Big City Sickness
Another month goes by and I finally get around to putting up another update. I’m doing this on a slow ass computer with a dial up modem so there’s no nice pictures posted on here with witty captions but I did manage to upload all my pics from my little adventures, with links to them throughout the articles. I’m still doing this thing but it can be hard to find the time and computer to update it so patients is a virtue. So what has all happened in the last month? Well lets see, I left Kangaroo Island on a pretty high note having a great time out there. When Kate was dropping me off at the bus stop she had Willow, her dog, with her and got Willow out of the car to say good-bye to me. We made our good-byes and just as Kate and Willow were about to climb back into the car a truck drove by with another dog in the back of it, barking away as it drove by. Willow took off chasing the truck down the street after her with Kate and I on hot pursuit yelling at her to come back. As the truck got to the corner and slowed down to turn just about running over Willow who, with us chasing after her and yelling, started to make her way back down the street towards us. Meanwhile the other dog jumped off the back of the truck and started chasing after Willow as she made her way back to us. The two then stopped in the middle of the street and sort of had a couple quick snaps at each other before the other dog took off after the truck it was on, which by then had made it’s way around the corner and was out of sight. We caught Willow after that and nearly had a heart attack with what just had happened. After that I was waiting around at the bus stop for (guess guess) the bus and Torran came by to say good-bye. I reiterated what had just progressed and he was like, “That’s what all that barking was about. I was around the corner and could hear two dogs fighting and then saw another dog running down the street after a truck and jump onto the back of it.” So that was my Kangaroo Island send off. I managed to get all my pics up from Kangaroo Island which are here.I made my way back into Adelaide and set up a bus ride to go to Melbourne spending a day just hoofing around the city and I think updating this thing. I took the overnight bus to Melbourne and actually slept rather well on it having had the whole isle to myself.
Melbourne
I spent the next 3 days in Melbourne, checking out some of the sights, getting errands done, hanging out and getting a feel for the city. It’s a dam nice city and it really reminds me of Vancouver; I could see myself living there someday, if just for a short stint. It was pretty interesting getting back into the backpacker swing of things and I must say I definitely don’t miss the hostel scene. That said, the hostel had an arrangement with a local gym for free admission and I got to have a “proper” gym workout for the first time in 5 months of which I have mixed feelings about. I trudged around the city, bought myself some warmer clothes, as Victoria is dam cold and a pair of good official Aussie boots. They’re dam nice boots and I feel truly Australian now. I went to the Queen Victoria Market while on town, which is a huge outdoor market with everything you can think of from fish/meat to fruit and veg to shoes and clothes to chocolate and cheese to shoes and clothes. It’s a pretty cool market and I enjoyed just walking around seeing what was all offered, even though I didn’t buy much, just a $6 bar of chocolate. Yeah quite insane but I’ll get on that later.I also spent a bit of time just walking and bussing around the city checking out the different precincts and suburbs. I enjoy doing that as you can get a good feeling of the city by just jumping on a bus and seeing where it goes or hoofing around the central parts of the city. Melbourne is definitely a bustling city that is actually open at night time compared to Adelaide. It’s got a pretty good restaurant scene and an even better cafe scene from what I could see. From what I’ve read Melbourne and it’s people are quite the coffee snobs and really really enjoy a good cup of coffee, sounds like my kind of people and place. Although I do enjoy touring the cities like that, at the same time find it a bit depressing. Cities have a lot of really great stuff in them, especially Melbourne, lots of cool shops, restaurants and interesting sights but unfortunately most things and just about everything costs money, something as a backpacker you really don’t want to blow away. Markets, theatres, museums, restaurants and cafes; Melbourne’s got it all and then some, of which all cost a fair bit of cash. It’s hard to see people that are living their daily lives taking advantage of all these things, like a good cup of coffee on a daily basis, while you view something like that as a luxury and must remain vigilant not breaking down and blowing cash on them. It’s sad though as I find myself roaming the streets at times peering through the windows of these great looking restaurants and cafes looking at that the menus they have pinned up and thinking what I would order if I were to go in. It’s a constant fight it seems to be a cheap bastard. There is one thing that I went and did that was definitely worth it and that was a live game of Australian Rules Football.
AFL
What an amazing sport. I’d say it’s a cross between soccer, American football and rugby. I tried watching it on TV before but just couldn’t figure it out, but with one live game I managed to figure out most of the rules and got a good feeling for the game and what a game. The speed of it is great and I’ve got to say that the athleticism of the athletes is amazing, I haven’t seen any other sport where the athletes have such a broad range of fitness as these guy’s do. The amount they run puts them in there with a soccer player and long distance runner, yet they have to be able to explode into a full sprint at any moment, add in their huge vertical leap in order to catch the ball, along with the fact that it’s a contact sport where they’re all big powerful guy’s constantly fighting for position and you’ve got a mixture for a pretty Crossfit athlete I think. I’d love to see this game come to Canada as a summer sport. I’ve heard that it’s trying to expand a bit and they’re looking at putting some teams or even another division or league in Dubai. I’m told there’s also a game played in Ireland that’s quite simular to it and I guess they have a tournament each year where the best from both leagues play against each other with a compromised set of rules. Again, a great game and reasonably priced too, only $18 and after seeing a live game, it’s got me wanting to see some hockey but alas.Here’s what little pics I took of Melbourne.
Warburton
After a couple days in Melbourne I took off out to a small town east of city called Warburton where I had a wwoof stay already set up. Warburton is a small town up in the Victorian Alps, about an hour and 45 minutes outside of central Melbourne, surprisingly the public transport actually goes all the way out there. The town is right in the mountains, if you want to call them mountains and I guess on one of the higher ones it’ll snow on the top of it a couple times a year. The country side was pretty dam nice and things were very green. The town itself is pretty nice, with lots of nice walking trails through the little river valley that had a bit of a rainforest growing in it, quaint little stores that seem to be closed more than open and that’s about it. The town itself really reminded me of the town in Beatlejuice for some reason. It’s a real weekender town with people coming out from the city on the weekends and staying at a B&B and just checking out the nature. The people that I was staying with were Janet Sorden and Eric Felber (who originated from Switzerland), a retired couple that used to live in the city and set up a bit of a “hobby farm”, as they called it, on 5 hectares to work on as a retirement project. It wasn’t much of a farm and in fact my grandparents house has a bigger veggie garden than they do. I’d say Eric & Janet had what you would call a country garden; lots of nice trees/plants, landscaping, ponds and walking paths. It’s definitely a beautiful garden but wasn’t really what I was hoping it to be. I’m a bit ignorant; I figure if it doesn’t grow food or is a companion to growing food there’s not much point but like I say I’m ignorant. They’re house was up in the hills overlooking the town so at least the view was really nice. Work was pretty much general up keep of the place with clearing brush and picking weeds being the majority of the work. It was pretty dam easy work and rather boring. The people themselves, Janet and Eric were pretty nice people but were a bit aloof and antisocial. Being that Eric was a Swiss-German and their main meals of the day is lunch, which would also be our one meal per day that we would sit down and have a meal together. The food was great as Janet was an amazing cook but it was also really the only time we’d socialize and talk and even then, some day’s getting a conversation out of them was like pulling teeth, especially from Eric. At first I thought he just didn’t like me but as time went by I realized that that was just the way he and her too both were. They had a couple neighbours over for Easter, where Janet made this amazing rabbit stew (rabbit is good), and even there they were both pretty quiet, again especially Eric. They’re anti-socialness and little things they did started to get to me a bit and I felt a bit of tension from them. Little things bothered me quiet a bit like during Easter dinner, when I finished my plate they didn’t offer seconds or anything and it was their neighbour that made the offer, yeah sounds stupid and I’m probably over analysing things but… At night time it was even worse; a regular evening for them involved sitting down and watching an opera or a symphony play. Now I have nothing against opera and like a little symphony but watching it on TV, especially the symphony, is pretty boring and the operas they were watching were terribly bad. One night I was reading in the living room while they were watching an opera based on the New Testament but in I think French or Italian so it had subtitles. I knew it was the bible right off the bat when they mentioned the rooster crowing after Peter denied Jesus three times. Anyway, if it weren’t for the subtitles I would have had no idea what it was about as instead of the characters wearing robes and sandals and costumes, they all wore plaid, very ugly plaid at that. The setting also appeared to be in a cafe or a coffee shop. The different camera angles and shots they used were quite funny and a couple times i just about laughed out loud. So that was my Warburton experience, I’d work a couple hours in the morning and then we’d have lunch. From there the afternoon was mine and I’d usually head down into the town to the local footy/cricket oval, which had a great spot for pull-ups and have a workout, after that I’d head home and, make myself dinner, read, watch TV in my room and that was about it, not the most exciting people or work. After a couple days there I was pretty much ready to leave but changed my mind and decided to stay. I figured that it was an alright stay and that the only reason I had to leave was that I really wasn’t learning anything. The food was good, I got to cook some of my own meals, the work was easy, I had my own rather pleasant room with a TV in it and my own bathroom. A couple day’s later I then realized that if I wasn’t learning anything and I wasn’t socializing much with the hosts and therefore making some type of exchange, why was I here? To get free room and board? Plus I realized that I was breaking the number one backpacker rule and a rule that I try to hold for life in general; don’t fall into a comfort zone. So with those revelations I made a couple phone calls to a couple other farms in the area and found a new place. After I told Eric and Janet that I was going they seemed to almost open up to me a lot more, it was weird and when Eric was dropping me off at the new farm he gave me great reviews and told them that I was in the top 95% of the people that he had stay with them. This was all find and dandy but it sure would have been nice if he told me that or said a simple, “good work” over the 10 days that I was there. Regardless the stay there was a nice stay and Eric and Janet were both nice people and I truly appreciate their hospitality and generosity, it was very…nice. Here’s the pics I took of Warburton.
Large Black Pigs
After Warburton I went out to another farm that nearby that specialized in a rare breed of pigs, Large Blacks, which are just basically really big pigs that are black. I guess they’re a pretty rare species with only like 80 some in Australia. The farm was owned by Christine and pretty much was operated by another lady, Wendy. Chris’ son, Joe lived there too and helped out with a lot of things. Now this was a true farm and they raised the pigs as a free range product selling it to restaurants, delis and farmers markets and such. The days were a lot longer and the work a lot harder but it was good farm work and Chris, Wendy and Joe were all great. The first day I was there, which was a Thursday, Wendy gave me the low-down of what I would be doing as she had the weekends off and since it was Anzac day the following week, was taking a long weekend so I would be the one to man the fort for the next couple days. Work was pretty much what you’d think work on a pig farm would be, feeding pigs and cleaning up pig shit. Sounds pretty bad I’m sure but it was all good. Working with the pigs was pretty interesting and I’ve definitely have a different perspective and opinion of them. I always new them to be rather smart and considered them clever but I never really appreciated their intelligence until I started to work with them. I also didn’t realize the soft side that they have. You’d think these big huge lumbering 1200 lbs animals would be tough to handle and because of their intelligence would be rather unruly but that wasn’t the case, give them a rub behind the ear and they’re your’s. One thing about their intelligence though is that once you bring food into the equation, their IQ drops down to that of a chicken; they simply lose their cool and go nuts, it’s really quite funny. All the paddocks that they graze in have electric fencing and at a lot of the gates there’s an electric wire along the ground about a meter away from the gate, so you can get into the field without having to worry about them getting out. Now the funny part is the jostling for position that occurs when you bring food to them. They know about the electric wire and are very wary of it but that doesn’t stop them from getting precariously close to it and in that jostling and positioning there’s always one, sometimes two that getting bumped into the wire by the others and gets good shock and goes running off. I think it’s intentional by the others to do this and it reminds me of teenage boys hanging around a river or pond or electric fence, waiting for one of the others to drop their guard and shove him into it. So yeah pigs are pretty cool and I had a pretty good time taking care of them. There was also a couple other animals there that I had/got to tend to; milking goats, bottle feeding a lamb, chickens, ducks, doves, cockatoos and a parrot were also part of the daily jobs on the farm. The goats pissed me off as I found them to be really pushy and actually pretty stupid but getting a chance to milk them was a cool little experience. Now including raising the pigs for their meat, Chris also trained animals for television. Down here there’s a soap opera called Neighbours, which isn’t that popular down here but is huge in the UK. All the English backpackers I’ve met seem to have seen an episode or 100 and are quite knowledgeable on many of the shows going ons. The show is shot in Melbourne and at the backpackers I was staying at, they had every Monday a “Neighbours Night” where they’d take you to the street where the show is shot and you’d get to meet some of the cast. In my room there was an English couple and they were quite keen on the idea, as were a couple of English guys that were checking in when I was. Anyways, Chris is the one who owns and trains all the animals on the show, whish are 2 dogs, a lamb, and a parrot of some sort, so yeah, I got to bottle feed a celebrity lamb and change the water of a celebrity parrot, ha.Outside of the work, which was pretty fun, I got to socialize and live with some really cool people in Chris, Joe and Joe’s girlfriend Laura who came around on the weekend. I had some really great conversations with Chris and on the last night I was there met her sister Helen, who came over for dinner. We were discussing food, all things good and reiterated how I like to, taking the time, effort and money to really enjoy and appreciate something like good food, coffee/tea, chocolate… Well I guess there’s an actual group/movement that’s dedicated to this and the same mindset called “Slow Food“. Slow Food and food in general
I had heard of it before but really didn’t know what it was about, thinking that it was about eating your food slow or something. I guess there’s local chapters all over the world and both Chris and Helen are part of their local one, I even see there’s a Slow Food Edmonton, which is something I’m going to have to check out when I get back home. From what they tell me, there’s larger get togethers that occur and from there you find out about different workshops and events that specialize in a certain thing for instance; Chris and Helen went to a cheese workshop where they showed you what makes a cheese good, what to look for while eating it and generally how to appreciate the it, they also showed them how to make cheese. They also went to a chocolate workshop that showed and informed them on the processes and ingredients, makes a good chocolate plus what to look for while eating it and how to appreciate it. They mentioned there’s also wine and beer workshops and even a coffee one. I definitely have to remember to check this out when I get back home. Another thing that Chris talked about in regards to good food was this once a year, $120 a ticket, 5 course gourmet dinner that she attends that I think was ran by Slow Food. Now you think, “dam $120 for one nights meal, she’s got to be insane”, but she put it in an interesting perspective, instead of going out for dinner once a month for a crappy $10 meal, she holds off and attends a dinner that she knows is going to be dam good. Makes sense to me. The same goes for my $6 bar of chocolate; snickers and mars don’t stand a chance against this chocolate and when I do eat it, I take my time with it and have it very small pieces, something you wouldn’t do with a crappy piece of chocolate that you’d eat while driving down the road or in front of the computer mindlessly chomping away.Now a couple things on food and restaurants down under; there are no all night dinners at all that I’ve seen ala Denny’s, Humpty’s, Smitty’s and so forth, there is also very few franchise restaurants here like Boston Pizza, Red Robbins, Earls, Olive Garden, Joey (Tomato) and the likes. There is though lots and lots of privately owned restaurants , specializing in a certain food; Thai, Indian, Vietnamese, Nepalese… I view this as a good thing personally. There’s very little “coffee shops” but instead nice little cafes that seem to take pride in their coffees, this is especially prevalent in Melbourne. Again this is the way to do it. Instead of getting that 1/2 litre Timmies coffee through the drive-thru that you power down, you get a dam good cup of coffee that you’d want to actually sit and enjoy. I’m sure I’ve made no friends now by bashing the Canadian icon which is Tim Horton’s and in fact, the night that I left Canada I had a large black coffee from the drive-thru and plan to make that one of the first things I do when I get back home just for nostalgia sake.
More Food
I have yet to eat out for dinner on my own choice and under my own wallet in my entire 6 months over here. I’ve been taken out for dinner about a 6 times, all but one I would have rather of just stayed at home and eaten a can of tuna and oranges or something healthy instead of the pizza or whatever I was taken out to. Now the only exception to this was the first meal I was taken out to by my cousin Mike in Sydney when I first arrived to Australia. He and his girlfriend Susan took me out to this amazing little Thai restaurant that was around the corner from his place, thanks again Mike. That was the only eat-out meal that I’ve had here that I would have paid for myself and that I would have wanted to go out to under my own free will. So that said, when I get back onto the mainland I have decided to treat myself to a dam good meal, blowing like $20 for a plate of food. Adelaide has quite a few really nice looking Asian and Indian restaurants that I’m planning on hitting up, ordering (guess) a curry. I’m thinking about going for a duck curry as I’ve never had duck before. I say that now but again, there’s a good chance cheapness with prevail and I’ll go down the street to the grocery store and get a can of tuna and oranges.After a great stay at Large Black Pigs I made my way back to Melbourne and then to Adelaide. Before I left Melbourne though I broke one of my own rules and treated myself to an espresso at a reputable looking cafe. It was pretty dam good and I must say I really enjoyed it. It was a nice little cafe on a busy street and I just sat back, enjoyed my drink, listening to some music and did some people watching. I’d really like to do more of that but when an espresso goes for $3 I’m sure the next time I do that I’ll either be home or in a country that’s like me, cheap.
Here’s my pics from Large Black Pigs.
Back in Adelaide
I don’t know if I could leave this town unless my life depended on it, saying that, it is a pretty nice city. I’d say it has everything that Sydney and Melbourne has but Sydney and Melbourne is x10 that of Adelaide. I spent just one day in town, again taking the overnight bus from Melbourne and again having a surprisingly good sleep on the bus but this time had to share the isle with another guy and awoke to find both of us spooning one another. My day pretty much was spent running around doing errands and getting shit done before I got out to Kangaroo Island and am cut off from the rest of civilization. It seems that’s all I do in cities these day’s, errands. I did do something really cool though, went and saw Xavier Rudd live. Rudd
So I’ve ranted and raved about this guy in the past and I noticed a month earlier before I left Kangaroo Island that he was playing in Adelaide at the end of the month so I figured that I might be able to pull off seeing him just before I got back out to the island. Now Rudd has a lot of different instruments in his music, ranging from didgeridoos, to a wooden xylophone, different string instruments, multiple style drums, chimes and tons of other percussion instruments. I totally thought that he would have backing band playing all these different instruments but to my surprise it was him and all him. He had this crazy set-up with like 3 didgeridoos, chimes, different drums and pretty much every instrument that you would hear on the album with his roadies passing him different string instruments depending on the song he was playing. All in all I wasn’t disappointed and was very impressed by his live performance, which allows me to plug him even further by the fact that he’s coming to Canada in the next couple weeks with stops in Edmonton on May 28th and Vancouver on June 2 so if you’ve heard a couple of his songs, like what you heard, take the chance and see him live, you won’t be disappointed.
Back on the Island
I’m now writing from Kate’s place on Kangaroo Island, it was a nice little trip to Melbourne and civilization. I figured that if I didn’t go to Melbourne and Victoria in general I wouldn’t have gone at all and I’m glad I did get the chance to check it out. I really liked the city and the country side. I could easily see myself living there at some time if all works out as I would like it to. My only complaint of Victoria was that it was dam cold and dam wet. Everyone always thinks, and I WAS guilty of it myself in the past, that it’s Australia, it doesn’t get cold there, it’s always a warm paradise. Wrong! The weather out there was pretty cool and I swear one morning there was frost on the ground plus you have to realize temperature is all relative; if you’re used to +30 and it goes down to +19, it’s going to feel cold. Same when it’s -30 and it goes up to -10, it feels a lot warmer.
My arrival back onto Kangaroo Island wasn’t as exciting as my departure but a bit funny. I got dropped off by the shuttle bus at a corner in the middle of nowhere where I was told either Torran or Kate would pick me up. I ended up waiting there for a bit wondering if it was the right corner and must have looked quite the sight to the people that drove by with me standing on a deserted corner in the middle of nowhere playing with a yo-yo, which I had just recently purchase, definitely a good travel toy.
It felt good to get back to Kate’s with the extreme beauty that surrounds her place plus getting to see and hangout with her and Torran again, even if it was only for a short while as they were off to South Africa in a couple days leaving me in change to make sure all the animals are happy and the house doesn’t burn down, or this time around get flooded.
When I arrived I pretty much hit the ground running. The next day was to be the closing of the cafe and Kate was planning a big party selling soups and bread as the meals, wine and beer for refreshments, a live band for entertainment and a bonfire for warmth. Before that though we needed to make enough soup for about 100 people so after unpacking my crap we dug right into the kitchen and started cooking soup. As I mentioned before, one of my favourite things about my stay at Kate’s was cooking with both her and Torran. We’d dig into the fridge and see what we had, pull out the spice box and just start throwing things together. This night and soup cooking was not the exception and we were back cooking up a storm with what we had. In the end there was like 6 or 7 different soups ranging from vegetable, beef vegetable, pea and ham, pumpkin, dhal… It was good fun.
We were up pretty dam late that night getting everything ready and had a pretty early start the next morning with Torran’s parents coming over and his dad showing us how to fill and make compost in the huge bin the two of us had previously made. I guess Torran’s dad was the compost man at one time. Him and Torran’s mom are a bit hippyish and used to just travel around from different community and such offering what skills they could for a living and picking up a lot along the way. I guess in a couple of these communities he would produce enough compost to make a large enough garden that could grow enough food to support up to 100 people. He was saying that in one bin that he made, it took only 3 weeks to turn all the materials into dirt. Later on he used to hold workshops for people that wanted to know how to make good compost so needless to say we were in pretty dam good hands. It was pretty interesting and I’m glad I got to see how to properly stack and heap the materials to make good dirt, which I’m sure will come into hand someday. I’m already eager to go back home and try my own hand it with a small bin. Yeah I am a hardcore dork aren’t I?
After that the party started and people slowly trickled in. At first I was to be the door man and collect the money for people that wanted soup and just generally chat up the people as they arrived but as more and more people started to get there and eat soup and such, we ran into problems like soup getting cold, running out, running out of bowls and spoons and cans and bottles piling up rather high. So from there I was pretty much bussing tables, stocking up the soups and bread and cleaning dishes. It was tough work but a lot of fun. It ended up being a fuller than full day for all of us and I’m sure I must clocked in about 16 hours of work but it was a lot of fun and the next couple day’s we pretty much sat around and did nothing but take the odd catnap and make an attempt to do something but would soon quit.
A couple days after the party Kate and Torran took off to South Africa, leaving my in charge of the house and animals. Things have been going and were going pretty smoothly up until the other night when there was this huge storm. The wind was crazy hard and I was sure it was one of those once in 10 years storms but to my surprise was told they happen like 2-3 times a year during the winters. All the animals were ok except for one of the joey kangaroos, Winger, who’s blind. Because the wind was so heavy he couldn’t hear anything else and was really spooked by it all. He took his bottle though and ate his apples but he was clearly unhappy by what was going on around him and fortunately the next day he was fine and back to his hopping self. There was also a lot of water that seeped into the cafe and I had to sweep it out and mop it up before it flooded the whole place and ruined some of the art works that Kate had in storage. I thought for sure that there’d be a couple trees knocked down and some damage done to the bird aviary and such but everything held out pretty good, except for one thing; the veggie garden.
All gone
I spent a lot of time working on that thing with both Sarah and Torran. While I was gone Torran put up the walls for the garden that were to be high enough to keep any pests out and trenched into the ground to prevent them from digging under the walls. Well the wind pretty much caught the walls, completely ripped them out of the trenches and uprooted most of the poles that supported the walls. I was pretty disillusioned by the sight of all that hard work laying on the ground in a twisted pile of metal and wood. I don’t even know if I’ll end up working on it much the next couple weeks as I have no idea where to start and wonder if there’s a better way to put it all back together without having to disassemble is all. On a positive note though the 3m high compost bin stood the test and didn’t get knocked over. Other than potentially dismantling a destroyed veggie garden my tasks and jobs for the next couple weeks are pretty much taking care of the animals and doing a couple little project that Kate has left for me to do. I’ve gotten a lot of the projects done thus far but there always seems to be something that comes up that I have to fix or scramble to save like during the storm, water started to seep into the cafe and puddle in a lot of areas so what was to be a quite night ended up to be a mad scramble but other then that, the animals are my number one priority. I’m really liking the kangaroos and spend up to an hour a day just hanging out with them feeding them their bottles and then feeding them cut up apple. They are the cutest little critters I’ve seen in a while and I feel pretty fortunate to be able to have this experience as I think it’s very Aussie. I also really like the cockatoos. At first I was a little freaked out by them but as time has gone by I love hanging out with them and have them fly around, landing on my head and seeing what I’m up to, they’re always good for a laugh.
Package from the north
When I arrived back on Kangaroo Island I got a nice little care pack from back home of some things that I had requested so I thought I’d throw on what I wanted and got.
- Cinnamon – I swore that cinnamon tasted different down here, it’s a lot more bitter and powdery tasting and I think it doesn’t taste the same so I asked for a package of cinnamon to confirm my suspicions. Sure enough I was right and it does taste different.
- Toque – Yep it’s toque weather and I wanted mine. It’s funny though because down here they’re called beanies so every time I call it a toque people just give me a blank look and wonder what the hell I’m talking about.
- Tea – Dragonwell, good stuff and couldn’t find it down here but then I did and now I have lots of it. It’s called Lung Chin in China and found it in an Asian food store.
- Track Pants – Yep, cold again and need them for working out.
- Newspapers – This one was a surprise and got like 4 Journals and a Leduc Rep, it was pretty nice actually but I found my biggest interest in the ads. It was cool to look at them and think, “I remember those”, or “Wow, that’s super cheap compared to here”, and so forth. It was a bit bizarre though and I had to give my head a shake at one point because as I read them I was listening to the radio here and they were announcing Australian news. See the ads from the IGA and comparing the prices I see that food is so much more than I had thought down here, which confuses the hell out of me. This is a warm climate and albeit is very extreme, you can potentially grow food year round whereas we have to import everything, but I guess that because we import so much there’s a surplus on the market or something, rambling on now…
- Crocks – This one was a surprise. I’m told they’re quite popular back home and in fact saw an article in the paper about them. At first I thought, great something else I have to lug around and thought it was rather inopportune as I had just bought so nice official Aussie style boots. I was thinking about ditching them (sorry mom) but after wearing them for a couple days have decided to hold onto them.
6 Month Review
As of May 4th I have been away from home for 6 months now, pretty crazy. The time has flown by but at the same time it doesn’t feeling like it has and I think it’s because I’ve been doing, experiencing and seeing so much more than just a computer monitor and inside of a cubical. It’s been a great 6 months and I look forward to the next 6 here in Australia. When I first came down here I didn’t know what I wanted out of my travels. I read back to one of my first posts and I alluded to wanting to perhaps “have some sort of religious awakening, an epiphany of some sorts, perhaps figure out the meaning of life or find myself”. Out of all those things I’d say that I have found myself a little. That probably sounds a little pretentious and rather pseudos-philosophical but I think it’s partially true. I’ve found out a lot about myself in these past 6 months something that I didn’t think would happen; like really how can you not know things about yourself? Sure enough though I’ve found out more things about me, who I am, what I want out of life, my future goals, what I hold important in life, what I like and what I don’t like since I’ve left home. I look over many of these things and really wonder how I didn’t see or realize them before I left home but I guess exposing myself to all these different experiences has allowed me to grow and see myself and my life in a different light and point of view. I guess I haven’t really “found myself” but have learned more about me and also grown a little more as a person, which I know now is what I want out of my travels and I think life in general wether it be through work, family/friends or just simply exposing yourself to different things.
Future Goals
After house sitting out here for the next month I figure I’ll have about 3 and a half months left before some of my family comes down here for a visit and I go to where ever afterwards. I’ve been thinking, what do I want in that remaining time and what do I want from my following travels? Well for starters, what I want out of all future travels is new experiences, to find out more about myself and grow more as a person. I feel my main priority and things that I hold dear while travelling is meeting other people, seeing how they live and being exposed to different ideas and ways of life. Australia isn’t that different from Canada in many of those regards but it is still different and I’m hoping that I’ll be exposed to much different cultures and experiences from what I’m used to in future travel. Food is also a major goal to fulfil but I think that you can bunch that together with culture in general.
Australia
What do I want out of the remaining time I have left down here in Australia? I’ve wrote in the past I thought a lot of people were missing out on a great experience by not doing something like wwoofing and that they weren’t getting as much as almighty me when all they were doing was working a crap job, partying and caring way to much about making money. I looked down my nose at a lot of these people, which are probably just about the majority of working holiday visa holder’s down here, for quite some time thinking that it was nothing they couldn’t do back home. I was going to write about how I felt like an outcast in the city and staying in the hostels and how I thought that all the people there are foolish for coming all the way to Australia and working some crappy joe job and living in a derelict hostel. I’m now realizing though that I don’t know shit. How do I know what they’re getting out of their travels and how can I be so sure that they’ve experienced nothing but partying? Perhaps they’re getting as great and introspective experience as I have but on a different turf. Just because I’m not a big party animal or a partier in general doesn’t make me better than them. So in saying all of this I’m realizing that I think the time has come for the end of my wwoofing experiences. I’ve been doing it now pretty much straight out since the end of January and including the short stays I had when I first arrived, I’ve been doing it about 6 months total now and I’m thinking that it’s time for a change of pace. I feel that I’ve gotten just about all I can and want out of it. I’ve had so many great and amazing experiences that at times it’s left my head spinning and on a natural high and most importantly I’ve learned a lot about myself and what I want out of life. So now where do I go from here? Well after my stay out here house sitting on Kangaroo Island for Kate, I’m going to join the rest of the pack, land myself in a big city, most likely Brisbane, find an alright hostel until I find a more permanent dwelling and look for a job, something that I’ve never done before and most likely will never do again. I’m thinking about simply bussing tables at a restaurant or cafe something that allows me to work and socialize with people, working to make just enough cash to cover my expenses and maybe have an extra $100 in my pocket at the end of the month. It’s all part of the main reason why I’m here; experience and I’ve had many great ones thus far plus I figure by doing this I could possible take advantage of all those nice cafes, restaurants and cool markets that seem quite prevalent down here. I really hope my plan can take off but who knows, I seem to change plans and goals on a weekly basis.
My only thing with this plan that I foresee myself not liking and just about going insane over is having to live in a hostel for a while. I plan to find a shared flat with some other travellers if that’s at all possible but there’s no way I could live long term in a hostel. I don’t mind the living situation or the dorm rooms and such, I just can’t stand to kitchens. Cooking, for me is such a huge stress reliever but in a hostel all it turns into is an event that makes me want to tear out my hair. While staying at the hostel I was in Melbourne, I pledged never to cook another meal again in a hostel, it was just too much. Back to tuna and oranges.
Miss
In being gone for 6 months now and although I’m glad I’m here and not back home there are things that I miss and look forward to doing again someday, many of which are those little things in your daily life that you can easily take for granted.
- Family – First and foremost for sure and I by family I also include good friends
- Canada – People often say that they’d travel their own country before they travelled abroad. I think it’s better to travel a different country first and then see your own, it gives you more of an appreciation of where you live, that is unless you hate your country…
- My bedroom – Looking back at the last 4 bedrooms that I’ve had, I must say they were all extremely comfortable and I miss them all but perhaps I just miss my bed.
- The Gym – I miss Flex FX in Leduc, it was good gym and I miss bringing myself pain in that place.
- My ice cold shower – Right after my workout, while I was still dripping with sweat and nearly overheating I’d have an ice cold shower. I always started it off rather tentatively but once I got in there I would love it.
I think that’s about it. Wow, that’s not a lot now is it? I’m sure I’m probably missing some but those are the major ones.
Insane Rambling
As a traveller that I’ve learned to enjoy and consider myself a conusor of showers much like George Costanza is with bathrooms. People say that I should write about book about my travels but I was thinking that I’d write a shower travel guide and rate the showers in different countries and places. When I got back to Adelaide from Kangaroo Island there was one thing on my mind, a hot shower. The weather was pretty cool and wet so I was eager to get inside of a nice warm hostel and jump into a hot shower with good pressure. Out at Kate’s place the shower was much to be desired with practically no pressure and not the warmest water in the world. Now after staying out on the Island and spending pretty much no cash, I could have easily went out and stayed at a nice place, hell even got my own room but the problem with that is, is that I view my cheapness as a matter of pride and something that I must be vigilant with. So instead I booked into the good old Hampton House, which has got to be the crappiest hostel in Adelaide but also the cheapest. Last time I was there it was insanely hot inside and the water pretty much came out of the head as steam even if it was just the cold turned on. This times things had changed, with the cooler weather brought a cooler hostel and cooler water pretty much destroying my wish for an amazing shower, for now. After a night on the bus and finally arriving in Melbourne, I was feeling pretty funky and found myself in All Nations Backpackers and much to my pleasure finally had the shower I so eagerly had wanted when I got off of Kangaroo Island. After some wonderful showers there I was out in Warburton at Eric and Janet’s beautiful house. Their house was probably the nicest house I have been in thus far in Australia and the bathroom, which I had all to myself was good enough for Caesar himself, that is except the shower. What a joke, I mean come on, with that nice of a house you could have something better than that sorry excuse for a shower, which the water pretty much fell out of the head and was barely luke warm, Needless to say I was very disappointed and was thinking fond memories of the shower out on Kangaroo Island but all was to be redeemed at Large Black Pigs. The shower there was great, wonderful pressure and heat, heat I tell you, it was wonderful.
Readings
One good thing about my short stay at Warburton was that they had a great library of books, especially Eric and while there put aside what I was currently reading, “Reading Lolita in Tehran” and picked up “Siddhartha” by Herman Hesse. It was a short read that took me about 4 days to read but what a great read it was. It’s a really good travellers book for sure, about a young man who leaves home in the search of wisdom and pretty much the meaning of life. The book follows his life, the different experiences he goes through, the different types of persons he becomes, roles he lives and wisdom he gains through all these experiences. Eric told me it was derived from the life of the Budda but I’m not sure about that. I recommend this book to everyone and anyone. It’s a quick read of only about 150 pages so give it a try. I’d give it 5 out of 5.
After reading Siddhartha I again, put aside Lolita and picked up “Pride and Prejudice” by Jane Austen. Eric highly recommended it to me saying that it was as an English classic as an English classic could be so I figured I’d give it a go. I started off reading his copy but with my eventual departure on the loom I manged to find a copy at the local Warburton book shop for $4. I’m currently about half way through it, am really enjoying it and would recommend it to all. Before I started reading it I had the notion that it was a “chick book” and think a lot of people that haven’t read it have that same mindset. The only thing more English classic then it would have to probably be Lord of the Rings, which everyone should read too.
The Maple Leaf
I have, like every other Canadian traveller out there, a Maple Leaf on my backpack, mine being on the back end of my luggage information tag that was given to me for my birthday. Before that I had no intention of having a Canadian flag on my pack. I think most people put them on there because they don’t want to be thought they to be American or something, which is stupid, thinking that everyone in the world loves Canadians and that they’ll get treated differently because of it. I remember the mindsets of some of the people back home who said that I should have one or I’d be shot, stabbed, rolled into a carpet and thrown into a dumpster, which is pretty small minded. Other than the American thing I couldn’t see another reason why I or other Canadians have the leaf their packs and would always be questioned by other travellers about it leaving me a bit speechless and searching for a good answer. I’ve finally come up with a good answer and reason as to why. For starters I am ,and I assume most other people are, proud of my country. Canada is one of the best, if not the best places in the world to live and I’m proud of that fact. Now most other travellers are proud to be German or French or whatever yet they don’t seem to advertise where they’re from, that’s where the maple leaf comes in. The maple leaf is a pretty cool and pretty distinguishable emblem, especially when you’re comparing it to other countries flags like France, Italy, Germany, Norway and Sweden that have just 3 coloured stripes, which is dam boring if you ask me. Factor in how much the maple leaf is marketed to us through beer and clothing alone and you can see where it all comes from. I know 2 people that have the maple leaf tattooed on them plus if you go to a beach on a hot summer’s day your bound to see a couple others with the same thing. It’s the playoffs and a Canadian team is playing? Well other than the teams emblem you’re bound to see quite of few people wearing a maple leaf too. Mystery solved.
Hotel Babylon
This is my show that I watch down here. It’s about the only TV show that I take an interest in and make an effort to see every week. It’s a British show, which right off the bat you’d think would mean it would suck but surprisingly it’s actually rather good. It’s based off a book by this guy who worked in a 5-star hotel for years and wrote about all the crazy happenings that occurred during his employment there. It’s pretty dam funny I think. I don’t know if you would get it in Canada but if you did it would probably be aired on a channel like Showcase or Bravo, check it out.
That’s my update for this time around and I hope you’ve enjoyed it. I plan on making another entry before I leave here so I’m hoping that it won’t again be a month plus between entries. Kate and Torren get back here on June 7 but I’ll probably spend a couple days out here catching up with them and hearing about their stories in South Africa leaving on like the 13th or 14th from which I will probably head off to Brisbane, finally leaving Adelaide behind me. Of course all this could change as I seem to change my mind quite a bit.
Safe Travels
Troy
Tags: Australia
misfittroy
Troy,
You missed Cooper in your list of things you miss.
Hey Arch,
Thanks for all the postcards buddy.
Youre missing some good Oilers action.
You should see all the pouty faces in Vancouver right now, makes me laugh.
Later
Tiff, you’re mistaken, Cooper is family.
It took me a week just to read your last post and yes I think you should do a shower book. It’s one of those things that people can be very particular about when it’s not right but at the same time they can’t really define what it is about a shower that they enjoy.
It sounds like you’ve had a lot of time to think about all of this stuff so I’m sure it’ll be good for you to go mingle with the other backpacker folk… Maybe you can find out what they wanted out of their time there because as you mentioned, although you’re doing some deep soul searching it’s not the only way to “discover” ones self.
Good luck in Brisbane. I’ll be checking back to compare your thoughts of the city to my experience there.
Go Oilers Go!!!