A trip to Australia would be incomplete without the occasional tipple, so you'll be delighted to hear that as will as sitting in the sun, looking at things, eating fine food and generally enjoying myself, I have been going to the pub from time to time.
In my first week I have been to an Irish theme pub, a comedy club, a cheesy backpackers nightclub(only briefly), a friday night drinking session with Michelle's siblings, a free breakfast at a pub before the grand final of the footie, and a sunday session. Oh yeah, and a wine tasting.
So I'm doing not bad so far. Yes, yes, I know I'm a bastard.
I've already mentioned the Irish theme bar, so moving swiftly on, I went out for a drink and some pool with the girl I'm staying with Kerensa. Australian bars are strange beasts when your used to the normal British version. You walk in and they are mostly like big pubs, but almost all of them seem to have out the back a huge barn or beer garden. Generally they all have a place where in the summer you can stand around in the sun and drink beer. There arent really that many small cosy pubs. There isnt much call for it with the weather the way it is in summer. The pubs also all seem to have several pool tables, probably because they have loads of space to fit them in, so a very pleasant evening can be spent drinking beer, yes beer, its actually alright when its realy cold, and playing pool.
After some careful manipulation of the alcohol in my bloodstream I achieved the correct level for reasonable pool play and managed to win a couple of games. After that we moved on to the Hip-E club, a dive along the lines of the subway west end or any other cheesy dive. The main difference I could see to its edinburgh equivalent was that this club night was free, had a free barbeque and you got a free drink when you went in. The place was filled with highly drunken backpackers and we stayed a while had a bit of a dance but, Kerensa having to work the next day, we didnt stay till the end.
The next night saw me out at a comedy club, the laugh resort, watching an Irish comedian, that Kerensa knows. The comic was preceded by another magician/performer who did various things, including juggling fire inside with the audience a few feet infront of him and a highly flammable looking cloth backdrop behind him. Very impressive.
A friday night drinking session with Michelle's syblings is pretty much as you would expect, as is a free breakfast at a pub before a major sporting event. So I won't bore you with the details. Drink, drink, eat kebab, sleep, eat greasy breakfast, drink, drink, pretty much sums it up, though of course there was some fine chat along the way as well.
A peculiarity of Perth seems to be the Sunday session, its a big thing to rock up, as the aussies would say, to the pub on a sunday afternoon and drink till chucking out time. It would have been rude of me not to participate in their customs, so another fine night of drinking and chatting was had by all. I think thats a pretty good way to end my first week in Perth.
In Australia it seems to be the in thing to shorten names then add either an -i or an -o to the end. That being the case, they have bottlo's instead of bottle shops, or off-licences as the Britishers would call them. Freemantle is called Freo, Subiaco, a suburb of Perth is called Subi. Its all a it bizarre. I'm sure I'll get the hang of it though.
So, apart from getting the hang of all the abbreviations, what have I been upto? I started the week wandering around Perth. I went in to the immigration office and took a ticket stood in line waited around and got given a big sticker to put in my passport to say I could stay for the year and work.
I've visited various touristy things like the museum, which largely consisted of stuffed animals so wasnt particularly exciting as museums go, and the art gallery in Perth, which as you might expect, had pictures hanging on the walls. I've also taken a ferry ride across the river to the south side of Perth and gone to the zoo, which as you might expect, has animals in it.
Zoo's are a strange places. I spent the day wandering around the zoo, dodging groups of school kids who seemed intent on running up to every cage or enclosure shouting "Look! I've seen one!" at the top of their voice, then running away. Very bizarre. I get interested by the various different animals they have on display at the zoo, then I get depressed by the fact they are all in cages as opposed to out in the wild eating each other and dying of starvation or in bush fires. As I said, they are strange places. Highlights of the zoo were some of the smaller animals, they had otters which are always great fun to watch, and various wee monkeys of different shades.
Some of the more random things I've done this week, I've gone on a guided tour round a recently commisioned attack submarine. Very interesting tour down at Freemantle, they have guides take you round a 300 foot long submarine that had a crew of 70. 300 foot sounds quite long until your actually inside looking at the space available for the men to live and work in. Very impressed with the tour really interesting. Apparently they have escape suits which mean they can escape from a submarine that is 600 feet below sea level, which is pretty deep.
I've also visited a Harry Krishna restaurant for lunch, a big plate of curry with rice for $6, apparently if your really poor you can do the dishes fora while instead of paying. You get a real mix of people, businessmen travellers and homeless people. Everythings vegetarian, and the food was really good. If your ever in town its worth a visit.
One of the major differences between Perth and Edinburgh is that Perth is very spread out, with lots of suburbs. Each suburb has its own big mall complex with a whle host of shops. On Thursdays its late night shopping, till 9pm and everyone and their dog is out shopping like its a saturday. I ventured out into this excitement and bought myself a phone, so I am once more mobile.
Now suitably armed with a communication device, I can find some people and go drink with them.
Finally! now I have some photos up of Big Ginger Monkeys!
So, I've finally touched down in Australia. A short 5 hour flight form KL to Perth down the west coast of Australia and I'm finally here. Unfortunately I think I've brought the weather with me, its quite windy which has cooled the place down a bit so I actually have to wear a jumper sometimes, and its been showery. I thought it was supposed to be a sun kissed paradise? :)
Flew in Yesterday and my first sight of proper aussie blokes apart from airport staff was a group of workmen in small shorts putting up some new immigration booths. Unfortunately customs officals don't seem to have the stereotypical sunny disposition so it was just your usual grumpy person stamping my passport.
My friend Kerensa very nicely came and picked me up and drove me around on a quick tour of Perth. Very nice looking place it is too. We had a quick walk around Kings Park as well and I got to see some of the crazy wildlife, including a Gallah! It wasnt flaming though. :)
After that I was taken to an Irish theme pub, which you'll be delighted to know looks exactly like every other Irish theme pub, and had some live music in one corner. I then had a pint of cold Tooeys new and talked to Kerensa's boyfriend and some other fine aussie blokes about AFL. All very civilised.
I think I could get to like it here. Just as well really.
Today I've been spending my time wandering round the centre of Perth looking at shops trying to figure the place out. In fact I think I'll go and do that some more. Have fun one and all and I'll try and have some photos up for you soon.
Well, as promised, my hotel is indeed in the middle of china town. This seems to mean its surrounded on all sides by a large number of stalls selling fake rolex watches, leather bags and other assorted tat. If I wanted any of it I'm sure I could spend days haggling with people. Unfortunately I already own enough tat to be going on with so I won't bother. Of slightly more interest there are also a huge number of food stalls selling plates of noodles and a coke for somewhere around the 70p mark. Madness.
I arrived in KL in the evening, wandered around in a daze for a while, collected my bags and navigated my way through the hoards of taxi drivers offering really good deals into the city. I found the bus into town which took about an hour, was air conditioned and cost about 2 pound 50. Then I got a taxi to my hotel. I think the best way to handle malay driving is to just not worry about it and remember you have travel insurance.
That evening I just wandered round the places near to my hotel, the markets seem to go on well into the night selling their assorted cheap plastic goods to unsuspecting tourists. I bought myself some water from a 7/11 and some rambutans, small spikey looking fruit that taste and look like lychees inside.
The next day I spent time alternating between wandering round busy markets and running away to my hotel room to recover. Its a big change, coming from a cold not very busy place, to a very hot humid vibrant busy place. So I think it would take me a while to really get into the swing on things. I also spent some time wandering around a giant shopping mall. They are really good at putting an unbelievable number of shops in one place.
My last day was more of the same really, I did wander along to the petronas towers, it looks quite far away on the map from my hotel but the centre of KL is very compact and you can walk around most places. You have to take your life in your hands with the traffic, but apart from that its pretty quick to get from A to B. I dutifully queued up to get on the free tour onto the sky bridge half way up the towers. I got to the front and got my ticket around 10 oclock. Unfortunately my ticket was for a tour at about 1:30. So I spent the rest of the morning wandering around another huge shopping mall. Though that did give me the opportunity to get some photos developed. So I have some pictures of monkeys. Havent quite got round to putting them up on my page yet, but watch this space.
The Petronas towers sky bridge is a must do I guess while your in the city. But to be honest, its just a covered walkway half way up some tall building. Yeah you get some views over the city, but its not amazingly special. I think the interesting part of visiting KL is when your down amongst the daily goings on in the city. Thats impressive and a total culture shock.
That night I had an early night and got up early to catch my flight onward to Perth. Australia here I come.
After going to see the Orangutans I relaxed by the pool for a while, I now understand why people spend lots of money on nice places to stay on holiday. It definately help to relax you. If your on a long haul flight I'd recomend breaking it up by a couple of days, just to recover from the jet lag and give you an opportunity to chill out by the pool, sipping freshly squeezed orange juice and enjoying the weather, or maybe spending some time in the hotel bar.
This particular hotel had a bar aclled the Amadeus. I fine establishment, very comfy chairs and dimmed ligting. Cassandra and I went there after dinner to chill out, play some pool and escape the dreadful musak that was piped throughout the rest of the hotel. Pan pipe versions of 80's power ballads, nasty.
After a promising start with a little bit of jazz/blues the chilled out music was replaced by a 4 piece band. 3 Girls singing, 1 tambourine, 1 guy on synthesisers. It was a bit surreal. They played a mix of local stuff, chinese, and english. Very very odd, they were very enthusiastic though.
We retired to the pool room which somewhat muffled the band so we could at least talk. So we chatted away and drank beer(Gasp! Beer? Arent you all proud?). After a few games we decided to brave the band and sat and listened to them for the rest of the evening, switching to G&T(Ah thats better :), near the end of the night.
The band played with gusto, stopping from time to time to flirt with the 2 middle aged new zealand guys who were sharing the bar with us for most of the evening. A bit disturbing considering one of the guys had sons in their twenties, maybe they were just all being friendly.
So that was Sandakan, next stop KL for 2 days.
The Orangutans can come and get food from a large platform out in the jungle near the Sepilok visitors centre, the workers at the sanctuary put out food for them in the mornings and afternoons so one of these times is the best time to go to see them. Never being much for mornings I decided to go along in the afternoon with Cassandra.
We arrived and were told that the Orangutans, being inquisitive types, were likely to steal things from us, I later saw a collection of things they had stolen from previous visitors, including keys, hats, cameras and water bottles. The one they had seen in the morning had a particularly good sense of smell so we were told not to take along any aerosols or food. Probably a good idea, male orangutans can grow almost as tall and certainly as heavy as a full grown man. I wouldnt want to mess with them.
We got there just in time, a mother and her young had arrived and were playing in a tree just next to the observation platform. We watched them play fight and swing around in the tree. They have amazing dexterity and acrobatic ability. Then the food arrived and they clambered across the viewing platform, the young one doing a forward roll to impress the spectators. Its difficult to do them justice with words, I took lots of photos, hopefully some of those will give you an idea of how totally cool Orangutans are.
The jungle itself was pretty impressive, huge tall trees with thick undergrowth and small rivers on the ground. Its no wonder the Orangutans stayed up in the canopy. Apart from the Orangutans the wildlife we saw was restricted to insects of various types, but thats okay, I got to see Ginger Monkeys!
My primary reason for stopping off in Sandakan, a place I'd never heard of before, was because of the Sepilok Orangutan sanctuary. Orangutans are Big Ginger and are closely related to us, being great apes like chimps and gorillas. As it turned out, the hotel was really nice too, so I got a very relaxing and quite luxurious introduction to travelling.
I arrived with my new friend Cassandra in the afternoon, and as soon as I stepped into my room discovered how good proper air conditioning is. Its about 20 degrees in Malaysia, with really high humidity, and thats at night. It goes up to around 30 in the day. Its really nice, but its a little bit different to Scotland. The hotel had 2 quite nice restaurants, a couple of gift shops a gym a pool, sauna, massages, a bar with a local band singing hits from across the world.
I spent the first evening in fine Scottish style, drinking in the hotel lobby. Cassandra and I had decided that going to sleep in the middle of the afternoon would be a very bad idea, so we resolved, with the help of some beer, to stay up till a reasonable hour. We managed to make it till 930, a very respectable effort I thought since I'd been up for a day and a half already.
Not content with just staying awake we also managed to arrange a tour for the next day out to the Orangutan sanctuary at Sepilok.
Well, I've started now. Got up horribly early after saying goodbye to some friends on Sunday night. Stayed out near the airport, but I still had to get up at 4 in the morning. I hate mornings. Flew down to London then had to wait a few hours there before getting on the plane to Kuala Lumpur(KL)...
Long haul flights are, well, long. Malaysia Airlines are really good though, we got marvellous food all through the trip. One of the very camp male trolley dollies was also flirting with me and most of the other male passengers. Very funny, but then he gave me the biggest measure of drambui I'd ever seen, so it wasnt all bad.
I was sat next to an old couple who were off to visit some people they had met while out at the sydney olympics working for the St John Ambulance. I was also sat next to a very pleasant young lady called Catriona, who was going home to visit her folks and work in her old school for a few months before moving back to London to be with her boyfriend. I think it makes such a difference having someone to chat to. Particularly when the video screens were playing up.
12 hours later we arrive in Kuala Lumpur, I wandered around in a daze for a while, then realised I'd lost my phone somewhere along the way. Ho hum. still, if thats the worst thing I lose I'll be doing well. Not content with having a 12 hour flight, I had previously decided to move on to a place called Sandakan close to the Sepilok orangutan sanctuary. Big Ginger Monkeys! Yay!
That meant another 3 or 4 hours flying and some waiting around in between. At Kota Kinabalu A lovely young lady called Cassandra, who was going home to visit her folks back in Australia, came up and chatted to me, it turned out we were staying in the same hotel in Sandakan, so I even had someone to talk to as I lay by the pool. I arrived at around 3 in the afternoon at Sandakan airport, got picked up and taken to the airport. And I had arrived in Malaysia.
I have decided that I hate packing. I pack away all the easy things, like books and DVD's then I'm left with years and years of accumulated papers, most of which I could probably throw out, but are just official enough that there may be some wierd reason I might need them. Along with paper I always end up with a box of stuff that doesnt fit in any particular category, which is what I'm avoiding now.
Still, 7 days to go, so I better get a move on.
The other thing Ive been doing is fixing some of the configuration settings for this blog, so it now looks right and the syndication stuff should work now andy so you can aggregate to your hearts content.
Well, now I have a web log up and vaguely running, I should probably write something. The idea is, since I'm going to Australia, people wont be able to easily get in contact with me, so rather than spam lots of people who may or may not care about my exciting adventures, I'll tell people to log at my blog and tehy can decide for themselves if they can be bothered.
10 more days to go! Its all a bit bizarre.
Okay, well, something odd went on with the priveliges so the extended entry disnae work
test
Ho hum, so I've got this new blog wotsit for going away to australia, and its beena fun afternoon trying to get it configured. But it appears to be displaying something now...
Mmmmm, I have no idea what going on. :)