learning how to be me…

Challenge 6: Dinner for 8  Your challenge, should you choose to accept it, is to plan a fabulous dinner party. You’ve been given a healthy budget, so don’t scrimp! Guest list – 8 people, dead or alive, real or ficticious. The menu – will this be your very own masterchef moment, or is outsourcing more your style? Is there a theme? What will be the entertainment for the evening? What will you wear? What will you talk about? Don’t forget the wine! Have fun planning, be as creative as you like. If you’re creative, maybe even design the invitation. Make this an event not to be missed! Link back here with the URL of your blog AND the entry by 7.30pm 1st July – Have fun!

This is my second blog this challenge and I have to say, so far I’ve been pretty happy with the challenge content, by now you will all know of my nomad ways, but if there is one thing I love more than travelling it is eating! So the idea of hosting an imaginary dinner party with the guests of my choice thrilled me, especially when I read that my guests didn’t necessarily need to be real! So, first things first, I took a walk over to my bookshelf and plonked down on my beanbag. I stared at my bookshelf for a long time wondering just how I could possibly choose which of my favourite characters to come dinner, in the end I settled on the list below: (NB: Technically I suppose, since it’s ‘dinner for 8’ I should probably be one of the eight but it was hard enough narrowing it down as it was. Hopefully that is acceptable oh powerful judges!)

1. My husband – because he is the chef and without him we’d be eating frozen pizza (well also because I love him lol)
2. Stephen King – partly because I’m such a huge fan but mainly because I would really love to see the way he interacts with the rest of the guests, in particular one of his own characters
3 + 4. Henry & Clare from The Time Travellers Wife by Audrey Niffeneger because theirs was a love story that has always stayed with me and I love the idea of them having the opportunity to spend time together at my party.
5. Roland from the Dark Tower Series – my favourite of all SK books, and also he and SK have already met and it seems fair that SK should know someone at the party since so far there are two other couples.

That’s it for the adults, then we have the kids table (though, for the record I haven’t quite decided if I would like these characters to come as the kids they were in these books or as the adults they are now in my imagination):
6. Scout from To Kill a Mockingbird – what a brave and beautiful girl!
7. Leslie from Bridge to Terabithia – another brave and beautiful girl and I think that she and Scout would have been great friends

Choosing by number 8 was the hardest of them all, I spent a long time agonising over whether to invite Jesse from Bridge to Terabitha so I could reunite him with Leslie just for a night, or to invite Jake from The Dark Tower because I would love to see he and Stephen King interact with one another. In the end I chose Jesse.

8. Jesse from Bridge to Terabithia because his heartbreak was my heartbreak when Leslie died and I want to bring them together for the evening.

Now for the meal. At the moment I have a bit of a yum cha fetish and love serving meals over the space of a whole evening, small plates of dumplings and sushi and noodles, tiny bowls of stir fry or itty bitty pies, all matched up with wines for the adults and smoothies for the kids – a homemade degustation menu. 10 courses in total (with some shameless links to my foodie blog):

Vegetarian Mini Calzone
Spicy Tempeh Nori Rolls
Vegan Pad Thai
Pineapple and Quinoa Stirfry
Ginger Scented Vegetable Pot Stickers
Itty Bitty Shepherd’s Pies
Peking Mushrooms with Mandarin Pancakes

And then onto the desserts:

Carrot Cupcakes
Home made double chocolate icecream
Raspberry Brownies

We’ll end up the meal with some coffee and peppermint tea – and of course a hired minibus to come and take our guests home so that they don’t drink and drive after too much wine.

And in the background, playing softly so that our guests aren’t interrupted and are free to talk, an itunes playlist tailor made for the evening including (but not limited to) the following artists:

Ella Fitzgerald
Mat Kearney
Nouvelle Vague
Oren Lavie
Angus & Julie Stone
Tracy Chapman
Joshua Radin
Joni Mitchell
Edith Piaf
Portishead
Iron and Wine
Ani Di Franco

Dress code for the evening is pretty straight forward, we are a jeans and bare feet type of crew so whatever they’re comfortable in is fine, that was the rule at our wedding so I figure it will work here too, besides I’m not sure that Roland would have any fancy clothes and for all we know Henry could be ‘visiting’ from another time and may have to end up wearing my husbands bathrobe, it doesn’t really feel fair to make them feel uncomfortable by dressing up.

Wow, I had so much fun writing this that I was almost disappointed to get home this afternoon and realise that it would just be hubby and I eating vegetarian frittata for dinner!

It’s Monday morning and I’m back at work, though the countdown has begun (5 weeks!) which makes it easier to bear. I had a really wonderful weekend, Saturday in particular was one of those perfect kind of days where everything seems right with the world.

On Friday night I met M & B for dinner in the city, we ate vegetarian food at Gopals on Swanston Street, saucy Kofta balls and rice with loads of salad. One of the nicest things about it was the fact that when we hugged goodbye at the end of the night, I wasn’t actually saying goodbye, which is usually the case after dinner with these two, usually I’m in town for a day or two, or they are in Sydney for the weekend, we eat a meal, fall in love with our friendship all over again, plan to change the world, or move into a commune together, and then go our separate ways. This time we said goodbye with a carefree hug and kiss on the cheek because we would be seeing each other the following day. What a wonderful feeling that was.

Friday night I spent some time of the phone with my lovely husband who was at home in our furnitureless house (what a lonely image), watched a movie on my laptop (Swing Vote – surprisingly enjoyable), and finished off ‘The Reader’ which I loved – and which was also one of the books on #60 of my 101/1001 list (1o1 books I own that I haven’t yet read) so I was able to cross another thing off there, then I fell asleep

I slept well in the hotel bed, especially in comparison to my previous night on the floor at home, and woke up to an sms from the lovely Chris telling me he’d meet me at ‘the clocks’ at midday.

We met under the clocks – he was early, I love that about him – and we hugged hello, tightly, like old friends, he grabbed my dreadlocks and flapped them around “they look great!” he said and I basked in the thrill of seeing him again. We walked to Degraves Street and he bought us some take away coffees, and then we walked. We walked most of the day, through the streets in the sunshine, talking and laughing and smoking (well he smoked). We went to the Eureka Tower, which was still being built when I left Melbourne. He took me to the viewing deck and we wandered around drinking it all in, he pointed out landmarks as we wandered and talked. He took me out onto The Edge – a glass viewing booth 88 floors up which creaks and groans and shakes as if at any moment you will fall into the streets below, it was scary and thrilling at once. After The Edge, we had coffee in the sun and looked out over Melbourne – one of our shared loves. Once we were back on solid ground, we caught a tram to St Kilda and had lunch, minestrone and gnocchi, a table for two, we ate outside – another tick off my list for #99 – and then walked along the beach (another one for numbers 9 + 42). We caught a tram back to the city, walked through the streets in search of more coffee and ended up back in my hotel room. Totally innocent of course. Five hours we spent together and it was really just perfect. We laughed so much, we shared some secrets and sad news, we confided in each other and joked at each others expense. Sometimes we stood close enough that his arm rested against mine. We took photos of our various reflections, in the windows at Eureka so it looked like we were floating through the air outside, in domed mirrors designed to save cars from precarious corners. We laughed at our differences, me with my impulsive moves and hairbrained schemes, him with his order and neatness and control. When we said goodbye he hugged me tightly and then he was gone, him back to his world and me back to mine.

That night I met with the gang for dumplings and beers. We ate at Camy’s where the waiters yelled at us for taking too long to order and refused to bring us menus. It used to be my favourite spot, but the service was just atrocious! It was kind of hilarious though too, when we were being scolded by the waiter like kindergarten children, or when one of us ordered a beer and they walked away in a huff and then came back and slammed a beer on the table and stalked off without waiting for anyone else to order, which just meant they had to keep coming back. The dumplings were as good as I remember though, and there was a queue out the door and into the alleyway beyond, so I guess they can afford to be rude. We ended up getting kicked out the second the last dumpling past our lips, “we need the table!” they shouted at us and shooed us out the door.

From there we went to Section 8, a funky little bar/carpark next door to Camy’s which is a newish edition to the Melbourne scene (this just means it arrived since I moved away). It is basically a fenced off parking lot with a bar in the corner (nice way to get around the non smoking laws), filled with stacked pallets (for seats) and graffitti and trees. The music was excellent, the seats were surprisingly comfortable and I felt surprisingly in my element there despite the fact that I’m essentially just a loved up housewife these days and rarely go out. We spent hours there huddled in our little corner booth under the gas heaters, smoking and drinking and bopping and laughing at the world. It was lovely and wonderful and excellent. I cuddled with the gay boys, laughed with old friends about the ridiculousness of our youth, planned future weddings, pep talked a friend going overseas for the first time, encouraged illicit lesbian affairs, discussed the effects of ‘teeny weenie willies’ and other such humiliating sexual experiences, the list goes on. One by one my friends slowly trickled away and soon it was just D and I bopping along to Michael Jackson tunes and having deep and meaningfuls until the early hours of the morning. Later on, once it was ‘that’ time of night when the boys in the start hitting on everything that moved we left our cozy little booth and wandered into the alleyway and walked home (one married woman and one funky little lesbian does not make a good pick up opportunity make). She dropped me off at my hotel and wandered on home and that was that. I couldn’t sleep for a long time after I got home – most likely all those coffee’s I’d consumed with Chris since I am normally a coffee non drinker. I called my husband, waking him from his sleep, and rambled to him for a while about our friends and the day I’d had, but eventually he went back to sleep and I was left in my hotel room on my own to ponder my day.

Sunday wasn’t such a wonderful day, in fact after only getting a couple of hours of sleep I woke up with a nasty headache (though I only had half of one alcoholic drink so who knows why!). I packed my things and trudged my way to the airport where I spent the day reading my book (The White Tiger – very good, but unfortunately not on any of my lists so I can’t cross it off!) and waiting for my flight. Eventually, after 6 hours at the airport, I got on a flight and headed on home. My favourite thing to do on a plane is watch the other travellers as they file in and pick the people I’d like to be friends with; the boy with the top hat and the sparkly red shoes, the girl with the purple dreadlocks almost to her knees, the man with the swirly tattoos all down his arms and the backs of his hands, the woman who is lost in her own thoughts and has a secret little smile in the corner of her mouth. Last night though there were suprisingly few, perhaps I was just too tired.

I got this latest ‘list of’ from Alice and since I’m such a big reader I thought I’d give it a go.

The Rules:

1) YOU MAY ONLY TAKE 15 MINUTES TO COMPLETE THIS EXERCISE – NO EDITS ALLOWED

2) List fifteen books you’ve read that will always stick with you

3) Post your list on your blog and drop a link into the comments here

My list is below, it includes a few series which I’m not sure is allowed in the original exercise but I can’t help but include them! Also although I make no apologies for number 7 and 8, I do have to admit that I’m slightly embarrassed by them:

1. The Time Travellers Wife – Audrey Niffenegger
2. Goodnight Mr Tom – Michelle Magorian
3. Bridge to Terabithia – Katherine Paterson
4. Tomorrow When the War Began (series) – John Marsden
5. Needful Things – Stephen King
6. Shantaram – Gregory David Roberts
7. Harry Potter (series) – JK Rowling
8. Twilight (series) – Stephanie Meyer
9. The Dark Tower (series) – Stephen King
10. Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close – Jonathan Safran Foer
11. The Kite Runner – Khaled Hosseini
12. April Fools Day – Bryce Courtenay
13. A Child in Time – Ian McEwan
14. Came Back to show you I could fly – Robin Klein
15. To Kill a Mockingbird – Harper Lee

Wow, that was a lot harder than I expected. A lot of the titles that appear in the list are ones that I read as a young adult when my love of books was just starting to form, there are also quite a few series which I love to read because I’m able to invest so much of myself into something that goes into such depth as series tend to do.

I’d love to see what your favourites are! Post away!

There is something really wonderful about coming to Melbourne. I find it so empowering to return here year after year. Though I only lived here for 5 years, it feels like home. Right now I’m holed up in my hotel room, a little seedy, with a view of another persons window less than a metre from mine, but just a few steps from degraves street – the hip coffee hub of town – and just a few minutes walk from ‘the clocks’ at Flinders Street Station, the ‘meeting place’ for friends and lovers alike.

Although I lived here for such a short time, those years were so filled with life. My Melbourne years were very much my ‘coming of age’ years and I will always treasure them. Most of my current day friends are friends I met through my first Melbourne job where I was receptionist in an international student accommodation building for 2.5 years. I still have friends all over the world from that job, not to mention that I met my 3 closest friends in those walls (room 519!). Of the 20 guests at my wedding, all but seven of them could be traced back to that job, and the people I met there.. in fact if I had never met them, I wouldn’t have met my husband. How different life would have been without that job.

When I first moved here I was running away from my small town upbringing, I craved the anonymity of a big city, the freedom to discover myself without a whole town watching. I moved here with my friend K and her 3 year old son D. I’ve no idea why they agreed to come with me but I’m so thrilled that they did. We shared a house in the suburbs our first year here, when I wasn’t working nights, or studying at TAFE, I would come home and read bedtime stories to D and he would fall asleep in my arms. But I was working in the city, and studying full time as well and making new friends in town and K was feeling abandoned. When our lease came up for renewal K decided to move in with her folks and so I moved out on my own in Richmond into a tiny flat in a crumbly old building. I loved that flat and it became the scene for many a party over the next few years. What started out as just my little place turned into the crash pad for a cast of thousands, soon there were three of us living there full time (the two gals from 519 and I) and various boyfriends and friends and interstate visitors pulling up a patch of floor whenever they needed to. There was always people, and music, and drinking and love in those four walls. The three of us – three girls, all out of towners and the very best of friends – were inseparable, we did almost everything together, and the times that we weren’t together we would be texting each other frantically about whatever it was we were doing. We were so close that when they went home to Perth for summer holidays, I would go with them, meeting their parents, partying with their school friends. It was heaven.

These days the three of us live in three different states. We see each other once or twice a year if we are lucky, though I still consider them my very best friends. One of us is married with two young daughters, it’s incredible to believe that we were once these three young girls, so lost and trusting and full of life, living at full speed every single day, drunk on freedom and passion and $5 bottles of pink ‘champagne’.

So coming into Melbourne – the skybus trip from the airport to Spencer St station specifically – brings back so much of that for me. Not to mention the years that came after, the early years before my husband was my husband and was just the cute boy I had a crush on, Melbourne was the scene for the first couple of dizzying years of our relationship when we were so desperately in love and lust and totally intoxicated with each other. Our first home together was a high rise apartment with city views which we shared with various people from the big hearted pommie boy stoner turned marathon runner to the crazy but lovable psycho girl and her equally crazy (but remarkably less lovable) boyfriend who would scream at each other in massive arguements long into the night. The parties we had there, with countless people smoking and drinking on our ginormous balcony – almost as big as and running for the entire length of the apartment, New Years parties, Australia Day parties, Orphan Christmasses for the people we knew whos families were a world away, or not worth visiting; Birthday parties and farewell parties and ‘oh look, I got a great deal on ecstacy’ parties.

My life here was always so varied and interesting, from drinking competitions with the USA frat boys to dancing up a storm in a dark and smoky goth club, my Melbourne years shaped me in a way that no other phase of my life has to date and I think that no matter where I go, no matter how many cities I live in or countries I move to, I will always think of Melbourne as my true home.

And what better place to do number 12 on my list “take a trip by myself”. I have left hubby at home for this little holiday, choosing to explore the Melbourne of my past without him. I’m here to eat at my favourite restaurants, meet with old friends, and wander the streets and I reminisce about my history here. It feels good to be here on my own, free to do as I please, and free too, to miss him a little as I go about my day, I think that’s so important in a marriage, to long for each other a little, it makes going home to him something to be treasure just a little bit more.

I saw this meme over at Carly_Grace’s blog today and thought I’d give it a go.. with 26 minutes left at work today it seems like the perfect thing to fill out my afternoon.

8 Things I’m looking forward to:

1. Spending the weekend in Melbourne
2. Moving to New Zealand
3. New Moon *blush* (how embarrassing!)
4. Seeing my husband
5. Meeting Ben
6. Having friends visit our new house
7. Having a baby
8. Working through my 101/1001 Day Zero Project list

8 Things I wish I could do:

1. Travel to every country
2. Win lotto
3. Change the world
4. Get a puppy
5. See my friends more often
6. Make everyone happy
7. Get a BFP
8. Write a really great novel

8 Things I love:

1. My husband
2. My friends
3. My family
4. Freedom
5. Adventures
6. Chocolate
7. Learning
8. Being an activist

8 Things I did Yesterday:

1. Had an afternoon nap
2. Bleached a few of my dreadlocks
3. Procrastinated
4. Tweeted
5. Watched ‘Before Sunrise’ (love that movie)
6. Had lunch with my little sister
7. Bought some erotic fiction from book depository
8. Looked at a friend’s photos of the Ferret races on the weekend

8 Shows I watch:

1. Mythbusters
2. Serial Killer Sunday
3. Pushing Daisies
4. Grey’s Anatomy
5. The Gruen Transfer
6. The L Word
7. True Blood
8. Media Watch

8 People I tag:

everyone who reads my blog (that probably isn’t even 8 people haha)

I am not one to shy away from a challenge so I was pretty pleased to discover the Blog This website through another blogger (The Lovely Leila). I suspect this is just going to become another way for me to procrastinate – if you know anything about me, you will know that when it comes to procrastination I need no assistance! – but I’m going to give it a go anyway.

Here is the challenge:

Everyone loves Holidays. Everyone has had a holiday – be it a great big backpacking adventure, a luxury weekend away,a caravan trek as a kid with the family taking in Big Bananas, Big Prawns, Big Pineapples et al, Camping in the neighbours yard under the stars for a few nights. Elaborately planned holidays, impromptu ‘let’s get out of here’ holidays. Blog about a holiday you’ve had that stands out – adventure, relaxation, family, friends, disaster, hilarious events! Who were you with? Where did you go? What made it so memorable? Share a photo if you want!

I am a huge fan of holidays. My friends are always picking on me about the fact that I am either on holiday or planning my next one and they are mostly right. As I type this I have 4 holidays ‘on the go’ in my planning book; The ultimate year long campervan adventure around Australia, The spiritual journey through Peru, The whirlwind backpacking adventure through India and Nepal, and the foodie paradise European jaunt. I’m hoping that at least two of them will happen in the next 48 months, and I expect that one – either India/Nepal or Peru – will be the backdrop for my 30th birthday next year, fingers crossed anyway!

It’s hard for me to pick a holiday to write about, because each holiday holds such special meaning for me and each of them has shaped me in some way. My first holiday with my husband (back when he was just ‘that cute boy I like’) where we quit our jobs and packed our lives into his car and spent 4 weeks driving from Melbourne to Perth and camping on the side of the road, before the car broke down in the desert leaving us stranded. My first time overseas – Christmas bungee jumping and drinking beer in Bali. ‘Finding myself’ by spending six months backpacking through South East Asia. Long weekends of foodie bliss in Melbourne. Sweltering summers filled with parties and drama with my Perth crew. Exploring rural Vietnam on the back of a motorcycle. Skydiving weekends in Temora NSW (lol – not the best holiday destination, I wouldn’t recommend it).. the list goes on, and they have all stood out, for some reason or another. Friendships were forged, memories made, heartbreak witnessed.. there was adventure and discovery and wonder.

I guess the most special holiday – of recent times anyway – would have to be my wedding and honeymoon earlier this year, it had everything: six weeks, 3 countries, family, friends, luxury, fun, disaster:

One of the problems with being a nomad, is that it involves a lot of leaving people behind, you spend a lot of your time saying goodbye. Because of that, getting married was very much about being able to get all the people we love in one place at one time. It seemed silly to have everyone travel to Sydney for the day, when we could travel somewhere new and interesting and since the (now) husband and I love to travel we decided that we would choose somewhere that none of us had been before to have our wedding. We decided, in the end, on sweltering Far North QLD, specifically the Daintree Rainforest. Our friends and family flew from all over the country and we all spent the week before the wedding in Port Douglas, drinking and eating our days away, lazing by the pool, having nanna naps in the afternoons. Each morning we would meet for breakfast in the hotel restaurant, dragging tables across the room to form an island where we would kiss each other good morning and eat toast and eggs while comparing hangovers and planning the day ahead. During the days we broke up into groups and did various activities, we scuba dived the Great Barrier Reef, went whitewater rafting, scoured markets by the water, did road trips through the cane fields and rainforests, had massages and facials, went shopping. It was wonderful.

The wedding itself was perfect, the setting was beautiful, and the whole day was lovely. Having our closest friends and family by our side, our short – but lovely – 4 minute ceremony, exchanging rings, the nerves and excitement, the ridiculous music requests at the reception, the food, our friend’s altered tuxedo, Mum walking me down the aisle, everything about it was exactly what we hoped for. Well except for the part where I cried all the way down the aisle, that was just embarrassing!

The morning after the wedding running on 3 hours sleep, my new husband and I woke up well before dawn and drove from our beautiful cabin in the rainforest along the windy coastal road to the Cairns airport. It was steamy, even though the sun was still 2 hours from rising, we drove with the air conditioner on full. We flew from Cairns to Sydney, caught a train to transfer us between terminals before getting on a flight to Fiji. Our first night we spend on Nadi mainland – we were exhausted and there was no point wasting a night at our super expensive resort when we had arrived so late and were so beat – but somehow there had been a miscommunication with the hotel and they had lost our booking. Luckily people tend to be extra nice to honeymooners and we managed to get a room where we promptly fell asleep.. how romantic!

The next morning we caught a bus to Denarau, spent an hour on the ferry and then were whisked from the ferry to our new – very luxurious – resort in a tiny little boat with an outboard motor. The Fijian men, shiny and smiling, pointed out parts of the island as we approached, the sun was shining, everything radiated with beauty.. it was like a brochure. The water was so clear we could see the colourful fish swimming along side the boat. We arrived at the resort and it was like the whole place existed just for us. A band met us at the pier singing the ‘welcome song’ and we were greeted with cocktails and ferried to the restaurant where we were placed in a quiet corner and bought the lunch menus. I’m ashamed to admit how much we paid for this holiday, I can’t even think about it without feeling overwhelmed but it was worth it for the special touches, like the personal menu they made up for me when they realised I was vegetarian, the chef created it specially for me when we arrived and a new one was created for me each morning. We were taken to our room – in a golf buggy – a huge and beautiful bure set right on the beach, with our own private plunge pool, a day bed set up with champagne and strawberries.. what bliss!

We spent 3 incredible days, eating unimaginably good meals, stuffing ourselves silly – huge buffets for breakfast, 3 course lunches, 4 course dinners. We had massages and walked along the beach at sunset, ate warm cookies delivered in the afternoon by the restaurant staff. It was absolute heaven.. until the rain came.

I have never seen anything like it, I was sure that the roof was going to fly off our Bure at any moment. Coconuts flew from trees and crashed on the ground, branches fell, waves crashed so ferociously that I feared we would be swept away. We were on the edge of a cyclone, though we didn’t know it at the time – no TVs in paradise. Then, as if the weather wasn’t bad enough, I got sick from the water, I couldn’t get out bed, except to crawl the bathroom and back. Eating was out of the question. I spent 2 days lying in bed moaning and listening to the rain and the wind. On the third day the manager of the hotel came and knocked on our door, worse weather was on the way, we were being evacuated. They gave us 20 minutes to pack our things but I was still sick and I hadn’t eaten in days so hubby did all the work. They wrapped our bags in big black garbage bags and off we went, huddling under a tiny umbrella as we rushed to the pick up point. They piled us into a tiny little boat with a tarp overhead (you think I’m making this up don’t you?) and we climbed aboard. They started her up and took us out into open water. It was black and raining, the wind howled and our little boat rocked and pitched. I watched the lightening in the distance and wondered if this was how I was going to die. I fought back nausea – from my illness as much as motion sickness – and waited. We sat there like that – our shiny Fijian men now as solemn as we were – for over an hour while we waited for the ferry to come and pick us up. I could have cried with relief when I saw it.

All the islands had been evacuated so the ferry was filled to the brim with soggy tourists, I briefly wondered what we would do if the ferry sank, we were clearly over capacity. In my mind I saw the news story complete with crash footage but I was too exhausted to dwell on it. I found a dry spot in the corner of the ferry where the bags were stowed and sat down – I couldn’t have stayed standing if I tried – I closed my eyes and waited. After what seemed like hours the ferry docked back at Denarau. I’d never been so happy to see dry land – even if it did seem soggier than expected. We picked up our bags and started heading to where we could get a taxi and find the hotel which the guys at the resort had booked for us in advance but as we turned a corner we saw hundreds of tourists milling about looking worried. A man – Australian – stood up on a box and shouted for us all to be quiet. He told us that Fiji had been hit by the worse storms in 20 years and that Nadi was completely flooded. He told us that there was no way off Denarau, that he didn’t know how long it would take for the flood waters to recede, that all the accommodation was already booked and that if you didn’thave accommodation you would have to sleep where you stood. I sent up a quick thank you to the gods of likuliku for having the foresight to book us somewhere in advance (and sent them a huge tip once we were home safe and sound) and got bundled into a taxi who took us to our hotel. It was more like a disaster zone than a resort, filled with worried locals who had been working and unable to get home for 3 days straight, and tourists wondering if they would ever get dry again. We were still drenched from the adventure in the little boat and we had to wait 2 hours for our room to be ready but we didn’t care.

When finally we got to our room we ordered room service (steamed vegetables for the sick girl), had showers and hung our clothes around the room to dry before falling into a catatonic sleep – what a day! The next day we woke up to find a note slid under our door from the management of the hotel. They still didn’t know when the roads would be opened. They had no way of getting fresh food to the hotel, we were on food restrictions until further notice, no more room service, instead they were having 2 buffets in the restaurant one at lunch and one at dinnertime using whatever provisions they had. I survived the next few days on mashed potatos and bread rolls – sometimes being a vegetarian can be very inconvenient and this was one of those times – practically everything on offer had some kind of meat in it. I was getting pretty weak after my illness and not eating for days and I briefly considered eating some chicken stirfry for the protein but chickened (haha) out when it came time to actually eat it. I couldn’t bring myself to put the meat in my mouth – I was feeling sick anyway and idea of eating meat was making it worse so I stuck with the bread rolls and hoped that we would get out soon. We stashed bottles of water in our backpacks from the mini bar and the shop downstairs just in case things got worse.

After 3 nights at the hotel we got notice that the roads were open and that although it wasn’t completely safe yet more rain was expected so if we wanted out we should get out now. Our flight wasn’t until the next day, but we didn’t want to risk getting stranded again so we made a break for it, even though it would mean spending a night at the airport. Driving through Nadi was devestating, the town was in tatters, and still very much submerged. The whole place was littered with rubbish and bits of houses and trees. Peoples homes were destroyed, schools in pieces. It was like a war zone – a wet one. We made it to the airport in one piece and settled in for the long wait until our flight the next day.. for 30 hours we waited and then finally we were on our way home. Well technically we were on our way to New Zealand where the second part of our honeymoon started, but you get the drift.

The one thing I can say, is that through it all the Fijian people were amazing, they were so considerate and wonderful to us. These people were watching their homes get destroyed, they were cut of from family and friends and not once did anyone treat us with impatience or rudeness. They were truly wonderful, though that isn’t really enough to convince me to visit the country again. The next phase of our honeymoon was really great, it was that trip that convinced us to make the move to New Zealand full time (though, I’m willing to concede that maybe it was just so great in comparison!). But I have to admit that I am still a little traumatised by bad weather, if I wake up in the middle of the night and it’s particularly rainy my heartrate raises a little, and after that holiday I have changed my ‘ideal home’ plans, before Fiji I always thought it would be so beautiful to live right on the beach like that, but now I realise that the ocean can be a very scary place and that the sound of waves crashing on the shore can be as terrifying as it is relaxing.

There are some people who have heard the story of our honeymoon and feel so sorry for us, I’m sure that some of them even think it is a sign of bad juju in our marriage but I feel quite the opposite. I figure if we can survive something like that in the first week of our married life then we can survive anything. And truly it really was a wonderful feeling to know that no matter what was thrown at me that week, my wonderful husband was right by my side holding my hand and carrying my bags and making sure that I was going to be okay. That’s a pretty great feeling.

Here is a bit of a photo montage of the holiday
(NB: the photos of the wedding day were taken by Shaun at Port Douglas Photography).

Just a quick update tonight to celebrate that I was able to cross off another of my list items today. # 92. See a movie with my Sister. This probably doesn’t sound like a huge deal, especially when you take into account the fact that she lives less than 5kms from me, but in actual fact I have only seen her once since December, and that was because we ran into each other unintentionally at the supermarket. We are both terrible when it comes to keeping in touch, so I’m pleased that we were able to do this together, especially since I only have 45 days or so until we leave the country and then we will be living 2000 kilometres from each other – and, come to think of it I’m not even sure she has a passport!

Anyway, I don’t have anything else to report!

This week my lovely husband started his new job. He is working nights, which as a chef isn’t all that strange, but he has been working days for the last 3 years so we have pretty much been on the same time zone the whole time we have been in Sydney. The change hasn’t been too bad, except that I have been exceptionally spoilt for the longest time and now suddenly am forced to cook for myself (as a result dinner this week so far has consisted of 2 strawberry freddo frogs and some hot chips). His working nights has meant that I have had lots of time after work for completing all sorts of very important stuff in preparation for our move overseas wasting time and watching stupid movies that are saved on my Foxtel IQ.

Last nights time waster was Miss Congeniality. I don’t really know what I was thinking when I hit play, something along the lines of ‘brainless easy fun’ most likely. I have seen the movie before, many years ago when it was quite new, so I knew what to expect.. standard romcom formula mashed in with a little ‘ugly girl becomes beautiful in the end’ storyline, some funny jokes, a bit of ditz humour.. you know the type. The problem is that somewhere between my last veiwing of Miss Congeniality (around the time I was a country girl moving to the big smoke for the first time followed closely by years of drunken shenanigans and gothed up partying and sharehouse adventures) and last night, I have taken what I like to think of as ‘the red pill’ and become somewhat of a feminist.

As a result, what was once a relaxing zone out type movie is now a jaw clenching/rant about the blatant misogyny type movie. The worst part is that the whole thing is packaged up in the lovely little psuedo feminist/girl power box and tied with a lovely pink ribbon. *puke*

To give you a bit of an idea here is some examples of the dialogue:

1. After one FBI agent brings up the photo of a female FBI agent and – using some doll dressing software – transforms the photo from one of her in her uniform to one of her in a bathing suit: “what did I tell you? Hot, right?” *insert enthusiastic noises as they leer at their collegue*, This is followed by groans of horror and disgust as the rest of the “unhot” female staff members are shown on screen with saggy arms and bellies.

2. The male and female lead are wresting and arguing about whether or not the female lead is going to wear a dress and she asks “where am I gonna put my gun?” he replies “no place I want to know about” and pats her on the butt. A harmless joke you say, except for the intended imagery of this woman being penetrated with a loaded gun.

3. The female lead appears at the welcome breakfast and she meets the other Miss America contenstants for the first time while the male agents sit in their office watching the footage (from her hidden camera) on screen. You hear them say “I love my job!” (who wouldn’t if you get to sit around objectifying women all day long!) “Not a bad view. Not bad at all!” “Look at all the hoochie mama!” “I like that – oh yeah!” *rolls eyes* it gets worse though when our protagonist enters the female dressing room and all the men gather round intently. One man says “You see the legs on that girl? Who’s your daddy?”

4. Then there is the female organiser of the event who talks about the people who are against the ‘pagaent’ she says “You know who I mean. Feminists… Intellectuals… Ugly Women” Because of course the only reason why you would be against it is because you are green with envy.. and of course it’s about more than leering men, you only have to see the reactions of the men supposedly hired to protect these women to see that!

5. The worst part though, and by far the most disturbing for me, wasn’t in the form of the spoken word but was a scene where ‘Frank’ the organiser’s son was testing out his bomb. The bomb – in the form of a tiara – was placed on the head of a naked female mannequin which was standing in a dark carpark. The figure of the naked woman was then blown up and her charred, smoking body – some parts still in flames graced our screens.. now if that isn’t misogynistic imagery what is?!?

The worst part of all of this is that this movie – and all movies in the genre – are aimed at women! This chick flick was made for – and marketed to – women the world over. No one expects that men are going to be queueing up to see this movie.. it really makes you wonder doesn’t it? I mean just what kind of anti-woman sentiment goes on in movies designed for men if this is what we see in a genre targetted at women? And what message are we sending to women when a ‘feel good’ girly movie is filled with so many negative references about body image and beauty? What are we teaching young women when men in a position of trust are shown to be ogling women and making negative remarks about their bodies as a form of comedy? When the female lead is considered ugly until she puts on heels and a dress and only then does the male lead fall in love with her?

There are so many more things I could say about this movie, but to be honest I’m just too freaked out by the fact that I once watched this movie without a second thought. In a way I suppose it shows that I’ve come a long way – in terms of ‘feminist’ enlightenment and that is something to feel good about. But at the same time it is a very stark reminder of just how insidious this stuff really is.

Back in Sydney.. we flew in yesterday morning. Strangely enough the temperature inside our Sydney house is colder than most of our NZ adventure despite the average daily temp being 10 degrees warmer here. I suspect it has something to do with the terrible insulation in our flat and hope – desperately – that our house in NZ will somehow be warmer.

Yesterday was a bit of a write off. After getting up at 4am for our flight I spent most of the day in bed. Today promises to be just as unproductive, there is so much to organise before the removalists arrive on the 23rd that I barely know where to begin.. so I’m a bit in denial about it all. Hubby is starting his new job tomorrow though, which means that he will be working nights, leaving me with lots of hours in the day to get things done while he is at work. Hopefully anyway.

During our little holiday I was able to finish off another one of my “1o1 books I own that I haven’t yet read” (#60). I read Monster Love by Carol Topolski. It was pretty interesting and I enjoyed reading it a lot, but I have to say that the last part of the book was intensely unsatisfying and the ending pretty much sucked. Up until that point I could barely put it down and even managed to read a good chunk of it in the car on the drive from Twizel to Christchurch, and I have to say anything that manages to tear my attention away from the breathtaking scenery of New Zealand is doing a damn good job of being entertaining! I’d recommend it – the book I mean – even with the sucky ending.. I think the rest of the book makes up for it.

That’s all from me for now, just wanted to add some photos of the last bits of our trip, including some more strange rock piles (even stranger than expected considering we were on the opposite side of the country than the last lot!), a beautiful stone church in the country with a glass window looking out onto the mountains instead of an altar/stained glass windows, rays of light beaming onto a snow capped mountain and a few others as well…

Our New Zealand holiday continues. We arrived in Queenstown yesterday afternoon and today we saw our new house for the first time. It’s exciting, and terrifying all at once. I am no longer worried that the house will be falling to pieces or will have rats in the bedrooms (I worry about some strange things – I know!) but now I am worried about not being happy here. It’s a silly thing to worry about, happiness is so subjective and so dynamic too. It’s not really something that can be measured or compared. I’m just a worrier I guess, always have been, and that’s not likely to change overnight!

I was able to tally up a few partial completions on my 101/1001 list today which is great. Hubby and I ate burgers on the shores of Lake Wakatipu today. It was bitterly cold, but wonderful and refreshing at the same time.. we discussed whether or not the meal could count as a picnic (Hubby thought it could – his definition of a picnic being a leisurely meal outdoors, but I decided that it was probably cheating.. a picnic for me includes either one or both of the following: a meal eaten outside on a blanket, or home made meal eaten outside: our meal today included no blanket and was burgers and chips from the local Fergburger restaurant), in the end it was decided that since it was my list then my interpretation of ‘picnic’ was most valid and so lunch today didn’t count as a picnic, meaning it couldn’t work towards #22 on the list (Have 2 picnics by lake Wakatipu, one during the day and one by moonlight), but it did still count against #99 (Eat 101 meals outside)so I’m still happy with that. Once we had finished with our meals we fed the ducks which was fun, they swarmed around us fearless and flocking.. it was eerie and delightful all at once.

Today, I was also able to put a mark against #42 (Visit the ocean at least 4 times) when, while driving from Franz Josef to Queenstown yesterday afternoon we turned a corner leaving lush green rainforest behind us and found ourselves face to face with the most turbulent ocean I have ever seen.. it was a gray day yesterday, overcast and rainy and windy, and the dark beach with the gray waves crashing violently on the sand really was a sight to behold. Strangely enough the length of coastline, about a kilometre in length was framed with piles and piles of pebbles and rocks, columns balancing precariously in spite of the crazy wind and the crashing waves.. it sure was something! I like to imagine that it is some kind of strange freak of nature that puts them there, the wind picking them up in the black of night and stacking them high.. though more likely it is bored children and thoughtful travellers. Either way it was quite beautiful and absurd.

Tomorrow we head to Twizel, and then on Friday back onto Christchurch for our flight home on Saturday. I thought I would be feeling sad about going home, but I’m feeling quite good about it. Not much need to be sad I suppose since we’ll be back in a matter of weeks. In the meantime there is lots of packing and paperwork to do.. I think that is the main thing to do when it comes to an international move; packing and paperwork. I’ll probably get a bunch more photos in the next couple of days, but until then, here are a couple of my favourties from the past couple of days.