Canberra, Australia via SCL - Daniel Boyle

james_dean · Post by **james_dean** » 20 Jul 2009 23:39

Why didn't ya go Copey, ya softcock.

Yes I'm jealous too

boyle · Post by **boyle** » 22 Jul 2009 00:04

Having a great time at worlds, although my left knee has been quite sore the last two days. Copey has been replaced with my friend from high school Dan Smiley, who also drinks beer rather than water. Apparently he has actually played more hack than Copey in Prague, and he doesnÂ´t even play!

The organisation has been really great. Everyday there is food for breakfast and lunch, and fruit available all day (so much watermelon!). When you get tired of kicking they sell beer for 1 euro. Yesterday was circle comp, I only warmed up, did my phases, which didnÂ´t go so well, and that was all I played. We went to the swimming pool yesterday (free with your worlds wristband), that was really great.

In the circle comp I think Olaf was the real standout yesterday, every round was full of long strings of very hard tricks. Nick Landes and Phil also had some really good rounds.

I have my routine today which is the main event I am excited about. I promised myself I wouldnÂ´t completely obliterate myself on the night before the routines ala this yearÂ´s nationals, but that didnÂ´t stop me from having quite numerous beers.

Last night Dan, Roy, Caroline and I went to see Propagandhi and then we went to the after party at a place called Yaam....the bar has a mini ramp in it! And also some sort of beach bar. I went skateboarding on some dudeÂ´s board, which is really not the best idea on the night before the routines....I dropped in, did a tail tap, went back up and came down fakie, then tried to do something else and jumped off, and some guy who was much better gave me props. I thought it was safest to sit back down after that...I am really suprised I have been skating at all on this trip, and more than once.

It is an awesome time, there are so many footbag players here. I have been hanging around with the Austrian crew a lot, I think I will go to Vienna after worlds...I wish I had a lot longer to spend in Europe..and a lot more money too!

boyle · Post by **boyle** » 25 Jul 2009 00:38

So today is the last day of worlds, I canÂ´t believe it has already come around so quickly. The circle comp final yesterday was insane, VasekÂ´s first run had something close to 200 contacts in it. He totally dominated the circle.

Last night I saw an Australian punk rock band, that as a matter of fact I have never heard of before. They were sort of like a street punk band, which is not really a style that I like, but the show was really fun. Went with Roy, Anita, Caroline and Dan Torr. Before the show we went to the vegetarian recommended restaraunt, where they did mock meat burgers and that sort of thing. My housemate Teigan will be really impressed, I have eaten at multiple veg restaruants in various countries!

So my current plan is to stay an extra night in Berlin, then go to Vienna for a few days, Prague for a couple of days, back to Frankfurt, then sit on a plane for a whole day, arrive back in Sydney at 6am, then go back to work the next day. Not looking forward to that part.

I hit my first new trick for the worlds, stepping ss torque. I also got 123 or so in shred 30, which is the first time IÂ´ve scored over 100, which has been a target for me for a while. It put me in 29th place out of 40, with some much better players than me below me. Pretty happy with that, that was the event that I probably was most happy with how I went for my standards.

james_dean · Post by **james_dean** » 25 Jul 2009 09:15

wow, huge props for performing well man. that's awesome.

PoisonTaffy · Post by **PoisonTaffy** » 26 Jul 2009 07:07

I had to leave the Glasshaus and catch some sleep before my flight, couldn't find you to say bye

boyle · Post by **boyle** » 29 Jul 2009 09:58

Hey Roy, it was great to meet you, I swear I made this post a few days ago. I had heaps of fun hanging out, and IÂ´m really glad we got to a punk rock show also! I will have to come visit Israel sometime next year.

So I am in Vienna right now, the hospitality of the Austrian crew knows no limits. I had a vague plan of maybe coming to Vienna at some stage after worlds, but nothing set in stone, but I had a lot of fun hanging out with all the Austrians at worlds, that I thought it would be a good idea. Verena left to go travelling today, so to get a kick with everybody, I would have to come on Tuesday, so thatÂ´s what I did.

From Berlin I went to Prague for a couple of days, I got a ride over with Petr, which meant I was sharing the backseat with a certain undisputed world champion. Petr let me sttay in his apartment for the one night, but he was moving house the next day, so I stayed in a hostel, which I had booked for the day after that, but there were no troubles changing the booking. The hostel totally sucked, and my time in Prague was mediocre to say the least, mainly because of my close positioning to a main highway, and the fact that everywhere I went I had a general feeling I would be robbed.

We had an awesome kick last night in Vienna, more than 10 people there, which is pretty good for a Tuesday night. Today I went and did some sightseeing with Anita and Tobias, it was good to have a local guide, and tonight we will go party, that will be fun too.

I am staying at AlexÂ´s place, he has given me my own set of keys, and he said he will stay at his girlfriendÂ´s tonight, so basically I have my own apartment in Vienna! I think this was the 100% right decision to come here. I will make my way back to Frankfurt on Friday or Saturday, then I must go back home on a very long flight, not excited about that...or going back to work. But it should all be good, especially as I should still have a small amount of money left over, which has come as a pleasant surprise.

I have traveled really well, especially for someone on their first overseas trip. I am glad I waited this long. If I hadÂ´ve travelled when I was a lot younger, I would have blown my money really quickly, then had to go back home early, and wouldnÂ´t have enjoyed things as much.

hacksterbator · Post by **hacksterbator** » 29 Jul 2009 11:03

boyle wrote:... and the fact that everywhere I went I had a general feeling I would be robbed.

welcome to prague. The only time i didn't get that feeling was when i has hanging out with ales. The rest of the time i had my hand on the knife in my pocket.
Glad to hear the trips is going well, and props on the results at worlds. Except for my 2nd place shred 30 defense... you dropped the ball there bro.

james_dean · Post by **james_dean** » 29 Jul 2009 23:56

Sounds great man. Good luck with the trip back... can't believe you have money left over that's awesome! Buy some random shit

hehe.

boyle · Post by **boyle** » 30 Jul 2009 00:37

haha, I think I may have got half your score from last year! However, that was my best effort, so I was quite happy.

boyle · Post by **boyle** » 02 Aug 2009 22:41

Last day of my trip.

I have had such a great time, and been treated really well by some awesome people. Now i have a long flight to take me back to winter

PoisonTaffy · Post by **PoisonTaffy** » 02 Aug 2009 23:22

I think it's more likely that I'll visit Australia next year. I just need to sell more art to afford it!

boyle · Post by **boyle** » 05 Aug 2009 17:53

That would be so sick. I would highly recommend coming out at the time of Narooma or Nationals, or both, they are about 3 months apart (January and April), that's a good length of time to have a holiday! It would be awesome to have you out here.

Canberra is a renowned art dealing hub, you should come here..http://the-riotact.com/?p=11381

So I am back in Australia now, I got back in at 6:30 in the morning yesterday. I stayed at my Grandma's yesterday, was fell fed and got all my dirty washing done. Now I'm just waiting for the bus back to Canberra. So in a few hours I can unpack my backpack and put it in the cupboard for a while.

So it was a pretty great trip I had. I'm a bit disappointed I couldn't kick as much as I wanted to at worlds. I had a seriously sore left knee and right ankle, but I have been resting so they seem to be improving.

I will probably take at least another week off from any serious kicking, and then start getting back to it. The most disappointing thing was I was in the most pain on the main day of competition, where I did my routine and Shred 30. It hurt too much to do some of the tricks in my routine, and I dropped far too much.

It was a great experience to go to my first worlds, and a great worlds to be my first. It was awesome to meet so many other people who are interested in something that at home everyone finds so incredibly obscure.

Anyhow, back in Canberra, I face a week of starts below 0 temperatures, starting work at 7am. I think I prefer swimming in the Badeschiff and searching for a 5 out of 5 scoops ice cream, that's for sure.

boyle · Post by **boyle** » 05 Aug 2009 18:16

these are some new tricks and links I hit during my travels

stepping diving butterfly
stepping ss rev swirl
flurry>ducking mirage
phoenix>blurry whirl in runners after 4 beers

I came close to hitting alpine bl. whirl a couple of times as well.
and some other stuff

I got to kick in the following place

Zurich x 2- one in the school near Tina's place, one in the main park near the station
Freiburg-on a rooftop by the river
Vevey- by the lake
Berlin
Vienna- MuseumsQuartier x2

These people treated me very well

Flavio- took me all around the sights of Switzerland and introduced me to huge amounts of the Swiss players

Alex- let me stay in his house for nearly a week, with my own keys and everything.

Everyone I shared with at the Xberger (Phil, Matt Bailey, Pawel, Olaf, David, Alvaro, Tuuka- all total champs). I was impressed that we managed to keep our room in a reasonable state for 8 dudes sharing for a week...I've definitely seen a lot worse!

Berlin Crew- put on the best tournament ever. Totally awesome.

Ken Somolinos- After 4 years it was awesome to hang out again, and good that I had improved significantly. Ken's dropless routine in the first pool was my spectator highlight of worlds.

Petr- Gave me a place to stay and a ride to Prague

Dan Torr- Shows a great sign of friendship when you say to someone "I'm heading to Berlin" and they say "oh yeah, I'm in London, I'll just pop over- by bus."

Roy Klein- Roy was so awesome to hang out with, it was totally like he was my brother or something. It's amazing that I felt I knew him, even though I had only talked to him very briefly on the internet...like..."see you at worlds". It was great talking punk rock and inline skating. You can't do that with everyone.

Anita- Was a great tour guide around Vienna, and I think was the first of the Austrians I started hanging out with. I didn't really plan on going to Vienna, but ended up spending a week there!

So I was just looking at the myspace of Evergreen Terrace the other day, they are one of my favourite bands...they are playing at Lido where they had the film night...I think tonight! I would certainly like to be there.

Here are things that I did that were dangerous to my health each day of worlds

day 1- walked huge amounts of distance with my pack (8.4km), not really knowing where I was going
day 2- jumped over an incredibly high spiked fence with quite a large drop below at the Spree Bar (most others had no trouble using the gate...)
day 3- chilli wodka.
day 4- went skateboarding on the mini at Yaam after a few beers (perfect idea the day before comp...)
day 5- nothing to stupid, but I got pretty drunk and did some wild dancing
day 6- golf. Kicking net bags with bare feet
day 7. Trying to cross the road in the middle of a protest rally.
day 8. Trying the night shred on the sandy floor instead of partying.

So taking a look at that list, it's nice to be back in one piece!

boyle · Post by **boyle** » 09 Aug 2009 06:47

I haven't kicked at all since I came home from Europe. I am on a bit of a downward spiral since I've returned, which is exactly what I promised myself that I wouldn't do.

We went to check out Copey's place tonight, it's pretty nice. I think I haven't kicked for a while...he hasn't kicked since nationals back in April, that is numerous months.

So anyway, before we met Cope we were at the Lighthouse, better known as the "FightHouse". So I was playing Caroline in pool and she had beaten me numerous times, though one time I beat her...but anyway, we had some songs in the jukebox and this guy comes along.......he's all like SOMEONE COULD BE DIEING HERE. So moments before Caroline had eaten some mushroom which she is highly allergic to, she could have been the one about to die, but they seemed to have no concern for this.

The girl had to be taken out in a stretcher, but this guy had lifted up the jukebox, then pulled it out at the plug out from the wall. The guy was pretty much a complete lunatic. Anyway, I yelled at him a bit, and really expected to be in some sort of altercation, but this never came to fruition.

We got a new pizza with no mushroom which was reasonably tasty, and we got a few bucks back from the jukebox, but still had all our songs on there, so that was a nice reprieve.

U have been working today and yesterday. Walking to work in the dark on the weekend in the frost is not really acceptable as awesome to me. I much preferred searching for ice cream in Vienna. The girl is duty manager called in sick for both days of the weekend, I had to do all her work and was not that keen on it.

I really wish I was still on holidays.

King Monkey · Post by **King Monkey** » 09 Aug 2009 20:04

Hahah mate that post made very little sense, im confused.
Have you been drinking?

boyle · Post by **boyle** » 09 Aug 2009 20:48

I had been drinking heavily before making the post.

It doesn't really make any sense to me either...

hacksterbator · Post by **hacksterbator** » 10 Aug 2009 13:41

Bwahaha! What the fuck was that? too funny. the spelling and punctuation seemed fine, so i wasn't sussing anything. I just though i had missed some post somewhere that would have clued me in to what the story was about. it wasnt untill the last paragraph that i figured you were quite possibly drunk.

PoisonTaffy · Post by **PoisonTaffy** » 10 Aug 2009 21:13

That whole post belongs in the hall of fame

james_dean · Post by **james_dean** » 10 Aug 2009 23:48

awesome. The accurate spelling and punctuation really did make that post haha.

boyle · Post by **boyle** » 11 Aug 2009 04:30

On second thoughts the whole post doesn't make any sense, because the actually event didn't make any sense (or because I drank 20 beers before making it...your choice).

Anyhow, the main segment of the story was the guy coming up and lifting up the jukebox and unplugging it, really for no reason. It was quite strange.

Caroline and I were going to play today, but it hailed. So we bailed on that one.

I did a few tours at the Australian Institute of Sport. On each tour I give a little footbag demonstration. As I have worked there a long time, and the other guides like watching it (as well as the fact it's a guaranteed time waster), they will get their groups together to watch at the same time.

So this morning I had a total of about 100, this evening 120 and maybe 100 in the afternoon as well. Now I would say most of these people would not have heard about footbag before, but now they have a little insight into...although not that much of course, there's only so much you can do in a couple of minutes!

So anyway, this morning I woke up to get ready for work, and realised it was 8.26, and I had to be at work at 8.30. So didn't quite get there on time. On walking outside it turned out it was pouring with rain.

Coming back to Canberra while it was still winter, I don't think this was the best of ideas. However, coming back now means I came back with money again, and I can start saving for my next trip, which is going to be a surfing trip in Papua New Guinea with my Dad. I think I will do some trips inside Australia before that, as it's not til Feb next year, but I better start saving.

I just got news that my favourite band, Machine Head are most likely going to be play next years Soundwave festival, alongside Faith No More and Alexisonfire, and some more. This is quite exciting news for me. I have been to two of these festivals before, and they both were a lot of fun.

The first one in Sydney was in 07 with Deftones, Hatebreed, Thrice, Terror, Parkway Drive, The Bronx, Suicidal Tendencies and quite a few others.

This year's one I had a really good time at too...Evergreen Terrace, Poison The Well, Dillinger Escape Plan, Minus The Bear, Nine Inch Nails, Alkaline Trio, Unearth, Alice In Chains and a few others. Such a wide variety both times round, I enjoyed a lot of these bands. I think I will try and go to multiple festivals this year. So that may put quite a hole in my budget.

So tomorrow it's my best friend's birthday, so we're going to do some more heavy drinking. If we encounter any crazy characters, I'll post it in here.

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Canberra, Australia via SCL - Daniel Boyle

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