Get me a ticket for an aeroplane…

Thursday began with an unusually early wake-up time for myself, due to my need to get myself to the airport by 6AM. Once I got there, the general airport trudgery began, with the bag drops, screening, and boarding the plane. I got a window seat on the left-hand side of the plane, which, in most cases is not the side of the plane that you want to be approaching Sydney in from the south (as you don’t see much).

That is, until I checked Virgin Blue’s remarkable Where the bloody hell are we? channel on the TV in front of me, and noticed that our flight path was very inland, and for some odd reason, we were approaching from the north. What this meant for me is that the plane approached on the western side of the city, which meant that I got sweeping harbour and city views on the way down. That’s a fantastic way to start the day 🙂

Drop my bags, see who’s in

Getting out of the airport proved to be a right-royal pain in the arse, due to the slackness of the baggage handlers (we touched down at 8:50, I left the terminal at 9:20), but once I did, I met up with the Bruces (Eddie and Julie, friends of my father from his days in Keith) who are hosting me for the nights that I’m not at NCSS. Nice family :). The trip from the airport was interesting, as it meant I got to see all of the interesting tollways and suburbs that you generally don’t get to care about as a tourist (I’m still not quite sure if that’s a good thing or not)

The Manly Ferry cuts its way to Circular Quay

I caught a ferry into the city from Manly in the afternoon, which Julie said would be a good way to acclimatise to the city. Conveniently, it was. I made my way to Darling Harbour, and waited for people.

People, in this case, meant Stephen Merity (Smerity), and a bunch of his friends, since we decided that it would be a good idea if we met before I become his tutor at NCSS (which is certainly going to happen). We made our way to lunch, which consisted of Yum Cha at the Regal on Sussex Street. From casual observation, it seems as though how Yum Cha is served depends greatly upon which Australian City you find yourself in. Whilst in Hobart, it’s a sit down and order process, in Sydney, Yum Cha consists of multiple Chinese women running around with large trollies, stopping only to smother your table with food on a regular basis. Or so it seems, anyway. Either way the food was still good.

After that, we saw I Am Legend the latest movie starring (and notably only starring) Will Smith. It’s a fairly standard suspensful-thriller-come-zombie-movie. Unfortunately, the movie wastes close to 45 minutes on seemingly random activities, and I personally didn’t see any point to the plot until late in the movie, that said, it was still enjoyable, and probably warrants three stars from me.

The day finished with me catching a ferry back to Manly, and having dinner with the Bruces at Dee Why.