Muscle Memory.

 It's 5am here, and jetlag reminded me I haven't wrote on here in a while and now would be a good time.

I just got back from visiting family and friends in the states. It's over five  months since I left Atlanta frozen in a sheet of January ice. Going back to my house was a strange experience,  I felt like a visitor at a friends house. I was told e that once you leave home, you never really come back. I can honestly say that that's completely true. Right now, home for for me is a house on 12 Westwood with a wicker hippo on the porch and an American flag proudly hanging in the dinning room. But I don't think I will ever fully have a place I fully feel at "home" till I start a family of my own.

 I started noticing little details as well. Like how Georgia has a certain smell. It's an earthy, farm like smell of thing growing I guess. I also realized how many red clayed dirt roads there are, all over grown with thick green foliage and protected by rusty gates that have long since been forgotten.

Something else I found bizarre was how quickly I picked back up on things. Friends I haven't seen in 1/2 a year I could just pick back up a conversation with like no time has passed at all. I could hop in a car and drive back on the right side of the road without a problem ( I did hit the windshield wiper for a turn signal a few times however). It was almost like muscle memory of my old habits and rituals had just kick started to life once my plane touched the ground. 

I did manage to get a lot in while I was back. I got some more winter clothes, which is nice because I didn't bring near enough. I went fishing with my dad and Papaw, I normally don't fully enjoy fishing trips but this one was pretty awesome. I got to go out to eat with heaps of people and get to get my fill of American cuisine at the same time. One of the highlights, was going rock climbing with my sister. I had never thought I would enjoy scaling walls high above the ground, due to a past phobia of heights, but I actually did! It's a sport I want to get more into when I come back. 

I'm debating on whether I should come return state side for another visit next month. I feel like I should just stay here, seeing as I spent a year just trying to get here. But it's kind of all up in the air now, and heaps of people are expecting me to come back.

The next few days look a little are going to involve a good deal of studying and typing up assessments that need to be turned in on Monday by midnight. Then, the rest of the week is going to be a breeze seeing as there is we don't have any tutorial classes. We have also decided we want to try getting plugged into a connect group.  I have been feeling like we have been getting left out of the Hillsong community by not belonging to one.

Fireworks and and fried chicken.

We went to the city again last night to see some street performers (dancers and jugglers mostly), drink chocolate, and watch fireworks. Today, is mother's day, so we cooked up some fried chicken and french fries for our adopted  Mexican "mum" here. As great as she is, she can't compare to my own one and only real mother back in the states whom I looking very forward to seeing and going out on one of lunches with when I get home. I know she doesn't fully understand how much Josh and I appreciate the long night shift hours she works at the hospital to support us and our family. But we do, and and are so grateful to have such a loving person in our lives that supports our dreams.

Highlights:

-One of the things we talked about in class over the week is why prophets seem to always die violent deaths. A good deal of people seemed confused and disturbed at the thought of this, but what I found strange is the fact that the notion didn't really bother me. To me, a martyrs death has always been the most honorable to way leave this earth. I would rather die a young martyr, than old and withering away in my bed.

- I have spent a good bit of the week tilling through the immense heap of footage I was given to make a video out of. I have a pretty good idea how I'm going to put it together, but unfortunately, the Final Cut program I "borrowed" has decided it wants to me the serial number that came on the box it came with...which I do not have. So it looks like I'm going to be spending a good bit of this week in the Mac lab at school cutting and pasting a rough cut together to show my director by the next Monday.

- Also, I miss my dog....

-I have been studying about angels and the unseen realm lately; halfly for devotion and partly for a novel I'm researching for. I have unearthed  heaps of information that has been sitting right in front of me. For instance,  when angels make an appearance on earth, they are usually described as being 12' tall men in shining robes. Why so tall? and why do they appear to look human, when other verses  describe them as not looking human at all (multiple animal like heads and wings)? I believe that the form the appear to us is just one that we could handle and yet still contain their heavenly glory (hence the 12' frame). I know a lot of people are reading this and thinking "Who cares?", But honestly I feel like the more I study about the things of God, the more real God becomes.

-This is my favorite video from the Exchange festival a few weeks ago. It took me awhile to find it, I believe this is the one that truly deserved to win (don't freak out, just click on the link to right if you want to see it >>) http://vimeo.com/22278917 

Sigh no more

This past week has been our break, and seeing as were traveling all over  last week, we decided to stay home-side for these past few days for the sake of finances.

Started running more. I discovered the route to a park with a track that loops around its perimeter. It's a bittersweet feeling running again,  especially when considering the 12 miles I was running this time last year with no problem...now it's about six laps before I head home.

I have also taken up prayer walking. Prayer has usually been something I have done off the cuff when I thought about it, most of the time when driving. But lately I have found sacrificing a few minutes unplugged from my ipod and with God to be worth it. I was inspired after running into a girl from school "prayer walking" on the side walk. She asked me if I needed her to pray for anything for me. It really stuck with me, so now I prayer walk too.

I did some job hunting over the break. I asked around in a knife shop, but the owner told me he was barely making means end as it was. Plus, even though I knew just as much as he did about a lot of the knives in the shop, he wanted someone with more selling experience. The next place I tried was an outfitter's shop (like an Australian REI), they told me to come back in June. That's defiantly a job I would LOVE to have. 

Yesterday, we had our first official camera class at noon. Most of it was spent showing us how to do things I already knew how to do, like setting up tripods. But our teacher is the best in the industry over here,  we consider it a real honor to be learning under him.

We had another moment of patriotic pride when we heard that bin Ladin had finally met his demise. I have to say though,  it was a struggle for me to keep from out bursting at a few of my international peers who were against the celebrating of the taking of another's life. I was actually shocked at the amount of disapproval of my country's handling of the ordeal.  However, most of them aren't the ones who have lived in a country that has been so viciously attacked as mine. Half my life time, my country has been trying bring him to justice, it's such a relief that it's over now.  I think once most of my international friends realize we aren't  blood drunk celebration of the killing of another one of God's children, but that justice has finally been served to monster who had been terrorizing the world for far too long.

By the way, sorry these entries are so scarce now a days. Our schedule is under construction and we have a handful of big assessments looming over us that take some time to work out.

I don't know if I have posted this song before...but it's this live version.

Mountains, trains, surf boards and pancakes.

Before I dive into and unpack the latest news and happening, there's some housekeeping that need to be done. First off, in regards to my last log summarizing my day, that was just an example of my MONDAYS (hence why the entry was titled "Monday"). Not everyday is as laid back as that one seems,  though it I said I had only one class, that class 3 hours long (4:15-7:15). Most week days we are actually going between classes and field work from around 8am-6pm.  However, the load here isn't overbearing at all, when considering the down time over the weekend and the amount of time we have to work on assessments. Now, onto the good stuff...


We have had a pretty eventful week showing our friend Schwartz around Australia this week.

Thursday: we took him into the city to show him the works: Sydney Opera House,  Coat hanger Bridge, and a diner at Pancakes On The Rocks.

Friday: We took him to see the Blue Mountains (always a pleasure for me). On the train ride there we ran into one of Australian friends from TV Media who offered to show us a "faster" way of  getting there. We ended up full out sprinting through the train station to catch our mountain bound train Bearden,  our Aussie friend and myself were the only ones able to get on as we watched the doors close on Josh and Schwartz dejected faces. We meet up with them later at Penerith, where we scarfed down some train station chicken burgers (it was Good Friday so everything else was closed), which actually wasn't too bad for chicken patties that was boiled with fries in the fry baskets. Here's a rough video I put together with what shots I could get with Stephan's camera, the SD card is messed up and only lets me film a few minutes worth at a time. Plus the quality on YouTube isn't as good as I had hoped. I'll do better in the future, promise.

Saturday, we went surfing. It was cold, rainy, and the swell wasn't the best, but what type of friends would we be if we didn't give Schwartsy the bragging rights to say he's been surfing in Australia? He managed to get up a few times on his big board he was using, which is more than I can say for myself who was thrashed around time and time again on my little six footer. I'm seriously considering selling it for either for something bigger, or squirrel the money away for safe keeping.

Monday

Someone has asked me to write an outline of my days...so here's one.

Morning-Woke up, worked out, ate coco pebbles, skyped some folks and took a shower.

Afternoon-Went to the school to work out some (equipment) booking. I also picked up my hard drive from my director who had loaded it down with the footage for me to edit. I then went back home and made some horrible Asian food.

Evening-Went back to the school for editing class. We didn't we really do anything in the actual class today. There was a few times I had to duck out to log more equipment in and out for people working on their short films.  I took the majority of the class time to polish up my Church News assessment that's due on Thursday.

Now- Just got done watching some Dexter. Once I get done typing out this entry I'm going to do one of two things. A.) Sleep. B.) Workout again...I'm leaning more towards the latter.

A quciky.

I know...it's been awhile, forgive me...

Well, no adventures this weekend. I had a TV media party last night, which was good to have some new faces over again and get to know some people we normally don't hang out with.

Speaking of TV media, I met with my director to write up deadlines for the short film we are supposed to turn in this semester. I haven't received the footage  I'm supposed to edit yet, but it's supposed to a documentary which should be pretty easy. It's also good because I feel my ministry is to make Christian based documentaries and short films (maybe a full length feature film one day). Media is such a massive and powerful tool of influence and the Christian community really isn't utilizing it like they should. Most Christian films are such poor quality that they make the audience feel like they just went back 15 years. No one today wants to watch something that looks like it's being played off an old VHS tape. I want to make films with some bite to them. Show an audience (Christian and secular alike) something that will open their minds of convict them in some way. Something that can't just be turned off and forgotten about, but something that will keep people will think about long after the credits have rolled.

We have a break coming up, and I desperately want to gather a group of my more out going friends (there's a lot of them here. Not surprising seeing most of them traveled across the globe to get here) to go on a camping trip in either the Blue Mountains or some lone beach up north somewhere so we can spend our days surfing and nights around a camp fire or in our hammocks gazing up at the star studded skies.  I'm not sure what we are going to do, but I know one thing for certain; if I spend my entire break pacing around my house, I'm going to go lose it. A free spirited beast like myself should never be held captive in this cage of dry-wall for too long.

Katoomba...

Finally, a day worth my readers' time!

Bearden and I went to early service this morning so we could have time to go to the Blue mountains today. After church, we went home and  hastily threw some gear together and hopped on a bus. From the bus, grabbed a train which we rode for about thirty minutes NW till we came to Penrith. We had some time to spare and were both starving so crossed the street to a shopping center and after getting searching the whole mall over we finally found the Oporto's (a Brazilian chicken burger joint) we were craving.

We only had enough time to grab the food, cross the street to the station and hop on another mountain bound train. We rode for about an 45 minutes till we rolled into a train station that made me feel like I had just sent back 60 years. The doors were wooden and manual to open and we had to literally jump from train to platform to make the two foot gap. It was raining as we walked through the quaint town of Katoomba. The miniature mountain metropolis was made up of dozens of outdoor  shops full of every piece of gear anyone would need.  As a gear junkie, I was proud to see that most of the stores' offerings was gear that I either had or was  looking at getting. I even bought a brimmed beanie with some money my mam maw sent me, she always like me in hats so it seemed fitting.  The village's populace seemed to be made up of hostel dwelling backpackers, ramblers and vagabonds...I felt right at home.

This is a corner of a mural at the town's train station. Bearden took the pic, and he'll probably put the full scale one up on his blog sometime in the next few day. But I just like this part cause it has the guy jumping the canyon on his horse.

The more we walked through the icy rain and blind-siding blast of chilling northern winds, the more I thought back to my water/wind proof element jacket hanging up at home across the back of a dinning room chair. I remember making a mental note to roll it up as tight as I could and to pack it down into my camelbak, but in the rush it was left behind. It didn't help that we were both in shorts and tee shirts. We only had to hike to the edge of the town to find the trail heads that lead over crest of the mountain. Bearden and I just barely touched on them when the rain started picking up and we decided to turn back. We did get to see some awesome sights, even with the fog.

Yes. I am wearing 3/4 length pants. I'm in Australia, it's the cool thing to do.

On the train ride home I sat next to the most delightful group of Asian people. They had a giant chocolate bar they were passing amongst them and they gave me a corner of it. One thing I have learned here is NEVER turn down free stuff... it doesn't come around often.

We got off at Penrith, only to realize that the train we just exited was supposed to take us all the way home and the next one didn't leave again for another hour. We walked back into the mall we had eaten at hours before. All the stores were closed so we just took advantage of the hand warmers to dry our clothes. Twenty minutes later, I'm carving up an orange with a buck knife while we shelter from the rain on a bus stop bench. Finally,  Sofie came and saved the day in her little black hatch back.

Later, when I got home,  I tried out the jet bath...it didn't work. Which means I sat in a tub of luke-warm water like an old person for nothing.

Also, I gathered some milk crates for a to make a bed frame...tad-ah (yes, that is the mattress I found on the side of the road).

                                                               

            Song, but no dance.