Moon Landing

The countdown is on. The countdown is real. 18 months after arriving in this crazy little huge metropolis I currently call home, I find myself preparing to pack up my bags and head back to London, that other little huge metropolis I call home. I won't leave until mid-June, and even then, I've got a summer of travels. To Hawaii, to Japan, to Malaysia and Vietnam. 

Nevertheless it’s bittersweet. Shanghai has been nothing short of provocative and every adventure, every travel has been tinged with a surreal this-isn’t-my-life kind of feeling. In China, I’ve never felt like I remotely fit in. But it’s funny how you learn to deal with and then, later, embrace that feeling. You become a curious Other, looming on the fringes of a society you will never understand and, often, care not to.  

I’ve read a lot of articles on the matter of expat life and the continual exodus of people, of changing faces—the exit, re-entry, as if we’re a group of people contemplating the moon landing and subsequent return to Earth. Never having been to the moon, I can’t say with any certainty this comparison is apt. But I can imagine that China and the moon have a lot in common; the moon and expat life, even more. There’s a metaphorical zero gravity I can’t quite put my finger on.

Perhaps part of this weightlessness is the notion that, in the teaching world at least, you give two terms notice (a cool eight months) before you’re set to leave. So for eight months, you gear up and gear up and build up an angst between I-know-I’m-leaving-but-I’m-still-here-trying-to-enjoy-the-present. And you build bucket lists with a group of people who've become your Shanghai family. People who, two years previous, were faces on a website and names on a list. More depressingly, people, many of whom once you leave this place, you will never see again.

With these individuals you experience a gamut of day-to-day that, in reality, is rather mundane but to the outside world is a feat larger than life. The sighs and pauses from friends and acquaintances: “China…phhhhh…I could never do that. What about their human rights? Don't they eat their pets?’ You laugh and dispel myths as the ambassador for your adopted land. But niggling at the back of your mind is a question: how do you leave the moon and ever return to the real world?

I’m hoping the answer to this is with a list of adventures to return to. In London I get Paul, I get sausage dog ownership, I get ukulele group lessons, I get British citizenship.  And I prepare for a mission to Mars; somewhere in the distant sky it looms.

Singapore

Or: the 13-hour layover tour of the world's largest tiny city state.

From the outset, things felt neat, clean, orderly. It's China in reverse:

Big buildings abound: 

Our 'tour' included getting lost trying to find our hotel, getting lost trying to find Raffles (home of the original Singapore Sling), getting lost trying to find dinner. We eventually made our way to Marina Bay Sands boulevard, a 5* hotel made famous by Asia's Got Talent, Paul and my favourite (or perhaps only available) TV show in China.

I marvelled and gasped at the building made famous by my TV dreams. Karen and Clare just looked at me bemused. 

 

But Paul understood and gasped, or whatever the equivalent text message noise for a gasp might be. So much so that we've got a two-day layover in the summer and we're checking into the hotel at 3pm and parking there until we're forced out.  

The Great Barrier Reef

Our last journey on the whistle stop tour of Australia took us to Cairns, one of several jumping points for a tour of the Great Barrier Reef. Much like seeing the Opera House for the first time, it took all of us a few moments to digest the reality of getting on a boat bound for the reef. This was perhaps made more surreal by the fact that we were joined by Peter Parker and his girlfriend, Kelly. We made friends with them at Janelle and Nick's wedding and our day on the water became a Table 10 reunion. After we put all bad Spiderman jokes aside, we hopped on the Reef Experience boat for a two-hour ride to the Outer Reef, a chunk called Norman Reef.

Reef Experience boasted their family-owned goodness before dividing us up into certified divers, novice have-a-go divers, snorkelers and passive boat sitters. Along with Rosa and I, Peter Parker was the only other certified diver on our 70-person trip. As such, Oli, Australian instructor extrodinaire, talked us through the hundred things in the ocean that would definitely try to kill us before taking us down 18 meters to a middling visibility sea.

Thus marks country number four I've dived in:

It started mildly enough with colourful coral, clownfish and the odd parrotfish:

        

 But then Oli found us a gem hidden amongst the coral diving for a snack:

 As he emerged, we made the closest equivalent to a gasp one can make with a BC:

 Our friend lazily swam:

 And rose:

 And made his way for a breath of fresh air:

We were mesmerised. And were then met with this beauty:

Once we eventually surfaced for air and I fought with water trapped in my middle ear, we marvelled. And then snorkelled where we marvelled some more. What more can I say about diving the Great Barrier Reef? 

Trinity Beach

Trinity Beach happened by mistake, a snafu in planning the end of our Australian adventure. We knew we'd be flying from Cairns back to Shanghai and we'd already booked our snorkel trip to the Great Barrier Reef. All that was left was accommodation. 

Unfortunately, Cairns is a bit of a hotbed of Reef activity and everything clean and/or reasonably priced was booked up during this later summer February. To our extreme advantage, we found a two bedroom suite, roughly three times the size of my Shangers flat, that also came equipped with two bathrooms, a kitchen, balcony, two pools and close access to Trinity Beach, a sleepy (in the best way possible) beach town with a few waterside restaurants, a swimming area and a tiny shop selling everything including ice cream by the scoop. 

We lazed our final three days away between a boat trip to the reef, the pool and the beach, where fighting off the nature trying to kill us seemed the order of the day:

If it's not jellyfish, it's crocodiles. Our taxi driver was very keen to wow us with his crocodile stories--despite the fact that we weren't sure they were true, we didn't care. He didn't care. We reveled in legendary Oz:

Beachside, poolside, water all around:

And the occasional selfie:

And surreal reminders of our location: 

We blissed out. Perhaps it was small fry on the grand scheme of such a large continent but we took our small fry and feasted. I never thought I'd want to live in Australia but the two weeks convinced me otherwise. Yes, it's quite literally the other side of the world. But sunshine. But avocados and other vegetarian, lactose and wheat allergy friendly foods. But squeaky beaches. But legend wrapped in truth. 

Australiiiiiaaaaaaa!

Byron Bay

On our second full day in Brisbane, we decided to venture out and down the Sunshine Coast and back into New South Wales. Hired car at hand, we marvelled at the 1.5 hour drive and immediate change in time zone as we crossed the NSW border.

As we drove the road was dotted with turns offs to ridiculous place names, some more literal than others:

But Byron was our destination so we avoided the temptation of flirting with other beaches. Our destination did not disappoint--a promenade dotted with surf shops and organic eateries flanked one side and a white sand world-class beach stretched on endlessly into the horizon on the other side.

The locals were friendly, chipper even. And. And.  The sand squeaked. Literal squeaking. So much so that we squeaked at its squeaking.

omgoodness yes.

Blue skies, sea breezes, happy people all around. It made absolutely no sense. So we squeaked some more. 

Brisbane

After three days in Melbourne, we bid farewell to hipster chic and hopped a quick Lion Air flight up to Brisbane and the Sunshine Coast, which boasts its 330 sunshiny days a year. 

It was a city of reunions for us: Karen's friend from school manages a hostel in the West End neighbourhood and put us up in a bunk bedded room for four. Later in the week, I reunited with Guy and Adi, two lovely guys I met travelling through Thailand six summers ago. 

Brisbane as a city was much sleepier than its more southern counterparts. Where Sydney was buzzy and Melbourne was trendy, Brisbane was relaxed. No one seemed in a particular rush and the blue skies helped create an unhurried sense of calm. Our first stop took us on the ferry cross-river to the Central Business District, a term Australian cities love to throw around:

Upon debarkation we wandered past riverside pubs filled with merry tipplers:

Lots of health nuts on their choice of wheeled modes of transport:

And a manmade beach complete with sand, sea and a variety of water fowl (and their birdish diseases):

Obviously coffee buses dotted the landscape too. I cannot explain how much Australians like their coffee. I cannot explain how, after a number of cumulative years in China, grateful we all were for this.

On our last morning, Clare, Karen, Rosa and I trekked across the city to Paddington (not that far in a car) and Shouk Cafe (now renamed with a second branch opening across town), owned and managed by two charming boys I met with Sarah and Jon in Thailand. Through the channels of Facebook, we'd kept in touch and upon arrival, we were regaled by both Guy and Adi as well as the food:

The breakfast was award winning and far too delicious for my words to do justice to. Our organic choices were accompanied by a complimentary fruit waffle delicacy, perhaps the most waffles I've ever tasted.

I love reunions. I love Australia. Winning all around.

St. Kilda

After the beaches of Sydney, it would be easy to dismiss St. Kilda, the beach a 20-minute tram ride for central Melbourne, as something of a let down. I get the impression a lot of Australians do; they look at the tourists there and scoff a bit in the but-why-would-you-go-there-when-there's-other-beaches-only-an-hour's-car-ride-away kind of way. If I were Australian with a plethora of beaches at my fingertips, perhaps I too would feel the same.

 

But any way you slice it, St. Kilda's got charm. It's Brighton, England with finer sand, a smaller high street area and an equally bohemian vibe. Pierced, hairy armpitted ukulele players busking tunes dot the main street; artists selling paintings and lost dreams coerce you into twenty-five minute conversations on their craft. 

As the day waxed on, friends started to gather, picnic-style, on the beach before making their way to the palm-tree lined Acland Street. Options to dine, shop and lounge abounded: 

What St. Kilda might lack in other things, it makes up in cake. Shop after shop boasted baked delights served alongside iced coffee, ice cold beer, any tipple of your choice:

And train car dining:

Not that Melbourne is a frenetic place that demands escape but if city life gets to be just that little too much, St. Kilda is the answer.