TMI

We got a huge pile of cards in the mail yesterday -- I don't think we even got around to opening them all before we left for our plane-viewing activity. While reading some, I marveled at the level of detail in the letters summing up the year. Do I really need to know what levels your kid has completed in some video game? Or which one of your kids placed higher with their calf at the county fair? I guess their lives are so interesting that they need to give us every detail. Much more interesting than ours, since we had such an uneventful year.

Jet lag: the six-day hangover

My head hurts, and pretty much has since we got on the plane Sunday afternoon, which was Saturday evening. I'm less disoriented now than I was a few days ago, that last sentence notwithstanding.

Our boys, who were waking up daily at 6 a.m. for the months leading up to our trip, have slept past 8 (2 a.m. Sydney time) every day. I have consistently been waking up at 2 a.m. (8 p.m. Sydney time).

I've had a stuffy nose and sore throat since we left Sydney, which could be due to allergies, jet lag, a cold, or the fires that created a haze over the Bay Area, or all of the above.

And slowly, slowly, I have been processing photos.

Our last day in Sydney

Tomorrow morning we'll head to the airport and leave on an early afternoon flight and arrive in SF tomorrow morning.

Today I headed to the Farmers Market to load up on the best chocolates I have ever had. Then our local babysitter came over and took the boys to the park so we could pack and clean. During nap time, Linda and I went over to Surry Hills and my favorite fabric store. I'm just sorry I won't get to see her fabulous new linens in her Sydney home.

This has truly been an exciting adventure, as Arthur would say. I am going to be really happy to get back to our house, with its dishwasher and clothes drier and double-paned windows and totally awesome cars. But I'm going to miss living in a big city where you can take the bus almost everywhere and there's an awesome view around every corner.

Top 5 Friday!

Arthur's top 5 adventures in Australia:

5) Taking in the view from the top of Sydney Tower



4) Taking the ferry to Manly, twice



3) Visiting Wildlife World and petting a koala and a huge bug (on separate visits)



2) Playing in the sand at Bondi Beach



1) Hiking to a waterfall overlook in the Blue Mountains

Nom nom nom

Tonight we got a sitter and went to a fab restaurant called longrain in the nearby neighborhood Surry Hills. It was oh so yummy and fantastic. The wine was a pinot called X from Victoria which sadly I can not find online. We had my favorite animal flesh of all, venison, and some fish in a green curry that was divine.

The rest of this week promises to be mellow but fun: tomorrow is Athena's birthday, so festiviteis at the zoo are planned (Linda managed to arrange for a baby elephant to be on display just for this holiday). This weekend there is another naturish weekend planned a few hours away.

In the coming days watch for posts and pics on our weekend in the Blue Mountains and the self-guided architecture tour I did on a couple days last week.

Cloth pilgrimage

I walked half way across town today to get to cloth, a fabric store in Surry Hills. I had read about the place in the Qantas in-flight magazine, and decided I had to go. It was roughly a 5k walk, but, happily, the vast majority of it was in Centennial Park. The boys chased birds, picked up big sticks and played at a play structure in the center of the park on the way to the shop. The last bit of the walk was through a pretty blah neighborhood (along Cleveland Street, fittingly).




They had a good selection of very cool home dec fabrics, and some stuff made out of them -- mostly pillow cases.



They had a big table of remnants, most of which were $5 AUD, for roughly 18x18" pieces. So I bought a bunch of them and plan to make some pillowcases in the patchwork-style of the ones on display.



My favorite is the one on the far left in this picture. I bought a half meter of it (that's pretty close to a half yard). I realized after I got home and was taking all these pics that it's probably my favorite because it's very evocative of mint-chocolate-chip ice cream (the photo doesn't do justice to the lovely shade of green).

The next few weeks

Some things I want to try before we go (aside from the usual touristy stuff):

A yoga studio that's a five minute walk from our flat.

Two fabric stores that are a 10-minute drive away.

Shop for at least one little souvenir at this uber-fabulous shop at The Spot in Randwick.

Sydney winter produce

Yesterday (Saturday) we went to a fantastic farmers market in an old rail yard.



The neighborhood around it wasn't as nice as Randwick or Balmain, but we had wonderful crepes for breakfast and, of course, there were several coffee stands.



We bought squash, Pink Lady apples, "spinach" (see below), eggs, flowers, and some other stuff that isn't so good for us.

Lots of people brought their doggies!







We also bought something they called spinach, but I'm pretty sure is what we in U.S. call chard.

I heart Rozelle

Yeesterday was a chill day, with Nathan working and me driving (more on that later) to Linda's to hang out. Linda lives in Balmain, a lovely neighborhood on the other side of the CBD from our place in Randwick. From there we walked to Darling Street in Rozelle. Pics are coming, but the neighborhoods are very evocative of the French Quarter in New Orleans. Some of the architecture looks very Southern, and some homes remind Nathan of something you might see in Colonial Williamsburg.

Darling Street is filled with cute shops and cafes. Our first stop was the Coffee Bean Cafe, Linda's favorite coffee shop. It was very kid-friendly, and there was even a kid in there who was less-well-behaved than mine*, which is always good. He was about 3 and his mom had a five-week-old. At one point the kid ran out the door and down the block, with Arthur following. Arthur didn't go nearly as far, and went back inside to "Aunt Linda" when I told him to, but Saul took off down the street and I had to run at top speed to get him. His mom didn't seen too concerned about his escapist tendancies, but I figured she could use the help and she seemed grateful.

After lunch (tuna wraps for moms, pizza and fries for boys) we went to the patisserie Strudel Baron: teeny, awesome cupcakes (actually the frosting and the oreo bit in the frosting was awesome, the cake was enh), brownie, and rum balls.

Finally, we went to a fabulous baby gear store called infancy. They were having a sale: half off winter clothes, including a rain jacket for Arthur, which I had unsuccessfully looked for at the Glebe mall last night. Pics of that to come, too...

Today we're off to the farmers market and maybe a museum.

*The boys are usually quiet well-behaved for their age, but they're still adjusting to this new environment and their behavior has been much worse than usual since we got here. Hopefully the adjustment period will end soon.

Opera House Tour

Yesterday we toured the famous Sydney Opera House. It is of course gorgeous and amazing from the outside, but touring the inside and learning its story makes it even more stunning.




Our tour guide was so-so...



The movies we watched about the design competition, the engineering feat of building the place, and the massive budget and schedule overruns were very interesting. (The design by a Danish architect was rejected, then pulled from the trash at the last minute; original cost and time estimate was $7 mil and 3 years, and ended up being $100 million and 16 years.)





Seeing the inside and understanding the construction, with each "sail" being made of a series of huge concrete "ribs" was really amazing.



Just in from the harbor on the Opera House peninsula is the Royal Botanic Garden; the view from the Opera House of the city skyscrapers framed by the trees of the huge garden is inspiring.

Good news everyone!

I finally figured out how to order coffee, which is important: "Tall black with soy milk, please." I don't know what this means, but it seems pretty similar to the coffee I know, so I'm good on that angle.

The other day at a restaurant I ordered a "flat white," which was kinda blah, then yesterday I got the tall black and it was good. (It was so warm I almost got an iced coffee, but it was twice as expensive, for some reason.)

This morning the teenage son of some friends of Adam and Linda is coming over to watch the boys so Nathan and I can take the tour of the inside of the opera house!

Exploring beautiful Sydney!

What a day! It must be in the 70s (Fahrenheit; still haven't figured out Centigrade conversions yet) today, and sunny! Sydney is gorgeous. And really easy to get around in via bus! At around 8:45 we got on a bus less than two blocks from our flat in Randwick and we were downtown at the Circular Quay (pronounced "key") in about 35 minutes. The morning bus was crowded and quiet. No one seemed to be reading anything to pass the time, just spacing out or nodding off.





At Circular Quay we walked past the ferry terminal and some very pricey real estate on our way to our first glimpse of the famous Opera House. It was a pretty dramatic sight, with its "sails" glistening in the morning sun. We walked all the way around the building and started heading up into the Royal Botanic Garden, which featured some impressive views of the Opera House (with much better lighting for morning photography). The Garden is big, beautiful and free; the boys loved walking around in the morning sun, collecting sticks and running across expanses of grass.





We examined a few of the gardens on our way to the central section of the Botanic Garden, where we surprised to find thousands of large bats handing from the trees! We didn't get around to finding a worker or volunteer to ask what kind they were and why they lived there, but we'll definitely be back.



At some point in our sightseeing Arthur got fixated on going up in the Sydney Tower, which looks kind of like the TV Tower in Berlin and is the height of the Eiffel Tower (does that make Sydney the Berlin of the Southern Hemisphere, or the Paris? I've never been to Paris, so I can't say...). From the Botanic Garden it was easy to make our way to the Tower and they gladly took our $25 AUD (per adult) to go up to the top of the tower. Noah slept in the stroller throughout the experience, but Arthur totally dug it.



After the tower experience we had to walk a couple blocks to buy bus passes, then back the other direction to catch the bus home. Nathan and I both noted how crowded the sidewalks were, even in the middle of the afternoon.

Hangin' with Haberlachs

The park across the street from Linda and Adam's house.


Arthur's getting good at catching!


This girl gets cuter every time we see her!

"You're going the wrooong waaayyy!!"

This is my first experience with the "keep left" driving system (I think some parts of Europe do it that way, but we did zero driving when we were there). I haven't actually done any driving since we got here; it's all been Nathan. But it's still terrifying to sit on the left side of the car and constantly be going the wrong way! Nathan has been doing great, and I certainly trust his driving skills, but I'm constantly fighting the urge to shriek and cover my eyes. The only annoyance now for him is that the turn signal and wiper stalks are also reversed, so he's constantly turning on his wipers when he's trying to signal!

At some point I realize I'm going to have to drive that thing. But today we're taking the bus up to Circular Quay (pronounced "key") to walk around central Sydney and see, among other things, the Opera House!

Getting there is half the fun?

Our travel to Sydney went astonishing well. We were expecting lots of bad behavior and less sleeping then necessary, but it all worked out pretty well.

Qantas pre-boards families with young children, so that was a happy surprise. But that was nothing compared to when we got to our seats, which had an excessive amount of leg room, and even footrests -- footrests!!!! Turns out we were in the last row of "premium economy" -- there was a small divider between our seats and the row behind, and I looked back and noticed that the seats there were much less plush. I quickly sent Linda an email on my phone, then sent her a pic. She was jealous that we had somehow been upgraded to this special class!

We all managed a reasonable amount of sleep -- some with, some without sleep aids -- and the 14-hour flight went relatively quickly -- that was when trouble started. Another big plane full of people arrived from Hong Kong about the same time, so the queue for customs was huge. I don't even remember how long it took us to get through. Then we got our checked bags, which wasn't too bad. But then we had to wait in another insane queue for "quarantine," which is where they check to make sure you aren't bringing anything into the country that will infest the local flora or fauna. Finally we got outside, into the fresh morning air, where we got to wait in yet another bloody queue (check out all my local lingo!) for a taxi. Next time I see another line like that I'm going to have to be seriously medicated. "Don't lose it now," Nathan implored me. I managed to make it until we all piled ourselves and our stuff into a "maxi taxi" and headed over to Randwick. Whew!

Tuesday morning in Sydney

At least I'm pretty sure it's Tuesday, which would mean Monday afternoon in California. It was not a great night for jet-lagged toddlers here. They woke up periodically from 1:30 on, and Nathan finally got up with them for good at 5. I had a brutal headache, possibly from jet lag, possibly from lack of coffee. (There is no coffee machine in this apartment; I found this out a couple weeks ago, so Linda bought me a coffee maker, but she was sick with food poisoning yesterday so we haven't seen her yet.) Hopefully it won't be more than another day or two before they're adjusted. Nathan and I haven't been feeling too bad jet-lag-wise, just a little tired.

First unexpected cultural difference: eggs are unrefrigerated in the store.

Second one: most of the restaurants nearby seem to be BYOB.

Speaking of coffee, at some point I need to figure out how to order it; Adam says they don't have American coffee everywhere, just espresso and cappuccino, because of Turkish and Greek influences.

View of city lights from our flat

The Pop Report

Almost a year ago I decided to try to get off the diet pop. Finally, it seems I'm close. The last few weeks I've only been drinking it about twice a week, and it seems that about half the time I drink it I immediately get a headache. So that's a good thing. And I figure pop won't be as pervasive in Australia as it is here, so that will help. I here they really know how to do coffee there, so I expect I'll be drinking a lot of that.

In other diet news, I'm trying out a dairy-free diet to see if it makes me feel any better, tummy-area-wise. Hopefully they have soy milk at the coffee joints in Sydney, or else I better get used to my coffee black.

G'day!

Technology is cool: we just did a video chat with Linda, who is in Sydney tomorrow afternoon while we're in Redwood City this evening!

I'm also glad we'll probably be going to Sydney in their winter, because Linda said they have humidity there in the summer. Blech.

Finally, we're still looking for a house swap, so if you know anyone who lives in Sydney and wants to spend some time in Redwood City... "Climate Best By Government Test"!!