Return

I think it is time to write again.

England is like another world. Adjusting back is strange and harder than I thought.

But I am not going to talk too much about England yet. On our way back from Sydney, we had an amazing stopover in Hong Kong and I must commit my memories to type.

We arrived direct from Sydney on Tuesday, early evening. The flight went well, plane was near empty so we had a row of seats to ourselves and it was really quiet, no queues for toilet etc. Landed in Hong Kong in some serious fog, boarded a train to HK Central station, then squeezed our mega amount of luggage into a Tardis-like HK taxi for a crazy-driving mad dash to our hotel in Wan Chai, on Hong Kong Island.

The hotel was amazing. We got a deluxe room which had plenty of space, and a great view over the racecourse and the edge of the skyscrapers. But we were hungry so headed straight out on the free shuttle bus to get the Star Ferry across to Tsim Sha Tsui on the mainland.



The Star Ferry is brilliant! The view from the water is fantastic, and with all the bright lights at night the fog didn't matter so much. And it only costs about 20p for a crossing. The ferry dropped us off in the heart of Kowloon and we made our way towards HK's mega shopping street, Nathan Road, endless shops, designer and more traditional, huge crowds and the obligatory shady men offering "copy bag, copy rolex". I completely misunderstood what was going on at first and was wondering what "coffee bag" was, whether it was like a tea bag. Then I realised that was Chinese pronunciation of 'copy'.

Somewhere off Nathan Road we found a vegetarian restaurant recommended in our Rough Guide, which had all you can eat Cantonese vegetarian buffet. It was so cheap and had free green tea and the food was really good - we were so hungry that I definitely had my money's worth anyway! Then it was train back to HK Island and bed.

The following morning we made our way over to the central business area of Hong Kong Island, walking around super-smart malls on our way to get the Peak Tram. The Peak Tram is a funicular railway that takes you up to Victoria Peak on Hong Kong Island, an upmarket residential area that until 1930 was reserved exclusively for non-Chinese.



The tram ejects you into a little shopping centre that seems especially designed to prevent you getting out. We did find the exit eventually though and had a good walk round. There's a great view from the top over the harbour, although unfortunately the fog was still thick so we couldn't see as much as we would have liked. We climbed up a bit further and found a pleasant garden, with a signposted walk that we did, thinking it would take us in a circuit but we ended up somewhere completely lost on the mountain with no people in sight! We retraced our steps in the end and found our way back to the tram.

We found a gallery cafe in Central for lunch with a thai vegetarian buffet - really nice. Then we caught the Star Ferry back over the Tsim Sha Tsui and wandered around a bit, got a coffee, then realised from the guide book that the Hong Kong Museum of History, which was just round the corner, was free entry for the afternoon. We went along and it was a brilliant museum - really well laid out and with plenty of detail covering the whole history of Hong Kong, from pre-history right through to HK being handed back to China and the creation of the Special Administrative Region. In one bit they had done a reconstruction of a Hong Kong street circa 1930 and you could wander into all the shops, it was fascinating!

We headed back to HK Island and got some sushi rolls in the mall near the hotel for dinner. We were stuffed after lunch still. We had a look round the shops too, which were really festive as they had late night shopping for Chinese New Year (a few days later) - it's like Christmas there! Then bed.

Thursday morning we made our way down to the Ferry Terminal once more, but this time not for the Star Ferry, oh no! We boarded the Lantau Island Ferry, to Mui Wo.

The ferry was pretty awful. Even though it only cost about 80p, it took almost an hour, was really rickety, and the route was really unscenic. The fog was still really thick so you couldn't see far enough to see anything interesting, but parked out in the sea between the islands are all these horrible huge industrial junky boats, container ships, some boats that just look like they are rotting away. These things kept looming out of the fog at us as we sailed past. Blah.

Lantau Island is the largest of HK's islands, and very mountainous. It feels very rural, even the town Mui Wo seemed rather sparse. We boarded a bus next in the main square and that wound its way up high into the mountains, giving some amazing views! Hong Kong is very craggy. After about half an hour, we arrived at our destination, Ngong Ping, next to which lies the Po Lin Monastery and its massive 26m high bronze Buddha statue.



The photos really don't give the best impression, the Tian Tan Buddha looms over you wherever you are.






It's very beautiful around the monastery. We went up into the dining hall where the monastery dishes up hearty vegetarian meals for a tiny price. The food was quite basic (mostly just plain rice and vegetables) but nice and there was plenty of it! We had about 5 different dishes.

After filling up, we made our way up to the summit and the statue.





After a good look round, we were back on the bus to Mui Wo and back on the boat to Hong Kong Island.

We wandered back to the hotel and kind of spent the rest of the afternoon lounging around in bed, drinking green tea and watching the sun set out of our huge window. It was really nice. We got up again eventually and went for a really nice dinner at a crazy cantonese vegetarian restaurant we found online. You had to go into this slightly grotty looking tenement building and up in a lift to get to it, but once in it was great, really busy, and even though there was a slightly awkward language barrier the staff were really welcoming - I think being slightly off the tourist trail, they weren't really used to international visitors!

A last look round the lights of Kowloon and Hong Kong Island, and we went back to the hotel to pack up and sleep before the long long long flight the next morning. There was a slight mis-hap checking in when my suitcase accidentally went down the luggage chute without a luggage tag, but it all got sorted in the end! The flight this time was not so fun. Halfway through I genuinely thought I was going to DIE of BOREDOM (13 hours aghhh) and this time the plane was really small and really crowded, and the seats didn't recline properly. McWrinkle wasn't too happy as he had his own seat on the first plane but this time had to go under the seat in front with my bag. I did fall asleep for an hour or so though, and the rest of the time watched Tudors.

Then we arrived back in Heathrow, passing through the corridors of arrivals with cheery photos of London sights on the walls, a positive beginning. Then it was COLD. SO COLD. And dark. I had two nights in a row without a day in between. And thus, with a seemingly endless night and some photos of London on the walls, began a new chapter of life.

Bye January, Bye Australia

January has seen some crazy times, that seem a world away now as I sit here wrapped in blankets, fire blazing, looking out of the window over frosty English countryside...

...The new year 2011 started as it meant to go on with layers of thick, sticky heat falling over Sydney.



We took a trip out to visit our old house in Meadowbank and caught the Parramatta River ferry back to the city, like we always used to do back in the day.



We hung out at Sydney Observatory and on Observatory Hill, my favourite place in the world...we did the night tour at Sydney Observatory also, got to look at Jupiter and a lovely nebula!



We took our last day trip out to the Blue Mountains - where the air was fresh and clean and delicious - walked the giant steps, Furber steps and through the Jamison Valley. I ached for the next 3 days.

We've seen the sights, walked over the Harbour Bridge, swam at Balmoral, and spent a lovely evening with Dean at the free open-air concert in the Domain, Sydney Symphony performing a Shakespeare-themed set of works, with our accompanying selection of wine, cheese and antipasto. We saw Kitty, Daisy and Lewis play some fun rock 'n' roll at the Sydney Festival, and The National play an amazing gig at the Enmore Theatre. We braved the queue for the Annie Leibowitz retrospective at the MCA and found it thoroughly worth the wait. We had flat whites and falafels at Shenkin in Erskineville (my favourite home for always), thickshakes at BuzzzBar in Newtown, poached eggs at Baffi and Mo in Redfern, rojak and cendol at Mamak in Chinatown, polenta chips and many other delights with David and Kristie at Bloodwood in Newtown, Four Ate Five's excellent chips in Surry Hills, Crust Pizza in Neutral Bay (Crust Pizza!!!), and the most fabulous 3 course meal with the most delectable bottle of wine at Glebe Point Diner.

I had my last day at work and my colleagues bought me some beautiful antique silver rose earrings. Mark and I held our leaving party at Emma's shop, we had a vegetarian BBQ, and we drank our 2003 vintage Moet that I had been saving for such an occasion.

Our last day in Sydney was a busy one, made rather difficult by the fact the weather suddenly decided it was a good idea to be 36 degrees (THIRTY SIX DEGREES) for the day. Poor Mark had to carry an 8kg box to the Post Office, then we had to find lunch somewhere that had air conditioning before we passed out (Deus ex Machina sufficed with their lovely salads, giving us a chance to cool down). Then a trip to the bank where I lost the plot slightly and Mark had to do my accounting for me which probably made the bank people think he was trying to steal all my money or something.

Then a trip up the Sydney Tower!



For some last minute postcard sending and surveying of our beautiful land...

And the day was over. Just the evening was left, a last drink with Dean at the Art House Hotel and then onwards into the night to watch Priscilla Queen of the Desert at Emma's in Surry Hills.

On Tuesday 25th at 8am, a taxi came to Neutral Bay, a taxi came and took us away. It took us over the Harbour Bridge, past Circular Quay, and south to the airport. A final flat white later and we boarded a plane, one final loop over Sydney, beautiful Sydney, Sydney my home, and we were gone.

Neutral Bay

My current bedroom in the Neutral Bay sharehouse. I like this house a lot, it has space in. The only downside is obviously that it is on the wrong (north) side of the bridge. It is SO straight here. So vanilla. And there are like, 5 supermarkets all within a few blocks of each other. At least we are not far from the beach. I am now one of those terrible people for whom there is no life outside the inner west.

In one week I will no longer live in Sydney. No longer live in Australia.

two thousand ten/eleven

December rather flew by. I assume it happened, there wasn't anything on the news about it going missing. So it must have just gone really fast. I don't remember a whole lot happening, other than going to see the Australian Ballet's most wonderful production of the Nutcracker at the Opera House. We both loved it so much, I want to go to the ballet again soon. And it was so Christmassy, the perfect show to see the week before Christmas.

Christmas happened and passed almost unnoticed as we weren't really able to do much normal celebrating. We had a rather super Christmas Eve though. I left work at midday and we trooped on down to the Fish Market, not a particularly fun walk in the searing heat but all worth it in the end as we stocked up on tasty sea creatures.



The fish market was heaving as seafood is Australia's Christmas dinner of choice. It took us a while to get round, but we eventually came away with oysters, a huge tuna steak, and some salmon and tuna sashimi as well as smoked salmon. After taking the fishies home to the fridge, we spent the rest of the afternoon in the city, wandering around the shops (I bought a rather fancy new iPod for myself, naughty).

Walked up to Crown Street in the evening to eat at Yulli's, the vegetarian restaurant, had a lovely bottle of wine then emerged again once more onto streets full of festive cheer....the Clock Hotel across the road seemed to call us in, the bar staff were all dressed as elves, and we demanded glasses of port, which took rather a while to find, but finally some tasty christmassy port did emerge. We drank it out on the balcony, under the clock tower for which the pub is named.

Christmas morning saw a slow start. We got up and made our way over to our new friend Emma's house, on the way we walked passed the Salvation Army office, they were throwing a party with lots of families there and they had a truck loaded up with bags of toys they were giving out. It warmed our hearts. Collected Emma then altogether walked down to Central and took the train to Newtown. We spent the day under the beautiful sun in the garden of a King Street terrace, in the company of a number of miscellaneous adults, an 8 year old, and 18 month old, and the world's most excitable dog. We feasted endlessly on prawns, roast vegetables, salads and large amounts of wine. An excellent day.

The next three days rained. Solidly. We stayed at home and watched the cricket. On Tuesday, we moved up to our new (and final) house in Neutral Bay, where we will stay for the next couple of weeks until the time comes to make the journey back to the UK.

I had to work Tuesday-Friday, and it was frantic. I have never known it so busy and it was really hard to keep calm, especially as we had a couple of minor disasters involving things going wrong and a couple of member complaints. Especially demoralizing as it seemed every other person in Sydney was still on holiday! Oh well, come New Year's Eve I was ready for some fun, after a nap of course.

We met up with some friends at a barbecue at a house in Surry Hills, then walked over to Oxford Street to try our luck getting into a mythical secret party which may or may not have existed. That failed, and since midnight was approaching we taxied down to Moore Park to sit on a hill, drink wine and watch the fireworks. It was nice up on the hill, just a small crowd of people, mostly just local families and quite a few children. There were 2 policemen but they just let everyone carry on drinking even though it's technically an alcohol-free area, as no one was causing any trouble. It was nice.



Mark, Emma and Anya on the hill.



Mark and I


Our view of the Sydney city skyline.

We went back to Emma's shop afterwards and cleared the rails for a party.



Ended up dancing and drinking and dozing on and off until the sun came up on 2011, and Mark and I made our way back to the North Shore to sleep our way through the rest of an extremely hot New Year's Day.

Strawberry Fields forever

I arrived at work this morning to find an inexplicable pile of avocados on my desk. Also on my desk, a present from our department's middle manager. I brought all of these things home. This brings the Christmas 2010 grand present total to a staggering....THREE. Oh well, at least I have a lot of avocados. Yum.

What HAS HAPPENED? It has been a long time since I last blogged. Oh, Mark's parents came to visit! We had a week up in Port Stephens around 3 hours drive from Sydney on the north coast of New South Wales, a week of perfect weather sandwiched in between days of heavy rain. Lady Luck smiled upon us.

We rented a little flat for the week in Nelson Bay and spent the first couple of days lazing around on the beach at the bottom of the road and buying mangos from the market. Around the third day, we caught the ferry over the bay to Tea Gardens and Hawk's Nest, watched dolphins play in the river and found the beautiful Jimmy's Beach.



We drove for a day to the Hunter Valley and visited some beautiful vineyards - wine tasted at Vinden Estates out in the most perfect courtyard with the most perfect view.



Also visited the well-known Tyrrell's wines and went on a very enjoyable and informative tour of their wine-making facilities.



There were so many big barrels!

A long drive home (and a dead kangaroo :( ) later, we refreshed ourselves with a good nights sleep ready for a hike up to Tomaree Head, which gave amazing views out over the ocean on one side, Shoal Bay on another and over the little ocean beaches of Zenith, Wreck and Box on the third.





One of my favourite things was our visit to see the sand dunes at Stockton Beach. At around 32km long and 1km wide they are one of the largest mobile sand masses in the world and are fascinating, desolate and desertlike, especially considering we visited on a savagely hot day.





It was kind of an odd pilgrimage as I have this fascination with sand dunes and their mythology. In my mind they are just places where everything is very hot and very absurd. I guess I have read too much Kobo Abe. But my goodness I loved that novel.

Weather

The weather has gone crazy. That hail storm actually happened. *shakes head in disbelief* Global warming? I think it's just global bizarre combustion of all sense and reason.

Melbs

My holidays are now complete. I think I went on 3 holidays in 5 weeks, which is rather decadent.

Holiday #2 involved a long weekend in Melbourne. Mark had been there all week, bumbling around at Melbourne Uni being philosophical and drinking coffee and wine and the rest of the time lounging around in a suite in a 4 star hotel. Oh the life of a philosopher.

I arrived on Friday via the aeroplane at around 10pm. Mark came to fetch me from the bus station and we caught the lovely tram up to Fitzroy to drink some wine and eat some late night desserts with some philosophy persons, before returning to the city and undertaking a lengthy slumber in the world's most comfortable bed.

Saturday it rained. And rained. And rained. And rained a bit more. We caught the trambulator to North Melbourne to a lovely cafe called the Auction Rooms and ate a wonderful brunch, accompanied by fresh juices and several coffees, giving us an excuse to sit there for almost 3 hours watching the rain fall outside. Not sure what to do, we ended up just heading back to the hotel and lying around for a bit, before heading back out on the tram back to Fitzroy to be our old friends Sam and Georgina's first ever houseguests in their new Melbourne flat!!! After a long stay working in NZ followed by several months travelling in South East Asia, they decided to move to Australia after visiting us in Sydney back in 2009. They had only been in the flat a few days and only had a mattress, 2 bar stools and an old TV to their names, but they also had a kitchen with wine so we had a bottle and talked about moving to Australia, moving to the UK, travelling.... It made me sad in a way that they are just arrived here and have a whole new life of fun to look forward to, while we are on our way out....I'm also sad that they are now in Australia just as we are leaving, so we won't get to hang out....the next time we see them will be at when they come back for their own wedding in the UK next July!

We walked out in the pouring rain over to the Veggie Bar and had a grand old meal and more and more wine before it was time to head to bed.

Sunday saw a slightly nicer day.



On the tram. Like the last time we went to Melbs, this time again I got so excited by the tram and took about 7386249372847 photos of the tram and us trambulating on it from inside and out. I have also used the word 'trambulating' so much now I think it might become a real word.

We went to Seven Seeds on Sunday for lunch - delicious toasted sandwiches and even more delicious coffee. We headed on down to the National Gallery of Victoria and had a little wander round, then back up to Brunswick Street for shopping and cafes. Sunday night was spent with Malaysian food and cocktails - we went back to Double Happiness, the bar we had been at on our last visit to Melbourne. It was brilliant.



I had a lychee based cocktail. Then we went over to our other favourite, the rooftop bar at Cookie and drank Kir Royale whilst gazing over the bright lights of Melbourne's CBD.

Monday we checked out of the hotel and went to the National Library of Victoria to print out boarding passes for the flight home. It's a pretty impressive place inside, all domed roofs and old books.

We were thinking about going up the Eureka Tower to the Skydeck on the 88th floor, the highest viewing platform in the Southern Hemisphere, but weren't sure as it was pretty expensive and the weather was still a bit grey. In the end though, we thought we'd go down there and have a look.



We decided to go up and it was so worth it! Seeing the city from so high up is really great. I didn't realise the sea was so close either, I thought Melbourne was inland, but you could see St Kilda and the coast really close by. It's also a lot higher than the Sydney tower so you get more of a sense of looking down rather than just out. Mark was clinging to the walls at first but he soon got used to it!



That's the view over the CBD.

From there we headed back to the hotel to collect our bags and make our way to the airport, where I proceeded to go mad for 2 hours as I had finished my Agatha Christie the day before (it was too exciting) and had literally nothing to do, until Mark went and bought me a newspaper to make me quieten down. Haha.