It's all hot and sticky...

Yes, Lisbon is in the middle of a heatwave that will last till about September! BAH! It's been 32ºC today, which is a tad too hot for me... it's also very humid, so there's no air. I'll get used to it!

Mark will be here on Tuesday, which will be good! Yay!

Went out with Rui and Pedro last night. First we went to the theatre where Rui works to be all Bohemian and watch a singer from Cabo Verde, and she was quite good! Zé, Rui's boyfriend, met us there, as that's where he works too. I think it was very Lowry-esque as a high percentage of the staff seemed to be gayers! Yay! lol

Afterwards we went to Barrio Alto and stood drinking in the street with about 2,000 other people. A fight broke out between two people who had obviously been drinking too much. There were other people from the theatre there too. We ended up in a place called Frágil, which is apparently the first gay bar in Lisbon. That was ok too, if a bit teeny! Along with us four was a man called Nuno, who works Front of House and Box Office at the theatre and another bloke, but I can't remember his name. Ended up in Trumps until 7am, and then we went home. Fun was had by all!

So yeah, not a bad time. Big hello to Jonathan, who's birthday night out it was last night. He went to see Hed Kandi, which I wish I were there to have seen, but was unable to! Grr! :-( Nevermind!

Well, I'm off!

Ben xxx

Eurovision 2006!

3rd time lucky! computer keeps overheating and turning itself off damn it! It's pissing me off!

Well, as I was saying, I've yet to comment on this year's Eurovision in Athens! I watched last Sunday after I'd recorded it 'cos I was at Sam's/Rob's birthday bashes.

I think our entry Teenage Life by Daz Sampson was a good one this year. I don't think there's been many rap-esque songs going into Eurovision, and the whole classroom things was something totally different from our usual "person singing on a stage prancing about/looking into the camer" that we normally pump out. Terry Wogan said that France has been doing the same thing for year after year, but really, so have we. You ain't gonna win it with a normal catchy song/ballard unless you're part of one of the voting blocks. Incidentally, I looked this up, seeing as all the information is now at our fingertips! Macedonia, in the last 3 competitions, noly usually recieves points from th surrounding countries, such as Bosnia, Serbia, Bulgaria, etc. They very rarely get a point from anyone non-Balkan, and when they do, it's usually no higher than a 3.

Therefore, I think that we did quite well this year. Ten countries voted for us, and eventhough they were low marks, ones and twos are better than nothing, and like I said, 10 countries voted for us, so we did well. I hope we do something good next year too. I'm so gladd one of the boyband/girlband/popstars rejects didn't get a see in.

Honestly, in this country we have some great music, and I think something britpop/indie/rock would do really well. There are some great artists out there, and they shouldn't be afraid of going to Eurovision. I can't see how we make some of the best music in Europe, and yet, we get lower marks than bloody Macedonia. I know this from my travels. No matter where you are, they will be listening to UK music. In Portugal, there's hardly any Portuguese artists. Spain is marginally better, but always sends some Andalucían pap like that Bloody Mary shite or Brujería crap they've sent recently.

To be honest, I'm totally glad that Finland won it with Lordi. It's something different, a sort of protest against the hyper pop/Balkan sheep's stomach instrument tat that's being purveyed at the mo.

Let's hope we get an even better song next year, with some good lyrics, a good tune, and we miight just make it into the top ten... still behind Macedonia no doubt!

Friday Night!

God, if this were home, I would be dancing ye olde baps off at some drinking/clubbing establishment in the village! I can't wait until I'm back there! I'm itching to go out and get lashed and dance the night away, to end it all with a Samiad's Kebab of Doom (+ Hummous)!

I'm a bit bored at the moment, and I'm sort of just existing without purpose! I've got next-to-nothing to do, so I'm just passing time each day. I should really go to the beach or something like that, but it gets a bit boring when you're on your own all the time. Everyone else is busy. :-(

Ah well, Mark comes to visit in 3 days' time, so I'm gonna look forward to that!

Ben xxx

My Film Rating

Did a film rating test as I was bored...

My life has been rated:
See what your rating is!
Created by Bart King

My life is porn! Argh!!!!

Salford Uni is crap (sometimes)

Back in Portugal after Rob's birthday! It was AMAZING and it was totally ace to see Geordie Jo, Joanne, Joe, Phil, Rob, and everyone else that I can't remember from drunkeness!! We went to 5th Ave and had a jolly good dance, eventhough a big asian woman kept giving me wild eyes... I went and hid around the post. Geordie got a bit emotional on saying goodbye at the end of the night. I told that she'd be fine and not to get upset and that I'll be back soon enough. She says she really misses me (as I do her), I just hope that everything goes alright! Rob had a comedy Italian haircut, where the barber had accidentally cut out a big bald spot behind his left ear... we had a good old chuckle at that!

Went to see "DaVinci Code" on Friday with Mark, Matt, Lorna, Martin and Martin's friends. I enjoyed it, but Lorna was feeling iffy and went early on. Nevertheless it was fantastic to see her and give her a big squeeze-hug! I think I might have said something that upset Lorna slightly, but it's my fault for assuming something was one way when it wasn't! My bad! Nevermind... PLUS, on Anthony Cotton Watch, he was there too, I tell you, he stalks Mark!! Eveywhere we go, Anthony Cotton is there too!

It was lovely seeing Mark and I saw Jenny and her boyfriend Ciaran on the bus, which was nice too. She has fab hair my sister at the moment! And Ciaran's chopped his slightly, which I suspect Jenny had a hand in, but that's not for me to comment on.

I got an e-mail from Janet Lloyd, the Head of Portuguese at Salford Uni:


Dear Ben

I'm writing regarding your module choices for Level 3, as you are
the only student to have chosen Portuguese Advanced Translation.
Unfortunately this means that we will not be able to run the
module. I notice that you have also chosen Spanish Advanced
Translation and this means that you will get the theoretical input,
and I would be more than happy to give you the materials for the
Portuguese translation, if you are interested. We could meet now
and then and go over them, but this would be an informal
arrangement.

All of this does mean that you will be 10 credits short; I seem to
remember that you wanted to avoid interpreting (though you may
have changed your mind after RA in Spain). The other option open
to you is to write a short dissertation.

Have a think about it and let me know. And remember, if you have
any questions, I'm here to help.

Best wishes

Janet

Director of Undergraduate Studies
School of Languages
University of Salford
Salford, Greater Manchester M5 4WT
UK

BAH! So yeah, that pissed me off a lot (it's not Janet's fault though!). On speaking to Janet, she accepted my idea for getting around it by me doing the advanced translations at home, and then we can have a half-hour meeting each week to go through the problems of the translation. She said that she had had a similar idea when writing this e-mail, and she'd definately speak to the Board of Directors about it. So there is still hope. I understand the reasons for doing it, but if both me and Janet are willing to do the classes in our agreed format, I really can't see what problem the uni has with it. Cocklesuckers!

Well, on a final note, look at this picture:


How cute is that?! A tortoise the same size as a raspberry! Awwww!

Well, on that crazyness, I'm off...

Love and hugs,

Ben xxxx

Ai, que dia quente!

Yes, today has been a total scorcher! 27-ish! Fook!

Well, I didn't sleep at all last night. Tried, but gave up around 4am. Now I think my body's back into some sort of cycle. I set off to uni, but forgot my wallet which contained my pass for the train and Metro! Gaa! Fortunately, the conductor on the train wasn't arsed, and I had enough change to buy areturn on the metro and for the journey back to Oeiras.

This meant thought that I couldn't have my brekkie inthe canteen at uni, nor have some coffees. The Internet was also down, so I couldn't even go on that between Wendy's lesson and Ana's lesson. BAH! Anyway, I did a whoop-ass translation from Portuguese to English about the ozone layer, and methyl bromide and fook knows what else. I did well though, and only got two little things wrong out of a whole side of A4! Yay!

English to Portuguese is a different matter, but no-one seems like they are arsed by it. I am a little, but it's bloody hard! Hopefully I'll get a little bit better, however, Wendy said to me today that the translation classes end at the end of May, so it's a total shambles. I don't know if I'm meant to be doing the exams or what. I'm going to ask about all this when I get back.

Flying home tomorrow! Looking forward to it, but I think I'll miss Lisbon! How weird is that?! Anyhew, got my bag packed, and I fly at 10:40am tomorrow, so I'll need to be up earlyish to get my flight ok. then I have to trudge up from Gatwick. Hmph...

Well, I'm off now,

Lots of love and hugs to you all, and I'll deffo see some of you this weekend!

Ben xxxx

"Me Minge!!"

Olá, ye bastards ye...

Hope all is well in your respective countries! I feel like crap today. I am well pissed off.... last night I tried to get to sleep at about 1am, after relaxing by reading my book.

Could I go to sleep? Could I bugger! I was lay there, sweating my baps off until about 5:30am, and then I just dropped off! I donºt even remeber falling to sleep. Well, nevertheless, I awoke at 3pm (again) which made me both angry and a little depressed.

I went and had a nice long shower, a shave (not had one in about two weeks, so I had a full-on beard going on, Richard Branson-esque!) and a good old scrub of the face with an exfoliate! Felt refreshed and glowing!

Went to Tourism in Portugal, but it's fooking boiling and my baps were melting! lol

Anyway, got to tourism and we were in the new lecture theatre, and the new restaurant is open. Had our first hour of classes, which went well (seeing as I was writing on plain paper - gaaaa! No lines!) and I learnt muito! During the break, a guy called Lourenço said that he and Anokas were arranging a trip to Sintra, with ISLA paying all of the entry fees to the museums and everything! I'd love to go, but as I'm going back for Rob's birthday, I'll have to miss it! BUGGER! Well annoyed, but hey, nothing I can do about it!

After the break, the class were all going mental about something. Apparently, the teacher (María Teresa - she's lovely) was a bit pissed that people aren't coming to the Friday class as 5pm. I agree it's a fooking daft time to have it, but if you have the class, you have to go to it! Anyway, she once again drew attention to me by saying to the class "Look, our colleage who doesn't have our nationality must be thinking that we are all incapable of listening, and that you act in this childish manner all the time". I was like, "err, I'm not saying anything, don't bring me into it!!". I could see what she was getting at.

Besides, afterwards, I went to the front of the class, and asked her if the Friday classes were still taking place, which she said that they were, but if people turn up, there'll be a class obviously. I explained that I wouldn't be able to come this week, but I usually do (which I do barr last week). Then I asked her if I had to do the Pousadas coursework assignment, and she said I didn't need to do it, and not to worry about it. JOY! Furthermore, I then asked her if she knew when the exams for Tourism would be, and she said that she didn't know, but that the exam was difficult, and that it would be all in Portuguese. She said that she'd speak to the ERASMUS director, and work out if I had to do the exams. She said probably not, and that she'd find some other way of evaluating me. She asked where Miek was too, so (with the help of another student) we explained what had happened with the festival and the car running over him.

She was a bit concerened, but said that she hoped all would be well. So, I think it's been a most successful day. Now I have to go home, do some translations and go to classes tomorrow (which I missed last week). I am going to try and go to sleep early again. If it won't work for me, and I can't drop off, I'm going to stay awake all night, in an attempt to get my body sorted. This not sleeping thing is driving me crazy.

It doesn't help that the house is bloody noisy, and those bloody sprinklers come out every two hours as from midnight. I'm well pissed off with those. HOW OFTEN DOES THE GRASS NEED WATERING DURING THE NIGHT?!

Anyway, I'm going to skootch off!

Besinhos os meus filos!

Ben xxx

Birthdays

This time of year is always rammed with birthdays. TONS of people's
birthdays in May and June! Got an e-mail off Jonathan, which made me
chuckle, and I'm just sat relaxing to on Oceano Pacífico on RFM. It's
slightly like Coma FM in Manchester (aka Smooth FM).

Just bumming around at the moment... body clock's a bit fooked since
that night out, and I'm finding it hard to drop off. I get to sleep
about 4am (which is bad) and wake up at about 12 noon (also v.bad). So,
after this, I'll probably try and get off to sleep again. I'm gonna make
te bed up nice and comfy!

I'm mucho looking forward to this extended weekend at home, if only for
seeing everyone! Especially Mark, who I'm missing a lot at the moment.
He says he's missing me too, so it'll be nice to cuddle up to one
another in bed! Perhaps that's why I'm finding it hard to fall asleep?

LGBT's website is going ok too. Not too bad at the moment. I'm trying to
be artistic, but it's not being too successful!! Matt S, Mark and Rory
are all giving good input, so that's helping.

Anyway, I'm going to skidaddle off to bed.

Love and hugs,

Ben xxxx

totallycrud.com

Yes, I'm fiddling with things for the website. I might as well make myself useful! I can't be arsed going to tourism and TTCE today, to I'm lolling around here, listening to Pulp, drinking apple juice and doing websiteness. I might go for a walk later, down along the beach! Ah bliss!

Just had an e-mail from Heather, she's bored bless her! She's having fun in Irún and has gone and got herself a boyfriend!

I was awoken rudely in the night by that bastard sprinkler, just outside my bedroom window. It soulds like the fire brigade is spraying water all over my window or something! Bastard thing!

I tidied the bedroom last night, which was therapeutic, spoke to Mark for a bit, which was nice too. I'm looking forward to going home for Rob's birthday, which will be next week. I'm coming home Thursday, as I have that day off anyway, and to get the cheap flight to London on Friday, I'd have to miss tourism and TTCE, so, in for a penny, in for a pound... might as well come home Thursday. Then I can spend time with Eastwood! Yay!

Anyway, I'm going to go and fry that sea bass that I bought the other day! Mmmmmm! Or possibly the mackrel, I'm not decided yet!

Ben xxx

Money

Hello all!

Not blogged in a few days, so I thought I'd do one now! I went out on Friday night with some people from our Tourism class, and we had a really good night! It was a big outdoor studenty event, and it involved drinking beer mixed with white sangría (don't ask me how that works!) eating random food, dancing to music in a Bruce Forsyth style, then two stints on the bumper cars! Well good!

Felt ropey the next day though, so I didn't go on Saturday night. Ajay had come down from O Porto, but apparently something crazy happened where Mike and one of Ajay's mates ended up in hospital. I've asked round at uni, and the story seems hazy. To be honest I'm not getting involved.

I got an e-newsletter from NUS about the AUT's action across the country with their refusal to set/mark exam papers. Where this is not such a problem for the people in the 1st/2nd years, the final year students will be moumentously fooked around. Is moumentously a word? Who knows, but what I do know is that the AUT and the Universities need to sort it all out, or else there's going to be some mad crisis, lots of unhappy and depressed students and friction between lecturers and students. to be honest it's a good thing I'm not at home at the moment, or else I'd probably be leading the language department on some sort of crazy crusade!

It's not that I don't agree with the AUT's stance: lectutures should be adequately paid. However, 90% of the money coming from the new top-up fees will be used to pay for the staff's pay increase. Does this mean that the money coming in from top-up fees will no longer solve all of the universities' woes, as the idea was sold to parliament? I think that there will be an increase in top-up fees. And when that happens, the AUT will be hypocritical if they support us in any action to stop top-up fees, as they have been the main beneficiaries.

If all this is still going on when I get back, and the mentalism is not being fixed, I may refuse to pay my tuition fees, and try and organise some sort of protest against the University. I believe that we could rightly argue that the universities are not keeping up their side of the bargain. We pay tuition fees to be tutored and we expect this to include exams, as well as final graduation. Should the university not provide this, though the fault of either the AUT strike or the Universities' lack of an adequate pay structure, I think we could rightly withold our fees.

That's my thoughts on the matter. Feel free to comment.

Apart from all this, I'm now learning how to use Dreamweaver, so I can re-do the LGBT's website. It's now on www.salfordlgbt.co.uk. Click on it if you want, it's got a random message on it!

Well, I'm off, lots of love and hugs!

Ben xxx

Empanada de Frango

I had one of these before from the canteen. Yummy! It is like a piece of puff pastry, with a garlicky chicken mixture on top, with the corners brought in. T'was tasty!

The leccy went off in our house at 9am today. It turns out it's the whole building. Natalie tried to get through to the Electric Company, but no-one answered! Bloody Electric Board! As far as I could see, no-one else in the building seems fussed, apart from the fact it's 21ºC today and all our food is defreezing. PAH! Plus, I've had to do a translation to present tomorrow, so instead of working by candlelight, I've done it in ISLA (eventhough the PCs are shite) and I'm listening to XFm Manchester whilst doing it/blogging.

I reckon I've done quite a good translation, but I reckon Ms. Frankenberg-Garcia will rip it to shreds. Typical! I've had to make one part fo it sound quite chatty, and the only chatty things I know are Northern, which she'll hate. For exmaple, one part says "pra sua governo", the "pra" being short for "para a". So, I've shortened it in English too, from "for your information" to "f'your information". She'll spout some bollocks about Americans not understanding it, but when has an American ever changed their spellings in books to UK spellings ("colour" and "color" is a good example, as is "pavements" vs. "sidewalk"). Rant over!

Anyway, I suppose I'm going to have to get back to my candle-lit abode and rock back and forth inthe darkness. I may be wrong, the leccy might be fixed, but I'm not holding my breath: this is Portugal!!

Besinhos,

Ben xxx

Flies of Doom and Sand in my bed

FOOK ME IT'S ROASTING! 25ºC is the Doyle temperature limit, and anything above makes me ill. Not good, especially when Rui told me it averages 31ºC during summer. Nice!

Well, I went out on Saturday night to Bar 106 which was a teeny place. You had to ring a doorbell to get into it (what's that all about) and then I ended up sitting in the bar talking to some random Swedish guy, who was gtting pissed off because someone was trying to talk to him in Portuguese, and I ended up being interpreter for about 3 mins. Then a Scouse bloke (who wasn't that Scouse) came over and chatted to me for a bit. He was telling me that he'd gone to Salford University. He asked me where I went to, and I told him Salford so we had sommat in common to talk about. We went from Bar 106 to Trumps (yes, that's it's name) which is by far better than Finalmente.

The travesty (drag) show was much better, a Brazillian-Czech melée dance routine, complete with the Czech boys doing backflips. The Brazillian drag queen moved well too, and mimed well-enough to the song, which was Madonna - New York. They only did two numbers, and went off, and the nght proceeded with much good music, both random house stuff I'd not heard, and dancey versions of pop tunes, all climaxing at 7am with Madonna - Ray of Light.

Realised what time it was at this point, and emerged from Trumps into the sun rising above Lisbon's castle to the East, which was totally gorgeous! Scouse guy had pulled around 2 and gone by about 3:30 so I danced the night away on my billy todd, but it was so rammed, it didn't matter.

Came home and fell over Rui's bike. Collapsed into bad at 8am. Hardcore, that's what I'm talking about! lol

Found sand in my bed from my time at the beach, so it's been uncomfortable, and there's loads of fruit flies lingering about, and generally flying around in circles in the front room. God, what a boring life that must be!

Well, I'm off my pretties!

Ben xxxx