I’ll be posting about all my travels since Melbourne soon. Until then, enjoy the view I have every time I go into my kitchen!

It’s getting warm here in Melbourne.  Today it hit 90, which was a bit high for my weak winter constitution.  Our little backpacker hovel doesn’t have air conditioning, so I’m doing the next best thing and moving to New Zealand tomorrow!

My work contract ended last Friday, and in the past week I’ve wasted no time getting into vacation mode.  I spent the weekend in Sydney, and was surprised to discover that I actually like it up there.  Melbourne & Sydney have a fierce rivalry and usually folks like one or the other, but despite my love for Melbs I think I could really enjoy living in Sydney.  I managed to pack quite a bit into the weekend – everything from a 10k coastal walk to some Prokofiev at the Opera House.  And I even got to ride a ferry!

Back in Melbs, I spent a couple free days doing classy things like watching ethnographic films at ACMI and eating delicious meals.  Then it was off to the Great Ocean Road for 2 days, where I took the above photo.  Also, in what is beginning to be a trend, I took to the skies over the 12 Apostles, in a helicopter this time.  Don’t worry, though – despite all this height-related tourism, I’m not jumping on (off?) the skydiving bandwagon just yet.

It’s kind of funny to be excited to leave a city I really like, but I think New Zealand is going to be great fun.  And it certainly helps that I’m planning to come back here in a couple years.  I’d write about my thoughts on moving around at more length, but I think the heat has completely fried my brain.  Time to pack the carryon, I think, and drink some wine!

Nothing like standing in a wicker basket with fire above your head at 5,000 feet at 6am to kickstart the day… more photos here.

Stefan Sagmeister, designer extraordinaire, talks about his practice of taking a year off every seven years for creative purposes.  Not that anybody should be surprised, but I enjoyed the hell out of this talk.  We’re using it as kind of a catalyst to get our travel blog project off the ground – but more on that later, when we’ve got everything in place.

Despite some recent setbacks, I am still enjoying my time here in Melbourne.  For those of you who didn’t hear, my camera (the big one) and mp3 player were stolen two weeks ago.  I’ve managed to get replacements for everything, and it’ll be all covered by insurance in the end.  But let me tell you – being without those things for a week and a half was brutal!  I’m just considering it all a reminder that I need to be less comfortable and more aware when  I’m overseas…

More excitingly, this month brought the Melbourne Arts Festival, which has been pretty much excellent so far.  Peter Greenaway was in town for a couple film screenings, lectures, and most importantly, his installation around Leonardo’s Last Supper.  In addition to all that, I got to see the London Philharmonic, and on Saturday I am going to a big event all about Tropicalia, with music and documentaries and such.  So I’ve been feeling rather cultured lately!

Speaking of cultural activities… one of my housemates plays on a rec netball team, and since basketball was on break, I agreed to give it a try.  I know I’ve always said netball is a sexist sport – take a look at its history, or perhaps this article – but I figured I’d give it a try, since it’s such a big thing down here.  My current goal is to not suck at it, which is more difficult than it sounds.  The sport just has SO MANY RULES!  For example, when you’re playing defense, you can’t have your hands up, and you can’t be any closer than 3 feet from the person with the ball.  “Intimidation” is against the rules.  And before you start playing, the refs actually check the fingernail length of all the players.  It’s hardly the kind of game you could ever play pickup, but so far I’m enjoying the challenge of learning a ridiculous new sport.

Oh, and I’ve got SIX WORKING DAYS left in the ENTIRE YEAR.  Just to rub that in!

My work contract ends 30th October, after which I have a week left in Australia.  I figure I can’t really justify four months here without at least visiting Sydney, so I’ve got a 3 day trip planned up there.  I’m also taking advantage of free midweek days by taking a 2 day trip to the Great Ocean Road, which everybody says is spectacular.  And then, on 8th November, it’s off to New Zealand.  From the 8th – 19th, I’ll be basing my travels out of Auckland.  I’m planning on spending a decent chunk of time exploring the northern tip of the island; according to my Kiwi housemates, the Bay of Islands is a must.  Then on the 19th, it’s off to Korea for 2 weeks of ridiculous expat Thanksgiving shenanigans, courtesy my friend Amy, who’s an English teacher out there.  She is quite resourceful and has discovered that we can pre-order a turkey through the US Army base in Seoul.  And we have lots of practice with overseas Thanksgivings – three years ago we successfully introduced a handful of Irish to our proud American tradition of gluttony.  If I still meet airline weight restrictions after our feast, I’ll be getting back to NZ on 2nd December.  The next day, I’m heading off to my new home for the next year, Wellington, by way of tourism.  I am planning for this journey to take about 2 weeks but am not committing to anything; travel with deadlines is no fun at all!  I’m using a backpacker’s hop-on hop-off bus called the Stray Bus to do the North Island circuit.  Here’s a map of it all:

The idea is that I get to Wellington somewhere around mid-December, and spend a while hanging out and enjoying the summer until January, when I’ll get back out into the job market.  I haven’t fully sorted this out yet, but I am hoping to spend New Year’s Eve at the Rhythm & Vines festival and Christmas in the cinema watching In the Loop with a hip flask.  Ambitious plans, I know.

So what else have I been doing in Melbourne, apart from planning my escape?  Here are some things:

Kiwi parties.  Winning trivia nights.  Hanging out at my new favorite place in Melbourne – the ACMI Mediatheque.  Cooking enormous meals.  Steffi, I have baked 3 things – be proud!  Playing squash and soon netball during the basketball break.  Watching the Huskies win, and win, and then lose horribly.  Avoiding AFL (this is difficult).  Eating kangaroo, drinking Cooper’s.  Battling with my employer, who have not been taking tax out of my paychecks.  They deserve every bit of their bankruptcy proceedings.  Meeting up with a college friend who happened to be in town.  $4 pizzas at Bimbos.  Telling myself I’ll meet the YHA folks in the city at 8:45 on Sundays for hikes, and then deciding to sleep in.  Drinking from goon bags.  White wine that tastes like red wine (and not in a good way).

Consider yourselves informed!

The Southern hemisphere time-warp has given me plenty of time for fun stuff, at least.  Last Saturday I finally did a typical Melbourne tourist activity: I took a day tour to Phillip Island to see the penguin parade, a sunset extravaganza in which little penguins come in from the sea to their nests and attempt to cross the beach without getting eaten by seagulls.  It’s sort of like a game of frogger, with predatory birds instead of cars.  The trip also included a visit to a “wildlife sanctuary” (read: petting zoo) which was home to the saddest koala in the world.  So of course this had to happen:

facedown, saddest koala in the world, originally uploaded by lynnith.

I came home from the trip around 11pm to find my housemates getting ready to go to a house party down the road.  This is where my planning obsession comes in handy – I’d picked up a couple bottles of emergency wine for exactly this sort of situation!  One emergency beer later, we headed for the party, stopping only for glamour shots with a large piece of construction equipment.  (I think there are pictures somewhere of this on Facebook)  Inexplicably, the party had quite a few people dressed in costume, which left my Kiwi housemate and I feeling rather unexciting in our normal outfits.  So we decided to pretend as if we were dressed up as divas – I chose Patti LaBelle, naturally.  The next day we discovered we’d taken quite a few clothespins and festive bits of ribbon from the party, so perhaps we should have gone as crows instead.

The week was pretty standard, as far as work-weeks go.  Monday I cooked lamb for the first time, braising it in a tomato-fig-spice sauce, which was just as delicious as it sounds.  Tuesday was basketball; we lost, but I played reasonably well.  On Thursday the housemates & I ventured out to find a good local pub, and ended up at a spot with a nice courtyard and low-key crowd.  The previous week we’d gone to a student dive, complete with a creepy cover band that kinda seemed like an incestuous family, and a pair of snow leopards on the prowl.  So the discovery of a decent local was a welcome one!

On Friday I went for drinks with one of my work friends, and met a bunch of her friends.  A lot of them work for one of the major ad networks here in Australia; it was cool to hang out with some younger ad folks for a change.  Her brother, an avid cyclist, was also there, and told me of a mystical place north of here where bikes cost $40.  I walked up there on Saturday afternoon and discovered what I can only describe as the North Pole for bike hobos.  There’s a giant bike workshop/co-op in the middle of an educational environmental park and/or hippie village; people donate functioning or broken bikes and the folks who volunteer there help you get yours into riding shape once you buy it.  It’s a great deal – I’ve got one sitting there with no brakes, and if there aren’t any nicer ones next week they’re going to help me fix it up!  So in a week I’ll have a sweet ride for cheaper than a slab of beer!!

Today I went on a day hike with the YHA Bushwalking club, which ended up being lots and lots of fun.  We went to a place called the “You Yangs”, which is basically a few hills plopped down in the middle of an endless expanse of flat farmland.  The folks on the hike today were mostly in their 20s and 30s, and all really interesting.  So I’ll definitely be going on more hikes; they meet every Sunday morning at the same time so I don’t have to actually commit to going until the day of… definitely my kind of club!  I mostly hiked with the same group of girls, who were all pretty sarcastic, especially about my American tourist-ness.  I started giving them a hard time on the way back about not having seen any kangaroos in the wild, when all of a sudden we saw one by the side of the road!  So now I’ve seen kangaroos in their natural setting, which is basically like seeing deer at home, except a billion times more awesome.

So all in all, things are still going really well here!  I think this about covers my life in Melbourne at the moment; I’m having a great time, and the city really suits me.  And next week I should have a bike, as well as a really interesting (and potentially excellent) story about work that hasn’t quite played out.  So stay tuned…

My life here is approaching some semblance of normalcy, now that the film festival (and my accompanying open bar-induced hangover) is over.  I’m settling in to the office routine, and though my job requires no actual thinking – I think it could be done by a child, to be honest – it’s pretty easy to speed through the day and I get to leave on time no matter what.  I actually rejected a call from a salesguy on Wednesday because he called at 5:30.  Perhaps my co-workers were mortified, but working past then is not in my contract, so they can shove it!  My goal for the job is to stay as un-ambitious as possible and just focus on two things: stockpiling cash for future adventures, and finding the most delicious Vietnamese food in Richmond.  So far it’s working – I had great pho at lunch the other day, and I get paid on Monday!!

Otherwise I am starting to find my place in this city.  Of course one of my more important tasks was finding a basketball team, and to that end I played three games last week.  The first one was pretty meh, it was a co-ed social club with all the usual issues – showboating guys loath to pass to the girls.  Fortunately, Melbourne has a HUGE sports centre in Albert Park, with all kinds of swimming pools, racquet sports, and about 12 basketball courts.  I’ve joined a team playing in a Tuesday night league, just like at home; they’re all super nice and fun to play with.  One of them also plays in a Thursday league, and for some reason I agreed to fill in since one of their players was out last week.  That team was pretty cool too, so I’ve agreed to be a sometime-substitute for them as well, when I don’t have any other Thursday plans.  It’s been nice to get back into that routine, even though I’m still feeling it…

My house & housemates continue to be pretty cool; we all still get along really well and often end up just hanging out in the living room after work.  Last Saturday, the weather was amazing – 60+ and sunny – so we randomly decided to go to the beach.  I even saw a Shiba Inu there, so, mission accomplished I guess!  It was E’s birthday on Friday so we went out to a chill downtown bar called The Lounge, which has a few floors & a cool second-story balcony with some nice city views.  Rooftop drinking & outdoor cinema are apparently Melbourne institutions so when the weather gets nicer I’m going to start exploring that a bit!  Oh, and on a side note, the CSI-type-show’s production company never called us back, so we are all pretty disappointed but will not be playing junkies/dealers/dead bodies in our living room on nationwide television.  So sad.

Yesterday I went over to Northcote to see a play my friend is stage managing.  We all know I don’t really do the whole theatre thing, but free makes anything worthwhile.  Also, the bio of one of the actors – who has a PhD in something medical – was very Tobias Funke-like!  The suburb is up on a hill (I swear it’s the only hill in the city!) & has amazing views of Melbourne; I think it’s like being on Beacon Hill but further south.  Northcote has some cool bars, as well, and after the play I ended up in the beer garden of one of them, playing bocce ball until about 1:30… and then I walked home, which takes about an hour, because I’m cheap!  I really like walking across a city at night, though, there’s something cool about passing through empty, dark suburban streets and ending up outside happening bars & things and just observing it all.

Okay – I think it’s just raining now to spite me.  I swear it has gotten windier and rainier since I started complaining about it.  Curses!!  I should probably just head over to the market, considering that if this rain never stops and we all get trapped in our houses for days I only have rice, peanut butter and eggs to keep me alive.  Hopefully I won’t drown on the way!

It’s so funny to be on the other side of this sort of thing. Instead of working my ass off & putting together training docs & harassing Doubleclick with unanswerable questions, I just get to be the low-level contractor who has to be trained from scratch on the site structure and the old ad server and such. I’m going in tomorrow for a few hours of site training to get an idea for how they sell the property and how things are divided up.  Work officially starts Monday, which is exactly two months after my last day of work in Seattle.  I’m actually ready, I think, to be a 9-5er again; it will be nice to use my brain a bit more, for sure!

Now that I have money coming in, I’ve gone and spent my paycheck of the future on basketball shoes.  Shit’s expensive here – I dropped AUD$140 on an okay pair of And1s!  But the good news is I think I’ve found a basketball team in the upper division of, according to the cool guy who sold me the shoes, the best league in Melbourne.  Once the film fest is over I’m going to play a trial game with them and see how it goes, so hopefully that will work out.  They even play on Tuesday nights, just like at home!

Speaking of the film festival, it’s now in full swing and I’ve liked everything I’ve seen thus far: No One Knows About Persian Cats, Moon, and Humpday.  I think I’m going to see a total of 10, which when you count in my volunteer shifts makes for a busy couple of weeks!  Starting off my time in Melbourne with a fest was a great idea – definitely a nice introduction to the arts scene here.  My volunteer shifts are cool, too, since merch sales really only pick up when folks are shuffling into the cinemas.  So I have a lot of free social time; I made friends with the venue manager, who says that she has some connections into basketball leagues here.  She’s made some calls on my behalf so if my prospective team doesn’t work out, I have a backup strategy.  One of my housemates was making fun of me for putting so much effort into finding a team that *doesn’t* practice; she has a point!

I’ve also been trying to do more touristy things, since I am nearly out of funemployment time.  On Tuesday, I decided to walk over to a waterfall I’d seen on the gigantic Melbourne map in the bathroom.  The waterfall itself ended up being really lame (like 2 feet high! why is that even on a map?) but it was in the middle of an awesome, huge park.  It’s built around a bunch of switchbacks in the Yarra River, which makes for some excellent walking and bird-spotting and stuff.  I ended up covering about 14km in total, and explored a big chunk of the park as well as the neighborhoods in between here and there (it’s three to the east).  It’s fairly close to my job as well, so I expect I’ll be spending more time out there as the weather gets nicer.  On Wednesday, I signed up for a group tour to the Yarra Valley wineries, which was tons of fun.  There were only 6 people on the tour, and there was a lot of wine, so we all had a great time.  It doesn’t sound very good, but a lot of Australian wineries make a sparkling Shiraz/Pinot Noir, and it is absolutely delicious.  Definitely one of those drinks to file under danger…

The house & housemates continue to be awesome.  The other day we got a letter from a TV production company asking us if they could use our house as a location for some CSI-type show.  We are all really excited and hoping they want it to be a crack den or something so we can get background roles as junkies or dead bodies.  If it works out, it’d be a hell of a souvenir of my time in Melbourne!!

Oh, and apparently I’ve arrived in Melbourne – I’ve run into folks I know twice now on the street this week.  I can count the number of people I know here on two hands so I’m not sure what to make of that…

Speaking of savings, I discovered a couple of exciting bargains this week, in celebration of our lord and savior and when he got all born again in July or whatever.  (Yes, I am talking about Hulk Hogan, aka Santa with Muscles)  Movies here are usually really expensive – like over $15 expensive – but on Mondays everybody goes infomercial sale crazy and things get cheap.  The cinema across the road goes down to $6 before 4pm and $8 after.  So Mondays are now officially cinema days – I’ll see any old trash for $6.  It’s my hip excuse for seeing Harry Potter this week.  (The verdict?  Better than a lot of them, except the third of course, which was a real movie.  It was overlong and the usual bla bla blas about Harry Potter movies but not bad for the price!)  The other bargain was pretty good, too.  Melbourne’s having an arts festival this fall and Fischerspooner are coming thru for a night as part of it.  Unlike most cities, where arts festivals generally mean inflated ticket prices and stupidity, here it means I get to see them for $17.  When you consider it’s at their Paramount or Moore-sized theatre and one US dollar is worth $1.25 Australian, it basically means I win at life.  So ha.

In other arts news, the film festival started this weekend, which means I’m now spending a couple days a week hawking merchandise and attempting to use a credit card machine.  I also have an excellent slate of movies lined up; just came back from the first one, No One Knows About Persian Cats, which I quite liked.  The audience were rather IMDb-like and stayed until the end of the credits…  Volunteering is actually pretty nice – in a 4 hour shift I do about 30 minutes worth of work and spend the rest of the time socializing or reading a cornucopia of free books on my Kindle.  If the iPhone gets to be the jesusphone, does that mean the Kindle gets to compete with the bible and be called the jesusbook?  Because I am plowing through the public domain – just finished the entire Sherlock Holmes library and am now halfway through Gulliver’s Travels.

Other than books and movies and obsessing about money I spent my week twice getting drunk with the housemates, once by sheer chance, and swearing off beer.  Did you know that for the price of one pint of beer at a bar, I can buy a whole bottle of Jacob’s Creek Shiraz?  Did you know that a six-pack of beer costs $17 here??  I never imagined beer would be so expensive in Australia, but it is, and I am coping sullenly.  Good thing I like wine!

Oh, and I have a job interview in the morning, and I think I really want the job, so here’s hoping I don’t fuck this one up!