Raelene and Chris in Europe

Monday, 20 October 2008

Location: Monaco

Hi Folks,

Well, time just keeps slipping through our fingers here. Our weeks are passing by so fast now. Our life has resumed to a somewhat normal function, "boulot, metro, dodo" but we are starting to plan our upcoming adventures and are enjoying doing things with friends on the weekends.

Our biggest saga for the last two months has been a broken washing machine. It broke on our return from Beijing so we have been making weekly trips to the laundrymat ever since. In typical french style it has taken seven weeks to resolve and finally a replacement delievered! I never thought I would be so happy to hear the sound of a washing machine!!

Friday night, we enjoyed a French "raclette" dinner with our friends Emese and David. This is the first time we had tried this meal and are now fans. It is similar to fondue but eaten more with charcuterie then vegetables and bread.

Saturday night, I was kindly offered a ticket from Julie and Thomas to see Giselle performed by the ballet Nationale de Paris in Monaco. This is the most beautiful ballet I have ever seen. More so it was engaging and would leave any little girl dreaming of being a ballerina. The ballet company is apparently the third best in the world and I would have no doubt. They performed with such finesse and grace that it hardly seemed as physically demanding as it really is.

We are very much enjoying our time here now and well, it simply feels normal. Sunday morning as I headed to the bakery it occured to me just how "normal" such things I was doing had become. To stop at the bakery and buy a baguette after work, go to the ballet, watch CSI in French - it is all normal now! We think less about what things were like in Australia and now start to consider that we may just have culture shock on our return:) We are still undecided as to how much longer we will stay here, but definitely through till November next year. After that, we will see what happens - only time will tell! But, we will be making a brief trip back to Australia in late April/early May for Chris's sisters' wedding so hope to catch up with everyone then.

Ciao, ciao Rae.

Saturday, 04 October 2008

Location: Nice, France

Meetings...by helicopter

Yes as Rae mentioned before it is a tough life here...I have to fly between my meetings by business class and helicopter !!

I had to fly to Canada for a committee meeting which I am part of with the world anti-doping agency. Then flying straight back I arrived at 8:15am in the morning and had to attend an IAAF meeting at 9am....of course Monaco is too far away to make that trip so quickly so I was forced to take the 7 minute helicpoter trip to be dropped off outside the hotel for my meeting !!! Ok so it was probably a once in a life time thing but for now I am enjoying pretending to be a VIP business person....wont last that is for sure


In other news life is quiet now that both Rae and I have finished our summer travels. The next trip is Rae to Guatemala in November for a week which should be heaps of fun (and work to), and then we have booked a trip to NY, USA for Christmas which we are very much looking forward to....saving our money for that one so we can sample the best NY has to offer at Xmas time.

Sunday, 28 September 2008

Location: Lausanne, Switzerland

Chris goes back to school.

that's right, I have now decided I dont' have enough to do already and will start studying! Actually it was a combination of a lot of things - but bascially Rae wanted to stay another year over here in France and while my job was not changing - it was a good chance to study as well, and I can only do this course while I am working with an International Federation. It is a Masters in Sports Administration run by the IOC. Only people working in the "olympic family" can apply which means not only will I have the Masters degree but also one that not many other people have which should help a lot when looking for other jobs in sport.

The course is split in 4 modules. The first was from 21-28 September in Lasuanne. The next will be January in Austria, then April in Jordan and finally September again in Lausanne. Each week long module we have lectures and course work on different parts of sports management. The first module was on strategic management and the lecturers are normally successful people in the industry.

There are around 30 of us doing the course and we come from all over the worl. Most people work with their national olympic committee or something similar. Luckily there are a few other quite young people that I made friends with and we had a good time...makes studying more fun. I am looking forward to meet them again in the next module in Innsbruk, Austria - and to do a bit of skiing in our spare time!

Between now and then I need to do the literature review for my project and write around 2,000 words on it. By the end of the year I have to submit a 15,000 word report and then do a presentation. My topic seems to change daily, but basically invovles researching the best electronic communication methods to use when educating athletes on various subjects.

Lucky for me I have to parents who either work at universities or specialise in statistics...makes my job easier !!!!

So for now - no more weekends for me.....head down in the books again - but at least this time it is really fun, on enjoyable topics with a great group of people...and I get to travel for it (paid by work of course!)

Ciao

Chris

Thursday, 25 September 2008

Location: Monaco

Bonjour!

Chris is currently in Lausanne doing the first module of his masters course while I am keeping busy with work as usual.
He will return Sunday only to leave again Wednesday for a meeting in Canada. He then returns back to Nice Saturday morning but has meetings all weekend....he is one busy boy!! Best part is that on his return Saturday he will take the helicopter between Nice airport and Monaco to save time! Oh, it is an executive life!! For me, I head off to Portugal next Friday for a four day work trip, so a nice easy one this time...touch wood.

Today they have a Banana Moon factory outlet sale here in Monaco. The other girls in the office geared me up for it...and let's just say that it was an experience. Okay, so everyone knows the French like clothes, well they just LOVE when clothes go on sale. This sale was admittedly dirt cheap for a brand name, but boy do the French ladies know how to shop. This place was packed to the rafters with women trawling through countless cardboard boxes searching for every piece of clothing imaginable - underwear, swimmers, ski gear, jackets, jeans, jumpers, shoes, skirts, t-shirts...you name it they had it! I pity the odd guy who mistakingly agreed to accompany his lady-friend. Chris would have felt tortured! When I met one of my colleagues coming out after her shopping expedition (French/Italian - so has double the shopping genes) she gave me a few extra pointers "...and don't feel shy to use your elbows!" Oh, that sends me laughing now...but she was right! If you even wanted a chance to look in a box you had to be determined and throw your body in the line. Anyhow, little old me, a little overwhelmed by the prowess of the French woman took it easy and just made a few purchases - a total of 5 items compared to the average 20! You were given a cardboard box as the shopping basket as you entered and boy did people fill them up! The line to get to the cash register took 30 minutes...now that is patience and perserverence :) All in all it was an experience but I think from now on I will be the day-after-sales-day-opening kind of girl...lol.

Saturday, 20 September 2008

Location: Tartu, Estonia

Well the World roganing Championships are over and we aren't world champions - but we did put in a world champion effort.

I should probably start at the start and explain what rogainig is to the people who don't know. Basically it is orienteering, but the event lasts for 24 hrs (noon until noon). There are many check points spread out in a forest worth differing amount of points depending on how difficult they are to find. You aim is as a team to visit as many as possible in the 24 hrs.

I (Chris...because Rae would never do something so silly) have done a number of these events before in Australia. This time I joined up with Luke and Sharon who are travelling the world for a year. We met at Helsinki airport and caught a ferry over to Estonia which took 2.5 hours (one of those great ones with full supermarkets on board..which was a bit strange). We didn't arrive in Tallin until midnight and caught a taxi to our campsite. Actually we thought our trip might end there as the taxi driver took us through this strange route and ended up parked in what looked to us like an old warehouse area! we thought he was going to kick us out and steal our stuff!! but no..apparently this was the camping site...turns out the camping area was about 10 square metres of grass in the middle of an industrial area - photos on the right.

The next day we caught a bus out to the event site and set up our camp in preperation for the next day. At 10am the next day we are given the map to the event showing where the check points are - and we had two hours to plan our route. In typical Sharon and Luke style we are standing on the start line and the starter is counting down from 30sec when they srart arguing if they have actually packed the headlights or not (kinds of necessary as we will be walking in the dark!!) so as the 350 other teams rush off from the start line we are still sitting down sorting through our backpacks !!! not a good start. But when we get going things are great and we are finding all our check points with no trouble. Unfortunately that is when the problems start - about 4 hrs into the event Sharon picks up an old injury which slows down our pace a lot. Still she struggles through...linping the whole way but toughing it out in an amazing way. Well we continue until nearly 2am in the morning and doing really well - but it is clear that Sharons legs are no good and we slowly head back to the event central - the benefit is we get a warm meal !!! We decided to go to bed and try again in the morning. Sharons legs are still really sore but again she makes an amazing effort to try and continue. Unfortunately it doesn't really work and we end near the bottom of all the teams...but condiering we only really did half of the time it is ok. And what is more we had a great time (well maybe not Sharon). It really is a character building event and we will be back for more.

The only thing about it is that we got quite wet!! Well I guess that was always going to be the case when it had been their wettest August for some time and then the descriptions on the map included "bog", "marsh", "boggy marsh", "impassable marsh", "wet ditch".....we spoke to some teams who had tried to take short cuts and ended up walking in waist deep water for over an hour !!!!!!!!!

We caught the bus back the that same evening and the next day I said goodbye to L&S as they continue on their trip and I head home to work the next day !!!!

Saturday, 06 September 2008

Location: Nice, France

Went to the Nice Fete du Port tonight and it was great.

Basically it was heaps of food stalls and other displays set up around the old port in Nice. The great things about these events as compared to Australia perhaps is that everyone comes down to them. There were thousands and thousands of people there creating a great athmosphere. Going to these things makes us really keen to make sure we do the same whenever we get back to Aus. For example we never went to the multicultural festival in Canberra..not sure why not but now we would definitely make the effort.

I mentioned the food - but it was a bit more than that. They had actually classed it as "slow food" in direct competition with fast food. around 10 top chefs from the city had each produced a small plate of food and all the plates were 5 Euro each. So you basically lined up at each stall (it took a while especially at the popular ones) and chose a couple of plates that appealled to you. Then when you had them you sat down at one of the hundreds of communal tables and had your meal in the company of the complete stranges :)

So we ate really well and then ended the night watching the fireworks before wandering home on foot two very contented Nice residents.

Friday, 05 September 2008

Location: Beijing, China

Well it has been nearly a month since the Games finished and trying to write about them is a bit like trying to write about your wedding after 5 years....you know it was fantastic and you know what happened, you just can't remember all the details (well the guys at least...maybe the girls remember all the minute details).

Anyway - for this reason I can't really give a full account of what happened in the last portion of the games.

I did say that Rae nearly caused an Olympic size scandal. Well she was eating one of her "lunches" provided by the local organisers where she was working in the stadium. Apparently the meals were so bad that even the local volunteers didn't like them, but Rae was trying to be polite and eat it...well that was until she found a finger nail in her food!! Well she tried to be polite and just put it to the side, but one of the volunteers noticed, and alterted their boss, who altered their boss, who alerted their boss....etc etc everyone came down to see the famous finger nail including the boss of the olympic food services. At one stage Rae thought they were going to call the President of the IOC himself that is how big a fuss they were making...I guess they don't want to offend VIP's like Rae. Anyway it all worked out well as they ditched the dodgy lunches for Rae and brought in fresh fruit platters each day for her :)

Rae's events went really well despite the heavy rain for the mens event. I think Rae has sent an email with the details so I won't write more here. If you are interested in the events you can visit www.pentathlon.org which is their website and Rae her self updates the content so you can be sure it is top notch :)

We saw heaps more events that I just about forget them all. The Womens basketball final was memorable for being disapointing to see the Aussies play so badly and lose easily. Chris saw the semi finals of the mens basketball including the American team. Again it was bizzare to see the cheapest tickets being scalped outside the stadium for over 1000 euro....but the stadium only 60 % full....didn't really make a good athmosphere.

We saw lots of athletics including an Aussie silver medal in the womens hurdles and the amazing 200m world record for Usain Bolt. I saw the old world record by Michael Johnson created at the Atlanta Olympics and it was commonly thought that it might last 30 or 40 years....well not any more !!!!

Saw some triathlon, diving, beach volleyball and much more. We also got lucky to get some tickets to the final of the womens handball...which as we previoulsy noted is now one of our favourite sports (although the mens is the best). The final wasn't memorable for the event - but more so for the fact that we enjoyed a private suite with free food and drinks !!!! Being married to Rae certainly had its benefits during the games !!! In fact during the basketball final she left me in the cheap seats in order to go sit in the IOC seats so that she got lots of free drinks and food and of course a better view !!!!!!

So that is about all I can remember. Of course we brought it all to an end with tickets to the closing ceremony. WE celebrated in style by attending a fundraising dinner which cost a fortune per table...but we got for free for one reason or another which I won't go into now but Rae's contacts are great :) It was hosted by Carl Lewis and we got him to sign out closing ceremony ticket which was pretty cool. The food was great and filled us up nicely for the walk over to the stadium nearby. The ceremony itself was awesome as expected. We had great seats again right in the middle and looking down on the action.


Oh yeah - forgot to say we went out to the Great wall. It was just as expected...but still inspires each time. Photos on the right. We didn't get anytime to do all the activities that we wanted (Rae did have to work after all) but are inspired to go back for a longer visit though Beijing and also the Chinese country side.

I will leave it there and no doubt bore lots of people with further details when we speak on the phone

Chris and Rae

Tuesday, 26 August 2008

Location: Beijing, China

Home time.

We are heading back tomorrow morning (car picks us up for the airport at 4:30 am). Didn't help that they made a mistake and rang us at 4:30 this morning saying the car was ready !!

Anyway have been way to busy with work (Rae), or watching events (Chris) that we haven't found time to update on all the happenings, so that will have to wait until we return. Ontop of things I laready promised to update - we will write about the closing ceremony, Australia v USA in the basketball final and sitting in private boxes watching the handball finals.

Oh yeah - and we also visited the Great Wall today which was excellent.....

speak to everyone soon when we are home

Rae and Chris

Thursday, 21 August 2008

Location: Beijing, China

Sorry - no time for updates - too busy watching events all day (ell I am, Rae is working). First day of competition for Rae today so she will be busy.

When I find a spare moment, possibly tomorrow afternoon will try and upload some more photos and a quick update on what we have been up to. Seen some great world records on the track, have visited the athletes village, and Rae has been causing olympic controversy with discoveries in her food.....updates coming soon.

Feeling bad because neither of us have visited a single cultural / tourist destination....but we will try and squeeze a few days of that in at the end which should be a nice change.

Ok - off to watch my first ever modern pentathlon event which goes for 12 hours !!!!

Chris