Sanicole Airshow 2011

18 September 2011,

We woke up, being very tired but looking forward to the day allot.

The day before me and my two brothers decided to go to the Sanicole Airshow the next day and made sure there are still tickets.

We woke up very early in the morning to arrive at the airshow an hour before it began to get good places to sit (next time we'll be able to choose a better spot).

Unfortunately the weather was not that great and in the future we'll definitely bring our own food since everything there was HELL expensive.

Many things had been learned that day but all in all everything was really great!

There were a few things we didn't know.

Firstly it was the 35th anniversary of the Sanicole Airshow:
This was celebrated by a formation flight of an MK48 SAR Sea King, two A 109BA Agustas and an AH-64D Apache from the Netherlands Airforce.

The Sanicole Airshow was founded 35 years ago by Gilbert Buekenberghs after finding inspiration from selling tickets at an airshow in England.

The organization of the airshow every year is mostly planned by the Buekenberghs family and supported by those who love aviation.

[AH-64D Apache]

[MK48 SAR Sea King] [A 109BA Agusta]

It was also the 65th birthday of the Belgian Air Force and was celebrated by the flyby of an Airbus A330 from the Belgian Air Force in formation with 4 (2 on each wing) F-16's.

[Airbus A330 + F-16 Fighting Falcons]

The last was of the 70 years commemoration of Pearl Harbor:
This was celebrated by an N3N-3 Canary, P-40D Kittyhawk (no picture available) and a Mitsubishi A6M Zero who performed a small re-enactment of the battle of Pearl Harbor.

[N3N-3 Canary] [Mitsubishi A6M Zero]

All in all it was a great airshow with a lot of aircraft you don't usually see flying around here nor in South Africa.

Some of my favourites were the Mi-24 Hind, JAS 39 Gripen, AH-64D Apache, F-16 Soloturk display (shame on you Belgium!) and the Royal Navy Lynx HAS.3 Black Cats (From England).

My favourite between these was the Apache Solo Display Team.

Never in my life have a seen a helicopter that can perform that well. I mean, a helicopter doing a flip and shooting out flares at the same time, that's just awesome!

[Mi-24 Hind] [JAS 39 Gripen]

[ AH-64D Apache] [F-16 Soloturk ]

[Lynx HAS.3 Black Cats]

The whole day was accompanied with very good pilots, some from the best pilots in the world. But of course it can't be compared to Waterkloof Airshow in Pretoria, South Africa.

Reasons for this are that there are way more aircraft flying, the show itself in the hangers are excellent with almost an impossible amount of things to see and experience, the food is (ALLOT) better. And the aircraft land and lift off in front of you. Did I mention the amount of aircraft? Also it's in summer, so nice and warm :D

But I'm not saying Sanicole was crap, it was very good (for Belgium) and I'm looking forward to next year.

Hopefully the weather will then be better.

[click on the images to make them larger]

Pics (2): The new family member.

[Simba]

The Darkness Comes

Many know of Britain's bad weather. A saying comes from there "if you don't like the weather, just wait 5 minutes".

Here in Belgium it's a bit different: "if you don't like the weather, just wait 5 minutes, it'll get worse".

Right, so that's basically just to show how bad the weather here can be.

I'm not talking about storms, this is relentless little sissy rain. I thought Belgium doesn't have a raining season since it always rains anyway... but no! I was wrong, the raining season starts tomorrow and the clouds have already begun to seep in...

As a matter of fact, Belgium INVENTED waterproof umbrellas and boots.

[YAY...]

Hobby!

After years of thinking "people who says reading is a hobby are insane" I have found myself trapped in its snare.

As a matter of fact, all I do these days is read. Even though we bought an XBox 360 just the other day I find myself reading quietly in my room instead of blowing people's heads off (GoW) throwing them with knives in their faces (CoD MW2) or just throwing them from buildings (Assassin's Creed).

[The four which I have so far]

These are some of my favorite books. The Dark Tower series by Stephen King book 1 - 4:
The Gunslinger (read)
The Drawing Of The Three (read)
The Wastelands (busy reading)
Wizard and Glass (didn't read yet)

Mostly I buy my books online at The Book Depository, it's cheap, fast, brand new and has free shipping world wide.

Pics (1) Laptop Setup

[After the back-light of my screen croaked I had no choice but to attach a very old external screen to my laptop.]

Phone mania!

Just over a year ago I bought myself my first touchscreen smartphone.

It's a Nokia 5230 [picture] as many know Nokia is my favorite make.

If you had a Nokia in your life you should already know of the quality that comes out when you purchase a Nokia. The power, the speed and of course, the durability.

Having a smartphone is like having another brain. It helps you remember things and also connects you to the world, your friends, family and loved ones from where ever you are.

Yes, I know what some of you iPhone fanatics are thinking:

"Psh! Nokia?! Come on mate, I have an IPHONE! It beats your phone by light-years!"

Well now, I have been around in Belgium and saw so many people walking around with that piece of fruit, showing it off whenever they could. But when I asked the majority of them "what can you do with your iPhone? What do you use it for?" the same reply comes out.

Well, music of course, and calling and texting and also browsing important things on the internet. And of course, games!"

My heart cries for you...

Facebook, twitter, gmail, youtube, being able to skype with it.

Sending your location to your friends to let them know where you are at the moment, what you're up to, blogging and of course USEFUL applications. Those are the things that your phone is capable of. It's everything you need in this fast growing technological world. But still, the minority of the people even know it can be done.

Why touchscreen?

As many of you know, touchscreen is the new "thing" and something everyone wants. But it's only when you actually know how to use your phone when you realize just how useful it actually is!

It makes things easier, your screen bigger and of course, shows the "smartness" of your phone.

The other day I read a CNN report that said that 90% of Americans still use "default" phones. Yes, I'm talking about that thing you had 10 years ago and is lying around somewhere i your drawer gathering dust.

Obviously there's nothing wrong with still using a default phone. Most of them can connect to the internet and you don't really need anything else.

At the end of the day, a smartphone only gets used out of necessity. Is it really necessary for you to be able to access all those (awesome) functions your phone is capable of?

I can still remember when I had my Nokia 5200. It was useful, strong and learned how to swim numerous times.

[NOKIA 5200]

Of course the only real reason why i bought my 5230 was out of actual necessity. Not just having to want to be able to use it for more purposes but also to be able to actually hear some one (speaker for the ear broke after 5 good years of service).

This is a list of what I use my phone for and how frequently:

Reading CNN (every day)
MSN (almost every day)
Facebook (not frequently)
GPS (not frequently)
Skype (frequently)
Music (ALLOT)

Games (not frequently)
Twitter (fairly frequently)
WhatsApp (every day)

Photos and Videos (frequently)

sms (frequently)
calling (not frequently)

So as you can see, a smartphone is something that actually only reigns supreme when using the internet and multimedia.

As for me, I'm happy with my Nokia 5230 and won't replace it even if I win the lottery. It's like a buddy and even has a name (the same as my PC). I've so far had almost no problems with it, I think the biggest problem is probably the amount of built in memory that it has. It makes it hard or next to impossible to do your OVI GPS maps updates :/

So next time you plan on buying a phone, think about what you will actually use it for.

In the end, I found that I use it for a lot more than i was planning to!

Another Broken System

They have a saying in Belgium:

"The wheel turns, but it turns slowly."

This cannot be more true. Once you want to do something here it goes through a process explained by Douglas Adams in the Hitchhikers Guide To The Galaxy.

For those who doesn't know, I have stopped studying and will be starting to work early or in the middle of next month.

Sure enough, the school system threw me off balance and failed me on everything they possibly could for the most fubar reasons they could possibly find.

One of which "your English is on too high a standard to teach here"... yeah, I know right?

Now, getting a job here in Belgium is no child's-play.

One needs to go through the necessary proceedings to just be able to look for a job. You need to REGISTER for it.

Granted, being "registered" as "werkzoekend" (unemployed) gives you some advantages in some things. For example if you follow a course offered by the institute where you registered as jobless, you get a nice free bus pass. Also if you're below the age of 25 and live with your parents you still get children tuition.

This institute can be quite helpful and also quite useless at the same time.

In the sense of them actually being there to HELP you find a job they actually have almost no contact with you at all (save for the odd email about a job opening which most of the time doesn't even match your job profile).

But in the good sense being registered with them actually gives you an advantage when you actually GOT the job. End of the matter is that for at least a short while, you get paid more. And that's pretty great.

The job that I got is as a shop assistant and cashier, I will be paid a boat load of money for that.

Most of the money will be used to firstly buy myself a new laptop (damn screen croaked on me again for the second time and it's coming to the end of it's very long life), saving up with my bro for an apartment and of course taking extra courses in my free time to build up my resume.

All of this will obviously be revolving around being able to visit my girlfriend as much as I can and sometimes spoiling her rotten (we've been together for over 3 years now and it's still going GREAT and always will without a doubt).

Now of course everything runs back to the "system" (if you can call it that, since Belgium STILL doesn't have a ruling government and I think it's nearing 2 years now).

Of course I'm not a Belgian yet so thus I need a working permit to work here.

Trouble is applying for it, what you need, what type to apply for and what you need to send with it. Not even mentioning precisely WHO actually needs to apply for it.

For me it's a work permit B and my employer needs to apply for it.

No idea how long I'll need to wait for it but in the end it will be well worth it!

Further on, life is better than the previous year.

I have a lot of friends, my dad has a job again (after being unemployed for almost a year) and me and my bro might do the same job and be able to move into our own place soon!

I just love it when everything comes together, it might be a slow Belgian wheel, but hey, at least it's turning.

UPDATED:
[I'll be trying to post more on my blog from now on. As a matter of fact I'd much rather choose to let you all know about things on here than on Facebook...]