Adelaide Park

ADELAIDE is always thought of as a gracious city and an easy place to live in, and despite a population of around one million and a veneer of sophistication, it still has the feel of an overgrown country town. It’s a pretty place, laid out on either side of the Torrens River, ringed with a green belt of parks and set against the rolling hills of the Mount Lofty Ranges. During the hot, dry summer the parklands are kept green by irrigation from the waters of the Murray River on which the city depends, though there’s always a sense that the rawness of the Outback is waiting to take over.

The original occupants of the Adelaide plains were the Kuarna people, though their traditional way of life was destroyed within twenty years of the landing of Governor John Hindmarsh at Holdfast Bay in 1836. The colony’s surveyor general, Colonel William Light, had visionary plans for the new city. After a long struggle with Hindmarsh, who wanted to build around a harbour, Light got his wish for an inland city with a strong connection to the river, formed around wide and spacious avenues and squares. Postwar immigration provided the final element missing from Light’s plan: the human one. Italians now make up the city’s biggest non-Anglo cultural group, and in the hot, dry summers, Mediterranean-style alfresco eating and drinking lend the city a vaguely European air. Not surprisingly, one of Adelaide’s chief delights is its food and wine, with South Australian vintages in every cellar, and restaurants and cafés as varied as Sydney and Melbourne’s, only much cheaper.

Outwardly conservative, Adelaide nonetheless takes advantage of South Australia’s liberal traditions, with a nudist beach, relaxed drug laws and 24-hour hotel licences. It’s the free and easy lifestyle within an ordered framework that’s so appealing; Adelaide may not be an obvious destination in itself, but it’s a great place for a relaxed break on your way up to the Northern Territory or across to Western Australia.

Visiting Adelaide

Visiting Adelaide? Come and stay at the beach!

This beautiful and unique hostel is housed in a historic building. We offer first class backpacker accommodation. NO BUNK BEDS! All rates include fresh linen, continental breakfast and 24hr tea/coffee. We have a newly refurbished lounge bar with cheap drinks, DJ’s and a large beer garden to chill out in the sunshine with a pint of Adelaide’s favorite Pale Ale.

We are meters from the beach and Jetty road with all its cafes, bars and shopping and beachside nightlife. Come and relax at Adelaide’s premier beach.

THINGS TO DO: boating, sailing, 7 day shopping, cinemas, shark museum, scuba diving, swimming, bowling, sun tanning, party nights, great sunsets, historic walks, pool tables, internet, karaoke, BBQs, , videos, , games room, tours – inc learn to surf tours, Kangaroo Island tours, wine tours FREE chocolate factory tour..

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Balinese Dances

Balinese Dances, music, and the theater of wayang are other forms of expression laden with religious connotations. The Trance Dance, for example, is performed when a village is suffering, say from an epidemic or bad harvest. The dance is intended to appease the gods and goddesses, with the hope that they will bless the village. Other dances also manifest the great complexity of Balinese daily lives which are never detached from their religious beliefs. Throughout the year, you can regularly find scheduled dance performances, especially the Balih-balihan or entertainment dances.

Dances

Along with the Hindu religion, the Indian influence in Balinese dances is also significant. Balinese strong identity adapts these various influences with indigineous religion of animism and folklore traditions, creating an expression distinctively flavored by Balinese ethnicity.

Much like the training of gamelan orchestra players, dance training begins when one is still very young. The teacher will stand in front of the children and start dancing. The children will follow her every movement. Once the teacher feels that a child understands the basic sequence, she will stand behind the child, and direct the child by holding her wrists. Practicing with a gamelan orchestra will only happen when the dance is considered to have entered the student. The dancer must learn to fully express the character that she is dancing for; self expression is not a known concept.

Based on their religious functions, Balinese dances can be categorized into three:

1. Wali (sacred) Dances

These dances are considered sacred, and must be performed in the inner court of the temple.

• Rejang
  Danced by females, Rejang dance is a procession of those who have just barely learned to walk to those who can barely walk, moving in a slow and stately fashion towards the altar, twirling fans or lifting their sashes. Their costumes range from a very simple attire to an elaborate dress complete with headdress as you would likely find in Tenganan.
• Baris
  Literally means warrior formation. Baris is a warrior dance usually danced by men. The movements are dramatic. It is hard to distinguish whether it is the dancer that follows the orchestra, or the other way around. You could say that they both go off into their own dimensions, yet at certain well-defined times meet to create an astounding tapestry. The dancers wear elaborate head decoration, from a gold-colored head band to leaves and strings of cempaka blossoms. Variants of this dance are sometimes danced by children and women. You can find this dance performed in Sanur, Tabanan, and Ubud.
• Pendet
  This dance is usually performed by married women, moving in very dignified and elegant way to carry and present offerings to the gods and the goddesses.
• Sang Hyang Dedari (Trance Dance)
• This dance is normally performed to entertain the gods and the goddesses to appease them or to ask for their blessings. A bad harvest or an outburst of an illness may warrant such a dance. The preparation for this dance may take months, as prepubescent girls who have never danced are trained to relax their mind to be able to get into a trance state. Day after day they visit the priest at the local temple to receive their lessons. When the priest concludes that they are ready, and the time is right, the dance will be performed in the court of the temple. Dressed in elaborate attire and immersed in the smoke of burning incense, the two young girls slowly dance as the accompanying chant of the village women gradually relax them to get into trance. The gods and the goddesses will enter their bodies as they enter trance, and they will dance with movements that they have not mastered in their normal state. They may act and sound like a horse or a monkey; at times, they end up dancing while balancing their back on a piece of bamboo supported by two men on both ends. When they collapse, the village women will chant to ask the gods and the goddesses to peacefully leave the bodies of the young girls. If they refuse, dancing will continue until they agree, at which point the girls will simply collapse.
• Barong
  Barong is probably the most well known dance. It is also another story-telling dance, narrating the fight between good and evil. This dance is the classic example of Balinese way of acting out mythology, resulting in myth and history being blended into one reality. Wanna know the story?

2. Bebali Dances

These dances are ceremonial, and usually performed in the middle court of a temple. In the spectrum of sacred and secular, these dances fall in the middle.

• Gambuh
  Gambuh is a danced drama. It tells the courtly story of a Javanese prince in his quest for a beautiful princess.

3. Balih-balihan Dances

These dances are often considered secular and entertaining. They are performed in the outer court or even outside the temple.

• Janger
  Janger is performed by young girls. Peacock crown shaped headwear made from intricately woven gold-colored, dried coconut leaves rests gallantly on their heads. The girls are open shouldered, dressed in a piece of cloth wrapped around the chest, and a batik wrap on the waist down. Most of the dances are performed sitting down, with highly coordinated hand, shoulder, and eye movements.
• Kebyar
  Kebyar is usually danced by two women with beautiful, long, shiny black hair, accentuated at the top by a band of cempaka blossoms. Fans on one hand, they move dramatically. Feet are strongly grounded, and hands and feet move abruptly.
• Legong
  The dance of legong tells a story. It is the most feminine dance. It is usually danced by two females before they reach puberty (in fact, they must retire by the time they reach puberty).
• Kecak
  Kecak is a spectacular dance usually performed at night, surrounding a bonfire. The westerners called this dance The Monkey Dance, for the movements may remind us of monkey’s movements. There can literally be one hundred or more bare chested men, sitting down on the ground surrounding the bonfire, led by a priest in the middle. The only music to accompany them are the beats of their palms hitting their chests, their thighs, or other parts of their bodies, or their claps, rhythmically accompanied by shouting and chanting.
  The dancers move in unison, creating a spectacular choreographic performance. Either hands stretched out, pulled in, rested on the shoulder of the next person, or waists gyrated left and right, etc.

Regularly scheduled performances of these dances, especially the Balih-balihan dances, can be found throughout the year.

Best Play To Retire

By:  Perry Gamsby

Dear Friend,

Are you dreaming looking for places to retire, find here best places to retire in tropical paradise and more in Philippines.

How Many Men Get To Live Their Dreams?

Truly live them! Pack up, sell up and start a new life in a tropical paradise? Date exotic, beautiful woman half their age and then spend each day doing just what you always wanted to do? Not many, I’d guess…… I have.

My name is Perry Gamsby. I had been coming to the Philippines once or twice a year for vacations since 1988. In 2001, I met my soon to be wife, got married in 2002 and went back to Sydney, Australia. Just long enough to sell the house and all the accumulated junk, then fly back to the Philippines and start a new life. In the thirteen years between ’88 and 2001 I have married an Aussie girl who later ran off with a richer man than I was, or ever will be. Monetarily anyway. Right now, I consider myself the richest man alive.

The Philippines is an excellent places to retire, if only from a view to how you can spread your retirement savings or income or pension from month to month and still live comfortably. Forget wasting away in a retirement home or village, retire to the Philippines and really LIVE! As little as US$500 a month can see you living quietly yet comfortably in a rural province. US$1000 per month and you can live well in Cebu or Davao and if you have US$1500, even the BIG CITY, Manila, will allow you to live in perhaps even a grander style than you did back home! Maids, drivers, cooks, domestic servants are all affordable and part of the culture here and you can hire you own live-in domestic helper from as little as US$30 a month!

Are You Disillusioned With The Women In Your Country? Well look to the Philippines. Filipina women are family minded loyal women who still believe in teamwork!

If you have been searching for someone special, the Philippines is full of them! If she really is one in a million, then there are 23 more just like her you haven’t met yet!!!! Be aware that Philippine Law strictly forbids mail order bride services operating from the country, so make sure any penpal or introduction service you use doesn’t promise marriage and doesn’t charge the Filipina any fees. Please avoid using the term mail order bride, it is a misnomer and offensive to many. Filipina’s are like any other woman, your mother, sister, the girl next door back home. Treat them with respect and dignity, no matter how rich or poor, where you meet them or what they do to survive. Be warned some girls will run scams and bleed some men for money, but we will show you how to detect a scammer, and also point you in the direction of someone who can help if you think you are being scammed!

I’m also the Chief Instructor for StreetWise Filipino Martial Arts and have been teaching self defense, Filipino Martial Arts, unarmed combat, security and police personal protection tactics and boxing for over 20 years, ever since I was a Military Policeman. I have been a World Champion Full Contact Stick Fighter and have many years of first hand, real life experience in the bodyguard and security industries before I left that life to pursue more family oriented activities and a less hectic working life! Interested visitors can arrange a training visit to Cebu or simply chew the fat on anything related to the art of self defense.

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Dear friend,

It’s true. Travel Agents are treated differently than the rest of us. And the reason is simple: The travel industry is a 4 trillion dollar a year business!

With that kind of money being spent on travel, you can just imagine the competition. The travel industry will spend millions on advertising and they’ll do what ever it takes to get them their piece of the pie.

It’s a known fact; the travel industry survives on the business supplied to them by Travel Agents. And because so much of their business relies on Travel Agents, the travel industry treats these Travel Agents like royalty!

In all honesty, if a travel related business or vendor is not known and utilized by the country’s travel agents, their business will suffer tremendously. In other words, travel companies need Travel Agents to survive…their business depends on them!

And most people don’t know that becoming a travel agent is quick and easy if you know the secrets. In fact, with our exclusive insider information contained in the Travel Industry Secrets, you’ll actually become a licensed Travel Agent in about twenty minutes…it’s that quick and it’s that easy!

When you become a Travel Agent, new doors are opened and courtesies are extended to you, that everyday folks aren’t privy to. Like I said, travel companies need travel agents and when you become one of them, you’ll be showered with discounts and gratuities by way of deeply discounted and even free travel benefits.

Just imagine setting sail on a Caribbean cruise this winter while everyone back home is shoveling snow and staying indoors, trying to keep warm. And not only are you enjoying the balmy breezes of the Caribbean, you’re doing so for just $35 a day while the occupants in the cabin next to you are paying upwards of $200 each day for the same cabin, the same food, and the same service.

Or maybe you just want to fly home to visit your relatives. Instead of paying $600 to fly across the country like you did last year, your ticket is discounted to only $285. And just before you board, you hear your name over the airline’s loudspeaker, calling you to the ticket counter. As you approach, you are notified that your discounted coach ticket has just been upgraded to first class. Now, your $285 dollar coach ticket has a value of over $1,500 simply because you are a licensed Travel Agent.

So, you arrive at your destination and make your way to the rental car agency. Before you left, you booked a standard size vehicle for 50% off the published rate. Once at the counter, the rental agent advises you that you are entitled to a free upgrade and they ask if you’re interested….

These are just a few of the courtesies that you’ll find extended to you when traveling as a licensed Travel Agent. But they get even better.

You see, the travel vendors – airlines, hotels, tour operators, car rental agencies, cruise lines, etc. recognizes the benefits of having travel agents being familiar with the products they are selling. Its for this very reason that in addition to favorable rates and discounts, these same vendors also offer free familiarization trips to resort destinations, free dinners, free shows, and free cocktail hours to learn about vendor offerings.

Just imagine…a couple weeks after receiving our priceless information, you get an invitation for you and a guest to spend an entire week at an all-inclusive resort, absolutely free. Normally, this experience would run a hefty $3,000 per couple. But this resort wants to pamper you and create an experience of a lifetime for one reason. So you, as a Travel Agent, will refer your “customers” back to them.

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You Don’t Have To Be Rich
To Have An Extravagant Disney World Vacations

Disney World Vacation Packages

By : Beth Haworth

On a late Spring afternoon, two families departed for Disney World. They were very much alike, these two families. Both had two children, both had middle class incomes, and both lived in the same neighborhood. Both families took the same flight to Disney World. Both stayed at the same luxury 5-Star Disney World resort. Both families attended the same shows and events, and ate at the same restaurants. Both families spent the same amount of time at Disney World, and returned home on the same flight.

But there was a difference….

One family spent $5,500 for their Disney World vacation. The other spent $2,700.  What made the difference?

Hi – I’m Beth Haworth. If you’re like me, you probably insist on getting the most you possibly can for your money.  I’ve written a guide to the best tips, tricks and savings available for a  Disney world Vacation. Strategies that can literally save you hundreds – if not thousands of dollars.

You see – I’m not only a best selling travel author – I was also a Disney Cast Member. And let me tell you – those were some of the best times of my life. I learned a lot – but I also kept my eyes open. I watched hundreds of families needlessly throwing their money away because they didn’t know any better way. If only they had known what I know! And that’s how my “Ultimate Disney World Vacation Savings Guide” e-Book was born. It’s everything I’ve learned and discovered in making a Disney Vacation an affordable and magical experience.  You can have a Disney World vacation every bit as enjoyable and rewarding as the family who spends 2, 3, or even 4 times as much money!

That’s a savings of $1,980 – for less than one hour of my time! And that’s not an off-season deal either! I’m talking right in the middle of peak Disney travel times in 2009! Follow the 9 easy steps in my Disney Savings Guide, and you can do it too. Why not pay for your trip in advance, rather than making credit card payments for months afterwards?

Every tip, every suggestion, every strategy you’ll find in my book is for real. I’ve done it all first hand. Both as an actual Disney Cast Member – and now as a Mom with three kids going on Disney vacations.

Let me tell you exactly how “The Ultimate Disney World Savings Guide” is going to save you a bundle of cash.  Need more …. Visit me

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