Onward and Upward
So tomorrow will mark stage three of Sydney for me. Well, the third (and hopefully final) living arrangement I've had down here. I'll be moving up to my newly acquired apartment in Manly. There is some good news with that, there is some bad news. Well, maybe it's all good news depending on how you look at it. I was all set to move in when my roommate-to-be Ben decided it would be a good idea to shaft me at the last possible minute (hour actually) and back out of sharing the room with me. A very verbal conversation commenced and I after I'd hung up on him I begin to simultaneously contemplate A) how the hell am I going to afford this room by myself? and B) how do I back out of this and not look like an total ass to everyone who's helped me get this room? So I sucked it up, called Kent, and told him the situation. His response, thankfully, was "well we'd still really like you to take the room, and we wouldn't expect you to pay that much for one room by yourself so let's meet half way." The offer was MORE than fair and he told me that if I managed to find someone else to share the room with he'd revert back to our original agreement and lower the rent. Thank, God. And, much to my glee, I got a call from my friend and fellow designer Tristan the next day telling me he will most likely be moving to The States in about a month and would like someone he knows to rent his room while he's gone. With no lease tied to the Manly apartment, this may prove to be an excellent option should things not pan out for any reason.
That bit of drama aside, this past month in Glebe has truly been great. There's nothing quite like knowing a couple of built in tour guides in a city and culture you don't know, let alone living with them! Regrettably I wasn't able to hang out with Laura much but Danny proved to be great companion. He's taken me to play cricket, hit three most excellent parties, introduced me to some great Thai food, showed me around University of Sydney, Wollongong, invited me to do an ocean swim, and overall just been a great person to hang with learn a little bit about what's it like living in Australia. Tonight was no exception. Danny, Laura, and myself decided we would all have a going away party and hit up a restaurant in Chinatown and then head on over to 505. 505 is an apartment in a warehouse which plays host to local musicians every Monday night. Literally, it's just someone's apartment. I'm kicking myself for not taking any video of this but if you can picture a big loft style apartment packed with 60 plus people all sitting quietly and attentively to the musicians in the corner of the room, that's pretty much what 505 is all about. It's definitely one of the more cultural things I've done down here and I'm sure something like this isn't advertised in the local paper. The stair well looks like every graffiti artist in the South Hemisphere has paid his or her respects to it's walls while the outside of the building is completely unassuming. They cater to a much more artistic and funkier group so the two gigs we saw perform tonight were both basically just jazz acts. That is if you considered the first solo act who drilled holes into a carrot and begin to play it like a flute, jazz. No joke. This guy utilized just about every instrument you could imagine and mixed each individual performance with some recording equipment and a Mac Book into one seamless piece. Great stuff that will definitely be missed and hopefully relived soon.
Oh, before I forget, some of you have been telling me that you can't see my Sydney album on my Facebook page. If you know how I get that album to appear on my page without people having to dig for it, I'm all ears.
Lata, ya'lls.
That bit of drama aside, this past month in Glebe has truly been great. There's nothing quite like knowing a couple of built in tour guides in a city and culture you don't know, let alone living with them! Regrettably I wasn't able to hang out with Laura much but Danny proved to be great companion. He's taken me to play cricket, hit three most excellent parties, introduced me to some great Thai food, showed me around University of Sydney, Wollongong, invited me to do an ocean swim, and overall just been a great person to hang with learn a little bit about what's it like living in Australia. Tonight was no exception. Danny, Laura, and myself decided we would all have a going away party and hit up a restaurant in Chinatown and then head on over to 505. 505 is an apartment in a warehouse which plays host to local musicians every Monday night. Literally, it's just someone's apartment. I'm kicking myself for not taking any video of this but if you can picture a big loft style apartment packed with 60 plus people all sitting quietly and attentively to the musicians in the corner of the room, that's pretty much what 505 is all about. It's definitely one of the more cultural things I've done down here and I'm sure something like this isn't advertised in the local paper. The stair well looks like every graffiti artist in the South Hemisphere has paid his or her respects to it's walls while the outside of the building is completely unassuming. They cater to a much more artistic and funkier group so the two gigs we saw perform tonight were both basically just jazz acts. That is if you considered the first solo act who drilled holes into a carrot and begin to play it like a flute, jazz. No joke. This guy utilized just about every instrument you could imagine and mixed each individual performance with some recording equipment and a Mac Book into one seamless piece. Great stuff that will definitely be missed and hopefully relived soon.
Oh, before I forget, some of you have been telling me that you can't see my Sydney album on my Facebook page. If you know how I get that album to appear on my page without people having to dig for it, I'm all ears.
Lata, ya'lls.