My Standards are Just Above Living with a 51 Year Old Divorcee

Well Kerry and I just got back from probably the most awkward experience that we’ve had since this journey began…
I had found this ad in the classifieds – a 3 bedroom apartment, needing 2 roommates, could be furnished upon request, and in a pretty good location. I called up the guy who placed the ad, Peter James, and spoke with him for a couple of minutes. He seemed a bit frazzled on the phone but offered for us to come immediately to see the place. Now we’re a bit anxious to find a place so we jumped on a train and went right over. Here’s were the awkwardness commences.
We had slight difficulties finding the place due to Peter’s poor directions (he told us to go right at the “40 degree angle” however there were only obtuse angles the entire way there). When we got there, we were greeted by a middle-aged, gray haired man…Peter James. He introduced himself, then told us that he didn’t care if we smoked joints on the balcony.
We hesitantly entered his apartment to find it bare and with garbage all over the floor. He proceeded to tell us that his “flatmates” had just moved out so the rooms might be a little messy. We walked into the rooms to find walls adorned with Beyonce posters, Dora the Explorer stickers and those glow in the dark plastic stars. We really began questioning the story behind this guy at this point. Only one of the rooms had a closet (which somehow had been flooded) so he made it clear that he’d be willing to share his closet with us. He had been adamant that his only rule was that we were kept the place clean. He then showed us the kitchen, which made our last hostel seem like the most immaculate place ever. As we were leaving, we peered out onto the balcony to find a drying rack with about 30 panties drying out there. Either Peter wears woman’s underwear or he’s going through a sudden divorce where his wife and 2 daughters left in a hurry and left only their undergarments. We think the latter is probably the actual story, there were photos of his family all around, the poor guy still had on his wedding band and he mentioned more than once that he was going through a difficult time.
As we were saying our goodbyes, Peter then reveals to us that his name is actually Russel, and that he didn’t want to have his real name in the classifieds. Of course not!
And so we’re now back at square one… but slightly more cautious.

I Miss My Morning Cup of Joe

So Thursday night was our last night in our hostel, which proved to be quite eventful. At about 4am the fire alarm went off and the hostel receptionist started banging on everyone's door and yelling for us to evacuate immediately. As soon as I opened the door, I realized why she was panicking. It was hazy and smelled like the whole hostel was burning down. We quickly ran down the 3 flights of stairs and gathered with the rest of the escapees outside the hostel. Two fire trucks came (although one proved to be useless as 5 of the firefighters were needed to complete a 3 point turn in the firetruck) and it turns out that one of the vending machines caught fire. Nothing that warranted extreme panicking or a dramatic evactuation.

I've come to learn that American coffee isn't even an option here. You can't order it in any cafe or restaurant - its all lattes, cappuccinos, tall blacks and flat whites. I started searching for a regular coffee maker, most stores don't carry it. And only about half of grocery stores sell ground coffee. The closest thing they sell to it is instant coffee. Yuck! So that has become one of my new obsessions. Every single grocery store we go into, I immediately walk to the coffee aisle to see if they sell ground coffee...even thought I don't have a coffee pot.

No luck yet with the apartment hunting. Hulk Hogan proved to be useless. We've decided to stay in another hostel this week - its much nicer than the last one and we've already practiced the escape route in case of a fire.

Kerry and I went to a Koala park yesterday and got to pet koalas and kangaroos and watch a very boring sheep shearing demonstration that lasted far too long. This weekend we're cooking a Thanksgiving dinner for some of our Australian friends and then going to the horse races - very exciting!!
Happy Thanksgiving to everyone!!! I miss you all!

Apparantly Hulk Hogan is big in Australia

Kerry’s brother is currently here in Sydney on business. He’s staying at the Sheraton hotel in the city and his company has given him VIP access to all the hotel amenities. He was generous enough to leave us a key so we’ve been completely taking advantage. Last night we went up for their free happy hour and hors d’oeuvres – we ate enough of the appetizers to suffice as our dinner. I think its probably the best thing I’ve eaten since I’ve been here.
So we went back to the Sheraton this morning for their continental breakfast and then used their pool on the 22nd floor, overlooking Hyde Park – quite fabulous. So then as we were walking out of the hotel, I see this orange colored, beefy looking guy get out of a car…it was Hulk Hogan! We started laughing, not sure why but he was probably the last celebrity I’d expect to spot in Sydney. I’m sure we will be back at that hotel tomorrow for another free meal so I’m going to try to seek him out and ask him if we can use him as a reference on our apartment application. He’s supposedly on a wrestling tour here – I knew Australia was at least 10 years behind us, I don’t think he could sell any of those tour tickets in America. So I figure he’s popular enough to use as a reference.
Tonight Kerry’s brother is taking us out to a fancy restaurant in Wolloomooloo – this is where Russel Crowe lives. So I’m going to see if I can arrange a chance meeting with him so I can ask him about using him as a reference as well. We’ve got a few apartments in North Sydney to look at tomorrow….keep fingers crossed!!

"You can't hail a cab unless you know where you're going!"

So we arrived in Sydney on November 1st. Teneal and Layne picked us up from the airport (I think they were completely horrified by our amount of luggage) and took us straight to do some sight seeing. We had lunch at Coogee Beach. Coogee is where Kerr and I initially wanted to live when we got here but more about apartment hunting later.
We drove up and down the coast that day, it was gorgeous!
The following day we did all the touristy things – walked around Sydney, saw the opera house, the bridge, took the ferry to Watson’s Bay (we saw Nicole Kidman’s house) and then we took the ferry to Darling Harbour. It was a great great day – we are lucky to have such awesome tour guides.
By the end of the first week, we had done all the touristy things – went to the Blue Mountains, ate meat pies, had schooners of Aussie beers at some famous pubs, etc.
We’ve been staying in this place called Mt. Annan with our wonderful hosts. Its about 2 hours by bus and train to the city. Its been a bit hard to try to find a place to live being so far away so we decided to come stay in a hostel for a week. When we first got to the hostel, we were completely horrified by it. But after being here a couple days, we don’t mind it so much. All we have to do is make sure we aren’t touching anything other than the sheet we each have. We’re pretty sure that there is a monkey living right outside our window – and our window doesn’t close. The hostel is in the middle of the city so its been convenient to get around. Its also been the BEST place to people watch. Here are a couple of the more funny stories.

• One guy was coming out of an “adult toy store” carrying 2 huge shopping bags and wearing a bicycle helmet. As if that’s not embarrassing enough, he set of the store alarm. We were highly amused by this. And also wondering how he was going to be able to ride his bike with all his new purchases.


• We saw an exhibitionist while waiting for a train. This lady was terrifying – and it was like 2pm on Sunday afternoon.


• When we first arrived to the city, we weren’t exactly sure where the hostel was so we hailed a cab. The cabdriver put our suitcases in the trunk and asked where we wanted to go. Kerry replied that she wasn’t exactly sure but it was on a street named “Barncleuth” near Elizabeth Bay. This did not go over well with the taxi driver, he then proceeded to throw our bags out of the cab and tell us that we should not take taxis if we didn’t know where we were going! We ended up walking about a block to the hostel.


• We woke up on Sunday morning to some really loud techno music. When we went to a café for some lattes, we realized that people here were still partying at 10:30 in the morning, from the night before. We had been asleep by 12 that night, clearly we don’t fit in.

So here’s the deal with the apartment hunting. Its nearly impossible to rent a place here – especially because we’re unemployed and without any prior Australian rental history. We’ve spent a good deal of time forging rental ledgers and signatures. We have spent many days walking all over city going to places, only to have our application be “unsuccessful”. At least we’re getting to be professionals at the public transit system.
So keep your fingers crossed for us – we need it!
Lastly, I had a second round interview today as an OT consultant. The interview was by far the most stressful interview I’ve ever had. Last week I had my initial interview and got lost coming out of the building, somehow locked myself in the basement and had to go through the fire exit to get out – sounding off the alarm. So I was pleased that I was even called back for a second interview! Today I had two people interviewing me. They went through all those hypothetical type questions that catch you off guard. But I just got a call back saying they thought I was ‘intelligent and personable’ – clearly they were impressed by my accent and pleased that today I didn’t set off the fire alarm. The thing that worries me the most about this job (apart from the fact that its nothing like my job in America and I don’t have a clue what I’d be doing) is that I would have to drive here. Crossing the street has been enough of a challenge!
I will try to be more diligent about updating my “b”-log so that I can remember some of the funnier moments :)

Thank Goodness for Grilled Cheese!

My trip started off at 6am on Sunday. I had a tearful goodbye with my parents. The night before we celebrated my farewell at a Bonnie Raitt concert and my dad made one of his special meals – was a great night! I met up with Kerry in Atlanta and then we flew to LA. We had 12 hours to kill in LA so we ended up getting a hotel room to relax, take showers and eat. Mind you, we each were lugging around 120 pounds of luggage. It was ridiculous and so expensive. We finally boarded our flight to Fiji at like 11 that night. We hadn’t slept at all so we were so exhausted and slap happy that they kept calling passenger with the last name “Hairbutt” to the counter and we were hysterically laughing. I slept the entire plane ride to Fiji- I didn’t even get up to pee. It was 11 hours.
So we arrived on the main island at like 5am on Tuesday. Monday never existed for me- so weird! Luckily the airport let us leave most of our luggage their so we didn’t have to lug that around. It wouldn’t even have been possible. The way it works is you get on a large ferry and then when you get close to your island, a tiny boat comes up to the ferry to collect you and your luggage. I have no idea how my suitcase didn’t end up in the water. The only thing on each of the islands is the one resort that’s on it.
The first island we stayed at was called Beachcomber – its known as the party island however we were apparently there the wrong time of year. We were completely wired when we got there at 9am so we decided to relax on the beach with some Coronas - $10 a piece! We met some yachties from New Zealand on the island who took us snorkeling and let us hang out on their sailboat – awesome snorkeling. I had wanted to go diving there however the “divemaster” was some local guy who didn’t even look like he knew how to swim. At night we went to get ready to go out and the water in our room wasn’t working so we went to front office and they upgraded us to a huge suite on the beach literally 10 steps from the water. Turns out the water on the entire island wasn’t working so they handed out liters of bottled water to bathe with. Classy. The next day was more of the same mixed in with some kayaking. The food at this place was horrendous. One of the days, Kerry and I ate grilled cheese sandwiches for all 3 meals because it was the only thing edible. One thing that was strange at this place was that even the staff didn’t really know what to do with themselves. Somehow they managed to get a bulldozer on the island and were constantly driving that thing around (in the middle of people sunbathing) for no reason. They didn’t have anything to bulldoze. We were quite amused by this.
After 2 days at Beachcomber we went to Manta Ray Island. This island was gorgeous. And our room was pretty cute – we actually had nets on the beds to keep the bugs out. The only downfall was communal bathrooms with ice cold showers. Oh and this island was very eco-friendly so they didn’t have any type of plumbing. The toilets were like gigantic holes – needless to say, the island was quite foul smelling. The snorkeling was even better at this place. Once again I wanted to go diving but the divemaster at this resort has some love affair with another patron going on and he couldn’t be bothered. He was such a creep. Anyways, we were there 2 days as well. And the food at this place was delicious. We were so famished by the time that we go there after surviving on grilled cheese for 2 days that we thought we had struck gold.
I’m glad I got to go to Fiji but I think it was a one time experience for me. I was surprised by this but there was not much to do. I read 3 books in the 5 days we were there. We met some cool people – all backpackers and several who we might meet up with again in Australia. So that was Fiji…the start of the adventure!
Pics will follow soon...