First days in Sydney

I already got in touch with Nadine (I met her on the CeBit 07 and we found out that we're in Sydney at the same time) so I could sleep 2 nights at her place...she lived in a large room with own kitchen/bathroom in a pool/guest house of some CEO.
I met the whole family ones (who turned out to be very nice) and considered asking them if I could move in after Nadine left but although the room was relatively cheap (150$/week) I preferred people around me rather than paying a cheap price, be more or less on my own and get woken up on weekends by the kid playing basketball early in the morning.

FeeBee vs. CEO Bentley (and 196x Corvette) *g* nice contrast!

I stayed for two days and then had a look at the reisebine hostel guide (I highly recommend this German page to everyone who intends to spent some time in Australia) and choose to go to Sydney's oldest suburb - Glebe and the Glebe Village Backpacker.

Glebe's name derives from the fact that the land on which it was developed was a glebe, originally owned by the Anglican church. 'The Glebe' was a land grant of 400 acres given by Govenor Arthur Phillip to Reverend Richard Johnson, Chaplain of the First Fleet, in 1790. Glebe was also home to a first grade football team in the New South Wales Rugby League (now the National Rugby League). The Glebe Dirty Reds were - as I heard - the first rugby team in Australia, relatively successful but got (unfairly?!?) excluded from the league in 1930.

The hostels totally matched my expectation with a large outdoor meeting area, BBQ days, a comfy TV room, a bed and most important nice people.

My mission for the upcoming days: Have fun with the people and find a shared accommodation (the hostel charges 140$/week for being in a 10!!! bed dorm). I signed up for the close by library for a 1,50$ and got 2 hours of internet every day in return (all day if you just wanna research and don't access mail/upload pictures). Looking at gumtree, domain.com.au and flatmates.com.au, writing down the basic facts and possible questions with the phone number and call the landlords for sightings and finally drive there. Finding a (resonable) place to stay is crap in almost all parts of the world, I reckon.

It took me 3 full days with a lot of ups and downs to find my current place but I paused every second day for some fun and relaxation. I even - as I found out later - ended up in Australia's biggest comedy show called "Chaser's war on everything" when they did some shots on the rental crisis in Sydney. I went to the sighting, a woman opened the door and a guy showed me around. When we went to the bathroom they showed me the bath top with a blanket and a pillow in it and said that this was supposed to be the sleeping place. There was another option outside next to the dryer...but I actually considered the little shed outside as sort of a last option....and seriously I've seen worse places. They toped it by a guy in a room pretending to throw up after a hard night out...but as a former backpacker you're kind of used to those situations. I got a strange feeling about this sighting but my guess was it might be a research project for the close by university. The woman called me after I drove a couple meters and explained the situation so I went back. Her behavior afterwards can be described as focusing on getting my signature to be able to publish it. She promised to notify me if they broadcast it...but as I said she probably would have said anything. I found out later that this promise didn't match the show's policies which didn't surprise me at all. After that I went back to the hostel and told the story. Cause I could cross another sighting of my list due to the same phone number I tried to find people to bust the show in telling'em a really great story (something like a girl goes in and tell'em that she's having gang bangs but inviting the house mates to join in) and then negotiate about the payment afterwards. Usually they pay 50 bucks

...but for a great shot I was sure they'd pay more. Unfortunately none of the girls/boys around didn't have the guts/time to earn quick money...
Anyway...you can see the whole 3rd October show here (Video). If you're wondering why I actually lay down...they cut out the parts where they were trying to get me in and I did it more for the sake of it...but it looks funny ;-)


We went to a quiz in a bar and won! a bar tab against aaaaall those other teams...cross cultural knowledge and a group of 10 helps ;-)

The other day we heard from a "secret" myspace sponsored "Digitalism" gig (they're German and made songs for "Daft Punk"). What a queue! At least myspace spent some money on goodies for us.

getting there

the queue

group picture

Having fun

some first impressions when I was wondering around Sydney...

Hyde Park Sydney with a little photo art exhibition
(I cross it every morning on my way to work)

Hyde Park fountain

Sydney Sky Tower (view from Hyde park)


figuring out where to go the next day (Allianz Australia at Darling harbour)

Fairfax view on Allianz

passing the pedestrian bridge with a street art event

I finally found a nice place to stay in Palmer St., Darlinghurst (next to the Ferrari/Maserati dealer on William Street. Pepe (the landlord)...

...asked me whether I'm up to go to the Spanish Festival at Darling Harbour with him and two Columbian girls. Sunshine, good food and something to do...Why not?

Marcella (she hardly speaks/understands any English by now) and me

nice show

Samba!

I think I jumped into the Harbour (link) at the very same weekend/day on Saturday night. After that I discovered a bit more about this place by spending some evenings with my (former) room mates (Steffi, Jens, Kevin)...

...and wondering around Sydney:

Mic @ Royal Botanic Gardens (where our IT Christmas party'll be)

what a view!

just really nice

where I witnessed an asian Wedding for about 15 minutes until the sealing kiss :-)
(Romantic but pretty public and probably expensive)

but back to Harbour Bridge and Opera

Mic sitting on Mrs Macquarie's Chair

Mrs Macquarie's Chair is an exposed sandstone rock cut into the shape of a bench, on a peninsula in Sydney Harbour, hand carved by convicts from sandstone in 1810 for Governor Macquarie's wife Elizabeth. The peninsula itself is named Mrs Macquarie's Point. It is part of the Royal Botanic Gardens, at the end of Mrs Macquarie's Road. Mrs Macquarie was the wife of Major-General Lachlan Macquarie, Governor of New South Wales from 1810 to 1821. Folklore has it that she used to sit on the rock and watch for ships from England sailing into the harbour. She was known to visit the area and sit enjoying the panoramic views of the harbour (even though it was way before the Harbour Bridge and Opera were built).

first resumee: I love Sydney!

what I definately do not love though is the parking situation. There is no free parking! All suburbs around the CBD (Central Business District) got signs who prohibit parking during a certain time of a day (usually in the morning). Pepe said it won't be a problem...for a week. Then I got my first parking ticket: 79$!
What to do? I noticed that brave FeeBee needs to hit the road again...with another backpacker...

...first I had to park her somewhere free of tickets...and the only 24 hour free parking spot in Sydney which is close to the centre is the car park of the Cricket?!? Stadium just a footwalk away from Kings Cross. I spoke to the staff and just didn't want me to park there for month...

...due to not having the time to properly fix FeeBee or even go to a mechanic I decided to give the Kings Cross (backpacker) Car Market a go and booked me in for 80 bucks (1 week). Additionally you should get a pink (car is ok) or white slip (car needs some fixing)

but I didn't have the time for that either (would have been white anyway).

I spent the whole Saturday in this - how backpackers call it - "dungeon" or "hell" waiting for customers and chatting to other (more or less frustarated) sellers.

Nothing happened. But we all had camping gear what made it a bit comfortable.

On Sunday I left after 1 hour cause I figured that most backpackers are rather concerned about their Saturday night hangover than buying a car. Therefore I left a description and some other marketing notes as well as price and my phone number on the car. If people are interested despite the front dint they will call me anyway I thought.

And they did. 3 evenings in a row I went down to the 2nd level (5th level is the exit) to have a chat with the now well known other sellers and to promote my FeeBee.

On Friday I had 2 Germans interested (who just bought a car, didn't fully pay it and crash it on the way out of Sydney after three days....yep...there is worse situations than mine...) and a french couple (who already testdrived it. They showed up after the "official trading hours" and we had a chat, even about the price...but he tried to push it to hard so I locked the car and was about to go upstairs cause we were already asked to leave (to pay another week). But then...the frenchies agreed on the compromide price...we did the formal stuff and I walked back a couple of 100$ bills in my pocket...

...to come back to next day for leaving my note on the car market roof and for bringing in the case of beer (I bought Goon). There were some other happy sellers around so we drank, went upstairs on a table (we had to leave again) to finally end up in a hostel at Kings Cross with a brilliant view on the rooftop...


after all I lost 3.300$ on the car experience which is pretty equivalent to a total crash BUT I could still drive her and yes it's been expensive but for the time I had her she was still cheaper than a stupid crappy wicked camper! Good karma will come back...some time!

Luv ya FeeBee!

And...

Good Luck to all upcoming sellers and buyers of "the dungeon"!