All the latest in London- Birthday Celebrations.

Heya to all you guys back home reading this, I want to wish those of you with HSC exams all the best of luck over the coming weeks and for those of you who are working well take a shot of cement and harden up caus its the real world haha. Seriously though guys I'm missing you all loads epically over the last weekend with my 19th birthday just come and gone, would have been good to celebrate it with some familiar faces. I can't believe its been a year alrea

The last few weeks has been HECTIC to say the least. After I got back from Hillsong Conference we began the mission of moving house. With less than a week to my birthday I was keen to get out of the old house and into the new one ASAP. With the help of 6 other men and 3 trucks we had all the gear shifted within 24hours but unpacking it was another story altogether!


As Friday loomed closer and with it my last day of being 18 I made some pretty rough sketchy plans for a good weekend out in London. Turned out to be the greatest birthday weekend ever! Compared to Sitting in a Mathematics examination this time last year it didn't have much to live up to. Friday morning I made my way into London with dad on route to the 'Metro Ski & Snowboard Show' at Olympia where I picked up some ace gear for this coming season in Canada but with sweet gear comes a hefty price tag. Thankfully it was my birthday though and so all my (birthday and Christmas) presents came from this show. Luckily too- with goggles alone costing $250 AUD and gloves a close second on $180 AUD. I also picked up some thermal gear and the best is yet to come I still haven't brought my actual board, bindings, jacket, pants or boots. The morning of the 24th before I headed up to London I got a Happy Birthday call from mum and with it some GREAT news. Tax man likes me this year with a nice tax return of $1157 AUD that will go a long way in helping me get kitted out with some more boarding gear.

Friday night I went out for dinner with the family to an Italian restaurant and retired home for some cake and champagne. It was about this time that I wish you guys were here to share some drinks with me! Even so we were up till 2am on the Wii talking the night away.

Saturday morning came...... and went. Saturday afternoon I arose from bed. (haha lame)
But after a nice sleep in I woke up for some breakfast left my cousins place and got the train over to my sisters place in Brentford (London). Where I met up with Jessicaaaaa 'ohhh chicka chicka'. Tonight was the night we had been waiting for... you know when your so desperate to see someting that even when tickets are SOLD OUT and sales staff tell you that your 6months too late for booking you still try to screw with the system and get what you want? Okay so maybe its just me but a show being SOLD OUT certainly was not going to stop me going! After a few days of serious thought of just winging it and telling them that I lost my ticket, or just simply jumping the baracades if they tried to stop me entering, I decided against my thoughts considering Brixton is one of the 'most dangerous suburbs of London to walk at night' I came up with a plan, a plan that might just work and legally too!

I grabed my trusty laptop and typed the letters E.B.A.Y into google.And there it was my answer to prayer 2x MIGHTY BOOSH LIVE ON STAGE TICKETS what more could I ask for on my birthday weekend. So Jess and I once again had the problems we had at Hillsong COnference with tube lines across London down, and so the trip to the Brixton Arena took about 40minutes longer than it should have but every second waiting on that tube line was worth it when Vince and Howard walked out on stage!

What followed was a night of crazy crimps "bouncy bouncy oh such a good time" extreme lighting, ridiculous costumes and endless laughs at the hilarious stupidity that only the Boosh can conjure!

But thats only Friday & Saturday! Sunday morning Jess and I woke up and headed out across London to Hillsong Church in Tottenham Court Road (but not before having the most AH-MAZE-ING breakfast ever cooked by the one and only Johny. It was like heaven in my mouth) At Church we met up with Danni =] After a great service and amazing worship from their new album 'Hail to the King' we were on the move again. This time a trio and on our way to Waterloo Station. Jess caught a train home for the Isle of White and Danni and I made our way back to my new house in the village of Hook. Where come Tuesday night it was SNOWING!!!! brrrr so maybe I should have been trying out those new gloves but I was to busy dodging snowballs from dad to even worry. And so the snow fight began, T-shirt, shorts and bare feet the true Aussie way!!!

And now I've finally settled into a job renovating our house, not without problems though with huge wasp nests found in the attics. "Ok so they are in the attic so what?" well picture this your in the shower singing along to your favourite tune (the mighty boosh crimps of course) and all of a sudden wasps start dropping down through the light fittings in the roof!!

Oh let the good times roll! And of course as usual all of this crazy mayhem (except maybe the shower) was recorded on video so keep an eye out I'll let you know when its uploaded!

(video is up you can see it at the bottom of the page or on youtube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=myIH_bm4LXM)

Hillsong London

Probably the best week of my trip so far! So good in fact that I have already made a video for it which can be seen at the very bottom of this page, if you can't find it you can also see it here!
I arrived in London on Wednesday 8th Oct and dropped my gear at my sisters place before heading across for the first night of conference at the ExCeL center in west London. After 90minutes of train rides and route planning I managed to get there and worked out the quickest way in and back each day. First a train into Waterloo then onto the Jubliee Line to Canary Wharf to take the DLR across to the ExCeL center. First few days this worked out fine but on the final day of conference there were planned engineering works on 2 lines across the entire London Underground network..... just so happens that those 2 lines were the Jubliee line and the DLR!!!! So my journey soon turned into a 2.5hour trek underneath the streets of London working my way through the available train lines. Add that to the $5650 bill I received on the same day... happy happy joy joy!

Good news is that I got accepted into Hillsong International Leadership College (HILC) in Sydney for the July 2009 intake, where I will be studying TV & Media for at least 12months. I'm so excited about the course, no so excited about the bill lol. But back to the Conference... I was waking up at 7am and getting home at midnight so by the end of the week was EXAUSTED but we had some incredible speakers including Brian and Bobbie + Joseph Prince who spoke some encouraging, life giving and challenging messages. Tie that in with some incredible music from Hillsong, Mary Mary and Israel Houghton in addition to some sweet break dancing performances and some great people and you have a week that tops all others in my trip this year!

On Saturday night the conference finished and I went out for dinner with Danielle and had a steak "mmmm real food, no more of this tuna sandwich stuff that I was living on in Greece!" Got home and fell asleep pretty much immediately and didn't wake up till 11.30 the next morning. Sunday was a lazy day spent catching up on emails and making a few phone calls. Sunday night was like a dream come true..... Johnny is a master chef and just so happened to be cooking us dinner, a FABULOUS Sunday roast which melted in my mouth followed by an amazing desert... I'm still not sure I want to leave London after that!

But it's over now and now I have to head back to Andover to get ready to move house on the 17th. Hopefully we will have most of the stuff unpacked quickly and then the real fun begins as I have the job of knocking down the 'unwanted' walls in order to make way for renevations! But before that happens I'm back of to London with Dad on the 24th Oct for my 19th birthday. We are going to the Metro Ski and Snowboard show at Olympia for the day which will be ace! Then come saturday I have friends coming from all across the UK and international friends as well stretching as far as Italy woop woop! Should be an incredible weekend!

Until then... adios!

Sunsets in Santorini to rain in London!

ATTN people reading this on facebook if the layout is crappy please visit the original site http://matty2410.blogspot.com/ thanks! I Thought I’d add a bit of flair to my blogs from here on in by including pictures I originally thought that I would have to send them out over email as attachments but this site might just be the answer to my prayers! Hang with me guys as I work out the ins and outs of how this site works!

Ok so I have been reminded that my blogs have started slowing down lately, the main reason is because I have actually stopped travelling for the time being. Last Monday the 30th September I arrived back into London Heathrow and because bad luck seems to follow me it wasn’t without another argument with the airport staff. This time UK immigration let me in without any long periods of questioning and I was stamped for another 6month visa which was ace! Problem was when I tried to board the plane from Athens they wouldn’t let me on.

But before I go into that.... the rest of my trip in Santorini was radical! Second day the girls and myself went on a day tour on a boat that looked much like it had come straight off the Pirates of the Caribbean set. With the high walls of rock surrounding the bay it made for some great photo opportunities. Knowing that the entire area is made solely from volcanic eruptions it might surprise you to know that the water is actually 400m deep!


First stop was the Volcano which last erupted in 1950, but we were assured that it was sleeping for the time being so we climbed off the boat and onto the rugged black landscape of the island volcano and made our way to the cone. After being told that one of this islands eruptions at around 1600BC was felt by Australia and New Zealand and created a Tsunami 100meters tall I felt so much safer. Our next stop was the “hot springs” which really were just muddy sulphur filled waters which were no warmer than 20 degrees, bit of a disappointment really.


Moving onto a little island that is only accessible by boat we climbed the donkey path to the top of the cliffs, most people took a donkey but basically we needed our little amount of money for more important things.... icecream! So climbing the uneven rocky path covered in donkey poo was a slippery experience, but the view from the top was so totally worth it!! Snapping a few pictures of the famous whitewashed, blue roofed churches we made our way back down the donkey path to once again get back on the boat!

This time we were on the final leg of our journey to the township of Oia (pronounced eee-a) which is said to be the BEST place in the world to watch a sunset. And I’m sure had there not been nearly 1000 other people lining the streets and sitting on the walls of the township it would have been a tranquil experience. The pirate ship with raised sails really made the scene! After the sun dropped over the horizon the crowd began clapping and cheering as though the sun only sets once a year and deserved a round of applause for its efforts. The streets quickly emptied as night fell over the town and the final leg of the journey was back home on the bus to our accommodation where once again our hotel staff were waiting to greet us with yet another round of free shots.

However this time it was slightly different. Rodger called them Pommygranit shots because if you look closely the glasses are filled with the fruit. Basically once you do the shot the small pieces of fruit prevent you from swallowing which means the liquid whatever it may be is left sitting in your mouth burning while you try to chew the fruit. However when its cold and raining it certainly does it’s job and quickly warms you up! We were in bed early that night after a 12hour day of touring.

The next day the sun was up and we were out on the beach. Not quite the quality beaches of Australia, with tiny black stones rather than golden sands and a huge cliff face of rock obscuring your view. But hey it was a chance to lay in the sun. What wasn’t expected is when we went to swim we walked into the water the small rocks dissapeared and were replaced by a slab of slimy volcanic rock which sloped ever so gradually. So it wansn't until we had walked/slipped for about 20meters into the water that we were in deep enough to swim.

That day the girls left and I was once again left to travel alone, so I went down to the youth hostel and I ran into some people I’d met in Ios... the night was only just begining. A large group of us went out for dinner and got to know one another. What followed was a crazy evening of pillow fights, a mixed up conversation as we all tried to pool our knowledge of Japanese together to hold a conversation with a group from Japan and apparently my 2 years of studying Japanese at boarding school paid off as I managed to introduce myself to them and after a polite bow I was allowed to sit down and join them in their Japanese drinking games. Went something like this “one YOKIE” “two YOKIE” “three YOKIE” whatever that means!

I woke up the next morning and it was raining outside which was enough to make me pack my bags and head to the Ferry. Was probably a good idea since I only had 40Euro to last me until I got back to the UK. Turns out that a Ferry from Santorini to Athens costs 33.5Euro which is like $67 Aus. So I thought about my options (I needed 20Euro for when I arrived in Athens to get me to my couchsurfing hosts place and onto the airport the following day) It’s impossible to pass security without a ticket and with a backpack its not that easy to hide! So I was basically stuffed, just as the last people were boarding the ferry it hit me, probably should have thought about it earlier because now the ferry was ready to leave and I was in a que to buy a ticket. The first stop for the ferry was an island called ‘Naxos’ which was much closer than Athens so the ticket was only half the price. Beauty of this idea is that the boat continues from Naxos to Athens and once your on the boat you no longer need your ticket. So I got the cheap ticket and SPRINTED to the boat and just sailed the 8hour ferry back to Athens “accidently” missing my stop at Naxos.

Which brings me to my airport dilema the following afternoon! I changed my dates when I got back to Athens the previous night and went to the airport with my new tickets. Now according to my ticket which I paid for before I left Australia date changes are absolutely free but because the world is in the shit and everyone wants everyone elses money for nothing, Swiss Air decided to make up their own rules and DEMAND a 86Euro ($170 Aus) fee for the date change! I refused to pay and walked away from the counter with my boarding pass. So when I herd my name called over the PA system of the airport “ding ding ding Attnetion passengers, Passenger Matthew Teague flying from Athens to Zurich is required at the check in desk immediatly” it was no suprise.

I told them my story “I’ve paid all my fees look at my ticket” which I thought was as simple as staring into a mirror and seeing yourself in the reflection but they rang their supervisors and their sales center and ALL of them demanded that I pay the fine. When they called for boarding of the plane they would not let me pass without paying so I wouldnt let any of the other passangers pass... If I wasnt getting on this plane no one was! Facts are even if I had wanted to I only had 10Euro left in my wallet now! So at this they got quite frustrated and security was called... ARGHH! I told them that they had to call Air New Zealand (which is who I booked my original world ticket through) so they called the Air NZ office in Athens which also said I needed to pay the fine. Still refusing to pay they made a few more calls and 10 minutes later I got a call from sales again who said “oh there is a note on the bottom of your ticket that says you are exempt from any fees for date changes” WELL DUH! I had only tried to tell thim this for the last 40mins! Then boarding began... Swiss staff gave no appoligies, no nothing just blank stares.

Got the flight to Zurich Switzerland and the connecting flight to Heathrow London and then dad picked me up and here I am back in Andover. My next adventure is to London for the Hillsong Europe conference this week.

Until then Adios!