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Nov. 15 -- Dec. 3, 2004: Sydney, the Oz Experience, By Dick Sutphen Tara and me with Ken’s four-wheeler in St. George, Queensland.
“We’re about to drive hundreds of miles into
MONDAY, NOVEMBER 15: TRAVELING TO OZ: We are packed and ready to leave our home in Malibu for LAX. Tara walks into my office waving our airline tickets to Sydney, Australia. “Why would we fly to San Francisco and then to Sydney?” she asks. Irritated. “Look at it as not having to do a layover in New Zealand,” I say. “Twenty-nine hours of traveling, five hours jet lag and a full day on stage as soon as we arrive?” She shakes the ticket printout at me. I smile. She leaves muttering things best not repeated. We arrive at LAX two-hours early and use our time waiting in one line or another. “Take off your shoes. Don’t set them on the conveyer belt like that. Like this!” says a security Nazi. “Don’t step through the scanner until I tell you to. Go back!” The metal buttons in my jeans evidently set off an alarm, so a 300-pound man in a blue uniform steps forward to check out my crotch with a hand-held scanner that is probably destroying a trillion white-blood cells in a very sensitive area. I know that some people go to an airport, put their bodies and belongings through the machines, manage not to set off metal detectors, walk to their gate, wait, and get on an airplane. This is not my karma. I want to point out that I understand the law of resistance, and I am quite careful not to invoke it. I also want to point out that airports should post signs saying, “All ye who enter here will be obliged to give up your dignity.” “They’re going to do body cavity searches,” I say to Tara. She looks at me like I’m daft. “That sign says so. Look.” She squints at a sign too far away to read. Having managed to get through the LAX entry gauntlet, we settle into a restaurant for a tiny meal at an exorbitant price. Our daughter Cheyenne is traveling with us to Sydney, Australia. Tara and I are the featured speakers who will conduct workshops at the Body Mind Spirit Festival. Cheyenne will handle back-table sales. After the four-day festival, we will explore Australia. At the gate, I settle back with a book, put on noise-filtering headphones, and soothing music to block out the nonstop, over-amped loudspeaker chatter from people that have never managed to learn the English language. I’m on page two of the book when people all around me jump to their feet, grab their bags and run away. “Hurry, I’ll bring your bags,” Tara says, lifting one earphone off my head. “Wha ... what?” “They’ve canceled our flight. The only chance for us to get to San Francisco tonight is for you to get us on the flight at gate 83.” I leap to my feet, join the crowd. “Wait!” Tara yells, pulling our boarding passes from my bag. She hands them to me, saying, “RUUUUNNNNNNNNN!” Having long legs, I quickly make my way through the crowd. People around me are talking about “mechanical failure”-- two words one does not want to hear prior to boarding an airplane. I had felt bad about skipping my exercise today. I need not have. Gate 83 is a mile this way, and another that way ... and way around the corner. I get to the counter, sweating and short of breath. Upon handing the counter lady our boarding passes, she looks at me sternly, says, “WE’VE BEEN PAGING YOU.” I babble something about noise-filtering headphones and many miles to travel. Then I notice the other counter woman talking into the microphone, but her voice is not being amplified. I point this out to my counter lady. “Oh, maybe that’s why you didn’t respond,” she says. “But I was over in the other airport, many miles away,” I say. “Never mind, we’re trying to get you on a direct flight to Sydney.” Tara’s sourcing comes to mind. She didn’t want to go to San Francisco, so she got the spirits involved. The counter lady would not understand sourcing, so I just say, “You’re an angel, but my bags are going to San Francisco.” The last time I traveled on this airline, I went to Cleveland, bags went to Chicago. The counter lady accepts the challenge. “Well, we’ll just have to find them.” “You can do that?” I say, visualizing 100,000 bags waiting to go in different directions. “We can try,” she says. Proud. Tara and Cheyenne finally appear at my side, glad to transfer my two heavy carry-on bags back to me. “You manifested a direct flight to Sydney,” I say. “As it should be,” she says. Now this is just a little too smug for me. “But it doesn’t leave until 10:30 PM, four-and-a-half hours from now. “Doesn’t matter,” she says. I thank the counter lady and ask, “What gate?” She tells me. The new gate is much farther away than the one from which this little moment of aliveness began. But I am comforted by the fact we don’t have to hurry to get there. * * * * * We have all four seats in the rear section of the plane under the movie screen. Cheyenne is excited to be on her way. As a parent, I am grateful my 16-year old daughter likes to be with us at all. She is nearly as tall as Tara and a young beauty. Wherever we go, all the young men watch her. I am working on accepting that this is what is, but I am not there yet. I manage to sleep six hours on the initial leg of our journey to OZ. I awaken, see that Tara and Chey are asleep, decide to watch a movie and then go back to sleep for another 90 minutes -- an airplane sleep record for me. Losing a full day at the International Date Line, we land in Sydney at 8:01 AM -- on time to the minute. For us there is no Tuesday, November 16 this year. We left Monday night and arrived Wednesday morning. We are happy to find that our luggage did indeed journey along with us. Clearing customs is quick and it is a short cab ride to our downtown apartment. The last time Cheyenne was here she was eight years old. Today, she points to a tower on the city skyline. “The golden tower,” she says. “I remember going to the top of that.” Our Medina Executive apartment won’t be ready for a couple hours, so we check our luggage and visit an outdoor cafe within the hotel. The Medina, once a post office, is now a 4-star home away from home on the edge of the Haymarket section of the city. We order three cappuccinos. Our young waitress wants to talk, ask questions, provide tourist advice. We enjoy the banter, but I feel like a space cadet. It is now 1 PM yesterday in Malibu according to my calculations. So we have a five-hour jet lag to deal with. The best way to resolve jet lag is to take lots of “Emer’gen-C,” an effervescent vitamin C and potassium fizzing drink mix, and to stay up until about 7 PM (Midnight at home) and then try to sleep until 7 AM. It’s nearly winter at home, which means summer here. The temperature is between 75 and 80 degrees. And the Aussie face flies are enough to drive you crazy. I forget about them until I get here. Waving your hand in front of your face is considered the Aussie salute, because the flies are very clear on their intent to land on your face. They are like no flies I have encountered anywhere else in the world. Half the size of American flies, they are a hundred times more abundant in number and more determined to have their way with you. Only nightfall, a stiff breeze, or cold weather sends them into hiding. We check into our two-bedroom apartment at noon. It is well furnished with a full kitchen and all the amenities, including a clothing washer and dryer. Tara and I work out in the gym, then lounge by the palm-tree-lined swimming pool where I journal write. Familiar with the layout of Sydney from previous visits, we decide to walk to Darling Harbor, the location of the Mind Body Spirit Festival. Called Cockle Bay by the early colonists, today the harbor is a tourist center, offering major parklands and entertainment facilities. A huge artistic fountain is designed to pull you into a fascinating spiraling creation. An I-Max theater, shopping center and dozens of restaurants compete for attention.
Flowing water creates the illusion that the spiral is moving. On our last visit, the restaurants here offered fish or Italian dining. Now they are all Asian. Tara wonders if the closing of Hong Kong had something do with a new influx of Asian people and money. With some difficulty, we find a non-Asian place where I order a hamburger -- the worst I have ever eaten. I never, ever want to know what was in it. We walk through an outlet mall with signs announcing 50% off the already discounted prices. A cotton shirt of marginal quality is $69. The Australian dollar is worth slightly less than an American dollar. By comparison, in outlet stores near Sedona, AZ, I recently purchased several Tommy Hilfiger shirts of the highest quality at $24. each. Tara used to send pairs of Levis’ to a male friend of hers in Australia, because the cost is so exorbitant here. From what I can see, despite the fact the OZ dollar is currently valued at 86 US cents, everything costs at least twice as much (in US$) as it would at home. Walking back towards our apartment, George Street is lined with travel agents who double as internet cafes. But it’s just after 5 PM, the streets are so filled with people it is difficult to make your way through the throngs, and the internet cafes are packed. When we come to an internet sign pointing up a narrow stairway, we climb to a hot, humid room filled with computers. Many are available. The man behind the counter is Chinese as are most of his customers. The keyboards are primarily Chinese characters, with tiny English letters beneath. I have had an airplane adventure and two food adventures in the last 24 hours. I am not ready for a computer adventure. However, Cheyenne, Tara and I sit down side by side at individual computers. I soon find that my computer will not allow me to reply to e-mails, so I end up sitting next to an Englishman who swears loudly that every time he goes to send an e-mail his words switch to Chinese characters and the computer signs his name, Chin. I write quickly, hoping the same thing will not happen to me. Back at our apartment, I stand like the space cadet I am, staring at our toilet. I have visited a few bathrooms since my arrival in Australia, and I am fascinated that all toilets have two buttons to choose from when it comes time to flush. Button A gives you a nice quick little flush, but when needing a serious flush, button B is best. I do not remember this from previous visits, but I will go on to discover that even in the remote outback, if they have flush toilets, two buttons are standard. I should point out that when pushing button B, it is best to stand away to avoid being sucked into the vortex. Tara is not interested in discussing this Aussie phenomena. “Time for bed, Richard.” |
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