So, we finally reached Melbourne after a month & a half of travelling. First impressions.... I like it. Comparing it to Sydney, Melbourne is much nicer. The city centre is relatively small compared to most big cities, but the suburbs just stretch on for miles. Sydney has a population of 4 million, Melbourne has 3.5 million. Not much difference, but it's much more laid back than Sydney. A nicer place to live & work, we reckon.

 

So, now we just need to find a job & somewhere to live, then we're sorted.

 

Oh, a note on the Asian community. Sydney was full of Asians, we were quite surprised at how many. This combined with my new found 'thing' for Asian girls meant walking through the streets broke my heart every 10 seconds, as we passed one beautiful Asian girl after another. Melbourne has a big Asian community too, though not as much as Sydney, so now I get tormented only every 20 seconds.

Though if you feel like torturing yourself, you can just walk through Chinatown.

I'm getting the hang of distinguishing between Thai, Malaysian, Chinese, Korean & Japanese too.

Havent been there yet, but we heard the Greek Precinct has more Greeks than any other city in the world (apart from in Greece obviously).

 

21 May 2004

 

OK, havent updated this in over a month. Trying to remember everything now.

Anyways, we love Melbourne. It's cool. When I say we, I mean myself & Emmet. Not that Mark doesnt like Melbourne, it's just that he's not here. Sparky's gone home. It was about a girl. (Always wanted to say that... it was in 'Good Will Hunting'). Anyway, not long into our journey, poor Marky realised 2 things.

1: Love conquers all, as he just wasn't happy without his beloved girlfriend Siobhan. 1,2,3....'Aaaah'. We were in Sydney when he decided to just spend a few days in Melbourne before going back home.

2: His sister got married last week, which he realised he really didnt want to miss.

So, given these 2 factors, he figured he'd go home in time for the wedding, so he brought forward his return flights home through New Zealand. He left us about a month ago, spent about 3 weeks in New Zealand, and arrived home on the day of the wedding. He kept this as a surprise to his family (which I'm sure it bloody well was), so me & Emmet couldnt let on he wasnt in Melbourne for the last month. Whenever we rang home, and they were asking how Mark was, we were like 'Eeh... he's grand'. His mobile didnt work in NZ, so he even had me texting his mother, pretending to be him just using my phone. The crazy fool. He had a ball in New Zealand, the best of all the travelling we did, he reckons. Just another example of what a small world it is, he got a helicopter tour out to some glacier, and met 3 of my college friends on it.

  

Anyway... Melbourne. It's nice here. Quite laid back for a big city. What I love about here is that you can stand in a spot & look up at all the skyscapers, turn around & you're looking at trees, parks & grass. Whatever you're into, its here. If you want the hustle & bustle of downtown, with everyone in business dress, its here (though believe me, it doesnt compare to the craziness of Chicago, which is a good thing). The place is full of cafes & restaurants.... I've become quite addicted to coffee.

If you want the suburbs that look pretty much like any quiet housing estate back home, its here (with better weather, Aussie accents & more laid back.)

 

We had a bitch of a time trying to find work, though. We soon realised that Engineering jobs are not gonna happen. They are looking for Electronics / Software / Process / Mechanical Engineers here, but our visas only allow us work in 1 position for 3 months. Given that most Engineering jobs take at least 2 months to get trained up in, its much easier for them to hire an Aussie.

 

So we spent a couple of weeks handing in CV's, registering with recruitment agencies, scouring the papers & making phonecalls. We were looking for pretty much anything except callcentres or restaurant work (they were a last resort). You'd think it'd be easy to get something, but no. The only recruitment agency to get back to us specialize in casual labour, and they saved our skin.

We spent almost 2 weeks stocking shelves in a warehouse / department store. This was grand, money was good, no customer service (an extremely good thing), just work away yourself. I spent most of it in the warehouse throwing boxes around, which I enjoyed. (I have a destructive streak in me). I was working with this cool Portugese/Indian/Aussie guy who kept calling me 'bro'. After about 2 days, I felt like I was in da hood.

 

Anyway, after this job, the agency got us working for the Australian Government, where we are now, in the Refugee Review Tribunal. Basically after an immigrant requests a protection visa so they dont get deported back to their home country, and the Department of Immigration refuses it, they can appeal it to this Tribunal. They come in for a hearing where a member of the tribunal hears any evidence they may have that they are refugees, and decide whether or not to grant/refuse the visa. Me & Emmet are working as Case Officers. Shirt & tie job. There's a lot of admin work, filing, using computers etc. Ya have your own desk with a phone & computer, so they make you feel a bit important. Apart from the admin work, (here's the cringe factor), I gotta meet the applicants claiming refugee status, their advisor, the interpreter, bring them into the Hearing room, and go through all these formalities which are tape-recorded; swear them under oath, etc. I leave after the start (they go on for hours), and get paged to come back when its nearly over. It is a pretty interesting job, and the staff here are great, it's just a bit nerve-wracking at times. We're here for at least another month, and if we're lucky they'll give us another few weeks.

     

We've been staying in a hostel right in the city centre all along, and will probably stay here for another month as work is a 10 minute walk away, & our friends are there too. If we get more permanent jobs along the way, we'll probably get an apartment or something.

We've been hanging out with a group of 4 Scottish girls that are staying in the hostel here. Fiona, Debbie, Angie & Clare (OK, Clare is English, but we'll just pretend she's Scottish). I never knew any Scottish people before these girls, but the country has earned my respect. The gang of them are shit-cool. They're the best laugh ever, dead easy going, have a great sense of humour, and are f*cking cracked. You can say anything to these girls without getting an Irish dirty look or 'That's disgusting'. They'd drink us Irish under the table, too. We've gotten to know them pretty well over the last month, & our stay in Melbourne has been all the better for it. One of the girls, Fiona... how will I put it... I've met my match. Not only that, but been outdone. Those of you who know me well enough will know what I mean by that ;-)

Oh, yeah, about 2 weeks ago, we did the whole 'By the way, whats your surname?' thing. The girls didnt believe me when I told them my surname. I had to show them ID to prove it. They though it was the funniest thing ever, and were laughing for days afterwards. Then we all saw 'The Green Mile' on tv, with the 'Like the drink... only not spelt the same' thing.... which proved quite amusing to them.

They're all leaving Melbourne in a month though, to travel up North :-( 

 

Amongst our many f*cked up conversations (in a good way), was a discussion about waxing. I pointed out to the girls that I had a couple of sparse hairs on my shoulders that I wouldnt mind getting rid of. They asked could they wax them, so after some persuasion, I agreed. It hurt a little bit, but it was nice pain. And I felt so smooth afterwards. Guys... give it a try, there's nothing to be afraid of.

 

On one of our many hangover days, we decided to go to one of the Melbourne museums. This was pretty good. It had lots of Biology sections, with body parts in jars and stuff. It even had the life cycle of digesting food in the stomach & colon and various bile/sh*t samples in jars. There was a button at the end that made farting noises, which we got great fun out of.

There was a Bug/Insect section which made us all feel itchy. It was full of huge disgusting beetles & tarantulas & red-back spiders etc.

There was a (crap) Australia section, that had some set from Neighbours there. That was one exciting kitchen. I guess you'd need to be a fan to appreciate it. Still, I had a good rumage in their fridge.

 

Another good thing for hangover days & non-hangover days are the parks in Melbourne. About a 15 minute walk from where we stay lies the Fitzroy gardens, huge beautiful parks, right next to the skyscrapers, which makes them all the more cool. You could quite easily spend the whole day there.  

 

Trying to think what else to say......

For all you gaming freaks out there like me... Melbourne is the place. The are internet/gaming cafes all over the place. I found this cool place in Chinatown, it has every single-player/network game you'd want to play.... for $2 an hour. It's always full of Asian guys & 1 white guy (me... the tan has faded).

 

Remember the Kilkenny girls we were rafting with in Cairns? They were in Melbourne for a few days, so we met up with them for pints (Elisia & Sharon were there, Nessa couldnt make it). They're in Fiji at the moment, heading to South America soon, amongst lots of other places. I'm jealous :-(

 

We also met up with Abby & Fully nearly 2 weeks ago. They were 2 of the 4 British girls on that nightmare journey from Phuket to Malaysia with us. There's a picture of the gang of us on the 'Malaysia & Singapore' page, when we got dumped on the side of the road somewhere in the south of Thailand. They were just in Melbourne for a night, after driving from Sydney & heading onto the Great Ocean Road. They're in Hawaii now, getting surfing lessons from Hawaiian fire-fighters last week, if I'm not mistaken. Again.. I'm jealous. About Hawaii, that is, not the fire-fighters.