Life Down Under- The First Month

PHEW. This job is both so much fun and extremely exhausting. Don't get me wrong, I'd do anything to have a job where I make sandwiches and play hide and seek all day over being sat in an office but it's tough entertaining a 13 year old and  6 year old all day, every day. Don't even get me started on the arguments I've had to break up and OH how there have been so many crocodile tears. But it's definitely rewarding. I've been welcomed into this family like I'm one of their own and I can definitely say it's my home away from home. I'm stationed pretty far out of Melbourne city but I'm a 10 minute walk from what must be one of the most underrated beaches in Melbourne- Bon Beach. Technically, the suburb is Chelsea, which is full of little restaurants and bars. I get plenty of free time to enjoy the area and I often get long weekends off when I can venture into the city via the train- TOP TIP: you will get fined for having your feet on the seats (I was warned in advance but some people learned the hard way).

My very first impression of the centre was 'holy moly, how on earth did I land a job in such an incredible place' and my expectations were only exceeded from there. I spent the whole day wandering around, taking in the stunning cityscape views from the Yarra River, but they were nothing compared to what you can see from the Eureka Skydeck. In a lift you go 88 floors in under 40 seconds to a 360˚ view of Melbourne. Sure, it wasn't the Rockefeller building, but I definitely felt lucky to be able to call this beautiful place my home for the next 6 months. The next two days the temperature reached 44˚C (111˚F) which is hotter than I have ever experienced in my life. Thank the Lord for air conditioning. I stayed inside.

As soon as it was bearable to go outside I made it my priority to see my friend Kaylee, who you may remember from my Thailand part 2 blog. I was SO happy to discover I'd landed a job in Melbourne as I knew Kaylee had moved there from Canada. We met up at Brighton Beach, famous for the long line of beach huts all painted differently. It happened to be Australia Day so everyone was out and about, it was pretty exciting.

The second time we met up we went to St Kilda Festival. St Kilda is the young, buzzing, beach party suburb of Melbourne. The free festival happens every year and apparently there were around 400,000 people there this year. There was some amazing music and some really cool stalls, but it was the setting that made it so incredible. It felt more like I was in LA. A long beachside boulevard lined with palm trees, dance groups, buskers, rides; it was like a dream! Unfortunately, we all had places to be the next day so we headed home pretty early, but we were all exhausted anyway.

One evening when I wasn't taking care of the kids, we took ourselves on a little street art tour with my camera. This is the one time I will say you shouldn't be afraid of sketchy side streets! I did a bit of research beforehand and found supposedly the best spots for a good dash of street art and they didn't disappoint. Evidently the most famous (thus the busiest) was Hozier Street. There were so many quirky murals and paintings: everyone who contributed was clearly super talented, but the most impressive was a gigantic, building size painting of Marshmellow, followed by a huge painting of Eminem. 

The next street was Union Street where we were lucky enough to catch an artist in the act... and he was painting a proposal onto the wall! Lauren better have said yes, she's a lucky girl! Union Street was just as amazing as Hozier and much less crowded. Our final stop for the day was AC/DC Lane. If you didn't guess, it was filled with Rock and Roll themed art: a mural of Jimmy Hendrix, the iconic Pink Floyd album cover, the Rolling Stones logo, etc, etc. Little did we know that this street lead us to ANOTHER little alleyway of incredible paintings, called Duckboard Place. Safe to say, we got a good few pics! The best part about it is that it's ever changing. People will constantly be adding to it and painting over things, and every time I go there will probably be something new to see. All the best places are within a 20 minute radius within the city centre, so there's no need to pay for a street art tour- SAVE YOUR PENNIES!

And THAT, my friends, is a short summary of my first month in Australia! I'm so lucky to have this opportunity and I've got so much more to come, I've got a particularly exciting thing going on next week! Hope you've enjoyed reading!

Love Lizzy x