Isle Of Man Where You Can

Just a really quick post and it doesn’t even have anything to do with any pictures that I took.

The Isle of Man, which is still home for me at the moment in a way, has unveiled a new marketing slogan:

“Isle of Man Where You Can.”

A new website was also added in the process and visiting http://www.whereyoucan.im quickly made it clear they lined this one up for the taking.

Now, I must make clear that I have nothing against the Isle of Man itself – it’s a lovely place with plenty of potential. When it comes to the honourable ones running the place, however, it’s a different matter.

So, seeing that the consultants involved lined this one up so beautifully, I couldn’t resist posting about it. Why? Because I know that my site has a higher ranking than the “Isle of Man Where You Can” campaign site, so if I got my sums right and you are googling for “Isle of Man Where You Can” in a few days time, my post and the below “interpretations” of that slogan will be the first thing you see, before the official site pops up in the results.  Probably something those consultants won’t be too happy about – but then: Isle of Man where you can…express your opinions about political leadership in more ways than one.

Isle Of Man Where You Can

Only just got around to loading these up. They are pictures from the 2012 Caracol in Makati, a Mardi Gras style parade with colourful costumes, as well as plenty of music and dancing.

There’s more than 170 pictures from the day, with most participants hopefully captured somewhere. As with all my images, if I snapped you, feel free to use it for your own personal use.

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Some more images from the 3rd Philippine International Pyromusical Competition at the Mall of Asia here in Manila. Last night saw the teams from China and the Netherlands light up the sky with more spectacular displays.

Around 40 pics have been added to the below gallery, with the first few being from Team China, followed by shots from Team Netherland’s display.

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Some pictures from the 17th Philippine International Hot Air Balloon Fiesta at Omni Aviation Complex in Clark Field, Angeles City, Pampanga.

Arguably, there aren’t very many pics of actual hot air balloons in this one but that was simply due to timing and adverse weather later in the day.Still, plenty of stuff to look at during a nice day out…

When I had my fire safty training a while ago, it was done in the carpark of the Isle of Man fire station in Douglas, with a bit of paper burning and everything nice and small. Turns out they do fire training different here – very different.

A big plume of smoke appeared from the building across the road earlier today and a few minutes later the local fire brigade appeared. Strangely, though, they only threw a bit of water in the general direction of the smoke and otherwise seemed pretty relaxed. A few minutes later an old cut up oil drum was placed in the middle of the street and some petrol was poured into it. The whole thing was then set alight and the residents of the building, by now all gathered outside, could have a go at extinguishing it.

Not satisfied with setting liters of petrol ablaze in the middle of a street (a street that wasn’t closed in any way – traffic just continued to flow past), a gas bottle was then produced and also set alight, again in the middle of the road, with cars and bikes happily driving by.

Turns out the whole thing was an exercise in fire safety for the residents and that’s simply how they do things here. Sure was realistic but I’m pretty certain the whole spectacle would have caused any UK H&S inspector to have a serious panic attack. Lucky there are none of those here then…



The 3rd Philippine International Pyromusical Competition is taking place here in Manila at the moment. The event sees eight teams from diferent countries compete over four weekends and as you can imagine it’s quite a spectacle. Last week was the start, with the first batch of pictures being from Team Malta. I’ll try and get some more from the other teams over the coming week.

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Some Hollywood glamour to brighten up things around here: The Bourne Legacy (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1194173) is currently being filmed here in Manila.

Security is mega tight but that of course didn’t stop me from having a go, so below are a few shots of Rachel Weisz as well as the movie set.

Please Note: No reproduction of below images without written permission. That means I want you to ask first, ok?

Some more images to fill the site, this time from Dubai. Always wanted to have a look at the place and it was pretty much like I imagined: sand, shiny buildings, more sand, more shiny buildings.

Included in this set are of course images of the Burj Khalifa, the world’s tallest buidling, Burj Al Arab, and a few posh cars. Burj Khalifa is eye-bendingly impressive to look at but also seems somewhat pointless. Pretty but pointless. A bit like the whole of Dubai, which seems like a slightly mental real-life version of Sim City.

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Boxing Day on the Isle of Man mainly means one thing. No, not shopping sprees or finally sending the in-laws on their way home, but the annual game of Cammag at St John’s!

Turnout was quite decent again and the game ended 4:0 for the South.

Below are a few pics and a video from the day.

Some more images from Bavaria, this time from the town of Mittenwald.

Mittenwald is located approx. 16 kilometers to the south-east of Garmisch-Partenkirchen in the Valley of the River Isar, on the northern foothills of the Alps.

The picturesque town is probably best known for the manufacture of violins, violas and cellos.