Adventures of Alex and Amy

May 29th - June 12th

Friday, May 29th
May 29th, the day that I had been counting down to for months finally had arrived. I woke up early, showered, and headed to the airport having decided to suck it up at pay the $15 for the "return" trip in and out of the airport so that I could wait outside of customs for Alex. Definitely worth it. I had to wait for almost an hour, with my neck getting tired from looking back and forth between the two exits, but finally he came out the door, dressed in cute new jeans, a yellow button-up and sport jacket, hauling his massive duffel with his signature yellow book bag on his back. Only he would choose to fly 14 hours in his "Sunday best."
After by accidentally taking the train in the wrong direction for one stop (guess my brain was a little muddled by the excitement of seeing him again after 4 1/2 months), we made it back to my house and settled in for a jet-lagged day full of laughing, talking and ordering in food.

Saturday, May 30th
On Saturday morning, we awoke early, starting the pattern of going to bed and waking up early that would last for most of the rest of his trip (I swear I was having sympathy jet-lag). We asked my flatmates for a recommendation for breakfast, and they suggested Deus Ex Machina, a unique cafe attached to a classic and custom-made motorcycle shop, actually one of the places that I had starred in my guidebook that I wanted to take Alex to. We walked down Parramatta Road (also called George St. and Broadway depending on where you are on the road) and started another trend, this one being breakfasts consisting of toast and eggs for Alex and something sickeningly sweet for me (in this case crepes filled with something like cream cheese with strawberries and orange sauce).
After breakfast we headed for Oxford St., a great street filled with shops and restaurants. We made our way to Paddington Markets and wandered around looking at the different stands. By this point, we were (of course) hungry again and grabbed some Thai food (only chopsticks were available -- eek!) - some sort of vegetarian medley for Alex and honey chicken for me (our new favorite thing) - and sat in the rain listening to two older men play ukulele.

Then, we walked past a cupcake stand and could not resist and grabbed some sort of apple caramel glutinous pleasure and ate it while watching the cutest bunnies in the entire world at the very-strictly "kids-only" petting pen. Seriously have never wanted to be a kid again more in my life. After tearing ourselves away from the bunnies, we stopped into the Australia Centre for Photography and shared speculations about the concepts behind the photographs. Some really excellent ones - I might stop back in this week. We headed back home for a nap and then I forced Alex to get up to go to dinner in attempts to get him on a normal schedule and ended up only making it as far as the pub across the street for a very sleepy meal - no recollection of what we got.

Sunday, May 31st
The next morning we woke up early again and headed to the Rocks to try out the infamous "Pancakes on the Rocks."

After a short wait, we were seated in the restaurant which had 0 character and cranky waitresses but excellent food. I (of course) got pancakes with grilled bananas and Alex probably got eggs. I'm going to just stop writing what we ordered for breakfast as we essentially got the same thing every morning.
After breakfast, we took the 35 second tour of Cadman's Cottage, which I have deemed the smallest historical attraction ever and wandering through the Rocks Markets we headed for the bridge, which always seems to be strangely difficult to find the stairs to, despite it being a very large structure. Still haven't quite figured out the best way to get there.

On our way back to Circular Quay it briefly started raining (it also did this a lot during his stay - little random spurts of rain and then sun) so we dipped into the Museum of Contemporary Art but sadly had to miss the room with all of the mirrors and lights that I had seen on my last visit there because there was a huge line.
After the museum, we impromptu-ly (so not a word) decided to take a ferry somewhere, and opted for Darling Harbour. From there, we made our way to Chinatown and managed to find a street with about 10,000 camping-supply stores, which was exactly what we were looking for as Alex somehow forgot to bring anything for the Blue Mountains (despite packing enough clothes that he claimed he wouldn't have to do laundry at all on his 17-day trip). After grabbing a new red hat, wool socks, and $6 garbage bag that would serve as a poncho, we headed to Chinatown and were immediately bombarded by Chinese women trying to convince us to choose their restaurant for lunch. We made a brief jaunt into the horribly crowded and cheesy Paddy's Markets before choosing a restaurant and splitting lunch. When we wandered up to George St. we came out right near the movie theater and decided to see Angels and Demons; Alex absolutely hated it, but I didn't think it was too awful. We settled in for an early night as we had to wake up early for the Blue Mountains the next morning.

Monday, June 1st
I hate Central Station. It is huge and confusing and always makes me nervous that I am going to miss my train. Despite this, we managed to make it to our 8:24 train on time and chatted on the 2 hour ride to Wentworth Falls. When we arrived, the weather didn't look fantastic, but it wasn't raining, and we met Lew right at the bottom of the stairs of the station. It was nice to see him again and he brought us back to Silvermere for rhubarb cake and tea ("white," as he called it, meaning with milk). After dropping our things off in our cottage (an entire cottage all to ourselves - bedroom, bathroom, living room, flat screen TV, balcony, kitchenette... fantastic), Lew drove us into town.

We wolfed down some paninis before heading to the Charles Darwin trail. We started from a different point than I had in February with the Marist guys and it was basically just like walking through a park trail. It was very well-kept with wooden walkways over all of the wet parts - didn't quite match my description of it being the hardest hike I had ever done in my life. But then, we emerged from the trail and were looking out over the massive fog-filled valley and the impressive Wentworth Falls, and the real hike began.

Now, he was definitely impressed.

We scrambled up and down stairs, over flooded out paths through the Valley of the Waters. I opted to have us avoid the "experienced walkers only" section of 7 sets of very scary stairs and we stayed on the National Pass.

I did pretty well until the last hour or so, and then I was dying. We managed to do the whole hike in less than 3 hours (perhaps why I was exhausted) and called Lew to pick us up from the conservation hut (which I was very happy to see). We lounged around the cottage for the rest of the night watching movies and ordered pizza from the least competent pizza delivery girl ever.

Tuesday, June 2nd
The next morning we walked into town to catch the train to Katoomba. We bought tickets for the Explorer Bus, which would take us around to all of the sights, and then grabbed another typical breakfast (they really know how to do breakfast here... we were very pleased with almost all of them). We wandered around the town for a little while until the bus came and took us to Katoomba Cascades. We took a short hike and ended up at the Furber Stairs at which point we split up, and for good reason. The path we needed to take to get to the "scenic railway" aka the steepest railroad in the world was at the top of the stairs, where we were. But for some reason, Alex thought it would be fun to go down the stairs, so I let him have his "fun" and I hung out on a bench for a while as our bus driver had specifically told us that anyone who went up the stairs would most definitely have to leave the area by ambulance as they were extremely steep. Even master-hiker Alex was a bit tired by the time he got back to the top, after many concerned hikers asked him, "You realize those stairs are straight up, right?" Crazy man.
After a short rest, we headed for the infamous scenic railway, which was more like a medium-speed roller coaster, but it was pretty fun - 415 metres long, vertical drop of 206 metres, steepest incline: 52 degrees, natural tunnel length: 80 metres.

From the railway we had a few options of routes to take to get to the gondola that would take us to a cable car that would take us across the valley. We opted for the longest hike (we thought) and set off. After a while we realized that there was no one following us, no one in front of us, and in fact, no one around at all. We kept going in hopes that we would find some sort of sign that would tell us we were going the right way, but in actuality we were hiking through the fog toward the Golden Stairs which were an unreasonable distance away. Oops.

Finally, by the time we got to the cable car the fog had lifted a bit and we were able to see some of the views that had been hidden all day. We started hiking toward Echo Point where we (hypothetically) would have a view of the infamous Three Sisters, which I was very excited to see. After tromping through horribly-constructed stairs that ended up being more like pools we made it to the fog-filled Echo Point with 0 visibility. So disappointing. We hopped on the bus again and got off at Gordon Falls where I unexpectedly got my view of the Three Sisters (finally), but from the other side, which made me feel like I kind of was getting my own personal view of it, which was kind of fun.

The fog had also lifted enough for us to see out over the tree-filled valley that was unbelievably expansive. After playing on the swings for a few minutes, we caught the bus to Leura Village, a cute little town with a train station that would be even closer to Wentworth Falls. We grabbed a few snacks, caught the train just in the nick of time (our timing was pretty much impeccable the entire trip) and walked back to the cottage. We heated up our leftover pizza, attempted to watch Lord of the Rings, and Alex was asleep within 8 minutes.

Wednesday, June 3rd
Wednesday morning we caught the train back to Sydney and spent the day recovering from our hiking days. We had free tickets for Terminator Salvation that night from FILMINK and ventured to Bar Reggio for dinner, a pizza place that my guidebook raved about. It was a bit out of the way but was really yummy. After Terminator (which was surprisingly good), we headed back for (shocker) another early night.

More later :-)

38 Hours Of Birthday

I've been known to have extended birthday celebrations, usually spread out over a few days, with family parties, friend parties, etc. etc. This year, my birthday seemed to last even longer. I got to celebrate my birthday on the 26th in Australia and the states, and spread it out throughout the week too. On Monday, May 25th, I got to see State of Play (with Ben Affleck, Russell Crowe and Rachel McAdams) for free for work. I really liked the film and was on the edge of my (very comfortable) seat the entire time. Definitely would recommend it. Tuesday was my official birthday here and I had to work. But my coworkers surprised my with a chocolate cake in the afternoon. I was so surprised when they came out singing with the cake and candles that I almost started singing too! I really have enjoyed my time there and really like all of them. After work, I just headed home, part of me wanting to go swing dancing, the other part of me just wanting to take it easy. I opted for option number 2, but my relaxation was interrupted by my flatmates Zoe and Brayne (not idea how to spell her name... or really how to pronounce it either...) insisting that I come see what they were doing. Turns out, they had randomly decided to buy ingredients to fry Mars Bars and were beyond excited. After 4 attempts, they eventually started to come out as something close to edible, and when we ran out of Mars Bars, we fried pears, manadarin orange slices and pieces of chocolate (which turned out to be bitter and awful) with peanut butter on top. Can't say they were the healthiest or tastiest creations, but it was a lot of fun and I was happy to be hanging out with them for an unconventional 21st birthday night. After work on Wednesday, I finally got around to taking a swing dancing lesson. It was hosted by Sydney's "Swing Patrol" and took place on the second floor of the Essen restaurant on Broadway, pretty close to my house. I decided to go for the Intermediate level, which ultimately was probably a mistake, as I was mostly thrown around the dance floor as I struggled to get back on beat. Nevertheless, I was not the worst one there, which is always a good feeling, and it was fun to be dancing again. I definitely want to try to go next semester at Vassar; they have lessons every Wednesday night. Unfortunately, that's also when LAS is, but I'll work it out somehow. On Thursday, I had planned to meet up with the girls from my homestay for a combined birthday dinner for myself and Hiroko, the Japanese student. We met at the Roof Bar, where all of the international students go on Thursdays. I waited for a while before Hiroko and her Korean friend showed up, and then chatted with them for a while. We ran into Mayana, the Brazilian girl who moved into my homestay a few days before I left, and also one of the Colombian boys I had met briefly at the Mardi Gras parade a while ago. The Korean girl and I spent a while talking to Calude, who was from France but looked Asian. He had been here for 8 months and was about to go home. I really love spending time talking to people from all over the world. Meeting the international students really added an interesting dimension to my experience here. When it started raining and our stomachs started rumbling, we (being me, Hiroko, the Korean girl, 2 Japanese girls and a Japanese guy) decided to head out and try to find somewhere to eat. We decided upon a Korean restaurant off of Pitt St. that they had all eaten at already with their class. I was a little nervous about trying Korean food because they kept saying that it was very spicy, but I ended up loving it. It is kind of like Chinese food, but without the bloated, sick feeling you usually get after eating it. We got many dishes to share and I liked each of them (but of course can't really remember what they were... one that tasted like General Tso's chicken, one that looked like a pizza but was made of egg and... not sure what else... one thing that I'm pretty sure was sardines, but didn't realize until after I ate two (when I asked my friends what it was, they said a small fish, so that's just my guess - the language barrier can be tricky sometimes). The funniest part of the meal was when I went to go grab a spoonful of the first dish and Hiroko said, "Oh, Amy, that might be easier with chopsticks," and I just laughed and said, "Easier for you, not me!" I am dreadful with chopsticks, but am gradually getting better.

Overall, it was a really fun night filled with new friends and great food. I was glad because it also served as a distraction. By the time I got home, I was only 9 hours until my favorite present arrived - Alex on a plane :-). More on my vacation with him in the next post! While my 21st birthday may not have been conventional, it sure was one to remember.

Moving, Movies and Managing a Website

Wow, it does not seem like it has been 2 weeks since I've written... not exactly sure what I've done... I finished my culture class paper... hopefully it turned out okay because I only have grades for 2 classes this semester... haven't found out either one yet... I finished my senior honors proposal (I'm going to make a travel guide for the Hudson River Valley geared toward college students there)... and I finished my application to Doctors Without Borders for the fall... I really hope I get it! I moved to Glebe and finished the Twilight series (hate to admit it, but I loved it).


I also walked to Bondi Beach from work to see it at sunset --

much farther than I had anticipated! I watched Slumdog Millionaire, which I loved and The Jane Austin Book Club, which I also loved, both of those just for fun. I watched Prey (terrible Aussie horror film, my review here), Night at the Museum 2: Battle of the Smithsonian (better than I expected), Shall We Kiss? and Land of the Lost all for the internship... now that I think about it, other than the month I was couch-ridden from my jaw surgery, I have probably watched more movies this month than ever before.
I've written countless reviews and articles for FILMINK (Offing David, Surrealism Soars) and ran the website last week when Rhiannon left. It was a pretty good week at work because I was so busy all the time. All week I've been trying to go swing dancing, but every night when I get home from work I am just too tired, and I'm starting to get sick, so I figured it wasn't the best idea... maybe next week, or when Alex is here!
The highlight of the last two weeks was yesterday's Sydney Writer's Festival. I picked out a few free sessions I wanted to see and one paid event - "Spoken 4" - a slam poetry performance. I was a little bit late, so I missed the first session, but it actually worked out perfectly, because then I got to go to "Will The Real Writers Please Stand Up?" which was spoken word performers Sarah Blasko (singer/songwriter), Miles Merrill (a slammer from Chicago and founder of The Australian Poetry Slam), Chris Bray (adventure writer who crossed an island in the Arctic Circle) and Emmanuel Jal (Sudanese "Lost Boy" hop hop artist/writer) talking about who gets to call themselves a writer and why. Sarah Blasko sang and had a beautiful voice, Miles Merrill doubled as moderator and preformed a poem about racism in Australia (which made me realize that Aboriginal jokes do NOT go over well here), Chris Bray read excerpts from his adventures and Emmanuel Jal stole the show with his performance.
From the Writer's Festival Website: "He was seven years old when he was taken from his family home to become a child soldier with the rebel army in Sudan. Put into battle in Ethiopia, Emmanuel was beaten, starved and brutalized. He tried to escape but was hunted down and imprisoned. He was rescued by a British aid worker who smuggled him into Nairobi. Now a hip hop artist, Emmanuel has won worldwide acclaim for his unique style of hip hop with its message of peace and reconciliation. His music can be heard alongside Coldplay, Gorillaz and Radiohead on the fundraising album Warchild: Help a Day in the Life. He also featured on John Lennon’s Instant Karma: The Amnesty International Campaign to Save Darfur with the likes of U2, REM and Lenny Kravitz. His first book is War Child: A Boy Soldier's Story." He had the entire audience standing up and dancing - even a little toddler who was loving his music. His message was so touching and it will stay with me forever.
I also went to a session with three authors who write historical fiction, the most interesting one being Nava Semel, award-winning Israeli author who has written a book through the eyes of a Holocaust survivor's grandchild. The festival was surprisingly well-attended, and I ended up having to change my schedule while I was there because you had to wait in line for a half an hour usually in order to get a seat at each session.
My last free session was "The Power of Performing Your Words" which was "five writers who perform their work in myriad ways perform live, dissect how and why they do it, and discuss performance as an alternative to publishing." It featured Sonya Renee (US National Individual Poetry Slam Champ -- awesome),

Tom Gleeson (stand-up comedian and writer -- hysterical), Edwina Blush (poet/singer/writer -- kinda strange) and Tug Dumbly (who I am equivilating with Troy of the Galway Players -- the founder of slam poetry in Sydney, essentially -- a bitter jerk who can write well), with participating chair Miles Merrill (that same guy from before -- kinda dorky, but a good writer). They all preformed awesomely and had a good conversation about spoken word.
I had some time to kill in between that session and the night-time slam performance, so I grabbed some wedges (with sweet chili sauce (which is starting to grow on me) and sour cream, of course) and sat in the lobby, writing in my notebook, people watching, and listening to the pianist.
After that, I headed over to the next pier (the whole festival took place in Walsh Bay on the finger wharves, which was really neat) for "Spoken 4," which featured Sonya Renee, Tug Dumbly, Edwina Blush and Omar Musa (2008 Australian National Poetry Slam champion whose poems reminded me of LAS's own Richard Frias (2-time Poetry Slam champ). I loved all of their performances, especially Sonya and Omar's.

All in all, it was a really awesome day and confirmed that I am capable of doing things on my own. Now it's time to bed before a long week at the internship before Alex comes on Friday!!!

Ahh... a moment of relief

Well, 3,930 words later, I am DONE with my paper for my online class -- finished a whole HOUR before the deadline... pretty impressive... unfortunately I spent most of the last week and a half working on it and wishing I was outside, as it has been beautiful in Sydney. But now that I'm done with that essay I get to... start the next one... this one is due tomorrow though, so I just have to work fast and it'll be over with. It is a comparison of the way Americans and Australians treat immigrants, so hopefully it will be pretty interesting to write, and I'm pretty much guaranteed an A in the class, so there's not too much pressure...

The internship this week was mostly boring, but on Wednesday, things picked up. I got to go to a breakfast launch for Playstation with Rhiannon and we had free yummy food, got free 4 gb jump drives, and enjoyed a morning out of the office. When I got back, I finished up an article, learned how to update part of the website (because when Rhiannon leaves in a week, I'll essentially be taking over her job), and then at about 3:00, she asked if I'd be willing to do an interview that afternoon with Michael Lawrence, producer of the most popular Australian doco (film lingo for documentary) - Bra Boys about the surfer gangs of Marourba Beach. He and his team recently partnered with VAS entertainment, the biggest action-sport film producers, based in L.A. I didn't feel that great, but it didn't seem like it was going to be that big of a deal, so I said sure, and started whipping up some questions. Dov (our publisher) kept forwarding me emails from his agent with updates about when we could do the interview and how, and then all of a sudden, around 4:30, she said, actually let's switch it to 5:15 so that the entire team can be in on it on conference call. Eek! All of a sudden I was going to be managing an interview with 3 people on speaker phone, with not that great of questions and a head cold. After I calmed down, I did a bit more research, added some questions, and made the call. It went really well (despite me dropping the iPod recording device about 5 minutes in and having it disconnect... minor glitch) and I think I'll be able to write a pretty good article about it. I have to pitch the idea to the publisher on Monday so they can decide whether it should just be for the website or whether it will go in the mag (publishing lingo for magazine ;-)). I can't believe I only have 12 days left at the internship (9 of those without Rhiannon :-().

On Friday, I took a break from working on my essay to head into the city to meet my friend Maxine who was visiting from Melbourne. I met she and two of her friends in Darling Harbour, grabbed some Thai take-away and grabbed a seat at the Darling Harbour's 21st Anniversary spectacular... I made up that name, but it was something like that. We weren't sure what to expect, but we weren't disappointed. When the show started at 7:15 (keep in mind it's pitch-black by then now that it's getting to be winter), four jet skis zoomed out from under the bridge and started shooting out fire and then fireworks, all weaving around each other.

(These are the four jet skis, shooting out fireworks.)

There was quite a long fireworks show, some launched from the jetskis, some from the land, all of it fantastic.

After the show, we sat on the steps for a while and chatted, and then I had to head back home to finish up my essay.
Tomorrow is Mother's Day and our host mom gets back from Kansas, so that will be fun. We are going to get her flowers and a card. Also, a Brazilian girl is moving into the homestay tomorrow, so Isabel and I have to move out of our room tonight. But for Isabel, it will just be two nights, because she is leaving to go back to Spain on Monday, and then I move to Glebe on Saturday! Busy week ahead!!!

Post-Vacation Slump

This week has consisted of dragging myself out of the post-vacation slump, as I like to call it. I am so spoiled, that returning to Sydney, Australia can put me into a grumpy mood, but it has. All of the excitement of seeing new places, eating at new restaurants, seeing beautiful views, is gone. Also, I have quite a lot of work to do (nothing compared to if I was at Marist right now, but compared to the rest of the semester, a lot) that I just can't seem to start. The earliest deadline is Friday, May 8 (which is really May 9 for me because it's on Eastern time), but it is a 10-12 page paper that I could potentially do a really thorough job on, if I leave enough time, so I really need to get started on that one. Following that, I have a 4 page paper due for my culture class due on May 10, a proposal for my honors project due on May 20, and my 8-10 page internship paper (pass/fail -- how am I going to find motivation for that one?!) that I want to finish before Alex gets here. I also need to be working on my cover letter for the internship I am applying for for the fall semester. Slightly overwhelmed. More frustrating is that I have had all week to start all of these, and I have found thousands of ways to procrastinate instead... some of these ended up being great though. On Thursday night, I dragged myself out of bed, into the shower, and into the city to meet up with Isabel and all of her friends from her English-language school. I talked with people from Brazil, Germany, France, Korea, Japan, Spain... I think that's it. It was such an eye-opening night, and I got to learn about so many different cultures. Then, Friday, for some reason I was motivated to exercise when I woke up and decided to go on a run. I mapped out where I would go, my destination: the Sugarloaf Bay. The map was somewhat unclear on how close I would actually be able to get to the bay, but I decided to try. I ran/power walked to the head of the trail and then ventured in. On the trail, I saw beautiful wildflowers (some that I have not encountered before -- and I didn't bring my camera :-(), huge spiders and big rock outcroppings. I almost gave up before I made it to the bay, but I decided to power on to the place that was marked by a lookout icon on the map. It was a beautiful spot and I decided to stop to take a rest. On my way back, I happened to look into one of the trees, and saw a bird that I thought looked like an owl. I was pretty sure it couldn't be, because it was daytime, but I asked my hostdad when I got back, and he named the owl he thought it was (which of course, I can't remember now...). I just stopped and watched it for about 3 minutes, and it didn't fly away. So cool. I made my way back to the house, ate, showered, and then went into the city to meet Isabel and Hiroko - the Japanese girl who is living in the homestay too. We walked to Circular Quay and the Opera House, trying, mostly unsuccessfully, to get some pictures of the bridge, opera house and city at night.

Then, we walked across the bridge and took in the brightly-lit skyline.
Petra had made us dinner that we had when we finally got home (we HATE the 208 bus which takes us far out of the way, making it take forever to get home) - pasta with mushrooms and ham - very yummy!

Back "home"

I'm back "home," which is all so relative now... new homestay, which is great so far -- roommates with Isabel and down the hall from Petra. I'm off of work until Monday, but have lots of school work to do... essays and applications galore!

Just a thought...

Missing someone is such a private feeling and yet also one that I sometimes want to scream from the rooftops...

Off to New Zealand!

Well, I'm off to New Zealand tomorrow! You can follow our trip on realtravel at - http://realtravel.com/b-282620-san_francisco_blog-wild_adventures_of_the_wheeler_girls

Too much to do between now at 7 am when I have to leave for the airport... eek!