I just noticed Swampy’s comment. He wins the competition, some floating volcanic rocks are on their way to him right now.
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travel
wotam
On Friday night I got a flight to Hobart, Tasmania, for a weekend away. I flew JetStar, the plane was an A320 (we like Airbus). Inside it was comfortable and shiny.
I stayed at the Hotel Grand Chancellor, a midrange hotel on the water, not far from the touristy Salamanca area. I liked my room, it was on the corner so I had windows on two sides, one facing towards the sea and the other looking across the Derwent River via the bridge. Looked really good at night. I had a king-size bed, as requested and it was luxury to sleep without either curling into a fetal position or hanging my feet over the edge. There is something that always pisses me off about hotels, and it is this: they never have an extractor fan in the bathroom. In this bathroom, they did. Ten points just for that.
I had paella for dinner. I guess Tasmanian scallops aren’t so expensive in Tasmania because my meal was full of them. I love scallops.
After dinner it was time to go to the pub, and I found myself in a room full of ferals watching a peculiar performer wearing a leopard-print fez perched atop a mexican wrester’s mask. An unusual show. Being Tasmania, they of course had Cascade on tap. So, naturally, Cascade was what I drank. Oh, and also vodka. Once I had finished with drinking it was off to the next stop, a bar not far from my hotel. Only one drink in they turned on the fuckoff lights so back to the hotel it was.
On Saturday I had a cup of coffee for lunch at a café/laundromat called Machine. I wasn’t feeling the best after that so I went back to my hotel room and slept until almost dark. It was time to go out!
I started at Isobar, only because I had heard of it and knew where it was. There was a hen’s night on and I was targetted to help the hen complete her checklist. She now has my number and the dollar she earned by selling me a kiss. My next stop was an “Irish” pub. It was a sausagefest and my beer was served in a plastic glass. I didn’t even bother to finish my drink. I finished up at some other nearby sandstone pub, where some guy told me that it had been snowing on Mt Wellington (the mountain over Hobart) that day. For my Northern readers, in Australia it will be Summer in eight days. Right now in Sydney it is 39°C.
Sunday I got up for a noontime breakfast of eggs benedict, once again at Machine. This was the first thing I had eaten since the paella, as I had forgotten to eat on Saturday. Afterwards I went to the Parliament Lawns (? or something) for a live music festival thing. They had wine for sale, packaged in small thin cans like Red Bull. The music wasn’t thrilling me, although I did get up for a bit of a dance to a reggae band.
Something I noticed in Hobart, possibly related to the freezing temperatures: there were a lot of people coughing everywhere. The pubs are all non-smoking, so that was not it. [update: it is because of germs, I now have a Hobart cold]
All too soon it was time to go home. When I arrived in Sydney I was hit by a wave of hot and humid air. It was like the experience of getting off a plane in a tropical country, what I felt in PNG or Malaysia. In two days I had acclimatised tot he cold of Tassie and my own city seemed tropical. I got over that pretty quickly.
I shouldn’t have gone.
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kava
Tonight I went to a kava ceremony, kava is an intoxicating drink made from the roots of a local plant and its consumption is a sacred part of Fijian culture. As the Alpha, I was nominated to be the acting chief. I had a special bowl, whilst the others had to share a bowl. No-one could drink until after me, and everyone had to clap three times whenever I drank. I am now a member of the village.
The immediate effect of the drug was a numb mouth (and taste of dirty soapy water). After a little while I began to feel a bit more relaxed but that’s all. Tristan claimed to be able to see jellyfish behind his eyelids, but he might have been fooling himself.
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coup
One of the other guests was called by her family in Australia, apparently Aussie TV is full of talk of political unrest here in Fiji. They say that there is to be a military coup. We have seen none of that here on Beqa Island and, regardless of what happens, we are safe here. Don’t worry. I know a few of you probably are worrying (Michelle, Phil). Just remember that everything always works out for me, and I get to have cool adventures along the way.
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cider, gravy, churches
Bula from Fiji! I am sitting in a comfy chair on Beqa Island, overlooking the calm waters of Beqa Lagoon. The birds are chirping, the wind is rustling through the coconut palms, and Tristan is luring a poor kitten to its doom. Small floating volcanic stones are bobbing up and down in the few gentle wavelets.
They tell me that the flight over took four hours, so I guess I must have slept for three. After all the flights to and from Europe in the last eighteen months, I was surprised that the flight to Fiji was only four hours. Perceptions change.
There are some small mammals that come out here at night, which the locals call mongoose but are about the size of a squirrel/ferret. They live in the bushes near the koi pond, I saw one during the day yesterday. I have spoken to the owner and he tells me that the mongoose were introduced in order to rid the island of snakes, and they have almost completed their mission. When asked what kind of snakes live on the island, he reassured me that there are no dangerous snakes, just tree snakes and carpet snakes. If the snakes aren’t a threat, why exterminate them?
I am on this trip with grownups, divers all, so the holiday is atypical in that we are not getting drunk every night. When we drink, we drink cocktails, and a maximum of two.
Tristan and I spent yesterday swimming. We both ended up red, myself more so (on the neck). I was not concerned, and this morning my nonchalance was proved justified: Tristan is massively burned and I am a bit more tanned. Thanks to Mum for my alleged Spanish genes.
Yesterday afternoon I had a massage. The lady came into my bure with the table, oil etc. I was not expecting her. The booking had been made by my roommate, Sirwin, but as he was away diving I kindly took one for the team. The massage was competent but it felt like she was running through a checklist. There was no love.
This morning I was woken by Tristan, who came to my bure to fetch me for breakfast. After breakfast I returned and went back to sleep. I was again woken by Tristan, who came to fetch me for lunch. The food is excellent, and the service comes with a broad smile. Hooray for holidays.
They have a single computer here, made of stone and twigs, which is connected to teh intarwebs via a microwave link to the mainland. I don’t think the link is very powerful as the trees in line-of-sight seem quite healthy and are not on fire. Use of the internet costs $2 flagfall and $1 per minute thereafter. I won’t be using it - this post is being typed on Tristan’s notebook, which I will plug in just to send the post, and a few emails. It turns out that I only miss the internet as a means of communication with friends and loved ones. So Rohani wins, although that was obvious from the start.
Don’t be expecting a lot of/any posts from me whilst here. I have swimming to do. In fact, I haven’t even taken any photos.
* Beqa is pronounced “benga”
** A special Fiji present for the first one to comment with reference to the title of this post. That probably means you, Chris
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leavings
In a few hours I will be jetting off to tropical Fiji for a week’s holiday with some friends. We will be staying on Beqa Island, without intarwebs or even TV.
I am not sure the specifics of what is happening, I don’t even physically have my ticket yet. I know that I return to Sydney at some time next Sunday (probably).
If possible I will be updating this blog but I doubt it. I will just write my posts in my trusty traveller’s moleskine and publish perhaps when I return.
I am not sure which will be harder: a week without internet or a week without Bunni. There is a lot of overlap between the two, anyway.
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countries I have visited
I was just thinking about this and decided that I should write it down, in case I someday forget. In order of first visit:
- Australia
- Papua New Guinea
- Antarctica (not a country, and it was a 1 day tour in a 747, it was AWESOME)
- New Zealand
- Malaysia
- Singapore
- The Netherlands
- Turkey
- United Kindom (England)
- Germany
- Switzerland
- Italy
- United Kingdom (Wales)
- China (Hong Kong)
- Thailand
- France
- Belgium
- Luxemburg
- Fiji (added October 2006)
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New Europe photos up
Last night I uploaded some photos from last month’s Europe trip. Some might seem familiar as Mel and Jem STOLE some of my IP and put them on their own blog. I mentioned this to Adam and his theory is that since their website is hosted on my server, technically it is me that is stealing my own IP.
Below is an example photo from the night of Koninginnedag. At the time, fuelled by Dutch beer and chocolate, we thought it was the Ultimate Party Photo. In the cruel light of day, however, the photo seemed slightly less ultimate.
John is modelling my patriotic orange beads, which I bought from a lady’s neck on Koninginnedag last year. I like Koninginnedag in Amsterdam, although Amsterdammers typically leave the city for that weekend. I think I will have to make it an annual pilgrimage.
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Köln
I am in an internet café in Köln, Germany. Seems like a nice city, although it took a long time to get here on the bumper-to-bumper autobahn traffic. 20km/hr on an ulimited speed road. Disappointed.
We stayed at the Ibis which was clean and inexpensive, and went out to find a real German restaurant. All the restaurants that we could find were either Spanish or Italian so I had to ask a local. Soon I was sitting down to a glass of beer and Sauerbraten with red cabbage and some weird kind of potato dumplings. Sauerbraten turns out to be just roast beef, not the sausage that I was hoping for. Despite this error I was very surprised to find that my Dutch language skills could be used in Germany - I was more or less able to accurately interpret the menu for the whole group. In fact I was also surprised that I retained enough schoolboy French to get by in Paris as well.
It is Jem’s birthday today so we are going in search of a store that sells Campers shoes, as is his wish. After that we will probably swing by the Rhein valley and try to find a bed and breakfast for the night. We have to be in Paris by Thursday afternoon, and I return to Australia on Friday night (arrive Saturday night).
Last night Adam and I went out to this bar that had chess and backgammon boards. I dominated in the chess, taking out both games, but Adam got me back by winning the next three games of backgammon.
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amsterdam - koninginnedag
I am in Amsterdam at the moment, tonight is my last night. We had a massive day yesterday for koninginnedag and we are all feeling a bit weak today. Lots of photos were taken and will be uploaded when I return to Australia.
I will post in more detail when I get a chance.
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