Europe 2015 Diary: six week trip flying via Stockholm

Friday 4 Sept 2015 Kingston

We have just packed our bags to head off tomorrow for the long haul to Stockholm via Singapore and Helsinki. As we head off for what is effectively a very privileged international holiday, laced with a small amount of enjoyable discretionary work on both ends, refugees fleeing from the military and political mess in Syria are massing at the Budapest train station trying desperately to get to Germany. We have played it safe from our position of huge advantage to avoid the 8 hours on the train out of Budapest and booked a one hour flight from Budapest to Belgrade with Air Serbia on 8 Oct.

I am really looking forward to our six weeks away, the first and last weeks in Sweden, the rest in eight other countries in Eastern Europe, five of which are totally new to me: Czech Republic, Poland, Slovakia, Hungary and Serbia. This trip will also  be my first time in Vienna, Austria and Berlin, Germany.

Saturday 5 Sept Mostly in the air ...

I start today's diary soon after passing over Derby in Northwestern Australia, the the last of the tidal coast giving way to the Indian Ocean. This daytime QANTAS flight from Melbourne earlier gave great views of Mt Franklin near home, the remote opal mining community of Coober Pedy, and the huge expanse of the Great Sandy Desert beyond Uluru. It is never possible to completely comprehend the ease of flying for eight hours and 6000kmnon stop from Melbourne to Singapore at an altitude of 38000 feet with the outside temperature at minus 60 degrees  F.

Our even longer ten hour all night leg beyond Singapore to Helsinki in Finland with Finnair will give us nothing but the odd night lights, taking us in a huge arc over Malaysia, along the coast of Thailand then north west over much of continental Asia including India, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Kazakstan, Russia and Estonia. The final short leg from Helsinki to Stockholm in Sweden will be early on Sunday morning.

It was 30 degrees, steamy and with low visibility as we landed in Singapore around 6pm, with over five hours to wait for our connecting flight. Singapore airport used to be cutting edge internationally but it's brown carpet and decor is now surpassed by the new generation of Chinese and Middle Eastern airports. There are still wonderful orchid displays in the terminal building, and in place of sunflowers now a cactus garden.

Sunday 6 September Flying into Helsinki and on to Stockholm, overnight Motel L

Completely overwhelmed with a need to sleep by the time we boarded in Singapore just before midnight. After a very ordinary Finnair dinner I was asleep as our flight headed over Langkawi in Malaysia and Phuket in Thailand before heading out over the Andaman Sea. I awoke right over Kabul in Afhanistan,

having passed right over the huge Indian city of New Delhi in the night. It is hard reconcile being right above and completely removed from the mess Australia and other 'allies' of the U.S.  have made in Afghanistan 12 km below in the past decade.

As we head into higher latitudes further north over Russia light gradually fills the sky. As I write this we have just had a pretty ordinary Finnair breakfast and  are thankfully only an hour our of Vantaa Airport in Helsinki, having passed over the Caspian Sea and overflown Kaluga in Russia. With a massive wing out my window we won't get to see much as we descend into Helsinki and it's remarkable archipelago of islands as we descend over the Gulf of Finland between Tallinn in Estonia and St Petersberg in Russia.

For a small nation of only 5.5 million people, Finland continues to punch  well above its weight in all branches of education. This week its former Prime Minister generously offered the use of his summer house to fleeing Syrian refugees. I would have liked to return to Helsinki in autumn on this trip, and fondly recall the beautiful city and our previous memorable trip to Ristijavi in Northern Finland via Kajaani.

What is remarkable to an Australian is the huge number of natural freshwater lakes in these northern latitudes, located within the comprehensively glaciated relatively flat landscape. My flight magazine tells me six per cent of Finland is covered with 188,000 freshwater lakes, and that 68 per cent of the land area is forested with mainly pine and spruce. The parts that are not forested are in the far north including Lapland, which right now will be covered with autumnal colour known in Finland as 'ruska '.

Our final 400 km flight today from Helsinki to Stockholm takes us west over the Gulf Of Bothnia into a different time zone, effectively arriving the same time we left around 9am in the morning.

The underground airport train station for our connection on to our hotel inSodermalm south of the central city was totally deserted. It was cool and grey and had been raining for much of the night. Everything about the Stockholm airport was totally ordered, clean and perfectly signposted in Swedish and English.

A combination of local train and tram from the airport brought us out right opposite our hotel in southern Sodermalm. The area around the hotel is mainly new multi-storey apartments and businesses, but is accessible by tram and train to the Central City and the old city on Gamla Stan. It was too wet and cold to venture far but we took the train in to Slussen and did a loop of the harbour on the Djurgarden Ferry before finding a small subterranean cafe in Gamla Stan for a light lunch.

Logging in via wifi at the hotel gave us news and pictures from Luke and Denise's wedding in Cork, as well as news from three diverse home sources of the federal Governments  renewed commitment to Men's Shed funding through

to 2019. Announced on Fathers Day by Tony Abbott, it provides strong ongoing bipartisan support for AMSA. Perhaps an early election is in the offing or else the demise of Tony Abbott.

Monday 7 Sept Stockholm 

Jet lag from the long weekend flight had me snoring by 7.30pm Sunday. Despite waking early I felt well enough to explore the exercise bike in the gym soon after it opened at 6am. We headed by light rail and train for Sodermalm for breakfast at Louie Louie, then wandered right through Sodermalm in true crisp but clear morning down to the Slussen wharf to catch the Djurgaten ferry to Skeppsholmen Island. Our plan was to visit Moderna Museet, the Modern Museum but it turns out all museums were closed  on Monday. We headed north via the bridge to Central Stockholm, grazing east in increasingly warm sunshine to Ostemalm. We had lunch at the Ostermalmstorg historic market, with distinctive red brick exterior and fine ironwork framework inside. I chose and really enjoyed the fried picked Baltic herring with finely chopped onions and mashed potato. We wandered back down to the harbour opposite the Music Museum and walked west along the harbour to Stashuset, the very striking Stockholm City Hall. We signed up for a 2pm tour which was well worth it. The Hall is the venue for the Nobel Prize celebrations each year on 10 Dec, the anniversary of Nobels death. Built relatively recently between 1911 and 1923, is borrows from a range of architectural traditions. Tuesday 8 Sept Stockholm

Today I am working at University of Stockholm, organised via Dr Camilla Thunborg and Prof Angieszka Bron in the Institute for Pedagogy and Didactics, which includes a seminar and workshop in the afternoon on men's learning and wellbeing. My highlight for the day was stepping out of the Metro Station at the University of Stockholm onto a beautifully polished and striated glacial pavement. Several of the participants today including Malgosia are part of the ESREA Older Learners Conference in Jonkoping in a few weeks  time.

We explored parts of the Royal Palace in Gamla Stan. We again had dinner at the excellent sushi restaurant on the waterfront near the hotel with boats cruising quietly past in the cool of the early evening. This is an ultramodern and very sophisticated city.

Wed 9 Sept travel from Stockholm to Jonkoping, overnight Vix Hotel

Three interconnecting train trips took us from Stockholm to Skovde Central to Falkoping and finally Jonkoping, through high latitude forests and fields and small towns. As elsewhere in Sweden, the public infrastructure and the people running them are excellent. The last part of the journey was along the western shores of Vattern, one of the biggest lakes in Central Sweden. Jonkoping, pronounced yearnshopping is a University town on the lakes southern shore.

Thursday 10 Sept Jonkoping

Today I am going to the University of Jonkoping to  meet with staff from ENCELL, the Swedish Institute of Lifelong Learning, initially hosted by Helene Ahl whom I first met at an ESREA Conference in Belfast ten years ago. In the evening we have been invited for a meal with Helene and family.

We walked up the hill past the arboretum to dinner Helene’s house, being shown their robotic electric lawnmower and highly ordered garden.

Friday 11 Sept Jonkoping

Today began with a 2 hour academic seminar, lunch with staff from ENCELL and an afternoon with Joel talking and walking about men's learning research. Our walk included a visit to the match museum and a coffee at NEO on the lakeside, there we enjoyed tapas dinner the same evening.

Sat 12 Sept Jonkoping to Malmö, Overnight Mayfair Hotel

The Jonkoping market was the focus of our Saturday morning walk, featuring local produce, particularly lingonberries and blueberries from the local area. We then headed for the train to Malmö. Our Hotel was central to the Malmö Rail Station where many refugees were being greeted and assisted. After a wander into the port area we retreated fro the cold wind. It was late when we fell into the hotel restaurant for excellent tastes of very small serves.

Sunday 13 Sept Malmö

Today was a day for exploring despite the cool showery weather. Our Malmö city ramble included the gardens and the Malmö Museum. In the afternoon I explored the port area including the Twisted Torso building and the Technology museum. My next job is definitely not as a submariner. We took the Triangln Metro train and had a hearty Iranian meal before heading back to the central city.

Monday 14 Sept Malmö, then to Copenhagen, Denmark, overnight Avenue Boutique Hotel

I set off for Shed I Malmö in a half cellar amongst city apartment blocks. Will English and other expatriates have set up a really successful Shed that serves their need, bit are struggling to work out how to make it more open to the local community. It turns out Wills father was Drew English that I went to Wesley College with, who now lives in Darwin. Helena and Joel came down to collect data for their project. Afterwards I shared a taxi back to the Station and we took the train to Copenhagen. The transfer to the Avenue Hotel was simple via Bus 66, and we ate a delightful Italian inspired dinner nearby as the rain came down

Tuesday 15 Sept Copenhagen

Mie Moller Neilsen arrived with Will English and drove me to the Stevns Shed. badging as Maens Modesteder or Men's Meeting Place is sensible. They have an excellent Shed in Stevns but the success is not replicated across all nine Danish

sites. The key will be to ensure men take control as early as possible once the funding withdraws. This was a most positive and enjoyable day, finishing up with a presentation to me of a book about the Stevns World Heritage area, where evidence of the devastating impact of a meteorite crater on life on earth first became evident stratigraphically.

I made some Notes below, re Sheds in Malmö and Denmark based on the previous day's visits and conversations.

The notes were mainly for Helena Ahl and Joel Hedegaard from University of Jonkoping in Sweden who asked for them to contribute to her study of Shed development, in the first instance through her small study of the Shed I Malmö. I am sharing them also with Will English and Mie Møller Neilson in the spirit of open and democratic communication that should underpin all Shed development and research.

The notes are based on my initial impressions on limited sources of information and one brief visit to each Shed and do not constitute a well researched judgement. 

The Shed I Malmö is a grassroots initiative based around an idea from a small number of expatriate Australians led by Will English, a young and thoughtful Australian PhD student. Initially the impetus for the Shed came from the experience of social isolation experienced as an English speaking person in a Swedish cultural context. Will's intuitive knowledge of sheds led him to discover there was a Movement. Helena has access to much of the other information about his Shed via Will and the associated shedders. It is located in an inner suburban suburban Malmö basement, comprising a workshop and social space. By Australian shed standards, it has an excellent social space and a small workshop area. Whilst this is designed as a Shed the space is not gendered and the age profile and demographic background of those involved is atypical compared with most Australian and Irish Men's Sheds. While the participants would like the Shed idea to take off more widely in Sweden, ideally be inclusive of an older male demographic beyond paid work, it is hard for the idea to take root based on a concept that is not part of Swedish culture and whose two main constituent words, Men and Shed are perhaps difficult to get traction with in a nation where gender equity is so deeply entrenched. If a Swedish word for Workshop was used for future sheds it may gain more traction. The Shed I Malmö shed uses English as their Lingua Franca and ICT platforms to organises which limits the extent to which it will extend far beyond the current younger, hipster demographic.

All of that said, I have a huge admiration for the way Will, the Shed I Malmö committee and supporters have got so far to get the necessary initial funding, to find a space, fit it out so comprehensively and make it fit for their purposes.

By contrast, the Maens Madeteder initiative, as documented in my Men's shed movement book, is a relatively top down, partly funded Danish initiative which forms part of a national Men's Health intervention. The plan is to create a number of Community based organisations, specifically and only for men. The

way it is being implemented, a number of mainly female project officers, coordinated by Mie Moller Neilsen are establishing men's activity groups in nine locations across Denmark. The Stevns Shed officially opened on the day of my visit is in my opinion well conceived and located in a former community craft facility. There is a wood workshop, a kitchen and a large meeting area. There seems to be a strong sense of camaraderie amongst the men and its female coordinator seems to clearly understand the fundamentals of Men's Sheds.

Several of the people involved visited the International Men's Shed event in Ireland last year. This experience has clearly been very valuable. The issue they are already contemplating is how to make these organisations sustainable in the medium and longer term. At present much of the early development has been directed by the paid coordinators, who have also been responsible for much of the funding and shed organisation. The initiative is in its very early days, but appears to have perhaps worked better in Stevns than in some other locations, with four Meeting Groups in suburban Arhus, three in Billund, and one in Bornholm, several experiencing some early, typical and understandable difficulties finding a suitable venue and traction in the community.

The way they are working initially is to set up a number of activities in each of the nine sites for men based around their expressed interests. This seems to be working best where there is something most or all of the men do and where the facility is used by most men that include integration beyond the specific activity they have chosen. When there are many activities for relatively small numbers of men the participants don't get an opportunity to develop an organisational identity.

Since the Shed is a term that will not simply translate into Danish, the initiative has in my opinion wisely called the initiative a Men's meeting place, and has attracted a male demographic that is typically older and beyond paid work.

This decision to gender the space in the name of the shed, and their use of a bold graphic made up of two men with arms crossed that resembles an M is novel and deliberately masculinist. I am told they are also using the Shoulder to Shoulder motto as in Australia. I am of the opinion that the Movement may and should take off beyond this particular initiative in the wider Danish community. This should and could involve other community organisations acting to sponsor or auspice Sheds, and may lead to independently affiliated sheds. If developed to the level in Ireland or Australia, one might anticipate perhaps 200 Shed based organisations across Denmark. The important thing will be to ensure there is a Danish body representative of the Shedders from the Shed organisations separate from the paid project officers, effectively The Company of Men. The development is more likely in rural Danish communities where there are more older men not in paid work.

The organisers via Mie have used the electronic and news media very proactively. I am hugely grateful for all involved, particularly Will and Mie, but also Helena and Joel to make me so welcome and to organise such informative visits to Sweden and Denmark. I am confident that whatever transpires, you do

understand the fundamentals of the success of the Men's Shed model. The hard thing is ensuring an appropriate and successful cultural translation.

Given the lack of empirical research in the UK and Denmark about any of the already established Sheds, there appears to be scope for such a larger international study based on the European experience. It might be usefully combined with or extended by a wider study of where and how men beyond paid work, particularly older men informally learn through other community places and spaces, including in Sweden, Ireland, Sweden and Finland. If I can assist or be involved in any way, I have made it clear I would welcome it.

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We ventured into the city on the bus that same evening for dinner bit were holed up during dinner in the Europa Restaurant in the CBD during an unexpected thunderstorm.

Wed 16 Sept Copenhagen

Today involved an excursion to North Zealand on the train to The excellent Louisiana Modern Art Museum. It included a number of impressive temporary exhibitions as well as an extensive outside sculpture garden. Again on the way back home after a late lunch at a restaurant near the University of Copenhagen the weather broke forcing us back to the hotel before dinner at a Lebanese restaurant nearby to our hotel.

Thursday 17 Sept Copenhagen to Prague, Czech Republic, overnight Hotel One.

It was a slow morning packing and heading to the Copenhagen airport via the Forum Metro Station. Flying Norwegian Airlines, the check in and bag drops were simple and totally automated. Being in the Szengen zone there was no need for passports.  A crazy bus driver in Prague took is by express bus to the Masavykaro Station, just a short walk from Motel 1. Here for five days, we are close to the Old City and within range of most of the main Prague attractions. Only time for a short exploratory ramble and look at the amazing building facades, squares and historic towers and cathedrals.

Friday 18 Sept Prague

We walked this morning to the remarkable Old Town Square and across the Vltava River via Charles Bridge, and back over Marie's Bridge. I bought tickets for our onward train journeys to Olomouc and Kraków and climbed up the 14th century Powder Tower. We took a tram to the base of the funicular leading up the the Petrin lookout, but it was closed for six months. Dinner at a vegan restaurant opposite the hotel in Nove Mesto, then to an excellent Vivaldi Four Seasons Concert with Violin Soloist Radana Bectomova in the beautiful Municipal House . It was by ten me,bears of the Bohemian Symphony Orchestra Prague, in the Municipal House, badged as Prague's most significant Art Nouveau building.

Saturday 19 Sept Prague

Today took us to the Prague Castle. There were many other people with the same idea, it being a fine warm Saturday. There were long queues for tickets as well as at the turnstiles to each site. The four attractions on the reduced price combination ticket included the huge St Vitus Cathedral, with its expansive stained glass windows. Despite looking ancient and Gothic it was actually completed quite recently in 1929. The relics inside included the massive Baroque silver tomb of St John of Nepomuk and the Chapel of St .Wencelas. St Wencelas 1 was the Duke of Bohemia 907-35 but the Carol his name is immortalised in did not appear until the 1800s.

At the heart of the old Royal Palace is Vladislav Hall dating to,the 1200s and the Bohemian Chancellery, the site of two Defenestrations of Prague, which literally involved throwing political opponents out a window in 1419 and 1618. The nearby simple but elegant Romanesque Chapel of St George goes back to the 10th Century.

We set out a little later for a walk around the Old Town including a climb with the other tourists in the crowd to the top of the Town Hall Tower. We ate Vegan again for dinner,

Sunday 20 Sept Prague

We had a short walk to a beautiful Cubist Restaurant for breakfast. Tonight we chose Italian, pizzas and gnocchi, for dinner because it was close by to the hotel. I enjoyed my first taste of the superb local Staropromen beer that Prague is famous for as part of my meal.

Monday 21 Sept Prague

Today being Monday many of the site and museum visit options were closed. We started slowly and headed by tram after breakfast to Vysehrad, the elevated now fortfied area south of the city that the first settlement was founded on from the 9th Century. The area in now mainly an expansive park with excellent views over the fortified walls to the Vltava River below and the city generally. Sights there include the highly ornamented Church of St Peter and Paul and the city's most prestigious burial ground that includes the grave of composer Antonin Dvorak. There is also an impressive but small brick arched Gothic cellar. After a protracted slow wander we headed north to the peaceful  nearby Charles University Botanical Gardens which included an impressive Geopark displaying large labelled examples of the regions main rock types. All plants were carefully named and arranged in elevated terraces  almost dwarfed in places by the surrounding buildings.

We explored the mainly modern shopping area north of Mustec which included an exterior look at the tallest cathedral in Prague, the Church of Our Lady of the Snows, and a simple nearby cubist lamppost. There is another stunning cubist shop in the area. We had a light lunch at a charming Italian restaurant that

included my first glass of wine for a while, an elegant Italian Nebbiolo. We had an enjoyable late afternoon wander in the warm sunshine north of our hotel in Nove Mesto. 

I met up for an hour before dinner with Linda Pospíšilová involved in a fatherhood initiative in The. Czech Republic. I was introduced to her via John Evoy who hosted her on a visit to Mens Sheds in Ireland last year.

It was my slightly eclectic choice for dinner at a nearby Thai restaurant.

Tuesday 22 Sep Prague to Olomouc, overnight Hotel Arigone

Olomouc is the sixth biggest city in the Czech Republic, with a population of around 100,000. We have chosen to come here to experience something other than the capital cities, and have chosen Olomouc because of its World Heritage status historic central city. Our trip there today by train takes us around two and a half hours heading east towards the other end of the country. Before we left I had a brisk solo walk down to the river, past the many tourist craft for a last look at the magnificent Charles Bridge and back through the early morning crowds gathering in the square anticipating a 10am performance from the ancient astronomical clock. 

This has been a very peaceful and enjoyable five day stay in Prague, a really beautiful and sophisticated city.

Olomouc has proved to be a good choice based on a quick look and wander after arrival early afternoon. The expansive main square, Horni or upper square has a 14th C Town Hall at the centre, under which we later had dinner. Nearby is the towns main attraction, The Holy Trinity Column, a humongous baroque sculpture on the World Heritage list   completed in 1754. A lower, Dolni square runs south of the main square and includes one of six historic fountains in the inner city squares.

Nearby is the huge Gothic St Moritz Cathedral completed in 1540 and begun in 1412 that we plan to visit tomorrow. Our late afternoon walk included the gardens along the Mlynsky River whose banks are fortified by original city walls on top of which the buildings comprising Olomouc University are located. The city is relatively quiet aside from the many young university students and mainly women having coffee and cake in the town cafes. The cakes here are something to crow loudly about. Dinner was excellent, with a port medallions with pepper and mustard and a Pilsner Urqell beer in Caesers Restaurant under the vaulted arches of the Town Hall.

Wed 23 Sept Olomouc, Czech Republic

Breakfast was part of the tariff at this Pension Arigone. Our morning wander was to the original town square, towered over by the tranquil St Wencelas Cathedral first consecrated in 1131, rebuilt a few times most recently with a neo-gothic makeover in the 1880s. The highly rated Archdiocesan Museum nearby was

closed for maintenance, as was the Olomouc Museum of Modern Art, so we headed for a coffee at Cafe 87 nearby, then to the main town square to sample the incredible cakes on display. 

Our afternoon ramble took us through the Botanical Gardens and back through the Palacy University. We bought a small bottle of Slivovice, which we later discovered on line In the Czech Republic is derived from plums, including damsel plums. It 'has somewhat symbolic status as a Moravian "national" drink, strongly presented in local traditions, culture and popculture like in proverbs, folk songs, TV shows and movies. It is primarily produced in the southern and eastern provinces where the country retains its rural character'. It also has 50 per cent alcohol and is drunk straight.

I circumnavigated the inner city via the outstanding green belt surrounding the old town. Tonight we chose to eat nearby at Restaurant  Villa Primaveri in an outstanding Art Deco building built in 1905 ... But it was closed or booked out, so we went to a restaurant on the bottom square, without the anticipated ambience but great food, including a huge entree of Olomocy Ayr cheese, dark bread with diced onion and pickles, followed by a most delicious main course of glazed pork ribs.

We had bought tickets for what we thought was a live concert of Bruckner's 7th Symphony in E minor as part of the local Podzimni Festival Duchovni Hudby. It seemed a bit weird having in a picture theatre: as it turns out it was a film of a performance in a local cathedral in 2005: which is why now explains why it said 'filmovy zazman' on the tickets.

Thursday 24 Sept Olomouc to Kraków, Poland. Overnight Apart Hotel Stare

We had a long Viber chat to Tanja now back at work in Melbourne, nearly recovered from jet lag after return from The Bra Cheese Festival. Karri posted  a photo on Instagram of the Italian Alps as they headed back to London. Dajarra is on school holidays brewing beer and potting up plants.

A brief final reflective walk after breakfast around this peaceful and historic city including carefully reading the interpretations of the central old town monuments and fountains, before taking a taxi to the Olomouc station for the EC, fast train to Kraków via Katowice. We sat on the first part of the journey next to a lady travelling with TravelForce, an organisation founded by Jimmy Carter dedicated to international understanding and exchange. The weather is still mild but it's getting cloudy and it's likely it will be cooler with rain for much of our stay in Kraków.

The six hour train trip today takes us north into the southern regional region Poland where Kraków is located on the Vistula River. Poland has a diverse range of environments from the Baltic coast in the north to the Tatra Mountains in the south, and shared land borders with Germany and the Czech Republic to the west and south west, Slovakia in the south, Ukraine in the south east, Belarus in the east and Lithuania and Russia in the north.

We missed a train connection in Katowice, Poland, but recovered well with a cheap and relatively quick bus transfer to Kraków, abandoning our four recent American train friends and assisted by two young Jehovahs Witness devotees. Strare Miasto in a wonderful place to stay just south of the old city.

We don't get into Kraków until around 6.30pm and had a wonderful dinner nearby, for me mussels followed by lemon meringue pie. Express is the only way to go coffee wise in these parts. The Lattes are pretty dreadful.

Friday 25 Sept in Kraków

I headed to the Kraków Glowny railway station to get tickets for our onward journey to Bratislava on Monday. The former station now has a humongous retail complex tacked onto it, but neatly connected to,the old town by a convenient pedestrian subway. As I passed St Mary's Church on the corner of the massive town square a bugler played the traditional hourly call. We had breakfast nearby after buying tickets for the Wielicza Salt Mine tour tomorrow morning.

After a ramble around the many stalls setting up in the square, mostly tourist paraphernalia and flowers, we headed in light drizzle to Wavel Hill, a hill fortress on the Vistula River south of the Old Town. We decided on two tours: of the State Rooms and the Lost Wavel archaeological tour. The former took us through the many room associated with four centuries of Polish Royalty and State from the 14th Century. The latter included interpretation of mainly stone artefacts from the site. I took a walk to the top of the Sandomierska Tower and we both wandered through the opulent Wavel Cathedral, the coronation and burial site of four generations of Polish royalty. We picked up enough supplies for breakfast and snacks on the way back for the three days since our apartment has a complete kitchen. 

After a short late afternoon rest, since it was raining, we had a meal nearby at the same restaurant as on our first night, this time pesto and salad.

Sat 26 Sept Kraków, including morning Salt Mines tour

We ate in this morning for breakfast before our pick up for the Wieleska Salt Mine tour. It was raining all day, a good day to spend underground. The tour start with English speaking guide was delayed by a celebratory Mass taking place in the main underground church, but finally we went down to mine vi the 300 wooden steps, constructed inside a former winding shaft. The Mine was added to the World Heritage register in 1978 on account of its important role in the development of Poland since mining started there around a thousand years ago. The earliest withdrawal of salt was through brine springs, which led to discovery of the massive Miocene, 13 million year old evaporites, with mining extending to around 350 metres from multiple mines and shafts. Today, well over one million people a year visit the site. The tour included excellent and appropriately humorous interpretation of the many chambers, drives, chapels, churches and former mining equipment. The mine workings have been stabilised by a huge

amount of timbering and some recent rock bolting, but most of the workings are in solid salt. The main church is totally salt, from the floor, steps, altar and even the chandeliers. Some chambers have hyper saline pools. Others have active subterranean sanatoriums. Around 150 metres down there is a cafe and tourist shop. Of course we had to buy some salt.

We went walking but it was raining heavily, with tourists everywhere on the wet and slippery streets, so we had a late afternoon dinner at nearby C k Dezerter Restaurant. My wheat beer, the haloumi style appetiser, the honey and prune port spare ribs with baked potatoes and red cabbage, followed by ice cream and expresso was simply devine. All up meal for us both only around $40 Australian.

I spent the evening marking a very good ANU PhD about Men's Sheds and health. Tthe next few days here and in Bratislava are forecast to be relatively fine. Back home the Grand finals teams are set: Hawthorn versus West Coast.

We decided not to go to the Auschwitz Birkenou Concentration camp that can be 'done' as a day trip from Kraków. I acknowledge but will never fully understand how 1.5 million people, mostly Polish Jews, can be so brutally and systematically murdered in this way, as happened here. I don't need to go and experience the place it occurred. The silent synagogues across this part of Central Europe are retake not enough.

Sun 27 Sept Kraków

Being up early on Sunday, the streets of Kraków and the main square were pretty much deserted. After breakfast we wandered through the main square up to the Barbican, the circular 15th Century red brick bastion that once formed part of the city's walled defence. By this stage the Sunday crowds were gathering. We obtained 1.30pm tickets for the excellent archaeological exhibition beneath the town square. It is based around the totally excavated and excellently interpreted ruins of the old Kraków market found under the square in 2005.  I had a 5 pm Skype with a journalist in Denmark about the Maens Modesteder development there, before we returned for dinner at C K Deserter. Again, I really enjoyed the relaxed ambience, a glass of red, herrings on a bed of coleslaw as an appetiser, and a Gypsy goulash

Monday 28 Sept Train for  Kraków to Bratislava, Slovakia. Overnight Loft Hotel.

Up early for the taxi to the Kraków Glowny railway station for our 7.02 train towards Bratislava in Slovenia. We have two changes. The first is at Katowice in Southern Poland. The second is at Breclau in the Czech Republic close to the Austrian and Czech Republic border. Am making these notes as we drift past fully laden apple trees and fairly comprehensively forested country at glacially slow speed. If we make each of our connections today, it will be a welcome miracle, but if on time our arrival in Bratislava is around 2pm.

We made the first connection easily and headed back towards the Czech border, passing through pretty attractive wooded country. Being early autumn there are

lots of red apples on the trees and pumpkins ready to pick in people's gardens. We came close on the rail trip to Zywiec, the area near where Greg Malchers father came from, but did have beer of that name.

While the second train was also late we made the connection easily with only an hour from Breclau to Bratislava. We are staying conveniently midway between the main old town and the main railway station.

The hotel room is excellent, with a complimentary minibar including two excellent beers and there is a microbrewery and restaurant for dinner downstairs. Slovenia and Austria where we head to on Thursday both have the Euro as their currency.

We walked downtown after check in. Bratislava is a relatively small city of only 450,000 people, with the small and compact old city north of the Dunube River bank. The town squares are small but there is a warm feel about the small number of old buildings and alleyways. We wandered through the small main square, Hlavne nam, flanked by the old town hall and its clock tower and walked back under St Michael's Gate,  which at one stage formed part of the medieval city wall, not replaced my a major arterial road. Tomorrow we will likely visit the Bratislava Castle and nearby St Martins Cathedral.

Tuesday 29 Sept Bratislava

A light hotel breakfast was followed by an exploration of the western part of the old town, starting at the impressive relatively simple St Martins Cathedral, including its large crypt, with some of the burials as recent as 1991. We crossed under the nearby motorway built along the axis of the former city walls and walked up the hill to the Bratislava Castle, recently renovated and excellently interpreted, having lain derelict after a fire in 1811 and a 1950s communist makeover. The cavernous interior was totally white and gold with white marble staircases and red carpet. I climbed up the the castle tower with excellent views over the Danube, and the city generally, with banks of wind towers just across the Austrian border.

After a light lunch I headed off to buy boat tickets for our transfer to Vienna on Thursday. On the way back I climbed up through the museum above St Martins Gate to the Tower, with great views of the nearby medieval rooftops, and checked out Prasna Basta as a place we returned to late for an excellent dinner.

Wed 30 Sept Bratislava 

We set off mid morning for the nearby Slavin Hill and War Memorial through fairly up market suburbia including Embassy area. The Slavin Memorial commemorates the seven thousand Russian troops that died liberating Bratislava from the Nazis and local collaborating fascists. There are seven large mass graves as well as individual graves. Atop the hill and the huge memorial is a 7 metre bronze figure stamping on a swastika.

The views over the surrounding area were excellent. We headed down the hill to the old city and visited the Blue Church, before having a most enjoyable late lunch and wine nearby and wandering back through the park. There is a lot of graffiti in the area north of the city and quite a lot of decaying soviet era apartment buildings.

We checked online, as this superficially seems like a relatively poor country despite its inner urban sophisticated and hipster scene. The overall unemployment rate in Slovakia is currently 12 per cent, with youth unemployment sitting at round 25 per cent.

Thurs 1 October Bratislava to Vienna, Austria by boat at 10.30am, overnight Hotel Daniel

A taxi to the Bratislava Danube River Port and we boarded the small but fast boat to take up 60km upriver to Vienna. The views were excellent all the way, with the castle and suburbs of Bratislava soon giving way to gravel and stone banks backed by swathes of riverine forest. We passed the ruins of Devin Castle where the Kremeslka River enters from the north on the Slovakian border, then along the Danube through the Austrian Donau auen National Park. Fishermans huts and nets were on both sides of the river as we approached the outskirts of Vienna, past the Airport and up the Danube Canal to the centre of the city.

We successfully negotiated the metro and tram to get to Hotel Daniel in the Belvedere area south of the city. After unpacking and orienting we headed back into the city, first to bit train tickets for the transfer on Saturday to Budapest, and then to marvel at Vienna's incredible beauty. First a walk in awe through St Stephens incredible and soaring Gothic Cathedral. Then a long and interesting walk along shopping malls, gardens and the museum district before a light Moroccan meal and return to the hotel. We have a good idea after some deliberate reconnaissance what we want to do tomorrow.

Friday 2 October Vienna

After a substantial hotel breakfast we set off to Belvedere Palace, built in 1719 for Prince Eugene of Savoy. The upper palace is huge and exquisitely decorated, housing a major collection of Austrian art as well as important international works, Klimt being Austrian is particularly well represented.  Tram D took us down to the Centre of Town, where we wandered through the Vienna Market, Naschmarkt and ate enough to constitute a light lunch. I looked through the Vienna Museum of Natural History, the finest such museum I have visited in the world, in terms of the splendour of the building and the breadth of what was on display. Unfortunately the Mumok Museum of contemporary was changing exhibits and had restricted vowing opportunities, so we walked in a loop that included the Town Hall, Rathuss and the Spanish Riding School. We are in for dinner at the hotel.

Sat 3 October train at 10am from Vienna to Budapest, Hungary, overnight Heritage Home Apartments

The train from Vienna passed thousands of Austrian wind towers before passing into Hungary. Much of the trip to Budapest was just south of the Slovakian Border. Like many other counties in this region, there are many other neighbours, including Ukraine to the north east, Romania, to the east, and Serbia, Croatia and Slovakia to the south.

Unlike the images we saw on TV six weeks ago, there were no refugees in sight on arrival at Keliti station. It took some time to get the new currency, the forint, and work out how to get a travel card for the Budapest trains and metro. Otherwise the transfer to our hotel in the Jewish District was very simple. It was Saturday and it was party time in the area around the hotel and also in the restaurant below our window. We had a walk down to the city centre of Pest after unsuccessfully getting to the local market adjacent to the green  maccano type steel bridge across the Danube. The streets, restaurant and laneways were full. This town has a sort of shabby grunge feel about it. We ate,dinner nearby at Spinoza, an Hungarian Jewish restaurant with an adjacent music theatre.

Sun 4 October Budapest 

Being Sunday the shops were shut, bit with Manu thousands of others on the Sunday, we headed for the Castle Hill district, first by tram, and then the funicular railway. To the south of the railway upper terminal above the King Matthais wall is the huge, rectangular Royal Palace. To the south is the Matthais Church with its brightly coloured tile roof and spires, as well as a recent stone folly come viewing wall, the Fisherman’s Bastion., with superb views over the city and the Danube.

In the evening we attended a New Music concert in a room off the exquisite Vidago Concert Hall. The quartet had excellent musicians, but one of the three pieces was so discordant I was left a little underwhelmed.

Mon 5 October Budapest

Today we headed first to the market to stock up for our self catering kitchen, then headed to Parliament for a tour, only to find it shut for an event. Underneath is a moving memorial with original Leo and photos dedicated to the thousands of people killed in the aftermath of the attempt by students in October 1956 to get Soviet troops out of Hungary. It led to reprisals with 20,000 arrested and 2000 executed including the reformist Prime Minister Imre Nagy. It was only in 1989 that the Communist government ceded power. All so very recent and in my lifetime.

We took the Metro out to City Park to check out  the Szechenyl Baths, one of several in the city tapping into natural heated water. They are bigger but less attractive than the Gellert Art Deco baths close to the Danube in Buda. Nearby was the big parade ground surrounded by bronze statues and a huge column.

After a brief break we set off for Citadella, a former fort south of Castle Hill. Dinner was nearby to where we are staying in one of the hundreds of restaurants and cafes in the Jewish Quarter of Pest.

Tues 6 October Budapest

Today began with a tram trip over to the green Elizabeth Bridge to Gellert Baths. The electronic watch at the ticket office gave us access to a stared cabin to change in. Aside from the large cool indoor and outdoor pools, there are a number of other thermal pools wth water temperatures of 35, 36, 38 and 40C. Each of the thermal  pools had water hotter carbonated water running in, producing limestone flow features below. The water was flowing out of a bearded figure, and the flowstone had grown much as in limestone caves.

The outside pool was steamy and the atmosphere around the baths was foggy: a wonderful time to visit. The sauna next to the outside pool was a bonus. While I really enjoyed the experience and was relaxed and exhausted afterwards, the whole complex is far from simple to navigate intuitively with a minimal knowledge of Hungarian. The feature of the experience is the stunning Art Deco structure and ornamentation.

Lunch was at a Noodle Box type place in an alleyway within the Jewish Quarter. We came back to the apartment to book a taxi shuttle pickup to the airport tomorrow evening. We made a call a few weeks ago with crowns at the Kaleti Station and the prospect of an 8 hour train trip to fly to Belgrade. The only flight we could get is an Air Serbia flight at 8.45pm, so we have also arranged a pick up and transfer to the hotel as the reception will be closed by the time we arrive around 11pm.

Our late afternoon Parliament tour was most interesting. The building was constructed quite late, in the 1890s, and is a mix of classical styles with extensive real gold ornamentation. The elaborate spires and main dome rise to around 100 metres, supported by external flying buttresses. Hungary had a bicameral parliamentary system when the Parliament was constructed, and two chambers in a symmetrical building. I notice on line that Hungary's government bonds have close to,junk bond status. Hopefully the $50 we contributed to the government to do the one hour tour helps with the balance of payments.

Dinner was at a Hummus and Felafel restaurant close by to the grand Synagogue.

Wed 7 October fly in the evening Budapest to Belgrade, airport pickup, overnight Zig Zag Apartments.

We had a slow morning, starting with doing our washing at Bubbles in a nearby arcade, and heading off late morning for nearby St Stephens Cathedral. Building of the massive dome commenced in the 1850s but was set back by a major collapse of the partly finished dome. The Cathedral with a modified dome was finally completed several architects later and consecrated in 1905. We wandered

towards the Danube and the Hungarian Parliament, admiring the main facade facing the river, and stopping to look at the collection of sculpted metal shoes symbolically set on the side of the Danube to remember Jews who departed from the site in 1944-5 as part of the Nazi Holocaust, never to return.

We took the now familiar Number 2 tram south along the river, intercepting a loop tram that took us back to the northern end of the Jewish Quarter, where we had a substantial dinner in lieu of a missed dinner tonight. I got email, confirmation that the books send 38 days ago from the UK to Serbia had finally arrived, albeit with the 8000 dinar in customs and delivery charges, around $100 AUD.

After a quick look at the outside of the Grand Synagogue it was time to get the airport shuttle, leaving a long three hour wait for our late evening plane to Belgrade. The Air Serbia flight was on time, indeed arriving early, but the taxi transfer we had arranged worked after a reminder phone call to the hotel.

Arriving in a small and dimly lit side street opposite a car park late on the edge of the Belgade city block at night and fumbling for keys to the apartment aside, the apartment was comfortable enough apart from having no shower, a complex leaky bath and a few other idiosyncrasies. We went for a quick walk to get oriented and buy some supplIes for breakfasts. Surprisingly many shops still open at midnight and lots of people and party animals out after midnight.

This has been a really interesting and enjoyable stay in Budapest. While the inner city area we stayed in was interesting, grungy and vibrant, the outer suburbs looked pretty dreary from the road to the airport. Some of the soviet era buildings are looking pretty tired and run down, with quite an amount of graffiti. There is a relatively small but efficient metro system, well integrated with reasonably dated trams and buses. While there is very little that is really old as in many other European cities, the public buildings form the late 19th century are grand, and the pedestrian streets in the main city are diverse and interesting. Travelling here as a pure vegetarian would be hard work in Budapest unless you enjoy tired lettuce salads with cheese. We are very fortunate as Australians to have such a wide range of good, fresh vegetables and particularly fruit, but no one does paprika like Hungarians. With Tokay, wine and Goose Liver Pate, this is the main items tourists including us buy in Budapest.

Thursday 8 Oct Belgrade ESREA Gender and Learning Conference, 9.3am to 5.30pm then sightseeing and dinner at Druga Piazza.

I headed out early to check my bearings and locate the Department of Pedagogy at University of Belgrade hosting the conference. It was good to meet a few familiar faces from the Coimbra conference. Ten nations are represented here including Germany, Portugal, Bulgaria, Serbia, Sweden, Switzerland and the U.K. The first day was more about formal learning but there were some interesting insights in a long daytime program. 

By the time of the organised city walk it was wet and cold. The walk guide was excellent but it was too cold to do much aside from the windy streets and the tour was abbreviated. Warming up to an excellent meal and wines was a bonus, with a taxi ride back to the apartment

Friday 9 Oct Belgrade ESREA Conference 9.30 All day and dinner at ManufacturaRestaurant.

Today there were more papers about informal learning, many very interesting. The Feminist Caravan item on the end of the day was conducted by some radical lesbian feminists about their confrontational Freedom Ride  type tour through Europe. The dinner meal was again excellent, with great company and conversation.

Sat 10 Oct Belgrade 9-1.30pm, including Book launch

The morning program after lunch was dedicated to the book launch. Aleksa did a good job in the circumstances, accounting for the confrontational questioning by the two Feminist Caravan women. They argued that any place for men to assemble was not acceptable. This warrants a future strong paper laying out a case for places for some men.

We headed back to the apartment as the rain started to come down. It was cold, wet and slippery limiting our adventuring even more, though I did get to walk to the Fortress and back through the city, taking a few pictures as a record.

The brief reflective note below was penned in Belgrade on Saturday evening before we flew north on Sunday to Berlin for two days on the way back to Sweden.

Autumn now in full swing here: it was a cold, grey and rainy afternoon, the only free time we both had after the end of the Conference here at lunchtime today/Sat. Too wet to do much, though I did get down to the Kalemegdan Fortress on the confluence on the huge Sava and massive Danube Rivers. Not a lot left of the fortress after scores of battles over the last millennium, some very recent.

Belgrade itself has some well developed shopping arcades in its town centre but would not attract your average tourist. Lots of bars and cafes but short on sites and museums for tourists to visit and particularly lacking interpretation. Lots of broken pavements and fatigued buildings and apartments once you leave the centre, all a bit grungy and in some parts seems slightly edgy.

Getting around here not as easy as in some places. The Serbian signage is in two parallel forms, Cyrillic - that looks a tad like Russian, and also modern Serbian, largely in the Latin script we are familiar with. Only some signs add English but enough local people speak English to get by. The food culture here has lots of vestiges of Greek and Turkish, but given Serbia's location, turbulent history, recent civil wars and 8 neighbours, its politics and prospects are far from simple

or secure. Serbia is relatively welcoming to refugees in part because of its own recent experiences of forced emigration. Belgrade was being bombed by NATO in 1999 when our children were all in their teens. Around one thousand Syrian refugees including many young children are camped in tents on a university campus in the cold rain tonight five minutes from our comfortable Belgrade apartment. 

We are looking forward to our brief experience of Berlin before we return to the familiarity of where we started 5 weeks ago in central Sweden, home of Husqvarn and a ginormous lake , where the leaves are likely turning and falling as the max daily temp there is in now in single digits and the minima drop below zero. 

Sun 11 October fly Belgrade to Berlin, overnight i31 Berlin Mitte

It was a very wet night but by our early morning taxi pick up it was fine and we had the usual long wait for our Air Serbia flight given the big safety buffer we tend to build into our travelling. The 1000km flight north to Berlin Tegel airport brought us down onto a freezing but sunny day: one degree as we landed and less than ten degrees maximum later. Surprisingly Tegel has no metro access but excellent and highly integrated bus connections to the closest metro  to our hotel just north of Mitte, on the edge of former East Berlin.

Our hotel is really excellent and perfectly located, with a long narrow room looking out onto busy Invalidensrasser, and has a gym with a bike as a bonus. After checking in we got oriented and headed into town on the U6 metro to Friedrichstrasse. We walked along the River Spree with its many tourist boats. To the left was the huge Budestag and dome, to the right ultramodern white buildings lining the river banks. We gave up on the long Sunday queue for tickets to the dome, and walked south to the striking  Holocaust monument with its thousands of rectangular grey blocks of stone, at uneven heights on an uneven base. It was only in 1999 that the German government agreed a monument was necessary and it was completed in 2005. Closer to home, there are no monuments to the genocide of Aboriginal Australians or to the Stolen Generations.

We walked into the calm pond that is a monument to the Monteith Roma people similarly subjected to NAZI, National Socialist genocide and brutalisation. Further on is a block of stone in a calm garden setting remembering the brutal and often deadly treatment of homosexual men in the same dreadful era.

We walked through the huge and symbolic Brandenburg Gate, once part of the East Berlin Wall, created during the Cold War and only removed 20 years ago in 1995. On the western horizon is the Victory Column. Topped by a  bronze sculpture of Victoria 8.3 metres high and weighing 35 tonnes, Berliners have given the statue the nickname Goldelse, meaning something like "Golden Lizzy". The column consist of four massive blocks of sandstone.

We took a bus to to the base of the huge communication tower constructed between 1965 and 1969 by the administration of the GDR  It was intended as a symbol of Berlin, which it remains today, as it is easily visible throughout the central and some suburban districts of Berlin. With its height of 368 meters, it is the tallest structure in Germany and 17th largest tower worldwide.

We headed back out of the cold mid afternoon for a break, an hour in the gym, dinner at a delightful Vietnamese fusion restaurant right next to the i31 Hotel and another session on the bike before an early night.

Mon 12 Oct Berlin

We started the day with an excellent hotel breakfast, then set off east on the M10 tram mast the Berlin Wall Documentation Centre set up on a section of the wall and the no go zone in between preserved along Bernauer Strausser. Where the wall has been removed, steel poles that simulate concrete reinforcement have been added. We came back there on the end of the day for a closer look at the excellent interpretation of what it was like before the wall came down. I. 1989.

We got off the M10 tram at Warschaeur Strausser Metro station, intercepting another section of the former wall north of the River Spree and west of the nearby historic bridge with its twin towers. Unlike the other section of the wall, this large section has been kept largely intact but had art work added, with souvenir shops nearby.

We caught the train west at Schlesisches Tor station. This area and the Gorlitzer area nearby seem like they are worthy of a second look on a return visit, with lots of interesting street and shop life and bicycles everywhere. When I Googled the area I can see that the nearby area centred on Gorlitzer Park has a huge problem with drugs. We got off the train at ZoologicL Gardens to look at the Bikini shopping area with a reputation for alternative retailing. My estimation was that most shops had interesting high end stuff but at very inflated prices.

My highlight was the bombed out cathedral Gedachtniskirke, Kaiser Wilhelm Church, and the nearby new church. The plan of the church is octagonal while the plan of the tower is hexagonal. These components are sited on a plateau measuring 100 metres long and 40 metres wide. The new buildings are constructed of concrete, steel and glass. The walls of the church are made of a concrete honeycomb containing 21,292 stained glass inlays. The glass, was inspired by the colours of the glass in Chartres Cathedral. The predominant colour is blue, with small areas of ruby red, emerald green and yellow. All pretty simple on the outside, spectacular on the inside.

We headed finally to the Porsdamer Place area south of the inner city, It has lots of new buildings and construction happening. We took the train back to the hotel before our closer look at the wall commemoration, viewing and interpretation area. Being Monday, all Museums including this one were shut, but there was lots of interesting plaques, monuments and artifacts associated with the Wall to make this area well worth visiting

This has been a very enjoyable brief  stay in Berlin. It was quite an eclectic mix. For me it was interesting coming to the place that was the centre of the rise and fall of the NAZI regime that I had read so much about since I was a child. The interpretation on some of the commemorative sites described the political insanity of the regime. My view is different. This regime was put in power on a deliberately rational and immoral agenda of overt racial purity that the people of Germany were knowingly led into. I sense that any form or racial and religious intolerance can lead to a similar outcome in other nations, even today.

Berlin does not have the brash feel that many modern cities have. Its Tegel airport is a tad tired and dated and its metro U and S systems are efficient but old. There are many cranes on the skyline and much development underway. The tourist infrastructure and interpretation is excellent and things like meals and train travel are not as expensive as I had perhaps anticipated. Some areas are clearly grungy but as in most cites, at the new heart including around Potsdamer Place retail in brand new shopping malls is the preeminent activity.

Tuesday 13 October Berlin to Stockholm with Air Berlin, then Next Jet tto Jonkoping, overnight Vox Hotel.

We were up very early to take public transport, U Metro and 128 bus to Tegel airport for our Air Berlin flight to Stockholm. We had tons of time.  Arriving from busy and tired Berlin airport at the relatively deserted, spotless, prim and proper Arlanda Stockholm airport was quite a contrast. After a three your wait including flight transfer we boarded our small Next Jet flight south to Jonkoping. We have five hours at Arlanda Stockholm on the way home but only a brief wait for our connecting flight in Helsinki on Friday.

The one hour flight back to Jonkoping was mainly in cloud. Only the last few minutes provided some glimpses of the lake and the town through the cloud as we landed. For simplicity we took the very expensive taxi option to the Vox hotel, $70 for the seven kilometres. After a short walk and reorientation of the area around the eastern side of the town we had a hearty early dinner at the Lebanese restaurant nearby.

Wed 14 October Jonkoping, registration and lunch at 12 midday, finish after 5pm

The breakfasts at the Vox Hotel are excellent. I walked across to the University with to register at 12 midday. It began with a sit down lunch then straight into the welcome and John Field's keynote presentation. The breakouts were interesting and diverse but mainly about work related learning for older people. The Mingle at 5pm turned out to be a light early dinner and drinks. At 8pm there were drinks in the John Bauer Hotel nearby.

Thursday 15 Oct Jonkoping Conference all day form 9am, paper session in the 2-4pm slot, then 4pm Book launch.

The Conference was excellent. Sabina Krasovec did a great job introducing my book, and all 8 books sold immediately afterwards, with destinations in Portugal, Estonia, Lithuania, Poland and the U.K. There was music and drinks afterwards before a bus took us the Husqvana Museum and then the restaurant on the lake for a really excellent dinner, with singing afterwards that I was encouraged to initiate. The dinner conversation included a plan to organise an ESREA study tour to Australia and New Zealand for February 2017.

Friday 16 Oct Conference 9-12am, pm fly to Next Jet Jonkoping to Stockholm, then Finnair to Helsinki, then flight home with Finnair towards Hong Kong.

The final two parallel sessions were my conference highlights, from Lithuania and Slovenia, as mentioned in my conference notes. There was a grab and go lunch before we shared a taxi to the airport with Shima, a PhD student based in Paris, studying under Dominic from Alsace who also shared the taxi. The flight to Stockholm  in the small SAAB turboprop was uneventful. We crashed out virtually all of our Euro and Swedish Kroner for the Australian dollar. The sit with Shima in the Stockholm airport lounge for most of the few hours until our mid evening flight was welcome, but this is going to be a long haul home beyond the first short leg to Helsinki.

As we were set to board this Helsinki flight we were advised it was cancelled. The ensuing hours were very poorly handled by Finnair. We ended up the Vantaa Hotel with scores of other disgruntled travellers with a loud party happening adjacent to the foyer downstairs. Sat 17 October the plan was to Fly to Hong Kong with Finnair then towards Melbourne with Qantas …

In fact we were on a flight out of Helsinki delayed until around 9.30 am finally arriving in Hong Kong close to midnight. The Airport Regal Hotel paid for by Finnair turned out to be a bonus, and gave us most of the day in Hong Kong, including. Trip into Kowloon and Honk Kong on the airport train. We flew out early evening on a Cathay flight towards Melbourne.

Sunday 18 October the plan was to  arrive Melbourne around 9am Sunday and and home, then to Newcastle  pm via 5.30pm shuttle  in Ballarat. All this changed as above,

Monday 19 October AMSA, Newcastle, including book launch.

We arrived into Melbourne around 7.30am, took a taxi in to pick up the car and headed home, arriving there by 11am. I unpacked and packed for the AMSA Newcastle trip. There was time also to mow the lawns before the 3pm airport shuttle and flight to Newcastle, arriving by 7pm. A driver took me on to the AMSA dinner by 8pm, early enough to get a meal before the presentation to John Evoy of the 2015 Ted Donnelly Award, richly deserved.

Tuesday 20 Oct AMSA, Newcastle

My keynote presentation was first up at 8.30am. It went very well. The book sales were brisk and all 70 sold by the end of lunch, with orders for 8 more to process and mail on top of the 20 others. VMSA have ordered another 50. The program was patchy. The two afternoon sessions were future oriented and were not really appropriate. The program for the next conference needs a serious rethink with more shedder involvement.

I sat with Barry Sheridan, George Kelly and Eva Beirne from Ireland, joined also by John Evoy for a delightful dinner on the Newcastle waterfront. Jet lag is OK though I woke for a half hour around 2am

Up at 5.30am for a 6am light breakfast and flight home towards Melbourne from Newcastle.