The weekend

Jeff cooked a pretty good meal of Thai curry.. It was either a good recipe he followed, or he is just a good cook! The oldest bank in Melbourne is the ANZ Gothic bank.. Jeff went there to open an account. Both the interior and exterior design was very gothic/Victorian.

On Saturday, May, Jeff and I went on the Great Ocean Road Day tour.
Here I was with Matt, our tour guide.One of the highlights of the trip was the 12 Apostles.. they are gigantic limestone formations that erode with time.

We pitied those we had to travel alone in our tour group. This is Simon, from Germany. We offered to take many of his photos for him.

I thought it would look pretty cool if May and I did a JetStar advertisement!
Here is London Bridge. The middle section behind my head eroded away and collapsed on 15 Nov 2000. During that moment, a couple was on the otherside, they had to wait 3 hours for helicopters to come rescue them. The NEWS crew got to them before the rescue helicopter and found the couple tried to hide from the cameras. Why?

Hehehe.. because they were both married, but just not to each other!

We spotted a wild Koala on a tree at the park we had lunch.
On Sunday, Jeff and I went for a walk on Southbank..

And the casino was on Southbank and so we went in. Jeff was asked for his age while I was not - do I look that old!!!!???

Segovia Cafe

After finishing clinic on Tuesday late afternoon, I got a text from Sabine, the Switz girl wanting to have a coffee before heading home for dinner.

So we met up and walked down to town.. we both wanted to find a small intimate cafe with a nice cultural atmosphere. So we explore the little lanes and found Segovia (a Spanish cafe) tucked in at the back of a lane off Little Collins Street. It had dim yellow lighting and candles, with soft Spanish music playing at the background. We later discovered it was one of the cafes listed on Lonely Planet.Carolina (German elective student) also met up with us there. We just ordered a coffee each and chatted in English (for my benefit), wanting to enjoy the atmosphere provided by this cafe as much as possible without spending too much (each slice of cake was $9.50 there).

I have forgotten all the German I learnt at the beginning of this year. Listening to them speak German motivates me to revise what I learnt -- I will see..

St Kilda Beach

We woke up to a very warm Sunday. The heat filled the air.. and we all knew it ---- it was a day for the BEACH!
So after packing lunch for a picnic at the beach, and purchasing our $10 thongs (the sellers keep saying "thongs" after we say jandals), we trammed (I cant say we bused so I have invented a new word) to St Kilda Beach, where we met up with Rick (my primary school classmate who now lives in Melbourne).
The sun rays were strong.. if you are not in the water or shade, the heat was nearly unbearable . And the water was still too cold to swim in so we soaked our feet, looked at the craft and art markets by the beach.. and then went to Gloria Jeans for a cool icy drink! Ahhh.. nice!

Since we didn't bring our swim wear, we could really only do what Asians do at the beach -- try to keep our faces shaded and take heaps of photos. hahaha.

By the beach, we saw a guy doing airbrush tatooing by the road, as a joke, Rick dared me to get one. After seeing its airbrushing tatoo and also very affordable.. I enthusiatically chose a design. Within 20 seconds, i have a pretty tatoo on my left shoulder.. OH YEAH!

Our apartment!

May and I spent our Friday afternoon moving into the apartment we rented right at the border of the business central district. It was very close to CBD (5 minutes walk) and 20 minutes walk to the hospital. It was not too small, very clean and tidy. The 2 bedroom, 1 kitchen, 1 bathroom apartment was on the 9th floor so it had splended view from the balcony.



This is the view in the late afternoon. And this is the night view.

Saturday

We welcomed Jeff to Melbourne by a tour around the city. This is us waiting at the elevators.

First we went around the city on a free tourist city shuttle with commentary. And then we walked zig zagged through the city. We took a look inside the immigration museum. I learnt that Melbourne was an escape nation of many European countries (Italians, British, Germans, Polish, etc) and Asians countries during the 19th century and during war time. That was why the city is very much so multi-racial.

There were several gothic and Victorian styled buildings, well perserved in the city. One of which is the ANZ gothic bank which is still operating. I should try to go inside when it's open during officehours.
In the city main streets, there were horses with carriages waiting for eager tourists (we weren't that eager). And we spotted "Three Business Men" brass statues. May and I tried to imitate his face and had lots of fun looking stupid posing for the photos.

There were also buskers, one of which is a lovely white lady moving slowly but very elegantly. She even battered her eyelids slowly! She was much more skillful than those I see in NZ. In front of AFL, there was a giant man with squeeshy sponge-filled legs.. haha.. I squeezed them and he wasnt too please.. haha. I cooked the first dinner for my new flatmates. It was rather nice - Spaghetti Bolognese with sprials.

On Sunday night, I cooked a Chinese meal. The rice was soft like congee - still eatable right?

Last Thursday

It was a beautiful day on Thursday, so May and I ended our afternoons early in the hospital and visited one of the nearby garden: Fitzroy Garden.
All the water fountains were not running due to the water restrictions in place, but they were a few interesting things to look at. Such as a beautiful bridge over a small pond, a model Tudor Village which is a gift from England to Melbourne after WWII for food supply during shortage, and a few cottages.



May had great anticipation to visit Captain Cook's cottage in this garden. When we found one sitting nicely by a row of tall trees, we assumed that was it and took quite a few photographs. However, we laughed at ourselves after finding the real Cook's cottage 100metres away, and realised we had mistaken the gardener's house/office for a historical significant structure.