In Bruges (again), the Soccer World Cup and Rock Werchter! Also Wikileaks on the side.

24 June 2010


Rock Werchter
Wow, the time has finally come. It's a week until Rock Werchter, the best festival in the world. (Thats not just me talking, it has actually been voted the best festival in the world... don't ask me how they work it out or decides though). Either way, I'm starting to get pretty excited. Wolfmother was meant to be there, which would have been awesome, but apparently the lead singer had a severe case of screwjamesoverlitus, so they can't make it anymore. Nevertheless, with a line-up like this one, its still gonna be incredible. Here's a taste of what I'll be pushing and shoving my way through the hordes to see (I say to see them cause I have a feeling the hearing will go pretty quickly): (These are just the ones I can think of off the top of my head, don't like all of them, but all are undeniably pretty big names)

• Pearl Jam
• Muse
• Vampire Weekend
• Them crooked vultures
• Jack Johnson
• Rise Against
• Greenday
• Rammstein
• Pink
• Corene Bailey Rae
• Arcade Fire
• The Black Box Revelation
• The Black Keys
• 30 Seconds to Mars
• Alice in Chains
• Paramore

Now you may not like all the bands there, but you have to agree, thats one awesome line-up!
Seriously. Well it all starts next Thurs and goes until the Sun, so its going to be four hardcore days of music, bad smells and possibly a few broken ribs. Hopefully it doesnt rain... Cause that'll suck big time.

World Cup Soccer
New Zealand are playing Paraguay today. Tense times. I'm hoping for a miracle. Italy are playing Slovakia as well and we kinda need Slovakia to do well... So maybe 2 miracles then.. Don't want to say anything more lest I jinx everything... Either way, good luck to the All Whites, they've done much better than everyone expected regardless of what happens now, so we'll at least have that I guess.

A shout out to all my peeps in South Korea and Uruguay, well done for making it through to the second round, you know I've got your back(s)   ;)

In Bruges (Again)
In other news, I'm going back to Bruges tomorrow - staying for the weekend. Bert is coming with. We both love the movie and he hasn't been to Bruges, which I think is blasphemy, especially considering the fact that he is indeed Belgian. Going to try and get to some of the places they filmed, recreate some scenes etc. Think I've mentioned that already in a previous post, hell I don't care, I'm gonna do it and everyone should know. So yeah, pretty psyched about the whole thing really. Will be good to see the city at night as well. You know, different atmosphere and everything. Maybe I'll see a midget or two. Fingers crossed eh.

Hmmm wonder who I offended with that last line... If I keep it up I might find myself running short of viewers.. Hahaha, get it get it get it???? Its funny cause midgets are short. And South African New Zealanders are mildly offensive...

Homework
I've been going extra crazy on listening to Pearl Jam lately - got 349 songs by them on my i-pod. Live albums and all. Also been brushing up on Muse.

Wikileaks
I'm not going to go on about this but if you haven't heard of Wikileaks, check it out here. Its revolutionary. A guy by the name of Julian Assange founded it - Aussie guy. At the moment he's kinda my idol. Regardless of what you think of him or the site, it is very interesting and I really recommend checking it out. Look up some stuff about Julian as well. He's like a modern day hero. For now anyway. He's what every government conspiracy theorist wishes they could be. Fair enough too. If you google either wikileaks or Julian Assange you'll find plenty of info so go wild.  For me its one of the biggest world-wide news worthy stories in a long time... ok Enough of that. Just have a look okay? Consider it your daily duty to humanity or something, you know, whatever chokes your puppy.


Conc.
To all those who have commented on my posts, (you know who you are) thanks a lot, really appreciate them, keep them coming. To those who haven't commented, feel free to do so, its great to hear what you have to say about all of this (whether I know you or not). Looking forward to hearing from you all.

Over and out.

2 Months!

20 april 2010

As the title may suggest, as of yesterday I've been here 2 months.  Still mostly alive (I checked some of my vitals but got bored and concluded that if I was still chugging away on the great train of life in a few hours I'd check the others then). Anyway, its been good so far.

Plans for the week.. hmm.. Well, tomorrow is Berts birthday, so doutbless a few people will be doing something for that, which should be good. Sadly tomorrow is indeed a Wednesday, which means I have Dutch in the afernoon - the issue not being that I have Dutch as such, it just means I have to come back to Antwerp from Brussels to meet Bert and his...crew.

In my excitement from Paris, I completely forgot to write about a fairly important part of my stay here. That is, I went to Bruges with Dirk and Terry. It kind of rocked my world. Not sure if I've mentioned it before, but I really love the movie 'In Bruges'. Like a lot. Unlike many movies these days, it is actually all filmed in the suggested place. Thus creating a splendid opportunity for me to sate my desire. For Bruges. Now if Bruges was a woman... Wow... although  lot of tourists pass through there so maybe I'd stay away. But I would at least hang around and check her out for a while.  In any case, for those who know the movie, I'll give you a quick rundown of where I went (fear not, there will be no spoilers, I love it too luch to destroy it like that). First off, we went to the clock tower. Which was really cool - sadly there was some construction going on so when we got to the top we had a fairly narrow view. Hoping to go back there later in the year when the construction is done. Hopefully stay the night and drift off into my own little fantasy world as I walk the streets. You know, its kinda like a fairytale village. I mean thats just my opinion here. Didn't get it off anyone else or anything like that. We then did the river trip, although it was a substancially more crowded boat than the one Colin and Brendon were on (damn right we're on first name terms). As we stepped onto the boat I looked across the river and low and behold, I saw the hotel they stayed at in the movie. Which we went past a few times, both on foot and by boat (in the throes of passion I took lots of pictures of the same thing with completly indistinguishable changes of angle). We also perused a few certain streets which were seen towards the end of the movie (don't want to give anything away here), which was cool. We found the park with the alcoves which made me warm inside. Again with the photos. To top it off we had truly great weather, so everything kinda fell into place.

Enough on Bruges.

HA! As if there is such a thing as enough of Bruges!

Okay but seriously I've got nothing else to say about it right now.

This weekend the other volunteers from AFS and myself have a 'mid-stay' camp. Think I mentioned that before actually. If I didn't, or you can't remember cause you weren't really reading then its a camp at which I'm fairly sure we'll have to talk about our experiences, host families, cultural differences and whatnot.


The day is ending, so I shall bid thee well. Goodnight and goodluck.