Tell Leura I love her

Every shop should have one of these benches, it is so civilized. Of course, it is not just for exhausted, bored husbands but also for mothers with tired kids, for retired people, and for shoppers in general. This bench in particular was found in Leura, a small town in the Blue Mountains. As far as cute factor goes, it really has it. There are lots of little interesting shops and galleries. Many artists and writers have made this their home and I can easily see why.  I am sending a link if you want to see what Leura is like: http://www.bluemts.com.au/tourist/towns/leura/

The Blue Mountains are about an hour and a half drive from us and they are very beautiful. The main bigger town is called Katoomba and you can actually go there by a heritage steam train, which we intend to do one day. In the photo below you can see The Three Sisters.  There are lots of walking tracks you can use and of course restaurants and coffee shops in abundance.

On the way there it is well worth a visit to Norman Lindsay’s studio and gardens. He was a famous artist, writer and cartoonist. Here is a link to this venue: http://www.normanlindsay.com.au/. The gardens are beautiful and you can admire some of his sculptures as well.  It sounds like I work for the tourist board for this region, but I really don’t. It is just a very beautiful area and I guess that after living almost 30 years in the French Alps I just enjoy being in the mountains again.

Oh, look someone is using the bench! They look like they need a beer and lunch.

WW and Skype

Just got back from what my husband affectionately calls his favorite charity, Weight Watchers. I have been an on-and-off member for ages and now it is time again. One of the reasons is that my skinny-marrink husband has put on a little bit of weight since we came to Australia. It is really no big deal but since he has always been slim and can't stand his little paunch for which we tease him mercilessly he wants to lose weight. And I have a lot to lose so ..... bring it on!

The problem is that we are still on our honeymoon experience when it comes to enjoying the abundance of food and places to have food here in Sydney. With all the different nationalities here you can find so many different types of food. And don't get me started on the seafood, yum! And the nice wine to go with it! In the photo you can see our UK friends and me enjoying seafood at the Sydney Fish Market.

But there comes a time when you have to draw the line and maybe this is the time, but we are not promising anything, but we will keep you posted if there is significant success.

On a completely different note, what did we do before Skype? I love getting up in the morning and switching on the computer to ses that one or maybe both of our daughters are on and that we can have a little chat. It is evening for them so they have time usually. Or maybe one of my friends back in Europe is on and we can have a good chinwag. And it is free!! The phone bill used to be our biggest expense when we lived in France in the old days.

Now that we are so far away and our family is so spread out it is such a blessing to be able to communicate on a regular basis.

The Big Potato

This is something that will appeal to the potato-loving Swedish readers, I am sure.

Robertson's claim to fame

Yes, it is a big potato. Australia doesn't have the Eiffel Tower, or Big Ben, or any of the other famous buildings or places that we can visit in Europe, so to make touristing a little bit more fun they have constructed different "big" things. In this case it's the big potato in Robertson, NSW. Usually there will be a gift shop and a coffee shop associated with it. Here is a link to some other "big" things you can visit. I have personally visited the big merino and a couple of others, but it is my goal to visit them all before I leave .

Now over to something else. When I went to the beach the other day I saw lots of school kids in the water learning to surf. I spoke to a cool dude with dreadlocks who turned out to be their gym teacher. I asked him if it was compulsory to do surfing and he said that it wasn't but that everyone wanted to do it. I guess when you live in a place where beaches are everywhere and surfing is very cool you just have to learn how to do it. They do have to take a swim test and be able to swim 200 m in a wave pool. I do pity the poor nerd, who hates sports and wants to stay inside and read etc, it must be hard. Because you see it is not only surfing, you also "have" to play a team sport, be it Australian Rules football or soccer or cricket, or softball if you are a girl. It is a very sport oriented place.

To finish off for today, let me tell you about one of my pet peeves right now. It is an ad on the radio and I don't even remember what it is for but the punch line is "Happy Wife, Happy Life".  It just gets me so annoyed, it is so chauvinistic and condescending and macho. Where do they get off insinuating that if you just keep the little woman happy (by buying whatever product they are advertising) she will be grateful and your life will be happy (and you can get back to your worthy, manly chores)!

Don't get too cocky!

Back again, after a few days of baby bliss.  Hubbie's niece came up from Melbourne with her baby and we had a great visit. Babies are so cute and hubby found just the right gob-smacking sound to keep her happy. Speaking of sound, I can hear him making bird sounds right now out on the balcony and he claims that the birds are answering back... (the birdman)

Anyway this is how our balcony looked right before we were trying to have a barbecue. It's as if the birds know that food will soon appear!

Shall I fire up the barbie now, Merle?

The hot weather has finally arrived. Today was 32^o and it was even hotter in Melbourne. So tomorrow will be the beach, maybe Cronulla. Stay tuned for the next installment!

Birds, birds, and more birds

We have so many birds in the trees around where we live and every morning you wake up from the birds. Birds were never something I paid much attention to before coming to Australia. I mean in my hometown we had seagulls making a racket of course. They also stole my nephew's glasses when he was at the beach. He wasn't wearing them but still, it is pretty cheeky and it was very hard for my sister to get the insurance company to understand. Then there was that canary that followed me into the house in France one day when I was gardening and stayed with us for eight weeks but that was exceptional.

No, the birds here are something else. The big white ones are called cockatoos and have a yellow crest on the head. Apparently they also come in black but I have never seen them. They get into everything. Sometimes when you are driving around you see big groups of them and they almost look as if someone has thrown out a bunch of old, white shopping bags. They can grab food with their claws and put it in their mouths in an almost dainty fashion.

Then we have the kookaburras. They make a very funny, almost cackling sound. Sometimes at barbecues they have been known to swoop down and grab things from the barbecue.

Black swan at Lakes Entrance, Victoria

There are others whose names I don't know, some are very colorful and beautiful. Oh, I almost forgot, there are penguins too, and pelicans, and guess what? The swans are black!

Some birds sound like a baby crying, and some sound very nice. When you wake up in the morning it is always to the birds, and in the beginning it was a nuisance but it is growing on me, especially since when I was young I read a book that warned us that birds would all die out because of humans polluting the planet. So I am grateful that it hasn't happened but sometimes when you want to sleep in and they start up .....

Here is a link to bird sounds of Australia.

Oysters, surfing, and skateboarding

Yesterday we had planned to go to Woy Woy, but No No we didn't. Instead we got caught up in the fun at Manly. We only went there because by the time we got over there to the north side it was lunch time and if it is the weekend that means oyster time. They have fantastic seafood here in Sydney, and we usually try to have a sightseeing outing on the weekend and somehow we seem always to find good oyster places.

What we didn't know was that there was the big surf championship in Manly and they had also set up a big skateboard thingy. Our presence must have raised the average age a bit. Along the promenade they had sunscreen tents where you could get suncream if you had not brought your own and when I went there to get some for my arms, a man in shorts and bare chested (and a bit chubby) asked the girl if she could put some on his back. She said:"No we are not allowed to do that"!!?? First I thought it sounded a bit unfriendly but now I can see why. First of all the man who asked her was a bit dodgy, and it is after all a very intimate thing putting cream on someone, not to mention putting it on a complete stranger. However, what do you do if you are alone on the beach? Are you doomed always to wear a t-shirt even in the water?

Just to finish off for today, let me tell you something about Woy Woy where we were supposed to have gone but where we might go next weekend. The name is from an aboriginal word meaning "big lagoon" or "much water". When I googled Woy Woy I also came across another little snippet of interest. The world's oldest blogger died at the age of 108 in Woy Woy. She started her blog at the age of 107 (what took her so long?) and her last blog was just two and a half weeks before she died at the age of 108. So I am not the oldest blogger after all.

Reasons and rubbish

You remember I said that we moved from France to Sydney simply “because we could”.

Well, there was a job opportunity that came up for hubby and since he is Aussie but had never really worked here after his PhD it seemed like a good idea. Also he has an elderly father that he wanted to see more of and my elderly mother who lived with us in France was happy to come along. So with much trepidation and anguish but also with a lot of excitement we decided to do it. The decision was hugely helped by the fact that it was just a five-year contract, so not forever. Also it turned out quite easy to find people to rent our house in France, so in August 2010 the removal people came and packed up. Boy, can they pack! When you have lived in a house for over 20 years, you tend to accumulate a lot of rubbish, but it was all packed up in two and a half days, in a 38° heat wave. Well, not all of it was packed up; we also did about 40 runs to the local tip and to charity shops.

Come to think of it, everybody should move once in a while to get that nice feeling of de-cluttering. You don’t all have to go to Australia to do it, in fact I guess you don’t have to move at all. Maybe normal people actually de-clutter all the time but somehow it hadn’t happened with us. We just put stuff up in the attic and in the garage for later, or for the kids or for the grand children. That was clearly not necessary, since the kids live very far away and don’t want their old stuff anyway and there are no grandchildren planned and when you go and try to find something that you know you put away you can’t find it anyway. So it is nice to get rid of things.

This brings me to my final point today.  Do you know what they do here in Australia with their old unwanted stuff? Instead of taking things to the tip they have a day or maybe two in the year when you put your old rubbish out in the street to be picked up. It’s a hoarder’s dream. There are armchairs, and sofas, and tables, and TVs, and everything you could possibly want (to throw away, of course!) At night you hear small trucks driving around, doing their rounds, to see what they can scavenge. Most people end up with more than they put out to begin with. But hey, like my nephew always says: “Reduce, reuse, recycle.” So it’s all good.

Upped and left

It’s incredible! We have been here now for one and a half years almost and still in a way it feels like we have just arrived.

    As the title of this blog shows, one day we decided that we wanted to have a change before retirement and old age and bad health set in so we “upped and left” for Australia. Fortunately for us, we didn’t have to go on a ship like in the old days, taking months to arrive and where sickness and death and famine were everyday occurrences. Nor did we have to sell everything we have to pay passage to crooks, and leave on little rinky boats from Asia to sail over treacherous waters to arrive in Australia. When I say arriving it is not always the case, and unfortunately, while we have been here, we have heard of many boat people perishing on the way to what they perceive Australia to be, paradise and a new life for their families.

    No, in our case we were taken well care of and had a removal company pack up our things and we were given tickets - no expense spared really. So, after quitting jobs and crying at farewell parties, we left France where we had been so happy for almost 30 years, and set off for Sydney.

    “Why”? You might wonder. Don’t think that we haven’t asked ourselves that question many times. I think the simple answer is: “because we could”.

    In the beginning I will probably dwell on what I perceive as very different here. It strikes you immediately that Aussies don’t live for work, but work to have a good life with lots of free time. Nothing wrong with that, but after having lived with a hubby who might come home at 8 or later every night and who is now out of the office at 5.30 tops, that is a big difference!

    Also this free time is spent doing lots and lots of sports. Organized sport aside, you cannot walk out without seeing people running or walking with weights in their hands. More on that another time…