And so the year begins ...

Getting back into the swing of things at work - and I'm doing a new CSS Positioning course at LVS, which is great. I do feel like my CSS knowledge is increasing and I'm understanding it all a lot more (not just copying and pasting code without being sure why it's used!)

Have been to yoga class about 3 times - great. I do need that discipline! But also someone else at my work is wanting to do yoga at lunchtimes so that should continue this year - hoorray. Going well - except for the arm balance one. I seem to be scared of falling and now can hardly get one foot off the floor, let alone 2!!

I'm also in the process of getting set up at home with ADSL and wireless. Well, I can't afford to do it all at once so got the Apple Airport Express first. That let's you connect to the internet wirelessly, and also (wonder of wonders) let's you stream your iTunes music collection to your home stereo. So it can play through those speakers. What I didn't realise was that you can only connect wirelessly via ADSL/DSL/cable. Don't know if this has always been the case, or just now that cable is becoming the dominant way of connecting.

And I still need to work out quite how to connect to my stereo's amplifier! I've plugged it in somewhere, but no music is coming through! Hopefully I'll get my head around it soon!!

On my computer (not my stereo yet!!): Malcolm McLaren's Fans - Lauretta

Woodford Folk Festival

Well - Woodford is over for another year ... Such an amazing 6-7 days ... I did yoga, drove musicians to where they were performing, listened to heaps of wonderful and different music, rehearsed and sang in the festival choir, danced my feet off, sweltered in the 40degC + heat, and cooled down sitting in shady places ... Ate wonderful food, met up with friends, talked for hours, slept a little bit! And lots more!

Yoga wasn't ashtanga - run by a group called Radiant Light yoga. Still, so good to do yoga though, and a lot of the poses were the same. I'd done a bit of yoga in the week before down at my Mum's place in Bowral, but it was good to do a class for 3 days.

Really, 'Woodford Folk Festival' is a bit of a misnomer. Yes, there's some lovely folk music, but there's also heaps of blues, jazz, world, pop, reggae and other music. Pretty much the only music they don't welcome there is country (thank goodness!!!) Plus Tibetan monks, various types of dance, cabaret, circus (lots of that this year), puppets, weird and wonderful street performers and who knows what else!!

Music that I really loved this year included Chris Berry's Panjea, (American band including a wonderful anti-death penalty song - "Why do we kill people ,who kill people, to teach people that killing people is wrong?"!! Right on!!!), Bomba, (fabulous big reggae band), Fruit (3 women singing gorgeous harmonies) and Ash Grunwald - great young Aussie blues/roots singer.

Beautiful patchwork quilt

This is a photo of the beautiful quilt that my wonderful friend Doris in Cardiff gave me ... Isn't it gorgeous?! I was just stunned (although just before I left on my overseas trip I discovered she had made it for me).

Went to yoga last night ... and then when I got home in the evening I was just so exhausted! Don't know why - maybe it's just the whole 'end of year' thing! Don't know what to say about it (my yoga practice). It seems like it's just 'treading water' - waiting till I've had my Christmas break and then start again in January. I've only been able to practice 2-3 times a week this past couple of weeks. Christmas stuff has intervened!

And I've been feeling generally pretty unmotivated! Unmotivated to go out and buy Christmas presents, have not sent a single Christmas card ... maybe it's because I was away till the middle of November, and I just didn't get into the whole Christmas swing!! Ah well - there's always next year! And I saw most of the people I'd be sending Christmas cards to overseas anyway!!

Anyway - off down to Bowral (where my Mum lives) on Saturday. She told me on the phone yesterday she had lined up a whole series of social 'events' that we've been invited to! Visiting people that I haven't seen for a while, so that should be fun (on the whole anyway!)

On my iPod: Faithless - God is a DJ
(gotta love Faithless!)

A Standing Ovation!

We sang the Messiah again on Saturday night at a little country town called Boonah (set it lovely rolling countryside with hills/mountains on 2-3 sides), and we got a standing ovation! It was a beautiful performance - the soloists were wonderful and I just loved it. (Even though I do still get lost in the Amen Chorus at the end!) Really, so much of it can be read as so relevant - I mean, "How Beautiful are the Feet of him that preaches the gospel of peace" - it's about Darshan!!

So, that's it - I've put my score away for another year ...

Yoga is going well, even though I haven't been practicing as much as I'd like ... Marichyasana A is getting easier and easier. B is nowhere near anything! And with C I'm definitely seeing that I can get there, hopefully within the next year.

I finish work for the year at the end of next week. Then I'm off down to my Mum's in New South Wales for Christmas, and back up here on Boxing Day for Woodford (the Woodford folk festival). Yeay - can't wait. That is such a fantastic 6-8 days. I should be able to blog from there - I seem to remember they have an internet cafe setup there ...

on my iPod: the John Butler Trio

India photos

Well, it's long past time I should be here again! (This blog I mean) Feel like I've been in a bit of a daze since I've been back. Constant running (driving) to rehearsals for The Messiah and consequent lack of sleep has no doubt contributed to this state! The first performance is tonight ... Having rehearsed in the cathedral a couple of nights this week I have to say I don't seem to know it as well as I thought I did!! The acoustics make it hard to hear what people around you (ie your voice part) are singing, and of course it's one thing to sing your part on your own, quite another to sing it against 3 other voice parts as part of a 40-50 person choir ... Still I do think it'll be wonderful.

Yoga has taken a definite back seat this week - haven't practiced at all! At least I know I'll be back in class on Monday night ...

Anyway - here are a few of my photos from India - enjoy!

Back in Oz

Here I am, back in sunny Australia (unlike India where I rarely saw the sun!). Got back on Friday night, and after a slight mix-up about being picked up, finally got home around 10.30pm. Mieke pussycat was very pleased to see me!! She tried to tell me she hadn't been fed for the whole 6 weeks I'd been away, but as she was pretty much her usually plump self, I didn't believe her!!!

India already seems a long way away although it's only 4 days ago that I was sitting in a taxi driving through Bangalore to the airport, thinking 'oh, I don't want to leave'!! There's something about India that I really love. But once I got to the airport and was in the departure lounge, it was 'on to the next thing', as it were.

I went to yoga class on Saturday afternoon and spent a lot of time reminiscing with Richard about the time we were there together. The rest of the weekend I lazed around. Did some washing, unpacked my case, but there is a big pile of clothes and stuff on the floor beside my bed that I haven't summoned up the energy to deal with yet!!

Today I've been at work, in a bit of a daze. Just reading emails and telling people about my holiday!! But tonight I absolutely have to drive in to Brisbane to go to a choir rehearsal for The Messiah. I've missed 3 rehearsals already, and really I came back at this time so I would be able to sing in The Messiah, so ... :)

I'll sort out some India pictures to upload soon ... and I'm also going to set up a Flickrs account to post more photos ... Later!

On my iPod: the Alto choruses for The Messiah of course!

Last days in India ... (this time!)

My last days in India. I fly out to Singapore and then on to Brisbane tomorrow night. The plane leaves at 11.55pm to be precise - as always. I guess it's better than last time - I think then the flight left at about 3.30am!! I have no idea why any flight I get to or from Bangalore always arrives/leaves so late!!

Practice has been going well. I was pretty tired on Monday - probably as a result of the ayurvedic massage the day before. But yesterday and today was good. Don't know if I've said this before, but Marichyasana C, which has always seemed like too impossible to imagine, has actually become a possibility for me - a somewhat remote one, but I do now believe I will be able to do it one day!

And pranayama has been going well. This week I've been moved on to the first of the breath retention ones. Interesting!!

This afternoon I took Eva to Commercial Street, to try and find the place where I got my nose pierced 3 years ago. To my astonishment I actually managed to find it, and she got hers done by the same little man!! (And the same Old Spice aftershave as disinfectant!!!) She also bought her nosering in the same place that we all went to then!

And I bought some more gold earrings! I've got 3 earrings at the moment, having lost one a few months ago, so decided it was time to replace that! I really love Indian gold. It's 22 carat, and is soo yellow. A lot of people like white or pale gold but me, I love the really yellow stuff! And India is of course the world's biggest consumer of gold.

We then had a happy time wandering up and down Commercial Street, drinking coffee, buying fabric, etc! It's funny to see Westerners. We never see any western people out in JP Nagar where we live. It's only when we go into the centre of Bangalore that we get to see tourists/travellers ...