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Hello. 

This blog is inactive. I leave it here in ruins as a memento of my past :-)

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http://alexdefreitas.wordpress.com/

Alex

tester

this is a test

I might just have it all wrong. But hear me out. Life is an awe inspiring thing. As each day unfolds I feel as though I am a young child, experiencing something for the very first time. This newness is what keeps me alive. I live to see what tomorrow will bring. Riding my bicycle through the city is unpredictable. The taxi darts across in a u-turn manoeuvre; I swerve, hop up onto the sidewalk and take a different path. Great! I fear routine. I dread waking knowing that I must be here at 0900hrs, walk to here by 1000hrs, and arrive home at 1649hrs. I can’t imagine getting my coffee from the same place at the same time day in, day out. Taking the long way home gives me more pleasure than you could ever possibly imagine. I feel as though I know this city like the back of my hand, yet, there are constantly new places that I can discover and explore. Whittaker Place FTW! I live for this. By foot I am an explorer. Columbus, Cook, Shackleton. How can I not have been here before!? You see, the thing is, how can you possibly be so focussed on one thing? Spend seven days of every week chained to your magnum opus? I think the ‘great work’ is life. You don’t have to know exactly why you are here to know that this is a pretty exciting place to be. Yeah, things seem to have gone a bit sideways. I will give you that. But does that change the fact that tomorrow we don’t have a clue about what’s going to happen. We don’t even have some idea. Doesn’t that excite you? A wise person, not much older than myself once told me that there is life outside of doctoral studies. Haven’t you heard? Faith is a personal thing. Believe in what you believe in because it’s what you believe. Don’t be put off by others. They are inconceivably different to you. I’m convinced that there are very few, if any, that have it all figured out. I know what I believe and it’s not what he told me or she told me. It’s what I know inside me to be true. What’s more, I bet you one hundred that it changes tomorrow. Given all of this, perhaps it’s best we all try get along. Isn’t that the goal? Yeah, aim for the stars, and work towards that almighty aspiration of yours. Just be prepared for it all to change in a moment. Most of all, at least if it were me, that is, I would do my best to smile. How can you possibly resist a smile? I say this for all of us when I ask, what’s with all the hate? I’m just as confused as you are. I’m worried. I’m nervous. I long to see others live well. I just have a feeling deep down inside that we might all be trying a little too hard. It’s all really just a long winded way of saying, slow down, I suppose. Try wandering aimlessly for a while. When was the last time you sat and watched the clouds go by? The clouds could tell us a lot.

Alleycat Tonight

How perfect is today!?

I couldn't stay inside. That's criminal for sure!

Just a reminder of the Alleycat tonight.

Gathering at 160 Beach Road from like 7pm.

It's deliberately easy, and all in the CBD, so all can get involved.

Some PRIZES courtesy of T. White's Bikes and Charge Bikes.

After we race the plan is to hang out, have some beer, do some tricks.

Some of the akfixed crew have sorted out lights and music and beers etc.

See you there!

(might roll with Critical Mass before - 530pm Albert Park)

Alex

Back to the blog

Back to the blog we go.

How is it that so much time passes inbetween visits?

'tis not good for people who check here and see no new posts in three months.

Anyways.... much has been happening as you would imagine.

Here's a cool image of me and the well known icon of my city glowing blue in the background:

PhD work comes along slowly.

Noone is really telling me what to do. So, I have weeks of no tangible progress at all....then some days where I will write something and be satisfied. For the most part it's a feeling of total and utter lostness in the emptness of academia. What the heck am I doing? Why is noone helping me? Do they even care? What after this? haha.

But I do love it. Despite my confusions I've always remained confident that I can do this. I will do this!

When I'm not sitting here in my office scanning the web, I'm out riding. Have been putting quite a bit of effort into nurturing something resembling a community of kids riding fixed gear bicycles in our fair city. You can find the website at www.akfixed.com. Most of the action goes down in the forums if you care to click the link and check it out.

It's snow season still. I've got a mammoth sore throat...but we're off for the weekend again.

Life is good, I s'pose.

Til next time

New Lynn Hotel

It's also a sad day.
Sad because I just read that the New Lynn Hotel will be taken to with a wrecking ball today.
This building is one of my favourite in the entire city.
My mind wanders when I pass it by and I imagine the weary travellers that must sheltered inside over a hundred years ago (built in 1881!).

I tried to find some images of it to post and came across these beautiful ones taken by Henk Stolk here on Redbubble.
Aren't they great!

Anyway. I am really disappointed that I couldn't visit one more time before it was too late.
A reminder I suppose, to make sure you do all the things that you just gotta do today aye!

Wellington (one)

Wellington.
I'm actually positive I wrote something here last night, but it seems to not exist. So perhaps I didn't. Or perhaps I was dreaming.

Anyway. Today is a great day, for a number of reasons really. Because I say that it is for a number of reasons, I shall number them for you.

1) I woke up to a pre-prepared Bircher Muesli that I soaked overnight in yoghurt and milk. It was delicious (although it turned into WAY too much after absorbing all that milk!)

2) Coralee called me and she was happy happy happy. It is the last day of term, but just hearing her happy made me happy. I really am emotionally connected to that girl!

3) Truck Protest. The trucks are protesting all over the country today in opposition to a rise in road user charges on really short notice - and fair enough too. We need trucks, but we could do without cars.

I skipped the early conference session to play in the wellington streets with kilometers of trucks all single file blasting their airhorns. It made me happy. This was one of the most passionate protests I've ever attended. Not even kidding. Recently, enviro type protests have increasingly frustrated me. So much angst and stuff. These truck drivers were genuinely concerned about their livlihoods - I could see in in their eyes.

I took some sweet video. I will compile it soon into an amateur home-video of my Wellington experience.

Highlights so far (it's only 10am):

Riding along watching trucks clogging the whole city and some suited man in a car pulling the fingers at me for taking up a lane. I caught up to him and asked "Sorry sir, was I holding you up" (the rest of the city was gridlock!).

Being on my bike in this strange territory - not knowing my way around - climbing hills only to find out I must go back down because I've gone totally the wrong way.

And finally, this smile that I can't shake from my face. It's here, and I'm glad.

Thanks for everything.
Alex

Beautiful

I know beautiful is not an adjective that most people might use to describe this video. But for me, it's all that comes to mind.

[City planners] need to take the people in the city seriously...shift from taking cars [more] seriously.

'Pedestrian priority streets' allow pedestrians, bicycles and cars all equal access, however, of course, the pedestrian and the bicycle always top the heirarchy - big trucks are at the bottom.

"It’s worth using money investing in bicycle systems"

"You just need to take a few little steps every year for forty years …look how fantastic it is now"

Hello. Today was a great day. It's Saturday, but that's not all. It's raining and I was just so stoked to be privileged enough to be cocooned up in our warm dry car as we drove west. Picked up a battery that's gonna help my laptop last a few hours at conferences from a man's house on an amazing hill out past Titirangi. The driveway was long and winding and the house was perched atop a hill with 200degrees of sea views. Manukau Harbour, the big Dam i forget its name. Beautiful. To top it off we had the most amazing lunch at a cafe in Titirangi. The hardware cafe I believe it was called. Everything looked awesome! I had a pumpkin salad and AMAZING cous cous and raisins and sundried tomatoes and stuff. Far out. So yum. I will definately return. Speaking of which. I'm in Wellington next week so I can try the sweet vege breakfast at Plum on Cuba Mall that I enjoyed with mom so much last year.

Anyways, lots to say but I won't. To the images.
One for yesterday:

27 June 2008

Mom waits for coffee. My keys sprawled across the table as they are quite often more than twice a day as I pause for coffee and catchups (its hard to sit with them in my back pocket)

28 June 2008

Dam. Sun. Just a great day.

Eskimo

26 June 2008another mundane everyday sight

and some night-time bicycle action.

25 June 2008
I promise that the images will get more interesting. We're just starting with the mundane. My everyday views. Images so ingrained in my mind that they will never be able to disappear.

24 June 2008

Three Hundred and Sixty-Five Black and White Images

Hi team. Welcome back. It certainly has been some time.
In our absence I have been thinking (obviously) a lot about stuff. I keep having the moments when I just absolutely need to share with someone, but alas, no-one is around to hear my thoughts. I'm married now. That's a change I suppose. PhD too. But as much time as I get to spend with my beautiful wife I still seem to miss so many of these moments. Sometimes I can't even speak as fast as the thoughts are entering my head - ask Coralee. I just have to give up mid-sentance and take a step back.

That's where this place comes in. I can share some more stuff that would otherwise be left unsaid. Not all of it. Not even close. But at least some, right?

It's not just words either. It's images.
I spend my days wandering cities.
I love the city
Its people
Its emptyness
Its vastness
Its buildings
Its history
Its everything
Its back and its front.

How many images have I digitally captured on my various cameras only to save away on a hard-disk in the hope that one day my kids might dust it off and see what their father was thinking.

I can only hope that my children's thoughts are as whirling, confused, colorful and alive as my own. Do they even see in the image what I saw when I took it? What I felt? I doubt it. But I hope so. (That's what one of my next tattoos is about, so stay tuned).

My phone takes particularly pleasing black and white images. The colors are often washed out, but I find I can get a reasonably nice photo in B&W. They are not as crisp as a nice camera, but they will do. The warm edges might help take the edge of the reality of daily life. When was living defined by sharp lines anyways? How can you even be sure of anything!?

So here it goes. 365 days in a year. 365 images I will post. I will be forced to return each day, partly out of duty, and partly in hopes of helping to surface thoughts that otherwise would have been left submerged - perhaps not have even existed at all.

Philosophical? Not really. It's quite simple you see.
Perhaps the only thing that will be simple in life - as we (I) stumble along, skidding sideways, looking for anywhere but the end along the way.

And to play catch up, I'll start with yesterday. Captions will be occasional, but I assure you, images will be daily. Let's do this:

22 June 2008

Cafe Scribe

23 June 2008

Not the great museum atop a hill, but always feels as majestic to me.

We're back.

It's a long story.
Actually, a lot of stories have accumulated since we last spoke.
Anyway, the point is that we've changed the page. Made it simple like life should be (but is not at all).

See you when I have some time to put words onto paper.
I promise

XO

Update time

Time for an update I think. I might try and work out how to spruce up this site a little bit. Or perhaps just keep coming to write. But for now, here's the current state of the bikes in the house tonight.
Pink one has a new stem finally. More upright for my baby. Still, we haven't taken it for a ride yet...Coralee!
Roadie is not much changed. I started carrying tools and tubes etc. Which paid off because I have been getting some wicked flats lately. Trying to ride 200km per week. It's kind of working out. Note the color-matching bottles thanks to BikeCentral.
Commuter has inhereted a new basket. Second hand from Leo at R&R. Next step is something bigger on the rear. I'm thinking a washing basket - black of course!
And finally, the IRO, my precious, my trusty steed every day. I tried the trispoke. Which kind of looks cool, but I feel too sketchy. A downgrade in performance. I'm not concerned about aerodynamics, or weight.

SO there you go. Nothing in particular. But a new post nonetheless.

I will be back soon

Alex

At night, we own the city

At daybreak the city swells.
People leave home, half awake, through folding bus doors
routine takes over.

Not that the city is predictable;
my city is changing with each turn that I make.
But as the day progresses, it is always most alive;
there is the most movement
In the simplest sense, I think that to move is to be alive.

Then, as darkness falls, the lights flicker and fade as chaos is resumed.
During the daytime, we are a part of the city
However, at night, we own the city.

Last night (Sunday) just before 11pm I set out by a bicycle with 16 speeds. Not deliberately to explore, more to deplete my batteries so that I might be able to sleep some. The gale-force weekend had covered Tamaki Drive with sand and debris which flicked onto my behind and made its way into the nozzle of my drink. The cars approaching me quickly from behind in the dark were not the only hazard, but I had to swerve to avoid rockfall from the cliffs above, and seaweed, at least 100 meters further inland than seaweed is ever supposed to lay.

The Hertzian spaces of the city can be switched on and off. And I would say that to some extent the city has had the ability to switch itself on and off since the introduction of the electric light bulb. But at night my city does not stop glowing. In fact, in last night's rain the lights of the port were as bright as I have ever seen them; reflecting and intensifying from every single drop.

Isn't it funny
How the city can seem at it's most alive at night; when everyone is away, at home.
As I rounded the corner at Kelly Tarltons the final stretch, the light was almost blinding.

In some cases it is surely true; that the city truly wakes at night, as people flock to its bars and clubs in search of companionship. However, it seems that Auckland is still sleepy at night, especially on a Sunday.

But last night as I pedaled my aching legs home, the glow of those lights, the brightness due to rain that I don't think I have appreciated before reminded me of the freedom that is to move freely through my streets as everything else is still.

One quarter of a year...

...has passed since I last posted. Haha, that is a long time.
And here I am, in the same building at university (but a different office).
since we last spoke?
Well, summer, weddings, honeymoon, PhD scholarship, beaches, and riding bikes.

My mind will not let me write much right now. Its too sore from all the pondering I tend to do facing this monitor when I should be researching useful things. But I shall be back.

From this open office window I hear the familiar sound of the train rattling by.
It's nice because the sound reminds be that I am not so far from home.
Speaking of which, it is now time to go and work. Ride around the city. hopefully clear my mind
preparation for a day of productivity tomorrow?
we will see
Alex

Bicycle Quotes

Bicycle Quotes

"Every time I see an adult on a bicycle, I no longer despair for the future of mankind" - H.G. Wells

When man invented the bicycle he reached the peak of his attainments.� Here was a machine of precision and balance for the convenience of man.� And (unlike subsequent inventions for man's convenience) the more he used it, the fitter his body became.� Here, for once, was a product of man's brain that was entirely beneficial to those who used it, and of no harm or irritation to others.� Progress should have stopped when man invented the bicycle. - Elizabeth West, Hovel "The bicycle is just as good company as most husbands and, when it gets old and shabby, a woman can dispose of it and get a new one without shocking the entire community." - Ann Strong, quoted in the Minneapolis Tribune in 1895 "As a social revolutionizer, the bicycle has never had an equal. It has put the human race on wheels, and thus changed completely many of the most ordinary processes and methods of social life. It is the great leveler, for not till all Americans got on bicycles was the great American principle that every man is just as good as any other man fully realized. All are on equal terms, all are happier than ever before." - New York Evening Post, June 2, 1896 "The negative attitude of cars is expressed in their very name, *automobiles*, which exalts the vehicle at the expense of the person transported by it. They are symbols of machismo, aggressivity and empty consumption. They've been perfected over the years, but they haven't evolved. They demand to be envied, feared, and lusted after. Most car designers waste space that should be devoted to passengers. Metal competes with flesh, and an object that should be our servant becomes our master. All that distance from humanity, all that self-importance..." - Phillipe Starck, 1996 (100 years later) "I still feel that variable gears are only for people over forty-five. Isn't it better to triumph by the strength of your muscles than by the artifice of a derailleur? We are getting soft...As for me, give me a fixed gear!" - Henri Desgrange, L'Equipe article of 1902 "...these glimpses of physicality made me think that one-day being in a car in a great city like Paris will be slightly vulgar. I was delighted to see so many classy bikes around, beautifully engineered and finished with road tyres, panniers and mudguards and not the clich� mountain bike nor the road racers (though all are welcome, compared to cars, in my vision). We saw such stylishly dressed people on good utility bicycles taking their space on the city roads." - Simon Baddeley, reporting on car free day in Paris, September 22, 2000 "It is by riding a bicycle that you learn the contours of a country best, since you have to sweat up the hills and coast down them. Thus you remember them as they actually are, while in a motor car only a high hill impresses you, and you have no such accurate remembrance of country you have driven through as you gain by riding a bicycle." - Ernest Hemingway, By-Line "I'll tell you what I think of bicycling. I think it has done more to emancipate women than any one thing in the world. I rejoice every time I see a woman ride by on a bike. It gives her a feeling of self-reliance and independence the moment she takes her seat; and away she goes, the picture of untrammelled womanhood." - Susan B. Anthony 1896 "Whoever invented the bicycle deserves the thanks of humanity." - Lord Charles Beresford (1846-1919), British Admiral and Member of Parliament From HERE ...and another When I see an adult on a bicycle, I do not despair for the future of the human race. - H.G. Wells Get a bicycle.You will not regret it if you live. - Mark Twain The bicycle, the bicycle surely, should always be the vehicle of novelists and poets. ~Christopher Morley

There is not much time before I fall asleep. I rode over 50km today on the road bike. It was nice to take it out for a change. After doing Tamaki Drive to St Heliers and back I realised that the reason I like riding fixed so much in town is passing traffic, and weaving to the front of lights etc.
So, I took off up Orakei Road (which was a mistake seeing it's SO steep) and went urban.

Here's the route.

Anyway. Saw some cool bikes in Ponsonby afterwards.
Reissue OM Flyer BMX
and an IRO Mark V!

I thought I was the only IRO in NZ :-)
WIll totally have to find out who this one belongs to! It was clearly one straight from IRO with everything from Stock IRO cranks to hubs and the Brooks saddle.

Im going to bed.
There was really no point in being here was there.
ALex.

Poetry in Pastry

This post inspired by a love of pies, and Andrew's Piecycle.

The University is an odd place. I sit here under fluorescent lights (although I should be grateful I get phone reception, as next year the Masters offices are located so far underground that your phone is not connected to the outside world) and emerge for short periods of time to get some lunch, or go to the bathroom. OK, quite a lot of the time I emerge just to ride my bike around.

But that is not the point. Now that it is no longer regular semester time it means that there are no longer my favorite custard pies in stock.

However, yesterday morning, the fine morning that it was I discovered a new item on display in the HSB cafe; an odd sight given that the plates are generally unchanged each day, the same stuff day in day out.

Now on this morning I noticed a small muffin-like parcel, wrapped in gladwrap. I was draw to this unfamiliar item and as I picked it up I realised that It was still warm. This means that it has been recently baked.

Well that sealed the deal, and as I waited for the register lady to sell me my pastry parcel I smelt the sweet warm smell of fresh baking leaking from the plastic parcel in my hands. It was still steaming.

Back at my computer I hastily unwrapped it and upon first bite discovered a most friggen awesome yum warm apple pie. Topped with cinnamon, the apple contents was just the right temperature, still hot from the oven. And the pastry...oh the pastry...it was warm, yes, but also sweet.

Anyway. I was in love.
I went back an hour later, alas, they were all gone.

So this morning I raced in as soon as I could possibly wake. There were my beloved pies waiting for me. Although I was slightly later than the last morning, they were still warm.

It turns out the cafe lady has been making them upon some engineering students' request given the absence of the regular apple and custard pies. I pleaded with her to continue making them into the new semester.

It would give me a little more reason to get to work early in the morning.

Alex