Hi again all!
Well time is flying by, we've almost been here a month! In our second week Ryan meet some guys who run Construct Recruitment and place Kiwi and Aussie builders onto sites in central London. They have about 150 guys on their books and you can be put onto a site for either as long as the project lasts or until you want to take a week off to jet off to Europe. They replace you on site with someone who is coming back from their week in Europe, and then when you come back, they'll find you work again. Seems perfect for what we're doing! They kitted Ryan out with all the PPE gear, and 3 t-shirts and will give him a hoodie when it gets colder - sweet deal!
At the end of our second week we watched Changing of the Guard which was neat, with all the pomp that accompanies the old guard changing shifts with the new guard. Was quite amusing when the old guards band broke out playing the theme tune to Thunderbirds, and the new guards band responded with the James Bond theme! After the ceremony we found 2 young Queen's guards, guarding a side entrance to the palace, so we got the obligatory photo taken. Not quite like the movies though, you can't wear the guards big black hat or play the fool with them or anything like that, you can't even touch the guards as we found out!! Walked around Waterloo Place & saw the statues to the Crimea War, including Florence Nightingale. Some of the city parks here are full of deck chairs for people to lounge about it. Poor buggers, obviously wish they had a nice beach close by! Saw Westminster Abbey, Big Ben and the Houses of Parliament - all very amazing!
Veronica, an old mate from high school, arrived on the 13th, and the following day the 3 of us were up early to go watch the Trooping the Colour for the Queen's bday. There were masses of people there, but we got a good posse opposite where all the bands and Queen's guard performed the ceremony. Saw all the royals arrive by carriage, Camilla with Wills and Harry, Princess Anne, Charlie, HRH herself and Prince Phillip! After the ceremony we headed up to Buckingham Palace and watched the whole whanua wave from the balcony!! The royal air force do flyovers the palace in formation at the end of the ceremony which is neat. We also go by 10 Downing St, but its blocked off at both ends by security gates and half a dozen police. :( Btw, George Bush came to visit the next day, and we hear that 800 police guard the ends of Downing St!!! Overkill?
Caught up with Jess, an old mate from uni, over all you can eat Hell Pizza (not sure if Hell Pizza has made its way into many South Island towns?) for £5. Ryan ate way too much pizza, as one should when its an all you can eat deal!! The pizza (esp the desert pizza) was superb, as was catching up with Jess after a couple of years!
Ryan started work at the Royal Horse Guards Hotel, just down the road from Buckingham Place and the Houses of Parliament back on the 17th. Beck Interiors are running the refurbishment of the hotel for the Olympics, and reckon there could be 6 months work for Ryan, so will see how that pans out. He's working 8am (sweet!) to 6pm (not so sweet) and is finding it pretty good so far. There's other guys there from Construct Recruitment, mainly Aussies, as well as lots of other nationalities.
The work front is a bit quiet for me at the moment. Stink. Mainly bcos the global credit crunch and a downturn in the England housing market is causing the Council's to see a drop off in the volume of household applications they're processing, which is making them consider taking on contract staff carefully. But the recruitment agencies working for me have told me to sit tight and not head back to NZ just yet!! They both reckon I'll be able to pick up a position when someone from NZ or Oz heads home. Also old workmates from HG working here, reckon the first job is the hardest to get as you have no UK experience. In the meantime I've been doing more sightseeing with Veronica while Ryan's working.
A couple of Wednesdays ago, Vee and I picked up cheap tickets for the matinee session of Les Miserables. Which was awesome!! Very London of us, going to the theatre! We wandered the streets around Piccadilly, finding the fab wee Piccadilly market! The following day we did a different kind of theatre, checking out the Globe Theatre (where Shakespeare's plays were written and performed! We get dirt cheap (£2.50) standing tickets to the afternoon show, doing what all the poor of London used to do, and stand to watch the play from in front of the stage (called Goundlings) in Shakespeare time. The play, The Merry Wives of Windsor is 3 hours long, so we're fair knackered from standing afterwards!
The following day, we'd had enough of standing, so opted for something different, and went to watch parliament in session at the House of Commons. I didn't realise, but the Parliament is housed in the Palace of Westminster, and there is a hall at its entrance which dates from like 1099, and is where Sir William Wallace had his trial in 1305 and where the royals, most recently the Queen mum, lie in state. There were bugger all MP's in the chamber on a Friday at midday, but there were a few from the opposition giving the government minister present hell over a bill designed to audit the costs and benefits of being a member of the EU. Enthralling stuff it was not. We stopped off at Abbey Road on our way home, and snuck some quick pics of ourselves marching across the pedestrian crossing outside EMI records, ah la, the cover of the Beatles Abbey Road record!
The 3 of us watched the AB's thrash the Poms in the second test and as the weather was pretty shit (for the first time since arriving though mind you), we checked out the Tate Modern. We left sure in our opinion that modern art is a crock, that we would all be capable of producing something fit for the Tate Modern, and bloody glad it was free to get it! We rounded off our Saturday, in typical London style, down at the pub for tea and pints watching Euro 2008. Soccer is kinda growing on me lol!
I spent the first 3 days of last week flat hunting. Looked at something mad like 25 places over the 3 days, mostly all double studios for just the two of us, before deciding to share a flat instead. We had to be out of the hostel by this Sunday just gone, so took a room in a flat we liked and organised to move in on Sunday.
Last Thursday, Vee and I treated ourselves to a posh avo tea at the Dorchester Hotel. Champagne, finger sandwiches (yes including cucumber and cream cheese), scones with jam and clotted cream (does the cream go on top or beneath the jam??) and delicious cakes. Ooh la la.
On Friday we keenly headed off to Wimbledon, not really knowing what to expect. We got there at midday, and hit the end of the queue and were given a queue card showing us to be approximately the 9000th person to arrive and join the queue. We queued for a couple of hours, deciding to leave when the drizzle started, but not before quizzing the stewards on a good time to arrive the following morning to get in. We stocked up on food and drink for queueing on Saturday, including the must have strawberries and left the hostel at 5am, catching the tube and arriving at 6.30am. We were dismayed to see the queue of campers in front of us, but stoked when our queue cards are numbered in the 3000's. We're guaranteed to get in on a Ground Pass for £20 and be able to watch any games on courts 3 - 19. Kiwi Marina Erakovic is playing first up at 12pm on Court 11, yahoo! We kill time in the queue before the gates open at 10.30 by reading mags and newspaper and get into the grounds at 11am, make our way to Court 11 and get awesome seats amongst all the other Kiwis. Marina lost in a close 3-setter, but it was definitely a game that was hers for the taking. We watched some bits of other games and then at 5pm headed to the re-sale office to queue once more for second hand £5 tickets to centre court to watch Nadal play Kiefer. Got in about 7.30pm when it was about 5-4 in the first set. Centre Court was AWESOME as was watching Nadal play!
On Sunday we moved outta the hostel and into a flat in Fulham/Hammersmith. Its about 10 mins walk from the Hammersmith tube stations, which is handy for Ryan to get to work. Its a really nice area and nice flat. There's another kiwi couple, a Welsh guy and an Aussie, who is moving out on Thurs and filling his room with someone else. We've got a big bedroom and en-suite and there's 2 kitchen / living rooms, one downstairs which we use and one upstairs. Its nice to be outta the hostel, not sure how long we'll stay as the lease is only until end of October.
That's about it for now, I promise that I'll try and get some pictures up on our blog and facebook!
Catch ya'll later, and keep the emails from home coming.
Well time is flying by, we've almost been here a month! In our second week Ryan meet some guys who run Construct Recruitment and place Kiwi and Aussie builders onto sites in central London. They have about 150 guys on their books and you can be put onto a site for either as long as the project lasts or until you want to take a week off to jet off to Europe. They replace you on site with someone who is coming back from their week in Europe, and then when you come back, they'll find you work again. Seems perfect for what we're doing! They kitted Ryan out with all the PPE gear, and 3 t-shirts and will give him a hoodie when it gets colder - sweet deal!
At the end of our second week we watched Changing of the Guard which was neat, with all the pomp that accompanies the old guard changing shifts with the new guard. Was quite amusing when the old guards band broke out playing the theme tune to Thunderbirds, and the new guards band responded with the James Bond theme! After the ceremony we found 2 young Queen's guards, guarding a side entrance to the palace, so we got the obligatory photo taken. Not quite like the movies though, you can't wear the guards big black hat or play the fool with them or anything like that, you can't even touch the guards as we found out!! Walked around Waterloo Place & saw the statues to the Crimea War, including Florence Nightingale. Some of the city parks here are full of deck chairs for people to lounge about it. Poor buggers, obviously wish they had a nice beach close by! Saw Westminster Abbey, Big Ben and the Houses of Parliament - all very amazing!
Veronica, an old mate from high school, arrived on the 13th, and the following day the 3 of us were up early to go watch the Trooping the Colour for the Queen's bday. There were masses of people there, but we got a good posse opposite where all the bands and Queen's guard performed the ceremony. Saw all the royals arrive by carriage, Camilla with Wills and Harry, Princess Anne, Charlie, HRH herself and Prince Phillip! After the ceremony we headed up to Buckingham Palace and watched the whole whanua wave from the balcony!! The royal air force do flyovers the palace in formation at the end of the ceremony which is neat. We also go by 10 Downing St, but its blocked off at both ends by security gates and half a dozen police. :( Btw, George Bush came to visit the next day, and we hear that 800 police guard the ends of Downing St!!! Overkill?
Caught up with Jess, an old mate from uni, over all you can eat Hell Pizza (not sure if Hell Pizza has made its way into many South Island towns?) for £5. Ryan ate way too much pizza, as one should when its an all you can eat deal!! The pizza (esp the desert pizza) was superb, as was catching up with Jess after a couple of years!
Ryan started work at the Royal Horse Guards Hotel, just down the road from Buckingham Place and the Houses of Parliament back on the 17th. Beck Interiors are running the refurbishment of the hotel for the Olympics, and reckon there could be 6 months work for Ryan, so will see how that pans out. He's working 8am (sweet!) to 6pm (not so sweet) and is finding it pretty good so far. There's other guys there from Construct Recruitment, mainly Aussies, as well as lots of other nationalities.
The work front is a bit quiet for me at the moment. Stink. Mainly bcos the global credit crunch and a downturn in the England housing market is causing the Council's to see a drop off in the volume of household applications they're processing, which is making them consider taking on contract staff carefully. But the recruitment agencies working for me have told me to sit tight and not head back to NZ just yet!! They both reckon I'll be able to pick up a position when someone from NZ or Oz heads home. Also old workmates from HG working here, reckon the first job is the hardest to get as you have no UK experience. In the meantime I've been doing more sightseeing with Veronica while Ryan's working.
A couple of Wednesdays ago, Vee and I picked up cheap tickets for the matinee session of Les Miserables. Which was awesome!! Very London of us, going to the theatre! We wandered the streets around Piccadilly, finding the fab wee Piccadilly market! The following day we did a different kind of theatre, checking out the Globe Theatre (where Shakespeare's plays were written and performed! We get dirt cheap (£2.50) standing tickets to the afternoon show, doing what all the poor of London used to do, and stand to watch the play from in front of the stage (called Goundlings) in Shakespeare time. The play, The Merry Wives of Windsor is 3 hours long, so we're fair knackered from standing afterwards!
The following day, we'd had enough of standing, so opted for something different, and went to watch parliament in session at the House of Commons. I didn't realise, but the Parliament is housed in the Palace of Westminster, and there is a hall at its entrance which dates from like 1099, and is where Sir William Wallace had his trial in 1305 and where the royals, most recently the Queen mum, lie in state. There were bugger all MP's in the chamber on a Friday at midday, but there were a few from the opposition giving the government minister present hell over a bill designed to audit the costs and benefits of being a member of the EU. Enthralling stuff it was not. We stopped off at Abbey Road on our way home, and snuck some quick pics of ourselves marching across the pedestrian crossing outside EMI records, ah la, the cover of the Beatles Abbey Road record!
The 3 of us watched the AB's thrash the Poms in the second test and as the weather was pretty shit (for the first time since arriving though mind you), we checked out the Tate Modern. We left sure in our opinion that modern art is a crock, that we would all be capable of producing something fit for the Tate Modern, and bloody glad it was free to get it! We rounded off our Saturday, in typical London style, down at the pub for tea and pints watching Euro 2008. Soccer is kinda growing on me lol!
I spent the first 3 days of last week flat hunting. Looked at something mad like 25 places over the 3 days, mostly all double studios for just the two of us, before deciding to share a flat instead. We had to be out of the hostel by this Sunday just gone, so took a room in a flat we liked and organised to move in on Sunday.
Last Thursday, Vee and I treated ourselves to a posh avo tea at the Dorchester Hotel. Champagne, finger sandwiches (yes including cucumber and cream cheese), scones with jam and clotted cream (does the cream go on top or beneath the jam??) and delicious cakes. Ooh la la.
On Friday we keenly headed off to Wimbledon, not really knowing what to expect. We got there at midday, and hit the end of the queue and were given a queue card showing us to be approximately the 9000th person to arrive and join the queue. We queued for a couple of hours, deciding to leave when the drizzle started, but not before quizzing the stewards on a good time to arrive the following morning to get in. We stocked up on food and drink for queueing on Saturday, including the must have strawberries and left the hostel at 5am, catching the tube and arriving at 6.30am. We were dismayed to see the queue of campers in front of us, but stoked when our queue cards are numbered in the 3000's. We're guaranteed to get in on a Ground Pass for £20 and be able to watch any games on courts 3 - 19. Kiwi Marina Erakovic is playing first up at 12pm on Court 11, yahoo! We kill time in the queue before the gates open at 10.30 by reading mags and newspaper and get into the grounds at 11am, make our way to Court 11 and get awesome seats amongst all the other Kiwis. Marina lost in a close 3-setter, but it was definitely a game that was hers for the taking. We watched some bits of other games and then at 5pm headed to the re-sale office to queue once more for second hand £5 tickets to centre court to watch Nadal play Kiefer. Got in about 7.30pm when it was about 5-4 in the first set. Centre Court was AWESOME as was watching Nadal play!
On Sunday we moved outta the hostel and into a flat in Fulham/Hammersmith. Its about 10 mins walk from the Hammersmith tube stations, which is handy for Ryan to get to work. Its a really nice area and nice flat. There's another kiwi couple, a Welsh guy and an Aussie, who is moving out on Thurs and filling his room with someone else. We've got a big bedroom and en-suite and there's 2 kitchen / living rooms, one downstairs which we use and one upstairs. Its nice to be outta the hostel, not sure how long we'll stay as the lease is only until end of October.
That's about it for now, I promise that I'll try and get some pictures up on our blog and facebook!
Catch ya'll later, and keep the emails from home coming.
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