And time goes on

hello, hello.

Well, after a great 3 weeks of petting koala's (No bear we have been told!!!) and kangaroos, feeding rainbow larakeets, wondering aimlessly around sydney, getting to know the Rollo siblings (David, Gemma and Stuart) and their friends, having wonderful home cooked meals, and generally just chilling out, our two heroes decided the time had come to take a pause in their travelling and launch into the scary and adult world of work and bills!!!!!!! (DA, DA, DAAAMMMMMM)

So we started looking for a suitable apartment. To begin with our standards where pretty modest: A nice clean furnished house in the coolest suburb in sydney, with 4 or 5 very socioable (how si that spellt!?!?!?!?!) people, for about $200 max! ....... as time went by, and we saw a few of these much hoped for apartments, we realised that maybe we were aiming for the heavens, so we accepted that either the apartment would be nice and clean, or it would be furnished,  or it would be in the coolest suburb (etc, etc) and we were getting a bit depressed to be honest (one of the places we saw was about 4m squared with no window but furnished (not too difficult as the bed was the only thing that fit in there), and the kitchen and bathroom (both of which were the same size as our room)were down the corridor, next to the landlords room and were to be shared with him and two other people!!!!!! we later realised that these were the places that asian (here you dont say asian because there are so many people here from different places in asia that most people can tell the difference from japanese and chinese... I still havnt got to that level) students rent when they come over to study and want to be close to campus... not to be racist or anything, but only japanese/chinese people could live in those conditions!!!!!) ummmm, ok, im getting lost in parentisis so let me get back to the story.

Anyway, when we were getting desperate and depressed (and pretty broke) we saw this old sign on a lamp-post. The writing was half washed away and we could only really read the number, but we thought "it cant be any worse then the rest of the stuff we've seen, and anyway, it'll probably be long taken, so why not just try" so we did, and the next day we went over to dear old Tempe ( a suburb right next to the airport, but also surprisingly close to the coolest suburb in sydney, only the distance of the highway that also goes through Tempe) and had a look at the house. It was a big and modern bungalow, with a quaint attic area. The tenants were 2 youngsters, run away from queensland to give life another go... me and pietro fell in love with it... and not only that but no one esle had seen the faded notice on the lamp-post, so the poor tenants (Nat and Adam) had no choice but to give us a try.

And we moved in, after promises of seeing the Rollo's often (and dont worry, we keep hounding the young siblings in our constant attempt of getting to know people).

On the day we moved in we found out that the prior tenant had gone uff in a puff, after a row and had taken with her the stuff that she was going to leave behind: her bed (our bed) the fridge, pots and pans, knives and forks, plates and last but not least Adam's shaving cream! Imagine our horror!!!! No Fridge!!!!!!!!! for me and pietro this was the worst news we had heard in a long time (as you all know, I LOVE to cook!!!!!). But we decided we would get a new fridge the next day, and after a night trip to the local salvation army (only 10 min. walk away) we also claimed and dragged home our new bed (it has actually become our favourite way of shopping). Obviously the fridge did not materialise right away, but me and pietro would start collecting the junk delicately places on the sidewalk and fill up our oh so empty room.

But now the big challenge arose!!! WORK!!!!! (also because now, not only were we broke, but we also had to pay rent!!). Our second search began, and I soon decided the easiest (and best paying) job would be nannying, while pietro decided that he wanted to do gardening or building, not because it payed particularly well, but because he thought he might enjoy that most. Because of my previuose babysitting experience (maybe slightly exaggerated) and because of pure luck, I have now found a wonderful job that I will start this week, looking after 2 boys, 14 and 22 months old, in a beautiful suburb in North Sydney. Pietro is still going to gardening interviews and has got an offer, but as a waiter, and he is not sure whether or not he will take it. But it is a bit hard to become a labourer if you havnt ever done it before, here you need a lot of experience in everything!!!!!!

And wait for it... we got our fridge yesterday!!!!!!! its wonderful, and our room looks like a real room, with lounging chair (or clothes chair as we like to refer to it) and wardrobe!!!  So now we must head out on our next adventure... the quest to fill up the sacred fridge!!!

Keep safe, kisses to you all!!!

Yvonne

P.S. we are not actually paying for internet, so its too slow to download pics at the moment, but will get to that as soon as possible

P.S.S. pietro just came back from a hard day of lawn mowing and has been offered a job!!!! he obviously still isnt sure (when is he ever) but the horizon seems oh so much brighter.