The Puzzle of My Life

Here it is the end of July already. I am perilously close to finishing my contract here. As of the moment of this writing, I am approximately 111 days away from stepping back onto American soil. Well...not soil per se, because they don't have open fields of dirt at LAX. But you know what I mean.

I'm doing my best to make these last days count. What can I accomplish for myself? What can I accomplish for other people? The guests of English Village? My co-workers? My boss? Etc. I really want to squeeze as much goodness into the remaining days as I can. I tell you this not only so you know what I'm thinking about, but so that you can encourage me to continue in this mindset.

In other news, I do know what I'll be doing once I return to California.

Starting on January 5, 2009, I'll be back in schools presenting interactive history programs for 4-6th graders. My experience in Korea, specifically with the kids, has reinforced my desire to work with kids in some capacity.

It started with camp (nope, not Disneyland--I didn't really work with kids there, and mostly the kids would just scream and whine, so I tended to avoid them).

Me at Disneyland, with mom and dad when they rode my Jungle Cruise--In 2004 I was invited to work at Idyllwild Arts Camp for the summer. I would be working with 13-15 year old boys. I thought it would be awful. But it turned out to be a highlight of my life. I returned every summer for the next 3 years.

Some awesome choir kids (Brett and Eric)--My awesome family for ALL my summers (except the first one because I arrived late)-- Hard at work (no...this was totally staged...I can't save anyone)--
Here you see I'm really not all that different from the campers--
From there, I worked with kids at the Mesa Arts Center in Mesa, Arizona. After moving back to AZ after camp that first summer (and after finishing my horrible experience at a tele-marketing company), I got a job as a teacher's assistant and substitute teacher at the beautiful, new, Mesa Arts Center. It was a very part-time thing, and I only worked a few days a week anyway. It was basically a summer day-care type program for kids interested in artsy stuff. They could take ceramics classes, improv classes, music classes, dance classes, acting classes, etc. It was a blast. Even though I was just an assistant (though I did teach a few acting/improv classes when the teacher was gone), I really bonded with the kids. One of the kids even invited me over to his house to play. It was hilarious. His mother was very nice and invited me for lunch--and then I literally played baseball in the backyard with some of the kids from the program. It was a very short, but very impactful experience.

Some of the kids I worked with; guess which one I got along with??? (duh, the kid making the face, that's Dylan)--Then there was Baton Rouge. Forgive me if you've already heard this story. During the summer of 2006, while working at camp, I met a group of teenagers from New Orleans. They'd lost their homes (and much of their life) in Hurricane Katrina the year before. After hanging out and talking with them for the two weeks of their stay in Idyllwild, I was invited by their sponsors (art therapists who had been hired by Rosie O'Donnell to work with the kids, and this trip to camp was part of their healing process) to join a group of workers in Baton Rouge, Louisiana (my birth state) to be present for the one year anniversary of Hurricane Katrina. Working not only with the teenagers at camp, but later the younger kids in Baton Rouge forever changed my internal understanding of life and education.

Looking official; notice the raindrops--I'd just helped save the side of this tent which had blown open due to the wind and rain-- The kids were working on art projects in the community tent--
Cute--
I promise I spent a LOT of time working--but here I'm clearly not...drinking my drink from Subway, scratching my head; the kids are showing their projects--
Then there was CWE. This company allowed me the opportunity to move back to California in 2006 (after I'd returned to AZ in 2004 after my first summer in Idyllwild). With my job, I traveled to hundreds of schools and did hundreds of programs for 4th, 5th, and 6th graders. In a year and a half, I got to work with some 12,000 kids. That's a lot. You could be a teacher for 300 years and not teach that many kids! Granted, I didn't get to spend an entire year with them, I only had 2 1/2 hours each time; but you get my point. I had the opportunity to influence, however small, lots of kids.

Some awesome 4th graders after the "Walk Through California"--And now Korea. Like Disneyland, this place is ultimately designed for kids. Adults sometimes like to learn English, too, but they don't usually like to pose for pictures with fuzzy characters like Hippokey, Doony, and the other weird characters at English Village. I've seen lots of kids here. I do have the opportunity to talk to many kids. Lots of kids see our shows.

Daniel and me (he speaks very good English, and is a regular visitor of EV)--I also get to visit kids at the group home/orphanage called Peacetown. Talk about an invaluable, life-changing experience. I just made my 5th visit this past Monday. We played games outside for the entire visit. I brought a frisbee and a beach ball--the ones I got free from buying boxes of various cereals. The kids had a great time outside, and they were rewarded with ice cream (we bought it). It was a great visit, like all the others. Natasha, my coworker who has spearheaded these visits, will be leaving at the end of August. Her contract is finished. From September through the end of my contract, I will be taking over. I will be emailing/calling Peacetown to schedule and plan our monthly visits. Natasha and I are the only ones who have gone EVERY time we've scheduled a visit. I'm looking forward to my small role in this entire thing; and as I've written before, if for no other reason, I am glad I came to Korea just to meet and visit with these kids.

What's remarkable about this entire Korea experience is that most of the kids do not speak English. It's funny, because I have all this various experience working with kids; and a lot of it doesn't even matter here.

Let's assume that I'm good at relating to kids. Who cares? It's a whole new game in Korea. If I say "I like your shirt" or ask "Do you like Mickey Mouse?" here...I get blank stares. The little tricks I learned in all my other experiences have not really helped me here. It's undoubtedly given me a foundation of how to relate to kids (getting down to their level to talk to them, especially if they're nervous or shy, etc.), but I've had to create new ways to get them to understand me.

Learning to communicate non-verbally is incredibly strange. Not necessarily difficult--but it's hard to measure whether you're successful at it or not. "Did the audience understand what I was asking because I spoke clearly or because my wild, animated movements helped them understand?" "Are they all talking over me because they just don't understand English and are bored, or am I not doing enough to captivate them?" It can be quite a headache.

All these experiences, as I've said, have simply reinforced my desire to work more with kids/youth. To some who know me best, this entire "working with kids" thing is hilariously bizarre. Had you asked me 5 years ago whether I'd want to work with kids, nearly exclusively, I would have laughed maliciously at you and then thrown paint at you.

But such is the journey of life...one which I hope I'm not close to finishing. There are many more blogs to write.

Counting Down

Hello.

I haven't been up to much, except trying to survive the horrendous weather to be had here in South Korea.

Temperatures of 85 plus 100% humidity equal out to being a pretty ugly day...especially when all my tasks involve wearing a costume piece and being outside in the elements.

In addition to that, it is apparently "rainy" season now. I say that, not because it's the official name for this time of year, but because IT RAINS A LOT. It's raining right now, in fact. Though calling it a "Rain Shower", as my weather.com info board tells me, doesn't quite adequately describe it. It's torrential. Fortunately, I do have an umbrella--but in weather like this--I need an umbrella for the lower half of my body as well--because the rain is just attacking my entire body.

I've lived in Louisiana, Pennsylvania, Arizona, and California. Obviously, there are certain weather elements in each of those places--Louisiana has hot and humid summers, Pennsylvania has cold and snowy winters, Arizona has hot everything, and California is just lovely.

I remember when I was a kid in Louisiana. I remember it would rain and rain and rain for what seemed like days on end. I remember the darkness at night would change to daylight for an instant with a bright flash of lightning. I still don't think I've ever seen lightning like what I saw in Louisiana.

But the rain here in South Korea is outrageous. I check my weather thing everyday...because it's just a habit. People in places like San Diego are lucky...their weather is generally always the same. The weatherman/meteorologists really have the simplest of all jobs. "Umm...well, today...it's going to be absolutely beautiful again. Now let's take a look at the 10 day forecast...here you can see we've simply copied and pasted today's forecast into the slots for the rest of the week."

But anyway, I look at the weather thing every day. Yesterday and today it said 100% chance of rain--and they were absolutely right. And as I said, the humidity is typically well above 80% every day. You might suggest that I turn on my air conditioner, but if you recall my story about using the heating unit--you should know that the air conditioner is equally ridiculously expensive. So I don't use it. I bought a fan, and it works very well.

I just returned from playing indoor volleyball at the gym we have here. It was my first time doing that since coming here 243 days ago. Oh yeah, I'm keeping track of my days now. I have 122 days left in Korea (that's not just working days, that's total). Counting down gives me something big to look forward to. There are some small things I have to look forward to:

1) We are making another trip to Peacetown--the kids home--next Monday. I very much look forward to spending time with the kids, and I even have started collecting little things to bring them. As I've mentioned before, "service" is a very popular thing in Korea. It's the receiving of an additional "something" for free when purchasing a certain product. Certain items of service make sense. For instance, there are certain boxes of cereal you can buy that have a cereal bowl taped to the box. That bowl is free when you buy the cereal. Cool.

However, sometimes the service item makes absolutely no sense, as it has nothing to do with the item you're buying. This isn't to say the service item isn't useful--it's just a funny combination. For instance, I bought a box of cereal last week, and taped to the box was a frisbee. Sweet. Also, I bought a box of cereal today (if you're keeping track, I've now eaten 44 boxes of cereal since arriving in Korea 243 days ago), and taped to the box, was an inflatable beach ball. Awesome. I could have chosen a sun visor, but I chose the beach ball instead--because I know the kids at Peacetown would love it. During winter time, I purchased a box of cereal that had some small, pink-striped, white gloves taped to the box. I needed gloves at the time, so this purchase was a no-brainer. But you see my point, few people wear small, pink-striped, white gloves while eating cereal. Perhaps I could start a new trend...

2) Auditions for the fall season were held a few weeks ago. The theme for the season (Sept-Nov) is "Family". The two shows that were picked for this season are "Johnny's Football" and "The Squirrels". The first show is about a brother and sister who are locked out of their house by their mother on a summer day. While they're playing with a football, the ball goes into their neighbors yard. The neighbor is a very mean character who the children are frightened of. This show teaches ESL words like "over", "under", "around", etc.--words that I think are important and simple. The story revolves around the kids trying to get the ball back. When our department read through ALL the scripts that had been written for this season, I loved this script immediately. And I voted for this one. I knew it would be a show I'd want to be in.

The second show is about a human boy who is adopted and raised by 2 squirrels, who teach him all about "squirrel" things. The boy runs away from home because his squirrel dad can't accept that he's not a squirrel, and the boy consequently gets sort of kidnapped by 2 raccoons who want to use his "squirrel" skills of gathering, climbing, and digging for their selfish purposes. When our department read through all the scripts, I disliked this script immediately. It was confusing; and I did not understand why "gathering", "climbing", and "digging" were important enough words to be the crux of the story. I did NOT vote for this one--but it made it into the top 2 anyway.

I think you can see where this is going.

I went into the auditions knowing that this would be the last show I'd be doing here. My contract ends on Wednesday, November 19; and the season runs through the end of November. I won't even finish the entire run of the show. Because I knew this would be my last show--I definitely wanted to make it a good one.

To make a long story short--I was NOT cast in "Johnny's Football", despite my listing it on my audition form. I was cast as Huey, the human boy in "The Squirrels".

I'm not terribly thrilled about it, but of course I'll do my best. I get to sing much more in this show than in the last show I did (where I sang about 2 lines)--so that's a good thing. Unfortunately, I have to spend nearly 3 months eliciting "Gather!", "Climb!", and "Dig!" answers from Korean children; which is quite an impossible task. It's nearly impossible to get them to say "Pencil" out loud--you think they're going to know gather? I'm a native English speaker--and I don't use that word! So that's a frustrating prospect.

But I have to do it. I have no other choice. "It's for the betterment of the group." So, I guess I've "taken one for the team" here.

I'm sure you're thinking--"Do you have to wear a squirrel costume?" The answer is NO. Thank God in Heaven.

I'm also sad that my friend Candy is not going to be in this show with me. You may remember seeing her name and picture in various blogs. She's really the only person I hang out with outside of work, and she's really the only person I have really clicked with over here. I'm not saying I don't get along with anyone else--but there's just not the friendship with anyone else. Undoubtedly, I will get closer with the other people who are in this show with me--but that's not the point I'm making.

Basically, I'm looking forward to performing again. That's all I can really say about that.

3) Since I only have 122 days left here in Korea, I have been thinking about what I'm doing once I return to California. As crazy as it sounds, I had actually entertained the notion of staying in Korea an additional 6 months. This would have only been for financial reasons, and no other. However, that thought entered my brain, and within 48 hours, drifted out again. The cons far outweigh the pros in this case. It will be time for me to come home.

But what will I do for work? A handful of people have asked me this question, and I certainly don't have a solid answer as of yet.

And while I don't want to jinx it, or lose my opportunity by mentioning it here; I am excited about the possibility of returning to CWE (California Weekly Explorer), the great company that allowed me to move back to California in 2006. I could write a whole series of blogs just on the wonderful memories I have from working there for a year and a half. Working with 4th, 5th, and 6th graders was some of the most incredible work I've ever done. Incredible in terms of the actual value of the work itself, the intelligence and humor of the students--and the amazing insight into America's education system I gained during my time with the company.

I have not talked to anyone on any sort of official basis, but there may be a position open, starting in January there. I would be able to return to California in November (eat at In-N-Out Burger promptly upon my arrival), in time to enjoy the Thanksgiving holiday, and have several weeks to visit with friends and family in Arizona as well before heading to Texas for Christmas. I could return to California to enjoy the New Year in my home country.

I'd work until June, when school gets out. Then, I'd be able to return to Idyllwild for the 5th time to work at the arts camp there. I'm missing Idyllwild very much right now. It's another of my life experiences that I could write voraciously about.

As many of you know, I want to work on a cruise ship. Even as I type this, I'm creating a one-man show for myself. My friend Shaun is helping me with some ideas. One possible title is: "Not So Famous". Ideally, it will combine comedy and song, talking about my various experiences (Disneyland, camp, Baton Rouge, Korea, etc.) and brushes with fame--not the least of which could be the time I chatted nonchalantly with Hugh Jackman, or the time Jim Carrey called me his cousin, or the time Michael Crawford gave me advice on how to make it as a performer.

As always--my mind is full of ideas and thoughts. There is much to consider. Obviously, all of these hopes and dreams rest on the idea that I will make it through the next 122 days. =)

Two weeks ago, my friend Candy got married--and I sang at the wedding, videotaped the wedding, walked her down the aisle (her family didn't fly over from Michigan), and took the wedding photos after the ceremony. It was a very nice day, and a wonderful experience. I have also been taking many photographs in between the rainfall. I will leave you with some pictures:

Both the rings--
My favorite shot of all that I took--
A grasshopper that wouldn't SHUTUP outside my house--
A dragonfly resting--
Two butterflies hooked at the rear end (they landed for a brief second)--
Spiders are officially EVERYWHERE in Korea, and I despise them; I was simply trying to get a good picture of one of these leaves, when I spotted this spider hanging out upside down RIGHT where my hand was (of course I screamed); do you see the spider?--

OH--I never posted a picture from this experience--but it's funny enough to share. This is from May; just before "School Days" ended. You may recall that there were 2 male characters in the show. Antonio, the Spaniard who was new to our school, endeavoring to learn English; and my character, Curtis, the idiot.

Well, Brian was the actor who was cast as Antonio, and Nic was cast as his understudy. However, Nic's contract ended in April, before the end of the show. So when Brian went on vacation in May--there was no one to do his part. Being the fanatical overachiever that I am, I volunteered to learn his part (though I knew much of it already after watching Brian play it about 100 times) and go in for him when he was on vacation--which was really only 2 shows. EASY. So here is a picture of me in HIS costume. Here you see Derek--who was MY understudy. Obviously, when I went in for Brian, Derek went in for me. It was a wild day--

UNTIL NEXT TIME!

My Time Down Under

It has been nearly 2 weeks since I returned from my trip to Sydney, Australia. I would have blogged sooner--but let me be the first to assure that it takes a great deal of time to sort through 1,773 pictures. I have now had sufficient time to go through all of the pictures I took and sufficient time to allow my index finger to heal from all the clicking.

Obviously, I won't be sharing all 1,773 pictures with you--because they aren't all great. That's the magic of digital photography. But I did take lots and lots of great pictures. I had 3 different cameras. I brought my new Kodak camera, which had replaced my former Minolta camera. I think I mentioned this in a previous blog, but my Minolta refused to recognize the presence of the memory card. I took it with me to Tokyo in April and gave it to Patrice to take back to California and get fixed. She did and brought it back to me in Australia. Plus, I had my video camera, which also can take pictures and store it on a memory card. It was a perfect system.

I left Korea on Sunday, June 8th, at around 8 p.m. The sun was setting. I had purchased tickets MONTHS before on Qantas Airlines, and the flight was being operated by Asiana Airlines, who I flew from LA to Seoul back in November. I did not fly on Korean Airlines, that's just a plane moving through the picture.

Meal One, Dinner: Salmon (my first time having salmon)--
Meal Two, Breakfast: Beef Bulgogi--
Night is falling...somewhere over the Pacific Ocean--
Sun rising somewhere in Australia, cool lake--
A new morning over Australia--
My first sight of the Australian coast--
A rainy morning landing in Sydney--
As I said in my previous blog, I landed on Monday morning, the 9th of June. After dropping our bags off at our hotel (we couldn't check in until 2 p.m.), Patrice and I just started walking around. I wanted to head towards the venue where Phantom would be playing, so we could escape any hiccups the next night when we attended the performance (of course, if you read my previous blog, you realize that wasn't the hiccup I needed to worry about). That's where I saw and photographed all the various billboards/signs/posters/advertisements for the show.

After we'd found the theater and investigated all there was to see there, it was lunch time. We conveniently found a large shopping area that had a large food court. Unlike Korean food courts, which have all kinds of wonderful Korean meal choices, this Australian food court offered stuff that I could not only read, but also found appealing! Imagine?! It really was a peaceful feeling. I was very tired, and I couldn't bring myself to decide what I wanted...so I had McDonalds. I know, I know!

To be perfectly honest, I have not had a McDonalds hamburger in probably 8 years. I do love their Chicken McNuggets and their McChicken sandwich...and of course the McFlurries; but I have refused to have a hamburger--because they're disgusting. But...and this is a BIG but, I thought being in Australia might mean that the burgers might taste differently--seeing how Australian beef is spoken of so highly.

Well, either way, whether it was Australian beef or Australian kangaroo...it wasn't good. It had the same rancid taste a McDonalds hamburger always has. Gross. But the fries were excellent!! Every subsequent time I ate a meal with french fries (called "chips" in Australia) they all had some terrific seasoning. My guess is sea salt--which I find to be delicious.

After lunch, we went to a Visitor Center to get information about a city pass or a transportation pass, etc.

Random building in Sydney; cool architecture--
In case you didn't know this, Sydney is a harbor city. Water splits the city. It's beautiful. The theater where Phantom is currently playing is on the harbor, as are most of the main attractions in Sydney.

Panorama of part of the harbor, Sydney Tower in the distance--

Maritime Museum in the Harbor--
A cool fountain in the ground, near our lunch spot--
Patrice in the fountain--
Our hotel was near Hyde Park, where the Anzac Museum is. It's built for the Australian and New Zealand soldiers who fought at Normandy in World War I. You see the Sydney Tower to the side.
Anzac Museum--
Anzac Museum at night--
Inside the Anzac Museum; that is not Jesus, it represents the soldiers who sacrificed themselves for freedom--
After we'd returned to the hotel, checked in, got settled, rested for a bit, and changed clothes--we headed back out into Sydney. Sadly, the sun sets at around 5:15 or so in Sydney...this being winter and all. So even though it wasn't late at all--it felt very late. In Korea the sun doesn't set until around 7:30, so this was quite an adjustment.

Anyway, as we were just wandering around in Sydney, we saw all kinds of lights and some commotion happening around the State Theater. There was even a red carpet. It definitely looked like a movie premier or something.

Patrice asked a woman who was standing guard near the red carpet, and she said that it was the Kung Fu Panda premier. Cool. When Patrice was talking to the lady, I could've sworn I saw Jack Black in the crowd, quite a distance away. I thought nothing of it, not remembering that he was the voice of the titular character in the film. But the woman said there were still tickets available if we'd like to watch the movie. We had nothing else to do, and it sounded like a cool thing to do. She asked another woman to escort us to the box office.

This woman walked us RIGHT ONTO THE RED CARPET, right in front of all the photographers who had, only moments before, taken pictures of Jack Black. The reason I can say that is because as we walked to the box office, Jack Black was not more than 10 feet away, goofing off and posing for pictures with a person in a panda suit.

Once we got our tickets for the movie, Jack Black walked directly in front of us...and I also noticed that Jeffrey Katzenberg was walking with him. I recognized him immediately. He's a producer and one of the founders, along with Steven Spielberg and David Geffen, of Dreamworks. He also used to work for the Disney Company.

Once inside, we found some seats on the far left side of the theater (it was large). Within a few moments, a lady came out and introduced some other guy, both of whom worked for the Sydney Film Festival, which this premiere was part of. Then the guy introduced Jeffrey Katzenberg, who talked briefly about making this film. He then introduced Jack Black.

Jack talked for a few moments--about nonsense. He's completely out of control, and truth be told, I have never liked him in anything I've ever seen him in. Fortunately, he didn't talk long and they started the movie.
I really enjoyed the movie. It was funny, touching, and had a great message. It was such a cool experience. And the next day, when I picked up a newspaper, I read that Cate Blanchett, who I was unaware was Australian, was also at the premiere with her kids.

Thus ended our first day in Sydney.

Here are a few random pictures from Sydney, that don't fit in any other category:

This is a picture of the Clock Tower of Central Station in Sydney-- The subway station nearest our hotel, called Museum Station--
Inside the subway station; it just happens to look EXACTLY like the subway station in Prince Caspian that the kids are in before they get magically transported back to Narnia-- Patrice in the subway...lots of graffiti...New York City isn't even this bad--
Luna Park, an amusement park in Sydney which opened in 1935--
I took over 100 pictures of the Opera House alone. It's a pretty incredible building, unlike anything I've ever seen. I suppose it's as creative a building as Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles, which is quite something. Here are some of the best pictures of the Opera House, at different times, different angles, etc. There are more throughout this blog.

Inside part of the Opera House, looking out to the other part, during our tour--
Panorama of the harbor with the Opera House and Harbour Bridge in the distance--
Panorama of the Opera House and Harbour Bridge--

Taken from the Opera House during our tour, sunset behind the Harbour Bridge--
On our way back from the Blue Mountains; notice the lights of Luna Park on the left, and the Opera House dimly lit towards the right--
At night--
Our first full day in Sydney was technically Tuesday. This was Phantom day. In the afternoon, we went whale watching. I had no idea that it was actually a perfect time of year to see whales. I really only planned to come to Australia because Phantom/Anthony Warlow was there. However, because it was the beginning of winter in Australia, the humpback whales were migrating to warmer waters to have their babies.

And though the weather had been rather gloomy and rainy since we arrived--the sun miraculously appeared as we were nearing the dock to get on our boat. It was incredible. The captain said this was the most beautiful day in 2 weeks--and a perfect day to see whales. In this blog, you will unfortunately not see any pictures of whales--only because I don't have any. I videotaped the excursion and Patrice took the pictures. She has some great pictures of the whales we saw--and I will post those pictures when I receive them (she put them on a CD and it is in the air as we speak).

On the boat, going to see whales--
My first shot of the Opera House--
So cool--
Notice the moon in the top left corner, and the different color of the Opera House; it goes from white to gray if the sun goes behind a cloud--
So strange--

Sydney Tower in the middle of the two buildings of the Opera House--
Panorama of the Opera House and the Harbour Bridge as we sail away towards the Pacific Ocean--
Patrice and the bridge--
Panorama showing the Sydney Tower, the Opera House, and the beginning of the bridge--

Out on the Pacific Ocean, you can still see the Sydney Tower--
It was FREEZING towards the end, especially at the front of the boat--
Heading back in to the harbor--
A tiny boat that was out whale watching with us--
The sun setting as we headed back into the harbor--

After we returned from whale watching, we headed back to the hotel to get cleaned up and dressed for Phantom, starring Anthony Warlow. As I've already detailed that debacle, I won't say any more about it.

WEDNESDAY:

We decided to spend the morning walking through Hyde Park up through the Royal Botanical Garden, all the way to the Opera House. It was about a 90 minute walk...specifically when you count how many times I stopped to take pictures.

A hilariously and ridiculously obese tree--

St. Mary's Cathedral--
St. Mary's Cathedral and Archibald Fountain--

St. Mary's Cathedral from the Royal Botanical Garden--
Getting closer--
Approaching the Opera House--
A view of the flags on top of the Harbour Bridge--
When we reached the Opera House, we intended to buy tickets to the musical version of Edward Scissorhands, a movie which I love. A kind worker at our hotel printed off information about it, and if we watched a matinee, we could get tickets for only $25. And it was at the Opera House, granted not in the main concert hall, but it would be neat to see a show at the Opera House.

We purchased our tickets and had time to get some lunch before the show.

It wasn't until about 5 minutes into the performance that we realized...this is not a musical...there is no singing...and no talking. This is a ballet. It was mentioned NOWHERE in the information I read. Hilarious. After about 5 minutes of the show...I leaned to Patrice and said, "Oh, please tell me there is singing in this..." There wasn't. It was visually interesting and the dancing was great; but that's all they did. I was hoping for some singing, but oh well. The music was great, but that's thanks to the movie music by Danny Elfman. Overall, it was an enjoyable show, but I would have preferred knowing what was going to happen before going into it. It makes for a funny story now.

THURSDAY:

We had made prior reservations to take a tour to the Blue Mountains, so called because of the oil of the eucalyptus trees which permeates the air and creates a blue haze. The Blue Mountains are about 2 hours NW of Sydney. Our tour van picked us up at about 7:45 a.m. and we headed out.

Our first stop was the Olympic Park in Sydney, which hosted the 2000 Olympics. We stayed for only about 15 minutes, just to get some pictures of the various buildings and surroundings. It was interesting to see.

A view from underneath the Torch, which for some reason wasn't lit-- After leaving Olympic Park, we headed to the town of Leura, a tiny mountain town in the Blue Mountains. We had about an hour to look around and do some shopping. It was a cute little town, and it reminded me of Idyllwild, CA.

After that, we headed directly to the Blue Mountains and Scenic World...all part of the tourism center of this place.

One stop in the Blue Mountains, named Dragon Head...do you see it?--

We took a cable car OVER a giant canyon, where I got a shot of Wentworth Falls--
We then took a steep train down to a lookout point, from which we hiked down a trail to the bottom of the canyon. This is basically Australia's version of the Grand Canyon, which our tour guide mentioned several times. Fortunately, he didn't say it was BETTER than the Grand Canyon, because I would have had to disagree with him...though it was a very cool spot. (So, Uncle Hank, don't worry, Australia doesn't have anything up on your place.)

Panorama of the Blue Mountains, notice the blue haze--

The Three Sisters are famous in the Blue Mountains. There are several ancient Aboriginese tales about these three mountains. You could see them from almost every angle in the Blue Mountains.

The Three Sisters behind us--

Panorama of the Three Sisters and the Blue Mountains--
After leaving the Blue Mountains, we headed to Featherdale Wildlife Park. This is advertised as the place where you can pet a koala and have your picture taken with one (though you won't see pictures of this yet, because Patrice is also sending me those)! Patrice definitely wanted to do that, and I was not opposed to meeting the cute animal. But in addition to that, we were also able to walk through the kangaroos pen, and pet them and feed them. To my knowledge, I'd never actually seen a kangaroo close up, and it was so cool. People have asked me if they punched or kicked, and I know they do--but they were kind to me.

A mom and her joey--

The joey and me--
Me posing next to a kangaroo--
I'd never seen a wombat before!--
Peacocks--A koala actually awake, it was feeding time-- Hilarious, an albino kangaroo with a regular joey in her pouch; who knew interacial relationships worked in the kangaroo world--

After Featherdale, we were driven to the dock where we'd catch our ferry back to Sydney. This was all part of the tour. We arrived back in Sydney at around 6:10. From there, we headed to a quick dinner and then to the theater to see if Anthony was performing in Phantom. He was and we watched. I died a little. In a good way. My previous blog explains it all.

FRIDAY:

Earlier in the week, we purchased two-day City Passes. Friday was our first of two consecutive days to use the pass. We had a handful of things to get through in two days, but we made a good plan of attack. We made a reservation for a Jet Boat cruise. Basically, they have these super-powered, high-speed, stunt boats, and they take people out and do big spins and other crazy manuevers. It sounded fun...though I knew once we started going, I may dislike it. Before leaving the harbor, our driver told us all the rules and such. When he was going to spin us around, he would signal us by waving his hand in a circular motion, then we'd all count down from 3, then he'd jerk the wheel or whatever and make us violently spin around on the water.

I had just seen Anthony Warlow perform Phantom the night before, so I was ready to die. It didn't matter what happened on the water, I was ready to go if it was my time.

Well, it wasn't really bad at all...other than the constant spritzing of salt water on my face...that and the horrible gym-locker stench of the plastic panchos they gave us to wear. Disgusting. We had a great view of the harbor (not that Patrice and I hadn't already experienced that the other 3 times we'd been out on the harbor; first with the whale watching, second taking the ferry around the harbor, and third taking our cruise back from the Blue Mountains the previous night). We sped through the other boats and kayaks that were out on the water. There is a lot of activity in Sydney Harbor. Ferries take people to different locations, just like a subway or a bus would. Tour boats are everywhere. Whale watching boats are plentiful. There are even yellow water taxis. Hmm.

Our driver was a cool guy, and he showed us some cool parts of the harbor. For example, he pointed out the Prime Ministers house on the harbor.

Then he spun us around about 5 times. It was a wild and crazy time. We made it back in one piece...and I spent a good 5 minutes scrubbing off my face and trying to get rid of the horrible locker-room smell.

After that, we went to the Aquarium in Sydney. It was pretty cool. I think the last time I was at an aquarium was when I lived in Sunnyvale, CA, and went to the Monterey Bay Aquarium. That was 1987.

This is an actual turtle, his lips are hilarious--

I got a cool closeup of a crocodiles mouth--

Yikes--
Hilarious sign from above the croc pen--
Looks like a baby raptor--
The big tank...with sharks and turtles and such--
I hate sharks--

Oh gosh--
An itty bitty starfish stuck to the glass in a fish tank--

Here are some random pictures from around Sydney:

I saw this spider when we were walking through the Botanical Garden; GROSSLY GARGANTUAN--
This one was at the zoo; HIDEOUSLY HUGE--
Sydney Tower and Archibald Fountain--

Sydney Tower as seen near our hotel--
Sydney Tower through the trees in Hyde Park--
SATURDAY:

Saturday was Patrice's 25th birthday! She wanted to go to the zoo, so we headed there in the morning. The Taronga Zoo is known as "the zoo with a view" because it is right on the harbor. Indeed, it has a great view, as you will see from some of these pictures.

It was drizzling slightly throughout our time at the zoo, and the orangutans covered themselves with pieces of burlap that were laying around their pen--
A beautiful Sumatran tiger--

Believe it or not, this is called a Red Panda; it has a tail like a fox, but a face like a panda; it was no bigger than an average sized dog; I'd never heard of it before, but it was so cute--
The eye of a _______?--
Giraffe!--
Sydney Tower and Opera House serve as the backdrop of the Giraffe's house--
Funny enough, while we were walking around, I heard some people talking about the San Diego Zoo; and my ears perked up, seeing as how I've been there numerous times and good ole' Uncle Hank works there. They were not Australians, and they were talking about how awesome the San Diego Zoo is. Honestly, even before I heard these people talking, all I could think about was how much NICER the San Diego Zoo is compared to this one. (So, don't worry Uncle Hank, Australia doesn't have anything up on your place.)

After the zoo, we took the ferry back to the other side of Sydney, and we went to the Pylon Lookout on the Harbour Bridge. Oddly enough, I don't think I'd ever heard the word "pylon" until just a few weeks before going to Australia. I was watching the BBC (one of the few English stations on our TV's in Korea), and some guys were talking about the giant metal structures that hold up power lines. They referred to them as pylons. Anyway, the Pylon Lookout is atop the giant stone structure at the base of the bridge. It boasts some great 360 degree shots of Sydney.
On our way to the Pylon--

Still walking across the bridge to the Pylon, Opera House in the background; and yes, to answer your impending question, I do have dreads tucked underneath that cool hat that my awesome friend Liz made me--
The Pylon is directly in front--
Looking out from the bridge--
Climbing the stairs inside the Pylon looking out the window to where we had just been walking moments before--

Notice the groups climbing the bridge, this was an activity we could have done, but it cost over $100 just to climb for a few hours, we settled on the Pylon Lookout--
NORTH--
SOUTH--
EAST--
WEST--

While I was taking pictures from the Pylon, I noticed a jet boat, just like the one we took, out and about on the water--
After we climbed down from the Pylon Lookout, we quickly headed to the Opera House to take a tour, which was also part of our City Pass plans.

Our tour guide was not unlike every other customer service person we'd had in Sydney. Very personable, nice, and a little insane. It was supposed to be an hour tour, but because our tour guide liked to talk so much, about Opera House related topics, we stretched it to about 75 minutes. Did you know that the original designer of the Opera House (a Danish man who is still alive, but apparently is very ill) has never seen it completely finished? Did you know there are 5 different theaters within the complex? Anyway, we got to set foot inside the theater where Patrice and I had watched Edward Scissorhands days earlier. We walked under the Opera House where they load all the huge opera sets in. We walked backstage through a lot of the building as well. The whole thing was informative, interesting, and fun.

After that, we had dinner. Then to cap the night off, we went to the top of Sydney Tower to see the city at night. It was nice, but not as nice as Seoul Tower, or the Space Needle in Seattle, or the Stratosphere in Las Vegas.

SUNDAY:

Sunday was our last real day in Sydney, as we were both flying out early Monday morning. We had sufficiently used our two-day City Passes, and wanted to spend Sunday filling in the holes of things we didn't do; shopping and such.

It was a dismal Sunday morning. The weather was stinky. Not literally stinky, but just not ideal. Especially for heading to Bondi Beach, but that's exactly what we'd planned for Sunday, and so we stuck with our plan. Obviously, being as Sydney was entering winter, we had no plans to lay out or enjoy the beach as if we were back in southern California (though just thinking of the beach in southern California makes my heart beat faster with anticipation of returning). We simply wanted to see the beach and visit the shops that were there.

Bondi Beach (I did some effects on this picture to make it appear as though it were a nice day--but in point of fact, it was sprinkling sideways, it was bitterly cold and windy, and the sky was dark)-- Because of the negative weather conditions, we didn't spend much time at the beach. We walked up and down the main street looking at some of the shops, and then we got back on the bus and headed back towards civilization. Patrice desperately wanted to get her grandfather a kangaroo belt, because that's what he wanted. We visited many shops looking for the perfect one--and we were thankfully able to find it.

Monday morning we woke up very early and got a shuttle back to the airport. I think our shuttle picked us up at 5:45 a.m. My flight left Sydney at 9:10 that morning and I headed back to Seoul to return to the 150 or so days I had left in Korea (at the time of this writing, it's 142 days remaining--but who's counting??).

Say goodbye to Sydney--

If it wasn't so stinkin' far away (and stinkin' expensive--a bottle of water cost $2.20)--I would be returning to Australia every weekend. But it was a grand vacation all around.

From whales to Warlow--the trip was worth every penny.