I will start off with the background of the tattoo:

I know a lot of you will be curious or sceptical about the title of this blog; Friends saying: "I thought he was against tattoos!", Parent's saying: "Tattoos ruin your body and job prospects!" and the sceptics thinking; "Is he talking about someone else?". Well, here are the answers; I am against tattoos which hold no meaning, are in visible places in office clothes and yes, I'm talking about me! I got a tattoo.

So if I'm against tattoos; What have I got, where and why?! You will have seen the picture now, so that's what I've got, the meaning: On the surface, it depicts travelling 'down under' to the other side of the world and that it is always my intention to return, for however long. Something that may hold future meaning too if I decide to live over here, I will always come back time after time to see those closest to me. But the deeper meaning started in Brisbane, in August, when I was feeling down, really down. Those who have kept up with my blog will recall I was close to going home, this was an emotionally testing time, but one which was followed by my best time I've had in Australia; working at Thala Beach Lodge. I'm sure you've worked out from that, the up and down signifies the ups and downs of travelling. It isn't all sunshine and rainbows, having a great time and partying with other backpackers, there are low times, but these low times make the high times better. Oh and the dots in aboriginal art mean travel.

I have it on the inside of my left bicep, hidden from view unless I were to wave my arm in the air whilst topless or wearing a very short sleeved top. I was going to get it on my back, but decided I don't have it for anyone else, or as a display piece of art, I want it somewhere close to heart and not obvious to others unless I show them.

10/03/13

The start of my birthday week and a fortnight which will be filled with more fun than I've had in the past 9 weeks! I'm currently sat in the airport café which opened at 5am, my time until that point wasn't so bad. I got kicked out of the airport at 10pm, and was able to fill my time playing my uke and I could just get enough wifi from the Qantas arrivals lounge to have a voice only skype call to the parents. I watched an episode of spartacus and got 2 hours sleep. I woke up at 3am when the security guard was unlocking the doors meaning I could go into the warmth with decent internet connection and plug sockets. I filled the time then with a couple more skype calls and a few youtube videos Jim cared to send me. It's 06:25 and I must add here, that every time I have done this all nighter style stopover, I get a horrible overtired feeling of anxiety, which I won't be able to shake until I get a few more hours sleep. Maybe I'll pick them up in Melbourne Airport whilst I'm waiting for Selina. I found a quote about travelling yesterday which sums up every overnight stopover I've had whilst travelling: "Your true traveller finds boredom rather agreeable than painful. It is the symbol of his liberty - his excessive freedom. He accepts his boredom, when it comes, not merely philosophically, but almost with pleasure". It's a bit pretentious but what I take from it is that the boredom and time wasting I do here or at other airports are a necessity for the enjoyment that peruses. A kind of 'without the bitter, the sweet just aint as sweet' moment.

Holy s*** it's hot! My first internal exclamation as I stepped foot off the plane. I'm now in the arrivals 'lounge' as I wait for Selina (standard) this area is a shed made of corrugated iron, and in a heat which is only rising, the heat intensifies.

11/01/13

Where to start? Where to f***ing start! Today has been one f*** up after the next. We got up and grabbed breakfast, I confirmed my dive with bayplay and set the time for 2pm. 11am we set off. Thought it would be enough time. However, when on the train to Frankston (to get the bus to Portsea) I checked the times on my phone. I wouldn't get there until 3:30. I didn't realise, and out of character, didn't check how long it would take. Selina had gone to St. Kilda for the day and to see if she could get a tattoo at the same time as me but because it's bank holiday monday, the tattoo shop is shut. I decided to go and see Selina and try to reschedule the dive, but tomorrow all the divemasters are busy with school children and Wednesday is my tattoo, I can't do it. They were really good about it though and said I can hire equipment, so me and Selina will go and do that tomorrow. On my way back, in this ridiculously sweaty day, I get on the tram, miss the stop and have to backtrack to catch the linking tram. Then it was time for another scew up; I got on the right tram, just going the wrong way. I got off at Caulfield, and finally back on track to get back to St Kilda beach. So glad I have my swim shorts and towel with me, I really need a dip in the water to cool off, and I mean that in both senses of the phrase. I think spending too much time with Selina is screwing with my organisation and time keeping.

13/03/13

Well, happy birthday to me! Got that's sad. It's 8:54 and I've already received birthday messages from people back home which is a lovely way to wake up! Monday (11th) night Me and Selina went to the Neighbours night and my god, what a night. I really wasn't expecting it to be messy at all. I'll try to piece together what happened; To start with we arrived at the bar and found it swarming with attractive girls, around the 20-24 mark. This is a welcome change from Tasmania, and it seems to be the case all over Melbourne. But I knew we were going through to another room and assumed these young people were just at the bar and wouldn't be going in to the neighbours night. How wrong I was! The place was swarming with British and Irish backpackers and the night followed suit. I was on a table with Selina and about 6 other girls who managed to stitch me up, writing a message to Alan Fletcher (Karl Kennedy) saying that we met before and does he remember me, so when he came on stage, he played along, asking had we met before and started singing happy birthday. Libby and Mal joined him on stage and the quiz started. There were mid-quiz games to win prizes and stuff, the first of which was a singing competition, which I avoided, but a few more beers and my confidence was ready to make a fool out of myself. The second one was a dancing competition?! I'm there! I didn't win, clearly. But I still got a $100 voucher for an Australian Tour opporator, don't know how/when I can use that, but still. Got something for my efforts. The rest of the night is a little hazy, but it involved shots, more beer, having a bloody good time with people we've just met, and eventually leaving the bar at about 1:30. Then we have yesterday. A day I wish I could have skipped most of. Me and Selina took the tram/train/bus to Portsea, a casual 3.5hr journey for the dive which was a snorkel. We saw a gurt off stingray and plenty of cool fish, it was great, I just wish it was closer. My hangover didn't need the journey there, or back. We got back and our group grew in numbers by 1, Ben had arrived. We monged out, watched some tv and went to the park. Yes, the park, what of it? We played on the swings and our group grew again by 1, Lloren arrived! I like reunions, always the 'Are things going to be the same?' Are they going to be awkward and I can tell you, it was awesome to see her again. We went back to the apartment and watched hot fuzz, drank some wine, ate some pizza, cheese and grapes (because we're classy like that) and then hit the hay. This takes us up until today; My Birthday! As I said on facebook, the past 3 years I've spent in 3 different countries; UK, Ireland and Australia! I wonder where I'll be next year!

I wasn't going to write any more today, but we've got a bit of down time in the apartment to chill out, freshen up and eat. I have my tattoo, my design, my philosophy and it was changed. Altered last minute by my dear friend; Selina. I changed from having both sides shaded with the dots white, to one side plain with the dots shaded and the other shaded with white dots, which fits in with the whole 'yin-yang' thing too.

15/03/13

So much has happened in the last 2 days, my birthday 'night out' wasn't a pub crawl as I was expecting, Lloren invited us to join her and her mates for all you can eat chicken wings. I don't want to eat another chicken in my life. I managed 31, which was surpassed by Selina, who got to 32. Ben managed 47 and some of the other guys topped 50. I was so close to being sick, it was unreal. We finished at 10pm, because the kitchen closed, and we weren't going out any time soon. The 4 of us; Ben, Lloren, Selina and me went back to the apartment, had a rest and got on it. Drinking games which consistently screwed me over, mainly due to my own error, but by the time we were all drunk, with the amount of chicken wings we were sleepy drunk and all hit the hay. This was about 1ish, I think I got to sleep about 3am.

We all woke up late and monged out, not hungover but just pretty tired but in the mood for a hangover day. We went to the library to use the internet and wow, the Victoria state library in Melbourne is not to be sniffed at! The area I saw was filled with PCs, Macs and consoles. Yes. 2 xboxes with kinect, wii's, another couple of xboxes with controller games. What is this place?! Easily the best library I've ever been in. We walked home via Aldi to get some food, steak was on the menu as it's the 14th March ;-) Ben went to his relatives house out of the city for a bbq and to maybe get us a place for the nights between leaving the apartment and leaving for the GOR. Me and Selina had a nap, because we're hardcore, watched the inbetweeners and headed to Lloren's for a few drinks. At the tram stop things got a bit emotional as we realised this is basically it for a minimum of 10 months. Drink helped and we went out with what felt like half of essex! Ben rejoined us later but for the 2nd night in a row, I couldn't drink to my normal standard. When I was sober in a club at about 2am I left the club, sat on the curb and scoffed a pieface with Lloren. Oh, and Ben's relatives had said that we can crash for a couple of nights.

This morning my alarm went off at 9:20, which means 2 things; Selina had already left, and Lloren's alarm at 8:30 had already gone off. She left in a hurry and I'm sure Selina did too as she forgot a few things. Apparently she did say goodbye but I must have been dead to the world as I can't remember waking up at all. When me and Ben packed up and left the weather was cool, a nice breeze considering the warm weather we've had. We got to Robyn and Michael's house and a nice warm welcome. I grabbed a shower and off we went, back into town. Ben was meeting an old uni friend for lunch which gave me a couple of hours to play with, I went to the library to use the internet, and when Ben met back up with me, he took me to Federation square, a place I recognised from the tv when the tennis was on. Walking towards the centre, there was a piano with a sign on. I expected it to say "Please do not play" or something like that because it was 'art' or something. Turns out the sign said "Please feel free to tinkle, but be careful, I am very old and the only one they have". I sat down and played a few songs. Stopping and starting, improvising at points and knocking out some well known classics like star wars and james bond. During my playing I had a few people take pictures of me, pictures of their friends next to me and sometimes people filming as if I was a busker or I wheeled my own piano there to play! When I finished, we were about to leave and this man approached me, asking if it was me who was playing star wars. I replied that it was indeed, to which he asked if I would like the opportunity to play on film and do a bit of acting too. I've just been talent scouted! Obviously; I couldn't do it. But it felt good. The rest of the day we searched for a pub that would show the 6 nations, and we've found one. I won't be missing the final weekend. England getting the grand slam in Wales! Bring it on.

16/03/13

Refreshed. A cheeky 12 hour sleep puts us in good stead for the rugby tonight, I've got a wash on and I've sorted through a load of photos. A decent 'sort your life out' day today. I realised I haven't written much about Melbourne in general! Yesterday, with Federation square and not having to be anywhere or do anything for a period of time gave me a chance to reflect on the city and I've come to the conclusion that I like it. A lot more than Sydney, and probably a bit more than Brisbane. Things I'd heard about it were all true, coffee culture, the 'quirkiness' and how artsy it is. But one thing that didn't match up was the weather 'You can have 4 seasons in one day' I heard frequently. But all week it's been warm, sunny and just great. Until today, it started off blue sky and sunshine, I look up and it's now raining, well, pissing it down. In half an hour there was a drastic change. Maybe I better wait for my jeans to finish in the wash before I go anywhere. Tonight may be the last time I see Lloren, we're going out for food and she's going to the Grand Prix tomorrow and leaves for Sydney Monday Morning.

17/03/13

Last night was a big one, the plan was for me to go to dinner with Lloren, meet up with Ben later and watch all 3 rugby matches through the night before having a Guinness breakfast and going home to bed. It was all going fine until I was flagging half way through the Scotland, France match. Me and Lloren walked a while before finding an Indian place for food and I foolishly went for a Rogan Josh, on par with the Korean food I had earlier in the week, I was close to crying as I took numerous breaks from my extremely hot curry. We went for drinks after and I had one of those 'step back' moments. I have fun when I'm with her, it's a shame she's going back to the UK so soon, a shame I have everything planned out. But hopefully if all goes well, we'll meet again, either in the UK or if she comes to Asia in the summer. We went on to meet Ben and his mate 'Mr Skins' in the pub up the road and to waste time before the first match at 1:30. Me and Lloren said a heartfelt good bye as we heard someone should "FINGER HER MILKYBOY!", the Welsh were in town. When we got to the 24hr pub, the Welsh out numbered us 6-1, probably with only 6 English. But the atmosphere, although lacking in the Italian/Ireland match, was phenomenal. The Welsh were loud and boisterous, but modest at the end, one of the things I truly love rugby, shaking hands after the game and agreeing that Enlgand played terribly. OH! One crazy thing happened! Before the match, I saw a girl who I thought I recognised, from Blue Parrot, in Sydney! Bee! That was nuts. So as I was saying, we left the bar when it closed at 6:40am and headed to the casino to watch the Scotland/France game. But by 7:15 I was a nodding dog. The bouncer picked up on it and we decided to call it quits. Still not a bad effort. We got home about 9:30am and slept until 2/4pm ish. My body clock is now all over the place. I had breakfast at 7pm and Lunch/Dinner at 8pm. I'm stuffed, kind of tired and not sure what's happening, but tomorrow morning we're hitting the Great Ocean Road!

Melbourne was great, a hectically busy, expensive, entertaining and emotional week. Because of all this, I didn't really get to experience the city itself and form a valued opinion on it. It's just too vast and too much is going on to make that in 1 week. But the people that have lived here swear by it and I can understand why. The pure idea that you can go out for a day, walk around, see things and experience things that you wouldn't ever see again without spending a penny is brilliant. I will be back here, to see it and live it properly, when, I don't know, but I will... I will.