Friday amusement

And it's all about money!

Day Six: The "Blue Mountains"

Katoomba, a town in the Blue Mountains, sits sixty miles east of and 3,335 feet above Sydney. The town was easily reachable by train; our hotel was another matter. We asked at the pub next to the station where it was; we were told it was about a five or ten minute walk. First, it was more like 20. Second, those 20 minutes were spent traversing a highway, passing the courthouse, winding our way through a movie theatre parking lot, trudging along an under-construction highway that had been blocked off for pedestrians, and finally up a small hill to our hotel.

When Kate and I went to London, we were impressed by the locals' ability to give directions that included accurate walking times. If someone told you it was a five minute walk, it was a five minute walk. Australians, despite their close ties to the Crown, do not share this ability. A "five minute walk" will take you anywhere from seven to 20.

After checking in (and getting an actual key!), we headed back into town for lunch and to catch the bus to the trails. I finally got to try pumpkin soup, and despite having to scoop off the dollop of sour cream, I was satisfied. Pumpkin is the vegetable of choice in Australia, though we were never able to determine why. Pumpkin soup was common, pumpkin was served as a side vegetable with lamb or other dishes, and pumpkin came on grilled veggie sandwiches (which I adore, and the Australians do very well), and even in tempura! Once we were full, we were ready to brave the chilly weather and explore the "mountains."

Growing up in the shadow of a 14,410 foot mountain means that, to you at least, real mountains have snow on them year-round and bear at least a faint resemblance to the Matterhorn. Geographical features failing to meet these characteristics are hills, and people who call them mountains just don't understand what the word "mountain" means. You can't go round calling just anything a mountain; if you do, the word begins to lose its meaning.

The "blue" in the name comes, we heard at least nine times, from the eucalyptus trees: the oil on the leaves mixes with dust to color the morning haze blue. It looked closer to a light green to me. So the "Blue Mountains" were, to me, light green hills. Despite being misnamed, though, the Blue Mountains contain the Three Sisters, which are pictured above, and are a World Heritage Site (one of many we visited on our trip).

We rode the steepest railway in the world down to the floor of the forest, checked out the exhibits on the old coal mines, took a cable car back up, and then the skyrail across a valley. The skyrail car had a floor made of panels that, when an electric current was passed through them, were clear so you could see through to the forest below.

We hiked around all afternoon, and, despite feeling colder than we had in months, saw all we wanted to see. For dinner, Kate was adventurous and ordered kangaroo! I tasted a bite, and thought it was all right — it tasted a bit like beef, but the steak sandwich I had for dinner was better.

Day Five: Plastic Money is AWEsome! And so is Lindt chocolate cherry cake.

We started our day at the Queen Victoria Building, which is a beautiful shopping arcade that began life in 1898 as the site of the Sydney markets. It was being restored, and the interior re-painted. Several color schemes were being tried out "in situ" as the sign said. I'd never expected that for a mall, as beautiful a mall as it was. It seemed like someone was awfully concerned something might look bad.

After shopping, we strolled down the street to St. Andrew's cathedral and looked around inside. A man who volunteered at the church noticed a winter hat (a touk, as the Canadians call 'em) lying on the floor near me and asked if it were mine. I said no, and then we chatted for a while. He asked where I was from, and was surprised when I told him the U.S.; "I thought you had an English accent," he said. He told me about the church and pointed out a Bible that, for years, the Church had thought was from 1539. About a year ago, though, an expert came along and decided it was actually from 1540. (Yes, this seems pedantic to me, too, but I'm glad the lady could tell the difference.)

Then we went to Martin Place, to wander, and to find the Lindt Chocolate cafe, where we split the chocolate cherry confection above, and Kate enjoyed some hot chocolate, which was a cup full of melted chocolate and a pitcher full of hot milk that she could mix herself into another, empty cup.

The end of Martin Place had the state capitol building of NSW, and near that was the Reserve Bank of Australia, which had a currency exhibit which was about to close. We went inside anyway, and I told the guard about my job, and he was so happy to find someone interested in currency, that he gave us a nearly-private tour of the museum and let us hang around after hours. Australia's money is made of plastic. The technical name is a polymer note, and they are colorful and durable. The only complaint I had is that once they get folded, it can be difficult to flatten them back out, but they last a long time, and are different sizes according to the denomination. The coolest part is that they have little plastic windows in the bottom left hand corners, which are security features.

The guard, Marcus, also showed us some of his private currency collection, which he had brought to work with him to show a few friends of his from Minnesota, who hadn't shown up. Then he actually gave both Kate & me some of his collection. He gave me an old paper $1 bill and a $1 coin from the first minting in 1984.

Australia switched from paper to plastic in 1988. The reason for the switch to plastic became clear immediately: the paper was actually paper, unlike our currency, which is actually fabric, and the only security feature appeared to be some wavy lines. Australia now prints (is that even the right word anymore?) polymer notes for something like 13 other countries, including Kuwait, Brazil and Vietnam.

We had a couple more adventures that night, which I already wrote about here and here.

Day Four: Kate decides Tasmanian Devils are like "little dogs with droopy butts"

We woke up, had what was now our favorite breakfast of pumpkin seed bread with jam, and boarded a train to Blacktown so we could visit the Featherdale Wildlife Park. We had to take a bus to the park from the train station in Blacktown, and it was the first time we'd been in a vehicle besides a train since we'd arrived. Australians drive on the left side of the road, and so everything is turned around (more about that later, when Kate & I actually drive a car!) Featherdale sits in the middle of a suburb, surrounded by houses with typical-of-Sydney tiny backyards.

The best part of the park was the Koala Sanctuary, where you can pet a koala and take loads of pictures of yourself petting said koala. The woman before us kept touching the koala on its head, which of course irritated it, and so the keeper had to bring out a different one for us. His name was Charlie, and he was six years old, which is about middle-aged for a koala. He ignored us, and was content to let us pet him and eat his eucalyptus leaves. Charlie's coat was soft and smooth.

Next door was a pen full of kangaroos, wallabies, wombats and emus which were allowed to wander freely. The kangaroos' coats were just as soft and smooth as Charlie's. An emu sort of came after us at the end of our visit to the pen, and gave us both a bit of a fright.

Next to the "petting zoo" was a small area for three penguins, which were fully-grown, but were no more than 11 inches tall each. And like nearly all things small, they were adorable. A sweet Australian woman struck up a conversation with me about my camera and I let her have a look through the lens. She was impressed of course, but seemed a bit disappointed it was a film SLR and not a digital.

We saw a crocodile, safely in his pen and away from me! The peacock was kind enough to open up her feathers for us. Next door were dingoes, which were playful with each other and a beautiful golden color, although not nearly as cute as the baby dingoes we'd seen near the koalas. We also saw a Tasmanian Devil, which turned out to be similar to a little dog with a droopy butt, as Kate put it. He spent all the time we were watching him running three-quarters of the way round the trunk of one tree in his pen, then over to the other tree, where he ran three-quarters of the way round its trunk. This must have entertained him considerably, but left us feeling like this particular animal had been misnamed.

Day Three: "You're doing remarkably well for people from your part of the world."

We started our day at the Rocks Market, which I had thought would be a farmer's market combined with a touristy-gift market, but which turned out to be only the latter. We didn't buy anything, but did try a sample of some Bailey's Irish Creme fudge, which was better than it sounds. One woman was selling animal sculptures made out of bent and reshaped flatware. The crab's pinchers were made of spoons, and a bird's wings were made of forks.

Then we walked back past Circular Quay Station and the Opera House and entered the Royal Botanic Gardens and Domain. We were never able to figure out why "Domain" was part of the name. We wandered around a bit, and then stumbled upon the "Government House" and signed up for a tour. Government houses in Australia are where the governor lives, not where any real government business is conducted, save for social and ceremonial functions. The last time a New South Wales governor lived in the house was 1996; the last two governors have chosen to live in their own homes.

An Englishman who never traveled to Oz designed the house, and it looks like a miniature English castle. Our tour guide said that the materials used to build it were suited to the English climate and not Australia's. He "talked with his mouth closed," as Kate said, and when we asked some questions about how the government in Australia works, and we were catching on, he said, "You're doing remarkably well for people from your part of the world. Canadians always get it straight away." (As Kate said to me later, "No offense, dude, but Canadians have almost exactly the same system!")

One of the house's rooms contained a piano designed by Wayne Stuart, which had four pedals and an extra octave. In the room next door, between two sofas and just out of sight, sat a coffee table designed by Caroline Casey, which one Sydney-sider had come on the tour to see. She was out of luck, though. We didn't go into the sitting room where this famous coffee table resided. The tour guide did show us a way to crouch down and try to catch a glimpse of it in a mirror, but the view was no more informative than the photos we were shown, which made me think the coffee table was ugly and misplaced. It is made of glass and polished steel panels, which are meant to reflect everything in the room because of their angles. The idea is intriguing, but the table sits in a room full of updated Victorian style furniture.

The afternoon and evening were reserved for seeing Sydney from above. First, we hiked to the top of the Harbour Bridge pylon to see Sydney at near-sunset and, after dinner, went to the Sydney Tower, and saw Sydney lit up.

Day Two: Daaaaling Haaabour

When we checked into our hotel on Day One, the woman at the front desk, a New Zealander named Veil, gave us a map and pointed out some of the things to see in Sydney. She worked her way through the map, and when she got to the last destination, she motioned the way a flight attendant would when pointing towards the rear exits, and said "to the West is Darling Harbour". She drew out the vowels to emphasize how important the place was.

As soon as we were in the elevators, Kate and I giggled about this, and compared it to when we checked into our hotel in London and the woman felt the need to explain to us that the U.K.'s money used a decimal system. (Granted, we later found out that it hasn't always been a decimal system, but it switched in 1971!)

We hadn't heard of Daaaaling Haaabour, but given Veil's introduction, we couldn't resist checking it out. Plus, I'd seen a story in the QANTAS magazine on the way over about how the Powerhouse Museum, which was on the other side of the Harbour from our hotel, was exhibiting some of the best in industrial design. (Sydney was also hosting an international design conference at the time.) On the way there, we passed the still-under-construction Ian Thorpe Aquatic Centre, which has a gorgeous wave-like roof and looks like it would be a beautiful place to swim.

The Powerhouse, which is Australia's biggest and most popular museum, has a little of everything, including aeroplanes, home design, environmental exhibits, exhibits where kids can learn and play, costumes and fashion, and glass works. There was even an exhibit about an economist, William Stanley Jevons, who was a true Renaissance man.

After walking back to the Harbour and having lunch, we headed down to the Chinese Garden of Friendship, which we quickly renamed the Chinese Garden of Bad Luck and Confusing Directions. Within five minutes of our arrival, Kate lost part of one of her fillings, and not long after, I turned my ankle. The map confused us to no end, and we had trouble finding the exit. The garden's koi pond had more than the standard three koi, though, so I left impressed, albeit it disoriented and worried about Kate's tooth.

Next up was Australia Wildlife World, where we saw our first koalas! We also saw wombats, wallabies, dragons (what we would call lizards), snakes, gigantic cockroaches, and the strangest bird I've ever encountered: a cassowary, which has a mean look in its eyes, and a horn on its head that makes it look like it should be working at the bird McDonald's.

More about Australia soon, I promise. Tonight, you get a post about Berkeley. Traveling forces you to contemplate your location, OK?

My introduction to Berkeley was a drive east on University Avenue from the Doubletree at the Berkeley Marina. University Ave. is a dingy-looking street lined with Indian and Nepalese restaurants, gas stations, apartments, auto-supply stores and copy shops. It is nothing like parts of Cleveland, but it is no Shaker Square, either. It seemed dirty to me, and grungy. All I could think about was, "Why didn't I go to the London School of Economics? Oh yeah, it was insanely expensive."

The rest of the town seemed like a collective trash bin at times. People leave things they don't want any longer — anything from stereo equipment to carrots — on the corner with "free" signs on them. Last year, someone vomited on the sidewalk just outside my apartment, twice within the same week. And I live on the nice side of town.

At first, this town drove me nuts. It was dirty. My fellow students all seemed to have an attitude. Then I fell in love with it, thinking that everyone here was understanding of individuality and that they were above superficial things like how you dressed or whether you wore make-up. After a year and a half working for the University and, through that job, dealing with what felt like the entire campus, reason prevailed. I finally realized that the people here are not above judging you and your appearance. They are not paying attention to you in the first place. They are only focusing on themselves.

At my former job with the University, one of my co-workers and I were chatting about this. "It either drives you nuts," she said, "Or, you turn into one of them."

Anyone who's lived here can attest that this town is its own little planet. So when I read this article this morning in the New York Times about Alice Waters, I laughed. The reporter summed up what people here can be like very well. Spend too long on this planet, and the culture shock from trying to interact with another planet can be too much to handle.

At the wedding I was just in, in Colorado, one of the other bridesmaids gushed constantly about California and how much she loves it. (She lives in Pittsburgh.) Certainly, I love California, too, but loving something does not mean thinking it is perfect, or even ideal.

It's polluted. My car sits on the street most of the time, and not long after I've had it washed, it's dirty again, from all the stuff in the air. This is the same reason it looks dirty here; buildings collect the same stuff the cars do, and it doesn't rain much, so the dirt doesn't wash off. It's crowded, and ridiculously overpriced. Taxes are high, and yet the state is always broke. I was here about a year when I decided I would never raise my children here, no matter how attached to the area I'd become.

When I was in Australia, I had dinner with a friend I'd worked with back in Seattle, who went to law school here at Cal. He and his wife were expecting their first child at any moment. We were talking about places we'd lived and places we were considering. He and his wife had considered moving back to the Bay Area because they liked it so much.

Then it felt like he was inside my head, echoing my thoughts.

"We love the Bay Area, but the two downsides are, one, the expense, and two, we don't want to raise our kids there."

I can't come up with a particular reason why I feel this way. The people I know who grew up here are fine; several members of my graduate school class were Bay Area natives. There's just something about this place that seems unsustainable, and ultimately, unrealistic. I'm glad Alice Waters got "dipped" and is now an "optimist of the first order", and as happy as I am to be living here, I think my old roommate, Lisa M, was right.

"To me, this place feels like paradise, which is exactly why I have to move on to somewhere new."

No, I'm not planning on leaving any time soon. But I think it takes a special person to live here their entire life -- someone who is comfortable with doing what I feel like so many people here have done: checking out of reality.

For those of you who heart eating your veggies

My friend Hannah, and her wife, Phoebe, have started a blog called "I heart kale." Check it out here.

And the Whalen family rejoices

Because Iowa State beat Iowa. At football.

Before we get to Day Two and more of Sydney, I realize I forgot about Seattle and Chicago

The start of this 29,000 mile journey was a trip to my home "town" of Renton, Washington. I didn't grow up in Renton; I grew up in Unincorporated South King County, between Renton and Kent. (Readers who grew up in Bellevue, Redmond, Queen Anne or Magnolia are free to snicker. I, and everyone else from the south end are used to it.)

People in Western Washington are snobby about where you live, and people from all of Washington State are snobby about whether you were born in the state. Those who weren't are considered to have shown up uninvited from somewhere else. I became so careful about answering the question "where are you from?" that I said, "I was born in Iowa, but grew up outside Seattle," so nobody could accuse me of trying to falsely claim Washington Native status, even though I arrived in Washington at three months old.

I am not sure why it is such a big deal to be a native. It's nothing you have control over. Place of birth and citizenship are up to your parents, not you. But Washingtonians don't want any new people. There were more than enough 20 years ago as far as most of them were concerned, so just imagine how they feel now.

When I was in college in Cleveland, I asked myself why I ever left Washington, but now I can't imagine living there again. The weather (gray and depressing so much of the year) and the people (polite, but mostly uninterested in real friendships) have driven this non-native away for good. Sorry Mom and Dad!

I do like to visit, though, especially in the summer. I never sleep so soundly anywhere as I do at my parents' house, which I still catch myself referring to as "my house." So I went home the weekend of my birthday to watch Mariners games on TV (they were on the road), try and calm my mother down about the cook top fiasco, be amused by my parents turning on the A/C in the car when it was 75 degrees outside, eat salmon that my dad had caught that morning, avoid being photographed while we were eating my birthday cake, and be amused but flattered by people who tried to guess my age.

I got home on the 23rd and left again on the 26th for my first-ever trip to Chicago, which everyone I know calls "a great city" and after three days there, I had to agree. Compared to San Francisco, it felt clean, safe and friendly (at least the parts I saw). I have spent 24 of my 28 years on the West Coast, and cannot deny its physical beauty, but have always felt life is more of a struggle here than it is in the Midwest, and that sometimes people here are still looking for what people in the Midwest have either found or never had to look for.

I saw the Art Institute, and consider myself lucky that I wasn't banned from the place, and (of course!) went to a baseball game. The Cubs were out of town, so I checked out U.S. Cellular Field Comiskey Park. I saw the bean in Millennium Park, which everyone told me I had to do, and which everyone tells everyone they have to do, considering the crowd. I can't wait to go back.

Then I had 10 days at home before departing for a different country/continent/hemisphere.

No wonder I'm so tired

I just calculated how many miles I've traveled over the last eight weeks, and it works out to be about 29,000.

Yeah.

Day One: Sydney and the Sun

Kate had read guidebooks about Australia before we landed in Sydney. I hadn't. But neither of us knew how bright, and how white, the sun would be, even at 8 a.m. In Seattle, where I grew up, the sun has a bluish cast, and here in California, it's closer to orange.

A few days after we arrived, we caught an episode of a TV show called "Great Australian Albums", which was about The Triffids, a pop/punk band from Perth that became popular in the eighties. In one of the interviews, a band member commented that he had never realized how strong the Australian sun was until he started traveling, first to London and then around the world to tour.

The first thing we did in Sydney was sign up for a tour of the Opera House, which was recently named a World Heritage Site. Its roof is made out of small, thick white tile that looks like it belongs in your shower. The inside is lots of glass and steel, but the original architect has never seen it in person.

We also went to the Museum of Sydney and saw, among other things, an exhibit of amazing old prints and maps of the city. You can get a taste of what we saw here. After that, though, we were beat and headed to our new home on Bond street for showers (which disappointed) and beds (which didn't).

And we're back

I have been travelling virtually non-stop since the 19th of July, and have not posted much. First, I went to Seattle for my birthday from 7/19 to 7/23, then to Chicago from 7/26 to 7/29, then to Australia from 8/8 to 9/3 and I'm actually in Denver now, for a wedding. I love travelling, though living out of a suitcase does get to me after a bit, but this was too much for me. I want to just stay in one place for at least a couple of months. So if any of you readers are dying to see me, let me suggest a trip to the Bay Area. It's beautiful this time of year.

I will be back home on Monday, and will start posting again, mostly about my trips. I kept a journal so I'm going to write about the good stuff for you. Stay tuned!