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U2

Tuesday night Andrea, her Matthew and I had a fantastic night at the U2 concert, watching them kick off the Asia-Pacific leg of the Vertigo tour at long last (they were meant to play in March but had to cancel due to illness). The concert was well worth the wait and the rains managed to stay away for the night which was nice. I was very close to selling my ticket because I had two exams the following day, one at 8:30am but about 5 seconds into the intro of City of Blinding Lights I was glad I had decided to go and proceeded to have a smile on my face for the rest of the night. Well apart from that part where there was a lady on the big screen who read the UDHR and I started weeping.

The concert itself was truly great, everything else though sort of sucked. The delays in the shuttle buses that were running to and from the venue, the lack of signage at the venue telling people where to go, the fact that security stopped checking bags pretty quickly as there was no way they could check everyone, the lack of enough food and merchandise stalls to process people quick enough. Lots of things really sucked and I am sure looking back on the concert the organisers are wishing they had been able to get the permits to hold it at Lang Park instead of at QE2, which has the logistics in place from all the Rugby games to deal with 45 000+ people.

We didn’t get to see Kanye West who was the support act but then I don’t think many people did and I am pretty certain most people didn’t really care about missing him because yeah enough said.

Set list
1) City of Blinding Lights
2) Vertigo
3) Elevation/The Go-Betweens – Streets of Your Town (a little tribute to Grant McLennan)
4) Until the End of the World
5) New Year’s Day
6) Beautiful Day
7) Yahweh
8) Walk On
9) Sometimes You Can’t Make It On Your Own/The Black Hills of Dakota
10) Love and Peace or Else
11) Sunday Bloody Sunday
Father Abraham/Political Interlude
12) Bullet the Blue Sky/ When Johnny Comes Marching Home/Hands that Built America
13) Passengers – Miss Sarajevo
Universal Declaration of Human Rights
14) Pride (In the Name of Love)
15) Where the Streets have No Name
Political Interlude
16) One

Encore #1
Political Interlude
17) Zoo Station
18) The Fly
19) With or Without You/The Go-Betweens – Streets of Your Town (a little tribute to Grant McLennan)

Encore #2
20) The Saints are Coming (World Premiere of the song!)
21) Angel of Harlem/Young Americans (as Young Australians)
22) Kite

I said to Andrea and Matthew that this has to be the biggest concert Brisbane has had in a long time and it seems that I was correct, it was in fact the biggest since two concerts in 1998, one by Elton John & Billy Joel and of course the other by U2.

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Study. Avoid Study.

There is really nothing that exciting to say as at the moment it is Study Week and all I have been doing is studying and avoiding studying by watching a couple of movies (Kuch naa Kaho was by far the best and Beautiful People came a close second), making biscuits, playing a few too many games of spider solitaire and that is really about all.

Study. Avoid Study. Study. Avoid Study. Repeat ad nauseum.

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musical weekend

I have had a rather musical weekend. On Friday night Mum and I went to the Powerhouse to take in a show as part of the Brisbane Cabaret Festival and on Saturday night I went to see Bernard Fanning at the Convention Centre.

Barbara Fordham is a voice that I guess that most people outside of Brisbane will never experience which is a real pity as this lady can sing. I would personally put her up there with Eva Cassidy on vocal talent and they both do really good versions of Fever.

For one of our pieces of assessment for year 12 English we went to see a rock musical called Still Standing and the singer in the band just blew me away with her voice. That was June or July, by Christmas I had seen her perform a further three times in a genre that she could own, the jazz standards as well as some other little pieces thrown in for fun. Then I guess I sort of lost track of when she was playing gigs. The other week I saw an ad for the Brisbane Cabaret Festival and spotted her name on the poster.

Off Mum and I trotted to the Powerhouse for a delightful night of music, conversation and fun. Barbara was the second act of the night, the first act was Jacob Diefenbach, a young lad who could certainly play the piano and had a couple of good songs. Then there was Barbara and her band playing a delightful set with plenty of laughs, commentary and ripping vocals. If you are ever in Brisbane and see the name Barbara Fordham on a poster or in a gig guide you should make every effort to go along.

Saturday night, I went along to the Bernard Fanning show, with support from Sime Nugent and Augie March. Ahhh what a night! Sime Nugent was pretty cool, just a man and his guitar singing about life. Augie March are a band that I have heard of for years and probably heard a few songs on the radio but never really “listened” to them before. They were pretty rocking too so will have to have a good check out of some of their songs. Then it was Mr Bernard Fanning, the poster boy of the Brisvegas music scene. He took over the world with the boys from Powderfinger and again with his solo album Tea and Symphony. He rocked. It was a really good night and he was well worth seeing live as he sounded even better live than on the CD.

Next up is U2 next Tuesday night 🙂

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Honey Cake

In our household Honey Cake usually refers to a dense Icelandic cake that Mum makes for Father’s Day and Pabbi’s Birthday, she dislikes it, I love it, Pabbi likes it and Matthew is indifferent over it just as he is with pretty much everything. After a busy morning spent on the computer researching my last assignment I decided to make myself a cake for afternoon tea and when I saw a recipe for Honey Cake in the wonderful Tessa Kiros book Apples for Jam, I said to myself, I will have to cook this. The best thing, we all like it.

honey cake

Honey Cake
Apples for Jam, p. 279
The recipe also lists 1 tbsp of finely chopped rosemary but I didn’t have any so it is absent and it tastes quite fine without it.

150g butter
0.5c brown sugar
0.5c honey (place the bottle in warm water for a while so the honey is easier to measure)
1 2/3c plain flour
1.5tsp baking powder
0.5tsp cinnamon
2 eggs

Line and grease a 22cm springform tin. In a small saucepan over a low heat melt the butter, sugar, honey and 1tbsp water, stirring once or twice until sugar is dissolved and butter is melted. Leave to cool for 10-15 mins. Preheat oven to 180°C.

Sift flour, cinnamon and baking powder in to a bowl; add the eggs and butter mixture. Mix until smooth. Pour into to the cake tin and bake for 30-40 minutes or until cooked. Leave to cool in the tin.

Icing
The recipe lists a lemon butter cream recipe but I just made a simple lemon icing sugar icing. A a couple of tablespoons icing sugar, a teaspoon of margarine and two of lemon juice, the zest of half a lemon and enough hot water to produce a spreadable paste. Ice the cake and sprinkle the zest from the other half of the lemon on the cake.

When I was in high school, I used to take a cake to school when my friends had birthdays. When it was my birthday the other month, Georgie Girl brought a slice of cake to uni for me. Her birthday is tomorrow so she is getting a slice of cake 🙂

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outrage

I just heard on the news that the USA has banned Vegemite, because according to their food laws only breads and cereals are allowed to contain folate, another source says that it might be that vegemite contains too much folate. *shakes heads*. When I went to the states in 2002, I carried three jars of the stuff with me and I remember the customs lady smiling at me when asking what food items I was carrying. I left one with my brother in San Jose, then onward to Iceland where I left another with another brother and finally on to Germany where I used it on my toast each morning.

It seems that the border patrols are targeting Australian travellers and searching for vegemite. I wonder though are they targeting Kiwis or Brits/UKers with their Promite and Marmite, both also yeast extracts and also contain folate? Perhaps Aussies are just more likely to travel with Vegemite than the others?

I heard Hugh Jackman on the radio the other month and he said that he tests his kids to make sure they are still “true blue” by presenting them with a vegemite sandwich and a peanut butter and jelly sandwich; they still pick the vegemite sandwich he knows everything is alright.

Australia is vegemite.

We are happy little Vegemites as bright as bright can be,
We all enjoy our Vegemite for breakfast, lunch and tea,
Our mummy says we’re growing stronger every single week,
Because we love our Vegemite,
We all adore our Vegemite,
It puts a rose in every cheek!

News Article – Happy Vegemites no longer

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This close

to graduation! I received my conditionally approved invite to graduate the other day in the mail and now I just have hope that the stars stay in alignment and I don’t to anything horribly wrong and fail a subject. Not that I have any reason to expect that to happen but like that should happen though.

It is slightly chilling and confronting to think that in a few weeks this life I have lived for the past four years will be coming to an end for the current time. One of the many ideas swirling round my head is go back to do my masters but not next year.

In the last four years of uni, I have learnt about things that I never imagined I would have done at the end of high school where I wanted to do organic chemistry or linguistics. In my senior years at school I didn’t do any humanities subjects and it wasn’t really something that had interested me. Whilst I didn’t know what I wanted to do with my life, an Arts degree was not something I really had on the horizon. I mean “Artsâ€?. I am certain that if someone had said to me in my final year of schooling that at uni you would complete a dual major in Asian History and Politics/International Relations, I would have gone “yeah right”.

Now though as I look back to myself as a year 12 student, I know that it was the right choice as it was the complete opposite of what I had done before. I think my Mother once said to me that in High School you pick the subjects you are good at to give you the marks you need for uni and when you are in Uni, you pick the subjects that you like, you may not be good at them but you still enjoy them.

Whilst I didn’t select my degree by what I liked but what I could still get into after missing out on the first round of placements and whatever was local and sounded interesting. My first preference ended up been Bachelor of Arts in Asian and International Studies described on the course page as something close to the following.

In recent years, Australia’s political, economic, and social ties with Asia have expanded, and will continue to become even stronger. This degree program is one of the few degrees in Australia to offer you a wide selection of Asian studies courses. Study focuses on the developing countries of East and South-East Asia. The program provides you with the unique opportunity to study an Asian language (Japanese, Chinese, Korean, Indonesian, or Thai) and to undertake a comprehensive set of prescribed Asian studies core courses, plus optional secondary specialisations.

My first year language was Indonesian and it is something that I really regret not continuing when after a year I transferred to a Bachelor of Education (primary) as when I returned to Asian Studies the next year I found it very hard to slip into the second year classes and dropped it and consequently my appeal to future employers halved.

I also wish that the course covered a greater variety of states in Asia, especially in South and Central Asia or even the less developed states in East and South East Asia like Mongolia or Cambodia, Vietnam. The real focus states of my degree have been China, Japan, South Korea, Thailand, Indonesia, Singapore, Malaysia and to a lesser extent Burma and the Philippines. C’est la Vie.

Next week I have an exam, two classes and a report to hand in, then a week of hardcore study. The following week I go to see U2 on the Tuesday night, the following morning I have an exam at 8:30am, later that day I have another exam at 5:30pm. Two days later on the Friday at 1:30pm I have my last exam. Once I walk out of that exam, I will grab my bike out of the back of the car, which Mathew will drive home and I will ride the 30 odd km home for the first, last and only time. It is 24km by car but the bike path has a few more detours than the highway 🙂

December 16, I will get dressed up and put on academic robes, walk across the stage, receive my degree and say to myself, “The past four years have been good and it’s only the beginning”.