Chickens

A cascade of seeds.

He looks innocent enough

Trying out the shoes

It's been yet another interesting day here in Oz and it's only 3Pm. The Baby, whom we'll call Thing1, has been learning to walk and is doing pretty well as far as finding her COM. Today presented a new challenge though when we put her in socks and little boots for the first time. You see, it was "cold" this morning...meaning it was 21 degrees. The 4 year old, whom I will call Thing2, is king of making messes and today proved no different. Today's mess brought to you by Thing2 and Chicken Feed.
xoxo,
F

Musings

The Holy Grail
Grease. r.e: fish and chips

Hallo Again,

I admit I'm getting a bit slower at posting but that's also because there aren't as many big things to post about now that I've seen most of the area. I'm sure more material (i.e pictures) will pour in once I'm in Sydney, Melbourne and then off on the rest of my trip.
Every day there are a few more observations I make regarding how living here is different from Canada...apart from the obvious. Having said that, my brain is doing a great job of being on vacation and I can't always recall the differences I've noticed unless I write them down. *Yes, I can hear you thinking those blond jokes; your brain would go on holiday too if given the chance*

Since being here I've been to the grocery store a few times and found that it is the same....but different. I may have mentioned to some of you how expensive certain things are. For example, the $1.99 trash magazine on stands at checkouts is...$11.95AUD! Our exchange rate is not quite that favorable to the Canadian Dollar. Thankfully, I'm not partial to trash mags so can live without.
Some more grocery finds:
Rather than Weetabix they have Weet-Bix (weet-bix are rectangular). Almost all the cereals are whole grain healthy ones, though about 81.6% of them also have dried fruit in them which I'm not too fond of. They don't have Shreddies or Mini Wheats...a tragedy, I know. That was sincere. "Sultana Bran" does not have the same ring to it as "Raisin Bran". Which brings me to my next point: Am I the only one who only just realized that "Kellogg's" has two "g"s? I can't say I feel like I've missed out on life for not noticing that earlier but there you go.
Nestle makes one of the only diet yogurts available. Weird.
Macleans is not a popular magazine with yearly university reviews and the ability to get people fired by voting them unpopular or "most-hated" (remember the Canadian Tire ad guy?). Macleans is a toothpaste.
Sanitarium is a health food company. I can see how the name works in some ways but I can't shake the image of mops, bleach, and dish gloves.

Yesterday I saw an advert from a bank saying "Do not steal cards; we haven't fed our falcon today". I don't want to be overly critical...but it's hard to resist. Wouldn't you think that the country with the highest number of deadly snakes, spiders, sea jellies, etc would be able to come up with something a bit more threatening than a falcon? Perhaps I'm much mistaken but from what I know of falcons they tend to eat small birds and small mammals. I've never known one to take on a human, but hey, maybe they are bold when hungry. Or, as with many things in Australia, they are ten times as big as I know them to be. Whatever the case, I'll be watching out for swan-sized-human-eating falcons from now on.

This reminds me, I saw a small bat last night! After only seeing mammoth-sized fruit bats it was a bit of a surprise to see a little one (yes, it definitely wasn't a bird).
On the topic of bugs**, I've now seen a cockroach in person and think they are disgusting. Just as I was trying to remember if they could fly it answered my question and flew straight towards my head. Needless to say I am not going into the shed again.
There are three St.Andrews Cross Spiders that have installed themselves on the trampoline and I must say they look really neat! It will be a shame to move them so I've put that off for at least a day. I also put it off because I needed to go check if they were poisonous or not :)

One last thing and then I will stop rambling. Tim Tams are amazing and everyone should try them, which in turn means that everyone should come to Australia. A.S.A.P. Tim Tams and white beaches are reason enough to stay here for life (alright, I am exaggerating a bit but they are quite good). That's about it for me at the moment.

xoxo,
F

P.S ** I do know bats are not bugs, I'm not that blond. It was a Calvin and Hobbes reference.

A Whole Month!

Possum.
Sunshine coast

The city center is barely visible through the fog.

Halfway down to the rather sad falls

I lied, there are two trickles, not just one. See if you can spot them :) I can't imagine the falls get any bigger than this as this is the wettest season in nearly a decade.


Hallo!

It has now been a month since I've been here though I find that hard to believe. The expression "time flies" is quite appropriate. It continues to rain daily here though I don't mind too much as they were in dire need of it.
This weekend was a fairly quiet one. One of my friends is in Brisbane for Uni so I caught up with her and we went to Mt.Coot-tha which is a touristy lookout on the city with some hiking trails. Unfortunately we didn't get the best view of the city because of the clouds from the rain.
Despite the weather, we went on a hike to Slaughter Falls. It's name is terribly inappropriate (unless of course Slaughter was someone's last name). I personally see it as though we were expecting to visit Niagara falls and wound up on the American side...but on a much smaller scale. What's worse is that we were joking on our way down the hill that the name is probably misleading and we would arrive there to find a trickle. How right we were.
Sunday was spent on the beach along Sunshine Coast. The beaches were nice enough but not "typically Australian" with white sand etc. It could have been a Canadian Beach in the summer- 20 degree temperature and everything. I kid. I am little more attached to the Gold Coast beaches because they take your breath away.
Some sad news: I've not been able to get a picture of a bat yet.
Some good news: I got a picture of a possum. Unlike bats, these little guys freeze when they see you and give you time to try and focus in the pitch black (there aren't many streetlights where I am) and won't leave until you do! Not great if humans decide to start eating them because they'll be very easy bait. If any of you know that this is already in practice, please don't tell/correct me as I really don't want to know.

xoxo,
F

A Typical Day

She eats everything in her path that she can manage to pick up or bring her mouth to. Sand at the beach and mulch at the park are no longer safe when she's around. And for all of those concerned, this was "kid friendly" paint and therefore not toxic.
The forever running around 4 year old.
As you all know I'm an Au Pair here in Australia for the first part of each weekday. Here are the two kids I look after, 8months and 4 years old. From these pictures you can get the gist of what they are like!

Where the Wild Things Are

I'm glad they were clear on the rules of staying alive; I was sorely tempted to climb in there as the fences weren't too high.
Molly the Koala


Napping Koala.

Galapagos Tortoise

Green Tree python


It wouldn't be a true trip to the zoo if there weren't elephants refusing to turn round and show us their better side.

Tasmanian Devil


As soft as a puppy

An Echidna who was marching all over the place with authority.

Fang #1 (there was a number 2). She was said to have "Big betty Davis eyes" and I wondered how Betty Davis felt about the comparison.
"Bluey"

"Acco"

One of the American Crocs.


Graham at the Crocoseum show. Graham is the croc...

Australia Zoo- Home of Steve Irwin

This Scarlet Macaw was used in one of the shows and apparently didn't feel like staying in the building because it flew to where the koalas and elephants were, about a ten minute walk away.
A kookaburra again.

Finches bathing. Sorry for the poor focus- they move faster than my shutter.
A purple bird for which I will soon find a name.


Plumed-whistling duck

Emerald Dove

Brolga showing off.
Possibly Star Finches.


Hallo Everyone,
Hopefully you're having a good weekend and the snow isn't coming down too hard. Here are some pictures of the birds at Australia Zoo. A large percentage of the population at Australia Zoo is taken up by crocodiles, as it was Steve Irwin's home, so I will post pictures of crocs when I get the chance tomorrow.
xoxo,
F

A couple more observations

- Sanitorium.......I'll let you guys guess what that is and will fill you in on it later. At first I thought it either had to do with a janitorial service (sanitation) or an asylum of some sort ("ium" and sanity). I was wrong on both accounts.

- Whoever named the streets round here had an affinity for the letter "o", or rather double "o"s. For example: Amaroo, thagoona, tarooko, boondooma, coondooroopa, mooloolah, etc.

- I have now determined that minutes go by 20 times as quickly as they do in the rest of the world because my "600 minute" calling card ran out in 30 minutes.

- "How'd you go?" means "how was your day?"

- "It's alright" replaces "you're welcome"

In Rainbows (but not Radiohead)

Sunset and the rainbow.

End of the storm.

An afternoon thunderstorm. (still going)
We have had a very rainy week here and from all accounts it sounds as though everyone is having a snowy week back at home. As a result of all the storms I have seen a lot of rainbows all of which have been in the same spot. The only downside is that I've not been able to take a picture of it in full as there are houses in the way. Somehow I don't think the residents care to have their homes demolished for better rainbow-viewing...and I cannot say I blame them.

Observations

Here are a few things I've taken note of since being here. I'm sure there will be more to add to the list as time goes on.
I will start with the most important one: an answer to the question that has probably been burning in all your minds. Then I will proceed in no particular order:

- The toilets do NOT flush in the opposite direction. They flush down and do not spiral in either direction. Disappointed? Blame the plumbers.

- Rat Tails are "in". I don't think they should ever have been revived. I apologize if that offends anyone.

- Cafes are called Takeaways; though you can still sit there and eat/drink.

- Buses have their own freeway (pretty neat- no traffic jams and always on time!). Your bus fare is dependent on your destination.

- There are switches on outlets.

- Brekky, Bickie, Tely, etc etc

- "Boot" rather than trunk

- No Graham cracker crumbs, no oreo cookie crumbs, no crumbs whatsoever= no crumb-crust pies.

- Guys wear short shorts for shorts rather than short pants for shorts.

- Flip flops are called "thongs" because it's more manly or so I'm told.

- Justin Timberlake remakes sound extremely funny in a deep voice with aussie accent.

- Raisins are called sultanas; peppers are Capsicum; sweet potatoes are kumara; and papaya is pawpaw

- Dumptrucks have mechanical arms that pick up the bins on the curb to tip them into the top. The city workers never have to touch the rubish bins.

- Book covers are different than the same books back at home.

- Spiders here put all spiders I've seen at home to shame.

- All forms of candy here are grouped under the term"lollies" regardless of whether they are on a stick or not. i.e: chocolate is "chocolate loly"

- Ribena comes in a Cranberry/Blackberry mix and is not only advertised everywhere but sold in takeaways (see the third point) !! If you don't not know what Ribena is, then shame on you.

- Coffee is very expensive. Perhaps there are fewer caffeine slaves here as a result.

- People are people the world over. No surprise there.


And as a final note, you can go ice skating in the middle of an Australian summer. If David Miller read this blog then perhaps he would feel guilty about delaying the opening of our ice rinks at home during the winter.

Kookaburra

"Yelling" at the honeyeater, whose wing is on the right side of the picture, trying to steal it's perch.
This is a laughing Kookaburra- the kind that eats all the gumdrops he can see or something to that effect. They are quite a bit bigger than I had expected.

Storms and Surf

I don't have pictures of surfing or swimming as it was raining too much to take the camera out but here are a couple pictures taken between downpours.

When it rains

Victoria bridge to city center.


Kangaroo Point cliffs.
Prehistoric pelicans.....officially called "Bio-mechanical Pelicans" by Christopher Trotter.

Prehistoric fish?

Captain Cook bridge.

An extremely rare and exotic solar paneled daisy.....

Saturday's storm clearing up in time for the beginning of the sunset.

Anchor from maritime museum.

It was an extremely rainy weekend here which is quite the change for Brisbane (we didn't get any of the flooding or rain that was happening across QLD in January). I still managed to get some sight seeing in:
-Went the full length of southbank's pathways past the Maritime museum with ships from 1880 and past Kangaroo point which is a popular place to rock climb.
- Visited Sanctuary Cove marina on the Gold Coast
- Went back to Surfer's paradise to go swimming and surfing during a storm. The water was still warm and it was a lot of fun despite the strong undertow reminding us to be cautious.
All around a great weekend despite the weather.
ttfn, F