down undah

Australia is a madhouse, and I am easily insane enough to feel at home.

Snapshots:

Meandering around the suburb of NewTown with my indisputably deranged friend Jon.

Taking pictures of the throbbing menagerie of parrot-garbed humanflesh parading before my eyes.

Watching the sun go down over cresting waves, waves swallowing and spitting surfers whose exuberant yells break free with the same abandon and regularity as their surging transport.

Talking into the night of literature, God, and the meaning of minuscule, meaningless things.

Strings of blasphemies, expostulations spewing from Jon's mouth as he exorcises the demons right out of his bewildered little dog.

Kangaroo steaks and butter-soft potato-pickle salad on a back porch in the fading light of evening as cockatoos screech from the branches of a peeling gum tree.

Wondering at the brightly colored parrots grabbing red beads from the hanging branches of trees that line the almost-unfathomably narrow streets, flanked by narrow houses as unique and peeling as they are expensive.

Jon's pugnacious children ravaging the quiet of early morning, confirming the rumors of Australians as will-strong scrappers.

Ancient pubs, convict-lain street-cobbles, an Anne Leibovitz exhibit, and my ironic attempts to ignore the imposing sails of the Sydney Opera House.


I would like to write more, but apparently jetlag actually exists.