2002-12-10 - 5:09 p.m.
Well, the wine tour went as well as could be expected. I tasted many dozens of wines, and learned the difference between a $10 bottle of wine and a $130 bottle of wine. Australians seem to do Shiraz particularly well...
Saturday we went wandering and ended up in the rave-y (sp?) section of town. I bought a cool pacman shirt and a bunch of us were enthusiastic about going dancing, although apparently the big massive happening that night 1.5 hours away was already sold out. By evening, though, all but Lila were too tired to go out. This made for some excitement, as when we had to leave for the airport the next morning, we discovered she still hadn't returned to the hostel. Finally caught up with her on the plane; turns out she ended up in a casino and lost track of time...
Sydney is a very picturesque city; I've been filling all of my memory cards during a day's outing. Good thing I can offload them onto my laptop. We went to the acquarium and saw, among other things, a platypus, which has got to be the world's coolest animal. It also looks very cute, burrowing into the sand for food.
Today is sort of a forced day off, as we're getting into some rain. All the locals are happy about the reprieve from the drought and bushfires, but most of the things I still want to do in Sydney (parks, bridges, ferries, beaches, zoo) seem much less appealing in the rain. I guess it's my bad luck for being here during one of the 23 days in a year that it's not sunny. At least I have time to catch up on laundry and email.
Today we sent off four people from our group, including my gf. Seeing them go brings the realization of my own impending return, in just two days. I'm a little conflicted; clearly, none of us want to leave here, and yet it's weird to have been away from home for so long. Of course, right after I get back I'm heading to Canada for three weeks, but at least that's on the same continent, and it's a kind of home. The backpacker culture here keeps inspiring fantasies of taking a lot of time off and just wandering the world... yet that in no way helps me get my thesis done.
Now reading: Annapurna, a book about the first expedition to climb an 8000m+ peak. I decided to put down my "more serious" historical perspective book for now...
end and beginning - 2003-03-04
the dogs must be crazy - 2003-03-03
strange thoughts on a train - 2003-02-28
movie madness - 2003-02-26
sense of community - 2003-02-25