Inseperable (Melbourne, Australia)

A friend of a friend of a friend...

Well, here I am at Jeremy's Mom's Friend's Sister's house. Last night as Jeremy and I were driving here I was like "Jeremy, aren't you so excited to visit you Mom's, friend's sister's husband Angelo?". He was nice white man who opened the door as we waited on the other side with a potted flower plant. We were surprised to find a white man as we were expecting some Filippino to greet us. Anyway, he's really nice and letting us stay at his house for a couple of nights until we leave for the road again.

Ruth

We'll be heading up towards Sydney tomorrow morning in my mint green station wagon, who've I've appropriatley named 'Ruth'. Oh the stories I could tell about Ruth! But I don't have that much time. Basically: no gas gauge, no temp gauge, faulty speedometer, no interior lights, no horn, no hazard lights. I once ran out of fuel while driving down to do my first (and only) day of grape picking when I had 4 Japanese backpackers in my car. I had to stand on the side of the road and wave down someone to bring me to a gas station. All the damn people just waved back at me like I was a mascot on the side of the road.

I've covered the rusty tailgate with ducktape! It looks pretty good, well much better than the rust I guess.

I will admit though that the engine is fine and has gotten me from Adelaide to Melbourne so far. In Adelaide I had to put up notices in the the hostels to try to find some companions to join me. The first time I put "Canadian guy" on the notes and got no responses. The second time around, after 3 days of waiting by the phone, I put more notes up without the "Canadian guy" and I was swamped with phone calls. Hmmm... go figure? Well, the second time around I also cut up the little slips of paper with the phone number at the bottom of the page, maybe that's what the difference was.

I had a blast with this British couple (Andrew and Elle) and this Dutch girl Marieke. In fact, Andrew, Elle, Jeremy and I will all be leaving for Sydney tomorrow. I've bought a bunch of camping gear and will slowly go up towards Sydney and just see the sights and relax on the beaches along the way.

Inseperable

Well, the other day I got to see Jeremy again, after 4 months and 3 weeks, he was definitley a sight for sore eyes. I waited at the airport for 2 hours, that's called 'frustrating'! Especially when his plane landed on time, but didn't get out of the customs gate 1.5 hrs afterwards. I stood by the 4 doors waiting and waiting, each time the door opened I thought it would be him. "nope, not that one, maybe the next, nope... nope... oh is that?... nope.... ". I was about to get him paged at the info desk cause I thought he missed his flight or something. Not to mention I had to use the toilet the whole time I was waiting, but didn't want to miss him come out the doors. Next thing I know, he comes up behind me and says "Hello".

Adelaide

I definitley had fun there, lots of people say that Adelaide's the boring, weird city. I like it more than Melbourne actually. They were having 3 different large festivals going on while I was there! All really expensive stuff, but it was still cool. The first night of the fringe was free entertainment and a parade. That was cool, I danced outdoors on the university campus where there was DJ Josh (a girl DJ!!). I hung out a lot at the house where I stayed with 3 people from New Zealand and got to know them. They're my sister's friends.

Like I said earlier I grape picked for one day and hated it, and got lost trying to find the place the second day and said screw it. But there's lots of wineries out there and got to visit where Brendon (flat-mate) worked. There's tonnes of orchards and some cool beaches, lots of neat shopping malls and arcades. Adelaide to me, is really a lot like Calgary, a big city but still has that small town feel to it.

Thank-you

By the way, I just want to say thank you to all of you that gave me your condolences. Kind words really do go a long way. Also, my 3 best friends, Jenny, Lillian and Charies were amazing and read my eulogy at the funeral service and helped out my Mom and Jeremy with the food arrangements and stuff. Its so nice to know that even though I'm not there, my friends are still my friends. Thanks guys, love you all.