Last full day on the Gold Coast- Norz suggested I go with her as she drove to her acupuncturist and she would drop me At Burleigh Head on the beach. From there I would be able to hike up the head through the forest an ancient basalt columns, then walk the beach while she had her appointment. I had over an hour and it was a wonderful way to spend it. At the top of the hike I was sharing my joy over the view of the pure green ocean and beach vista with some people ip there and chatted a bit. I met Carlton, an American. as we chatted he ended up really reinforcing my morning devotion message:
as we live looking to God for our sustenance, trusting patiently and not trying to take everything into our own hands, He will faithfully transform our lives. The scripture this came from was about how God will transform a desert into A lush pool and an oasis! Thank you Carlton for the encouragement!
trip to KL yesterday-
Jeeta and Bon took me to the train and we discovered that I would be re-routed into a taxi to Brisbane.The taxi was paid by train people and was a much nicer way to travel! (due to "incident on the tracks"that was delaying trains by 1.5 hrs.)
There was a very sweet couple next to me on Brisbane -Singapore leg (7.5 hrs.). they were traveling for almost 23 hours going to Slovokia via Helsinki! They had been a host family for US students, etc. we had a great discussion about how things had changed in different ways in our respective countries in our lifetimes (we are all in our fifties). For instance, When they were kids in the Brisbane area, few people had electric washing machines. Of course, in suburban U.S. Everyone did! also they did not get TV's and color TV's until much later than we did. Same with indoor bathrooms! Had no idea!
the only "backward" thing I discovered there was that few people use their dryer, or they choose not to have one, like Noreen. People hang their clothes to dry in the house or outside. I do not think that is so backward, though, since it really saves energy and money. I am going to get a rack to put in my guest room to dry laundry when I return home!
Susie Griffith, an older, spirited gal from Brisbane, nabbed me immediately at Singapore airport. She had noticed me traveling alone in Brisbane and had apparently decided she would join up with me so we would support each other. We found our way to Terminal 2 together in the huge and complicated Singapore airport, chatted on the short plane ride , then gave moral support to each other through the hour-long customs line. The youthful energy of the secondary athletics contingent from W.Australia which was behind us also kept our spirits up.
Once we were finally out of customs, we were both wondering if our cars and drivers would really be waiting for us. Susie even suggested that we share a car (but I had paid for mine, so if it showed I figured I should use it). We shared relief together when our drivers found us straight away! I was thrilled to see my name printed out on a sign! Sisie and I hugged and kissed each other's cheeks when parting!
God bless you , Susie!
Friday, July 8, 2011
Tuesday, July 5, 2011
A day with wildlife...
July 5
All things bright and beautiful, all creatures great and small,
All things wise and wonderful,
the Lord God made them all-
A day at Currumbin Wildlife Sanctuary and Currumbin Beach
Spent late morning playing with Boh with Norz & Jeeta, then we all piled into the car for a ride to drop me at Currumbin Wildlife Sanctuary. What a treat I was in for! Even if you simply like to tramp in the bush like I do, it was a great place to be. It is a huge track of jungly land with wonderful pathways up and down. Also, there were wonderful displays of small and large animals with plenty of information available about them: birds, snakes (Enormous cobras!), lizards, new nocturnal mammals like potoroos, wallabies, tree kangaroos, etc. There were also events, like the Croc. Show, kangaroo feeding, aboriginal dancing and the amazing Lorikeet feeding. If I had had time I would have also done the Green Challenge, which is an extensive high ropes course. It was fun to watch anyway! One woman put her ten-yearold up there at noon and hadn't been able to get him to come down out of the trees by 3! I fed wallabies and saw many birds I never saw before. The highlight, though, had to be the Lorikeet feeding. People gather in the central area that has little playground-sized Ferris Wheels and trays all along the fence. The Lorikeets see the activity and start to gather in great numbers in the trees around there. As they do, they flash red and green as they fly. They are vividly colored. Next, the naturalists come around and fill your trays with a nectar-like liquid (water, honey and a powder supplement). If the Hitchcock film The Birds scared you, you might not want to participate because the Lorikeets start to go crazy, diving in to land on all the trays and the trays are being held by the audience. We were told to hold them high. Some trays had up to 7 or 8 birds on them. There were hundreds of birds hopping onto the trays & people's heads, too! They would open their beaks and just start lapping the liquid up rapidly. Every so often they all hop around and reconfigure; sometimes some sort of alert went through the flock and they all leaped into the air and flew at once up around the stand of trees, creating a great wind with their wings! They would swoop back down and do the whole thing again! I had many birds stop to see me. The first one shocked me so that I yelled and dropped my tray! Twice I had one sitting on my head, which caused a shiver down my back. I was not keen on too many on my head. I saw one poop on one gal's head. Guessing she will shampoo tonight!
After 4-5 hours, I just walked a couple of blocks to the ocean beach and walked there for a while. I have named it Squeaky Sand Beach. Such soft, squeaky sand! Boon says it is like walking on talcum powder. AT sunset I head to a cafe for tea while I wait for Boon to come pick me up... And of course another delicious meal based on Jeeta's & Boon's Malaysian & Chinese background!
All things bright and beautiful, all creatures great and small,
All things wise and wonderful,
the Lord God made them all-
A day at Currumbin Wildlife Sanctuary and Currumbin Beach
Spent late morning playing with Boh with Norz & Jeeta, then we all piled into the car for a ride to drop me at Currumbin Wildlife Sanctuary. What a treat I was in for! Even if you simply like to tramp in the bush like I do, it was a great place to be. It is a huge track of jungly land with wonderful pathways up and down. Also, there were wonderful displays of small and large animals with plenty of information available about them: birds, snakes (Enormous cobras!), lizards, new nocturnal mammals like potoroos, wallabies, tree kangaroos, etc. There were also events, like the Croc. Show, kangaroo feeding, aboriginal dancing and the amazing Lorikeet feeding. If I had had time I would have also done the Green Challenge, which is an extensive high ropes course. It was fun to watch anyway! One woman put her ten-yearold up there at noon and hadn't been able to get him to come down out of the trees by 3! I fed wallabies and saw many birds I never saw before. The highlight, though, had to be the Lorikeet feeding. People gather in the central area that has little playground-sized Ferris Wheels and trays all along the fence. The Lorikeets see the activity and start to gather in great numbers in the trees around there. As they do, they flash red and green as they fly. They are vividly colored. Next, the naturalists come around and fill your trays with a nectar-like liquid (water, honey and a powder supplement). If the Hitchcock film The Birds scared you, you might not want to participate because the Lorikeets start to go crazy, diving in to land on all the trays and the trays are being held by the audience. We were told to hold them high. Some trays had up to 7 or 8 birds on them. There were hundreds of birds hopping onto the trays & people's heads, too! They would open their beaks and just start lapping the liquid up rapidly. Every so often they all hop around and reconfigure; sometimes some sort of alert went through the flock and they all leaped into the air and flew at once up around the stand of trees, creating a great wind with their wings! They would swoop back down and do the whole thing again! I had many birds stop to see me. The first one shocked me so that I yelled and dropped my tray! Twice I had one sitting on my head, which caused a shiver down my back. I was not keen on too many on my head. I saw one poop on one gal's head. Guessing she will shampoo tonight!
After 4-5 hours, I just walked a couple of blocks to the ocean beach and walked there for a while. I have named it Squeaky Sand Beach. Such soft, squeaky sand! Boon says it is like walking on talcum powder. AT sunset I head to a cafe for tea while I wait for Boon to come pick me up... And of course another delicious meal based on Jeeta's & Boon's Malaysian & Chinese background!
Australia!
Walk -caught by rain and met Gai and her teacher friend.
My first morning on the Gold Coast I wanted to take a walk to get the lay of the lay & a bit of exercise. Almost as soon as I left the house & walked in to the sunny morning, the weather changed. It started blowing hard & then raining a cool rain. I had walked far enough that I figured I needed to duck into some place to wait it out, rather than walk back in the storm. I went into a little cafe & ordered some coffee (from now on, you can assume "morning walk" means "find some good coffee"!). As I read the paper I came across an article with the title "Loss of Jobs Takes the Biscuit." Well, int he US this has no real meaning. Another English language trial! I went ahead to read the article to see if it said more about biscuits. It did not. The article was about a food company trashing 7000 jobs, down-sizing & automating. Maybe this took the cake, as in "this is the last straw"? I asked a woman who came by if she could shed any light on this. She wasn't sure, she said it may be old-fashioned, but probably did mean something like "take the cake." It was also probably a cute pun since the company makes biscuits. LOL After hearing how it was that I am in Australia, she invited me to join her & her gal friend. We had a lovely chat about various things, including education, since her friend is a teacher. Nice meet up! When I returned to Boo's & Jeeta's, there was Boon waiting. He said he had drive around twice looking for me in the storm! Bless his heart!
Once the weather improved and Boh was rested and awake, we all took a walk to the mall to get some things for him. It is close. The best thing was the lunch!! We sat outside on the Promenade, next to a little lake and ate a delicious Malaysian seafood-noodle dish along with an amazing milk tea that was really a work of art. Please see my photos on FB for the images.
The next day, Jeeta & Boon took me touring the Gold Coast a bit. We went to the long, sleek beach known as Surfer's Paradise. WOW Beautiful lunch at a surfing club, out on the terrace looking at the view! Very relaxing. We had a quick stop at home & then Jeeta & I off to the airport for our weekend in Sydney with her brother, Dev (Dave).
July two -with Dev, Jeeta , Ajit. First to Ajit's, then to the Sri Lankan restaurant Janani's for Thali (photo on FB), harbor bridge to Bondi Beach, then Centennial Park and Fox Studios for coffee and then MacMahon Park.
We saw the Opera House from many angles, but saving the view from the water for Sunday. Home to rest & freshen up, then to Dev's friend Zara's house for Bollywood party. BTW, have I mentioned how fun it was to listen to Jeeta talking nd laughing with her brother? It reminded me of being with my sister Wanda because we usually start laughing over the smallest things, even just driving along. They were laughing so much, pretty soon I was laughing too! Actually, Dev has a really funny and interesting commentary going all the time. The party was quite fun. Good food, good people! They had dressed the gals in Indian dress for dancing, Bollywood style Got there late for that, but I had worn a skirt & scarf, so I coudl dance with flair like the rest of them. Great time!
July 3- Headed out to to sounds of the Oldies on the car radio again. This tie to visit the Opera House. It is not just a compelling and immense icon for Australia, but they have also made the whole area a frestive gathering place for the community & tourists. All around on the terraces are various cafes, restaurants and food vendors int he open air. Various place live bands were playing jazz or blues. We got some wharf food & chowed down waiting for our cruise boat. The cruise was WONDERFUL! It took us all over the harbor with a guide providing information. The Sydney Harbor is very unique. It is many bays, really, that all open into a central harbor; therefore, there are lots of little areas, or communities hidden here and there as surprises to discover on a cruise like that. The zoo, rich men's row (where Tom Cruise & Nicole Kidman once owned a house), Luna Park (1930's amusement park), Darling Harbor, and of course, the Opera House! The sun shined, the sea sparkled, the colorful ferries & water taxis sped by! There was also a sailing regatta going on & our boat just plunged right throughout the multi-colored sails as all those boats keeled way over on all sides of us. Jeeta & Dev sat nicely while I ran all over our boat getting photos, being tossed around by the wave actively & getting caught 1/2way in the door by the strong wind. It was an utterly perfect day. And topped off savoring chocolate-chili gelato as we walked back along the waterfront in the sun. A-a-ah! We toured a bit more on the way home, singing together in the car & getting a bit lost so that we went over the Harbor Bridge ONE MORE TIME! Dev said Sydney had performed at her best, like a tart all done up, exuding her appeal when she knows she is being watched ;-) Later, at Dev's we watched 2 colorful & tear-jerking Bollywood films (I had never seen one before at all). The evening ended with Ajit coming by with takeaway Tandoori chicken, Naan, etc. A-a-a-ah, again! This morning we returned to Robina on a plane and are having a low-key day.
My first morning on the Gold Coast I wanted to take a walk to get the lay of the lay & a bit of exercise. Almost as soon as I left the house & walked in to the sunny morning, the weather changed. It started blowing hard & then raining a cool rain. I had walked far enough that I figured I needed to duck into some place to wait it out, rather than walk back in the storm. I went into a little cafe & ordered some coffee (from now on, you can assume "morning walk" means "find some good coffee"!). As I read the paper I came across an article with the title "Loss of Jobs Takes the Biscuit." Well, int he US this has no real meaning. Another English language trial! I went ahead to read the article to see if it said more about biscuits. It did not. The article was about a food company trashing 7000 jobs, down-sizing & automating. Maybe this took the cake, as in "this is the last straw"? I asked a woman who came by if she could shed any light on this. She wasn't sure, she said it may be old-fashioned, but probably did mean something like "take the cake." It was also probably a cute pun since the company makes biscuits. LOL After hearing how it was that I am in Australia, she invited me to join her & her gal friend. We had a lovely chat about various things, including education, since her friend is a teacher. Nice meet up! When I returned to Boo's & Jeeta's, there was Boon waiting. He said he had drive around twice looking for me in the storm! Bless his heart!
Once the weather improved and Boh was rested and awake, we all took a walk to the mall to get some things for him. It is close. The best thing was the lunch!! We sat outside on the Promenade, next to a little lake and ate a delicious Malaysian seafood-noodle dish along with an amazing milk tea that was really a work of art. Please see my photos on FB for the images.
The next day, Jeeta & Boon took me touring the Gold Coast a bit. We went to the long, sleek beach known as Surfer's Paradise. WOW Beautiful lunch at a surfing club, out on the terrace looking at the view! Very relaxing. We had a quick stop at home & then Jeeta & I off to the airport for our weekend in Sydney with her brother, Dev (Dave).
July two -with Dev, Jeeta , Ajit. First to Ajit's, then to the Sri Lankan restaurant Janani's for Thali (photo on FB), harbor bridge to Bondi Beach, then Centennial Park and Fox Studios for coffee and then MacMahon Park.
We saw the Opera House from many angles, but saving the view from the water for Sunday. Home to rest & freshen up, then to Dev's friend Zara's house for Bollywood party. BTW, have I mentioned how fun it was to listen to Jeeta talking nd laughing with her brother? It reminded me of being with my sister Wanda because we usually start laughing over the smallest things, even just driving along. They were laughing so much, pretty soon I was laughing too! Actually, Dev has a really funny and interesting commentary going all the time. The party was quite fun. Good food, good people! They had dressed the gals in Indian dress for dancing, Bollywood style Got there late for that, but I had worn a skirt & scarf, so I coudl dance with flair like the rest of them. Great time!
July 3- Headed out to to sounds of the Oldies on the car radio again. This tie to visit the Opera House. It is not just a compelling and immense icon for Australia, but they have also made the whole area a frestive gathering place for the community & tourists. All around on the terraces are various cafes, restaurants and food vendors int he open air. Various place live bands were playing jazz or blues. We got some wharf food & chowed down waiting for our cruise boat. The cruise was WONDERFUL! It took us all over the harbor with a guide providing information. The Sydney Harbor is very unique. It is many bays, really, that all open into a central harbor; therefore, there are lots of little areas, or communities hidden here and there as surprises to discover on a cruise like that. The zoo, rich men's row (where Tom Cruise & Nicole Kidman once owned a house), Luna Park (1930's amusement park), Darling Harbor, and of course, the Opera House! The sun shined, the sea sparkled, the colorful ferries & water taxis sped by! There was also a sailing regatta going on & our boat just plunged right throughout the multi-colored sails as all those boats keeled way over on all sides of us. Jeeta & Dev sat nicely while I ran all over our boat getting photos, being tossed around by the wave actively & getting caught 1/2way in the door by the strong wind. It was an utterly perfect day. And topped off savoring chocolate-chili gelato as we walked back along the waterfront in the sun. A-a-ah! We toured a bit more on the way home, singing together in the car & getting a bit lost so that we went over the Harbor Bridge ONE MORE TIME! Dev said Sydney had performed at her best, like a tart all done up, exuding her appeal when she knows she is being watched ;-) Later, at Dev's we watched 2 colorful & tear-jerking Bollywood films (I had never seen one before at all). The evening ended with Ajit coming by with takeaway Tandoori chicken, Naan, etc. A-a-a-ah, again! This morning we returned to Robina on a plane and are having a low-key day.
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