Tea and biscuits: a belated Valentine's Day

Tonight I had the most fabulously chilled out tea party with some lady friends of mine. In an effort to reaffirm and deepen our friendship (oh bless) and just to spend time with each other we have been holding little tea drinking sessions! It’s actually adorable. We sit around and discuss our lives, drinking scrumptious teas in lovely teacups that are freshly brewed from ornate teapots. Tonight was extra special because as we were sitting around our circle of tea, with a backdrop of thunder and heavy rain pouring down, we suddenly had a blackout. After a little shock and a lot of me holding onto Michelle, whilst I was jumping up and down with excitement (I’m still young, what of it), we found some tall and small, and tea light candles and decorated the room with light.

             It really was just a fabulous chance to catch up with some friends and check in on each other. Having just had Valentine’s Day, I have been thinking a lot of about love and friendship and all matters of the heart. Whilst I disagree with the consumerist driven, greed and jealous centric praxis of the holiday, having recently had a small revelation in my life, I am trying to change the way I view and act toward love. Whilst Valentine’s Day and the people celebrating it, get so caught up with expressing romantic love, this often precludes the other forms that love takes on! Whilst it is easy to get bitter if your single, and upset and lonely, we need to not forget that we are always surrounded by love, day in and day out. We need to remember that we need to love ourselves first and foremost, but we also need to utilise and rely on the strength of love found in our friendships. These relationships are of uttermost importance, because when things go sour with your romantic love, these people are the crutch upon which you rest.

One of my friends has just recently gotten out of a long-term relationship and has been struggling with this idea of love. There have been moments in her break up that she has asserted that she needs to find a man to validate herself and justify herself, her independence and beauty. I find it upsetting that my dear friend, my beautiful, confident, intelligent friend feels that in order to be a better person, a more whole version of herself, she needs to be in a relationship. Whilst having time to talk to her about all of this (and she was at my little tea party) I think she is coming to realise that the most important relationship anyone can have is the one you have with yourself. Even more so when you have just broken up with someone you dearly loved. I explained to her that love can’t just be switched off and on and that in order to properly heal from the trauma that, let’s face it 99.99% of people go through when the get out of a relationship regardless of how it ends, she needs to reassert herself and her independence and self worth not through another person.

Whilst I have faith that my friend will realise her importance and I think that she understands that she needs some time to be single, it reminded me of something really insightful a guy friend of mine said recently. On the topic of Valentine’s Day and relationships, he noted that society doesn’t really teach us (or really allow for us) to be single. I think this is something really important to realise, and this realisation is quite saddening. When did it become that we were to be defined by our romantic relationship status? When did it become ok to conflate your identity and self worth with a social status of being in a relationship? I was out shopping today (not the fun type but the boring, let’s buy some groceries type) and this woman walked past me talking very loudly on the phone. I couldn’t help but overhear (that’s a nice way of me saying that she was practically having the conversation with me, standing next to me, screaming) but she was obviously talking to a friend. She said, “I’m so glad you finally can be happy, all you really needed was to find someone and it’s about time you had a boyfriend”. This woman was only young, but I found the conversation so hollowing. She equated her friends worth and her happiness with whether or not she had a man. When did that become ok?

           

Society doesn’t teach us to be single. Now you could make some argument about the evolutionary need to be in a relationship of sorts so that we can procreate and continue living, but honestly, in this day and age, fuck off. We need to start working at loving ourselves more. Being confident and happy and secure in who we are and what we do, loving ourselves as individuals and for being individual enough to assert our self worth independent of another. And we need to start loving our friends more and taking out that time in the day to check in and check on these types of relationships. We need to realise that partners come and go, but it’s the friendships that were there before, that are usually the ones that help you out when its over. Stop taking our friendship love for granted and starting living life with more self-love. Wow this might have just gotten a little preachy, but honestly, if you can’t love yourself, how can you expect anyone else to love you?

                              Because loving my friends is about going geo-caching with there fine asses.

                            

Melbourne alleyways: a photo essay

     Having only recently started this blog, and even more so, having written blogposts, it has only just dawned on me that it takes a bit of effort! I spend hours and hours on paragraphs for the essays I produce for university (literally I will spend over five hours on the INTRODUCTION) and whilst some will call that a little crazy, a little obsessive, and a little over the top, it's my usual attention to detail that allows me to fully explore and realise my ideas and arguments in academia. I think blogging needs a bit more attention, as I keep realising I leave out words and add ones in that don't belong! Argh- just preaching my efforts to be a better writer!

    Well, I have posted quite abit about my trip to Melbourne and coming back I have been able to talk about and recount those memories to all my wonderful friends, family and the strangers I pick up on the streets. Melbourne is a great city and it was wonderful to be down there again. We drank at many wonderful bars and ate at even more brilliant food stops. We shopped along Brunswick St in Fitzroy and down along Smith Street. We found a costume shop and spent hours trying on costumes and hair pieces and having the staff have a good ol' laugh with us. We chilled out along the very italian main stay that is Lygon Street, enjoying bucket loads of pasta, pizza, gelati and fro-yo. We saw the Great Ocean Road, the Yarra Valley and so many great things. We visited numerous art galleries and museums, like the Australian Centre for the Moving Image in Federation Square. As well as the incredible Ian Potter Gallery- the Aboriginal art collections were phenomenal! I have such a budding interest in Aboriginal culture but specifically material culture. I study art theory at University as well as cultural history, so material culture, I find, compelling and insightful because it addresses people- and we all know I love my people ahhaha. Also worthy of important mention, the Koorie Centre- which showcases Victorian Aboriginal culture and looks at things like the Stolen Generation, white invasion as well as including contemporary art exhibitions (and it is curated amazingly!). We went to fabulous market places, all around the city, we got to enjoy Chinese New Year, and ate along the Acland "the French place" street in St Kilda, and walked along the beach and oh my. We had a fabulous time.

    One highlight was finding the backalleys of Melbourne and documenting the changing artistic face of these walls. There is something wonderful about this city that reminds me strikingly of my time in Berlin. I attribute it to the open counter culture atmosphere that Melbourne so proudly badges upon itself. Seeing graffiti and so many tattoos demonstrates this visible attack upon the prevailing status quo and there is something humbling about being involved in a city that openly considers other ideologies and experiences, assaulting the forced and assumed 'naturalness' of so many things.


So here is just a few bits and pieces to summate my time in Melbourne:

The Great Ocean Road

          There is something that is uncanny about travelling in your own country: that strange mix of familiarity and difference, it makes for a magical time when exploring the place you call home. So I had been in Melbourne for a few days and whilst I could really recount everything that I did, saw, drank, ate, experienced, smelt, enjoyed and such, in the sake of time and also the fact I have so much to say, I think I will just contain my trip to mostly photos and a little summary of a few highlights.

     I didn't take my laptop with me which is a regret really because I could use this blog as more of a diary than a retrospective exposé and a collection of the photos I also put on facebook. But hey, let's enjoy it ahaha.

    Now I was lucky enough to complete a day tour of the Great Ocean Road. Now before I here you jump up and down at the fact it was a tour and I am generally anti-tour as I believe travel is best when done independently, there are some times when you just need to suck it up and do it. There are lots of benefits of taking day tours and these do sometimes extend to longer travel and whilst I can't really use any of these reasons to explain why I took the tour- just be at peace with the fact it was a freaking AH-MAH-ZINGGGG tour. I know when I go over to Europe, I really enjoy not having to think for a day or two so I book some day tours and whilst this was my first Australian tour- it definitely won't be my last. There is also this annoying fact that not yet being 23/25 I can't hire a car so therefore the Great Ocean Road was really only accessible to us via this tour. We had a great lot of choice for who we could go with but we choose wildlife tours and I would highly recommend them to anyone.

   Along the day Flic and I were lucky enough to spot Koalas in situ and feed King Parrots from out hands. Everyone else seemed to scarred for the birds to eat from their hands until Flic and I held out and arms and after a few seconds, they swooped onto us in multiples! It was thrilling as the last time I remember feeding birds was when I was very little and would visit my neighbour who seemed to somehow have every bird in all of Sydney flock to his backyard. We got a few happy snaps at Memorial Arch. Interesting fact, the Great Ocean Road is a memorial to the soldiers of WW1 and because of it's nature as a road, and it's very long, snaking across the Victoria coast line, it is in fact the worlds largest (and I suppose longest in the same sense) memorial!

 

     

       We drove through and got to visit some cute little towns and beaches along the way and what really excites me is the hippy vibe that these little surf and family holidaying spots have. I'm not just talking about surfie dudes and eskies but actually very exciting Indian and South East Asian jewellery shops and clothing places and there is this really cool alternative scene which I was really into. I know I don't mean to talk about the weather alot, but I was complaining about how hot it had been and Victoria and the fact that Melbournians just don't understand  the concept of air conditioning or its more primitive cousin, the fan. Well on this fine and sunny day, it actually wasn't very fine nor was it very sunny. The rain broke the night before, and Flic and I were sans any warm clothing as we were locked in our oven of accommodation. There were some sporadic showers and a whole heap of wind- but it was all greeted with welcoming arms on our behalf. 

      So where was I? I saw the freaking Twelve Apostles! And by twelve, I really mean about 5 because that is all that is standing. We approached the look out and boy was it windy! After taking the obligatory tourist photos and just freaking out at how amazing the apostles were and the magnificent colours that sketched the cliff face, the rain began. It bucketed down, saturating us! But when you're Flic and me, we don't turn away from a little bad weather, like the rest of the people enjoying the view. No, we ventured in further, for better views, pushing against the pounding rain and violent winds, we persisted. 

     We returned to the bus, attempting to dry off before we boarded. Luckily for us, the rains had given way and the remaining winds had semi dried us off. Yet I still think we must have looked like we had just crawled out of a rainwater pipe, because our tour guides took pity on us and bought us coffee. I felt really bad, because it was the tour guides, buying US, drinks, and when we thanked them, they laughed at us and were all "well you just look so hopeless" and I didn't know whether to cry or laugh (jokes it was total "oh we are sad" laughing hahaha). 

     We also got to see some other pretty cool fallen away cliff bits including the Razorback, Loch and Gorge and London Bridge. Our day was jam packed and we totally loved every second of it, we even did a little intrepid (not really) rainforest walk. 

   
   
It's a shame that both those little photos are a bit blurry! But I really like them the best so I thought I would share those ones.

      The music that our guides were playing in the morning was pretty phenom but as the day progressed, the taste got progressively worse, to the point where our two leaders were playing songs from the Muppets. I.kid.you.not. So I kicked them off their radion system and took over. I even made a little playlist for the long drive home, something nice and easy to cater for the fact we had a very varied tour bus, including a 20 somethings English couple, a couple of French dudes, some old Thai and Indian ladies etc but once the playlist finished Craig the guide leader got a little freaky with my ipod and blasted some Spice Girls and Backstreet Boys and oh so much fun. I was so into it and it was crazy to have this 40 something guy totally singing along to Wannabe. So me and Flic, whilst we were totally chilling out to my original playlist got our shit pumping when good ol' hits from the 90s came on. Yeah budddyyyy.

      God, Australia is beautiful!

Melbournia and markets

      You know I learnt a lot about both the city of Melbourne but also about my country whilst I was away even though it was a short little trip. Resisting the urge to write one very, very long post about my trip, I have instead, annoyingly, chosen to break it up into segments, simply because I can.
 
       Did you know the founder of Melbourne was this dude called Batman and for a while the city was called Batmania. Now imagine that! Whilst I love me some Christian Bale and the huskiness that is Batman, and I did enjoy a simulation ride on the Batmobile when I was a little girl, sadly the sci-fi world and myself are missing out on realising our inner Batman dreams because the city has been renamed. Viva la Batmania (and bring on the Bale!). Imagine if Australia kept the capital of Victoria as Batmania! Good golly Gotham.

       Whilst I was down in Melbourne, I meet up with a good friend of mine, Amanda. I met Amanda whilst I was in Ireland in January 2010 and instantly feel in love with her kind spirit. Yes, Amanda, you can call me a sap and go get me a box of tissues, but you know I adore you! haha. I remember being in my hostel room (and I had booked a dorm of 6 and I was the only one there and had been for a few nights!), I had just gotten out of the shower (total lie, I got out hours ago but decided to lounge around in my towel instead of getting changed because the concept of a hostel room sans people was very exciting for my me-no-weary-clothesy type of personality) and I heard this rattle of the door. The person on the other side obviously couldn't figure out how to use the key so I went and opened it, half naked and all, to find this teeny tiny baby blue windbreaker clad, red head at my door. She allowed me to quickly change, and we soon figured out that we were going on the same tour of Ireland, together. Somehow we bonded really quickly and I remember having these amazing conversations about life and love and all things exciting.
   
      You see right before I left to go to Europe, I was meant to be going with my boyfriend at the time, let's call him T, T was a little silly (read: just practically stupid about everything in life) and made a mistake with his student visa for his student exchange. We had planned this beautiful holiday to Italy and travel around the British Isles and two days before we were due to fly out, he found out his student visa was rejected. That day was Christmas eve. Then Christmas came, Boxing day and then on the 27th I flew out, without him, and I travelled, unprepared, shaken, and dealing with a broken heart. Opening up to Amanda and really connecting to her did me a world of good because whilst I was having an amazing time, I was struggling within myself. I love her dearly and am so happy that I got to meet such an amazing person whilst I was away!
BUT THAT'S NOT THE POINT OF THIS POST!

      I met up with this truly great girl only once whilst I was down in Melbourne, because the little scrag happens to be uberly talented and was going to L.A a few days after I got down into Victoria for this singing and recording gig. God I have talented friends.

      Well we headed to the Queen Victoria Night markets and it was so great! Such a great atmosphere: all these ethnic, hippy market stalls and all this exciting and culturally diverse food stands mixing up everything from Sengalese curry to Quesadillas to German weiners. And the sangria. Don't get me started on the cheap but cheerful large cups of sangria. The sun was shining, the liquor and food flowing and the people of Melbourne were out enjoying their city- where the sun doesn't set till 9pm. There was even entertainment, so I was chilling with my very large cup of Sangria surrounded by some tattooed, coloured hair, grungey types, watching this phenom indigenous hip hop dance crew show some 'tude. They really got the crowd going and it was a fabulous mix of cultures and environments and wow, Melbourne you impressive thangggg.

Voila:

     
      One of the following nights I also headed to the St Kilda markets. It was a great atmosphere, hanging besides the large Luna Park face entrance, near the beach, with similar ethnic food, jewellery and clothing market stalls- all just chilling. But better yet, the St Kilda folk were out in force! Flic and I chilled for ages watching a bunch of circus folk showcase their skills. From a girl doing flips and tricks off this one guy and then them getting a bunch of others involved in the act, to a group of very talented hula hoopers doing god-only-knows- how-they-make-there-bodies-do-that moves and some guy with a crystal ball and some other girl with a propeller hat- the St Kilda circus community where impressive!

 





       Another night I went to this fabulous eating establishment (yes I am using such fancy language because the joint is a pretty famous little place): The Moroccan Soup Bar. I had met a few local men and on hearing I was a vegetarian, recommended this place above all others to me. Let me tell you, it was in North Fitzroy and I thought it was be ok to walk from the near beginning of Brunswick St all the way up. Never again. The tram is the only way to go in such hot weather as the walk is a loooonnngg one. We arrived to a packed house and had to wait half hour for a table for two, but that was ok by us. Flic and I darted next door to this sublime drinking hole called the Monkey Bar. It has a great concept, to ensure that the wine is fresh, they only open up 3 red and 3 white each night and pour the glasses out of the two tripartite choices until the bottles are all used up! Only then will they crack open a new one. Did I mention they had this amazing emphasis on locally produced wine? They also do food and it's all biodynamic and organic and just fabulous. Annndddddd they had some really nice industrial drop lights to say the least.

     So back to the soup bar. Let me just sum it up in a few word: we came, we ate, we died from a food orgasm. The owner approached us and asked quite simply if we had any food allergies and whether or not we like sharing. No and of course, sharing is fundamental to eating Moroccan and really eating anything worth of company. She then went away. No menus. No nothing, except some brilliant spearmint tea and suddenly a plate of dips comes out. It was divine, Flic and I devoured this plate, wiping it clean with our lebanese bread. Then all of a sudden our next stage comes out. We are greeted with two large bowls, one 7-vegie slow cooked stew type wonder and the other this crackly cooked leb bread and chickpea dish, plus a huge plate filled with all types of beautiful lentils and dips and just general amazingness. We then ate till we could eat no more. We ate and ate and ate and died. We were only half way through and crying from the pain of being too full but enjoying the food too much. Oh dilemmas. We then polished off what we could with some very yummy baklava and wandered out of the joint grasping onto our bellies trying not to topple over with a food baby. Besides the fact that the food was fabulous and it is very much an institution in Melbourne, what I loved most was that all the take away orders were done in store. No phone calls. And all the take away food was catered for by patrons bringing in their own tupperware. I loved this idea, not only does it reduce waste, but it also a great pot luck system and a community about healthy and thoughtful consumption. Kudos. And whilst you shouldn't go thinking this is a food blog (because god knows food isn't really my area- unless you count eating it, because I can definitely do that- but cooking it and critiquing it - isn't what I am going to be doing on any regular basis whatsoever)

Melbourne!

        So I have just come back from a little holiday down to Melbourne for about a week and a bit and unfortunately I didn't bring my laptop down so I couldn't post anything about my trip! So I am going to fill this little post in about my time down there retrospectively. Don't hate...
       I actually had the most amazing time down there, albeit a very sweaty and exhausting time, but still a good one. You see the weather (how talking about the weather, am I really that boring?) in Sydney has been a horrible wet and cold summer and Melbourne was a bright and sunny 35 degrees and I was dying. God I packed jumpers and pants (and trust a girl when she says she only owns three pairs of pants because she just never wears them and whilst I didn't wear them- as predicted- I brought those little suckers down!) thinking it would be similar//colder weather than Sydney. Rookie mistake.
    So besides the weather and me getting a little cranky about the heat and problems with our accommodation and flights and just other silly-should-know-better travelling bits, everything went nice and smoothly. I was down there for Australia Day and my friend Flic, and I, found ourselves meandering through the Yarra Valley, enjoying a wine or seven at a few different wineries. Actually I died from how amazing some of the vino I had and just the atmosphere was sublime. I got to visit: Yering Farm, this adorable old school winery, where the grapes are hand picked and they only release a small number of bottles each year; Yering Station, which was the first winery in Australia to win an international award for excellence in wine; Rochford, where there was this amazing band setting up and I got this adorable older American couple slow dance. The backdrop of a large green expanse, the buzzing from the alcohol and this adorable, quaint American duo waltzing to classic Australian rock on our National holiday- it was beautiful; and finally Domain Chandon- one of four subsidiaries of the Moet et Chandon house, so yeah the sparkles went aiight.

Here are a few little cute snaps of one of my many days in paradise and for the record I don't claim to be a photographer, I just enjoy documenting life and am partial to a sneaky photo or two (like my snap shot of aforementioned Americans):

....and did I mention that at one of the wineries, Flic and I found these beautiful, little, silver metal butterflies just laying out in the middle of nowhere, on top of a wooden table. Lucky charms?