Big City....Bright Lights

Haven't had much of an opportunity to add to the blog these last few days. It has been all work followed by utter exhaustion at night after work. I have completely conformed to the new time zone now as yesterday was the first time I stayed up past 8PM and thought nothing of it. Working with the people at the office has taught me more about the cuture of the people who live here. For some odd reason, most men here are extremely skinny. I don't mean some, I mean almost every one of them. I am convicned that if I see someone who looks a little heavy, he's not even from here. I don't know why this is but I can tell you there are odd things on the breakfast buffet here every morning at the hotel. How about a big bowl full of 10" long carrots that are 1" in diameter? Yeah, nothing like a big ole carrot with your Starbucks......wait a minute, there is no Starbucks. I am told the closest thing I can find to American coffe is a "long black". Even the coffee machines have "long black" buttons on them. So what the hell is a "long black?". Near as I can tell, this black gook comes out of the machine when making coffee and the black stuff keeps coming out for longer peiods compared to other coffees.

They have salads on the breakfast buffet too....I mean like dinner salads with onions.....not to mention smoked salmon. Salmon comes with everything....breakfast , noon, and night. I have been eating so much salmon, my skin is staring to feel a little scaley (not really)! The food is weird though, right next to every salmon plate at every meal is lean HAM. These people eat more HAM than anything else. Like in London....HAM is like their steak. Anyway, I have never seen so many skinny males in my life.....you must see it to believe it.

The language continues to catch my attention. The people here use very common English words but in combinations that are odd. I over heard a fellow worker today on the phone saying these exact words....."Fair enough, I will ring up my mate so we can have a bit of a chat...and I am sure he'll take care of it....straight away". The people don't call people on the phone....they "ring them up".

We had a video conference today which was interesting in that the people we were meeting with were from New Zeeland, Auckland, and Wellington. Last week, I couldn't tell you.... where these places are on a map, but now I know people who actually live there. On the Victoria license plates, it says "The Place to Be". Queensland (another state way up north) is considered "the sunshine state". Yesterday we met with IT support .... on the phone in Bangladore. I still am not sure where the hell that place is! What seems weird is that the people all around here are very engaged with other surrounding countries.

Anyway, life here is just like any big city. You have to get out in the bush I guess to see something that is unique to the region. It's weird for me that people here go UP NORTH for warm weather vacations in the winter time.....yes, UP NORTH is closer to the equator. I used the term "dear in the headlights" today and people sort of laughed..... because they don't have deer here....they have kangaroos..... and those things are hit by cars much like deer are back home.

Anyway, found a free moment this evening to jot down a few things as I took the photo attached outside my window. It looks like any other city but spend a day listening to all the people having conversations.... and you'll soon find that "Dorothy, we are not in Kansas anymore", we are in the land of "Ozzies".

Getting Familiar

After waking up (very early) Sunday morning I felt like a new person. I have learned more than once that when travelling so very far away, it really does take some time to recover...and feel normal once again (whatever normal is). It was a beautiful sunny morning so I decided to venture out for a walk and see how far I was from the bank I was here to work with. There is a nice river walk along the banks of the Yarro river that take me much of the way to where I need to be. One of the photos above is a fancy walking bridge across the river and my hotel is in the background. There are businesses and apartments all along the river through town. After about a 20 minute walk, I arrived at ANZ Bank (they don't say Zeeee here though, it is ZED). Technically I am working at A N Zed. Weird but true.

There are actually a number of tiny quirks in the language I am finding. The people here don't call anyone on the phone....they "ring" them. I overheard a person talking to another saying "I rang my mate and told her I'd be late". Just sort of struck me funny.

I stopped at the Melbourne visitor center which was near the bank and talked with some nice people there about where to go and what to do. They advised me to jump on a tram and go to the beach where there was always interesting things to see and do. I included a picture of what the TRAM looks like. They are sort of a hop-on / hop-off transportation system and reminded me of the trams in Portland.....important to have ticket on hand in case an "inspector" hops on they say!

I walked around the beach front and just enjoyed the sunny day walking around and seeing people and how they lived. After I became tired of walking aimlessly, I jumped on another tram and headed back to more familiar turf downtown (about 3 miles from the beach), and eventually back to my hotel.

It seems everything in this city is all about RUGBY. It is on just about every TV station there is. I have been watching because of little choice and I think I am learning a bit of how the game is played. One thing for sure....it is a very rough sport! It reminds me of the "ultimate fighters" and UFC fighting.....with the only difference being someone just gave a bunch of them a very round football and threw a whole bunch of them out on a field and said have at it....half of you try and take the ball this way, the other half try and take it that way....now go beat the crap out of each other as you try.

My day ended about 8PM as I could stay awake no longer. I crashed once again but this Monday morning.....I am feeling even more normal now.

On the Ground Again.......

Melbourne is on the southern edges of the country and the weather seems to be a bit nicer than Sydney. After we landed and I made my way through customs, I was asked to participate in training a dog that smells baggage and lets authorities know that "something a'int right". The officer said the dog needs motivation and encouragement so success once in a while is important for the dog. The guy sticks a sausage that is a foot long inside my zipper bag and asks me to proceed to the next check point. I told the guy the damn sausage was so large (an inch thick) I think that I smell it! I thought if the dog misses this one....... The pooch nearly went ballistic as I walked by, go figure. Apparantly..... neither explosives OR FOOD is allowed to be brought into Australia!

I made my way to the STAR bus which is a hotel shuttle serving the downtown hotels. A local rep for the bus there helped me find where I get on the bus, helped me with my luggage loading the bus and then refused to accept a tip for his help. The bus driver came over and helped out too and even he would not take a tip. Then the door man at the Hilton helps me with all of it and wheels all my luggage into the hotel and right up to my room! He will not accept a tip! Well, in reading the local magazine a little later it says tipping here in Australia is not customary. They will be accepted in some places and situations, but it is not a custom and not expected. In some businesses, an employee is not allowed to accept a tip. WOW! Steve Weiland must have loved being here!

I unpacked and took a long shower to clean the essence of "airport" off of me. I went out for a walk along the south wharf and the banks of the Yarra River which runs throught the city. I quickly realized that utter exhaustion was settling in and my head started to ache. Doing the math, I realized that I had slept for about 8 of the last 50 hours. I thought about what sleep depravation does to a person.......then headed back to my room and was fast asleep by 7PM local time.

Brisbane for Breakfast

The flight left LAX at about 10:30PM PST and as soon as we levelled off, dinner was served. I watched a movie while dinner was served but didn't finish it. Not 2 hours into the flight I hit the magic button that told the seat to go completely flat out 180. I completely passed out but awoke wondering "did I fall asleep"? Am I...for the first time ever going to have trouble sleeping now? I thought to myself, I should have listened to Colleen and take some drugs! I laid there half awake wondering about my sleep plan....about how am I going to spend my free day recovering from travel? The deck 2 cabin was black and I thought to myself, I might be the only one awake! I grabbed my phone and lit the clock up....It said 9:50 AM LA time! I had been unconscious for about 8 hours! I was shocked at how great I felt! I figured my snoring must have kept everyone around me up until they just couldn't stay awake anymore.... so they all just passed out. Minutes later I was drinking my first cup of coffee. Two hours later everyone was up and anxiously awaiting breakfast.

Then the announcement came: We have good news and bad news, the good news is that we are ahead of schedule, the bad news is that Sydney will not let us land until 6AM local time due to an airport curfew, and....we don't have enough fuel to circle Sydney while we wait for the airport to open! Sooooooo.... ladies and gentleman, we are going to Brisbane International Airport! They will not let us off the plane to walk around there (customs was not prepared for our clan), but they will give us some fuel!

So we landed in Brisbane, were served breakfast on the ground, and were entertained out the window by the guys who rolled out of bed a bit unexpectantly to come and re-fuel our plane. When the process was done we rolled back out to the taxi way. It was light now so we could see outside and it was rather clear to me that the taxi ways, runways, and the entire airport in general, didn't seem made for 747's. I was sure our wheels were going to hit the mud!

We did make it out though and United was kind enough to hold my plane in Sydney so I could get to Melbourne. They did make us hustle though, the airport looked like an upscale mall but I missed most of it on the run. I was doing great until I was randomly selected to be make sure I wasn't carrying any explosives as I went through "international carry-on bag transfer". It is now 10:40 AM local time Saturday morning August 27th. Don't ask me where Friday August 26th went, but we are about to land in Melbourne. Good morning Australia!

Decisions....Decisions

On the way into LAX, I kept thinking about my sleep plan except....I couldn't decide. Then I realized that while in LA on the ground this would be my only chance (for hours on end) to relay my thoughts on my fantasy football selections to my wife (we have a pretty tough crowd in the league...if you delay your choice too long, everyone starts writing really nasty emails to you). After reviewing my final fantasy football selection options and sending them off to Peg via email, I heard the announcement, it is time to begin boarding.

They use two seperate entrances to board the 747-400 so my first confusion was which door to use? After deciding that any old door should at least get me on the plane (or as Richard Pryor always preferred....IN the plane), I was quickly faced with another decsion about where to go. Now when boarding a cruise ship one always is concerned with "which deck are we on? For the first time that I can remember though, I had to figure out "which deck" of the plane I was on! Turns out I was up one deck so I took the stairs up to my seat some two stories above the LAX tarmac and sort of gazed around wondering what all the control buttons around me do? For a moment I thought to myself "what the heck are all these buttons and switches for?", am I supposed to be flying this thing? I quickly learned that 8 of the illuminated lights simply repositioned my seat from head to toe. After finding the perfect spot for all eight controls, I texted each member of my immediate family and told them that "if my plane runs out of fuel somewhere over the Southern Cross, I just wanted them to know that I love them very much". More about fuel later (I almost jinxed us!). About the same time that my last text message was sent, we were rolling down the LAX runway (yeah I cheated a little).

Phase I Segment I Complete 4 Hours Down 18 to Go

As I suspected, the flight to LA seemed like a Sunday drive in the country. Does anybody actually go for a Sunday drive anymore? What happened? Anyway, I get to sit in the red carpet club even though I am not a member....nice. Time to re-charge the electronics and catch up on the Fantasy Football draft. I will have to leave Peg my next 4 picks because the long haul puts me out of touch with the league.

My flight to Sydney is being delayed a bit because they do not want anyone landing there before 6AM. Clearly they do not understand the anxiety of the people on a full 747-400 after they have been in the air for 16 hours.

I am being told I will have dinner and breakfast on this long haul but nobody seems to be able to tell me which order they are coming in. Once I figure that out, I will come up with a sleeping plan. I have never had to plan my sleep before....then again, I've never had to count on my wonderful wife to draft my fantasy football team either.

The Journey Begins

Preparing for my trip to Melbourne, Victoria Australia was pretty much the same as preparing for any business trip, but it just felt different. I never needed a visa to go to Defiance, Ohio or a foreign currency to go on a trip to Miami (although when in Miami I do wonder if USD is accepted everywhere).

The weirdness I feel inside is simply the distance involved I think. I feel like I am headed for the dark side of the moon. I will never be farther away from the ones I love. I am sure that once I arrive, everything will seem normal...I just will not know a soul in the entire hemisphere!

It is now 5:00PM CST on Thursday (sitting in ORD) and they tell me I will arrive in Melbourne on Saturday morning at 9:40 AM. Hmmmmm....it seems I am heading through some sort of time warp as I change hemispheres. At the right time, I will recline myself and sleep while trusting the crew(s) to keep us on course. Flying first to Los Angeles, the Chicago to California trip will never seem as short.... as it will tonight.....knowing the long haul is just ahead.

I find comfort in knowing that when I arrive, the signs will all be in English and the people will all speak English (or some form of it anyway) . I also find comfort in knowing the local Hilton will make me feel right at home. Home though.....will never be so far away.