Australia, 2009-11-23
After fifteen hours on a plane, busrides, and walking around, I’m a bit more ripe than I anticipated. Oh, that shower felt good.
Lanaea and I walked from Bondi Junction to the hostel, Bondi Beachouse, which turned out to be a couple kilometers. It felt good after so much sitting. But, try as I might to amplify my awareness: threats, exits, locale, possible joints for dinner, interesting cultural habits, etc., one of the first things I do is look left-right-left before crossing the street. And just about get clipped by a car — oh yeah, they drive on the left here. Make sure I do right-left-right in the future.
It’s the little things that’ll getcha.
The hostel is decent by hostel standards, moderately sized with a terrace overlooking Tamarama Bay to the south. As soon as we walked in we met an American from Maine who was trying to get together more pats in order to scrounge together a Thanksgiving dinner on Thursday. Unfortunately, we’ll be in central Sydney come Thursday so we’ll have to make do on our own. He’s also told us that Melbourne just received a month’s worth of rain in the last day. Bridges have been washed out — as in completely destroyed. This might make our Great Ocean Road drive a bit more of an adventure.
Wandering down to Bondi Beach, we come across an oceanside pool, where the surf crashes over the separator, filling and draining the pool. Weeks later, I’d see that same pool on the news, with the Australian Olympic swim team modeling suits in front of it.
On the culinary side, bacon here is a real man’s bacon: not overcooked, in huge thick slices, with lots of fat. Normally, I’m not such a fan of the fat, but in the case: oh hell yes. The coffee, however, I haven’t adjusted to. If you don’t want something fancy, it’s either a “long black” — espresso with no milk or cream — or a “flat white,” — which looks and tastes like a latte, despite being a separate line item on the menu. The place on Hall St we had brunch at (it’s 10a local time, and we were served an unsatisfying ariline breakfast at 4:30a) served up Lanaea’s flat white with a little message in the foam, very intricate and well executed, and I wonder if they just do that for the tourists. (Aside from the accents, it’s apparent we’re first-timers when I stare, non-plussed, in response to the question, “What kind of coffee?”)
After a short while, we realized it was still near noon, and had more things we wanted to do than time to do them. Bondi to Coogee beach walk, Blue Mountains, Hunter Valley, Manly beach, Operahous and Harbor Bridge, exploring Bondi, etc. We started down the cost to Tamarama, which was distinctive thus ar for it’s encolsing rock formations, more so than anything else. There was another oceanside pool, which we’d soon find commonplace, but at this point was still a novelty. There was also the awkward formation of picnic tables — a circular concrete roofing, under which four equal sized partitions were divided, such that each group would be completely separated visually, but not aurally, from each other, yet in very close proximity. It seemed very Japanese to me.
We continued on, despite the looming thunderheads and rolling thuds of distant storms, and found ourselves descending on a stunning display of necrotic headstones and mausoleums. Waverly Cemetery. It abutts the coast, with a freshly renovated walkway just below it, yet the dichotomy is not obscene, but strikingly complementary. The cemetary covers several hillsides, with classic granite, marble, and wrought iron markers ranging back 200 years. It is profoundy beautiful, if you take the time to absorb the engravings.
A smatter of rain brought us back northbound, hostel-bound, looking for food. A word to the wise: there is no cheap food in Bondi. (Although we didn’t actually check prices and “Hungry Jack,” what appears to be the Burger King Down Under), but eventually reached such a stage of famishment that we ended up dropping AUD $45 on “gourmet” burgers, fries, and a couple beers.
Refreshed with a belly of food and a patina of defeat, we rallied to the grocery store to pick up fruit and PB&J making to cut down on food expenses. Another warning, for those with restricted diets: organics are three times as expensive as standard brands, but gluten free is extremely common. Despite not recognizing any of the brands of cereal except Special K, the names seem somehow more honest, chemical names made easy to pronounce.
Oh, a the cheapest six pack of beer was $16. Ouch.
After food, we trundled down to the central courtyard of the hostel, which is the social center of the hostel, with a few beers and the intent to make some friends. We met and chatted with Sofia, a Scot and ex-Cisco PM looking for something else, Fanny from Ireland who really missed home cooking, a few English kids fresh out of high school (or whatever the UK equivalent is) that were living in Bondi for a year or so. They informed us that the reason boxed wine wasn’t allowed in the hostel anymore is that some girl had gotten so drunk on it — and it’s apparently a wicked kind of drunk such wine instills — that she’d crapped in the hallways. As in plural. As in systematically laying cable throughout the hostel.
Fortunately, it’d been thoroughly cleaned by the time we’d arrived.
We were also introduced to a local lush, a really good natured lush, who I shall dub “Hamilton.” He was already wine bottle or two deep, as was apparently his custom. His name I can’t recall, nor the town in New Zealand he was from, but after relating the beauty of his farm, I asked were it was.
“Oh, it’s near SomePlace.”
“What large city is that near?”
“Hamilton.”
“What larger city is that near?”
“Auckland.”
“Ok, I know that one.”
