Do you like to travel alone? (Australia Part 2)

Lest you think I have completely abandoned my posts on our December Australia trip...

----overdue post as we've been back for 3.5 months---

Jamie had a couple more days of his project left so he continued his commute to the client site while I had free reign on all of Sydney by my lonesome. It. Was. Fantastic. I easily managed the public transit system there, figured out the challenge of simple things like looking the opposite direction while crossing the street (gasp! honk! eek!), and even mastered the international method of buying a SIM card for mobile phones (honestly, the most economical way to handle mobiles ever). 

• Jamie et al. immediately tied into Vodafone when they landed and most companies have free company-to-company calling or texting so I only did a superficial price comparison before identifying the best plan for me at the same company.
• They all got pay-as-you-go mobiles as soon as they landed. Dinky flip phone things that didn't handle data, limited the number of minutes they could make phone calls, and now they own these dinky phones. Silly tuckies.
• I came in with my global-enabled iPhone, having called Verizon before leaving the country to unlock the device (important to do for Verizon customers!), picked up a SIM card for $1, and bought a $14 data plan.
• This $14 included: free calls & texts to Vodafone customers (uh...everyone I knew in the country), 450 mobile minutes which included international calling (if only I could figure out the time difference), 150MB of data (don't really know what that means, but didn't come close to using it all), and free access to Facebook, Twitter, Foursquare, LinkedIn, and Myspace (huh?).
• What more could I have possibly needed? SO CHEAP.

ok, enough about the phone. 

I started off each morning with a flat white or a long black:

Might I add that we have limited coffee options in Hanover?
These were über-luxury moments.

And set out on full day-long excursions on my own:

Old. 
(notice which side of the street the cars are on)

New.

Um...oldish/new? 

Don't know how to qualify artificial floral walls.

With my map-ready mobile device, complete with foursquare capability, I hardly did any research before hitting the streets. I chose to do more of a go-as-I-please couple of days, popping in and out of shops, taking in some local magazines at delicious coffee joints, soaking up some sunshine in the local parks, and enjoying the fact that I was in a fun metropolitan area.

Had to try a mini pie from Pie Face.

It's like the Starbucks of hand pies; they're EVERYWHERE and conceptually v.cool.

Taste = meh...probably really good hangover food.

Rechargeable batteries in glittery colours.

"Regular" batteries were hard to find. Other countries are fun.

I had done the most efficient job of almost immediately adjusting my clock by forcing myself awake while hopping on and off of planes until Sydney bedtime and crashing on the longer flight over. Unfortunately I only had a window seat for my to-canada and cross-canada flights and a MIDDLE SEAT for the 15 hour journey. It took a whole lotta "getting zen" and maybe some light pharmaceuticals to get there, but the effort was well worth its weight in gold once I got across the ocean.

Racks of false eyeballs (designer contacts).

"Naturally", they were next to the thousands of false eyelashes.

Waking up slightly early each morning, I was able to cram in so much exploring before meeting up with friends for post-work dinner, drinks, and going out. And while I did my fair share of window shopping, the multiple flights remaining on my agenda prohibited me from doing much purchasing. That and the insane exchange rate that made everyday items 150% more expensive than in the US. Oh, and our grad school family budget. All these things, limiting my natural tendencies.

This drugstore-brand-in-the-usa nail bar was in a high-end department store makeup section.

The row of nailpolish moved about on a track like toy train.

There were juicing bars everywhere with piles of fresh veggies/fruits!

Cucumber? Apple? Kale? Lime?

I love these things!

So exciting!

BLEAGH.

It was horrible.

I bet even this prehistoric bird would even toss out my kale, apple, celery juice:

BLEAGH. CACAW!