28/ 04/ 09: Queensland's Sunshine Coast starts in the Mountains

Early in the morning I arrived at Brisbane Airport, and after my suitcase got x-rayed and examined - contact lenses look really suspicious! - we headed for the Glasshouse Mountains. The mountains are listed as World Heritage. Standing up to 300m high and ethereally shaped, the Aborigines traditionally believe these peaks to be a family of mountain spirits, they are surrounded by national parks and little rivers. The Aboriginal legend about this family and how the rivers were born is quite sad.

But let's talk about more happy things as my experiences in Queensland have only been happy ones so far. The Tourism Queensland booked a cottage for me with an amazing view of the Glasshouse Mountains. I have never seen anything like it in my life! I seriously had tears in my eyes, it was so beautiful! I am not kidding you. The cottages were just perfect, very simple, very Bauhaus, but very modern and luxurious while and at the same time sustainable. Is there possibly more you could ask for?! The floor-to-ceiling glass walls and large open decks overlooked kangaroos grazing in front of the cottages, behind them the lush woods of the Hinterland and in the distance the two grandest Glasshouse Mountains: Mount Beerwah and Mount Coonowrin! Check it out on: www.glassonglasshouse.com.au

More excitement was in store though! We visited the Australian Zoo. What a great legacy Steve Irwin left! I had the best time ever in a zoo and let me tell you, I usually really don't like zoos. I haven't been to one in ten years, because they are so upsetting. But in the Australian Zoo the enclosures are really big and well kept, the birds truly have space to fly and the zoo gets really involved with protecting the animals in the wild. If you want to help as well, support them by checking out www.savestevesplace.com and sign their online petition. In the picture I am holding an one year old alligator! Surprisingly cute and fragile! Here Wayne Poole, an expert guide of the Australian Zoo, is explaining to me how alligators are more romantic lovers than koalas. They blow bubbles underneath the female's belly for weeks before mating. That is why they are my favourites and deserved a picture in my blog! Even though I also petted koalas, kangaroos, a wombat and echidnas (not really petted them! But they licked an insect cocktail off my hands!). What a great first day in Australia that was! I really thought it couldn't get any better.

28/ 04/ 09: Queensland's Sunshine Coast starts in the Mountains

Early in the morning I arrived at Brisbane Airport, and after my suitcase got x-rayed and examined - contact lenses look really suspicious! - we headed for the Glasshouse Mountains. The mountains are listed as World Heritage. Standing up to 300m high and ethereally shaped, the Aborigines traditionally believe these peaks to be a family of mountain spirits, they are surrounded by national parks and little rivers. The Aboriginal legend about this family and how the rivers were born is quite sad.

But let's talk about more happy things as my experiences in Queensland have only been happy ones so far. The Tourism Queensland booked a cottage for me with an amazing view of the Glasshouse Mountains. I have never seen anything like it in my life! I seriously had tears in my eyes, it was so beautiful! I am not kidding you. The cottages were just perfect, very simple, very Bauhaus, but very modern and luxurious while and at the same time sustainable. Is there possibly more you could ask for?! The floor-to-ceiling glass walls and large open decks overlooked kangaroos grazing in front of the cottages, behind them the lush woods of the Hinterland and in the distance the two grandest Glasshouse Mountains: Mount Beerwah and Mount Coonowrin! Check it out on: www.glassonglasshouse.com.au

More excitement was in store though! We visited the Australian Zoo. What a great legacy Steve Irwin left! I had the best time ever in a zoo and let me tell you, I usually really don't like zoos. I haven't been to one in ten years, because they are so upsetting. But in the Australian Zoo the enclosures are really big and well kept, the birds truly have space to fly and the zoo gets really involved with protecting the animals in the wild. If you want to help as well, support them by checking out www.savestevesplace.com and sign their online petition. In the picture I am holding an one year old alligator! Surprisingly cute and fragile! Here Wayne Poole, an expert guide of the Australian Zoo, is explaining to me how alligators are more romantic lovers than koalas. They blow bubbles underneath the female's belly for weeks before mating. That is why they are my favourites and deserved a picture in my blog! Even though I also petted koalas, kangaroos, a wombat and echidnas (not really petted them! But they licked an insect cocktail off my hands!). What a great first day in Australia that was! I really thought it couldn't get any better.

One step closer to making my trip sustainable

Two days ago I arrived in Queensland and you won't believe all the exciting adventures I experienced since: Glasshouse Mountains, Australian Zoo, Fraser Island, Noosa, Surfing Lessons. Blogs about it will follow soon! Thanks to Emirates and them upgrading me to Business class, my holiday started on the plane and I arrived rested. Here a picture of crew members Mike and Bryana. Some more fun pictures will follow as soon as I get my hands on a scanner.

While I am very excited to be here in Queensland, from the outset my wish was that the natural wonders of Queensland and the Great Barrier Reef would be there for future generations. Before setting off on my trip, I realized there is no better place to start making my journey sustainable than myself, so I went online to myclimate.org to calculate the emissions that would be created by my trip in order to buy quality offsets (Gold Standard CERs), i.e. carbon credits. The website offers a handy calculator for figuring out the emissions you generate in your everyday life and by travelling. It is surprisingly accurate and simple to use at the same time.

Luckily, my brother Andrej currently works in London in the field of carbon credits and knows a thing or two about emission reduction projects, so I got a decent idea of how offsetting can make a difference for our climate and nature, especially if many people do it. Most high standard emission reduction projects either fund renewable energy to replace fossile energy in places where this would not be economically viable without the sale of carbon credits or by funding the destruction of greenhouse gases, e.g. methane where they are created by waste, mining or industry. The resulting carbon credits, so called Certified Emission Reductions or CERs are issued by an agency of the UN after a lengthy process of registration, monitoring and verification. They represent emissions, which have already been reduced in a certified project, so this is not an investment into some vague promise about the future, but very much based on real data and emission reductions.
Sustainability is everyone's business.

One step closer to making my trip sustainable

Two days ago I arrived in Queensland and you won't believe all the exciting adventures I experienced since: Glasshouse Mountains, Australian Zoo, Fraser Island, Noosa, Surfing Lessons. Blogs about it will follow soon! Thanks to Emirates and them upgrading me to Business class, my holiday started on the plane and I arrived rested. Here a picture of crew members Mike and Bryana. Some more fun pictures will follow as soon as I get my hands on a scanner.

While I am very excited to be here in Queensland, from the outset my wish was that the natural wonders of Queensland and the Great Barrier Reef would be there for future generations. Before setting off on my trip, I realized there is no better place to start making my journey sustainable than myself, so I went online to myclimate.org to calculate the emissions that would be created by my trip in order to buy quality offsets (Gold Standard CERs), i.e. carbon credits. The website offers a handy calculator for figuring out the emissions you generate in your everyday life and by travelling. It is surprisingly accurate and simple to use at the same time.

Luckily, my brother Andrej currently works in London in the field of carbon credits and knows a thing or two about emission reduction projects, so I got a decent idea of how offsetting can make a difference for our climate and nature, especially if many people do it. Most high standard emission reduction projects either fund renewable energy to replace fossile energy in places where this would not be economically viable without the sale of carbon credits or by funding the destruction of greenhouse gases, e.g. methane where they are created by waste, mining or industry. The resulting carbon credits, so called Certified Emission Reductions or CERs are issued by an agency of the UN after a lengthy process of registration, monitoring and verification. They represent emissions, which have already been reduced in a certified project, so this is not an investment into some vague promise about the future, but very much based on real data and emission reductions.
Sustainability is everyone's business.

Meat Australian Wildlife

Actually I ended up trying the kangaroo and it didn't taste bad at all. Still I am much more looking forward to seeing them alive. Soon! Today I am leaving for Queensland! :-)

Meat Australian Wildlife

Actually I ended up trying the kangaroo and it didn't taste bad at all. Still I am much more looking forward to seeing them alive. Soon! Today I am leaving for Queensland! :-)

Roopashree: Tutor in an Indian Restaurant

My other best friend who is also planning to stay with me for 6 weeks as housemate on Hamilton Island if I get the "Best Job in the World" is Roopashree and I would like to tell you a bit about her and our friendship here:

Roopashree and I used to work together in an Indian Restaurant in Beverly Hills. She was of great help as she is originally from India and gave me essential advice in how to deal with Indian costumers. Firstly, you have to be decisive in taking the orders and suggest who will make the first order otherwise you will lose a LOT of time until they decide who goes first. Secondly, and most importantly as this can get really dangerous if done wrong:

Once you bring the bill, take a step back, because immediately every single person at the table will desperately try to be the first to give you their money or credit card. At the same time they will each try to snatch away their friends' instrument to invite everybody. Don't forget not to step in before the fight is over, because if you did that you would be blamed for taking somebody's card over everyone else's.

Roopashree worked as an art director for national commercials in India. In 1998 she moved to the United States to study film and television at Templeton University in Pennsylvania. After finishing her degree she moved to Los Angeles and that is where we met. She is one of my best friends, along with Katalin, of course ;-). Katalin and I are always surprised by Roopashree's ability to cause men to give her flowers for any occasion and without them expecting anything in return apart from her smile. I guess, she is an Indian princess at heart.

This is what she has to say about me: ""Having good friends from many cultures has enabled Mirjam to understand different kinds of people and be open to new journeys that life will bring along her path."

Roopashree: Tutor in an Indian Restaurant

My other best friend who is also planning to stay with me for 6 weeks as housemate on Hamilton Island if I get the "Best Job in the World" is Roopashree and I would like to tell you a bit about her and our friendship here:

Roopashree and I used to work together in an Indian Restaurant in Beverly Hills. She was of great help as she is originally from India and gave me essential advice in how to deal with Indian costumers. Firstly, you have to be decisive in taking the orders and suggest who will make the first order otherwise you will lose a LOT of time until they decide who goes first. Secondly, and most importantly as this can get really dangerous if done wrong:

Once you bring the bill, take a step back, because immediately every single person at the table will desperately try to be the first to give you their money or credit card. At the same time they will each try to snatch away their friends' instrument to invite everybody. Don't forget not to step in before the fight is over, because if you did that you would be blamed for taking somebody's card over everyone else's.

Roopashree worked as an art director for national commercials in India. In 1998 she moved to the United States to study film and television at Templeton University in Pennsylvania. After finishing her degree she moved to Los Angeles and that is where we met. She is one of my best friends, along with Katalin, of course ;-). Katalin and I are always surprised by Roopashree's ability to cause men to give her flowers for any occasion and without them expecting anything in return apart from her smile. I guess, she is an Indian princess at heart.

This is what she has to say about me: ""Having good friends from many cultures has enabled Mirjam to understand different kinds of people and be open to new journeys that life will bring along her path."

Katalin: A person to contact in case of an emergency

As one of my best friends who would stay with me as a housemate in Hamilton Island for at least six weeks if I get the "Best Job in the World", I would like to tell you a little bit more about Katalin.

Katalin was my „emergency contact“ in Los Angeles. Obviously apartment managers and insurances don’t want to call your family abroad for an emergency, so you need to fill in a person residing in the United States. My person was Katalin, which made her sort of my family there. She took the responsibility with joy. She is the kind of person that really calls you later that day, when she had to hang up and told you “I will call you later.” This was another thing we had in common as foreigners in another country: we really thought “later” meant “later today” rather than “later in my life” or never.

Together we learned the differences between our old continent and the brave new world. Katalin was born in Moscow, her mother is Russian and her father is Hungarian. Her family is till today filled with journalists and as her father was one, they moved a lot and she grew up in Washington D.C. as well as Budapest. She studied ballet in Moscow at the Bolshoi Ballet. She danced on various stages in Russia and at the Hungarian State Opera House. In 2000 she relocated to Los Angeles and has stayed there ever since. I met her in Los Angeles during my studies at the Lee Strasberg. She works as a freelance dancer and ballet teacher, last she was seen dancing in the Nutcracker. She also worked as a multilingual translator and editor at a famous toy company. No advertisement here, though she really looks like Barbie whenever she puts on her pink dress.

This is what she has to say about why I should get “The Best Job in the World”:
“I once heard about the definition of professional in a tv ad "Professional is someone who does things till they dont get it wrong" and thats Mirjam , she is a perfectionist and thats why she is the one for this job.”

Katalin: A person to contact in case of an emergency

As one of my best friends who would stay with me as a housemate in Hamilton Island for at least six weeks if I get the "Best Job in the World", I would like to tell you a little bit more about Katalin.

Katalin was my „emergency contact“ in Los Angeles. Obviously apartment managers and insurances don’t want to call your family abroad for an emergency, so you need to fill in a person residing in the United States. My person was Katalin, which made her sort of my family there. She took the responsibility with joy. She is the kind of person that really calls you later that day, when she had to hang up and told you “I will call you later.” This was another thing we had in common as foreigners in another country: we really thought “later” meant “later today” rather than “later in my life” or never.

Together we learned the differences between our old continent and the brave new world. Katalin was born in Moscow, her mother is Russian and her father is Hungarian. Her family is till today filled with journalists and as her father was one, they moved a lot and she grew up in Washington D.C. as well as Budapest. She studied ballet in Moscow at the Bolshoi Ballet. She danced on various stages in Russia and at the Hungarian State Opera House. In 2000 she relocated to Los Angeles and has stayed there ever since. I met her in Los Angeles during my studies at the Lee Strasberg. She works as a freelance dancer and ballet teacher, last she was seen dancing in the Nutcracker. She also worked as a multilingual translator and editor at a famous toy company. No advertisement here, though she really looks like Barbie whenever she puts on her pink dress.

This is what she has to say about why I should get “The Best Job in the World”:
“I once heard about the definition of professional in a tv ad "Professional is someone who does things till they dont get it wrong" and thats Mirjam , she is a perfectionist and thats why she is the one for this job.”

In case I get the "Best Job in the World" I will be packing...

The winning candidate in the "Best Job in the World" competition does not have to live in his or her gorgeous Hamilton Island pad (HIP) on their own, but gets to choose who to bring along for all or parts of the journey. So, among other questions I was asked by Tourism Queensland was the one about whom I would bring with me.

I do not have a partner or children, so I am quite free in my choice of housemate for my HIP if I should win. Of course I have my parents, but they will have to stay behind in Germany to take care of my cat Cessa. My brothers and their wives have jobs and commitments, as do many of my friends - I am talking jobs here, not wives :-). So most of my family and my friends would visit me for 2 weeks at a time or so.

However, my two best friends, whom I met during the course of my studies in Los Angeles, would be staying with me for at least six weeks at a time. Katalin and Roopashree, these two young women are very precious to me and I am grateful that our paths crossed. In the course of a week I will introduce them both to you. For starters, a few short facts about them:

Katalin is Russian-Hungarian and originally hails from Budapest, while Roopashree is from Bangalore, India. The two of them still live in Los Angeles and would be thrilled to leave the city of angels to walk on heavenly white beaches. Whitehaven Beach sounds predestined for this purpose. The content of quartz crystal is 99,7% on Whitehaven Beach, which makes it the whitest beach in the world. For eight kilometres one can walk this heavenly white beach, even if you are not an angel or come from an angel's city!

In case I get the "Best Job in the World" I will be packing...

The winning candidate in the "Best Job in the World" competition does not have to live in his or her gorgeous Hamilton Island pad (HIP) on their own, but gets to choose who to bring along for all or parts of the journey. So, among other questions I was asked by Tourism Queensland was the one about whom I would bring with me.

I do not have a partner or children, so I am quite free in my choice of housemate for my HIP if I should win. Of course I have my parents, but they will have to stay behind in Germany to take care of my cat Cessa. My brothers and their wives have jobs and commitments, as do many of my friends - I am talking jobs here, not wives :-). So most of my family and my friends would visit me for 2 weeks at a time or so.

However, my two best friends, whom I met during the course of my studies in Los Angeles, would be staying with me for at least six weeks at a time. Katalin and Roopashree, these two young women are very precious to me and I am grateful that our paths crossed. In the course of a week I will introduce them both to you. For starters, a few short facts about them:

Katalin is Russian-Hungarian and originally hails from Budapest, while Roopashree is from Bangalore, India. The two of them still live in Los Angeles and would be thrilled to leave the city of angels to walk on heavenly white beaches. Whitehaven Beach sounds predestined for this purpose. The content of quartz crystal is 99,7% on Whitehaven Beach, which makes it the whitest beach in the world. For eight kilometres one can walk this heavenly white beach, even if you are not an angel or come from an angel's city!