A month already!!

The first moth has passed. The first two weeks didn’t seem to go too fast. Now the time is flying by.

We celebrated our one month anniversary here by getting Dave up at 5:30 am to go to an International Women’s Day breakfast. For those of you who don’t know Dave is dangerous before about 10 am.  When we got there we were asked about special dietary requirements and Dave asked for gluten-free. Because he was getting a special diet, he got served first – before the 2,300 women in the room. I’m never letting him live that down. An elder opened the breakfast – she was called auntie. The speaker was an ABC - Australian Broadcasting Corporation (not the American one) - foreign correspondent named Sally Sara. She’s has an interesting career and is a great speaker.

The service was more than we would ever get at home. The waiter put the napkin on my lap for me, and every time we took a drink of our juice or water someone was there asking if we wanted them refilled, even though there were jugs of both on the table. This seems to be the type of service waiters and clerks provide here. And, tipping is not common. Interestingly when walking down the streets people do not get out of the way, will run into you and not seem to notice. They do not say hello to others on the street. But, if you stop someone to ask for help they break their backs trying to be helpful and in stores and restaurants the service is great. Clerks and waiters are never rude and never seem bored.

I was bragging about getting used to walking on the left, but I must admit that at 6:10 am when walking up an empty flight of stairs to the breakfast I walked up on the right. I will likely do the same driving!!

People also queue – we were told they “know how to line-up” before we came. Driving by a bus stop the other day we noticed that everyone was standing in single file waiting for the bus. We have been in line-up three people deep and few blocks long. No one butts in and no one pushes.

Walking home on the river path a coupe of days ago we were treated to green and red parrots.  They fly so fast they look just look dark in most light and on most angels. They sure do make a racket. It reminded me of the Starlings at home trying to get rid of the Robins. They are about the same size as a Starling. Their behaviour sure doesn’t fit with our romantic view of parrots.

We have spent the last four days at WOMadelaide. It is world music – music from everywhere. We were enthralled and educated.  To give you a sampling we heard:

§   YAMATO, the Drummers of Japan. They did a car commercial – I think it was Toyota.

§   Ravi Shankar

§   Besh o droM – Gypsy fusion

§   Babylonian Circus fro France – 10 person big band

§   The Ethiopiques

§   Los Amigos Invisibles from Caracas

§   Mariem Hassam from Western Sahara – she did straight up blues in Arabic

§   Tutti Ensemble – an amazing Australian community choir

We were also treated to the Kathakali Dance Ensemble from India. They take six hours to put on their make-up and did it in the park so people could watch.  Also, LAFA and Artist Dance Company, modern dance from Taiwan.

And many more…  and it all happened in the Botanic Gardens here under the eucalyptus trees.

I guess the last couple years for WOMadelaide was really hot – like 41 degrees some days. This year we have not had heat, we were promised rain but the only hard rain was when we were at an indoor festival performance on Saturday evening so that has been lucky for us.

Even after hard rain the ground here doesn’t seem to be wet – and certainly there is no mud. Sunday it rained hard in the afternoon for a few minutes. Then it was cloudy and cool. In the evening when we went to sit on the ground it was not wet.

We could smell the eucalyptus oil in the gardens and we can also smell it and the tea tree on our river pathway. The tea tree oil smell is really strong some evenings.

There are fences here made from tea tree. They are very small tree branches put together to make a solid fence – photo to follow. They look very flammable and some friends told us they are getting rid of theirs because they do burn very quickly. These are the same people who have water in their pool to use on the house in case of a nearby fire.

Sue is busy with dance lessons. She started the second week we were here – nothing slow about that woman when it comes to finding dance. She is taking drop-in lessons from members of professional companies. She goes four or five times a week. After all the festivals are over she is setting up some private lessons and will continue with the group lessons. There are a lot of opportunities for her here.

Looking forward I need to plan some trips to Kangaroo Island, along the Ocean drive between here and Melbourne (part of this is the Limestone Coast), into the Adelaide Hills, to Borassa wine country, etc. Life (on sab –beach - ical) is hard!! Oh yeah – trips to the beach, too.