Scratching your head wondering what to do tonight and over the weekend?  Here’s some recommendations from local RAYVers. Thanks for the suggestions and keep them coming!

TONIGHT:

- Night Noodle Markets  (Civic Park, N Sydney)
Happening every Friday night from now until April. Good chance to get the taste buds going, before the Night Noodle Markets start in Hyde Park next Thursday. (More on that next week)
(From Leanne S)

- Black & Blue Gallery (Surry Hills)
David Withers & Lachlan Anthony - Make Yourself at Home
We’ve heard this is meant to be a pretty cool show.

“A piquant show of installation, sculpture and photography that interrogates artefacts which fill domestic and urban fields of contemporary experience. Reconfiguring the scale, location and state; of furniture, clothing and products, affects an uncanny climate in which the audience is asked to re-think the significance and potentiality of previously understood objects. Whilst humorous at first encounter, upon closer engagement these surreal reconfigurations intimate a more malevolent undertow.”
(From Edwina S)

THE WEEKEND:

- Australian International Motor Show  (Darling Harbour)
9th - 19th October

- Crack the Code! @ Sydney Olympic Park (Kids)
Using a compass, orienteer yourself around the centre of Sydney Olympic Park.  Collect the clues along the way, decode the message and collect your prize from the Visitor Centre.
(from Tara W)

- The Way We Wear Vintage Fashion Fair (Hunters Hill)
Hunters Hill Town Hall/Masonic Temple/RSL Hall
$12 Adults / $6 Child / $30 Family
The fifth ‘The Way We Wear Vintage Fashion Fair’ with dealers from all over Australia in three separate buildings selling two hundred years of fashion and fashion accessories.
(from Yvonne G)

- C-90 @ Palmer Projects (Darlinghurst)
Mark Drew (China Heights founder) explores cassette related artworks through a variety of installations, prints and canvas.
(from Ed Q)

- Art & About Activities (across Sydney)
Lots of stuff going on here, including Live Lanes and Sydney Life previously covered in the blog.

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Send your news, updates, events & local suggestions to us here.

Fran J recently added a review about the Prince Alfred Park Swimming Pool in Surry Hills.  We’ve been to this pool a few times chilling out with the usual suspects from in and around Surry Hills.  As Fran J said in her review, it’s not the most glamorous of public pools in Sydney - but it’s always been a pretty cool place to chill out in the Summer sun.  At the moment, as most Surry Hills residents will know, the pool is reflecting somewhat of a building site, with sleepers on the grass and the pool collecting leaves and rubbish as it’s been emptied.  But, do not fear - this is all in preparation for a full redevelopment.  It’s been a while since anything has happened over there and some of you (if you’re local) might be wondering what’s going on.  We’ve been scratching our heads that’s for sure.  As a bit of an update, the City of Sydney have recently announced that work will commence on the new pool late November 2008 - at which point the old buildings and pool will start to be removed.  Hoorah!  However, the replacement of the pool and the start of the new development will begin around April 2009 - and (wait for it) these are expected to be completed around mid 2010.

So - long and short - if you’re hanging around wondering when the pool is going to be complete - you’ve got a couple of years yet!  Our recommendation is to head on over to the Victoria Park Swimming Pool located up by Broadway.  Failing that, become friends with someone who has a rooftop pool and have a swim in style.   We’re opting for the latter.  Anyone got a rooftop pool?

The City of Sydney has recently made a couple of updates to the pool developments.  You can check out the proposed plans here.

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Share your thoughts on Prince Alfred Park Swimming Pool here

Share your thoughts on Victoria Park Swimming Pool here

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Send your news, updates, events & local suggestions to us here.

The latest RAYV Gossip went out today.  If you’re not a member of RAYV or don’t subscribe to the newsletter, you can check out the latest edition here:

RAYV Gossip - October 9th 2008

Hey folks, we’re looking for regular, community contributors to the RAYV Local Blog.  Soon you’ll see a new look blog covering a much larger variety of content.  We’re looking to highlight what’s going in Sydney for grown ups and kids and also what’s happening in your local community.  Things we’re looking to cover:

- Recommended activities
- Events
- Local business openings
- Great local offers
- Update of local developments
- News from local councils
- Tips for local businesses
- Funny facts & figures
- etc etc (i.e. anything else you want)

If you’ve got a love for writing and sharing your knowledge, we (and 1000’s of other Sydney-siders) would love to hear from you.

We hope the Sydney Local Blog will become a community led and focussed blog and we looking for your help to make it come alive.  We’re looking for regular contributors who would be happy to offer short posts - published under their name and profile.

We’re also looking for hat tips and one off recommendations that we will happily write up into a post ourselves.

If you’d like to know more about become a Community Contributor, we’d love to hear from you.  Drop us an email here.

If you have a local recommendation, tip about anything local - please email us the details.  Include your name and website (if you have one) if you’d like us to credit you for your recommendation.

Hey folks, we’re now on Twitter, tweeting away about local recommendations from RAYVers in Sydney.   This is another way to keep up to date with local recommendations when viewing your other favourite sites.   If it happens on RAYV - it’s displayed on Twitter.   You can check out the RAYV Twitter page here. Click to follow us and be updated instantly.   If you don’t have a Twitter account - you can sign up for free here and then add us to the list of people you wish to follow.

If you’re not on Twitter and not the tweeting type, no worries!  If you’re not visiting RAYV every day, you could always add our RAYV Feed to your RSS reader - and be updated every time a new activity occurs on RAYV.

It’s nearly here folks.  Are you counting down the hours until the day ends and you officially start a long weekend.?  Let’s just hope the weather holds out!

If you’re feeling a bit arty this weekend, why not check out Art & About 2008?  Has it really been a whole year since the last one?  Wow.

Starting this weekend (Sat) you can check out ‘Live Lanes - By George’ & ‘Sydney Life’ - the first of many events for Art & About.

Live Lanes - By George
4th October - 31st January (don’t worry if you miss it this weekend then!)

With work by artists from the City of Sydney’s artist run initiatives By George! explores the potential of the City’s laneways, bringing them back to life with creativity, innovation and new energy. 

Sydney Life (Central walkway, Hyde Park North)
4th October - 26th October

Sydney Life, the annual photography competition held in Hyde Park as part of Art & About, is stronger than ever in 2008.

There were many passionate arguments from the four judges during the judging. The result is a fascinating collection of different moods, observations and styles. There is humour, comment, portraiture, darkness and domesticity.

Sydney Life is proud of its record of showing a mix of emerging and established artists. This year is no exception. Many well-known photographers entered, several of whom have been selected in previous years. There are also the works of many new and up and coming photographers included in the final selection.

The location of Hyde Park continues to be the star of this popular public art event. I am delighted that Sydney Life is once again enlivening this much-loved green respite in the middle of the CBD.

Sandy Edwards Curator, Sydney Life

For the full Art & About calendar of events - check out the Art & About website.  We’ll highlight some more of the events nearer the time.

Have a great long Sydney weekend folks.  And remember - let’s hear all about where you went and the experiences you had over on RAYV.  All reviews written throughout the month of October are automatically entered into our ‘Bowl Us Over’ - Strike Bowling competition.

See you on the other side.

Ian

Thanks to our good chums over at Strike Bowling Bar we’re giving away $1500 in vouchers for use at any one of their Sydney locations.  There’s 4 prizes up for grabs.  x2 $500 vouchers and x2 $250 vouchers.  Needless to say, that’s a lot of bowling and a hefty amount of money to put behind the bar.  If you’re not popular already, you will be if you win this!

The competition runs between Oct 1 and Oct 31st.  Winners will be announced the first week of November.

For all the details on how to enter - click here.

Good luck - bowl us over.

ST2K brings together the best of Sydney’s emerging street art culture.  Artists and the public are invited to participate in all live art events.

Tonight (1st Oct) sees the opening of Here Comes Trouble at the Pine Street Creative Arts Centre in Chippendale (NSW 2008).  An exhibition of street art and DIY culture. The exhibition will run for the whole month of October and will operate as the hub of the festival.

This a FREE event ladies and gentlemen (always a winner) and showcases the work of some great local talent.  RAYV’s friend Dan Geaves (from Pareto Fundraising) will also be exhibiting.  Want to know what he’s created?  You’ll have to pop down and see it for yourself!  You could also be very generous and buy it! We’ll be there tonight with the RAYV stickers on, so come and say hi.

For details about the other events happening throughout the month of October for the ST2K: Sydney Street Art Festival click here.  We’ll also be highlighting them on the blog as and when they happen.

Here Comes Trouble
Pine Street Arts Centre
1st - 30 Oct
6pm-9pm
FREE

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Share your thoughts on the Pine Street Creative Arts Centre here.

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Yes, it’s not far away, just a couple more days and we slip into a nice a long weekend in Sydney.   Let’s hope the weather holds out! Still working out what to do?   Here’s a suggestion! We just received a mail about this exhibition, it looks pretty cool, so we thought we’d share it.

David Mist - Swinging Sydney

Well-known fashion photographer David Mist captured the fashions and flavour of life in Sydney in the late 1960s.

Born in London, Mist trained and worked in the UK before moving to Sydney in 1961 to work in Laurence Le Guay and John Nisbett’s studio. With Sydney’s fashion scene still in its infancy, Mist’s European trained eye was highly sought after and he quickly established himself in the burgeoning industry here.

The exhibition draws from his fashion and commissioned work, including set-up and candid images that depict a young, hip and increasingly cosmopolitan city.

The exhibiton is being held at the Museum of Sydney, in association with the Powerhouse Museum.

Exhibition runs from 27th September ‘08 - 8th February ‘09
Museum of Sydney
9.30am - 5pm
$10/Adult $5/Child
Full details here
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Share your thoughts on the Museum of Sydney here.

Share your thoughts on the Powerhouse Museum here.

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Something  for the big and little kids and of course for a great cause.  The Teddy Bears’ Picnic is happening on Sunday 19th October, from 10.30am - 4pm at the Rosehill Gardens, Rosehill.  All proceeds from the day go towards the Children’s Hospital at Westmead.

The Teddy Bears’ Picnic is a fun family day out with a great atmosphere and plenty to do. The event is organised for all ages, including parents, and includes a wide range of activities such as face painting (one of RAYV Man’s other favourite past times), jumping castles (Woohoo!), an exciting Centre Stage Concert, showbags, rides, sports clinics, a giant sandpit and much more. Your all inclusive one low ticket price includes all activities, shows, rides and parking!

This is a perfect day out  for the family and friends.

Tickets are $15 or $50 for the family tour.  Go on, splash out, this is for a great cause.  For the full details, check out the Children’s Hospital at Westmead website.

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Share your thoughts on the Children’s Hospital at Westmead here.

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