Week 22/23 - First week or so in Australia

So, it was goodbye to Asia and back to the western world of Australia. First stop Sydney. And there to greet me was my mum and dad's friends - Chris and Diane. The plan was to stay with them and get a job until just after the new year when I would then be moving on - but you have to wait til then to find out where. Althugh it's not that much of a mystery because I've probably told you all anyway. Screw it. In January I'm off to Perth to meet Joanne my cousin. Anyway.

It was pretty late by the time we got back to their house in Terrey Hills. I hadn't realised just how far out the city they lived but it seemed like a nice area. And Chris drove back a route so I could see the bridge and the opera house. So I got all excited for that. It was also nice to unpack my backpack completely. And I had draws to put all my stuff in. A huge novelty! I spent the next 5 days looking for jobs. I called so many agencies, signed up to a few more, but there was just no work about. One of the days I went in to the city and had a wander about which was nice. One thing that struk me was that Australia had a slightly weird smell to it. But then I realised that it was probably just the cleaner air to Asia! I walked around the botanical gardens where I saw a tree of bats, went in to St Mary's - the biggest cathedral in Australia, and generally just got familiar with the city. I know this sounds really stupid but it felt a bit like London. Only bigger buildings and it was hot. But everyone was off to work, and a load of street names were the same as London and it was just nice being back in a main city again. Another thing which was odd was the road crossings. I noticed that people actually waited for the green man even if there was clearly nothing in the road. I later found out that it's actually illegal to cross when the green man is not showing. If you get caught by a copper in a bad mood you could be fined $80 for it! So after 5 months of playing hopper on the asian roads I found this pretty hard to adapt to.

Once evening in Terrey Hills I was on the porch and had my first big spider encounter. A huntsman spider. Shit. It was big. Big and hairy. Apparently they're not dangerous. But they're still bloody big!! And another night I was just about to go to sleep and spotted a spider on the ceiling. It was alot smaller which I got worried about as I think they're more likely to be poisonous. I had a whole scenario going on in my head that I'd be found dead from this spider. So I sat for about 45 minutes watching it, took a picture of it, and then went to sleep. Not sure on my thought processes to be honest but it wasn't there in the morning so maybe it hates having it's picture taken and scarpered...

So no luck on the job thing and I began to feel really down and lost. After a few chats and virtual hugs with my mum and dad I decided it was maybe best to go check in to a hostel in the city and maybe I'd be able to find a job better there. They have job boards and stuff and I might have talked to people who knew where to look etc. So that's what I did. But still no job luck. When I checked in to my hostel though I chatted to a bloke who was born in Queen Mary's (I was born in Queen Mary's for anyone who might not know). He doesn't live or come from Sidcup, just randomly born there. The world gets smaller every time I talk to someone new. I got given my sheets and my dorm key and checked out my new home. It stank! Sharing a room with another 11 people in a hot room is a bit of a shock after all the nice 'guest houses' I'd been staying in over the last 5 months in Asia!

On the Saturday I met up with a guy called Michael who Sarah (my cousin - hello Sarah!!) put me in touch with. He used to work with her and now works in Sydney. So we met up with a few of his friends, and went up the Sydney tower, and then over to lunar park which is an amusement park type thing. It was fun, and it was nice to be back in the swing of meeting people and exchanging travel stories etc. That evening we had a few drinks and I made friends with Joanna. Actually the group were about to go home, and me and Joanna turned to eachother and decided to stay out. You'll see alot more of her as we get on really well. She also works in a travel shop, so over the next few days I booked up a trip up the coast. The job hunt wasn't too successful so I decided to go and see the east coast. I had 2 weeks as I needed to be back on 19th for Chris and Dianne's wedding. So I booked a trip to Fraser Island and then a bus ticket back down to Sydney where I could jump on and off wherever I fancied...