july 6 : train day

Last night, every single person in our room went to the bathroom between 4:30 and 5:00 am.

We are spending the day traveling from Sydney to Byron Bay, 10 hours by train. Early in the morning, we get on the train and unload our packs, sleeping bags, and 4 bags of groceries. Naomi and I had a giggling fit about the amount of food we brought for our 12 hour trip. Enough to feed us for 3 days. In case you are wondering:

• salad
• pasta and sauce
• oranges
• yogurt
• tuna
• crackers
• cookies
• peanuts and walnuts
• trailmix
• tea and sugar
• chocolate bars
• V8
• lettuce and spinach (that's in addition to the salad)
• peanut butter
• nutella
• peanut butter sandwiches, already prepared
• coconut bread from the Korean bread store
• cheese
• water bottles
• MMs
  

We unpacked it all and it barely stayed up on our TWO meal trays long enough to take a picture. Then we put it away and picked at it throughout the day, barely making a dent.

The beginning of the route is seriously the windiest, slowest train I have ever been on. Part of the route goes through the Great Dividing Range Mountains, and that windy slowness is understandable. But miles and miles of the trip takes place over flattened fields and through relatively flat forests. The train S-curves through these parts as well, never going above 40 mph. It is as though the railroad engineers decided to follow the contours of an imaginary river EXACTLY. This commute it going to take us 12 hours but it could probably be shortened in half if they relaid the tracks in a a straight line and then the train could quit meandering and speed up. Also, then I could on the train without getting dizzy.

Twenty minutes outside of Sydney, we are in wilderness. Lush hills of eucalyptus and bush. Green, green, green. Hills for miles. Fog filling the valleys and lazily smoking upwards. Feels like rainforest.

Lush, green forests make way for pasture land and rolling hills, scattered trees. Sheep and cows grazing.

Lots of eucalyptus forests.

Pastures and farmland turn into small towns with grassy fields and rivers.

What do we do on the bus? We read and eat. We see one black guy on the train. This is the most exciting thing to happen all day. We vow to never take an all-day train again.

Australian thing of the day: Coconut bread, which is probably Taiwanese, but it counts since I ate the whole bag along the Australian countryside. Coconut bread feels like a cloud on your tongue, warm, light, and sweet. I would eat this for breakfast every day if I had a Taiwanese bread machine.

Australian thing of the day 2: Orange flavored MMs. Just like the regular ones, with a shot of orange flavor. Worth the inflated overseas price.

july 5 : sid-nee

After the game we went to THE GROCERY STORE which thrilled both of us beyond belief. I love foreign markets. We wandered up and down the aisles and probably spent a good 20 minutes ogling at their selection of tuna. We left with tons and tons of food.

After eating dinner back at the hostel, I got a call from Julian, Glenda's cousin. He came by and the three of us went to a bar and talked about how much he hates Australians. I drank Australian beer which was gross, just as gross as American beer. Julian was a wealth of information and provided us with several awesome Michael Jackson jokes. Which I have dutifully reprinted below.


Q: When does Michael Jackson know it is time to go to bed
A: When the big hand touches the little hand.

Q: How does Michael Jackson pick his nose?
A: From a catalogue.

Micheal Jackson went swimming in Sydney Harbor. Do you know why he didn't drown? He was holding on to a buoy.

Did you know that Michael Jackson thought that Boys II Men was an ordering service.

And my favorite cringe-worthy MJ joke, from Benja many years ago:
Q: What's the difference between Neil Armstrong and Michael Jackson?
A: Neil Armstrong walked on the moon, and Michael Jackson touches little boys.

aussie rules football rules

On Sunday we had planned to go to the Jewish Museum and then the Australian Museum. We took the train to Kings Cross and started walking around, trying to find that famous Coca Cola sign. I have to report that I was sorely disappointed by it. I was expecting a metallic, glittering, stand up cursive affair, like the one in Strictly Ballroom. The two-dimensional plastic poster was boring. Baz Luhrman's Sydney is much more brilliant.

Just as we passed the red and white sign, we spotted a bunch of people wearing red and white clothes. They were all walking in the same direction. We followed them. We decided to go to a rugby game!

Or so we thought! The playing grounds were called "Sydney Cricket Grounds," and there was a bit of worry that we might be held captive to a long and slow cricket death match. Judging from the kids' balls they had brought, which were football-like but slightly bigger and rounder, we decided on rugby. The first half of the game we spent trying to figure out how points were scored. In rugby, we decided, you earned 6 points by getting the ball through the middle posts, and just one point from the side posts. In rugby, you did not wear helmets or padding or any protection at all. During halftime, I turned around and asked a fellow what sport we were watching. With real concern in his eyes, he informed me that this was an Australian Football League game.

THESE ARE THE RULES TO AUSTRALIAN RULES FOOTBALL, AS FAR AS WE CAN TELL.

1. The players must wear short shorts. That is their only rule. They are pretty much allowed to do whatever they want to get the ball through the goal posts – run, walk, throw, catch, bounce, tackle, block, grab, punch, etc. You can grab a player's groin and box him in the nose while grabbing the ball from under his shirt. Anything goes. They are pretty strict about the shorts, though.
2. The referees, who also wear short shorts, must sprint across the field at Olympic speed when handling and out-of-play ball. They need to practice their running and backwards throwing year round if they are to qualify for referee-ship for the season. No out of shape refs here, nosiree.
   
3. Spectators must wear tons of Swan flair, hats, sweaters, scarves, flags, shirts. It is best if you wear all of this at once. If you don't have official membership gear, you can just wear a lot of red and white.
4. During quarter breaks, you must leave your seat and buy food. If you are buying beer, you must spill half of the cup while walking back to your seat.
5. Don't you dare eat broccoli at the game.
6. The winning team fans will stand and sing their team song at the end of the game.

Australian thing of the day: Australian football.

july 4 : sid-nee

Yesterday was a big walking day. First I woke up at 5:30, which didn't seem too bad for the first night of jet lag. So I spent the wee hours of the morning reading in the lounge, where there is a giant brown couch, deep cushions, huge ottoman, where I want to spend every lazy moment.

Naomi was arriving at 7ish, and through a series of mixed messages with the check in people, she headed up to my room to wait for me while I waited for her in the lounge. At about 8 I went upstairs and discovered her. She had been trying to wake up another girl in the room by called my name and the other girl was very sleepily ignoring her. We rejoiced and I marked the occasion by eating a power bar. (“Wait, you ate a power bar? I don't remember that.” --Naomi)

First stop: Paddy's Market for fresh produce. We got a bunch of stuff for salad and snacks and then ravenously ate back at YHA. I miss salad dressing and have vowed to buy a bottle at the next opportunity.

Second stop: Railway station to buy tickets to Byron Bay or just bug the ticket people about various passes, railway savers, student rates, YHA fares. Naomi's ticket guy sucked, but my lady was really cool and added up every single train ride I plan to take (9) and then established that none of the rail passes would save me any money. So after all that, we didn't buy tickets and instead “thought about it.”

I asked Naomi what we would do to mark the July 4 holiday and she remarked that I was wearing red earmuffs. And a white shirt. And blue jeans. We sang patriotic songs (badly) on our walk through the city. We both love You're a Grand Ole' Flag but neither of us knows the words beyond, you're a high flying flag.

On our way to Sydney Opera House! But first actually, we passed the NSW state library first, and it had a really impressive exterior (Victorian/Gothic stonework! Stained glass windows! Copper dome!) and an even cooler interior. A huge old map from 1644 was done in stone in the foyer, and you know how I love maps. The library had a huge reading room like NY Public Library, books stacked on three story walls with old fashioned banisters and ladders, open white ceiling that felt like a giant sky-light. We wandered into an exhibition of old panoramic photos of Australia, and I impressed Naomi by identifying most of them and reporting where they were taken. (2 movies, 2 books, and lot of Wikipedia research.)

Sydney Opera House! You all know what this looks like! Up close, it is way cooler. I thought the canopies were made out of canvas and billowed in the wind, but really they are stone and tiled in a shiny/matte pattern. Up close, they really do resemble huge clam shells. There was really good people watching and bridge-walker watching, so we sat awhile and marveled.

Then off to the Royal Botanical Gardens which are like a great big manicured park with birds and bats and picnickers. We saw lots of fig trees (ficus!), ferns, bamboo which is really loud and frightening when blowing in the wind, seriously “creak creak creaky” as if they are going to fall down on you any moment, fruit bats hanging upside down, a wedding party photograph session, mini trees inside wrought iron jails, palm trees, a pond, lots of birds that we are not allowed to feed! Ever! And of course, the Wollemi Pine, thought to be millions of years extinct until it was found growing happily in Australia and now you can buy your own Wollemi Pine in the gift shop. Also we saw a group of twenty-somethings wearing red and black and tutus and hats and really just lots and lots of clothing that fit the color scheme, shouting and singing and drinking and they even had their own Donald Duck mascot. Maybe a class reunion? I wanted to join them with my red ear warmers but alas. While checking my hair for guano droppings I noticed that I had had a bloody nose and NAOMI DIDN'T TELL ME. Minus ten points.

Hungry and exhausted, we headed home but first stopped at Art Gallery NSW, because it was free. And the exterior was Victorian/Gothic/copper with Ionian pillars. SO PROUD that I can distinguish between pillar styles, thank you 6th Grade History Alive! I wanted to see the silk ikats of Central Asia, but the guard told us that it had just closed, but don't worry, “It's nothing, just a lot of clothes. You won't like it.”

We left our judgmental guard and slowly plodded home. Stopped to internet and discovered that SARAH PALIN RESIGNED!!??!?!!?! Wanted to spend the next three hours reading huffpo and mudflats and being flabbergasted and deliriously happy.

In celebration of our nation's birth, the bar next door was playing patriotic songs and having a pole-dancing competition to win a free trip to Fraser Island. We instead went to sleep.

Australian thing of the day: Custard Apple. Looks like an artichoke from a distance, a really lumpy giant guava from up close. It is squishy like a rotten apple. Inside is white, like a pear, but softer. It tastes like guava/mango/pear/apple. Once we established that it wouldn't make us gag, we cut it up and ate it in salad.
Verdict: Yum.

electrical storm

Hm. I just plugged in the computer charger, with the Australia plug and surge protector on the end, and the wall socket sparked and smoked. I took it out immediately, and thank goodness it wasn't connected to my computer. There are smoke marks on the output of the surge protector. Maybe it wasn't ready for 240V? It says the max voltage surge is 330V. I'm scared to plug in my computer, ever.

july 3 : sid-nee

Of wandering around only half conscious...

Three hours to kill until noon check in, when I can take a much needed nap. I sit in the lounge intending to do internet or read, but instead fall asleep all over my computer. I got myself a real chai latte from a cafe and had a walk around the neighborhood. Scoping out the food places (numerable), the people (white and asian, no black), and the neighborhood (meh). Happily returned to my hostel and took a much needed, horizontal nap.

At two-ish I forced myself awake to go do more touring. First I had a veggie burger at Hungry Jacks, which is really just Burger King in disguise. I mean, logo and everything. I was happy to be inside because Sydney is really windy and Wimbledon was playing.

Then I unintentionally took a religious tour of central Sydney. First was St. Andrews Cathedral, a gorgeous Victorian/Gothic stone building with stain-glass windows and copper (green) spires. There was nothing really notable about it other than it was large and pretty and had a nice courtyard with huge flowering eucalyptus trees. I'm just going to go ahead and assume all of the trees here are some kind of eucalyptus. On the other side of the courtyard is City Hall, but that was under construction. Across the street was the Queen Victoria Shopping Center, or something to that effect, with a great statue of HRH looking totally like the Queen of Hearts in Alice in Wonderland, and a fountain statue of her pet dog. When you walked by the dog, he greeted you and requested you make a coin donation to his wishing fountain. The dog statue spoke English. I am not making this up.

Next to Victoria's shopping arcade were two little theaters with brilliant gold art-deco interiors. I took some pictures, then walked on to the Great Synagogue. It reminded me of Bnei Jeshrun in NY-- all stone, round petaled stain-glass, squished up against the buildings on either side of it. The Great Synagogue also had a pretty wrought iron fence around it, which seemed little superfluous.

I walked through Hyde Park, which is a truly charming park in the center of the city. It's about the size of two square blocks and has manicured lawns and a few garden areas. What makes this park really lovely are the stately fig trees lining the perimeter and foot paths. These fig trees are the kinds whose smooth trunks and branches twist and braid around each other. The branches grow really tall and long and provide a lush leafy canopy. In the center of the park there is a stunning fountain with bronze statues of Apollo and that other character slaying the Minotaur (I am the worst teacher) and let's pretend it was Athena sitting with a deer.

Off to St. Mary's Cathedral! A gorgeous Victorian/Gothic stone building with stained-glass windows and copper spires! Apparently they have the oldest continuing choir in Australia, but they weren't there today, boo. Next door was an old prison barracks converted into a museum, but it was closing and I nearly got locked inside.

A block away sits St. James' Church, which was my favorite worshiping spot. From the outside, it appeared to be another Victorian/Gothic stone building with stained-glass windows and copper spires, but inside it was small and personal. The ceiling was low, the walls were flat, there were no gargantuan pillars holding the roof up. The architect of St. James' apparently was a convict. The altar wall was made of hammered gold and it was awesome to look at. I guess I lingered too long in the pews because I was invited to take part in their prayer service.

As I was walking back to YHA, I passed the Great Synagogue again, but this time it was open for Kabbalat Shabbat. I took a peek inside and was a little disappointed at its Easter egg interior. Pretty, but not . . . religious?

At 5:30 I decided to call it a day. I'm going to try to make some phone calls, eat dinner, and then sleep like a log.

july 1 : arrival

I would be remiss if I didn't let you know about my plane outfit. Although it is July 1 in Los Angeles, it is the heart of winter on my 747 airbus. Thus, I am wearing a full sweatsuit combo (which I got form New LA lost and found, SCORE!) and a down jacket. I nearly died of heat stroke getting dressed in my apt.

I see a strange man with curly homeless hair, wearing black loafers with white socks. I wonder if he weren't famous, would Michael Jackson be stopped at security as a “person of interest?” Would he get through El Al security? Can you picture him removing his shoes (and bedazzled military jacket) in the x-ray line?

Right now I am the Central Sydney YHA, tired out of my MIND and I have about 4 hours to kill until my room is ready and I can take a nap. It's the combination of Dramamine, Benadryl, jet lag, and red-eye flight. It is a real chore to keep my eyes open. I'm also reclining on a very comfortable couch, which doesn't help my cause. I attempted to purchase a chai latte from the coffee vending machine, but it ate my coins. Perhaps I'll leave this building and find some real Australian caffeine.