The Real World: Sydney

After yesterday's short painful morning jog, we washed up and David headed into work. While at home, I cleaned up a little more before going out to get a cell phone in this country. I was able to get a cell phone, sim card and pre-paid plan for $79 AUD. It was a pretty good deal! So now I'm not completely isolated.

I headed into the city to get our visas put into our passports. Australia is a strange country where they don't put the visas in until AFTER you get here. The passport agency was very similar to a DMV. First, you queue to get a sticker that indicates what your purpose is. Then you wait for your number to get called. The interesting part of our trip was that I discovered that I CAN work here if I wanted to. As of now, I've been pretty busy, so we'll see what happens.

Since the passport agency was near Darling Harbour and Chinatown, we went on a little adventure and after walking all around the wharf looking for the Real World house, we had given up. Then on our way back into Chinatow, we accidentally stumbled upon it!


It was actually much more run down than it ever looked on TV, but I guess they were here about a year ago and no one else has really lived in it.


Here's the tables that are right next to their house where people would often go to talk outside the house!


Afterwards, David and I headed to explore Chinatown. There were so many places to choose from, but we ended up at a dumpling restaurant. Their xiao long bao are no where as good as Taiwan Cafe in Boston and their fried dumplings were also not that great (mostly oily and not fried enough). BUT I'd give it another try for boiled dumplings, since the actual dumpling wasn't bad. We went to a bakery and bought a bunch of buns since we were going to a co-workers house to hang out. They live right across from downtown Sydney and have amazing views. These pictures do not do it justice. We'll be partying it up here for New Year's since the fireworks are off the Sydney Harbour Bridge.



We didn't get home until late (around 11:30 pm) and I am finally on a normal sleeping schedule for myself. Today's adventures include finding Ikea and getting some stuff for the apt.