Australian Sunsets

Robby Gets a Jobby

Last week, after spending his first 26 days back in Sydney looking for work, Rob accepted a job as the financial controller for the Sydney Masonic Centre ( www.smc.au.com ). The SMC is sponsoring a work visa for him. It's called a 457 Employer Sponsored Visa and I get to reap the benefits of it! His visa will allow me to live and work in Australia as well under "defacto" relationship status. It will allow us both to be in Australia for FOUR YEARS!!!! Don't worry, family...I don't think I'll stay that long. We're now waiting for the paperwork to process with Australian Immigration before he is able to start work.

Here are some pictures of Rob's new office building:

Rob Does Cockatoo Island

I still don't really know what Cockatoo Island is....but Rob went there and took a hundred pictures. While he was still job hunting and meeting with recruiters he had plenty of free time while I was at work so he did quite a bit of Sydney touring. (By the way, he got a job!! Details to come...).

Anyway, the 2008 Biennale of Sydney was going on so Rob took a ferry over to Cockatoo Island to see the art exhibition. Here's some of what he saw out there:

Randoms

A few random recent pictures:



Rob and I on night out in Darling Harbour


Playing the "pokies"-what they call slot machines


What I walk by every day on my way to work


Another spot that I pass on my walk to work: Martin Place





Some of the "artwork" in the lobby of my office building. It's strange.


Lobby at work

The largest Apple Store in the Southern Hemisphere just opened up in Sydney last month. It's enormous and wildly popular. Especially with the release of the first iPhone in Australia. There was a line out the door for a week!




Playing


Cool staircase in the Apple Store


View from my "front yard" on Market Street


My home! We live just above the gray part which are the parking levels.


Our new house pet. Just kidding. Rob took this picture at Wildlife World.

Good Food and Wine Festival and Sydney Film Festival

Rob scored us 1/2 price tickets to Sydney's Good Food & Wine Festival at the Sydney Exhibition Center. The event was spread over three halls with more than 300 exhibitors comprising Australia's leading wine companies and most innovative food marketers and producers showcasing the latest culinary trends from all around the world. We were able to entertain and stuff ourselves all day and sample free food, see a live cooking demonstration from celebrity television chefs Matt and Tobie and try more wines than you could imagine.

A couple of the wine vendors were some of the same wineries that we visited on our tour of the Hunter Valley back in March:







We got to go to another festival too: The Sydney Film Festival that showcased contemporary cinema from Australia and around the world. The event was established in 1954 and is a major cultural event on the city's social calendar and one of the world's longest running film festivals. Rob and I only got to get to one film which was shown at the State Theatre in the heart of the Central Business District on Market Street. We saw a film called Married Life with Rachael McAdams and Pierce Brosnan.

Another Celebrity Sighting

This may not mean anything to those of you who don't watch the Australian "The Biggest Loser", but those of us on welfare cable in Australia who make a nightly ritual out of it will appreciate this:

I just saw SHANNON! The GORGEOUS male trainer from the show. Katie, Gracie, Karla, Melanie, and everyone else who tuned in to The Biggest Loser 6 nights a week last season will appreciate my star-struckedness. He was walking down George Street holding hands with his girlfriend and I was without a camera. :( I stood in the middle of the street staring for a good 2-3minutes debating whether to follow him or to go on to work. I had to let him go, but maybe we'll cross paths again.

PS-As I typed this and posted the pictures, I just realized that I may in fact be: The Biggest Loser.