Neerim East is a tiny country town where Jen’s parents live. They own a couple hundred acres and cows and a beautiful old farm house with 12-foot ceilings and big rooms. We arrived last night, and have pretty much just relaxed and piddled around since.

Today we went into Yarra and went shopping at a little shopping strip of cute shops. Lunch was spent at the local Country Club, where I had Moroccan Lamb Risotto and fell in love with the duck salad that Jen ordered. When I get home I’m going to hunt down the reason why we don’t sell more duck, because it’s really yummy.

Another trip to the grocery store had me again shocked at the prices of everything here. It’s more reasonable in a small town than it is in Melbourne, but there’s nothing I’ve found that’s cheaper, even with the exchange rate. Jen hypothesizes that it’s because there’s such a sparse population in AU compared to the US. The two countries are nearly the same size, but Melbourne has a population that’s equivalent to Chicago, and it’s one of the largest cities in the country.

I reached my maximum threshold for “togetherness” today. Right now I’m sitting in Jen’s parents’ office with Alanis Morissette playing in my Discman while playing on the computer and eating a popsicle. Yes, occasionally I’m just antisocial.

I told Jen and her mum that there are only two things about Oz that bother me. The first is the bizarre lack of readily-available napkins at meals. A minor thing, really. The second is that Australians don’t necessarily say “excuse me” when they want to pass someone in an aisle or in the street or whatever. If two people want to cross each other’s paths, one must just give way without a word. If we get behind someone who’s going slow or stopped and we want to pass, we just wait for someone to notice and make room. It’s annoying. When I’m in front, I use the apparently-American “excuse me” and move forward. No one bats an eye, so I’m surprised it’s not more frequently used. But really, I suppose it’s a minor thing as well.

When I can spend a week and a half in a different country with an entirely different culture, and this is all that bothers me, it’s easy to see why I’d want to move here permanently.

Besides, it was 32C here today. That’s summer weather. There were snow flurries in St. Louis. I’ve no interest in returning to Missouri at this point.

With sunburnt shoulders,

michelle

p.s. It was nice to find AltoidsAddict’s new journal as esteseparatist.