KatieTheKat

Today on my bike ride from Murdoch to the city, I saw dolphins jumping and playing in the water, stopped to watch a big blue tongue lizard crawl across the path, saw lots of big jellyfish in the water, and passed by numerous cormorants, black swans, and other water birds. How lovely life is!

Hello hello,

Here I am, finally getting settled in to my new home in Perth. It is a tres swanky 6th-floor apartment in a fancy building right near the city which I am sharing with 2 other often absent flatmates. Downstairs there are all kinds of facilities, from a very chilly swimming pool to a warm hot tub, a sauna, a gym, a pool table, and a BBQ and kitchen for 'entertaining'. Sounds like this place has it all? Well, just about... but there is one thing lacking. My walls are white and barren.

Kat's Barren Wall:

I was thinking it would make the place much more homey if I were to get some postcards I could stick up on the walls :) Plus, if I got some postcards from Vancouver, I could show Michael what he has to look forward to when he comes in November! So.. my dear friends and family.. I ask you to postcard me - and you may even get something in return..

Here is my new mailing address:
69/9 Delhi Street
West Perth, WA
Australia
6005
(It's so easy I know it by heart already!)

I will very much look forward to hearing from you.

And in return I promise that my draft blog entry from my longhouse visit way back in Malaysia does soon see the light of day! (My excuse is that things have been awfully hectic ever since I got back to Perth. And also My Internet connection was only just connected today.)

kat.

There are some photos from Malaysia and Singapore to be found in my gallery here. Those from the longhouse and from my earlier adventures with Scott will be coming shortly. In the meantime, I am currently busy with scrambling to find a home to work from here in Perth...

So, I just got back to Brisbane this morning. As I was going through immigration, one of the trained dogs came around and the man in charge of him asked me to put my carry-on bag on the floor. The dog immediately started sniffing it then attacking it and trying to drag it off. The man asked for my customs declaration and made a note on it. Then the immigration official asked me if I had any food in my bag and I told her there was some chocolate and some mints. She seemed skeptical and asked me if there was anything else - when I said no, she too made a note on my card then waved me through.

I picked up my bag and headed off with my card (on which I had already had to mark "yes" to some of the questions due to a few bits of food and some potentially muddy camping gear), knowing that I would probably have to pull some things out of my bag to satisfy the quarantine officers.

What I didn't expect was to be ushered off to a corner desk to be greeted by a woman with latex gloves who proceeded to start pulling everything out of my pack (and it was such a perfect packing job too!).. what was really shocking was when a man came around to inform me that the dog was a drug-sniffer and that a scan had revealed traces of the chemical which they use as an indicator for the presence of ecstasy! He proceeded to question me about my use of narcotics, assuring me that all they really cared about was whether I was bringing any thing back. Of course I informed him that I don't even drink, but still there was a very thorough search of all of my belongings. Thankfully they decided I was clean before proceeding with the strip search :). Anyhow, I'm not sure where the chemicals could have come from - the only possibility I see is the 2 books I picked up at book exchanges in a hostel in KL and in Kuching. I think I will try to get rid of them before my flight to Perth in order to hopefully avoid another search there.

So, there we go. Straight-edged Katie, a suspected drug smuggler. One more story to add to my list of questionings by security authorities/border agents, the length of which I find surprisingly long..

Anyhow. Here I am back in Australia. It feels a bit weird, and not only because of the incident at the airport or my lack of sleep (I might have had about an hour's worth on the plane). Despite my large (and drug tainted) backpack, I feel so anonymous here. No longer does everyone I pass look at me as an obvious foreigner. No longer do most (or even any) people say hello to me as I walk by. Suddenly, a green pedestrian signal means it is safe to cross the street since the traffic has actually heeded its red and stopped. Suddenly I can understand all the signs and menus. Finding a good hot meal for about $1 is no longer possible. Nor can I request fresh watermelon juice with any hope of obtaining some of that delicious elixir. But then it is not so hot that I feel I need it. No longer does walking down the street with a backpack mean that every taxi and bus that passes by will stop and ask me where I'm going. Actually I don't have to walk on the street anymore - the sidewalks (oh sorry, pavements) are not covered in tables and chairs and store merchandise. When I first got to Malaysia, it didn't feel so different. But my short two and a half weeks felt like a long time. It really was another world.

Ps. I'll finish the story about the longhouse a little later.