Some Odd Fellows

Yesterday was a pretty typical day. I rose around 9:00 am. (Side note: I am loving not having to set an alarm. And yes, 9:00 am is sleeping in for me, but I know you're still jealous). Then I went for my daily morning run. I discovered the most incredible running route around the outer edge of the Royal Botanical Gardens. The path runs alongside the ocean and loops around to the Sydney Opera House.  If you look at the map below, you can see what I'm talking about. I start in the bottom right corner near the word LEGEND and run all along the ouside (the white path) till I reach the opera house. It's stunning. Mom asked me to take pictures, but it's kinda hard to run with a camera in hand so you will just have to take my word that its purely gorgeous. There is no better motivation to get up each morning and run than this scenery.

Yesterday, I stopped to stretch after running a bit. I had found an unoccupied, shady spot located under a tree and overlooking the harbor.  Mid-stretch, I look to my right and there is a man standing about 3 yards away from me with his bright yellow camera lifted to his eye and pointed directly at me.  I looked around to see what he was taking a picture of, when I realized it was me! I immediately gave him a death stare and asked him not to take a picture of me. "No?" he asked seemingly confused, as if this was some absurd request. "NO" I replied sternly. Evidently, he didn't speak english. But the majority of what we say is communicated through our expressions, tone of voice, and body language. My displeasure and discomfort with his actions was more than evident. He put his camera down and I resumed stretching. But I'm no dummy. I looked over my shoulder only to see the man slowly lifting his camera back to its original position. If looks could kill that man would have fell over on the spot. But they can't (which is a good thing, I wouldn't want to be arrested for murder down under) so I had to pick myself up and continue on my jog without properly stretching. I was irritated, nonetheless. A person jogging is not a rare Sydney sight. I am not a celebrity. There is absolutely no reason why you should invade my privacy and ruin my stretching session Mr. Foreign Tourist (odd fellow #1). Put your camera down and leave me alone! Thank you. 

After my jog I showered, made lunch and ran some errands. Then I headed off to work at the Summit. Tonight we had an exclusive event for Nissan, the car company. They are having a 3 day conference in Sydney, and we were hosting their welcome dinner. This meant that I didn't have to sit dinner guests as usual. Instead, I was in charge of operating the elevator on the ground floor to take the 200+ guests to the top of the tower. This was a rather mundane task. It reminded me of LOST, the greatest television show I have ever had the privilege to watch. If you haven't seen it you are seriously missing out. Go rent the season DVDs, lock yourself in your house for a week, and watch them. You will not regret it. It will change your life. But back to how it reminds me of my job. At one point in LOST there was a button that needed to be pushed continuously at a specific time or everyone was going to die (something like that, the exact reason is a little fuzzy). So someone was appointed the designated button pusher. It was their sole responsibility to PUSH THAT BUTTON no matter what. This was a life or death matter. It was serious business. And that was me for two hours last night. The designated elevator button pusher. Very important. If I didn't push that button, Nissan employees would not make it to the 47th floor to enjoy a first class, three course meal. That would be a real travesty. So I pushed that elevator button over and over and over...

Eventually, I was relieved of my burdensome button-pushing duties and ventured to the top floor to help cater the event. After three hours, the 200 guests (most of whom were male) had drank almost all of our wine and beer beverages. No surprise here, it's a known fact that Aussies can and do drink a lot. But what I can tell you it that after three hours of drinking, Nissan employees can be quite entertaining. At one point I had a group of about 10 Australian men (odd fellows #2) singing the Jefferson Starship song "Sarah" (Their song was spelt "Sara" but I have added the 'h' because it it the proper way to spell my name).  Oh yes, in booming voices they sang, "Sarah, Sarah, no time is a good time for goodbye!" It was quite amusing. And I learned a valuable lesson: never tell drunk patrons your real name. It's the golden rule of being a cocktail waitress. Now I get why. Cheers!