Photo updates

Since we have 2 Christmas dinners and 2 birthday parties in July, I thought I should post some of the pickies relating to the above...

The Christiansen family Christmas in July (nb: no lights - complete blackout...)

Dad demonstrating the difficulties of eating too much, too late at night (see his little Bessy present!)

Tom cutting his birthday cake (another cheesecake!) with Nicole (shares the same birthday as him!)

I just wanna wish you well

I suppose I have been a tad bit slack when it comes to updating... We have been here 2 weeks now and have quite happily fallen into the rhythm of fresh fruit salads every morning, enormous tapas style lunches and great tasty dinners.

Yesterday we celebrated Christmas in July, and ironically the power decided to shut itself off (in the entire Emu Park, Zilzie and Tanby) for 2 stints of 1 hour each - so the Turkey had a little trouble cooking. BUT - at around 10:30pm we had a delicious roast with veges (by that time we emptied 2 bottles of bubbly) and poor dad had to crash in his bed within 5 minutes of finishing his meal. Not used to these late nights anymore!

Emme heads back to Bris on the weekend, and Tom and I have decided to rent a car and head up north for a few days - hoping to get up to Bowen and maybe Eungella before coming back here for 2 nights and then heading to Bris to stay with em for the remainder of our holiday. Am already balking at the thought of flying back...

Have already decided that 2 years is far too long between visits - am quite happy to come back once a year from now on.

Catch up at the Sailing Club

From left to right...

Brock, Rachel (+1), Katchia, ikke, Danielle (+1).

Everybody seems to be proliferating...!

We both ad a great evening of sukiyaki with Dan and Katchia last night as well (including some wine and a game of cranium!). I think it's time we can call tom a real aussie now that he can participate in 95% of the questions from the Australian Cranium!

A little silliness

Just realised that I am quite difficult to understand while laughing...

Translation = "And the best bit about this is Tom already filmed this once before and forgot to press record".

This is what crazy people do to entertain themselves on long-haul flights...

The wonderful world of jet-lag and qwerty keyboards

We are finally here (although still recovering a little) after around 30 hours in travelling... Will have to start mentally preparing myself already for our return flights...!!
It has been a frosty 5 degrees the first two nights, and in a huge house without any heating whatsoever, it is a little nipply, but lucky for us, it warms up to a nice 20 in the daytime with not a cloud in site.
We have spent our first few days just seeing the neighbours, sleeping (more like passing out), taking a little trip to Yeppoon and just trying to get into the rhythm here. While this seems to be working for tom, I am currently sitting here wide awake for the 2nd morning in a row at 5:30am...

Some of the benefits at Singapore airport - Free foot massages! Of course we took good advantage of these!

The first sunrise I have seen for probably 15 years. Quite magical actually, and didn't realise the luxury I grew up in. These photos are taken from my parents driveway.

And of course, beautiful princess Bessy (with her tennis ball)!

One last note, first thing I noticed here is the silence. Feels incredibly eery at night, but once the sun starts coming up, the birds all start screeching and I feel at home again with plenty of noise!

A special thanks to Katchia for calling around yesterday, so unexpectedly! We are heading over to Yeppoon together today to visit friends, and I look forward to it!

Progress/mess

De valizen staan bijna klaar, dus Tom dacht dat het tijd was om een lekker porto te drinken.

lalalala - Lakonia

Last year, in July, Tom received a voucher from lakonia and being the procrastinators we are, we finally validated it yesterday (since it expires while we are away, and we couldn't have that!). Basically, it is a heated pool + spa + another spa + sauna + steamroom + cold pool + sunbed which is completely private per couple. So we, of course, took advantage of all the facilities, with the steamroom being my particular favourite.





2 days until we depart, and nothing done as yet. At least (most of) the clothes are clean...

There is an answer to the darkest times. It's clear we don't understand it, but the last thing on my mind is to leave you

Well here's my half-annual contribution again. Ingrid normally keeps you up to date as good as she can so I don't need to make any more comments. For those of you who know her: frankly, I am not allowed to mess up her blog!

I've finally finished my first year of uni in Belgium. It has been a wonderful year and one of the best choices of my life to commence something I really believe in. I made it through with only 2 fails, which for Belgian standards is not too bad, especially because I didn't consider myself smart enough to pass even one in the beginning of the year.

Quick note: In Belgium the schooling system works a bit differently from the Australian one. We have 2 semesters which contain 12 courses (7 the first, 5 the second semester). You have a 3 week period of exams. If you do not pass an exam, you get a retry in August. That's when you need to pass, otherwise you can't go up a year. I can give an explanation of median and average and standard deviation to show you all what I learned and to prove that I am not doing badly, but I'll keep it to the simple explanation that the average is 3 to 4 fails on the first go (for psychology anyway). Since I did not receive my complete score yet, I am still better than average.

The problem with psychology is that it is one of the most popular courses at the moment. We started with 240 students. By the time the first exam period had approached, there were about 180 left and for the second exam period we had numbers of around 100. Of the remaining 100 students probably another 60-70 will remain in the second year. This is all due to the simplicity they give to psychology on television these days. For once and for all - people, psych is NOT telling people what clothes to wear to feel good or how to stop eating because you're fat! One of my favourite therapies is electric shock therapy; it looks like fun and you can inflict pain on somebody without being blamed.

Anyway, I'm pretty confident for the summer because I know which errors I made. With this blog I'd also like to give full credit to Ingi for allowing me to go and also to withstand my moods during the exam periods, she's been bliss! Kym and Ben, I'd also like to thank for their patience when they came over during the first exam period and noticed my tension. At least with all the techniques we learned it was better the second semester.

Most important thing we learned over the course of the year: "NEVER EVER have friends or family as patients and if you do: charge double"

Now everything is finished and I am having a week off before we fly to Australia. It feels like a camp I've been on and now I've returned home. You always come home from camp or holidays and you feel bored, restless, missing the buzz,... There's no more studying and I still have to get used to it.

But I am sure that it's not going to take long since I am now rejoining my friends to say goodbyes before we leave (read: drink alcohol and talk about soccer).

I would promise to write sooner now, but I won't since Ingrid will take over.

Funny quote: "80% of statistics is invented on the spot"

Think about it next time somebody tells you that 70% of all people do this or eat that...

Whoever knows the author, I'll buy you a beer