Sydney Stories - Week 36

Hello,

Hope you had a good week.

Have you ever tried to dry your hands using the hot air blower in public bathrooms and ever had your hands dried up? In the Sydney Town Hall railway station they have installed a power blow dryer system. You need to insert your palms in a slit when two quite powerful jets of warm air dries you up. It was quite impressive. Never seen the air hand dryer so effective. Wonder how many other public toilets have caught up with this technology.

These days I happen to meet a lot of my apartment mates in the train. I guess you start to gain respect after you've been seen around with your wife and kids. The same guys never bothered to talk to me earlier. ;-) In fact one of them also works in the same building as mine. 

After a long break from good Malaysian food my appetite was well satisfied this weekend with Malaysian food for 3 days in a row. Friday is my usual Thai day took yet another deviation this time. This time, I found a small Malaysian restaurant tucked into a corner in a nearby train station. I happened to see that by chance while coming back from somewhere. The effort was definitely worth it. Finally had some decent char kway teaw. Keep getting confused for the right spelling. Maybe anything goes for Malay? 

On Saturday morning my friend Siva called me up and asked if we were interested to join them on a trip to Blue Mountains national park. Agreed to join without much research. It is technically about an hour's drive from our place. However it would've helped if we knew where we were supposed to go. I assumed he knew and he assumed I knew. Poor GPS can only tell us the way if we give a destination right.  It took about 5 hours to go where we wanted to go. Decided never ever to step out of the house "unplanned". 

The particular spot where we wanted to go was in a town called Katoomba. Ended up in yet another Malaysian restaurant for lunch. Had kway teaw, nasi goreng and hokkien mee. Wasn't disappointed at all. My friends hadn't tasted Malay food before, they were a bit hesitant looking at the dark coloured nasi goreng. They were quite happy too.

The Blue mountain national park is where one of the popular landmarks of Australia where the three sisters peaks are  located. Thanks to all the adventure in the morning we didn't have much time to spend there. Managed to take a cable car ride (the last one trip for the day actually) across the mountains. It was quite impressive. A lot of my friends had underplayed the Blue mountains saying there was nothing much except for the 3 peaks. I think we will be going back there a few times. 

And yes,  made a decent kway teaw (again for the 3rd consecutive day - "something wrong" (as Nandhitha would say)). It was kway teaw minus any meat. I think the chives and bean sprouts makes the difference. 

Have a great week.

Chetty