A Send Off from Sydney: The Highlights Part 2

In between coast-to-coast trips, I spent most of my remaining weeks in Sydney doing the following: freaking out, planning, working, begging relatives for cash (hi Mum) and occasionally emerging from my stressful cocoon and making the effort to be social. These are the things/places/people I'll actually miss (correction: am missing) in the Harbour City.

1. High Tea with my favourite ladies - I will never forget the afternoon we spent running around trying to find the Sofitel Wentworth in the pouring rain and the fabulous reward of French desserts and tea we shared, looking dishevelled as all hell, with the blue blood/blue rinse set surrounding us western suburbs ratbags from all angles. Fabulous tea, fabulous company, occasionally fabulous (tastes ranged from bleurgh to ooohh on the nonsensical expression scale) and a fabulously gorgeous waiter made the battle with the elements worth it. It sucks we couldn't get into the Victoria Room.

2. Boys 'n' Berry - My two favourite men and I tripping down to the south coast for a giggle on a Saturday afternoon. We had conquered the west for my birthday and the South followed for my farewell. We had lunch at the Postman's Ghost (unfortunately, said ghost declined to show up during our meal, but the bruschetta was fantastic), tried on a variety of stupid hats in one of the many left-of-centre clothing stores (left-of-centre here meaning rainbow, tyed-dyed knits favoured by elderly potheads the world over) and sung along to Cherry Lips at full volume somewhere outside of Shoalhaven.

3. Countless 'this is the final time, I swear' visits to Newtown. The hardest part of leaving has been giving up my self-appointed title of 'Newtown Rat' right when I was beginning to fit in (my hair colour finally became the standard after I added the black streaks) and then heading to the real world where having red and black hair to match your regularly red and black clothing kind of brands you as a bit of a punkass or worse still, emo child. More than anything I miss the weekly pilgrimages to Ice and Slice and Burgerfuel and Thai Pothong and Quick Brown Fox and, most of all, the people who would join me there.

4. Darling Harbour & Palm Beach - My final night in Sydney stands amongst my favourite moments of all time. Jian and Simon and I being complete dickheads on the Monorail (I am so amazed that we didn't get kicked off, much less arrested for some of the things we were doing), finally visiting the Lindt cafe (overrated, has nothing on Max Brenner), sitting on the edge of the harbour yelling obscenities, screwing around in Tumbalong Park and then roadtripping to Palm Beach as a final flourish. It was like all the good parts of being drunk (so I'm told, having not had any decent experiences the few times that I've been drunk :P) - the recklessness and that floating feeling you get when you're completely carefree. I don't think I ever properly thanked my two boys for taking me out that night so: Jian, Simon, (if you're reading this) - thanks you darlings.

5. I would like to personally thank each and every person in this photo:

for a) coming to the airport to see me off and b) being there for me since birth in some cases and a slightly shorter period of time in others. Every single person in that photograph is worth coming back for...if/when I eventually have to return to Australia.

Thus ends my entries about Australia (for now...). Now that I've been all loving and sweet and caring, I can get down to the nasty stuff.