Humm…… what do I remember of the city, from top of my mind:
- cold winds: hard to keep your hands out while on the road, can feel it coming up from the pole
- trams: all over the place, quite fast and convenient but not cheap
- hook turns: some kind of unique rule for cars to accommodate the trams
- lamb roll called kabob: Australian version of shawarma roll
- fruit juice stands and special preparation called ‘liver cleanser’: carrot, ginger and celery mixed into a interesting drink
- taxi strike: don’t think it happens often, was something we saw when there as one of them got stabbed and they wanted city to subsidize the fiberglass between drive and passenger
- large number of students everywhere you go
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Those are the highlights from my two day trip to Melbourne last week of April 2008. It was a business trip to attend a seminar so took a place close to the city center so as to avoid the need to travel much for the official work in the early morning. I stayed at a place smack at the center of the city shopping district and called “The Mall”.
Its quite a spread out city with looks clean and friendly. Somehow have a feel of a small town while being a metro. Quite well connected with several means of transportation, from trams, to trains to water way transportations, though every thing is quite expensive considering the exchange rate of AU$ that you get in Australia. It was quite a surprise when I gave a US$100 note at the money exchange at the airport and got back only AU$92, humm.. seems like they have decided to set there own exchange rate over and above what the world forex exchange does.
Despite the cold winds, its quite a living city streets. Lots of outdoor sitting with those lamp post kind heating arrangements, there are also those invisible black heaters fitted into the outdoor shades. It was quite fun actually to have the couple of beers sitting outside at the sun down, there were quite a bunch of beer types and the one I chose was nice and smooth. There were several international food choices around from Chinese to Vietnamese to Indian, Greek etc. Spread around are small video casinos with slot machines and people drinking around or enjoying some cold sandwiches. On the street you find lot of fruit and flower sellers also this nuts sellers who sells this quite expensive kind of roasted chest nuts I suppose. Main street areas are also filled with stuff of interest to travelers, from day trips to gold coast and around, souvenir shops to even expensively decorated gem stones found around there area.
Enjoyed the lunch at a food court at some mall come rail station/terminal kind of place, this huge stuffed roll of roasted lamb, vegetable and bunch of other things. This alone is worth going back to the city again, guess that explains how easy its to please me.
Life seems to have a different pace at this city, good for them; at least they get to smell the rose while trying to live the regular life. There are lots of street performers in the evening from musicians to artist etc all over the city. Its quite nice to take a stroll along the main street or the river side where there are lots of different restaurants and a very large casino.
