Welcome to the new website for yours truely. If you are expecting fancy pop-ups, gimmicks or freebies you’ve come to the wrong place - what you see is what you get I’m afraid. Don’t be hasty in hitting that X icon in the top right hand corner just yet, though. Moreover, if you want to hear more of my tales then selected favourites and click on add. If you’re working on a MAC like moi, choose bookmarks instead. Incidentally, the domain of my new website, living-in-a-land-down-under is taken from the Men At Work classic Down Under. FYI, it went to number one in Britain back in 1981 and it’s a very patriotic song in these shores. Furthermore, it was even used in the closing ceremony of the Sydney Olympics in 2000 and that Hollywood blockbuster Crocodile Dundee in Los Angeles. If you haven’t heard it, download it, but do it for free.

Anyway, I feel that I have a tale to tell you.

As most of you reading will have known, mattontour2006 had to be removed (RIP in little buddy). The reason? Potentially defamatory remarks I may have made in my last instalment regarding my job at the time. Believe me, I’ve learnt a lesson and my initial shock reaction still remains, although I would love to be able to replace it with an almost childish snigger. Moreover, I certainly wasn’t laughing on Monday 11th August – the day I was given the boot, which is a first for me.

That very morning I was beavering away at the desk, helplessly I should add, but I was being productive in my own mind, when I was told to ‘pack my bag and report to the boss’. None the wiser as to what was about to happen, I had a feeling I was to be reprimanded, but for what, I did not know. However, as I was led into an office I was confronted by an angry manager who had a print out of my previous blog on the desk in front of him. I immediately knew what the problem was – and I was about to face the music for my actions. I had made the mistake of being far too blasé in my previous blog regarding the job, and I was told in no uncertain terms that I had until 5pm on that very day to remove the content of the website as they were considering pressing charges for defamation. Obviously I cannot republish what I said, but in my honest opinion 80% of it was based on personal opinion, and the other 20% was, perhaps, an attempt to gain some one-upmanship on the them and their regimes. Maths aside, I know that my comments were unprofessional and unjust, so I have apologised, almost grovelled in fact.

The whole incident was cringe worthy; with the threat ringing in my ears I knew what I had to do, and I was more than willing to do it. After all, who would have won if it had gone to court? Who has the most to lose? Before I was allowed to leave the building with my tail between my legs I was told that I had gone on record and that I would never work for the organisation again (oh no, anything but that for a punishment, please!) and I was also ordered to report to the employment agency whom I was employed with to inform them of the whole incident.

Going to the agency I wasn’t in fear. (To be honest I was happy to have five minutes to myself) I thought that I could explain my case, apologise vehemently as the repercussions were serious, and say that I never meant any harm. However, as soon as I was called into the office they, too, had a print out of my blog. It was facing me on the table, and again, it was cringe worthy. They were rightly annoyed, and I felt awful for them, because as far as agency’s go in Sydney, they have been one of the better ones. Since being dismissed they remain to be excellent – almost faultless – as they’ve liaised with me and advised me on what to do. As I explained in the meeting, with my head resting in my hands, it was probably 40% unfortunate and 60% idiocy on my behalf, but I wasn’t prepared to dwell on it as I really wanted to be out of the office.

As I made a hasty retreat for the exit I was told by one of the women from the agency that all associated were fuming with me. I have since learnt that the agency assumed my badmouthing had taken place on the very work computer I was provided with. (I know my actions were stupid, but I am not that stupid). She, or the agency I should say, had read a vast majority of my blog, too. How do I know this? Because when I left she told me that I might want to delete all the extracts regarding my time at Central Queensland University – another role provided by them. I knew instantly that I would not be gaining employee of the month, or that I wouldn’t be expecting a call asking to work for them anytime soon.

The whole experience shocked me, and I had so many questions I wanted to ask, but all my inquisitiveness was clouded by apologies and redemption. I would like to know, for example, how they found out. In the very meeting when I was given my orders it was explained to me that the organisation operate a computer search, and presumably they check for the name of the company against employees’ names. Moreover, and I would like to know the answer to this above the former, what did they think of my writing style? Did they rate it? Were there things I could have improved on? So many questions left unanswered, which ironically, was much like my time spent there. I have kept the extract, along with all other instalments, as I wasn’t prepared to delete my entire blog, as it has acted like my diary. As Mae West once wrote, ‘if you keep a diary one day it will keep you’, as after all, I may need it to defend myself if court action arises, plus, I want to look back on my travels one day for nostalgic sakes. Also, according to the word count provided by Microsoft Word, I had written 61,134 words and I wasn’t going to delete all of them on a whim.

Like I said, the whole experience has shocked me, and I do feel ashamed, but I have since calmed and I have certainly learnt a lesson. Or have I?

In order to keep my mind occupied (it was working overtime with all negative outcomes) I wanted to find some work – any work – and I duly did. For the Tuesday and Thursday of that week (12th and 14th) I worked in a large retail store lugging boxes and helping out behind the scenes as they were in the middle of a shop refit. To be honest the work was a doddle, but it wasn’t great pay. However, at the time I would have worked for free if it meant keeping my mind busy and away from thoughts consisting of deportation. Sadly, like some unnamed recent roles I have held, the place was scattered with the type of people who thought they were much bigger than their job title permitted them to be. I don’t know why, but I have very little respect for people in authority who make no effort to find out one’s name and instead resort to addressing temps as ‘mate’. Nevertheless, the work served its purpose.

Sandwiched between those two days of work arouse the opportunity to get back to football coaching – a job I’d willingly do full time, and you’ll never hear me say a bad word about it (Wednesday 13th). Before a ball was kicked I was deep in conversation with the fellow trainees, and I found out some amazing facts. Firstly, two of them have played professional football in Scotland. If my memory serves me correctly, one of the chaps mentioned both Queen of the South and Dundee as part of his work history. I was slightly star struck, and even nowadays he gets paid playing in the NSW Premier League – that’s amazing! To my amusement he asked me if I played, to which I explained the knee injury I sustained when I was about 18 and I haven’t kicked a ball since. He seemed convinced by it – and so he should have been as it was the truth – but I wasn’t going to tell him of my White Hart Reserves days in Division Four of the Taunton Saturday League. I use to put the nets up and collect the corner flags (being tall and playing full back – the closest position to one of the corner flags – was my downfall). He would never have completed such chores in his life.

However, to make myself feel better, I know that there is a massive difference between being a top-flight footballer and to that of a coach. When you’re teaching a bunch of eight-year-olds reputations go out of the window and if you cannot keep their minds inspired then you’re in trouble. I’d like to think the children that very afternoon enjoyed themselves as I put an emphasis on enjoyment and participation, regardless of age or ability.

All self inflicted doom and gloom was lifted come that very weekend (Saturday 16th) as my actual football fix had returned. The Australian A-League recommenced at the same time as that of the Premiership and I managed to make a night of it. This was aided by a startling revelation – Australia sells Scrumpy Jack Cider in tins. During my days at the bank I was informed of a national off-licence that imports a variety of British beers and spirits (I did learn something) and I duly stocked up on this little beauty as it had been 18 long months since my last tipple. I must admit, I probably looked like a wino as I bought them out of cider, but there were only 3 cans in the shop. (It cost me something like $13 for three cans, but it was money well spent). My carbon footprint in making this purchase is shocking, but I’ll be back for more. Furthermore, I recycled the cans to make amends.

Anyway, back to the football. The curtain raiser in the A-League between Sydney and Melbourne was a damp squib; it finished 0-0, and no, it wasn’t one of those classic nil nil’s. The standard was poor and it was played at a tentative pace typical of a first game in the season. However, I was expecting more from the start of the Premiership, and like it’s Australian counterpart, it was dreadful. Admittedly, I am speaking from a Tottenham point of view, but I am fed up with the season already. Two games in and two defeats – same old, same old really, but being the superstitious person that I am, I am always looking for potential reasons why it hasn’t gone to plan. My conclusion is that we lost because Lysey stayed the night on both occasions. Therefore, for the forthcoming Chelsea match I have told her that she cannot stay. I know, I am an amazing boyfriend, but there is some logic behind this: Chelsea are undefeated at home for over 100 games so our chances of winning are slim. Personally I believe she’ll be back over next week, but if we win there’s a massive bridge I may have to cross!

30/8/08

I just can’t help myself. I have reverted to writing about work, once again, and like before it’s not going to be glowing. I tell myself this, though: what else am I to write about? Work takes up 37.5 hours of my week, I sleep for something like 50plus hours, and my social life is hardly blossoming as I am in the process of saving for a holiday in Fiji. Therefore, I will write about the one thing that happens on a regular basis, but I’ll try to adjust it in order to avoid any court threats. My defence, your honour is as follows: the brain is like a muscle and if I don’t use it it’ll go flabby. My vocabulary will suffer to the point where I will be using fillers in every sentence such as ‘you know… umm… thingy-me-bob’, and to counter that I need to continue writing.

After getting the boot the previous Monday I made a hasty retreat home to delete all pages as well as feverously search for work. Lo and behold, I was offered a full time job the next day and I am still there! For how much longer though is anyone’s guess, but the positives out of all of this is that I was not out of work for long. Anyway, the role; I work at a place that sells health insurance (or at least that’s what I think they do), but my job is to scan in a bunch of files and also complete an array of data entry. Riveting it is not, but like I previously said, I intended to get back in the saddle to get my mind off things. It’s money and a means to an end as, like I already mentioned, both Lysey and I have booked our flights to Fiji. (Stroll on November 2nd – 12 days island hopping awaits me).

However, I am not enjoying myself. To make matters worse I work for a man, who, initially it seemed took pleasure in putting me down, either by bleating orders, or showing no respect or gratitude in return. I have been belittled more than once and to be honest thinking about it made me angry. Two weeks into the role though and he has gone up in my estimation considerably. I put this down to the fact I never retaliated to his put downs; if he said something unworthwhile I respond with one word answers. (It seems to have worked). Moreover, he has also worked alongside me for one afternoon and ever since he has, like I said, gone up in my estimation. Anyway, the only reason why I am persisting in the role is solely because of my forthcoming holiday, but I am active in my search for alternative employment. Notice how I am a little vague with the details, but there are a few reasons for that: notably, the job is so monotonous there is very little to tell; talking about it could make me angry, and finally, the last time I opened my mouth it ended acrimoniously. Nevertheless, it's serving its purpose of providing me with enough dough to head to Fiji, and the working environment is ever improving.

I have managed to maintain my happiness though. Not only have I gone back to writing, but I have also had evening upon evening of Olympic coverage to keep me occupied. In my previous blog I was very critical of the Australian coverage, and I still am, but Britain has more than managed to hold its own and that’s great kudos for a gloating Pommy. Moreover, my previous views of the Olympic coverage were as follows: ‘…I have a sports fix to provide me with my entertainment, what with the start of the football season and the Olympics. Starting with the latter, here in Australia we are only two hours behind Beijing, so I have that advantage over anyone watching from Britain. However, I would willingly swap that for the level of coverage you British receive courtesy of the Beeb. Even though I have not watched any world wide sporting event elsewhere before, I would argue that the BBC do it best, just because of their various media outlets: the website, Five Live, BBC One, BBC Two, the red button in the corner offering interactive coverage - does it get any more comprehensive? By an Australian equivalent, the coverage is laughable. The main media outlet shows the coverage in association with Bunnings Warehouse and Harvey Norman - there's a store near you. (By the way, they're both akin to B&Q and Debenhams). You just don't sell out when it comes to world wide events. Nobody wants to see or hear an advert.

Moreover, and this admission did not come as a surprise to me, the coverage is just 'too Australian'. By that I mean when checking the TV schedule for events I enjoy, such as badminton, they just focus on the Australians taking part. When watching Athens four years ago I got into badminton as I followed the progress of Gail Emms and Nathan Robertson, who bagged a bronze for Britain. However, when I tuned in to watch badminton the other day they showed some Australian versus some Spaniard. I couldn't give a **** who won! (By the way, the Spaniard won, but I didn't care.) Incidentally, I also enjoy sports where there is no British involvement, or if there is, we are not in medal contention, such as table tennis or gymnastics. Both events are yet to commence, but hopefully the coverage will be comprehensive enough not to solely focus on anyone not donning green and gold.’

The coverage, sadly, didn’t improve. I recall one night last week (I believe it was Wednesday 20th) when Britain was cleaning up at the cycling. Well, here in Australia we watched the softball semi-final between Australia and Japan. The match lasted for five hours as it kept going to sudden death. Seriously, I have never been so bored in my life when it comes to watching sport. (It made watching Tim Henman in action enjoyable). Thankfully, London 2012 has cut softball from the program. Nevertheless, I managed to make best of bad situation and I was constantly glued to any highlights of us winning gold after gold. Furthermore, now that it has finished I am little gutted as the TV schedule has returned to normal and we’re now saturated with Pop Idol. (They show it 5 times a week – why?) They should follow the trend set when they cut Big Brother if you ask me. I say this solely because Australians aren’t marketable when it comes to pop music. The airwaves here are polluted with past American and British idol winners, but as soon as an Aussie wins s/he falls into the abyss. There is not the chart setup here unlike England so they technically have nothing to play for. Perhaps this is a reason to persist – to prove people like myself wrong, but don’t bother. Moreover, and I feel compelled to share this with you, they were hosting regional heats around the major cities of Australia, ala Sydney, Melbourne, Perth etc, but they also held one in London. This is all true, and six people got through the heats and they all received a free flight home to Sydney! Could you imagine Simon Cowell flying to Sydney to recruit would be British hopefuls? I haven’t purchased a return flight yet, but I’m holding out on Cowell and his cronies to pay for my way home. To me, it just sums up how crap this show really is. For the record, I haven’t been watching this, I have just caught snippets between channel hopping. I’d prefer to watch someone sing on the karaoke machine in a pub; at least that way I can have a pint while some loser sings.

Anyway, I haven’t just developed square eyes in my spare time. This weekend (Friday 22nd) Lysey was on duty so to speak in her role as an I-Grad at her plush hotel located on the beach at Coogee. In her current role she had to audit the restaurant and that meant we had to act like guinea pigs and receive a free meal. It’s a tough life admittedly, but my baby snapper and free bottles of wine softened the blow somewhat. We also stayed that very night and our balcony overlooking the beach was stunning. It has easily become my favourite weekend retreat while residing here and I can’t wait to hit the beach in the forthcoming summer months.

On the theme of food, both Lysey and I partook in our long awaited cooking class (Sunday 24th), or should I say or bar-b-q class. This had been on the to-do-list for a matter of months, but for reasons out of my control we had to wait until the end of August. (I wasn’t stalling. I know I cannot cook, but I was eager to learn) I must admit, I was nervous about the prospect, but once there they put everything into layman terms and this very man managed to cook king prawns, baby octopus and sword fish. The latter, incidentally, was stunning, but it carries high levels of mercury. Therefore, one would not be advised to live of it for a longer than a month. Furthermore, pregnant ladies (they’re not likely to be men now) aren’t advised to eat it. I brought a giggle to the group when I enquired if Lysey was pregnant, but I was the one laughing as I watched her devour her swordfish.

All of the above were either entrees or nibbles as the main course, not cooked by us (there were something like a dozen would be cooks in attendance), was a whole snapper – my second for the weekend. Since discovering the underwater delight I simply cannot get enough of it. Who knows, when I return to England I may stage a welcome home party and I could cook snapper as a treat (although I do just live down the road from a Domino’s Pizza). To be honest, I do not know if, when, or where I will use my new culinary skills, but I’d be up for the challenge.

Finally (I will revert back to writing weekly from now on), next week sees me gain another year. I see it as nothing to celebrate – I am going to be 26 after all, but I have given the maths of the situation no thought at all (not because I am losing my memory through old age). This is solely down the birthday surprise Lysey has in store for me. All I know is that come Monday I need my passport as we’re going away somewhere for three days. I cannot remember the last time I was surprised in such a way, but I am thoroughly looking forward to it. All I do know is that it should be hot enough for me to wear my flip-flops. That means the tub of sun tan lotion may be getting a dusting down.

Indeed, happy birthday to me!