Splurging on Awesomeness

The Elephant Backpackers was not my favourite place to stay. They had crazy ass rules about not having ANY food or drink in the rooms, not even water and their bunk beds were minus ladders and safety rails so I thought I was about to die every time I rolled over in bed. The bathroom was an attempt at the wet room as well so basically there was no shower curtain and there was a drain in the bathroom floor for over flow and everything ended up damp and soggy from condensation because the window didn’t open. And they charged you for using the luggage room! Mental! It was kind of on the outskirts of a residential area as well so it’s the only place in the area full of tourists so you feel a bit conspicuous wandering around with your suitcase.

The good thing though was it was super close to the office and the CBD so I could walk in every day rather than wasting money on trains or buses. The rain decided to be torrential as well during my stay (worst July in 60 years according to the surfer dude in the office) so I guess at least I wasn’t too far out to get home and dry quickly.

Actually my first full day in Woolloomooloo wasn’t too bad weather wise. I met up with Heather and went for a stroll around Darling Harbour, looking for somewhere for lunch. The cheapest place was a Turkish restaurant which had distinctly not Turkish lunches for $9.95. I can’t quite remember the name but I want to say Kasbah, maybe? I had steak and chips and Heather had barbecue chicken (like I said, very un-Turkish). I was expecting the portions to be tiny because it was the cheapest place in the harbour but it was actually rather generous portions. It was dead when we went in but I think we drew the crowds in because they were super busy by the time we left. I had wanted to sit outside and enjoy the view but it was rather blustery and the seagulls were dive bombing anyone with food (Finding Nemo was right. You just know they’re about to start squawking “Mine, mine, mine” any second) so we opted for an inside table with a view. Luckily the inside tables had paper table cloths and chalk provided for doodling so I passed the time quite happily whilst we were waiting for food to arrive. When we paid the bill the waiter was chatting to me about what we were doing in Australia and he actually asked me to come in and meet his manager about working there! He hadn’t seen a CV or asked me about my experience or anything! I didn’t go in to meet his manager in the end because there’s no way I would’ve ever been hired. One: I’m far too clumsy to ever be a waitress, two: I haven’t done the course you need to do to serve alcohol in Australia and three: the restaurant is Arabian themed - I couldn’t in a million years look Arabian. I think he just wanted me to give him his number or something!

After our non-Turkish lunch I wanted dessert and Heather wanted to use the bathroom so we wandered into the food court in the shopping centre. Whilst Heather went to the loo, I loitered over by the gelato stand, trying not to drool on the glass counter. The gelato guy spotted and me and started giving me free samples of everything! I didn’t even ask for any! He recommended the Hokey Pokey which is basically bits of cinder toffee in vanilla ice cream and super nice. He tried to sell me on Rocky Road as well but I just don’t get what people see in marshmallows, especially cold chewy ones. In the end he’d given me so many samples I figured I had to at least buy some (It doesn’t take much really to get me to buy ice-cream!) I went for one scoop Oreo and one scoop Chocolate Supreme. The gelato man tried to warn me that it was super rich and chocolatey – clearly he didn’t know he was talking a woman with super human capacities for chocolate consumption. I was a tad disappointed with the Oreo. It tasted like the black bit of the cookie without the white bit, which is definitely the best bit... it was still nice though. Heather got toffee and she said that was nice too so it might be worth another trip to sample more gelato!

The next day was uber-rainy so I decided to go to the aquarium as an indoor activity. On the way I bumped into Kate, Lynsey, Amy and Nicola who were going to go to the botanical gardens but had been put off by the rain so I sold them on coming to the aquarium with me. It was amazing! There were loads of weird looking fish that I’d never even heard of as well as all the regular aquarium fishies. The long-necked turtles were bizarre. I’ve never seen anything like them in my life. They looked like a turtle had had a baby with a brontosaurus! There were seahorses and glow in the dark coral and these tiny little penguins called fairy penguins. That’s got to be the cutest name for a penguin. It had two walk through tunnels. The first had dugongs in it which basically look like manatees that have been punched in the nose. It was also full of the biggest rays I have ever seen. You didn’t get to stroke one like you do in SeaWorld but I get to touch a sea cucumber and a blue starfish. BLUE!!! I didn’t even know blue starfish existed but now they’re definitely my favourite kind of starfish! The second tunnel was where the sharks lived. They were mainly nurse sharks (no great whites!) and there was one little tiny zebra fish in there with them. I’m pretty sure he must’ve been eaten by now. The giant sea turtles were also chilling with the sharks. One of them looked like he’d got his head stuck in a rock but apparently that’s just how they sleep so they don’t drift away in the current, which I think is pretty smart for a turtle. Right toward the end there was a room where it was glass all around you, including the floor. I didn’t like that room. I don’t like walking on glass. Even if I know that its super strong reinforced stuff I’m still paranoid of it shattering and falling through it. There was a really good tacky gift shop after that though so I left happy...even if the gift shop did seem disproportionately clownfish related! If I was staying in Sydney I would definitely get an annual pass and just hang out in the Aquarium all the time.

Afterwards the girls had to head back to their hostel to pack as they were flying to Brisbane in the morning so I bummed around the CBD by myself for a while and walked down to The Rocks. It all used to be warehouses and shipping docks down there but it’s been regenerated into restaurants and shops. It still looks like rape alley when it gets dark though! I had a Skype date with my Mum to keep so I didn’t want to wander too far. I tried to kill some time drinking a Dr Pepper by the water (It is so hard to find regular Dr Pepper in Australia but they have Dr Pepper Cherry everywhere! I might have to try that as a substitute) but the drizzle morphed into torrential downpour so I headed down George Street, ducking and weaving under the shop awnings and other people’s umbrellas. My plan was to go to a McDonald’s and use free wifi but none of the ones on George Street had a wifi sign in the window like in King’s Cross so I used an Internet cafe which is hidden in a dungeon below a McDonald’s! (I later found out that pretty much every Maccy’s that I’d walked past actually has wifi, they just assume you know so I could’ve gone in the first one and not had to wander through the rain for ages. Gutted!) The Internet cafe was wall to wall nerdy gamers. It was like the Mean Girls cafeteria scene, they were all arranged by what game they were playing. I have contemplated sitting by the World of Warcraft people and annoying them with my anecdotes of watching the wife play WOW at uni but instead I hid in a corner with the other non-gamers and Skyped my Mum. The computer dungeon was pretty soundproof so I didn’t know what the situation was outside until I got up there. It was even worse than before. I bought myself a hot chocolate and a cookies and cream cheesecake to take back with me to the hostel, thinking it would give me something to look forward to. Unfortunately the girl had run out of bags to put the cheesecake in so she put it in a Happy Meal box! Seriously, McDonald’s lady? You expect a flimsy cardboard box to hold up in a typhoon-esque storm? Really? I was practically cradling it all the way back to the hostel to keep it safe from the storm. Just as I turned the corner onto my street one of the handles ripped off the box so I power walked down the street, ran up to my room and, breaking all the rules, devoured the cheesecake right there before anyone could tell me off. It was a good cheesecake and McDonald’s seem to have the cheapest cakes in Sydney so I’ll probably go back for another one at some point.

Surprise, surprise, there was a storm the next day too. I spent the morning in the office where I found out that Heather had booked a flight up to Cairns at the weekend. She’d been asking me to go with her but I was reluctant to go without a job offer and without having everything sorted in regards to bank accounts etc. Almost everyone else had left Sydney as well at this point so that along with the weather and just a general lack of awesomeness in Sydney left me a bit bummed out so I decided to blow a little bit of money and go see Hairspray. Steve and Jonny took the piss out of me because they were deciding whether to skip lunch or not to save money whereas I just decided to blow money on going to the theatre on a whim, but I don’t care! I want to have a good time while I’m here. Yes we all need to save money but I don’t want to go home at the end of it all and say all I did every night was stay in eating beans on toast and watching TV because I wanted to save money. If I wanted to do that I’d have stayed in Windermere and saved myself the airfare. Or maybe I’m just crazy... Either way, I’m glad I did. Hairspray was AMAZING! I felt a bit awkward at first hanging around the lobby by myself (especially after I put a ladder in my tights when I went to the bathroom) but once we were seated it was okay. There were lots of empty seats so I “upgraded” myself to further along my row so I had a perfect view. The cast were all really good but I think the guy playing Link looked way too old to be a teen idol! One of the highlights was Wilbur Turnblad dying on stage when Edna said something funny. He couldn’t carry on singing for laughing. It was absolutely hilarious. The sets were all computerised, it was just incredible how well they worked and were perfectly synchronised with the cast and I want to steal the sparkly dresses and go-go boots the backing dancers wore during Welcome to the Sixties. It was just what I needed to lift my mood. Even the tsunami-like conditions couldn’t damper my spirits. If anything it made me for the first time in my life regret giving up tap dancing lessons because it would have been the perfect night to recreate the Singin’ in the Rain dance!

Oh, I almost forgot the highlight of the night! In my last post I said I didn’t think that the Harbour Bridge was all that, well now I definitely think there’s a better bridge in Sydney. The pedestrian bridge over Darling Harbour pivots!!!! It is just mind-blowing! That’s the only word to describe it. I have never seen a pivoting bridge before. It reminded me of the moving staircases in Harry Potter. Some people were clearly annoyed at having to wait in the rain while the boat went past but I was completely spellbound watching the bridge move. I’ve walked across that bridge at least half a dozen times and I always thought it was an all-in-one-piece, typical solid bridge. It joins so well that I never noticed it had the ability (to me, superpower) to break into three sections. The monorail line runs just over the pedestrian bridge and that doesn’t move so I guess the boats have to be lower than that. If the monorail line moved as well as the bridge I think my head would actually explode!

The weather the next day was just as bad but the outlook was brighter. I’d decided I was sick of Sydney city and was moving to Bondi Beach that day and I got a job offer just on the outskirts of Brisbane so I booked my flights further north (or as I think of it, to the warmth and sunshine). The guy who called about the job has a very thick accent so I think I might be getting suckered into moving into a hillbilly town but I guess the beauty of the position I’m in is if I hate it there’s nothing tying me down and forcing me to stay. I can just move on to the next place. The lady in charge of travel in the office hooked me up with a cheap flight and while she was sorting out the arrangements Heather and I went to Woolworths’ cafe for a cheap lunch to celebrate our upcoming trips to Queensland. The Woolworths here are more like supermarkets than the ones we used to have back home and the cafe just reminded me of a Morrison’s cafe. We were the only people in there under 45 and they all seemed like regulars. I can see why though. I spite of the dodgy plastic chairs the food is good, you get a huge portion and the lady charged me less because I didn’t want salad. Bargain!

After I got my flight tickets I had to get back to my hostel, pick up my suitcase and get my stuff over to Bondi. In my infinite wisdom I decided to take a shortcut through the Botanical Gardens because they’d be deserted in the rain. Silly me, I didn’t think of why they’d be deserted in the rain! Half of the paths were flooded, the ponds were overflowing and I had to keep tiptoeing over squelchy grass to get to where I wanted to be. It was so yucky. You know the saying “lovely weather for ducks”? Well, even the ducks looked miserable that day! I did get to see loads of the things I haven’t seen before and I did have the gardens practically all to myself. By the time I reached Woolloomooloo I was completely drenched and ready to call a taxi to take me to Bondi instead of the arduous journey using public transport but I had to trek up to the cash machine first. Practically crawling up the Domain hill with the rain gushing down it like a waterfall and dragging the heaviest suitcase in the universe behind me was the most physically strenuous thing I have ever done in my life. I felt like I needed a gold medal when I got to the top. I’m sure that hill wasn’t that steep when the weather was dry! By the time I’d done that I thought I could conquer the world, public transport would be a piece of cake! It wasn’t actually that bad. I had to change trains and then catch a bus from Bondi Junction to the Beach but it was fine. It would’ve been easier if my suitcase wasn’t so cumbersome but until someone invents the shrink ray there’s nothing I can do about that. I’m glad I have a suitcase instead of a backpack. A few of the girls brought backpacks and ended up buying suitcases in Hong Kong because they were just too heavy for them. My suitcase is pretty heavy but if I get tired pulling it I can just stand still and rest my arms. Undoing all the straps and unloading your backpack off of your back takes so much effort it wouldn’t be worth the hassle.

Getting off the bus in Bondi Beach I got my first proper look at the Pacific Ocean (from an airplane doesn’t count) but the sun was setting and it was still raining so I didn’t wait around to sightsee. My hostel (Surfside) was just around the corner from the beach. It’s gated and obviously I had no way of getting in so I had to ring a buzzer. When no-one answered I called the number on the sign. No answer there either. I was a little perplexed and kept trying until finally someone answered the phone. Apparently reception is only open for certain hours a day and you’re supposed to make prior arrangements to check-out/in out of those times. Nobody told me! They gave me their top secret code for the gate so I could get in and there was my key and a lollipop waiting for me in an envelope. I dumped my stuff in my room and got changed. By the time I went back downstairs there was someone on reception so I could officially sign in. I sort of wish I’d just slinked out before their shift started so I wouldn’t have had to pay the key deposit etc but oh well, at least I’ll get it back soon. The guy on reception was actually really lovely and tried to convince me to join him and the other guys for taco night in the hostel and I might have been tempted to go hang out with them (but not eat tacos) but I already had prior arrangements. The guy on reception gave me directions over to Bondi Road, which is where Vicki has moved to, so I went over to nosey at her flat. I have to say, I’m not an easily scared person but her house was terrifying. It looks almost exactly like the house in Monster House and walking through the front garden you get the distinct impression that the house is going to spring to life and try to eat you. All the windows in the front of the house were dark and the light on the porch wasn’t working so I had to creep up to the front door in the pitch black darkness and press her doorbell. I kept watching the stairwell from outside, waiting for her to turn the light on and come and get me. When that didn’t happen after a couple of doorbell rings I got a little creeped out and called Vicki to make sure I hadn’t accidentally entered the Twilight Zone. She forgot to tell me her doorbell doesn’t work and they always use the backdoor to get into the house. So that’s why it looked like nobody living had passed its threshold for the past few decades! She came and got me and led me round back, up a staircase and into her flat. It’s quite small but nice. I guess the down side is her cooker doesn’t work and she shares a room with someone but it’s cheap and it’s in a good location so I would’ve really liked it if I wasn’t super scared of the building! We had a bit of a catch up chat and I briefly met her flatmates but I couldn’t stay long as I was on my way to what will probably be the pinnacle of my Sydney stay...

Opera at the Sydney Opera House! Oh yes! My second splurge of the trip and I think I made a good decision. Once I knew La Boheme was playing I took it as a sign that if I could find reasonably cheap seats I should go. I probably picked the worst day as it meant I’d had to go back and forth from the CBD to Bondi but it was the cheapest date I could find. The bus on the way in hit every single red light and the traffic was horrendous. Google had told me the journey would be about 45 minutes but it took almost twice as long! I was practically having a panic attack as the bus’s progression seemed to get slower and slower. I ended up having to practically run through Circular Quay, up the million steps to the Opera House and got ushered straight into my seat as they were almost ready to start. As a confirmed Renthead, I loved how Marcello wore a stripy sweater like Marc and Colline had a tartan coat just like Collins. I know that Rent probably copied La Boheme but still the little similarities made me giggle. What I couldn’t get my head around was how loud the audience was. While the stage hands were changing the scenery everyone started chatting to each other. Maybe it was just the good acoustics in the theatre making the noise really echo but it was deafening. If you watch a play or a musical there might be a few whispers during scene changes but normally you just sit in anticipation of the next scene. I do anyway. It kind of ruins the suspension of disbelief to have a conversation mid-performance but it seems the norm with the opera crowd. I was also surprised at how casual everyone had dressed. I’d put on the best dress I had with me, which was creased and from Primark and I looked better than most of the women there. Some of them were in jeans and Uggs! I was expecting to look like a pauper because they’d be in their suits and cocktail dresses like in Pretty Woman. I think the Hairspray crowd dressed better to be honest! The show was amazing though. I cried bucket loads. I think it should come with a warning or there should at least be an usher handing out tissues at the door. I won’t post any spoilers but I totally wasn’t prepared for it. Rent has a happy ending, kind of, but the ending of La Boheme is just so sad and final. I was wiping away the tears whilst trying to applaud the cast!

I decided I needed a hamburger and a gelato after the show to cheer me up, plus I had to kill time waiting for the bus back to Bondi. The traffic was minimal at that time so the journey was closer to the ETA I had in mind (still not 45 minutes though). I was pretty much ready to collapse in my bed when I got in but the douche bags in the room next-door were playing lame-ass techno trance at full blast. (In fact the same douche bags are playing the same lame techno trance tonight). I get that it’s the weekend and to some people that means listening to crappy dance music but some of us would rather listen to show tunes and go to sleep thank you very much. I don’t want to sound like an old fuddy duddy because I like to party as much as the next girl but I don’t like to be forced to listen to some loser’s attempt of recreating Gatecrasher in his dorm room at getting on for one o’clock in the morning. If he was blasting the Spice Girls or Arctic Monkeys or the Grease soundtrack I might be more forgiving. Luckily the endless droning sameness actually helped me go to sleep and I didn’t wake up again until gone ten o’clock the next morning.

It was rainy when I got up this morning. I was going to meet Heather back in Central to find some free, indoor activity for us to do whilst we kept warm but I decided to go get a proper look at the Pacific Ocean first. The waves were crashing, the palm trees were blowing and to top it all off the sun was shining! The only things ruining the perfect picture were the ugly guys in nut-huggers jogging up and down the sands. I text Heather and asked her to come to the beach instead because I wanted to enjoy the momentary sunshine but she couldn’t be bothered with the journey to Bondi Beach. I loitered on the promenade, watching the world go by for a little while and then headed up to the 7-11 to get a lunch of crisps and chocolate, which I ate down on the promenade. I decided to walk all the way to the end of the beach where the safe to swim area was and on my way I spotted them: SURFERS! All my dreams and expectations of Australia summed up in one word! They were way down the far end of the beach where the cliffs curve out (because obviously this is where the bigger waves are) so I walked all the way along and parked myself on a bench and watched them surf for a while, They were a little far out so I couldn’t tell if any of them were swoon-worthy but I could tell which of them were good surfers! After a while it started spitting so I decided to head back to the hostel and do something boring like laundry but by the time I’d got back the rain had stopped again. I was just deciding whether to head back out again when I got a call from Vicki who’d just got off work and wanted to hang out so I headed back out. We walked down to the beach again because although she’s been in Bondi longer than I have, she’s never been to the beach as the weather’s been so bad. Vicki really wanted to actually go on the beach and I figured if she was making me touch yucky sand then I had to go the whole hog and touch the ocean so I hid behind a picnic table in the park and whipped off my tights to go for a paddle. The sand was the clingy yellow kind but the water wasn’t as cold as I had expected, although it was nowhere near warm enough to do more than dip your toes in the water! After that I decided I needed a hot chocolate to warm up so we popped in to McDonald’s (cheapest place along the front) and had a chat while we warmed up a bit. Then we went on a wander through the shops and I swear we found the coolest bookshop in the world. It’s a bookshop/cafe and I think it’s called Gertrude and Alice’s. It had amazing looking cakes and every single wall was floor to ceiling lined with books! Cake and books = my idea of Heaven! They also buy books so I might flog them the one I picked up at the YHA when I traded in that stupid, anti-climactic whale book which I finally got through. We also found a Nando’s and a supermarket selling cookie dough! If I was staying in Sydney I would totally move to Bondi. Everyone keeps saying it’s over-rated and I bet that in the summer it gets really crowded but I reckon it is the place to be in Sydney.