I'm headed to Australia (round 2), for fun and exciting adventures; beaches, palm trees, driving on the wrong side of the road, funny accents, really weird slang words, kangaroos, and lots o' booze (ugh i hate rhymes)...... stay tuned for pics and updates, and more than likely, odd theories on ridiculous things, that no one else ever wants to listen to =)
Australia has been pretty unbelievable. I've been here almost 6 weeks now(?) , it's been a slow start, but things are definitely coming together nicely. The first two weeks or so were a bit of a struggle, finding my way around, meeting new friends, fighting off some homesickness, and trying to find a job.
Loz and her "special" friend =)
The job hunt has been an adventure in it's own, I've met with quite a few salon owners and managers, some that I thought I would have really loved to work at, and some I knew immediately that it would be a horrible match! I've done a few haircut models, with a really positive outcome... or so it seemed at the time, but everyone is kind of weary about work visa, and is looking for a permanent resident, so they can stick around longer. So I've pretty much given up on hairdressing... it only makes sense though, If I owned a salon I wouldn't want to hire someone that would be building up a clientele, knowing that they were on a timed visit either. I gave up on hairdressing and started looking for kitchen work, not the greatest jobs, but they pay.... and usually cash. As soon as I started looking I lucked out, and found an ad for counter help at this vegan pizza place we go to a lot down the road... awesome! and now I have a job =)
Sinks in the Casino... minus the sink? the water just runs back...it's weird.
I walked into a casino for the first time ever a couple weeks ago! It was quite overwhelming, and the security was intense..... definitely not my thing. Not to mention the fact that I got kicked out of the black jack area by my Canadian friend Jimmy, because he thought I was bad luck. grrr. There's a little bar down the road though thats kind of part casino/part restaurant/part pub, where I learned alllll about "pokies" which we would call penny slots.... ha. Those little machines have definitely peaked my interest!
First experience with pokies!
My birthday is coming up next week!!! I don't know why I sound so excited.... I hate birthdays. I'm a firm believer that everyone should just have a generic birthday every year on new years.... but I'm pretty excited, because I'm heading off to Adelaide in the morning to visit Abbey! Adelaide's a smaller city, north west, about an hour flight. We've rented a cabin close to the beach for three nights! We'll be beaching and boozing mostly haha and she's taking me on a dolphin cruise! I'm so excited! Slightly nervous about hanging out at a beach that needs to be patrolled by helicopters for sharks, but c'est la vie... I'm on a giant island in the middle of the ocean, I suppose it's to be expected! Definitely more updates to come about that next week, and lots of pictures!
Jimmy the Canadian, my new Malaysian friends, and myself after way too much tequila!
I've met so many awesome people since I've been here... a lot of locals, and people from the "country" which has been a blast!! as well as a lot of people from all over the world. I've gotten involved in this site called couchsurfing.org. It sounds a bit different than what it actually is though. It's more or less an unbelievable international community of travelers. It's not about "couch hopping" it's more about meeting people and networking world wide. There are weekly meetings and plenty of events, and Melbourne is actually one of the most active cities on the site!
First of all, as I said in the previous post... LA was amazing, and I can't wait to go back for a longer period of time. Below is a pic I took before I left the airport. It looks like some sort of space station... lol. Which I guess... in a way LAX kind of is...
I traveled from LAX 13 hours to Auckland, New Zealand, which was really awesome. The flight was long, and I had an 8 hour layover there, but I met some really cool people, and the airport was really clean and nice!
I mean.... they even tell you not to spit in the trash cans! ha. From NZ It was another 4 hour flight to Melbourne. Definitely a lot of time travel. Started out, going from VT to Chicago... back one hour, then Chicago to LA, back 2 hours... then LA to NZ which was forward......19? 21? something like that.... and then back another 2 hours. phew. From LA through to Melbourne, I flew Air New Zealand, which I, seriously, highly recommend..... seats were comfy, airline staff was friendly, and it was relatively cheap, compared to my other options, especially booking on such short notice! Oh and the food was great too.... of course I ordered the vegan option in advance, so I wasn't quite sure what to expect, but it was really decent!
Settling in has kind of been rough, I haven't really felt the greatest, the time change is killer... but It's been nice just relaxing here.
My hobbit hole enterance/ally way =)
Tram stop, with the shop in the background...
oh, and seriously? I was worried about not being able to bring my purses from home..... There's a Salvation Army across the street, filled with brand new stuff!
I know this is a bad pic... but I have to say that I was prettttttty excited when I ran across the Aussie version of Big Buck Hunter =) If you've hung out with me at all in Burlington that you would understand haha!
So it's been a pretty awesome first few days...... minus the constant daytime headache. I set up an Australian bank account, and a phone plan! now........ mission for monday is to find a job!!! =)
I'm kind of in love with LA. As soon as Spencer picked me up at the airport, we drove away, I looked around, and said "hmm...... this is Melbourne, except people don't talk funny, and they drive normal....oh and the palm trees are different." I've finally set foot in this city, outside of the airport. I've flown over a few times, and spent some time in LAX, but I'm now happy to say I've finally spent some time in Los Angeles, and am pretty much completely in love with the city.....definitely could see myself living here some day. The picture to the left is a view of Hollywood Boulevard from Spencer's living room, obviously looks better in person, but still pretty cool.
I got in yesterday around 10:30 am. hung out and rested all day, then had dinner and wine with a friend, who also is originally from VT, he now owns a hair salon in Beverly Hills, after traveling Europe for many years. He's a cool guy, it was definitely a good night! I kind of took over Spencer's apartment last night, while him and Kara took off to some giant rave in San Bernardino. Check out their costumes... Definitely the cutest little raver kids you'll ever meet!
Today, I wandered around the Melrose Trading Post, while Spence, and Kara sold crystals. I didn't get many pics from the flea market, I wish I did though, such a cool place!!!!!!! So many cool vintage things, I couldn't look around too much, because I wasn't allowed to buy anything, my luggage is completely maxed out for the airline weight regulations. I did get a good sized piece of Black Tourmaline, which gets rid of negative energy, and is supposed to be good for jet lag, as well as many other things like promoting creativity, and a white calcite pendant, for intuition, traveling, inner peace, cleansing, and new beginnings.Also picked up a Blue Agate keychain, which is good for grounding, calming, and self confidence. I'm kind of hooked on crystals now... which is cool, kind of goes along perfect with other recent self discoveries. =D
In the food court section I found a little crepe booth.......... basically just like Skinny Pancake in Vermont. It was amazing! Also, there are so many great vegan restaurants around I don't even know where to start!!! I've kind of just been going for the junk food places, since there's no such thing as that in VT. Last night I had a breakfast tofu scramble wrap with sweet potatoes, and bacon bits. Tonight I had vegan cheesy breadsticks and salad.... mmmmm....... oh gosh, now I can't wait for Lord of the Fries in Melb.
So... I guess to sum things up. Cali is pretty awesome, this visit was planned as more of a long layover, and less of a touristy thing, which is cool, but I definitely can't wait to come back and full on explore this place!
I head out tomorrow night for Oz......... tomorrow will be filled with Macy's, Whole Foods, rest, and relaxation before my 13 hour flight to New Zealand, 8 hour layover there, then 4 hour flight to Melbourne....... ah I wish I could just teleport places, but the traveling is half the fun. sometimes, other times only in afterthought =)
I've been thinking more about the OWS movement, and digging deeper into it. Talking with friends, we have come up with many other possible situations, as to how this whole thing came to be. I'm really loving every one's opinions on this, and am pretty impressed with some of the things that people have come up with.
The death of Tupac was brought up in conversation today... or rather the conspiracy theory revolving around it. The majority of us believe that there was a disagreement, or east coast/west coast rivalry going on between Biggie and Tupac, and that is how they both ended up dead. Some believe that the Government, or Illuminati killed him, to stop him from provoking young black men into a revolution. He knew how corrupt the world was, and was determined to change it, or at least inform as many people as he could. This is the video that set off this conversation, and goes into much more detail!
Okay, so the point is....... if you become a target when your thoughts/beliefs go against the norm... than how come no one has been targeted with the organization of OWS? Wouldn't that be grounds for conspiracy against the government or something? I would think they would have shut this whole thing down before it started (without anyone knowing a thing)... unless, it was them that started it. You could also argue, on the other hand, that they tried to ignore the movement at first with the media black out, but.... I'm pretty sure that was all part of it just to piss everyone off, only because they could! They were looking for a reaction, to build all of this into a big hype... and they got what they were looking for.
Why would they bother doing all of this? It's all a distraction. Is it pure coincidence that there are massive global Blackberry outages? And what about this blocked terrorist attempt to kill the Saudi UN ambassador on US soil? Should we really be believing everything that's going on? Things are absolutely insane right now, who is to say that isn't more propaganda...a ploy to instill more fear into the American people. This was taken to an entirely new level by one of my friends, who thinks that this was a distraction to take attention from the OWS movement, and prepare us for the New World Order.... starting with WWIII, and a secret agenda called "Satan's lie". hmm.......woah. Taking this all even further... could this be the beginning of the end of the world? Our 2012?
The movement very well could have started out as a Democratic strategy for re election in 2012, like I mentioned in my earlier post. The seed could have been planted, and everything could have just grown (world wide) from there, and blown up in their faces. Or...... it could be something much much bigger! Either way, we are all just puppets, pawns in "their" little game. Anyway you look at it, there's nothing we can really do no matter what type of conspiracy this is... it's just interesting to think about.
I love the IDEA of the OWS movement, as does the rest of the world apparently, or rather 99%....but there are so many things that just don't add up right.
Last December (2010) I went on a little surprise adventure to Australia. I really hadn't done much research in advance on Melbourne, or Australia in general, because I never really figured I would go there. It wasn't at the top of my list of places to travel to for some reason. I wasn't 100% sure what I was getting in to, but I knew who I was going to be there with, and knew I was headed for a good time. Prediction was accurate. Australia is amazing.
I left VT in a snow storm, kicked my boots off at the airport, and took off to the other side of the world. Roughly 36? 38? 40? hours later, I arrived in Melbourne... mid-summer. Shocking to say the least, considering this was my first major travel experience, and how overtired I was from the amount of hours spent traveling, not to mention the 16 hour time difference, and a day leap into the future.
Within a few hours, I was sitting at a corner bar with a group of locals (would you expect anything else from me?). Given all of the factors mentioned above, sitting there listening to they're friendly chit chat was sort of a mind trip, and almost like a puzzle trying to de-code their Aussie slang..... especially in that state of mind. Luckily I had Rob, and soon Laron to translate some things, and laugh at me of course, because that always makes things better........
New Years came up a few days later, which just happens to be my favorite holiday. How awesome was it to have a summer New Years? Sweet as! (might be a typical response over there). 2011 was brought in with mass amounts of Tequila, some other crazy Aussies, and the best display of fire works over the city (any city) that I have ever seen....
The next couple weeks were spent exploring the city, mountains and beaches with Rob and Laron. It was pretty helpful to have a fellow American with me to show me the ropes and figure different things out. Laron, or LaRon as I liked to call her, had spent some time there the previous year visiting, and had gone back to live on a work visa..... because yes, it is that amazing!
Laron has since passed, and I can't even begin to describe what a wonderful person she was. Spending time with her changed my life in so many ways, and continues to... if you knew her, you know what I'm talking about. She was one of the few genuinely decent people in the world, there are an endless list of amazing words to describe her....and I am so fortunate to be able to call her a friend. Rest In Peace Laron <3
The new and exciting Occupy Wall Street movement, the start of a revolution...or something. At first I was completely all for it. We have every right to stand up for this, and I love how many people have opened their eyes to the corruption and nonsense of our government and financial system.
Up until last night I was very active on the topic on facebook and twitter, and even planned to attend my hometown's tribute to OWS today. I even wondered briefly if I would be considered a Socialist, when I've always been more or less anti-politics. Then I started talking to a friend, who couldn't care less about the subject, and I couldn't figure out why. He is well aware of the corruption and greed, and usually cares about this sort of stuff to a certain extent, and I consider him one of the most intelligent people I've ever met....so why wouldn't he want to be a part of this huge, now global, movement? I went up to bat for this hard, and he asked me about this whole 99% vs the 1% and who the 1% really was.... and it hit me........
Everyone knows how crazy the structure of things are and how corrupt everything is. That's why we're in this situation in the first place. Has anyone ever thought that the "1%" or the corruption itself set this whole movement off just to get everyone all pissed off and scrambling around, maybe causing a distraction, or to pull something, of some sorts, in someone's favor in the end?
Now, like I said before, I completely agree with all of the protests, and I think that everyone is definitely in the right for what they are saying! I also love that fact that this movement has gotten so huge and opened so many peoples eyes to what is going on in the world, the ignorance is slowly being erased, but..... could it be that this is exactly what "they" wanted?
After stopping myself mid conversation, and coming to this realization, I was determined to figure this out. I spent probably entirely too much time researching online for more answers.....and was definitely able to piece some together.
According to the official OWS website, there is a new collaboration of some sorts with MoveOn.org, AFL-CIO, SEIU, which are all huge supporters of the Obama administration and reelection (which in itself is backed by Wall Street). Others are saying that this is the new left wing tea party... So, who is really running OWS? Isn't it supposed to be a "leaderless" movement?
I've mentioned this to quite a few people, most people end up agreeing when they actually think about it, although I have had a couple people say that they would think it would be Republican based, as opposed to Democrat but, I'm willing to bet that this is nothing but a left wing conspiracy, a democratic re election strategy.
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