Durham

Me and shenay at Durham castle!

High art

Just browsing some art at the Muse Dorse.

Like the old saying says, I don't know art but I know what I like.

Trip to Paris- 16th-18th Jan

We went to Paris this week, it was a Xmas pressie from Ross to me, as our last little trip just the two of us before the baby is born... we had a brill time, apart from me getting more tired.. but we stopped off in alot of cafe's for breaks which was nice anyway.

The pictures above are of me in Jardin Du Luxenburg, which was a lovely walk.. and a picture of Ross in out favourite cafe we always go to when we go to Paris, the Cafe Panis, right next to Notre Dame... this was as soon as we got there, 10.30am english time and ross was already on the red wine, but then again it was the best red wine we've ever tasted Bouilly mmmmm god i was dying to have some...

Baby shower

Hi guys....here's the pictures from the baby shower.

They are all in this website: http://www.flickr.com/photos/rosswigham/sets/72157594476617368

Thanks for all the presents and for coming. and thanks to my mum for making the food.

Posted by PIN!!

Busy harbour

The ships are stacked in pretty tight - wouldn't want to drive one of those through.

Rickshaw traffic jam

Taxis are an absolute nightmare to get hold of, so these are the easiest if not the cheapest way to get back after a night out.

Raffles or Regency super mart?

I've heard quite a few people dismissing Singapore for being too modern and overly built up compared to all the other countries in South East Asia. As it's normally rich, middle class white people saying it I've always found it a bit hollow as if they should all be living in mud huts and walking round barefoot.

It is far more commercial tahn anywhere else in that area and there are lots of shopping centres and international chains which is a bit of a shame, but's there's also loads of well preserved old buildings and natural areas.

Although you don't need to stay there all that long I thought it was really interesting to see the contrast between here and other places in the region.

Why did the tourist cross the road

Although the roads in Singapore are pretty bust they're also well ordered and completely organised. They do all roadworks at night and have timers on the crossings. Once the green man comes on you get exactly 30 seconds to get across the road before the traffic starts. In Britain that would probably be a rough guide, but over there once the time is up the cars are coming ready or not.

It's good in one way becuase the timer also tells you how long until the next green man will come on again, but it also acts as a bit of a challenge, if you get there and the timer is on 3 seconds do you chance it and sprint across about 9 lanes?

I think the drivers take it as a personal insult if you do try to beat them across - we saw a group of English public school boys give it a go, swanning across in their collars-up rugby shirts, before having to dodge moving cars who seemed to be actullay trying to hit them. Good for them!

Happy New year

The first day of 2007....seven years since the Millenium....Time seems to be speeding up!

Despite the freezing cold we went for a walk to try and freshen up a bit. If you ever go out for a meal with someone who isn't drinking alcohol it's really hard to judge the pace you should be going at. Really they should provide you with a pace setter like they do in the athletics or you end up flying through beers, bottles of wine, champaigne, window lean.....

Because we were meeting friends for New Years Day I didn't go to the match, which turned out to be one of the best for years.

Happy New Year!

NYE

Despite the opportunity for extreme drunkenness, I always think there’s something mildly depressing about New Year’s Eve. You’re another year older, the bars are all packed with once-a-year drinkers, you have to pay to get into the tatty boozer where they would normally pay you to come in and there’s that determined air of forced fun that you usually only find in America.

Because Pinar can’t drink we needed to find something a bit different to do this year, something that didn’t involve trailing round bars and house parties watching me get drunk. We ended up going into Newcastle having a meal, watching some live music then coming home and it was actually much better than the usual run on Dec 31.

Christmas TV

There’s only so many episodes of the Two Ronnies or Eastenders Christmas specials you can watch committing serious crimes, especially locked in the house over the festive holiday.

With TV plumbing unprecedented levels of shitness this year we went over to the Area for a bit of a break. The Blue Planet live is just like watching Planet Earth at home on your TV, except you have 18 meter screen and a 76 piece orchestra playing the music.

If anything the screen was a bit too big but it was a really good way to spend a night and a really eclectic mix of people.

Happy Christmas

If you're reading in Sydney Pinar went to the beach on Christmas day as well!

Sorry for waking you up with our phone call...we got the times wrong!

Wedding of the Turks

this is a turkish wedding we went to last night in london, it was very traditional. We actually had a good time.. and done abit of dancing of our own....

Empty London

Maybe it's the time of year but getting into the centre of London was unusually easy. Instead of the usual hustle and bustle, flurry of elbows and dodging of crackheads, I got an easy stroll to the station and jumped on an almost deserted train. In fact there was only one other person on it which is unheard of.

London would be a joy if it was like this every time. Still, it was only a day later it got it's own back when it took us 2 hours to drive 15 miles on a Sunday. Great.

Signs

Dubious health claims from cigarette firm and a dangerously ambiguous advert for sauce!

Old school

We went over to Beamish the other week to see how they lived in them old days. The place is a spooky reconstruction of 1914 with the whole area fenced off and set-up excatly how it was. They have actors walking around in period dress, a tram, a steamtrain and a whole village where you can basically walk around and take in the sights of vintage Britain.

The place has grown loads over the years and has a manor house, a mine!, a farm and all sorts of other things to see. You can go into all the houses/shops/banks etc and see how they did things in those days and they even have a fully working pub.

The Victorian dentist is always a favorite, but the sweet shop has all the old classics sold by the quarter.

It's pretty crazy walking round and seeing all the actors really hamming it up - I kept expecting them to mafuntion like those yul brinner robots in westworld! (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0070909/)

First day in Singapore

Our first day in Singapore was a bit of an ordeal because the long flight and change of time zones meant we had missed a full nights sleep. To make things worse the hotel wasn't ready when we got there so we had to walk round like zombies for a while.

To make matters worse we got caught in a cloud burst and when it rains there it really rains. Still it was over in a few minutes and it was back to being red hot. It feels like you're getting slowly steamed.

Singapore is great though - a strange mix of old and new, modern and ancient.

back to the future

The promise of a free scarf for every season ticket holder was anticipated with a bit of trepedation - I suppose we're all used to getting it in the neck of these lot.

Surprisingly the scarfs were of a really high quality and the event seemed to do the trick.

The goal-induced scarf twirling celebrations were like something out of the 1930's, all that was missing were those old claxon rattle things.

the sleeping turtle

a sleepy turtle, a killer shark and the most dangerous beast of teh sea - the stingray!

The killer of poor old steve irwin this one looks pretty angry. Later on the trip, I'd come face to face with one while diving in Fiji. That was before the Irwin slaying and it would never have occured to me that they coule be dangerous.

The one I saw off Fiji was really playfull and seemingly harmless.

I was more concerned with looking out for sharks and when I cut my arm on some coral I would have beaten Ian thorpe's time with the speed I swam back to shore. Pinar says she's never seen anyone swim so fast but i wasn't taking any chances, the blood flowing behind me was like an invitation to jaws.

underwater world

A rainy day in Aukland and a trip to Kelly Tarlton's underwater world. It was a pretty good way to spend the afternoon and the penguin house was particularly cool. They had a good arctic exhibition as well, with all the stuff from Captain Scott's doomed trip.