Oz

AUSTRALIA NOW!

There are lots of things that i miss about Laos. Looking at some photos of our 3-week trip (‘travelling’ isn’t really fair – we saw 3 towns) i realised how much i miss the clothes worn by foreigners on that great South-East-Asian circuit. Vest (Beerlao branded), linen trousers which either drape to the ground, or bunch around the knee (making me feel a bit like one of the forty thieves) and some self-consciously unworn flip-flops. No Lao person (Laotian?) i’ve ever seen wears this ridiculous set of peacock feathers, and those who do in Brighton tend to be seen only by the other squatters in their flat near Preston Park. But in South-East Asia, or the slither of it which i saw, it’s everywhere. The choice is between this or sweating around as a conspicuous fashionista. After all, cut-off denim shorts aren’t all that cool when it’s 40 degrees.

We’re in Australia now and everything is completely extortionate. The irony of our forgone drinks with dinner and tuk-tuk haggling’s futility does not escape us as we hand over 6 dollars for the four-fifths of a pint that they call a ‘schooner’. (The tuk-tuk chakras got us back with some crash-based karma.)

Haggling in very poor countries is one of those things which all foreigners fret over as a very personal dilemma – no one wants to deprive a smiley kid of dental care, but paying the quoted price of 25 pounds for a counterfeit West Ham shirt (sponsored by Jobswerve!) isn’t fun either. It’s galling to leave your cut-price 5-man ensuite with air-con to buy breakfast, and having to sidestep the woman washing with a hosepipe in the guesthouse courtyard. People who are backpacking tend to ponce around touting a very enlightened version of martyrdom through frugality, but it’s all a bit of a show really. Travelling in the Hard Seat carriage is cheaper and more exotic than it’s pampered and pillowed neighbour but on the whole we’re all on a foreign, if a little weighty, holiday.

Hostels in Australia are different. No one can afford a single room, so it’s all dorm-beds and conviviality. There are long-term hostel workers from a lucky dip (or smorgasbord – what is this word?! Why is the UK press suddenly full of it?!) of European countries, who form an insolently indolent model UN behind the laundry counter. There are the solitary bearded man who sits with a joint and teases his dreadlocks with all the precision of a watchmaker. Then there’s us – younger, more English, and arse-achingly out of place as we toil over a 45-minute game of pool.

We’ve been crawling up the Pacific Highway for 3 weeks now in Dylan. Dylan was not our choice of name. Maddy and Tessa chose it and we all think its rubbish. We even had to press Maddy to not name the poor sod ‘Dylon’, fearing we’d be mistaken for homesick tye-die enthusiasts. He’s a ’95 Ford Falcon and has a shelf-life of probably four weeks. A homeless German in Byron Bay gave a prognosis of two months, but we’ve taken many wrong turnings since then. He’s gone shaky and can’t speed up when Maddy floors it. Maybe he has Parkinson’s.

Jon! How could i forget Jon?! Jon the Great Canadian, Jon the fact-rich 24-year old who teaches Doctors how to do things via skype. We met him on Mt. Warning (named by either Captain Cook or volcano-conscious Aboriginals, depending on how PC your guide-book is) and a hitch to Surfers Paradise has evolved like a pokemon into a two-week trip up the coast. Jon knows lots and lots of facts, and often leaves at dusk to take pictures of the kangaroos and wallabies around our house. As such, i have a kind of trust for his authoritativeness that a toddler does for a parent or a primary school teacher. He knows too many facts to not trust, and being the wily North American he is, he’s used this to his advantage a bit. Last week, he told me that hummingbirds fly so quickly that they technically time-travel, and i responded with the sage concurrence of a slow nod. It’s a case of it’s-true-because-mummy-said-so and, frankly speaking, mummy lied.

Time to go and inspect Brum’s inspired design of ‘Steacon’ – like a Christmas pig-in-blanket for a tiger – pictures soon!