Fragments from the Australia Diaries 2000 (part 9) - Sydney

dun-diddle-dun-diddle-dun-dun

TIE ME KANGAROO DOWN MATE 

My cuz Lian has made it over from Dublin and has moved in, yay. Myself, Lian and Sharon are officially the three musketeers (Bags D'Artagnan - who wasn't actually one of the three, but whateves!)

I have been a busy little camper but I am avec cold at the mo. I think I am at the end of it, last night it reached its pinnacle. I was whoopin up a storm, barking away...
All this bru-ha-ha was interrupted by my wails of “Oh Gawwd, I’m dying here…”. Needless to say, as we all share the same room the girls were falling all over themselves to assist in an impromptu exorcism. As a result I was banished to the other room and plied with sleeping pills. Ah no, they were very good, I banished myself and begged for the pills (jeez, doesn’t that sound like my epitaph or something). The pills didn’t kick in at first, so my banshee act continued well into the morning, drowning out all alarms, the two girls both arrived late to work (oops).

Once they had left, true to form the tabs took effect. Zzzzzzz....

Well, what have I been up to. I am having a ball. So much to tell…em, oh yeah, I'm working for a Swiss finance company in Client Relations! (talk about ..zzz...). I thought I'd stick with finance but try a different angle, not sure if it's for me in the long term, but it's fine and the office is a prime location. It overlooks the harbour, about 30 floors up, breathtaking stuff. I was temping for a while in an insurance place, wreck-the-head. Had lunch everyday with a girl who would always get a burger and chips, put all her chips in her burger bun and chow down, all gone in about 60 seconds, beautiful sight.

I did the whole Irish thing here the other week and we met up with friends in Bondi for a few drinks then headed on to Cheers. Cheers is a 24 hour bar which is jammed to the rafters with muck savages and Dublin scumbags. Now having said that I had a great night. It doesn’t matter where you are it’s who you’re with, blah blah blah. But there is no chance of me becoming a regular, I'm no 'NORM!'. (If you can't remember than line from the TV show Cheers then shame on you and your youth). 

The minute we arrived in the door we were harangued by these IRA heads who, while trying it on, chastised us for not being patriotic enough (don't even know why, think it was because we're "jackeens"). I made my escape when one of them burst into the Fields of Athenry for the 6^th time. I couldn’t get to the bar, I tried 3 times and each time I was intercepted by a slew of drunken Irishmen. One Kerryman even introduced me to his sister and his cousin, thankfully the girls had the presence of mind to drag me away before I got the spare key to his combine harvester.

Don't get me wrong, I have been known to burst into Irish rebel songs myself. I'm not one of these people who leave home shores and immediately shed their Irishness and start complaining about the Irish abroad, Irish pubs, etc. I'm exceedingly proud of my nationality and I like Irish pubs abroad (and the Irish that frequent them). But I'm allowed slag them off, it's the whole legal loophole, you can tease your own kind, kith and kin, but if someone looks askance even once at your peeps, even if they are following your example, they're history! (Oh-no-they-did-unt)

Retro is a great club here if you're out with the girls and just in the mood for a dance and a bit of craic, (I am totally showing my age by saying that, given they play music from the 70’s and 80’s).  It’s all divided into different floors, I loved it. We were throwing shapes, reenacting all our teen disco moves, and yes, to my surprise and horror I still remember all the words to Ice Ice Baby.

We went up to Palm Beach (otherwise known as Summer Bay, home to Pippa and our other Home & Away faves). You just jump on a regular bus from downtown Sydney to get there. It really is beautiful, the sand is bright orange! You even get to see the surf club where 'Alf' is down as the manager.

Oh ha ha, I nearly forgot... myself and Lian joined a gym. Ok I should clarify, it is actually an East Leagues Club (G’wan the Roosters!). They are like a GAA club for Aussie rules (please note, I have never darkened the door of a GAA place). I don't really follow sport unless Ireland is playing. But at some point there was some celebration on our street cos the Roosters (local boys) did well and some Roosters paraphernalia ended up in our flat for a spell. So we are token supports (esp as we've never seen them play, Aussie Rules is like Gaelic football but for metrosexuals, right? kidding!). Anyway, you pay $6 for a 3 month membership and you get to use the pool and small gym. They also have discounted beer, pool, darts, gambling, etc, (that stuff's not really our cup of tea, but my brother and his mates seemed to find that part of my 'gym' story the most interesting). 

After work the other day I met up with the girls and we went to a revolving restaurant on top of this huge tower in the heart of Sydney (in fact I think it's called Sydney Tower, love the Aussies, say what you see, no messin or fancy talk!). It was great fun. We went for the buffet meal, so I was thinking canteen style tables and chairs and a bit of a free for all at the food cart. But in fact, it was all dim lighting and swish-swoo booths. I ate Camel, Kangaroo, and Emu. All pretty gross. Anyway, we had a lovely 3 hour feed and a twirl.

Well my cold is rearing it's ugly head so I believe my time has come to an end... (not my lifetime, my internet cafe time)

<<PREVIOUS POST                    NEXT POST>>