All posts by Jon

Date Night

Adventures

With Sara’s leisure / hobo time winding down, she decided it was time to cash in the wonderful going away gift that her Book Club ladies gave her.  Luckily, she decided to bring me along! We were headed to the CBD to eat at a Middle Eastern restaurant named Maha. So, we hopped onto a tram and rode into the city.

Tram ussie
Tram ussie

First, we stopped at the Bull and Bear Pub for a few warm up drinks. The pub reminded Sara of the Regal Beagle of Three’s Company fame and I couldn’t disagree.  After finishing a pint and a pot (8 oz),  we headed over to Maha for our dinner.  Note, I find it un-American that a pot of beer costs exactly half of what a pint costs.  Where is my volume discount?

After some arriving at the storefront, which was down a small alley, Sara was able to figure out how to get in the door.  I tried to go in the service entrance.  They presented us with the below menu, which had 4 choices of what do for dinner.   We chose the 4 course “Spice Journey Soufra”.  Here’s the menu.

To quote Fletch, "If this were at all legible, you could read it."
To quote Fletch, “If this were at all legible, you could read it.”
The Maha sign outside
The Maha sign outside

 

 

 

 

 

 

We opted to pair our food with some Lebanese beers and enjoyed them, my pale ale by 961 Beer was spiced using Lebanese spices and was very interesting.  Sara got their Red ale.

The food was delightful and managed to fill me up and then some.  I’ll leave you to read about the various things we ate by looking at their web site or squinting really hard and looking at the image above.

After our wonderous meal, we decided to talk a bit of a walk to shake off our food coma.  I took Sara to the Crown Casino and we lost $3 playing the pokies (slots).  I showed her the shocking number of roulette tables in this casino (literally at at least 50 and more than half of their table games).  Sadly there are no craps tables here.  On our way to the tram,  we spotted a great possibility for our next date night – I know this much is TRUE.

Huh huh huh hu-uh huh
Huh huh huh hu-uh huh

One month in…

Random Musings

Well, I’ve been here a month now and am settling in to a routine.  I’m running on the trails and have even been playing in basketball leagues.  It is beginning to feel normal to be here.  Sometimes I even forget I’m in different country / hemisphere.  Then I go to catch a tram or train and find myself standing on the wrong side of the platform.  I still look both ways twice when crossing streets.  Oh, and then I see strange things that seem familiar in grocery stores.  Like this cereal:

Rice what now?
Rice what now?

Or I happen down the baking aisle and stop and double take when I see eggs.  Yes, eggs, not refrigerated.

Eggs?
Eggs?

Early on when I got here I went to a comedy show, and the Irish comic compared Australian culture to how schoolkids act when the teacher leaves the room.   I’m finding that description apt at times.

2015-04-12 16.02.04 2015-04-16 11.37.43

There was just of video out of their prime minister skolling (chugging) a pint of beer at a bar and it is just kind of shown on the news as a funny thing that happened.

I have signed up for a carshare service here, so my next goal is to take up driving so I can stop carrying groceries and beers back from the stores.  Also, I can become more confused by life here driving on the wrong side of the road from the wrong side of the car.  “Turn on Red” doesn’t seem to be legal.  Oh, and I’ll have to deal with trams and “hook turns”.