friends, yeomen and countrymen

One thing that has been remarkable to me during my stay in Sydney is the how multicultural the city is. It is not surprising to be walking down the street and hear no English being spoken. I would guess that of the people I have met the ratio of those who were born here to those who have recently arrived is around 1:4. Some highlights:

I met a guy named Kuda who is an accountant from Zimbabwe. We had an interesting conversation as he told me about what he has to go through in order to propose to his girlfriend. He has to go with an entourage to the home of his girlfriend and negotiate a dowry. Even in this day and age the dowry is based upon a herd of cattle, so once it is agreed that the dowry should be 10 cows, they then must negotiate the price of the cattle. Factors such as his job and the fact that he is working overseas comes into the price per head. Once the negotiating is done, they confer and agree and he has to pony up the cash. In one concession to modern times, he did say that he won’t have to go home for this to happen, he can wait for his entourage to do the haggling while he stays in Australia listening in on his mobile phone. He said he was budgeting for a few thousand dollars, or approximately $300 per head of cattle. It sounds like the actual negotiated price didn’t have much to do with actual beef prices, otherwise the global food shortage might translate into a national wedding shortage.

I was in a crowded place and I saw this guy who had a funny smile. He was wearing huge brown framed glasses and a moustache. He looked like Weird Al Yankovic but with short red hair. It occurred to me that he was either foreign or wearing the moustache ironically. It seems like at least North America and Australia these days, there is some transition point somewhere north of 35 that a man can wear a moustache without irony. He can wear it and feel like Magnum PI, or Clark Gable, depending on his growth pattern. Prior to this transition time however, any man wearing a mustache is laughed at until he gives them a knowing smirk revealing to all his ironic detachment from his facial hair. Anyway, this guy is in his early twenties. I met him on the bus and he introduced himself as Oscar. He is Swedish and just here to work and travel. His one task is to determine what to study the next year. Very pleasant fellow. Couldn’t figure out the attitude with which he was wearing a moustache, though.

I met Danilo, a Brazilian fellow who had a German accent. He sported a long goatee that was braided into a neat front pony tail. He works as an architect.

I met Carlos, a Mexican big wall climber whose goal is to set new routes in every continent of the globe. So far he has set up new big wall routes in Mexico, Brazil, Pakistan and Morocco. He was in Australia to look for his next big route. He works as a carpenter and saves his money to take the next trip. Currently he is staying in the Blue Mountains of New South Wales trading renovation work for lodging. He says that climbing in Mexico is quite safe for foreigners but a little dangerous for locals. He reckons the danger is greater from banditos than from falling while climbing.

I met Simba, a bond trader from Zimbabe. He trained as an electrical engineer and decided he didn’t like it so he went into finance.

I met Kate from South Africa, she trained as a lawyer and now deals with the legal implications of making a tonne of money for an investment bank.

Bill from Fiji is an IT consultant. He says he loves to surf, but is a warm weather surfer only. Once the wetsuits come out he stays home. He listened in amazement as I regaled him with stories of surfers from Nova Scotia who are out in the middle of winter. Wearing thick neoprene to keep out the -20 degree air temperature and the -2 degree water temperature, these folk are hardy.

The list goes on and there is always somebody new with a different story to tell. My exposure to people born in Australia is pretty limited, so much so that I had to attend the Australian Rules Football game with a Canadian who could explain what he knew of the rules. Many comparisons were drawn to hockey, dogsledding and biathlon.

Gratuitous scenery shot

I have been asked to add some photos of my time here in Australia. I am of course in constant deference to my legions of readers, so here is a snap of Wentworth Falls, in the Blue Mountains. The place is beautiful and smells like eucalyptus everywhere. The best part is that it is accessible by the train system from the city centre.

He ain’t heavy, he’s my brolly

I bought myself an umbrella a while back to replace my loaner. I was stuck in a logic problem in the research phase of the purchase though. I wondered just what makes an expensive umbrella worth the money. My intuition told me that an expensive umbrella would suffer from the same basic issues as a cheap one: breakage of ribs or struts or spars or whatever they’re called, ripping of the nylon, etc. I did a cursory internet search for umbrellas and discovered that I could purchase an Armani umbrella for $700. The fancy touches included a silver handle and mahogany shaft. It still had thin steel ribs and used nylon to block the rain. Anyway, I defaulted to a cheap one but not the cheapest. I spent $10 when I could have spent $5. I hoped that paying 100% more than the base model would yield a much better brolly. Of course you can never know in advance which straw will break the brolly’s back. As such, I felt that there was no way to really know how much benefit you would get from a more expensive model. I opted for a collapsible one that would fit into my bag easily and therefore be convenient enough to carry all the time. I had been stuck walking in the rain in the past due to a misreading of the weather, so I wanted to be able to keep one at all times. So I had a good stretch of time with the collapsible umbrella, and I carried it everywhere (insert montage of me and my umbrella in various scenic locales throughout Sydney). Until last night.

I walked home from work in the rain. The umbrella held up well for the first half of the walk, but as the rain increased and the wind increased, there was definitely a lot more stress on the parts of the umbrella. I trudged through the driving rain, and of course I was concerned for the health of the brolly, but I was wearing my dress pants so I didn’t want to put it away. I looked at other pedestrians and saw sorry looking umbrellas everywhere. The perfect dome shape was deformed all over the place. Forlorn looking umbrellas were the norm. I still had faith that a combination of savvy walking and well angled holding and just plain good will would save the day. Alas, in the end the wind won and one particular gust blew my umbrella inside out snapping some of the spars in the process. It was a violent end to a good umbrella. I made a show of trying to go on with the busted up nylon still protecting me, but in the end I just walked home in the pouring rain. I tossed my umbrella out upon my arrival at home. There is a silver lining to the story because sitting atop the rubbish bin when I threw out the umbrella was a suit jacket and vest, just sitting there, waiting to be adopted by a new owner. Or should I say silvery lining.

There is of course no way to know if a more expensive model would have survived the trip, but I prefer to think not. I choose to believe that my umbrella gave a valiant effort, and was the equal to any $700 Armani model. In other news, I hope that I won’t have to write the word umbrella again because I feel that I have hit my quota for the year.