There's a menace on the roads in New South Wales...

I got my driver's license! And it was disturbingly easy, all I had to do was pass an eye test and present my old license. Now I actually have to figure out how to drive through a roundabout on the left hand side.

Blue Mountains

A couple of weeks ago, I finally made it out of the city for a trip up to the Blue Mountains. There are numerous places you can go in the area, but I decided to go to Katoomba, which is probably one of the more popular destinations. I can see why; we drove right up to a viewpoint, and overlooking a gorge were the Three Sisters, a stunning rock formation that is one of the main attractions in the region.

The Blue Mountains were recognized by European settlers as an area rich in coal, and there are still abandoned rusty mining tools lying around all over. Probably one of the best remnants of the now-abandoned mining operation is the Katoomba Scenic Railway, which qualifies as the steepest railway in the world at a 52 degree incline! The train carries you down into the valley, where there are boardwalks and bushwalking trails.

From above, you can take cable cars across the valley. We decided to take the cable car across, and then walk along the trails back to the car.

Even though the air is much cooler at 1000 metres, the cockatoos are still everywhere.

We stayed the night about 10 minutes outside of Katoomba. Unfortunately, a lot of the accommodations in the area are SUPER creepy and old-fashioned. This was the “sitting room”. Yes that is brandy in the background. Unfortunately I still think it tastes like cough syrup.

Australia is in mourning...

...one of the members of Men at Work has passed away.

http://www.heraldsun.com.au/entertainment/friends-tell-of-love-for-eccentric-star-greg-ham/story-e6frf96f-1226333756338

Update

Lately I’ve been getting anxious because it seems like the year has gone by MUCH quicker than I thought it would. In a couple of days, it will have been 8 months that I’ve been in Australia, and for the most part it’s been really great. The thing that sucks is that it feels like I haven’t even gotten around to doing what I wanted. I originally came to do some volunteering with the symphony, but mostly to do a bunch of travelling throughout Australia and New Zealand. When I initially got here, the cost of living was an enormous shock, and I went through my (pathetic) savings quickly, so I’ve been working nonstop to get to the point where I have a little more disposable income. Also, while I do like my job, it’s the kind of thing I actually have to take seriously, which limits the amount of free time I have.

I recently asked my employer to sponsor me on a 457 temporary visa, which would allow me to stay up to four years. I’m not sure I would want to stay that long, but I do feel like I could use another year to get some more experience at my job and of course to have a chance for more of the fun stuff! She agreed, so now I’m in the process of applying for it. There’s no guarantee I’ll get one; 457 visas are often used to exploit overseas workers, so I’m a little nervous that the Department of Immigration is being extra picky about granting them. I’m already looking at plane fares back home on August 25^th-hopefully it will be for a fun trip to Seattle and not a permanent move back.

Lunchtime Snapshots

It’s starting to feel a bit like fall in Sydney. We set our clocks back this weekend, so I was confused to wake up at 6am Monday to blinding sunlight coming through my window. It’s still fairly hot during the days, but the nights are getting cool enough that a few leaves are starting to fall from the trees. Luckily I only work four days this week, since both Good Friday and Easter Monday (Easter Monday!?) are public holidays in Australia. The forecast is for good weather all week, so I decided to scarf down my sandwich at my desk and then use my lunch break for more worthwhile activities like walking around Hyde Park, which consists of about 40 acres of trees, walking paths, and monuments right in the middle of the Central Business District.

One of my favourite sections of the park is a long path that is lined with fig trees that arch all the way across the walkway. During the hottest part of summer the trees are filled with cicadas that make a really loud humming/chirping noise, but today it was mostly quiet.

At the end of the path there is the Archibald Fountain. It’s apparently there to commemorate the close association France and Australia had during World War I, but I don’t really see the connection because it portrays Roman gods grabbing on to bulls' horns and shooting arrows and playing lutes and stuff. I really like it though, because if you walk around it there is always something new to look at. It points east towards St. Mary’s Cathedral, and since it was almost time for 1pm mass the bells were going off.

There were lots of schoolkids around the park eating lunch, which is always sure to attract maybe the creepiest bird I’ve ever seen: the Ibis. The ones in the park are not shy at all and you can frequently see them diving into trash cans or trying to snatch people’s lunches with their disgusting beaks.

Footy!

Yesterday I went to my first game of footy! From what I can tell, the term footy is loosely used to describe Australian Rules football (AFL), Rugby Union or Rugby League (NRL) games, the latter being the variety I went to.

 NRL is more popular in New South Wales than it is in other states, and the players and fans have a reputation (perpetuated by Rugby Union enthusiasts) for being a lot rougher and unsophisticated, partially because Union is mostly played in private schools. I’ll stay out of that debate, but apparently fights break out fairly often at games, to the point where they have purposely begun to water down the beer to maintain the peace. Luckily for me, it was a fairly orderly match between the Newcastle Knights and the Cronulla Sharks (my team).

When we got there, a game was already going on for the Under 20 players (the teams that feed into the regular Sharks team). The stadium holds about 20,000 people, and since it was the first home game of the season and a beautiful day outside, I would estimate that it was close to capacity. The stadium is quite old, with never-remodelled bathrooms featuring a chain hanging from the ceiling that you pull to flush the toilet. There is a grandstand on each side of the field, but we just sat in the grassy hill on the south side of the field. I was close enough to the field to hear players swear, and there were some colourful moments throughout the game. The Sharkies had a rough time, and weren’t able to score a single try (similar to a touchdown, but you have to ground the ball in the end zone). Hopefully they’re just dusting off the cobwebs and can get in better shape before the next game!

The view from where I was standing.

Spotted: An OSU fan!?

Visitors!

This past week I had my first houseguests in Sydney! Rochelle and Stephan came down for ten days, and even though I had to work for a good portion of those days, I managed to squeeze in some leisure time. I took work off the Monday they arrived in Sydney, and met them at the airport to show them back to my house in Cronulla. They were a little tired from the flight, but jetlag from Seattle to Australia actually isn’t too bad (apparently it’s awful on the way back to the US). They really wanted to see the beach so we headed down there pretty much right away for a swim.

 
I had to work Tuesday, but Rochelle and Stephan met me at my office in the city for a few drinks. After 5:00 on Tuesdays, the Australian Museum is open to adults only. They serve beer and wine, and there is live music while you wander around looking at the exhibits. I would definitely go back since I probably only looked at half of the exhibits-the Aboriginal art exhibit was my favourite, but they had a lot of other nice exhibits specific to Australian animals, dinosaurs that used to live here, birds, etc.

Here we are at St. Mary's Cathedral before heading into the museum.

Saturday and Sunday were my only days off, so we had to cram in as much touristy stuff as possible. We went on a free walking tour of the city that I had gone on with Tony and Katrina when I first arrived in Sydney. It was fun to learn about places I walk by everyday without giving any thought. For example, in the Queen Victoria Building there is a clock donated by the Queen of England, with a letter enclosed that cannot be opened until 2080. Or the glass floor in Custom’s House with an extremely accurate model of the city underneath. Or the barracks near Hyde Park where convicts as young as seven years old were housed.

Sunday we took the ferry to the Taronga Zoo, which is probably the nicest zoo I’ve been to. It’s up on a hill on the north side of Sydney Harbour, so you get glimpses of the skyline while you walk between the exhibits. I finally saw a platypus! They’re usually very shy, but this one was swimming circles right in front of the glass. The Tasmanian devil was asleep in his den, but I still got to see him up close. I didn’t realize this, but the devil population is currently threatened due to a facial cancer that has a 100% mortality rate. It’s a very unusual cancer because it is contagious, and devils pass it when they bite each other in fights-very sad!

View from the ferry to the zoo.

 Making friends with a wallabee.

That night we went to opera bar and relaxed with a few beers. It was a really warm night, so we could sit outside with a view of the harbour and the hundreds of bats that were flying out of the botanic gardens. It was a really nice end to their time here, and I was really sad to see them go. Hopefully I get some more visitors soon!

View from Opera Bar.