Right near da beach

Since I'm going to be here for so long, I don't feel the urgency to jam pack my weekends, which is good and bad.  It gives me time to relax, but at the same time I feel lazy.  I'm in Australia and it's beautiful outside.  GET OUT AND DO SOMETHING.  A few different people sent me a story from the New York Times, so I had a list to start with.

On Friday night I met up with Chris and Eric, two consultants from my company that I hung out with in Miami a few weeks ago.  They're on another project in North Sydney and agreed to come and meet me at my hotel since I was phone-less and had free drinks in the Executive Lounge.  We went out to a pub at the bottom of my hotel after a while and a random Aussie named Michael befriended us.  He invited us to go out with him and his friends from there to George Street, which is the place to go in downtown Sydney.  We went to a place called The Ivy that had $9 drinks - yikes.  Somehow, I think I'm going to have to get used to this.

Michael and company ended up leaving early, then Eric and I got separated from Chris.  We looked for him for about a half an hour and then left.  Eric caught a taxi and I was free to roam back to the hotel.  I struck up a conversation with two girls that were walking in the same direction as me and we came to an unforseen crossroads:

Girl 1: "So how old are you?"
Me: "Guess."
Girl 1: "21."
Me (shocked/mock insulted face)
Girl 2: "20."
Me (even more insulted face)
Girl 1: "19?"
Me: "Really?  Come on.  I'm 28."
Girl 1: "Wow, so you're pretty much a pedophile right now." (jokingly)
Me: "I guess that makes you all like 20?"
Girl 2: "18."

Lesson learned: be whatever age they want you to be.  Joking aside, they were cool (one of them was named Georgia!) and pointed me in the direction of my hotel without any more blows to my ego.  The underagers being out and about are definitely something I will have to get used to as you will see on Saturday night (read on).

Unfortunately I had to work on Saturday morning, so I hung around the hotel lounge until about noon.  I took a recommendation from the consierge and decided to take a ferry to Manly Beach.  Before I left I had a mission to get a new mobile phone. Eric advised me before I left to talk to AT&T about unlocking my BlackBerry so it could be used with other carriers. It was a pretty simple process, so all I had to do was swap out SIM cards. I bought a Vodafone card at a convenience store near my hotel since they allow pre-pay and contract plans. I opted for the pre-pay, so I just had to log in online with my new ID and put money on it, then I was ready to go.

The wharf was a short walk from my hotel and the ticket to Manly Beach was only $12.00 round trip.  The half hour ferry ride ended up being the best part... the view of the opera house and the harbor were amazing.  The water was calm (I hear it can toss the ferry around sometimes) and the weather was 80 with a breeze.  The beach was nice as well.  There were surfers everywhere and yes, I did see some topless sunbathers.

I strolled from one end of the beach to the other, which took about 35 minutes each way.  The water was a little too cold to get in, plus I didn't want to set my things down unattended.  I thought about trying to get into a pickup game of volleyball, but it looked like some kind of tournament was going on.  I still hadn't talked to a soul all day, so I made an effort on the way back to the ferry to talk to a girl that was also alone (ok, so I creeped her for about 50 meters until I was sure she was alone, too).  Her name was Lise and she was from Sweden.  I thought I had found a new Carolien until she told me she had lived here for a year and her visa was up.  She had to go back to home in two days. Nuts. We ended up talking the whole ferry ride back to Circular Quay and then got a drink at a pub in The Rocks, which is a restaurant and market area between my hotel and Harbor Bridge. We exchanged information just in case - I've learned that by now. We talked about meeting up that night but since it was her last night in town I was pretty sure she would be celebrating with friends.

I talked to Chris and we planned to meet in King's Cross, an area recommended by some people on the previous night. I heard it could get a little dicey late at night, but we were going out together so it shouldn't be a problem. Chris had been there quite a few times so he knew where to (and not to) go. Even so, I walked up to a few girls and asked for recommendations. Yes, they turned out to be 18. They threw out a few namse and then said there was also a place called Sugar hill where all of the cougars hung out. At first this threw me off, but then I thought... a cougar to an 18 hear old is probably around 28. I'll keep that one in mind.

We hit up a few pubs and then found cheap drinks ($5) and stuck around for a bit. Lise and I tradied texts while all of the young'uns walk by, to a point where I felt uncomfortable and creepy. Adding to that was the fact that they were all wearing tube dresses a la Jessica Dos (who looks really good in them I might add).  Imagine this dress but two inches shorter on a girl not quite this hot and 7 years younger.  I'm not saying they were skanky or anything... we'll just call it skimpy.

So Chris and I are sitting in this bar and 3 cops stroll in and start taking pictures and documenting things.  A waitress comes by and randomly puts a plate of pizza slices on our table.  I asked one what was going on and he started interviewing me.  I wasn't sure if I was about to be in trouble or what.

Cop: "Did you get a menu?"
Me: "Um, no..."
Cop: "This is a restaurant.  You should get a menu."
(Note - it was around 11:30 pm at that point)
Me: "Uh, ok."
Cop: "How did you get this pizza?"
Me: "The waitress gave it to me."

He started lecturing about how they were operating outside of their license and I was starting to regret asking him what was going on. It was a crackdown on the restaurant, and I felt kind of bad that I contributed to the evidence.  Can I do a takeback on that? I don't think it's realistic to expect a restaurant to serve food until the wee hours of the morning, but I don't know the rules in Australia.  The owner or manager was running around, sweating bullets and the cops stayed for a good hour interviewing the cook, waitresses and paitrons.  We left after a while to try something new.

We bounced around to a few places, but we had to be picky.  The area used to be the red light district and many reminders remained.  I'm pretty sure I saw a few (unattractive) hookers on the street and there were a few strip clubs here and there.  A few had pretty good names - The Ba-da Bing, The Pleasure Chest - way to go, marketing team.  We finally decided on a bar... wait for it... Sugar Hill.  It had a short line and the cover was only $10.  I'm sure if we had females with us we could've gotten in for free.  Just as I suspected, it wasn't a cougar bar - everyone just wasn't 18.  There were a few older people in there, but the music was good so we decided to stick around.  I bumped into an Aussie named Kirsty and we danced with her and a few friends for most of the night.  She lived in Coogee and promised to give me recommendations on places to live.  Check off another beneficial friend to have in Australia.  Also - an Australian accent bumps you up a number on the 1-10 scale.

On Sunday I was supposed to meet Eric to go on a walk between Bondi and Coogee Beaches.  These two beaches are the other 'it' sunspots in Sydney.  Eric called me to meet up and I texted back an hour or so later, then made my way to the beach.  I didn't hear from him, so I ventured on the walk myself.  Almost immediately I heard American accents, and two California girls named Tiffany and Tori started the walk at the same time as me.  They were on vacation, so no luck on the long term friend front, but we kept each other company and had a good time.  The hike was beautiful, taking you right along the coast for some breathtaking views of the ocean (see picture).  You also can go through a cemetery and venture into beach neighborhoods.

It probably wasn't a good idea to do the 2 hour trek in flip flops because #1 it started on the sand and that chafes and #2 there were lots of hills and stairs.  We survived though and rewarded ourselves with dinner at a cool spot on Coogee Beach that had 7 bars, one of which was called The Aquarium.  It was getting dark and a bit cooler, so we didn't even go down to the beach itself. After dinner I took a bus home and hit the sack early.  I made 6 friends this weekend, though most won't be here long enough to hang with.  I'm not sure what I'll be doing next weekend but I have a few ideas: climb the Harbor Bridge, visit Darling Harbor, and oh yeah, find an apartment!