Title significance — Nothing to do with the Cars hit by the same name…or Neil Diamond’s song either…great…now that’s stuck in my head.

Well, it’s been awhile and a lot has happened. I’ve repeated this story to a few people, so I thought that it would be good to catch everyone up.

So…we’re not moving to Australia. This was a difficult decision. As you might recall, I was given an incredible opportunity by an incredible company (Atlassian PTY, and I’m serious, they rock), and we had it all figured out. We were going to move to Sydney after I tried things out, and the company had an idea of what I could do. We started selling things and prepping the house (and our friends and family) for the move. It was all going great…until…

I received an email from someone I once worked for that asked me to consider an opportunity with his company in Austin. I have an enormous amount of respect for this person. An opportunity in Austin, at a company with his leadership caused me to be curious…and I try not to be that way (“The cure for boredom is curiousity. There is no cure for curiosity” – Dorothy Parker).

Suffice it to say, I got an offer I couldn’t refuse (and not in the organized crime, intimidation context). Atlassian was disappointed and my friends in Sydney were as well, but given all the circumstances, I think this is probably the best decision for us (at least at this point).

While I will always remember my 3 months in Sydney quite fondly, it made me appreciate things here in Texas much more.

I’m entering the final days of “Gro-vember” and could use your help.  If you can donate a few bucks to 3 worth charities, please click the link below and help me out.  You will be helping out people that need it, and you’ll have my undying gratitude.  Who knows…I might bring you something kangaroo from Australia.

But seriously…please consider giving a few bucks under my name so I can shave this awful moustache off my face.

Mike’s Grovember Page.

Today, I decided to go over to Rhodes and visit the mall that has the IKEA (yes, I went to IKEA again…shocker).  I rode my bike to Hornsby Station and took it the train.  If you travel with a bike outside of rush hour, you can do so free…otherwise you’ll need to buy a child’s ticket for it.  Now, that’s pretty handy on a Saturday when you want to go see the city.  Where was I?  I rode the train from Hornsby to Rhodes, then rode my bike to IKEA.

The funny thing about IKEA is that a lot of the products are the same ones you can get in the States (and other places too I’m guessing), and they’re roughly the same price.  Today I bought a shelf that I’ve affixed to my desk.  It now holds my monitor and i don’t have to look down to surf the web.

I didn’t buy much besides that…I didn’t have much room in my backpack (I was riding my bike if you’ll remember).

I took the bike to Rhodes Station and rode the train back to Hornsby.  My friend met me there and was good enough to stuff the bike in the back of his SUV and gave me a ride home.

I’m going to do this again…but maybe another part of Sydney.

Similarly, Australia has some fun little differences I noticed in my short time here thus far.

For those Aussie friends and colleagues that are reading this, please indulge this newbie to Australia in reporting to folks back home. I was presented with many of these differences when I went shopping for roast ingredients recently.

Shopping Hours – Most malls and shops are open till 9pm in the US. Not so in the Sydney area. With the exception of Thursday, the stores will close at 5:30pm or 6pm. Grocery stores are open a bit later and stores like Kmart are open 24 hours. Now, call me a capitalistic American, but it might be that the retailers are leaving a bit of money on the table…then again, they may not care.

LiquorLand – The two main grocery stores here are Coles and Woolworth’s (Woolie’s for short). Both supermarkets have side liquor businesses known as LiquorLand and Dan Murphy’s respectively. Now, I’m from Texas where liquor is kept in liquor stores and are only open 10 to 9 Monday through Saturday. This was a little bizarre to me, but maybe not for my friends in California.

Hungry Jack – This is Burger King. Apparently the company didn’t want to call themselves “Burger King” in Australia because of a “Burger Queen” chain that was here in the past. KFC is here and McDonald’s too (no Royale with Cheese though).

Cell Phones – This is a bit of madness. There are cell phone stores everywhere. In the Hornsby shopping centre (Westfield) there are *twelve* cell phone shops (not including grocery stores that also sell mobile phones). You can get a pre-paid plan (which is easiest for me) or you can get a contract similar to the US…but what you get for it is a little confusing. You get a “cap” that is expressed in dollars (e.g., $300 per month) where your phone calls and texts are drawn from. To make things a little more confusing, some plans offer free unlimited texts and free unlimited visits to Facebook, Foursquare, Twitter, LinkedIn, and MySpace (among others). The consumer friendly part is that they tell you the total cost of the phone over the length of the contract. An iPhone might cost you $1200 before it’s all said and done.

Coffee – A co-worker sneered at my Starbucks mug.  Apparently (in spite of the Starbucks presence in Sydney), a “tall black” (think Cafe Americano) is preferred over the offering from my country’s Seattle.  I like the “tall blacks” but I can’t drink as many of them.  I’m starting to acquire a taste for tea.

Beer – It’s quite expensive here…even the stuff they brew here.  If it’s “imported” (which means it’s better, right?) it’s even more expensive.  Budwiser is $16 a six-pack.  Just think about that for a minute.

I’m sure there will be more of these…this is just what I came up with on a train ride one morning.

I’m alive and doing fine down under.  Take care up there.

So, just to keep the separation of work and personal, I will only say that the job is pretty much everything I expected.  Great group, lots of talent and a wonderful culture.

Non-work has been pretty fun too.  As you might have seen from Sunday, I’ve been all around Sydney doing all the tourist-y things that you’re supposed to do.  There’s a few more pictures (and a few videos) I’ll put up later.

Let’s see…I climbed on top of the Harbour Bridge on Wednesday…not on the road part, but on the metal structure part.  I stood on top of one of the highest points in the city and got a great view of everything around.  It was breezy, but we were hooked on a static line the entire trip, so we weren’t likely to plunge into the harbour below.  I have a picture to prove this, but I’ll have to scan it I think.

After the bridge climb, I went to a well known pub called The Australian Hotel.  There I had a spiced eggplant pizza…really.  Now, if you think that’s a bit…exotic, some of the folks with me had duck pizza, bacon pizza and kangaroo pizza.  Whenever someone here says I should try kangaroo, I’m always convinced they’re pulling my leg…like, let’s see if we can get the foreigner to eat kangaroo (snicker, snicker), but apparently people do eat it.  Farm-raised is the way to go.  The wild version is too gamey.  Vegemite is another suspect food that people actually eat.  There are those at the office that eat it on toast all the time.  I haven’t been brave enough to try either Vegemite or kangaroo…at least not yet.

I got the opportunity to ride a ferry out to Manly Beach twice this week.  The beach is really nice even though not tremendously busy (it is just turning spring here now), but the ferry ride was very nice…especially coming back on Thursday night when the city was lit up and the stars were out.  I rode on the front benches of the boat (outside) and it was a kick.

Saturday was spent doing a little shopping at “the shops” in Hornsby and getting my desktop computer up and running.  I built a small form factor desktop computer to be my home away from home while apart from the rest of Guentzel network.  I had some spare parts, but I bought a nice, tough Thermaltake case that did the trick.  I was able to stuff it in my carry-on luggage and didn’t have any issues going through US security or Australian security.  Anyway, I lacked a keyboard, mouse, monitor and speakers.  The shops helped out with that.  Everything was up and running by Saturday night. Woo-hoo!

The Sydney Running Festival (on Sunday) was also a lot of fun.  It reminded me of the Capital 10,000 in many ways; a huge number of people coming out for a running event.  I wore my Thundercloud Subs Turkey Trot t-shirt and a Texas flag bandanna to represent my home town.  I ran the 9K in about an hour, but because of a misunderstanding of the bus schedule (mine), I had to run from the house to the train station (around 7K) to make the train in time.  Afterwards I was wondering why I didn’t just do the half marathon instead…oh wait…because it’s 13.1 miles!!!

The first week is in the books and I’m in the second week now.  If I can manage it, I’ll post more.

I was going to write a long blog post about all the fun things I did this first week…but I’m really too tired to do it.  I ran a race today, and I’m knackered (heh).

Instead, I’ll put up some pics of me in the big city.  Maybe I’ll caption them later.   Enjoy.

Anyway, where was I? Oh yes, Sydney is actually quite beautiful.  When you hear about a remote city these days, you immediately go the Google and start reading up (especially if you’re going to visit there).  And while the internet an prepare you for what you might see in Sydney, predictably, it doesn’t do the place justice.  You don’t really know about the place until you walk through the shops, talk to the locals and sample the wildlife.  It’s been 3 days and (while I’m still jet lagged) I’ve seen so many cool birds and plants that seem just mundane to other Aussies.  No snakes yet…they’re not mundane to anyone.

Things I’ve liked so far:

• Sydney is a Metropolitan City – As you might expect, a city of approximately 4 million people will probably feel like a big city.  There are cafes on every street downtown.  There are coffee shops everywhere (more on that later) and there is a rich variety of cultures.  I’m currently writing this blog post on the CityRail system (a train that takes me from Hornsby to the Central Business District) and despite what the locals say, it’s actually pretty good.
• Interesting wildlife – I’ve seen (and heard) birds that are unlike what I’ve experienced in other parts of the United States.  Not surprising, but still pretty interesting.  There’s a breed of cockatoo that is as common as grackles in central Texas…and about as loved as Grackles too.  These are large white birds that look like the bird in Baretta (old reference, I know) but these birds are as large as a small cat.  The reason that they’re reviled is that they are extremely destructive to trees, houses and electrical lines (although when the bird hangs upside down peeling insulation from the power lines, they are occasionally electrocuted).
• The Food – While the price of food is quite a bit higher here than in Texas, the diversity of cuisine (so far) is pretty nice.  There is a huge Asian influence here, so you often get the choice of Chinese, Japanese, Thai, Indian or Vietnamese to name a few.  When I arrived, my friend took me to a food court at Westfield Mall and the vast majority of selections were one of the previously mentioned varieties.  Thankfully, I love Asian food and I’m looking forward to trying them all.

Myths exploded thus far:

• Toilets swirl the opposite direction in Australia – Not true.  The water just gets poured on top…no swirling.
• There are dangerous snakes and spiders everywhere – While I’m sure there are in lots of places, it’s not something you have to worry about day to day.
• Men At Work plays 24/7 – Alright, I made this one up.  They don’t play Men at Work 24 hours a day.

I’m still trying to get established (electronically speaking) so I haven’t unloaded my camera data card yet.  I’ll need to grab a reader from a store somewhere.  When I do, I’ll post more pictures.  I’ve also neglected to get a cell phone because I’m still trying to figure out a way to jailbreak my iPhone to work with other carriers.  My AT&T plan doesn’t work here and my phone is “locked” to AT&T.

It’s hard to believe it’s just been 3 days.  It seems like so much longer.