Life, Travel

What I Reckon: 10 Types of Inconsiderate Hostellers

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Now I  am not entirely sure whether this extends from my genetic predisposition to have zero patience for morons (thanks Dad!) or whether I am just getting way too old for this shit,  but the people I am meeting in hostels of late are doing my goddamn head in. And there are particular categories of offenders that I can throw out there that are up there with the worst. Here are 10 kinds of people that shit me.

The 6am packers

In what fucking world did you grow up in where it is OK to turn the light on while 8 other people are still sleeping at 5 or 6am so you can screw about packing all your junk into a bag because you have an early flight. Here’s an idea! Pack the night before so you don’t need to wake everybody up and piss everybody off while you are trying to fit everything in your bag. Nuff said.

The 2am shaggers

I get that you’re drunk. I get that you’re horny. But hostel bathrooms are there for a reason. Not just for showering and doing your hair. Be a gem and disappear now because I am pretty sure that most people don’t want to be subjected to your too loud moaning or your bed rocking. Especially the bed rocking. This also applies to masturbation. One time in  El Salvador I woke up with a shocking hangover and thought I was in the middle of an earthquake. After 2 minutes I thought to myself “hold on a minute?? They don’t usually go this long” then got up to go puke only to discover the moron in the bunk above me was jacking himself watching porn….. hello! Anyone can walk in at any moment and I am right there!!! Have some dignity! Shake that shit elsewhere.

The food stealers

There is nothing worse than coming home a) hungry b) drunk c) hungover d) broke or e) all of the above to find that some arsehole has decided to take it upon themselves to steal whatever lovely snack you had set aside for yourself in the fridge all and eat it all for themselves. In a land where few of us actually have a lot of money, this is the lowest of lows. God help you if I ever catch you because my hangry self will probably krav maga your arse back to the supermarket to buy me another dinner you tight arse lazy fucker.

The plastic bag rustlers

There is nothing more grating in this world than the sound of a million rustling plastic bags while you are trying to sleep. Now I am all for plastic bags because they are useful. But fifty million of them!?! All on the go between 11pm and 7am. Are you fucking kidding me. Control yourselves. Organise your shit. Stop being a disturber of the peace.

The loud fuckers

There is jovial.  And then there is just too fucking loud. Two days ago whilst lying in bed with a sinus headache I was subjected to a fucking hyena laughing her head off in the bedroom at 8am whilst drinking her tea in bed. You know what?! Nobody cares to listen to you talk shit at this time of day and laugh about it. Who the hell is this fucking happy in the morning anyway? Maybe if you’d have done us all a favour and shared whatever drugs you were on I may not have had such an issue with your ear piercing ridiculousness. Better yet, just take it outside.

The ‘Wayyy too drunks’

Now we have all been here at some point in our travels. Even I will admit to being somewhat of a menace at 5am coming home to find an equally drunk fucker in my bed, getting disoriented and trying to figure out if I was in the right room and then having a cry about Goldilocks being in my bed and the pizza all being gone (granted, the guy was blonde. And the pizza was my tasty snack left by my sober self on my bed in foil for my drunk self. He managed to throw it on the floor and the cats had gotten into it.  You can understand why I was upset here….) anyway… I am getting off point (always good in a rant). The point is, we will allow for this on some occasions. What is at all times completely unacceptable are the following. 1. Puking on people, beds, or on people’s luggage.  2. Same goes for urination. 3. Climbing into bed with strangers. I had to wake up to a guy doing this. I shoved him out on the floor. Serves you right shithead. 4. Doing this every night of the week when you are the only person in your room doing it. If you are going to be a menace in a quiet hostel, book into the party hostel down the road. Don’t be an arsehole.

The complainers

I don’t know if you noticed. But I’m enjoying myself right now.  I’m having a great time. If you are not, remove yourself from people who don’t really care how shit your day or your life is. I’ve just met you. I don’t care.

The comparers

If everything at home is more awesome than it is here, why the hell are you here? Either shush, enjoy yourself and the new experiences or stay at home. Same goes for food. I don’t care if they don’t have a tofu burger with fries in Vietnam. Eat a goddamn noodle for fucks sake and enjoy it.

The ‘I know everything’s’

There’s being helpful, then there’s being a fucking know it all. Nobody likes a know it all. Even if you’ve been to a million countries and the rest, you don’t need to weigh your expert opinion in on every single conversation had in the hostel. Stop trying so hard and actually listen for a change and maybe you’ll learn something new. Like the fact that you don’t actually know everything and that other people have interesting things to say too.

The unwanted sexual advancers

Here’s a novel concept. We’ve just met and that means your hand should not be attached to my arse. Or my waist.  Or any other part of me. And I don’t give a shit if you don’t understand my language. No is pretty easy to understand. As is me removing your hands from me and glaring at you like you’re a fuckwit. Get the hint.  Not interested.

Anyway, I think that is my rant just about covered. But if you have anymore that you would like to add, please sign them up in the comments box below. Peace out!

 

Life, Opinion

What I Reckon…. About Selfies

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A couple of months ago while I was roaming around the streets of Sofia, I met a young English couple and we got chatting. Somehow we managed to get onto the topic of his mum constantly being on the soapbox about something. Add to this another conversation about words that people hate. Many women hate the word ‘moist’. I personally hate the word ‘flannel’. My Canadian ex-boyfriend hated the word ‘reckon’. No matter how much I hounded him about saying it, he just wouldn’t.

So from here the English couple and I started throwing around the word ‘reckon’. It was agreed that the words ‘I reckon’ are usually proceeded by a massive rant, in agreeability to the statement of another, or is usually proceeded by a dumb activity and the phrase ‘hold my beer’. We decided that this should become the foundation of a blog post and here it is. The first ever ‘What I Reckon’.

The first thing I want to get on my soapbox about is selfies. I absolutely LOATHE selfies with the fire of a thousand suns. While I can appreciate that there is the odd occasion where one might take a photo of oneself to say ‘I was there’ or ‘this was a special occasion’ to family, friends or not yet thought of grandchildren, there is absolutely no need to take a million photos of yourself and post them to the internet.

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Classic Duck Face

I sat behind a girl on the bus who was dolled up to the nines and took about 25 selfies before she chose one to put on Instagram. ‘Hey guys! Look at me! I’m on a fucking bus! How cool am I???’

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Aren’t I Sexy? Face

I was also warned by the hostel worker in Croatia about taking selfies on the boardwalks at Plitvice Lakes. A person died there falling off the edge of a waterfall being a dumb arse trying to take a selfie. Fact. More people have died this year from selfies than from shark attacks. Most of these people are doing dumb shit trying to look cool for the people of social media. “Hey, I am on the roof of a train! And whoops, I just got electrocuted!” or “Check me out on the edge of a cliff! And oops, I just went over the edge of it!” or “Don’t I look cool posing with this loaded gun! Oh I just shot myself or my friend in the head with it! Oops!” Wouldn’t it be nice if people actually stopped to think about safety first instead of how cool they will look on Facebook.

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“Like, I am so excited!’ Face

While I was at Plitvice, I came down the hill and saw a massive line. Thinking to myself ‘this cannot be the boat queue, I haven’t walked 5km yet’, I asked about it. The woman couldn’t tell me what the queue was for, so I started pushing in along the side. Turns out the queue was for selfies. And there they are, hundreds of people lined up trying to get a million pictures of themselves on their selfie sticks. Here is a novel idea. JUST TAKE ONE and then move the fuck along.

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“I am being silly because I am bored and have nothing else to do” Face

Arseholes everywhere are harassing you about buying their selfie sticks. I personally relate to that Cyanide and Happiness cartoon where the guy stabs the other guy with his own selfie stick. This is how much I hate selfies and selfie sticks.

from http://imgur.com/gallery/ffbbcrj
from http://imgur.com/gallery/ffbbcrj

Other selfie related loathing comes from boys. No I DO NOT want to take a selfie of myself or my tits and send it to you. I HAVE BETTER SHIT TO DO WITH MY TIME. That and I don’t need to be putting that shit out there to the world. I have seen what happens here. Ask all the celebs who’s t and a wind up stolen off of iCloud. I loved it when I had a smashed front camera on my phone. Couldn’t even selfie if I tried and what a great excuse! Stop pestering me about sending you a selfie. I look the same as the last time you saw me and if you want to look at my glorious face, find a picture of me doing something cool on Facebook. Because I am not sending you a picture of my tits.

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Boys, this is the only picture of ‘my boobs’ you are going to get!

And of course to all of you out there who have nothing better to do with your time than take a million photos of yourself, GET ANOTHER HOBBY. I once taught a 14 year old who told me she had amassed 10,000 selfies of herself. I told her the same thing. I am pretty sure everyone knows what you look like by now. Stop jamming up my newsfeed with your face.

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Sullen Face

Anyway, like I said before, time and place. I am not saying that you shouldn’t take any photos of yourself. What I am saying is take one or two, put the lens away and enjoy the moment you are in. Enjoy actually living in the real world. Because in the real world, nobody cares about what the fuck you look like this hour. You look the same as you did ten minutes ago. In fact, wouldn’t it be nice if we could actually celebrate the minds of people and the intelligent thought processes they have instead of how well their eyebrows are groomed. I am getting quite fed up of all of the selfie bullshit. Might be time to move to a village where people don’t have phones.

Learning, Travel

Shit I Learned In Milan

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I went to visit Milan for the weekend. And of course shit was to be learned. Unlikely shit to learn in Milan, if I am to be honest, but here goes.

Animal related learnings

Kangaroos can swim

I am Australian and I had to find this out from a Venezuelan dude that works behind the hostel desk…. Probably because I have never seen it happen because living in drought country doesn’t really lend itself to there being loads of water.

Mosquitoes are arseholes

I go to sleep. The high pitched squealing of these bitches are buzzing around my head and I can’t sleep. At some point, because all of the rest of my body is covered with blanket, the mosquito decides to bite me on my eye socket. I awaken with my eye swollen shut. Excellent. So the following evening I ask for fly spray. Spray the room. Go to sleep. Wake up to find that my other eye has now been bitten and that this one is now also swollen shut. Fuck you mosquitoes. So much for looking pretty in pictures in Milan. I tried most of the time in my make-up-less state to not look like a victim of violence. The Venezuelan and I decided that the only thing on this planet that mosquitoes are good for are feeding spiders.

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Covering my swollen bitch eyes with sunglasses…. so damn cool

Etymology

The glorious guide I had on my free walking tour, Marco, was an incredible wealth of knowledge, if not slightly unhinged. I watched this outstanding bad ass ask the masses if we mind him smoking then proceed to pull out and chuff on a cigar around the city, no hands. Anyway, he has this thing about etymology. I am unsure whether any of the following is true but they are entertaining so here we go:

Serendipity

In the 1500’s the country now known as Sri Lanka was called Serendip. The king of Serendip, being an all round conquering wench of the time, sent an army to India in search of gold to make him rich. The did not find any gold. However they did discover that glorious thing called ‘tea’. The tea ended up making the king more money than he would have made finding the gold. Thus serendipity – finding something you weren’t looking for that is of greater value to you than the thing you actually were looking for.

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The bone chapel of Milan, where the walls are decorated with the bones of plague victims

Gadget

Upon the unveiling of the Statue of Liberty in New York, a company was contracted to make miniature souvenirs for people to take home. The company making them was a French company who was owned by a man named ‘Gaget’, pronounced ‘gah-zhay’. Anyway, as we like to do in the English language, we took this work and Anglicised/butchered it to its current pronunciation ‘gad-get’. This is still the word used in Italian to describe souvenirs, however through the progression of the times, we have now come to use the word to describe electronics.

Bankrupt

From the Italian, ‘banca rota’. When a merchant in Milan was in massive debt and unable to pay that debt back they would repossess all of his things and have a sale to get all of the money back. At the end of the sales, they used to break his desk – the thing he would use for selling his merchandise. This breaking, ‘rota’ being the word for ‘to break’ became a tradition. The banca rota. Which again, when Anglicised/butchered, becomes known as ‘bankrupt’ in English.

Other random shit

The Visconti family had the emblem of a viper snake eating a man, despite the fact that vipers are small and cannot eat a man. It is believed that they stole this from some family they conquered somewhere else in the world. Anyway, this is now the symbol of the city of Milan and can also be found in the Alpha Romeo car logo.

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Vipers eating humans??? Just a bit odd.

One family in Milan back in the day who’s name translated into ‘testicles’ decided that their family coat of arms should just consist of three testicles. And so it was.

Oh and while I was there I also saw a guy making music by running a violin bow along the sharp edge of a saw used for cutting wood.

And so, as my tour concluded, the tour guide took us to the most provocative piece of art in the city located outside of the stock exchange. And it was there that both he and the stock exchange, gave us the finger and stole our money and left. THE END.

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Milan! I salute you!

And that shall be the end of the shit! Enjoy your week!

Adventure, Learning, Life

Shit I Learned In Venice

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Of course in traditional Dano fashion, I went to Venice in an array of disorganization. I decided when I got there to check into the hostel and go for a walk. And I didn’t really manage to get anything that day done other than walking. I walked, I ate, I went on a walking tour where I managed to learn some shit. Mostly I learned that I was too late after the walking tour to do any of the shit that I wanted to do so now I need to go back. But in the meantime here are a few little stories of interest from Venice.

The Capital City of THE WORLD!!!

In times where we were without such tools as cars and planes, man hit the trading route on horse and foot. The trading route passed through the former capital of the world, Constantinople. But the Venetians of course were not happy with this and decided that they must do something about it to steal the title. To become the capital city of the world there are a few different things that a city must have.

Firstly a city must have a saint. Venice was attributed to Saint Theodore… but who the hell even knows who this is?? So they decided that they wanted Saint Mark instead. Much better known. But wait………

Second rule is that the bones of the saint must be within the city. But of course the bones of Saint Mark were in Alexandria. Problem? Nope! No problem. Three Venetian merchants went to the city of Alexandria and stole the bones of Saint Mark. Before they could get the bones out of the city limits however, the alarm went out, “Marks bones have gone, lock the place down, we need to find them”. Every person’s goods were searched before exiting the city by the guards…. so how are we going to get out of this one?

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The Grand Canal of Venice

I know! We shall hide the bones of Saint Mark amid chunks of pork meat so that the Muslim guards would turn their noses up at it and refuse to touch the disgusting pork meat and we shall be home free! And this is what they did. The bones of Saint Mark were escorted back to Venice.

The Venitians were then set. So off they went to Constantinople to rape, steal, pillage and burn the place to the ground. And they did. Anything of value, like the horses at the gates of the city, were sent back to Venice. They melted down statues, stole marble pillars and used them to build their basilica. They were right demonisers. But they had their way. And after this they managed to instate Venice as the capital trade city of the world!! Hooray!

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Saint Mark’s Basilica with all of the looted columns from Constantinople.

Masks

The masks of Venice originated so that the nobility of the city could go out and do their business anonymously and without judgement. The gold mask in the photo below is typically what the rich people would wear and of course there is a little gap underneath so they can sip their expensive wine and eat their expensive foods without issue. The black mask was typically worn by servants. There is a mouthpiece on the inside that they must clamp down on with their teeth to keep the mask on their faces. This was to prevent servants speaking or gossiping to other servants about what their masters have been up to. The white mask with a birds beak was the plague doctors mask. Apparently if you were the length of the beak away from someone it would prevent you getting the plague. It was also how these people were recognized when they came about to clean up the streets of the bodies after family members turfed them out when they got sick to avoid getting sick themselves. Lovely hey?

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The traditional masks of Venice

Other shit I learned….

  • The theatre starts at 7pm and not 8pm.
  • There is a dress code for the theatre that doesn’t involve shorts and running shoes.
  • Getting lost in Venice is very easy
  • Never trust a restaurant that has pictures on their menu
  • One should actually do some research about what they want to do and when it is available before they get there.
  • Gondola drivers must be Venetian and earn approximately twenty thousand euro a month!

 

Learning, Life, Travel

Murphy’s Law #1 – The first 48 hours of my holiday

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We have all heard it and as the age old adage of Murphy goes “what can go wrong, will go wrong”. On top of this there is even the amendment “if there is a possibility of several things going wrong, then the thing that will go wrong will be the one that will do the most damage”. And then there is the other variation of where everything just goes wrong with the first of course being “the worst”. So with that in mind, let the story of my first 48 hours of holiday begin (that bitch Karma is totally not getting a Christmas card this year).

Getting to the Airport

I had a 2.30pm flight. It takes an hour and fifteen minutes according to Maps for me to to get to the airport. So I left home at 11am….

After hustling to try and get a ticket for 20 mins and getting the train to Luton I sat with a truckload of other impatient and cranky passengers whilst getting the entertainment of the year. This flamboyant gay guy covered in glitter proceeded to give everybody on the train an entire run down of his last night and pretty much his life whilst on the phone to his friends. Majority of people however couldn’t suppress their historical laughter as he proceeded to inform everybody that the other night he went out and did 14 shots of sambuca, blacked out and woke up with 23 Daim bars from Tesco. At this point I was optimistic and getting geared up for a good holiday.

Then the shit started to hit the fan… traffic was so bad on the highway that it took 45 minutes for a bus that would normally take 6 to ferry everyone to the airport. It is 1.30 pm. I have an hour until departure. I am full blown flipping my nut at this stage….

Checking In

Because Wizz Air are a disorganized cluster fuck of an operation, when I tried to check in online 2 days earlier it told me I couldn’t and needed to call customer service. So I called customer service. They told me to go and check in at the counter and it would be free.

So as I get to the airport there is a line bigger than Goliath and I was like “fuck this” and pushed through priority queue. I managed to get seen fairly quickly on the proviso I had no checked luggage because their conveyor system had shat itself and left everyone unable to check in.

It was at this time I was told that I was a “standby” passenger for the plane as they had overbooked it. Fury! I booked this flight 2 months in advance to attend a dental appointment the next day. I was getting on a flight one way or another or heads were going to roll. Their massive screw up lead me to this situation so they could fix it.

Standing By

While “standing by” I met a guy who was also on standby. He was graciously nonchalant about the situation because his boss was having a flip out. If he didn’t get back to the Formula One in Budapest to move a piece of equipment that only he was authorized to move by midnight the company would be fined 50,000 pounds. The guy says it serves his boss right for booking a cheap shit flight with 15 people on standby at the last minute.

Thankfully there was space and we got on the plane. But this wasn’t the last of the stand by… we sat there. Then sat there some more. Then I had a nap. Sat there some more. Read 75 pages of my book. And then sat there some more. After about an hour and a half of sitting on the tarmac going nowhere we were informed that the passenger manifest did not add the same as the number of people on board. So they had to figure out who the passenger was and then find their luggage. At some point a guy got irate on the plane and the cops had to be called to come and get him. The kids were even more off the show running up and down the aisles and hanging from the rafters like a pack of monkeys. One even tried to eat the apple core I put on the floor earlier because there was no bin. So shit was getting crazy and I had another nap and read some more….

5pm rolls around. We have been on a plane grounded for 2 and a half hours when Wizz Air tell us that they will be kindly making food and drink available for purchase. Riotous carnage then ensued and within five minutes we were allowed a free “snack or drink”. By the time I got to the end of the queue that whole thing had gone out the window and people were just taking whatever. I wound up with a sandwich, snickers bar and an orange juice. Eventually at 6pm, things got sorted and after 3 and a half hours of being on the tarmac we took off with a mass eruption of applause from everyone on board.

Touchdown

9pm Budapest time… finally arrived. Four hours behind schedule. Made my way to the hostel.

Midnight Snack

After checking into the hostel I had a chat to few people and went to bed. Dentist in the morning and I was just relieved to get there. It was hot, the window was open and I set about trying to sleep. I couldn’t shake the feeling that I was being gnawed at however and figured if it was on my toes it was probably mosquitoes. Within 3 hours my suspicions were confirmed and I caught a bed bug between my fingers and killed it. I took it out to reception and put it on the guys desk.

“I’m allergic and I can’t stay in there or any room where this is a risk” I told him. I took residence upstairs far away from any room with my stuff and slept (I use the term sleep loosely here) in the beanbag on the floor.

The following day he tells me that what I put on his desk wasn’t a bed bug and that my 9 glorious welts must be from a spider or a mosquito. I got angry. “I put that bug on your desk and you are going to make me out a liar?” He says “but I looked online and the bites don’t show up for a day or so”.

“Not if you’re allergic” I told him. But at this point I had to go to the dentist.

Dentist

You know you are having a really shit day when the most positive aspect of your day is the fact that you only needed 2 fillings when you assumed you would need up to 6. With a half dead mouth, an incapacity to smile and a slightly happier wallet that I anticipated, I got on my bike back to the hostel to go fight with the manager.

Captive Passport Negotiations

 Upon my departure of the hostel in the morning, the staff told me that I had to pay 2 nights accommodation or no passport. I had ‘slept’ there one night. And refused to pay the second. Apparently I need to give them 24 hours notice. And I am like “not when I am in an antihistamine-induced half-coma because of your establishment.

Despite having physically presenting them a bug, I had to deal with the manager berating me like I was a child who knew nothing. “Do you even know what bed bugs look like?” I said to him “Yes. I have dealt with them up to 15 times now and I know what they look like and how my body responds to them.”. He told me he was going to have to “respectfully disagree with me” in his condescending arsehole tone and then gave me my passport back without me paying a cent. After getting my hands back on my passport I told him I didn’t appreciate being spoken down to and called a liar and that regardless of whether he “respectfully disagrees” it is in his best interests to do something about it and then I left.

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The current state of a portion of my lower back

I then spent a good hour wandering around trying to find somewhere to stay that wasn’t full. And I did. For one night at least. But I still have to move the next night. I now lie here in my gloriously bed bug free bed (I hope) tired, covered in giant welts and cortisone cream still shaking and unable to sleep from my allergic reaction and hoping that the rest of my Balkan’s Adventure doesn’t keep this tone. If it does I might have to hang up the travel shoes for good and become a hermit.

Learning, Life, Travel

10 Steps To Doing Life Like That Awesome Dude Charles Darwin

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My friend and I trekked on bus and train to get to the far reaches of the town of Downe, UK. The historical importance of this place is that it was home to Charles Darwin and was the place where he not only sat and wrote his famous book ‘On The Origin Of Species’, but where he did a load of investigations for the book and where he raised his family. What I did not expect was just how much of a freakin’ awesome dude Darwin was in his life. So here is some shit I learned about that Darwin guy and why we should all be doing life like Darwin. Here are the steps to immortality and awesomeness:

  1. Get born into a rich family

So the key thing you need to do is get born rich. Both of his grandfathers were incredible in their own rights. On the paternal side there was Erasmus Darwin who also wrote his own theories about how all life is linked and was no doubt an inspiration to Charles. As a doctor and investor, he was also loaded.

On the other side of the family was the Wedgewood’s. These guys were super loaded from making the famous Wedgewood pottery. Rock and roll, a life of luxury and not having to work for a living, all set to go!

2.    Become a gigantic obsessive compulsive fruit loop.

Of my favourite stories of Down House is of Darwin in his youth collecting beetles. Being the obsessive compulsive guy he was, he was hunting beetles in the back yard and found 3 new species he didn’t have. One for the left hand. One for the right. And oh shit! What am I going to do with the third one??? I know! I’ll put the one in my hand in my mouth, pick up the new one and we’re all good. Except we are not. Because the beetle in my mouth just did a very acrid shit in my mouth and I had to spit it out and lost all my other beetles in the process…. oops.

We shall then rinse (mouth and process) and repeat obsessive collector behaviour some more because it is fun and what will see us to becoming lodged in history for all of eternity.

3.    Drop out of the most prestigious university in the country

Darwin originally started attending university in Scotland for medicine. And flunked. Then he went to the famous Cambridge University to study to be a vicar. Not having  a keen interest in study and basically not really giving too much of a shit, he dropped out of that too. Dad was pissed, obviously, but you know, these things happen.

4.    Get your uncle to convince your dad to foot the bill for your gap year sailing the world

When Darwin dropped out, he was all ‘what am I going to do now?’ Then along came the opportunity to go on the HMS Beagle as a companion to the captain so he didn’t get so lonely and top himself like the last captain. By doing this he paved the way for the millions of teens in this century by deciding on taking a few ‘gap years’. And like all children on a gap year, they go to their parents with hand out and say ‘can I have some money? I’ll pay you back’. And Darwin’s dad says ‘hells to the no! You shall not go!’

So of course he then goes and gets good ‘ole Uncle Jo to help and he is all ‘let me deal with Dad’ and all of a sudden Charles is allowed to go on his round the world sailing trip and Dad pays for it. And off he sails into the sunset to go chill out with turtles and all kinds of fun plants and animals to make discoveries and to do all those things that people did on 19th century gap years.

5.    Make a pros and cons list about marriage

Everybody gets to that point in their life where they don’t know what to do with themselves next. When Darwin finished his massive gap year, he came home and contemplated getting married. He couldn’t decide what to do. And so he made a massive pros and cons list that is still to this day displayed in his house and decided that the pros won out. Then he married his cousin, Emma Wedgewood. Unlike loads of very unromantic and excessively ‘civil’ marriages of Victorian England, these two seemed to love each other and actually spent time with each other hanging out and doing stuff like playing backgammon. Way to be awesome to your wife, Darwin. More men should take a leaf from your book. Except for the whole marrying your cousin bit.

6.    Move to the countryside cause its cheap and pop out a few kids

Because it was cheaper than inner city London and still is, it is advisable to do it like Darwin and move to the country and get a big property with lots of space to chill out in. Then you can have a garden to investigate plants and worms. You can also pop out a few kids with your significant other and let them have fun running around the lawn and helping you out with your investigations.

7.    Be the most awesome and fun Dad in the world

To be the most awesome Dad in the world like Darwin, you have to spend some time with your kids doing stuff.  It is also advisable to build a massive wooden slide that you can use to slide down the staircase on the inside of the house. You need not be one of these stiff upper lip Victorian types who shows no affection. It is advisable to show affection and love to your kids and play with them outside and then you too can be like Darwin.

8.     Hang out with worms

Cause all of the most coolest and humble people in the world love a good worm. His last research projects were on the humble worm and their contribution to the ecosystem and processing nutrients. Not at all afraid to get his hands dirty! What a guy!

9.     Write an awesome book

After twenty years in the making of a theory, you will then receive another scientists work in the mail for observation, freak the hell out when you realize that is the same theory as yours and then go into total meltdown. You will then spend a year summarizing your findings and release a book that will be shunned by the entire Catholic Church that you were supposed to become a vicar in and be only truly appreciated for your genius by half of the scientific community. Well at least for now.

10.     Become a scientific icon and get buried with famous people

After all of the years of ridiculousness and hoo-haa, you will eventually become very sick at a ripe old age with heart disease and pass away in the company of family. Then because you are so awesome, people will not allow your wishes to be buried at home to be fulfilled but instead they will petition to have you buried in Westminster Abbey with that good old bloke Isaac Newton so you can be scientific tomb buddies for all eternity.

So there you have it! Ten steps to being the most awesome dude ever like Darwin. I am pretty sure that he is up there with my most favourite of scientific heroes. Its a shame that more people can’t be as smart and kind as Darwin. If the world was full of Darwin’s, I think it would be pretty damn awesome!

 

 

 

 

 

Adventure, Learning, Life, Travel

Shit I Learned In Cambridge

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Of course being a scientist lends to me being a total nerdball when heading to the land of Cambridge. And being the grand educational facility that it is, I obviously learned a bit of shit.

Nobel Prize Winners

  • The first bit of shit I learned is that there have been 90 Nobel Prize winners that have come from Cambridge. They boast more than Oxford so they win that grand rivalry, and these are more interesting to me because majority of them are in science related fields.
  • One such Nobel Prize was won by Watson who discovered the double helix formation of DNA in the Cavendish Laboratory in Cambridge and then headed on down to the Eagle Pub to tell everyone about his discovery. We of course went in here to have a drink where all the great minds of science got smashed since the 1500’s. This pub is also full of RAF names, stickers and photos from those that went to serve in World War 2.
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The plaque on the wall outside The Eagle Pub declaring this is the place where Watson first announced his discovery of DNA double helix
  • Other Nobel Prize winners to come out of the Cavendish Laboratory at Cambridge are Lord Rutherford for his work on the radioactive decay, Lord Rayleigh for the discovery of Argon and a whole bunch of physicists. Of course, I love the chemists more because that is what I trained to do, but the brains that have passed through these buildings are unsurpassed.
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Outside the Physical Laboratory at Cavendish. Where all the action takes place.

Cambridge Shenanigans

  • With the amazing minds of the world gathering here, there had to be some kind of mischief during the downtime. Favourite past times of many of the students here involved free climbing buildings. At one point during Christmas some unknown pranksters decided that scaling the famous church at King’s College and placing Santa hats on the spires would be funny. This was accepted as being comical. The following week when they decided to put a fluorescent orange traffic cone on the spire instead it was not well received by the college. So after putting all of the scaffolding up to safely take the traffic cone down, the pranksters of course rescaled the building and moved the traffic cone from where it was to the other end of the building that didn’t have scaffolding. Lol!
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The church at King’s College with the spires that have been home to Santa hats and traffic cones
  • As impressive as this was, I think my favourite shenanigan involved the statue of King Henry VIII at the entrance of Trinity College. He used to have a golden sceptre in his hand…. then of course somebody free climbed the building and replaced the sceptre with a wooden chair leg. Nobody found the sceptre. The chair leg is still there. At some point somebody took the chair leg but there was such an outcry to have the chair leg put back that they replaced it a couple of days later.
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King Henry VIII holding his wooden chair leg
  • Another feat of the minds of physics was achieved when they managed to put a car on top of the Senate building in the middle of the night with pulley systems. The engine was removed first so that the load wasn’t as great, but still a pretty impressive achievement. This somewhat reminds me of some kids in my brothers year level at school mounting their MDT teacher’s car on a stump next to the school parking lot. Maybe they weren’t worked hard enough. Too much time on their hands……

Getting Exam Results and Graduating

  • It is unfortunate for the slackers, but all of the results for Cambridge University students are put on display in a whole bunch of showcases for the entire public to see. Even worse than that is in mathematics, whose faculty decided that they would publicly read out exam results in front of everybody and bestow a massive wooden spoon upon the worst grade holder for them to carry for the entirety of the year. Ouch.
  • And with all of the amazing parties that they have at the end of it all, there comes, with great engineering, the float down the river. But instead of using the punting boats, they have to make their own from cardboard boxes. I would imagine that some of them would have had quite a good shellacking.
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Normal people attempting ‘punting’ down the river. This is where the cardboard boxes go too.

Trinity College Awesomeness

  • The most incredible mind to attend at Trinity College was Sir Isaac Newton. While his gravitational ideas were actually conceived of somewhere else, it is said that the tree currently outside of the college is planted with a seed from the apple tree that led Newton to his theories.
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RAF memorabilia on the walls of the Eagle Pub
  • And of course then there is Prince Charles. Who attended Trinity College with his two bodyguards. Upon completion of his courses, his bodyguards requested to sit the exams too as they had sat through all of the lectures. Apparently they both got better grades than Charles. Rumour. But hilarious.

Well, that is all from Cambridge! Til next time I learn some more shit!

 

 

 

Learning, Life

Making A Mess Of Life

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About every six months or so I find myself in a position where I am grossly unhappy with certain aspects of my life and my relationships with people begin to falter as I fall deeper and deeper into the hole. I start behaving more and more like an arsehole. Then right as I feel like I am about to bury myself I decide “Fuck it, had enough of this shit, I’m moving!”. For the first time in a very long time I am now finding that I am having to find ways of resolving particular situations that don’t involve booking a plane ticket to somewhere else. And it’s hard. It’s really, really hard. Because not only do I not know where to start with fixing anything, it is hard to know which battles are lost and which are worth fighting for. Which ones you can turn around and change, and which ones you should just walk away from.

As work and home become equal contenders in the category of “places I really don’t want to be or have to deal with right now”, one must sit back and decide “Do I stick it out? Or do I change the things I am unhappy with?” Better yet, “What is it that I can actually change that may make my life a little easier?”

The first I discovered is my attitude. My attitude sucks right now. I will be the first to admit it. And as things get worse, my attitude gets worse. At some point, this cycle needs to be broken. Some say meditation helps, however I think I would find myself in the same position as my friend a couple of years ago yelling at the meditation man “Stop telling me to calm the fuck down! I am calm! If you tell me to be calm one more time I will ram your head through the wall!” The only ways I can think of right now are 1. Retreating into myself for a while and not having contact or conversations with people to avoid said situations until they blow over and are forgotten about or 2. Manning the fuck up and accepting responsibility for my shit behaviour in the hope that the people I am dealing with aren’t petty grudge holders. From my dealings with many, I find grudge holding to be huge. Which is quite sad because those that hold grudges are generally more miserable than those that aren’t.

Then as I go into fixing messes head first, because that is how I deal with everything I remember something that my Dad told me after his many years of life experience. In his wisdom he once told me ‘2 days. Everything is usually better after 2 days. So if you can just hold on for that 2 days and work through it, then you will be just fine’. And right he is. In those 2 days proceeding the point where I hit perceived rock bottom, I managed to claw my way out of it. As I always do.

Despite the fact that I still have this nagging urge to go somewhere else, I am now realizing that it is my choice to enjoy the right now where I am until then. It is my choice in how I respond to other people. It is my choice of how I let others treat me. And mostly, it is my own choice how it is that I manage my attitude. Because 100% of life is about how you tackle what it is that life throws your way, shitty curveballs and all. So game on, bring it!

Learning, Life

Fifty Shades of Ridiculousness

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Of course, like most stories in my life, this happened because I got drunk and made a stupid decision. Despite my saying that I would never ever read this trash novel, I found myself drunk and bored in the hostel bar with it staring at me from the hostel bookshelf and so I succumbed. And because I had started it, of course, I had to finish it.

Once I was done I had some incredibly mixed feelings about this book especially since so many people have read it and loved it and it has now been made into a movie. With a discussion with a friend who is in the BDSM community and a lot of time to sit and think, I have come to the following conclusions about this book that all women need to know and understand. Please either revel in or forgive the excessive sarcasm.

  1. BDSM Relationships are about ultimate trust and respect

From the learning that I have undertaken since starting to read this book, it is my understanding that those who enter a BDSM relationship do so with mutual understanding, respect and trust. Open communication is pivotal in establishing the boundaries in this relationship. All I hear when I read this book is “I’m Anastasia and I don’t want to do this” and then “Oh but my name is Christian and I don’t care what you want, I want you and I will do whatever I want. And if you don’t like it now, I will make you like it later or I will leave your whiny, clingy, virgin arse. Oh by the way, here is a new car to lessen the pain of your rawly spanked arse”. I’m sorry. But this just does not fly with me at all. A submissive should have the power to say what they are and are not willing to do and have it respected. There is no respect here at all and boundaries continue being crossed regardless of how many times she says no. Not on.

2.   No woman should believe that she can change a man ever

One of the largest themes of this book is how this massively ‘fifty shades of fucked up’ dude who was abused and burnt with cigarettes as a child and was introduced in his adolescent years by a child molester to BDSM to help save his soul from doing evil things. He then becomes so overwhelmed by this incredible girl he meets that to an extent he is willing to change his sadistic and massive control freakazoid ways to become an ‘ever considerate partner’. Well I call bullshit. At no point in time ever should a woman go into a relationship thinking that she has the ability to change whoever it is that she is with. You either learn to love and respect who they are for all their flaws OR you walk away. This book propagates the ridiculous idea that as women we have this ability to change the man. Especially if he is all damaged and screwed up from his childhood. We just need to fix it and make it better and of course because we are so awesome this guy is going to change for the better. It is deluded. It is stupid. You should never expect this to happen EVER! Because it very rarely does. And you are really not going to be the exception.

3.   A person who gives you ultimatums and takes away your choices does not love or respect you

“You will drive the car I tell you to”, “you will behave like this or I will punish and manipulate you”, “oh you want to go on a holiday and see your family and get some time to think? Ok, but let me just jump on my private jet 30 minutes after you leave and follow you there because I just can’t stay away, I need you so much!”. What utter trash. A person who cannot respect your need for space or boundaries and gives you ultimatums in respect to your choices instead of sitting down and coming to an agreed upon compromise is not a person you want to be with. Why this book propagates a person who gives ultimatums as being ‘oh so sexy’ is beyond me. You know what is sexy? Considerate. Respectful. Honest. These things are sexy. You know what else is sexy? Allowing your partner to have time away from you to digest whether or not they actually like you or whether or not you are a psychopathic, stalker arsehole without your constant input.

4.  There is a difference between love and addiction

“Oh no! I can’t stay away from him! He’s an abusive manipulative arse, but I think I love him!” For the record if this is how you are feeling then you are not in love, you are in addiction mode. Love is open minded. Love recognizes flaws, challenges them and accepts them in an honest way. Addiction is that clingy, needy, whiny ‘I need you with every inch of my body, right now’, honeymoon period rubbish that doesn’t come from a logical mindset. When you keep going back despite all the crying and tears and unhappiness and lack of assurance and jealousy, you are not in love. You are addicted. And you should be getting out. Excusing shitty behaviour in the name of love sets a bad example to young women and men everywhere. This is not how we should treat each other. Men will think they can. Women will think it is normal. This is not what a relationship should look like. Lets do our daughters and sons a favour and show them that this shit is not acceptable. Maybe then we won’t wind up with so much domestic violence and psychological abuse in relationships.

5.   Having sex with somebody after you get into an argument with them does not solve your problems

Here’s an idea. After I bring up an important issue that I have with our relationship, lets deflect the question and start having sex instead. Yep. Great idea. Then nothing ever gets solved and we take all of the horrid feelings we have to deal with and replace them with orgasmic ones instead so that we never have to deal with anything difficult ever. This again comes back to respect. Respect enough to listen and hear. Then come to an agreement. Then have sex. But understand that this whole sex to fix problems is a very bandaid approach to relationships and again shouldn’t be encouraged in a book that is read by women everywhere and encouraged as normal and erotic. Here’s another sexy idea if I haven’t already stated it. Respect. Communication. Mmmm….. so sexy right now.

6.    Relationships are about open and honest communication

Pretty much my summary point. People in loving romantic relationships should consider each other equal. Not all of this ‘you tell me everything about you and I will evade any personal question that I don’t feel like answering today or ever and then spank you. And then have sex with you’. Sharing should be equal. A partner should be able to share and to listen. You know, it again comes back to that thing Aretha sings about all the time…. what was that again?

7.    Money can’t buy me love…. or can it?

And now we come to The Beatles. Women, listen to The Beatles. Not drug-influenced stuff about Lucy and skies and diamonds and octopuses gardens in the sea, but the ‘money can’t buy me love’ bit. Because it can’t. But this book embraces the notion that when someone is pissed at me, I can control what they are doing and smother them with love in the form of a Blackberry and a MacBook Pro and a new Audi…. anyone see a whole bunch of brand name dropping here?? It is also a massive question as to whether money can apparently buy you awesome advertising in the form of an erotic fictional novel that preys upon the need of the average female to feel swept off her feet and wanted by a powerful man that nobody else has managed to change but her because she is so wonderful and special and can have an orgasm in thirty seconds flat every time…. but then again, I’m clearly a pessimist. What would I know?

In all seriousness though, if I ever have daughters, I would not want them reading this trash. Too many people in today’s society class this abusive rubbish as entertainment. It is yet another piece of advertising geared towards all of the insecurities of the woman. Be better than that. Because you are better than that. Put down the silly novel that promotes domestic violence, lack of respect and emotional abuse and start setting a better example of what is and is not acceptable for yourself and for all the youth that you are a role model for. And if you find yourself caving to any of these points above, recognize the signs, and walk away. Because if you don’t, you’ll wind up just like Anastasia. With no sense of self, and a being a complainy, needy, puppet of a man, who doesn’t have any respect for you and who clearly doesn’t deserve a good woman. Same for any of you boys out there in the reverse situation. Got yourself a manipulative and controlling woman. Ditch that bitch. The more we accept that this form of treatment of each other is acceptable, the more damaging it will be to our society. Rant over. Peace out!

 

Adventure, Learning, Travel

Shit I Learned In Madrid

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I was recently fortunate enough to get some free time from yelling at kids and doing work to spend some time in the amazing country of Spain. I started my time in Madrid, the capital of the country. Madrid is an incredible city and the amount of shit that I learned while I was here was a great way to kick start the trip!

City Facts

  • Madrid was founded by the Muslims and was named “Magerit”, meaning “place of water”.
  • The citadel walls were originally made of flintstone so that when weapons hit the wall it would spark. Thus making it the city ‘build on water with walls of fire’.

Food and Drink

  • We can all thank the poor drunks of Spain for the glorious invention of Tapas. It turns out that when faced with the awkward decision of either ‘eating’ or ‘drinking’ with not enough money to do both, the people of Spain chose to drink. This of course was not great for productivity in the workforce and as such King Alphonse (the 10th I think…) passed a law stating that a small snack should be served with each beverage. This law is still in place in Granada and I spent most of my time there drunk. I was embracing the life of the poor commoner you see and when faced with the option of 3 euro bocadillo or 2.50 euro wine with free tapas, the poor person in me chose the wine!
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Mmmm…. sangria and croquettes
  • The name ‘tapas’ did not arrive on the scene until Alphonse the 13th. Apparently whilst sitting in a windy bar, with dirt blowing all over the place the server at the bar was so stressed about dirt getting in his drink he placed a piece of ham over the king’s drink. When the king asked what this was, the server in a panic responded that it was a ‘tapar’ which translates to ‘a cover’. And now we have tapas everywhere! Hooray!
  • During the Spanish Inquisition where they were killing all of the Muslims and Jews, they would carry ham around in their pockets and hang ham in their doorways to show that they were in fact “Christian”.
  • The oldest restaurant in the world is in Madrid. It is called the Botin and was actually opened by a French person. Hemmingway apparently ate here. Another restaurant in Madrid’s claim to fame is that “Hemmingway didn’t eat here”. Total get around he was!
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The oldest restaurant in the world
Royal Tidbits
  • Carlos the Second (who apparently came at the end of the “Carlos Felipe sandwich” via which there was King Carlos, then Felipe, then Felipe, then Felipe, then Carlos 2nd) anyway, he was apparently so deformed from the incestuous nature of the royal family that he had a special member of staff that was assigned to chew his food and put it in his mouth for him… just like a mama bird.
  • Speaking of Felipe’s, the Philippines was named after King Felipe the second of Spain. It was previously a Portuguese territory until Felipe the second conquered Portugal.
  • Felipe the fourth thought so highly of himself he commissioned a statue of himself on a horse. The catch is that unlike any other statue of a man on a horse at the time he wanted the horse to be only on it’s hind two legs and rearing in the front. There were of course issues with the weight distribution of the horse as it kept snapping off at the legs due to ridiculously unstable weight distribution. They managed to solve this debacle by employing the amazing Galileo… who of course suggested making the hind legs solid and the rest of the statue hollow. Genius. Anyway, after it was finished Felipe was still not happy as the statue looked nothing like him. So they cut the head off and added another one in for good measure.
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Felipe the fourth on his two legged horse despite not being killed in battle
  • The position of the legs on a horse for a statue of a person posthumously indicates how they died. All four legs on the ground means they didn’t die in battle. One leg off the ground means that they were injured in battle and died from later injuries. Two legs off the ground means that they died in battle.

Alrighty then…. a whole bunch of interesting history stuff. I promise that next week when I get to the next instalment I will hit you guys with more of the funny shit I learned in Spain! Til then, adios! 🙂

A woman's lifelong aversion to the word 'No'….