Our time in Australia is almost over – it has been a great part of our trip but we are also ready to move on to Thailand. When we originally planned for 9 months on the road it made sense to spend more than 2 months in Australia, mainly because the weather is so nice this time of year. Now that we are heading home after less than 6 months we want to get on to more foreign cultures.

Over the last two weeks in Sydney we have had some great adventures. We have been staying in Elizabeth Bay, which is right off the Sydney Harbour. It is very close to downtown Sydney as well as the famous backpacker area, Kings Cross. We can see the harbour from our apartment – we were even able to see the New Year’s Fireworks from the balcony. You can see the location on Google Maps or, for the more geeky, you can use the attached KML file to fly to the location in Google Earth.

We also sold the car that we purchased when we arrived in Sydney – it turned out to be easier to sell than we had thought. We had help buying the car back in November from Brad’s friend Ali and it was Ali’s brother Mohammed that helped in selling the car. Mohammed’s father-in-law crashed his car a while back and needed a car quickly (he had relatives in town). So he was willing to buy the car as-is for a reasonable amount. After checking the car out he and Mohammed and another friend of theirs went off to get the cash. They came back later and we sat in the car parked in front of the apartment to count it.

Now think about that scene for a minute: Four Middle Eastern looking fellows in a car counting out a fairly large sum of cash. I joked that it looked like a drug deal and Mohammed’s friend said it looked more like a terrorist thing. I said that if a cop stopped by (we were parked illegally) it might be better to say “tourist” rather than “terrorist”. Enunciation can be important in these situations. It all went down fine and the money is now deposited in our offshore account.

In some ways the risk of some unfortunate travel accident was higher while passing money around in that car than it has been when facing carpet pythons and deadly spiders here in Australia. Many things have changed in Australia since Dave last visited, but the vague sense of racism has not. Ali and his family are Lebanese and there were riots between the whites and Lebanese here in Sydney a year ago. They were entirely racially motivated. Unlike in the US, where calling someone an American means they are a citizen, if you say someone is “Australian” here what you mean is that they are white. The cultures still stay separate to a great degree. There are some benefits to this – third or fourth generation immigrants keep their language and culture. But it does preserve a sense of separateness and it makes it easy to blame problems on the “undesirables” that are entering the country.

They have been debating recently whether an influx of refugees from Lebanon about thirty years ago is the cause of their current problems with racial tensions in Sydney. We have seen several articles about it in the paper because they released some secret documents (which by law are held for 30 years) from the government about the decision to let the refugees in. There are arguments about whether those refugees represented an “undesirable” population that eventually led to today’s situation. For an outsider it appears pretty hypocritical: Australia was a nation founded by “undesirables”; both the convicts and their wardens, who were often considered worse than the convicts themselves. We have got plenty of this type of hypocrisy back home as well, but it is easier to see it as an outsider.

The influence that is doing much more damage, in our opinion, is American modern culture. We have found that most Australians seem to agree with this assessment, but it does not mean they have any idea how to stop or change it. Australia is becoming more like America every day from what we see and hear, but another course is difficult to find.

Next Stop: Thailand
We will fly to Bangkok on the 15th of January. Dave’s cousin, Rachel, and her partner Jenny will be arriving in Bangkok on the 16th of January. They are starting a world traveling trip as well (with their infant son, Oren) and thought Thailand would be a good place to kick it off. They will move on to Croatia next where they will buy a boat to travel in. Our families get along well and Rachel and Jenny are experienced travelers. They have friends in Bangkok and we hope to see them after we have both settled in a bit. It will be fantastic to see family after being away for a few months. Anyone else want to make a trip to Thailand over the next month or two? The weather will be nice!