Monday, March 23, 2009

Updates from Australia

Krista and I had a good flight into Australia. We didn't watch any of the movies. Okay, I watched one... it was the riveting account of the man who invented the intermittent windshield wipers and the evil automobile manufacturers who stole the invention. FORD! The monolithic evil in the movie. The main character was supposed to come across as a hero, I think, but mostly he seemed insane after being offered 30 million as a sort of apology from Ford and then deciding he would rather go to court despite the fact that it comepletely tore his family and marriage apart. Anyway. That was the best movie playing. Krista gave up on it after about twenty minutes, declaring it "boring." HA! If she had held on she would have learned that windshield wipers are hard to make.

We arrived in Sydney a bit ahead of time and made it quickly through customs. They are very serious about you not bringing in most food items. My Aussie friend Geoff says this is because Australia is an island and they don't want any "nasty little bugs" getting in. And I hate to point this out, but Australia has more poisonous animals per square foot than anywhere else in the world. But it's good that they are trying hard not to let any other nasty bugs in.

Geoff took us to his house for a few hours where we hung out with him and his wife Liz, as well as a couple of American friends. Then our friend Shawn came and picked us up and we went out to an excellent lunch at Trellini's. Then we went to the place we're staying in Newcastle. I'd put a picture up, but I know you people will tease me about the pictures of the place. I know your merciless sense of humor!

Then we went to dinner with Shawn and Heather and their little girl, which was fun... Mediterranean food. We managed to keep ourselves awake til about 9 last night, which was pretty good considering. Saw the Southern Cross in the sky last night, which was great. We went on a little walk around town in the evening. It's interesting, they don't have many street lights so it was pretty dark. And we saw an ENORMOUS bat flying around. Krista says that the Brits called them "flying foxes" when they first arrived because they are so huge. I believe it. Also, I think the Brits are cute for saying that. They should have gotten some pegasuses and flying dogs and they could have had a flying fox hunt. I bet they never thought of that. (EDIT: Krista adds that they really did think they were some breed of flying foxes... they didn't know they were bats.)

We had a nice breakfast this morning, and then Krista went out to campus and I hung out for the day with Shawn and his daughter. We went to a park and had lunch at Hungry Jack's, which is Aussie for "Burger King." I wanted to try the "Aussie Burger" (note to self: pronounced 'ozzie burger') but it had an egg on it, so that was right out. We also talked a lot about Shawn's team here and ministry, which was fun.

Now Krista and I are back at our place, and in a couple of hours we'll go out with the team for Thai food and spend some time together. We're having a good time so far, and enjoying Australia and our friends and co-workers here.

I've learned that the Aussies like to shorten a lot of words and have other words we don't use. Two favorites so far:

Brekky (breakfast)
"There are biskys in the bisky jar"... roughly translated "cookies in the cookie jar"

I also like the pedestrian crossing signs, which are yellow signs with two big walking legs on them.

Okay, that's enough for now. I'll post again soon.

3 comments:

  1. Marc was nearly transferred to Sydney a couple of years ago, but plans fell through at the last moment. We were terribly disappointed. (Though I must say, the scary spiders creeped me out! The Huntsman spiders are HUGE!)

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  2. Do you notice how much there is about food in Matt's blog? No pictures of the food though - too bad. Have a chocky bicky for me.

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  3. Anonymous3:52 AM

    we're thankful to have your humor here matt! keep it up :)

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