kjp

I gave my first prepared speech to the rostrum club that I'm in. As per the tradition (my first speech), it was "About Me". The slightly sanitised for public consumption version of it is below (removal of work and name details). Some of the feedback: never end on "Thankyou" - that's what the audience should say; be careful with the tempo - I was nervous at the end for some reason - and it showed up with a pace that was a bit too fast; I should be careful not to fidget (too expressive with my hands).

Introduction
Hi everyone. I’m K. P. This afternoon I’m going to talk a little bit about myself. I’ll go through my upbringing; how I occasionally entertain with my music; then go onto what I’m doing outdoors this weekend, and finish up with my travel plans for later this year.

Biography
I was born in Canberra in the very early 1980’s. After spending a few years in Melbourne, my family (mum, dad, and my two sisters) settled back in Canberra. The primary school 100 metres down the foothpath was followed by high school a 20 minute bike ride away, followed by university at the ANU – one of the universities in Canberra. Along the way I learnt clarinet, bicycled, rowed, bushwalked and orienteered. (Orienteering is a sport of cross country running requiring navigation). Pocket money came through IT support work, clarinet teaching and maths tutoring. After my 5 years at uni studying engineering and maths, I had a break for a year, and then moved up to Brisbane at the start of 2004. This was when I started my first full time engineering job – working for P. as a D. E.. The move to Brisbane coincided with a growing social confidence: these days I spend a decent amount of time eating, drinking, and going out with friends. One of the down sides of the move to Brisbane is that I am far from my family in Canberra and Sydney. This was quite a problem in the time around March 2006, when my dad died from a brain tumour. After many visits to Canberra and Sydney in 2006, I was fortunate that during 2007 my mum, younger sister, elder sister, brother in law and 2 year old niece all stayed with me at various times through the year. Recently at work, I’ve started in a permanent position in S. P. design.

Music – Entertaining – Clarinet Performing
For most of my life I have been fortunate to play clarinet in various concert bands. These bands have ranged from 15 to 60 woodwind, brass and percussion musicians. I find that being in amongst a group of people playing music all together is exciting and rewarding. In particular I love the buzz of performing. The pressure is on – people have paid their money to hear the band – and you need to play well – now. I currently play in a concert band called Queensland Wind and Brass. It’s the third year I’ve been with them – and have enjoyed every minute of it. Amongst a handful of park and mall gigs, I’m looking forward to our three major concerts later in the year and the national band competition being held at Easter.

Outdoors – This Weekend – Rogaine
Now this weekend I’ll be taking part in my first rogaine for this year. Rogaining is a sport of long distance cross country bushwalking. Using a map and compass, competitors try to find as many checkpoints as they can in a set amount of time. Events vary in location and duration. The event on Sunday is an eight hour event – being held just west of Brisbane, overlooking where Lake Wivenhoe should be. I’m really looking forward to it – I enjoying being outdoors in the bush. It’s a nice feeling being in nature – away from the busyness of the city, getting a bit of fresh air. Rogaining is quite challenging both physically and mentally. Navigating can be quite a complex task at the best of times, but more difficult when you’re tired after 8 hours of walking. During previous races I’ve been known to say things like “This sucks – I’m so tired and sore” and “I’m never going to do this stupid sport again”… but for some reason I keep going back. I like the satisfaction after accomplishing what is a very demanding event. Ohh, I said the event is on Sunday: and it is – mostly. It’s an 8 hour event; starting at 11 pm on Saturday night, going through to 7 am Sunday morning. Yes, I am slightly crazy. So if you wake up at 4am on Sunday morning in your nice cosy bed, think of me somewhere out there, trudging around bush, trying to avoid getting lost. It better not rain.

Adventure – Travel – China and South America
I am a fairly stable sort of person. I like doing my job, seeing my friends, doing a few activities through the week, having a bit of a break on the weekend – and repeating next week. Occasionally though, I do need a bit of adventure, and this is usually in the shape of travelling overseas. In 2005 I spent 6 weeks travelling in China. China is a large diverse country with many ethnic minorities. It is very quickly modernising, trying to keep the 100s of millions of very poor people in touch with the richer parts of the country. Later this year I will hopefully visit parts of South America. I’m hoping to spend about 5 weeks (maybe more if I can get the leave) in Peru, Bolivia and maybe the Galapagos Islands. Like China, I’ll try to enjoy several different aspects of South America in my trip: including a culture very different to Western, Australian culture; very old historical sites; and spectacular scenery. I suspect the walk up Machu Picchu will be all of these. So far I haven’t really done much in the way of planning. But I’m getting itchy feet – it’s time for another adventure.

Conclusion
Well, this afternoon I’ve talked a little about myself… there are many things I haven’t mentioned – the beach, my engineering, photography, cooking and philosophy. But the key things in my life are my family, friends, music and the outdoors. Thankyou.

Well, I’m planning a trip to South America. It’s just in the planning stages at the moment: not confirmed. Hopefully, it will be about 5 or maybe 6 weeks (depends on leave from work), in August / September / October / November this year. The trip will probably be based around 2 or 3 weeks in Peru, with time in some (or all of) Bolivia, Ecuador, Galapagos Islands. Maybe Chile and Argentina, but unlikely. Unlikely to visit Brazil as well. Like my 2005 China, I suspect the emphasis will be on old stuff; mountains; and different cultures. I’ll probably visit Machu Picchu (probably do the walk), Lake Titicaca, amongst others. Still figuring exactly where I’ll go. My current thought is for a 3 week tour in Peru, ending in Bolivia; then 1 / 2 weeks backpacking; then a short week in Galapagos Islands.

Different to my preparation before my China trip, I’m not going to a Spanish course. Instead I’ll be going through books and CDs myself (probably the Hugo one – good reputation). Spanish at least has the same (mostly anyway) script as English, and not tonal, so probably will be easier to get a basic grasp compared to Mandarin.

So I’ve been wondering about myself a bit recently. This has been for a few reasons: a change at work (significant and good); a speech I need to give at rostrum (about... me); introspection encouraged at a work “soft skills” thingy; cleaning up my apartment; thinking about a Christmas letter for 2007 (ha!).

Part of the story is that over the past year, I haven’t been very happy, at all… but I haven’t realised it until recently. The fact that things around the apartment didn’t ever seem to get done; disorganisation, not being able to stay focussed were all probably signs of something going awry.

So, some questions for me: (a) who am I; (b) who do I want to be. If they’re not the same, then I (or anyone for that matter) is going to get stressed. There’s several jokes for (a), but I probably should write down (b) for my own good.

So, I’ve got to think about who I want to be. An incomplete list: happy, healthy, friendly, caring, trusting, wise, unmaterialistic. But what do I want from my living arrangements? Simple, organised, clean, tidy. And what do I want for my day to day routine? Exercise, healthy food, sleep. I eat well, but don’t get enough of either exercise or sleep.

It’s interesting that I’m happy to keep the apartment clean when I have flatmate, but I’m slack about it when it’s only me (really only cleaning before people are around). It’s probably an indicator of my own self value / state of mind. Living by myself has been good – I’ve been able to have my own space, and do what I like. But the downside has been the increase in a sense of loneliness / isolation. This last point is quite subtle really – it’s hard to pick unless you’re looking from the outside / back at yourself. Hmmmm.

Part of it also that I haven’t had something to work on (to keep me busy outside of work and band, outdoors stuff, social stuff, etc). The only real thing would have been house hunting – but nothing came of that. I do have a ‘project’ to keep me busy for the next half a year or so (South America – more in the next post).

Another interpretation for the past year is that I’ve been a bit of peter pan, not wanting to grow up / not being responsible for my future (ie: ambling through life). There’s maybe a bit of this – but not dominant issue. But having something to work towards (South America) probably helps. The other issue is being single – not wanting to move on with things because then I’m further down the path of singletonness.

So some tasks for me: reorganise the apartment (already doing this); get someone in to share the flat; start walking / jogging to work; going to bed before I’m tired (turning off computer and stereo at a set time).

At a soft skills / emotional intelligence course in October (?) last year, there was a section on personality types, and how they interact. There seems to be many different personality type tests available. In the past I’d done a Myers Brigg test online. Well, did it several (four) times, and got four different answers. Hmmmm something odd there. Also, understanding people with 16 personality types might be useful for a psychologist, but not very useful for me in everyday life. Anyhow, the test on the course classified people’s temperaments according to four birds: Peacock, Dove, Owl, Eagle. This was very interesting; and useful for understanding how and why and who I get stressed out with. It makes it very interesting thinking about family, people at work. Useful as it’s good to understand yourself a bit more.

Anyhow, enough from me.

A few places that I need to keep an eye on:

Brisbane Jazz Club
UQ Music Concert Diary 2008
The Con Events Calendar
The Queensland Orchestra
The Zoo Calendar
Art of Fighting Concerts