Freo to the locals

Old dock-type buildings in Fremantle

After wandering around Perth late yesterday I realised I'd pretty much done it. So today I took a train out of the city and visited the neighbouring port city of Fremantle. 'Freo' as the locals call it, is about 20mins from Perth, and is a proper working port, with massive container ships loading up right near the centre. The buildings have that old warehouse feel to them, and the ornate plasterwork everywhere reminded me of the restored docks in Hull. That's about it for that comparison though, as it was gloriously sunny and the air didn't have a fishy tang to it. I wandered around for a bit, admiring all the porty-goings on. Both Perth and Fremantle have one major bonus for tourists (and pensioners and students too, come to think of it) in that every bus that crosses the city centre is free. So you can hop on and off as much as you like - provided you know where you're going, of course.

I consulted the famed LP guidebook, and it led me to the 'stunning' and 'fascinating' Maritime Museum of Western Australia. It could quite easily have been both of these things, but unfortunately it was also 'half-closed' for 'renovation', so I'd whizzed around it in about 20 minutes. Still, that meant I went next door into the Fremantle Motor Museum - and that was much better. I'm no petrol-head (still have never got round to driving), but the cars there were great - including some old Formula 1 classics, which really got me interested. The entire collection is owned by one man (presumably a very rich man) - and he was there in overalls tinkering with one of the displays, doing some renovating of his own.

I know I said in an old post that I'm a museum junkie - but I outdid myself in Freo. In the afternoon I went to the Museum of Shipwrecks, and that was the best of the lot. They had all kinds of exhibits - apparently Western Australia is littered with wrecked ships from the hapless Dutch traders who ploughed into the rocky shores whilst trying to work their way up the coast to the then Dutch East Indies (Indonesia). The museum gave the impression that the Dutch were practically hurling their ships onto the hostile shores - particularly the Alhobros Islands (the name means 'look out'). If you're ever in Fremantle I urge you to go - it was fantastic, and I learned all kinds of things I'll be looking out for when I go up the coast on Saturday. But tomorrow - I'm off to look for giant rats...

The most isolated city

The Perth skyline at night

So the start of the 'month of travels' began this morning with a whopping five-hour internal flight across to the other side of Australia. Now if you're American or Russian, flying that long and still being in the same country isn't new - but to me it certainly is. I was trying to think of how many countries I could get to within 5hrs of Edinburgh, but gave up when I was well into double figures. They don't call Perth the 'most isolated capital city on Earth' for nothing. It's closer to Singapore than Sydney. I got a ramshackle bus into the city and found where I was staying fairly easily - Perth is very small. Although maybe I've been in the spectacularly sprawling mass of Sydney for too long to appreciate the smaller cities.

My flight over was reasonable, considering the cold I've picked up - the last one I got was the last time I went travelling - and the hangover I had saddled myself with after the final Japanese lesson. It wasn't much of lesson, more a end-of-term meal and piss-up. We went to a Japanese lesson and had a great meal - which Nobuko-san instructed us to order in Japanese. She also ordered bottles and bottles of steaming sake, which we kept polishing off with increasingly loud cries of 'kampai!!'. I tell you, warm sake does wonders for a blocked nose. So that's it for my return to student-hood, I'll be able to try it for real in a couple of weeks.

The night ended on an amusing note, when the bloke I sat next to for the lessons confused me with another bloke in our class, and gave me a couple of anime DVD's. Hey, I do watch it - but I'm not the fan he thought I was. I managed to duck most of his questions, and took the disc home. I didn't feel bad, as the guy it was intended for didn't show up, and it wasn't bought specially - just downloaded from a laptop onto a blank disc. At that point we were both pretty drunk, and he seemed pleased that I'd taken it. So I've got some anime to watch when I get back - my Japanese education continues...

Tour Guide

M&D take in the harbour view from a ferry



If you've been wondering why the flurry of activity has died recently on DUaB, it's because I've been employed as a tour guide for the past week. My parents arrived on the 3rd of September and I played the part of tour leader. Initially this involved me getting up at 4am to meet them off the plane from Singapore, and watch as the evils of jetlag took hold and they slipped into the traveller's fug (before lunch, no less). But after a couple of half-days at the beginning of their stay, they attuned to the Antipodean timeframe and were keen to get out and about. We were undone by the weather to begin with - rain and cold winds for the first couple of days. My carefully-planned itinerary quickly went down the tubes and I spent much of the rest of the week winging it.

They had eight days in Sydney, all told, so managed to see practically everything the city has to offer. We did all the usual central attractions - Opera House, Harbour Bridge, Botanic Gardens, Taronga Zoo etc. I tried to get them out on the harbour ferries as much as possible, and I think they appreciated the city more for that (see photo above). We also took in day trips to the Blue Mountains and the Hunter Valley, both in spectacular Spring weather. I'd not been to the Hunter before, and thoroughly enjoyed it.

So they are now off up on a Barrier Reef cruise, and my tour guide duties are on hold for a while - at least until we get to Tokyo and I can show them round a city I've never visited. Tomorrow I fly off to Perth and the gaping expanse of Western Australia. I've got just over a week there - doing the backpacker thing again - before I come back to Sydney for my final 3days in Australia. How time flies, eh? Look out for more blog posting over the end of this week as I get on the road again.

The end of work

You'll be seeing more photos like this from now on...

Count the days between today and the 7th of November. That's how long I've got until I'll set foot in an office again. Yes, today was my last day at work. The 'working traveller' part of my visa is over - I'm just a plain old 'traveller' again, or backpacker, if you will. Call me what you like (and I've heard most of them), I'm a free man again for a while (until my scheduled return to the NHS in Edinburgh).

Not that I minded working - far from it. I was fortunate enough to land myself with a great temp agency, and managed to get myself put into two jobs which I enjoyed. Well, maybe enjoyed is too strong a word, but if they were menial they were at least varied, so I was never doing one thing too long. And no data entry, either. I'm certainly not contemplating switching careers to the enigmatic worlds of Superannuation or Human Resources, but they did they job for me (and me them).

On my last day today, the two women I work with took me out to lunch, and then presented me with a bottle of wine (from the Hunter Valley, naturally) and a cartoon of drunken kangaroos (not half as bad at it sounds). I handed over my pass and the key to my office, and that was that - back to civvy street.

So tomorrow I'm off to an accountant - first time for everything - clutching mounds of paperwork and a hopeful expression. I've been told by my agency that this Lithuanian bloke they know is good for getting tax back for us working travellers (again, he's not as bad as he sounds, apparently). They take out a $110 fee and I get the rest back within 10 working days. If that happens, blimey, I'll be well chuffed.

After that, my parents arrive this weekend, so I'll be doing my tourguide impression for a week or so. Then hopefully I'll be jetting off to WA for at least a week, and then it's briefly back to Sydney before I go to Japan. Almost wrote an entire post without mentioning that... ;)

Please enjoy the image which overflows

There are times when time it cannot modify

Who doesn't love shonky translations of Japanese websites? Google usually takes a pot shot at translating, and the results are always more entertaining than the websites themselves. Take these - from the homepage of the Honda Welcome Plaza in Aoyama, Tokyo. I particularly love the notes on ASIMO (a recently developed high-tech robot). Executions three times a day? Bring the popcorn!


Concerning the exhibition please inquire to HONDA smile of the information counter concerning question and the catalog claim of the four wheel car & bicycle general-purpose product.


The ASIMO it participates as a HONDA welcome plaza Aoyama's role of the guide. Introduction of the program which is televised with multiple vision and the guide et cetera of various events which are done at the plaza, everyday are done. Furthermore in forum and event, chairmanship part of opening! In the ASIMO which participates at the plaza, by all means, please come to meeting.

In the midst of ASIMO demonstration execution!
1 day 3 time schedule
10:30 - 10:35
11:50 - 11:55
15:00 - 15:10
* There are times when it modifies with the circumstances of the event and the like.


Both four wheel car & the bicycle, the new model of topic and model of popularity, in life the general-purpose product and the welfare car et cetera which participate are displayed. Actually you sitting down in the seat, please try atmosphere and handling feeling et cetera, freely. There is also a colourway of the body. Please request the unclear point and question, with ease.


Even from now on with HONDA welcome plaza Aoyama, regardless of the two wheels ･ four wheel the event which you can enjoy to everyone it is in the midst of planning. Concerning future schedule, because it keeps publishing to event news on occasion, don't you think? propriety everyone please check!

As easy as 123

Supotsu-ka!

Last night's Japanese class produced a language rule that completely amazed me - different counting systems are used depending on the shape of the object you're counting. In English we would say 'three bananas', or 'three postcards', but in Japanese the words used to correspond to the number three above would be different. There's the -mai system, which relates to things that are flat (plates, tshirts, slices of pizza etc), and the -hon system for things that are cylindrical in shape (bottles, trees, fingers etc). If you happen to be counting something that's of an indeterminate shape - like potatoes, televisions, lions - you use the more regular hitotsu, futatsu, mittsu (i.e. 123) system. The -mai and -hon systems above are combined with the other 123-system - ichi, ni, san etc. However the hitotsu, futatsu, mittsu system only goes up to ten - after which you swap to the ichi, ni, san system. Confused? As you can imagine this led to a barrage of bewildered questions that verged on the philosophical - How thick does a book have to be before it ceases to be flat? How would you count trees that have fallen over? What if the pizza's deep-pan?

The second half of the lesson was spent looking at Japanese words that have been developed from English. They look almost unrecognisable when written phonetically, but when you see the word 'sanoitchi' next to a picture of a sandwich, you get an idea of the prononciation. Japanese is of course an ancient language, so modern inventions are less likely to have 'original' names - like 'kamera', 'terebi', 'sutereo' - and my personal favourite 'tepu-rekoda'. Try saying them aloud and the meaning becomes clear - if you want to do some baking, you might put on an 'epuron' beforehand. In a department store you'd go down an 'esukareta' between floors - and maybe come back up in an 'erebeta'. And if that special someone bought you a 'purezento' - you might tell them those three little words - "Ai rabu yu".

How to boil rice

Geraldine finishing the obento


My near-total immersion in all things Japanese continues apace - whether its reading about the country, studying the history, learning the language, or defeating her armies on Battlefield 1942 at my local LAN gaming cafe. This weekend I added another string to my Japanese bow by learning how to cook proper Japanese food at a college course. I had noticed the one-off course when I was signing up for the language school, and suggested it to my flatmate Geraldine who is also a fan of raw things on rice.

The course was held in a school in Leichhardt, an area with a large Italian population a short bus ride west of the city centre. There were about 15 people in the class, run by two Japanese ladies. I've never even considered going to a cooking class before, but I've got to say it was pretty good. There was a mix of people there from the older serial mature student types down to working travellers like us. After a quick introduction to Japanese food, we had a traditional elevenses of green tea, rice crackers wrapped in seaweed and a 'healthy snack' - small bags of flaked almonds mixed with tiny dried fish. I do mean tiny, the longest of these dehydrated guys was about the width of my thumbnail. They reminded me of the neon tetras I used to keep as a young lad. Still, they tasted pretty fishy - and went well with the almonds.

We learned to cook chicken teryaki, salmon, bean salad with sesame dressing, egg roll, and rice balls. The method of doing the rice was interesting, as it took ages, but produced amazing sticky rice - the proper stuff. You have to knead the rice under cold water until no more starchy stuff comes out, apparently - then leave it for half an hour before you start cooking it. I just boil it for 20mins and drain the scum off - but no longer! We watched while Sumi-san did a demonstration, and then divided into groups of four and did our own versions. We were paired with a couple of students (the young variety) who enjoyed themselves despite having almost no cooking skills - but the food we made was amazing. At the end each foursome had prepared their very own Japanese obento lunchbox and we all sat down to eat. It really was good stuff, and thanks to the course, I now know how easy most of it is to rustle up.

On the trail of Billy Blue

Luna Park - Sydney's controversial fairground

Yesterday I took a short hop over the water to North Sydney, and walked back down to the harbour. One of the closest spots you can reach to the other side is at Blues Point Reserve, a small spit dominated by a large tower block. Universally derided since it was built, Blues Point Tower is consistantly voted Sydney's ugliest building, although to me it's no worse than any other concrete tower block. Of course very few concrete tower blocks are built within a few feet of Sydney harbour, and with views back to the bridge/Opera House/etc. If it wasn't there, the site would only be full of swanky condos I imagine.

One of the first people to live on that spot was a colourful character named Billy Blue. A Jamaican, he was transported for stealing a bag of sugar, and after his sentence ended he acquired a rowing boat and became a ferryman. The first to help people across the harbour, Blue was something of an eccentric. By 1807 he was a local legend, seen shouting at people from his boat (he ended up with a small fleet of rowing boats). Awarded the title 'Water Baliff' by the Governer of the colony, Blue preferred to be called the 'Old Commodore' and dressed in full naval uniform. He got so eccentric that eventually he would refuse to do the rowing, and his passengers would have to do it themselves. He demanded people salute him as an officer, and would entertain people with tales of naval adventures. When he became too infirm to take to the boats, he was granted the patch of land where his ferry started, and when he died aged almost 100, it was named after him.

A short jaunt around from Blues Point is the Luna Park fairground - the monstrous gates of which are something of a local landmark. They are illuminated at night, and can be seen from Circular Quay, like some kind of grinning troll sitting under the far end of the bridge. The fairground opened in the sixties, but was closed after a catastrophic fire on the Ghost Train killed about half a dozen children. Eventually it re-opened, but has struggled since to pull in the punters. It always seems reasonably busy, but I guess the lure of fairgrounds has faded for kids these days. The locals over at Milson's Point hate it - they get the screams and banging music from 10am to 11pm every day - it obviously intrudes on their pristine views. Maybe they should move to the Blues Point Tower, which is always said to have the best views in the city - as it's the only view where the Tower isn't in it...

13 into 10 doesn't go

Kyo wa ii tenki desu ne

Last night was lesson three in my Japanese course - and the difficulty levels have soared compared to the first two weeks. I'd only just learnt how to count from 1-10 - this week we covered asking the time, telling the time, counting to 100, days of the week and months of the year. Some are relatively easy, like the last category there - January is 'month-one', February 'month-two', March 'month-three', and so on. Telling the time is much harder - for 11:30 we would say 'eleven-thirty' - this translates as 'juichi-ji han desu'. 11:40 is 'juichi-ji yonju-ppun'. It's pretty tough, especially when spoken quickly.

Counting to 100 is reasonable, once you've mastered the premise that Japanese numbers are similar to the French system - 20 is 'two-ten', 30 'three-ten' etc. It just takes a long time to learn. As Nobuko-san said when our faltering voices tried to say 67 'rokuju-shichi' 'Numbers are killing you'. It doesn't help that three of the basic numbers - 4, 7, and 9 - have two alternative sayings. 4 as a number is commonly 'shi', but 4 written as part of a phone number is 'yon'. If you get mixed up, both are understood, but essentially you have to learn 13 numbers to be able to recite the top ten. 'Japanese is a moody language' admitted Nobuko-san, to which we all admitted 'Hai. So desu'...

Birthday feast(s)

How many candles?


Last Wednesday was my birthday, and although the thought occurred to me to take the day off, I decided to work as normal - no such thing as free time off for us temps. It wasn't that bad really, the people at work got me a cake and then the two women I work for in the HR department took me to lunch at a nearby Marriott hotel. It was a gloriously sunny day, so we sat outside on a patio with a few conference delegates and the droning traffic to keep us company.

When I got home the food-related celebrations continued as my flatmate Geraldine cooked an outstanding curry for me, which we ate in true birthday style - in front of the telly. Afterwards she disappeared and came back with the cake from my work (they made me take it home) covered in candles. I'd not had to blow out candles since I was a kid, so gave it one almighty puff - and succeeded in removing the top layer of shaved coconut all over the carpet. Still, I got most of the candles out as well.

My other flatmate was away then, so the three of us went for dinner last night to a French restaurant in Surry Hills. Whenever you read a description of Surry Hills, the word 'bohemian' is usually in there somewhere. Essentially the area is a bit grubby, but down to earth and with a lot of hidden restaurants, bars and galleries. I suppose it all depends on your definition of bohemian - or if you even care. Still, the restaurant we went to was very good - proper French food, very tasty, very little of it, piled in artful towers in the centre of the plate. It was expensive ($50), but good - although I could have eaten everything again - as Gerard said "There's a bowl of Weaties at home with my name on it."

On the way home we stopped in a pub for a couple of drinks, and arrived just before England beat Australia by 2 runs in an incredible finish to the 2nd Ashes Test. The result caused a fair bit of shouting, and predictably a fight broke out - Surry Hills is popular with Brits for the cheap rental prices. The lone doorman did his best to get in the middle, and did a good job of chucking out one side (the Australian) and barring the other (about five English lads - who were getting quite a kicking) from leaving. It spilled out onto the street eventually, but everything had cleared away by the time we left. Still, it gave me something to write about, eh?

Away from Home

Palm Beach (left) and Station Beach from Barranjoey Head

I went on another exploration on Sunday, this time to the far North of the Sydney boundary. Imagine, if you will, getting on a bus in the centre of your city and being driven for 1hr 45minutes. Not a coach, or long-distance vehicle, but a regular city bus. The L90 goes such a distance, from Central Station to Palm Beach. My 40-minute journey to work passes 11 fare stages (i.e. 11 places where the fare increases slightly). The trip to Palm Beach passes 29 - although even then it costs only $5.20 to get there (just over GBP2). It's a long way to Palm Beach.

But is it worth it? Well, sort of. It's a nice beach, the waves were the most impressive I've seen for a while - certainly the loudest. Palm Beach itself lies along one side of Barranjoey Head, a hammer-shaped spur that juts out into the mouth of the Hawkesbury River where it meets the Tasman Sea. I walked up a trail that wound up a forested hill to a lighthouse, with impressive views around. Back down by the beach seaplanes took off regularly, shattering the silence as they battered across the water to gain elevation.

I'm told that nearby Whale Beach is even nicer, but didn't have time to get down to it. I'm also told that they film the outdoors portions of the soap Home and Away around these beaches, although I've never seen it, of course. Ahem. It was certainly a good place for a Sunday afternoon stroll, but in my opinion there are nicer beaches nearer to the city (within 20 fare stages at least).

A-League of their own

Your author (bottom right, in blue and white Rovers kit)


The other week I went along to the first game in the pre-season campaign of Sydney's newest sporting franchise - Sydney FC. As a team, they've been around for a while, but the brand new domestic Australian football league - the A-League - starts this month. One of the Rovers fans in Sydney is a season ticket holder at Sydney FC (and at GBP60 they are considerably cheaper than season tickets of football teams in the UK), so I met up with him and the other hard-core Sydney FC fans.

The game was held at the Aussie Stadium, in front of about 9,000 people - which wasn't bad for a pre-season game against unknown opponents (the New Zealand Knights, anyone?). It was interesting watching a new football team start off - something that you never really get to see as most English teams were founded around 100 years ago. The small group of - let's face it - football nerds that I was with had chosen an area behind one of the goals to stand (yes, standing at football). It had been recently christened 'The Cove' for reasons I'm not too sure about, and was draped with banners for the team, until the fans were told by stadium security to take them down.

The game was enthusiastically dreadful, but Sydney wound out winning 3-1 and have been installed as favourites to win the new A-League. Predicatably they are seen as flash and overconfident (something Sydney is accused of a lot) - and this comes as no surprise when their star player is none other than ex-Rovers makeweight Dwight Yorke - the ultimate footballing playboy and father of a child with the model Jordan. I later read that Yorke was seen drinking in an Oxford Street bar a couple of hours after the match, so some things never change.

Nice and easy, Japanesy

Te o furenaide kudasai!

Last night was the first of the Level 1 Japanese language classes that I signed up for. I decided to learn some basic Japanese to help when I go there in two months, to give me and my 'chichi' a better chance of getting around. I tried to get on a course entitled 'Japanese for Travel' - which would have been ideal - but it was cancelled due to lack of numbers and I was shunted onto the Japanese Level 1 course instead. Still, this course is broader, and looks at some kanji and writing, so it's just as useful.

The course is run at the University of Wollongong (that being a small city to the South of Sydney), but based at their Sydney campus, right next to Central Station. There are about 15 of us in the group, the usual mix of younger travellers and serial mature students who sit at the front and ask questions. Our teacher is an affable motherly type called Nobuko-san, who has a fun way of getting us to repeat sayings - raising her hands and shouting 'Hai!!' (yes) like we're unruly schoolkids. Which I suppose in a way, we were. I was the only one wearing a tie, for a start.

We learned a few phrases of introduction, listened to a bafflingly fast tape (Nobuko-san gamely tried to work the CD player - what is it with teachers and electrical equipment?), and had a rapid-fire Q&A about Japan. During this I learned that the population of Tokyo is 30million (during the day - it goes down at night), Japan would fit 20 times into Australia (NSW is twice the size of Japan), and one of the basics of Shintoism is that every mountain has a God, every river has a God, etc. A Korean student in the front row found this perplexing. 'And that's the main religion in Japan?' he asked, incredulous.

By far the hardest thing for me was sentence structure - not because of the different way Japanese sentences are constructed, but because I realised I haven't a clue how English sentences are constructed. It took me five minutes just to remember what a verb was, and by the time she explained the Japanese equivalent of past form/present form I was hopelessy lost. Still, I'm not trying to become fluent, or to learn how to construct precise sentences. I just need to be able to communicate and ask for things, so we can get by. Next week, we're doing days of the week and telling the time. And we didn't get any homework!

The story so far...

The Harbour Bridge from Circular Quay railway station

Reading over these last few posts it struck me that this is the perfect time to fill you in on my plans, rather than more musings about delivery vans or bus stations. I've now been out here for just over nine months, which to be honest seems like ages - it's not gone by as quickly as I thought it might. I've got basically three months left until I have to return to the UK. So how am I going to spend it?

Firstly, I've got another month left working from my allotted three months - which I'll probably spend here in my current job (unless something unexpected and dramatic happens). So essentially I've got until the end of August to get money together for anything I plan to do before I fly North. Towards the middle of September I'm planning another short trip away - probably to the Outback. I was going to Melbourne for a week or so, but although it's supposed to be nice (and as previously mentioned I do like my cities), the Outback is something entirely unique, so I should make the effort to see it before it's too late.

I'd like to go somewhere remote, so was thinking about flying over to Perth and then going up the coast of Western Australia. That way I can have a base and still see some Outbacky stuff. Plus I've always wanted to visit Shark Bay - the only place in the world where you can see Stromatolites - footstool shaped colonies of coral-type animals so old they were claiming pensions and reminiscing about the good old days long before ancient reptiles even started thinking about flopping out of the seas onto the land.

After that I'll be off to Tokyo on the 25th of September, for two weeks of high-tech excitement and unidentifiable food. Thanks to my ticketing cock-up I'll be coming back two days earlier, but at least I'll be there for a couple of weeks. There then follows a crazy week starting the 10th October when I leave Tokyo, and arrive in the early hours of the 11th in Sydney. That will be my last day in Australia, as my next flight leaves early on the 12th for Seoul, South Korea. There I've got a free overnight stay in a hotel (thank you Korean Airlines), before flying onwards on the 13th, arriving in London on the 14th. So that's four cities and three continents in four days, including Asia twice. That's going to be some week...

A question of buses

Save Preston Bus Station!

If you come from Preston you inevitably know a thing or two about buses. Home to the longest bus station in Europe (I've waited so long to get that into this blog), I've been travelling about on their blue and white double deckers since it cost 30p to get into town. Apparently it's over one pound now - but you almost always give your (exact) money to a less-than-cheerful driver. Edinburgh too - the maroon buses there are the pride of the city as they drive from one side to the other and try to clog Princes Street as much as possible. Again, in my experience (something I should stress here) the drivers can be pretty grumpy. They do get shot from time to time, so maybe that's it. Or it could be the lack of length of their bus station, who knows.

But come to Sydney - and what a difference! Bus drivers that say hello when you get on, that say goodbye when you get off - I even had one ask me how my day had gone once. On more than one occasion the driver of a different bus has stopped and told me the one I'm waiting for is a few minutes behind him. Just the other week two came at once (they are buses, after all) and due to a mix-up one left a few people behind who wanted to get on. So the driver of my bus told them to get on ours, refused to take their money, then drove up behind the other bus at some traffic lights and ran across to tell him he'd missed some passengers. The other driver apologised and waited for the people to walk over to his bus. And you know what? Sydney doesn't even have a bus station! As my American readers would say - go figure.

Utes alive!

Is it a car? Or is it a van?

The humble white van is something you hardly see on Australian roads - instead workmen drive around in things that look like they were constructed on Scrapheap Challenge. As black cabs are to the UK, and yellow school buses are to the US - Utes are to Australia. You can't flag them down and get a ride though, so come to think of it that analogy was rubbish. You see a lot of them on the roads, at any rate. The basic ones are just a cab bolted to a chassis - called a 'Cab-Chassis' they are popular with workmen and builders (I'm told you can sometime see them in - ahem - Neighbours).

At the other end of the scale are the sporty turbo Utes - massive V8-powered beasts that are only used for testing the 100k speed limit. I don't think there's an equivalent of 'white van man' over here, but all the anti-speeding ads on TV feature men driving Utes coming to grief. Learner drivers (P-platers) are soon to be banned from driving powerful cars like Utes after a number of well-publicised accidents. The newest models have two rows of seats and four-wheel drive - so the move away from a tool-carrier to a family 4x4/SUV isn't far away. Speaking of which, in this country of the Outback and thousands of square kilometres of desert - which part of the country has the highest 4x4 ownership? Cremorne - a leafy suburb of North Sydney.

The Little Differences

Striped Orb-Web spider, roughly palm-sized

But Rich what's it really like living in Australia? is a question most of you must have muttered at some point after reading this blog - probably whilst waving your fist at the monitor. Well - apart from the (ahem) weather, there are plenty of small differences that the casual visitor will miss - but yours truly has noted. In the current period of working and no travelling, what better time to reveal some of these unique gems? *cough* filler posts *cough*

1. Spiders
How many times have I talked about spiders? Too many, for all you arachnaphobes, no doubt. Well that proves my point. Back home spiders are a nuisance at worst - they spin webs and go about their spidery business, but that's about it. Most of them are small, dull and brown - and although they fulfill a useful purpose, and without them we'd be knee-deep in flies blah blah - they just aren't that interesting.

So if you like your eight-legged insect overlords on the exciting side (and who doesn't?) then you have to come over here. Whether it's multi-coloured garden spiders, fat glistening orb web spiders, or massive slavering Huntsmen - arachnids here are worth writing about. A large spider in the UK would be...what, the size of your little finger? Large spiders in Australia are the size of your hand - believe me, I know. Check the archives for the post about my evening visitor. Yikes.

The world gave Australia rabbits and cats - Australia gave them back the white-tailed spider (well, New Zealand at least). If you even look at one of these guys funny, it'll go for you. When they bite you, it feels like a mosquito - but soon becomes agonising - essentially the part of you they bite dies, and has to be cut out (or off) to save you. The worst part is these things are small and love hiding indoors. Erm, I'll be checking under the bed tonight then...

Thinking about work

This long-necked turtle is far more stressed than I am

The other night I caught myself doing something no temp should ever do - I thought about work while I was at home. The sheer beauty of temping is that the job you do is so stress-free that as soon as you leave the office (or on some days even when you're still there) you flick an internal switch and log off. Of course when I'm in my office I'm concentrated and productive (ahem), but the instant I turn off the computer I can stop thinking about it. As such, I have the same levels of work stress as a pot plant - and with less watering. I think that's why office temping is the ideal job for working travellers like me, as it gives you decent money but practically no hassle.

The alternative a lot of people I've met go for is fruit picking - but a day in the sun picking apples or whatever is much harder than it sounds. For a start most of those places have quotas to fill, or you get paid by the box/bag/punnet etc. So you need to work hard to earn a decent amount. Plus they are usually located in out of the way places, and involve repetitive work. One girl I met in New Zealand described people turning up in the morning and jumping the fence in the afternoon to escape, such was the stress levels imposed by their bosses.

Maybe in recognition of this - and the fact that if it wasn't for travellers the seasonal picking industry would grind to a halt - the Australian Government recently announced a change in the visa regulations. The one-year working visa I'm on can be extended for another 12 months - but only if you complete three months of seasonal picking. The changes are due to come in at the start of November - two weeks after my visa expires - but even if they applied to me I'm not sure if I'd go for it. Admittedly it's 9 months of extended stay for 3 months of work, but 3 months is a lot of oranges/cabbages/whatever. Maybe if they broaden the regulations to include office temps I'd consider it - but somehow I doubt they'll be doing that any time soon...

The Olympic Spirit

An empty Sydney Olympic Stadium hosts a cricket match

If you saw the news the other day, you'll know that delegates from the IOC voted to award the 2012 Olympic games to London. Like a lot of British people, I think that's a great thing (although I'm sure there are plenty that don't). Staging an Olympic games puts strains on a city unlike any other one-off event, as was made clear in the run-up to the Athens games earlier last year. The issues of funding, taxes, congestion and security are all important while the games are happening - but what happens after all the athletes have left, and the medals, plaudits and drug bans handed out?

Sydney staged arguably the best Olympic games ever - it was certainly a vast improvement on the widely-criticised Atlanta event in 1996. The 2000 games were almost a coming of age for Sydney - people here still talk about them, and the positive effect they had on the image of the city. What legacy did it leave for Sydneysiders? Undoubtably it gave Australians and Australian sport a long-awaited moment in the spotlight, and their successes are remembered fondly by people who witnessed them. It also left the city with a huge complex of sporting venues and the problems of how to utilise them.

Sydney Olympic Park is the collection of stadia from the 2000 games, and even now it feels new when you walk around - it certainly has the shiniest station on the Cityrail network. It still hosts sporting events, to keep the venues paying off their contruction debts. I've been to basketball, football and cricket matches there, and have always been impressed by the facilities (if not the sporting performances). However, as far as I know the site is still losing money - it's difficult to encourage new events to come. Nobody wants to repeat the experience of the 1976 Montreal Olympics, which produced debts of up to C$1 billion that were lumped onto the taxpayer. Certainly Londoners won't want this to happen to them. But maybe the financial debts are eased by the spectacle of the event - this was certainly the case with the 2000 games here. The Olympics live on in the minds of Sydneysiders, like the blue line that marked the route of the marathon which is still visible on the city streets. Hopefully the 2012 games will be as memorable.

The lungs of the city

The art-deco ANZAC Memorial glistens in the sunshine

I read somewhere once that parks are considered to be the lungs of a city. If that's true, then central Sydney's lungs would undoubtedly be Hyde Park, the long rectangular green space that flanks the business district (which would be the brain, I guess). Named after the more famous park in London, the Sydney version quickly became the focal point of the fledgling colony back from it's formation in the late 18th Century. There's no real comparison to London's Hyde Park though - it's far smaller, there's no zoo (although it does have a corner). Back in the old days of settlement it was used as a mustering ground for soldiers from the adjacent barracks - but it has also been used as a cricket pitch, an arena for prize fights, and was the first racecourse in the city - which explains the roughly oval/rectangular shape (or ovtangular as I like to call it).

These days it's used mostly as a place to have lunch, an open-air theatre for drunks or a place to sleep for backpackers if they can't find their way to Kings Cross (for which you can decide your own body part analogy). Divided into two parts by Park Street, much of the greenery is dominated by two rows of huge Fig trees, which to my untrained eyes resemble giant florets of broccoli. In the Northern half is the splendidly OTT Archibald Fountain, completed in 1932 and featuring a typical scene from some legend or other, complete with stags, naked men, and turtles that continually vomit streams of water. If you follow the fig-dominated path to the other half (looking both ways as you cross Park Street, of course), you arrive at the other major feature, the art deco ANZAC Memorial, also built in the 1930's and dedicated to the 120,000 ANZACS who fought in the Great War.

There are other things of interest in Hyde Park too - like a manicured garden and veranda, and statues of Prince Albert and Captain Cook. But the real fun is to be had walking around looking at the people and animals that live or pass through the park - every Friday for instance, numerous Asian wedding parties gather to get photographed with the picturesque backdrop - one evening I counted five groups (and managed to get in a few pictures without even trying). On another walk home I saw bats, cockroaches and rats scampering about. There are large black and white storks that use their foot-long bills to reach into litter bins and remove sandwich wrappers, and possums that occasionally trot from tree to tree looking like grey cats with shrunken heads (trust me on this).