Swaps Boy, Drug Dealing, Latin Dancing, Shopping and Greece

(Simon Update #13)

Hi guys and girls

It's been a long time since I last sent an update. Maybe three or four weeks. Lots has happened...a holiday in greece, starting work, dinners, bar hopping. God, I don't even remember all of it...

Simon

NEW ADVENTURES OF SWAPS BOY
Well, I'm working...and god is it tough getting up before 9.00am!!!! Started work the day after getting back from Greece. 

Found out work has changed slightly and I am now project manager for a project to develop a trade capture system to front end JP Morgan's swap processing system. We have a blank sheet of paper to transform how trade capture is done including using ecommerce to do various parts of the process. First stage is planning which includes coming up with a 'Trade Capture Vision' for the next 2-3 years and a plan for the first release. Time is tight however because we want a November release and build must finish in July. So.....I have to get people working on Phase 1 before we've actually finsihed the Vision.

Still, I'm pretty excited as the business is new (err..what's a swap and how do you capture one?), I finally get to manage a decent sized system development and the project is strategically important. Lots of pressure on me to deliver this one....gulp! 

I really wanted a challenge from this job and I've got it in spades. Will have to be careful what I ask for in future. It's sink or swim and I feel closer to drowning than I ever have than all the work I've done at Andersen Consulting or Price Waterhouse. Still, I know what I have to do so I'm just going to go at it. Next weeks diary is full already.

Ohhh! Just in case anyone is wondering what a swap is...it's a transaction where a client is paying interest on a fixed rate loan can swap that fixed rate obligation for a floating rate obligation (or vice versa) with JPM. This is called an interest rate swap. JPM also deals with caps, floors, collars, currency swaps and a whole world of exotic financially engineered derivatives that I have to try and understand ASAP. 

DRUG DEALING ACROSS AMERICA
Just got a new game for the Palm Pilot which is pretty sick and highly addictive. It's called DopeWars. You start out as a drug dealer with $2000 in cash, owing $5000 to the loan shark (at 12.5%/day!) and have to go around 6 American cities buying and selling various drugs whilst avoiding the cops busting you and having the loan shark breaking your legs. End goal is to make millions and spend the rest of your days lying on the beach in the Caribbean. Yell out if this doesn't disgust you and I'll send you the executable. 

GOING OUT!!!!!
Well. Have to say life is a bit easier now that I've got some money coming in the door. Can't remember all I've done in the last 4 weeks but have kicked off Ally Macbeal dinners and had a few of those, been to a few pubs all over the place and a few bars as well. 

K-Bar was pretty good a couple of weeks ago and Bar Salsa in Charing Cross Road last night was absolutely sensational. I think it's going to become my new hangout. They had a full on Salsa band, the place was packed and lots of latin dancing everywhere. My kind of place.

Have also purchased a cheap video recorder and been having a few eat in video nights with friends.


SHOP TILL YOU DROP!
Last three weeks have seen me shopping every weekend for clothes given that the work dress code is business casual. I've bought 2 pairs of shoes, 2 pairs of pants, 5 shirts, 2 t-shirts and a pair of boots to replace my old boots that finally died a well-deserved death. 
However, I can't stop yet as the weather has got incrediably cold and the clothes that I wore in Melbourne's Winter arn't cutting it here. In the morning on the way to work, I wear a t-shirt, shirt, 2 jumpers, my wool coat and I'm still freezing. Time to get 'real' winter jacket.

Incredibly...after this buying frenzy...I'm still living on money I actually have in the bank even after paying off the reserve fund and putting money aside for rent. I don't owe anyone a penny!


8 DAYS, 7 NIGHTS IN GREECE
Saturday 23/10/99 London - Flew out on a late night Virgin Airways flight after having only booked the flights the day before. Flight cost £178 return which I didn't think was too bad. Food was some of the best I've had on an airline. 

Sunday 24/10/99 Athens - Got into Athens airport at about 2 or 3am. Feeling pretty excited about it all. Caught a bus to Plaka where the hostel was. Took me ages to find the hostel and when I got there, they didn't have a bed. Ended up chatting with Eric, an American uni student who just come through Albania, Bosnia, Moldova and more. We got bored since we couldn't sleep so we wandered around the streets checking out the ruins and ended up near the Acropolis. Looked at trying to get in but settled for watching the sun come up over the Acropolis and watching the city of Athens start to wake up.

Checked out the Acropolis when it opened at 8.30am. Amazing place. Awe inspiring. Couldn't get over how old it was and that people had been walking when I was walking thousands of years ago. Totally loved the little streets winding down and around the acropolis. Ruins are everywhere. Lots of cafes everywhere with heaps of greeks slowly wiling away the afternoon with their friends and their frappas (like Starbucks Frappacino). Cats are everywhere and looking extremely healthy. Greeks love their cats according to the LP guide book. 

Saw changing of guards at the tomb on the unknown soldier as well as the President of Greece and numerous dignitaries laying wreaths on the tomb. The guards were dressed in their distinctive costumes with funny shoes, tights and pom poms. Not that I was going to make fun of them. All the guards were built like brick shithouses.

Crashed at the hostel in the afternoon and didn't wake up till early evening. Both Eric and met up with Jo (aussie) and Carol (canak) and went for dinner under the Acropolis and with a fantastic view if the city at night. Good atmosphere, good food and good company. Life doesn't get much better than this.

Monday 25/10/99 Athens - Aborted attempt to go to Delphi due to missing the bus. Went back to hostel, booked ferry to Crete and ended up having lunch with Jo after losing Eric. Checked out the National Archaeological Museum. Definitely the best museum for sheer size of collection. Some absolutely amazing pieces there. Still in awe of how old it all is and how lifelike some of the statues look like. Frescos and reliefs on sides of pottery also pretty amazing. 

Left museum and took a cab tour to the highest hill in Athens. Great view of the city. It's absolutely huge, packed with millions of cars and people. Raced back to hostel and caught a train to the port suburb of Piraeus. Stuck standing to my first greek weirdo. Was some young guy who was obviously on some substance and hadn't washed for days. His eyes were three quarters rolled into the top of his head and he had an unlit cigarette in his hand. Periodically, between half falling over sleep, scratching his backside and wiping the drool from the corner of his mouth, he would put his index finger in his mouth and suck it with his eyes still in the back of his head. Worse....the train was so full that I couldn't drag my pack and me away from him. Ugghhh! 

Pireus is the seedy port town they talk about in the guide books and at 8.00 in the evening, it looked it. Managed to get aboard the ferry with no troubles and into my tiny airless cabin. Wasn't bad for £12 but wondered if I should have slept on the deck like some other were doing. Figured that might be asking for trouble though.

Tuesday 26/10/99 Hania, Crete - Woke up to the sound of klaxons at 6.00am and realised that the ship wasn't sinking, it had just arrived in the port of Hania. Had a coffee and talked to a nice greek waitress who then turned out to be serbian. Gots some greek language tips and caught the bus into town. 

Hania I must say is absolutely gorgeous. Old venetian/greek architecture, houses with brightly painted doors and shutters, rambling streets and alley ways, pastry shops, the remains of a fort, cafes all around the harbour, old boat houses from 1400s where they used to bring Venetian galleys in for repair and an old light house on the tip of the harbour entrance where you can just sit and watch the day go by. Checked out a venetian art museum as well as the greek navel...naval museum. Apparently there's a great beach and a scenic gorge walk but I didn't have time to see it. Hopped on the 6pm bus to Iraklia. Pity in many ways. Would've just liked to spend a few days just sitting on the beach or ina harbourside cafe watching the sun go down.

Arrived in Iraklia just as the sun went down. Bus trip was interesting in that you got to see how rocky the place was. Turns out the island used to be covered in forests but the planting of olive trees turned out to be an ecological disaster. Olive trees have deep roots and thus don't keep the surface soil from blowing away like the native fauna. Most of Greece is in the same boat. Just though you'd be interested.

Had a dinner of tzitiki and bread while watching the sun go down. Harbour fort is just great but the rest of the place is pretty dirty and showing signs of construction everywhere. Met a mexican guy called Oskar and went for beers. Spent a few hours in the street just watching people go by, periodically getting up to get more cheap beers from the corner store. Talk about life. Greeks are the biggest mid week ragers I've ever seen. Everyone's out and the cafes are full. The night is cool...buy not cold. It's just a great night to be outside. Didn't see much in the way of clubs which made me wonder how people meet. Checked out a replay out the Tyson/Norris fight at a sports cafe with great relish but disappointed to see it went 1 round after a technical foul. Sigh!

Wednesday 27/10/99 Iraklia, Crete - Got up and caught a bus to check out the Minoan palace of Knossos - home of the legendary minotaur. Well, it was pretty impressive as it's been partly reconstructed and gives you a good idea of how the Minoans used to live before they got wiped out by the Santorini volcano induced tidal wave and marauding Mycaenaens. Not surprising that they got their butts kicked since they didn't have walls around the palace and weren't that great at fighting judging from. A pity really as they seemed like a peaceful bunch of folks who were big on art and like worshiping bulls. If bulls were sacred to them, I wonder what they thought of bull shit. 

Have to say I was a bit irritated by all the german package tour families and pensioners. Have to say, there's something that really irritates me about touristy germans. Mind you, I'm not alone - most of Europe thought the same thing between 1939 - 1945, greeks included. Worse, I got surrounded by German pensioners when I looked up from my roasted eggplant and cheese who seemed loud with one old woman having a better moustache and goatee than I've ever been able to grow. Maybe I was just jealous.

Checked out Knossos museaum which was cool and a great cultural museum with local costumes, a pictorial history of the german WW2 occupation of Crete (de ja vu?) and the library of cretes most famous son, Nikos Kazantzakis - author of Zorba the Greek. On his grave, words to be inspired by "Ah, let this song to be my life! I hope for nothing! I fear nothing! I am free!" 

Booked a flight from Athens to Santorini return. Caught overnight ferry to Athens. More of the same.

Thursday 28/10/99 Athens - Whoa...another long night. Dropped my bags off at the hostel and went to the bus station to catch a bus to Delphi. Missed it, spend an hour talking to Nancy on the phone in Sydney (phone bill will be frightening!) before finally catching the 10.30 bus to Delphi. Took 3 hours to get there and only had 2 hours to check it out. Needless to say I raced around like crazy. Delphi used to be the home of the Oracle. The Delphi Oracle was some crazy high priestess chick who breathed in vapours coming out of the ground, gabbled a heap and surrounded by other priestesses who would inteprete it all. Ancient greeks believed she had the power to predict the future and consulted her on everything from affairs of sate, war and their love life. 

Needless to say, if any girl was involved in that shit today, her parents would kidnap her back from the cult and have her checked into rehab faster than she can say 'Whoah...this is trippy man'. Still, it was impressive to check out these ruins in the the middle of such a mountainous region of greece. There was lots of treasuries of the ancient greek cities, a main temple with some columns still standing, a theatre and...my favourite ruin...an impressive incrediably preserved stadium high abouve the temple and surrounded by pine trees. 

Raced around the accompanying museum and back up the hill to village to catch the bus back to Athens faster than the roadrunner. Meep Meep!

Caught flight to Santorini arriving in at 1.00am and crashing totally at the hostel.

Friday 29/10/99 Fira, Santorini - Climbed out of bed at 12.00pm, opened the door and almost fell back inside completely blinded by the sunlight. Welcome to paradise! Well, at first I couldn't see what everyone was so excited about. The place looked like a dump. Caught a taxi to Karmari beach to get away from it all. Was the only person on the beach apart from some stray dog that kept on trying to sniff my crotch while I wasn't looking. Most of the shops and cafes were closed due to the end of tourist season. Caught the bus backed to Fira and resolved to make a big night out it, wash, dress and generally look nice. Took a walk up the hill and then discovered what the fuss about Santorini was about. 

Sitting back, drinking a pina colada, I looked down sheer cliff on a bay formed from the remains of a volcano. Absolutely fabulous. Watch the sun go down and had another pina colada. Met up with this old aussie couple. Really down to earth and extremely funny. Ended up having dinner with them and getting a bit tipsy on the local wine.

Legged it from the restaurant after saying my good byes to try and find the next good time. Ran into Eric again and ended up at a place called "Murphys" an irish bar playing "Men at Work" and INXS. Drank heaps, talked heaps and ended up dancing heaps with some highly drunk 20 year old american college girl.....anyway...got some action and it turned out to be a really great night...which was surprising because Santorini was basically dead post tourist season and I was expecting to go to bed early.

Saturday 30/10/99 Fira, Santorini - Shook off the post drink seediness, packed my pack and ran down the steep donkey shit covered steps to the wharf where the tour boats were taking off for a tour of the bay. Met another american girl on the way who admired the way I forcefully pushed past the donkeys without fear. Showed her the trick of touching their rumps to let them know you're behind them. She was most impressed.

Got on board the boat and once the deck started rolling, I immediately remembered why I'm not called Captain Chuck Chunder for nothing. Thankfully, the cheese and bacon calzone stayed down and eventually we made it to the volcanic island in the middle of bay. Volcanic island was impressive as was the hot sulphur coming out of the rocks. I jumped up and down on the island a few times to see if I could move the continental plates but couldn't get anything exciting happening. Bugger! Took the boat around to a secluded hotsprings bay. Have to say, it looked like a toddlers pool they had been peed in by multiple kiddies and smelt just as good. Water wasn't that hot either. Still it was good to swim in the water around the boat. The water was so blue and so clear it was amazing. Had lunch on another surrounding island after a fairly exhausting stair climb upto the village. Left the boat at Io and checked out the town with an aussie couple who I met. Nice folks. He's a doctor and working in italy. We ended up having dinner together before I scampered for the plane back to Athens. Managed to get a bed at the hostel despite the time. Out like a light.

Sunday 31/10/99 Athens - Athens again. Still like it but you can do it in 2 days easy. Still in love with the streets of Plaka which surrounded the Acropolis. Checked out the Temple of Zeus and the Ancient (but restored) Roman stadium, site of where they held the first modern olympic games. I must have a thing for ancient stadiums as this one was pretty good.

Had a shitty time at the airport and flight home. Athens is not one of the best. Check in computers failed, flight was delayed, finally boarded, delayed on tarmac, got going, stuck circling over london, luggage took an hour to come because the hold door on the plane wouldn't open. Sigh! Still met a uni lecturer and had interesting discussions about political science. Fascinating stuff and lots of travel perks and advising governments.