Melbourne

 I made my way back from French island with a nice morning walk, and headed for Melbourne to meet up with a friend from high school Hope. I have now twice brought champagne as a house gift for letting me stay to a group who are currently not drinking. I learned when I got here that she’s pregnant! So exciting for her and her husband. They seem very happy. Hopes husband was working when I got there so we spent most of the day chatting and relaxing and got some delicious food nearby. 

She lives in a very cute and trendy neighborhood and it’s a beautiful home. It looks really small from the outside, and it is very narrow, the the home extended a really far back making it quite a large space. 

I over the few days I stayed with her I ate some incredible food, spent days chatting with her and her husband and friends about life, and generally just enjoyed socializing. One evening we went to an electronic jazz concert which was really interesting. It’s not something I would chose to listen to but found it generally quite fascinating. The musicians played lots of different instruments and non-instruments and played then in untraditional ways. Like playing a clarinet, but instead of blowing into it, making a clicking pop with the reed, or a conch shell which can play a surprising number of notes, or children’s toys. It was a really interesting experience. Overall it was a really great few days. 

I made my way to the airport for my flight to Vietnam. Unfortunately, I found out my visa had my passport expiry date wrong by one day… so I had to buy an ‘emergency’ one… for A$500. More than I spent on my round trip flight here…. Which is something. But alas, I’m a bit frustrated and embarrassed and mad at myself, but I cannot be changed. So I will sit with my anger and make sure I don’t make the same mistake again. Did it blow up my budget a bit? Yes. But the only alternative was to rebook my flights and lose a number of bookings I’ve already made and I’m not going to do that. Oh well. Hopefully this is my only catastrophe this trip and the rest  go smoothly.