Overalls so Far (not the clothes kind)

Day 15—Overall Thoughts

Here are some of my overall impressions so far:

Hong Kong:

Clean, SO easy to navigate, friendly, don’t get stared at since they are used to ex-pats everywhere, you can buy anything you could possibly need, good and cheap food (if you look for it), beautiful surrounding mountains, I’d go again!

Australia:

I’m struck by how much I’m NOT struck by much here.  To be quite honest, it’s not what I expected (so far, in the cities, at least).  Not to say that I don’t like it—I do, just that I honestly feel like I’m in the states.  Except for talking funny and driving on the wrong side of the road, they’re pretty much just like us.  To (mis)quoteBill Bryson (sorry, don’t have the book in front of me—btw, thanks, court!)—He said something along the lines of the most fascinating thing about Australia is that after such a long flight, you’d expect to at least see people riding around on camels or something, yet you get here, and Australians are JUST like us!

Other things of note on the Aussies:

1.      They love to work out and are very active.

2.      Bathrooms here are split. One has the bath/shower and is actually the bathroom. The other has the toilet and is just the “toilet”

3.      Toilets have 2 flushers. One for number 1 and one for number 2.

4.      School day is from 9:30 to 3:30… I like that!

5.      The big look here is tattoos and piercings.

6.      Lots of city folk smoke.

7.      They love to say “no worries”

8.      Veggiemite is not as bad as I thought. Nutella is the bomb. Haven’t tried wheatbix yet.

Traveling Alone:

So far so good.  I’m enjoying the ability to eat when hungry, not eat when not, sleep in when tired and get up early if I choose, see sights when I feel like it and sit around when I don’t…basically, it’s nice not to answer to anyone but me. 

That said, I do miss all of you, terribly, and would prefer you here alongside me—I mean, at least for like a day or two until we got sick of each other : )

I enjoy meeting new people, which I think is often limited when traveling with people.

Shuffle Dance and Other Randoms When in This Side of the World:

As a side note and a word of caution, if you travel to this side of the world, expect to do MANY, and I really mean many shuffle dances.  You know the kind of dance when you’re walking down the street and you and the person walking towards you both start to walk the same way and you almost bump each other.  It happens ALL the time here….because we’re trained to walk right and they’re trained to walk left, which when facing each other is the same way! This also explains why I keep almost going up down escalators and down up escalators since I expect them to be on the opposite side, and why I’m a walking hazard when turning the corner since I hug the building to my right and the people coming around the corner hug the building to their left…I’m not sure how I’ve avoided a collision so far since I’ve had several close calls!