Quirky Brunswick

It was the long weekend of Queen's Birthday on 8 June, we took another day off so we could have a super long weekend to do what we love most. Today we wandered into Brunswick, one of the many varied suburbs near Melbourne. The main road is Sydney Road which stretches for miles.

So we took a slow stroll in this beautiful Melbourne weather - wet, cold, windy, freezing, occasionally the sun comes up to say a shy hi and goes back into hiding really quite quickly. The temperature gauge in our car showed 9C but when it is windy, the windchill makes it feel like 2C less.

Sydney Road is full of surprises, the world cultures seemed all lined up in one street. Greek bakeries, Italian restaurants & supermarkets, Turkish homewares, lebanese cafes & clothing stores, Vietnamese/South East Asian restaurants, Vietnamese fabric stores, Japanese restaurants are home on this street. In between, there are a couple of bars with live music, the Brunswick Music Festival is held every March. This is a good place for unusual fashion stores unlike your typical Bridge Road or Chapel Street.

Love the clothes in Friends of Couture (www.friendsofcouture.com.au), the brand carries clothes that has an alternative style but wearable and reasonably priced. Across the road, probably by the same owner, is Episode which sells second hand clothing, mainly vintage. I found some milk maid type of clothes, really odd. But what's interesting is the clothes from Friends of Couture were also found here at discount prices because they are either losing a button or running thread that makes the value goes down by half.

There is one other store which I aspire to buy all my clothes from is Digging for Apples (www.diggingforapples.com) up the road towards Moreland precinct. High fashion with an edge, the buyer of this store has done all the selections for me (ahem!). Designer pieces from Nudie Jeans, Sass & Bide, Romance was Born, Claude Maus, Zambesi and Karen Walker were on for 20-40%. But the tags were between $230 - $1080. All I could do is take their card and walked out. Maybe one day I will save enough.

Food was great at Kaleidoscope where we had lunch, their influence was Mediterranean, I had lentil soup and Alex had risotto. We had to go to Choukette, a french pattiserie because that's how I discovered Brunswick. But the cakes were dissapointing, not as tasty as I thought it would be. We rested our tired feet at Bar Etiquette - weird bar with just 4 customers including us the whole time we were there. So we had a nice chat with Mike, the bartender and gather some advice on where to have our dinner. The bar was set in a two storey house, the rooms upstairs all had a different theme but all dark and filled with lounge chairs. Music was good but the art on the wall by Leigh Watson is better.

Swimming with the dolphins

I am here in the Bay of Islands, North Island in New Zealand. We took a full day cruise called The Cream Trip. It's the best trip to get a overall history and taster of the islands here.

Everything here is a feast to the eyes, green lush grass, rolling hills, even the sheep here looks happy. The boat took us from one island to the other, and it is still delivering mail to several of the island over the last century, even with the existence of roads now.

The most amazing thing on the trip is swimming with the dolphins, the water was cold and choppy, it always is with cloudy weather but I cant miss the chance. So I paid $30, and jumped into this big net with fellow dolphin swimmers and the boat went chasing for the dolphins. It was easy to find them, and there were at least 6 of them easy to spot from the boat. When the crew asked us to jump in and shouted "Quick, go after them." It was like a mad rush, the humans keep swimming into each other. Well they were the ones who asked us to look into the water with our snorkels. How are we to spot the dolphins looking down into dark blue sea? And the open ocean and the thought of getting the waves sweeping me away had me hyperventilating. Alas, the dolphins were only metres away but nearly close enough to touch and swim next too. But they were beautiful creatures, greyish black smooth shiny skin and there was a 3 month old baby too. Baby dolphins do not leave their mother until 3 years old coz they are mammals. I will post my photos or video later. Alex got me gasping for breath on the human net as the boat went chasing for the dolphins. Drank lots of sea water but all well worth it.

April's month focus

I have almost the whole month off. Yay!!
Kicking off the celebration month is our trip to North Island, New Zealand. We are approved for our permanent resident visa and leaving to Auckland for the visa evidencing. It's confusing isnt it? Leaving the country to be certified as an Australian Permanent Resident and returning as a legal resident of OZ land. We are thrilled and I feel honoured to introduce New Zealand, my most loved country to my husband.

We should have enough time to explore North Island. Will leave the best part South Island for another trip...

Then I go back to home sweet home to say hello to my new nephew. Soak in mom and dad's pampering, graze all my favourite food and catch with lifelong friends in KL and Singapore.

Here are some photos of my NZ trip during my Contiki tour. Photos which I kept in handy so I can remind myself of the good times I had.

With these photos, are photos of awesome friends I have in my lifetime.