Today in 2 weeks time I’ll be in Adelaide, probably enjoying a nice morning coffee and curing a small hangover. J And in 3 weeks time I’ll already be back home among the beloved ones, having had a long waited sauna with a couple of beers. J Untill that time I still have 11 more days to work here. In 7 weeks time again back Down Under, being free as the wind and seeing where it takes me.
Meanwhile it has been the usual business here – work, all kinds of jobs, all kinds of weather. Except for one small highlight. Last weekend in Adelaide. The previous time I visited Kent and Tiina, they suggested that I’d come back to Adelaide on July 8th because that’s when Esto Pub Night #18 will take place in Eesti Maja. And I obviously could not miss that. Friday was a short day at work, had to finish early enough to get to Murray Bridge first to sort out the registration of my car. Unfortunately I still have to make another trip Murray Bridge now on Monday as I failed to present a proof of residential address where I stayed. As it turns out Service SA (similar to our ARK, but you do all kinds of registrations and governmental things there) needs to have a written document showing my residential address here in state South Australia. Lucky me, Tiina works in a bank and they have a certain form just for that, so now on Monday I’ll be able to finally state that this car belongs to me.
The current house of Eesti Maja has belonged to the Estonian community since 1958. Upon entering the house and especially the main hall, you find yourself in a building as if it was a older town hall in a small town or borough – varnished wooden walls, arms of (Estonian) cities, counties and families, posters in Estonian about events and parties, old maps in wooden frames. And the upper shelves at the bar counter filled with all types of Estonian liqueur (all empty of course), funny and familiar posters, signs. It felt like being back home. Except for the one small difference. Most of the people spoke in English. Apart from the oldest members of the community who in fact still, after living most of their life in Australia, speak excellent fluent Estonian. That was a suprise to me! It was a great time there, meeting interesting people, both with Estonian origin and elsewhere. For example Clint who is of asian origin, lived in Võru for 3 years together with an Estonian girl, but broke up with her because he would not have made it there working on his occupation – tradie (read: a specialist in building, tiling, plumming etc) and she did not want to move over to Aussie. He was introduced as: „It’s Clint, he lived in Estonia, but his girlfriend ran off with his washing machine“. J To make the long story short, the evening consisted of pleasant conversations, a typical estonian peasoup, plenty of drinks, incl. Viru Valge, unfortunately no Estonian beer which was still stuck in customs in Melbourne (wrong choice of logistics provider I’d say), useful new contacts and most important of all – a great time out! J Have a look at the gallery of the event. To finish the night appropriately, Richard, one of the key figures in the Estonian community these days, suggested to have a couple of more drinks at his place. Without knowing it yet, we headed to one of the most expensive neighbourhoods in Adelaide. A great wine in a great looking study of an expensive, just about 3,5mln dollar house seemed like a fair plan. J Getting there was easy – just call a dialer driver and soon a car with a spare driver stopped in front of Eesti Maja and off we went. I think dialer driver is a wonderful service – you never know when going out how the evening will turn out, but when going with your car there’s always the dilemma of either leaving the car in town and struggling to get it home the next day or not enjoying a nice evening with good company and a couple of drinks.
As Saturday morning was a bit hangoverish, what would be better idea to get rid of it than going out to Glenelg (established in 1836, it is the oldest European settlement on mainland South Australia), the popular seaside suburb of Adelaide for a couple of dozen of oysters! This is my new best hangover treatment. J If only it was summertime and and one of those many-million-dollar-boats was about to take out on the sea...
On my way back to Nildottie I decided to have a quick stop in Hahndorf – the first and oldest surviving German settlement in Australia dating back to 1839. As it is the most popular town in Adelaide Hills, I thought to go and have a look and why not enjoy a good cup of coffee with a piece of cake. Haven’t had a cake since I moved to SA. Although it’s winter and it was Sunday, there were plenty of tourists around which the locals described as a really quiet day. J However, I was somehow expecting a bit more from it. Maybe a nice 1L jug of genuine Warsteiner beer would have helped.
P.S. Lodging a tax declaration here is a pain in the buttocks, despite the fact that e-tax has made it a LOT easier according to the locals.
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