Canadia Sweet Canadia

As everyone should be aware by now I am back home again after a long journey.

I guess after this update it's back to normal everyday life updates which won't be nearly as exciting or juicy. Oh well, I better make this last one a goody.

So at the end of May my Swedish woman and I made tracks back to the nearest populated area away from the garlic warehouse. This area being the small city of Mildura. It was also our third time being in this town and coincidentally the same town where I first met her. oh the memories.

We ended up going to a hostel which housed some Irish and Scottish folks that we both knew from the garlic warehouse who had left the week before us. When checking in I thought our original plan was just to stay two nights and then head off to the city of Adelaide and spend our remaining few days together there. This did not seem to click with Ulrika right away. She found some orange picking/packing work near Mildura and then laid the bombshell on me that we'd have to go our separate ways. I was beyond pissed off. I don't believe I was more angry in the last 9 months then when I was right at that moment. We had made plans, I was counting on spending my time with her. I tried to ignore what she had told me and we both headed out to do some mild drinking, but after not saying anything to each other for about 15 minutes we both headed back to the hostel in dead silence. Just outside the hostel in the middle of the street we broke out into our first argument and I ended up saying something that I didn't mean to, but it kind of slipped. I ended up just tearing a strip out of her for being a greedy, money grubber. At this point I was almost in tears (or so she claims). I headed off to bed at this point in the worst possible mood.

The next day Ulrika told me that what I had said struck a chord with her and she realized that she had more then enough money to last her for another 4-5 months without working and admitted to getting a bit greedy. I felt better and she said she'd still come to Adelaide with me to have some fun. I was kind of confused though. Nothing that I ever say makes any sense or makes people think, but somehow I had an affect on her and it ended up being the best thing that I could have done. We only spent 3 days in Adelaide together, but they proved to be some of the best days I could have ever hoped for. Our last night worked out to be something special, like I had always dreamed it would be. Use your imagination. Afterwards we said our goodbyes and I felt so empty. This girl was what held me together the last 6-7 weeks. I was panicking on what I was going to do without her. She ended up sending me the sweetest text message which made me miss her all the more. Thankfully we still keep in touch quite often (at least this last week we have).

I went back to Melbourne to waste away my last 3 days of Australian goodness. I went and saw the third star wars movie (still didn't like any of the prequels) and went on a tour of the great ocean road and all it's beauty. The best part was how the staff of the hostel I stayed at still remembered me and some didn't even know that I had left.

At the Tullamarine airport in Melbourne I was "randomly" selected for some kind of search for drugs and stuff. Before they search you the guard has to let you read a paragraph on why it's important that they do this etc... I took notice that on the paper this same paragraph was written in different languages and spanned about 15 pages or more. Of course the book was open to the front with English being the first language, but the second one was Arabic. Now my thinking is "hmmm, this tells you who it is they target the most for these random searches." It couldn't have been alphabetical either for Indian (i think) was the next one on the list. Nice to see racism is still alive and well.

My flight home was somewhat of an annoyance. I was stuck beside the crying/squealing baby. So for the next 14 hours it went something like this: "WAAAAAAaaaaAAAaaaaAAAA". You get the idea. At LAX I went through the same procedure that I had to go through when going to Australia so I won't reiterate on what I've already said 9 months ago. I was lucky enough to spend my time talking with a rather gorgeous American girl named Kate while we went through customs, collected our bags, and waited outside the terminal. Once we parted ways when she had to check in for her flight to New York I found that I still had 4 hours to wait for my flight to Calgary. The waiting commenced only to have our flight delayed by 40 minutes. The flight back to Calgary was rather uneventful.

Upon my return I was greeted my Mum and my dad soon afterwards. All was well again and I felt happy to be home.

Now for my final thoughts on my trip. Well, I think I pretty much accomplished what I had set out to do. Many people thought it was just about sight-seeing and going on a holiday. To those people I must say you haven't been paying attention to anything I've written at all. I still stand by what I said to Derek the last time I saw him before leaving when he asked me why I was going. I said "Canadian girls don't like me, so I'm going to discover other nationalities." So looking back on how many success stories I've had with the women (note: it's more then what I have written. I couldn't write about all my encounters or I wouldn't have any stories to tell when I got back.) I was able to find women who actually found me attractive (wow!) and able to hold a relationship at some stage. Heck, I even received a marriage proposal, had a fake marriage going on with another girl and the ultimate for me being told that I was loved. Well that's a bit more then I had originally wanted to find, but beggars can't be choosers so it's all a success and I can't complain about the overall trip. I was also able to discover a lot about myself and start heading down the path that will decide how I'll be for the rest of my life. With that being said, I still have a mission to accomplish which will require me to continue my travels in other countries.

The next night I was able to catch up with my 'School' circle of friends and had a blast. I really missed them and I felt it was an honor to hang out with them again.

Now as for today, I made a special trip downtown to see Crystal for she had been bugging me about when she could see me. I was quite nervous and uncomfortable about seeing her after last summers encounter, but I felt that I should get it done and out of the way sooner rather then later. I mean I had learned more about this girl through our email conversations while I was gone then I did before I left. I had no idea what to expect! I knew I had to do it though, just so I could see if the girl I thought she was all this time is true. If the image that I have had of her for almost a year without even being around her is what she truly is..... and if it is, then I could be in trouble. I was afraid that I may still be attracted to her. Our get together went quite smoothly actually. It was awkward at first with me doing all the talking and her being silent as the grave. That doesn't exactly make me feel comfortable, but she eventually came out of her shell and was exactly as I had remembered her, which made me feel that maybe I could like her the way that I did. But now I'm so conflicted! I've heard some stories about her in the time that I was gone and I now have other peoples judgments of her clashing with mine. I'm not sure if I'm ignoring these things on purpose because I want to like her or if I really just can't see them. Then again, it might be also because I'm still feeling quite lonely from the separation anxiety with Ulrika and I realize that I'm not traveling anymore and that meeting women is going to be a trial again.

Wow, it's like I almost never left. 3 days being back and I'm already in one of my trademark situations. It's good to be home.

Farmer Billy-Joe-Bob-Mike

So you probably all think that with a two month gap I must've gotten into some major mischief if I couldn't be bothered to update..... and you are correct.

Where to begin?

I left Melbourne at the very beginning of April to try my green thumb at fruit picking in a lil' ol town in the far north western corner of Victoria called Mildura. In tow I had another canadian bloke named Klay and an english lass named Lisa. All of us were dying and needed money, and the idea of being a drug trafficer didn't seem very likely. So we would seek our fortunes in the 'bush' pulling out veggies and fruit for a living.

The family that owned and set up work for us in Mildura were fucking crazy. I have no other way of explaining them. I think the 70's and 80's drug fad blew their brains away long ago. So what did we get stuck picking? Asperagus..... what the flipping hell? The so called money didn't seem to happen either. We were getting paid $8 for a bin of asperagus which pretty much came to us making about $40 a day. Screw that! We raised a stink after a week and begged to switch farms to hopfully increase our pocket money. We were able to do grapes for one day only to be switched off that and onto Green beans.... if you guessed that there was no money in green beans either then give yourself a gold star. We were earning a whopping $1 a kilo for the beans so I wasn't getting anything more then $50 for my 8 hours of labour. At this point I was about to give up when an ad for a garlic packing factory caught my eye in one of the job advertisments. I jumped on the horn and found that they wouldn't be ready for another week. Could I survive one more week in green bean land? Hahahaha (let me catch my breath from laughing so hard). Okay, that's better. Nope, I couldn't stand to stay at that hostel anymore with the crazy lady running the show and stealing all our money. I needed something to do for a week that wouldn't cost me money. I prayed to god for an answer and god sent me a young swedish girl named Ulrika. She was working the same farms as me and had also had enough. She told me about a grape farm where we could work for food and accomodation for a week but we would earn no money. Being a male, I must've just been staring at her beauty and only heard the part where she said I could go with her. I followed my hormones on a wild adventure.

Next stop, Ballarat. Ulrika and I ended up in ballarat at 4am and got ourselves to the family farm that we would be living with for a week. At this point I found out there was no money to be earned and I soon found out how big of an idiot I was, but I figured "all is not lost, I still have a cute girl by my side. It can't be too bad." The first few days were easy. I must've clocked an average of 2 hours of work a day for a place to sleep and food on the table. I spent any and all free time trying to impress Ulrika with my skills (if any) in cooking, social events and just pretty much my overall idiocy which was apparently entertaining to her. Soon afterwards another backpacker showed up to help on the farm. a 40 year old dutch woman who was annoying as hell. I won't go into detail, but I must say I haven't met anyone more annoying then this woman. Period. Anyhoo, we got to harvest some wine grapes with the family for a day and worked at a farmers market selling their wine that they make from those grapes. Plus lots of free wine for us. Ching ching! We then got to experience the joys of potato picking with the family pot head. I suppose it wasn't all bad, he did offer his spliff to the rest of us then took us out to the pub for some free drinks. We also got to endure the splendid task of chestnut picking. The pot head said he'd pick us up from the chestnut paddock in an hour..... 3 hours later we figured he wasn't coming and we gave up and walked back to the farm house. We found out later that the sheep live in the chestnut paddock as well and ate our 4 bins of nuts we had picked. ooops. Ulrika got to have her dream of driving an 'aussie car' on the farm, which to her is just a beat up old truck (it was missing the driver side door) with me hanging off the side yelling "YEEEEEHAAAA". Then our most adventurous journey upto that point had to take place, the walk from the farm to the nearest town ,daylesford, so we could get cellphone reception to check our messages. It started with us hitching about 5km up the road then a 2 hour walk before we gave up. We then walked back only to find that the family said we had just hiked about 18km. Whooo. We were bound and determined to get our cellphone reception so I took drastic measures. The next day we decided that the big hill that was on the neighbours farm should be tall enough for us to use our phones. The first idea brought up by the old dutch woman is for us to climb the fence. I was voted as going first, big mistake. I found that it was an electric cattle fence and got a nice shock and jump start to my heart. For about 3 seconds I was devoid of no thoughts or senses. 5 seconds after that we all thought it was funny. I then thought of doing the reasonable thing to do, beat on the neighbours door and just ask to climb the hill. That approach was more fruitful and less 'shocking'. In the end we got our cellphone reception only to find that i'm the only popular one of the three of us.

Our week finally ended and Ulrika and I had to waste 8 hours in Ballarat before our bus upto Mildura (yup, back there again) was to depart. I got comfy and slept spread across a bench with my head in her lap while she read her book.

Back in Mildura finally. We got picked up and sped to our new home in the bush living in portable units right next to the factory. We had two days of hourly wage work and then got busted down to cutting garlic for 2 cents a piece. Sure that sounds bad, but I actually made $150 in one day doing it. Then half the Korean empire moved into the portables and too much money was being made by them so the company gave us a paycut..... 35 cents a kilo..... suck my white ass! I was back to making $70-$80 a day. And so it's been for the last 4 weeks. Things are okay though. We get to goto the pub once a week with our wages and party hard, and I have a strange relationship with a swedish girl.

So, looking over my last update on how I figured I would meet a girl that would hit me big in the month of April... I was correct! It's hard to define my relationship with Ulrika though. Sometimes we're the tightest couple who share the bottom bunk of a bunkbed, and other days we're no more then just good friends. For the moment she likes to pawn us off as a couple and I let it slide for I know that we'll seperate in another 2 weeks at the most. I'm actually quite amazed that I have met a girl who is just as sarcastic and completly non-serious as I am. Even though I have mentally and emotionally prepared myself for the seperation, I know i'll be hearbroken either way when it comes to an end.

And there you have it. I believe some smaller things happened inbetween as well but I need to save some stories for when I get home..... and for those that keep asking, I'll be home in June. I'm about 95% positive on that now.

It's been awhile

Holy chow! That month called February just flew by didn't it?

OK, now that I left everyone in suspense about what has happened to me, I'm back to inform you all..... absolutely nothing. I was just so poor that I couldn't afford to pay for Internet time. Yup, I was the man with 40 cents for the last 3 weeks. Everything is a bit better now. I'm a real rags to riches story.

Who wants to read about my last month? Everybody? Yay

Alright, I believe I last left off with Fie ripping my heart out of my ass. Yup, sounds like a good place to pick up on. (Fie actually didn't hurt me that much. It took me all of a week to get over her)

So I ended up getting a job with sales and marketing company, and guess what I had to do? Door to Door sales! You know those guys who ring your doorbell while your eating supper, watching the Simpsons or on the can? That was ME!! What was I selling? Electricity!! Yup, i was trying to get people to convert from one electricity company to another. Needless to say I sucked at it and only did it for a week. Even better thing is I got screwed out of all the money they owed me for my sales because the contract said I had to work a certain amount of time and make a certain amount of sales before being eligible to get paid..... what kind of bullshit is that? So the money that I thought would save my life...... didn't.

Next up, I've been doing office relocations the other half of the time and man oh man one of these removal companies is the most unorganized company in Victoria. We had about 12 backpackers doing all the work and 3 guys who did the driving of the vans who sat around doing fuck all and telling us to get back to work. Then we'd load up the truck to the way they wanted it only for them to realize that they want it loaded up differently. Frustrating as hell and the pay is crap. So what does this leave for little ol me? FRUIT PICKING!!!

I'll be off next week to fruit pick my life away for the much needed money. Everyone else seems to have done it and they make mad loads of money. So I figure it's my turn.

In sadder news, my best buddy Adam has left for New Zealand then carries on to go home to Manchester. My best buddy whom I knew from my 2nd week in Oz.... the guy who travelled with me off and on from Melbourne to Brisbane. Gone...... Now I need a new best friend. Before Adam left we got to go to the Free day at the Grand Prix track. I got a picture of myself with the Ferrari girls too. (that one will go up in the gallery when I get a chance). Adam took one of my jumpers too!!! That bastard. I left it with him one night when he was crying bout how cold it was outside, so I gave him a sweater and I never got it back! It's all good though, we had major discussions about having him come to see me in Canada either this summer or the next, and then we'd discuss what we were going to do when I get out to England. It makes me all giddy inside. We spent one whole day at a pub (12pm - 8pm) drinking and remembering our time together and everything we've done.

Back to my penniless problem. You're probably wondering how it was I survived without any money, right? one word for you... MOOCH! That was me. No, I wasn't a bum on the street and I didn't bug people for money, but instead I would romance women who would feed me and buy me drinks at the bar. I shall never buy a drink for a woman again, for now I know that it works the other around too. Wheee!

Somewhere along the lines of my life, the powers that be (fate? if you believe in that. I'm becoming a very scared believer in it now) decided it would be fun just for shits and giggles that we thrust my favourite German woman back into the spotlight of my life. Freja made a wonderful return into my life only 5 days ago. Now, the last time I talked with her was when I ran into her in Cairns on my last day back in early Jan when we had a good talk and things seemed pretty smoothed over. Well, things just didn't feel quite right. She happened to check into the same hostel that I've been at for the last 2 1/2 months and she was quick to learn that I was staying there. I saw her probably only an hour after her checking in and you'd think I'd be happy to see her again... I wasn't. I couldn't even smile at the girl. We both gave each other a blank stare and moved on like we had never met each other before. I was tired of doing this same old dance where I see her, get excited and go up and talk like it's old times. The true test would be if she would talk to me first. It took a day and I think the jealousy factor may have played a part in it, but she finally spoke up and asked me how things were going. It was in the evening out front of the hostel with some friends of mine just talking shit like usual. Freja was on the steps smoking and watching me like a hawk (how uncomfortable) when a group of English girls came by and we all started to have a laugh with them. Freja didn't say a word until she could see that me and one of the English birds were getting pretty close. I didn't talk with Freja very much considering that I want her to believe that I'm over her and want nothing to do with her..... when in fact it's quite the inverse of that. The whole ordeal left me emotionally drained.

So if the current routine holds firm then the next time I shall encounter Freja will be in the month of May in the city of Perth (I'm just taking a stab in the dark on the location). I'm counting on it, for I'm sure it will be the last time that I see her in Australia, but I'd like to make sure it's not the last time I ever see her.

On the flip-side if this pattern continues then I calculate that the next time I'll meet another girl that will have a big impact on me could be in April. How sad that I see in pattern in my lifes events.

I'm already planning my trip to Europe and where I want to go while I'm there. I already know I'll be spending an incredible amount of time in England (2 year working visa! Booya!) and Germany, however long it is I can stay there. Anyone who wants to join me start saving your Pennies for we fly in 2007.

Welcome to ouch-town. Population: You

The weeks seem to get better and better around here.

Things with Fie got back to normal and even shifted a little bit in my favour of things possibly being a bit more serious.

On Monday (31st of Jan) I was in the kitchen having breakfast as per usual, when Fie comes along around the same time she usually does and sits down with me to chat about our usual jargon of nothing. She asks me what I had planned for my day and told her that it was about time I put some serious effort into looking for a job, at which point she asks me if I could do that tomorrow and hang out with her since she has the day off. So we head down to St.Kilda to enjoy the extremely sunny day at the beach. Fie was even brave enough to lay in the sun topless. She even asked me if it was okay with me to do that. Well of course it is. I've already seen them so I don't exactly care anymore. After toasting ourselves in the sun for 3 hours we went and had some lunch and off to do something fun. At least fun for Fie.... yup, it was Shopping. Ugh! I spent my time taking the piss out of her on all the shoes that she liked. All in all, a fantastic day.

The rest of the week progressed as usual. We would see each other in the morning before she left for work, then again in the evening when she came back. One night when we had almost everyone in our dorm room around in the room at the same time we were all talking about the normal guy stuff and I made fun of David (like usual) because he's slept through people shagging on the bunk below him twice. We took the piss out of each other for awhile when my phone goes off with an SMS message. Everyone thought it was Fie, but I knew it wasn't because she didn't have my number. It happened to be my best English female friend, Amy. So everyone in the dorm thinks that I'm playing two women (which I wasn't, but I probably could have). I ended up agreeing to go to the bar with Amy for the night. I quickly got changed and as soon as I opened the door to leave Fie was on the other side ready to knock (what are the chances). She tells me that "we need to talk" alright, I was ready for this from the beginning and just didn't care cause I wanted to go see Amy anyways. Instead of hearing the usual banter of how we can't get close to each other blah blah blah... Fie just wanted to tell me about her day. She just needed someone to bitch to. Then she seemed quite jealous when I told her that I was off to spend my night drinking with Amy. I didn't feel too upset by it.

After that Fie seemed to step up her efforts to keep my attention. I must say, it worked. We spent even more time together, and on Friday night I made her supper and it seemed like things could have been going excellent for us. She ended up rating all my music and seems to have the same tastes as I, and we spent the rest of Friday night cuddled up in an empty kitchen just talking and drinking tea. Things couldn't get much better.

The weekend was drab. Really boring, and I was working on distancing myself from Fie considering that she was leaving on Tuesday morning. She caught wind of this by Sunday and kept telling me that I was acting weird (I actually wasn't acting weird. I just wasn't spending as much time with her was all). Then it happened last night, her last night in Melbourne. We were down in the bar and she was heading off to bed so I decided that I have to ask for some contact details to keep in touch. Especially if she was to keep her promise of showing me around Copenhagen when I get to Denmark. Instead she told me no. She didn't want to give me her email address or phone number. She felt it was best that we just keep what happened over the last week, as it was and not tempt fate. I was so heart-broken. I guess I was a bit blinded by the way we had gotten along so well. So here I am, feeling a bit lonely about the whole thing. Dave is doing his best to keep me entertained and just make fun of me like usual. It works sometimes. As my buddy Joe put it, I'll hurt for a bit until I meet the next best girl and then I'll have problems remembering Fie's name after that. I know it's true and I suppose it's my turn to wait it out again. I can only hope that I don't have to wait another 2 months before something comes up again.

Read warning labels

CAUTION: The following update contains some things that some people may not want to read about. So don't go reading the rest of this if you have a weak stomach or a wild imagination. You must be this tall to read this update, and those with heart conditions or those that are pregnant are highly advised not to read..... now on with the show.

How good is your reading comprehension people? If it's bad, just skip down to my first entry of January (i think). I mentioned a girl that was around while I was doing my laundry who I thought was cute, but a bit scary in the way she kept smiling at me. Anyways, I was finally able to chat her up about a week ago and we've been hanging out a bit ever since. Her name is Fie (Fee) and is from Denmark. Well she acts quite a bit different then the way she looks like she would. I would think that she's this cute little shy girl, but she's actually much like myself when it comes down to making fun of each other. At first I was cool with this, but then started to get mixed signals from her. One minute she'd be really sweet and nice, then the next she'd be slagging me off for something. It was kind of unattractive and rather annoying so I didn't feel to motivated to pursue anything further with her besides someone to chat with.

So the other night I was hanging out in my favourite spot.... the hostel bar. I was chatting up a cute dutch girl for about 3 hours and had already bought her most of her drinks for the night, when Fie shows up. She taps me on the shoulder and just says 'Hi', and I end up chatting to her for just a little bit. The dutch girl ends up finding someone else to talk with and Fie apologizes to me for wrecking my chances with her. I was a bit frustrated, but tried not to let it show and offered Fie a drink instead. Declining my offer she instead steals my beer. ugh. what a cheeky girl. At this point I'm not drunk, but I'm about borderline tipsy, meaning I say what I'm actually thinking. I eventually tell her how I hate that I can't figure her out because of her "hot and cold" attitude towards me. She just giggles about it as I continue to go on my rant of how annoying I find it when she tells me "I'll make things a bit easier for you" and we end up kissing. Well I'm a happy camper at this point and we end up moving from the bar over to the lounge area with all the couches. We end up snogging for about an hour or so with some small chit chat between coming up for air. Then she becomes really forward by asking me "Do you want to have sex tonight?" Tell me how many guys would turn that offer down? The only downside being, she's sleeping in a 12 person dorm and myself in a 6. Weighing our options my very full 6 person dorm became the shag pad of choice for the night. The challenge: Being VERY quiet. A task not easily accomplished on the bottom bunk (with my good mate Dave above me. Thankfully he slept through the ordeal). On our way up from the bar through reception I let go of her hand and she passed me a puzzling look. I quickly explained how I don't think anyone should see us. She disagreed, so right in front of the reception desk in front of maybe 10 - 15 people she puts the tongue down the throat again. Okay, she made her point, but then she had to rub it in a bit by doing it again in the elevator with more people in there. I felt a bit embarrassed.

So Fie is a bit different in bed then what I'm used to, but I lived. She likes to be the one in control, where as I like being in control as well. You can imagine arguing about small things while trying to whisper and please each other at the same time. That's the kind of multi-tasking I'm not exactly good with. I eventually just caved in and told her we'd do everything her way. Which was rather annoying because it made me feel a little inadequate, like she didn't trust me. Plus, it didn't help that she had told me how many other guys she has shagged since being in Australia (the number is quite high), meaning I'm thinking she's a bit loose, could be carrying some kind of disease by now and worst of all, she's going to compare me to everyone else she's gone to bed with. That left me feeling a bit off and I know I was not the best she'd ever had. Now, another problem is it's been really really hot at night recently and our rooms don't have fans or AC in them. Plus with 6 people crammed into a small room it gets even worse. So when it comes to the end and Fie says "Alright, lets cuddle til we fall asleep" this lasted about 30 minutes before she kicked off the Duvet cover and told me it was way too hot and that she was gonna go back to her room. Okay, I'm much more used to the girl spending the night afterwards as well, so that hurt me a bit, because I wasn't sure if she really was that hot or if it was an excuse to leave. Plus she told me that it was a one night thing and that we have to go back to normal... and then right after her telling me that while she was getting dressed she tells me goodnight, and I did the same and she stood there waiting. I ask what's wrong and she tells me that I'm supposed to kiss her.... I'm thinking what the heck for? I did it anyways just to keep her happy. Now, I'm alright with that if I were never going to see her again, but the truth is she's around for another week. Yikes. I work much better when I can one night stand on my last night in a place or the girls last night. Not seeing them again makes things that much easier to get over. Where as in this case, I had already liked Fie for a bit, and I'm still hanging out with her after the fact. maybe this wasn't such a good idea in the first place.

The next day was tough on me. I told Dave everything (he's my best mate at the hostel and really open when it comes to sex) and we spent the day away from the hostel so I could try and avoid her for a bit (how childish am I?) We actually took two fishing rods that had been left in our room by a previous room mate and took them to cash converters for some cash. 35 bucks for not doing anything? Oooooh yeah!

I eventually did decide that I really should talk with Fie just to see how normal things could be. I think we both had a hard time with it, but things went better then expected. She's being really nice to me and things flowed quite smoothly. Even this morning we sat down and had breakfast together in a polite and civil manner. Maybe things could go back to normal?

We went through this already...

Happy Australia Day!

Australia day is pretty much the same thing as Canada day. A day off from work to drink yourself stupid and watch pretty fireworks. Now this would be pretty special if it weren't for the fact that this is everyday life for Ozzies... in some cases the fireworks are an everyday event as well. So it's business as usual in the southern hemisphere.

The last few days have been Deja Vu fueled. Lets see if I can recap in my hungover state.

So the other day when I'm in the hostel kitchen making my supper I catch a glimpse of this crazy beautiful girl. I do a double take because I thought I had seen her before and not in Melbourne. I continue my cooking ways until she approaches me and says what I was thinking, "I know you from somewhere." Well, seems I wasn't going nuts. Turns out we were both staying at the same hostel in Cairns for the same amount of time. We just never ever talked to each other. So Amy and I sat down and had a quick conversation over supper about what we did in Cairns and how it was so weird that we never felt the need to talk to each other for a whole two months of living in the same complex.

After we were done eating and cleaning up she asks me if I would like to join her and her friend in the bar for a few drinks. I'm not stupid, I'd never say no to an invitation like that. The rest of the evening was filled with non-stop conversation. Not once did we have a silent pause. Not only that, but we seem to like all the same stuff, our birthdays are exactly a month apart (well she's actually a year and a month older then me) Oct 28 vs Nov 28. It was just too funny how we could even finish each others sentences sometimes. We engaged in a few games of pool and had an over all terrific time with each other. If it weren't for the fact that she told me that she's swearing off boys for the next little bit I would've kissed her, cause things were getting that close. Even better news is she's going to be moving into St. Kilda, the exact area where Adam and I are going to be moving into and she's sticking around Melbourne for 3 months. She's even hinting at the idea of her and I travelling together for a bit because her friend, Tanya, goes back home in 3 months and she doesn't want to be alone. I'm hoping that this is finally going to be my silver lining out of the last month of women having no interest in me.

So, Ozzy Day! Actually, not much happened apart from a lot of drinking in Adams backyard. They had an inflatable pool set up so we could all get drunk in the pool for awhile. Good fun was had by all. Adam disappeared for a bit and his lady friend who he fancies (and has shagged) Anthea, stuck around with me and kept me company. There were some points where she was getting a smidgen too friendly with me which I was uncomfortable with due to the fact that I know Adam is really into her. Don't get me wrong, Anthea is an amazing woman. She's gorgeous, funny and studied that same thing that I did in college, so we naturally have a lot in common, but I had to keep changing subjects, chairs, anything to keep Anthea from getting too close and try to resume anything with me in case Adam were to return at any minute.

After 5 hours of hard drinking I started to feel it and Adam and I both had to make a visit to the alley way and empty out the bad mojo. When I returned I had 3 ozzy girls looking after me who kept bringing me water and talking to me. One girl said she thought it was so funny that even in my drunken state I was still polite. Of course I was the hit with most of the women seemings as how everyone at the party was either English or Australian and me being the only Canadian made me ripe for the picking. Turns out a lot of people had already heard about me through Adam telling his stories of adventures travelling north. I was told that I was a legend for sticking it out so long with Adam.

That's about it. So to Recap:

-Met Amy, an English girl, whom is super fantastic.

-Got Drunk on Oz day

-Had to fight off another pretty English girl who is off limits to me.

wow, what a week.

The Age old question

I seem to have hit a nice little slump in my whorish ways. Not that I haven't been in one for the past few months, but now I'm at least putting some effort into it again now that my depression has lifted.

In one week, count'em 7 days, I have lost my chance with four girls..... four! that's almost a whole hand of fingers to count with. Yikes. How has it happened? Glad you asked....

Girl the first: One of my room mates was this cute English chick whom I had gotten into talking with quite a bit. One night I invited her out to come to Rock and Roll Wrestling in St. Kilda with Adam and all his friends (I'll get to rock and roll wrestling in a bit). She declined, but offered me a counter offer of joining her in the hostel bar for drinks that night instead. I told her that I'd try to meet up with her a bit later. Well I got so engaged with Rock and Roll Wrestling that I didn't end up getting back to the hostel til about midnight. I frantically searched the bar in hopes that I hadn't lost my chance with her. Well, knowing my string of luck you can guess what happened. Some other guys told me she met someone else and they had left at about 10pm. Crushed, I went to bed at about 2am and was awakened at 5am by this English girl fucking the guy she picked up at the bar. Oh the horrors. I got no sleep that night for she is a smidgen on the loud side when she gets excited. Thankfully, she moved out the next day.

Girl the Second: Another English girl. A few years older then me, but you wouldn't think that would be a problem? At least she told me it wasn't. I was actually telling her how older girls usually react differently to me once they find out how old I really am, hence I usually stick to people my own age or younger. She assured me that the age has nothing to do with anything and that I look older and act older so she's fine with it. I had spent 3 days getting to know her and on the last night she kept making references about how her dorm is pretty empty and I can come back up to her room after we were done drinking. I'm all cool and calm about it... just in my usual Mike way of course, until another guy that I was talking to earlier came into the picture.

Back story on other guy: Another English guy, the same age as the English girl. I was only talking to him cause the bartender saw us both sitting alone (which I was fine with because I was waiting for the English girl. I wasn't a loner.) and 'made' us talk to each other. The guys cool enough, but he didn't have to ruin my night.

Back to the story: So the English girl is all interested in who my new friend is and they end up talking the rest of the night and don't even bother to look at me until the English guy is nice enough to get me back in the conversation. Being a guy he asked me about my sexual encounters with the girls out here and which nationality I think is best, before I can answer the English girl is disgusted because she thinks I'm too young to be doing that sort of thing. Too young? After she told me that age doesn't make a difference at all? Well it turns out they both got really friendly in one of the women's shower stalls (says the English guy) about 15 minutes after I left. Woohoo! Go me. The English just aren't biting.

Girl the third: My own fault really. I was doing my laundry and reading one of my German books and I happened to notice this girl staring at me and smiling. So I do the polite thing and smile back and go back to reading. She ends up looking around a bit before smiling at me again and kind of cocking her head to side. I still don't pay much attention to it. She ends up leaving for a bit walks by about 10 minutes later still staring and smiling. OK, now I'm creeped out. But I assume I wouldn't have gotten creeped out if I had just talked to her the first time around when I noticed that she was cute instead of burying my head back into the German language. I still see her around, but like I say it's just a bit creepy now and no longer cute.

Girl the fourth: Just last night I pulled off some good old Canadian charm and ended up chatting to a girl from Norway. She joined me for a bit in the bar before she had gone back to her room to sleep. At about 1am she came back down to the bar after having a shower and getting all prettied up. I was actually kind of amazed at how stunning she was and in all honesty when she came up to me asked me if I remembered her I seriously didn't know who she was. I felt like such a knob for that one. So we talked a lot more and she kept giving off these signals with her moving closer to me on the couch and touching me. Well, what's a guy to do but respond in kind? I tried to touch her hand and she recoils. She didn't change facial expression or even stop talking, but it was apparent that she wants to touch me, but I'm not allowed to touch her. jeez.

That's not even all my failed attempts. Most of the time I just have the problem with too many "Pretty" guys coming over and stealing the girls that I'm talking with. My analogy for it was: I'm the fisherman out on the boat pulling in this great big net of fish, then some fucking ass pirate comes along, steals my fish and sinks my boat! Okay, it's a bit over the top, but still frustrating as hell.

Okay, Rock and Roll Wrestling! The coolest thing I have seen since my return to Melbourne. It's held in a dirty little bar all the way in the dirty side of town called St. Kilda. They have a hardcore rock and roll band play about half a set and then they do a few matches of WWE style wrestling. Oh it's so cheesy, plus how they all have their personas and little back stories. It really is a soap opera for men. Too bad I didn't have my camera with me at the time. That would've been some quality shots.

I'm off to try and beat this "Age" dilemma with a cardboard tube.

Mein Fuhrer!

Happy New years to all.

New years eve was a blast! Ended up bar hopping for most of the night and when I went into the bar that I used to work at I got myself a load of free drinks for myself and my friends. That was probably my downfall and the reason I felt soooo sick. It took two days to fully recover and then I was back on the Piss (Beer).

I was even lucky to have the company of a beautiful Ozzy girl for most of the night (unfortunately not the important part of the night, but that's OK.) We started chatting just because she said how much she loves Canadian accents. After that I was trying to go for the kill. We had a real fun time though.

But I'm not here today to talk about New Years and my massive drinking problem. That's for my AA Meetings. Instead, I'm gonna rant on how the cosmos always find a way of making things right in the world.

For the past little bit my buddy Bjorn and I have been trying to hire a car and get some people to travel down south together and just have a good time and then go our separate ways in Sydney. Things were looking grim as we found that there are no rental cars left in Cairns..... NO RENTAL CARS!!! What the hell? This city gets worse everyday! In the end I decided I'd just buy a plane ticket and fly to Melbourne and continue on my way along the south of Australia and eventually get over to the west coast which is supposedly the coast of milk and honey.

So today as Bjorn and I were walking around town towards the travel agent we pass a small bistro (for the record I really don't like this bistro) and I saw a girl in there and I just happened to nudge Bjorn and say "She kind of looks like my ex-girlfriend, Freja" as we passed by I took another look and got a good side view only to see that it really was her. My knees got pretty weak at this point and Bjorn kept egging me on to go talk to her. Of course I was dead afraid of what she might say or maybe she'd just walk away.

I eventually did it though. I ran back, just tapped her on the shoulder and wished her a happy birthday (Her birthday being back on the 29th of Dec). To my surprise she didn't walk away, she didn't say anything mean to me. In fact we talked for an hour about what we had done the last 2 months and what we are going to be doing next. At the end of it all I apologized for whatever I had done to upset her in the first place and she said that we're all good now and that she'll keep in touch.

That's all I needed. And at least this time I was able to say goodbye to her. I decided that I should best avoid the topic of why she left me in the first place and just stick to the conversation that was working. I'm just so happy to know that she's okay, she's having fun and now she'll talk to me again. i feel like I can sleep better at night now.

The other day I was able to finally escape the grasp that Cairns had on me and I'm not back in Melbourne deciding on what it is I should do next. My two main options are to stay here and work for a month and then jet off to New Zealand when my other friends are going, or motor on over to Adelaide and just keep cruising the country from there. I'll stick around a few more days to figure out what idea I like best.

I was also able to meet up with Adam again when I got back, so I'm sure I'll be hanging out with him and his friends for the next little bit.

That about sums it all up. I left a warm tropical "paradise" to come back to a rainy and cold metropolis. I had a bit of Deja Vu when I was taking the Sky Bus shuttle from the airport into town, just like I did over 4 months ago when I first arrived, and thought about how much I had changed and matured since my first arrival. It was good to reflect.