Back home

Homeward bound is my facebook status at the moment, and here I am with my brother sitting at the computer.

We are discussing what film to watch, its cold outside and I'm enjoying not being at work.

That's the strange thing about work - its leaves little time for a social life! So now I'm off work for some time, I'm enjoying it a lot.

I've got lots of plans for my time down here in the south - bowling with brothers, eating out and maybe watching a film at the cinema. :-)

But now the computer is needed for someone else, so Adios.

:-)

Pjamas?!

Up here there is a bit of a fashion to go out with your pjamas on! I have just come back from the shops and seen two girls in pjs walking back into their house.

So I was thinking, why would you do this? Well here are some thoughts that might have been going through their minds:

"I'm really tired so I'll pop out to the shops and then be able to go to sleep straightaway when I get back".

"I've literally got no clothes so I have to go out in these..."

"I'm so pleased with these new pjamas I want everyone to see them so I'm going to 'go public' in them."

Well - I still reckon its pretty weird!

It looks like I'm sticking to the informal rule of only writing on this every month - not intentional honest.

Anyway, adios for now.

Sunday views from the north.

Sitting here infront of my computer its easy to write on this. But there are quite a few occasions when I think about something, and I say to myself - I really want to write on my blog about that. But I don't have a pen on me and I can't write it on my phone, so often the thoughts have to remain just that, and stay in my head.

But anyway since I'm here now, I can write about going to see Up, the new Pixar film.

I'm quite a fan of Pixar, but I reckon this was the best one yet.

It was funny, but still made a point, which is not the case with all of them - I thought Ratatouille was good, but not quite as thoughtful as Toy Story or Up.

The animation was, as usual, first class.

And it was just plain funny! Which is always good for a film I reckon. If only the seats had a bit more legroom, then the cinema experience would have been pretty much perfect.

Adios.

Holiday!

I've been on holiday this week.

I came down south and experienced all the joys of warm weather, beaches, and old friends.

Back to work next week, but its not with a dread that I'm going back up to Newcastle. No I like living there, and am really starting to feel at home there!

And that is quite a surprise given that 3 months ago I didn't know anyone, or where I was going to live!

p.s - full-time work holiday is really different to uni holiday! Shorter, but sweeter as a result.

Is it really "grim up north"?

Newcastle.

It seems a long way away sometimes, especially on weather maps! The BBC forecast is often "so there will be plenty of sunshine in the South East, particularly focusing on Canterbury, but the North East will be 12C with a strong westerly wind." (Well not quite, but it is amazing how often the South East is so much warmer than here!)

But even if that idea of Newcastle is true, the idea that it's "grim" up here is not true!

In fact I was down in London the other day and thinking about how that felt quite different to Newcastle. The night atmosphere here is much more vibrant - kind of fresh and new and exciting. London seems not to have that; almost like 'this is something we've always done, its a bit of a grind being out, but lets do it anyway'!

Maybe thats because people come here for Hen and Stag parties and so are exploring the city for the first time.

I finally got my graduation DVD through today!

It has taken a lot longer than they said it would which is really annoying. I often came back from work hoping it'd be there, but it never was, until today.

Uni does feel like a long time ago now. With friends going back soon, I am missing it, but pleased to be here as well.

Right. Its ten past ten. Time for the working man (that's me) to sign off. So until next time... happy living.

(Maybe I should develop a goodbye phrase - what do you reckon?!)

It's sunny, it's a Saturday, and this is Sam's blog about a stupendous day.

I've had a truly brilliant day.

Saturdays mean a whole lot more when you're working office hours the rest of the week. Today felt really long, which was nice.

The sun was shining and it was warm, which isn't that normal for up here, whatever the locals tell you...

I was with family friends and had a quiet morning watching Everybody loves Raymond (which i... love...) and enjoying not being at work really early!

And then I decided to discover the METRO CENTRE...

Now, if you have been doing some research, or reading these posts carefully, you will know that Newcastle is very fond of the word "Metro".

Its underground trains are called the Metro, there is the Metro music venue, the Metro Centre, and probably a dodgy pizza place called "Metropizza" as well.

But anyway, the Metro Centre is a large shopping centre (the biggest in the North East, England, Europe, the galaxy... take your pick) and is actually in GATESHEAD. So I made a mistake above.

People in Gateshead are understandably keen to point out that many of the newly built attractions - the Sage concert theatre, the Baltic (a modern art gallery) and the Metro Centre, are all in Gateshead, and not Newcastle.

This place is indeed massive - red zone, blue zone, green zone, yellow zone, central arcade. All on two levels - and loads of shops.

I bought a few small things - some nice pens and a holder to brighten my desk, and a very swish bedside light. It really is very nice. Very nice. I like it. :-)

And then I came out into more sunshine and warmth to watch football on the tele.

Newcastle were playing, live on BBC 1 - which was exciting. And as a new Newcastler, I was supporting them - they drew sadly, and were wearing a horrendous yellow striped shirt. It really is awful.

I also enjoyed a lovely piece of salmon, and homemade chips, and watched Total Wipeout.

Total Wipeout is a programme I don't think I'll find funny every time I watch it, but I do. Its just brilliant!

So, a lovely day, and now off to sleep. :-)

New layout

I'm trying a new layout. What do you think?

Longbarn life

Before I talk about Longbarn life, I'm listening to a programme on Radio 4 about MI6 - or the SIS (Secret Intelligence Service) as they are formally called - and its quite sobering.

It seems to be pretty different to Spooks and James Bond, some of it must be quite dull and office-like I think. The programme is talking about 'moles' in the service as well, which sounds awful (unless they were moles in the KGB...)

So anyway, Longbarn. What a great camp it was again.

What really struck me this time was seeing children changing as the week went on.

Every night we had 'S.T.E.P' (singing, thinking, exploring, praying) when these 50 children heard a Bible story, along with great songs (with me singing too which was fun).

Children who seemed very uninterested at the beginning of the week were singing and listening enthusiastically by the end of it. It really made me think about why I do it and encourage me that it makes such a difference.

This year was also great with the leaders! We had a lot of laughs, about everything from playing Top Trumps, to falling over in the mud, to losing at handball (6-2 on one day!).

It was so much fun.

But now I'm back in newCASTLE.

And I like it here. I'm getting to know places and enjoying exploring the area.

Work is good too, and I'm enjoying being paid a lot too!! (I'm enjoying it a lot, I'm not being paid a lot, well more than when I was at Essentials...)

Green grass

Coming home from work today I decided not to go all the way back on the Metro, so I walked.

And you'd think walking from one part of Newcastle to another I would pass concrete block after concrete block.

Well, thankfully, Newcastle isn't like that!

It seems to have lots of public parks, large open spaces of green loveliness.

So it was really great walking back through Jesmond Dene and Heaton Park.

Fresh air, trees, space and the outside.

Lovely, and unusual for a big city which is known for it industrial heritage.

Shopping centres, weather, and other things that British people like to talk about.

Well, I haven't written on this blog for some time.

So Newcastle life is going well, it is not as hot as some parts of the country, in fact yesterday it rained ALL DAY! Not just spitting rain, massive buckets of water from the sky. Today is better weather wise, a lot brighter.

Josh came up to Newcastle last week. We went to the the city centre, and into a rather large shopping centre - eldon place or something - and it did the thing that all shopping centres do: make you feel like you're in any city in a any county, SOMEWHERE in the UK.

It is very strange how this happens, and it might be something to do with the shops all being the same in the whole country, but it really did feel like I could be in Reading, or London, or Scotland.

So we attempted to make our way out, and then spent about 20 minutes wandering round this vast bright shopping centre unable to find the exit! At one point we could see the street from above but couldn't get out, it was weird!

Website curiosity

Just seen the front page of www.kent.ac.uk - my old uni website and had to laugh.

They have a link for "Canterbury open day" above the link for "Swine flu update". 

Probably not the kind of welcome they were going for...

You're a what?

I haven't written on this for AGES... 

Well, "from a final year to the world" is this blog's tagline, and I'm going to have to change that, because I am now officially a graduand. What's that? Umm, Google...? Its a person who's finished their degree, but has not actually graduated. So I will be a graduand for a matter of days, I'm going to enjoy it!

The good news is that I have a 2:1, and the other good news is that I've now moved to Newcastle for a job up here. 

For people reading this who are not British (or indeed, know only the south of England...), Newcastle is nearly 300 miles from London, and on the River Tyne. It is famous for its football team (recently relegated), its ale, coal, and recent rejuvenation. 

Its a great place, and this blog I'm sure will soon be full of the differences between my former home of Whitstable and Newcastle. 

FA Cup final day

Today is the end of the football season, and the BBC have done a beautiful picture collection of the FA Cup trophy being mended:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/in_pictures/8072594.stm

The exam term, and unique uni goings on

At the University of Kent we have this weird 6 week exam term at the end of each year. The other terms are 12 weeks, so this one always feels very short.

And with everyone doing exams, different people are counting down to when they finish all the time. It's quite strange, we say things like - "only 6 days left", or "1 down, 3 [exams] to go". So everyone is counting down to when they no longer have exams to do. Its all a bit odd - we're rather taken up with what is to come, and what's over the horizon, and not what is happening now.

This is just one of the things that is really strange about uni, and one of the things that I'll probably forget when I leave - which is why I wanted to write it down now.

One of the other things that is strange about uni is the village atmosphere. Being on a campus with 15,000 people, you tend to get to recognise a lot of them by face if not by name as well. But what is really odd is that I go for weeks without seeing someone and then I see them 3 times in a week! I don't have that in the town I live in when I'm not at uni, it's a very particular oddity of university.

And another thing...

I've gone through my 3 years at University and I've seen how people have changed so much over that time. I have changed loads, so I've noticed it in me as well, but there are a lot of people who seem very different from that first September in 2006 of my first year.

Generally I notice the ones I don't know very well as I can be more detached from them. Some people have put on lots of weight over the three years, some have taken up smoking, others have got deeply involved in religious societies, others taken up sports clubs. You could say, "well that's just life", well yes, but in the microcosm of University, its much more noticeable, as we live in close proximity to each other, we're not separated by work/life boundaries or the miles of distance of a large city.

We live our lives in the full view of 15,000 people!

Saturday's thoughts

As I sat in Canterbury high street, it seemed to me that the city had lost itself.

I had walked through the clinical Whitefriars and down the high street and it just didn't seem to have that 'mystery' factor that made it different to other cities.

But I was to be proved wrong, and right, in one go.

I found a seat under a large tree near cafe rouge and read the paper. Soon people sat next to me. I can't remember most of them specifically, but they sat there.

A man then stood in front of me for quite some time. Then a little boy came up with another child, and a woman, perhaps his mother. The boy said to the man - who the family clearly knew "can I have an ice cream?"! "What's the special word?" came the inevitable reply, "please" the boy said.

And then, "you're looking smart today..." the boy looked at the man and waited.

I smiled, as did his mum and the man.

"He's learning quickly" she said and laughed.

It was nice to see some humour in the world; something that made the world such a good place to be.

And so there is something here that makes Canterbury different (and the same) from other towns: it wasn't the shops, or the fashions, or the tangible material things that made this world a lovely place to be. It is the people. Small moments, little actions. Real people, real life.

Its worth writing about.

inQuire front page

Even better than the link...

Here is a picture of a recent front page.

The one I stayed up until half past 3 in the morning to do!

inQuire link

Here is the link for inQuire's website: www.inquirelive.co.uk

I'll try and get some pictures of inQuire too.

As promised 2

The last inQuire seems rather some time ago now.

I looked at it again the other day thought and I was really pleased with the front page especially. I worked really hard to get that story. It was on Canterbury City Council's use of the RIPA.

That, for everyone who doesn't know what RIPA (I was in that situation before I wrote the story!), is the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act. And it allows local councils to use covert surveillance to monitor people who they think could be committing crimes. It means councils have used CCTV to watch people fly tipping or other 'minor crimes'.

CCC have used this 23 times in five years.

And also in the final issue of inQuire, I wrote a piece for the features section of inQuire about whether Easter has lost its true meaning!

I was really pleased with this piece, as it gave me a chance to write about Jesus' last days in Jerusalem, and his death and resurrection.

It was hard to write, and certainly made a change from the news writing I usually do, but great to have something in the features section for my portfolio.

As promised 1

So, North Korea.

I reckon we (the West) might be wrong.

In the past, with Iraq, the USA and Britain were convinced that they had WMD. But, after many years inside Iraq, none have been found. So what is stopping the West being wrong again?

Apparently North Korea was launching a weapon which could in the future be used for nuclear weapons. North Korea dispute this. So who should we believe?

Blogs to come

North Korea, its launch, and the Western media,

the final inQuire,

friends,

and leaving University.

Blogs to be written and posted soon...

24 hours

I thought about something I would share with the world recently...

Life sometimes seems SO busy that I worry about the future, and the past.

Especially at the moment, with my degree nearly at an end; I am looking for a job and want to finish my degree well with the essays I hand in.

So it was with these thoughts in mind, that a new, more postive thought came to me: the brilliance of the 24 hour day.

I say Praise God that He invented the day as 24 hours.

We cannot affect the time outside of these 24 hours, it is only these hours we have each day, and that is all we need worry about.

fruit

Today I'm writing this blog on an Apple!

Its a massive one and it is rather impressive. 

Back at 'home' now, in Thatcham. As opposed to my other 'home' in Whitstable. We were discussing the RECESSION yesterday, and came to this conclusion...

The chain of debt is rapidly going up the ladder. It started with individuals who borrowed money which was more than the value of what they were borrowing against. 

This then moved up the chain to banks, who had to start borrowing from each other. But as we know soon the banks stopped borrowing to each other. 

So now, its the Government that is borrowing money!

But where is this money coming from? Is it from the 'oil rich' nations in the Middle East, or Russia and China? 

It seems to me that there must be a different way to combat the problems. And surely this is a good place to start. The blogosphere. So many people write about their views on life, there must be some innovative ways to stop the rot and get out of the problem. 

I don't know what it is, but maybe you do? 

Twitter, facebook, spotify: is there more to life than this?

I've just watched a TV programme where the conversation started by saying "so are you on Twitter, MySpace, facebook and all that?", "yes", the man replied, "I went on Jonathan Ross' show yesterday and now I have 1500 followers [on his Twitter account].

Isn't there more to life than social networking? I think there is. These websites are so temporary, and fleeting. MySpace is replaced by facebook which is replaced by Twitter, which is replaced by Spotify, which follows in the steps of Last.fm. And soon there will be another website. Something else offering social networking, or music, a collection of the two.

I don't think these sites are all bad. I use most of them - indeed, I am using a blog now and that hadn't been heard of five years ago - but I know that it is not the be all and end all of life. And yet people seem to think it might be.

This show I just watched talked about the sites as common place. Not amazing, and out of the realms of possibility, like a Ferrari, or going to the moon, but normal, everyday, involving everyone. So if you're young - 15 say - then the peer pressure to be on all of these things is going to be massive. When I was growing up, it was football stickers and pogs, and yoyos, but now you need an internet connection, and a fast computer to keep up with the trend.

Other problems like privacy, and advertising are involved too, but the biggest problem is that we think without these sites, our lives become uninteresting.

This is not true.

I am a Christian, and my relationship with Jesus means I have a friend by my side the whole time.

Recently I was walking to Uni along a road I walk down most days. I was stressed about doing the newspaper, and an essay, and I felt a nudge to notice the bigger things around me - the blossom on the hedge, the smell of the freshly cut grass, the feel of the air on my face. These things were tangible, these things were real, and these things were what I could be pleased to experience. The other issues were important, but just to stop thinking about them for a moment, and focus on those things that are bigger in life was refreshing.

So, yes there is more to life than Twitter, facebook and spotify.

Got go now, I'm off to check out some music on a certain website beginning with s and ending with y...!

Sam Wylie's thoughts on journalism and Kent life: Seeds of hope (or doubt)

Sam Wylie's thoughts on journalism and Kent life: Seeds of hope (or doubt)

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/eng_prem/7922069.stm

Seeds of hope (or doubt)

A thought, a decision, a missed tackle. Anything can be a seed of hope (or doubt).

Today, Liverpool FC made their seed of hope grow that little bigger, and Manchester Utd created a seed of doubt.

With a comprehensive victory against Real Madrid in the week, and a thumping defeat of Man U today, Liverpool may be starting to hope again.

A hope for the Premier League title, not the Champions League, that's old hat, but the PL, the big one, the best one.

4-1 will be the cry. A Gerrard, Torres victory once more. Vidic getting the blame for the 'other red' team losing. The penalty, Liverpool having better clear cut chances and other aspects of the game that will be the talking point.

But its the seed of hope that that winning gives which is the important thing.

A seed, which with more rain, good ground (and probably the deforestation of the trees around it) will lead to Liverpool once more being crowned Champions of England!

Essential musings

The funny thing about working in a shop is you get to learn all about people's eating habits...

Today I served people around supper time: one guy bought a massive piece of steak, and someone else got 2 things of pot noodles and a can of red bull!

Earlier this week, I had something published in the Kentish Gazette, which I sent to them after writing the story for inQuire. I rang the KM group and asked them if they'd be interested in the stor, and they were. :-) So p18, and on the web with my name at the top.

The story was about Kent Union gaining Sunday Times best 100 companies recognition.

Elections are on the way here in the world of Kent: elections for the Student Union Vice President roles, as well as the President him/her self and part time positions. (Bored yet?)

Well, actually its not boring!

I think not enough people vote in these elections, and I think the outcome is very important. It will direct what happens to Kent Union over the next year, and as KU is currently one of the biggest in the country (in terms of people employed and activities undertaken) there is a lot that could go wrong!

There are a few people who are running under a similar banner, the socialist one, and they say they will give part of their earnings to a learning fund which doesn't have very much money.

I'm not sure about some of them though, do they have a trustworthy attitude, and the respectability to run the Union? Will people listen to them, and will they make a difference?

There's a lot I don't know (part 2)

We started the journey in an eventful fashion. I was trying to finish the inQuire news section together and it was taking a while.

The sun was shining brightly outside and my two companions were waiting to go.

When I finished in the office, I walked downstairs and set the alarm off because everyone else had gone, and put the alarm on without realising that I was still in there!

We had a real laugh on the way up - stopping at a Burger King somewhere between Canterbury and Durham, I asked for a large burger meal of some description. It was TINY!!!

But, not to be deterred, in full Wylie and Harvey fashion I picked myself up, and said "I'm not satisfied with this, please can I have another burger and some more chips?". They tried to take the burger away and give me a replacement one, but that would have been the same TINY size, so I had both, and some more chips, and felt thoroughly happy with my British complaint.

We thought about saying the Burger King people that we'd travelled five hours just to get to this Burger King and were there for a special 18th birthday meal...

There's a lot I don't know

Travelling up to Durham on Friday I realised a lot about the things I don't know.

We were in the car driving for 7 and a half hours following many signs to 'the north'. We went past lots of places I'd heard of, but didn't really know where they were.

By travelling over 300 miles from Canterbury to Durham, we'd nearly gone further than France, and the things I'd discovered felt almost as great.

I would have liked to updated this blog during the weekend, but I couldn't find a computer (partly because I wasn't looking for one) and I couldn't work out how to do it on my phone.

So I'm sitting in Whitstable now trying to rememeber some of the things I was thinking about then to write down now.

My new phone arrived in the post yesterday!

The Samsung Tocco - its pretty cool - with a touch screen and something called smile recognition! It knows when people are smiling and only takes a picture then. :-) picture :-( no picture.

And I have just filled in the National Student Survey. This is the survey of final year students in the UK about what we think of our course. Last year a lot of people did it - about 200,000 - but it was open to abuse, abuse which was documented in some cases. This year my university was offering a £5 reward to people who completed it.

Why? Well, so we would spend five minutes of our lives answering questions about the last three years of our lives.

The questions were slightly odd, well the answers really. I was given the choice of strongly agree, agree, neither agree or disagree, disagree and strongly disagree. Now - the results last year were portrayed as "students love our degree and our university". Is that because lots of people wrote strongly agree? But for which questions? And what about all those people - and I'm sure there were lots that answered "neither agree or disagree"?

Today an extraordinary thing happened

11th February saw something amazing happen on campus. So amazing, this correspondent felt compelled to write about it on his blog.

Students were actually involved in something other than themselves! Four separate events on campus were going on and people were stopping, listening and thinking about what was happening!

For many, this news would not come as a surprise. Students, many think, are very politically minded, and will often stand up and make a noise about things they do or don't like - look at Nelson Mandela and Nestle, and the campaigns around them in previous years.

However, whether it is the 21st century, or whether it is just the University of Kent, people just don't seem to bother here. 320 people attended the recent AGM, less than 3,000 voted in the Union elections, 'Varsity' - the local sporting derby between Kent and ChristChurch university is unknown to most. Over 15,000 students are part of this university, but many appear not to want to be too much a part of it.

But, today that was not the case. On one part of campus stood the Fruit and Veg stall. This was booming with customers. It is situated in a good part of campus, unlike its former site, in the depths of the Venue. A popular innovation liked by all.

But a little further along was a large white marquee with the words 'have your say' above, and the smell of burgers to the side. This marquee was part of Kent Union's attempt to hear from students about the direction of the Union for the next five years - their strategic plan for 2009-2013.

And people were in the marquee, reading the notice boards, writing down suggestions, and eating the burgers. It was a success - around 100 people had been through only a couple of hours after it was set up! Yes the free food was helping, but just to get people through the doors was good.

Thirdly (and a bit of a plug) inQuire! Woohoo, my own newspaper (well, I'm one of the section editors). I had great fun handing these out today, and people looked interested when I gave them one and started talking about the story on the front page. Again, people interested in what is going on at their Uni.

And finally, a table set up outside Essentials, advertising a Pro Evo Soccer competition in aid of a Gaza society. People here too were stopping, listening and signing up.

So, a normal Wednesday afternoon, but not normal activities, its so good to see people involved in what is going on around them, I like that a lot, and sitting here in the library, the world looks a happy place.

Job hunting

I haven't written on this for a while, so Honkit, here is the next entry.

June 2009 sees this particular blogger leave his degree at the University of Kent and enter the big wide world (note: that phrase was used when I left primary school, secondary school, sixth form. I think I'm at least partially in the big wide world already!)

I'm looking a job at a newspaper. My aim is to write for a national newspaper, and I have applied to a national newspapers graduate scheme, but I am also following advice to start in a local newspaper, and so I'm reasearching that now.

By picking big towns which are likely to have good newspapers I think I'll be able to find good newspapers to start with - that is what the advice I was given.

So I thought that instead of making the decision when I went to uni of not picking anything with 400 miles of my home, I would start in the South East: London, Brighton, Southampton, Dover, Portsmouth. Any other good towns?

Maybe I'll send a couple of letters off to Liverpool and Manchester too.

So, back to it...

time

By the way, the times at the bottom of these blogs aren't English time. I didn't post the last one in the middle of the night. Its 11.20 am here.

"followers"

Today I discovered this blog has a follower. Exciting, someone must be reading all these words!

I guess that is what blogging is all about - getting my thoughts out to the world. :-)

Its friday now, and next week is the beginning of term. This term has been a long time coming.

Today's job is to finish my CV. I'm sending it off to The Times for their graduate programme, which looks really interesting. And it pays too!

3 days of work experience and then...

Well, its less than a week till the beginning of term. Its the start of my final 'real' term before I graduate as the last term is only six weeks.

I've had a day of Tesco shopping and watching the Formula 1 review of the year. It was an extraordinary year in Formula 1.

AND the biggest thing that happened today was seeing my articles published in the local papers - the east kent gazette, faversham news and sheppey gazette. I was only there for three days on work experience and I wrote loads of articles for them. The first one was about the situation in Israel and Gaza! I had to some up the situation in a sentence.

I'm really pleased to have these stories in the paper; I've wanted for ages to be a journalist and I'm a lot closer to getting there now.