The Perth Report

Hi again,

It’s strange sending a report to Dana instead of with her. Oh well, “I guess I can only blame myself”.

A quick run through the last 1.5 weeks or so: after Denmark we skipped over to Albany, which is a rather nice big town on the south coast of WA. Spent two days there, not working too hard (due to rain and other reasons). Then it was back to Perth, some last-minute gift shopping and then to the airport. Dana flew home, and I went to an island for 4 days, then back to Perth, and tomorrow it’s back to the Albany area (which we didn’t have nearly enough time to explore together).

Rotto

And so it was, that Dana went home, and I went to Rottnest Island (a.k.a. Rotto). This is where Perth people go to escape the harsh realities of city life. It’s just 30 minutes away by boat, and there are great beaches, peace and quiet and lots of birds and good surfing and thousands of quokkas. A quokka is a weird cross between a rat and a kangaroo (hence the name “Rat Nest Island”), and they’re damn cute. It’s sometimes hard to take pictures of them, because they try to eat the camera. They always think the tourists are going to feed them (wonder where they got that idea).

All transport on Rotto is by bicycle. It’s like a perpetual Yom Kippur. It’s fun and good exercise, but you have to watch out because people seem to make no attempt to follow the rules of the road. It’s especially a problem with little people.

The island is way too small for a city of 1.4 million, so each holiday they have a ballot to decide who gets to stay there. Luckily there’s no holiday now, and I got a bed with no problem. The youth hostel there is in an old army barracks, complete with a parade ground, a red-brick mess hall and a huge Aussie flag on top. The door of my dorm said “Company Sergeant Major”.

I’d promise to have pictures online soon, but I’m starting to feel like a politician with all those broken promises :-)

Chillin’

One of my goals on this trip was to just chill out - relax and do nothing. This is not a natural state for me, but it’s something that can be practiced and eventually enjoyed a great deal. Like a kind of sport. So there I was lying on the beach on Rotto, watching the waves crash on the reef in the distance, watching the sea birds perching on big rock in front, thinking about life, the universe, and everything. It was all going quite well until I looked to the side and saw the head of a snake, about 30 cm from my face. Fortunately, the head was attached to the body of a skink (a type of lizard), which turned and left the scene even faster than I could.

Oh well, maybe next time.

The Quiz

On Monday night the hostel I’m staying at in Perth held a trivia quiz. The prize was a surfing lesson. I didn’t want the prize, so I declined to participate, and by the 2nd question I’d teamed up with a girl named Louise, and we solved it together. We made a good team - Louise knew Marge Simpson’s maiden name as well as who was the second James Bond (not to mention the exact age of Michael Jackson!) and I contributed answers regarding world capitals and nuclear disasters (I also knew that the alcoholic drink made from honey is called mead). We won the quiz with 18.5 points out of 30. The thing is, Louise didn’t want the prize either, so she gave it to a friend. Which goes to show that luck and the right connections will get you further in life than brains ever will.

Israelis in Western Australia - by the Numbers

• Number of encounters with Israelis since we arrived in WA: 2
• Number of times we got the “Hey, I’ve never seen an Israel driver’s license before” response when renting a vehicle: 2
• Last known visit by Israelis to my hostel in Perth: 8 months ago

On the other hand, it seems that everywhere you turn here you find people who’ve spent time in Israel as volunteers, in Giv’at Hayim, or Dgania, or wherever. And when I met my British roommate at the hostel, he had Infected Mushroom playing on the CD (that’s a famous Israeli trance outfit, as I’m sure you all know).

Bread

There is a town here called New Norcia, which is famous for making good bread. So naturally I went there. The bread is good, but I’m not sure it’s better than in any of the local village bakeries. It certainly doesn’t compete with our own humble Lehem Erez. Fortunately, there are some other interesting things to see around town, so I didn’t drive two hours each way just to be disappointed.

And that’s all for now.

Bye-bye, and I hope everyone had a happy, high-cholesterol Independence Day!!!

- Ron (& the-one-formerly-known-as-Dana)