Bundoora X-country

Just got back from a great race! probably my best race of the season thus far. It was down in Bundoora (or up actually if u think about it, cos bundoora's altitute is higher than melbournes). But all technicalities aside, it was a beautiful park in a beautiful suburb made marginally less beautiful by the mud-covered cross country route. It had been raining the past week, and about 2000 little kids had just run a high school x-country in the morning before us, so by the time it was our turn to race, there was mud everywhere!

The race itself was 12km....4x3km laps (shudder). I went out pretty hard cos i squeezed my way to the front of the start, and everyone in the front usually go hard at the gun. I ended up running a 45.30 which i was extremely pleased with. My past couple of races werent too good, so it was nice to get back on track with this one. Now looking forward to the half marathon in september. BUT, theres still two more shorter races to get thru before then!

Its back to uni on monday. I had my last day at work on friday. What a relief! I know its good and all, but man...it was tiring. School is so much better. Only one more sem to graduation..better enjoy it while it lasts!

Ta. till next time.

back from sydney..

setting off early in the morning

My cousin, Terrance, came to visit me all the way from US and A recently for 8 days. I havnt seen him is almost 4 years! Its funny, bcos he's one of my closest cousins despite living the farthest (by far!) away! I felt kinda bad cos i couldnt take too much time off my full time job at the archi firm to show him around melbourne. I did manage to negotiate for 3 days off (out of the 8 days that he was here) and we planned a trip to sydney along with my housemate, Jeff, and usual suspects Esther and Crystal! To spice things up a little, we decided to drive up to sydney instead of flying. Its said to be one the "those things" that one needs to do while studying in melbourne, so we decided to give it a shot.

and what a looooong ride it was!

we set off at 6am in the morning and reached sydney at 7pm!! although, we did stop over in the nation's capital, Canberra, for 2 hours. No sign of John Howard tho.. haha. In total, we travelled jsut over 1000km in one day!!! thats like going to Malacca and back 4 times!!!! holy cow! Jeff and i took turns to drive. Esther came up with the idea that we should all make our own 'road trip mix cd' and play it along the way. haha. thats was good fun.. listening to all the various music tastes. Terrance and i also made a "best of the songs-u-love-to-hate" cd with such infamous hits as "Toxic", "Show Me the Meaning of Being Lonely", "Cry Me a River", and "Baby One More Time".

Parliament House, Canberra. (from left: Crystal, Jeff, Terrance, Me, Esther)

The first thing i noticed when i got to syndey was that there were so many more cars!! I felt like i was driving along orchard road during a TAKA sale. CARS EVERYWHERE! stress! stress! Through jeff's skillful navigation, we arrived safely at our backpackers and to my surprise (and delight!), it was located directly opposite the road from the COMIC STORE!!! we went out from some food and then turned in for the night.


(ok im gonna start doing this in point form)

Day 1: Took a morning jog to the opera house.
Visited Paddy's Market. (like a pasar malam but in the day)
Went to the Toronga Zoo.
Visited opera house at night.

Day 2: Visited opera house and harbour bridge in the daytime to take pics.
Went to the FISH MARKET!!! this place was seriously heaven. I could spend soooo much money here eating fresh seafood!
Terrance and i went to the casino at night. He won 30 bucks. haha. (its scary how much money some of the other casino patrons were spending! like hundreds of dollars on a single bet!)

Day 3: last day. Went around the city shopping. (and i spent a bomb on comic books. I wont disclose the figure, or what items i spent on, cos you'll all think im crazy. and you'd be right.)

Went to visit some film locations!!!! THIS WAS REALLY INTERESTING! It dawned on me that The Matrix and Superman Returns were filmed in sydney, so i went location scouting with terrance and we found these two KEY locations from both films. see if u can recognise them!

Metropolis General Hospital from Superman Returns.

"Were you listening to me Neo, or were you looking at the woman in the red dress? Look again. Freeze it!"















Alas, it was time to go back to melboure after a sweeet holiday. Blew quite a large amount of money, but thats what holidays are all about, no? Back to work now to recover my finances and prepare for the next big splurge at the end of the year (and boy is it gonna be a BIG one).... NEW ZEALAND!!! get your kiwi game on!