Vegemite? Seriously??

That would top my “list of questions you would like to ask the Aussies”. I did ask the question to an Aussie and he laughed and said “I have it for breakfast everyday”.Yes , ofcourse.

I had read quite a few moving-to-Australia blogs before coming here (mostly US/UK citizens who had moved here, couldn’t find even one by an Indian and I had decided that I will start one telling the story of how we tumbled down under, but 3 months later I don’t even have a blog post to show for it ) and all of them mentioned vegemite and no one seemed to like it. I thought I would be an exception ;-) the theory of acquired tastes you know. I bought a jar , the very first weekend after coming here , took one lick and the jar has stayed at the back of the cupboard ever since. Come on , seriously ?? Why not peanut butter or nutella or just plain butter?

Another thing all these bloggers found perplexing was the 4WD shopping trolleys (which you can conveniently take home and just leave at the roadside; they will come and pick it up). I find it equally taxing; I would rather carry a 10kg rice bag than push and heave a 4 WD trolley that moves as if it has a mind of its own.

With three months sneak preview of married life and 9 months of long distance marriage and a rather bumpy ride down the migration lane to mark our first year of married life , I had gone through the whole thing with a “Sydney , you better be good “ attitude ;-) The truckloads of paper work that we had to go through to prove that our relationship was “genuine and continuing” -relationship statements and chat history and what else – and the rather long visa process are enough to put any “non genuine” ones out of the race , I believe. hehe.

And yes Sydney has been a nice experience. Australia is my first experience of a developed country and maybe my views are biased. But Sydney is beautiful, even by Kerala standards, and the views from the cliffs on the coast are breathtaking. I am still getting used to the fact that vehicles stop for you at zebra crossings while you can walk as if you own the road (no, not really) and not get honked at. The public transportation system is excellent. I love that you can see people from all different countries around you and hear all those languages and try all those cuisines. And I have started to like the Aussie accent (I even watch Master Chef Australia at the pretext of “getting to know the Aussie accent”). I went to a country town here as part of work and my colleague did a typical Aussie “How ya doing mate” for my benefit. Of course, he had to “translate” it for me :-D

And yes, I saw kangaroos :-D