2013 in 10 Events

Ten events in 2013 that made headlines in Australia. 

Image by Simon

1. Benedict XVI resigns as Pope, being the first since 1415 and the first to do so voluntarily since 1294. 

Image by Catholic Church (England and Wales)

2. Margaret Thatcher, the longest serving British Prime Minister, died at 87 years.

Memorial outside The British Embassy in Santiago.
Image by Rivera Notario

3. Edward Snowden was given temporary asylum in Russia.

Street art portrait of Snowden
Image by Thierry Ehrmann

4. Prince George of Cambridge was born. 

Image by Christopher Neve

5. Australia had three Prime Ministers in one year: Julia Gillard, Kevin Rudd and Tony Abbott. 

Tony Abbott, the current Prime Minister of Australia.
Image by Troy Constable Photography™

The do's and don'ts of the Melbourne Show

Recently, I went to the Melbourne Show 2013. I have been to the Melbourne Show each year for as long as I can remember and I will share some tips I have learnt over the years.

Do: Visit exhibitions there
This year, Masterchef Australia was filmed in Melbourne, on the show grounds. As a Masterchef fan, it was opportunity not to be missed. 

Rutherglen 2013

Two weeks ago, I had the opportunity to stay at a farm in Rutherglen for a week.
Rutherglen is a small town near Albury and the Victoria/New South Wales border. 
I have been to Rutherglen a couple of times, during summer and winter and under the impression that the weather is only very hot or very cold. I learnt that spring and autumn are the best seasons to visit, the weather is warm during midday, cool in the afternoon and not too cold at night.

While I was there, I did some jobs around the farm and explored the town. The farm that I stayed at is called Mt Ophir which has bed-and-breakfast facilities, a winery and livestock. The area has great country scenery which makes excellent photos.

Youth Alive 2013

After an amazing experience last year, I was motivated to go to Youth Alive 2013. 

Youth Alive in Melbourne City is the final event of several smaller youth alive concerts hosted in several regional churches across Victoria. The concert has two other performers apart from the Youth Alive band; this year it was New Empire and Young Chozen (who also attended last year). 

New Empire is a Christian pop-rock band from Sydney. They have performed with other Christian artists in the past, such as Hillsong and Owl City. It happened to be the lead singer's (Jeremy Fowler) birthday and the audience sang 'Happy Birthday' to him before they performed. "Thanks, you made my 42nd birthday great", he joked afterwards. 


Here's some photos of the event:

The sunset

Fluent Indonesian in 3 months in Australia

Image by Nicolas Raymond

Since 2010, I have been 'studying' Indonesian and have gotten A's on my reports, assignments and tests. But I still can't speak it fluently. Around August 2012, I started 'learning' Indonesian; speaking it on Skype, learning vocabulary on Memrise1 and other resources outside of the classroom. 

For the last couple of years, I have been reading Benny Lewis' blog 'Fluent in 3 months'2 and learnt some key points about languages such as:

• 'Fluent in 3 Months' is not a guarantee, but a challenge.
• You are more likely to succeed in the challenge if you tell a large number of people about it. (I did announce on FaceBook that my new year's resolution is to be fluent in Indonesian)
• Your target language should be part of your daily schedule. (I am working out how to balance assignments with learning Indonesian)
• You learn more from speaking that writing. (Indonesian uses a phonetic Latin alphabet, so each word is written how you speak it)
• Whether you were good at languages at school or not is irrelevant: your commitment is. (I did have the advantage of very enthusiastic teachers who focused on speaking) 
• You don't need to be in the country to become fluent. (He learnt Egyptian Arabic in Brazil)
• All languages are hard, with the exception of Esperanto for some people. 

Image by zsoolt

Travel Review: Melbourne CBD

About three weeks ago, I went to Melbourne City for five days. As I live outside the metro area and used to seeing farmland, this was an interesting experience for me. This is a journal of what I did. 

Day 1: 

I travelled into the city via train and exited at Southern Cross Station. I was with a group of other country-people who were also exploring the city. We started the day by doing an amazing race-like challenge where we given clues of what we have to photograph. 

For lunch, I ate at Your Thai restaurant. I ordered vegetable dumplings and a green tea milkshake (I had no idea that existed). Then to finish the day, we walked to the Eureka Tower (tallest tower in Melbourne and 2nd tallest residential building in Australia). This gave us a better understanding of how the city is set out. Many people in the group went on the edge, an experience where you a put in a glass box that extends out of the building, this gives you a stronger sense of how high the building is because it has a glass floor. I didn't want to do this for two reasons: I am not fond of heights and I didn't want to pay $10 for a glass floor.
Going on the terrace was scary, because it was so high up, the winds were very strong and when I was taking photos I was worried that my phone would fall out the guard. 

Africafe (Good Food and Wine Show Part II)

En español  Em Português

At the Good Food and Wine Show last year, one of the most memorable stalls I went to was Africafe. An organisation which sells ethical tea and coffee where all the profits go towards buying mosquito nets and malaria treatment. I met the lady who started Africafe, Swati Somaina who grew up in Tanzania. 

Image by epSos.de

In 1981, Swati was diagnosed with malaria and was bedridden for 6 months with a horrible fever and never-ending headaches. Eventually, the best doctor in the town, Dr Ahmed saved her life by giving her a triple dose of quinine injection. It was a hard decision, as it can be lethal. She was very privileged by having him stand by her while she recovered. 

Volunteering at Wycliffe

Two weeks ago, I volunteered at Wycliffe's national centre in Kangaroo Grounds. Wycliffe is a non-government organisation which translates the Bible into languages that have no written Bible. 

Wycliffe was founded by an American named Cameron Townsend in 1934 after a mission trip to Guatemala where a native Guatemalan man asked him "Why doesn't your God speak my language?" when he was distributing Spanish Bibles. He named the organisation after John Wycliffe, who translated the Bible from Latin to Old English in 1382. Priests and other members of the Catholic Church at that time, thought he was starting a cult. 

Figures about languages in relation to the Bible (2013):

Section                                Number of languages

Complete Bible                  around* 518

New Testament (only)       around 1275

Some scripture                   around 1005

Currently in progress         around 2075

None                                    around 1967

Altogether, there are around 6877 living languages. *Around because linguists have discovered some languages are dialects and vice vera. 

Day 1. 
When I first arrived, I had an open mind, and didn't know what to expect. I was taught the basic history of Wycliffe; what its goal is and about EQUIP training. Later that day, I did a basic language class which included learning to pronounce different sounds in the international phonetic alphabet (such as clicks, the Indonesian 'p' sound as well as the 't' and 'd' sounds found in Indian languages), doing language puzzles and a language understanding game, where I was taught the names of objects in a language (in this case, Northern Tanna) but not allowed to verbalise the name. Then, I had to  show my understanding by picking up the object the teacher called out. At the end of the day, I helped set up a conference room and set out towels, soaps and letters in the guest lodges. 

There was a heavy fog on the morning that I arrived at Wycliffe National Centre

Wycliffe and EQUIP national centre

10 reasons to learn Auslan (BANZSL)

En español

Auslan or BANZSL (British, Australian, New Zealand Sign Language) is a sign language which originates from a deaf sign language used in Britain during the 19th Century. Contrary to a common belief, not all sign languages are the same. For example, ASL (American Sign Language) is very different to BSL (British Sign Language). Also, signed languages are not just word for word spoken language signed but they have their own syntax, grammar and word origins. Also, some countries actually have sign language as one of their official languages, for example: New Zealand. 

I'm going to give you ten reasons to learn Auslan (the sign language in Australia).

Creative Common by Deaf Action 

Creative Common by Wycliffe South Africa

Lyre birds

After visiting Mason's falls in Kinglake and seeing an actual lyrebird in the wild (I have only seen them in captivity), I have been researching about lyrebirds and have learnt quite a bit about them. I already knew that they mimic other bird calls and sounds around them but I didn't know how well they could mimic. 

I can see why they're significant enough to be on the 10c coin. Lyre birds can mimic chainsaw sounds, camera clicks and even human voice!

If you listen close enough you can hear; 
0:58 "C'mere chook, chook"
1:05 "What are you doing?"
1:46 "Hey don't touch that"

Australia has some very unique animals and we should be grateful that these animals aren't extinct. 

Also, I hope to write a post about my trip but we took over 3000 photos on the trip so I will have a series of posts in the future. 

Pay It Forward 2013

Every January, Xfactor Youth has a volunteer camp called 'Pay It Forward' where young people help others in our community (and sometimes in other regional town's - Mildura) who can't help themselves or find difficulties in completing a job or task. 

This camp has two objectives, firstly to share God's love with others by paying it forward and secondly,  growing in your own faith in God in your spiritual journey.

We spent 5 days this year; weeding, cleaning, painting, gardening, mulching, putting bikes together, moving furniture, moving chicken coups, learning, throwing paint, getting our lunches eaten by goats (well only my sandwich got eaten) and pouring water on people's heads. 

These photos have been taken by Ben Young and others.

On the first day, I went to Doreen Primary School to move bricks.

Tom carried 13 bricks. 

We also made a fence of logs.

We also kept finding chicken heads everywhere.

Day 2 - helping the Northern Austistic School

We had a competition to see what group could make the
best dessert for $10 or less in 45 minutes. 

This is what one of the people we helped said.

Day 3 - Cleaning around the church

We also went to the pool

We had paper stuck to our backs and people could write 

things that we like about that person. 

Pay It Forward was a fun experience and I hope to go to Pay It Forward next year. 

Links: 

Xfactor Youth FaceBook (if you want to go to Pay It Forward next year)

10 iconic songs of 2012 in Australia

As this year comes to an end, reflect on the year by listening to 10 iconic songs of 2012. 

10. Pumped Up Kicks - Foster the People

Every time I hear this song I think of the beach, maybe because I heard in February. 

9. Wild Ones - Flo Rida ft. Sia

I'm pretty sure Dubai sponsored the video... and Sia doesn't even appear in the video. She must feel ripped off. 

8. We Are Young - Fun. ft Janelle Monáe 

Because we are...

7. Call Me Maybe - Carly Rae Jepsen

The first song meme of the year... sung by a Canadian.

6. You Won't Let Me - Karise Eden

If you're not from Australia, you probably didn't know that Karise Eden was the winner of Voice 2012 with the help of Seal (the singer, not the animal). 

5. Anywhere in the World - Mark Ronson, Katy B

I included this song because it was the promo for the Olympics.

4. One More Night - Maroon 5 

She even took the fish!

3. Boom Boom - Justice Crew

Finally a dance song that's not American but by an Australian and New Zealand boy band.

2. Battle Scars - Guy Sebastian ft. Lupe Fiasco

This song was number 1 in Australia, number 2 in New Zealand and Norway and... number 73 in US Billboard Hot 100. 

1. Gangnam Style (강남스타일) - PSY 

This was the first K-Pop song to become popular internationally, Psy has been to many countries 
for interviews and performances. With more than 1 billion views, this is without a doubt, the biggest song 
of 2012. 

I wish I could include more but I had to stick to 10 songs. What's your opinion? What songs would you change?

Comparing politician signatures with Greek and Hebrew Letters

Recently I've noticed that many politicians of high importance have Greek and Hebrew letters in their signatures. This is what I've noticed: 

USA –

Barack Obama: The 'O' is a 'phi'.

George W. Bush: The last two letters resemble the Hebrew letters: 'kof' and 'shin'.

Joe Biden: The ‘e’ looks like the cursive Hebrew ‘gimel’ and ‘B’ looks like a ‘kof’.  

Mitt Romney: The double 't' resembles the Greek letter ‘pi’ and ‘R’ resembles a stylised version of the Hebrew letter ‘he’.

UK –

Tony Blair: The ‘B’ resembles the Greek letter ‘beta’ and ‘l’ resembles the cursive Hebrew letter ‘tzadik’.

Prince William, Duke of Cambridge: The ‘w’ resembles the Greek letter (lower case) ‘upsilon’ and ‘y’ resembles a stretched out cursive Hebrew ‘bet’.

France – 

François Hollande: The top of the signature resembles the Greek letter ‘pi’ and the two 'l' look like two ‘tzadik’-s. 

François Fillon: The 'O' looks like the Greek letter ‘phi’, ‘the second last letter in the first half of the signature resembles 'omega’ and the 'i' resembles cursive Hebrew letter ‘gimel’.

Nicolas Sarkozy: The 'N' resembles the cursive Hebrew letter ‘chet’ and the 'l' and 'S' resemble two ‘pe’-s. 

China – 

Hu Jintao: There are the Greek letters ‘phi’ , ‘omega’, ‘tau’ in it. 

Wen Jiabao: There are the Greek letters ‘phi’, ‘omega’, ‘theta’ in it.

Australia – 

 

Julia Gillard: The 'u' resembles the Greek letter ‘iota’, the 'l' looks like ‘lambda’ and the 'G' resembles a ‘zeta’.

Kevin Rudd: The 'K' looks like a crooked Greek letter ‘sigma’ and the cursive Hebrew letter ‘shin’. 

If you can see more Greek or Hebrew letters in the signatures or if you want me to write one about the politicians from a country I haven't mentioned, please comment in the comment section.  

Does your signature have Greek or Hebrew letters in it? 

Links: 

Greek Language and Alphabet 

Hebrew Language and Abjab