This last week saw the start of the Edinburgh Festival 2008. It's hard to explain the incredible size and excitement of it. The festival completely takes over the entire city for all of August, whilst the population of the city grows to literally 3 times it's size. The buses are busier, the pubs are busier, the streets are busier, and you right off the fact that a trip through central will ever be a quick experience during this time. It's extremely festive. People flock from all over the world which means that every time you walk along the streets you hear another language being spoken. In fact, just yesterday I was walking along George Street (the most prestigious street in Edinburgh - all business like and commercial) and I heard a group of woman speaking Zulu. It was pretty wicked. So here are the photos from the opening parade that runs all through the main streets of the city, as well as an embedded video of the starting lines of the parade - bag pipes, of course. It's a great time to be living in Edinburgh. Photos here.

Edinburgh Festival Parade 2008 from Ducklight Travels on Vimeo.

Three months worth of digging around for information to prove Jen and my relationship and it all came down to one day. Last week Friday, 20th June 2008, was the set date for the application to be submitted by my lawyer, on my behalf. He gets to explain all the goods and bads about the application to the officer rather than myself and that's definitely a good thing because of all his experience with applications such as these. The paperwork was finalised last week when the last steps were taken to send through our passports to him in Glasgow, Royal Mail, special delivery. £5.05 later and I was given a tracking slip that would ensure my package was on his doorstep by 9am the following morning. Would I have trusted two passports and a 10-thick pile of legal documents in South African post? Most definitely not. Was I still unsure of the safety of it even with the Royal Mail special delivery stamp? For sure. It worked out okay though and just as promised the passports were with him the following day, just 24 hours prior to the application. Nail biting stuff.

Of course it was nail biting. Though the repercussions were never completely life or death, there were many parts to our lives that would be greatly affected by the outcomes of this application. If it was denied we would almost definitely be heading back to SA on a plane in August due to my inability to continue working in the UK on my working holidaymaker visa. It meant the loss of many thousands of pounds of potential earnings and savings. Not to mention our six month lease that we just signed in our new awesome penthouse flat, and my mobile, broadband and many other service contracts needing to be cut short. Knowing Britain, ending those contracts short would have been quite a costly exercise, coupled with the fact that... I'm just not ready to leave yet.

I'm not ready to leave it behind. As many posts before this have said, my views on the life that we have made over here have almost always been positive. We have established ourselves in a completely foreign country and we've built up comfortable lives over here even when faced against many difficult struggles. And it didn't just happen. We worked for it. I'm not the type of person who talks of fate, nor luck, very often. Just as I don't believe in our paths being out of our control, I don't believe that things just "happen for a reason". I damn well fought for this. I worked my butt off to make sure that I reached a stable position over here, I never accepted failure and I certainly didn't accept a half-ass effort. The position in life that I am currently in was worked for and wouldn't have been achieved by just sitting and waiting for it to fall on my lap. Our jobs, our flat, our friends, our trips away, our car, our gadgets, our lives... didn't just happen. We made them happen and just as we can take the credit for them, we can also take the blame.

That is why this application meant so much... it was the ability to continue on this path and keep up what we have worked so hard for. To have it declined and sent packing would've been to lose all that we had worked so hard for and just like all the adversity we've come up against so far, I wasn't going to fail. We called in favours, we had to use snail-mail (many many times), we dug through our personal lives, we got other people to dig through our personal lives, we were thorough and I didn't want to think for one second that I didn't do everything I could have possibly done to ensure it's success.

And just like our previous successes. My residency permit was approved. Within half an hour at the home office Richard called me and told me the good news - "We're about half way through the process now, they've just taken your passport and documentation away. It's all been approved." Can I explain the feeling when he uttered those words? Not a chance. For lack of a better saying, it was oodles of weight off my shoulders. Months of stress all bundled in to one package that fell from my shoulders and down the stairs I was standing next to as he told me that my permit was approved. A huge sigh of relief and the start of yet another chapter in our lives together. Another story to tell people about - another box ticked. After all, we worked for it and we succeeded.

(I was going to post a picture of the actual passport but then I decided that it may be a pretty controversial thing to have publicly available. Not to mention that I suddenly realised I would become one of those people who gave all their privacy data away just for a blog post.)

Muppet and Chicken met up for a man-weekend in the city of Amsterdam. They hired bikes and spoke Dutch. It was an epic time and whilst these were the documented images from my camera, Muppets "manual" cam hopefully captured some equally impressive shots. We must've ridden like 30 miles at least that weekend and drank our weight in beer. Amsterdam ftw.

Check out the pics here.

I awoke to Jen lying smiling next to me. She was softly telling me to wake up and get out of bed. It was far earlier than I usually wake up - my puffy face showed this. 7am. Rolling out of bed is still slightly disorientating – we have only been in our new flat for 3 nights now. Though it's strange not having Jack and Isje around anymore, the incredible flat always makes an attempt to make up for it. Breakfasting on your 4th floor penthouse balcony with views of all of Edinburgh including the famous centuries old Castle, can do that to you.

So, out of bed and into the shower. Jen leaves for work just minutes after my eyes have fully adjusted to the light. How strange that human beings wake up so early. My mind ponders early wake ups for a second whilst the water heats up to steamy. I don't think about it too long because my mind is packed full with all the logistics necessary over the forthcoming hour. The early wake up call was because of a meeting in Glasgow at 9:30am with Richard, an immigration lawyer. Richard will be the one who will solve all of my permit issues and will be instrumental in my not far off now application for an unmarried partner visa for the UK. He's tight with the home office and his services are almost mandatory when lodging an application such as this.

I make my way out of our new ensuite bathroom and, after I choose my clothes for the day, head straight to the cupboards which have been storing all of Jen and my “paper lives” for the last few days. The stack is intimidating. Three folders full of bank, mobile phone, and internet provider statements; pay slips, personal letters, photos together, cards and ticket stubs from previous travels. It's comprehensive. It's invasive. It tells a story - A story about us.

As I flick through each paper-separated month, I stumble upon nuggets of our personal paper trail – boarding passes from one of our trips to Italy; a stub from the Edinburgh Beltane fire festival; photos of us from Rhodes graduation; the card Jen gave me for my 21st birthday. It's been tough gathering all of this information and anyone who's been involved in that, and is reading this, I'd like to thank you again.

I'm running out of time so I stuff all the folders into my backpack, throw my Eee PC in the bag for good measure and dash downstairs to get my bike. I have only 20 minutes to cycle to the train station – there's no way I'll make the 8:31. I push myself – months of cycling has made me quite agile on my bike and I've learnt just how hard I can push myself and what my capabilities are. I ride up the large Edinburgh hills, sharing lanes with buses, cars and other cyclists. Skip the Leith walk turning circle – it will take too long. Almost there, just one hill to go. I know I've missed it when my cellphone alarm starts going off in my pocket – 8:30, my usual time to wake up. As it blurts out an irritating song, too tightly stuffed into my jeans to be able to be switched off whilst riding at the same time, I think about how much I sound like an ice cream truck driving, though cycling in my case, and wonder how feasible it would be to run an ice cream service on a bicycle. My mind wanders...

Once I lock up my bike and purchase my day return ticket to Glasgow, I grab a roll from the Upper Crust. £1.25 for a bottle of water – oh how they take advantage of the worker on the move. I make sure to be at the platform when the train arrives to ensure I get two seats for myself – I'll need the second one for the document sifting that will need to take place for the 45 minute duration of the journey. The train sets off and I text Richard to let him know which train I'm on.

I dig in straight away and amongst the sifting and sorting, I pause to take bites from my “Breakfast Bacon” roll. The journey progresses. By now I'm elbow deep in documentation ranging from personal bank statements to the invite I gave Jen for my 21st party. The British sitting around me seem to glance every so often at the piles of paper work surrounding me. I stop and think about whether they vaguely realise that all this paperwork is some (hopefully all) of the evidence necessary to grant me working rights in the UK. They most probably see the South African passport pop up every once in a while and curse under their breaths that it's “yet another immigrant. If it's not the Poles, it's the South Africans.” I chuckle to myself as I pass over the photo of our circle of friends at our Rhodes graduation as well as one of our hall balls. I ignore the people around me because they are not the people in the photos. I carry on sorting.

The meeting with Richard goes well – we chat for 2 hours about multiple scenarios which may arise from the outcomes of this application. Backup plans, forward plans, Stockholm in the Summer and Iceland in the winter. We move off from the Costa we'd sat down in and I head towards the train station to board the next service to Edinburgh Waverley. Now parted with all my documentation – so that Richard could look over it – the burden that the application has placed on myself, and Jen, is physically and metaphorically off my shoulders. The train ride back will be fruitful – with the Eee PC in my backpack I'll most certainly get enough time to write a story about the happenings of today and post it on Ducklight. And here it ends.

Possibly the best band in the world, live in concert at one of their most recent gigs. They published it all live over a webcast. They're incredible. This concert is *just* like the one we went to in Glasgow. Sweden, we'll see you again soon.

Last night was the Edinburgh Beltane Fire Festival 2008, to welcome in the Summer. It was filled with mad crazy people dancing around half-naked, waving flames and chanting things. Was quite an awesome experience and the evening was capped off with a typical Scottish rain storm! Summer? Check them out here.

Music has a magical ability to take us back in an instant. It is a gift that is not paralleled by any medium except smell. One whiff of jasmine and I’m five again, playing with my cousins next to my grandparent’s fence, the smell of fresh braai meat wafting past.

This week, since I am doing a very repetitive job (opening and closing documents and collating the info contained therein) I have indulged in a little nostalgia- listening to the most random songs I can think of. If it pops into my head I’ll listen to it- Indecent Obsession, Bon Jovi, Phil Collins- it instantly takes me back. The Daniel Bedingfield playing in my headphones at the moment makes me almost able to taste the dodgy R7 vodka lime and sprite from the Union.

I’m no psychotherapist, but the desire to indulge in a bit of nostalgia is probably a result of a series of changes and upheavals. To whit: new car, new house (next month), new housemates (next month), and new family role as my sister counts down the last 30 days til the birth of Jethro. Although these are all exciting developments, sometimes there can be a sense of needing to stop, take a deep breath, and remember where I came from before moving forward. Today is one of those days.

It’s May Day, and that means out with the old and in with the new. The end of winter and the beginning of summer. The time of re-birth- it’s all blissfully symbolic.

Last night we went to the epic battle between summer and winter known as Beltane, on Calton Hill. Beltane is a fire festival that celebrates the coming of summer, and is the Celtic/Gaelic (too lazy to look it up) word for ‘May’. Each year the Beltane Fire Society (mostly made up of Edinburgh University students) creates a massive production up on the hill- massive bonfires and effigies, loads of drumming, naked pagans dressed only in body paint- basically, all the ingredients needed for a good party. It was quite a spectical, and hopefully we will have some blurry pics up on Ducklight soon. As an aside- although Rhodes had some very active societies, they didn’t ever have one that burned effigies while frolicking in the cold in only body paint and chaps. I think they should take a long hard look at themselves with a view to rectifyng this as soon as possible.

You may have also noticed the glorious blue and white of our Costa Blanca photos. We journied to Spain two weeks ago for some much needed R&R, and it was splendid. We took advantage of a misloaded offer on the Travel Republic website, so that a room in a four star hotel with full board was cheaper than the bed and breakfast option. It was spectacular. Obviously the scenery was great too, but the food! For breakfast there was bacon, eggs, omelette's, mushrooms, tomato, cold meats, fruit, about 10 different kinds of pastry and a selection of fish (Spaniards…). For lunch there was a glut of chicken, meat and fish dishes, cold meats and salads, fruit, and an entire dessert table. Supper was the pinnacle with everything from garlic and chilli prawns to lamb shank, roast rabbit and crème brulee. Then you get the blue skies, the gentle sea breezes, the iridescent blue of the Med and the endless whiteness of the pebble beaches and you have a simply magnificent place. Of course, the 2 euro beers didn’t hurt either. I would go back in a heartbeat. Spain is absolutely beautiful.

Looking forward Heather climbs on a plane this afternoon and will arrive tomorrow afternoon in bonny Scotland…just in time to say hello to the rain. Don’t tell her though, cause the weather has been brilliant up til now. Next weekend we head off to Milan, Venice and Verona for a whirlwind trip. It should be brilliant.

You may or may not have noticed that the brand new Ducklight Travels is up. Kyle has been slaving away at it, and now for the first time we can exclusively answer all the questions you may have like ‘Does the haka summon the loch ness monster?’ and ‘Do Highland Coos get itchy?’.

And they say you can’t learn anything from moving pictures. Enjoy!

So last night was one of the best nights we've had in a long while. The evening started off with a spectacular potato covered in avocado and cheese, for dinner. The train ride to Glasgow is around 50 minutes so we just ferreted the carcass of the tattie along the way. We arrived in Glasgow and made our way towards King Tuts Wah Wah Hut, the venue where Shout Out Louds were to play. A brisk 10 minute walk and we were there... one of the cosiest and most famous venues of all time. As you walk in it's just a pub as usual but when you mission all the way into the back you find the stage with an area in front of it that would hold no more than say, 500 people. We had a good 2 hours to kill before the show so we sat drinking pints and talking strategy. One of the main problems we faced when we arrived was the fact that they were only going to come on at around 10:35pm and our last train back to Edinburgh was scheduled for 11:30pm. This would be tight considering it's a 15 minute walk to the station from the venue. We put our heads together and started coming up with some plan B's. First we phoned Jack back in Edinburgh and asked him to look up some cheap hostels in the area we were in and he came back to us with one that would cost £17 per person. We ummed and aaah'd over it... would it be worth the extra £34 to see the entire show and not just half of it. It was a conundrum. Suddenly I remembered that our head 3D animator at work lives in Glasgow. I got hold of his number and gave him a call... Success! He was on his way back to Edinburgh sometime around midnight so all would work out... He also ended up living about 10 minutes walk from the venue so everything would be perfect.

A few pints along now and Shout Out Louds come on stage. We find the perfect position in front of the mixer and get to stand on top of a bench to see over the tops of everyone. It was a brilliant view. There was literally 3m between us and them and when the show got underway we were jumping around like crazy people. They are pretty much the best band out there I reckon. I cannot explain how good the gig was in words, it was just *that* good. We recorded many songs with the trusty video camera which is how I can give you this fresh, never before seen footage of one of their songs last night. Spectacular.

Shout Out Louds - Tonight I'll Have To Leave It from DucklightTravels on Vimeo.

Once the show finished we were downstairs in the pub about to leave when in walks the bassist from Shout Out Louds. He's standing near to us and Jen leans over and says how awesome they are. We tell him we're from South Africa to which he replies, "That's pretty far." The conversation didn't get too deep because we were both going different directions - him to the bar, and us out the door - but we did manage to tell them that we're spreading their name in SA and that they rock the planet side ways. We then headed out towards Campbell's flat and a phone call along the way revealed that he had fallen asleep on the train and because it was the last stop, they then took it back to the depot to have it washed! He woke up to the guard telling him that they're washing the train and then heading back to Glasgow station in a bit. He plans to meet us somewhere in central so for the time being we head down the main road to one of the local pubs. We stumble into a sports bar called, "Sports Bar" and immediately find ourselves in one of the most uber sports bars you get over here. Trashy techno music and dodgy Neds at the bar. Insane. We have a pint and once Campbell arrives we head towards his place. We continue to drink his special collections of beers until after 3am. Later we crash on the couches and set an alarm clock for 6am to catch the first train back to Edinburgh. Madness. The alarm clock goes after what felt like 10 minutes of sleep and we're running down the road in the rain trying to get to the station in time. We make it with about a minute to spare, settle down at one of the tables and sleep for the journey. I got home and slept for an hour before having to get up to go to work... let's just say that today isn't going to be easy.

Shout Out Louds for the win. You rocked our world.