Samsung Global Bloggers

Simon and TC with a crazy lady who probably owns lots of cats

There were about 70 other Samsung Global Bloggers from 20 different countries who were bought to London to blog about the Olympics.

We were split into groups and given video assignments each day. There were some serious social media gurus among the group; from  people with 30,000 Twitter followers (I have 86) to people you couldn’t befriend on Facebook because they had too many (apparently they cut you off at 5,000).

I was fortunate enough to be in ‘the relaxed group’. TC from Malaysia, Simon from Austria and I decided early on that we’d rather spend our time exploring London than editing videos in the hotel.

Unfortunately this meant that our videos weren’t quite of the same quality, and didn’t end up making it to the website. One of them did make the cut and you can watch that little gem here (Daily show no. 7). Don't be surprised if I get an Oscar nod for my performance.

Olympians

Me and teammate James 'the missile' Magnussen

Samsung hooked us SGBs up pretty well. We got fancy new phones, a hotel room in London and a bunch of Olympic tickets. I got to see rowing, tennis, gymnastics, beach volleyball and a bunch of women’s basketball games, but the real highlight was getting an invite to the Australian Olympic Team reception.

We walked the green carpet with the Australian Olympic team past throngs of cheering fans to the reception where Eddie Maguire was waiting to greet us.

The Olympians weren’t hard to spot. They’re all either huge or tiny. I started chatting to a guy who looked quite familiar to me.
“So what sport do you play?” I asked
He peered down at me from 8 foot high, surprised by the question.
“Ummmm basketball”
“Oh right…. Yes of course”

Days later I realised I’d been talking to Aussie basketball captain Matthew Nielson. I reckon he loved it.

One face I did recognise was Australian Women’s Basketball captain Lauren Jackson. After she was announced as flag bearer for the Opening Ceremony, the party really started.

The Voice

John Farnham came out singing ‘The Voice’. I didn’t think it could get any better. Then he sang ACDC. Surely nothing could top that. Then someone asked me if I was competing.

You're Dumped.

If you’ve ever been backpacking you’ll know how much it sucks carrying around a backpack. Add a trombone and it’s almost too much to bear.

Security has never been a priority for me. I trust that people won’t take my stuff. More than that, I trust that people don’t want my stuff. A bag of dirty clothes and a beat up trombone is hardly good bounty.

Over the years I’ve found some great free places to dump my stuff. Open lockers are pretty good; convenient, safe-ish and relatively unsuspicious. Free museums and galleries are great too. Check your bag in, then sneak out. The only problem is you might have the people from the gallery chasing you down the street yelling ‘hey, wait, you forgot your bag’.

My latest theory is ‘if you can’t see it, you can’t steal it’. The idea being that I hide my bags somewhere, usually in a bush, then pick them up later.

Fast forward to the Olympics in London. I decided to take my trombone to the beach volleyball to add to the already upbeat atmosphere. Unfortunately when I reached security I was informed that no bags over 25 litres would be admitted into Olympic venues.

They told me there might be lockers at the nearest tube station. I didn’t believe them. The game was about to start and I wasn’t about to miss it looking for somewhere to dump my trombone.

The venue was just by St James Park and there was security everywhere. I found a bush and stashed my trombone. I tried to look casual as I emerged from the shrubbery covered in dirt, leaves in my hair.

Four hours later I returned to discover that my trombone was gone. In it’s place was this note:

I went to the police station and picked up my trombone without trouble. I think I found a new place to leave my stuff.

Waaaa waaaa waaa waaaaaaaa

That’s the sound of a sad trombone, and I’m sorry to say that I have a very sad trombone on my hands.

My wonderful parents bought me this trombone very cheaply when I was 12. It’s a 1983 Conn, and never looked like much, but it makes a beautiful sound.

Over the years I’ve come to know my trombone quite well. I learnt quite recently that it doesn’t like flying.

It came off the plane bent and dented with a broken spit valve. Not in a way that only musicians would notice, but in a way that even people who have never seen a trombone in their life notice.

Things got worse when I found a crack in the bell the other day. Thank goodness for duct tape.

It still has a few more flights to go. I hope it makes it.

The Busking Mafia

Yes they do exist in various cities, mostly in Europe as I’ve begun to discover.

The busking mafia is basically a group of buskers who take over all the best busking spots and don‘t let anyone else play. Gasp, horror, the evils of society finally come to light!

Apparently since Romania became part of the EU, tons of Romanians have made there way to the richer European countries where they form organised busking and begging communities.

My friend Michael, a local Hamburger, had suspected something was up about these buskers for a while. In the 5 days I spent in Hamburg, I saw about 20 different people playing the accordion.

If you want to busk somewhere and there’s already a busker there, you should ask the current busker how long they will be and suggest swapping on an hourly basis. That’s pretty common busker etiquette.

Most cities have busking laws stating that a busker can’t occupy a pitch for more than an hour or two,

This is where the mafia come in.

The accordion players in Hamburg didn’t stay in the same place all day, rather swapped every few hours, so you could never get a good spot.

Bergen, Norway did not have such a strong busking presence, but was rife with beggars. Rumour has it, beggars and accordion players are in cahoots, controlling the scene on the street and making a fortune.

I played in a spot in Bergen where I’d seen an accordion player the day before. I had a good set. Then the accordion player came up to me.

“I play here” he said “you go, I play here”.

My non confrontational nature really came to light. I said OK and walked away.
For more on the beggar/busking mafia in Bergen, read this article.

Gothenburg in Sweden had a similar system but with a begging mafia rather than a busking mafia. Apparently up to 60 beggars were driven to town in a bus and picked up at the end of the day. Where they live, nobody knows

Fortunately they gave me no trouble. We nodded at each other and I made sure I played a long way away. I’d rather not find a horse’s head in my bed thank you very much.

A Time for Change

I have a love-hate relationship with coins. I love that they’re money, but I hate pretty much everything else about them. They’re heavy, noisy, easy to lose but hard to get rid of.

I learnt the importance of getting rid of coins the hard way. I tried to get rid of my coins before I left Germany but no banks would take them. Fortunately my lovely friends in Hamburg offered to take them off my hands, unfortunately, that didn’t happen.

I suddenly found myself in Scandinavia lugging over 150 euros in coins through 3 different countries with 3 different currencies. It’s a lot like putting rocks in your backpack. Stupid.

In Norway I bought myself a ticket for a fjord tour. The man went out back to print my ticket.

On his return he found 800krona in coins neatly piled on the counter.

He looked at the coins, unsure of what to do.

“So, ummm, you’ll be paying in cash then?” he asked.

Some people are not so nice about it. I bought a local bus ticket in Italy. It was only a 1.50euro so I thought it would be a good opportunity to use up some of the annoying bronze coins I was lugging around.

I started counting out 1c, 2c and 5c coins. The man started to lose his patience.
“Do you have anything bigger?” he asked
I looked up from counting.
“No” I lied

I got to about 1.30 and ran out of bronze coins. I had to subtly pull out a few 10c coins. That’s when he cracked.

“No, no I can’t accept these coins” he said
“But you have to” I said, “it’s legal tender”
“I cannot! No one will take these coins.”
“I know, but you have to”

Stubborn Maya was out to play.

We argued a little longer. A line started to build behind me. I had all the time in the world, the shopkeeper did not. I won.

Samsung. Global. Blogger. Winner. Stupid.

While I was working on Hayman, my mother asked me ‘what’s next?’
After going from working on the street to a 5 star resort, the obvious next step was the Olympics.

I started looking at Olympic jobs last year, and even applied for a few that I was grossly unqualified for. It seemed the Olympic organisers were mainly looking for people could organise things. i.e not me.

Then I heard about this Samsung Olympic blogging competition. It had my name written all over it- Olympics, blogging, videos.

Fast forward a couple of months and I’m sitting in a hostel in Copenhagen and I found out I won.

I looked around for the Germen guy I’d befriended, he wasn’t there. I didn’t know anyone else. I smiled at people in a way that said ‘you should come talk to me so I can tell you how awesome I am’. Didn’t happen.

I skyped my very excited parents. Mum wanted all the details so I decided it would be easier to forward her the email. The email that said if you don’t reply in 5 days time you forfeit your prize.

Obviously I replied in time. I wasn’t going to let this opportunity go begging, or was I?

7 days later I was surprised that I still hadn’t heard back. I checked my original email. I’d accidentally sent it to my Mum. Yes, I am that incompetent.

I wrote a somewhat hysterical email to the original address and played the waiting game. That painful kind of waiting game where your stomach is in knots and you’re filled with regret.

Anyhoo, it’s all good now. It looks like the universe has smiled down on me once again. Lucky Maya.

My prize:

• Flights to London (not using them, already here)
• 10 nights accommodation in London (in a hotel, not a tent or a bus shelter :))
• Tickets to at least one Olympic event 
• Samsung Galaxy Note or Samsung phone

For more info on the competition click here

Packing Light

Here’s the problem with travelling with a trombone: you have to travel with a trombone.

I’ve always considered myself a good packer, but it doesn’t matter how skilfully I’ve picked out my clothes or how well I squish everything in, at the end of the day I still have to carry around a massive trombone.

Last week I had my biggest packing challenge yet: to get my trombone and backpack on a Ryan Air flight as one bag weighing under 15kg.

I wasn’t particularly worried about the weight, I knew I could get it under 15kg if I tried really, really hard, it was the ‘one bag’ part that concerned me. I voiced this concern to my travel agent before I left.
“Just wrap them together” she said casually.

Of course! It was genius! Suddenly my whole notion of basic words changed. ‘What is a bag?’ ‘What is one?' The lines started to get blurry.

In the days leading up to my flight, I started hearing horror stories about how mean Ryan Air is when it comes to baggage. When I told people my plan, they were sceptical.
‘I don’t think that will work’
‘Seriously, I wouldn’t’
‘I’m not sure if you can pull this off’

Sounded like a challenge to me.
Alas, couch surfer Magnus made a suggestion that seemed to be a lot more logical.
‘Can you put the trombone in your backpack?’
Yes I could (with about 30cm sticking out the top).
I sighed, this was going to be far too easy.
I covered the sticking out trombone with my backpack‘s raincoat, and wrapped it in duct tape.

As you can see, it looks a lot like one bag. I had no problems with Ryan Air, the girl checking in didn‘t even look at it.

I understand that in some ways this is far less impressive than the top photo, but I still think it’s pretty impressive that I managed to fit a trombone in my backpack. I think I can say that aside from the trombone, I did pack light.

Monthly Update

One month in and I’ve broken even (excluding flights), but only just.

The busking has been a bit tougher than I expected. Clearly I’m not in Oz anymore.

France was lovely, but the French gave me no money. Once I figured that out aand headed for Parisian tourist trap, everything got better.

Things certainly improved as I travelled north. Hamburg was OK but would’ve been better had the weather cooperated.

I discovered my new favourite coin in Copenhagen; the 20 krona (about $4)

Sadly Sweden has their 20 krona as a note, but back to Norway and it was a coin again.

My best success was in Norway, but everything was so expensive that it didn’t work that much better than other places.

Best busking spots:

For money: random park in Oslo
For beauty: Flam, Norway (view of the fjords)
For atmosphere: Schanzenvierte, Hamburg (after Germany won the football)
Best all rounder: Pont Neuf, Paris

My Epic Busking Adventure: European Edition

The Paris Office

After successfully busking my way around Canada, Australia and New Zealand, it’s Europe’s turn.

The plan is to busk in the rich countries, so I’ll be mainly sticking to Scandinavia and the north west, then head to London for the Olympics. In saying that, planning has never been my strong suit, so who knows where I'll end up.