Helen Chats - No 1.

We have now been on our way for a week so it is time to give you all an update.
The journey over was relatively stress free- a longer than expected wait at Singapore airport- [Melbourne feeder flight delayed nearly an hour and a half, so we lost our slot and were then near two hours late], and a somewhat tedious coach journey from London to Leeds.
Enjoyed travelling in the new A380-especially the take off, which was shown in real time on the video screen via a camera on the back tail(at the apex thereof). It’s a REALLY monstrous plane and defies all logic of how it can get off the ground. Yes I do know the physics pertaining and it still amazes me. Question: These rules have always been there, it was just the learning curve that was lacking. How many more rules exist that we don’t yet understand? How many other possibilities are waiting? “Beam me up Scotty!”
The run to take off down the runway seemed just too long, you know how you get “that Feeling” that says ok lift off—well I had it for quite a bit longer before we did in fact lift. The old 747’s used to shake as they approached final take off speed, this craft does too, in a much more genteel way but it does shake and rumble. In flight its like silk. Landing at Heathrow was also very genteel, just glided in and settled. The in flight camera is on all the time, so watching the sun rise over the curve of the globe was quite awesome.
London was looking very fine-clean buildings and a sense of goodwill-very few signs of the previous excitement of the weekend-except of course that the papers were full of photos and bits of gossip. I saw a brief headline whilst we were having breakfast at Heathrow about Osama bin Laden and then couldn’t find anything in the written press to confirm the ‘sad loss’ until we actually reached Leeds later in the day.
Whilst in Leeds we have mooched around the city for a day getting electronics organized for Europe (phones: bought SIM cards on QANTAS [boasted cheap roaming costs] which proved to be ‘useless’ lousy reception and unintelligible service operators with no customer focus. Frustrated we went to a Voda Phone store and they were magic.
We carry a computer- tablet for travel [light weight] and a 640gig extnl drive with our work files. Because the tablet does not sit permanently connected to www at home base, it had fallen well behind the Microsoft [XP] update patches. It has 2mgb of RAM, power saving settings, Nortons v5, defraged and cleaned up---still sssoooooo slow it was driving me/us mad. Did a deep- very deep, scan…came up clean.
“Fish” at PC World in Leeds was the techo person you dream of. We were 24 Microsoft updates behind! With these onboard we were back top speed. Great guy, great service and cant speak too highly of our experience there.
Ipad: - NO you cannot have two apple accounts from the same ipad. If you want to share the machine, either you have one account and use one credit card or you buy a machine each. Steve, its not good user awareness or sensitivity for same. We have not enjoyed our ipad, Its doing what we want, but the learning curve is too full of hurdles. User manuals on line don’t cut it. 24 hour online help with a myriad leads also does not – unless you have nothing else to do and are eminently patient and servile.
Yes we bought extended Apple Care. On the Sunday morning before we left, in final desperation I tried to ring Apple re the mess caused by trying to run two purchase accounts. After an hour of frustration I rang our local new you beaut whizz bang Apple store. Well if ever Apple want bad press the young lady I encountered was eminently equipped to make sure they get it! Her message was in short, we are a retail store, we don’t give help by phone. Yes we have ‘experts’ here in the store, yes they are here now, no I wont call one to speak to you. No I cant/wont assist you……..hmmmmm……
Apple Care? = Don’t Care! ………….Yes please do quote me.
AND also quote me…..
“Fish” at PC World Leeds, is the sort of techo you dream about. Good on ya mate!

Helen still speaks…I decided on a haircut--why is it that hairdresser's all over the world have problems understanding the phrase "just a trim and keep the length"--and of course I am totally at their mercy cos once I have taken my glasses off and my bionics out I cant hear much and see even less!! Consequently all my efforts at growing my hair over the past 18 months has been undone!!
We went to a Janacek opera in Leeds which was well directed, well sung and very dark and depressing but an enjoyable experience. Had a fabulous Chinese meal courtesy of Ma, lovely afternoon tea with Ma and generally got over the lack of sleep from the last week in Perth and the trip here.
We have now just returned from a fantastic few days with my two school friends and their husbands in the Yorkshire Dales. It RAINED and we got WET--what a wonderful feeling after our –so far- six years of almost no ‘proper’ rain. Of course the green of the grass is amazing, the trees are a sort of yellowy green and the scenery great. The Dales are lined with dry stone walls almost as if put together for a jigsaw puzzle each piece of stone fitting on top of the next. Back breaking work for the farmers and others who built them. A period of English history that does not get much comment, The ‘enclosing’ following Henry’s [VIII] break up of the Monasteries.

Of course it gets dark quite late at this time of the year in the UK and we were able to take advantage of this by having long days-one evening we played a riotous game of "rapidough" which entails teams making prescribed objects out of playdough which have to be guessed by the "observers". I would like to report that the SMOGS (St Mary's Old Girls) won -but we didn’t. We also went down memory lane and try as hard as possible I couldn’t think of any inspiring teachers from our old school days-but these friendships certainly rank as the highest attainments from my grammar school days. Sally didn’t remember anything of cross country which I hated with a passion, but we suspect she was skulking in the change rooms hoping desperately that no-one would find her. I spoke well of orchestras and choral society and then reminisced about our mock general election at which I was the member representing the Communist party-I lost my deposit cos not even my friends would vote for me!!

I think the men were intrigued by the conversations and memories and enjoyed the shrieks of laughter that often peppered our chattering. [Not if you were trying to snooze off. By the noise those females were making -especially Helen- they should have been winning hands down!]

We visited castles with histories that went back to the 1400s and further and had teas and coffees and scones at every opportunity, walked a bit, ate a bit more and opened another bottle of wine, and another and another. A trip around the Wensleydale Creamery saw an influx of cheeses all accompanied by more wine!!
We stayed in a stone cottage originally built in 1670- beautifully kitted out with everything we needed-all the modern luxuries we expect in this day and age but set in an old cottage and built Pre Cook!
We visited a garden called "the forbidden corner" the quirkiest garden I have ever seen, with traps and statues, piddling boys, a gnome cricket match, frogs dancing in a fountain and the possibility of [you] getting wet at every corner from frogs that squirt you as you break a light beam etc. An arm sticking out of a brick wall, a teddy bears' picnic in the woods, witches and elves hovering in deep dungeons-a fantasy with imagination that was a wonder to behold and not for the faint hearted, or short skirted!

One intriguing UK innovation was the mobile post office!! A van with all the facilities of a post office which spends its days going from small town to small town, giving people with no access to postal services all the services they need. How amazing.

We did do some work. Apart from the fun we had, our group meeting was also of three teachers and two computer system gurus. But this posting is about breaking the mould and being travel chatty.

So “that all from him and that’s all from me”

Helen
(Helen Bryant)