Melbourne was really fun! I'm so happy that I made the trip. =)
Thursday 7/9 nearly midnight AEST
- Landed at Melbourne Tullamarine Airport. Dad, Mum, and Uncle Henry picked me up... and I just stared starry-eyed at the big and modern airport - big in comparison to Perth of course. Uncle Henry is my mum's de jure cousin, but de facto brother because she was adopted by Uncle Henry's family when she was young, i.e. she was looked after by Henry's mother. You know those days when our ancestors had lots of children and couldn't possibly look after them themselves, so they let their other relatives take care of them? So they grew up together, and I know my mum always looked to Uncle Henry as her big brother. In fact, my mum's name (Felicia) was given by Uncle Henry!
Friday 8/9
- Stayed at home pretty much to finish my Australian Democracy assignment. Luckily it was a minor one; 500 words essay plan & annotated bibliography. 7.5% of the unit.
- Had yum cha (dim sum) with Uncle Henry, Mum, Dad, Aunty Siew Kin, and my cousin Le-Shan. At this place called Dragon Palace Restaurant at 149 Lonsdale Street. Le-Shan just started work this year at KPMG, Aunty Siew Kin is a consultant, and Henry works for Exxon-Mobil - all in the city. Was really good; the eat-all-you-want yum cha for just $16.80 nett per head. And this is GOOD. Not those dodgy e-a-y-w types in Perth.
- Went to OCF Carlton at night. Thanks to Ren Haw who brought me around and was being a really nice host! hee. OCF Carlton has messages and Bible Studies every week, while OCF Perth alternates those. Anyways, I had the opportunity to hear the Convention speaker (Melvin Lo) lead our BS group... was on 2 Timothy. I enjoyed being there at OCF Carlton... and yeah was just blessed to see how another OCF centre serves God.
Saturday 9/9
- Again, pretty much stayed at home to do my assignment.
- Went to an old folk's home to visit my Grand Aunty Bertha, i.e. Uncle Henry's mother = the one who looked after my mum till she (mum) was about 20 I think. She's 92 years old this year, and just had Alzheimer's... but this was the main reason why my parents came to Melbourne, to visit her, even though she didn't seem to recognise us anymore. She's still strong and healthy, but she kept asking us who we were. She doesn't even recognise her son anymore. But I have fond memories of her when she visited Malaysia.
- At night, Uncle John (my mum's own blood brother) came over for dinner together with my cousin Joanna. I've never met both of them before... so was happy that I suddenly had a "new" uncle and cousin in Melbourne. Food was awesome, and I loved the fireplace chat we had after that.
Sunday 10/9
- Uncle John had invited us to go to his church today. It was this church called Australia for Christ Fellowship... located somewhere near Monash Clayton. I knew the day before it was a chrismatic church, and I wasn't very comfortable with that. Uncle was telling me of some split in the church as well, over the notion that the senior pastor should have absolute control over everything, and that how he doesn't agree with that. Ironically, the senior pastor just migrated from JB and had speaked in Hebron (my home church) before... so my folks know him somewhat well. Anyways, the pastor talked about the life of Ruth and I don't know... I think I was also a bit uncomfortable with how 95% of the church were Asians... and they just didn't seem like they assimilated into Australia, basically it seemed no different from Singapore. I guess I'm still trying to come to terms with what friends have been telling me; that we worship Christ in our own and unique way.
- Had lunch at this Italian restaurant called Sofia's. The gelato and pizza was really good and cheap! In fact, even Jeremy has heard of this restaurant before. And oh, before church, Uncle John brought us around Monash Clayton... really huge too!
- Went over to Uncle John's house. Met my other cousin, Anna Lisa. Anna is currently doing her last semester in Nursing at Deakin University. Chatted for quite a bit... you know, it's sometimes a bit odd that you can suddenly "discover" so many cousins in a few days. sheesh. She had bought some Krispy Kreme in the morning too... so had a bit of try of that - btw, KK is some donut company which people seem to think is really good.
- Since Jo and Anna's brother, Jack was working at Coles, Uncle brought us to meet him there too. Pity I couldn't get to meet Aunty Phyllis cos she was working at the hospital. You know, I'm still quite surprised how we all could hit it off so well even though they are ABCs. =)
- Reached back at Uncle Henry's place at Hawthorn around 4pm. And we sped all the way down to Philip Island to see the Penguin Parade. Was really cold! Bring more jackets if you happen to be there. Since Exxon-Mobil is a corporate sponsor of Penguin Parade, we managed to get 50% off. I.e. we (3 of us) paid $26.10 total, instead of the $52.20 that we'd have to pay for 3 adults. Uncle didn't go in though, since he had already went when my Aunty Lily (from KL) visited Melbourne in April.
- Had dinner at a Vietnamese Restaurant along Glenferrie Road - this main road full of food just outside our place.
Part II will be written this week.
Summary: Monday - Anna showed me Melbourne in the afternoon. We managed to persuade Sha-Han to skip school and join us too! Went Melbourne Uni, Crown Casino, South Bank, and bummed around. Had lunch with Le-Shan in the city. I especially loved this cos' it was just cousins and there were no adults around. You know how when adults around, the dynamics change a bit.. e.g. some things you can't talk about, and maybe cousins don't want to go shopping, but adults do? You get what I mean ya.
Tuesday & Wednesday - Great Ocean Road! I drove like 800+ km - all of it on myself. =) 12 Apostles (awesome and worth the 5hour drive!), London Bridge, and the small little towns in regional Victoria. Came back to Melbourne in the late afternoon, and I had ice-cream supper with 3 of the Convention Committee this year - Lee Yung, Ren Haw, and Priscilla - all of whom I knew from last year's Perth Convention. heehe.
Thursday - Queen Victoria Market, yum cha again, and nearly missed my flight back to Perth! (What's new? lol) Arrived in Perth at 5.10pm WST.
My parents go back to JB tomorrow (Sunday).