Sydney So Far

Am on another adventure, this time in the land down under. Decided last minute to bunk at lars' place for a week long vacation. Asked her when her uni (which is university of Sydney post grad course) schedule allowed her to host me, she said last week of August. This was towards the end of July. In a flurry of work work work and all the preparation needed to fly to Sydney (visa, papers for visa, ticket, money for ticket) I am here. It's my 5th day in Sydney and apparently, 1 week is too short to just spend in one city. But let me organize my thoughts and start from the beginning.

I made it!
The plane departs for Melbourne/Sydney at 2005 hours according to my paper ticket on 20 Aug 2005. I interpreted it to mean 10:05 pm. Imagine my surprise (and relief) when I got to PAL's check-in counter and realized that had I not been my "early - paranoid" self, I would've missed the plane! I got to the airport at 1905 hours and had 15 minutes to make it to the gate. Oh well, excitement number 1. Got a window seat 34A (it's easy to seat single passengers even if it's close to boarding time)

The Flight to Sydney
afforded me sleep and Miss congeniality 2. Not too shabby. It was funny. Got to talking to my seatmate, retired Coca-cola something from Cebu, Mr. Carvajal. Told him I knew some people there and he apparently was acquainted with the family too (That's your family,Tang). Some things I learned from him: a. if you have a relative in PAL, you get an annual ticket to anywhere at a big big discount, b. 1 week in Sydney is not enough (as now I agree), c. retirement is a great time to travel

I was warned by Lars to declare something (at least the medicines, still had remnants of cough) at customs because Australia's quarantine laws are very strict. The customs form asked if you were "bringing soil" in, like in rubber shoes, and me, being straightforward me, answered a yes and joined the long line for the "something to declare" queue in the airport. Not too bad, they just had me bring out the rubber shoes and declared "That's nothing, no worries (which I have come to realize is a generic Aussie reply to most anything)". so off I went to meet Larissa.

Day 1
We got a cab to Leichardt, an Inner west suburb about 15 minutes away from the city and Lars was already convincing me to move to Sydney. (After 5 days here, it has started me thinking) . The streets are clean and homey. Aussies are outdoorsy. So maybe, I like. We got to her house which she shares with 3.5 other people and we started our walking tour of the Sydney sights. Lars did warn me that there will be a lot of walking. We took the bus to the city (which was my lesson for Day 1 - how to go about Sydney) and walked to Darling Harbour, ate bruschetta, pan-fried salmon and prawn wonton with tofu and rocket lettuce salad at Blackbird on Cockle Bay wharf. We did take pictures. Now if I can only figure out how to upload, you could see how yummy it was. After lunch, booked my day tour to the Blue Mountains for Aug 25 when Lars had a full day at uni and we walked many many blocks to Circular Quay (maybe 8-10 blocks, i didn't count). Saw the Opera house, took pictures. Exchanged money (I didn't know which would yield higher returns higher or lower divisor or whatever), took the train to househunt and walked back to Leichardt and I quickly expired on the bed. No stamina on the first day. Unfortunately, I fell asleep on top of the doona (thick warm comforter) and so was awakened shivering after a 20hour nap. We did plan to eat Italian (Leichardt was teeming with Italian cafes) and thanks to Lars and the weather for getting me out of bed for a sumptuous wood-baked pizza at Cafe Gioia's only a block away from home. I did have some tiramisu gelato. What a wonderful day 1. Oh, did get into bed with a trashy (but poignant) novel in my hand.