Barbie Roo!

Didn’t get the best of sleep but I was up and ready when Nat came back from here pilates, first stop was Bunnings (B&Q) to get my keys cut. We then popped past a Western Union joint to get some birthday money from my Dad (thanks!). Feeling the hunger we popped past Rose’s house to have food at the asian place just around the corner. Rose’s mate Greg was there and he looked like Crocodile Dundee. 🙂 I nom’d on some pad thai. There are lots of asian restaurants and massage places in Melbourne I noticed, and asian people.

After food Nat was keen to splurdge her money on a new wakeboard so we went past the shop to get one in time for tomorrows antics. That done (and Nat chuffed as) we headed home (via good ol’ Dan Murphy’s bottle shop for some Torpedo Extra IPA, lovely stuff) and cleaned out the garage a bit.

NOM NOM NOM

Roo on the barbie!

Armed with beers we walked 5 minutes down the road to Nat’s folks house for a barbie. Got to meet her mum Robin, ate lots of ‘roo (delicious!), talked about many things and left with a jigsaw puzzle. There is even some old home brew kit that they said I could have and they also pointed out Aldi will be selling mountain bikes dirt cheap on Wednesday so I’ll be looking to pick one up. Barbie today was great! 😀

Bank’s, Board’s, Bike’s & Barley

Today I got stuff done.

Setup an account at the bank Nat uses (keep it simple) which was easy to do, filled in the online form for my Tax File Number (again piece of piss), kicked off a transfer of moola, looked at wakeboard’s and scanned a bike shop for deals. I really want to get a bicycle soon so I can get out exercising but exploring the city with ease, places like Gumtree will be my cheapest option here I think (won’t be a full-sus Chris). Nat was checking out the wakeboard’s as we should be wakeboarding at the weekend which should be bloody ace fun! (I need to study on some Youtube videos I think)

We went past Nat’s folks house, lovely place so it is, where her dad was busy working on an old car in the garage (there is an old Triumph there too and his MG was parked in the local car park). We were invited to a barbie tomorrow which will be my first here in Australia, bloody excited so I am! I’ll get to meet her mum and hopefully cook some ‘roo. 😀

Afterwards we chilled at home and Nat’s sister Kath came by for a bit (good to meet her), I cooked some sweet tattie & pearl barley risotto for us. Great to be cooking again, love it! Had a few beers, exterminated a white tail spider, watched some South Park and then went to bed.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME

(and Luke I suppose…)

Yup 28 today and I think this is the first time I’ve spent a birthday away from home, couldn’t have picked a place further away eh? There was no real plans today other than to get a bank account setup and possibly a tax file number. None of this happened.

We did go to the super market though (desperate need of loo roll) and I splurged on butcher meet, deli cheese and loads of other stuff (Irn Bru!) in Coles. Loved it. Nat had to meet a dude that was picking up tee’s from the festival so we nipped past a bottle shop drive thru for some beers. This kind of booze service signifies to me that Oz definitely takes the crown of problem drinkers from us Scots. Nat got me some Punk IPA for my birthday. 🙂

Chilled at the house with another of Nat’s mates (Monica), drank some beer, made mac & cheese (yas!) then headed off to explore town a wee bit. Sorted me out with a MyKi transport card, much like the Beijing one I can use it for buses, trains, trams, etc. A short walk to the train station we were off to Southern Cross Station and a tram up the hill. You feel a massive difference in the city with it’s grid like formation, tall buildings, trams everywhere, yellow cabs scooting about, feels a bit like an American city to be honest.

Melbourne Central Station

We went to a pub next to one of the main rivers running through the city, the Yarra River. Sitting outside enjoying the views of the city was great, prices of a pint ($12) not so much! We then walked/trammed it to another part of the city scooting past Chinatown (need to check that out) and Central Station then into Dejavu for a crafty $6 pint (proper beer, good tunes and a special for Wednesdays).

Again on a tram and a quick scoot through the Queen Victoria Night Market which looks bloody awesome! It’s housed under a huge set of roofs with shed loads of different food being cooked away, it smelled great! Bloody busy though and I wasn’t actually hungry so didn’t buy anything, this time (it’s on every Wednesday). We went up to Rose’s house (a really cool converted warehouse studio type thing) for a few beers and pie’s before heading back home (Nat was shattered).

Took three different forms of public transport, visited two pubs, wandered the streets, eyed up the night market and did a food shop. Today was pretty good. 🙂

(I know fail on photo’s but I’ve got time!)

I like my hippies well done

Well just back from an epic 6 day hippy festival (Rainbow Serpent) and Jebus we are all glad to be home. I haven’t exactly noted everything down as I’m writing this post-fest so my memory isn’t great. Let’s start from the beginning…

We packed Erik’s Hilux to the brim, and on the roof, full of kit for the stall and the stall itself. Weather was great, not too hot, and the site was near the community of Lexton about 2 hours drive from Melbourne. We bought beer (6 slabs = 144 tins. Yes this all got drunk also need to check out all the bottle shops here, feels more and more like America) and food on the way (fish seems cheap here). We left a little later than expected and arrived at the back of 5PM.

Fook me this place is dry, just a sea of yellow in the fields of bone dry grass no wonder bush fires are common as muck (you see warning signs on the road including one’s for Kuala’s and roo’s). It didn’t take too long to get the stall and tent’s setup, the stall area’s are called island’s and that’s what it’s like with the private campsites in the middle. We were right next to the chillout stage complete with sofa’s and occasionally chest reverberating bass (as days went by this became quite annoying, it’s a 24hr festival FYI).

The Stall

Clothes and stoof all made in Melbourne

Art and my hats

Masks, folk liked these

Chillout stage

Trippers would be trippin’ seeing this

By the end this fella had tripped off his face, literally it was smashed off

Behind the scenes of the stall

An actual fridge, Erik was a Legend bringing this

Skulled

Padi hat – check, Wife beater – check, Beer – check

Can’t remember entirely what we did on the first day, or any after for that matter. We arrived a day early because we had the stall to setup so it was quite cool walking around the empty site (it was still getting setup too). There was 5 main stages (Chillout, Market, The Playground, Main Stage and Sunset) with The Playground being my favourite complete with huge circus tent and live stage shared with DJ’s and live bands, jived mostly here I must say. There was loads of food stalls too offering all different kinds of food from veggie, meat, Turkish, pizza, frozen yogurt and Baby Burgers. An area called The Village was right next to us too and this had various tents usually doing workshops (legs crossed hooing and humming) and galleries. The stars were really out the first night so it was great just lying back and taking in the view.

So to avoid sounding like a stuck record essentially each day consisted of consuming large quantities of beer (then whatever other alcohol was available), eating lots of different food, watching the sights of the festival (some bloody trippy get-ups and also a Festi-Couch) and jiving my ass off at various stages. There was a magician called Max and his Dad is one of the guys in this video, that was great to meet him. As each day went by sleep decreased, temperature increased and it slowly became punishment, and I didn’t even need to man the stall. The experience was great though, full of hippies and people off their trolley (just seems to be an excuse for people to take lots of drugs this festival).

Packing up today was fecking tough going (the heat and lack of sleep made me feel delusional also I’d drunk quite a bit of wine the night before and found my tent flat as a pancake when going to bed) but it didn’t take too long thankfully. The trip back home was a sticky smelly one and having a shower was AMAZING (not showering for the entire time and only changing a tee every other, yup JUST a tee, think about that…) the amount of dirt that came off (“Oh I’ve tanned well…. ah bugger”). It’s been six days folks and the temp has crept up to just under 40C today, jebus.

Ordered a lamb and ricotta pizza (very nom) and just chilled. Tomorrow will be my birthday but I want to get a few boring things out the way first like bank account, tax file number, etc first. Oh and belated Birthday messages to Rachel and Joanna hope you both had great one’s! 🙂 I got a card from my Dad today too complete with Nana bruck inside, that was nice. Anyway I’m done here, signing out. (More pictures will follow once Jean has posted them)

Fish & Chips

Sleep deprived and some possible jet lag (only a 3 hour difference but I’m sure it doesn’t help) I woke up after 12PM. Ah decent coffee and toast slathered in real butter, oh yes.

Not long after getting fed and cleaned up Jean (Nat’s house mate) got back from taking her car to the garage. We had a good chat and she went to print some tee’s whilst I updated this here blog. Her brother and mate turned up to drop off some lights for the festival stall. Lance, her brother, is off to a remote community in Australia for a year to teach. Mental. Once they left so did we for a wee cruise tour of Melbourne. 🙂

For the most part Melbourne is fairly flat both in terms of the landscape  (definitely has it’s share of hills and bumps though) and skyline, with all the tall buildings jutting out in the centre of Melbourne (business end). This was a fairly refreshing contrast to Beijing + no smog. 🙂 We needed fed and Jean mentioned fish and chips. YES! Not only that Moonee Valley racecourse was just a stones throw from the house and did good, cheap grub.

Moonee Valley Racecourse

The view overlooking the race course, lush green belt and the mega buildings at the heart was very lovely to look at. Food was good too and had my first pint here, well schooner actually (think it was like $20/12GBP total). We then set off again in the car doing a horse shoe shaped route (Melbourne basically) touching on a good chunk of the different districts, the one’s I can remember were Footscray, Richmond, Williamstown (lovely beach area here and cycle track that goes round the entire beach front), Chapel St (this place was good for shopping and eating out), West Gate bridge (with it’s suicide bars, oh and a dude threw his kids off here… *shudders*) and Brunswick (which is where this lot mainly go out and where my research has pointed for good beer).

Williamstown Beach

Marina overlooking central Melbourne

3 hours later we got back home with some beers (Fat Yak 6-pack $20/12GBP) and not long after Nat turned up with her man Erik (sound guy) and we all just chilled/chatted in the garden with said beers. Their mate Rose turned up with some books to sell at the festival (she owns a bookstore) and mentioned two things about Aberdeen (“Fit?” and “Watch out for the seagulls” – haha! My seagull stories went down well 😉 ). Me, Nat and Rose stayed up just before 3AM.

Packing for the festival tomorrow, it doesn’t Officially start until Thursday but we get early access to setup the stall. Jebus a 5 odd day festival is going to be some introduction to Oz… 🙂

(My blog and communication will take a hit for those few days so don’t expect to hear from me until after)

Zaijian Zhongguo. G’day Australia!

Getting up at 4.30AM was not the best but worth it to say goodbye to the wee toe rag. There was no crying (everyone was half asleep which helped) I gave him a hug and he was out the door. I went back to bed and got up 3 hours later, my body clock isn’t going to like this.

Goa A Yi was in uber clean mode so that was one of the reasons I couldn’t sleep. She was soon attacking my room, cleaning sheets, the floor, dusting, etc I felt a wee bit in the way so decided to leave until she was done. Bags were packed though and I was ready to scoot, tried to rest but that didn’t happen really. My last lunch here was dumplings (including some fried ones) so that was pleasing food to leave on. Not long after that, around 2PM, I said my goodbye’s to Goa A Yi, wishing her a Happy New Year, and we left for the airport.

Ben and Yu were going to Terminal 3 (I was going to the older Terminal 2) so they were dropped off first. Praised the family for taking care of me so well these past six months, shook Ben’s hand and gave Yu a hug, and the new adventure started from there. 🙂

And oh how boring it started… 11 hours waiting at the airport waiting for my 2.30AM flight to Kuala Lumpur and not a bar to quench my thirst! I spent my time reading, day dreaming, walking about, eating a sandwich, fuelling up on coffee and doing nothing. It’s enough to make someone go mental I would think, not planning on doing it again any time soon. Closer to departure I joined a fairly big and slow moving queue to check in, then a quick security check and I was in departures where there was still no pub, not much was open really at this time.

Cut a boring story short I got on the plan, sat for 6 hours, bought a G+T (got some Malaysian money as change) then arrived in Kuala Lumpur. It was the next day now (Monday 20th) and the morning. This airport was fairly shit, small, bit of disrepair, nothing much to entertain except ‘What lies beneath’ on the TV (which is shit). There was a pub though but I didn’t have enough money for a beer, sad times. A few hours wait here, the gate was called and I was soon on the plane for an 8 hour flight too Melbourne. I had a pre-paid meal and a beer bought with Chinese money that I still had. Drifting in and out of consciousness and finishing my book (Pride and Prejudice would you believe! It was free and actually quite good) was the norm for this flight before I seen Oz from the sky.

We were flying above a layer of clouds that stretched across all that I could see, it looked like land with the moon reflecting from it’s surface. Felt like we were leaving space when we decended into the clouds and then the lights of Melbourne appeared. Cool. 😀

We landed just after midnight and I feared that my luggage wouldn’t be there and that I would get torn into by customs. Couldn’t have been further from the truth. Customs was a breeze and didn’t wait long to pickup my bag, I was soon out the exit door and in the arrivals area. I couldn’t see Nat so walked a wee bit at waited next to a cafe.

“A’right mate?”

“Nat!”

Gave her a massive hug and then set off for the car. I’m finally here with my mate in Melbourne! Was fecking great getting out of the airport I don’t want to see another any time soon. The drive home wasn’t long either, about 15 minutes away. The house is really nice too, big open plan kitchen/dining/living space, wee balcony, enclosed courtyard and a garage/studio. We grabbed a beer in the courtyard, chatted and then zonked off to bed as it was like 2AM and Nat had work.

I’m in Australia. WTF. 😀

My China in bullet points

Thought I’d put together a rough outline of my loathing and loving of China in a few bullet points…

What I won’t miss:

1. The Smog (quite a big one this)
2. People spitting everywhere
3. Having to use a VPN
4. People’s driving
5. Not being able to cook (unique to me this one)
6. Oil stains from food
7. Not being able to drink from the tap
8. No one gives a f*ck (note: see things I will miss)

What I WILL miss:

1. Friends (Randy, Suzy, Henry, Yuki)
2. Family (they were great)
3. Food! (Jian Bing, Jidan Guan Bing, ANY Bing, Dumpling, Baozi, Noodle, etc)
4. CHEAP CHEAP
5. The Subway
6. Hutong exploring
7. Great Leap (Enda you’re a dude)
8. Learning a new language
9. No one gives a f*ck (it can be of advantage sometimes!)
10. Food! (yes again!)

There will be more but this is what came to mind…

Time fly’s in China

I woke up at 4AM this morning and couldn’t get back to sleep for another hour, that was horrible. When I did get up, at the back of 9AM, everyone seemed to be gone… Eventually Goa A Yi turned up and Benjamin not long after, by himself, said he was at the zoo. We had lunch which included bing (yas!) and he set off again but this time to watch a film, I took this opportunity to wash clothes and pack.

Wow packing feels weird. Has it been 6 months all ready?! I’m not even going home! This has been my home whilst in China and I’m excited for new adventures but a wee bit sad to see it go.

When Benjamin came back from the cinema we built the other Lego kit he’d got from his Dad, a hovercraft. His Dad and Mum arrived home just before tea and handed over a brand new iPhone 5 to Benjamin. A 7 year old has a better phone than me, jebus. To be fair he is off to Taiwan tomorrow and this means they can always be in touch, I got his number as well so we can WeChat. 🙂 Talk over food was fairly standard, they are quite preoccupied with travel plans for tomorrow (they are off to Japan on a business trip), I will be joining them to the airport. My flight isn’t technically until Monday (2AM) so I’ll have a long wait at the airport, I would stay at the house but no-one will be there so I can’t.

After food it wasn’t long until Benjamin needed a shower and I finalised my packing. He’s been OK today, definitely acting sad but overall fine, kids get over stuff quite quickly really. Randy and Suzy were out and obviously wanted me to join them for some last drinks but with Benjamin leaving so early in the morning and me feeling knackered I couldn’t go out. Glad I got to see them yesterday though, that was good. 🙂

So an FYI my blog will have some delayed updates whilst I’m travelling but I’ll make sure and update it when I arrive in Oz. Tomorrow will be my ‘Goodbye China’ post.

A quiet lunch and spicy food

To my surprise I think Benjamin went to school this morning. WTF is going on?! Not questioning it I was quick to get out the door and for a walk (it was smoggy but cleared a bit). I followed the subway line all the way to Huixinxijie Nankou station, which took a little over two hours, following the river/canal parks and observing various morning activities being performed by older people. Since I was meeting Randy at the pub I hopped on the subway so as not to be late.

I arrived early. Enda was working and asked where I was yesterday wondering if I’d left all ready, the regular that I am. He gave me another sample of their 100th Brew Barley Wine and we chatted, he wasn’t as busy today. Randy arrived so we ordered (and destroyed) burgers straight away and not long after my mate Royce arrived (Aussie/South African, actually from Zimbabwe) then pub acquaintances of his arrived and we soon had a posse going. After many drinks (free one from Enda and Royce along with Randy footing the bill, what a pal), lots of varied topics of discussion (Royce being the eldest had the most taboo subjects to talk about!) I said my goodbye’s to Enda the Irishman (such a dude I’ve been treated so well in that place) along with Royce and crew. This was around 7PM, been here for about 7 hours…

Tiny ‘VIP’ room

Me and Randy met Suzy at Andingmen for food at a nearby Szechuan restaurant called ‘Zhang MaMa‘ so it’s spicy food and Suzy’s home town. The place was full but they had a room around the corner where we could eat, was like a VIP room hutong style. Food was great (can’t remember much about it to be honest other than it was tasty and cheap) and we stayed a bit before getting the last subway home. Turned out to be a great night. 🙂

How to block your eBay account: Step 1.

Bloody hell so much for him being back to school! It would seem holidays have kicked in (which would explain why Linda was home too) but it felt like the school had been brought here as four of his mates turned up along with some A Yi’s. Jebus. I would have been out the door and to the pub but the air was shite today. 😦 Everyone buggered off after lunch so I was able to really chill then, until I tried to buy something on eBay…

At least this made me smile a bit

I was all set to buy some brewing equipment (shock horror) on Aussie eBay when my account was blocked. Fair enough, I’m in Beijing buying something in Melbourne, it looks kinda suspect. I couldn’t do the verification process as it had an old telephone number and their online chat directed me to a customer service call centre. I was on the phone for 30mins trying to get the block removed but ended with me having to send a photocopy of my driving licence to prove who I am. This process can take 7-10 days. WTF. Slightly pee’d off I resigned to the fact I could do no more and joined Randy and Benjamin for a game of Scrabble. (Mum tell Andy this is for his own good… 😉 )

I’m so proud…

Benjamin’s Dad didn’t arrive today (he’d left by-the-by but was coming back) and Yu was off to Hong Kong. I got my certificate in the mail, yaaaay. At least one thing today fairly perked me up from the eBay nightmare, Nat had emailed saying a group of us would be staying in a pimpin’ beach holiday home after the festival! HELLZ YEAH. 😀 I’m loving Oz all ready.