I arrived yesterday about 1.30 at North Weald airfield in Essex where I checked in, collected my jamboree neckerchief and ID card then got on a coach for the 20 minute ride to the Jamboree site. From the coach stop it was about a half hour walk to the IST subcamp, which is a bit difficult carrying all the stuff I had to carry! The site is pretty muddy in places, but the camping areas are generally ok at the moment. I imagine whent the participants arrive, 40,000 feet will destroy most of the grassy areas.

Been to some training thingies this afternoon for my job which starts tomorrow. I am part of the Stewarding team (basically security) which means I get to walk around the site seeing whats going on I have a meeting at 1400 tomorrow where I will get all the details of what I will be doing and my rota.

I’ve tried to upload some photos to my gallery, but it is a pain as usual and won’t let me. I’ll try another time when I can get more internet credit.

Just finishing the last bit of packing, trying to squeeze those last few things into my bag and throw out the things I wont need. I’ll be arriving at the North Weald check in centre around 1pm tomorrow afternoon, where I will register and be assigned to a working group. Then it’s onto the Jamboree site itself,  about 20 minutes drive away on the shuttle bus. On the Wednesday and Thursday there will be a number of training and orientation meetings I have to attend and generally help get the site ready for the arrival of the participants on Thursday and Friday.

I’m going to try to post here as often as I can to let people know what I’m up to and put some photos in my gallery, so check back regularly! There are several internet cafe’s on the site so that shouldn’t be a problem hopefully.

Just visited the website of the UK contingent for the Jamboree, and seen the job allocations have been posted. In about February this year I filled in a form with my preferences for Service Team jobs whilst at the Jamboree, ranging from catering to HR to health and security. Today I got my job allocation; if I remember correctly it was my first choice - Health and Welfare, which includes stewarding and security and emergency control. Should be a good excuse to wander round the site making sure everything is in order. I was actually dreading having a job such as catering or HR that meant I spent long periods of the Jamboree indoors away from all the action.

I depart for the Jamboree a week on Tuesday, 24th July (two days before the participants arrive on site). There will be a range of training sessions specific to roles and helping with any last minute set up before people start to arrive on the Thursday. I also got word last week that the only bar on site will be in the Adult Hub, right where I will be staying. Great!

I finally got my results from my degree. Had to go in to uni on Wednesday to collect them which was weird not having been there for a few weeks.

Well, I got a 2:2 classification which I am very proud of. This is about what I have been expecting for a while, so no surprises really. I need to send a SAE to get the actual breakdown of results which will be interesting.

So from now until I graduate on 17th July, I’m not really sure what I’ll be doing. I’ll probably spend a lot of time searching for a good job, but I won’t be able to start anything until I get back from the Jamboree mid August. I think I’ll just make the most of the time off and enjoy the summer.

Today I went to the first stage selection tests for National Air Traffic Services, to become an Air Traffic Controller. I had to go to a really nice hotel in Manchester, so got the train from Wolverhampton this morning.

The day consisted of a number of aptitude tests, such as personality questionnaires and spacial awareness tests, as well as a motivation test which asked questions based on a document sent out earlier. There was also a talk by a current ATCO about what the training involves and some details of the job. It all sounds really interesting and something that I could see myself doing.

I find out in about three weeks whether I have passed stage 1, when I will be invited to stage 2 and stage 3 if I pass that. After stage 3 I will go to their college in Bournemouth for between six and nine months for my training.

I’ve now officially finished everything at uni. All done! My last exam, Corporate Finance was last Thursday, and I had a poster presentation for my dissertation yesterday morning. Overall I think they all went ok, despite having nine exams in the first week. It was a hard week, but I came out the other side.

Results should be out sometime during the week beginning 18th June, so not long now. They will be made available on WebCT I believe so I won’t have to go in to collect them.

So… where to from here? I’ve got a few weeks now with nothing to do, until around the middle of July when I graduate and go to the Jamboree the week after. I’ll spend some time looking for a job and have some other stuff that needs sorting out, so it’s not like I’ve got nothing to keep me occupied.

Had my first exam today - Inorganic Chemistry Paper 2 (mostly solid state stuff: lattice defects, superconductors, magnetic materials, fuel cells, etc.). It was a good start, the questions were fairly predictable based on patterns from past exam papers so it was a nice first exam really. So thats one down, only eight to go - five of those this week! Best get back to revision.

This morning Clare ran the Race for Life in Derby, for Cancer Research UK. She is aiming to raise £50 for this fantastic charity. If you are in a charitable mood, sponsor her online. You don’t even have to go anywhere, you can donate as much or as little as you like and it takes less than five minutes .No excuses!

With my first exam two weeks on Monday, I’ve been getting into the revision thing since last week. I’ve made myself a little revision timetable of the subjects I want to do each day, and have stuck to it so far. I have a set of revision lectures next week and the week after, one for each lecturer. These are usually quite useful as they give you a good idea about what will be in the exam depending on what they concentrate the session on. Doesn’t seem long until they will be upon me, a short while after they will be over and I can concentrate my efforts on the search for a job.

Just got back from my skiing holiday in Austria. I went with the Scouts for seven days to Wildshonau in Austria. Got some really good photos and a couple of videos in the photo gallery.

The coach journey out took near to 24 hours with a couple of stops in Luxembourg and Germany. We arrived about 3pm, picked up our skis from the ski hire place then had dinner. For the next three days we skied in Wildshonau itself so those who needed to learn could do so there on the relatively easy slopes. Bearing in mind it was the very end of the season the snow conditions were pretty good. Only the slopes nearer the top had snow on them, and some of those had patches of grass and mud in places. As I could already ski a group of us went round and explored the slopes on our own (photo of us on the chairlift)

On Thursday we went to a new resort in the Wilder Kaiser region which was about a 45 minute journey. This resort is one of the biggest resort in Austria with around 250 km of slopes, although not all were open. On the first day a few of us just did some runs to find our way around. Compared to the last place, this one was huge. We managed to go the whole day without skiing the same slope twice! On Friday the Explorer scout people skied together to help Jo and Emma - video of Jo skiing like a pro. The last day I was really tired so I just did a few runs and took it easy before starting the journey back at about 8.30

Here’s a photo of me standing with some huge mountain in the background.