Parliament — Melbourne

Today I’m just posting pictures with little commentary because I have had a bad case of the blahs today and I cannot seem to concentrate.

Victoria Parliament in Melbourne pictured below:

Parliament of Victoria, Melbourne, AUS

Lighting fixtures outside of Parliament building. Note the crowns.

Across the street in one direction is the Hotel Windsor, Melbourne’s oldest surviving hotel.  Now privately owned, it is truly a “grand hotel”.  Notice how this 1880’s building is set in the middle of modern buildings.

Hotel Windsor

Across from Parliament in the other direction is the Princess Theatre, an ornate theater dating back to the 1850’s.  There have been numerous ghost sitings at the Princess.  Today it is still a theater.  I believe Jersey Boys was playing there when we were in Melbourne.

The Princess Theatre in Melbourne

Detail of the front of the Princess Theatre:

Gold angel and lions atop Princess Theatre, Melbourne

Queen Victoria Market–Melbourne

On one of our Melbourne days, we headed over to the Queen Victoria Market, which is not open every day so we were glad to catch it on an open day.  The market is a huge area, right in the middle of the city, where one can find small temporary shops selling anything from boomerangs to totebags to veggies and fruits.  You can also find inside a covered and permanent area, several delis, chocolate shops, bakeries, cheese stores, and almost anything you’d like to eat or drink while shopping.

It was a wonderful experience.  We shopped and before leaving we each found some delicious “take away” food, some tropical smoothies, a table to sit at, and then we headed for the bakery for a cookie for each of us.  We could have gone back another day but because of our trip’s timing and the market’s hours of business, we were not able to.

Below you’ll find photos of the front of the market place from two different entrances, a shot of kangaroo meat at the meat shop, stacks of chocolate, and colorful artwork!

Queen Victoria Market entrance

Another entrance to Queen Victoria Market

Kangaroo Meat (sign says Peppered Roo)

Stacks of Chocolate!

Boomerangs

Aboriginal art work for sale at Queen Victoria Market

Melbourne

Melbourne (pronounced MelBUrN by locals), is a city with a rich variety of architecture and people and experiences.  For the first two days we stayed in the CBD (Central Business District) which I liken to staying in Manhattan when visiting New York.  Although we were in the middle of the business district, we did find a free tram to take us all over and it stopped at the end of the block of where we were staying!  The only downside was that it only ran during business hours, which in Australia end at about 5 PM.  After that, we were on our own, either walking or on a taxi.  We did a lot of walking!

It’s impossible to put all of our Melbourne experiences into one blog post so I won’t even try.

One thing that is hard to miss in Melbourne is the way that the old is respected along with the new.  All over you will see old buildings from the founding of Melbourne (1835) to the present, all side by side.  It was refreshing to see that the old has not been abandoned to make way for the new.

Federation Square, Melbourne

One of my favorite  buildings is Flinders Station which is seen below and in the far back of the photo above.  It’s a bright yellow train station where one can catch a train to all parts of the city and beyond.  It is also the center for eating, socializing, and getting an internet connection.  At any given time it is abuzz with activity.

Flinders Station

Another thing that is hard to miss in Melbourne is the presence of public transportation.  From any given point in the CBD, one will see buses, trams, trains, raised trains, etc.  There is a flurry of activity all around and if not careful, you might get on the wrong bus or tram and not have the correct pass/ticket when required!  That’s one of the reasons we stuck with the free City Circle tram…we didn’t have to worry about having the correct change or the correct bus pass.

Tram stop with raised train in background.

 

In the picture above, notice the raised train tracks in the background and then the street with a tram stop in the middle of it.  That’s right, in most places tram and bus riders will have to wait for their transportation in the middle of the road and in many cases there is no island on which to wait as there is in the picture above.  We waited, in some instances, in the middle of the road in a spot where there was no more than about 18 inches between the cars on either side of us.  It was difficult not to be blown away onto oncoming traffic in one direction or another!  And in many cases there is no rail or divider of any kind whatsoever!

Melbourne Gaol

Above is a photo of the Old Melbourne Gaol where legendary Ned Kelly was imprisoned and hung for murder in 1880.  The city has been built up all around this area with old buildings like this one right next to modern skyscrapers.

More in upcoming posts.

Off And Running

NaNoWriMo is under way once again.  Over the next 29 days, I will be trying to write a 50,000 word novel.  I’ve done it before.  It’s usually fun and challenging.  I’ll also be trying to post here every day.  That’s more of a challenge.  However, this year I have all of my Australia pictures to fall back on so you’ll be seeing some of those.

Last night I attended a write-in for NaNoWriMo and started off writing 1,679 words in one hour.  I promptly left the group and came home where it was much quieter than the rowdy group writing at the restaurant.  Today I added a few more words so I am currently at 1,918 words.

See you during the month.

 

Headlights In the Rain

[Written a couple of years ago and posted on a previous blog.  This one is non-fiction, straight from my childhood.]

I was so tired. I wanted to be home, warm, safe, in my bed, but I wasn’t. My mother and my brothers and sisters and I were walking home from the movies. It was dark and late. We had stayed all afternoon. We watched both movies and the cartoons over and over again. My mother gave us money to get food at the snack bar when we complained we were hungry.

We wanted to go home but my mother said it wasn’t time yet. So we stayed longer. Finally all the movies were over and everyone had left. We were the only ones there and the man came and said we had to leave. So we did.

When we walked outside, it was dark and cold and raining. My little sister complained that she didn’t want to walk. She cried and told my mother to call our father to come get us. My mother said no. She said our father should be asleep now and we couldn’t wake him up. So we started to walk.

This wasn’t the first time. It happened all the time. When my father didn’t have to work on the weekends, he would drink beer. A lot of beer. Then he would fight with us and with our mother. My mother always let him say things to her and even hit her but when he started to hit us, she would get mad at him. She would find a way to send us outside or in the other room where he couldn’t hit us. Then she would come and tell us to get our shoes on and our clothes ready because we were going for a walk. We had to be quiet.

And that is what happened today. He drank his beers. He yelled at my mother. He hit her. Then he started yelling at us. When he got up to hit David, my mother distracted my father and motioned for David to leave the room. Then we got our jackets and quietly waited for her. It didn’t take long. We went to the movies, walking quickly and looking back to make sure he wasn’t following us. Then we watched the movies and waited.

Now we are walking home, in the rain and I know we are all hoping he will be asleep when we get there, or the fighting will start again and we can’t leave at night time, in the rain, because all there is out there are headlights in the rain.

Update + A Story

I’m back from my trip. What a trip. I will write lots about it but time is getting away from me these days. I haven’t even unloaded the car and I’ve been back a week. I’m in the middle of doing a lot of stuff including going through over 1,000 photos! I’ve begun to post albums in Facebook. If you know me there, take a look. There are probably another three albums to come, maybe four. I’ve promised myself I will finish that part by Saturday evening.

I am also getting ready for NaNoWriMo which begins at midnight on the first of November. I plan on attending a midnight write-in that night. I finally think I know what my novel will be about. No real plot yet. I have a nameless Main Character and some other less-than-main-characters to help her out. Not a lot more than that but that’s okay. I don’t usually begin with much more of an idea of where I’m going and I tend to finish with at least a day to spare. It will happen.

October is National Domestic Violence Awareness Month. This is a cause that is near and dear to my heart, as most of my readers know. I am posting a fictional story that I originally wrote in 2001. Some of you may have read it. The idea is not that you “enjoy” the story but that you think about it and others like it out there. I’m thinking this story may actually play a big part in my upcoming NaNoWriMo novel. You will find it below.

 

The Small Girl

The small girl sat by herself, clutching the thin gray blanket around her shaking shoulders. No one noticed the silent tears on her ashen face. No one noticed the low, melodic humming coming from the child or the vacant look in her round green eyes.

Everyone huddled around the mother. Everyone huddled around the man. Everyone huddled around the police and the paramedics. Everyone paid attention to everyone, except the small girl.

No one saw the child slowly get up and walk away. No one noticed her stooped shoulders at all. No one even looked for her.

The small girl walked down the street alone, she walked with emptiness in her eyes, not seeing where she was going. She walked into the quiet, lonely street.

She had been asleep in her bed when she’d wakened to the sound of screaming and crying. She turned over and tried to go back to sleep, knowing that it would be hours before the noise stopped, placing her flat pillow over her head to drown out the noise.

The screaming didn’t stop. The crying continued. When it got louder, she finally got up and walked to the door of her room and turned the knob slowly. The screaming and the swearing grew louder as she opened the door just a crack.

She saw through the narrow slit in the door that her mother and the man were in the kitchen. There were empty beer bottles on the table – the beer they’d had at dinner time. Next to the bottles were full glasses with the dark watery liquid that she could still smell in her own hair, after he’d thrown it in her face when she’d asked him not to yell at her mommy.

She knew that if she went out there they would both yell at her to go back to bed and if they were very angry, they would hit her before she could run away. She wanted to know what was going on. Why was her mommy crying this time?

“You know I didn’t mean anything. You know I only love you. Come on, you know there’s only you!” It was her mommy’s voice. She wasn’t crying anymore. She was pleading. She wanted him to believe her.

“Don’t gimme that shit! I seen you looking at him. You always look at him like that when you think I’m not seeing you. I seen you. You were eyein’ him up and down. You know it.”

“Ah, come on, Baby. You know I was only trying to make you jealous. You’re the only one for me. You know that.”

“Get away from me bitch! You know you dun it with him. You don’t know what love is. You just get that itch between yer legs and you jump on anything that’ll scratch it.”

She heard her mommy laugh. She was moving toward the man with her arms out to hug him. Then she heard the chair hit the floor hard. She couldn’t see her mommy anymore.

The small girl closed the door and ran back to her bed. She put the pillow over her head again. She knew he was going to hit her. Or they might end up hugging and kissing and then they’d go to her mommy’s room and she wouldn’t be able to sleep. There would be too much noise, but at least the screaming and yelling would stop. She hoped they wouldn’t be too noisy this time. Maybe they’d fall asleep before morning so she could sleep too.

But it hadn’t stopped. Her mother had screamed. He had yelled at her to shut up. The house had shaken.

The small girl got up again. Something was different this time. She could feel it. She quickly and quietly walked to the door and opened it wider. She could see her mommy on the floor. He had hit her. She wasn’t moving. He was standing over her with a broken chair. He had hit her with the chair.

She watched as he kicked her mommy. “Git up! I’m hungry. Git me somethin to eat. Git up. You know yer just faking it. Come on. Git up!”

Her mommy still didn’t get up. She moved a little bit. She moaned. But she didn’t get up. The man walked over to her and kicked her. Her mommy groaned and moved a little. The small girl was so scared that she could not breathe. Would he keep on kicking her? Why didn’t her mommy get up?

She watched as he kicked her again and again. She couldn’t stand there and watch. Her mommy wasn’t moving anymore. She just made little sounds and her body moved from side to side as he kicked her.

The small girl ran out screaming, “Stop it! Leave my mommy alone! Stop! Don’t!”

The man turned on her and pulled his foot back, preparing to kick her too. She was faster than he was and so she moved just in time and his boot had missed her. He cursed at her. She was afraid that he would come after her. She ran back to her room, closing and locking the door. She heard him laugh behind her. She heard him slam another bottle of beer on the table top. She heard her mother moan and begin to move again.

The small girl opened the door and saw him kick her mommy again, just as her mommy was going to start getting up. She ran out and tried to help her mommy get up but he ran between them and pushed her away. The small girl hit her head as she fell against the wall. She didn’t cry. She got up and went to help her mother who was still trying to get up.

He pushed her away again and slapped her mommy. “You love her so much? Why? Because you don’t know her. That’s why you love her. But you don’t know her. She’s a tramp. Is that what you wanna be too? Are you gonna be a tramp too? Come on! Help her again and I’ll kick you too! Come on!” He kicked her mother again, only this time she had moved and he kicked her in the head.

When she heard his boot hit her head, the small girl ran to her mommy’s room and opened the drawer next to the bed, where the phone and the alarm clock were. She pushed everything aside grabbing until she found the gun her grandpa had given her mommy the last time the man had beaten her. She grabbed it, almost dropping it and ran back to the kitchen pointing the gun at the man.

“Stop! Stop! Leave my mommy alone!”

“Oh you’re gonna shoot me now?” He laughed at her and kicked her mommy again. Her mommy wasn’t moving anymore, just making low gurgling noises.

The small girl moved toward her mommy. She reached for her, trying to pick her up, to get her out of the way and out of the room … to safety. She tried to reach her but she couldn’t without getting close enough to him so he could hit her again. He laughed as he moved toward her, cursing and coming closer to her every second.

The girl reached for her mommy and then she heard the loud noise and she felt herself shake, then fall against the wall. She didn’t hear him anymore. She didn’t hear her mommy either. She couldn’t hear anything but the loud, sharp sound of the gun, then the sound of his body slamming against the wall. She heard him sliding down the wall, finally resting on the floor. She saw his mouth open and she imagined that he had groaned, but she could only hear the loud noise ringing in her head.

Soon she was outside in the cold. Someone gave her a thin gray blanket. She watched as the ambulance came and then the police. She watched as they pulled his body out, his face covered up with a sheet. She watched as the men worked over her mother, putting a clear plastic mask over her face and a foam collar around her neck. They strapped her to a board and as they put her on the ambulance, the small girl turned her empty stare away from her mommy, pulled the blanket around herself and walked down the dark, lonely street where no one saw her. No one noticed her. She walked in the dark. She stared into the night, not seeing it. She walked into the street not seeing it.

No one saw the red sports car hit her, not even the small girl whose empty eyes saw nothing and whose cold, lonely body felt nothing.

Heading Home

Our flight is in about 18 hours.  It has been a fantastic trip but it’s time to go home.  We’ll be in the U.S. on Saturday afternoon but I won’t be home to Portland for a few days as I’ll be staying in he Bay Area to see a new niece, Trinity.  She was born the day I left but was born at 33 weeks so she has been in the hospital.  I think she’ll be home this weekend and I am going to try to see her before I head for home.

I’m tired.  It’s time.  I want my own bed.  I miss my kitty.  I miss Tina and I miss being in the same country as Susie.

Sydney Harbor from Taronga Zoo.

And I am missing the ripened tomatoes on my plants!

Lots of pictures to come and some observations on traveling and on Australia, all wehn I get home to Portland, midweek.

Last night we stayed overnight at the Taronga Zoo in Sydney.  It was super but we didnt’ get much sleep.  More on this later.

Crikey!

We left Melbourne on Saturday and flew to Cairns.  It was a super early day for us.  We had to get up at 4:30 for a 5:30 am taxi pickup to the airport.  Yuck.  But we made it fine and enjoyed the flight to Cairns, although JetStar’s service and their staff leave a lot to be desired.  It’s a good thing we’re taking Virgin Blue when we go to Sydney because I wouldn’t want to travel on JetStar again.

Our hotel is super!  Tony did a great job finding bargain places.  This one was the most expensive of our accomodations but still under $100/night.   We were surprised to find that we were upgraded to a suite upon arrival.  That makes this a super deal.  We have a huge suite on the top floor (7 th) with a beach and mountain view.

Moi on our balcony in Cairns.

Sunday we boarded a catamaran which took us on a 90 minute ride out to the Great Barrier Reef!  Once there we had 5 hours to explore the area by snorkel, diving, glass bottom boat, semi-submersible, and the underwater theater.  I don’t swim so I didn’t get to go in the water.  However, I did get to check out the other options and took some neat pictures.  Tony went snorkeling and it was a kick to see him enjoying this as much as he did.  This was the highlight of the trip for him.

Before taking off from the Great Barrier Reef, they feed the fish which brings big and tiny fish from all over. This picture was taken through the glass of the underwater theater.

One of the things I love about this place is the birds!  We have been treated to a concert of chirping and screeching by no fewer than 20 different kinds of birds including lorakeets, herons, cranes, and many others.  They hang out in the trees around our hotel so early morning and just before sunset, the trees serenade us and put on a beautiful show as they fly up high into trees and swoop down to the water and back to the trees.  I wish I had thought to bring a mini cassette recorder so I could record it all.  I might try recording the sound on the cell phone or something.

Tomorrow will be a day of exploring the local area then on Tuesday we will be going to the rainforest!!!  Should make for lots of great pictures.

Internet is very pricey at our hotel ($20/day) so we didn’t pay for it yesterday and probably won’t pay for it again after today.  With luck we’ll have internet when we get to Sydney.

Down Under

Not a lot of time today but below you’ll find pictures from Wednesday (Tuesday in the U.S.A.).  I am also posting on Facebook and trying to post different pics here and there.  I’m a bit limited because I only have my netbook with an 8 inch screen so I can’t edit pictures very well because I simply can’t see them well on this screen.

No Worries!

I love this Aussie expression most of all!  What a thought, “no worries”!

It rained in the early morning but by the time we got out of the hotel (’round 9) it had stopped raining, mostly.  We took the free City Circle tram, which has a stop almost right outside our hotel door, into Elizabeth Street Station then a short walk (about 4 or 5 blocks, I think) to Queen Victoria Market.  It’s a HUGE market.  We didn’t explore it completely but we still spent about 2 1/2 hours there.  We had “take away” food from one of the stands there and a smoothie from another then finished it off with a delicious chocolate dipped cookie!

We headed back to the free tram and continued on to Parliament to take some pictures before walking to Collins Street and by many designer shops.  It was tempting not to go into Prada and ask if the “Devil” was in. 

This was only half our day.  I’ll fill you in on more tomorrow.