New Years Eve, disaster

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Ah, New Years Eve… probably the most hyped-up day of the entire year. After enough nights out boozing and giggling with strangers and creepy men at the Establishment and Hugo's, I opt to spend this night watching the Harbor fireworks over the bridge from a park in Balmain East. Funnily, much like Christmas Eve this other major holiday night was spent laying out on a blanket watching the sky with a diver from Berlin. Only this time it wasn't the uber-sexy Fabian, but was my friend Daniel who I met on Gili Trawangan off Bali in August - happened to be living in Melbourne at the moment. Small world it is… and who says you never see these people you meet on travels again??

Daniel and I reunite, shoot the shit through the night and I meet his whole group in from Melbourne who are getting completely hammered next to us. The plan after the midnight fireworks show was to head back into the city and to a few parties near the Opera House. That is, unless a few Italian girls in the group got so drunk they passed out in the park - one of which (lets call her Gabby) is completely out cold. By 1 I was getting pretty antsy and told Daniel I had to have a few drinks with another crowd back in the city anyways so I would head back in myself and meet up with him later after the Melbourne guys got their act together - done deal.

I'm walking back up to a bus stop alone (Sydney shut down all transportation ex-buses in the area back to City for the night) and wait in a tremendously long line, and bless my lucky stars land a seat sitting at a window - decide to pass out for a bit in a power nap.

The next thing I know, I wake up head throbbing to some Aussie shouting at the bus driver to let him off, banging/kicking/pulling at the doors like a ridiculously spoiled brat. This continues for about 5 minutes, and the guy eventually gets out - whew you think you're done and heading on - then a fucking baby stroller comes crashing through the front door windows. I mean, are you kidding with this?? We are about halfway back to the main road to City, and are being evacuated and forced to either 1) walk all the way back to the original bus stops in Balmain East to catch another bus back or 2) walk another 2 miles to the main road to try our luck with a taxi.

I of course refuse to go backward and start the trek with a British guy and a Scottish girl living in Bondi. We bond, complain about Aussie drunks, and exchange BBQ invites for the next day, then get tired and eat gyros. Eventually we make it to the main road where we wait for a good half hour with no luck on taxis of course bc it's NYE - and City is NOT walkable from this area. Luckily, some hooker-esque girls standing next to me say they called a taxi and I was welcome to hooker myself into their vehicle if I wanted. Taxi never came. What a disaster of a night. The story of transport back into City ends with us chasing down an overstuffed bus heading towards City and a dude basically humping my left leg the way home as I gag from his smell and try to avoid eye contact for 30 minutes.

The next morning I call Daniel to check on plans to meet in Bondi before I fly out. Daniel whines on the phone and fills me in on what Hell the previous night turned out to be. Basically involving persuading Gabby to leave the park at all, then carrying drunk Italians uphill to transport, to not being able to get Gabby out of the ferry terminal when they finally did make it to City. And now Gabby is missing and the group is still in possession of her phone, passport, and money. 

When I flew off at 4:30 they still hadn't found her - I should really check on that…

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