|
Index Previous Letter
Next Letter
Being There
Being in New York and remembering "home" - in fact being an expat anywhere and remembering home - can often involve an overuse of selective memory. Well, that's what I used to think.When you get back, things are often not what you've expected or imagined. The service isn't as good, people not as friendly. All those complaints you've had about New York can seem just as relevant on home ground. Has Australia gotten worse, or had you idealized the place? I used to believe I'd idealized it. I'd feel like screaming at the slow Teltra customer service rep in Melbourne, just as much as at the Bell Atlantic one in New York. The Qantas staff were no better than the America Airlines ones. As for friends, there seemed to be less on every visit. But just as one group of expats, group A, tends to idealize Australia, there's another group, Group B, that downgrade it. People of the ilk of Germaine Greer and Clive James have an idea of Australia as it was thirty years ago, and criticize it for being narrow-minded, racist and parochial. Such people seem to believe that the fault lies with Australia, rather than with their out-dated memory of the place. Where does the truth lie? After a somewhat different trip "back home", I've come to believe that the truth is somewhere in the eye of the beholder, and that the image one has of Australia as an expat, has more to do with one's own attitude than with the nature of the place itself. Take me and Coolangatta for example. Last week I took my somewhat alternative-life-style daughter on a three-day holiday to Coolangatta on the Queensland Gold Coast. Recovering from a personal crisis and having some expectations of both the weather and the "four star" hotel, I started the trip with a "Group A" attitude. Instead of experiencing a sunny Queensland, we froze. It was cloudy, cold and raining. The "four star" hotel was more like a single star. The rooms were cleaned and towels changed, only once every three days. The "restaurant" closed at 6:30 p.m. if no customers had shown up by then. The video didn't work and the A/C was faulty. When we complained that the heating unit was broken we were told there was a spare blanket in the closet. This was not the Australia with which I'd been comparing America, when I'd complained about poor motel accommodation in Texas some weeks before. Then I remembered and took stock. I remembered my friends in Melbourne in the past weeks. How they'd all been there all the time and I just hadn't seen them before. I remembered how they came forward when needed, and were quite forgiving of the frantic New Yorker, who'd been too busy being a New Yorker on previous trips to really seek them out. I remembered the day before, when renting a car and getting lost in the Lamington National Park, how a local walking along the road with his pet duck, had stopped in the rain for at least ten minutes to explain in necessary detail how to find our way back. I remembered the waiter at a Coolangatta restaurant who'd given us his own personal bottle of wine for free when we wandered in wineless, expecting it to be fully-lisenced. On the day we were to leave Coolangatta, the sun shone. The place started actually to look like Queeensland. Blue sky, white sand, a bright aqua sea, palm trees ... the works. As I was packing in our room I looked out of the window which gave a full view of the palm-lined sparkling hotel pool. There was my young adult daughter, frolicking and leaping around like a child in the sparkling blue water, in complete and gay abandon. I realized that I'd come home. And not only that - but that any place is what you make of it. Melbourne August 1 2000  Your Questions and CommentsRobert from Melbourne, emailed:I have literally just stumbled across your web site, I am sitting here in sunny Melbourne looking for more info on the Eight mile Creek Restaurant. As The owners Will and Frank Ford are old friends of mine. I would suggest to any Australian in NY to mosey on down to 240 Mulberry St., Manhattan, and judge the place once you have actually tried it. I have looked at quite a few of their cuisine reviews and so far most are impressed. Not to mention that the owners are great guys (well grounded). So, I look forward to returning to your site and seeing your review?!!! Thanks Robert. I'll certainly take you up on that. Let's hope that unlike the four star restaurant in Queensland, that they don't close at six thirty if no customers have shown up yet. Ian emailed: I just read a letter on you web page from "Richard of North Carolina" asking where he can get Coopers beer here in the States. Its available here in Wisconsin at a local bottle shop - I don't know who the distributor is but I checked Coopers website and they have a couple of distributors listed. Can you pass this link onto Richard? www.coopers.com.au/world_agents/ba.htm. Julie from Ohio emailed: This is for Richard in North Carolina who is looking for Coopers beer. Here in Ohio, you can get a bottle of Coopers Ale at the Outback Steakhouse, and I have also seen various Coopers products (often Pale Ale) at specialty liquor stores. Good luck! Another Julie emailed: To Richard from North Carolina: I am from Adelaide and now residing in New York City and understand your quest for the great Coopers beer. I have taken my American boyfriend on two trips back home to Adelaide and I have to say that he has become a major fan of "Coopers Dark". He has tried to locate Coopers beer here and has discovered that "Pale Ale" and "Sparkling Ale" are imported and available in New York City at various locations. Additionally, Coopers does have home-brew packages that are available throughout the world. Michael emailed: I might have the opportunity to work in New York in the IT Industry If someone had the opportunity to work in New York would you say they should go, I mean the experience and working in New York would look great on the CV I'm kind of excited, plus a little nervous, I spent 2 weeks in 97 in New York and had a good time Living overseas isn't new to me I spent 2 years living in London, although New York would be different to London, London is quite an exciting place as well. No worries. I'd go... I went! Nathan emailed: Hi how are you, I'm 23yr male (actually that sounds like I'm writing on a chat site don't it!) Oh well, anyway I am a struggling writer originally from Perth, living in Sydney. I have nothing more to say other than that I landed on the website by error and whilst there had a read and found that it was excellent. You really are a great writer and I dig the way you write so Australian (ie. 'with it') about NY. I'd love to live in New York however the chances of that seem to be quite remote at this stage but just thought I'd let you know that your a star! Keep it up I'll add this to my favourites and come back often. |