Home

Perth, AustraliaSo after leaving Bangkok airport (where there was a lovely display of The Churning Of The Sea Of Milk which was on the side of Angkor Wat) I boarded the plane to Kuala Lumpur for my final flight back home to Perth, Australia. As much as I love Asia it was good to be going home, despite a certain amount of uncertainty of the work and accomodation front. Never mind all that though, so far everything has always worked out okay and these fays I am a man of very simple pleasures, some of the best experiences of my life have occurred at my poorest and I have often been at my most miserable when surrounded with all the trappings of the material existence. I posted last time about a Zen riddle about the guy hanging off the cliff facing certain death above and below, the whole story is a metaphor for human existance, the black and white mice symbolise night and day, time ticking away with certain doom waiting for us no matter what course of action we take. Some may find this too terrifying or horrible to contemplate but the whole point of the tale is that you have to enjoy each moment, to eat the strawberries whenever you can in order to really appreciate life for how beautiful it really is. To do this we must quieten our monkey minds, stop it from jumping around from thinking about the past and the future and to focus only on what is real, which is the moment at hand.So begins my long journey towards this end....Touched down is Perth at 5:30am on Saturday morning, the pilot of the plane looked like an idiot salesperson who used to work for me which was a bit unsettling and There were no blankets offered to passengers despite the freezing temperature inside the plane. I nearly missed the plane as I was sitting inside the new lounge section at the airport, so new that they hadnt installed speakers so you could hear the boarding announcements being made at the gate outside.Got a mate to pick me up from the Perth airport, kudos to him for making the trip so early in the morning. If you ever want to find out who your real friends are, try that on them.Made it to my mates wedding at 1pm after shaving of the beard, putting on the suit I got from Bangkok and doing my hair, a very nice ceremony where he arrived at the church in a Hummer, after which we went to the Matilda bay Brewery where the reception was held. A magnificent location right on the river, beautiful day and weather, I will post some photos when I can get a broadband connection instead of dial up which will take forever to load up.A lovely reception and got the chance to chat with my mate's neighbour with whom I shared travel stories before winding up at midnight when i headed into the nightclub district of Northbridge for another mate's birthday party.Not having my passport on me and my drivers license having long since expired, I was denied entry into the club where her party was being held for as I had no ID. Welcome Home!From here I jumped in a cab for the long drive to my mates house where I was staying, total fare: AU$70....Takeaway lessons here:Australia is very beaurocratic.Australia is bloody expensive after AsiaThe upside was that my mate had let me stay at his beautiful house while he and his wife went on their honeymoon, time to relax and take it easy for a bit before beginning the job hunt to replenish by rapidly deteriorating bank balance.Cheers Cobba!