Australia: Where the Weather is Unpredictable but the Men are Hott!

After spending 12 days exploring the land down under, here are some general observations:

First off, let me just say that the general population is ridiculously attractive: men and women alike; but ooh the boys are cuute!

And this is not a stiff place at all; it’s laid back and care free! What an amazing feeling.

Melbourne has a very vibrant arts scene. Big theater town. Lots of music venues, fine art, the works. I approve.

Good cheap wine. Enough of a reason to move there!

Pinball machines. They’re everywhere! This place is stuck in the 1980s. Lots of people still ride skateboards, too.

There’s plenty of food to choose from, of all ethnicity's. And it has good Western food, so I definitely got my fix for awhile. But dining isn’t cheap. In Singapore restaurants can be ridiculously expensive, but you can avoid those and eat reasonably at chains, or ridiculously cheap at local stalls. But here, the middle of the road food is still pretty expensive. But I’m sure if I lived there I’d find my way around that. But the pub food is yummy (I love pub cultures, especially where it’s acceptable to go in a pub and have a beer at noon.) OH! And they serve bread with every meal and salads. I miss having that in Singapore.

Hungry Jacks is a fast food chain that is a complete knock-off of Burger King. The label is identical and they even have the Whopper.

Trams are the favorite mode of transportation in Melbourne, though it makes it hard to photograph the city (if you see my pictures from Melbourne, you’ll notice almost all the photos have wires in the picture—those are for the trams.)

Taxis are ridiculously expensive. More expensive than anywhere I’ve ever been. Don’t take them. It’s that simple.

“Good on ya” and “No worries” are common phrases.

Australians are very proud of their home states/cities. Especially Melbournians; they’re convinced it’s the best place on Earth!

Australians love America! (A rare treat to find these days. Actually, in this regard, they reminded me of the Irish, who also love Americans. Actually, the pub food reminds me of Dublin too; you know, the meat-oriented dishes; the pies, etc.) And its interesting, because, they have a similar (though not quite) history to us, and they got started around the same time as us.

Melbournian Mania

Melbourne’s on the Eastern Peninsula of Australia, in Victoria. I flew JetStar and I opted for the super saver which meant one carry on item, no checked baggage. We had a layover in Darwin, which is nowhere near Melbourne. Darwin is in the North West of Australia, so flying from Darwin-Melbourne is like flying from LA-NY.

In Melbourne I stayed at the Albany Hotel, a boutique hotel in South Yarra, the yuppie district of Melbourne. The hotel was really retro and had giant posters of McJagger and the Beatles and Audrey Hepburn esque women. The hotel had a free private car service in their Rolls Royce, so I took that to a jazz club that I had read about. The place was called, Bennet’s Lane, located in a seedy alley, where all jazz clubs should be! A man who asked me for a light as I was heading inside, warned me, “get ready, it’s hot in there!” to which I responded, “I just arrived from Singapore, so if you want to talk about heat…” Turns out he had lived in Singapore for a year. By the end of the night he was asking me to write his biography. The benefit was, though, that he invited me to sit with him and his visiting friends, a couple from the Midwest US.

The jazz was delightful. And those who know me well know that I am at my happiest when I’m in a jazz club. Any city that hosts a high caliber jazz club is a city worth visiting, and Melbourne was definitely one of those. I spoke with some of the musicians afterwards, and turns out, the drummer played regular gigs at Sweet Rhythms, the former Sweet Basils in Manhattan, which happens to be where my beloved sister Andi and my brother (in-law) Paul got engaged! Small world.

The next day I slept late and gradually made my way to the city center. Melbourne reminded me a little bit like Munich, because the juxtaposition of old world and modern architecture was very much apart of the city layout. I loved Munich (for the day I was there), and Melbourne gave me a similar feel. Also, like Munich, there are stretches and stretches of green spaces, in various parks and gardens.

I had bad luck with weather in Melbourne, where it rained most of the weekend. A popular observation about the climate in Australia, and I guess Melbourne especially, is that you can experience four seasons in one day, but it’s a nice change from Singapore where you experience one season all year long!

I went to the Australian Centre for the Moving Image, (the ACMI museum), which for a film student is an awesome stop to make. I saw an exhibit called “Setting the Scene” and it was all about Production Design in major motion pictures. They had video clips from various films and interviews with the directors/designers that talked about what went into the production design, and set pieces from various films such as Australia and Metropolis, and lots of photo stills. I felt like I was in a Film Aesthetics class and it was fun cause it made me feel like I was at Tisch Asia, but with props.

Because the weather was so bad, and I was tired from traveling, I spent most of the third day within the vicinity of my hotel, but I got a lot of writing done on my Robert Capa play. There was a restaurant/pub down the street called The Fawkner, which I found to be a very inspiring place to work. The Fawkner is great atmosphere. In fact, I decided to set a short story in the bar, so I went back several times for inspiration. The Fawkner is a yuppy-ish pseudo-upscale looking place, with a fireplace and stools for chairs; a marble-top bar stool; and a bartender you can flirt with. There’s a poster on the wall that says Bourin Bourin and Jack Johnson plays in the background. The menu is written on a chalkboard and the kitchen is open-window, with a cook who's the owner and tries too hard to flirt. This place was wrought with contradictions.

I met up with the Aussie drummer. We went to a night club called Revolver. This place was almost too unbelievable to be real: straight out of A Clockwork Orange. It was entirely red. The lighting was this very dim red—red lamps hung down from the ceiling—red sofas lined the walls—graffiti art—Pinball machines and arcade games in the corner—a DJ spinning techno—and the clientele all wore black leotard-like outfits. To top it off, this place is open 24 hours from 6pm on Thursday night to 6am on Monday morning.

Sydney: A View From the Bridge

If you thought Melbourne sounded great, just wait til you get to Sydney! Now this place is alive! I loved Sydney, it had the urban feel I look for in a city, and yet, there was something very calming and peaceful about the place. I found Sydney especially easy to navigate, and it was a very walkable city, which I enjoy. There are harbors on every end of the city, which makes for nice outdoor dining or peaceful walks, or good places to write. Hyde park is awesome. It’s this giant patch of grass in the middle of the city, where men in business suits sit on the grass to eat lunch and women stretch out and sunbathe. I mean, don’t these people have jobs? (Of course, who am I to talk…)

It’s funny, cause everyone in Melbourne talks about Sydney like it’s a trash dump. (Actually, that’s one thing I liked about Melbourne is the city-pride and unity. Everyone who is from Melbourne is confident that it’s the best place in the world, and there’s something nice about that.) But those from Sydney are quite partial to Sydney too.

I stayed at a hotel called The Pensione. Every room had a Rothko print, and Rothko's lined the halls. The Pensione had a much better/more central location than the hotel I stayed at in Melbourne, which made my stay in Sydney more accessible. Actually, come to think about it, at The Albany, there was a print of Renoir’s, "The Boating Party," above my bed, which incidentally is one of my favorite paintings.

After arriving in Sydney, I decided to go for a walk and just explore for the first day. My hotel was on George St., and I walked down Liverpool all the way to the Darling Harbor (not very far). I was pleasantly surprised with stumbling upon the parks and the fountains and eventually the pier. I walked around the harbor, took lots of photos, and eventually sat down for a glass of wine at a harborside restaurant. This area was called Cockle Bay Wharf.

My second day in Sydney was lovely! I set out for the city with the goal of ultimately reaching the Opera House. A friend of mine gave me a suggested walking tour, which proved to be very useful. I started off with lunch at an outdoor café at the edge of Hyde Park. This is a big green spot with fountains and statues, and a world war two monument. Like I alluded to earlier, it amazed me at how many people were there grazing on the grass in the middle of the day. I took my time walking around the park, saw St. Mary’s Cathedral (apparently, there’s a public swimming pool underneath it); the Victoria Barracks; St. James’ Cathedral; The Supreme Court of New South Wales; The Mint; The Sydney Hospital; Parliament; The Library (all these were buildings along Macquerie St.). I then saw the Botanic Gardens, with some beautiful roses and a great view of Sydney. I then found my way to the Sydney Opera House via another lovely park, which had an incredible view of the Harbor; the Harbor Bridge and the Opera House. I’m glad I went this way, because it was high up and not congested and a beautiful introduction to the iconic sights of Sydney. And then I made it. To the Sydney Opera House, and it is truly amazing feeling to be standing in front of this infamous structure. I remember studying it as a kid as one of the Seven Wonders of the Modern World. (I’m guessing by now there are more than seven? Isn’t Dubai in itself a wonder?) Standing at this overwhelming sight, I kind of felt like my Mom and Dad did in Borneo: I never imagined I’d see the Sydney Opera House…in Australia! (I had never really heard of Borneo before coming to S.E. Asia, so I couldn’t quite have the same sentiment of: I never in my life imagined I’d end up in Borneo…cause I never in my life had heard of it. Sad, I know.)

I decided not to splurge on climbing the Harbor Bridge, but I did opt for the tour of the Opera House. And it was well worth it! We were taken through the loading/unloading dock where they store all the scenery; We saw one of the “smaller” theaters that houses plays, and it was one of the most impressive theater spaces I’ve ever seen! (Seats 500…yeah, this is small… and has a revolving floor, trap doors, mini orchestra pit, etc.) The stage was set for a Tom Stoppard play, Travesties. We were then taken through one of the main foyers, which had royal purple carpeting and a balcony that hosted a (yet again) beautiful view of the harbor. We were shown the Concert Hall, which was by far the most impressive aspect of the Opera House. The ceilings were amazing, there was an enormous pipe organ (pretty impractical though, especially since there are probably only 6 or 7 people in the world capable of playing it); and the seats in the concert hall absorb sound, so if it’s empty, it’ll still seem as though a body is in it, thus making for better acoustics. We were shown a couple of videos about the origin and construction of the Opera House, which took 18 years to built. They didn’t even know if it was even possible to construct their plans, once they started building. It was kind of a “don’t try this at home” kind of gig. They also showed us the theater that houses the Opera and the Ballet. (The National Opera is based in Sydney, whereas the National Ballet is based in Melbourne, but they swap for half the year, so that the ballet goes to Sydney and performs in the Opera House, and the Opera goes to Melbourne and performs in the Arts Center.) And actually, the opera theater was the least impressive of the three we saw.

I had some tea on the pier and enjoyed the view before I headed back to the Opera for the evening’s performance of (dun, dun dun…) Shostakovich’s Lady McBeth at Mtensk. (I always get stuck with the dark, depressing Operas! Remember Vienna? Standing room only for Schoenberg’s Moses un Aaron. Hahaha.) But, none-the-less, it was an incredible experience and a good production value. Afterwards, I had to rush back to my hotel to take a phone interview for an internship in DC; a 15 hour time difference.

On Day three in Sydney, I explored the ever-impressive Art Gallery of New South Wales. Another reason to move to Sydney. It was a fine institution. And free! After spending several hours at the art gallery, I walked down to (yet another) wharf and all the way to Potts Point and up to King’s Cross. (King’s Cross is considered to be a seedier/quirkier side of Sydney…you know, you stumble upon independent art studios, and second hand bookstores in between grungy bars and adult book stores. It’s great.) I ate lunch at a sidewalk café and walked a good chunk of the city back to my hotel.