It's been one week...

since you looked at me, threw your hands in the air and said your crazy!

I've been in Queenstown little over a week now but it feels like I've been here a whole lot longer… in a good way.

Things at my new job are going well for NZski. I'm given a lot of responsibility and creative freedom and I can't wait for the season to kick in and get out on the slopes. I still can't fully comprehend my job, everyone keeps telling me it's the best job in the company! I'm basically paid to snowboard and film, pretty awesome!!!!!!!

I've started playing ice hockey, which is awesome! Having played roller hockey when I was younger, ice hockey was something I'd always wanted to play. My skating is starting to get to where it needs to be and is coming on more and more with every training session.

I came out of hockey last night stoked at how training had gone and to the news that I have football training on Thursday. Awesome. All being well, Tuesdays and Sundays will be ice hockey and Thursdays and Saturdays football. When the season kicks in, there'll be all the boarding in-between. I am actually stoked on everything so far!

Up next is finding a house!

Music sharing at 33,000 feet!

I love planes. They are awesome. Masive metal birds in the sky. I also love the people you meet on planes. I met a couple of rad people on the way to Sydney a week ago. I managed to secure exit row seats for my flight to Sydney. It's essentially business class without the expense. Massive amount of space and loads more comfort, especially on those long hauls.

I was sat next to a young guy called George, who I would have thought was 18-20. Turns out he was 16, 12 years younger than me! It's amazing how much you can have in common with someone that much younger or that much older. We talked about music for a few hours and being that we both had macs, started sharing music with each other over our bluetooth connections.

How mad / amazing is that?! We're over 30,000 feet up in the sky, with two laptops, sharing music wirelessly. Pretty ridiculous right?!

Made the Top 20!

Pretty hyped right now that I made the top 20 of the STA World Traveller intern. I was getting all excited when I logged on to see the site was updating and a few minutes later, there it was! The next round is a phone interview, but no word on when it will be yet. So a phone interview, where they knock another 10 out and then voting starts one last time. Here's hoping for the top 10!

Staring at the Majority

We were perched up high in a restaurant drinking faux Sprite looking down at the Irrawaddy River and the endless stream of people going about their day to day lives. A camera in most cases arouses attention from young and old alike and within a couple of minutes it was no different here.

Children climbed through the barbed wire and up the wall to peak into the lens, adults stopped and waved with big smiles and then carried on. Panning across the riverbed the abundance of people living off the river was unreal. I'd never seen anything like it and it slowly dwelled on me that a large proportion of the world's population live in similar circumstances.

One woman was washing her clothes in the river whilst, 20 yards away on another bamboo made floating platform another emerged from the bathroom. The river was the source of and for everything. Slightly further away a huge pig was tied to a stick in the sand and hens roamed in a small make shift pen whilst children skipped nearby.

We cycled along the river a short distance and the scene was much the same, hundreds of people living along the shore of the Irrawaddy. I wandered what it would be to live with so little. These people knew no other way of life, they had no modern conveniences that we have in the West. I wandered who was worse off. Think about that for a while before you rush to your inevitable conclusion.

The last time I thought about such a simple way of life was in Fiji on an island at the top of the Yasawa group. I remember one of the people there telling me they only really needed money for petrol for the boats and clothes. They grew all their own produce and traded with other islands. I thought how idyllic it was, living in such spectacular surroundings and thought whether I could live like that.

I think it would only be a matter of time before you longed for Facebook, your mobile phone and the freedom of travel. You also start to think about other little things that could soon turn into major problems. What happens if I get ill? What happens if I break a bone? I'm at the top of a small chain of islands and I can't imagine the health care system on the mainland being particularly well equipped. It conjured up images of Tom Hanks removing a rotten tooth in a rather creative way in the film, Castaway.

There is an awful lot to be learnt from observing those with a lot less than we have, it makes you realise that how much of yours is expendable, your ipod, your macbook, your mobile. At the same time it makes you realise how beneficial all these items are in being able to communicate, being able to learn and being able to experience and share those experiences of travelling with others.

Travelling is living

'Moving is living' according to George Clooney's character in the Oscar nominated film, 'Up in the Air.' He's nearly right...

Travelling is living. It's probably the time where I feel most alive. It all begins in the airport, I love airports. Hundreds of people, different departure gates, an abundance of destinations. I always look at the departure screens thinking of where I want to go next or if there's a destination I would prefer to be heading to. It also serves to make me realise that as much as I think I am well travelled, there is still so much more to see and do.

I know plenty of people who envy the amount of travelling I've done, and I by no means take it for granted. I've taken extra care to ensure that I am not tied down to many commitments or responsibilities so when the desire arrives I can get to that airport one more time and head to the next destination, the next adventure.

Work of course is a huge means to being able to fund these adventures. Having worked as a cameraman, editor, producer and even presenter has made it possible to go on a lot of trips and not being tied to any particular company, working freelance, has allowed me to come back and find some more work to fund the next adventure fairly easily. It has also made it possible on the rare occasion to pick up a little bit of work on the road.

Everyone should travel. It's all about meeting new people, seeing new places, challenging your ideas and giving you a new perspective. Without sounding cliched, it really does broaden your horizons and make you more open minded and probably appreciative of the things you have. When you've been to places like Burma and seen some of the conditions people have to live in, some of the day to day realities that they face, well, it's the experiences such as those that challenge your ideas and perspective on the world.

I've met people that have no desire to travel or to see the world and I can't understand why. I don't know how you can find your place in the world, until you've experienced at least some of it. Don't get me wrong, I know for a lot of people it's not a possibility, but they're not the people I'm talking about. I'm talking about those who have the opportunity but don't take it.

I'm always looking for the next fix, travelling is my drug of choice and it's not something I'd ever want to go into rehab for.

The STA Comp

I've been getting stuck into as much as possible since returning and saw on the STA website a competition to take two incredibly lucky people round the world for three months blogging, filming and documenting their journey.

An all expenses paid opportunity to see new places, meet new people and share amazing experiences with the rest of the world? I couldn't think of anything better.

After much deliberation and at the last minute, I managed to get a video together and apply. I found out I'm in the top 50 and am now putting together my application to hopefully make the final 20! Here's hoping!

Returning from Australia

So, I've been back from Australia for two weeks now and I'm glad to be back. Initially I thought returning would be for the worst, even on the plane I thought it was a mistake but now, I'm really stoked to be back.

I have had an awesome time in Australia (again) and had the chance to catch up with old friends, get a little bit of skateboarding and filming in and the opportunity to play football at a really high level again. That is certainly what I'm missing most.

Returning to London has been amazing. A REAL city, with REAL culture and LOTS to do. Catching up with old friends, going out to dinner in different places and idle days walking around one of the best cities in the world has been awesome.

There is plenty to see and do in Australia, great places to visit, but it has to be said, the cities there have nothing compared to London. It is pretty much a cultural void in comparison.

So for the meantime, it's great to be home.