Is there anyone who have Advanced Bionic in Auckland???

I am writing this blog wondering to myself - Is there anyone in Auckland have an Advanced Bionic cochlear implant? Am I the only one here? Ok I have been in Auckland for over a week now and have been busy setting up a photography studio for my cousin. Now that I am getting to know my cousins properly, I can't help wondering about the support that I may need incase I would have some problem with my implant.

New Zealand and Australia do have cochlear implant center but they only promote Nucleus Freedom. I find this very interesting because of our technology these days should be up to date. We have ipod, car, internet services and so on. So why not different brands?

A month ago, I had some problem with my implant. Four days after my 9th months tuning, I lost all my low frequency by 70% and could no longer understand what people were saying. I was still getting used to high frequencies which I haven't heard for 26 years so without the low frequencies I am lost.

Staff at the centre believed that I may have been stressed or ill. Of course I was stressed. I worry about lot of things. People were booking me for their wedding day and had to cancel due to losing their job. Not easy trying to find the next pay day. Another thing was moving to new location until I know where I would like to stay. I could move anywhere in the world could I?

Now that I am in New Zealand, doing some soul searching, wondering what I can do to support the cochlear implant center to improve their services and technology using my photography skill. Here me thinking..... I am an Advanced Bionic user and I can help Advanced Bionic to promote themselves to New Zealand.

My question to people out there........ do you want more than one choices on which cochlear implant brand to have? Please get in touch and I'll shall see what I can do for you.

Meerkat has gone camping

Meerkat has gone camping in the countryside somewhere far, far away in the galaxy. I had no idea where I went to but I didn't care as long as I would enjoy myself. The weather forecast was a bit unsettle but then camping was all about "come rain or shine" Just let it be. So Meerkat went camping for two nights. As Giles and I prepared to put our tent up, all I could hear was this tweet tweet and chirping all day long. There were some other kind of sounds such as traffic, wind blowing, trees creaked, people walking or children laughter in the background. There wasn't many children while we were there but I have seen them playing about on their bikes.

Anyway, the new sound that I have came across. I was quite amazed that I heard this. I know I went camping for many years. I used to be the only Brownies in Scout cub (Back in the day, girls were not allow in Scout) Mucking about in the rain, singing at the campfire, doing games and so on. How I missed camping!

Well do you wanna know what I haven't heard before? Oh ok I'll tell you. ya know how people always said back in the days that they could tell how they knew the kettle have been boiled by some kind of whistle. Well, for the first time ever I actually got to hear it. I couldn't hear the water bubbling like I used to but that may be to do with my low pitches need tuning again. Isn't amazing that I could hear the kettle being boiled without the need of looking at the lights or switch? But of course you couldn't take the electric kettle to camping could you? This is a nice change for me. :D

Here are some pics from our camping weekend:

Happy Camping from the Meerkat and Mr Shirty!