Sydney Stories - Week 66 - Easter Special

Hello,

Life seems to be getting interesting every 33 weeks in Sydney. Week-33 was when we had bought the car. It took another 33 weeks for us to actually do some sight seeing in and around Sydney. Brace yourselves...this one is going to be long.

We had a very refreshing discovery this week in a nearby suburb called Pendle Hill. This place has a row of Sri Lankan - Indian restaurants (take away places rather) that serve a dinner for a family (of 4) for about $15. To give you a comparison, in any other restaurant a single dish  would cost about $15. You do the math...

The other day I was on the train and there was an Indian woman and 2 caucasian kids (girls). The first instance I thought maybe a baby sitter. However the kids very soon broke that speculation by calling her mom. At some point the kids started fighting over some candy and the elder one (probably about 7-8 yrs old) gobbled the particular colour that the younger one (about 4 yrs) wanted. She started crying "It is not fair...". The mom quickly quipped - "Life is not always fair darling." and went to explain that concept of life's unfairness. Could only think - WOW - now that's quite an early start for life's lessons.

Good Friday, Easter and ANZAC day - put together gave us a 5 day weekend. The longest public holiday I've ever enjoyed so far. I guess Prabhu Deva's song "Pandigai thaethi Sundayil vandhaa.." does not apply to Australia. Holidays have to be taken during week days even if it means 2 events happen on the same day, 2 week days have to be given off. So our weekend started on a Thursday night when we had friends come over for dinner and hence the Gobi Manchurian. The girls did have a lot of fun.

A lot of plans were thought of for months on what could be done during Easter. For a long time we were contemplating on a road trip to Melbourne. However decided against any major trip for a simple reason -  we haven't looked around much in Sydney yet. Decided to take a completely casual "play by the ear" holiday without any concrete plans.

On Saturday we left on a short trip to Hunter Valley Garden along with 2 other families. 1 of them was Nandhitha's pre-school friend's parents and another of their friends - both of them from Wipro. Hunter Valley is the wine country for this region in Australia. It was a nice drive up there with just a little bit of scare from the rain god. Probably not a great season to visit though as the vines were all dried up. Uma took over most part of the driving. The main agenda was to take part in an Easter egg hunt which was organized in Hunter Valley Garden (www.hvg.com.au).

 Our last memories of an egg hunt was a few years ago in Phoenix when Nandhitha was about Nandha's age and we didn't want to miss it for any reason. We somehow made it to the last session of the egg hunt. Nandhitha had fun and Nandha had his own private egg hunt too without the pressure of his peers running over him. At the end of the hunt each participating kid was given a bag of Cadbury Easter eggs.  A trip cannot turn out to be too pleasant if you are tagging along with some one where your cell phones don't work. The battery in mine died and the pre-paid call charge in Uma's drained up after (quite) a few calls. It was a comedy of life. Got to make another trip to the garden some other time in leisure. We made it back home by around 7.30 PM completely drained out on energy. Wonder how our parents managed to take us out while we were this age. I was telling Uma that next time we go out on such trips need to have an energy shot taken - double shot long black (aka strong black coffee) couldn't do the trick!!

Sunday our plan was to take a ferry to the city and cover a bit of Sydney CBD (Central Business District - Downtown in USA). We had a pretty lazy start without any hard bound plans. The ferry was an interesting experience too. We parked our car near the ferry wharf in Parramatta. Being the Easter sunday the ferry was quite crowded that we had to wait for 2 hours for our turn. We had to "reserve" our seats so we could get on to the ferry. Of course we made the best use of the time - had lunch which was originally scheduled to be had in the city. Went to a Thai restaurant - Saute Thai. More about that in the kitchen. Got to know a bit of history of Parramatta - which is an English version of the aboriginal word Baramada (or Burramatta) meaning the place where eels rest. Now I understand why the local rugby team is called Parramatta Eels.

The ferry ride as such was nothing great. It was a typical ride along the backwaters of Sydney. However the view that we got just as we were entering the city was something. The ferry reached Circular Quay after a 45 minute ride. It usually stops in a few places along the way, but since it was full occupancy it turned to be an express ride. Circular Quay is where we need to go to the Opera House.

 Even though we initially thought of covering a few places in the city, yesterday was spent completely at the Opera.

 This was the first visit for Uma and kids to the Opera. My first with a camera so I was having a field day myself. We took the guided tour around the house which is considered to be one amongst the "World Heritage Sites". It was an interesting tour even though we had taken only the basic version. 

There is an extended back stage version - maybe some other time. Nandhitha became the star of the tour. When the guide took a short break for questions it was Nandhitha's hands that went up first. :-) Of course she "forgot" what she wanted to ask. The next time she stopped for a question everybody was looking at Nandhitha if she had any. ;-)  Anytime a project goes over schedule and budget it can easily be called as "Project Opera". It was initially budgeted for 7 million dollars to be completed in 3 years. It "just" took 102 million dollars and 16 years to complete. Not sure where this can be attributed to. We hung around there till about 7 PM to get a view of the skyline at night. 

 and returned by train. I asked Nandhitha whether she wanted to go back by the ferry or by train. She says "It's Daddy's choice isn't it how we go home?" and then adds on "but but but...in the boat there are too any holes (windows) and lot of cold air and I feel cold. So better take the train so it is not cold." And so the train. 

The transportation for the entire journey costed $5. In Sydney they have a concept called "Sunday Funday" where they encourage families to get out and use the public transport for quality family time. So each ticket cost $2.50 for the whole day and you can take a train, bus or a ferry anywhere within metropolitan Sydney. I already had my monthly pass and just had to buy tickets for Uma and Nandhitha.

So long folks...the weekend is yet to be over. More about that in this week's ramblings.

More photos available at: Hunter Valley Gardens and Opera House.

Have A Great Week!!

C