Prior to arranging my trip, my cousing Calvin had announced his engagement and planned to have his wedding in South Africa in 2012. I was contemplating going via in my world trip but it did not appear feasible in flights and hoping to be settled in Australia by the time May came around. I grew up with Calv with his sisters, Tamaryn and Taniele during my childhood in South Africa and it was nothing but happy memories. Calv is the definition of a gentle giant, I remember meeting him as a 17 year old after a long absense and all I saw was a muscled man towering over me but he had a big grin on his face and welcomed me with a hug. Due to trouble with the venue, the family decided to move the wedding to the fiancee’s hometown, Gold Coast, Australia. An hour train journey from Brisbane.

Having spent the night in Surfer’s Paradise I arrived at the venue rather early hoping I made it to the right place. The venue seemed a bit deserted so I was wondering if I actually made it to the right place. I wandered around to the pool and saw rows of chairs set up with white ceremonial decorations and a carept rolled out, a runway for the bride. There stood a lone man who looked of importance. I went up to him and asked “are you the wedding organiser?” He gave me a stern look while replying, “No, I’m Bret. The father of the bride”. “Oh” I started sheepishly, “I’m Ryan, Calvin’s cousin”. He pondered for a moment and pointed me in the direction of the house where I could find Tam and Tin helping the bride into wedding dress in the role of bridesmaids.

I crossed the area that was to be used as the reception and stepped into a quaint old-school living room. Out from one of the room’s appeared a flustered young lady who seemed to be the one in charge. “Are you with the music people?” she challenged me. That’s karma for you. “No, I’m looking for Tamaryn. I’m her cousin”. She disappeared back into the room of mayhem. A few moments later out came the mother of bridge and quickly dismissed me saying Tam was far too busy. Back to the pool I went.

As I was waiting, the masses started to arrive. It was not long before Patrice and Ingrid appeared (Calvin’s parents) and it was so nice to catch up with them after a 5 years absense. Then out stepped the groom, dressed all in black. “Hey! Ryan my cuzzie!” he exclaimed as we swapped man hugs with pats on the back. He seemed a tad on the nervous side but mostly cool as a cucumber. Soon everyone started getting into position as the ceremony was about to start. There was not enough chairs so I took a standing position at the side on the groom half. Team Calvin!

The music started playing and first walked down the two little, sweet flower girls, one being Rayah, Tam’s daughter. It was the first time I had ever seen her. Next followed Tin and then Tam who both looked beautiful in their bridesmaid dresses. After the rest of the bridesmaid did their slow step to the alter, the bride and good ol’ Bret appeared. Danah is a model by trade so it was an easy feat for her to look like a Disney princess in a wedding gown. Calvin could not stop smiling as his future wife stopped in front of him grabbing his hand with both of hers, never letting it go until the end of the ceremony. As the minister announced all the wonders of marriage there were very few dry eyes left in attendance. Even big Calv was doing his best to keep his composure. The couple exchanged personalised vows and rings, the line that stood out for me was when Calv said in mid-stride “I freaking love you”. Rehersed or not it was heart felt and made everyone laugh. The rings were exchanged and Calv was allowed to kiss his new bride but did one better by picking up Danah and spinning her around in a cradal embrace.

Afterwards when everyone was congratulating the brand new husband and wife I snuck off to see the bridesmaids. No, not like that! Just wanted to see my cousins. “Tam!” I exclamined. Tam turned around with first a look of confussion that turned into pleasant suprise. After hugging, Tin appeared, “hey stranger” I smiled. We caught up briefly before they had to run off for photographs. This was the perfect opportunity to help myself to the snacks table, all I had for breakfast was a Kit-Kat chunky. Whilst gorging myself, Calv called me for photos. I was confused. “Who, me?” I mumbled with a mouth full of cupcake. In the photo was the bride, Calv, his immediate family and me. It felt a bit random standing there with Calv and his nearest and dearest but at the same time it was humbling that I could be in that picture.

The couple then cut their wedding cake, which I admit, was way better that I imagined a wedding cake to taste. I chatted with Jordan and Gardner while the rest of the crowd mingled. Jordan was the boyfriend of one of Danah’s friends and shared the common circumstance of not knowing many people there. Gardner was a great laugh. Originally from Zimbabwe he had made it in Australia, fell in love with a local girl, planning to get married by the end of the year and was currently working to save up to put himself through medical school. He told me he knew since he was 5 years old being a doctor was the only thing he ever wanted to be. He was quite inspiring as I have never had a certain field I wanted to pursue. I will not be short of gumption when I firgure out what that is.

The reception was located in a sizeable garden under the protection of a white marquee that contained rows of immaculately decorated tables facing the bridal table. Unfortunatly, Calv’s Grandad was omitted to hospital a few days earlier. The person that Calvin is, he and Danah went out of their way after the photo shoot to pay a suprise visit to see him. I can just imagine Danah in her floating wedding dress wandering the hospital wards and the look on Calvin’s Grandad’s face when he turned around to the see the pair of them standing there. Anyway, I was privilleged to be promoted from the cool kid’s table to sit next to Patrice at the parents table. Woop woop! There was a banquet of an assorted buffet, I did my best to recreate a typical British Sunday roast of beef, potatoes and Yorkshire pudding. Om nom!

The speeches were to follow. The siblings of each half of the couple got up to deliver their heart warming accounts of the couple and humorous anecdotes. Then it was the turn of the fathers. What was most striking of the speeches was the use of the term power couple, which was a fitting label.

The back paved garden was the scene of the dance floor with the DJs set up in one corner with fairy lights shining off a warm glow on the ground. After the first dance and some partying it was time for the bride to throw the bouquet. All the single girls jostled for position. Danah threw the flowers over the head and it was her tallest friend, who to put it frankly, was a bit of a party animal. Guess it’ll be time for her to settle down now. All of a sudden it was Calv’s turn to throw the garter that he recently took his wife’s leg. The single guys were beginning to gather. “Go on cuz,” Taniele said while pushing me in the back. My protests were of no avail as I ended up next to a bunch of boistrous Australians. Pity for them my position in cricket is only specialist fielder and I caught the garter with ease. Howzat?! I smiled with embarassement while onlookers cheered.

After an amazing day it was time for the newlyweds to being their journey together. All of us got sparklers and matches to make a tunnel for the couple to run underneath, off to their honeymoon destination of Fiji.

Aubrey once told me that reception had said that 408 was a lucky room. This was probably said to a lot of people about their particular rooms but the month I spent in it was truly a memorable experience. The room itself was quite small, lined with 3 bunk beds, a tiny table & chair, a mirror and some storage cabnets. The storage cabnet was quite useful as there was enough room for my bag and a shelf for my documents with an outlet for my chargers. The window also provided a view of the Brisbane skyline…if you look at an extreme angle. I took the bottom bed of the middle bunk and it proved to be well positioned to talk to travellers to either side. You must know that Brisbane has few tourist spots which means the room had a very high turnover in occupants. Most days I would return from work and meet someone new. You never know if you’ll be sharing with someone awesome or lame. I call this phenomenom the room mate lottery.

Fortunately, I’ve been blessed with intriguing room mates for the most part. My initial room mates of Alex the German, Sarah the Canadian and the Chinese girls Aubrey & Yolanda and soon after Wesley. were all good company but they have been discussed in earlier blogs so I’ll move on. Then there was the English couple of Paul & Collette. Unlike other couples who had stayed in the room, they were a delight to talk to. One evening Paul, Collette, Wesley & myself were all bored so we decided to go to this travel talk. There was a prize of a free surf lesson and as the other 3 had all been surfing before they agreed to give the prize to me if they won. There was only 8 of us in the talk so we had a 50% chance of winning. Our names all went into a hat and the name that was drawn was our dear Collette! Afterwards she handed me the voucher and said was going to stalk me on facebook until I went surfing. What a nice gal.

There were 3 additional Canadians that graced the room. The 2 dudes were a laugh to talk to which added to my ever growing opinion of Canadians. The girl was very nerdy, ergo very sexy. Late at night when everyone was settling down for bed I noticed she had a GAMEBOY COLOR! I know what you’re thinking, this could not get any better. Wrong. The game she was playing was the original Super Mario Bros. Overthrown with love I offered to trade her my 3DS with Super Mario World 3D for her old school device and enjoyed a night of sweet sweet gaming. Sadly, she was in 408 for only one night.

There was a chap from Thailand here as well who after asking for his name 3 times I just refered to him as “dude”. He was struggling with his new fighter pilot sim for the i-pad where you move the tablet to move the plane. I was like, “move over dude, let me show you how it’s done”. He said “whaaa, you so good at this game!”. Just a natural.

The worst type of room mates are those who travel in pairs and only speak in their native tongue. There have been a few and they are extremely hard to engage in conversation as they keep to themselves. Then there was the Australian. First off, I never trust natives who stay in a hostel. This fella was a bit intense, being the expert on all things sport and refered to Australians by their region…”were there many Western Australians at the game?”…”Queenslanders are best at all sports. We won all the titles last year”. Hard work. Plus he chewed with his mouth open which is never cool in my book. The one that took the biscuit was this homeless looking guy with a fuzzy comb over and walked around with a dazed look on his face. Apparently he went to sleep with his shoes on and also left his junk all over the floor with his cabinet wide open. One night I walked in and he was just sitting on his bed in his boxers, scratching his inner thigh creating the most grotesque noise you could imagine. Oh and another morning I woke up to raspy heavy breathing as someone was stumbling around the room. I was too freaked out to leave the bed until he was gone.

That brings me to the best combination of room mates I had whilst residing at 408. There was Steven, a soft spoken Scotsman who had been chilling with me in Brizzy for as long as I can remember. For most of the day you could find him in bed watching movies on his laptop until darkness fell upon the sky and he would be ready for a drinking session until 5 am. Then there was Izzy, the loveable German pixie whose English was far better than mine. She noted that watching too much television was responsible for her American accent. She was very accident prone though as everything she owned mysteriously broke. My fancy going out watch broke in her proximity. Who could forget Alistair, another Scot who spoke at 200 words per minute. Once he got into telling a story it was best to leave him to it. He was all about the banter and had the sense of humour I missed from my British friends. The last person was Elisa, a girl I labelled as a sloth in a previous life due to her 16 hours of sleep she would get a day (not an exaggeration). She had an addictive personality and would obsess over the littlest things. I did enjoy our philosophical chats that would last into 4 am in the morning.

Hanging out with these guys was so much fun and this one particular night Steve, Alistair and me all went out to experience Fortitude Valley, one of Brisbane’s top night spots. We went to this huge, futuristic night club called “The Family” and it was enjoyable to watch Alistair, someone from a small Scottish town who had never been to somewhere as extravagant, party the night away. He was like a kid in a candy story. It was an exciting night until one of the bouncers kindly escourted Steven outside for some fresh air. Australians are nice like that. Losing Steven, Alistair and me headed back to the hostel. There we met Izzy and Elisa at around 2 am and proceeded to have a party in our room with a lot of snacks and sweets. Just a typical night in 408.

Brisbane Roar vs Perth Glory - A-League Grand Final

Too be honest with you, I have an abysmal record as a sports fan. My beloved teams of Leeds United and Miami Heat have not won a game that I have attended. My NFL team, the Dallas Cowboys, have a mighty 5 Superbowl wins in their history. They have not won it in the 16 years I have supported them. So I thought I would give the Brisbane Roar a try!

My hostel is in a ideal situation only a 10 minute walk from the Suncorp Stadium that is home to the Reds (rugby union), Broncos (rugby league) and Lions (Aussie Rules). Australia is reknown for their love of all sports where kids are brought up on being athletic and competitive. Football falls short in popularity. Aussie Rules football, rugby union, rugby league, cricket are all ahead of boring old soccer. No matter. I decided I would support Brisbane Roar.

The first match I got tickets were to was an Asian Champions League group match against Korean team, Ulsan Hyundai. Coincidentally, the day I picked up my tickets was the same day the A-League grand final tickets also went on sale, so I picked up one for that as well. I managed to get a decent seat for $30, a price unheard of for a Champions League game back in the UK.

It was a warm, clear Tuesdat night in the Suncorp Stadium and as I approached the ground, it was quite something. It is a 55,000 seater, enclosed stadium, making it bigger than most English Premier League stadiums. I navigated to my seat that was literally pitchside, row 3, just a few feet off the halfway line. I was fortunate to get a seat to this rather nice local called Mark who had been a Roar fan for as long as Roar had been established. We chatted about my trip and his time in Brisbane and he also told me about the current squad and crazy A-League rules. The stadium itself looked very bare in the floodlights as only a couple thousand fans turned up for the match. There was almost as many Koreans as there were Australians in the ground and boy did they let everyone know they were here.

The quality was quite shocking, perhaps the same standard as the 3rd or 4th tier of English football. At one stage I felt like putting on some boots and running on to the pitch to add some flair to the occassion. Roar play a frustrating game of always passing back to the keeper. If a winger near the opposition’s box had few options he would pass back to the defense, who would pass back to the goalie. It would be passed back to a defender and the process would repeat. I was shocked how many times the ball would be played across the face of their own goal or how a defender would let the ball bounce in front of them when a striker was lurking. I’m an average player but I know the fundamental no-nos like that. Besides all that it was a close encounter. They went 1-0 early on before Roar equalised from the left-back. Both teams then hit the post and it looked like it was going to head to a draw. A few minutes from full-time, the lanky Roar defender touched a Korean in the box and he went down like a bag of potatoes. This Korean team were notorious divers! Mark and myself cursed the ref as we were doing the entire game. Ulsan went 2-1 up and that was that. Another lose to my record as a spectator.

No dramas! I still had the GRAND FINAL to look forward to, Brisbane Roar vs Perth Glory. My two new Scottish mates from the hostel, Steven and Alistair, accompanied me to the stadium on match day and we soaked in the atmosphere. It was a bit surreal as we walked by mobs of Roar and Glory fans giving each other serious but light-hearted abuse. If this was the UK, many a fight would’ve broken out by now. There were a lot of activites going on around the stadium, I queued up for contest to kick a ball into the back of a Hyundai but only managed to hit the side of the car. Shucks! The Scots were gutted not to have bought tickets as it was a sellout and looked to be a cracker. I found my seat directly behind one of the goals, 10 rows back and stared around me for the sea of orange and purple supporters. I was hoping to see some Roar goals in front of me and dreading to see any Perth ones.

The first half was poor and uneventful, I believe Perth managed one shot on the goal I was sitting behind. 0-0. The second half was a different story. Early on, on the far side of the ground Perth Glory opened the scoring with a soft goal coming off one of the Roar players. Perth were now quite content to defend while Roar kept their frustrating possesion game tactics. The clock was at 83 minutes and it looked like Perth Glory were going to be crowned champions when the left back broke down the wing and crossed in a deadly ball, calmy headed into the net by the Albanian Roar nicknamed the bear. Sitting directly behind the goal I lept from seat and joined in the celebrations of the rest of the Roar fans, going crazy in delight with the equaliser. Luck was going our way when a Perth player got sent off just before half-time. Good-bye I waved to him.

In a moment of controvery, way into injury time, Bear dribbled past around 4 Perth players in the box before finally going down. PENALTY!!! “No way!” screamed the Perth players as they surrounded the ref but he simply waved away their protests. Bear placed the ball on the spot while me and the fans behind the goal were standing and holding our breath. On the 7th minute of injury time, Bear put the ball past the keeper as cool as a cucumber sending the orange part of the stadium into jubilations. We were all screaming and jumping up and down while the players mobbed the goalscorer. It was the first time a team in the A-League had won back to back Championships and I was there to take part in the history.

Maybe things have turned a corner in me being a sports fan.

I have a fear of being attacked by wild koalas

Brisbane near my work

My main objective for Brisbane was to live here for a few months, find a job and experience the Australian lifestyle. The first day I spent getting a new sim card, opening my bank account and sorting out my medical care. The next day the job hunt commenced!

I browsed the Internet cafes in the area to see if any were cheaper than my hostel (charging $5 / hour) and I found a ‘reasonable’  one for $3 / hour and after the mandatory facebook check it was game time! It was a painful search going through 100s and 100s of adverts but I sent my CV off to about 10 posts. As soon as I plopped on my bed, my phone started ringing. What’s this?? Who would have my Oz number?? It was a recruitment agent, we’ll call her Kelly, who wanted to meet with me on Tuesday. I badly timed the beginning of my job search as the Easter weekend was looming and no one would be in work to look at my CV! It did buy me some time to buy some work clothes and shoes as I couldn’t fit all that rubbish in my initial packing of my backpack. On the Saturday I paid visit to Target to get some stylish threads that came to a total of $80. Everything seems so expensive when you’re unemployed.

The Tuesday I dressed all smart-like and met with Kelly and it went well. She said she might have two jobs to line me up with. At the end of the day I fell on my hostel bed ripping the interview clothes off my body where by sheer coincidence my phone started ringing again. It was ANOTHER recruitment agent, let’s call her Dawn, who of course wanted to meet with me tomorrow. This is promising I though to myself — the phone rang again!! This time it was, let’s call her Caitlin, another recruitment agent…but she had a REAL interview already lined up for me, the job I really wanted out of all those I applied for! “Fantastic,” I told her. I was going to meet her at 11 am the next morning followed by the interview with the employer. So I went to the laundry room and washed all my clothes for the first time since China and cleaned up well.

Early the next morning I had breakfast and got ready for a gruelling day. Walking to town was tricky in the heat as I strategically planned it to spend the majority of the time walking in the shade to keep myself fresh. I met with the lovely Caitlin and she told me I had a very impressive CV and she asked me questions about my career and skills. Chicks dig guys with skills. I asked her for some advice and she told me just to be myself and sent me on my merry way.

Thirty minutes later I was sitting across the table from two interviewers in a typical office boardroom, they had their questions at the ready. They asked me technical questions and what I would do in certain scenarios. A few threw me but I did my best to answer them. Randomly they asked me what my three favourite movies were, perhaps to get an indication of my personality. “Jurassic Park of course as my first as it’s a classic,” they nodded in approval. “Fight Club”…”well of course,” they replied. “—and for my third…The Matrix”. “Ahh very good but did you like The Matrix 2 and 3?” A big landmine! For a fact I know The Matrix 2 and 3 are not well received in IT circles but I stuck to my guns…

“Yes! I liked them.”

“Really?”

“I know they’re not popular but I love them.”

[Pause] “…you stood up for yourself. I like that.”

Would that cost me the job?? The last question was very interesting. He handed me his pen and asked me, “In a technical enviornment, name me 5 ways you would use this pen.” A real doozy of a question when under pressure. After deliberation with myself I answer:

1.) Use it to take notes from the client

2.) Use it as a stress toy

3.) Use the lid as a bookmark in documentation

4.) If I couldn’t reach my PC, to use it to hit the power button

5.) To point at the screen

He told me he used the question to see if people could think outside of the box. Most people he had interviewed could only name 3 and one guy could not name any. I thanked them for their time but one of them said he still needed to interview a few more people and would get to me by the end of the week. I really want that job.

I was then walking around the Brisbane CBD searching for the next office skyscrapper my appointment would take place in. It seems like every recruitment agency is on floor 17. I spoke to Dawn about positions I ‘might’ be interested in and she had one that I ‘might’ be good at. I told her I ‘might’ get back to her.

On the walk back to the hostel I noticed I had a new voice message on my phone. I decided I was too hot and bothered to listen to it now so I waited until I was relaxed in before I played the message. It was Caitline, she forgot to tell me to give her a call after the interview to let her know how it went. Once she answered, we spoke about how it was. “It went ok” I said, “there were a few tricky questions but I got through them.” She paused for a moment before replying, “it went better than ok. You got the job! They called back right after you had left and would like to offer you the position.” Result.

A couple of days later I was signing a 6 week contract for a IT support role for a respectable Australian company that will look good on my CV. It is much more money than I was back on in the UK and it is only a 15 minute walk from my hostel. I start Monday!

The Red Panda!