le tour
A weekend of diverse experiences could only describe our last weekend here before we jet off next Friday night for a three-week break back home. A plush waiting room, funky styling and gleaming state of the art equipment couldn’t quite get my mind off the incessant high pitched whine of the drill in someone else’s mouth on Friday afternoon. Enroute to Chad and Cathy’s place for an end of semester Christmas get-together I was waiting my turn at “Dr Seattle’s” dentist clinic with the awful prospect of receiving my 2nd root canal treatment when my mouth was still throbbing with pain from the last one. I’ll spare the gory details, but I will be glad when I see him for the last time (I hope!) tomorrow afternoon. Lop-sided mouth pumped with Novocain and armed with a Christmas present for Chad of 2 bottles of Absolut vodka, I traipsed over to Chad and Cathy’s place. As the anesthetic wore off, I couldn’t ask to be in better company. Our team is full of delightful people this year and the Brekke’s house was festooned with lights and dripping with gorgeous decorations for Christmas. They had originally planned to come to Australia for the Christmas break and probably visit us as well, but Cathy has had some difficulties with her pregnancy and they decided to err on the side of safety and stay “Taiwan-side” for the break. We had a resplendent feast that they are renowned for, and good food and wine and company all combined for a very pleasant evening. Cass was there just ahead of me, but she is suffering from a bad cold, so we only stayed for a few hours, especially as my tooth began to ache.
Ross and I teamed up with Bob Penry, our Californian colleague to find some surf on Saturday morning. The Rocket won our approval and we spent a couple of hours getting some fair quality little waves. Bob had a snooze on the beach for a while, sleeping off a few drinks the night before and preparing for the big one as we all did that afternoon: the Tour de Rourke. Shaun is getting married at Christmas in Tasmania (which we’re attending) and this was the bigger than Ben Hur buck’s night. We met at the Pig at 6.30 for a feast and our first drinks. There were about 50 guys! Each of the nine pubs had a tour leader (wearing the leader’s yellow jersey) who made a rule that everyone had to stick to. Over the course of the night, left handed drinking (skull a shot if caught out), avoiding a little toy chicken placed on a shoulder (skull), not pointing except with an elbow (skull) and grabbing another and saying “g’day mate” when a stupid jester’s hat was put on by the leader – (last one: skull) were all in evidence and got many people caught out. (By the way, I’m using “skull” here to indicate downing a drink in one draught: I’m sure the spelling’s not right, but it is appropriate considering what met me when I looked in the mirror on Sunday morning!)
A few pubs in Tienmu hosted the black t-shirt clad crew before a coach transported us down to the “combat zone”, where the festivities picked up a pace. Now well oiled, the throng was getting caught with the chicken and by the time we again boarded the bus to the Brass Monkey, I had taken over the maillot jaune. My rules include doing a conga dance of at least 7 people every time the whistle blew and when the hat went on, people had to hug each other and say, “I love you mate”. This proved to be fairly comical in the middle of an otherwise sedate crowd of drinkers on a Saturday night! We were off to the infamous “Hooters” after that and everyone had to get their bare breast signed by a Hooters girl, but Ross decided the fun was yet to begin. He was tour captain for Saints and Sinners and the rule was that if you dared to put the hat on, you could be mobbed by everyone “stacks on” style. We demolished a 7-11 when someone ran in there to escape a stacking mob and I think we might have been asked to leave the last bar after a few more incidents saw tables and chairs go flying in all directions. The last stop was Carnegie’s nightclub, famous for its encouragement of people to dance on the wide wooden bar. Many of the boys took just this opportunity, but after an hour or so of watching this entertainment, Lewy, Ross and myself got a taxi home. Carl was in great form all night and seems to feature in a lot of the photos. Shaun had a hit list of photos that he needed to get in the night and managed to achieve quite a few. I have a web link to this photo site, but for the sake of the public’s health, I will not include it. If you’re interested, let me know and I’ll refer you to it when I get home next week!
I was amazingly healthy on Sunday, so Cass and I booked some tickets online and went to watch “After the Sunset” at the Tienmu Warner Brothers cinema. We had a light lunch and a cup of coffee beforehand at the McCafe opposite and all in all, had a very lovely day. The weather here is just perfect at the moment: crisp and just a touch of bite in the morning and glorious cool sunny days. I have to be honest though: I’m REALLY looking forward to some of that hot Aussie sun after spending last Christmas in the snows of Prague and Paris…………….can’t wait. Cass has already got our first evening planned: get some hamburgers from the shop round the corner, bottle of wine and watch some cricket from the WACA. Bliss.