Hello From Australia: The Beginning

June 27, 2013

“Margaritas, Long Islands, Mojitos and AMF’s are what we’re serving up tonight, all for $9.”

This was the opening line from our waitress at the airport before our flight to Sydney on Friday night, June 21st, setting the official mood for our trip down under. If this were a documentary on a clan of twenty something alcoholic Americans visiting Australia for the first time, that would be the opening line. (I kid about the alcoholic part. Really, I do. Or I’m in the denial stage.)

This is my first blog post since I started my very first world travel, and I definitely can’t fit everything in that I want to share with you all, so I figure I’ll write about it in slots. This blog is about the first leg of the trip, (actually, the first day) which might be a bit long, but I’ll try to cover as much of it as possible, in as minimal words as possible, so as not to bore you to death, because firsts can be a bit boring when they’re drawn out.

Firstly, the plane. Oh yeah, pictures included. This was my seat.

I of course had to take a picture of it. First item of note, it was a middle seat. Second item of note, it was a bit cramped. I tried not to fret though, as I was going to AUSTRALIA for bloody sake, and I figured once I got everything situated I would be fine. I was sitting in between two older gentlemen, both with Australian accents (naturally). As we finally took off about an hour after I boarded the plane, I realized all at once that holy fuck I would be in this seat for another 15 hours, and that at the first sign of “you are now free to move about the cabin” I would be booking it to the bathroom to wash up and prep for bed.

So around 11:45pm, I was up and about the cabin, moving about the country. Er, the world. It felt great to wash my face and brush my teeth, and I told myself I would take out my contacts at some point on the flight when I was too tired to watch TV. I was a bit worried about the contacts though, because I knew as soon as I took them off, I’d be blind as a bloody bat and wouldn’t be able to see shit. But I figured it would force me to close me eyes, and also, it would give my left eye some relief, as it had been giving me grief ever since I got off work, and I didn’t want to leave them in so they could aggravate some kind of would-be infection.

And oh yeah, I was told there would be free booze on this flight? That was practically the first thing I thought about after we boarded. Around 1230am they started to serve dinner and drinks. I wasn’t hungry, but was feeling a bit sick and ready to be completely knocked out, so I ordered a vodka tonic. The steward apologized for making it ‘a bit heavy handed’ but I told him of course, that was nothing to be sorry for. I started listening to music and fiddling around with the flight path pictures on the entertainment screen thing in front of me, and became fairly unhinged at the sight of this:

Seriously, why do they put that shit there. It’s extremely disorienting to know how far away from home you are. So I watched a bit of TV, and finally pulled out my contacts for some shut eye around 145am.

It was the worst shut eye imaginable. I think I slept for 30 minutes, woke up, then 30 more minutes, woke up, then maybe 50 or so more. At 7am I awoke with the most horrible nausea and crazy urge to pee, but of course, I was in the middle seat, and the gentleman next to me looked like he was in a very deep stage of REM sleep. I didn’t know quite what to do but endure it for another hour until I felt him adjust his position, at which point I bravely tapped him on the shoulder and asked if he could let me use the lou.

Breakfast came at around 10am, 12 hours into the flight. That was still US time though. I ended up watching a movie and turned it off shortly before we landed, feeling sick but too excited to let that sick have its turn. When we finally deplaned, I felt pretty disgusting. My hair felt oily and my clothes felt smelly, but I was excited to go through customs and get my very first stamp on my passport. As soon as we made our way out onto the train that would take us to our hotel, I took pictures of bloody everything.

They call Burger King “Hungry Jacks” out here. I have yet to try it.

It was a bit cold, but I couldn’t feel it. The air smelled crisp and cleaner than back home. Or if it wasn’t cleaner, it was just different. A bit like the smell after rain combined with really fresh air.

We made our way out into the city from the train, and the sound the signal made to cross the crosswalk sounded like Pac Man (I videotaped it). And when I say “we” from here on out, I mean my friends (Arthur, Ted, Andrew) and myself, but just so you can put faces to names, these guys.

We made our way to the hotel, called Break Free on George street, to drop off our bags. I just realized I didn’t take a picture of the outside of it, but it wasn’t much to see because it was mashed really close together in between two other buildings on a busy street. Here is the inside of the lobby.

Since we had to wait for Roy and Dominique to meet up with us for official check in, (they were the people we came to see) we waited across the street at Starbucks for about an hour, where we were only able to access the internet for up to 30 minutes at a time with purchase. (Lame). It was at this Starbucks that I also became familiar with the currency. Coins meant much more than they did at home (there are $1 and $2 coins here), and there weren’t any restrictions on breaking large bills in coffee shops or anywhere else.

When we finally met up with Roy and Dominique, it was like a reunion of epic proportions. Roy is an old high school friend of mine, and I hadn’t seen Dominique since the day I met her, maybe in 2010. It was raining outside, and we were exhausted from the plane ride, but the buzz of being in a far away country with old friends was enough to get us going for our first adventure-filled day in Sydney, Australia.

Since we got to drop all of our luggage off at the hotel, and we couldn’t check in until 3pm, we hopped on a bus to the Sydney Opera House, which was conveniently located next to the Harbour bridge. Once there, we had a bit of a field day with the pictures.

It was gloomy as hell initially, but I like to think the emerging sunlight a few minutes after our very first glimpse of the opera house was my dad’s doing.

Shortly after we finished taking butt loads of pictures outside, we made our way inside for a tour of the opera house. I couldn’t get over the fact that I was in another country. Every time we moved an inch, I felt like taking a deep breath because it was all so new. Fresh memories were constantly being imprinted onto my brain. I couldn’t believe the ground I was walking on was so far away from home. I felt small, because I knew whatever I did down here would have absolutely no impact on anything back home. And what I mean by that is, I was all alone. I couldn’t just drive 40 minutes to see family and friends. I couldn’t just pick up my phone and call. It was bizarre and a bit mind bending. But moving on.

We had about an hour to kill before the opera house tour, so we all sat down at this bar/restaurant near the entrance for our first drink together. I was still wrapping my head around what time it was in the states too, and couldn’t figure out what kind of tired I should be.

Overall the opera house tour was cool. We got to wear head sets so we could hear our tour guide, who was a pretty cool guy. The opera house was sort of a tragic story too, because the guy who designed it never got to see the fruition of his design when the opera house was finally complete. I’d go into more, but you’re probably ready to quit reading at this point. I remember being exhausted on this leg of the journey myself.

After the tour we were all pretty much zombies. We headed back to the hotel to finally check in and get situated. And by situated, I mean…

Now I can’t be certain, but I’m pretty sure we drank before we set about finding some dinner. We ended up getting some food from some Kebob place that felt like a random pitstop for food at 2am after a night of heavy drinking–but it was only 530pm. I couldn’t believe it. We knew we were leaving on the first day of summer in the states to arrive on the first day of winter in Australia, but the early sunset was going to take some getting used to. Especially when you’re not sure what time your body is functioning in, or exactly how much sleep you got on the plane. At any rate, standing in line for food felt like waiting at an In’n’Out after too many Tokyo teas in Weho. I think I was in need of much sleep.

Later on, we got drunk and played Apples to Apples until we got delirious. We placed bets on who could fit the most cheetos in their mouths, and of course I videotaped all. We told ourselves we had to stay awake until at least 9pm, even though I think we were all about ready to collapse at 7pm.

It took me 2 days to write this blog post, because I like to get so damn specific, and make it pretty and perfect, and that’s hard when you’re having so much damn fun. I do realize of course, that I just spent 1700 words on one day in Sydney, so I guess publishing this now would be good, so I can get started on the next chapter–er, blog post. Next time I’ll try not to get so specific, but so much happened after this first day that needs telling! That being said, I hope you’ve enjoyed this read, and I’ll be back in a jiff.

I miss you! And Australia says hi.