St. Elmo's Fire (cant upload pics for some reason)

I wandered the city by myself after meeting up with Steffi for some late brekkie at a well-known café called DeGraves, on DeGraves Lane – this funky little lane of small boutiques and street cafés. Melbourne is full of these little lanes and it’s great fun discovering the hidden yummies, cool togs and funky people wandering around in them.

After our excellent French Toast, I started to grab a tram at Flinders Street, but got sidetracked at Federation Square to see what the big crowd was about. SAVE VICTORIA’S FORESTS! Lots of green-friendly folks walking around with petitions while a great band got everyone dancing. There had been a guy living in a tree for a week on St. Kilda Road (a main road leading into town connecting St. Kilda and the city) to get interest in the event. I didn’t see him, but I saw the pic in the news.

Once I had jiggled my booty to a couple songs, I took off on the tram to Fitzroy Street and the Esplanade to check out the Sunday market of crafts. I was close to getting some art, but wanted to think more about it. So I kept walking and made my way to Luna Park, which I entered for the first time and saw, really and truly, for the first time a huge group of Aboriginal children. I can never decide if I think it’s rude to ask for a picture, or if I’m just shy about approaching strangers, but these kids had this dark skin; hair that nearly blended in with their skin color; wide, slightly flattened noses; and the biggest smiles. I have seen some here and there, but most have become slightly more European in appearance, but not this group. And they also weren’t dressed up like a tourist attraction. They were common day Aboriginal children. Just beautiful.

From Luna Park, I caught about 5 minutes of a street performer who was either American or Canadian from what I could hear of his accent before traipsing down to Acland Street to enter all the funky stores including a personal fave, Klein’s. My plan was to hang in St. Kilda and then grab a pastry from one of the awesome European bakery shops and watch the sunset on the beach, but I got called to Prahran by Bob for dinner and a movie.

So I grabbed a tram outside McDonald’s and made my way to Chapel Street where I met up with Bob and introduced him to my favorite Teppanyaki place – Kanpai! We had some chili, sizzling mussels and then a mixed teppanyaki with rice. Yum! Normally I crave them so much that I would just want to order a second plate, but I was pretty full. We went to the Jam Factory to check out what was showing and unfortunately, there’s just not much on right now. I don’t know how it’s possible that there are only like 6 movies playing in the big theatres right now. We grabbed tickets for Poseidon knowing full well it would likely be bad, but with Josh Lucas being easy on the eyes, ah, what’s a girl to do? But it was, indeed, not such a good flick – entertaining, but not good!

I rounded out my night by taking some the pastries and goodies I picked up on Acland Street to Steve. He had been studying hard for his exam, so I thought I would bring him something yummy to cheer him up. I finally made it home around midnight…

Overall, it’s funny sometimes how taking a day to get lost in this city by myself can really give me perspective on some things. Riding the tram in with the bay on one side and the city on the other, it makes me really happy. Wherever it is that I end up going next to make a life – I can see it having both of these things: water (bay, ocean, lake – if not the Thames) and a city full of life, culture, foods, people!