Cruisey Christmas

This year, Wes' office had a special party just for themselves. As a special treat, everyone got together and rented out a harbour cruiser for a two hour afternoon lunch party. We joined in for the festivities, since it was a good chance for him to introduce me to his coworkers and enjoy doing something a little bit touristy.

Happy Birthday Tori! (with a buttload of birds)

One of Wes' friends recently celebrated her birthday, so we headed down to her place to join in on the festivities. We brought booze and a camera and documented the resulting insanity and consequent joviality.

Apparently, mixing strange foods together is an Australian party tradition.

Though a lot of the guests passed in and out, we stayed through the afternoon and evening, enjoying drinks, stories, a sausage sizzle and a slew of silly antics. Since the photos really speak for themselves, there won't be a lot of commentary in today's post.

Another Wander Down Wollongong Way

As I keep bringing up, Wes is in the process of selling his townhouse down in Wollongong, which is why we've spent so much time down that way. We used to go there every week on garbage night, to clear things out. A couple of weeks back, we headed down again to meet up with the cleaning crew he'd hired (which turned out to be a woman and her son and was rather a bust).

While they set to the task of eliminating dirt and dust, we set to the task of eating lunch, taking a walk and generally being good for nothing tourists on the beach. As per usual, I got a lot of use out of Wes' camera on the occasion.

This is "Squirt" or Why Spiders Are Not Pets

This week, we had our first huntsman in the house. He wasn't very large at all, measuring less than 2cm with his legs all spread out, and was relatively docile. He hid when we entered the bathroom and panicked if we came anywhere near his clever hiding spot under the crown molding.

We weren't going to keep him and Wes was annoyed that I hadn't killed him on sight (for starters, I couldn't reach him on the ceiling and I also had no idea that we had spray in the house; plus, he was so TINY!). It was not I, however, who named him.

No 'Ritas at Norita

About two, three weeks ago (yes, I am seriously behind on the blogging), Wes and I met Pete and Jon for dinner at Sushi Hotaru with plans to go after to Norita. As always, the sushi was great, but the highlight of the night was our trip to get dessert. I hadn't been to Norita yet and Wes had proclaimed that that night was The Night for Norita.

So away we went!

Norita is a cafe which specializes in desserts and board games. Unfortunately, these desserts are alcohol free, so there are no ritas at Norita. Harhar.

The idea is that you order one as you play the other. They have games you can "rent" for a small fee or, for those who play more than just now and again, you can bring your own. Because we'd been talking Apples to Apples up to Pete since the weekend, we brought it along to let him see it first hand.

(Plus, Norita's Scrabble sets are all missing letters.)

Adventures in the Greater North

A funny thing about really good weekends is that when you are having a great time, you forget to photograph it. Worse yet, you don't get around to writing about it for ages. Thankfully, I have a pretty good memory for these sorts of things.

For Mike Coyle's birthday last month, we headed up his way near Gosford for the weekend to celebrate.

Culinary Adventures, Another Installment

The funny thing about being the Crohn's party in the dynamic Foodie and Crohn's Girl duo is that a lot of the foods I'd really like to try are usually a big risk. Every time Wes says "let's have ______!" tonight, I have to weigh the pros against the cons and pray that the weight of the meal doesn't land me on a toilet for a few hours that night.

Crude, to be sure, but the truth.

All the same, we have had many adventures in trying new and exciting foods together, already. We've had yum cha, a family feed, dinner with friends, sushi train trials and a whole Japanese festival of goodies. Today, I get to tell you all about the awesome food we've had the last few weeks!

Dinner Date with a Firefly

Eventually, we ran out of touristy things to do at the top of the Sydney Tower Eye , so we packed it in and headed back to the Galeries to have dinner. As he had predicted earlier in the day, Wes and I would indeed be eating at Hotaru one day.

We just didn't expect it to be so soon!

Meeting the Family -- Part Two

It recently came to my attention that Blogger ate half of the post I made about meeting Wes' family a couple of weeks ago, so I'm going to try and fix that here by retelling the tale that Blogger took.

Bird's Eye View

Eventually, we'd had our fill of food and festivities and Wes offered to show me the grandest views you can get while in the city, at the top of the Sydney Tower Eye!

In order to actually get to the Eye (the logo for which we agreed looks eerily like Sauron's Eye), we had to cross through part of the city, then through another shopping center, up about five floors and around a winding corridor. At last, we lined up to purchase tickets and yet again stood waiting.

On the way to the tower itself, we passed the Queen Victoria Building and several other landmarks. Sydney has a lot of really great architecture to admire!

Matsuri in Sydney or More Japanese Food Than You Should Cram into a Day

Darling Harbour hosts quite a few cultural and social events throughout the course of the year. It has a nice, centralized location which makes it easy to find and just as easy to stumble upon, which makes it ideal for these sorts of things.

On Saturday, there were two festivals going on at the same time. One of them, we had planned to see. The other was a complete surprise! I also got the chance to get a bird's eye view of the city and eat at a sushi train for the first time ever.

It was a very eventful and fulfilling day!

Which means that this is going to be yet another really long post.

Tripping Through Taronga -- Part 4

On Thursday, I got a chance to go to Taronga Zoo for the first time ever. Taronga is a world-famous zoo, just a ferry's ride away from Sydney, and it very much deserves its reputation. It not only has amazing animals but amazing views, as I joked to Wes when we were walking around:

Come to Taronga Zoo. See our fabulous animals and city views.

It really was a great experience and I'd love to go back in the future.

Now, stick close to me, this is going to be a long one in multiple pieces! Be warned, there are a LOT of photos!

Tripping Through Taronga -- Part 3

On Thursday, I got a chance to go to Taronga Zoo for the first time ever. Taronga is a world-famous zoo, just a ferry's ride away from Sydney, and it very much deserves its reputation. It not only has amazing animals but amazing views, as I joked to Wes when we were walking around:

Come to Taronga Zoo. See our fabulous animals and city views.

It really was a great experience and I'd love to go back in the future.

Now, stick close to me, this is going to be a long one in multiple pieces! Be warned, there are a LOT of photos!

Tripping Through Taronga -- Part 2

On Thursday, I got a chance to go to Taronga Zoo for the first time ever. Taronga is a world-famous zoo, just a ferry's ride away from Sydney, and it very much deserves its reputation. It not only has amazing animals but amazing views, as I joked to Wes when we were walking around:

Come to Taronga Zoo. See our fabulous animals and city views.

It really was a great experience and I'd love to go back in the future.

Now, stick close to me, this is going to be a long one in multiple pieces! Be warned, there are a LOT of photos!

Tripping Through Taronga -- Part 1

On Thursday, I got a chance to go to Taronga Zoo for the first time ever. Taronga is a world-famous zoo, just a ferry's ride away from Sydney, and it very much deserves its reputation. It not only has amazing animals but amazing views, as I joked to Wes when we were walking around:

Come to Taronga Zoo. See our fabulous animals and city views.

It really was a great experience and I'd love to go back in the future.

Now, stick close to me, this is going to be a long one in multiple pieces! Be warned, there are a LOT of photos!

Face-time, Dining with Michelle

One by one and in little bunches, I've been meeting Wes' friends from around Sydney. Wednesday night, I got to meet Michelle, a long time classmate and friend of his from university. Long story short, she offered to make dinner and we accepted. I finally got the chance to make the gooey butter cake; Mom sent me the recipe for the cake so I could make it for the family barbecue, but I didn't get to do it. Luckily, I was able to do so for dinner with Michelle.

Academic Pursuits (and not my own)

On Tuesday, Wes had a meeting with his advisor, Chris. I decided to ride along and take a walk on the University of New South Wales campus. He'd shown me photos in the past of the area and always spoke of it fondly, so I thought it might be fun to tag along and take some photos.

Turns out, like most things, the UNSW campus is even nicer in person!

Meeting the Family

It's always really hard to meet your significant other's family for the first time. It usually feels almost like a test, to see if you're worthy of being with whomever it is that you're with. Having to meet them when you're from another country and haven't even really talked to them before is even harder. You're out of your element in so many ways and nervous as hell. Well, I was, anyway.

Meeting the friends is the same thing, if you come from different circles. If they don't like you, all kinds of friction is imminent.

I met Wes' friends (Pete one day, Mike, Jon and Nick another) within a week of my arrival. I also met his dad as soon as we stepped out of the airport. Wes' sister, mother and grandmother, however, were still in the wings.

In all three instances where I met with Wes' nearest and dearest, I was pretty relaxed. Coming face to face with his sister's family, in their own house no less, was a bit more nerve wracking. First of all, it was slightly more formal than a quick yum cha lunch or a concert meet-up. Though, to be honest, I'm not sure exactly why.

I simply felt that if she and her husband didn't like me, I was in huge trouble. I guess it's because Wes is really close to his sister; their opinions matter.

Fortunately for me, things went really well!

Running Rings Around the 'Gong

I'm getting a bit out of order here, since I'm still in the process of editing photos from this weekend, but here's a little adventure from earlier this week!

In what is quickly becoming a weekly tradition, on Monday, Wes and I went out to Wollongong to clear out some more garbage from the townhouse and to do some shopping. I've mentioned previously that the drive down has some really gorgeous scenery; this time, Wes decided to show me a park near Bulli Overlook so we could take them in the views in a bit more leisurely fashion.

We stopped at the Sublime Point Lookout, a little park that looks over the cliff with views of the ocean, forest and city below. As we wandered up and down the clifftop, we also found a little hiking trail through the bush and took a (very short) walk. Neither of us was particularly well-equipped for hiking, but braved the path, anyway.

Welcome to your doooooom.

I'll mostly let the photos speak for themselves, just this once.

Culinary Adventures, the First of Many

Since I've arrived, Wes and I have enjoyed a number of adventures in the way of foods. Some of them have been a great success (like the yum cha) and others have been a bit of a flub (like Thursday night's really hard and really overcooked enchiladas). Friday night, we had a home cooked (pre-made grocery store) meal of pork belly roast and apple sauce with veggies and garlic bread.

Wes also pointed out that thus far, this blog has very few photos and absolutely no photos of me. So. You get photos. Of me. And dinner, naturally.

Sneaking into the 'Gong

Monday, I had my first experience with Wes' old place in Wollongong. We drove down briefly after feeding his sister's fish to take out the trash, pick up his old toaster and drop off a present for his friend Sal.

I was still feeling a bit unwell, but we figured a bit of fresh air might do me some good, considering how nice the weather outside was.

What I Really Did On My Birthday

Now, I really expected yesterday to be a very simple, very boring sort of day. I spent the morning reflecting on the year past while Wes was at work and musing on what we'd do for the rest of the day. Little did I know that our plans would change along the way rather unexpectedly.

And even less did I know that there were a few twists waiting for me at the end of a nice evening out.

Happy Birthday Abroad

With everything that's been going on the last couple of days, I actually sort of forgot that today's my birthday. Only sort of, because people do keep reminding me. And technically because in terms of chronology and time differences, my birthday isn't for another twelve hours or something like that.

But yes. Only sort of, because people keep reminding me that I've grown older again. Like my parents. And Facebook friends.

And Wes.

Who is adamant that we celebrate somehow or another, in spite of my bout with Plane Plague and his family's absenteeism.

This lack of fanfare is actually sort of normal for me, though. I tend to forget my birthday, as generally there isn't much going on of note in terms of celebration. It's always very busy around my birthday and rarely because of my birthday. Last year was sort of an exception, with Wes visiting me for the occasion. Normally, it's just another day in the Life of Kate, so I tend to half-ignore it.

Some people may find that sort of behavior strange, but I'm perfectly okay with this (unintentional) tradition of treating my birthday like any other day. To be honest, I'm pretty damn lucky and receive what many would consider "special treatment" on regular days of the year from the people I love, so making a birthday "extra special" seems maybe just a bit greedy on my part. It's not like getting older is a huge accomplishment these days, after all. Especially not with all the advances in modern medicine. haha

All the same, this is my first birthday in Australia, so maybe it does deserve just a little bit of extra attention and reflection.

Leaving the Nest Part Two -- Chinese Food, a Concert and Drunken Train-goers

On Friday, I made my second (and technically more important) trip with Wes into the city to see Blind Guardian perform.  It was my big, bad planned "debut" of sorts, to meet his friends and test to see if I can handle Sydney at its loudest.

I passed. Mostly. And then I passed out.

Fighting Off Winged Flu -- a.k.a. Why I Hate Plane Plague

I have chamomile tea.

I have Lemsip.

I have a duvet.

I also have a respiratory flu, as contracted on the airplane on the way over.

Leaving the Nest for the City

Thursday was a pretty intense adventure as far as my daily dose of adrenaline goes.

There were train rides, car rides, exotic foods and foreign bands all crammed into the space of a short 8 hours. Somehow (somewhat miraculously and beyond my understanding), I survived. As did the car's carpeting.

A Red Bird Earns Her Wings

The first step out of the United States was perhaps the scariest part of my whole trip.

I am one of those unfortunate people who do not deal well with planes. They make me nervous (and often nauseated), even on short flights, so the prospect of being on a plane for fifteen hours (and switching around between planes for nearly twenty total hours) struck a chord of fear in my belly from the beginning of my trip planning.

Lucky for me, Wes handled the actual details of the flights through a travel agent, so I was able to mostly ignore the impending period of airborne travel.

At least, until the last minute.