Wednesday 26 December 2012

Where in the Wednesday: Who are you and what are you doing?

A few points of interest:

  • I have some exciting news! I've had this idea for a weekly post going for a little while now, but I'm finally getting my act together and doing something about it. It won't surprise you to know that this feature is called Where in the Wednesday (or WitW, because I am lazy). Every Wednesday (more shocks!) I'll profile a place that has struck my interest. The rules: no capital/main cities; no landmarks. Sorry, Machu Pichu. **
  • I saw the Hobbit! Asdfghjkl, etc. Oh, what can I say? I cried through the opening credits I was so happy.

(Yes, I'm in Instagram! anscenicworld, of course.)

Was it the best film I've ever seen in my life? No, not really. Peter Jackson is not the world's most cunning director. The 3D was iffy and the colours cartoonish and Hugo Weaving as goddamn creepy as ever. But it made me the happiest I've ever been from a film. Martin Freeman (not Morgan, not Morgan) was great as an anxious wreck, as always, and, despite Elijah cropping up like a rash that won't quit, Pete managed to stay on track and not deviate more than was expected. I'll even forgive Radagast the Brown.

Original found here

Best of all, I'm apparently not the only one uncomfortably attracted to Kili. Come on, like you weren't wondering what you were going to do without Viggo Mortensen to spy on. Oh, and this fan service happened.

As you can see, I'm just spilling over with Hobbit-related joy at the moment.

  • And Christmas and New Year's and my birthday are all happening in a rush. This is the big one, you know. In nine short days I'll be eligable to vote (!!!) in next year's election! And adopt and marry and drink and get tattooed and book a flight and sign my own forms and get a library card and a boat licence. But most importantly: vote. (It's compulsory here anyway, you know. That doesn't change my excitement!)

**My full and sincere apologies to anyone out there that has, or knows of, a similar structure. If you do know somebody with a weekly Where in the Wednesday, please let me know at anscenicworld@gmail.com so I can get in touch with them on the ASAP. If I've learnt anything about the Internet, it's this: transparency is essential and people love crappy puns. So while the pun is my own, I would be surprised if I was the first to exploit its supreme cheesiness.

 

Sunday 23 December 2012

Show me the mula

Another thing. I think I've established by now that, despite all my very best intentions, I just can't escape my innate miseryguts... ness... and all I can do is accept it and try not to be too moany. I will never have a pastel-coloured, charming blog; nor will I be deep and significant. My doom is to be flippant and jaded. I'm just too goddamn Australian.

Which is why I'm unashamed to present the pinnacle of Western literature, the meeting-place of many great minds: the indescribably sensational and regrettably literal sh*thole that is the Flinders Str Station bathrooms. Known widely as the worst in the city, they're my only option at that lolly-shop job you're acquainted with; and, since I take at least four bathroom breaks a shift to segment the monotony, they're something I've had to come to terms with. Naturally, much like Lizzie for Mr. Darcy, my hatred turned to passionate love. I want to share the enlightening things I've read there for two reasons, the first being that they deserve it. They're masterpieces. The second is that I want you to never have to go there yourselves. These bathrooms are disgusting.

Here's a selection of the best to enjoy in the comfort of your (clean, sweet-smelling) home. Fair warning: some of these are reasonably unpleasant, which you can understand given the context.

"'If high shcool's the best time of your life, I'm hanging myself with a jump-rope tonight' - Jackie-Onassis Kennedy" "Actually darling... it's 'Kennedy Onassis'." "Look closely... I added in the 'nassis Kennedy'. Her name isn't Jackie-Onassis. Darling." (Jackie-O is an Australian radio host that falls into the famous-for-being famous category.)
"You forgot the apostrofy." "Apostraphe!" "Noobs!! It's Apostrophe!!!"
"I don't hate you. I just lost all my respect for you."
"Show me the mula $$$" (My personal favourite.)
"Thank you all for the wonderful literature! you all make my purging much more entertaining and enlightening." (Despite the use of alliterated, double-superlatives, this little note is not courtesy of me. I'm engaged at the moment in a serious debate over if anyone truly cares about the various measaurements of a young man named Austin. I deemed it a little too inappropariate for here. I'm sure you'd agree.)
Unfortunately, I just realised that this is my last post before Christmas. What timing! I hope you had/are having/will have a great non-denominational, general festive period.
 

Thursday 20 December 2012

In this edition of Kinfolk...

Maybe not. Actually, this hilarity is just a segue into tonight's adventure to the Open Air Cinema with the inconquerable J. I figure, since she's the first person I told about my blog, she ought to be the first to get a mention on it.

I begin by reiterating that it's summer where I am.

The Open Air Cinema is a fairly literal business. You bring a picnic rug or rent a deck chair and then spend an hour forty or so shifting about, trying to get the feeling back into your legs.

Hard life.

Ah, but who am I kidding? This was so much fun. I had my first Subway (verdict: satisfactory; doubt those meatballs were the epitome of eatin' fresh, but they did taste good), and then we saw a bongo drum orchestra. There was some kind of hippie night market -- you could buy fisherman's pants and those weird woven hats with the ear flaps -- and a man who, clearly at the end of his pride, was trying to flog the last of his stock as "strawberries for Christmas", "stawberries for your ice-cream" and "strawberries for you, sir".

St. Kilda is such a fun place, in spite of all the murders. It's sort of seedy and a last hippie outpost, but I guess that's the charm. It even has a Coney Island-esque amusement park; C I-esque in that it had its hey-day about seventy years ago and now is only really patroned by tourists, children's birthday parties and second-daters running out of ideas. It's a shame because the place is actually pretty nice, especialy when it's all lit up. It's the kids these days, with their "electronic mail" and "skateboards".

Right. The sun set at last and we headed to the place to see...

...Emilio Estevez! What a film. We laughed; we cried; we fumbled and failed to take a picture of the opening tites and instead snapped a shot of the lead actor.

I admit to you now that this was my first ever viewing of the Breakfast Club. What can I say? I'm impressed, both by the film itself and by Estevez's cold, dead shark eyes. Apart from moments of frustration (ie: "Oh my God, leave Claire alone already, it's not her fault she's a ginger") it was sensational. I'm always in awe of a film that takes such hilariously rigid stereotypes and makes a decent picture. Plus! it had a montage (a dance montage!!) and a makeover and those are just my favourite things in a film.

And a highly unflattering selfie to end a sensational evening.

 

Wednesday 19 December 2012

Flashback harp and Vaseline on the lens

How meta is this?

It's been a month since I started this blog (and about ten days since I decided to write a review of how things have been going, took a picture, wrote 'How meta is this?' and subsequently forgot all about it). I assure you I won't be writing these every month I pass here, but I think now's as good a time as any to have a think about how things are going.

Reading over my things, I realise I've strayed from my original idea, and, in essence, the purpose of my blog. I'm writing about a (or an, I suppose) scenic world, not an near-unemployment or an questionable/attention-seeking grammar. And now that I'm sort of in the habit of blogging, I'm going to try to drag myself back into that vein. I was talking with my endlessly wonderful aunt about blogging, and something she said really struck true: no-one wants to read about the cupcakes I'm baking. (Unless I provide a recipe and/or beautiful photographs -- look, hey, I'm not a food blogger and anyway, this is just an analogy.) Whatever I do, I have to offer you all something they can't get anyplace else. Anyone can pull haphazard, wonky cupcakes together; that's not what I'm here to write about. I'm going to pull myself back to my intended route, kicking and screaming. I'm going to have less incidental posts; I'm going to actually do something, then write about it. In honesty, I've been kind of lazy.

At this point, I'd like to put it out there that any constructive criticism, feedback and tips on any element of my blogging is a thousand times welcome. I need all the help I can get!

That said, more than anything else I'm just proud I've survived a month actually blogging. And that I actually started! How can I describe how good it felt to reach out to some bloggers I really admire and to hear lovely things back; to read comments, however few; and -- this one really set my heart racing -- to finally finally see my Bloglovin' followers rise from one (me) to two. My readers may only number in the teens at this point, but I've started; I'm breaking into this beautiful blogging community at long last. And it feels so good.

 

Saturday 15 December 2012

20/20

For reasons too tragic to disclose (I'm learning to be responsible and senior at my once-a-week lolly shop job) I was up at five today. I'm not really a morning person, as evidenced by the fact that once, still drunk with sleep, I took a swing at a friend and made her lip bleed. Wonderful, wonderful me.

But I pulled myself out of bed at the prospect of those three sweet minimum wage hours (remember from the last post how desperate I am?) and off I went. In a way, it was nice; there was a sense of community in the mutual hatred of that ungodly hour. It was mostly weary tradies (do other countries use that word?) and shocked-looking businesspeople... and me, poor little lolly girl. You might feel like I'm getting a bit off-topic in a moment, but stay with me. One thing was different on this trip, and it wasn't the number of folks fumbling with broadsheets. I had new contact lenses.

For the right sighted, contacts and glasses and complicated surgery all seem like such a hassle. Let me level with you: for a vast majority of the time, they are. Apart from the cred you earn from having prescription glass in those frames and being able to terrify eight year-olds by sticking fingers in your eye, it's not much joy. But when you have your script updated; that's when I pity the optically sound.

How can I describe what it's like to relive the novelty of first sight? Over time, as your eyes wither, you don't notice that details fade. But when your -2.75 script jumps to a -3.50, you abruptly realise that you've been missing out. Everything is suddenly clear-cut and beautiful. The first thing I do is look at leaves; what grows to be a blurred green mess becomes thousands of individual shapes, all crisply edged with individual shadows. Then everything comes in a rush: power lines and eaves on houses and the deliberate lines of a skyscraper. The morning helped: I managed, through dumb luck, to time my departure so that my ten-minute walk fell in that golden half hour, when everything is dripping with light and you feel like the air is thick with it. (Naturally, I was too busy gawping at No Parking signs to take any proper pictures; just these blurry hot air balloons from the train.)

Sometimes it's the small things, I suppose.a

 

Monday 10 December 2012

This is getting Dickens-esque

 

I'm going to end up as a chimney-sweep. --Alright, I'm over-dramatising (as usual), but you've got to hear me out. I'm currently involved in this ridiculous job hunt -- and Lawd help me when I try to get employment in the sector I actually want a career in, because right now I'm nursing a serious case of the blues at Kmart's stony silence. It should not be this hard to get a retail job.

Some pretty interesting things have come out of my job hunt, though. I've been going in waves: first the undeniably better-paid world of sales and marketing, known also as "Hello, have you heard about the savings you can make if you switched to So-and-so Energy?" While I'm not sure how I would have enjoyed being hated for a living, it was a reality I never had to face as they were looking for people older and taller. I suppose I wouldn't buy energy from some bored-looking kid (it's just my face, there's not much I can do) who has to get other people to get the cereal down in the supermarket for her. I'm going to be very kind to door-to-door salespeople since I've had a brush with their world.

After finding myself without any interviews, I began panic and went through an application frenzy on the Internet. A lot of pride was forsaken that day; I admit to writing "...and I just LOVE LOVE LOVE coffee!" on my Starbucks application. Also, I made an application to Starbucks.

Finally, a couple of days ago, I gave up on glitzy, fast-paced dreams and faced reality: my local suburb. Williamstown is a seaside 'burb with a towny feel; everybody knows everybody's business. Naturally, we attract too many daytrippers and Hong Kong tourists not to have 47,000 cafes; so, resumes in hand, I stalked the streets. Williamstown's an old place, by colonial Australian standards, and we have many old and beautiful things, like the trees you can see up above. It turned out to be quite a pleasant afternoon, with the sun shining and the cookware store hiring. Kmart may have forsaken me, but hope endures.

 

Tuesday 4 December 2012

It's beginning to sort of resemble Christmas

Originals here and here
They had a snowstorm in Helsinki. In Prague, the Christmas markets are beginning to show their beautiful selves. It's 18 degrees C in Hobart. Now, I hate to complain, but it seems like the whole world -- maybe less Argentina -- is in the grips of a winter wonderland.

I do love Australia, and I adore Melbourne. Autumn is a sensation and I only get a little hayfever-y in spring. But December is the month when my mind turns to knitted sweaters and slipping over on black ice. I know snow stops being charming by about day three, but my romantic vision of that Vinter Vonderland persists. I blame Hollywood and Ben Affleck.

But that's not the point of this blog! It's meant to be charming and pretty. Blogs are pretty and charming. That's the way it's meant to be. So I hoofed it into the city to snap some of my favourite Christmassy places. It's not all nauseating postcards of Surfin' Santa and crummy season-appropriate rewrites of carols. No, we can copy the Northern Hemisphere every bit as well as Argentina.

So let's see what we see.
ASW Top Tourism Tip: Melbourne's arcades are sensational places. Melburnians always seem to vouch for the alleyways; and they're fascinating and pokey and everything they ought to be. But the arcades are reliable in the way arcades are. You know one store only sells Russian matryoshka dolls? They're all carved by tooth in Smolensk or something. It's pretty great.

They have a forest down at Fed Square, too. I mean, it was hardly Nova Scotia -- the trees were fake! -- but we do love ourselves a traditional Christmas here. I can't wait for baking ovens on baking days, gluhwein, ecologically unsound conifers and goddamn velvet.

Oh, and one particular film.

Friday 30 November 2012

Hello, home

Well, that was a very lovely week.

Pretty, pretty, pretty week.

It's a real shame I lack the technical skill to show you how shut-up-and-sit-down beautiful the country I live in is. (I also made the sensational decision to leave my picture-taking to the very last day, when it was overcast.) (Overcast for an Australian summer, that is.)

I did a lot of things; most of them involved television. At this moment, I have seen more of Reno 911! than I ever anticipated or actually desired, but hey. Spent a lot of time shouting at a questionably rendered Mario on the Nintendo 64, too, so at least my time was productive.

There I am!

And then there was HAMBURGER. As far as I can tell, it's a fish 'n' chip shop, but the only signage is what you see: HAMBURGER. (People on the Peninsula are sometimes a little strange.) I had to walk everywhere down there, as the ranch was in the middle of nowhere -- as "middle of nowhere" as a house on the main road can be, but anyway -- and HAMBURGER marked the half-way point, roughly. Orange on brown never looked so good.

So, what about those shenanigans I alluded to? Well, it was pretty crazy; one morning -- and stick with me here, because this is going to sound a bit preposterous -- I woke up with a hairtie around my wrist I'd never seen before. And I lost one of my thongs. (That's a flip-flop; we have some pretty funny names for things down here at the bottom of the world.) And I got a prickle in my foot. As I said: off the hook.

 

Friday 23 November 2012

Schoolies, or How to Fall Off a Balcony

Ooh, I shouldn't. Because that does happen, often with tragic results. But it basically sums up what schoolies is to Australian high school leavers. What better way to commemorate thirteen years of first-rate, first world education than by drinking for a week in a beach house until everything you learnt is permanently eradicated.

Atta boys... Original here

But I digress. Because, despite the stereotype, I can smugly announce that my schoolies will be a charming, relaxing week away, with just the right amount of fun-in-the-sun nonsense and "Shut up, it's 11am; it's barely morning." Even I, Empress of Kvetch, struggle to find things to complain about. ...alright, that's a lie, but I'm very talented in that way.

Ooh, if you insist... Originals here

We're going "down the coast", which is tricky as Melbourne is in Port Phillip Bay... In truth, we're going around to one of the peninsulas, so we'll be between bay and proper coast. There's your answer, then. As far as I can tell, the plan is to read and swim and eat and watch TV and sleep; a general attempt to begin the post-exam healing process. We don't find out our ATAR (ie: Year 12 score used to get into university) until mid-December, and then it's a month before university offers are released. "Merry Christmas/Happy New Year/Happy Birthday! We got you this overhanging thundercloud of doubt. --Much love, the Victorian Curriculum and Assessment Authority".

So here I am, half-way through this lovely holiday. (Oh, the magic of scheduling posts.) Anyway, I legitimately don't think I have any readers at this stage (which is fine, everybody starts at zero... totally fine... doesn't bother me...) so that's a weight off my mind. Oh, and yes, I will start using my own images soon. It's on my List of Things.

Ooh, by the way, I'm trying to figure out what in hell is going on with formatting... The Blogsy app is great but I am not. We'll see.


Wednesday 21 November 2012

How to build a life

I've reached a fascinating point in my life. For the first time, I have total independence (well, almost... I've got to be recognised as a legal adult first). Free from whatever high school was meant to be. Now I'm to spread my wings and fly off into the sunset on a unicorn. Or something. The only problem is I have no idea what I'm doing.

 

Frankly, I don't know how to exist in the real world. Weekdays are a mystery to me. What do people do? Where do they go? Do they brunch? Should I be brunching? All of these questions are giving me an incalculable amount of grief. I'm filling up the breathing space between exams and schoolies (I'll explain that for you next time) with two months' worth of errands: optometrists and concession cards and bobby pins, but after that I'm running on empty.

 

My aim is to Visit Things. Isn't that sort of the whole point of my blog? I mean, I exist in the world's most goddamn liveable city. (In your face, Melbourne, FL.) I have so many great resources at my fingertips; galleries and theatres and parks and summer. I leave to spend a year or so in London in March; it's time to grow up and finally appreciate my home.

I've a sort of rough hit-list buzzing about in my head; Melbourne's hilariously full of galleries and coffee shops and book shops (all of the good things). But I think I'd like to give you a tour of my life in this city that scrapes below the NGV and the Eureka Tower.

 

Source: TimeOut Melbourne

I fully accept the wishy-washiness of this post. But I'll get there. It'll happen. I could have blogged about the optometrist. You don't want that. But, for the record, I'm -2.75 in my left eye and -2.5 in my right.

 

Monday 19 November 2012

Dear souvenirs

I thought the nicest way to get to know one another might be a cutesy tour of my favourite souvenirs. I count the things I bring back amongst my most prized possessions, mainly because they always have such lovely memories attached. It's like a miniature trip away every time I see them.

Oh jeez, and reading back over this I realise I sound like the spoilt princess to end them all. Let me explain: my family travels so much because we put a priority on it, valuing it above other things and saving accordingly. I know how lucky I am! Phew, okay, little moment of anxious defensivism (is that a word?) over.

I got the two glass birds in a New Zealand junk shop. My pa and I went over there a couple of years ago to indulge a mutual love of Lord of the Rings (am I excited about the Hobbit? In a word: yes.) Along the way, I was permitted to indulge in a not-so-mutual love of Art Deco architecture, and thus we pilgrimmed it up to a town, population 22, that turned out not to be Napier. I mean, the four buildings in the town were lovely, but... The birds are grand anyway and serve a reminder of a happy road-trip amongst the most beautiful mountains and plains you could find.

The house is probably my favourite thing all of all my things. I was lucky enough to spend last Christmas in Austria, leeching off some friends over there. You're supposed to put a candle in it: then the windows and the door ajar welcome you warmly. I bought this in the Kristkindlmarkt out the back of Schloss Schönbrunn in Vienna. Those Christmas markets... They're like a fairy tale. Twinkle lights and good company and gluhwein and schnapps ahoy. Even thinking about them now makes me tingle.
The cranes in snow is a cloth something I got in Kagoshima, Japan, when I stayed on exchange. Japanese people are right into cloth somethings, I found. If there's an excuse to use one, eight'll be procured. If not, they're just beautiful things to hang around the house and occasionally wrap lunch in. This one I found at a rest stop with my host family as we travelled through brittle Autumn mountains, eating sticky-sweet bontan ame and driving through clouds of sulphur.

My Sturt's Desert Pea dishcloth's been through a lot. My folks decided it was time to see our own country, so we went up through the outback a couple of years ago, from Adelaide to Alice Springs. And, despite days and days of searching for the famous plant, this tea towel is the closest I got to the real thing. We got eerie piles of rocks beside abandoned roads instead.


And this little owl! Another Japan favourite, from Miyajima Island (famous for that torii gate in the water). He's a little clay bell that I got as consolation for never making it to the handicrafts museum (a wound that still stings; God, I love handicrafts!). On Miyajima, the trick is to rent a bike, avoid having your map eaten by the terrifically tame deer, buy as many lucky charms from the shrine as you can carry and eat seventeen soft serve cones. If I took anything away from Japan (metaphorically... I took lots) it's that soft serve is goddamn everywhere. And the convenience store fried chicken is to die for.

 

Sunday 11 November 2012

Just testing a few settings

Can't find the source, which is dodgy and shameful.

Proper and serious blog launch coming up soon, which I'm very excited about. I've got lots of things I can't wait to share! Also, I'll never have to think about those nasty exams again... Until I find out if I was accepted into my dream university course or not. 'Least I won't have to study; just sweat fingerprints into the newspaper and cling to my ticket to London. (Yes, I have one... Got your interest yet? Maybe you should follow me somehow by choosing your poison to the left there...)

Source: We Heart It

See you soon, beautiful people!

Friday 19 October 2012

Is it a hiatus if you have't started?

Follow my blog with Bloglovin
I'll be honest with you: I have nothing to say until I'm done with my awful exams in late November. At that time, I'll pretend to be interesting at you and take lots of negative space heavy photographs of myself in fashionable sunglasses in front of independent galleries and cupcake shops. I'll also be talking about travel an awful lot. If that sounds appealing to you, please, check back then. If not, here's a poorly formatted picture of my dog looking really cute for your trouble.