Fresh off the boat

After an overnight flight from Hong Kong, we arrived in Perth at 7am.  Our apartment would not be ready until 2pm, so we decided to take the shuttle bus into central Perth to get set up with mobiles (say "cell phone" and you'll get a funny look), a bank account, and transit cards.  We got 2 of the 3 done.  The bank account would have to wait until we had proof of address in Australia.  I would have to continue clinging onto my money bags for dear life for the next few days.

The good news is that my jailbroken and "unlocked" iphone worked with the new Virgin SIM card I got.  The bad news is that to unlock my iphone, it had to be downgraded to an old iOS that doesn't support most apps.  Well, at least I didn't need to pour another $190 into Rogers' coffers to get it properly unlocked.

Dragging our luggage around the city wasn't as bad as I expected.  Perth is not as crowded as Toronto and there are large pedestrian areas.  People were kind and offered to help us - at least that's what I think they were trying to say in funny-sounding words.  I think I understood about half of what they were saying.  Eventually, we found our way on the train to Fremantle, the city we will be staying in.

Old sign at the Fremantle Maritime Museum.  Fremantle welcomed many boat people to Australia.

Like these children, sent to populate Australia.  Or so the sign at the museum says.  They look as tired as we did arriving in town.

Fremantle is Perth's port harbour, approximately 19km from Perth CBD or "central business district" (they don't say "downtown" here).  Although it is officially it's own city, it feels like a suburb of Perth, like Etobicoke to downtown Toronto.  The town itself feels a lot like Kingston, with old colonial buildings next to the water.

Fremantle Town Hall and half of Chris' head.

Part of Fremantle town square.  The area between the posts is actually a road - such a nice road that we didn't realise it until a car was driving up to us tourists standing around shooting photos.

But Kingston doesn't have palm trees like these ones:

Husband and the Palm Tree

We managed to find a furnished apartment to live in.  It is located within walking distance of the Fremantle Hospital and the train station.  It is also next to a Woolworths (like Loblaws), Target (yes, Tar-jay, but 1980's K-mart style),  and Australia's version of Best Buy called Dick Smith's.  It isn't exactly on the beach, but it has a view of the harbour on one side, and a view of the city's ferris wheel which is lit up at night (Rob Ford, eat your heart out... but you probably already have eaten to heart-attack time anyway.)  I'll post a pic of that later...

Fremantle port harbour, view from our front door.

Our apartment is modest, but has all the basics including wifi and air conditioning - a crucial element since it is 36 degrees today.  Yes, 36 degrees celcius.  I hear it's -15 in Toronto.  Rub it in.  Rub it in like sunscreen on my tan.

The entrance, kitchen, and living room.  Chris has already claimed his station on this ship.

The dining area opens into the living room and door to the balcony.  I get the couch.

Everything in the apartment seemed fine until we were met with this:

Antique Bosch water heater

Alas, I have met ye before.  I knew how to use these things when I was in Mauritius.  But I forgot.  Of three showers so far, only one has been a hot shower.  This will take some work, but I'll figure it out.  It doesn't help that the bottom knob is stuck.

And then, there are these pests....

This is a view from the outdoor hallway, from the 6th floor downwards.  About 3 levels down, a big black bird just sits around and squawks.  They like to squawk at 5am.  The only way I can describe their noise is by "squawking".  Not chirping, not singing, ohhhhh no... squawking.  Wait until around 0:16 when it really starts to pick up.  I don't know what these birds are called, but I'd like to know if there are any Australian laws against shooting them.  If anyone knows what these birds are, please tell me!

Upcoming posts: 
Australia Day celebrations and the Australian love of 1980's high-waisted short shorts and cut off belly tops.

Hong Kong: The Kongclusion

This is the last day in HK before we leave for HOSTRALIA or Ow Zow as the Cantonese say. Today we made a pilgrimage to the medical museum aaaaaaand that was it. I bought some shoes but that didn't make for very interesting pictures.

Before we begin, I'd like to apologize on behalf of Chinese people everywhere for the popularity of the following toothpaste.

"Darlie" toothpaste is a well known toothpaste brand sold in China which was originally called "Darkie" toothpaste. The name was changed after the brand was bought by Colgate-Palmolive in 1985, but fans of the oral hygiene agent were reassured by the company that black people toothpaste is still black people toothpaste.

Sorry.

On to the museum!

 We boarded the MTR to Central station and found our way eventually to this location. The museum is halfway up a pretty steep hill - lots of stairs.

Ancient Chinese escalator

There is a dog poop problem. Sign in lower left.

 Tickets were cheap - $10 HK which is probably close to $1.25 Canadian. The museum was made of 3 floors and focused on a few medical disasters in Hong Kong including bubonic plague and SARS. There were also a few pieces of old equipment on loan which I'd never seen before.

Halo systems for scoliosis. If you had a swayback they used to shove pieces of steel into your bones until they could sway you back upright. The upper ring gets fixed via screws into your skull while the lower ring gets fixed into your spine or pelvis, I forget which one. Then you look like a one man cage match.

Vitamin EEEEEEEEEEEEEEther. This is a basket face mask you'd cover in ether soaked gauze when you were going for a appendectomy or when you just can't take going home to the wife and kids.

The gas, she is not for cars.

The ET tube of our ancestors.

Reproduction of a Chinese medicine shop. So a placebo of a placebo YA HEARD ME SO WUT.

Oral airway for Robocop.

Amy ponders the considerations for using a 1970s surgical table.

Back when bandages were washed and reused, this bandage roller had a size adjustable spool allowing bandages sized for your finger and bandages sized for your butt.

Esophageal stents.

Morphine cooking apparatus. Because there is no class in a spoon and a cracked Zippo.

The top one is a cranial perforator for... perforating... craniums... and the lower one is an extraction forceps.

Immunization knife - before there were preloaded syringes, you made a slice in the skin and rubbed in your vaccine. This is the knife you would use. Watch out - butterfly style blade. Docs were gangstas back in the day.

BCG vaccinator - serious needles

Immunization shield - basically a wire basket to protect your immunization site. The vaccine could leak and get into your eyes and then it's not fun and games anymore.

Plumbing from the SARS apartment. Absence of a P trap allowed the virus to come out of someone's crapper drain and backwash up into other people's apartment washrooms which is one way it spread seemingly through floors/walls.

Fixed drain pipes. And to think SARS could have been averted if Mike Holmes had been in Hong Kong.

This is where the rats go to sleep after the lab techs are done playing with them everyday... right?

Museum grounds. Watch out for poop.

So that's it for Hong Kong. Next we'll be posting from our digs in Fremantle. Have to remember to stock up on koala repellent.

HK

First stop: Hong Kong

Planned to stay for a few days to visit Gong Gong and some of the family. Usually when we visit we go to a restaurant and eat and then while we're waiting to go to the next restaurant we eat. We've never taken the time to see the sights beyong Ocean Park and the Peak, so I always assumed there wasn't anything to actually do in Hong Kong. This time we made an effort to do/see things we haven't done in previous trips, like see the police museum and see a kung fu demo.

The public transportation in HK is pretty well organized. My uncle said it's the only system in the world that turns a profit. Despite this, the prices for getting around are pretty cheap compared to Toronto. Also they have these signs.

There is no loud talking more bothersome than oblivious loud talking

I think the translation is pretty evident even if you can't make out the English. Took the 15 bus from Central up the peak about halfway and got to the police museum, which had a lot of interesting displays including a Viet refugee boat (aka a coracle), a buttload of guns, batons and bomb disposal equipment and a DIY heroin facility. The museum also had a display about the criminal goingsons in the Kowloon Walled City which I'd wanted to see in person but I guess I was about a decade too late.

Unfortunately, the attendant said no photos allowed so we didn't get any pictures beyond the outside of the building. Didn't want to get in trouble with the HoKoPoPo.

This cannon is actually military and has nothing to do with policing. A cop found it after WWII and thought it would look pimp at his musem.

Sunday is the day all the Filipino nurses get off work. The streets and parks were TEEMING with short Filipino people. Here's a before and after picture of the park outside our hotel.

FILIPINO LADIES IN DA HOWSE

Filipino ladies in your house... cooking, cleaning...

Made me feel like a giant. I was twice as tall as everybody else milling around me on the street but I couldn't avoid getting swept away by a tsunami of foreign home care workers.

On to the kung fu. A bunch of bad mudderfudders get together in Kowloon Park every Sunday to put on a kung fu and lion dance demo. I spent way too much time fiddling on my camera's full manual settings, so I missed a lot of good stuff but the head sifu didn't come out to the end. By that time I think I got the hang of it.

Lion dance - this one is called "Snake Listens"

Mom chilling with dragon all up in her grill

Then the dragon goes to town on the snake

YEAH GIT EM

DRAGONS RULE SNAKES DROOL

Demonstration of a spear form. The Chinese spear is known as "the king of weapons" because of its long range, versatility and general badassedness.

Chinese double edged sword demo - this guy was moving so slowly there was more blur in the seniors under the green tent than there was in his sword

The famous flag waving child assassins of Kowloon

WAVE IT LIKE YOU MEAN IT

Why there are like a billion versions of running in the summer Olympics but not a single flag waving event is beyond me

The guan dao (halberd)

I thought these kids were going to fight each other when they came out together

Even though it wasn't a fight... it was still good. Like in high school when there's going to be a fight and everybody makes a big circle around the kids and then the teacher shows up and makes them shake hands... that kind of good.

Butterfly swords. Or rather, butterfly chunks of wood.

If they give real weapons to the kids, I bet this guy did something really dumb to have to use fancy cutting boards instead of swords.

Or maybe they're real weapons painted brown.

Head sifu - crazy fast. So cray cray.

Kowloon park hedge maze for children/large yorkies

Hong Kong Island waterfront from Tsim Sha Tsui Avenue of Stars

This guy was somehow going up river without paddling and without a motor

 Later on we ended up at the Avenue of Stars on the Tsim Sha Tsui Waterfront. Made the journey especially to see this guy.

LE BRUCE

LE WIFE

Kowloon waterfront from HK island

Holy hell do I ever hate blogger. There is honestly no more cumbersome way to post photos. Will fix formatting later. Right now we're heading to the medical museum. Hopefully we'll have some obscene and gross pictures to show next. Later skaters.