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Published: September 23rd 2008
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Well we arrived in Sydney mid-August a.k.a mid-winter and my god is Sydney cold in winter or what!! We landed in the airport only to be left in the terminal for an hour because the whole of the baggage area had shut down because the storm outside was so bad!! The look on Sarahs face said it all...people really weren't lying when they said Sydney gets cold in winter !! Anyway we headed off to our hostel which was really centrally located and straight away hit the shops ...for boots, jackets and socks!! All things that hadn't been in great demand along the coast!!
Once we were wrapped up the apartment hunt began! We had long-since decided that we wanted to live in Bondi, for a number if reasons ; firstly there are tonnes of backpackers out that way, there are always lots of tourists which should mean lots of jobs and obviously and possibly most important we wanted to live by the beach, especially considering that we were going to be here for the summer months!!
So the apartment hunt started with us ringing a lot of places to try and arrange viewings for the following day, which
we did. We went to bed with three viewings confirmed, each two hours apart to give us time to get there, meet our potential flatmates, have chats etc and still get to our next place with plenty of time...well, place number one was scheduled for four pm and by 4.05pm we were back on the street...what a kip!! The bedroom didn't even have a bed, it had a single mattress in the middle of the floor (this was advertised on gumteee as their master bedroom, scary eh?!?) , the kitchen presses had almost all fallen off and the place stank! Not to mention the current tenants- Mags and Odie from Bally-go-backwards!! Poor Odie looked like he hadn't seen the light of day in months and between them both they could barely string a sentence! Let's just say we said we'd give them a call...!!
So thanks to our two hour time gap between place number one and two (place two was a whole 5 min walk from place one) we had plenty of time to kill and got to explore Bondi a bit, and even in an overcast day with the rain clouds threatening overhead we knew we were
where we wanted to live!! The whole atmosphere in the town us just laid back and relaxed with dozens of cafes and bars lining the streets offering alfresco dining! This was definitly where we wanted to be, and so set off to place number two with high hopes...at least it couldn't get any worse!!
And it didn't,it got better, a whole lot better!! We instantly hit it off with the three guys in the house in Roscoe St. They were all Dutch, with fantastic English and the apartment was just what we were looking for! We ended up staying there an hour drinking a beer and chatting, and by the time came for us to leave they announced that they would like us to move in! They had had little chats between themselves in Dutch while we were looking around and thought we would fit in nicely...just one problem- we still had no idea what each other was thinking, so we left with a promise tho give them a call by the end of the evening! Well we weren't even down the stairs and we were already nodding our heads at each other in complete agreement that this was
137 pics later!!!
We decided to fill our room with pics from home and our travells...deffo feels more like home now!!! the place for us! It was such a great feeling, we rang them back and confirmed everything...we were moving in the next day!! Woo!! Needless to say this called for another shopping session...we had to make the place look like our home, so we hit the shops yet again and pimped the room up Dave and Sarah style!!!
So our new flatmates are Marc, Merel and Robbie! Marc and Merel are a couple who are here together as Marc is doing his masters here in Marketing and Merel is working! Then Robbie is also Dutch, but was not friends with M&M before coming to Oz, and he is studying his masters here too!
The next few weeks were really just spent chilling out, getting to know our flatmates- and all the people they introduced us to, hanging out with them, getting to know Bondi oh and of course, looking for jobs! Sarah found one pretty easily in Nine West and was chuffed as its only a 20min walk from home, the money is good and the discount is brill! Also the girls in her job are really good fun and they all seem to get on really well...two
of the girls are Irish, one of them from Leixlip...how random! In Oz and working with a girl that lives a ten min drive from us in Dublin! So she was happy out, Dave on the other hand had a bit trouble finding work. Basically, in order to be an electrician he needed to get a green card, which he didn't really want to do, so he decided to try out retail...but he didn't really have the experience...but in the end he got super lucky and job a job in a restaurant at the end of our street (a whole one minute walk away)....and best of all, he has Friday and Saturday off and they days he is in are from 12-9pm, meaning plenty of time for drinking and still lots of time for lie-ins/hangovers!!!
We haven't had very many nights out since getting here mainly because the city is just so expensive to go drinking in, but it's good because everyone is in the same boat so what we have had is plenty of fun drunken nights with all the people we've met, and numerous games of Ring of Fire have been played at this stage-- just check
out the pics for photographic evidence!!!
We have really settled in here and are so happy to call this place home for the next few months! Summer time is just starting and the place is really beginning to liven up (and thankfully the blankets, duvets, hotwater bottles, boots and jackets have all been put away--ok we might have gone a bit over the top when we got here, but we were freezing!!!- by we, we of course mean Sarah)!! Dave has just recently bought himself a surf board and despite giving himself a black eye with it the first time he went out he is getting on ok, thanks to Marc giving him lessons!! Cowabunga dude and all that jazz!!!
What is also super cool is that so many people from home are going to be in Sydney for Christmas..so even though we're away from home, with our new friends we have made and all the Lucan-its who will be here this is already looking like it's going to be a class Christmas /start to 2009!
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Gill
non-member comment
Hi Bro!!
Hi bro (and Sarah of course). just got to read your latest blog - great to see you've settled in Bondi. Now, I hope there are pictures of me and my child on that wall of yours?!?!?! And Dave, I will be telling Adele about the photo collection too - I'm sure she'll be very interested to know whether she is included also! Heard ye were talking to the little guy on Skype yesterday - what do you reckon, he's great craic isn't he!? talk soon. Gilly xxxxxx