THE GREAT OCEAN ROAD.

Leaving Melbourne and being dramatically thrown straight into an RV with yer folks that you haven't seen in months. Afterwards like this, I'm happy to announce that Yes - we survived our 8 day road trip through Victoria and SA. Despite how it was, indeed, a great road, 8 days was far too much. Especially seeing how this RV we rented was designed for two adults and... One child. 

Two adults and one child. What that means is basically that I, the child, had to spend the days squeezed in between the two of them (the adults) in the front seat. Now we shall not forget how a certain person, to my right, was in the midst of severe nicotine (in terms of snus) withdrawal mood swings and the person to my left wasn't coping too well, mentally, with the fact that traffic suddenly had swaped sides. At my position in the middle of the car I had two very important tasks that I took on with fullest responsibility: a) being the manual GPS and b) being the announcer of The Magic Words. ("OK, snack break!").

       Yet, the days were nothing compared to the nights. The nights that I, as the beloved and privileged child that I am, had to spend on the marvelous LOFT*.

Now the *Loft offers you a very generous 1,5 metre to stretch out on with a claustropobic height of, say, 25 centimetres. To top things off all I got in terms of a duvet the first night was a towel, as the car rental people only brought us one blanket to share between 3 people. How exactly this blanket was supposed to cover first two people on the bottom levell which, mind you, it barely did - then stetch all the way up to the marvelous loft? Well, to this day, it beats me...

The beautiful scenery made it all worth while though. Driving through South Coast Australia was like travelling through a range of all other countries I've visited. You just don't know what sort of vegetation the next corner (and there's quite a few of them) will bring.

MELBOURNE (or 'Stockholm, Bristol and NYC has a love child')

It is mid January and Melbourne is in the beginning of a plus-40-degress-four-days-in-a-row period, and these are of course coinciding with my first days in the city. When I arrive at Tullamarine airport just after midnight local time it's well above thirty celsius. As I can't check in at the hostel until 10am the following morning, I spend my first night sleeping on a pile of laundry bags in the corridor.

City glitter. One of many evenings at the Spencer's balcony, watching that darn ferris wheel.

Despite how it literally hurts to breathe in the heat, I am very excited to explore the city. Here's like a mixture of Bristol, Stockholm and perhaps New York City. (Perhaps, as I've never been to the big apple). Colonial buildings crosses skyscrapers and street art. Some days I feel, because of the time difference, like I live in a universe parallell to where my loved ones are. While they're doing their morning chores and head off to work/university in Europe, I'm in the future wandering these streets and if I were to get run over by a tram, this town's full of them, no one would know who I even was.

Can't write about Melbourne without featuring Ganesha. 

Being alone and nearly broke in a new city is definately a challenge. But it is an important lesson that everything works out, eventually. I find a job cleaning at different festivals (festival season, yay!), do work for accommondation at the hostel (where I'll end up staying for the next 4 months) and meet some really good people to spend time with in the Melbourne summer. Suddenly the sun is shining again.