Well being in Berlin at the moment, and it being snowy then novelty still hasn't worn off. Despite it being very cool I have some snowy realisations/tips to share with you boiling Aussies. Most of these things had never quite clicked in my mine before regarding snow.

1. When there is Snow is it VERY cold, really, really COLD.

2. You should wear many layers including shawls/scarfs (as long as you haven't left them at the airport) and gloves (which should NOT have holes in them).

3. You should also wear two pairs of pants even though it will make you look like a heffalump.

4. No matter how much you wear you will always be colder than the Germans, girls in mini-skirts will highlight this point.

5. Snow is actually made of water, jumping around in it like a maniac and picking it up does result in wetness of the feet/legs/hands which results in more coldness.... it may look fun.... but....

6. Those patches of black on the pavement/road aren't just puddles or discolouration, they're ice. Which is slippery. Don't walk on them, especially when a large group of cool-looking Germans are going past and you fall on your bum...

Well I'm really cold and the moment, nothing seems to warm me after about 4 hours in the cold. Think cold and I'll see you all in two weeks!! I love Berlin!

xx

Well I'm in the UK staying with Mike, I've been here for a while but been decidedly lazy with the email/note writing.I don't think I've written anything since just before I left for Copenhangen, that was in September!
Copenhagen was gorgeous, a very small city for the amount of time I spent there. Hostel was nice, about a 20 minute walk out of the city but it had cold showers.

Then Berlin, I LOVED Berlin, its easily my favourite city in the world. I stayed a little out of the city in a really pleasant hostel, I had a whole room to myself for about three days then the company for the last two was nice, I made some soup friends (there was a really yummy cheap soup place round the corner). Berlin in incredibly cheap too. Whilst there went on a free tour, saw some awesome stuff on it (it was an alternative Berlin tour) including an op-shop where you pay for clothes by the KILO!

Ended up going for a drink with the tour guy and his assistant a couple of days later. That night made friend with a kiwi and went to Tacheles a really cool gallery and night spot, wandered home via the Fire club (we missed tha last train) and made friend with an amusing young german kid on the way. Fire club was awesome, had a really underground feel (it was about 1am) some great jazz from a crazy looking midget in sunglasses.

The next day I did what I'd planned to go to Belin for, visiting Nico's grave in the Gruenwald Forest for BJ. Took a train to Wannsee then a historical omnibus into the middle of the forest and walked to the cemetry, it was gorgeous!  Photos are in my album. From there decided to trek across the forest and up a hill to see the ruins of old Berlin, it was gorgeous too. Found a harmonica on tree stump "Zelda" style.

Wandered again the next day then went out for soup with katherine (an american girl) then we met up with tour guide and his assistant for a trial pub tour, went to pay what you like wine bars and a gay bar called Rosies. Got lost on the was home but fortunatly Katherines knowledge of Czech and some trams got us home in the end.

Had to catch a train for 7 hours the next morning to Amsterdam, arrived late and with a splitting headache. Checked in at "Durty Nelly's" which happened to be on Warmoerstrasse in between a strip club and a sex shop across from a modern art gallery. Not too bad as a place, didn't meet anyone exciting there though. Went on a New Amsterdam tour, fairly uneventful, slightly irritating guide.
Spent a lot of time  wandering Amsterdam, eating chips and mayo.. Went to Anne Frank's house. Took a free red light district tour and was one of only 2 on the tour, made friends with the guide who happened to be a big shot in the compeny and ended up going out for an amusing night being ferried around amsterdam pretty much by the tour company.

Flew into Birmingham the morning after, very short plane trip after getting up too too early. Was rather good to see Thom. Ate cereal and soup for a few days, stayed in and watched TV. Had yummy (cheap) fish burgers at the student bar.

Then headed into London a few days later, caight up with Andyroo in the Liverpool Street station then headed down to KELVEDON to see MIKE, yoiy!
Between then and now, I spent a few days in London with Andyroo and Anja in Andrew's aunt's giant house in Fulham! Went to Prague, contracted bad stomach virus, was incredibly sick, flew back to the UK to go to the doctors and have been here ever since. (I'm pretending Prague never happened.)

This afternoon I'm heading into Colechester, the nearest big town (and oldest recorded town in the UK) to procure curly fries and chocolate for my boy, then picking him up from work. Tomorrow I go to Birmingham to see Thom again, then hopefully to see Ffi in Wales then to Dublin to see Jeanne then back here for Xmas. Then after that Berlin for a week or so, maybe catch up with Miss in Austria the home on the 17th of Jan.

Love and miss you all.
xx
Kate

Well I'm still in NYC despite the title of this blog, everyone must be sick of hearing about New York. I shall be leaving on Monday though, so its all OK.
I will miss it though, here is a list of things i can think of now:

- squirrels
- cheap ice cream
- Matt & Devan's couch
- Flounder
- SUBWAYS
- the guy in the transit passage between the L and the 1 who plays Beatles Songs
- the walk home from the subway
- Broadway shows
- American accents
- Unlimited Metro cards
- soup with matt
- bagels for breakfast
- supermarkets
- Spanish Milo
- Leaky shower at Devan & Matts
- Fairway
- yellow school busses
- Our posse (the guys who hang around infront of our building)
- hearing Spanish all the time
- Spanish music
- Seeing amazing dancers everyday
- Ripley Grier
- Dance studios

Well thats about all I can think of now, despite these things, I'm very much ready to head onwards. I should've taken more photos though.
I've got the 2nd of my three shows tonight, it looked good the other day, I had people tell me it was the most professional festival show they've seen this year, which is good. All day Tuesday was hell though, I was working with the lighting designers of "Jersey Boys" the most popular show on Broadway at the moment which was extraordinarily stressful. So now that this is over, the world seems a more peaceful place. At the moment I'm sitting in the kitchen listening to Kittyhawk and the sounds of the kids outside, (we have an elementary school just outside our back window) the weather is very pleasant and i just got a package from my birthday from mum with a Rip it Up and Haighs chocolates. I just spent a few hours on skype talking to Mike about random junk. I really need to do some laundry and sort out my stuff.
I'm eating frozen bananas.

Tuesday I'll be arriving in Copenhagen, I'm there for a little bit, seeing Malin then heading to Berlin on a train. Then in Berlin for a while then making my way to Amsterdam. From Amsterdam I'm flying to Birmingham around the 23rd October, to stay with my dear Thom for a little while. Then down to stay with Mike for a few weeks, hopefully I'll be able to see Anja & Andrew then too. Then floating away through eastern europe for a month and a half then back to the UK for xmas & Mike's Birthday. The traveling the UK visiting everyone from camp & seeing Jeanne in Dublin. Then eventually flying home I leave Heathrow JAN 17th and arrive in Adelaide JAN 19th at 5pm, I've got an overnight in Singapore.

Then once I get home plans are to drive over to Melbourne BDO (anyone want to tag along?) then that weekend I'm heading to Brisbane for my cousins wedding.
Then no idea... back to real life, it's a little scary. Mike's coming over to live for a while from sometime late in Feb or March...

I still miss you all muchly.

love love.

Kate

Hey all,
Sorry its been so long since my last email, I've been a bit lazy.
I'm back in NYC at the moment, staying in Chinatown for a few days. Mike & I are living in a tiny room currently watching bad Japanese Game Shows, we eat too much ice cream. It feels like we move countries every few days the boroughs are so vastly different.
Since I last emailed much has happened. I think last time I emailed was before we went to Devan's place. We stayed for the first few days with Thom (English, Actor), Claire (Adelaide,Lifeguard) & Sim(Mike's friend) in a four bed room in Chelsea, up three flights of stairs. It was an amazing location, about 20 seconds from Madison Square Garden & Penn Station, I think we were there for about five nights. Then Thom decided to go home, Mike, Sim, Claire & I headed up to South Orange, NJ to stay with Mike's Super CIT, superbrad. Superbrad is awesome & crazy. We ate at diners, went rockclimbing, sat in a huge church for two hours while superbrad practiced playing the organ, went to his girlfriend's place & watched him firetwirl & all squished into his tiny bedroom, despite the fact he had a huge house. It was awesome to be in a house again, & to get to eat cereal whenever we wanted.

Then after staying at superbrad's for the weekend we headed back into the city, problem was we hadn't booked anywhere to stay early enough and as the US Open Tennis was on there was nowhere! Fortunatly for us Devan (who was the Production Manager at camp last year and came up for the last few weeks this year) took us in. So Claire, Mike & I slept on Devan's living room floor. That night we met up with a heap of FW people & all went to an awesome (cheap) food place, Chat "N Chew. Then all went back to Devan's for drinking & Ice Cream.

Ok at this point I should prossibly explain the engagement which people may or may not have noticed on facebook! Well Mike & I had to say we were engaged to apply to rent a place for a few weeks (which we didn't end up getting anyway). So we were sitting on the Roof Garden of the Met with Claire & Ryan and thought, hey what if we got engaged, it would be rather pleasant to spend the rest of our time in the states engaged. So we bought rings at a costume shop (mine is awesome and has a giant green stone) & that night out at dinner with everyone Mike got down on one knee, said a little speech & we were engaged. Only thing is we're not going to be doing the same thing or in the same place & neither of us will compromise so we'll be breaking up when we leave. If we both go back to camp next year we'll see each other though. So now I get to say I was engaged to an English boy in NYC! & whomever wasn't talking to mum about this, you should already know that I'm odd!

So back to the story. We stayed at Devan's for a while, Claire left for LA so Mike & I were left alone. We did (free) things, such as going to Coney Island, hanging about in the apple store waiting for my laptop to be fixed… etc.

Then later in the week Mike & I moved to a vaguely dodgy hotel on the Upper West Side near the river. We slept a lot & ate ice cream a lot & tried to get tickets for avenue Q, but failed. So after that we headed up to stay with David Valentine (aka Squidward in the Asia Pacific tour of Spongebob the musical – which skipped Australia because apparently no one wanted to see it) in a suburb near Philadelphia. The three hours of trains there was much fun. Then we got pickeded up at the train station and proceeded to David's place to play large amounts of video games & watch movies. We also ate a lot of Mexican food, drank red wine & coke mixed together (it's actually quite nice) and went to a mall. Natalie & Ryan came down later that day having finished post camp up at FW and we all hung about. Last day there we headed into downtown Philly so that Natalie could get a tattoo & we could eat even more ice cream (notice the reoccurring theme?)

Then back to new york… again. We stayed for a few days in a supremely dodgy hotel just above central park in Spanish Harlem. We saw Avenue Q the night before last (go lottery tickets & mike's wonderful lottery winning'ness!) went' to free night at the MOMA last night. We're staying on Bowery in Chinatown at the moment, it's really busy and lovely and cheap, I like it here muchly. We may prossibly head over to Coney Island for some swimming today. Tomorrow is Broadway on Broadway in Times Square so we'll probably see a heap of French Woods people, then Monday Mike leaves, (& I get very sad for a while!)

I'm moving in with Devan & Matt Bond from camp on Monday as I've acquired a new job over here. I'm working as the Production Stage Manager for a show called Platforms in the NY Musical Theatre Festival, should be fun, so I'll be changing my flight and I'll be over here until about 7th October. Which is lovely, the weather in just changing and its getting quite gorgeous and autumn'y.

Well good job to anyone who stayed on board to the end.
I love you all, let me know how life is.

Xx

Kate

Well today I got a $26 ticket to Spring Awakening on Broadway, so good!
So far the most i've paid for a show is $30, I'm going well. It helps to know people too
Last night we has a huge amazing dinner at peking duck house in chinatown. We met up with a heap of other people from camp.
This morning Claire came down from where she was staying and now we have 5/6 people in our shoebox.
Tonight methinks we're heading back into the cinema to see Sunshine then more wanderings. I am developing blisters from the sonstant walking.
I shall miss this place when we leavin on Friday.
Early Friday morning we're heading up to Superbrad's place in New Jersy to stay for the weekend, go rock climbing and I'm going to make cupcakes.
Then no plans.... perhaps philidelphia.
Well I shall update more soon.
xx

Well finally, camp is over (as much as I loved it it was most definitly time) and we're in the city. At the moment I'm sitting with my new laptop (with vaguely stolen internets) on the top bunk in out tiny room on the fourth floor of a hostel in chelsea(ie up four flights of stairs), the room is about 2meters by 4meters, and it contains two bunk beds, at the moment there are only three of us in here but Sim should be joining us tonight and Claire tomorrow night.
I now have messenger and skype (katemcrostie@hotmail.com & kate.mcrostie) so talk to me sometime. We're here for another three nights then we'll probably head to nj, to stay with superbrad for a bit then perhaps back into the city or to philidelphia.
The bus ride in from camp was long, then we got to the airport and made our way into the city, we accidently got on an amtrak train in which was kind of cool, so four of us and all our luggage were in a dining car, then moo met here mum at penn station and we proceded to walk to the hostel then drag our bags up the three flights of stairs (well mike ran and jumped up the stairs) The hostel is in the most amazing location, about 30sec from madison square gardens, you can walk to anywhere!
Last night we went up the Empire State Building to meet Mike's friend Sim, it was a gorgeously warm night and there was hardly anyone around which was loverly.
This morning we met moo and her mum out the front of the hostel and had brunch at a diner nearby, mmmm Tollhouse Pancakes. Then did some random sightseeing, (NY Public Library, Grand Central Station) then mike and i went to buy me new jeans (both of mine have holes in the crotch.) and are now sitting (/sleeping) in the room considering food and heading back out. We're meeting up with sim and his friends at toys r us the have dinner at hard rock then prossibly go on the staten island ferry.
Tomorrow I'm planning on heading downtown to see Syd (my cousin) in the morning then wandering downtown for a while. 5.30 tomorrow evening we're meeting up with about 60 frenchwoods people for dinner in chinatown. I'm retaking my birthday tomorrow as it was crap last week.
xxxx
Kate

Well camp is still going well, everyone is still finishing dinner with their bunks and my space key isn't messed up so i shall have time to write.
At the moment i'm in the staff lounge eating a 3 muskateers bar (like a milky way but much bigger) they're my new favourite thing (alongside deep fried broccoli) and they're only 85c from the vending machines. (S'more's pop tarts are good too.) mainly we eat huge helpings of salad and decent food which isn't too bad, the kids have canteen after evening activity where they get pizza and ice cream (great idea just before bed huh?!)
We have squirrels everywhere here, they're way cute and much less annoying that possums, they just sit place and look cute and chase eachother and squeek.
Today i photocopied for 4 hours. I'm super awesome so i get all my work done in 2 lessons then move on to the job of photocopy bitch. it's awesome! actually i think i could while away my years in and office. I also know the binding and shredding machines quite well.
The kids here are amazing, they harmonize happy birthday! just like the musical company people but even better. They're all really bright and uber talented but quite hyperactive.
Tomorrow I'm running the staff magic show with my dear magic boys in my theatre which sould be fun, we've been having sleep-overs in the magic department when twe have nights off, its fun, drinking round the lake continues too!
I now have a radio too which i'm attached to all the time so i can be called, its quite fun.
only 5 more days until our next day off, i've got no idea what we're going to get up to but it should be goodly, then soon after that we get kids in our bunk :(
I think i'm going to have an early night tonight, its quite due, got back to the bunk at 6am this morning then slept through breakfast. Its much like having a party/town night to go to every night!
I still haven't gotten around to taking "ANY" photos, yes i know, i suck but i promise i will soon, its so beautiful here you kids have to see it.
It still doesn't feel like we're in america much, until you use money or anything, we're in the french woods bubble of mulit culturalism, honestly and the moment i desperatly want to come back next year! give it a few weeks though and i'm reckon my feelings may be a little quashed.
Hopefully i'll have some time off tomorrow to head down to circus and have a play, i think i'm going to give highwire a go, and hopefully get back into yoga tomorrow (the late nights have made me lazy) despite the food and lack of yoga though i'm wasting away,( i had to get new jeans mine are too big now) i'm sure it'll go the other way when i hit europe though, its from constantly running around, my calf muscles are giant from the hills.
Despite all the awesomeness over here i miss you guys muchly.
xx
Kate

Sent this a few days ago when I was in NYC, I'm at camp now but discovered that i can indeed use myspace, so updates ahoy!

Hey Guys,
Well I wrote a huge email the day before yesterday but accidentally deleted it before i sen it, I suck.
I've got 11.21 mins left of inet so i guess i'll be breif.
I'm in NYC at my hostel heading to camp in a few hours so expect a bigger update probably tomorrow.
I saw Rent last night, lined up for $20 student rush tickets, was in the second row right in the middle, it was AMAZING i actually started crying in the first song because i couldn't believe that i was actually on bradway seeing rent making eye contact with the actors, the people next to me must have thought i was nuts.
LA was pretty uneventful, made a few friends, learnt some spanish fron a lovely spanish girl staying in the same hotel room, went to santa monica for the day with Lauren (other roommate) and wandered. The flight over was funny, the plane was delayed for two hours so we didn't end up leaving la until after midnight, was fun though, there were 3 others from orientation so we had a blast. Flew into NYC about 6.30am the whole was alongside the city, was beautiful. took a bus into the city in peak hour (it took about 2 hrs) and wandered until 4pm when i could check into my hostel. Then has a FREEZING cold shower, (the showers here are always cold it seems).
That night i had a 75c bagel (from my favorite bagel stand on the corner) and some fruit and soy yoghurt from a yummy organic place up the road, t'was lovely, went to bed pretty early. The woman in the bunk under mine LIVES in the hostel, she's in ny trying to break into the film industry, how odd.
Yesterday wandered around the east village for ages and went into hundreds of vintage shops, they're amazing, but pricey, bought a cheapish purple dress.
Then headed into Times square for rent. Wandederd, ahd the second of the days iced coffees (its boiling)
The subways here are awesome, i think i've got my subway ettiquite down now, i feel quite like i belong, even got asked for directions yesterday!
Well you kids will hear more when i get to camp.
LOVE LOVE.

Kate (in new york)

Well I had my last shift at work last night so this is all starting to feel real...

I head of from Adelaide Tuesday morning for a brief stop in Auckland then on to LA.
I'm staying a night in LA then on to NYC late the next evening. I've got three days in New York (got any doing suggestions?) before French Woods picks me up and I start three months of Stage Managing & kids out in the middle of nowhere (I'm going to melt!)

Then camp finishes on the 26th of August (three days after my birthday!) and I'm floating around the states for a month or so before I fly to Copenhagen on the 20th September. Hopefully then I'll visit Malin & do some traveling with Anya and just wander around Europe for a while (any ideas??) before I fly home from London at some point late this/early next year.

I'll attempt to post photos and stuff and I'll most definitely email muchly.

love love.