Friday, May 25, 2007

Hello once again!

I managed to rustle up enough photos for a decent update, Its getting tougher to come up with interesting things to tell you lot about as I'm pretty sure you don't want to hear about me at work or Charlie and myself sitting on the couch watching TV.....



Speaking of the couch, this is our light fitting which is directly above our heads when sitting on it. I'm trying to improve my photography by taking pictures of boring things and trying to make them look cool without any photoshop or computer magic, its pretty hard, but I quite like this.


This is 4 photos stitched together and shows our gaff! (Click on the photo to make it bigger so you can nose around our apartment)


This is the same thing but its the view from our window. (just in case you had forgotten you can click on all the photos to make them bigger!!)



Another week, Another Gig, Another Weird band name:
"Clap your hands say Yeah!"
I had bought the tickets for this gig a while back while we were still in the hostels, Money was pretty tight, but we both love this band so much and I just could not miss the gig!!


We arrived pretty early so we were right up the front, which is great for Charlie as she gets to see everything, not so great for the people stuck behind me though.


All these photos were taken on the sly as it was a strict "No photos/Video" gig. I managed to get a few shots, but the large man-mountain of a security guard at the front of the stage made it clear it would be taken off me if I kept shooting.


This is the lead singer, He kinda reminds me of a young Bob Dylan.


The band were pretty young and apart from the main singer, they looked pretty nervous to be up there.


As it was the first time they played in Australia they played pretty much every song off their first album and all the great ones from their new second one.


I had to kinda keep the camera down and click away without letting the security guard see me.


Nervous guy, He kept his head down and would barely look up at the crowd!



Spotlight.


Some parts of their songs have a weird distortion on them, turns out it this!!


Despite only drinking water and having to go home straight after as I had to get up for work the next day at 7.30am, I had a brilliant night, both myself and Charlie were pretty blown away by them and were surprised at just how good they were live!! Living in Galway you don't really get much of a chance to go to gigs unless you travel to Dublin (Which we do, if we can) so we are gonna go to as many gigs while we are here!!!



No, this is not our bedroom in Melbourne!! This is one of the nicest beds we slept in while we were in Asia, but unfortunately we didn't get to sleep for very long as we were up every morning at 4.45am......


But watching a sunrise like this more than made up for it, These photos are from the first day we spent looking around the Ancient Temples of Angkor. The lake above is actually a man made water reserve that was built at the same time as the temples (around 1000 years ago) so they could keep the waters from the monsoon season for Irrigating the land during the dry season.


These little blighters were sitting with us while we watched the sunrise, they spent most of the time asking did we want coffee or drinks. If you even nod your head or say maybe to them, you may as well have signed a written contract because if you walk away without buying it they will be very upset/angry. I said to one of them that Ill get a water after the sunset, but I accidentally bought it off a different girl.......... big mistake!!


This is Ta Prohm. Charlie had done an amazing job of planning our days so we could see all the temples we wanted to, she even took in to consideration what the light was like at certain parts of the day!!! Nice one Charlo!!!


Ta Prohm was a great place to start as the sun was just rising and the temple was in ruins and the jungle was reclaiming it very slowly......


These trees were bloody huge and the roots were basically enveloping the walls and structures


How cool is that........


Bit of a nasty weed problem they have over there......


After Ta Prohm we went and had some breakfast and were joined by these little troublemakers, they were trying to sell us there beads and stuff but also just wanted to talk to us and have some fun, I managed to get one photo of them 'cus every other time they blocked their faces and said it was $5!! Cheeky sods!! When traveling around you often see other travellers getting angry with kids like these as they are pretty relentless with their pestering to buy stuff, but they are just kids and 99% are very funny and cheeky and are loads of fun to wind up, They also tell you stuff that the adults wouldn't, we always ask them about going to school, which to them is a crazy idea as they can make so much money by hanging around the temples and other tourist spots. Often its the parents sending the kids out to get money for the family, you can often see the older kids pushing the younger, "cuter" kids towards towards the tourists as they would have a better chance of getting stuff!! They also target guys who are with their girlfriends as they know guys don't like to look cheap in front of the lady friends....... One thing these kids aren't is stupid.
I'm not getting all high and mighty here, but you often see other travellers (usually Yanks) looking around these temples talking about "how amazing their culture is" but not taking the time of day to talk to these kids, just telling them to "F&*k Off" when they come up to them, To Charlie and myself those kids are the real Cambodia, not the temples.


This is Ta Keo, Its a Mountain temple and was made for the Ancient Hindu God Shiva. So there.


Stairway to Heaven. (and Charlies bum)


Still Climbing!! It was still pretty early but the sun was making its presence felt..... Just imagine what it took to build that.


I bloody love this shot,(click it, its worth it!) Although Charlie keeps giving out as I walked through here without looking up till Charlie made me, so credit goes to Charlie for making me look upwards......


Looking pretty smug about making me look upwards eh?


As alot of the temples are in ruin, there are loads of restoration works going on, obviously this is very expensive and time consuming but its definitely worth it. It also keeps the craftsmanship alive and well, and the local scaffolding shop doesn't do too badly either........


This is a big smiley face at the South Gate of Angkor Thom. Very Cheerful!


When you see huge groups like this at a temple, just get out of their way if you can or either try and get in front of them, if that fails, just wait till they are gone. They swarm all over the temple as one, very much like ants over a dead animal. Luckily they are easy to spot, they are the ones with ill-fitting baseball caps and bumbags, normally over-weight and very loud.


A very tall and very straight Tree.


This is the Leper King. King of the Lepers..... Kinda like Sash is the Queen of Spas.


For carvings that were done over 800 years ago, they look pretty good.



Im cheating a little here, i actually took this on the second day from a teathered balloon!
That is Angkor Wat, the biggest temple in the whole of Angkor and the largest religeous structure in the world. Yup, its pretty big and was made around 900 years ago. The Cambodians are super proud of it and its on their flag and national beer (which is damm tasty!)


This is inside Angkor Wat, Its the busiest temple and the one everyone talks about, while it is seriously impressive, the crowds of people did detract from it a little, but thats to be expected.


This is inside the main structure and we are up on the second terrace, so you get some idea of how bloody huge this is.


Ah, How we laughed at my stupid beard........


Thats the center tower of the highest part of Angkor Wat, and yup thats us at the bottom!


Check out my 2 lovely ladies...


Charlies timing worked out perfect as we were here in time to have a good look around and then enjoy an amazing sunset over Angkor.


And what better way to enjoy it but with a few cold beers....... Such a great day.


Whats this? A package from our bestest friends back home, Sash and Gugs!!!


AROMAT!!!!!!!!, for people who have no Idea what that is, its the best condement for chips ever or any type of food, and it cant be gotten here!!!! Im gonna have to ration it to make it last as long as possible, and of course Hula Hoops which you cant get over here either. I also got 3 Wham bars, but they were devowered within seconds of the box being opened!! Charlie got loads of Bra's and socks and some special moisturiser that costs a bomb and is super happy too!!



They also sent me over my favorite magazine "Focus" (Dont worry mum, its a Science mag, Its not normally about how to kill people) and 3 pairs of underpants....... Now im not too sure if the photos shows it too well but 2 of the pants are PINK. Sash thought it would be funny to send me over nice PINK pants..... Ha Ha very funny!! actually in that picture there is only 1 pink pants as im actually wearing the other ones (and very comfy they are too) thank god the other pair was a nice manly camoflage pair... right thats way too much talk about my pants. Thanks SOOOOO much guys and once we are flush with a bit of cash we will send something cool back over to yourselves!! (Not you Sash)



To Celebrate the arrival of the Aromat I went and treated myself to a big badass steak and potato wedges!!!! Yummy!

I know this was a long one, but thanks for reading it!! We hope your all really well and having fun.

Lots of love
Charlie & Sean.

Sunday, May 13, 2007

Hello everyone!

We hope everyone one is keeping well, we are both a bit hungover today, we went to a gig last night:


Yup, its a pretty weird name for a band, but we love them!!! We have both been listening to them quite a bit while we were on buses/trains/planes on our travels, I was pretty chuffed that they were playing over here and mentioned it to a guy in work, He then informed me they are actually from Melbourne and have been playing locally for years........ Typical!
Even so it was the first time they have played their hometown in 22 months, in which time they have become very well known all over the world, so it was very much a case of "Local band done good" They even had all their mothers in the crowd!!


This guy was the support act "Muscles", as you can see he was very young but was really really good, just one guy and a few keyboards, very catchy music!!


Then it was the main act!!


I had heard from a few people that they are not very good live as the music is pretty varied and there are loads of instrument being used by the six band members.


But they were brilliant!!


They were going pretty crazy on stage and swapping instruments after most songs, there was even a trumpet for a few of the songs!!


This is the lead singer "Cameron Bird" he has an amazing voice and is a brilliant front man.





He kinda looks like Joe Strummer from the Clash.








By the end of the gig Mr Bird was looking pretty wrecked!! It was such a great show and for $20 (€12) you could not go wrong, especially when it was a 5 min walk from our apartment!! If you like bands like Arcade Fire, Bloc Party you should check out Architecture in Helsinki!!


We went for another one of our strolls on saturday (I was working friday - 4 Day week, its getting pretty tough!!) I was messing around with a new camera lense my (Brillant) Sister, Jacqui sent over a while ago. I was also messing around with the black and white settings of my camera.


Sunset over St. Kilda beach.


Colourless sunset? I quite like it...... Check out all the birds!!!


Charlie leaving me behind to run off to the playground.....


Charlie getting pretty pissed off with the constant stopping to take pictures, especially ones with her in it!


See how cool Black and white photos are, thats just a picture of a street, yet it kinda looks cool!!


Charlie on a bench. Even she likes that photo of herself.


The lense that Jacqui sent over is a great lense, but its a "Prime" lense which means it doesnt zoom, so we had to try and squeeze our heads into the shot! Charlie stealing the limelight.... typical.


Dont worry, soon my giant head bashed hers out the way........ Much better.


Well we finally got to the playground and kicked all the kids off the rides... this thing is crazy, its on rollers and the blue ring spins around on the posts, Its off center so its very hard to stay upright but I managed (Just about) While we were playing on this a homeless guy wandered over and started watching us and started smiling at us falling around the place, He asked were we married, I said that we were not, he then said that we should be!!!!! While it was a nice thing to hear, I dont think im going to break my rule of not taking "life advice" from homeless people.......

Time to go.....

Sean & Charlie