2006: An Oz Odyssey: 92 Flinders Street: front door key, wardrobe, private bathroom

After five months in a van, and eight months living out of a backpack, those three everyday things represented five-star luxury for us. Even getting up for work didn't seem too much of a chore. Yes, I did finally find employment, though in neither the IT nor the gay entertainment industry. In the end I decided to re-write my CV to emphasise the bar and restaurant jobs I had in France and Germany, and drop it into all the bars and restaurants along Crown Street. Crown Street is the hub of swanky inner suburb Surry Hills, was just round the corner from our house, and is rather less "eclectic" than Oxford Street.

All but one place said no, but luckily that one place was a posh brunch restaurant owned by apparently famous TV chef Bill Granger that specialised in scrambled eggs. I waited tables for breakfast and lunch, about four days a week. You can see it here, via the sorcery of the internet: http://www.bills.com.au/restaurants/surry.htm.
Assorted celebrities? Not an assortment, but I did serve Stan Collymore a Coke. Lucky for him I'm a Forest fan (YOU TREES!) and was never that keen on Gladiators. Friendly service? Of course, although through ever more gritted teeth as the summer of "cricket" progressed.
(NB - the irony of a super-pedant working for a place whose 5-letter name is lacking an apostrophe was not lost on me. But the eggs, but the eggs...)

Sadly, watching the ritual slaughter of English batsmen on TV took up quite a lot of my summertime in Sydney. I must be an optimist - I kept watching session after humiliating session, convinced that England would turn the corner. (Of course they did, only they waited until the Ashes were long gone and I'd left my job - what use is that?)

Mum and Stewart came out to Melbourne for Christmas and as we'd left booking flights too late, we decided to get back behind the wheel and drive the 900km down to Melbourne. We were confident that a speedy modern car could do the journey in half the time we'd taken in the van, i.e. one day not two, and we were just about right. And so far the rental company hasn't taken any money off our credit card for speeding fines, so it's all good.
Melbourne did its best to reinforce my general disappointment in Australia's weather (see below) - it hailed on Christmas Day. So I can't really say what it's like to spend Christmas in summertime. Ah well - I can still tell you that eating out all through Christmas is a good thing.

Most of the rest of the summer was taken up with more eating and drinking. Having voted for Sydney over Melbourne because of the beaches, I must have gone in the sea about three times over the whole summer. Most of that was because of the weather though, to be fair. Until mid-January the weather was barely better than an English summer, and without the two-week heatwave we always get back home. Seriously. As far as I can judge after 9 months, Australia's weather is hugely overrated, especially on the east coast.

No matter - with reliable backup from our housemates Matt and Elena, Faye and I managed to cover an incredible percentage of Sydney's restaurants, and the place doesn't lack for them. There are more details on Faye's blog of course, but the highlights were, in no particular order:
- Huge racks of ribs at Hurricane's in Bondi
- Lebanese food and apple tobacco from hookah pipes at Hannibal's
- Posh Chinese at Billy Kwong (owned by another apparently famous TV chef, Kylie Kwong)
- Cheap-as-chips-but-healthier curries at Home Indian Diner and North Indian Cuisine. Mm, beef vindaloo. Australia does a mint vindaloo. Not literally.
- Roast suckling pig with about a kilo of crackling at Pilu, a swanky place on Freshwater Beach, north of Manly.
- Scrambled eggs at bills, of course. For every five hours I worked I got a free meal, and more often than not that meant the scrambled eggs, bacon and toast. Oh yeaahh... Sounds ordinary but the eggs are made with loads of cream and the toast is about an inch and a half thick. And there's bacon.

Our bedroom

Our balcony

El and the view from her and Matt's room (above our balcony)

That's not even half a rack of ribs at Hurricane's. And that's a steak on my plate. Oh yes.

Dinner and fizzy wine with Mum and Stewart on the beach in St Kilda, Melbourne, on Christmas Eve.

The Boxing Day Test, Melbourne Cricket Ground, Boxing Day. Not all it's cracked up to be folks, when England are scoring at around two runs an over. We did see the fat one's 700th wicket though.