Melbourne and St Kilda

Been having a very productive week.

Last Thursday we met up with four girls here who had been staying at Manly Backpackers over Christmas and New Year - two of them I shared a room with at the hostel.

There is Tania and then, would you believe, three Jenny's - English, Swedish and Finnish...

We went out and partied with them in St Kilda - they live in a cool little residential area near the Botanical Gardens. It's away past Acland Street - a cool street full of funky shops, cafes selling THE most amazing cakes, all sorts of eateries...

Anyway, we met up with Wolsey, who had come down from Manly with Oirish John and his lady - so it was a bit of a Manly renuion.

As Tania was leaving the following day, the Jennys said we could move in. Rent is fairly decent (and cheaper than the hostel) so we went back to the hostel on Friday night and moved into the girl's place on Saturday.

On Friday evening, Danielle and I went to watch March of the Penguins at the Moonlight Cinema in town. There has been a huge water festival over the holiday (Labor Day) weekend in Melbourne so there was a carnival along both sides of the river bank with rides, live music and so on.

So we huddled on our beach towels on one side of the river, watching a screen on the other bank and behind it the skyscrapers of the city. It was pretty special.

The next day we lugged our stuff to St Kilda and into the flat. It's pretty awesome to have our own place again - and all girls! No smelly boys!

After moving in, I hauled ass around town handing CVs into cafes and bars. It's pretty backpacker orientated so there aren't many jobs going - esp as it's the end of summer.

But I ended up scoring a trial at a restaurant called Amello's at St Kilda baths on the beachfront.

So Sunday, I rocked up and was sent back 10 years to when I started my first waitressing job - and was polishing cutlery like a demon. The people there were pretty cool and the food is great - cheap staff lunches at $5 (two quid) for a delicious pizza, pasta, fish and chips, salads, pretty much most of the dishes off the menu or anything you can think of.

They asked me to stay on a few hours (paid) and then gave me a job which was awesome, pretty fast work.

So of course we had to go out and celebrate with a few beers... We hit a few bars and ended up meeting Wolsey and two surprises - Chandler who had left Sydney in January and Patrick - one of the first people I spoke to in Manly.

So we had a ball dancing and drinking the night away - until my head hit the pillow at 6am. It wasn't so great when i had to be at work at 12...

But things are going well. St Kilda's has grown on me massively although I am sad to be a little out of city life. It's awesome to have friends here already - although English and Finnish leave in two weeks or less.

Life is good, the sun is still shining (sort of) although the winds and stronger and cooler now. Winter is on it's way...