My Neighborhood
People have asked me for nittier-grittier details concerning what’s it like where I’m living in Australia.
For 5 weeks I've rented a bright studio apartment in the Newtown area of Sydney. Nothing fancy, it’s a perfect landing pad: a place to write, sleep, store my gear & wash up between events. Through the sliding glass door, the balcony has a view of a mellow parking lot, the flag of Scotland (on a castle-like university library) & two sycamore trees where lonely crows sit & bawl.
The Newtown neighborhood is ideal for me. Near the University of Sydney, Carillon Avenue is right off King Street, which is happily bustling every night of the week til 2 am. I can walk to the bus, the train, a movie theatre & all sorts of bookshops, vintage clothiers, bottle shops (=liquor stores), cafes & great restaurants.
Bookstores like: Better Read than Dead.
Sushi joints called: Eat Me Sushi.
(my favorite was a Jakarta Mexican restaurant called: Nacho Mama)
When I work alone all day & don't know anyone in town, it's good to be in an area with a lot of people & social businesses close at hand. Even being alone in a crowd, I prefer a happy crowd sometimes. The streets throng with students & hip adults. There are white homeless men panhandling (unimaginable in Jakarta). Some punks. Plenty of tattoos & piercings. Big dogs. Vegans. Young professionals in black coats. Restaurants & cafes tended to throw doors & all their front windows wide open; you just wear your coats inside.
Campos
Campos coffee is around the corner. Here, for black coffee you order a Long Black, but most people order what’s called a Flat White, which differs from a latte, I’m told, in that it’s slightly less fluffy on top. Campos makes a truly splendid coffee with artful ‘leaves’ swirling every lidless foam. Inside it’s packed & the guys working there are not your average baristas. They’re adults for one & consummate professionals: always working at full tilt, always pleasant, but with the attitude of serious craftsmen. I don’t know why that matters, but it works on me.
Durable Goods
I came with 2 suitcases & 2 carry on bags. Upon arrival, I finally unpacked the set of gloves, wool socks & the sweater I’ve been carrying for 5 months. In Sydney I added a wool coat & hat, & 50kg of books, which I shipped back. I wear the same pair of jeans & hikers just about every day for 5 weeks, as everything I else from Indonesia is too light.
I have a little desk for my laptop, an internet connection, a frying pan, 6 eggs & a hotpot. Life is good.
The Weather
Most days it was about 60 F & rained often. In fact, there were bad storms & floods while I was there (which did NOT happen after the Second Fleet arrived here in June 1790. The weather was off script!), which drought-ridden Australia welcomed.
Some days I walked through a green park, where people walked dogs & lorikeets cheetered in the eucalypts, to attend an early morning yoga class. I had to get up early (for me) because—for my one shiver of winter this year—it got dark at 5 pm.
Relaxing to Violence
My studio had a TV featuring 5 channels of hideous violent crime: local & world news violence; hospital drama violence; police drama violence; courtroom drama violence; & forensics investigator violence, all of whose protagonists--& I’m including the news reporters here--are brilliant, beautiful but 'quirky', misunderstood, fighting the good fight & tragically screwed up. Ah, the West. Nothing like a solid American explosion or six to cap a day of researching a penal colony.
Some nights, brimming with the violence I’ve done to my own characters, I can’t watch any of these 5 channels. At those moments all I can take is a Saturday morning special. Even lorikeets squabbling in the trees can be too much. I lean out on the balcony & plead with them to stop fighting. Just work it out, you birds. Can't we all just get along?
Some nights, after hearing the latest shaken policeman / lawyer / pathologist / news anchor remark, yet again, that he's NEVER seen ANY crime this HEINOUS in his WHOLE CAREER...I just want have a drink, cry through some happy kids’ movie about ponies, & sleep soundly.
And then write a book about about blowing bubbles in the park.
For 5 weeks I've rented a bright studio apartment in the Newtown area of Sydney. Nothing fancy, it’s a perfect landing pad: a place to write, sleep, store my gear & wash up between events. Through the sliding glass door, the balcony has a view of a mellow parking lot, the flag of Scotland (on a castle-like university library) & two sycamore trees where lonely crows sit & bawl.
The Newtown neighborhood is ideal for me. Near the University of Sydney, Carillon Avenue is right off King Street, which is happily bustling every night of the week til 2 am. I can walk to the bus, the train, a movie theatre & all sorts of bookshops, vintage clothiers, bottle shops (=liquor stores), cafes & great restaurants.
Bookstores like: Better Read than Dead.
Sushi joints called: Eat Me Sushi.
(my favorite was a Jakarta Mexican restaurant called: Nacho Mama)
When I work alone all day & don't know anyone in town, it's good to be in an area with a lot of people & social businesses close at hand. Even being alone in a crowd, I prefer a happy crowd sometimes. The streets throng with students & hip adults. There are white homeless men panhandling (unimaginable in Jakarta). Some punks. Plenty of tattoos & piercings. Big dogs. Vegans. Young professionals in black coats. Restaurants & cafes tended to throw doors & all their front windows wide open; you just wear your coats inside.
Campos
Campos coffee is around the corner. Here, for black coffee you order a Long Black, but most people order what’s called a Flat White, which differs from a latte, I’m told, in that it’s slightly less fluffy on top. Campos makes a truly splendid coffee with artful ‘leaves’ swirling every lidless foam. Inside it’s packed & the guys working there are not your average baristas. They’re adults for one & consummate professionals: always working at full tilt, always pleasant, but with the attitude of serious craftsmen. I don’t know why that matters, but it works on me.
Durable Goods
I came with 2 suitcases & 2 carry on bags. Upon arrival, I finally unpacked the set of gloves, wool socks & the sweater I’ve been carrying for 5 months. In Sydney I added a wool coat & hat, & 50kg of books, which I shipped back. I wear the same pair of jeans & hikers just about every day for 5 weeks, as everything I else from Indonesia is too light.
I have a little desk for my laptop, an internet connection, a frying pan, 6 eggs & a hotpot. Life is good.
The Weather
Most days it was about 60 F & rained often. In fact, there were bad storms & floods while I was there (which did NOT happen after the Second Fleet arrived here in June 1790. The weather was off script!), which drought-ridden Australia welcomed.
Some days I walked through a green park, where people walked dogs & lorikeets cheetered in the eucalypts, to attend an early morning yoga class. I had to get up early (for me) because—for my one shiver of winter this year—it got dark at 5 pm.
Relaxing to Violence
My studio had a TV featuring 5 channels of hideous violent crime: local & world news violence; hospital drama violence; police drama violence; courtroom drama violence; & forensics investigator violence, all of whose protagonists--& I’m including the news reporters here--are brilliant, beautiful but 'quirky', misunderstood, fighting the good fight & tragically screwed up. Ah, the West. Nothing like a solid American explosion or six to cap a day of researching a penal colony.
Some nights, brimming with the violence I’ve done to my own characters, I can’t watch any of these 5 channels. At those moments all I can take is a Saturday morning special. Even lorikeets squabbling in the trees can be too much. I lean out on the balcony & plead with them to stop fighting. Just work it out, you birds. Can't we all just get along?
Some nights, after hearing the latest shaken policeman / lawyer / pathologist / news anchor remark, yet again, that he's NEVER seen ANY crime this HEINOUS in his WHOLE CAREER...I just want have a drink, cry through some happy kids’ movie about ponies, & sleep soundly.
And then write a book about about blowing bubbles in the park.
posted by Anne E. Campisi at 11:34 AM
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