I have done heaps of stuff and been good. Since it all blurs I will just take some excerts from my journal for the past stuff then update on how things are now. I write this on my laptop and will upload when I find an internet place. (Update: This was written over the end of April)

Everywhere I have been wearing a lungi. A lungi is basically a simple skirt. Which you fold up. It is awesome. Turns out in India the whole working class (the males that is) wear them. And a whole bunch more (class wise) does at night for sleeping. How did I not know this before? Finally a place where dudes understand!

From my trip to Hampi: 'I am now on a bus, I do now know where it is going, but I have the best seat. Right next to the driver'

What a lovely analogy of life. But woah that was an intense trip.

I ended up taking about 4 or 5 busses to finally get there. It was right in the middle of the Holi (Colour) Festival, so every time we drove past croud we had to shut the bus windows to stop the plethora of colour bombs that were lanuchned at any and all moving things.

Ok turns out I don't write much. Here is a lovely story from Kerala.

I was sitting on the docks, looking out to Kochin. Being unimpressed, mostly tired from a huge train ride I guess. This I wrote:

"Life without love tents to not insipre me. I will now turn to the Word."

So I started reading the bible, as you do. Simple enough so far. The cool bit is when I look back and see the next entry (in my journal):

"So the Lord gave me a homeless guy today, to feed and clothe and hang out with. We went on a boat togther and somehow he ended up getting a free shirt from some guy at a shop we went past".

Love is totally found when you seek it eh.

The first day I decided to fast was in Chennai. That day happend to be a sunday. So I went to an 'All Saints' Church I randomly found (while walking the streets the day before). Turns out that after the service they were having a tri-yearly banquet feast type thing for something. How does that work?!

Next, its onto the now stuff:

Kolcutta is awesome. You often walk places and are quite impressed. They have that good old fashioned way of grouping things into places by genre. I guess it makes big citys run well, but it also has the great characteristic of being very impressive. So I recently have found my self walking into markets, of various forms, and being a little taken back. Not too much, but a little, tho eaisly enough to say things like: 'woah, that is a lot of dead animals hanging in one place', or other such similar comments. Very enjoyable.

I have seen some wild things. I also know this is only the public surface of India. Although a lot of life is lived in the open here. Especially toilets, hah, for example, infact a few weeks back in Hampi as I was walking down some small, though still busy enough, dusty little street, just behind some shops and hotels, there was a little gutter for water, perhaps a foot deep, just plain old. The amusing part is that squatting above it was perhaps 20 little school kids, all neatly lined up, prolly each about 5 or 6 years old, just doing their daily poos and wees break while gigglings and playing along. Hah, just keep walking, nothing special too see here. 

While waiting to get things sorted I have spent a couple nights here on the street meeting some awesome folk. Thats one thing about India, its hard to be alone, even when you are trying to be. Especially if you are white, you quickly meet drug dealers and beggars etc. It has been a great time sitting, talking with everyone, having tea. Anyway, tomorrow I am going to see the guy from the place I might be working. Exciting. 

Now writing a few days later: So I am living in an orphanage (see below photo, ok wait, no photo yet).

When I arrived I was given three packets of biscuits and 12 red roses. A love gift.

I teach the kids english in the mornings and evenings and also give little Bible studys (At the moment it is basically re-writing parabels to be told with animals). They teach me sports and many other games etc. 

They try to stop me doing stuff, like cleaning and dishes etc, but I battle them. Often I have to chase a kid who takes my plate after I finish eating and trys to wash it before I can. 

I have been eating so much food here tho, even I am impressed. I will be staying here for a month I think.

@mum: I forgot to tell you, I got rid of my old back jeans before I left. Perhaps I should have courired them to you so you coulda ritually burnt them. Hah. They were getting a little old I must admit, begining to fall apart. I still remember when I acquired them though (second hand). It was at that cook and ferguison st house with dins when I was 18. 

Currently reading:

The message of Prayer - Tim Chester

Crime and Punishment - Dostoyevsky

A quick summary of my movements:

nz -> plane -> mumbai

mumbai -> train -> madagon (south goa, overnight stay only)

madagon -> bus(s) -> hubeli -> koppal -> hospet -> hampi

hampi -> train -> bangnalore (couple days)

bangalore -> train -> ernakulam (kochin, kerala) (couple days)

ernakulam -> train -> chenai (few days)

chenai -> train -> kolkata (and I plan to stay here for a while now)

14 riders later I arrive in Nelson.

Have been having a grand time, singing, dancing, frying. Grg and I wrote a lovely air app. Been running in the hills. Watering at the local spots. Sun indeed. Heading to chch tomorrow, fly out on the 17th.

Prepare your outside work,

Make it fit for yourself in the field;

And afterward build your house.

**Edit: Man to get to Chch, what an effort! One more night spent on the side of the road. But 7 rides later I arrived. I also got to stay with my awesome friends Jen and Sam, so my last night in NZ was great!

I ate some tuna. It was ok.

So I flew to Timaru yesterday. It was the first time I have been this far south. Quite exciting.

Just as I was leaving the plane, the lady in front of me turns and asks:

¨Do you have a ride to town? I have a taxi waiting if you wanna join me¨

Turns out the airport is like 10k from the city. That worked out well.

Then I spent the night under a bush. The south island is very cold at night time.

Today was also successful. I stood in the beautiful sun and surroundings, saw many lakes and hills and ran over a Weka. (The Weka part was not so much success as accident, and im not even sure it was a Weka, just a poor little black thing who liked to play on the road)

Four rides later I am now sitting in Queenstown looking at the Remarkables.

If you have a CSS class in your skin (This is assuming that CSS compression is still turned on) and you do not want it to be changed into a 'compressed name' (After you have deployed your skin) then you cannot have any corresponding names.

For example, if you want the add a class 'temp' into an element of your site via MDF and need to use this class with JS, then you cannot have a CSS entry matching it, else the class will get compressed, thus changed!

This solves the case of the missing class's!

Pro Tip: Some stuff you need to double class to override default styles eg: .powerClass.styleClass{

So I have been on contract again, doing the Oracle. Specifically, Webcenter Spaces 11g (11.1.1.3.0). It has been a great learning experience so far, although difficult, as document issues constantly arise.

One of the main issues I had is finding the newist versions, and the correct paths (Often paths within the doc do not work, thus you need to have an idea where it came from in order search it out)

Now I have no idea how to find this page from within their site, but was lucky enough to be sent it from a friend: http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/middleware/webcenter/white-papers-088385.html

So here it is, the golden link! Now, if only it was 2 weeks ago...