the plankmeister's interweblet

Sunday, April 14, 2002

Bondi Beach : Australia

The banging door and swollen bladder forced me up and out at 8:30, so I went in search of an internet cafe to relieve myself and grab some breakfast. Found just such a place across the road. Attended to the bladder problem, then internetted for a while, until a man came and sat at the computer next to me while sucking and slurping on a sweet so utterly loudly, irritatingly and disgustingly that it forced me to leave. So I ended up having breakfast at McDonalds. Then found another net place to finish what I'd started. Then went for a wander round Bondi, and headed back to the apartment to see if anyone else was up, and hoping they would be so I could get in. Everyone was up, and Laura had a plan to go to a place in Sydney called Newtown, where there's a cheap market. So off we go on our Magical Mystery Tour. When we get to central station, we discover that this weekend, all the trains aren't actually running because of track works. Bugger. There's a whole fleet of buses that have relpaced the trains. So we head off to try and find the bus that replaces the particular train we needed. Some helpful guy in a bright yellow official-looking top advised us to chuck a big L-shape and the bus you need leaves from bay... and that's where it went wrong. What he actually said was ...leaves from bay 4 to 6. Route 20. But by the time we'd all done the chinese whisper thing amongst ourselves whilst chucking a big L-shape we managed to contort in into Bus 426 leaves from Bay 20. So there were are... searching for bay 20. Trawling Sydney for bay 20... Does Sydney have a bay 20? No it does not. It has all the bays you'd chronologically expect up to number 19, but no bay 20. So we wander aimlessly until we find a normal bus stop from which buses go to Newtown. We get on a bus. And get off again, because the tickets we have only work on the rail replacement buses, not the normal buses. So we head back to bay 19, hoping that in some bizarre way, if we ran into the wall there we'd end up at bay 20 (like the train platform in Harry Potter for the Hogwarts Express) but it didn't work. However, Laura boarded an out of service looking bus, and apprehended the driver. Several minutes later, we're all hopping on the bus, because the driver has offered to take us to the bus stop we need! Free! How good is that? He was sat there on his break, reading the paper, having a bite to eat, and he doesn't have to, but he's going to take us on a brief tour round this part of Sydney to take us to the right bus stop! Aussies do go out of their way to be helpful...When we arrive at out detination, we are actually back pretty much exactly where we started. We thank the driver profusely, and head down the hill past the man who told us to go to bay 20. On the way down the hill, we replayed what he'd said and worked out that he said Bays 4 to 6 so we pretended not to notice him, even though he was smiling at us knowingly. And there we go! Bays 4 to 6, which we walked past not 30 minutes ago... A big sign: Route 20. Newtown. Ooops! Oh well. We climb aboard and venture to Newtown. Today's adventure is already turning into an expedition! We get there, and Kira notices a sign scribbled on the pavement with chalk pointing to the market. We find other similar signs on the pavement, and gleen from them that we need to catch another bus there. Arse. And there's not even an hour left of the market, so we decide that's a bad idea and head off to do some sightseeing of Newtown. Newtown. Imagine a busy, bustling street in Tottenham. Or Brixton. Or somewhere like that... It's home away from home. It really feels like London here! Scarily so! Hundreds of restaurants and clothes shops, and sex shops. As we walk past one sex shop, Rich jests "Will we go in?" And Laura, taking the jest a little further, says "Ok!" and walks towards the door. Few moments of daring go on, where Richard and Laura take a step closer each to the door, and then before we can do anything about it, we're all inside walking up the stairs giggling like children. Well. Suffice to say that some of the objects in there put the fear of god into me. Kira and Laura were walking round with screwed up faces looking at things... Me and Richard, too. They certainly don't censor anything in Australia! After Laura took several photos of various objects (on panoramic mode) we decided to beat a hasty retreat, but not before Laura came up with the idea of buying something from the 'Lucky Dip' bin near the door. So we did. Collapsing in fits of giggles, we run from the shop like kids on christmas day trying to guess what their little presents might be. I don't think little kids would get presents like these though...We decide to open them later when we find somewhere to eat. The search for a Thai restaurant commences, and we eventually find one that opens for dinner in a coulpe of hours, so we head (via lots of clothes shops) to a bar to do a spot of Sunday afternoon drinking. We all decide to pass our little surprise gifts to the person on the left, and open them with glee! Richard got some bum beads. I got some "cock rings". Kira also got some "cock rings". Laura got a big box of condoms. Much laughter. In fact, so much laughter, that I actually fell off my chair. Getting up, I gave a bow to the clapping audience, and spy some guy walking over to me. I thought he might be the barman asking me to leave, but no! It was Zak! One of the Aussie guys I met last time I was in Byron. Said hi and all that stuff... Amazing how small this world is! Several beverages later, and it's time to head off to the restaurant. All this time I've been (excuse the pun) fingering my rings, and I'm now wearing two pink rubber "stippled effect" (For HER pleasure!) rings on my thumbs. In the restaurant, we order a few different dishes. Thai food is SOOOOO tasty. Yummm! I can highly recommend anything. Just randomly pick something off the menu. You can't fail to be pleased with whatever you get. After we ate, we headed back to the bus stop, but stopped at a bar for a few games of pool. Several more beverages later, we leave and head to the bus stop again. Back at Central station, I decide to show everyone how stretchy condoms are by stretching one over a statue's head. It snaps. As does the next one, and the next one. Oh well. Much laughter. We head down to the trains and much fun is had running up the down excalator, and sliding down the gap between the up and down escalators... Much laughter! Once on the train, Rich switches into CrAzY mode and grabs one of my stylish pink rubber rings and flicks it like a rubber band down the end of the carriage while shouting "Cock rings! Anybody need a cock ring! Anyone!? Only used 5 times!" and then he goes to fetch it again. And flick it back down the carriage. At this point, nearly everyone on the carriage is in absolute hysterics... Except for one woman lookig very prim and proper. So Richard flicks the cock ring right at her and it bounces off her head. "It's ok... It's only been used 5 times!" he says, and offers it to her on the palm of his hand. She's not impressed. So Rich sits down and behaves. I don't think I've ever laughed so explosively as that in my life. I mean... Who goes flicking cock rings around a packed train carriage!?!?! HAHAHAHAHAHA!!!I end up doing the stretch a condom over your head and inflate it trick. Much to the amusement of a security guard on the train. She thinks it's hilarious! Several photos are taken. Back in Bondi, we toy with the idea of continuing the night out, but Kira has to go to work in the morning ("I have a career to think about!" hahahaha) so we end up just going back to the apartment. Kira goes to bed and Rich, Laura and I watch TV and chat. Laura makes some Laura Specials which are cheese, onion, tomato and chilli sauce on toast. Yum! Then me and Rich set up our respective beds (I've got the cushions tonight! woohoo!) and we all hit the sack. A quality day's entertainment! :)