World Buskers Festival

Last week saw Christchurch pay host to its annual World Buskers Festival. This turned out to be a great laugh. There were several stages set up around the city centre, with acts taking it in turn to perform throughout the day. The festival organisers pay for accomadation and flights for the acts, who are picked from the best street performers around the world, but it's up to them to pass the hat as usual for their wages.

As Malc's company host the website we ended up with VIP tickets to one of the evening performances held in the outdoor courtyard of the arts centre, with food and wine thrown in. We spent most lunchtimes watching acts out in the street, as well as 'Buskers at Brighton' in our neck of the woods. Highlights include

• Gamarjobat - japanese silent acrobat / magician duo
• Scott Nery - Dry witted american pancake juggler
• Joel Salom - Australian juggler accompanied by Erik the robotic dog
• Nate Cooper - Skinny drunken pogo-ing juggler / 'strongman'
• Blackstreet Boyz - Jive talkin' hip-hop dancers / comedians from LA

The photo above shows one of the 'stages', and is also the view from Malcs office balcony.

Other exciting news this weeks is the long awaited purchase of a surfboard by Darren, so Malc finally has a surfing partner, and the impending arrival of Katherine and Roy on Sunday for a two week visit. Also, summer seems to be here at last! Hopefully we can rub it in a bit to all those who were gloating about the UK heatwave last summer while our socks were freezing up.

Take care and stay tuned,

Malc & Annie

Now the dust has settled from Chrimbo and New Year, it's time for an update. Quite a lot has happened, so here are the highlights.

We went away for a weekend with Carol and did a dolphin swim with the Dusky Dolphins in Kaikoura. Although the sea was a bit lumpy, it was really awesome. You have to make noises down your snorkel otherwise they don't pay you much attention, which was pretty comical in itself. I think we didn't give a very good representation of the human race, the dolphins are probably arguing right now about whether we are an intelligent species or not. It's really amazing when you get eye contact with one though, and they sometimes swim around you in a circle to see if you can keep up (you can't!).

Christmas saw the 'Invasion of the Martins'. Darrens brothers Rob, Dan and sister Suzie, plus partners Nat, Veronica and Richard came to stay in Christchurch for Christmas and New Year. Dan and Veronica stayed with us in the sleepout, with the rest staying with Darren and Nicole. So what seemed likely to be our first lonely Christmas was actually pretty busy, with 11 of us in total kicking around. Lots of eating out, surfing days for the lads, and a BBQ on Christmas day at Darrens. Annie and Nicole kept their pact to go in the sea on Christmas morning, and Darren and Carol joined them. Malc stayed back as official photographer, the water temperature is still 'bracing' to put it politely. Once up to waist depth, most people would express it a little less politely.

Which brings us on to the weather. Our dreams of our first Kiwi summer basking on the beach proved a little optimistic. What we got was the worst December in NZ for 70 years, and most definately the worst weather since we have been here. Thankfully, things seem to be picking up now, apparently February will be nice!

Other big news is Annie quitting her job. It's a long story, but basically things had been getting pretty stressfull and 2 days before Christmas she was asked to work over the whole of the holiday, so she 'stuck it to the man' and left. Will update with details of the new job when it turns up!

Also we have booked a trip back to the UK on May 2nd, hopefully for 3 weeks, as we had return tickets to get out here. We'll be visiting Suffolk, Old Brighton and Cornwall during our stay, so hope to catch up with all you loyal blog readers then! Until then, thanks for reading and hang loose. M & A xxx.