The Australian Diaries

The Australian Diaries

14^th February 2014

Most Valentine’s Days are the same. A lot of talk before, but with very little happening on the day itself. With age, even the talk seems to be reducing. A case of much ado about nothing, I suppose.

This one, however, was different. As always, there was a lot of talk preceding the event. But the day itself was different. Rajesh called in the morning to ask Ranga and me to book tickets for the Cricket World Cup 2015, which was to be played in (drum roll, hero introduction music!) AUSTRALIA!

Brushing aside our initial responses (“Hangover talk!”, “Call me back when you are sober”, “Have you been smoking that stuff again?”, etc), he convinced us to go online and actually book tickets. The man is a born salesman.

In case you are wondering about the connection to Valentine’s day, this is a love story. With a difference. From test cricket, to pyjama cricket, down  to the latest IPL cricketainment, we had been in love with this beast called Cricket. And now this love story would be played out in Australia and everything that came along with the land down under.

The way the tournament was scheduled and designed, it was safe to assume that India will at least reach the quarter finals. We went about, in right earnest, getting the balance of venues and matches that involved India. In hindsight, it was a tad too ambitious. The project manager in me was up in arms, but was pointedly ignored. The list of risks and assumptions were way too many for any sane person’s liking. India reaching the quarter finals? Leave approval for 3 weeks so early in the year? Funding a month-long vacation in Australia? Looked like we took the advice of ‘Dreaming Big, Doing Bigger’ of several life coaches a little too seriously.

However, with the madness that usually accompanies love, match tickets were booked, credit card bills were paid the following month (or three!) and all was forgotten. But not for long!

31^st December, 2014

Year-end revelries usually revolve around a couple of things: an epic piss-up at night and a set of resolutions the next morning. This one was a little different. All talk was about our impending trip to Australia. Friends and family seemed more confident of us making the trip than we were. Travel planning/arm chair travelling (over many glasses of alcoholic beverages) is turning out to be the latest national hobby. What never ceases to surprise is the enthusiasm with which people shout out ‘Count me in! If mere intent to could replace travel, I would have travelled the length and breadth of the world. Twice!

However, the enthusiasm the world around us seemed to be showing about our trip convinced us that this was a holiday that had to be taken. Not that we needed any convincing to take any holiday, given the kind of people that we are.

14^th February, 2015

One year from Rajesh’s call, things had moved rapidly. Holiday applications were put in. And approved! Visa applications had been submitted to the travel agent. Getting documents in order for the Australian visa was akin to getting a new identity in spy movies. One’s life history had to match the evidence provided.

Meanwhile India was getting walloped Down Under and in the ODI series, ensuring than expectations for the World Cup were at rock-bottom, if not lower. However, the opening game against Pakistan ensured that there was a marked surge not just in the general interest levels, but also in the number of visa applicants and associated costs.

Thanks to my superior planning skills, however, we had our visas within the next one week. By “we”, of course, I mean Ranga and me. Rajesh, in typical style, had complicated his life by agreeing to go on a business trip to Germany a week before our trip. And Kurien, unfortunately, had to drop out due to business commitments.

16^th March, 2015

Kurien is a stickler for tradition. Despite having to drop out of the trip, he was quick to point out that we had to honour the age old tradition of sipping on a few chilled ones on the terrace of Sherlock Holmes before departing for any trip. Strategy plotting, revisiting itineraries and must do’s usually form the agenda of these conversations.  JD joined on this one to give us the ladies perspective, which was restricted to pleading with us to not make fools of ourselves if we managed to get on the TV cameras.

Sufficiently tanked up, we uber-ed it to the Airport, where Irshad, from Sri Lankan Airlines ensured that our holiday would be off to a great start. He managed to get us fantastic seats all the way to Sydney. If three seats for two from Colombo to KL was the cake, four seats for two from KL to Sydney was the icing. The benchmark had been set and it was up to us to raise the bar now.

A 2-hour layover at Colombo and a similar one at KL weren’t too bad and nothing worth complaining about. Getting a foot massage in the middle of the night was our way of killing time – any excuse for our well-being will do.

Useful tip – get hot green tea at the KL airport. You can easily wait for an hour for the tea to cool down while you catch up on reading on the Kindle.

The usual movie watching, snacking on stale airline food, catching a few winks and hoping that elusive pretty woman makes interesting conversation completed the rest of the uneventful flight to Sydney. All flights being on time is worth a mention. Even Malaysian Airlines got into the spirit of things by landing on hard firm ground at Sydney, and not on some water-body along the way.

17^th March, 2015

Sydney welcomed us with perfect weather. Stepping out of a 7 hour flight into a cool 22 degrees at 8 PM local time was literally a breath of fresh air. Any signs of fatigue and weariness disappeared in seconds.

At the airport itself, we got ourselves equipped with local sims. Optus offers very good short term pre-paid cards that is perfect for trips like these.

We took a taxi from the airport to our hotel. The moment the taxi driver knew we were from India, he readily indulged us in some banter, ranging from NaMo’s policies, India’s economy, ‘fun’ (a-hem)  things to do in Sydney etc. He dropped us off at Potts Point which is close to Kings Cross station. Apparently this stretch is supposed to be dangerous and if anything had to go wrong in Sydney it would be here.

(My take on this piece of advice – if anything had to wrong it could happen anywhere in the world including inside your house. There wasn’t a single incident that was scary, disturbing or racist over the entire trip!)

The taxi driver even gave us a discount because he had overshot the way a little bit.

We checked in to a decent sized room and went off to explore Kings Cross. A good enough night life greeted us, although many places shut early on Tuesday. However, some great live music with some local brew ensured a great first evening down under.

Our Australia holiday had begun on a great note!

18^th March, 2015

The big day! We were off to the SCG for our first match down-under. It didn’t appear to be a mad busy working day from the looks of it. Crisp air, broad pavements, no honking cars, beautiful road side cafés – Sydney was really putting on a show for us.

Map-reading and geographical awareness has always tickled my brain. It tickles even more when I am abroad. But I am never averse to asking for directions from the locals. A construction worker, who we asked, initially feigned ignorance of the cricket world cup happening, just so that he could show off his iPhone and insisted on showing us at least a couple of different walking routes. The Aussies have a wicked sense of humour.

The route to the stadium was strewn with distractions. An impromptu stroll into a sports bar led to a couple of VB’s – supposed to be their cheapest beer – both in terms of quality and price. Way better than our local Kingfisher. By the way, not much of Foster’s anywhere. Didn’t someone say that the “Australian for beer” campaign was planned and shot in India?

We didn’t know how much more we had to walk, but a few steps out of the bar, we bumped into a couple of Englishmen going to the match as well. We realized we were just across the stadium. (To put things in perspective – distance between Koshy’s and Chinnaswamy stadium!)

Walking over the well-manicured lawns of the SCG, we shared our sympathies on the current state of English cricket. They were complete sports and saw the lighter side of it. I guess you have to, if you are an English cricket fan.

At the stadium, the lack of maddening crowds or a buzz that you would associate with cricket in India made us wonder just for a moment if there really was a quarter final going on. A fear that was quickly dispelled with the swarm of Sri Lankan fans. A Colombo feel engulfed the surrounding.

A Pakistani randomly walked up to us as we were waiting for the gates to open and asked, nay, demanded an extra ticket. When we said we didn’t have any, he even went  a step further, asking tickets for the semi-finals, trying to convince us that India wouldn’t make it anyway. Ah! What is cricket without an India-Pak rivalry. Can’t say he did much to make us love Pakistan, though.

The gates opened sharp at 1 PM and after a short walk inside, we got our first full glimpse of the home of the Don and Waugh brothers.  As we got our first glimpse of the famous grounds, with “Country Roads” playing in the background causing goose bumps, we needed a moment of reverent silence before we could react.

Calm and composure returned shortly and we got back to the business of getting beers to have in the stands. This is of special significance because we’ve always wanted to do this ever since we’ve been watching broadcast of matches in Australia. Oh India, I love you and all that. But long way to go on this frontL

The match itself was hardly the nail biter expected out of a quarter final, but we got a complete experience filled with showers, bright sunlight, a streaker (male, unfortunately!) and drunken aussies. (Clearly, alcohol doesn’t discriminate!)

It’s a joy watching a match with Sri Lankan fans. Whatever the state of the match, there is always singing and dancing, when they are around. And hardly any bad behaviour.

The match itself could be summed up in the words of one disgruntled Sri Lankan fan - ‘Wonder why the ball is being changed. It needs to be hit for it to lose shape’

Behind our seats, there were a bunch of Indian fans with a banner that read “Madcaps from Madras. From Street Cricket to SCG.”

Take out Madras, and it was pretty much what we felt after our first day of cricket in Australia

19^th – 21^st March, 2015

The next few days after the SCG game was a blur of fun and entertainment. This was also about the time when we started losing track of time and dates, an indicator of a really good holiday!

We now had a week’s break before the next game. We decided to be locals and took an OPAL card (one that can be used on trains, buses and ferries). Taking local transport is a great way to experience a place. And over the next few days, we managed to do exactly that.

We started off on the 19^th with a trip to Manly beach. This involved a train journey from Kings Cross to Circular Quay, which meant changing trains at Town Hall, followed by a Ferry ride to Manly, with the Sydney Opera House and the Harbour Bridge as the background!

At Manly, on the way from the Ferry station to the beach, there is a wonderful walkway, with shops and pubs lined up on the sides. We stopped at one of the latter to enquire if they would be showing the cricket match in the afternoon, the one involving India and another neighbour of ours, Bangladesh! We needn’t have asked. The man at the bar simply pointed to their “Cricketer’s Arms Keeper’s Lager”!

Before the match, we went for a walk on the pristine Manly beach. No wonder the locals rate it to be better than Bondi!  And we decided to have burger brunch at a place called Moo’s Burgers, a tribute to our returning funky towner, Tennessey!

After lunch, we went back to the pub to watch the match. The live betting was a temptation, but we resisted! The match itself was pretty uneventful, save for that famous “no-ball” non-dismissal of Rohit Sharma, which almost led to Bangladesh breaking off diplomatic relations with India. Once again, we met an English couple, who were sporting about the fact that Bangladesh had knocked them out of the World Cup!

The 20^th was a CBD day. We met my good friend Sheetal for lunch at the Opera Bar on a bright sunny day. From there, we headed out to George Street, a quaint little locality teeming with shops and history. But not before a small adventure. We took a train from Circular Quay to Martin Place, where Ranga was immediately attacked by two Police Dogs. Karma, as he came to realize, is a female dog!

We visited a couple of historic pubs and did what the Aussies are famous for – downing beer on a Friday afternoon, while watching Australia beat  another team (Pakistan this time) in cricket. From there, my friend took us back to CBD, where we went to Palmer and Co, one of Sydney’s hidden pubs, which seemed to be a grown-up version of The Leaky Cauldron from the Harry Potter world. After a few more beers here, we headed to a Belgian Restaurant ‘The Heritage’ nearby, where we feasted on some excellent mussels.

We finished off the day by getting Sheetal to use Uber for the first time. We believe in changing lives!

21st – 22nd March, 2015

Even in a super-friendly place like Australia, there are bound to be a few grumpy souls. We had one of those for a cab-driver to the airport on 21^st. His major compliant in life seemed to be that he was not given free tickets to the world cup games despite being an SCG life-member. Fortunately, it was just a 20 min ride and we had Gold Coast to look forward to.

The flight from Sydney to Gold Coast is usually just about an hour or so. But not when you have exciting people like us on the flight. A thunder storm in Gold Coast meant that our flight was unable to land in Gold Coast. So our flight was diverted to Brisbane.

From Brisbane, we had to take a bus to Gold Coast, giving us a view of Australia’s awesome highway routes. It was nearly evening by the time we reached Gold Coast airport.

Our taxi ride to our hotel from the Airport introduced us to Keith, who was exactly who you would imagine an Aussie taxi driver to be - friendly and chatty without being over-bearing. When he learnt that we were here for the World Cup and that we were hoping for India to beat Australia in the semis, he simply said, “You really think Australia is going to lose a home game?”

Our hotel at Gold Coast, Surfers Paradise, was one of those that overlooks the beach. The kind of place one sees only in the movies. A spectacular view greeted us from our balcony on the 11^th floor room! The evening was another blur of pub hopping and beer-swilling – Beer Garden, Irish Pub, Waxy et al

Sunday morning saw us heading to a beach restaurant for typical Australian breakfast. Which was pretty much like an English breakfast. Only bigger. And better!

We indulged in a Thai massage in the afternoon to loosen up our limbs and get us ready for the evening.

My good friend, Rupa, who lives in Gold Coast picked us up from our hotel in the evening with her husband. Both of them have lived in Australia for a long time and they took us to their beautiful house. Over many bottles of wine, old times were revisited, old friends were discussed and a wonderful dinner was consumed. Did I mention that her husband was a master-chef?

23rd-25th March, 2015

We had asked Keith to take us to Byron Bay. His only condition was that he wanted to take a selfie with us. Talk about being famous!

I slept through the trip to Byron Bay, while Ranga was getting to hear the details of Keith’s life history. In fact, Keith seemed so happy with Ranga that he apparently even showed topless pictures of some of his earlier customers, in addition to teaching him Koala (pronounced Ku-va-laa) means “bear” in the aboriginal language and that saying “Koala bear” is a form of tautology. I am so glad I was asleep!

We reached Byron Bay around lunch time. If Gold Coast was one extreme in terms of high energy and buzz, Byron Bay was exactly the opposite. It’s a small sleepy town and rightly called the Backpackers Paradise with the ‘smokes’ and cookies. The only activity that anyone makes the effort for is to surf. A lighthouse makes for good viewing, which indicates eastern most tip of Australia.

We had lunch at an Indian restaurant nearby and soaked in the peaceful atmosphere of the town for the rest of the evening. The continuous partying of the previous few days took a bit of a toll on us and we had a rare early night.

Bright and refreshed, we went back to our plans on the 24th. The pub by the beach was showing the semi between New Zealand and South Africa. There was plenty of excitement as there were a good bunch of Kiwis as well as lots of Aussies wanting the Kiwis to lose! Of course, there was also an American couple, who were completely clueless to the whole thing.

The match itself was a humdinger, that went New Zealand’s way after dithering like a Karan Johar heroine for two hours. We decided to celebrate the Kiwi victory by visiting a well-known local pub. Just to be sure, we asked the bouncer if there was a dress-code. He looked at my casual T-shirt, shorts and rubber flip flops with a critical eye and said, “You are over-dressed, mate!” Oh Australia how I love you!

The next day morning, good old Keith came to pick us up and take us to the Gold Coast Airport to fly back to Sydney. Most of us in India are not used to time zones. So it was a novelty for us to go through multiple time zones. Let me explain. Sydney is in New South Wales, which follows the Australian Eastern Daylight Time (AEDT) this time of the year. So does Byron Bay. Gold Coast is in Queensland, which follows the Australian Eastern Standard Time (AEST). Which means Sydney is an hour ahead of Gold Coast. Our trip from Byron Bay to Sydney through Gold Coast, therefore, meant that we were going from AEST to AEDT for the taxi ride between Byron Bay and Gold Coast, gaining one hour. And then again from AEDT to AEST while flying from Gold Coast, losing an hour! Who said time travel is not possible?!

Anyway, the taxi drive from Byron Bay to Gold Coast was uneventful, except for some enlightening discussions between Ranga and Keith about Solar panels and their pricing strategies.

At the Gold Coast airport, which we finally managed to enter after missing out on the earlier trip, we treated ourselves to a massage chair at the airport before our trip “home”

After a fairly uneventful flight, we found ourselves back home in Sydney. Few places in the world give you that distinct warm feeling and Sydney was clearly one of them.

The next day was clearly a big day. To prepare for the big event, we went to The Rocks with another good friend of mine, Sujay. The Rocks is a historic area of Sydney very close to the Harbour. A very European looking area, where we kicked off proceedings with a couple of beers in a German Bar.

From there, Sujay decided to take us to the Shangri-La Cocktail Bar on the 40^th Floor with a stunning view of the Sydney cityscape. Thanks to my friends out here, we really got to see a completely non-touristy side of Sydney

26th March, 2015

India vs Australia. Semi Finals!  Whodathunk?

Seriously, when we were making plans for Australia, not in our wildest dreams did we expect to be watching an Ind vs Aus match. That too, a semi-final in SCG!

We woke up next day, in a state of nervous excitement. After the traditional pre-match beer, we headed to the SCG. A very different SCG from the South Africa – Sri Lanka match. Bursting to the seams with Indian fans, it was difficult to believe that this was not Mumbai or Bangalore.

It is impossible to describe the atmosphere outside the stadium. These pictures might do a better job.

Rajesh was due to meet us outside the stadium. As I had mentioned earlier, he had legged it off to Germany for a week and had reached Sydney much later. While waiting for him, we bumped into a couple of known faces – Nishant and Sibi. Both of them had been traversing around Australia and NZ for a couple of weeks, watching cricket from the quarter finals onwards.

Rajesh finally landed up along with two other friends – Mukul and Rasika. It was obvious that Rajesh was missing us a lot, as the first words he uttered upon seeing us was, “My battery is nearly dead. Do you have a charger?”

We all piled on into the SCG. Ranga and I were SCG veterans, so we simply walked it casually. But for Rajesh and Mukul, it was a special moment. To understand how they felt, rewind back to my diary entry on 16^th March 2015!

Singing the anthem with tens of thousands of other Indians was special and is something that will remain etched in memory. I still get goose-bumps when I think of that moment.

The match itself was acutely disappointing for an Indian fan. Ranga started off by predicting that Australia would be all out for 28. He was close. They made 328. The rest of match involved Ranga making nonsense remarks and Rajesh constantly asking him for Wi-Fi connectivity or the portable charger every 5 minutes.

After the match, we all slunk away to our respective hotels, given that we were due to fly out early next day to Melbourne.

Later in the evening, Ranga and I went out for a couple of drinks and came home late to find ourselves locked out of our room. Calls to the contact number listed got us no response. And we had a flight to catch early in the morning. Clearly Sydney liked us so much that she didn’t want to let us go!

All was sorted out soon and we went back to bed for the final time in Sydney.

27th-28th March, 2015

It was finally time to say goodbye to Sydney. We left early morning to catch a train to the airport. Rajesh joined us at the airport. Mukul and Rasika were spending an extra day in Sydney.

Melbourne greeted us with grey skies and a nice breeze. As we couldn’t check into our rooms till noon, we left our bags at the reception and headed out to breakfast at a nice local café, where we also picked up a local map of Melbourne. After that, we decided to explore the trams in Melbourne. With a confidence that comes with ignorance, we boarded the next available tram. Ideally when you want to go from Point A to Point B, you take a tram that is going from Point A to Point B. We, of course, took one that went Point A to Point Z, Y, X… all the way back to Point B. To top it off, midway through the journey, we realised that the tram ride is not free and we had to pay for it. Somehow we made it out of the journey unscathed! We immediately got ourselves MyKi travel cards after this tram journey.

At the CBD, we saw a guy wearing a black cricket workd cup T-shirt. Rajesh, of course, had to say something. He asked the man, “You are a kiwi supporter, mate?” The guy gave one look at Rajesh and his response said everything you needed to know about the Trans-Tasman rivalry – “Fuck, no!”

Anyway, if there are three men around, can a boat be far behind? Rajesh came up with this brilliant suggestion that we could take a boat cruise down the Yarra river. Picking up some beers, we embarked on this boat cruise for the next 4 hours. Yes. 4 hours! Tempted by the offer of free coffee and biscuits on board, Rajesh somehow convinced us that we should do the entire to and fro trip down the Yarra river. If there was free wifi on the boat, he would have got us to spend the entire goddamn trip on the boat!

It was a pretty good cruise, however, with the river cutting through the heart of Melbourne. 

We reached our hotel later in the evening. Our room was a massive suite. It is worth mentioning that the places we stayed across Australia all had large and comfortable rooms.

In the evening, while I walked around CBD, Rajesh and Ranga headed out to watch a variety show in the evening, given that the Comedy Festival was on in Melbourne. Apparently, they were the only 2 non-white people and also the only ones under 75 watching the show. But clearly, they had a good time. And on the way back at night, they decided to take cab and they ended up sharing the cab with two other ladies who were also going in the same direction. I am sure that kind of thing will never happen in India!

On the 28^th, we made a trip down to the MCG to pick up our match tickets. What a marvelous place it is. And it is just across the road from the Rod Laver arena. It was like our childhood dreams had suddenly come true with a vengeance!

We watched the Aussie cricket team going through a serious nets session. The intensity was unmistakable. We also took pictures with the statues of Shane Warne and Dennis Lillie. We ended up boarding one of those hop-on hop-off buses to go back to CBD. And yet again, we realised we had not paid for these tickets. This was really becoming a habit!

We had an hour or so to kill before our next ‘engagement’, which Rajesh spent hunting around for free wifi zones!

The engagement I mentioned was a book reading session moderated by Gideon Haigh for the release of Daniel Brettig’s book – from Ashes to Ashes, which captures how Australian cricket went from a high to low and then back to a high over the last 6-7 years. A fascinating discussion ensued about all things cricket. Easily one of the highlights of the trip.

I turned in early, as I normally do before a big match, while Rajesh went out with Mukul/Rasika and Ranga went out to meet another friend.

 

29th March, 2015

This was it. The finals. At the Em. Cee. Gee!

With India not featuring in the finals, we could watch the game without worrying too much about the result and purely for the LOVE of the game. Just being part of the 93,000 people who had turned up for the finals was something special. MCG is one of those venues where neither photographs nor TV images do justice to the place.

The final was one of the dullest matches that the world cup had produced. But it was more than made up for by the crowd. There were a bunch of kiwis behind us. One of them seemed completely overwhelmed by the size of the ground. He kept saying, “It’s a big ground, the MCG” pretty much through the match. I guess it probably looked bigger than his entire country. Australia won. By an innings. Or something like that.

On the way back, we decided to walk back to our hotel, which was about a couple of kilometers away. Rajesh was leaving early the next day. So we turned it early.

30th-31st March, 2015

This was it. Our glorious holiday was finally coming to an end. Rajesh left early morning on the 30^th. Ranga and I wandered all over Melbourne during the day, just soaking in the last few hours in Australia. We had a good Punjabi lunch at an Indian restaurant. I went back to the hotel in the afternoon, while Ranga decided to hang out in CBD.

Around evening, while we were waiting for our taxi to the airport, a middle-aged couple came in to the hotel. They had apparently vacated their previous hotel because the woman saw a bug in the bathroom. So she first wanted her husband, a very disgruntled man by then, to check their room to see if it was bug-free. He came back and said the room seems fine. The woman wanted to know if he could be 100% sure that the room was big free. The man said he could not be sure of that. A brief altercation later, they decide to vacate this place as well. But no so fast! The receptionist told them that they can only return the advance (which they had foolishly swiped before checking the room!) after three days. This led to further recriminations – wife blaming husband, husband blaming receptionist, receptionist calling manager etc. Finally they managed to sort everything out and left in the quest for a bug-free life. Should invite them to India sometime!

By the time the soap opera ended, our taxi had come and we grudgingly headed to the airport. We briefly flirted with the idea of staying on as illegal immigrants, but sense (or lack of it) prevailed.

At 01:05 AM on the 31^st, our Malaysian Airlines flight took off and soon we were at KL, looking forward to the 8 hour layover.

For some reason, I asked Ranga to show me his ticket. Turned out that his layover in KL was only 2 hours and the layover in Colombo was 8 hours. The exact opposite of mine. If I hadn’t asked for his ticket, Ranga would have happily spent 8 hours in KL airport, only to discover that his flight had left some 6 hours ago!

We parted at KL and reconvened at Colombo some 8 hours later. In a few hours, we were back in Bangalore!

End-notes

If Ladakh helped in learning a lot about (ahem) myself, this trip was taking it a step further and filling in a few blanks. Australia is the place to go for sun, sand, beaches, beer, sport and legalized betting. I can guarantee that you will relook at the quality of life your lead along with work life balance. I’ve heard a lot about Travel being the best educator and this leads me to wonder why a specialized degree in Travel (not combined with Tourism) isn’t more popular around the world.