Tuesday, July 12, 2005
Daytripping
Soundtrack: “A Rush Of Blood To The Head” by Coldplay
Tuesday 5th July. I got up at 6.15am again to get the same 7.07am train, but getting off at Strathfield instead of in the city so that I could join the Chinese tourists’ Canberra day-trip. [The lady at the Chinese travel agents somehow managed to pronounce “Strathfield” as “Sheffield,” which I thought could have been a likely name because there are loads of northern place names around Sydney e.g. Newcastle, Liverpool, Birkenhead Point. Just as well I looked at the receipt the night before, or else I don’t know where I would’ve ended up.] Now, I know that I’m fairly naff, but I’ve got nothing on other Chinese people – they’re so uncool! I’m bloody Gwen Stefani compared to them. But no worries. I’m fine when left to my own devices and they all have a herd mentality, so it was pretty easy to distance myself from them.
The drive down was through some lovely scenery – under a blue, cloudless sky, we drove down through the Southern Highlands, then went through the Canberra Hills to the reach the capital itself. Before going into town, we stopped at a model village called Cockington Green, which sounds like some sort of stoner-porn flick. I didn’t fancy paying $13.50 to wander around randomly after the excesses of the day before, so I ended up having lunch in a mock Tudor pub, which was quite surreal, especially as the landlord had hung a selection of chamber pots from the ceiling. After stopping for everybody else to have lunch at a Chinese restaurant, we finally went to see interesting stuff. First stop was a huge fountain thing shooting out of a lake. And then, the National Mint, which isn’t really worth writing about apart from to whinge. We were there for twenty minutes, so I rushed to the factory floor’s viewing gallery, but hardly anybody was working and it was crap. And then a tour of the embassies, which, wonderfully, are all built in national style. My favourites were the Thai embassy (pretty, intricate, immaculately decorated buildings) and the Papua New Guinea embassy (a big longhouse type-thing). An honourable mention goes to the NZ embassy, which has statues of cows on its front lawn.
And then, to the Parliament. Comparing it to the Scottish Parliament (because they were both built around the same time), the Aussie one was nicer on the outside and in the reception area, but the chambers themselves were crap – even the SA Parliamentary chambers were better. This is the direct opposite to the Scottish ones, so one-all, but I’m going to let the Scottish ones win because of the views of the hills around Edinburgh from the main chamber. And then, a moving trip to the War Memorial (I dragged myself out before I ended up crying at the futility of war and the needless waste of human life), and then it was time for a long drive back north.
It was a day of “and then”s, which I wouldn’t let wind me up. I’m not very good at this tour malarky – I like to have the freedom to do my own thing in my own time, instead of being told that I only had fifteen minutes to look at the big fountain thing (there was a really interesting exhibition centre behind it that I could’ve spent a fair while in) and twenty minutes at the War Memorial (there was a museum there that I could also have a spent a fair while in). On the other hand, I was the cool kid, which was odd.
Tuesday 5th July. I got up at 6.15am again to get the same 7.07am train, but getting off at Strathfield instead of in the city so that I could join the Chinese tourists’ Canberra day-trip. [The lady at the Chinese travel agents somehow managed to pronounce “Strathfield” as “Sheffield,” which I thought could have been a likely name because there are loads of northern place names around Sydney e.g. Newcastle, Liverpool, Birkenhead Point. Just as well I looked at the receipt the night before, or else I don’t know where I would’ve ended up.] Now, I know that I’m fairly naff, but I’ve got nothing on other Chinese people – they’re so uncool! I’m bloody Gwen Stefani compared to them. But no worries. I’m fine when left to my own devices and they all have a herd mentality, so it was pretty easy to distance myself from them.
The drive down was through some lovely scenery – under a blue, cloudless sky, we drove down through the Southern Highlands, then went through the Canberra Hills to the reach the capital itself. Before going into town, we stopped at a model village called Cockington Green, which sounds like some sort of stoner-porn flick. I didn’t fancy paying $13.50 to wander around randomly after the excesses of the day before, so I ended up having lunch in a mock Tudor pub, which was quite surreal, especially as the landlord had hung a selection of chamber pots from the ceiling. After stopping for everybody else to have lunch at a Chinese restaurant, we finally went to see interesting stuff. First stop was a huge fountain thing shooting out of a lake. And then, the National Mint, which isn’t really worth writing about apart from to whinge. We were there for twenty minutes, so I rushed to the factory floor’s viewing gallery, but hardly anybody was working and it was crap. And then a tour of the embassies, which, wonderfully, are all built in national style. My favourites were the Thai embassy (pretty, intricate, immaculately decorated buildings) and the Papua New Guinea embassy (a big longhouse type-thing). An honourable mention goes to the NZ embassy, which has statues of cows on its front lawn.
And then, to the Parliament. Comparing it to the Scottish Parliament (because they were both built around the same time), the Aussie one was nicer on the outside and in the reception area, but the chambers themselves were crap – even the SA Parliamentary chambers were better. This is the direct opposite to the Scottish ones, so one-all, but I’m going to let the Scottish ones win because of the views of the hills around Edinburgh from the main chamber. And then, a moving trip to the War Memorial (I dragged myself out before I ended up crying at the futility of war and the needless waste of human life), and then it was time for a long drive back north.
It was a day of “and then”s, which I wouldn’t let wind me up. I’m not very good at this tour malarky – I like to have the freedom to do my own thing in my own time, instead of being told that I only had fifteen minutes to look at the big fountain thing (there was a really interesting exhibition centre behind it that I could’ve spent a fair while in) and twenty minutes at the War Memorial (there was a museum there that I could also have a spent a fair while in). On the other hand, I was the cool kid, which was odd.
