The Plunge Down Under

To the CBD and Back Again

We woke up this morning to rain showers, and for the first time in my life that I can remember, I wanted to do nothing but go back to bed.  Of course there have been times, especially when there has been a newborn or a sick child in the house, that I have been dead tired at the start of a day, and felt the desperate need for more sleep.  But this time was different. I felt the waves of depression and self-pity washing over me, and the longing for my old, familiar, comfortable, wonderful life back in Pittsburgh was almost unbearable.

Not even the promise of hot coffee, or the morning ritual of reading all of yesterday's emails from the U.S., motivated me.  For once the children were happily playing a game of Uno Spin in the kitchen and didn't miss me, so I crawled back into bed and considered doing nothing for the day.  However, somewhat amazingly, and one might add providentially, we had something on our calendar for today.  I don't like to break commitments so an hour later I was back up again and marshaling the troops for a trip to downtown Melbourne (known here as the Central Business District, or CBD).

Here they are later in the day in Federation Square, a gathering place in Melbourne just across from the Flinders Train Station:

Were it not for my new American friend, we most certainly would not have been downtown today enjoying the sunshine and unusually mild weather.  Three days ago I was reviewing old emails and came across a possible contact for us in Melbourne sent to us from a mutual friend in Pittsburgh.  This contact was a family with four children that moved to Australia from Orlando three years ago with Campus Crusade.  They had encouraged me to get in touch with them back in March, but in the busyness of getting ready to move, I neglected to do so.  Somewhat embarrassed, I emailed the family Tuesday night explaining that we had finally arrived and were settling in.  By 11am the next morning, Crystal was at my front door with flowers, offering her support, advice, encouragement, a tissue, or a shoulder to cry on--in short all of the things that one needs when relocating half a world away.

During the course of our three hour or so conversation---so much ground to be covered that we didn't begin to scratch the surface--I had mentioned wanting to take the kids on the train to the CBD.  When Crystal heard about the Fare Free Friday promised today, we made plans to try out the train system and visit the art gallery.  I allowed plenty of extra time to walk to our local train station since we had a three-year-old in tow, and we set off around 9:30am. 

 

James was quivering with excitement at the prospect of riding a train (I was excited about it being free).

 

Our train, pulling into the station:

 

The train was very quiet inside, as I remembered the trains to be in the U.K.   Thankfully James was too enthralled to be noisy.

 

As we exited the train station, we met up with Crystal (on the left below).  She willingly played the role of tour guide for us.  Here we are looking over the Yarra River.  Ross works in the dark gray building directly to the right of the tallest building two pictures below.

First stop was the National Gallery of Victoria, free to the public.  There is a big interest in the arts here, so we thought this might be a good place to start.  I figured the kids might be good for an hour or so, but we only lasted forty-five minutes.  

Across the street from the National Gallery of Victoria are the Queen Victoria Public Gardens, where the younger set were able to blow off some steam and enjoy the trees after their art lesson.

Crystal told us a little bit about the gum trees in the park.  She pointed out the nuts they produce and explained that children use them as toys when they fall to the ground:

 
As far as I can tell all the trees called gum trees are Eucalypts, although the reverse is not true. There are over 700 species of Eucalypts down under--not surprisingly they are often referred to as Australia's iconic forest tree.    

 

We also made our way to another park, known as the Birrarung Marr, where Crystal and I were able to chat while the children played.  She assured me that not wanting to get out of bed is a normal part of adjusting to a new culture and was able to provide many other helpful insights and suggestions.

A fun slide for James, challenging climbing rocks for the older three--it was a perfect fit for us today.

 
 

We finished out our adventure in the CBD with Turkish kebabs, another suggestion from Crystal.  They were delicious, and I'm so glad the kids were willing to try them.  We sat on the steps of the tiny shop and devoured them while gazing at St. Paul's Cathedral across the street. 

 

Yesterday we weren't quite so adventurous and had fast food from the restaurant below for lunch.  Can you guess what its counterpart is in the U.S.?

Fortified with lamb and chicken, we headed back to Flinders Station and much to my relief, we were able to find our train with little trouble.

 

The station closest to our house is on the Frankston Line.  The clock shows the time that the next train is scheduled to leave.  We missed the 2:06, so had to wait for the 2:21.

A final verification that we were waiting on the correct platform:

 

The walk home from our station seemed twice as long as the children remembered from earlier, but fortunately we had a couple of Hershey kisses which we used to entice James to walk the last few blocks.   Chocolate has been my friend in more ways than one during the past two weeks.

Adventures in Eating, Part One

One of the delightful (and, depending on the situation and one's current mood, oftentimes frustrating) aspects of living in a new place is exploring the local cuisine.  We are only just beginning this part of the adventure, but I thought I would share some of what we have experienced so far.  I'll start with breakfast, known here as brekky, since it is my favorite.  Just below is what Ross had on hand for our first morning down under.

 

We supplemented the rice cereal with date scones from a local bakery, one of my new favorite foods.  We later discovered they also sell double chocolate scones, white chocolate berry scones, and fruit scones, all delicious.

All of the dairy products have a slightly different taste to them.  I'm not sure what causes this (different diet of the cows?) but in any case, we are trying to accustom ourselves to it, some with more success than others.  Ross likes the Greek yoghurt sold here, poured over fresh fruit.  The bananas, although identical looking to those in our grocery stores, have both a different texture and flavor to them.

 
 

With next to nothing on our schedule down here,  the children have enjoyed accompanying me to the grocery store every other day.  The first time I let them each pick out a cereal.  James chose the one below, familiar looking, but again with a different name:

We have also been eating sausages for breakfast, called chipolatas, and all except Katie agree they are better than the very different breakfast sausage to which we were accustomed in Pittsburgh.  Smoked salmon is another favorite.

 

Unfortunately I have been unable to find anything resembling half and half for my coffee in the morning.  I met an American yesterday who has been here for three years, and she confirmed that I will have to make do with full cream milk.  She did say, however, that she has convinced her local butcher to make American style bacon for her, something I may have to try here in our neighborhood. 

Adventures in Driving

I suppose it had to happen at least once during our sojourn down under, but I certainly hope it never happens again.  Today I drove almost the entire length of our street on the right hand side of the road.  The worst part is that it never occurred to me that there was a problem until I came upon a roundabout and realized that it made no sense to yield to the right when I was driving on the right. I completed the circuit of the roundabout in the wrong direction, and then quickly switched over to the left side with no harm done.  Thankfully there were no other cars in sight in the usually busy intersection--no one to honk at me, and no one to witness the flaming face of the driver.

The irony is that for the first time I was planning to drive outside of our local area and brave the motorway.  I deliberated for some time as to whether this was wise, but in the end continued on in a rather more alert state than normal.  The rest of the journey continued without incident other than a few drivers impatiently passing and cutting in front of me.  

I took the picture below when waiting to enter another roundabout further on.  This time, at least, I was on the left side of the road, and because of traffic, had time to decipher the sign and confirm the exit I needed ahead of time.  Roundabouts can be confusing at first, but one good thing about them is that you can keep driving around in circles until you figure out which way you need to go.  We did that frequently when we lived in England, and I imagine we will be doing the same from time to time here.

After I returned home from this excursion, Sophie informed me that she was in urgent need of triple A batteries.  I was glad to be able to walk to the local grocery store rather than take the car out again.  It appears that visiting a store will unfortunately be a daily occurrence for some time as we work to replace the necessities we left behind in our house in Pittsburgh.  Yesterday we headed out for spices and seasonings (which must be the only item in the grocery store sold at half the price or less compared to the U.S.). Tomorrow we will need to replenish supplies in our much smaller refrigerator.

Saturday at Healesville Sanctuary

Thanks to numerous recommendations this week to start our sightseeing at an animal sanctuary about an hour or so outside the city, we had little trouble deciding what to do with our first Saturday down under.  The hour turned into nearly two due to the inevitable wrong turns when driving in a new city combined with our inability to interpret the voice on the navigation system, but still it was a successful day.  We wandered around the grounds enjoying the animals and birds and picking up tidbits of information along the way.  The unanimous favorite was the koala, followed closely by the kangaroo and the platypus.

The last twenty minutes of the drive took us into the beautiful Yarra Valley.  Rolling hillsides of grazing sheep and frisking lambs in green pastures alternated with carefully-tended vineyards against a backdrop of blue foothills, white clouds and sunny skies: truly a feast for the eyes.  Unfortunately we didn't stop the to take pictures, but I'll include two that I took from the car window as we continued our journey.

At this point our offspring weren't at all sure this was going to be worth the trip, but a snack of meat pies, ham, roast chicken, and vegemite sandwiches before we entered helped to raise everyone's spirits (the thirty-five dollar price tag for this snack caused me to make a mental note to bring our own food in the future).  I think I was the only one brave enough to try the vegemite---rather bitter, but edible enough if one is starving I suppose.

First stop was the kangaroo presentation.  We were given carrot slices to feed them, although most were either too shy, or weren't hungry enough, to come out of their shelters.

The birds of prey demonstration more than made of up for lackluster kangaroos.  The show included breath-taking displays of several of Australia's iconic raptors, including the peregrine falcon, the endemic black-breasted buzzard, and the wedge tailed eagle.  The latter skimmed literally over our heads as it swooped throughout the outdoor stadium.

The birds of prey were followed by a gentleman of both aboriginal and Scottish descent who demonstrated the didgeridoo and the boomerang for us.  Claiming the authority of four generations, he explained that a boomerang should be no larger than the one pictured below, and furthermore, it should not be painted.  He modeled the proper throwing technique of the boomerang numerous times, making it seem very simple, but apparently it is not, for in addition to hand-made boomerangs, he also conveniently sells a dvd with throwing instructions.

I had some vague notion of the didgeridoo before today, namely that it produces eerie, almost bone-chilling sounds, but I did not know that they were traditionally formed from Eucalyptus trees that  had their insides hollowed out by termites.

Next we came upon the Tasmanian devil, the only remaining carnivorous marsupial, and found only in the island of Tasmania.  Its jaws are strong enough to crush a skull, making us grateful for the electric fence surrounding the enclosure.  It is also known for the strong scent it gives off when stressed.

The echidna, also known as a spiny anteater, reminded us of our porcupine.  It is a monotreme, or egg-laying mammal, an order which also includes the platypus.  I was unable to capture a picture of the platypus as the only place we could view it was a darkened room where no flash photography was permitted, but we loved watching it swim underwater.  There was some discussion amongst us as to whether it is the male or female that is venomous, but according to wikipedia, it is the male that has a venomous spur on its hind foot that is capable of causing severe pain to humans.

The gum trees and other vegetation were also fascinating.  Katie took several pictures of plaques indicating the age of the manna gums throughout the sanctuary.

Brolgas, a type of crane:

 

Pelicans:

We wanted to see wombats, but had no luck this time.  On the way home we dragged the children to two separate furniture places, then headed for an early supper at a restaurant close to our house called Giorgios.  The highlight was a Greek appetizer called saganaki, pan seared cheese served with fig and rocket salad (arugula).  Yum.  

James was begging for his bed by 7pm, and the others followed him shortly thereafter.  Perhaps it will take us a full week to adjust after all.

 

Outside Our House

Melburnians have been apologizing to us for the lousy winter weather of late.  Apparently it has been the worst winter in ten years or so.  I will admit to being disappointed to not see the sun for two straight days, but it is nothing like lousy weather by Pittsburgh standards.  Here are some photos shot around the outside of our house, most of them taken when the sun was shining two days ago.

Our mailbox, just inside the front gate:

Most mail boxes seem to have a sign similar to the one below:

 

 

I have counted six doors to the outside, all of which must be locked by key from the inside as well as the outside:

 


 

The prediction for tomorrow is sunshine and sixty degrees, so we hope to visit a wildlife sanctuary and see some of the animals unique to Australia.

In Which We Visit Target and the Library

We woke this morning to chilly temperatures and the prediction of gray, rainy weather throughout the day. The mood in the house was cheerful, however, because finally everyone had an almost normal night's sleep.  When you consider that the time here is a full fourteen hours ahead of Pittsburgh, this was an accomplishment indeed.  It means that we managed to stay awake last night until at least 7pm local time (5am the same day EST), and stay in bed until 5am local time (3pm the previous day EST).  I think we are almost there.  We even ate lunch at noon today rather than in the early morning hours.

To celebrate, we loaded everyone into the car and headed for the local shopping mall.  Walking is easier than driving, but if you are planning to buy more than three or four things, having a car is convenient.  As I navigated the tight turns into the underground parking garage, I was grateful that the Odyssey sold in Australia is two thirds the size of its counterpart in the U.S.  We found a parking spot in the pink Q section and headed for the moving ramps up into the shopping center:  

 

We recognized the Target logo, but little else in the store was familiar.  It was about half the size of the Target in Cranberry, and unbeknownst to us, a giant toy sale began today, making it almost impossible to navigate through the store. Imagine if all the toys went on sale at a fifty percent reduction two days before Christmas, and this will give you an idea of what it was like. 

An additional challenge for Americans just arriving down under is the trolleys (aka shopping carts).   They require a coin to unlock (which one?  I had no idea), and all four wheels swivel, making them difficult to push in a straight line.  You have to hold them at about a forty-five degree angle.  However the swivel wheels do make them easier to turn around in tight corners.   This brought back memories of England where the trolleys operate in a similar manner.  We were soon on our way fighting the crowds through the store watching the mad scramble for toys. 

I have to confess that we picked up a few toys ourselves.  It has been a bit like Christmas around here.  Ross wanted to have a few things for the children when they arrived, but he was at a bit of a loss picking out things for the girls, and purchased mostly Lego sets.  Today we tried to even it out a bit.

Getting the trolley back down to the parking garage is also an interesting experience.  The wheels are designed to grip the metal grating so they cannot slide away and out of control.  Once the trolley is unloaded,  it must be taken to the proper return station in order to retrieve the coin locked inside.
By the time we made it back to the parking garage, cars were queuing for the next available space.  Hopefully this was due to the toy sale and not a normal occurrence for a weekday morning.  We headed straight to the library, which turned out to be a great experience.  The two librarians who helped us were very friendly, and one even agreed that there was no rush to get the children into school.

 

Each child was given a tote bag for taking home books.  Katie is holding one below.  Note the placement of the steering wheel.  One guidebook suggests that if you, the driver, head to the passenger seat by mistake, which will inevitably happen more than once, get inside and pretend to fish for something in the glove compartment.  This helps save face.

 

Below is a sampling of the books we brought home with us.  I figure that the sooner we learn how to identify snakes the better.  We also have some very unique looking and sounding birds in our front and back gardens.  I would not call them musical by any stretch of the imagination, but I am curious to find out what they might be.

To close this particular post, I would like to say how much I appreciate all of your comments and feedback.  The responses, whether through email, Facebook or typepad itself, have added an unexpected element of fun to the blogging experience, and make all of you feel not quite so far away.

Inside Our House

Some of you have requested more photos of the inside of our house: This post is dedicated to you.  When I was here in February our relocation agent told us that there was not much available on the rental market, so I adjusted my expectations accordingly.  This house, however, seemed to be exactly what we were hoping to find.  We were told that it was built around 1910, and that care has been taken to preserve period detail.

The furniture in the pictures below is from a rental company.  We will probably try to get the rest of what we need second-hand as we do not plan to bring furniture back with us.

 

 

The drawing room/living room/dining room, shown below, is what has me a bit baffled.  It currently has a piano in it.  I'll show it from a few different angles, and would appreciate any advice you might have on what to do with it.  The children have taken to calling it the ball room.

 

 

 

Now for some pictures upstairs:  

 

 

The storage space and built in cupboards in this house are amazing.  I don't anticipate that we will use even half of the space available, especially in the kitchen.  The radiators are proving to be a good spot to dry the laundry.  It takes the house a while to warm up in the morning, but I think I prefer this kind of heat.

The sun has come out this afternoon, so I just finished taking lots of shots outdoors.  Stay tuned for "Outside Our House."

Off to a Mostly Good Start

We have made it to 6:30pm on Tuesday, our second day, and the good news is that four of us are still awake.  Poor Sophie and James joined us for an early supper, but were too tired to eat much of anything and went straight to bed.  Sophie has had the hardest time with sleeping, although she has remained surprisingly upbeat.  She slept the least on the plane, and then had a hard time again last night.

The highlight of the day was collecting shells this afternoon at Brighton Beach, approximately seven miles from our house.  We drove around for an hour or so first exploring the neighborhoods close to ours, something the older three did not at all appreciate.  Grumpiness quickly turned to squeals of pleasure, however, once they discovered the piles of pretty shells, and in no time at all they were wading into Port Phillip Bay searching for the perfect shells for their collections.  Ross and I were happy to keep on our warm jackets and watch them.

 

 

Our attempts to awaken the children yesterday afternoon proved fruitless, so we gave up and took pictures of them sleeping instead. 

 

We were afraid they all might be up by midnight, but thankfully they did pretty well.  James got up around 11:30pm, but after being dosed with Benadryl, he was sent back to bed where he remained until 5am.  Katie was up at 1am, we found out later, and after raiding the fridge, she read for two hours and then went back to sleep.  Poor Sophie was up with a miserable stomach bug from 10:30pm to 2am, but eventually slept some on the couch.

I am going to include more pictures to show how we spent our first full day.  First, of course, are the coffee pictures.

Cappuccino at 5am:

 

Bodum coffee at 6:30am:

 

The cream turned out to be too thick to stir into the coffee, so I had to make do with milk.

Sunrise from upstairs bedroom window:

Discovering that a load of wash in the tiny machine will take as long as Ross told me it would:

 

Burning off some steam outdoors:

 

View from the front bedroom window

Our first proper meal together--a lunch of sausages, quesadillas and avocado:

 

James tooling around the house on his new bicycle.

On a final note, I got behind the wheel and managed to drive to the local shopping mall and back without any trouble other than turning on the wipers every time I meant to turn on a right or left hand turn signal.  We shopped at Woolworths, one of the larger grocery stores, but that will be a post for another day.

Thirty Hours Later

Approximately thirty hours after my last post we walked through the front gate of our home in Melbourne.  There were a few trying moments, to be sure, including an unplanned stop in Sydney to refuel, but overall the trip went remarkably well.  We arrived to beautiful sunshine, crisp air, and the excitement of exploring a new home.  I'll post some pictures I took along the way.

One last picture before leaving my parents' house in Akron, Ohio:

Arrival at the Cleveland Airport around 4pm

Boarding the flight to Los Angeles:

 

James slept through the beautiful views of the Grand Canyon.  After lots of oohs and aahs, Cameron made plans to return and rappel his way down to the bottom.

Five hours later, 11pm EST, sunshine, palm trees and surprisingly cool temperatures in L.A.

Three miserable hours at the insanely busy LA airport, and we finally boarded what became a 17 hour flight to Melbourne.  James fell asleep before takeoff, and everyone followed quickly thereafter.  Movies, candy bags and new toys from both friends and grandparents helped fill the remaining hours until we landed in Australia (special thanks to all who contributed).  Our relieved fellow passengers, who had avoided eye contact with us throughout the flight, complimented us on how well the children did.  Hopefully they didn't witness the bickering that broke out during the long wait to get through immigration.

It took four trolleys, and then three cars, to transport all of us to our house in Malvern.  The girls and I rode with Brian, who entertained us with tidbits of information and advice on how to avoid the numerous deadly animals to be found down under.  Always assume that every moving thing on the ground is poisonous, we were told, especially the snakes.  If a snake is spotted, remain perfectly immobile and it will not strike.  This should work for Ross and myself, but I cannot imagine the younger children being able to remain still.  Thankfully, we were assured, effective antidotes have been developed, so as long as we are not too far in the outback, no lasting harm should occur.  As for shark attacks, they are fairly rare, but they do bite from time to time, so be sure to swim only where the lifeguards are on the lookout. 

We have now made our first venture out in the neighborhood and surrounding streets, feeling a bit like we are carrying a sign, "Just Off the Boat."  After lunch at a deli a few blocks from our house, we walked down to the local mall.  Cameron amused us along the way by complaining of "airplane leg or something like that.."  This led Ross to conclude that our jet-lagged kids needed ice cream, and I used this opportunity to take a quick run through Target to look for a camera battery.  I was sent to a local camera shop, where a helpful and friendly clerk provided me with what I needed--for an exorbitant price, but as Ross remarked, cheaper than buying a new camera.

We are going to do our best to stay up until 7pm local time, although the middle two children have dropped like flies.  I don't imagine they will enjoy being wakened in a couple of hours, but wake them we plan to do, or they will be up for the day at midnight.  I foresee some more soda pop and ice cream in our near future.

Reunited

 

Squeals of delight could be heard as James flew out the front door of my parents' house to greet Ross this morning.  Here is a picture of James saying good-bye to Ross in June at the Hilton Head Airport:

 

We leave in about 15 minutes for the Cleveland airport.   Excitement has been steadily building among the children even as the adults fight off the looming dread of separation.  I am thankful we do not live in pioneer times.  We will only be a short 24 hour plane ride away. . .