Trip to Tokyo

Matthew and I went to Tokyo again -- business trip for him, holiday for me. As with our first trip in 2010, we had an excellent time! Our photos from the trip are below.

Tokyo Oct-Nov 2012

Japanese Class

Konnichiwa. I started a beginners Japanese class last week. It seems good so far, as there are only 5 or 6 people in the class, and the teacher has been teaching Japanese for 25+ years. Wish me luck!

BTW, if you haven't already discovered the website Forvo, it's pretty cool. If a user has a word they don't know how to pronounce, they submit it, and another user (native-speaker of that language) records the requested word for the website.

More Aussie to American Dictionary

hoon = a driver or motorcyclist who makes a lot of noise while driving
postie = postman
tradie = tradesman
bikie = biker, motorcycle rider
pushie = push bike = bicycle
chook = chicken; also sometimes a nickname for people whose surname is White, because chickens are white
lift = elevator
light globes = light bulbs
garbage bags = bin bags
mozzies = mosquitoes
footpath = sidewalk
arvo = afternoon
reno = renovation
muso = musician
rockmelon = cantaloupe
mobile = cell phone
shopping trolley = shopping cart
pram = baby stroller
chips = chips - oddly, they don’t say crisps like in Britain; to specify French fries, they say hot chips
sauce = tomato sauce = ketchup
pie = generally a savoury pie, less often a sweet pie
ONO (in classified ads) = Or Nearest Offer = OBO in U.S.
lounge = living room
power point = electrical outlet
doona = duvet
Manchester = a city, but also an Aussie term for bedding, as in the Manchester Department will have sheets (apparently originated because Manchester had so many cotton mills, so they call household linens Manchester)
bottle shop = liquor store/wine shop
hotel = a hotel with sleeping accommodations or sometimes a hotel is just a bar/pub. And in the Aussie spirit of shortening everything, even hotels get nicknames - the Sandringham Hotel is the Sando and the Marlborough Hotel is the Marly.

Shopping Centre

Yesterday I sat on the floor of our new apartment waiting for the rental furniture to be delivered. The relocation company is providing us with "furniture hire" because our shipment was inexplicably delayed by 3 weeks.

Finally they arrived and dropped off a bed with sheets and pillows, a love seat, a coffee table, a few lamps, and box of kitchen goods. After I unpacked the boxes with the linens and kitchen stuff, I realized they forgot to give us the bath towels and all they included in the kitchen box was dishes - they didn't provide the basic kitchen supplies set with pots and pans, etc. So, still more eating out for us for a few more days!

After I made the bed, I decided to walk to the giant shopping centre to buy cleaning supplies. I emptied a small wheeled suitcase and took that with me to haul my stuff back in, since it's 3.4 km round trip.

Who'd have thought finding the right store to buy cleaning supplies would be hard? First I went into Target. It has the same logo as the American one, but apparently it's not the same company - they settled a lawsuit and the Aussie one can still use the red and white target logo, even though they're a different company.

This Aussie Target had some clothes, toys, bedding, some things for the bathroom like shower curtains, kitchen stuff like dishes, toasters, etc and that was about it. They didn't have any cleaning stuff at all, and I don't think they had anything like a Health and Beauty section, either. So, they don't stock as many types of items as American Target.

Next stop, K-Mart. Again, the logo looks the same, but according to this article from Discount Store News, the American company sold its interest in K-Mart Australia in 1978 to Coles, an Aussie grocery store chain.

Sidenote, the grocery store market in Australia, or at least New South Wales, is basically a duopoly. There are a few smaller stores, but by far the majority of one's options for nearby supermarkets are either Coles or Woolworths, generally known as Woolies.

Back to K-Mart, it stocks a larger selection of types of items than Target - they also sell automotive supplies, camping gear, make up, some snack food, etc. However, the cleaning aisle only had laundry detergent (aka washing powder) and bleach. There were no garbage bags, no Windex type cleaners, no regular kitchen sponges (although there were a few scrubber items near the mops and brooms). What the ef?

So, off to Coles. Previously, I'd only been to the Coles Express in the CBD (Central Business District - aka downtown), and I'd never seen any cleaning supplies there. This was the big Coles, though, and they had a whole aisle with tons of different scrubbie sponges, garbage bags, floor cleaners, Windex, dishwasher detergent, etc.

Hooray, I finally found everything I needed. It only took me several hours and having to go to 3 different stores. And then walking 1.7 km home while wheeling a suitcase full of stuff! (Thank goodness all 3 stores were in the same giant shopping centre!)

Royal Botanic Gardens and Sydney Opera House, and Saturday Night Beer Crawl

On Saturday 28 August we went to the Museum of Contemporary Art, and had a lovely stroll through the Royal Botanic Gardens, where there are interesting plants, lots of cool birds, and also flying foxes (fruit bats)!




We ended up at the Sydney Opera House at sunset.




We also did a pub crawl with a new friend (also named Mark), who showed us that there is good beer in Sydney. We went to:

Redoak Beer Cafe - the Irish Red Ale was good; the Honey Ale also was good, but a bit sweet.

James Squire Brewhouse - enjoyed the Governor King, but we didn't care for the Highwayman.

Heritage Belgian Beer Cafe - cool space; we liked the Leffe Brune and the Chimay Grande Reserve; the Kriek, a cherry lambic, was interesting, but too weird to drink a whole glass.

Then we tried to go to the Lord Nelson Hotel, but they'd closed early, so we ended up at the Mercantile Hotel, where we had some more James Squire on draught.

By the way, "Hotel" here can also mean a bar/pub which may or may not offer overnight accommodations.

Here are the rest of our pics from the day.

Week 1 Update

It's hard to believe we've been in Sydney one week as of today! It still doesn't feel quite real that we're living here, it still feels like vacation (or holiday, as they say here).

It's technically still winter here, but you can tell it will be spring soon. The mornings and evenings have been chilly, but in the afternoon when the sun is out, it's almost short sleeves weather. There have been a few cloudy days, but mostly it's been pretty blue skies and sun, which is lovely.

There are lots of varieties of food available here - Turkish, Thai, Indonesian, Maylay, Indian, etc etc. We still need to go out for dim sum, which here is called yum cha.

On Saturday, we met up with the real estate agent, who drove us around to look at available housing. Real estate in Sydney is very expensive, and it was a little disappointing to see what our budget gets you here. Pretty quickly we changed our minds from needing a full 2-bedroom to a 1-bedroom with a study, just so we can get something a little nicer in our price range.

Saturday was also Election Day here. Voting is compulsory in Australia - you vote or you get a heavy fine. On Saturday night, friends of our friends had an election party, so we went along and everyone was keen to try to explain Aussie politics to us ("Liberal" is conservative here, and the liberal Labor party is red, while the conservative Liberal party is blue). When we left, the election for Prime Minister was too close to call and it's still undecided. This is the first hung Parliament since 1940 - ABC News explains in this article.

On Sunday, we went to the Art Gallery of New South Wales, which is free and has a nice collection of art, and then we took the train to our friends' house, where we borrowed bicycles and rode around their neighborhood and the nearby areas a bit. It was weird to be cycling on the left side of the road!

Yesterday was Matthew's first day at work. I'll let him tell about it, I'll just add that new Google employees really are called Nooglers!

Australia has its own oracle octopus

Cassandra, an octopus at the Sydney Institute of Marine Science, has selected Labor's Julia Gillard over Tony Abbott in Australia's upcoming federal election for Prime Minister.

Article and photo at Sydney Morning Herald: Gillard's chances get a legs-up.

Just to confuse me, Aussies spell labor without a 'u', but spell humour with a 'u.'

More Aussie to American Dictionary

pom or pommy = a British person; supposedly shortened rhyming slang, pomegranate a near enough rhyme to immigrant. See this Wikipedia article for various etymologies.

bench = kitchen counter

Aussie to American Dictionary

white goods = large household appliances, such as fridges and washing machines
op shop (opportunity shop) = thrift store