April 27

***Pic One is some city art stuff that's been going up all over. It's basically hundreds of little plastic cups shoved into fences but it looks pretty great when it's all done Pic two is Caroline and I. I can't remember which night this was since we were out together for the past three nights in a row. Pic three is the gang from this weekend. Caroline, Laura, Me and our friend Ryan.**
Busy Busy Busy. Never a dull moment in the big city! I've been spending some of my evenings checking out some of the local suburbs near my place. They've got such cute little side-streets with art pieces installed in the sidewalks, light posts or other interesting places. I'm going to have to remember to bring my camera next time I'm out there so that you can see what I mean, but trust me, it's fabulous.
On Tuesday night, I went out for dinner again with the French guy that used to live at my place. We decided to be a little more adventurous and go for some serious japaneese food. I've been adoring Sushi lately, so I figured it was time to try sushimi... basically a little slab of raw fish. ooooh goodness, it was SO good. I mean, not something you'd want to eat every day, but as something special it was fantastic. I'm becoming much more handy with chop sticks too, but still a little slow. We also went to see the film 'Forgetting Sarah Marshal'. It was quite rude, but still really funny.
Wednesday night I took another stroll and ended up on a posh street in the middle of Surry Hills. The streets were lined with tiny restaurants (literally the size of someone's living-room) with enough space to fit about 10 people. What a cool feeling, very cozy. I ended up in a little cafe and ordered a decaf capuccino (now completely addicted to coffee). I Curled up in a corner lounge with my book and read for an hour before the very friendly owner came over & brought me another coffee 'on the house'. How nice! So I'm reading my book and eventually a guy with a guitar and a girl get up, sit on some stools and start singing some smooth jazzy music. How lucky for me to be there! I'm definately going to make a point of getting there again sometime this week.
Thursday night was party night because of Friday's holiday here. Friday was Anzak day (basically like rememberance day with parades and wreaths and flowers, but everyone gets the day of work, yay!) I went out to 'the argyle' with Laura, Caroline (Laura's new house-mate from New Zealand and very cool girl) and some of their other friends. We stayed out pretty late, as usual, and by the end of the night Laura and I got in to an intense conversation about my returning to Canada. "Please don't go!!" she says over and over. Aww how cute, If only I could convince her to come to Canada, everyone would love her!
On Friday morning/lunch time, I went out for lunch with some of the boys from the house. We always have such a great time together, it's so interesting learning about their cultures and different places they're been to in their lives. One of the new guys in the house, Fred, is French and is an Opera Singer/Dancer. Or Carsten who's an IT business owner back in Germany and tells stories of what it was like to live in Berlin when 'the wall' came down. Or the little ginger haired Irish guy, Cillian, who's one of the most rude & crude people I've ever met, but I can't help loving being friends with him. It's such a different situation in the house but somehow it totally works.
Friday afternoon, the same crew from Thursday got together for some Anzak Day festivities. There's a law here about a game called 'two-up' where it's illegal to play every day except for Anzak Day. Basically, it's betting on heads or tails. If you want to bet heads, you hold your money by your head. If someone wants to take your bet, they come up to you and give you whatever amount of money. The main coin-flipper-guy flips the coins and BAM, you win or you loose. I didn't bet because I can't afford to loose, but Laura bet $20 and lost it all in a matter of 30 seconds. The whole thing gets pretty rowdy and some people loose thousands of dollars.
Saturday, I spent most of the day reading my book in the park. I've borrowed some really intense books from one of my friends here & I'm trying to broaden my horizons by reading something other than cheesy chic books. It's going pretty well so far. For Saturday evening, I went to a nearby suburb 'crows-nest' for a dinner party with one of the friends of my landlord that I met last week. The whole thing was so grown-up, I loved it! The host cooked everything himself, even backing the bread! I stayed there until about 11:30 and then went out to meet Laura and Caroline in Darling Harbour where we club-hopped until about 5am. I'll never EVER get sick of it!!
Today was another relaxing day.. the weather being stellar here, Laura and I went out to Hyde park to discuss our eventful weekend, look at fashion mags and get some sun. Wow, I'm really going to miss this place.

April 20

**This is my Favoutire Kiwi(From New Zealand), Kelvin We spent another full night in the back patio playing cards and drinking wine with a bunch of housemates**
This week just FLEW by!
I was out every night going to Bondi, out with friends or to the movies with Laura. Laura's got a cool new job with great perks like 2 free tickets to a movie every week. So we've now got a weekly date to see one of the random movies they send her to. Last week was Prom Night (terrible movie) but we went out for dinner first at Star Bar and then to the cafe at the theatre for a coffee before the movie. Cinema's are crazy here.. there are bars and cafe's inside them for people to hang around before and after movies. There are also special theatres where you can go and actually have dinner while you watch your movie. It's super expensive.
On Friday night, I stayed in with my roomies for another night of intense fun. I'm currently in a serious love/hate relatinship with the house. It's terrible because I can't cook there anymore (kitchenn is too gross) and the bathrooms are not even usable, but the friends I've made there are fantastic. I'm going to miss them SO much when it's time to leave.
Saturday night was the weirdest night of my life. I first went to a party with the footie guy's that I met back in Byron Bay. One of their friends showed up who I have an odd history with so I ended up having to leave. I called one of my friends from the house who was out in King's Cross and met up with him. It turned out that he was there with my landlord and friends and the whole night kept getting weirder and weirder. I knew my landlord, Garnet, was an odd guy, but this just set that idea in stone. We ended up at 4am at a dodgy Kareoke bar singing at the top of our lungs. The Kareoke bar's here aren't like they are back home. Basically you get a room and a teev and a couple of mics and sit in there with just your friends. It's fun that way because you don't have to worry about a bar full of people and you can sing as much as you like. But I suppose that's when things get a little crazy. We left at about 6, went to the nearest McDonalds for some more hysteria and then back home.
I'm just taking it easy today.. I might shop for a new suitcase as my old one is totally busted. Then maybe a nap.

April 14

**This picture is from a few weeks ago when a bunch of us from my house went to the beach for Christian's going away party. These are just a few of the guy's I live with. Seamus from Sweden, Tom from Australia, Jared from America, Ozzy from Turkey and Christian from Germany. They are cooking heaps of meat on one of the outdoor BBQ's that can be found at the beach**
Last week was great! I spent lots of time going out around Sydney visiting friends in Bondi, etc. On Friday night I spent the night in with my roomies, just sitting around playing poker and drinking wine. Saturday night, I was out with Laura and a bunch of other girls. We went to a place called Chinese Laundry. It's a funky BIG place with a billion small rooms with different types of music playing.
On Sunday night, I went out with Night Patrol to give food to homeless people. One of the men had a guitar, so we spent most of the night until 11pm sitting in the park with about 20 homeless people listening to the guitar and singing. What an amazing experience.

April 8

**The first Picture is of me with Alicia, and the second is Sonia and I. She'e the one I've been doing all the volunteer stuff with**
The weekend was SO good!
I went to Wagga Wagga with a group of people from the St Vincent De Paul (Vinnies) volunteer stuff that I do. There were seven of us from Sydney travelling down in a big van/truck.. a five hour drive. We had a great time travelling there, although there were plenty of dead wallaby's (mini kangaroo-type creatures) on the side of the road. I was telling the others that it reminded me of the raccoon's that we see in Canada and no one knew what a raccoon was. odd.
We stopped off on the way for some famous Australian savoury pies from some place with pastry awards, yum!
Saturday night was the St Vinnie's Ball, it was fantastic! I borrowed a dress from Laura so that I didn't have to go out any buy anything new. I won one of the prizes.. a bottle of wine and a $25 certificate for a local store (although, Wagga is so small that nothing was open on Sunday and I had to give my certificate away to a local!!) We had a great dinner and danced the night away.
After the ball, we all went to a local bar (of course in our high-class attire) and had a fantastic time till about 3am. I swear that no one in the bar had ever seen a female before. Those country guys were like white on rice, although when I'm in Sydney, no one generally cares that I have a Canadian accent & being in such a non-tourist place, the Aussies were loving it. We ended up staying in a Catholic Boy's school for the night because it was free, but it was such an old creaky place it was creepy in the middle of the night.
Sunday was chill too.. just relaxing in the park and preparing for the long drive home.
I was back to work on Monday which has been pretty uneventful lately, although I still like what I'm doing, I'm losing a little respect for my boss. Always making promises that he can't keep.
That's about it, I suppose. See you next time.

April 4

**Here we were waiting in the pouring rain for the Jack Johnson concert. It was totally worth it!**
This week's been pretty standard, although they've paid me a bit at work so I can start paying rent again, YAY!
I can't believe I forgot to mention the best part about Melbourne in my last entry!! The three of us took a bus down to Philips bay and watched 'the penguin parade'!! It was spectacular. There's a whole viewing platform and everyone sits at sundown and watches hundreds of teeny penguins get the courage to get out of the ocean and waddle up the beach. They get to the grassy hilly bit and then go to their burrows. Then we all walk along a boardwalk and watch them find their homes. The penguins don't care about people at all... actually at one point, one of them busted out onto the road and one of the security people had to get everyone out of the way so that he could get to the other side. UNFORTUNATELY their tiny eyes can't handle camera flashes, so we weren't able to take pictures, but trust me, they were adorable.
Lately, I've just been spending time with Laura and a few of the people from mt house. We go for dinner or cook for eachother or just chill out after work. Laura moved out of the house last weekend, so I'm missing her being around, but I still see her all the time. Tonight I'm going out to Bondi Beach to have dinner with another friend that used to live at my house, but now that he's moved to the beach, I'm going to see his new place. I'm so jealous, my house is a dungeon.