he's an overall nice bloke...

Tuesday night was my first shift at the old Hungry Mile, or Barangaroo...the names changed to Bangaroo and Shootaroo by the end of the first shift...there were of course, other names for it, but meh....and between 1700 (when we went on shift) to 2000, we were absoloutely smashed...the moment we cleared a bed, there was someone else sititng there ready to come in...someone did their ankle in, another girl was complaining of pressure and pain in her leg after a flight from the US, someone else was suffering from hypothermia, a girl from the UK was in considerable pain due to a accident she suffered years before where her shoulder blade was sent into her spine, and a guy in that same group decided to have an epileptic fit...never stopped....oh yea, and there was this Italian fella that was complaining of pain from a constipation that he had cleared, but still felt, so we were trying our hardest to get a translator in, but nothing happened, and he eventually left with nothing (we couldn't give him meds because we couldn't get anything from him!) Then we had a guy who was crowd surfing come down heavily and that was sorted out quite interestingly...oh well...

Wednesday saw me at the Domain for the first of two nights, and it was a distinct change from Barangaroo the night before...the crowd wasn't that large, and actually we closed up early, because, while nice to some, they decided to show Joan of Arc, from 1928, and play a musical adaption of it....the place cleared up quick smartly actually...

Thursday, got to see the Pope speed by in his Popemobile, and caught up with my sis, Mike, and the boys at the Domain again...was a bit more interesting, including being screamed at by the Royal Parks and Gardens staff because we were driving the ambulance over the grass...

Friday I did a double, firstly at Darling Harbour...if the first moments after stepping off the bus were an indication of how my day was going to be, bring it on...quite literally, just dropped off my bag and kit for the briefing, when Angus (one of the doctors) went "Two people with me, NOW!" I was standing right in front of the door, so guess who went along...we walked from DH to the other side of the Entertainment Centre near Paddy's Markets to a lady who was involved in a Hit-and-Run...which happened an hour ago...in North Sydney...the shock finally hit her, and she started feeling a little bad...not much more we could have done except send her to hospital for further assessment and report it to the police...went back to the briefing, and found out I was a Team Leader of one...me...(I had the first aid post to myself...and couldn't do much more than say, "Here, take this and go to the Advanced Casualty Management Centre [ACMC] for further treatment...no, I do not have splinter probes here...")...as you can imagine, nothing happened....had ten people come see me the entire shift, of which I was able to only treat three, the rest were referals to the ACMC...although my first cas that I treated in the morning was going to be a saviour later on that day...

I was back at Barangaroo after my DH stint, the trip which was a fun one itself...my first casualty that I treated at DH was actually the head of security for Barangaroo and DH, so when he spotted me trying to fight the walls of humanity moving around after the Stations of the Cross, he just went, "Oi, come this way!"...more or less, he sent me around through the security area and they didn't even stop me from getting around the place...

Barangaroo was slow that evening, cold, and not much happening...but we did manage to aquisition a bit of gear from the food tent next door...we were walking away with the bounty back to the main building from the post, and the police stopped us...they were like, "What's this, why is there so much stuff?" To which I replied, "We've aquisitioned some stuff for ourselves and the others back at the base..." and just stood there...the cop then went, "Well, I guess we should aquisiton some stuff for ourselves too then, see you later..." And the four of us just walked away chuckling...

Saturday was a good day...Hywel and Ricky and I went around Sydney, after lunch with Nathan at the Doncaster Hotel...good food there...cook your own...hehe...then off to Randwick that evening...

Ten of the 21 Team Leaders showed up for duty that night, so Ricky, Hywel and myself all stood up and offered our assistance...at this stage, it's nearly 2300, and we're on shift until 0800...and most of the Johnnies were down the the Wombat Flu...or Pilgrim Flu, which ever way you called it...it was cold...one post had to be evacuated to anoter post because they ran out of gas for their heater; I had a spare tank in my post, so I sent the buys on a resup mission across Randwick...during this time, three of them came down with a touch of hypothermia, and had to be evacuated to the rewarming centres...we were sharing one thermometer between two posts, but found out later there was another post nearby with three thremometers sitting pretty...had a girl come in suffering from an anxiety attack, then she had a psudotremor episode, then another anxiety attack...it was continous BS from her...shoffed her off to the Onsite Medical Centre (OMC) for further treatment....found out later that she was doing it all night to the team before me...apart from that, not much else happened, except for the last half an hour, when everyone's awake and starts to come in, then there's the hand over too and all...and a young girl come in with quite severe abdo pains, and the call over the radio for an AED to be sent near by...I can assure you, jumping the fences and barriers at Randwick is not something I'd happily redo again if they asked me to do...there was six I had to jump in the racecourse to get to the place, only to be told to stand down when I got there...three there, three back...anyhow, while the Final Mass was going, I stood the team down, and managed to hitch a ride back to Kensington with the cops in their little buggy...then had to climb another fence to open the doors to get into the accomodation block...needless to say, I passed out after a hot shower...

Monday, and it was "catcha next times" and "see ya's" all around, and flew into Maroochydore late after my plane broke down (it was interesting....three things broke down on me that week....first it was the bus on Sat night when we were on our way back to Kensington from Sydney, then an ambulance during the night shift, then the plane on Monday...bad mojo...)

So, at the end of that week...WYD had finally finished, the Pope's gone back to the Vatican, and I really didn't know what was going to happen next...

Flights, Fights, Cold, Friends, Family, Awkward Moments, WYD, Uni And Work...Plus The Rest...Part 1

30 days...finally have a moment to myself where I can sort of sort out what's been happening over the past month...I'm still not quite sure where all that time went, but trust me, it's been too fast...especially the part where I meet up with my family...over too damned quickly...

Well, let's start from the top...24 June...arrived into Sydney just after lunch, and was at Central when Sully called me to offer me work that weekend...I was like, "Well, Boss, if you can chip in for a flight back north and back again to Sydney, I'll gladly do that weekend shift..." Needless to say, Sully laughed it off and just said to enjoy the trip...(I did get a phone call Tuesday past confirming that I was back at Redcliffe this weekend...so all good...)

Stayed with Craig for two days, managed to catch up with Steve before he left for Karyn and Canada...was locked out of the house, so technically I did not pack anything at all while I was down there, so looks like I could be back in Bathurst in September....not something I was planning on doing, so we'll have to see first how things pan out....there's alot of stuff still there that has a close meaning to me, some stuff that my dad gave me...if not it would have been written off and I moved on...I just hope that no bastard actually stole a watch that was actually my dad's that I accidentally left behind in January...that would be unforgivable on a most unimaginable scale...I believe the words castration with a rusty spoon, or some other imaginative torture technique come to mind...so, since I was locked out of the house, I'm also lacking a place to stay....luckily enough, Lena and the boys were nice enough to put me up for the rest of my stay in Bathurst...

Went paint balling for Dave's bucks party, and had a right royal ball of a time...Dave especially....I think I pegged him a few times...READ: at least 100...:D...it's his bucks, so he was targeted on principal anyway....the bruises and welts spoke for themselves...

The wedding was a week later, and was great, and the reception was excellent too...food was good, company better...and it was good fun catching up with Dave and Glenda, and his parents Bill and Barbra...

Also became addicted to Stargate SG-1 while I was in Bathurst...Aaron and Kari finally got all ten seasons of SG-1, plus the two movies, and the four seasons of Stargate: Atlantis...I think I managed to blaze through five seasons, so that's giving me some reason to go back to Bathurst at some stage too...or to download them....decisions, decisions...

Mum, sis, Mike and the boys (Steven and Jo) came up the same weekend, and off we went to Kiama to spend a few days with my aunty's and have a look around the place...then, we left mum there to have a bit of a holiday while the rest of us started the trip to Canberra for Days in the Diocese...

We joined with the Chemin-Neuf Community and had a great time just being there...everything was in French, and when Thursday rolled along, we had the entire Latvian contigent for WYD with us too...stayed with Peter and Elaine, who were absoloutely fabulous people...also managed to sneak in some time to meet up with Summa for a drink, and catch up with all the news of what's been going on...anyway, while in Canberra, we danced at Civic, then at EPIC for the Days in the Diocese Mass, went to the Australian War Memorial (which, up until then, I've been trying to get to for years, but just never had the time to make it over), the National Museum, and also to a French Mass, there there were three Archbishops and it was transmitted live to France from Australia...all in all, a wonderful experience...

Truthfully, I miss Canberra...was with my family, without mum unfortunately, but had time to relax and really enjoy myself for the first time in ages, and make new friends...I think some of the friends I've made over the past few weeks are worth alot more than some I've made in my entire time here in Australia...and that's saying something...