Five years

Kristy and I celebrated two five-year milestones in 2009.

Firstly, the 30th of October was our five year wedding anniversary. Most people here don’t believe me when I tell them that, and to be honest I can hardly believe it either! I can still remember watching Kristy coming down the isle on that wonderful day, and thinking, “hey, sweet dress!!”. Since then, she’s worn many dresses which I’ve also thought have been sweet choices, but none of them have been quite as special. But five years later, I still love her just as much as I did on that day, and I think she looks just as adorable in her shiny red ski jacket as she did in her glistening white wedding dress.

Secondly, the 28th of November was the five year anniversary of when we left the comfort of Brisbane for the great unknown of New York (and then London). I’m sure that Kristy’s Dad will never forgive us for leaving on his birthday (sorry!), but the UN waits for no-one (though technically they had already waited a month for me!).

We’ve certainly had our fair share of adventures over the last five years, and I can hardly wait to see what the next five will bring, as well as where they will take us.

Here’s a few photos that remind me of some of my favourite parts from the last five years. This is by no means an exhaustive list!

The start of it all!

Nice job with the rose petals, people. This is one of my favourite photos of the day, and we have a huge version of it waiting for us back in Australia somewhere.

New Year’s Eve 2004/5 in Times Square

We were both quite sick for our first month in New York, and on New Year’s Eve it was my turn to be feeling off colour. As such, we didn’t bother going down to Times Square early, to be herded into pens with the rest of the sheep crowd; instead, we headed out around 11:30 PM and tried our luck. We didn’t make it in to Times Square for the famous dropping of the ball, but the aftermath was still pretty spectacular.

Our first apartment

Not only was this our first apartment in New York, but it was our first home ever. And of course, we did the same thing that almost everyone did when they get an empty apartment/flat/house – went to Ikea, and laid down some cash. Which, of course, then meant we had to spend most of a weekend building the furniture.

I remember that we didn’t have a hammer, so I was trying to use my shoe as one instead. But it didn’t work. We bought a hammer.

Ben and Michelle’s visit

Our first overseas visitors (in what ended up being a rather long string of visitors)! Team BaM (not even engaged at that point!) stopped by on their emigration to London, and it was lovely to have them there to share New York with us. We didn’t want them to leave (though to be fair, we never do!).

Riding around Central Park

I still maintain that this was absolutely one of the best things we did in New York. Central Park is just awesome, and riding around it gave us a chance to see just how diverse it is.

Working for the UN

The U-freakin’-N baby. One of the only places you can say that you’ve worked to absolutely anyone, and they’re pretty much guaranteed to know what it is. Though working for the public sector is not something I’d rush to do again (oh, the bureaucracy!), it was still an amazing opportunity to be a (very small!) part of the UN. I’ll always be grateful to Craig for hooking me up on this one!

The Cookes

It’s certainly no secret that I absolutely adore my cousins, and working in their homeland gave us plenty of opportunities (though not nearly enough!) to get to know them better. Their lovely Floridian house immediately became our “home away from home”, and it’s a comforting feeling to know that even now, if everything gets too much, it’s not too far to go for a week of refuge.

Jason and Louise

New York is a lonely old town, and we really felt the impact after moving away from our family and friends in Oz. Things really picked up for us when we met Jason and Louise – kindred spirits who moved from Sydney to New York around the same time that we did, and consequently had been through many of the same experiences. We enjoyed living in New York a lot more once we had met them, and we really felt their absence when they left us again for Sydney.

Breakfast with Ben and Michelle

Time – 0:14, Size: 1.60 MB

Nothing seems too amazing about surprising your friends by turning up for breakfast; except for the fact that we flew from New York to London to do it! And boy were they surprised! The audio is a little rough, but I believe Ben’s words were, “Goodness me, what are you doing here?”.

They were even more surprised to then learn that we’d be staying at their place for the next 4 days – good thing they didn’t have any guests already!

My Las Vegas Birthday

So there I was, lining up a photo of the Volcano in front of the Mirage, when some jerk grabbed my backpack and pulled me off balance. I spun around to confront my assailant, but instead of saying, “pardon me sir, but you seem to have accidentally tried to steal my backpack” like I had planned, I instead was shocked to see my brother standing there, grinning like a cheshire cat. So instead, I said something along the lines of, “golly gee, this is unexpected!”. Then we went for ribs.

Hidden Worlds

Indiana Jones eat your heart out! Swimming around sink-holes in Mexico has to be close to the top of the “best things I’ve ever done, ever” list. I absolutely loved it. I don’t know why exactly; possibly just the fact that it was just so different from anything else I had ever done. But whatever it was, I can’t recommend it highly enough. Just brilliant.

Moving to London

I have to admit, I love living in London. The pace of life is more laid back than in New York, and the people are just so much friendlier! Of course, it was much easier to move here as well – we’d already adapted to the overseas experience for a start, but more importantly, so many of our friends (Stacey and Wes, Julian and Shelley, Pat, John and Kirsty, Casper, Nath) were already here; most especially, Ben and Michelle, to whom we’ll be forever be grateful for letting us spend eight long weeks sleeping on their couch. London is such a wonderful place to live, and part of me knows that I’ll never want to leave. (But don’t worry, I couldn’t stay away from our beaches forever…)

A road-trip to Paris

Not long after we got here, John and Kirsty offered to take us for “a drive around the Arc de Triomphe”. I’ll admit; we were noobs, and we didn’t fully appreciate what exactly this meant – but what an adventure it was! We went from London to Paris and back in around 30 hours, including a number of laps around the Arc de Triomphe, a visit to the Eiffel Tower at 2:30 AM, and four illegal hours of sleep at a truck stop somewhere along a French highway. Todd also came along for the ride, and after surviving the best part of 24 hours in a car with him, we knew that we’d get along just fine.

Christmas in Morzine

We’ve had some pretty awesome Christmases in our time, but for me, the one we spent in Morzine with Lou and Steve, Ben and Michelle, and Kirsty, is easily the best. There was snow everywhere, and although I can’t remember if it actually snowed on Christmas day, we certainly skied on Christmas day! Kristy even wore her Santa hat on the slopes!

Climbing Ben Nevis

Why on earth we thought we’d be able to climb the tallest mountain in the UK unscathed – having had zero training beforehand, that is – is beyond me. Still, that’s what Stacey wanted to do to celebrate her 30th, so that’s what we did with her. This one definitely comes in as one of the hardest things that I’ve done to date. I remember my legs felt like jelly for the last hour or two on the way down, and on more than one occasion, I almost took a tumble. But we made it up and back safely, and the sense of accomplishment has long outlived the days of pain we experienced afterwards.

The Neverender Tour

When I heard that Coheed and Cambria were playing a series of four concerts over four nights – one night for each of their albums – I knew that I was going to be going to them all. Lucky for me, Ali from work was keen to go too, so I wasn’t there alone. It was amazing. I was definitely sick of travelling to and from Tottenham Court Road by the end of the week, but it was totally worth it, and given the chance, I’d be doing it all again.

Skiing

All of my favourite holidays involve some type of high energy activity – snorkelling, skiing, swimming (seemingly they all have to start with “s”, too) etc – but definitely my favourite of these is skiing. Belting down the slopes all day burns about 3,000 kCal, which means you sleep better than ever (from being so exhausted), you don’t have any chance to think about work, you can eat absolutely anything you want, and you come back thinner. What’s not to love?!

Weddings

Since moving overseas, we’ve unfortunately had to miss a few weddings that we would have loved to attend; but we have felt very honoured to attend five:

• Ben and Michelle, 6th May 2006, Brisbane, Queensland, Australia
• Jason and Louise, 15th September 2007, Freshwater, New South Wales, Australia
• Aubain and Ingrid, 26th April 2008, Amsterdam, Holland
• Stacey and Wes, 6th March 2009, Port Arthur, Tasmania, Australia
• Jason and Susan, 21st March 2009, Kingscliff, New South Wales, Australia

(Yes, there’s only four weddings pictured here, and that’s because I’ve lost every single photo from our trip back to Australia in September 2007 – hence, all of Jason and Louise’s wedding photos. I’ll never use iPhoto again.)

Dunns River Falls

The first time we went to Jamaica and visited Dunns River Falls, Kristy and I didn’t bother climbing up because we didn’t want to be just another link in the chain. This time though, with the encouragement of Natalie, our little exploration party of her, Dani, Jason and I (and Kristy in parts) found our own way up! And just like at Hidden Worlds, I can’t explain exactly why this was so awesome; it just was! I wanted to go back down and do it all over again!

Uncle Martyn’s 70th

Our trip back to Jamaica this year was mostly just to be there for Uncle Martyn’s 70th birthday party, and he sure does know how to throw ‘em! We also got to meet a bunch ‘o rellies that we didn’t even know existed – as well as catch up with some of our favourites from the Cooke/Veira camp. It was so lovely and relaxing – we definitely didn’t want to leave!

Like I said; this is by no means an exhaustive list – it’s more the ones that came to mind, that I could quickly find photos for. But it’s certainly representative of what a great five years we’ve had; I’m hoping that the next five are even better. Stay tuned!