Message from Adelaide

After being in Australia for a year, i've got the chance to see the finest part of the country funally. I made a 6-day trip from Alice Springs to Adelaide to see the outback of the central area. The trip was finished yesterday and it seems to me that 6 days are not enough to explore 10% of the advanturous of central Oz. Challenging climbs, rock pool swimming, spotting kangroos and other wildlife, sleeping under the star...every moment is so impressive and time flew much faster than usual. I am sure the spectaclar views of the red centre will remain in my memory ofr a long time.
Trip is not end yet. I am going to explore the southern part of Australia in about 10 days. Kangroo Island and Great Ocean Road are the highlight of the coming trip. Will be back to Sydney around 5/2.

P.S I'd like to stay always from mobile phone or Internet during the tour. But i got some free coupons which gave me incentive/temptation to involve in the Net again.

Lucky Girl

Caption: My 98 Toyota Corolla AE102. I know it is a bit disagreeing with an environmentally friendly lifestyle to shift from public transport to private car, but it saves me lots of time and money. The public transport here is unreliable and it is more expensive than driving. Obviously the Aussie Government needs to pay some attention on this issue.

I always feel that I am a lucky and blessed person. Not fortunate with jet pot but things around me just go smoothly and nicely all the time. Although lots of them happened unexpectedly and unwanted, outcomes are not bad at all. Sometimes even some "dangerous" incidents for many people become adventurous experience for me. Nice! I treasure and appreciate this kind of fortune very much.
Such feeling strengthened a lot after I started my driving life. I brought a used Corolla last week in order to increase my mobility in Oz as well as saving my time+money. When I picked my car last Friday, it was the first time I have to drive a car independently. I won’t say my driving skill is bad but absolutely it is not good at all. Due to the nervousness and stressfulness I had for my debut driving, I almost crossed an intersection when the red light was on and changed lane improperly for couple times. Fortunately, I passed through all of them. The most horrible thing was about my parking. I can’t find any word that can describe how dreadful it is... Forget about to park successfully for once or twice, I don’t think I can park my car in the proper position for less than 3 or 4 times trials. Situation became ten times worse when I noticed that I was blocking the traffic during parallel street parking: always forget to give a signle light before stoping my car for parking and I even got tangled with the R/D (modes of automatic transmission) and left/right during reversing my car. I couldn’t remember how many times I had scratched the tyres as i also parked too close to kerbs. Not hard to imagine how horrible my parking was/is. I was so relief that I came home "entirely" at the end, both the Corolla and me.
But it is not the reason why I said I feel luckier after getting the car. The reason is how jammy I was when I had my driving test!! To be honest, I cannot recall exactly what happened during the test. The only thing I remembered is the examiner was a bit mindfulness during the test as I had to reminded him that I’d done the parking already when he asked me to do it at the second time. By the way, I am confident that I drive pretty well in a straight and big road, of course without any parking required.
One last thing to mention: the day I started of my independent driving life was a Black Friday, hopefully it doesn’t portend anything.

P.S. I read an interesting quote recently and I love it very much. It might become my motto one day, I suppose:
"When I read about the evils of drinking, I gave up reading." –by Henry Youngsman

New Year’s plan

Caption: I went to a zoo with my friend last week. It is a “open zoo” that animals (except birds and dangerous animal) can move freely in the zoo. Tourists are also allowed to touch them. Interesting experience.

Last year I found myself just living like a koala: sleep, eat and doing nothing. What I mean doing nothing is nothing I did last year inspired me a lot or gave me unforgettable memory/experience, except my studies on environment management.
I used to write diary everyday, especially the time when I was in Spain since there were too many memorable and adventurous stories for me to write down like a novel. However, the frequency of writing my journal drops dramatically after I finished my gran journey in Europe My life seems too usual and it is too boring to “record” them. Similar situation after I came to Australia. Sometimes, I strongly feel that I’ve already used up all my quota of “adventurous experience”.
By the way, one of my 2006 resolutions is to re-take my habitat of writing diary more often. Try not to be lazy and write down what I feel and what I see everyday. I always have strange or crazy feelings/thought/ideas about life or whatever which are worth to write them down. I would like to try a use a different dimension to see or to feel my everyday life.
Need some change in 2006.