A little Christmas Cheer

It's that time of year again, or so the stereos at work tell me.  They've been blasting holiday music for at least a month, but it's hard to get into the Christmas spirit when temperatures have been over 100 and the sun is as strong as it is here - it's funny listening to songs about white Christmases and snowmen.  Somehow the pieces don't add up.

As always, the holidays are a good opportunity for reflection.  Two years ago I was in Buenos Aires in the middle of my South American adventure; last year, it was Te Anau, with a nice swim in the lake and a backyard barbeque.  The time seems to have gone so fast.  Intellectually, two years sounds like a really really long time, but in experience it's been one never-ending journey.  This year that journey finds me in Melbourne, and while I'm maybe not the happiest I've ever been, I'm certainly learning a lot about life.  Here are a token few pictures to show what it's like:

Downtown Melbourne, Bourke St.

One of five or six window displays in Myer, a big department store, telling the story of Gingerbread Friends.

More downtown - colonial and modern buildings all smushed together.  The yellow building is one of the most iconic in Melbourne, the Flinders Street train station.

Wall art is common and detailed and impressive.

Federation Square.

Downtown is full of little alleyways packed with tables and competing odors from many eateries.

Queen Victoria Market, your one-stop shop for all things fresh.

Sunset from our new living room yesterday.

"Your new living room?"  Yes, our new living room.  Since the last post I wrote, lots of things have changed.  We moved to a new house in Preston, a suburb north of the city, that's quite a bit closer to work and quite a bit cheaper in rent.  We're still sharing the house with a few other people, but they're not the most social creatures, at least not with housemates, so everyone keeps to themselves.  The neighborhood is nice and quiet, and we have a big park across the street, perfect for tossing around a frisbee.  Since moving out of our old place, we've run into endless drama with Nicqui.  I've honestly been hesitant to tell anyone about it because it already seems like we've had really bad luck and I don't want to tempt the universe or jinx us any more, but at the same time maybe if you guys can send us some good thoughts or Christmas spirit, things will turn around.  She did end up finding people to take her room so she moved up to Brisbane and has been acting as a landlord remotely.  Long story short, when we told her we wanted to move out (one week's notice, as she requested) she started arguing over how much money she would pay us back of our bond and extra rent we'd paid, and then on move-out day she flat-out refused to pay us back anything.  She's done this all via text message and ignores our phone calls.  We've done absolutely nothing wrong and tried to right by her, taking care of the place, no damages to speak of, but I'll chalk it up to her being tight on money and thinking she can take advantage of two young trusting travelers.  Looking back on the whole thing, it feels rather pre-meditated.  Bah humbug.  We're not going down without a fight, but I'm apprehensive about jumping into the legal system here.  Let's hope justice prevails.

Work is still just work.  We were both transferred to a different store, one closer to town in a massive shopping center called Northland.  Half of the staff from Uni Hill were transferred, since they hired too many of us for the one store, and we've been getting slightly better hours.  Christmas time means late night trade as well, so we've been staying open until midnight trying to sell sell sell.  Neither one of us has been super happy about the number of hours we've been getting, since it's still our only job, but Cory just told me today that one of the other girls will be leaving in a couple weeks so we may all be able to pick up more shifts.  Fingers crossed for that one too!

In more exciting news, I've got a ticket home for May and June, which I'm really really looking forward to.  The graduations and weddings and other events and visits will keep me busy I'm sure, but I don't mind - I want to take advantage of my first trip back home in a year and half.  The end of June will see me flying back to Australia to reunite with Cory, maybe pick some fruit, and then travel up through Asia (just a rough idea at this point).  Who knows where we'll end up!

I've been trying to stay active, since that was one of my biggest beefs with winter at Ohau.  I still ride my bike everywhere I go, and I've just started running again.  Yes, running!  On a random day wandering around handing out resumes, I went into a running store and started talking to the sales people there about what kind of running shoe I'd hypothetically need, and it turns out I've been treating my feet all wrong for years.  I assumed that, with my super high arch, I would pronate (my foot would rotate and cave inwards) and I would need tons of arch support to fight this - really the opposite of this happens, with my super high arch pushing my foot outwards and making me supernate.  So instead of lots of arch support, I need none of it.  A neutral shoe that lets my foot rotate inwards to realign my body.  Yikes.  After much deliberation and research and jogging around running stores, I finally settled on a new pair of shoes to replace my old grungy ones, and in only a couple days I can already feel the difference.  My feet and legs still get sore, but from using the muscles in different ways, not from being pulled and pushed out of whack.  Running feels good again, instead of painful, which is incredibly liberating for me.  I can actually run again!  I've also been trying to be more conscious of my stride when I run, trying to strike more in the middle of my foot instead of hitting hard on the heel first.  This keeps my feet under my body and lessens the impact on my knees....magic.  Amazing.  How did I never realize this before.  Turning over a new leaf just in time for the new year.

Despite being on the other side of the world, not a day goes by that I don't think about my friends and loved ones, and of course at the holidays I think about you more.  I hope this Christmas finds you feeling content and loved, that you feel proud and happy when you look back on 2013, and that you're excited and ready to make the most of 2014.  Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, Feliz Navidad.  Sending love and sunshine!