Sydney and the Titty Van

Australia! Talk about culture shock! Luckily we had not come straight from Laos or it would have been worse. Our flight was not too bad; it was another ValuAir (cheapo) flight. Luckily we were now forewarned from the last flight that blankets, pillows, and sandwiches were $10 each! The only issue was a problem with the airline in Bali that left us in the check in line for hours - plenty of time for the Arak to wear off and leave us wondering if they would really delay the flight for economy passengers. Luckily they did.

We arrived in Sydney in the morning, bleary eyed and droopy tailed. It would ultimately take us some time to get used to Western prices again. At first it was extra shocking because even though the exchange rate gives our dollar 50% more buying power, everything is 50% more expensive, so if you don't do the exchange rate mentally in your head, you have a heart attack, at least after Bali prices. I can't imagine traveling in Australia when the exchange rate was 1-1! Anyway long story short: we were super cheap for the first week! So we took the train from the airport. It was extremely easy and when we asked one passenger when we were to get off, all of the other passengers started offering directions, help, and advice. This was our first experience of Australian insane super-niceness. We got off at Circular Quay to catch the ferry, and got to admire the opera house and the didgeridoo players accompanied by techno beats (we bought the CD so you can all savor the music with us later.) The opera house looked a lot smaller in real life, especially from the side, and was dwarfed by a huge cruise ship in the harbor. I was sure it was just a tourist cafe with a fake opera house roof at first until we moved around and saw the front!

We then easily transferred to the ferry and were off to Neutral Bay, where some friends of my parents had kindly offered us their spare bedroom. Downtown Sydney had been just another city - cleaner than Bangkok, and everyone speaks English (sort of) but not too shocking. Neutral Bay, a nice suburb just a short ferry ride from downtown, was major culture shock! We wandered about for a bit before selecting the most likely candidate for the correct house and letting ourselves in. Luckily we had guessed right! It was so strange to stay in a nice old Victorian in a quiet suburban area - hard to explain really! It was just little things, like hot water coming out of the sink as well as the shower, and tap water you can drink, and a microwave, quiet tree-lined sidewalks outside, drivers that stop for pedestrians in crosswalks, and red lights too! After a nap we walked up to the supermarket which was also a big change from Asia, leaving us in awe of all the food. Luckily we couldn't carry too much or we would have bought everything, especially cheese and steaks! And don't even get me started on all the Cadbury candy bars! And then there's the wines! Mmmm....

We learned that in Australia grocery stores are not allowed to sell alcohol so there is usually a liquor store basically inside the grocery store. If you buy six bottles of wine you get 30% off. And the wines are already only $8 Australian or so for a decent wine like Yellowtail. Also it is cheaper to actually go to the butcher shops to buy steaks where you can get three big tee-bones for only $15 Australian. Conveniently there is a grocery store, butcher, and greengrocer in every shopping mall, not just clothes like in America. There is also a town library in almost every shopping mall! This is just one of many examples of how (to us anyway) Australia just seemed to make sense. Some other examples:

• Toilets have two flush buttons, half flush for #1, full flush for #2! (There is a major drought there just like at home in California.)
  
• ATMs will not give you your cash until you take your card back.
  
• Voting is mandatory.
• There are frequent nice rest areas on all highways and major roads.
• Small cars and car trucks! There are not so many gas guzzlers in Australia. The national car seems to be a white Holden Commodore station wagon, sometimes seen with a hitch towing same. And I've never seen so many small cars with the backseats replaced by a utility bed. Even regular Toyota pickups sometimes have the stock bed replaced with a utility bed!
  
• Cell phones are mostly pre-paid.
• Free gas bbqs at most beach and town parks. Ok, maybe this wouldn't make sense in California.
• Speed cameras on the road. I've never seen speed limits so carefully obeyed before!
  
• And, though it takes some getting used to, instead of 4-way stop signs that cause tons of traffic and where the right of way is always contested, you just sail through a roundabout, often without even stopping, and the right of way is always clear! (If you get hit from the right then it's your fault, and that's that.) The only problem will be if we ever go to France, we'll probably drive through the roundabouts in the wrong direction (clockwise) and die.

Anyway, after grocery shopping, we had another nap, and woke up to find our host Kimberley had made us and the downstairs tenant Jenny a delicious chicken dinner, with peaches and ice cream for dessert. Example #2 of Australian super-niceness! This quickly convinced us to stay with them for a few days and catch up on little things we'd pretty much given up on, like laundry, personal grooming, and our blog. On the first day, we caught the ferry into downtown Sydney, and went to King's Cross, the backpacker area, which made us even more grateful for our nice place to stay. King's Cross is a lot like the Tenderloin in San Francisco, full of shanty boarding houses, drunks, pimps, and whores. And I think we saw the nice half of it! We went there looking for a used travel guide but all we could find was an Adult Book Exchange - which we did try (I mean "Lonely Planet" and "Rough Guide" - maybe they would have one by mistake!) But no luck, until we eventually found a bookstore down the street.

We spent the next few days hanging out in Sydney, where we visited all the free museums and saw a movie in a real movie theater - the first movie theater since leaving home! We also went to the celebrity cricket match, where we found out that non-cricketing celebrities were also players! For example, Joel Parkinson (pro Australian surfer we saw in Bali) was apparently still following us around, and couldn't bowl for anything. This was probably the wrong introduction to cricket since the already confusing opaque rules were made more confusing by the general madness of the celebrity match, in which the announcer attempted to catch fly balls and some kid kept coming out to bowl. It was apparent even to us ignorant Americans that the kid was better than poor Parko though.

We also went out to Manly beach one day. We did not get in the water, partly because of the serial killer sharks around Sydney (four attacks just while we were in Australia) and partly because it would have been like paddling in Hong Kong crowds. However we did find great surfboards for a good price! In Australia boards are cheaper than in California even before you do the currency conversion. Sam picked up his dream board - a Channel Islands Biscuit - for $680 Australian. It was a beautiful board, custom ordered with a nice resin swirl but never picked up, and on sale since the down payment had already been made. It was similar to his Bali board, but with three finds so Sam wouldn't die in bigger waves. I got a barely used imitation Wombat - basically a longboard chopped in half. Perfect for a learner while still convenient for travelling around.

Even though we could have happily stayed in Neutral Bay for longer, soon it was time to pick up our campervan we had reserved from Wicked Campers. Campervans are a popular way to travel in Australia since they can be rented or bought cheaply there ($40 a day rental), and campgrounds and beachparks are nice while the hotels are fairly expensive (even a shared communal dorm room is $25 a person.) Wicked was one of the original iconic brands and still retains its hippie heritage, with laid-back staff, lots of freebies left by previous travellers, and brightly painted vans. When we arrived, the worst paintjob in the lot by far was a van covered in rows of, well, naked titties, in all colors, with huge nipples, and on the back: RBT Random Breast Testing. (A play on Random Breath Testing, a common way to combat drunk driving in Australia.) We laughed and prayed that it wasn't our van. But guess what? It was our van, due to being the only automatic and my dumb ass not being able to drive a stick, especially not left-handed.

The van came equipped with everything you might need - sleeping mats, a little gas stove, a sink and water container, a cooler or "Eskie," pot, pan, silverware, plates, mugs, pillows, sheets, and even two folding chairs. So there wasn't too much we needed to do to get on the road. Except start the van, hmm. After some efforts to get the poor old titty van started, we slowly drove off the lot. Because the van didn't go any faster! It had over 400,000 kilometers on it, but at least it helped us avoid speeding tickets by shaking like crazy above 85 kph, and top speed on all hills was 40 kph. This was a little scary in 110 kph zones! Anyway we drove the van rather shamefacedly to Neutral Bay where we parked it in front of the fancy apartments there and tried not to meet anyone's eye. Though we soon realized that the best bet was simply to make eye contact, laugh sheepishly, and explain that the van was a rental! We did get some glares, but most people got a kick out of the van - some stared and honked while narrowly avoiding wrecking their cars, and one group of girls wanted their picture taken in front of it! But all that later. For now, we packed up the van, and then headed off on the Pacific Highway, well equipped with towels and travel advice from our hosts.