We are constantly bombarded by the locals in incredulous disbelief that we aren’t traveling the country on the weekends. It seems like we are expected to be traveling cross-country constantly. Darwin the first weekend of October, Brisbane this Thursday for a 3 day weekend, maybe a quick jaunt to Sydney to catch a concert the last weekend of the month. It is often, for me anyways, a bit disheartening. It is hard to explain to those who are working and earning a paycheck, and driving around in their personal vehicles that we are STUDENTS, who are working 40-hour work weeks without a paycheck (and in fact PAYING to work via tuition) living in a foreign country and relying on public transportation. Not to mention that rather than getting the 4 weeks annual vacation leave that they are granted, we have but 20 lovely days (including holidays).
But this weekend, we were able to actually do something. No vacations or trips or anything real exotic, but at least I can say “YES!” to the question “Did you get up to anything over the weekend?”
Exhausted from our first week of re-learning at Repat, Chad and I decided to head to the city on Friday with a hankering for some Sushi Train (the first fantastic sushi we’ve had since arriving in Australia!) and hoping to finally make it to Willem Dafoe’s new movie “The Hunter”. We always forget what an overwhelming experience it is in the CBD on a Friday night – the only “late night” in the city besides Thursday. (Everything closes by 5 pm every other night, including Saturday and Sunday) The restaurants all smell scrumptious and the streets are brimming with people and clinking glasses of wine and beer. Teenage girls are showing off their hoo-haas in their ridiculously short skirts, and the boys are showing of their lack of, well, everything, in their shorty shorts and tight pink shirts and too-gelled hair.
We ended up seeing 13 assassins, who’s review promised: “It absolutely, undeniably delivers the goods. And those goods are soaked in blood. It's an incredibly violent, insanely entertaining movie that features scores of baddies getting killed by sword, arrow, knife, boiling oil, even a stampede of bulls. Wait, hold on. Not just bulls. Flaming bulls! How can you NOT see a movie with a review like that? It was all in subtitles, but there were, indeed, a couple of flaming bulls, and more blood than the things I discuss in a few more paragraphs…
Saturday we ventured into Port Adelaide for none other than the Port Adelaide Festival. For those of you who have not been to Port Adelaide, don’t feel bad. You really needn’t bother. It is a very country-bumpkin (or “Bogan”, as they say in these parts) town, with not a whole lot goin’ on. Old buildings, docks along the inlet, and a rather sorry looking little metal lighthouse about 2 storeys high. We’d never been though, and the festival was free, and it was sunny outside, and, mainly, there was a train that took us straight there.
We met a very informative beekeeper selling some yummy honey, a lot of weirdos, and went on a tour of Torrens Island – an island that was used as a an old quarantine center for smallpox and the like back in the early 1900’s. It was quite interesting, even more so because our tour guide was from – where else? – Oregon!! What a small world.
All was fine and dandy – a day well spent – until we arrived back in the city where we had to switch trains. There was a bit of a layover, so Chad and I sat on the benches outside the terminal, watching the interesting Adelaide folks… who were turning into zombies.
You think I’m kidding. Check this out: adelaidezombiewalk.weebly.com/ I used the bathroom at the station only to find myself tiptoeing around enormous puddles of blood, and trying to creatively find a way to use the faucet without getting my fingers coated in the stuff. Beside me, a herd of girls were giggling and getting ‘ready’ in torn stippers clothes, wedding gowns, prom dresses, and camo gear. All I could think was “those poor janitors”. We watched hoards alight from the incoming trains. All ages, all costumes, all sorts of makeup. We had no idea at the time what was going on, and only heard whispers of “Zombie Wars”. Talk about bizarre!
Sunday we found ourselves in Yoga, thinking somehow we would do some cardio and a quick workout after the 45 minute class. Let’s just say yoga may not be for us, and leave it at that shall we?
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