God save the ... holidays!

G'day everyone! Although technically the Queen of England's date of birth is on April 26, every second Monday in June each year within Australia (except for Western Australia and Queensland)has celebrated as a holiday in compliment to her majestys' birthday since 1788 (and for 111 years of independence). Furthermore this year Qu. Elizabeth II celebrated her Diamond Jubilee as monarch just one week before June 11th.

Fortunately this year's long June weekend had some really nice weather on Monday, which is a rare sight during winter in Melbourne (generally a very cloudy sky). The result — pictures:

Top left to bottom right: (1) Swanston Street in Melbourne Central with tram (usually loaded with people during rush hour), (2) Yarra river (viewing westward), (3) Part of Melbourne Skyline (looking NE), (4) St. Pauls Cathedral, (5) Flinders Street (train) Station, (6) State library of Victoria.

In other news the first poll is done and seeing as there is a general desire for a'couple more infos, I'll try my best posting some more in the near future. Hope you're all well. Have an awesome weekend!
Cheers
Jan

How would you make Melbourne a better place?

Found this on an internet forum the other day, and just had to share it:

(source:  www.reddit.com/r/funny)

Mozart meets Jazz

Hi Y'all,

Iwaki Auditorium in Melbourne
(source: http://www.whitehat.com.au)

The Melbourne Iwaki Auditorium, named after a former Japanese conductor of the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra, holds a free concert every other weekend which is broadcasted live on ABC Melbourne on the radio.

Joe and Zoe performing at Iwaki Auditorium
(source: http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/)

Last week pianist Joe Chindamo and violinist Zoe Black performed a few Jazzy arrangements of classic pieces such as J.S.Bach's Air on G string. It was a lovely performance, and if you want to check it out just click the link here and it will send you to the episode on ABC's website.

You might have noticed a few changes on the right hand side of the blog - amongst other things I now have added a poll! This seemed to be an applicable way to get some feedback from you (my dear readers), as your imput matters to me. If you have specific requests or want to talk something away you can always leave a comment below every entry.

Have a good Geek Pride Day!
Jan

Come by, say hi

Greetings everyone,

just wanted to give a quick update on my new home in Melbourne. It is a two-floor house fairly close to campus (about 30mins via public transport, which in Melbourne terms is close) in the district of Kensington. I live there with two befriending Chinese people: one of them working, the second one studying as an accountant at RMIT university (the other university in Melbourne).

The Pictures above show (top left to bottom right): (1) Apartment from outside, (2) my room, (3) the living room, (4) the kitchen, (5) the garden behind the house, (6) the owners' chicken. I'll introduce my roommates another time. Have a good Sunday!,

Cheers
Jan

Earth Day 2012!

Hello everyone,

it is Earth Day once again (also known as International Mother Earth Day since 2009), making it the 42nd anniversary of increasing environmental awareness around the world.
I'd like to share this link with you showing an Earth Day entry on The Big Picture, the photo blog of The Boston Globe. Enjoy!

-Jan

And in todays episode of "Fun with Flags" ...

... we have the Melbourne city flag!

Melbourne, nowadays the capital of the state of Victoria, Australia was established in 1835 by John Batman (yes Batman, an identically named suburb still exists today).

Four images representing the main activities of mid19th century Melbourne grouped around the red Saint Goerge cross (a Christian martyr and patron of England). The Cross contains a red-golden crown symbolising the city's monarchal affiliation to the English royal dynasty.
The four images (starting from the top left and proceeding clockwise) are a fleece hanging from a ring (wool shearing), a bull (livestock breeding), a three mast-ship (shipping) and a whale (if you hadn't already guessed, it is whaling). The flag reoccurs within the city's coat of arms. Until next Time!

Cheers
Jan

See you later Aligator!

G'Day to all of you!

So the day of departure finally arrived last Friday, and thus my ~30 hours journey to the Southern Hemisphere began. Almost 12h of flight to the city-state Singapur, a 4h break at Airport, 7 more hours to Sydney, where every outsider (and locals alike) needs to pass thorough quarantine checks until allowed to proceed his or her jouney, 4 more hours of wait before the final flight to Melboune (short hop of 2h). When travelling to Australia its best not to bring anything organic beside yourself, otherwhise fines can be charged up to AUD $1000 and in severe cases you might be put into jail. So it is probably for the best to leave those muddy shoes and the original Rembrandt with the fancy wooden picture frame at home (foreign wood worms are considered a threat to the Australian ecosystem).

Although well into the fall season, to be greeted by 25 degrees Celsius and sunshine in Mid March is not too uncommon in Melbourne. Too bad I literally fell straight into bed as soon as arriving at the hostel, but no need to hurry, as Melbourne can be found on the same latitude as Santa Cruz County (California). Anyhow, as this small blog entry concludes, I'd like to my best wishes to all of you, especially to the ones I hadn't had the chance to see off in person. Take care and hopefully you'll stick around, as there are more entries on their way. Cheers!

-Jan