Yesterday

Yesterday we went to look at a couple of properties.  One was in Manly, a 3 (possibly 4) bedroomed furnished house.  It was really nice, awesomely modern, clean, you could tell that the landlord had OCD, but unfortunately the room that was advertised as convertible into a 4th bedroom was entirely unsuitable. Downstairs there was the 3rd bedroom with a TV room beside it, but you had to walk through that room from the 3rd bedroom to get to the rest of the house, or to use the bathroom.  Not exactly a room that someone is going to want to live in!  Another downside was that it was about a 30 minute drive to the airport.

The second place we viewed was in Northgate, just north-west of the airport, maybe about 8km away, another fully furnished house, not quite as modern but it was really nice and suitable for 4 people.  We've made an application for it... so now we have to wait to see whether they accept the application.  The whole Australian system of trying to rent a place and be 'accepted' is really strange to me!  It took an incredibly long time to fill out all of the application forms, and to scan and process passport details and proof of employment, etc. so if they refuse the application now I think everyone will be just a small bit peeved, to put it nicely.

The best part of the day was driving around in this:

Gotta say, I'm in luuurve!  Just wish I could afford a car like this - but at least I have it for the 30 day rental period.  The awesome is that everyone else has been given pathetic little cars and I didn't even ask for anything specific, but was just handed the keys!

Today I'm beginning to study for the course next week on operating procedures, etc. and as I really am not enjoying getting back in the books I figured I would post a blog instead!  Now that I have done this, I must get back to work!

TTFN!!!

the last two days

Here I am again!  I was going to do a blog post last night about the EP course, but got caught up with other things like eating and drinking, which usually come before blogging on my schedule, and then it was late, and I had to get caught up with other things like brushing my teeth and sleeping.  After two days of my brain being slowly pulled out of my ears with a pair of blunt pliers, it was a nice thing to be able to eat and drink in my own time.

Anyway, here are some pictures of Wets yesterday:

Here's Ian and JG posing before jumping in...

at which point, we were all instructed "do NOT jump into the pool!"  So of course...

does diving count?  I think GM and DK were a little confused on this count!

A little bit wet, waiting to get our life jackets inflated:

Ian pretending to be dead (see, JG and myself were not the only ones messing)

And proof at last that I am alive!

Cannonballing into the water while holding my nose (because I am a sissy):

Before Wets, we did our verbal and physical assessments for EP.  This included saying where everything was located in the airplane, and what it does, and what the precautions are, etc. etc.  For instance, there are 4 oxygen canisters with 2 supplemental and 2 therapeutic masks.  These are located 1 under each CCM seat, and 2 above row 9D/F.  They must be correctly stowed, dust covers fitted, free from oil and grease, have their masks located in the same place, and at least 1500 PSI.  To use, you have to hang it around your neck, use the high pressure valve located at the right of the gauge, connect the mask tubing, turn the valve all the way on, and then 1/4 back, check that the green flow valve is showing, check that the oxygen bag is beginning to inflate, and put on the passenger's face (upside down on an infant).  Precautions for use are that no dust is in the valves, it's free of oil and grease, the passenger isn't wearing heavy oil based make-up (wipe it off if they are) and make sure that the tube does not over extend.  Stop using it when it is down to 50PSI unless all other oxygen cylinders have also been depleted.  After use, it must be replaced in stowage, and the PIC must be informed of its use.  That is just one item of emergency equipment that we had to learn about !!!

After we did all of that, individually (while the others waited in the canteen for their turn in the hot seat), we went out to the aircraft and learned how to open the doors.  Quite amusing to see a previously captain such as JG with 11 years' ATR experience and a previous examiner, reaching forward to lift up the main door only to be told by the girl "stop!  I have to demonstrate it to you first!" after which, JG attempts again, only to be told "no!  You can't hold it there, you have to hold this particular handle here, you're doing it wrong!"  As JB said: "how degrading can this get?" and C said "save me from this inane drivel!" amongst other things that I won't include on my blog.

I apologise for doing this post all backwards.  Really I should have started with the assessments, moved on to the door operation and fire-fighting, and finished with a description of Wets and the pictures.  I also want to point out that the messing carried out during Wets was mainly due to 2 days of listening to "this inane drivel" and being so frustrated that all 8 of us just had to vent somehow!

Another post coming up shortly :)

TTFN!

Emergency Procedures

Today started at 0545, at least that's when my alarm clock woke me up.  Class started at 0700, which is a pretty stupid time to start a ground school course, in my opinion.  We learnt lots of new things in class today.  We learnt how to open the flight deck door in the ATR, the three elements of fire and how many smoke detectors there are in a 72-500, to name but a few!  Lots of new and exciting things, and I wrote lots of notes on the above - mainly to keep myself from falling asleep, but still I wrote lots of notes.

See?  Here's a picture to prove what I did today.  The desk contains a mixture of items, from left to right (what I can see, at least) a couple of oxygen cylinders with masks (one supplementary and one therapeutical, in case you were interested), a megaphone, a couple of smoke hoods, a teddy bear (still haven't worked out what that was for) an infant pretending to be a doll (or maybe vice versa) a portable ELT and a life jacket.

Here is IF not looking very studious at all, and no I did not ask him if I could put him on my blog, and neither do I care whether he wants me to or not.  He doesn't actually have my blog address... so HA!

And finally here is a very boring photograph of some of the information we have to know for tomorrow - which of course, I'm not going to know.  Plan to pass the exam anyway, once again - HA!

Also tomorrow (which was supposed to be today) we are all trolling off to the airport to visit our first Australian ATR.  Unfortunately the aircraft which we were supposed to visit today was commandeered to fly to Port Macsomethingorother to rescue another aircraft that had a bird strike.  Sound familiar?  So sad, we won't actually learn how to open an aircraft door until tomorrow.  How shall I ever last that long?

Apparently the company opens doors differently over here.  Apparently we are supposed to forget how we used to open doors, and learn to do it the company way.  I'm not quite sure what this involves, and how they can possibly make door opening different... but we shall see, tomorrow.  Presuming the birds stay out of the way.

After we go see an airplane, open some doors, etc. we have verbal and practical assessments on things we were supposed to learn today, and a written test.  For example, how many smoke detectors there are on an ATR.  For some reason, all the different aircraft (6 so far) all have their equipment in different locations, although they are all 500 series.  For instance, one might have a fire extinguisher in the left hand hat bin and another aircraft in the right hand hat bin.  Not quite sure what the thinking is for this, but there must be a method in their madness - mustn't there??

Then, after we do all of those highly riveting activities, we move on to the pool to do our Wet drills.  This involves practising the HELP position (heat escape listening posture) which involves holding ones knees in one's arms and trying to get as small as possible in the water whilst held buoyant by the life jacket.  I actually am not sure what a listening posture is, and what meaning it holds, but the position is supposed to increase body temperature and increase survivability by 50% or something like that.  Then we have to hold hands and sing ring-a-ring-a-rosy (is that what it's called?) or at least we have to hold hands and swim in a circle - I am determined to sing, perhaps under my breath?  Then we have to swim 25 metres while pulling someone else who is also wearing a lifejacket.  Another opportunity to demonstrate my amazing doggy-paddle skills.

That, folks, is about all I have to share for tonight!  Nothing particularly interesting to report at the moment - except that I have one place to look at on Saturday with a view to living there... hopefully it is as nice as the pictures, and that the owner actually wants us to live there!

TTFN!!!

The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly

The Ugly

Australia is a pretty strange place.  We were walking through town yesterday and found a marketplace stall that was selling these... take a close look and see if you can work out what they actually are...

The Good

We went across to Manly today, to have a wee look around to see what the place was like, and to see whether we wanted to live there.  It seems like a nice place, near the harbour, pretty quiet, and some nice places.  We didn't actually go to see any particular places as we were unable to make appointments in time, but here is a picture of a weird tree:

Here is a picture of a closeup of one of the weird tree's branches.

Pretty weird, huh?

This is the harbour in Manly.  Unfortunately you're unable to see any of the water due to the large number of floaty things with big sticks on top.

The Bad

Did a little bit of car hunting too, and everything seems extremely expensive, although we did manage to find one or two priced at just $990!  Unfortunately, one of them was missing the engine, and the other, pictured below, was rather the worse for wear.  You can't really see too well in the picture but, I'm not sure it would even get one trip to the airport...

Nothing more to really report at this stage!  Tomorrow is day 1 of Emergency Procedures, so up at silly o'clock to leave here at 0615 - first time I've ever heard of a groundschool class actually starting at 0700!  Did I mention these Australians are weird? :)

TTFN!!!

The Weevil

 I forgot to mention I met an Australian weevil today.  I tried to give it a hug but its feet were all sticky and it wouldn't come off the wall.  It was very pretty though, all black and yellow spotty, with little yellow feet, but it was the right shape for a weevil.  I had to settle for stroking my namesake but I like Australia even more now - weevils FTW!

TTFN

Where was I?

Where was I?  So S and I have found somewhere to live.  Yep, we saw a place, thought it was amazing, and figured we'd move there.  Sorted.  Well, it didn't quite end up as simple as that, as we did that a few times, phoned a couple of different estate agents, didn't actually go see anywhere - but figured we'd like to live there anyway - the story of our lives.  But ya know, sure, that looks nice - we'll live there, no problem, no point looking any further!  Anyway that took the morning and early afternoon.  Quite enjoyable, not particularly profitable, but at least there was a lot of sunshine, and plenty of estate agents - but S and I still haven't found anywhere to live.

Where was I?  This afternoon we had a barbie with lots of sausages, mine were amazing, RM's were horrible and tasted of seaweed, J's - well, nobody tried J's, I don't think anyone was brave enough, but I think everyone liked mine!  Nice homemade burgers, from a distance, as at this stage I was way too full of amazing sausages and amazing leg of lamb chops.  Watched R and J attempting to clean the BBQs using a selection of paper towels, water, bread and celery.  Yeah the cleaning arrangement didn't work out too well, but at least it kept them busy.  Had a good old chat, found somewhere to live, emailed a few estate agents, discussed exams, studying methods, considered the fact that I still haven't looked at the new SOPs, and realised that we still don't have anywhere to live.

Where was I?  Tomorrow S and I are going to cook a roast dinner for everyone - well, everyone who wants to eat our roast dinner, depending on whether they trust our cooking, and also depending on whether we quit fighting about butter versus olive oil with the roast potatoes, and about how to make gravy.  Obviously matters of state.  Or at least states that matter, or something like that.  Got a few people who say they're going to come, others who aren't so sure, and others?  Well, others.

Where was I?  So S and I have found somewhere to live.  Apparently there's a place called... actually I can't remember what it's called, but apparently it's something like the Australian version of Malahide, so we've decided we're going to live there, 'cause there's a port, and the sea, and it's pretty cool.  We haven't actually seen it yet, but Ro'N and ML went to see it earlier and they say it's like Malahide and it has a port and it's pretty cool, so I think we've found somewhere to live.  There's also a place called Borimba (spelling fairly doubtful) which we viewed this morning, and we've decided we're going to live there.  It seems pretty cheap, and it's near the river, and heh, the pictures in the brochure looked OK, so it's sorted, so we've found somewhere to live.

Where was I?  Did I mention the sausages?  Oh yeah, and S and I still haven't found somewhere to live.

TTFN !

Of Trees & Rain

Today it is raining.  We discussed this during the last 3 weeks, saying that the weather was so beautiful, so warm and so sunny, that it obviously was aware that we had our heads in the books and no time to enjoy it.  We were sitting in class gazing out of the window at the clear blue sky, sweltering as we walked across the compound to lunch, wishing that we could lie on the City Beach in the soft silver sand, instead viewing this:

Given the above, C insisted that we really should make sure that once our studying was complete, we pretended that we still had to study so that the weather didn’t realise... and would stay nice.  Unfortunately I think we haven’t been doing the Pretending Game so well, as ever since Monday it’s been fairly cloudy - and today it is raining.  It’s actually drizzling most of the time, every now and then clearing up, and then raining again.  Not exactly the sort of weather where you can sunbathe.  

Anyway, yesterday after dragging myself over to the City Beach to take photos for You Know Who, I returned home via the botanical gardens, keeping my eyes peeled for sleeping bats in the trees, but unfortunately not viewing any.  I took some pictures, but didn’t post them yesterday as the posts were fairly full already.  Here they are:

Skippy!!!

I took this picture mainly to show how large the stems? trunks? of the bamboo were

a view of the amazingly tall bamboo

this final picture is specifically for Dad, the barefoot-runner of Ireland.  Just to prove that he is not the only freak in the universe - they have them here! :)  Sorry the picture is so blurry... but by the time I got my phone out to take a photo, he was already quite a distance ahead.

TTFN!!!