On returning to poundy’s nick and I (ana) go out for some well earned "man time" unfortunatkey nick is already tipsy as we head out for the city…he has been drinking at some high powered meeting in Brisbane all day and had to rush back to Sydney to go out drinking with me….a hard life. Manage to have a good night though although we don’t eally move around much as I think I over compensated in trying to catch up to nicks drunken state J some how manage to last the night though and "the girls" seemed to have had a good time on there own drinking and trashing the male species no doubt.
For the last month (or 6) emma has been reminging me that it is her birthday on Feb 4th as such I have had plenty of time to arrange something a little unusual….i cant however take all the credit for it as it was joh who gave me the idea….anyway the plan was to book a night in a good hotel (ridges in sydney) and have a trip to the twilight concert at Taronga Zoo…this is an outdoor concert held in amazing grounds of the zoo with impressive views out over the city…..the evening I chose was the abba tribute band "bjorn again" who are supposed to be very good.
We borrow loads of picnic utensils from poundy…including a cool bag etc and set of the Birkenhead point shopping centre to buy our picnic supplies….we decide on prawns as the staple diet and manage to buy a kilo of freshly caught cooked prawns for ridiculously cheap price..sainsbury’s will never be the same again.
We buy some other goodies…wine….fruit…etc and pack out cool bag and head off to the hotel. Hotel is very nice although it seems I miss calculated the price an it costs me twice as much as I anticipated…hey ho L
We get ready and head to the lobby for a drink and to wait for the mini bus with all the other people who to the concert from our hotel. Most of the other people going are in their 60’s so we wonder what the demographic of the concert is going to be! But when we arrive there are several young and old people …a good mixture and packed….2000 people there…a sell out.
We find a really good spot on the grass and set up….there is a couple of hours till the concert start and we kill time by eating prawns and drinking wine….this back packing is hard!!!
When bjorn again come on it is to a big cheer and I feel nostalgic and sad that I never saw the real thing in the 70’s and that emma wasnt even born J
The group are superb I can highly recommend them, they play a good mix of songs …abba and some others including "black Sabbath" !! everybody dances and has a good time. Even I managed to get dragged into dancing briefly as I was taking a picture of emma dancing from afar and some woman forces me to go and join emma so she can photograph/video us both…..great fun L
The concert ends all too quickly and we head back to the hotel to eat the rest of the prawns and discus the night…..we meet some friendly aussies …retired chemists…who we chat with and discuss all things including English cricket.
On returning to poundy’s place we spend the next few days playing with Imogen and Bea and generally getting to know them better….emma and I will miss them a lot….although they are quite a handful they are definatley fun to be around and constantly entertaining!
We go for numerous coffees and spend some time with joh and melana (her next door neighbour) including a day spent at the Sydney Olympic pool which was good except that I (ana ) spent the rest of the day trying unsuccessfully to remove trapped water from my ear…
Another day emma and I head down to the rocks market by Sydney harbour and emma finally gets to see an art gallery J w also spend the day/evening at a pub down there which is well known for live music….we are not disappointed and see all sorts of crazy characters not least those on stage.
Gradually after days relaxing and tying up a few work loose ends the time draws near to us leaving for Singapore we spend the last night having sips of port and reminiscing…and the next day leave for the airport.
….a sad day and we must say again are thank you’s for poundy and joh’s hospitality…and emma apologises once again for losing the cool bag ice block J
