Overcast or not, I decide to see Sydney's famed beaches today. Quick
train and bus rides bring me from my hostel to Bondi Beach. Despite
the rain, surfers in wetsuits dot the water like deranged penguins. I
decide that, in spite of a total lack of any surfing ability, I'll
give it a try.
Bumming a board and a wetsuit, things are going well until I try to
get dressed. I dismiss anybody's doubts about whether I'm totally
incompetent by putting the wetsuit on backwards; the long cord on the
zipper apparently is there because the zipper's supposed to be in
back.
In the water, I'm even less discreet about lacking ability. I'm OK
until I get in more than about 4 feet of water: if it's too deep for
me to throw my surfboard over the top of incoming waves, I tend to get
pushed around by the water. However, I can proudly say that I manage
to get a good half a second atop a not-so-massive wave in water that I
can stand in. I last under an hour but have a great time, although a
surfer I certainly am not.
More to my liking is climbing the rocky edges of the bay's coasts. I
almost feel in shape as I'm pulling myself up and down ledges without
breaking anything. These feelings of fitness quickly diminish as my
arms get sore way faster than they should, but some Chinese grandma
gasping as I jump on rocks as her son fishes keeps me going strong.
And a little too long: it starts to rain shortly after I start walking
back to the bus stop, and starts to pour a bit after that. Not sure
if I'm more scary or amusing as I walk through the train station
panting and dripping, goofy grin on my face.
Dinner and a movie are at Govinda's, one of the cooler places I've
ever eaten. It's an obviously tasty Indian vegetarian buffet plus a
movie for $20 AUD. I resee "The Hitchiker's Guide To The Galaxy," a
good movie to motivate me to travel more, from the 2 pillows and
angled piece of wood that my seat / bed theater location consists of.
Definitely the most comfortable theater I've experienced and a very
cool concept. I'm so stuffed with tasty Indian delecacies that I even
manage to stay awake for the whole thing.
The rest of the night's Internet cafes, typing up these damn journals
that I've been behind on and moving photos off my camera. Cool geeky
discoveries: downloading gmailfs and opening up a junk gmail account
will give me a couple gigs for file storage, and 01ftp.com lets me ftp
files to my website without installing software. Wow: even on
vacation, I'm still a dork:)