Australia Run Down

Australia is great. Here is the run down:


1. Our home

We moved into a little apartment. Down side is that we have no backyard, which we had in our previous house and loooved. Up side is that we are a block and a half away from the surf beach and a half block away from a little cove with calmer waters and a netted off area for the kids to go swimming. We love our little place and the location. I literally walk everywhere. Within a five minute walking radius from my house we have:


public transportation, ferry and bus
library
post office
bank
2 grocery stores
family doctor
bakery
video rental
cinema
pharmacy
10 different fast food restaurants
clothes and shoe shopping
nice sit-down cafes and restaurants
playground (a couple more playgrounds are within 10-20 minute walk)
aquarium
barber

I only have driven three times in the last three weeks. To Target (they have Targets here!), Mosman Beach and to a park to meet up with friends. It's crazy. I love being able to walk to all of these places so quickly.



2. Our Ward
We love our new ward and have felt very very welcomed here. Our ward is largely Polynesian, some Asian, and a few white people here and there. William and Burke make up 2 of the 3 white kids in Primay and Nursery. Don has already gotten a calling in Young Men's. He'll be great and is very excited. It's fun to be able to feel the Australian/Polynesian culture a bit and I am excited to become more familiar with it. I have started going to an informal playgroup with a few moms that meet about once a week.



3. The language
I love hearing all these new phrases.


brekkie=breakfast

kindy=kindergarten, obviously, but what I didn't know is that it isn't just a slang word, it is what they really call it, even in newspapers

cozzies=swimsuits...the formal name for swimsuits is swim costumes, and costumes got shortened to cozzies

slippery dip=slide...that's a fun one!

chewy=gum

pinch=take, steal...someone at Don's work took a piece of his gum while Don was away from his desk. When Don came back, the guy told him he had "pinched a chewy" off of him

tip=tag...the kids play games of tip here


heaps=heaps. As in, you can save heaps of money shopping at Aldi's. I like this word heaps. It's heaps cool. I hear this word used all the time.

4. The Names

I love the names of cities and places here. So charming

Breakfast Point

Darling Harbor

5. Random
Yoga and Asian style yoga (I don't know what it is called) is very commonly done here in parks and along beaches. We ate lunch at a park one day and this guy did his exercises for almost an hour. As I run down the beach in the mornings, there are several groups of people doing these exercises. You also see a lot of people practicing boxing with eachother.

Another thing that cracks me up when I go running is that I'll look to the side and see men in speedos and then look in front of me and see a lady with a jacket and gloves on. Quite the dichotomy. It is the end of winter here and probably around 60 degrees in the morning. To me, definitely not jacket and glove type weather, but also not speedo weather...the water is very very cold! Don just joined a group of swimmers that swim just under a mile every morning at 7 am. The group is probably about 40 people. Some wear wetsuits. Don doesn't have one, so he just wears a regular swimsuit. There is no way I could handle that cold water (about 60 F), but Don does great, and since he was a swimmer in high school it's very fun for him to be able to exercise this way again so conveniently!