Oz..back again!

So I am back in Darwin.

It has been almost a year but, it seems like just yesterday I was here in Australia.. in this culture which looks the same but is so different than Canada.

First, there is the heat. 

I felt it in Cairns.. the heavy humidity.. the thick, velvety sunshine.  That's where I landed.  Canada can get hot in the summertime, but the sun feels... harsher some how.  

BC and the Queensland coasts are both green.. but while the trees are tall and mainly covered in needles: pine, spruce, tamarack, cedar.. in Madeira Park, the brush in Australia is shorter, broader, and things bend more easily in the breeze.  Cairns seldom gets hit by the eye of a storm, but it stands ready. 

Then there are the people.

Brits and Australians don’t really have chins.. or shoulders.  I knew this, but have been reminded.  Canadians came from the same breed, but we seem to have one or the other..

And they talk funny.. An Australian accent can be sexy and alluring or shrill and annoying.  It matches their personality.. Australians can be blunt, and crude.. many are a rough, rude people.

While I found the ladies at the Body Shop in Coquitlam B.C. helpful, smiley and cracking jokes about free products..  In Cairns I was greeted, in the identical environment, with the serious, stern, arrogant faces of the sales ladies… no jokes and certainly NO free products!   

The taxi driver was nice: but he was from India.

In Vancouver, as I headed to mom and dads place a lifetime ago, connecting the train and the bus to the ferry.. there were Indigenous Canadians having a bit of a Pow Wow right there on Granville and Howe. They claimed the very centre of the city to be ancestral land.   No problem..  the Canadian Government must have agreed, as police redirected the traffic around the five or so of them beating on drums and chanting at one of the busiest intersections in the country! 

Wish I had ancestral land..

In Darwin the 'black fellahs' downtown swear at each other.. aggressively.. loudly.  They hang around.. nothing to do.. no purpose.  There seems to be no joy in life if you are an Indigenous person living in the NT.  On the street, people avoid them.  Pretend they aren't there.  But a huge chunk of their tax dollars go toward keeping them.. alive. 

I like the Canadian way better.. dancing around in one of the most beautiful cities in the world dressed in traditional red and black colours!  Singing..eating.. living  all.. right there on the street.  

Hope I can handle the culture, or lack of it, working and living in the Northern Territory again.  A lot of folks here just don't seem to be living their dream.. they are just getting through one day at a time.

Like the Quantas airline employee.. looking down her nose, quite literally,  informing me tartly " there are no Quantas flights to Darwin". 

Problem was.. I had a ticket..

And I made my flight to Darwin on Qantas, meeting up with Vas at the airport.   He is already thinking about not working and has started shopping for caravans. A fellow from a band, which isn't doing so well, dropped by our hotel to show us his treasure.. or piece of junk.. depending on how you look at it.  He is thin, blond... nice.. cool!  Who needs a chin anyway when you're a cool-musician-surfer-dude.  

Vas watched Rick Ponting get 100 points (NOT RUNS!) oops.. got it wrong… against India yesterday.  Well done.. Go Australia! 

Ponting is blond.. cool.  No chin.. very Australian.  

Cool guys..
and Australia has cool critters too.. 

In Madeira there were those huge Blue Herons out on the island.. here in Darwin they have huge crazy black and white birds with big shwoopy beaks wandering around in the park across the street. Not sure what they are.. didn't look like they could fly.

Ya.. it isn't Canada, but that is sort of at the point.  Variety is what makes everything .. new.. and interesting.. All Good! 

My new boss says my home in Mataranka is clean and there is beer in the fridge.. See.. these guys may over do it on the sports front, talk funny and be missing their chins, but they know what a person wants.  Clean and beer in the fridge!  

Vas and I will head south soon enough, but for now, this hotel is nice.  It's right on the Esplanade and we are looking out over the park to the ocean beyond.  We can see a military ship.. the naval base is not too far away.  It reminds me how close we are to Asia.. and the Japanese invasion during WWII. 

And my mind keeps drifting to the place I will next call home.  I may buy a scooter.. to get to the hot pools near where I am going to live..  or not.

Ya.. it's hot in Darwin.. but I like hot.  

I can do this..