commercialised sport and middle-aged air-hostesses

I've almost finished my cup of tea in a special "Air New Zealand - Anton Oliver" insulated cardboard cup. On the cup it informs me that Air New Zealand is a fanatical sponsor of the All Blacks. Well as far as I can see, any company would be fanatic if their investment in a professional sports team brought such great dividends. What the heck happened to the good old days of non-professional sport, where the All Blacks were down to earth kiwi blokes who could have been your next-door neighbor? Now we've got Dan Carter advertising underwear by way of stripping off on unduly large placards and banners hung on towering edifices in our major cities. The numbered Air New Zealand cup collection; "oh, do you mind if I have the number 6 cup please?". Dear me.

The middle-aged air-hostess is bringing the elderly Japanese couple in the seat behind me up to date with the 21st century, explaining that Australia and New Zealand do infact have different currencies, and "oh, that's fantastic, you're going to Australia". I get eye-contact with the middle-aged air-hostess as she finishes her conversation with the travellers behind me. I draw your attention to the fact that she is middle-aged simply because it is a bit interesting. "Do you know how high we are?" The air-hostess looks somewhat puzzled and I rephrase my question. She takes a step back into the aisle, towards the right hand side of the plane. Peering out the port-hole she purses her lips and screws up her nose. "I can ask the Captain..." her words trail off. "Oh no, I was just after a rough estimate..." "rough?" "Yeah, just an idea..." "We'd be at about 30,000 feet... between 26,000 and 30,000 feet."

Freak me out, those wings look so small compared to the size of the plane. Why don't they have bigger ones, just in case. Why do they go through the rigmarole of showing us the video about what we should do "if there is an emergency". They seem to presume that the only emergencies take place while over a body of water. Seems to me, seeing as we're flying up New Zealand, they might not be able to make it over to the sea.

The Captain's just signed out, he reckons we'll be outside the terminal at 2:15... Well I think Si's cellphone is 10 minutes ahead so I guess we're around about 45 minutes away. Ahhh, just spoke to the middle-aged hostess (that's a bit harsh, she's probably only just turned 30...), and she informs me that the Captain got it wrong, seeing as it's 2:35pm now, we should be landing at about quarter to three. Ah, well that's all good...

I'm just ripping into a green "lime" aeroplane lolly now, Lyd will probably kill me if she finds out, because I know she and Nath like them. Heck, I'll get them...

At this stage the middle-aged air-hostess turned up and gave me the evil eye. "Better close that up now" she said, her voice laced with danger. ctrl+s, alt+f4, I shut the lid of the Toshiba Portege 4010 and sat it on the empty seat beside me.

It's all Greek to me

I wrote this about two years ago, and the pictures were taken around April 2005 when my Family and I were in Greece.

Our family home-educates. The way we studied history was basically by starting with creation, and then moving on up till the Victorian era - at which stage my other sibblings went back to square one - you can never get enough history. Out of all the ancient civilizations, Greece was my favourite. The ancient Greek civilization played the second most influential part in the shaping of Western culture as we know it. (the most influential has been Christianity). We call the ancient Greek culture "helenistic". I really appreciated the ancient Greeks. For their battles won, their cool "gods", and their amazing buildings and massive empire.

It seems, on the whole, that the Greeks, though claiming allegiance to a host of "gods" living on Mount Olympus, were quite nominal in their belief. They were open to debate and new ideas, and they did not attempt to stamp out Christianity - at least, not to the extent that the Roman empire did. The Greeks loved everything that was aesthetically good, and pleasing. Culture, design and thought flourished throughout the Greek empire.

The Romans, on the other hand, I find to be quite repugnant. A grossly immoral and bloodthirsty nation of the dissipated rich. Partying, watching forced battles between slaves, and watching Christians burnt alive or ripped apart by lions were these people's chief recreation.

Several years previous to our family's visit to Greece, we had studied ancient Greece. Here's some pictures of ruins and stuff, a few of which, I stumbled into...

Souvilaki time.