Back here I am in search of … accommodation

Fun fact: Melbourne was founded by Batman. Seriously. Look it up :)

So, back at the blog after a day of silence. Like I said, we celebrated dad’s birthday on the 9th and went for a walk in the city to see the sights. First up were some of the many markets, including the oldest arcade in Melbourne, the Royal Arcade, which dates back to the 19th century.

For the Potter-fans, the vibe was quite like I imagine Diagon Alley, and there was even a shop called the Spellbox, selling talismans, ornate scepters (magic wands?) and little glass pyramids. Hmm, just got a product idea – “Earth Ray-screen”. Like sunscreen only not.

Anyways, after that we went to a place where the supernatural is taken much more seriously – St. Patrick’s Cathedral. There were several weddings going on, so we couldn’t see the inside, but just walking around the impressive building was rewarding in itself.

After that we had a walk in the park (Fitzroy Gardens) and met a friendly and talkative park ranger, who was trying to fix some automated sprinklers – I believe they were dyslexic and misread “automatic” as “autonomous”. Dad pointed out another sprinkler that didn’t seem to work, and this one seemed to take offense at being tampered with.

God one, dad :)

After that we saw Cooks’ Cottage, the house of the parents of the “discoverer” of Australia (others found it, he claimed and explored it – and can you discover a land that’s already inhabited?). At first I thought the numbers in the pamphlet didn’t add up, but as it turns out they do: It is an unusual house in the regards that it outdates the country in which it stands – it was built in 1755, while Eastern Australia was claimed to the British Empire in 1770… Which is possible because the house was dismantled and moved from England to Melbourne in 1934.

We continued by the free city-circle tram to Federation Square and finished the day by going to a nice Italian restaurant near the hotel.

The day after I got up way too early and my parents were nice enough to drive me to the airport (their flight to Tassie wasn’t until noon). When I finally arrived in Sydney I got to my share house in Redfern and moved in. The people here are nice and friendly, but after listening to my gut feeling and my new friends among the locals, I’ve decided to look for better accommodation. This is due both to the neighbourhood, which is run down, and doesn’t really make you feel safe, the house being trashy, and the rent being too high. I’ve learned that you shouldn’t rent from someone individually, but rent as a group, so as to avoid the greedy Aussies trying to make a quick buck off the less experienced foreigners and students by renting out shoddy houses. So as per the 28th I’ll be homeless again if I haven’t found anything else by then, in which case I’ll go back to the hostels. I’m hoping it won’t come to that, although I’m actually quite used to hostels by now, and many of them are less trashy than my current residency. Either way, I’m hopeful that I’ll find something good in the coming weeks.

So, today was the first day of orientation at UTS, and I don’t think I’ve ever gotten so many new contacts on my phone in such a short period of time. Apart from the socializing, there was a whole bunch of welcomes, information and offers thrown at us everywhere we looked as we were haplessly herded from hall to hall. Actually it was a lot nicer than that made it sound, but by the time you’ve done it for a whole day, your head starts buzzing. So in the end it was nice to go to the local cafe, The Loft, and just kick back for a while – with a chai latte of course :)