New Low for ASX S&P 200

The new low of 4400 has been hit over night. the index is back up to 4600 at 11am, one hour after trading started.
The news seems to be panicky and it is interesting to read the comments.

Belgrave

Went to Belgrave today. The day was beautiful. 20 Degrees temperature. The train ride takes an hour from the city. Puffing Billy station is right next to the Met station. The rail actually continues, which is really amazing to see.
The real ride starts at 11:30 and is worth visiting. Only that ride goes all the way. The other rides go only half way and miss all of the wooden bridges that are located at the second half of the rail.
The full ride takes 2 hours each way. I expect to go for this ride one of the next weekends.

I visited Dandenong Ranges National Park and walked through some tracks there. The scenery reminded me of home and the mountains I used to walk through. Except I didn't push my bicycle at the same time. :)
The day was great. My legs are shaking and I felt so sleepy that I look forward to enjoying an afternoon nap.

Apart from that, the good news awaits at home. The US bailout plan has been agreed upon and set to President Bush for signature. The markets are to shoot up tomorrow. More on that at the Finance Blog and other news at my regular blog.

Plans for Sunday

Mmm, Sunday is tomorrow and I'm looking at the map. Where could I go this weekend? The interesting areas are green on the map. :) I believe the choice this time will be Belgrave line. The one that goes as far east as the trains go. The final station is at the foot of Mt.Dandenong. Right across the road is the Puffing Billy train station. I'd very much like to get a ride on that train. It was recommended to me long time ago, on one of the first weekends I've had a bicycle in Australia. But, because of the rail works on the line, I couldn't get there that very weekend.
So, the forecast is about 20 degrees during the day and sunny. Sounds perfect for a ride.

Footy finals are on. Actually, just finishing. It seems I'll have to go through a sea of footy fans on my way home. :S

Markets

All I do these days is watch this roller-coaster of the news related to financial markets. The news popping up are in such a contrast that they don't make much sense. Isolating the noise, though, tells me this could be the bottom of the fall and things should be easier from now on. That's in the markets, though. The practical effects in the real world are only starting to show. The slowdown in economic activity is starting to result in the things like recession in New Zealand, house prices predicted to fall in Asian financial centers because the financial institutions will start laying-off people, unemployment on the rise, etc.
Here in Australia these effects can be felt almost immediately. This is not quite the case with Eastern-European markets. Those are getting more tied to other markets but not yet in a significant way. Therefore, the effects of the turmoil in those markets don't have as much effects on the happenings there.

Well, having no news about other things, that's all I can entertain myself with. These must be historical moments. Some say things like this happen once in a lifetime. So, it's interesting to follow through.
Otherwise, I'd be most happy to receive a call from a recruiter but that just doesn't happen. A temporary thing would (will) be approval of my next leave so then I'll have a break again. In which case the length of the recruitment process will not look as bad as it does now. Anyway... Every month spent here takes me closer to my life goals and I'm trying to get used to that feeling.

Midwest, damn it - Travian?!

midwest: Do you write it or not?!

Ha,
what a development. Yesterday I asked Midwest to write a few lines on
his blog and so he did. The interesting part goes a little deeper. I've
had some time after I came from holidays. I decided to slow down a bit
and make more room for relaxation and recreation. So, I was more on the
lookout rather than actively looking for a video game I would play. I
haven't done that for a really long time so now I'm kind of missing it.
The last thing I played was the Elder Scrolls IV - Oblivion and that
was at least a year ago.
So, Midwest goes ahead and writes the post
mentioning Travian. The initial description is just what I was looking
for. With high internet availability it makes more sense to play a
simple game online. So, the dice has rolled.
Here is the description on Wikipedia. I see there are domains in different parts of the world, so here is the Australian one.
OK, let's see what it's like... :)

Life Habits

I just ran across a research about life habits of citizens of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Life Habits

(edit 2011-03-13: It seems the link has been unavailable for a while now. The new Prism Research's site does not contain the link anymore.)

The research was conducted in 2004 by Prism Research. There are a few interesting research results available on the site.
I came across this company's web site after I saw the email of the contact person from Australian Consulate in Sarajevo was at this domain.

Compare that to your lifestyle.

Hurstbridge - Fairfield, Trip 1

Here is my first bikely map. Hurstbridge - Fairfield, Trip 1. The best thing with these maps is that there is the distance calculated for the trip. The distance for this trip is 36.3 km. No wonder I could not go up-hill anymore. :)) Yet, I was so close to the city at that time. I also cycled to Victoria Park station earlier in the day, which leaves only a couple of kilometers that I crossed in a train. That's amazing. I should get one of those road computers and install it on a bike.

Edit.
Correction - adjusting the point from automatic line drawing along the streets to the actual paths I used corrected the distance to 38.8km so far. Scary. If I continue to correct the points it can only grow higher.

Bikely

I have used this site very little in the past but now I got reminded about it and it's much more fun. They are using Google Maps API to draw maps, which is exactly what I did with Google Maps itself. Only, the site expands on the bike path details. Now I can log all my rides.
I'm going to draw yesterday's ride from Hurstbridge. There are some interesting areas on the way.
Another useful thing is that other people are submitting routes and I might avoid situations like yesterday where I had to ride along and on the streets, waiting to cross a bike path somewhere. I'd prefer to stay on the bike paths the whole time, if possible. The scenery is much more interesting and it is way more quiet than on the roads.
So, off to draw my first map. :)

Zagreb

My brother asked me yesterday if there are any news about Zagreb project. Well, there aren't but the question threw me into thinking again. Big issues are at stake in that case and just thinking about it gives me headache. Things would be quite risky for the next two years. After that my Australian visa would expire and I would either be here again or not. And that would be the final decision. Of course, by then I'd expect to settle down and sort out some other issues. That would be another test and the decision would be prolonged a couple of years into the future.
Oh, sometimes I envy the people who got born in countries like Australia and never even have to think about similar issues...

Hurstbridge

Today I went to see the location of Computershare. It is only about 15 minutes on a bicycle or 5 minutes on a train with 10 minutes walk from the station. I thought it would be more but looking at the satellite images leaves a wrong impression, as usual.
Then I went to Hurstbridge. This was my first experience of an Australian outback. That was the feeling I had when I got there. Countryside, a small town, lots of forests, farms, horses, open roads. Saw a lot of people on motorcycles. I think the road goes into the mountains from here so it must be a beautiful place for rides. I cycled through some wonderful areas. There are wide streets and bicycle paths all the way back to the city and I followed most of them. If (or when) I go the next time it will be much easier to find them.
I was impressed by Eltham and the surroundings. No doubt one of the nicest areas in and around Melbourne. I'm more and more convinced that I could live completely on the Hurstbridge train line. :) Work, home, friends, leisure-time areas, they are all on this line. Guess I'm more of an in-land type than the beach type. Seeing the ocean is good once every couple of months but I start to really miss the rivers, greenery, trees, and hills if I don't see them at least once in two weeks. Even going to the city is quite enough once every couple of weeks or once a month.
I cycled on a great path next to Watsonia barracks. That's my potential unit location. Looks great. Surrounded by trees and close to Yarra river. The scenery is beautiful. If there was no antennas I'd never thought it wasn't a farm or a ranch. :)
This day was a great one. I spend around five hours riding around. The Hurstbridge train station is 36.7 km away from Flinders Street station. That is closer to the city than Frankston yet the feeling in quite different. Hurstbridge seems much more different to urban areas. Maybe it's because of the hilly terrain as opposed to Frankston, which is on the ocean shore.
I think I should go to the western suburbs the next weekend. And, then, to the mountains at the East. That would mean I travelled all the train lines across the Melbourne metropolitan area. Wow, would that be the time to go somewhere else, then?

Avstralia

Not much happening in real life. All the development is in the markets right now. See the finance blog for updates on what I'm currently entertaining myself with.
There might be some news in regards to work but nothing firm as of yet. I'll post as soon as things get a bit clearer. Currently waiting for the response from the Defence and also to get approval for the next leave.

Spring

The Spring is here big-time. After coming back from holidays, the weather got better. There are sunny days and clear skies. These days the temperatures go up to 25. At nights it is about 18. Already feels too hot. I can't wear a jacket when walking or cycling to and from work. It is time to swap trousers for shorts. And that period is to last for months from now. Makes me feel so much happier. Looking forward to being outside much more than in the past few months I've spent in Australia. The Summer vacation (in Europe) got me out of the cold room and now I'm back to similar temperatures here. Great.

Flights from Melbourne to Europe

I'm looking for good, reliable, and affordable carriers for flights from Melbourne to Europe and web sites that find good fares.

Here are some sites I came across, that produce good results:

JetAbroad
BestFlights

and here are some cheap airfare providers

in Asia:
AirAsia
JetStar
Tiger Airways

in Europe:
SkyEurope
RyanAir
EasyJet
German Wings

Back to Oz

This is just to let everyone know I'm back to the magical land of Oz after a beautifully refreshing holiday. Seen some nice landscapes, met wonderful people, really enjoyed myself that month off and now it's time to get back to the machine.
Now follows the standard back-to-routine transitional period of checking and answering emails, handling stuff that was waiting, etc.
Actually, it appears nothing has changed here in Australia so I can stay relaxed.

Talked to defence recruiters. Will have to wait another month for the SSC results. Hopefully, hopefully. It's been four months since my initiation of this procedure. This is taking too long.

Everything else is pretty much the same. I'm still enjoying the memories from the previous month, sad that I had not more time to see other places and people I wanted to but also looking forward to arrange my next visit.