Sydney At Large

Other than the reality of my personal/emotional life being like a roller coaster these days, the fact remains that I am now in Australia—and generally loving it. In many ways, being here feels much like being in the states may, but, at the same time, it’s completely different. If anything, I am enjoying the subtly inherent in the differences between here and elsewhere.

One of my favorite things so far is the Aussie accent and vocabulary. I have had moments (particularly on the phone) where I felt like myself and the person on the other line were speaking a different language. On the other hand, Kristin and I have had endless laughs about different pronunciations, inflections, and words. One of the most endearing Aussie habit (at least to me) is their tendency to add -ie- to the end of words while shortening them at the same time. For example: Uni, margie, sunnies, boardies, the postie, Vinnies...the list goes on (10 points if you know what those all are in their lengthened versions. I know I am also picking up (unintentionally) a bit of the phrasing used here (eg: "have a chat") and some of the words (eg: massive, heaps, swimmers, keen). I could go on forever about these crazy language things, but I suspect it is much more interesting to actually experience than read about.

One of the most simple, but most disconcerting differences between here and home is that the traffic drives on the left side of the street--therefore all road rules, locations, etc are flipped around. I'm actually nearly used to it after about 3 weeks, but Noah is still quite thrown off and I still look over both shoulders a million times before crossing the street, just to be sure.

Approaching Christmas as summer is arriving has been a joyous experience. Having the Christmas season mean warmer days, beach time, picnics, longer days, and summer school holidays definitely colors the season differently than the environment I've grown up with at home. I have decided that mot people are just as overly busy and slightly stressed out as people at home often are at this time of year, but that it is all hidden better maybe in part because there are simply ore hours of daylight to be productive in, so one has time to go Christmas shopping, attend all those holiday fundraising and socializing functions, work, and still have time to sit on the beach for a bit now and then. Plus, no time is spent bundling up or down every time you come in or out of the house :).

Even so, it doesn't quite feel like Christmas as I know it, but I'm OK with that I think. There are fewer Christmas lights and less Christmas music playing in stores, few Christmas fundraisers, and definitely no horse-drawn sleighs. However, the mall and grocery stores are just as packed as they would be at home, the same Christmas tins are on sale, people still have family Christmas traditions (albeit a beach picnic instead of a cross-country ski), and the beaches/campgrounds/national parks are noticeably busier than when I arrived. I'm looking forward to trying on the tradition of a swim at the beach, a movie in the afternoon, and a BBQ for dinner with relatives, it can't be all that bad.

One last word/observation from my last few weeks here involves the coffee culture. (All my time at Pendl's makes me an interested, if somewhat critical customer). To start with, instant coffee seems to be all the rage here. Yuck. (It is what Kristin's family drinks, although they do have a drip coffee maker that is about 30 years old and french press that was buried in the back of the cupboard until I pulled it out.) I mean, the instant is drinkable, but it's not truly coffee. Beyond that, coffee shops are pretty much everywhere and commonplace, but it is impossible to buy a cup of drip house coffee anywhere. The concept doesn't exist. The closest thing you can get is what is called a long or short black (which is most closely equated with an Americano in my coffee lingo and just as expensive as a latte). Other than that, the options are: Flat White, Cappuccino, or Latte, all of which are often the same size, cost nearly the same, and, more or less, seem to be about the same thing despite the different names (pretty much a latte, by my description). This is a bad thing for my budget approach to going out for coffee, since the only options are the 3-4$ lattes...oh well. I also think I will poke into a Starbucks at some point just to see if they do have house coffee, or if that part of the Starbucks identity is foregone here because the market for it may not exist, hmmm...makes one wonder.

Anyway, there are (quite) a few random thoughts by Martha from Australia. Take from them what you will. Merry Christmas to all!!!

Unpredictability Knocks Again

What a crazy two weeks the last two have been! The most relevant hectic-ness started after returning from camping. The next few days were grey and rainy and Kristin was busy with some side work, family responsibilites etc, so I had a lot of time to sit and think (which isn't always a good thing). What I found out though was that I was suffering from a case of (gasp) homesickness. I hardly even knew what to make of this. It is such a strange experience/emotion and so far out of my normal experience. But, as is often the case, the first step to recovery is admitting there is a problem and those few listless days resulted in some drastic, overall positive changes:

1. Noah is now in Australia with me. He arrived on the 15th (we bought the ticket on the 10th) and I think both of us are alternately in shock that we are now in Sydney together, but are both happier for it. We are still staying with Kristin and her family who have been absolutely amazing to me/us over the last month. It is already a home away from home here, which is great. We are planning to stay here through at least the 8th of January because Kristin and I have tickets to see a Cirque de Soleil show at the opera house that afternoon, and I have no intention of missing out on it. After that, who knows.

2. Since the whole reason Noah hadn't planned on coming to meet me earlier in the first place was his lack of funding, I am subsidizing his spur of the moment holiday. (As my wonderful sister pointed out to me though, using my nest egg in this way makes sense; the core intention of saving up was to buy myself a period of time with the complete freedom to do whatever I wanted to/made me happy and helping Noah afford to be here with me fits that bill.) At the end of the day though, we will be living the cliche of young, in love, and broke--although right now we are only young, in love, and poor, but a couple of months here will change that. The ultimate upswing of this is that South East Asia will likely be happening some other day on some other adventure and that (barring a lucky lotto ticket) we will be returning to the States at the end of February when my Aussie visa expires. At that point, it follows logically that we'll head back to Driggs, at least for a little while so, at the least, my parents can meet the person that has caused their rather level-headed, reasonable daughter to behave in a rather abnormal manner the last few months. (It does help a little though that no matter how logical I am, I have always been a bit unpredictable). Don't hold me to any of that though, I'm not hedging bets on anything going as "planned" these days.

3. I am truly happy, although still often conflicted with myself over the rapid, extreme change of events over the last few months, but that is almost to be expected I think. I am still a bit homesick for mom, dad and Robin at times, especially thinking about the upcoming Christmas holiday that I have never spent anywhere else than at home with the three of them. I am, however, not at all missing the winter weather and continue to revel in the beach and sunshine aspect this Christmastime has to offer. Other than that, I am blown away by life, myself, Noah, and, more generally, the Universe at large. Here's to the last couple weeks of 2008!

Welcome to Sydney

Well, let's see. As previously mentioned, I am staying at my friend Kristin's house (we were fellow Guatemalan language students back in Xela.) She grew up in a suburb North of Sydney called Mona Vale and has just recently returned from her own extended overseas experience. We have spent a considerable amount of our time simply hanging out and chatting, eating, laughing...and chatting. It's been great. She is not working right now, so we are essentially both on "holiday." Other than showing me around her stomping grounds (downtown Mona Vale, the beach, both about a 15 minute walk away), Kristen has taken me to the nearby touristy area of Manly, where we sat on the beach, had Fish & Chips for lunch, and enjoyed people watching.

We went into Sydney proper last Thursday via bus/ferry and visited many of the stereotypical sites (Walked out on the Harbor Bridge, by the Opera House, through the Botanical Gardens, visited the Sydney Christmas tree, Pitt Street Mall, Darling Harbour, the Conservatorium- where Kristin attended "Uni"-you get the idea). Later that day we met up with a student from Peru (Marco), whom Kristin met through a language exchange, and all three of us spent some time chatting in Spanish and then English (my Spanish is rusty!). We have some tentative plans to give salsa dancing in the city a try this weekend. All in all, I am so happy to be here and very grateful for the hospitality of Kristin and her family. It is just the environment I need to be in right now.

This weekend we went camping with a group of Kristin's friends. We drove up to Myall Lakes National Park, about 3 1/2 hours away. Half of the group went up earlier in the week and one of the guys owns a little speed boat. We arrived way after dark and met him at the dock to have us and our stuff zipped across the lake to a campground area where no one but our group was staying. It was wonderful. We were camping in high style and basically just hung about on Saturday, swimming, eating, reading, napping. It was fun to meet Kristin's friends, many of whom she attended both primary school and high school with. I caught a quick glimpse of a baby Dingo in the morning (aparently they will sometimes drag coolers (aka in Aussie-"Esquis") into the bush and eat all the food) and we had a small Goanna (similar in looks to an iguana, but not quite) hanging around after smelling the eggs we had for breakfast. It was a beautiful area and fun to get out into the "bush" even if in luxury.

The cicadas here are everywhere and so loud, so much so that I almost stopped hearing them over the weekend. On the camping trip I made a comment to this effect and one of the girls along said the noise was one she had always associated with Christmas time. It is a noise I associate with the jungle... We returned Sunday with plans to make another few excursions of the sort over the approaching summer holiday. (The school year, just like the seasons are backwards here, which makes total sense, but was not something I had thought about.)

I am constantly reminding myself that it is December and am enjoying the month (and, by extension, the Christmas season) so much more than I often do. The longer days, warmer temperatures, approaching summer holidays, and layed-back attitude seems more appropriate for the holiday season. Plus, I am enjoying discovering subtle differences in the way of life while still starting to feel a bit at home. For not being busy, time is still slipping by quite easily and I assume it will continue to do so.

New Zealand...or not...

Last Saturday (or, actually, two Saturdays ag0) watched me see Noah off at the bus station in Charlottesville, pack up my stuff, return the rental car, and head to the airport, to end up in LA later that evening. One night in a hotel (thanks mom and dad), and 13.5 hours of flight time later, I found myself landing (in the future) at the Auckland airport in New Zealand (home is 4 hours ahead of me right now, but a day behind, weird). I was fortunate enough to sleep a great portion of the long flight, but still landed with massive jet lag, as is to be expected. I caught a shuttle to Bamber House where I had booked a reservation before leaving the states. The office was closed when I arrived (because it was so early in the morning) and as it turned out, I didn’t get a bed until about 1 that afternoon, which meant I fell asleep on one of the lounge couches for an hour or two in the morning and barely made it to the grocery store that afternoon before falling asleep for the night.

Upon landing and getting oriented, the strangest thing happened. I realized that I didn’t really want to be in New Zealand right now. I was, for some inexplicable reason, not feeling the vibe of traveling here, right now. I tried to pass off that feeling the first day to jet lag, missing Noah, having no plans etc, but it didn’t really go away. After waking up the next morning to find someone had taken the $60 US cash I had from my wallet overnight while I slept, finding out that a friend from the states I had hoped to cross paths with wasn’t going to be in Auckland after all, and still having this sensation that now was not my time for an affair with New Zealand after having slept a solid 12-13 hours, I decided to honor the gut instinct. So, I did what had to be done and got my flight switched to take me to Australia on the 30^th (which is today, I am writing this at the airport where my 5:45 am flight was delayed over two hours, but not soon enough for me to know I didn’t have to get up at 2:30 in the morning to get to the airport, oh well, the joys of travel).

What that means is that, ironically enough, my New Zealand experience has consisted of 5 days in Auckland, which is, they say, the “worst” part of the country (I have consistently received advice to get out of it into the countryside as soon as possible). I haven’t thought it was too bad as far as cities go, although I have admittedly been fine with staying fairly low key. Between recovering from the jet lag, getting my head sorted out (or starting to) what with all the craziness of the last month, and enjoying the warmer weather and interesting company one finds at a hostel, the last 5 days has been actually quite needed and pleasant. I managed to climb the volcano Mt. Eden three times (it was right nearby, and more of a walk than a climb) and there is a great view of the city from up there, plus cows grazing all over it. Another day I walked around the city with someone else from the hostel, seeing at least part of it on foot. I was inspired by a fellow backpacker (who didn’t know what it was) to make pumpkin pie in honor of Thanksgiving; a mundane, tasty adventure though. I actually had to buy pumpkin and bake it, as canned pumpkin puree is apparently not something one can purchase here. It turned out quite well though--despite the square baking pan--and it is always fun to share stuff like that; anyone not from North America had never had pumpkin pie (pumpkin pie is sweet, not savory?) and it made for a good afternoon activity. All in all, I’m sure I’ll be back to New Zealand sometime in the future, but am feeling quite glad I listened to that first instinct and decided to move on. I feel grateful I am in a position to do so.

So, as it goes, here comes Australia! I’m actually feeling quite a bit more excited than I was for New Zealand, for whatever reason. I am planning to stay first with my friend Kristin (from Sydney) who I met in Xela on my Guatemala trip last year and have stayed in touch with. After that, who knows, but I’ve got some ideas, we’ll see how it works out.

I did write this post at the airport in New Zealand on Sunday (or Saturday for most of you reading this), but have not had the time/chance to get it up and posted until now. I made it to Kristin's house easily and am loving being here. We are having a great time together, her family has been nothing but welcoming, and the weather is all warm and sun-shinny. I think if anything, it looks like I'll be staying with her for a while and I'm feeling like this is more where I should be!