AU vs. US (the environment series): Green bags

Australia seems to have a bit of a split personality in regards to the environment. With some things they are pretty progressive, while with others they are a bit behind the times. And sometimes they are WAY behind the times, but we’ll save that for another day.

So “Eco-friendly AU” has made it a mission to eliminate plastic shopping bags. Instead there are reusable cloth “green bags” (which are sometimes green, but can also be red or blue or pink…). They even have insulated green bags to keep things cool. Everyone has them, and most people are pretty good about using them. Grocery stores almost expect you to have green bags (instead of in the US where you feel like a nuisance if you bring your own bags). Target Australia has even joined the cause, and is no longer providing free plastic check-out bags. If you want a bag you need to buy a compostable bag or a reusable cloth bag. South Australia has outlawed free plastic shopping bags altogether.

Although this idea is certainly around in the US, Australia seems to have actually acted on it a lot more. So, in the effort to reduce the emissions and harmful waste associated with plastic bags, AU wins.

Bangarra Dance Co

Last night we went down to the Opera House to see "Fire: a retrospective" performed by the Bangarra Dance Co - an indigenous Australian dance group.

The performance was great. I won't say too much about it because I don't do that "theatre critic" thing very well. But I'll say this: they kicked ass with props! They had one dance where they did all this crazy stuff with blankets, another with sticks, a car, and one number with a slip and slide. Yes, you read that correctly, and it was just as awesome as you might imagine. Who needs Ice-capades when you have a slip and slide!

On a separate note, it was a very wet, stormy night - would never have guessed that a crazy dust storm was on its way in.

Under a blood red sky

We woke up this morning to an eerie orange glow in the bedroom. Looked out the window, and this crazy orange haze was everywhere. My first reaction was "So this is what you get when you mix sunrise, wind, and fire." (They've been doing some preventative burning in the nearby NP, which has made things fairly hazy at times.) But the thing was, the air smelled like dirt, not smoke. Turned out - it was dirt. The largest dust storm Sydney has ever seen, to be specific.

The orange glow kept getting more intense and surreal as the sun got higher in the sky, and coupled with the intense gusts of wind, the morning had a very creepy feel. Well, "creepy" is how I'd describe it, but some other people prefer "apocolyptic" - literally. Whatever you like - I'm stickin' with "creepy" until proven otherwise. When the sun was able to peek through a bit, things had a bit of a metallic glow to to them - especially car windows. Very funky.

The best color was fairly early, and I was too lazy to get dressed and go outside to take good pics. I blame it on lingering jet-lag and the fact that we were out late last night. So excuse the window screen in all the pics, but you can see some really good pics here.



PS - now we have orange boogers.

Fruit of the day: Feijoa

These are great little fruits, and I swear they taste like SweetTarts. The consistency is a bit like a pear (a little gritty), but they are really sweet and have a nice little zing to them. They're originally from South America, but has apparently gotten big in New Zealand and Australia.

Beach-time!

We were supposed to do this on our first day back, but the weather didn’t cooperate. So today, we finally headed to the beach. It was the perfect temperature, beautiful blue sky, great waves, got a fabulous cup of coffee and blueberry muffin – we were a happy little family enjoying the day together. Some guy walked by us on the beach and said “Doesn’t get much better than this!” Yup.

Ani – perhaps due to a bit of separation anxiety, or perhaps because she didn’t get out much over the last 3 weeks – was a bit funny. She didn’t seem to be as exploratory as usual, and she also seemed to need a refresher on how to interact with other dogs. It was like she was testing out every possible social reaction with the dogs we encountered: bark at, chase, stalk, ignore, fight, play, lie down and let all the dogs come to her. Not sure what she figured out - she ended up just sitting by us. She also got to chase seagulls, which made her happy.



And a random note: Julie, a fellow grad student and Ani’s housemate while we were in the States, didn’t dip her toes in the ocean until 1 day before she moved back to the US! Ben and I couldn’t believe it! Sydney is ON the coast – it took us less than a week after arriving before we got to the beach. Oh well – to each their own.

And on a reflective note: today was also the Sydney marathon. A year ago, Ben was supposed to be running the marathon on an equally gorgeous day, but managed to contract a respiratory infection the week before, so we went hiking in Ku-ring-gai NP, instead.

Molly Magpie

Before we went to the US, there was a magpie that started stealing clumps of Ani hair from the backyard (glad someone likes the fact that she sheds so much!).

Now, there’s a nice nest above our backyard and, as best as we can tell, three hungry mouths occupying it. That’s about all we can see from our vantage point. Both parents seem to be taking very good care of them.

And there are more baby birds by Ben’s office – a little family of masked lapwings. Mom and dad and the 4 little ones spend their day running around the little grassy area outside Ben’s window, so they’re great entertainment (unfortunately, not the best for productivity).
All 4 little ones are in this pic, and that's B's window in the background.


Plover babies are just so cute. There’s one I’ve named the pokey little puppy. Ben said maybe we should call it Kerry, instead. Not amused. (Oh wait, is that the sound of Robin’s laughter?)

Home again, Home again

Can’t believe our whirl-wind visit through the midwest is over - one successful defence, one successful wedding, LOTS of fun visits with great people, plenty of laughs, too much good food… and now we’re back in Oz. And we were welcomed home with a very enthusiastic Ani-greeting! And spring – Australia definitely shifted seasons while we were gone.

But it was a little weird coming back, and I think it was weird because it was so easy. Last year, after all the planning and a journey half-way around the world, we arrived to a whole new world and people met us at the airport and showed us around, and everything was novel and special. This time, after our demi-global voyage, we slipped right back in to life-as-usual. We got off the plane and caught our usual train with all the morning commuters (and were able to answer questions of confused travellers), we stopped at our neighbourhood ATM that we always stop at, we came home to our house and our dog, we drove on the left-side of the road without thinking about it (OK, maybe there was a little bit of thinking), we got groceries at “our” Coles. It’s weird to travel that far and have everything be so familiar – pick right up with your normal routine. At one point when we were walking out of the train-station with the schoolies and business people and we all looked like we were going about our day-to-day routine, I kinda wanted to stop and say “Hey – this isn’t our normal routine. We just got back from a big trip. Shouldn’t someone be saying ‘welcome back, mate!’ ?”

I guess I’ve gotten a similar feeling after returning from a long camping-trip or study abroad – after a big experience like that, you feel like something should have changed, but it hasn’t. It’s a little disconcerting that everything is the same and it’s so easy to fit back in. Re-entry to the US has happened enough that I guess we’re a bit jaded, so it wasn’t weird going back to the US, but it was weird coming “home” to Australia.

Random thoughts from the US

Things in the US are big. Houses, highways, refrigerators, washing machines, cars, restaurant meals, fountain sodas, grocery stores (and the aisles and the containers) – on average, most things are bigger in the US. I didn’t notice the smallness of Australia so much when we moved there, but it really struck me on this trip back to the US. Unfortunately, that also includes us. I think we both put on about 5 kilos during the 3 weeks we were there!

We need to work on our Aussie accents. Everyone was disappointed by our lack of accents – even our own parents, whom we’ve spoken with on a semi-weekly basis the whole time we’ve been in Australia. We’ve picked up some of the vocab, so now we need to focus on the accent. Next time, we’ll sound like fair-dinkum Aussies.

After Sydney, the US feels like one big bargain store. Things are generally cheaper in the US, even though OZ is closer to China – I think we’re getting ripped off. So we bought new running shoes, a computer, some clothes, toiletries (including real deodorant), and I’m sure some other stuff.

It’s very weird to jump between different parts of your life, especially when they’re a recent part of your life so it’s easy and comfortable to slip back in. Seeing grade-school friends, college friends, grad school friends, “real world” friends; popping from one family to the other; driving our old Honda (thanks Amanda!) down familiar streets, walking the halls of Purdue, hanging out in the Brookfield Zoo endo office. It felt kind of like someone had stuck our lives in a blender. Made a nice smoothie, but still messes with your mind a little.

Internet access in the US is such a nice thing.