Canterbury Cockroach

These seem to randomly run across the sidewalk here. cockroach video

Campsie retail shift?

From what F had told me about the council approval process, I was thinking competition would be stifled here. It is in some places, but Campsie (essentially Chinatown, but also significant Korean, Vietnamese) seems to be a free-for-all. There are about 4-5 fresh seafood and meat shops within 5 blocks. All of the seafood shops are unfavorably smelly - you have to go to the next train stop to find an un-smelly one! A new Chinese supermarket (all goods labeled in Chinese, AND they have a twitter account?!) just opened that is selling what the equivalent of about 30 nearby mom&pop stores are selling. Will the storefronts be emptied? There seem to be enough customers and loyalties, but I'm sure things will shift. Campsie is a destination shopping hub for some people.

Downtown lunch hour

Scene from the park adjacent to downtown Sydney, during lunch hour on a weekday. Park video

Ketchup or Tomato Sauce?

This is how most ketchup in Australian fast food outlets is packaged - and the restaurants charge you 80 cents for it !!! Master Foods packaging

Garbage anyone?

Someone dumped a television in the "council" strip of land on the quiet side of our fence. Since we have several televisions to discard (old CRT technology and also incapable of receiving digital signals without converter boxes), I thought, "hmm... if they're picking that up, maybe I should call for a 'major trash pick-up' (two allowed per year), and get rid of the other four televisions.

Garbage in Sydney is handled at the council level. A council is similar to a city council, except the council area usually covers several "towns," so it would be more like a county in the US (but similar administrative functions to a city council).

Anyway, I call the garbage number (which rings the COUNCIL office), and explain the situation. Sorry - a two week notice is required for the "large items pick-up."

"Would you like to report an illegal dumping?" Should I just bring in the television and hold it until we get rid of ours? No - I'm not going to accumulate other people's dumped trash.

"OK, I'll report it as an illegal dumping." Since that's what it is. I'm reporting this via cell phone, as I'm walking on the bridge across the river. When the guy finally comes on, I am across the bridge, where someone has dumped an old computer and about six bags of garbage - much worse than our single television.

Yes, I'll report the television, and while I'm at it, they should also stop by this bridge and pick up all this crap.

Less than 24 hours later, I hear a garbage truck and a crunching sound. They have picked up the television, and crushed it into the back of the truck. Wow. Service. Although the political news in Australia is filled with party accusations and scandalous rubbish, in general, Australians believe they get good service from their government - that they get their money's worth for their taxes. I am prone to agreement (though I haven't paid those notorious taxes yet). The funny thing is I hear the most complaints from George - who is likely in the lowest tax bracket. Those in the 45% bracket are more likely looking at what they can do to keep under that bracket, and not complaining about the service they get for their money.

Memorial or Commemoration

There seems to be a tradition here of getting a lock engraved with the name of a couple or someone deceased, and locking it to something in a scenic area. This video is taken from the Sea Cliff Bridge.

A Highly Successful Failure

John and Peter operated a highly successful catering business based in Bondi Junction (for those outside of Australia, see Bondi Rescue - the Ozzy version of Baywatch). When the Carriageworks, a large industrial space was renovated as an art and theater venue, johnandpeter opened their first restaurant. This is where Miss G hoped to have our reception, and in the event of rain, our ceremony.

Miss G's first meeting with johnandpetercanteen's representative was both promising and frustrating. The representative made lots of promises and quoted good prices, but would put nothing on paper.

The second meeting, with johnandpetercanteen's business manager was a bit more sobering. "This is what we can do. This is what we can't do." Things were looking a bit bleak. The meeting space was ok (it had been changed from the original - what was an open space was now enclosed by a sheer curtain, and the original long single table would no longer fit - had to be reconfigured to two long tables. The restaurant would be operating at the same time (no reception-specific music?), and there could potentially be a loud party going on in the adjoining art space (ack!) No promises, barely adequate as a reception space, and virtually unworkable as a ceremony space. It was also revealed that the person who originally made all the promises was not there, and "may not be back." Ahem.

Meeting three - whoohoo!! Big news on the restaurant front. The restaurant has had a frustrating start, and so it would no longer be functioning as a restaurant. But the good news - the reason for the frustration is that there were so many people asking to rent the space (and catering), that it was wrecking their restaurant business. People would show up for the restaurant only to find that the space was being used privately (no reservations?) So johnandpeter, the highly successful catering and event planners were "closing the restaurant" and going to operate it as a private event space.

Meeting three was with an extremely astute event planner, Sabina Evans-Zanardi. The restaurant would be CLOSED during our reception, so we potentially had the entire space (for the same price that we originally were going to pay for just the back private space). As far as the adjoining art space, they were setting up for a show, but on the day of our reception, the art space would be closed by the time our event started. In the event of rain, we could use the main restaurant space, and they would arrange it however we wanted. In addition to going through menu options and prices, Sabina made suggestions regarding timing and pacing of food, dessert, and other events to help the social flow of the event. Awesome.

Water taxi?

The Sydney water taxis seem that they might induce motion sickness! Water taxi video

Veal shanks and pork necks... that sounds to me like the parts you give to the dog, but I did, in the past six months hear about a trendy butcher who was attempting to follow the philosophy of a previous era when I'm not sure what the dogs ate, but humans sought to utilize every portion of the slaughtered animal.

In this era where pets of the target clientele are fed much better than children in many parts of the world, I'm not sure getting chi chi customers to eat pigs ears is a noble endeavor. Furthermore, veal shanks and pork necks just did not SOUND like something I wanted to eat, so I ordered a recognizable "snapper." Of course, there are about 100 different species of snapper, so what's that?

In the "typical male" department, I have to say, I have no problem asking for directions. But as a human being, I'm not really fond of being required to ask the waiter to explain every item on the menu, and take notes, before I can even BEGIN to think about what I want to eat. There are chefs out there who are intelligent beings, and they create culinary masterpieces that are extraordinary. However, I'm just having dinner, and I don't want to have to do homework, extra reading, or extensively consult with a waiter beforehand. Furthermore, my tastebuds can't read, but yeah, I know there's that "expectation" factor that justifies the price tag. Can you tell I don't watch the food channel?

The "snapper" was delicious. My partner had the pork neck, and I have to say, it looked much better on the plate, and tasted much better on the palate, than it appeared on the menu.

But that's not why I'm here.

I'm here to see the wedding reception venue, and discuss the ceremony with the celebrant. And all of that is a disaster. Because there's a rage! party going on in the same giant industrial building, meaning we have to talk over thumping music and it dawns on my partner that the same thing could be occurring while we're trying to have a reception in an intimate corner that's separated from the rest by mesh curtains.

Add to the noise problem the matter that the person who made all kinds of promises about the space (that there were guarantees of NOT having other loud events on the same afternoon as the reception) has not been available. Further inquiry reveals that this person "may not be back." As in... permanently. And so we start over with a new person, and consider finding a new venue if necessary.

Oh, and my partner has honored my wishes to not go the traditional Greek route of slaughtering a lamb and having the whole thing on a spit for this special occasion. Unbeknownst to me, however, it appears she has made arrangements for a whole pig to be on a spit. Neck and all.

Last flight for awhile?!

Finally... I have flown across the Pacific, hopefully for the last time for awhile. I have landed permanently (?!) and the wedding is six weeks away. This time, I flew from the Midwest of the US, so the flight was longer, but it actually went better. I had to get up at 3:30am in the Midwest, and went to sleep on the plane. I had a stop-over in Phoenix, which was a bit confusing, since the airline only gave me one boarding pass, but had to actually use the same boarding pass to board a second plane. From there, I had a 12 hour layover in Los Angeles. Luckily, my bags were checked through so I didn't have to deal with them, and I have a friend in the area, so we had a wonderful time taking the bus to Santa Monica and strolling along the beach. After spending the day in Santa Monica (and I was lugging my carry-on with me the entire time), I was tired and went to sleep on the plane again. I woke up for an 11pm (California time) dinner, watched Toy Story 3 (fell asleep during it, but resumed it later), and an episode of 30 Rock. Being so tired was definitely helpful in tolerating the long flight, since I slept through most of it. On previous flights, I had been miserable trying to sleep but unable to get very comfortable. When we landed in Auckland, it was 5am and still dark. I was hoping it would get light before the plane departed, since I had a window seat and wanted to see New Zealand from the air. Unfortunately, the plane took off in heavy clouds, rain, and darkness, and sunlight only greeted us when we rose above the thick clouds. I saw nothing of New Zealand but the inside of the airport and thick cloud cover. I'm inspired to go back, but as I've learned more about their weather and water temperatures, I'm glad to be in Australia. The cloud cover didn't really dissipate until we got close to Sydney, and I was greeted by lovely fall weather and my future bride. This all went a long way towards making me feel like I was home.

Coming to take me away!

F.  is now on the plane headed to the States to help me sort through my possessions and to meet the family. Then I'm off to Australia to get married!

Houses and people living in them

<p>My observation was that although I had read that Australians have very large houses compared to other nations,&#160; I was seeing more extended families in those houses,&#160; so the space was being used by more people.&#160; However,&#160; checking further into the statistics,&#160; the US and Australia have the same number of people per household.&#160; I suspected and confirmed that my observations were skewed because I was seeing largely first and second generation immigrant neighborhoods. New homes in the US were becoming some of the largest in the world,&#160; but with the artificially created boom now over,&#160; that may change. The US and Australia are adjacent in the <a href="http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/peo_ave_siz_of_hou-people-average-size-of-households"> global statistics</a>. </p>

Other Hoosiers!!

While sequestered in the purgatory that is the Homeland Security stockyard at LAX, ran into two other Hoosiers who were returning from Perth - a guy from Bloomington and a woman from ? who is a math teacher.

Driver's license

Woohoo! Instructions: use existing stateside license (including motorcycle) for first 6 months. After that, show proof of living in Australia for 6 months and convert to New South Wales driver's license. (in the Queen's English... licensing / licence; hmm...)

No written test, no driving test - that's only for people who have no previous license (licence), people who violate the rules, or the elderly.

Rumor: lose your New South Wales license (licence)? Fly over to Indonesia and pick up a license there for $30; use it to drive in NSW.

Wedding Factory

The Royal Botanical Gardens in Sydney are a wedding factory. There were three weddings going on when we visited on a Friday afternoon.

Wedding Factory

The Royal Botanical Gardens in Sydney are a wedding factory. There were three weddings going on when we visited on a Friday afternoon.

Ugly Australian

Had a drive-by by an ugly Australian today. Guy yelled something out his car window - rather out of the blue - we were on the sidewalk in Woolongong (NSW). I didn't even catch what he said but F. did. Oddly enough, this is the second primitive-minded person I've met from Woolongong - a former industrial city now home to a university and sprouting condos by the seashore. I'm speculating that the traditional industrially-employed residents are not so thrilled to be getting priced out of their hometown.

Empire

How strange to be in a land where Empire is accepted as truth,  and royalty is still the figurehead. There is certainly more dignity to that than to the honor of blind avarice and greed as somehow noble endeavors,  and invasions of other countries based on ideals that are held up as excuses ,  but not honored.