Australia Day and other random stories

Photos are of my Australia Day in London are here.

How do you spend Australia Day in another country? For me, I cooked up a huuuuge roast lamb, invited my Aussie and New Zealander friends around (Liz and Emma), drank Aussie beer and finished with pavlova. We also listened to the Triple J hottest 100 countdown over the internet.

We then engaged in some silliness with the cardboard cutout of George (Clooney) who I found sitting outside our house the other week, conveniently already cut out where his tongue is (hmmm). And we also had champas.

....And then cocktails at the pub around the corner where more Aussies were to be found. Good thing the pub is only 10 or 20 metres away - makes for a quick trip home! Did not prevent me from having a pounding headache the next day though. Must drink more water. Oh well.

Other random stories - public transportation (and stories about crazy people).

I have 2 stories to share. The first is of catching the tube home one afternoon on a weekend. The tube wasn't packed (for a change). We pull into a station. I can hear loud music coming from somewhere - which is odd - because you never hear loud music down in the tube. There's no mobile or radio reception, and people generally listen to their the ipods or read newspapers. Communication or interaction is not encouraged, unless you're with a friend or shamelessly drunk.

Anyway, the source of the loud music happens to be this very straight looking 50 year old man with a boombox over his shoulder pelting out the tune of "I'm every woman". It was really funny, but again, eye contact is not encouraged. He stumbled off the tube a couple of stations later, boombox and can of beer in hand. Personally I think it's very hobo to drink booze on public transport - but everyone seems to do it here - it's the norm.

My second story occurs at an overland (above ground) train station on the way to work one morning. An old man starts talking to me (whilst I'm thinking "here we go" and rolling my eyes internally). Turns out he wanted to make sure he was getting the right train for his station - which happened to be where I was getting off/going anyway. He also wanted to make sure he didn't fall asleep as well. So I made sure he got the right train with me and we sat on the train together. He'd just bought some fresh fruit as well, and gave me some to eat (I was starving), and made sure he got off the right station with me (he did nodd off a couple of times). So I guess not everyone is crazy here. Although, they are entertaining.. :)

Holidays at home and ahead

Brisbane photos are here.

Well, I went home for 2 weeks over Christmas / New Year. I arrived on Christmas Day at 7pm after an incredibly long flight with very little sleep. I got to fly on one of those new A300 airbuses (the double decker one). My Mum, sister and her boyfriend met me at the airport. Ash broke away from the barrier and gave me a huge hug. I was back in Brisbane. It wasn’t as hot as I thought it would be – it had been raining. And the rain didn’t stop the entire time I was there, except for may be 2 days. Apparently I brought the weather with me.

Highlights

I got to catch up with and see my family and friends.
I got to see my Dad’s new house. It’s huge. There’s a pool and a big outdoor barbecue area.
I went to all my favourite restaurants, and ate all the food I had been missing so badly.
Australian bacon is the best – English bacon just doesn’t compare. Same goes for seafood.
It was nice wearing summer clothes for a change, leaving the cold English weather and 500 layers of clothing behind.
I stayed in a beautiful hotel in the city at the beginning – the Stamford Plaza Hotel – thanks to Bahadir, it was lovely.
I went to the beach / Noosa twice.
I had a big barbeque at my Dad’s house and invited heaps of people over.
I guess I was kind of spoilt while I was home.

Lowlights

It rained almost the entire time – I came back and the weather in London was better than Brisbane (which is seriously wrong). So I didn’t end up staying at the coast or doing any of the day trips such as Byron.
I had to find a new home for my cat Kiddy, which was stressful / challenging, but turned out well in the end, I think. He’s now living down the Gold Coast.
Did I mention it rained, constantly?

All these things aside, it was interesting going home to Brisbane. Brisbane itself hadn’t changed much, and there still wasn’t a great deal to actually “do” there. There were little changes, like new shops etc. But living in Australia, you very much embrace the outdoors, and nearly everything revolves around and is dependant on this. When you are forced indoors (due to weather), there really isn’t a lot to do (apart from watching boring daytime tv or going shopping), and you are forced to make your own fun - if you’re motivated to do so.

I also visited my old work, which was very weird. Everyone had moved desks, there were some new faces - it was good seeing my old work buddies though. And it was funny seeing my face plastered over all the screensavers there. I got to have my chai latte from the cafeteria which I *adored*. Hot drinks over here in the UK are never hot enough, or your cold drinks are never cold – they just can’t seem to get it quite right.

Something random – a lot of people commented on the watch I was wearing. It was of course purple, and I bought it new off ebay a few months ago. But if you want your own – you can buy it from this site: http://www.blingwatches.co.uk/advanced_search_result.php?keywords=Swiss+Balance+Ladies+Mosaic+Watch

Anyway, I’m back in London now and looking forward to the year ahead. I’ve got a few more trips if all goes to plan – hopefully Edinburgh, Switzerland, Devon, Cornwall and Paris next month for my birthday with my friend Karen who's coming out to stay with me for a couple of weeks from Canada! We're also going to Eurodisney while we're there. I’ve also decided to apply another visa so I can keep working - I feel as though I've barely scratched the surface with all the travelling I want to do over here. I’ve also decided that when my lease is up at the end of April, I'd like to move out of (dodgy) Brixton and over to Clapham Junction. It’s a great area – lots of cute shops, restaurants, bars – it’s very lively and also right near a major train station – so it would make getting to work a hell of a lot easier and it's still only 10-15 minutes outside of Central London itself. I’m really looking forward to moving and discovering a new area.

So that's my holiday at home and my plans for this year..