Danny's done a 'Brad'...

That's right! He's gone and done a runner back to England!

But not for too long...

While Danny makes his epic travels across Asia and Europe to get back to England in time for Christmas, I'm still here in the great city of Brisbane. You can catch Danny's adventures at www.dannyhontour.blogspot.com (promised I'd plug your blog at some point). He should be back here come the end of January.

As I was saying, I'm grinding out a few months here. Working lots and saving more. Other than the occasional night out to watch a big match, I'm saving pretty hardcore.

Too much work and no play will make Brad a rich boy, hopefully.

I've agreed with my boss to work over the entire holiday period on x2 pay, which is pretty fantastic. Although I'll miss out on Christmas celebrations, I'll be earning mega-bucks. With these funds Dan and I have many a plan, of which we will update you with as they come into practice, so not to disappoint. Some sneak previews include a potential Road Trip from Brisbane to Perth via all the major cities and a trip to The Cook Islands to catch up with Sam (see the Nepal blogs if you forgot who 'The Legend, Sam' is), who is now living there. To mention a few...

As you know, the idea of 'saving' is pretty difficult for me to comprehend, but I'm doing really well with sticking to my budget and I'm in for an additional massive lump sum once I leave employment (I get all that Tax and Superannuation back remember!).

So for now, that's pretty much it.

I'll be sure to update if anything exciting happens!

Australian Weather

Although much better than ours, it does have it's days...

This is a photo of Brisbane City, where I live and work, during Sundays storm.

Home Sweet Home

So! Dan and I have a home!

We've moved to the suburb of Moorooka in the South of Brisbane. The set-up of our home is as follows: Upstairs Dexter and Teresa, the owners of the property, live. Their level of the house consists of 2 bedrooms, a bathroom, kitchen, lounge, study, dinning room and laundry room. Yup, it's pretty big!

Then on the ground floor of the house (by the way, there are no stairs connecting the upstairs to the downstairs) Dan and I live with our housemate Dave. Each of us have our own room in the downstairs home which consists of 3 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, lounge and kitchen.

The house is great and a real bargain at $135 (£57 OUCH, what's happening to the £ guys?!) a week. That's inclusive of all utility bills and such.

So now I'm settled and have a permanent home, I actually have a daily routine:

5am: Wake up and get ready for work (no, seriously, I really do get up at 5)

6:15am: Leave home to catch the train into work

7am: Arrive in the Central Business District of Brisbane and grab a fruit-shake

7:30am: Start work

.....

4:30pm: Work over! Head back home on the train

5:30ish pm: Arrive home and promptly settle on one of the sofas and play on the newly acquired X-Box 360 that Dan and I have bought!

10pmish: Collapse in bed and start over!

Can't say I can complain about my weekdays.

Weekends however, well... weekends... I'm not sure I could guess what is going to happen during a weekend even if my life depended on it!

I.E. This week, whilst watching Arsenal whoop Man Utd, a guy we met in a bar in Bangkok, Thailand (Paddy, you may recall him from previous blogs) turned up in the same bar as us! Seriously, these nights are so spontaneous, I really look forward to the weekend just to see what I'm going to end up doing.

So as you can see, I'm really settled here. Work is great. I'm getting exposure to all sorts of systems on a huge international scale and all of the people I work with are great. However, there's a sour edge to work at the moment, as out department is being outsourced to Infosys... Yup, one of those awful call centers based in India. So at present, many Infosys employees are roaming our office, dropping in on our work, trying to figure out what the hell we are doing. The contract was sold for $70 Million dollars for 3 years*... (pretty sure the majority of that was just for me). The transition will occur at the end of February, so as of 27th February I will be un-employed, but not seeking employment, as I am able to claim back all of my tax (30% of my earnings) and my super-annuation (9% of my earnings paid into an account by my employer, additional to my salary) back. It should amount to quite a bit, so I'll no doubt head out on a new adventure come the new year.

Well, Dan and I are off to Woolworths to get the groceries in (Woolworths is like Asda here!). Catch up soon!

*Infosys Deal: http://www.australianit.news.com.au/story/0,24897,24561078-5013040,00.html

Settled

So I'm employed and on Sunday Dan and I are moving into our new home in Moorooka!

My new place of employment is actually really cool. I work as an 'IT Service Delivery Officer', supporting around 45,000 users world wide with their IT requirements. Pretty insane.

I'll update you when we've moved into our new home.

Viva Las ... Brisbane?

Not quite Las Vegas, but on my last night before starting employment...

Yup, I got the job!

...Dan and I hit the Casino.

After several hours of Roulette, I find myself AU$370 richer.

Things are so good right now.

Becoming a Local

So after returning from Byron, now equipped with my Tax File Number, I went about becoming more settled and saving some money. The Hostel was costing a fortune, so we headed out to 'Kangaroo Point', a suburb, just outside of the CBD, where we found a cheap Motel to stay in. This would have been a good temporary residence, if it wasn't for 'Johnny Irish Builder' smashing away with his hammer every morning at 6am...

I have however secured myself an interview at Rio Tinto (riotinto.com) for an 'IT Service Delivery Officer' position. I'll let you know how it goes.

Byron Bay

Just Google search 'Cheeky Monkeys'...

Dan was escorted out

Great times!

Matt and the French Guy

Now that I'm settled here in Brisbane, it was time for Dan to show me some of the local pubs and such. The Pig and Whistle being our first stop.

After finding a table a waitress headed our way and took our order for Fish and Chips and a beer. Upon hearing this, the two guys sat next to us decided that it was time to interrupt our night and mock us for being so 'typically English'. Matt and 'The French Guy', locals to Brisbane, told us all about some great places to go and such.

Matt is heading to Byron Bay in a few days for a holiday. He's offered us a lift. We obliged. Apparently I'm going to Byron Bay...

Brisbane (Home?)

So I've landed in Australia.

It's only taken me 6 months, a trip to England, a Voluntary Severance payment and 9 flights, but I'm here! Credit where credit is due I say...

Upon landing in Brisbane I got my passport stamped (actually I'm slightly concerned about this. The immigration guy just stamped my passport with a date stamp, even though I'm here on a working visa. Surely this can't be right?!) and headed to the nearest pay-phone to call Dan and find out what to do!

Dan was alive, not drunk and actually pretty useful in assisting me get to 'The Transit Centre' where he was headed to meet me. After a dirty McDonalds breakfast (oh, things don't change) and a quick catch up, we headed to 'Chill Backpackers'. A hostel for backpackers in Brisbane.

I've become quite accustomed to having my own space, so a 10 share room wasn't my idea of a good place to stay. So we got a twin room @ AU$80 per night and proceeded to get me set up to the same position Dan is in (employable).

After visiting ANZ bank and an internet cafe, I now have a bank account and a Tax File Number is being processed for me. These two thing are all I need to undertake employment here in Australia.

My tax file number will take 7 days to process and arrive, so I may as well go on holiday...right?

Byron Bay, here we come!

Formula One Fever

Vrrrrrrooom!

This has to be the greatest sporting event I have ever attended. The outer trackside is buzzing with people who don't have track-side tickets, all eagerly anticipating the opportunity to see the worlds greatest drivers on the first ever night race.

Marina Bay has undergone a years worth of asphalt relaying to produce the perfect track for the night. And what a great site it is (sorry, please excuse the pun).

The cars were lined up on the starting blocks, engines were roaring and as soon as the cars took off, everybody who had turned up roared and cheered their favourite teams as they battled it out on the Marina Bay night circuit.

The noise is the most intense sound I have ever heard. When the cars break from 300 kmph to 120 kmph for the corner i was stood on the crashing of the break pads is deafening. Then the cars speeds off back down the straight. All of this was taking place in a matter of 5 seconds. I have videos of the cars flying past and I'll be sure to link them. It really is incredible.

A huge night in Grand Prix, with Massa driving off with his fuel pump still attached and Hamilton looking to have guaranteed himself the championship, it really was a historic night. And I was there to experience it, completely by chance.

Super!

Tomorrow i fly to Brisbane! Can't wait...

Orchard Road

How can life get any better?

A road of shopping malls, the size of the Bullring! I think I'm in heaven. How have i never been here before?

But really, this road is the greatest shopping centre I have ever seen and you know how I love my shopping. So a pretty intense day sees me stocking up on some 'much needed' purchases. Firstly I've gone and bought one of the great new Sony Compacts (http://www.sonystyle.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/ProductDisplay?catalogId=10551&storeId=10151&langId=-1&productId=8198552921665495060). This device is so advanced, it's photo editing suite that is installed on the camera allows you to manipulate images to make people appear as though they are smiling, even if they weren't!

Like i said...a much needed purchase.

Another thing I noticed I seem to have a lack of is shoes. At a mere 4 pairs, it was definatley time to buy some more. So some ultra rare Converse were added to todays shopping basket.

Finally, impulsive buying had well and truly settled in and I bought myself a watch. At S$600 (£256) I'm now the proud owner of a great Swiss watch, sure to last me a while.

All that shopping has exhausted me, so this is going to be brief.

Update on the Grand Prix soon!

In Love!

Yup. It’s true. I really, really do love… Singapore!

Today I headed out of the hotel, on foot, equipped with my iPod touch and a cached Google Map, to help me find my way around. However, 2 minutes into wandering away from my hotel I found ‘Location Services’ on my iPod had kicked in and I was being tracked along my journey! Incredible! I basically had a GPS system in my hand, for free!

I headed down to ‘Little India’ a place set up during a time when a lot of people from India started to migrate to Singapore. The idea was to give immigrants their own areas of the city to live in. ‘Little India’ is a really great place with 3 large Temples, great Indian restraunts and more jewellery stores than I have ever seen before!

After getting some food in a restraunt, I jumped on the ‘MRT (Mass Rapid Transport (The Tube))’ and headed for City Hall. The area was full of F1 enthusiasts all anxiously awaiting race night.

I managed to get some great photos of the track (i'll be sure to post them). I've decided to head down to trackside for Qualifying and the Race...

Tomorrow... Shopping...