Matt Down Under

Three weeks ago I went to Melbourne for the weekend to see Pearl Jam at the Etihad Stadium. It was a fantastic show in front of 45.000 people (according to the newspapers), with support acts Liam Finn and Ben Harper.

When I arrived in Melbourne I was greeted by an impressive heat, it made it almost impossible to walk around the city. I was booked in at the YHA Metro hostel in North Melbourne and I had a few hours to kill since I arrived early in the morning and check-in was in the afternoon. I walked around the Spencer Street shopping centre for a while but didn’t actually buy something. I wasn’t there to do shopping, I had booked my airplane tickets for carry-on baggage only to save a few dollars.

While walking around the city I noticed a poster from an exhibition about Dennis Hopper at the ACMI at Fed Square and decided to check it out. Maybe I was just hoping for air-conditioning but the poster was a photo from ‘Easy Rider’ and for me that’s one of the best movies ever, so I was curious and went there. Unfortunately it was a bit pricey, so I went to see a free exhibition about video games and the evolution of tv and movies instead.

After the exhibition I walked from Federation Square to North Melbourne and checked in at the YHA, just in time before the storm and rain. After a short dinner I walked to the Etihad Stadium in the Docklands and enjoyed the show. I didn’t know any of the support acts before but I really liked both of them. But Pearl Jam was just impressive, they played a set of two and a half hours, a great mix of old and new songs.

Visiting Geelong

The concert was on Friday night and on Saturday I took the bus to Geelong to visit my friend and former business partner Frank and his family. It’s always nice to stay with locals, I had a great time. I got to see a lot of Geelong and its history, did some gardening and it’s certainly a nice place to be.

Christmas in Germany

The last few weeks have been very busy for me. At work we had two websites launched by members of the Tasmanian government this week alone, and next week I will go on a trip to Thailand. From there I will fly to Germany later, for the first time after two years in Australia. When I come back I’ll have a few days stopover in Singapore. So I’m busy now finishing all sorts of work that needs to be done before I leave.

Check out some more Pearl Jam photos here.