Wilson's Prom

A quick video recap of our camping trip down in Wilson's Prom last weekend.  Unfortunately I didn't get any shots of the hike or of Waterloo Bay where we stayed the second night, as I wanted to minimize weight for the 24km of hiking and I didn't want to risk dropping/soaking/destroying my camera on the hike.  In retrospect, I should've brought it, but oh well... as the song says, "No time for cameras, we'll use our eyes instead."

For those curious of how beautiful the scenery was, check out the below photos from the interwebs:

Photo courtesy of couriermail.com.au

Photo courtesy of kgrahamsjourneys.wordpress.com

The World is Alight

As it is capturing headlines worldwide, you may be familiar with the fact that Australia is experiencing record-breaking heat waves, and rampant bush fires in nearly all six states.  As a result, Lydia and I have donned our fire-retardant attire and forged ahead in our lives as usual (kidding).  While we’ve definitely had some hot days, Melbourne’s weather is fickle as ever, including one recent swing of one day reaching a high of 41C (105F) one day, with the following day reaching no higher than 21C (68F).  For the most part, we’re pretty isolated from the bush fires in greater Melbourne, and it would seem that most of Victoria has been spared this year (thus far).  The same can’t be said for our island neighbour to the south of Tasmania, and rural parts of New South Wales to the north, both of which have experienced some devastating bush fires.

Bush fires aren’t uncommon in Australia during the summer months, as the vegetation dries out quickly in the dry heat and winds, and eucalypt oil in much of the fallen foliage serves as an abundant fuel source.  Even in the relatively temperate and moist Dandenong mountains just east of Melbourne, bush fire has had it’s both devastating and necessary effect, as recently as 2009.  In fact, much of the native Australian flora is dependent upon semi-regular bush fire, whether to clear out old growth to make room for new, or in the case of a few Australian plants, as a necessity for reproduction.  Take for example the Acorn Banksia, which requires fire for its seeds to disperse.

Prior to European settlement, many Aboriginals would intentionally light bush fires, both as a means of hunting as well as to protect from too much dried fuel from accumulating.

And while bush fires can have devastating impacts to many homes and croplands, many times these fires are left unaltered in the rural outback.  Take for instance this image taken by NASA, known colloquially as “Black Marble.”

Source: "WA bushfires light NASA's 'Black Marble' photo of Earth," Herald Sun

Without knowledge of Australian urbanisation and geographic landscape, one might think that Western Australia is full of bustling metropolises, on the magnitude of Tokyo or New York City.  Even NASA had to take a second look at their photographs, which were taken in April and October 2012.  As it turns out, those patches of light are in fact unchecked bush fires in the Australian uninhabited expanse.

It’s pretty incredible to imagine the exact scale of those fires (although as this article reports, they may appear larger than they actually were due to the photographic techniques NASA used to assemble its images), but even more incredible is the fact that these fires would be burning without anyone really knowing.  

Sharing Culture

Over that past month and a half, Lydia and I have been soaking up as much Aussie culture as possible, poking around town, attending footy games, eating Kangaroo and Tim Tams, and visiting Koala Sanctuaries.  It was high-time to share some of our cutlure with Australia, and what better time than at my birthday party last weekend.  Given our limited time and resources, we wanted to focus on one effort that is indubitably and quintessentially American- Apple Pie? Baseball? Obesity? Nay- Beer Pong!

Having spent a considerable amount of my college career partaking in the art of beer pong, and witnessing it's ability to bridge cultural, gender, and age gaps, we knew it was the perfect activity to which we should devote ourselves to share with our friends.  Unfortunately, we came to this realization rather late in the game and thus only had a week to tap into our creative inspirations, gather materials, and actually build our dream.  After careful planning, analyzing, and brainstorming, we determined the most appropriate way to decorate our masterpiece- in the traditional red and black livery of the fine institution that I attended and the football field where dreams are realized (or in the case of this season so far- crushed).  We briefly considered splitting the table in half- having one side of the table in UGA colors and the other in William & Mary. Lydia decided that given our limited time, the added complexity of integrating two different football fields into one, and William & Mary's nearly all-together lacking football program (I was surprised to hear that they had one at all... to which Lydia was quick to cite W&M outstanding academics), that the UGA table alone would suffice.

The weekend of September 3rd was devoted in part to obtaining these materials- the board, paint, tape, and plastic painters' shields.  Our immediate challenge was locating the above materials in a public-transportation accessible location.  One of the ongoing (although relative minor) challenges we face here in Australia is knowing where to find things that we need... there are no Home Depots, Best Buys, or [affordable] Targets here, so we're often left to our own devices (although aided by modern technology).  We recalled seeing a substantial hardware store up in Clifton Hill, having visited some of Lydia's family friends' friends that live there a few weeks ago.  We set out on our mission via the tram on Saturday the 4th and sure enough found the hardware store, which had a small selection of lumber and materials, tools, and equipment (roughly 1/20 of what the typical Home Depot stocks).  Unfortunately unlike the large hardware retailers back in the States, this hardware store did not offer cutting services.  Lacking the necessary power tools to do so ourselves, and determining the impracticality of purchasing our own (Lydia was particularly adept at this, while I devoted most of my cognitive efforts to what all I could accomplish around the house with a mitre saw), we opted to look elsewhere to find an establishment that could cut our beer pong table to official dimensions (as determined by the International Beer Pong Means and Standards Organization that I made up for this post):

Length	1800mm
Width	900mm
Thickness	12mm

Sure enough, around the corner and a block or two over, we found a proper lumber wharehouse (closer to a lumber yard) where we were able to find a particle board (or a "chip board" as it is known in Australia) that met our exact dimensions; no cutting necessary. When picking up the lumber, a very helpful gentleman, whom few would mistake for working in a trade other than lumber, lended us a hand in retrieving the board and attempted to make friendly conversation.

Since Lydia and I have been here in Australia, we haven't had too hard of a time understanding the Australians around us; spare a few colloquialisms, slang, and minor pronunciation differences, we've been able to communicate effectively so far. Furthermore, we have become acquainted with the endearing though slightly derogatory term of "tradies." Tradies, is short for "tradesmen;" think electricians, car mechanics, plumbers, etc. You can drink a "trady coffee," which is the ubiquitious term of coffee that has a disproportionately higher volume of cream and sugar than to coffee, or if your pants fit too liberally in the back, you may be wearing "trady" pants. Nevertheless, Lydia and I hadn't yet really met with a Trady or could confirm any of these stereotypes. Then we walked into an Australian lumber yard... While it was obvious that the gentleman was very friendly (he went out of his way to ensure our needs were met, and was more than willing to lend a hand), communication proved... difficult. We had carefully navigated around any extended converstation and nearly made it out clear of any awkwardness or "faux pas," until the last exchange:

Trady: "Du yah 'avawayas t'geau?"
[Lydia and Matt exchange a bewildered look]
Matt: "um, sorry, what was that?"
Trady: "Du yah 'avawayas t'geau!?"
[awkward silence while fumbling for a response]
Matt: "Oh, no, thank you though"
Trady [half tempo]: "Nuou! Du-yah-'av-awayas t-geau wth'at?"
Matt [piecing together the syllabyls]: "Oh! No, not too far, just down to Victoria Parade. Thanks for your help
[Matt and Lydia leave before another question is asked, exit stage left]

After getting back to the entrance of the lumber yard, we were both surprised to find a more-than-adequate hardware store, spread in deceptively small buildings on either side of the entrance way. Lydia, enthused and enlivened with the promise of getting all of the necessary materials in one place asked the clerk for spray paint, which included the communication issue we experienced in our last exchange, although this time roles reversed:

Lydia: "Doyouhavespraypaint?"
Clerk: "I'm sorry?"
Lydia [More assertively]: "Doyouhavespraypaint?"
Clerk [bewildered]: "I'm sorry, I didn't understand you."
[Lydia turns around to Matt with a look of desperation]
Matt: "Do you stock spray paint?"
Clerk: "Yes, right over this way..."

After a thirty minute lesson from the more-than-helpful store clerks, and two summarized explanations of the rules of beer pong to bewildered Australians, we were on our way home, with wood board, red, green, white, and black spray paint, masking tape, and two plastic painters' shields. Not having the luxury of a car or ute, we decided to walk the journey home; after all, it was a straight shot.  Lydia entertained the idea of taking the tram home, but I dismissed it, as we'd have to walk one block West, wait on a tram, have to awkwardly board the tram with the large wood board, then have to get off at the nearest stop to our apartment and walk three additional blocks home.  So we set out on foot.

And that was a mistake.  Not having walked to the store from our apartment (we took the tram), I had misjudged the distance we had traveled by about half a mile, give or take.  The distance, coupled with the aerodynamics of a large flat surface and strong gusts of wind, made the journey less than enjoyable.  At first I insisted that I could walk the board home myself, so long as Lydia carry the other supplies.  That approach lasted about two blocks; after nearly taking off twice, I conceded that Lydia was right and we should have taken the tram.  Admitting defeat, I dejectedly took one side of the board, Lydia the other, and we set out the rest of the way home:

After walking what seemed like hours, enduring some perplexed and musing glances of passing pedestrians and traffic, and only some mild bickering, we happened upon a great discovery: adjacent to the public housing building halfway between the hardware store and and our apartment lay the next best thing to a flatbed truck - an abandoned shopping cart.  Leveraging the convenience of our new found transport device, we no longer had to walk our supplies home - we could roll it:

The shopping cart proved an asset, as we could double our pace and both walk forward, although it was still a two-person job.  While one of us powered the cart, the other had to ensure the board did not slide off, coupled with continually having to check over our shoulders to ensure an enraged vagrant was not in hot pursuit, it was easier said than done.  Nonetheless, we endured and made it the rest of the way home with our supplies, after toppling the configuration twice and drawing a minutia of blood only once.  All in all, we walked the 6ft x 3ft board 2.1km home, or 1.3 miles:



View Larger Map
With all of our supplies at home, we now faced the challenge of setting up an adequate space to actually paint the table.  Without a garage, basement, or other suitable construction area, we had to fabricate our own.  We briefly considered conducting our painting in the common court yard or in our designated parking space, however we decided against it both out of inconvenience and in consideration of apartment building guidelines.  Although we doubt any provision exists against the painting of drinking paraphanalia in common spaces, we didn't want to be the precedent for it to be amended.

This left our porch area as the only other suitable alternative, although the area was only slightly larger than the wood board itself, and we had to be extraordinarily careful not to inadvertently and permanently accent the surrounding area in GA colors.  Armed with our painters' masking plastic and masking tape, we delicately fabricated our studio, being sure to cover every exposed inch.  After finishing, our porch resembled something similar to the plastic "clean room" assembled to extract Elliot et al in E.T., or the "business room" in the popular TV series Dexter.

We systematically painted each layer of the table, starting with the green base layer, followed by the yard lines (which employed a good deal of measurements, computations, and taping), the external border and endzone letters, the red border, the characteristic "G" and the waterproof sealant.  At a drying time of 1 hour, precise measuring and remeasuring, and the cutting of stencils (required for the endzone letters and Georgia "G"), the table took disciplined devotion of pre- and post-work efforts every day of the week.  Lydia actually paid for a cab one day during lunch to come home and apply an additional coat of paint.  In short, the table was not thrown together in haste:

I would be remiss if I failed to mention my slight "oversight."  At the risk of being the butt of many jokes, I cannot withhold information from our readers...  When determining the placement of the G emblem, or more specifically the first coat of the white oval background behind the G, I painfully measured and remeasured, to the millimeter, the precise place where the G should be applied vertically on the table.  All told, it took me around 25 minutes to be comfortable that the oval was centered and could be painted.  After carefully taping down the mask, setting up our makeshift paint shield (derived from a derelict box found in the recycle room at the base of the building) I applied the first coat of white, which applied quite nicely on top of the green- to the point where no additional coats need be applied.  After letting the oval dry for an hour, Lydia and I evaluated our strategy for applying the thin red outline, when it struck me, as subtle as a punch to the gut; although I had painstakingly centered the oval vertically on the table, I had failed to consider doing the same horizontally.  After all, I just needed to center the 50-yard line within the stencil, and that was that.  Enter in Einstein's theory of relativity, or so how it applies to beer pong tables.  In my devotion to centering the oval perfectly vertically, I chose not the 50-yard line as my horizontal center, but one of the 40-yard lines.  Up close measuring on the table with our posterboard paint masks covering the rest of the table and thus obscuring the other yard lines, I was none the wiser; after all, the 40-yard line looks identical to the 50-yard line.

After some earnest self-discipline and reproach, as well as some choice words not fit for publication, we had no other choice but to paint over the misplaced oval in green and re-paint the segment of the 40-yard line to redo the Georgia G emblem.  All told, this pushed back our timeline about 3 hours- mostly as a result of having to wait for paint to dry.

Despite this, we managed to finish the table in time (although sans yard-line marker numbers as we cut our stencils too large) and were able to enjoy the table for the party.  And it was a hit- nearly everyone in attendance was able to play a game of beer pong on the table, followed by a untold number of games of flipcup:

Erica and Jay defending their cups

The finished table, pre-party

Bradley and Tom mid-game

Post-flipcup Discussion

The table endured and served its purpose- we were able to share our cultural tradition with our new-found Aussie friends and bring a little bit of home to Australia.  The table remains proudly displayed leaning against the wall in the apartment, as an esteemed piece of both art and utility.

Shelter Found, 7-Eleven Assists

We knew we needed a phone once we got here to help contact agents during our apartment hunting. As Matt explained, our Droid smart phones from the states don't work in Australia. However, until we knew phone plan discounts provided by our company, we didn't want to buy a smart phone just yet. So, we bought this magenta pink phone-that-just-makes-calls to share during our first 2 weeks here. 

It certainly makes calls, but no GPS. We needed a map!

This is the map we used to navigate the city while inspecting potential apartments.

Why yes, it is from 7 eleven.... 

And it does have all of their locations marked....
But it did the trick!

The biggest thing we learned while apartment hunting, has to do with inspection times. We primarily used Domain, with the addition of a few other sites, to help find available apartments. When ready, agents would list inspection 15 minute windows that anybody could attend to view their apartment. This has its drawbacks. First of all, it becomes highly publicized, so by that time you are fighting with a bunch of other contenders for your application to be picked. Secondly, most places with inspections were not the nice places.

Before we got to Australia, we tried e-mailing agents through Domain to set up times to view once we got there. This more often than not ended up with emails going to the wrong place, or replied to with a template response included inspection times occurring before we even arrived.

One option is to ask the agent at an inspection if they have any other places you could see. That worked for us twice. However, the best way to apartment hunt here, is to go directly call a real estate office. They will know have all their current properties available that all their agents are responsible for. Many front desks of these offices were willing to let us come on down, pick up keys, and see available apartments in our price range that very day. We found two places we loved doing this! One we found the number for by seeing their available apartments on Domain. The other we found through random business cards we obtained, but more on that later. 

The first apartment we loved was right in the CBD (Central Business District)....but were told that we would have to wait for our references to be reviewed. Once the agent got back to us, she told us that she would review our references... and the owner was replacing the carpets of the place so it wouldn't be available for a week at the earliest. 

As a backup, we wanted to find another place we liked enough to put in an application. The rest of the places we had seen had only been so so, and we had toured many apartments. At our wits end, we remembered some business cards we had picked up.

The first day we were in Melbourne (as in just off the plane), we inspected two places. While chugging Monster energy drinks to combat our exhaustion, we attempted to figure out the tram system, and headed to the first apartment inspection. We ended up there pretty early, and it was locked. During our walk from the tram stop to the apartment, we had noticed a different (much nicer looking) apartment complex. We decided to wandered over and check it out to kill time. Hey, worst comes to worst it could be unlocked and a warm place to wait in! This complex was also locked. To our luck, a nice older man was walking in, and showed us the front desk that had a phone on it to call management. Nobody was at the desk, so we picked up the phone, and explained that we were curious if any places were available in that apartment. A fellow with a thick Australian accent replied that he didn't lease it out himself, but he had some business cards of agents he could give us. As we waited for him to come downstairs, we realized we were almost late for our inspection. We allllmost left, but just then, the fellow I spoke with on the phone walked into the lobby and gave us the business cards. Cards in hand, we hurried back to the inspection. I'm glad we waited for the cards at the nice complex, because the inspection we were supposed to go to was horrible, damp, dimly lit, prime Huntsman territory. 

Anyways, we decided to try giving the 'calling the leasing agency' thing another whirl, and called the agents on those random business cards. Two of them had places available we could see that day, within our price range, and where we wanted to live!

The first place was pretty close to what we wanted, but between the baby blue carpeting and older fixtures, we wanted to see the next place. Still, a pretty decent backup.

The minute we walked into the second leasing agency, we A) laughed ourselves because they were literally next door to our hotel the Westin B) were very impressed by how swanky, hip, and well lit the place was. We hoped their apartments were just as nice! We picked up the keys to two apartments in a complex of theirs that had availability. To get there, we walked through the beautiful Fitzroy Gardens, and arrived at what is now our apartment complex. Downstairs was a wine bar, a grocery store, and a bunch of restaurants. The apartment lobby was gorgeous. However, we knew from past apartments that many complexes had done face lifts to the downstairs and not updated the upstairs, so didn't get our hopes entirely up. When we got to the floor of the first apartment and were still impressed. When we walked in, we looked at each other grinning. We checked out the apartment on the other floor, and loved it too, but preferred the layout of first one we saw. Incredibly excited, we hurried back to the leasing agency. We now had a backup of that place in the CBD, plus both of these apartments with this new agency. Finally, after our week long quest for apartments where none seemed quite right, we could take a breath, and stop freaking out about how much longer we would have to live in a hotel.

Through a combination of us willing to take the apartment that day, and offering to pay an extra month up front, we got the apartment that we loved! We had already pulled together all the information an apartment application needed when we applied to the other place, so we were ready to apply. She reviewed our bank statements/offer letters/passport and accepted the bond (agencies use bonds, individuals leasing their apartments directly use deposits, but they mean the same thing), and gave us the keys that day.

We now live in East Melbourne, right near Fitzroy Gardens. Thank you, 7 Eleven map and pink phone to call that random agent. On top of everything, we later found out that the complex is the renovated historical Victoria Bitter Ale Brewery. Though perhaps not the most delicious beer currently, as beer lovers, we still find it pretty cool. Pictures/video of the place to come!

http://www.student.nbend.k12.or.us/2012/nbalvarez/Images/MonsterEnergyDrinks.jpg