Monochrome Weekend

For more monochrome madness, visit Aileni's Monochrome Weekend.

Weekend Reflections

For more reflections visit James' Newtown Area Photo.

RPA - Sky Watch Friday

For more Sky Watch from around the world, drop in to the home of Sky Watch Friday.

RPA - The New

RPA - The Old

Royal Prince Alfred Hospital (RPA) was named after Queen Victoria's second son, His Royal Highness Prince Alfred, later Duke of Edinburgh. During a visit to Australia in 1868 Prince Alfred was the victim of an assassination attempt while on a picnic in the northern Sydney suburb of Clontarf.

Australians opened a public subscription fund to build a hospital as a memorial to his safe recovery. The prince authorised his coat of arms to be used as the new hospital's crest. King Edward VII granted the hospital its Royal prefix in 1902. RPA opened as a 146-bed hospital and received its first patients in 1882 at the Missenden Road site. During that year 1069 patients were admitted.

Now widely acknowledged for its tradition of medical innovation and leadership, RPA is responsible for producing many of the country's top clinicians. Its national and international reputation for excellence has long been established through the efforts of staff in patient care, teaching, research and support services, making it one of the State's premier tertiary referral hospitals. (Source - Sydney South West Area Health Service)

RPA - Casualty

Three ECGs, two sets of blood tests, 10 hours of very good care in casualty, two cardiac scans and an exercise stress test - all under the public health system. The only thing I have to pay for is the ambulance ride and that is covered by my health insurance. I may moan about the Medicare levy come tax time but to know that this level of health care is there if you need it is extremely reassuring.

RPA - Emergency

This week I had expected to bring you images of the Chinese New Year Parade. Circumstances, however, meant that the only photos I took last week were of various aspects of Royal Prince Alfred Hospital, one of Sydney's major teaching hospitals.

So far all seems to be well. The chest pain wasn't my heart and all tests to date are clear. But it did mess up the week somewhat.

Monochrome Weekend

For more monochrome madness, visit Aileni's Monochrome Weekend.

Weekend Reflections

Cathedral in the sky.

The companion to yesterday's shot. For more reflections visit James' Newtown Area Photo.

Sky Watch Friday

For more Sky Watch from around the world, drop in to the home of Sky Watch Friday.

Chinese New Year (4)

The trouble with being short (and not liking crowds) is that you tend to miss things. This is all I saw of the lion dance.

Chinese New Year (3)

Chinese New Year (2)

How to make dumplings.

Chinese New Year

Several versions of the symbol of the Year of the Tiger welcome in Chinese New Year at the opening ceremony in Belmore Park.

Monochrome Weekend

Festival in the Desert, Essakane, Mali, 2008

For more monochrome madness, visit Aileni's Monochrome Weekend.

Weekend Reflections

For more reflections visit James' Newtown Area Photo.

Sky Watch Friday - Laneways by George - The Urban Barcode

Abercrombie Lane is transformed from a place of movement and passage to a place of stasis and conversation about the City. The existing street conditions are extended into the laneway as painted shadows to the entrance of the lane on George Street and at Pitt Street.

Part way along Abercrombie Lane, suspended white fluorescent tubes represent the bar code to Jan Gehl's book 'Life Between Buildings'. Beneath this suspended code lies another bar code painted in black - 'Two or Three Things I Know About Her', by Jean-Luc Godard.

The two codes frame a space of dialogue on the City and create the opportunity for one to engage with it. Alongside graphic and sculptural installations, Abercrombie Lane is home to a pocked sized open air cinema, screening films that promote dialogue about the nature of our cities.

For more Sky Watch from around the world, drop in to the home of Sky Watch Friday.

Laneways by George

Not sure which one this is but it may be what remains of Potential Spaces. These installation have been in place for a couple of months now and some of them are the worse for wear.

Laneways by George - The Meeting Place

The Meeting Place is a playful installation which encourages participation and interaction whilst heightening the experience of moving through the urban space of Little Hunter Street. The four metre high fabric walls sit within the laneway, compressing the pedestrian path and framing a sliver of sky that accentuates the unique space of the lane.

People negotiate their way through the laneway through communication and contact with other people moving in the opposite direction. This social aspect of watching, communicating and negotiating with people will increase positive human contact with a sense of play.

Free Amir Sadeghi

I have just read on Portland Daily Photo that our much respected fellow blogger, Amir of Tehran Live, has been arrested again, this time for publishing these photos. As before I hope he is safe and well and released quickly. My thoughts are with him and his family.

Sydney Festival - All over for another year

Trafalgar Square

Did you know Sydney had a Trafalgar Square?

I've walked past this building many, many times and never noticed its name. Its probably the new paint job that made me notice.

Trafalgar Square is a good and externally well preserved example of Victorian commercial architecture. It is of historic significance as a late example of the Victorian store and commercial building, forming part of the local warehouse precinct which grew up around Darling Harbour in the latter half of the nineteenth century. It is also associated with the well known architects Sheerin and Hennessy. The building is of aesthetic significance as a well detailed Victorian building which contributes to the streetscape of the Clarence Street warehouse group.


 Trafalgar Square is a refurbished former warehouse building five bays wide, which has three storeys of office accommodation above two levels of retail, the lowest partly below street level. It has timber shopfronts at the lower two levels, and a stucco facade above, with a pedimented parapet and timber box-framed windows. Internally, most of the former niches in main dividing walls have been converted to archways connecting the bays, and new plasterboard ceilings have recently been constructed, revealing details of timber beams and their stone brackets. The interior of the building has recently been fully refurbished. (Source - NSW Heritage Database)

Monochrome Weekend

Humberstone, Chile, 2004

For more monochrome madness, visit Aileni's Monochrome Weekend.

Weekend Reflections

For more reflections visit James' Newtown Area Photo.

Sky Watch Friday

An old one, but one of the most spectacular sunsets I've seen in this city.

For more Sky Watch from around the world, drop in to the home of Sky Watch Friday.

Wedding snaps

The Japanese wedding industry is pretty keen on Sydney as a destination. Here a young couple poses for photos at the Opera House, oblivious to the passing tourists and the odd rogue photographer.

Laneways by George - Seven Metre Bar

(Richard Goodwin, Russell Lowe, Adrian McGregor)

"On current trajectories polar ice cap melts will drown Underwood Street. so do we raise the bar? At 7m above sea level this collaboration between an artist, architect/gamer and landscape architect combines the landscape of weather, an architecture of catastrophe and the technology of games." So says the blurb. One of the stranger laneway installations.

Sydney Festival - Busker

Theme Day - Wood

Click here to view thumbnails for all participants