Post-Christmas shopping

I'm tired of shopping now.  I hope Karyn is too.

Today, in search of further sales, we went to the local Factory Outlet centre (Direct Factory Outlet in Fyshwick).  Fortunately DFO now has a few electronic stores that I can spend my time in instead of clothing and footware stores.  Hey, I only need 3 pairs of shoes in total, so the need for new shoes only occurs once a year or so.

So far, at the sales I've picked up a neat LCD desk light and some iPod speakers (below) that were a present from Matt.  I wanted some speakers so that I could listen to podcasts while I exercise on my treadmill.  I've been using earbuds for a while now, but I keep catching the earbud cord and pulling the iPod off the shelf next to me.

It was a bit bizzare evaluating the various speakers.  I took my iPod shopping with me so I could check out the various products by listening to how they play what I listen to, so while other people are blasting out their music, I was blasting out Buzz Out Loud and the ABC Science podcast.  I had to test them out relatively loud because I want to listen to podcasts while using the treadmill, and I needed to make sure that I could hear it over the sound of the treadmill motor.

I selected the Logitech Pure-Fi Anywhere 2 because it seemed to have the best quality sound at high volume.  Its remote control of the iPod works a treat as well.

I'll be giving it a for-real workout tomorrow morning while Karyn and her mother go shopping again (without me !!).

Canberra Races

We went to the races today.

There weren't many people there.

Most of the people were up in the Members Stand, where we were.

However the number of people did pick up as the day progressed. Maybe a lot of people were down at the coast after Christmas.

I took my small digital camera to experiment with. It's a Panasonic Lumix DMC-FS5. I bought this one for my recent trip to India, as a small camera that I could keep in my pocket in case unexpected photo opportunities arose (which they did). This one has lots of clever options that I wanted to experiment with. One of these was the speed burst mode that seemed to capture a frame every tenth of a second. In this mode the camera switches to a 2M pixel image with the option of continuous firing (until you run out of storage). Here is the quality of picture that it took in this mode.

Unfortunately the camera doesn't allow you to manually set the speed, only select "SPORT" mode. As you can see from this photo, it didn't set the speed up to about 1/1000 of a second or above to eliminate the blur. THis means that I'll have to stay with my Kodak digital camera for horse work.

Christmas Day

Today got off to a really good start.  At 3AM actually.  This is when my mother-in-law's dog decided to get sick and spew all over the carpet in her bedroom.

I decided that I would only get in the way if I got out of bed, so I turned over and went back to sleep.

At 5AM her dog got up onto our bed and was sick again.  Over our quilt this time.

Because my previous reasoning was so successful, I again feigned sleep and turned over and tried to go back to sleep.  This wasn't so easy with my wife taking the quilt cover off, but I finally managed it.

I surfaced again at about 8AM,  fortunately to the sound of my mother-in-law delivering a cup of coffee.  Perhaps she felt guilty.  The coffee was too sweet.  But I struggled through it.

We all went downstairs and opened our presents.  We all agreed that we had all received great presents, and that we had done our duty in contributing to fix the global financial crisis by spending so much money.

I then sneaked outside to have a quick swim before getting sidetracked into getting lunch ready.  Although the day started a bit dull, the clouds disappeared and the day was warming up to about 30 degrees C.  I wondered what it was like today in the northern hemisphere.

This year we tried our first baked ham, glazing it with cinnimon, apricot jam, and brown sugar.  It was yum.

We roasted pork, turkey and chicken in the barbeque, and baked the vegetables in the oven.  We cooked far too much food for one day, so it looks like we'll be having left-overs for the next few days.  I reckon that rather than have every chef on TV present their own Christmas recipes, they should have them present good recipes for left-overs instead.

We all ate too much (a family tradition, I reckon).  I decided to have a quick power-nap, Karyn decided to float around the pool in her boat, and Fay had a big snooze to compensate for her 3AM start.  Matt, of course, played World of Warcraft all afternoon and got one of his characters up to level 70.  Or was that 80?  Anyway, he seemed quite pleased with himself.  He got a new netbook for Christmas, so he could play WoW on one computer and chat on MSN at the same time on his new netbook.  He'll probably want a dual-screen setup next.

I spent a while chatting with Cherie, Richard and Lynne in Sydney while looking at my treadmill and thinking that I really should get some exercise.  But everybody said that I should have a day off, so I decided not to.  I did some sit-ups and went for a swim instead.  I still have 8 kg to lose to get to my target.

Karyn retired to the bedroom to watch some TV, Matt stayed in his study and played WoW, Fay went to bed, and I played a few levels of Far Cry.  Just to maintain my lightening-fast reaction times, you understand.   Since I've got myself a new quad-core computer, I've got back into playing some games that my previous machine was just too underpowered to play.

Here is Matt trying to show Fay which way to point the camera.

Anyway, its time for bed now.  It's 1AM now, and Fay has just come down to rinse out some towels that her dog has just soiled.  I took some more old towels up there to find that she's covered the whole floor with them.  Maybe in the morning I should get her a plastic drop sheet that we use for painting.

Karyn is excited about the Boxing Day sales tomorrow (or in about 8 hours).  So it looks like more help for the global financial crisis.

Bye for now.

Christmas Shopping at Hall Markets

This weekend we went shopping at the Hall country markets. Hall is a small township just outside Canberra (but still in the ACT).

It's better going there in Summer because you are just stomping around on hard dirt or clay. In Winter it gets pretty muddy with all the people walking around. The weather was pretty good, as it was sunny but only about 26 degrees C.

Karyn was looking for some hand-made wooden butterflies to decorate the brick wall outside the dining room window, but we couldn't find any on sale.  We already have a colourful orange one and a green one attached to a tree in the back garden.  She consoled herself with buying some fresh liquorice instead.

I took the following photos with my camera just to see how they turn out.

Picked up new car

I picked up my new car today.

I wonder if that "new car" smell is real or comes from a bottle?

The good thing about a bright yellow car is that there aren't too many of them around. Looking at the other cars in the traffic, I realised that most were white or silver. This means that they all look similar in some way. I've already discovered one benefit - when I went to point out my new car to someone I worked with on the 6th floor - looking out the window, there was a single yellow car in the carpark below. I don't know how many times in the past I've stood in a carpark and wondered where I left my car; hopefully this will happen less now.

One disappointment has been the lack of an iPod dock. The salesman didn't even know what an iPod was. When I asked about an iPod dock, he pointed to an 3.5in audio socket and said "you can plug any MP3 player in there". I said that I wanted an iPod dock and he went off to ask the spare parts folks. He then said that I should go to a car radio shop and get them to install one because Honda don't have one. Oh well, I thought.

A few hours later I was reading the car radio part of the manual, and low and behold, you can get a USB socket installed to plug your iPod in. The radio even has an iPod mode that allows you to control the iPod from the steering wheel controls. It looks like this is standard on the next model up. Lousy salesmen !

No other gripes with the car so far. Fingers crossed.

I bought a new car

I bought a new car today.  A Honda Jazz.

I don't think that my wife likes the shade of acid yellow that I've picked.  But at least it's safe.  I read somewhere that yellow is the safest, followed by white.

I just want a small, fuel-efficient car to get me to and from work in comfort.

I had a bright red car once.  I'd only had it for about 3 months when somebody ran into me, on a bright sunny day.  The other driver said that they didn't see me stopped in the middle of the road with my indicator on waiting to turn into another street.   So much for brains registering red.

Unfortunately there's no way that Matthew (our almost 18 year old son) will be able to drive it - the added insurance premium for under 25 drivers  is prohibitive.  It increases the premium from about $500/year to about $1,600.

It's been about 5 years since we bought a car, and its still overly complex, arranging the car loan, insurance, etc.  Everyone in the process is keen on cross-selling you another product.  The car dealer wants to finance the loan, and sell the insurance, and insurance on the insurance.  The credit union wants to lend us the money and also wants to provide the insurance.  Presumably the insurance companies will want to finance the loan as well just to make it more complex.

Karyn did a fantastic job negotiating a price.  She told them what she wanted to pay, and stuck to it.  The salesman said that he couldn't go that low, and wheeled out the sales manager.  The sales manager said that he couldn't go that low either.  He even got to the stage of offering a full tank of fuel and a promise to wash the car every time I brought it in for a service.  But Karyn stuck to her guns.  They (the salesman and the sales manager) then had to go to the Dealer Principal who agreed to go further and meet her price provided they transferred the extra $ to someone else's purchase.

I reckon I should rent Karyn out as a negotiator, except there wasn't any negotiation from her.

Now we have to wait a week to pick up the car.  I just hope that we can get all the paperwork done on time.

Beach volleyball court replaced

Someone came past today and covered the new beach volleyball court with artificial grass. It ruined my dream of getting some of those Speedo-clad volleyball babes to come over and play.

I think that my wife was behind it.

A new beach volleyball court installed

I came home today to find that half of our back garden has been turned into a beach volleyball court.

Shopping for a NetBook

Today we bought a NetBook for Karyn.

We didn't start shopping for one; I just wanted to show them to Karyn as a potential Christmas present.  Because she often wants to access the Internet while watching TV, I thought that she might like something that she can sit on the seat next to her and put on her lap when she wants.  

I didn't anticipate the level of enthusiasm.  It took all of 30 seconds for her to get excited, especially when she realised you could get white ones.   She'd previously said that she'd like a MacBook because they looked nice and you could get white ones.

We had to do the "shopping around" thing, and then spent the rest of the day going from shop to shop, mall to mall, comparing prices and models.  Then low and behold, we ended up where we started from because (a) the price was OK and (b) they had white ones.

We ended up with an Acer Aspire One (in white). It has a 9" screen, a good sized keyboard, and 1GB of memory running Windows XP Home.

The photo doesn't do it's size justice.  It is a bit wider than a piece of A4 paper folded in half.  It fits comfortably in Karyn's handbag.

What surprised me during our shopping trip were the comments from the various salesmen. 

"We only get them in blue," said one.

"We recommend this one because it has twice the battery life"  The one he was pointing us at was twice the price and twice the weight and seemed to be more like a conventional laptop than an ultra-portable netbook.

"You should consider this one because it has a bigger screen with a wider viewing angle"  As though you were going to use one of these babies sitting on someone else's lap.  Let me tell you, you need good eyesight to use one of these without squinting.

Anyway, my surprise Christmas present is now ruined and I guess I'll have to find something else .

But at least she can't complain when I buy myself a new quad-core machine next week.

Mumbai - Day 8

Today we made a trek to one of the most fearsome places on the earth for husbands - a jewelery store.

My mother wanted to go there.  Fortunately for me my wife doesn't like jewelery, especially that tacky stuff covered with diamonds, sapphires and emeralds.  Unlike being in hardware store, I can just sit back and not pick anything up.  The store was very unpretentious, just single door with the usual security guard in front.  Once inside, the owner greeted us and we said that we had been recommended by my sister-in-law.  From the gleam in his eyes when I said that, I reckon my brother has a problem on his hands.  "I'll take you upstairs in a minute," he said, "but maybe you'd like to look around here first?" "How about one of these lovely carved animals - maybe a good present for friends".   I said that I have no friends.  "How about one of these excellent silk scarves?"   "Nobody wears scarves in Australia", I replied.

It's bad enough having to visit a jeweler without them ambushing you with a foyer filled with buy-able stuff. 

"How about a genuine antique brass compass once owned by a maharajah?"  I felt like saying "Hey man, my wife has a GPS so she hardly ever gets us lost these days", but I politely declined.  I kept eying the stairs hoping that we could go upstairs, but he wasn't finished yet. "How about one of these pashmina shawls made from the finest cashmere and silk".  While they did feel and look really nice, I couldn't think of whether modern Australian women wear shawls any more.  I don't remember seeing them at Target or Best and Less.

Eventually we were invited upstairs to where the real sales battle was to take place.


My mother enquired about pearl earrings.  "I have just what you want here," he said, pulling out velvet-covered boxes. "But first, how about looking at these diamond rings?" He deftly laid out a handful of yellow and white gold rings encrusted with diamonds, sapphires and other precious stones.  I reckon that I saw a copy of Princess Diana's engagement ring in there somewhere. 

"Maybe you should put that one aside," said my mother, who is obviously hooked by anything glittering and expensive-looking.  The salesman was really getting excited by this reaction to the opening of a single display box.  He clicked his fingers to an assistant and ordered us tea and coffee.  He knew that we were all in for a long session.  I remembered then that we'd just got out of our car earlier and I told the driver that I'd call him when we were ready to be picked up; I hope he was able to find a parking space in one of the busiest cities on the planet otherwise he'd be driving around the block a very, very, large number of times.

"Pear earrings," my mother said.  "You were going to show us some pearl earrings".

"Ah, yes, earrings. I have them here".  He opened another box that contained no pearls, but lots of sparkling light that I now recognised as diamonds and other precious stones. "Maybe madam would like to try these on", he said, obviously ignoring the word "pearl" and handing her some white gold earrings covered with diamonds and royal blue sapphires. He draped an extremely expensive matching bracelet on her arm and said that the two look very good together.  My mother declined the bracelet, but he realised he had her with the earrings.  "I'll just put these over here with the others".

We finally got him to recognise the word "pearl", so he snapped a command to his assistant who then returned with a box crammed with pearls, from the tiny ones that I hope my wife likes to ones the size of marbles.  The box probably had many hundreds of thousands of dollars worth inside.  He pulled out a few.  It must have been music to his ears when my mother kept saying "larger.."  I got bored with this and wandered off to take pictures of the massacre.  Remember I said a battle took place upstairs?  Well we lost. Big time.  They argued about settings and such, and I took pictures and admired the stuff that my mother was leaving alone.

Finally the pain was all over.  Or so I thought.  He opened a draw and pulled out dozens of rings.
"Here are a few trinkets. Very cheap."  "Maybe you would like to buy a handful for friends, with Christmas coming up soon", he said helpfully.

"The stones are only garnets, citrines and amethysts," he said like a snake,  "they make good presents and nobody realises that you didn't pay much for them".  I reckon that he had an x-ray machine that had detected that we still had some small change left in our pockets.  He was desperate to get even our lunch money.

We reaffimed that we have no friends so we didn't want to buy any more, then made a dash for the door.  It's funny how you can spend such a large amount of money and only have one pocket stuffed full.  In JB HiFi I could have filled a small truck.

He farewelled us at the door and said that we should come back and have tea and coffee again because he has some really good pieces that we haven't seen yet.  

Other miscellaneous pictures:

• indian taxi
• typical sidestreet (our driver took us through some backstreets)
• oxen delivering kerosene with the commonplace rubbish on side of street

One thing I saw late this afternnoon was on the building site next door.  Talk about sex discrimination!   This group of women appeared on the building site and they gave them the easy job of carrying bags of cement on their heads into one of the buildings.

Bye for now.

Mumbai - Days 6 & 7

We've had a leisurely couple of days with not a lot to report that is different from what I've talked about before.

One remarkable thing happened on the building site opposite.  We looked out the window to find that a group of workers had surrounded another; a few minutes later somebody appeared with a big stick and started whipping him.  After about 10 minutes the security guards arrived and took him away.  He probably did something heinous like stealing or lifting his feet up so his wife can clean.

In the evening we went to a friend's place to have a barbeque while we watched the sun set through the smog. 

The next morning we had a relaxing breakfast at the JK Marriott hotel. 
The restaurant has a huge ceiling and overlooks a fantastic artificial lake (see picture).  Beyond that is the Arabian Sea with Oman on the other side.  One quirk with this hotel is that they don't like you taking pictures of the flowers - a little man runs up and tries to stop you.

Afterwoods we went to the Indian equivalent of Harvey Norman to look at furniture (see pictures).  The furniture shopping district contains lots of narrow shops with a single aisle in the middle that you can just walk through. 

Oh, they also have attack goats to guard the furniture. 

Opposite is one of the popular shopping malls (joke).

It was so hot we went for a cold drink at the Renaissance Hotel and then shopping for saris and stuff at a fabric shop.  I picked up a few silk outfits for Karyn.  I hope they fit, because it seems that in India, they have sizes of small, very small, very very small, and large.  I hope Karyn doesn't get upset that I had to buy her size Large clothing, but every other size seems too tiny.

Just outside was a curious barricade manned by 3 guards (picture).  It barricaded the footpath, not the road, and we, like everybody else just walked around it.  Nobody seemed to know why it was there, but everyone thought that the guards were doing a sterling job because nobody had stolen the barricade so far.

Anyway, that's all to report for the weekend. 

Mumbai - Day 5

Another long day.

Today we took another trip to South Mumbai. It only took 2 hours of dodgem-cars. See the video I uploaded to YouTube to see what it is like - note that the concept of "footpath" is foreign to these residents of Mumbai.

Although the thought of a two-hour trip just to get to the centre of the city seems bad, there is something to see everywhere. Wherever you look there is something interesting, strange, or colorful to see. I've included a photo of a motorcyclist attacking a taxi driver with his fist.

One thing I noticed while driving was the electrical wiring for some of the houses - there are power lines hanging everywhere (see picture). Its no surprise why there are power failures when it rains.

One nifty innovation are traffic lights with countdown timers (see photo below). When the lights go red the counter starts counting down so that you know when they will go green. When they go green, the counter starts again so you know when they are going red. It should work well, but if the road is clear, then cars start driving off when the counter has got down to 10 or so. If they don't, the 100 or so cars behind them start honking their horns.


Going into southern Mumbai, the older and more established part of the city we traveled on long flyover that crosses over a vast number of buildings and accommodation. Looking off to the side (see photo) you can see hundreds of side streets below, packed with people and vehicles, that seem to just go on an on into the distance. You get the sense that this city is packed with people for tens of miles in all directions.

When we got to the heart of the city we went to the museum once called the Prince of Wales Museum but now called: Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Vastu Sangrahalaya. I think that this is so westerners can't find it any more.
You pay to go in, and then you have to pay if you want to take pictures. I thought this was OK, and paid up. When we went to go in they searched our bag and found my bottle of water. "No water inside," they said. Apparently they wanted to confiscate it. It was strange to stand there in the swelting heat to be told that you can't carry any water with you - and we were still 100m from the entrance. Instead we drank it and left the empty bottle - think that they must be applying the same rule as the airports in not allowing you to carry more than 100ml bottles - who knows? I thought to myself, "well it's only a short walk to the museum building, and it'll be better inside"

Once inside, I realised that there was no airconditioning - it was just as hot inside as it was outside. So much for not needing water.

I took a photo, and immediately a guard rushed up to me and said that I can't use a flash. I then realised that although I'd paid to be able to take pictures, I couldn't actually take any pictures because it was too dark inside.

How a camera flash will damage a 2,000 year old statue carved from granite, I don't know. But, here is a picture of a 2,000 year old Persian carving that I decided to damage with my flash without anyone noticing.

The museum was quite run down, a common scenario with historic buildings I was later to realise. The building was filled with schoolkids running around, pointing out the naughty bits on figurines to one another. It reminded me of when I was younger.

There were some very old paintings on one of the floors, but they were so darkened with grime that they were difficult to see properly. Also many of the antique gilt frames were damaged or covered with mould. When you think about it, a non-airconditioned museum with 35+ degree heat and 80% humidity isn't exactly the best place to store classical paintings. It was also difficult for me to appreciate history when all I could think about were swimming pools and icy-cold gin and tonics.

Exhausted from the unrelenting heat, the intrepid explorers headed off to the Taj Mahal Hotel for some tiffin. Surrounded by the luxury that we deserved, we downed iced coffee until we felt better. It is a great pity that several weeks later some Pakistani terrorists decided to remodel the hotel using handgrenades and machine guns.

Did you know that upmarket hotels have staff in the toilets to escort you to your allocated urinal? Unsettling, if nothing else. They then turn on the taps for you to wash your hands, then hand you a freshly-laundered handtowel, and then turn the taps off for you and open the door for you to leave. I don't know if the women have it so good.


The hotel is just opposite the Gateway to India, the most famous landmark in Mumbai that was constructed for the monarchy to enter and leave from. Like everything else here is is being repaired. But very, very, slowly. I think that erosion is going faster than the repairs.

We eventually toddled back home to Powai (pictured), another 2 hour drive, and you can see the difference. There are footpaths! It seems silly to miss seeing them. I heard later that some Indians don't like Powai because the architecture and layout of the suburb doesn't look Indian enough. Maybe they'd feel better if people stole the paving and dumped rubbish around the place.

Anyway, that's enough for today. We are having a rest day tomorrow, so I'll have to sit around and watch the maid do the housework and dream of a better life back home.

Mumbai - Day 4

We went for a bit of a drive around today.  It was a big public holiday today, so the roads were surprisingly empty.  

The car got up to at least 80 kph - any faster and you risk falling into a pothole or running into a beggar. 

Yep, we got accosted by two today - one old lady (picture on right) who apparently wanted money to get her teeth fixed, and another who came up to the car with a baby in one hand and an empty baby bottle in the other, crying that she needed money to feed the baby.  When we ignored her, she started banging on the car window with increasing fervor.  My brother said that they usually have a bandage around the baby's head for good measure with some tomato sauce for effect.  He said that some beggars actually rent babies for the day.  It would have made a good picture but I couldn't get a clear shot.  I understand that these poor women must have disobeyed their husbands or not kept their houses clean enough and were therefore banished to the streets.

The trip took us to south Mumbai in only an hour - on a normal weekday it takes between 2 and 4 hours.  Last night it took my brother over an hour and fifteen minutes to travel home from work that is only 7km away.  

Most of the old British Raj buildings have fallen into disrepair. There doesn't seem to be much drive to preserve these buildings.  

One building that is really nice is the Taj Mahal Hotel (picture below) It's is one of those really expensive hotels where you can only just afford a coffee.  Here I was forced to buy something disgustingly expensive for my wife, just in case I couldn't find anything else.  The problem is that we can only really shop at "westerner-friendly" shopping malls and shops as these are the only places where we can safely eat or drink, and they only sell western-style stuff for the well-to-do Indians.  Surprisingly, there are few Indian souvenirs for sale, and I can't say that I've even seen a souvenir shop.

We had lunch at the Marriot hotel - one of those hotels that terrorists like to blow up.  By now we are used to the mandatory car search, the bag search, the bomb-detecting ion scan and the metal detector treatment before you are allowed to enter places like this.  We had lunch there because its one of the few places where people who aren't used to the local disease-producing bacteria can eat.  Presumably you have to be careful about the water used to wash the lettuce in. In the hotel food shop you can also buy bread sliced thinly!  The usual sliced bread that we've been able to buy is 1 inch thick, and it doesn't make a good sandwich.

I'm just getting the hang of having a driver.

His job is to drive you wherever you want to go and then wait until you want to go somewhere else.  He normally drives my brother to work each morning, and then waits until he wants to go home at about 6pm.  That's it.  If Richard decided that he needed to go somewhere, his job is to be ready.  So if you go shopping, he drops you at the door of the shop that you want (racing around to open the door for you), and then disappears until you come out of the shop and he magically appears to drive you to the shop 100m away.  Etiquette allows you to walk into an adjoining shop without being driven there.  I shudder to think of what this would do to Australian women and their shopping habits (and their backsides from not walking).

I'm having to type this in Notepad at the moment because the internet is down.  I realise that there is a pattern emerging where the internet goes down whenever it rains.  My brother said that in Hyderabad where he lived before Mumbai, every time it rained they lost power as well. That explains why he has his computer connected to an uninterruptable power supply.

I got a classic picture today of a person driving a motorscooter and texting at the same time.  Here everyone is wedded to their mobiles.  Even the people running around the exercise track seem to carry them.  I'm not getting many good photos taking them through the windows, but the driver doesn't want the windows down or the doors unlocked just in case a beggar tries to steal things when we are stopped in traffic. 

Speaking of mobiles, I've been lent my sister-in-law's mobile.  All day long it goes off with pre-recorded messages trying to sell you stuff.  The problem is that the messages are in Hindi, so all the cute jingles they play just go over my head.  Also you get bombarded by txt messages offering you things like mystical-image-of-the-day wall papers.  If any Australian phone company ever says that they are going to allow advertising, I suggest that you change companies immediately.

I've also attached a few more street scenes, like the following one that shows our apartment block in the distance, looking a lot like the ivory towers they are. 


You can see from the shop frontages why you can't walk on the footpaths. 

A common street shop.

Oh, yes, here's also one of a woman weaving baskets on the street. Her son-in-law has picked a space for her in front of a bus shelter (sitting in the bus lane).

Anyway, that's all for now.  the internet is back up (its been down for a day) so I can send this and get started on Day 5.