That's how most Australians pronounce the name of their capital city (Canberra) ;-) Sounds funny to me but again, people from Quebec will typically say Briz Bain for Brisbane!
The Conference was interesting, I caught up with many people I've been meaning to meet for a long time, Compuware (our software provider) fed us a lot of really good food and the wine was flowing... That's what business trips are all about, right?
Did I miss my 2 men? Oh yes! I called home every morning, as I couldn't sleep past 6 o'clock anyway... bad habit from having a child I suppose. And it seems Philippe said "maman" for the first time while I was away.
I did a tiny bit of shopping on the City Walk and found really cute European-designed and made baby all-leather sandals for $103.00 !!! Excuse-me: no thanks! Given his growth rate, Philippe would need about 4-5 pairs in the coming year. Needless to say it's a bit much!
I stayed with Ruth, a friend of mine who left Hobart a year ago. She lives in Watson, a nice quiet suburb about 15 minutes from the CBD (City Business District, or down town if you want) . Last time I saw her was at my birthday last year so we had a lot to say. We stayed up quite late every night, even though Ruth needed to rest as she flew back to Tasmania with me to ride the ABC Giving Tree, a charity bike ride across Tasmania (about 500km!) to raise money for children in need for Christmas. She's just a machine! Unstoppable! Strong! Fit!
As the conference was only 2 days, I had the Friday off to visit the city. I decided to go to the War Memorial. This is huge! You could spend 2 full days visiting the museum if you wanted to read everything. I learned a lot about how the Australians were involved in the 2 world wars, not something we learn at high school in Canada. The war in the Pacific was terrible: the Japanese were very cruel with their war prisoners. There was also a special exhibit on Lawrence of Arabia. I got to see the clothes he wore, some of the maps he drew, etc. Very neat!
That's it. I flew back home and I was the most excited one (between Philippe and myself) when I opened the door. Marc was happy I was back, he was even more happy that maman was back!
