The future is gorgeous!

Well, i have been here a week today, and I have to say I LOVE IT. I still don't have a place to live permanently, but luckily I can stay with friends until I find a place. Australia is very much like Canada, but on the beach....and with more of a british influence. I have noticed some crazy/weird things about this place though:

• the aussies don't wear shoes...anywhere! in the grocery store, riding skateboards, in restaurants, on busses- it's gross! However, I did have a case of Aussie feet on two occasions: #1. my favourite $2 flip flops from Bangkok broke and I had to walk home from the train barefoot and #2 the next day I put on my new flip flops and had so many blisters i walked home barefoot and the sidewalk was SO HOT by the time i got home I had blisters on the soles of my feet too!....ok, enough about my gross feet...I'll spare you the picture of that :-)
  

• they call flip flops "THONGS" hehehehe. that took me a while to get used to when overhearing people talk about how uncomfortable their "thongs" are.

• there are wild parrots in the parks and on the beach! when I first saw the white ones I thought they were seagulls until further investigation I noticed it was a parrot!!! the ones on the beach are bright pink!
  

• they abreviate EVERYTHING! ie- the pink parrots are called "pink cockys", rottnest island is "rotto", fremantle (the port town here) is called Freo, of course, the "barbies" are BBQ's..... the train is "traino"...."uni" = university....which is great for me since I LOVE to abreviate (whatev....ridic...you get the idea)
  

• they have drive though liquor stores, or "bottle shops" as they call them. Looks similar to a gas station, but when you drive up, you tell them what you want ie- " a six pack of toohey tins please mate", and they bring it right up to your car, you pay and drive away. AND they also sell pre-mixed drinks like Jack Daniels and coke in bottles and cans.

• minimum wage is $15/hr and it goes up according to your age.....I've seen ads for office receptionists making $30-$40 per hour

• when you walk into a store, or ask someone a question, or meet someone, instead of saying "hi...hello....hey" they say "how ya going?" which drives me nuts cuz you always have to respond! usually i just stutter and mumble something along the lines of "uuuh ya hi".
  

• Aussie's LOVE their wine and beer! which of course I understand since the wine is FANTASTIC and sold in six packs at the bottle shops. On tuesday night I went to see a foreign film with some family friends. the film was part of the perth ats fest and was outside by the water in a huge park surrounded by trees. all the seats were like beach chairs, and the seats in the row in front of us had bottle holders....not cup holders for your drinks....but wine bottle holders! hahahaha I almost died laughing

• everything comes to a standstill at 6:00. All the shops close and the busses go from a 5 min frequency to once every 1/2 hr! Then everyone goes home, has a drink and waits for the sun to set before having dinner...about 9:00 these days (too hot when the sun is up)

ok, so those are just a few crazy things going on here....there are way more but I can't remember them just now. I put a few more pics on http://www.ballofdirt.com/members/69530.html
just click on journals.

love to all!
xo sarah