Our first week in Melbourne

Come Away by Sons of the East:

Come away with me, baby;

Join me in my car;

 We can go real far away;

Away, from here.

Before we left Toronto at the end of August, one of my co-workers pulled me into her office and told me about this band she knew, Sons of the East, that she was completely obsessed with. She told me they were from Australia, had never toured in Canada, but if I had the chance to see them in Melbourne, I should. Well, Hilary, our tickets have been purchased. On October 13th Dave and I will see Sons of the East at the Gasometer Hotel in Melbourne, and I'll be sure to send you photos from the gig.

All that aside, from the moment we touched down in Melbourne, Dave and I were determined not to be tourists. This isn't something we talked about openly, or actively worked against: it was more of an unspoken agreement that this is our home now, and we will treat it as such. Maybe because of this, our first week in Melbourne was not the Australian vacation we'd been dreaming about for months. We have not attempted to surf, we have not seen any kangaroos, nor have we been privy to the famous Australian heat. To be honest, if it wasn't for cars driving on the opposite side of the road, and the occasional "How ya going?" posed our way, it would be easy to mistake Melbourne for Vancouver, if not Toronto.

I'm a little ashamed to admit that Dave and I slept the first 20 of 24 hours we were here. The month-long journey through Europe, coupled with the 40-hour journey from Norway to London, Singapore and eventually Melbourne proved to be too much for our bodies. Our flight landed at 10:00 am (local time) on Saturday, September 3rd and we were asleep in out Airbnb a few hours later. We awoke briefly Saturday night for dinner, and then retreated back to bed for most of Sunday. Jetlag: 1, Heather and Dave: 0.

Having said that, we did eventually manage to rouse ourselves enough to explore our new city. Here are some of my initial observations from our first week in Melbourne:

1. They are OBSESSED with a sport they call "footy" aka Australian Rules Football. This seems to be an Australia-only sport, that really only gained traction outside of the province of Victoria in the past few years. It's essentially a mix of soccer and rugby, played on a massive round field by two teams of 18 players each. It turns out Dave and I arrived in Melbourne just in time for the Grand Finals ("playoffs"), which are one of the most attended sporting events in the world. Really, I looked it up. 
2. Melbourne is known for it's coffee culture. Recently, it was even been voted as having the best coffee in the world. This is all great for a coffee lover like myself, but one hiccup in this extra-hipster-ish-approach-to-caffeine is it's impossible to buy a simply drip coffee anywhere in the city. Dave spent a lot of time this week looking up the differences between a flat white, long black, americano, etc. just to perfect his ordering in light of this.
3. Melbourne's transit system is leagues ahead of Toronto's. They recently introduced Myki across all transit platforms (similar to the GTA's Presto payment system) and as someone new to the city, it has made getting around a million times easier. The way Myki works is you buy the card for $6 and then you load money onto your card, enough for single fares or to purchase a weekly, monthly, or annual transit pass. One your pass is loaded you "touch on" and "touch off" each time you ride the metro, tram, or bus. Advantages of this system: There is a $7.80 cap per day, which means if you're paying in cash, after two journeys on the transit system you essentially gain unlimited access. Melbourne also introduced a "free tram zone" in the CBD (downtown core) which allows passengers traveling within the CBD on a tram, to do so for free.
4. McDonald's is branded as Macca's in Australia. Weird, right?
5. Possums are everywhere. Picture this: it's your first night out in Melbourne, you're walking through the quiet suburbs just outside the CBD, when you look up and notice that EVERY SINGLE TREE is filled with ugly, cat-like creatures. This was Dave and I's first introduction to Australian wildlife, which, to be fair we were warned about. I can honestly say that in a week in Melbourne I've now seen more possums than raccoons in my lifetime. They are really that present. So far we've had no threatening encounters with any of these creatures, and my gut tells me they're quiet tame since they're left to roam about the suburbs, but I will keep you posted.

Otherwise, our first week was spent filled with the typical elements of day-today-day life, plus a few extra errands to help us settle in. We activated our cell phones on Australia's network. We opened bank accounts and transferred money from Canada (thanks Sue for helping with that!). We started apartment hunting, and already have a couple good leads.

Probably no surprise to some, it turns out wherever you are in the world life goes on. Wake up, eat breakfast, go downtown, work, go back home, eat dinner, sleep, and then wake up and do it all over again. Of course, we have all of Australian and Oceania at our finger tips to explore. And we will. 

But Dave's requested no more trips, at least for a little while. I'm giving it a month.

Cheers,

Heather