Snapshots by John Holman
We go to the Art Gallery of NSW three or four times a year but always in April to see the Archibald’s. These shots were taken April 2006 while we sat on the deck enjoying a wondrous day and drinking a traditional (for us) glass of Champagne.
Snapshots by John Holman
The new Fancy Zoom effect I’m using comes from a script developed by Cabel’s Blog and converted into a Wordpress Plugin by WP Elements.
Snapshot by John Holman
I’m back and I’ll be taking a rest from blogging for a while. I’ve also switched off comments so I don’t have to worry about spammers.
Talk soon! 
I asked a friend to send me a photo from his library that I could use for this post. I said, ‘I’m off to India tomorrow, have you got something apt, an image that says travel, something I can use to tell my readers that I’m on the road and may not be posting that much for the next 3 weeks.’
He sent me this hippie shirt — drying on a line. I mean, am I a hippie?
I’m finally heading to India after a few false starts and some troubles with a permit. The permit, a Protected Area Permit (PAP) is required by the Indian Government in order to stay in the Tibetan Settlement of Bylakuppe, which is in South India, near Mysore.
My wife was going there to teach English and geography for a couple of months and I was staying with her and then travelling up north to do some work with Buddha’s Smile School.
Anyway, we sent all the necessary documents to Delhi more than 4 months ago. They were sent via His Holiness the Dalai Lama’s office in Australia, so we know the Indian Government got them. However, we are still yet to see hide or hair of the permits.
One might say, if one wasn’t being very Zen and cool about it all: ‘What a complete and utter stuff-up, guys!!’
Forget that we offered this as a freebie. Forget the waisted money spent on air tickets and a hotel and the time we spent finding/buying teaching aids, etc. Forget all that because I am being very Zen about it all. Like hell I am. 
One of my obsessions over the past few years has been to try and reduce my travel technology down to a couple of items — namely a smart phone (Treo 680) and a digital camera (Panasonic FZ5).
The Treo 680 contains all my travel information and contact details and on the road I also use it to browse the Internet and to send and receive emails. I also write stuff and send it out in MSWord format with the help of Documents to Go and my Palm Wireless Keyboard.
With a program called CallRec I can record anything from a phone conversation to the sound of a Indian Sitar. And with an 8GB SD-card full of ebooks and music and a video or two it also helps keep me occupied.
I’ve found my Treo to be so versatile I rarely need to travel with a laptop any more.
