Hello all
Due to popular demand (ha ha) but mostly cause I'm ploughing through my bottle of duty free Stolichnaya, here's my just back.
Arrival.
It's 6AM, the immigration lady is all smiles and Nami has been an angel (totally unbelievable, and out of character)
Walk out of the terminal... the air is so fresh and cool it hurts your lungs... the smell of eucalyptus
The air is clearer, colours are sharper and more vivid (I feel like I'm in a Rinso advert).
I look outside – wide, wide, wide, wide, wide. Australia is so flat, there's so much sky.
Nothing interrupts the horizon... no mountains out of the corner of your eye, no palm trees, nothing.
The drive home.
I have to put a seat belt on.
My sister breeds German Shepherds, her car is stinky and everything is covered in dog hair. I don't want to get in...
My sister drives sedately, between the white lines.
We stop for the ORANGE light!
We let someone else go first and don't slow down when someone is waiting to pull out of a side street, expecting them to pull out in front.
Gaz and Shaz and Daz are all still saying the same things on the radio.
It's so wide and clear. There is so much space between the road and any buildings.
Blackboys, no they're not any more! Now they're grass trees. They sit in clumps on roadside banks, with Zamia palms, amid the struggling weeds on a sea of white sand. Khakis and browns dominate where my eye is used to green.
Everyone has a new car and there are so many different types and models.
Off the freeway and into the burbs.
Tidy, fenced yards with lawned verges.
The sides of the houses are finished the same as the front, all sides have windows.
Gardens have been tendered to, looked after, cared for.
So many wide open spaces, grassed and just there, anyone's to use.
Mum's place.
Mum's lost weight and I tell her. Can't hurt to have a few brownie points in the bank to start, I'm sure I'll have plenty of opportunities to lose them later on.
Izumi has been here a week already and is (typically) organised so I let her do her thing and our luggage disappears into various drawers and cupboards. If I can find my jocks when I need them then hey, I'll be happy.
I'm shagged, Nami is holding out and everyone is laying it on thick 'hasn't she grown'. "Isn't she quick?"
I desperately need some beauty sleep so I leave them, for me it's "Goodnight" for a while.
The Stoli is taking it's toll...
Cheers for now, FB.