How I Met Your Mother in Melbourne

ling-hb

This photo is our inside joke. I was wearing a shirt that Ling got for me. She’s wearing a shirt that I got for her (she really wanted to see koalas).

Quite a few people have commented that my updates have been infrequent since I’ve met her. Haha! We’ve been somewhat busy but I’ll be getting up to speed starting from today with regular posts. I’m catching a flight to Bali so here’s one last photo for the candy bar themed post.

custom candy ripe

This is a limited edition Cherry Ripe which comes with a blank spot where the candy name is supposed to go. It’s meant for you to write a message to your loved one in the (). I saw it and thought of her – wrote “LIFE, <3, (universe)” in the space and gave it to Ling.

I thought it’ll be a sweet thing to do. smirk

I’m in Melbourne with Ling!

hb ling melbourne

Greetings everyone! I’m in Melbourne right now for a couple of days with Ling. That’s her right there.

rydges on swanston

The photo was taken right in front of the tram stop at Rydges on Swanston, where we’re staying. It’s AUD 680 (about RM 2,100) per night!

victoria public library

This is the Victoria Public Library in front of Melbourne Central Station. I haven’t been back in about 10 years!

myki

A lot has changed since then – MyKi is required for trams and trains. It’s a pre-loaded card that allows you to travel by just scanning it on public transport. It was still old school plain cardboard tickets when I was in Melbourne in 2003.

candy bars

Candy! These are variants that only Australia has.

no doz

No-Doz caffeine pills! For all your wakefulness needs. 😉

bigm

Big M milk! There’s all sorts of flavors and 1% fat versions now. I remember blogging about this when I was living on campus in 2002 – there was a Big M Banana Flavoured milk giveaway on the campus shop the same month I *started blogging* due to the expiry date coming up.

photo bomb

Best photo bomb ever! Haha! It’s our first overseas vacation together. In a sense, this was how we met. The HIMYM story is actually slightly longer than that but how we started our relationship was due to this Melbourne trip. 🙂

Posted: 6:08 pm Melbourne time (GMT +11)

There’s Nothing Like Australia!

Interesting fact:
This blog was started on the 19th of April, 2002 when I was living in Melbourne

kangaroo

I’ve lived in Australia for 4 years while doing my college and uni. I’ve also stayed in other places while growing up but nothing beats Australia in my heart. I’ve always loved the place and have been back three times since graduating! 🙂

It’s a great country that has a bit of everything due to its unique location – you’ve got the temperate climates to the north to the infamous 4-seasons-in-a-day weather in Melbourne, towards the south. This makes it the perfect place for adventure lovers – there is a wide variety of activities to suit all tastes.

surfing byron

…and the things to do!

carving

I like to travel around and experience new things and I did a lot of that while I was there. Hands down my favorite is snowboarding – Mount Buller in Victoria is where I learned skiing and snowboarding when I was there.

sea kayaking

There’s also sea kayaking in Byron Bay, New South Wales where you power over the surf and get to watch dolphins and sometimes even whales migrating. I thought that was a lot of fun!

katoomba

If you love running, don’t miss the Six Foot Track 45 kilometer super marathon from Katoomba to the Blue Mountains in New South Wales. It’s Australia’s largest 100% off-road running event.

bridge climb

Australia also boasts of having two of the three legal bridge climbs in the world. Well, you can technically climb bridges anywhere but you’ll be liable to a fine or jail time. Heh. Or you can do it legally at Sydney Harbour Bridge and Brisbane’s Story Bridge.

camels

Highlighting the pure diversity of Australia, there are also camels in the “outback” – the desert interior. These are the only feral herds of their kind in the world. You can have a camel safari right at the outback! Bet you didn’t know that about Australia! 🙂

sand dunes australia

The Stockton Sand Dunes near Port Stephens are some of the largest sand dunes in the entire Southern Hemisphere. It can go up to 1 kilometer wide and 30 meters high at some places.

There’s also an abundance of nature activities and magnificent vistas in the Land Down Under:

It’s a very beautiful country – there’s the Great Ocean Walk between 12 Apostles and Apollo Bay. It’s Victoria’s (the state Melbourne is in) premier long-distance walking track where you get to see the tallest cliffs in mainland Australia, waterfalls cascading down limestone walls, ancient shipwrecks, Aboriginal middens and manna gums with resident koala populations.

I’ve heard that the 12 Apostles (rock stacks in the ocean) are steadily getting eroded so it would be a good idea to go visit soon!

12 apostles

Of course, there’s also Phillip Island with its unique population of little penguins. You can see the cute little things landing on Summerland Beach every evening during the “penguin parade”. Photography is permitted but no flash is allowed coz you’ll scare them off.

Lake Eyre in South Australia is another popular destination – it’s one of the world’s largest salt pans and since it only fills up a few times a century, it’s drying up fast so this is another one to go for before it completely dries up. There are scenic flights over the lake.

sydney

There’s really something for everyone in Australia and while I’m talking about adventure and the outdoors over here (it’s what I’m into) there are a myriad of other activities for those who have interests that lies elsewhere. I haven’t touched even a tiny portion of what’s available for adrenaline lovers Down Under.

crab

Shopping, dining (the best crab meal I’ve had was on a chartered river cruise in NSW), or just plain sightseeing, there’s a newly revamped portal at australia.com for you to browse through and decide what you want to do before you go.

uluru

The amazing thing is that every article in that extremely detailed website is also translated into perfect Bahasa Malaysia! There are also other language options and I found the new tourism video to be very aspirational – it’s the one that I titled this post after and you can see it right at the main page of australia.com

aboriginal dance

Cheers and I hope that you’ll come to love the country where I spent about 1/3 of my adult life living in as much as I do! 🙂

Melbourne: Day 4 – Melbourne Changes (Part I)

Day 4 of the
Convocation: Melbourne, Australia (December 2003)
series.

Part I: Melbourne Changes

Queen Victoria (QV) complex

new_mall.jpg

The QV site is one of the changes I noticed – the development work
has completed for some buildings and there were several shops already
open. This is the area beside the State Library and used to be the
Queen Victoria Hospital site before it was demolished. I remember
seeing the QV block being in development for a long time, last I saw,
it was a huge pit in the ground and now the QV complex has sprung up.

strike.jpg

There is a bowling bar called Strike bordering the edge that faces
the State Library. I would assume a bowling bar is a bowling alley that
has a liquor license, but I didn’t have time to drop in and check. I
had to cover a lot of places before the convocation later in the
evening.

qvsite.jpg

This is the other end of the QV building – it has banners proclaiming the opening of Big W and Safeway.

bigw.jpg

The escalator goes straight down into Big W (a department store
chain). I had to navigate through the store before exiting to the main
square.

safeway.jpg

I later found out that this side alley beside the escalators leads
directly to the central area and to Safeway (a supermarket chain).

food_court.jpg

This is the central area/food court. There are several food outlets
here – off the top of my head, I remember seeing KFC, Wendy’s, and some
fruit juice shake franchise.

breadtalk.jpg

There’s also a bakery called Breadtop. I misread it as BreadTalk at first, found that funny.

Melbourne Central

melb_central_change.jpg

I found out that Melbourne Central has undergone development work as
well on the first day I arrived. I saw that the escalators from
Melbourne Central Station has been boarded up and redirected to another
entry point.

nandos.jpg

Prior to that, signs of construction work can be seen – the area
after Nando’s on Swanston Street is covered up until the newsagent’s
opening.

melb_central_sign.jpg

There isn’t much going on inside either – most of the mall seems to
be closed and boarded up with a notice about development. The newsagent
is open, as well as several shops on the ground floor. The upper floors
seem to be devoid of commerce though as can be seen from this photo:

melb_central_empty.jpg

Melbourne: Day 3 – McDonald’s Salads Plus

Day 3 of the
Convocation: Melbourne, Australia (December 2003)
series.

I woke up after a solid 26 hours of sleep on Monday. This is the
third day I’m in Melbourne and I realize that I’ve technically wasted
one whole day sleeping. 🙂 I woke up feeling famished and went
in search for food again and to take some photos of Melbourne city. I
went pass a McDonald’s and saw that they had this Salads Plus menu with
healthier options. McDonald’s in Australia has been pitching this angle
for quite a while now so I decided to sample their Salads Plus menu.

salads_plus_menu.jpg

The Salads Plus menu consists of a variety of low fat and more
nutritious options that have 10 grams of fat or less each. I’m not
watching my weight or anything…people say I should gain a couple of
kilograms, but work and the related necessities to maintain
productivity has the effect of suppressing appetite and increasing
metabolism at the same time. I digress. The reasons I’m attempting to
eat the entire range and review it should not be foreign to long time
readers – I just want to. 🙂

Chicken Foldover

chicken_foldover.jpg

This is touted to have only 9 grams of fat per serving. It’s made
with Bega So Light cheese and has roasted chicken breast meat and
veggies on a herbed toasted flatbread.

chicken_foldover_eat.jpg

I didn’t expect much from it, but was pleasantly surprised to find
out that it actually tastes good! It could be the 26 hours without food
though, but still, it’s pretty good.

Vege Burger

vege_burger.jpg

This one has 10 grams of fat per serving and it’s Sanitarium vege
patty in a herbed foccacia bun. The patty is made from chickpeas,
vegetables and spices a.k.a. fake meat. It also has a piece of beetroot.

vege_burger_eat.jpg

I didn’t like this one…the patty tastes like potatoes. Not that
there’s anything wrong with that, but generally vegetarian meat
substitutes tastes unpalatable to me. The only thing that saved it is
the sweet chilli sauce inside. I couldn’t have chocked it down without
that.

Berrynice Yoghurt Crunch

berrynice_yoghurt_crunch.jpg

It just says 97% fat free on this one. It looks like ice cream, but
it’s actually yoghurt. There’s strawberries and blueberries in it
though, and it’s topped with oats. They use Nestle low fat yoghurt.
McDonald’s partners up with other food manufacturers in the Salads Plus
menu if you haven’t noticed.

That was what I had in the first sitting. After walking around and
taking more photos, I passed by a different McDonald’s and decided to
see if I could eat through the whole Salads Plus menu. 🙂

salads_plus.jpg

This McDonald’s has a fridge at the counter with the salads and other stuff:

salads_plus_fridge.jpg

The salads occupy the first two layers and the third one has yoghurt
(including the Berrynice Yoghurt Crunch) and fruit juice. It looks like
the Berrynice Yoghurt Crunch is prepared and packaged instead of made
during your order. I decided to have a salad this time, since after
all, this is the Salads Plus menu. There are two salads – Garden Mixed
Salad and Roast Chicken Salad. Naturally, I went for the second one.

Roast Chicken Salad

roast_chicken_salad.jpg

This salad features roasted breast chicken, Bega So Light cheese,
lettuce, tomato, and cranberries. It’s 97% fat free and there are three
dressings to choose from – French, Low Fat Italian and Mango and Sesame.

roast_chicken_salad_set.jpg

It’s served with bagel chips. The above shows the salad with the
small container of bagel chips and a packet of dressing. Here’s a close
up of the bagel chips (croutons?):

croutons.jpg

This is the dressing I chose – Mango and Sesame:

mango_sesame_dressing.jpg

The salad looks like this after everything is added in:

roast_chicken_salad_eat.jpg

No, I didn’t toss it because I wanted to eat it like this. It tastes
surprisingly good (again). I was puzzled to find that I actually
enjoyed eating this salad. The mango dressing is really good, goes well
with the salad and complements the cranberry pieces well. It’s also
very filling, but that could be due to the fact that I’ve already eaten
two hours ago…

Orange & Poppyseed Muffin Lite

orange_poppyseed_muffin.jpg

This is also 97% fat free and it tastes like the normal McDonald’s
muffins…I could barely finish this one. It’s quite large. It’s a
muffin, can’t describe it much more than that. It’s had orange pieces
in it and crunchy poppyseeds on top. I reckon I’ll have an excuse
should I test positive for opiates at customs…”Officer, I swear, it
was those damn poppy seed muffins I had. I hear they produce false
positive for opiates in urine tests”.

That’s true by the way – poppy seeds have morphine and codeine which
(if you eat enough) will cause you to fail a drug test. You’ll still
have explain away the cannabinoids and amphetamines positives though. 😉

Anyway, I didn’t manage to eat through the Salads Plus menu…I
didn’t go to Melbourne just to have McDonald’s everyday. However, the
only items I missed out on is the Garden Mixed Salad, Raspberry Muffin
Lite and the Granny Smith red & green apples (which you could get
at the supermarket anyway). My apologies for not eating though the
menu, but I covered the meat (no pun intended) of it, so this ends day
three of my Melbourne trip.

Melbourne: Day 2 – The Paramount

Day 2 of the
Convocation: Melbourne, Australia (December 2003)
series.

the_paramount.jpg
The Paramount

There was a change of accommodations on the second day to The
Paramount Serviced Apartments at Exhibition Street. I didn’t know if I
should go to Unilodge or The Paramount when I got back from the doof. I
wasn’t sure if the rest of my family (my sister flew in around
midnight) had already checked out. I tried looking into Unilodge and by
a stroke of luck, there they were – right at the reception desk to
check out.

We checked in at The Paramount after that and the facilities here
are much better than at Unilodge. There are washing machines, dryers,
dishwashers, a full sized fridge, and even a nifty food grinder in the
sink. Here’s a couple of shots of the interior:

para_living.jpg
The lounge area – sorry about the backlight, was too scattered to notice then.

para_kitchen.jpg
This is the kitchen.

I was so ready to pengsan
[pengsan.com] then, I’ve been awake for a long time by that time and I
was feeling totally knackered. I was ready to sleep for a day…but
before that, the search for food must begin! Hibernation requires food
intake beforehand – it allows longer hours of sleep and you feel better
when you wake up, especially when you’ve not been eating before that.

para_food.jpg
Food court at The Paramount shopping arcade.

I’ve been to The Paramount’s shopping arcade before, it’s just off
Little Bourke Street (Chinatown) and there’s a short cut elevator that
exits there instead of in Exhibition Street. I got some food at the
food court, just one normal meal, take away, instead of overloading
like I usually do, because space is needed for the other hibernation
prerequisite – alcohol. 🙂

hemp_beer.jpg

I have a couple of beers leftover from the night, but I wasn’t about
to put my faith in two measly beers so I also went to the bottle shop
at the shopping arcade to grab another six pack. The photo above shows
Burke’s Original Hemp Filtered Premium Ale. I’ve had these a couple of
times before, it’s a good tasting one. It’s filtered with hemp
(cannabis plants cultivated to produce negligible amounts of THC), and
their ads play on that angle a lot like most hemp beer manufacturers.

hemp_ale.jpg
Burke’s Original Hemp Filtered Naturally Brewed Premium Ale

Needless to say, hemp does not affect the beer in any way. You’ll have to do what veritas did with 95% alcohol and cannabis
[sixthseal.com] for a cannabis/alcohol concoction. Nevertheless,
Burke’s is an easy to drink beer, perfect for chugging. I made sure to
take generous amounts of nitrazepam (a fast acting benzodiazepine with
long hypnotic effects) and some lorazepam (a benzodiazepine with great
anticonvulsant properties) sublingually before the meal. Please note
that I have a legitimate prescription from a licensed medical
practitioner for the two.

para_dining.jpg
This is the dining area beside the lounge where I ate.

Anyway, the rest of my family was heading out for sightseeing so I
informed them of my intension of sleeping 24 hours so they could take
both the keys down. The Paramount has an excessive security framework
that requires the keys to operate just about everything. You can’t even
press the buttons on the lift without swiping the keys through the
scanner first and there are several doors that needs swipe access as
well before you can exit the building.

Well, after that’s sorted, I started drinking and I may have been
too liberal with the benzodiazepines because I nearly fell asleep on
the table. I decided that I would eat half of the food and then go to
sleep because the benzos sure isn’t going to wait for me to finish up.
😉 There are two bedrooms, one with a large queen bed and one with two
singles. I stumbled into one of the singles and passed out.

para_bed.jpg

I slept for 26 hours.

Melbourne: Wildlife with Deviant Species (UK) live outdoors doof

Day 1 + 2 of the
Convocation: Melbourne, Australia (December 2003)
series.

I managed to meet up with Liam, Andrew and Ashley after I woke up
from the much appreciated nap, and we headed back to halls to stock up
on supplies before heading out. It was good to see halls again after
all this while, managed to get a photo of Roberts Hall. Introductions
were made (I only knew Liam then) and we headed out to Glen Waverley
after everyone was sorted. I had only bought along a 1 liter bottle of
water and worn my warm jumper, and was surprised to find everyone
packing bags. Needless to say, I was inexperienced with doofs (outdoor
raves).

beer_ecky.jpg

Anyway, Liam drove down to Glen where we picked up a slab of Carlton
Draught stubbies and two packs of ice from the bottleshop. In case
anyone was wondering, I meant ice as in “the frozen form of water”.
Just to make things, er…crystal clear and all that. 😉 Okay,
enough lame jokes. Ashley had brought along an esky (cooler) and the
picture you see above is a shot of Ashley and Liam loading it with beer
and packing it with ice.

pit_stop.jpg
I forgot the name of this town.

This was all done in the car park beside the bottleshop. We stopped
for gas after that and drove straight down to Jeeralang, where the
event was going to be held. It’s part of the Strzelecki Ranges. The
drive was slated to be about 2 hours and it does seem far away coz I
distinctly remember passing Mt Baw Baw. We did made a pit stop at a
town near the venue for KFC before continuing the journey though.

driving_up.jpg
Driving up the steep road.

The road into the venue wasn’t marked, and it was a really steep
drive up. I did see a “Wildlife – Deviant Species Live” sign at one
point so we were on the right track. There was this sharp turn halfway
up that had a bent street light, so it seems that at least one car
didn’t make it to the top unscathed. 😉 It was a beautiful night
though, the city lights were visible and you could see past the trees
and down into the bottom of the hill with the amazing bush air breezing
in.

checkpoint.jpg
Checkpoint!

We got to the checkpoint where the promoters were and damn, was that
guy enthusiastic about the night. It gave off a great vibe. We got to
the top just when it was turning dark and I knew I made a mistake
regarding attire when I stepped out of the car. It was freezing! I
don’t know how cold it was, but the wind chill was insidious. Warm beer
never tasted so good…and there’s no need to worry about hyperthermia
issues, that’s for sure. 😉

hobo_fire.jpg
Warmth available here.

The doof was starting music at 10 pm so we went to the hobo fire
that was going on in front of the stage. It seemed to be the most
popular spot with the weather that night. I had to make frequent trips
back to the car to warm up. It’s a good thing Liam parked near the
stage and there was this trippy light device under some trees to guide
the way. The lights refracted off the tree leaves in a surprisingly
mesmerizing manner. It felt like a psychedelic light show.

the_guide.jpg
The Great Illuminating One!

The trees were a bit tricky to navigate though – there were branches
sticking out at the most unexpected places and navigating though the
maze without The Guide (which was what we dubbed the trippy light)
without being sober would be unthinkable. The first DJ set came on, and
I vaguely remember someone ordering bales of hay at one point for seats
around the fire. I haven’t acclimatized yet, so the extreme temperature
change was quite uncomfortable. The others had spare coats but I
declined and stayed by the fire instead.

set_setup.jpg
Setting up the set.

early_doof.jpg
The early ones…

The crowd started small and grew larger as the night went on, this
psy-trance event wasn’t heavily publicized – they probably wanted it to
be a smaller gathering for the psytrance regulars. I didn’t dance much,
I was er…mashed, so to speak and besides I was freezing my ass off in
the chilly weather. The fire was good, though it was a wood fire, so
smoke inhalation was an issue after a while beside it.

night_doof.jpg
The crowd fills up…

night_doof2.jpg
as the night progresses.

I actually convinced myself that I had hypothermia at one point. It
wasn’t really hard to do that under the circumstances, and I was
seriously thinking about leaving. I thought I was going to freeze to
death if I stayed since the coldest spell hasn’t even hit yet.
Thankfully, the guys talked me out of that thought loop. Thanks
everyone! 🙂 Also, Andrew gave me his warm coat, cheers for that! I
stopped thinking about hypothermia and did the second inventory stock
take and it was all lovely after that. 🙂

deviant_species.jpg
Deviant Species live set!

deviant_set.jpg
This one taken without flash.

I only managed to get three photos of Deviant Species playing live.
I was too mashed to move. They played till dawn was breaking…it was
amazing to see the sun rise slowly over the valleys and watch the place
light up. It really is a beautiful place to have a daylight doof in.
Check out the scenery:

dawn1.jpg

dawn2.jpg

dawn3.jpg

The venue looks different in daylight too. I thought I saw a large
giraffe or some other animal, details are a bit hazy from the night. I
was standing at the cliffs and was surprised to see a large giraffe
appearing here, of all places. Checking with the others produced mixed
responses, but I saw it vividly, and in daylight too! That is, until
the “giraffe” moved and it turned out to be a man beside a rock with
the opposite hills making it look that way after all. 🙂

our_path.jpg
This was what our path to the car looked like in the light of dawn.

three_dawn.jpg
This is us after watching the sunrise.

Liam was recharging for the drive back so we never got a full group photo, but here’s one of us three:

three_sober.jpg
L-R: Huai Bin (me), Andrew, Ashley.

To the best of my knowledge, everyone in the photo is completely
sober. It must be the lighting that made it seem otherwise. I have to
say that my memory of the night is rather fuzzy, but I can fully assure
you that no psychedelics were consumed at the particular point in time
this shot was taken.

Here’s some photos of the morning set with Santos De Castro and Paul Wright (Deviant Species):

morning_set1.jpg
A large frame capture from the car.

morning_set2.jpg
Moving into the crowd.

morning_set3.jpg
Deviant Species were still playing the set.

I enjoyed the talks in the car, it was great, just gotta love the
scene over in Melbourne. Excellent company – it was great to go raving
with Liam again, and I’m glad I got to know Andrew and Ashley. I had a
wonderful time. It’s not about the music, it’s about the…*cough*. 🙂

I’m sorry that you lost your glasses Ashley, hope you find it!

noon_chillout.jpg
It was close to noon when we left the doof.

Memorable quotes of the night:

“I think I actually have to start earlier to warm myself up”

“Would be one hell of a come down tomorrow eh?”
“Do you want to talk about this now?”

“I can’t believe you’re yawning right after smoking that hit of meth!”

“I’m going off to check on my hallucinations now”

“I’m peaking so hard…I feel full on rushes everytime I move”

and many other classics I couldn’t remember. 🙂

comedown.jpg

Despite my expression when the event was over and inventory stock
clearence was done, it was worth every second of it! I’ll do it all
over again. 🙂

I Squid!

Melbourne: Day 1 – Unilodge on Swanston

Day 1 of the
Convocation: Melbourne, Australia (December 2003)
series.

It was around 8 AM when the plane touched down in Tullamarine
(Melbourne) airport. I just had two hours of fitful sleep over four
days and seriously doubted my ability to head to the Deviant Species
doof later that night. Customs was good though, I only had two checks
on my declaration list and the customs officer said I could go through
the Green Exit (no need for checks). Not bringing food along was a good
idea, not that I had any use for that anyway, since I’m just coming
over for my convocation.

melb_customs.jpg
Melbourne airport customs.

It’s not readily visible from this photo but Melbourne customs
officials seems to have a certain configuration – there’s the one on
the desk you talk to, a row of sturdy blokes after that, and a third
row of older, and presumably more experienced officers. It’s just an
observation I’ve made, and I’ve been held up at customs before, and it
seems that at least the second and third row have communication devices
with the CCTV monitoring division, which I postulate is for spotting
dodgy or nervous characters. I have several interesting encounters, but
that’s not relevant to the post, so I’ll refrain from mentioning them.
🙂

Anyway, my two checks were for shoes and medication. The customs
officer said dress shoes are fine and asked me what my medication was.
I told him it’s just my benzodiazepine prescription, and he said that’s
fine, just go through the green exit. It didn’t turn out to be a hassle
after all. Oh, and if anyone is interested, there were no sniffer dogs
in sight at either baggage retrieval or customs – I’ve gone through
close to 10 times and there was always a sniffer dog around, but not
this time. Yes, I brought my wallet along, though not my backpack.

unilodge.jpg
Unilodge on Swanston.

Well, I caught the SkyBus to Spencer Street Station and found out
that they had a courtesy shuttle bus to CBD hotels, so I hopped on that
to Unilodge at Swanston Street. We’re staying there for the night due
to a mess up with our booking with The Paramount. They have fully
serviced apartments during uni holidays, and it’s pretty spacey –
here’s a couple of shots of the interior:

unilodge_lounge.jpg
This is the lounge area – windows open to a great view of the city.

unilodge_kitchen.jpg
There’s a full kitchen too.

unilodge_view.jpg
Melbourne – a bird’s eye view.

This is the view from outside the lounge, there’s a balcony that
goes 3/4 around. This photo is of the RMIT/Hungry Jack’s intersection
right when you exit Melbourne Central Station, except this is taken
from the 12th floor.

I decided to take a walk around town instead of sleeping, figured I
won’t have enough time before I had to get in touch with Liam. It was
Saturday morning and there wasn’t a lot of traffic at that time so it
was good to walk around. I noticed a couple of changes since I was last
in Melbourne (July 2003) – Melbourne Central is under heavy renovation
and the familiar Melbourne Central Station escalators weren’t there
anymore.

melb_central_change.jpg
Melbourne Central Station under construction.

The escalators have moved into the mall instead of being out front
and the upper few floors of Melbourne Central seems to be closed. I
walked down to Elizabeth Street to see if there’s anyplace I could
offload my CF Cards into a CD-ROM. I could fit about 52 shots into a
128 MB CF Card with my 5 MP Nikon 5700, and my other two CF Cards are
32 MB and 16 MB respectively…which means I’ll need something to store
the pictures in. I found that the best place to transfer from CF Card
-> CD-ROM is at Ted’s.

They charge A$ 9.95 per CD and they use one of those dedicated Agfa
red boxes to do it. There’s another shop nearby that’s A$ 8.99 per CD –
they’re using a standard PC with flash card readers and a CD-RW to do
it though, so I went with Ted’s for the perceived privacy with the Agfa
“black box” (don’t know what’s inside those things), since some photos
were not meant for public viewing. 😉

new_mall.jpg
The new mall beside the state library.

I walked back to Swanston and noticed that a new mall seems to have
sprung up beside the state library. It’s not fully functional yet, but
there’s a bowling alley, a Safeway and some food courts inside. I
didn’t take photos of the interior the first day, since I’ve just
offloaded my CF Card into a CD-ROM and wanted to save space for the
doof later, but I did get pictures before I came back. The mall seems
pretty big – it must be the one that’s under construction before I left.

It’s surprising how much construction work can be done in a couple
of months…it went from a deep pit into a monolithic (okay, I lack a
better term) structure. I went into Safeway to get a 1 litre bottle of
water and went to Dick Smith’s at Bourke Street to get an adapter for
charging my digicam battery. It was past 1 pm by the time I called Liam
and we arranged to meet at 3 pm. I went back to Unilodge, charged my
digicam battery and saw this tempting, tempting sight:

unilodge_bed.jpg
Tempt me not, fair maiden…

I was reminded of my sleep deprivation and decided to try and see if
I could cram an hour’s sleep before I went. It’s something challenging
for me, especially if I’ve not been sleeping in the days prior to the
attempt. I set two alarm clocks, but they both failed me…it was way
past 4 pm by the time I woke up and I didn’t have a contact number so
Liam couldn’t reach me.

Did I wake up too late? Will I make it to the Deviant Species doof? Burning questions which will be answered in tomorrow’s post!

Okay, those are stupid questions since you all know I made it to the doof…check back tomorrow for photos from the event!

Greetings from Melbourne

melb_arrive.jpg

Hello, I’ve arrived in Melbourne yesterday or the day before, I
really can’t gather my scattered thoughts right now, The outdoor doof
was very cold. More about that later, got back yesterday and slept for
more than 24 hours (what a waste) to recover from my non sleep in the
day before I left and the non sleep in the plane. Anyway, I’m going off
now, I’ll do a day by day run through when I reach home, it will be
sporadic posts like this until I get back. Later!

Destination: Melbourne, Australia (and a contest for readers)

melb_convo_baggage.jpg

Greetings, my excellent friends! This is the last post I’ll be
making before leaving for Melbourne. I will update there, but posts are
likely to be sporadic since I’ll be very busy once I get off the
flight. Anyway, due to a mess up with bookings, I’ll be staying at UniLodge
[unilodge.com.au] on Saturday and Sunday. Technically staying anyway, I
won’t be in for most of the day. It’s the one smack dab in the middle
of the city (Swanston), beside Melbourne Central, the one with a Subway
beside it. I’ll be moving to The Paramount [theparamount.com.au] after the first two days till the end of my stay.

I will be going to the Deviant Species
[deviantspecies.co.uk] (dark sounding psy, lovely!) headlined outdoor
rave (which makes it technically a doof?) at the abandoned mountaintop
airstrip on Saturday, right after I arrive. It will be fucking awesome,
I’ve been looking for an event to put a cap to the Melbourne scene, and
I had thought the Lab4 one at Hard Kandy would be good (the circle
completes), but I will not be able to make it to that one due to my
flight.

However, my buddy Liam, who happens to be staying at halls over the
summer, told me about this psytrance event and it sounds absolutely
perfect – the venue sounds amazing, and it’s has an underground feel to
it. Call (03)88104396 for venue details. I’m looking forward to this
one, good thing Liam has bought himself a car so transportation is
sorted. 🙂 Yeah, Liam is the same guy some of you might remember in the
“last rave” in Melbourne [sixthseal.com] before I came back.

This will go on till Sunday so I’ll have one day to recover before
my convocation ceremony on Tuesday. T+ 48 eh…prognosis doesn’t look
all that good, but that’s never stopped me before. 😉 It will be my
last (really) rave in Melbourne in the foreseeable future, so I’m going
to have fun. You go in hard, and you go in fast! Don’t stop! Which hard trance song has this sample? Name the song title. Hint:
The one word title is biblical in nature and is tied to this site’s
domain (sixthseal.com) in the events depicted in the book of Revelation.

The first one who gets it right will have to email me a postal
address to receive a gift. The gift will be something from a headshop.
Should the winner be from Malaysia or another restrictive country, it
may be considered “drug paraphernalia” or “counter culture”, so there
is the option to request an alternative item, or accept the gift at
your own risk. Naturally, the item will be mailed from Melbourne and
the contest will end on the 17th of December 2003 at 12:01 am so I’ll
have time to send it out the next day. If there isn’t a correct answer
by that time, the prize will go to a commentor (on this post) chosen at
my discretion and the winner will be announced.

This is important: The winner must agree to provide a photo
of himself/herself with the prize (upon receipt of the gift) for
publication on sixthseal.com. If the winner does not own or have access
to a digicam, a photo print from a non-digital camera can be mailed to
a physical address which I will provide or scanned and emailed to my
email address. By doing this, the winner agrees to transfer full
ownership of the photo to sixthseal.com and forfeits all rights to the
photo, thus giving sixthseal.com full ownership and copyright to the
photo. Obviously, this is based on trust, so please don’t agree unless
you’re willing to fulfil the above requirements.

You can comment on this post without entering the contest, the
contest is based on the correct answer to the question above. However,
commenting on the post without answering the contest question qualifies
you as the alternate winner in case where there is no correct answer,
though you will be given the option to decline if you don’t agree to
the contest regulations. Another alternate winner will be chosen based
in the case this happens until someone who agrees to the conditions is
selected. sixthseal.com reserves the right to publish all (if any) the
names of the alternate winners who decline. Without the pretentious
legalese, this just means I’ll say something like “xxx was contacted
for (reason) but declined. yyy was then contacted for (reason) and
agreed. yyy is the alternate winner.”

Anyway, we’ve digressed far from the real reason I’ll be going to
Melbourne. 😉 Regarding the graduation ceremony, it will be at Robert
Blackwood Hall @ 8 pm, and since it’s summer, it should be relatively
light during the photography session after the regalia hire. I will be
using the on-site professional graduation photography services, would
be doing the standard boring degree in hand, smile on face, “I have
graduated from university” pose with a backdrop of bookshelves…as
well as family shots (all of them will be there) and…unorthodox ones. =D

No one would possibly want to publish the unorthodox ones, so, dear
readers, anyone with deep pockets who’s willing to put out the
obligatory “announce to the whole world that someone has graduated” ad
with a very subtle and discreet subversive message will have my
external thanks as well as the shared notoriety of (probably) the first
subversive graduation congratulations ad of this manner in the history
of Malaysia! 😉

I’ve always had a bit of a pet peeve at the “I study 16 hour days
and I attribute my good results to the blood, sweat and tears from
that. Self discipline is very important, I force myself to study when
people go out to have fun and I don’t have a girlfriend because that
will affect results.” type statements in UPSR/PMR/SPM/STPM high
achiever interviews. I’ve seen other people with similar results say
“Hmm…never did study till the last 2 weeks…crammed my ass off and
what do you know, straight A’s. I’ll be damned.” but those never get
printed/shown, presumably to not affect those poor impressionable minds
out there.

My unofficial graduation photo would be one which accurately shows how I got through university. 😉

The next update will be from Melbourne. Till then, take care of each other and have an excellent weekend!

Set engines to Warp 9. Engage! Bring us out of here.

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