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02/21/2001 |
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Sydney - AUSTRALIA |
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33°51 E 151°12 |
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+ 72 |
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After
the sleepless night in the Greyhound, we spend
the morning writing the Journal, then we relax
a little bit... but not all of us !
While
Maya has a little rest, Aleko and Theo go to
the hairdresser, as Marco and Vale are already
gone to the 'doctor' for Cyber1, our ill
computer. It seems the machine could be
repaired. An engineer promises the machine
will be ready for tomorrow. He thinks it's
only a problem of internal power supply.
Then
we have a walk in Sydney, between the
skyscrapers and the hundred years old
buildings, on the bay, close to the incredible
Opera... Businessmen going to the office,
young people of any country, many homosexual
couples (The Gay Parade will take place in a
couple of weeks, like every year in Sydney),
some homeless and very few Aborigines.
But
there's a bad news waiting for us at the
hotel: it's not a problem of power supply but
mother-card (ouuuuuch!!!), that doesn't work
anymore for unknown reasons.
3
weeks at least are necessary to repair Cyber1,
the time to get the missing elements in
Europe, that they don't have here. But... A
Compaq should be the same all over the World
!? Well, absolutely not. Every Continent has
its own characteristics, and our model, a
Presario 18 XL 381 -last generation- has no
international guarantee... We got to pay
everything!
We
try all that we can to convince the engineers
to do something: exchange the machine with
another one, repair the machine here and send
it to Argentina, a bottle of whisky and at
last cash... but there's nothing that we can
do, we are really in trouble.
All
we have to do now is to buy Cyber 3, a new
computer ! The price will be around 4500 A$...
We'll send Cyber 1 in Europe to be repaired.
Thank you anyway Cyber 1.
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Sydney
oh Sydney, why do we like you so
much?
I
live in one of the most beautiful
bays in the World, my sky is
almost always blue under a
temperate climate, I have the feet
on the beach, I am cultural and
extravagant, with a mix of
European and American, I am
poly-ethnic, I offer some work and
opportunities to all of the social
levels, I am in the vanguard of
fashions, I was asked to organize
the Y2K Olympics.
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Sydney
oh Sydney, which monuments do you
have ?
The
Opera on the Bay, with its roofs
like sails, the mythical
'Coathanger' Sydney Harbour
bridge, the Rocks, where the first
colons and pioneers settled, the
Botanical Garden with a huge
forest in the center of the city,
et...
Sydney
oh Sydney, what are your faults ?
If
I seem very cool, I'm also quite
rigid (too many bureaucrats!), the
sea wounds me sometimes (storms
have destroyed some houses), I got
net to protect the swimmers from
the sharks.
Sydney
oh Sydney, you are a model for the
cities of the future!
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On
this Continent, many travelers
came to meet the Car@van. Here are
some Australian words to define
different nationalities:
Pom:
English
Pomgranite:
English - Pejorative
Septic:
American
Dings:
Italian
Kiwi:
New-Zealander
Squarehead:
German
Ghan:
Afghan
Wong:
strangers as well as Vietnamese
boat-people
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Some
of the highlights of the Car@van
on the Red Continent:
The
arrival in Darwin and the European
virtual travelers who met us, the
encounter with aborigine movie
stars, face to face with
crocodiles, kangaroos, koalas,
visits in Aboriginal sacred
places, Uluru - the greatest
monolith in the World - interviews
with Australian press and radios,
20 hours on the Ghan and our show,
a lunch with an Aboriginal family,
Kangaroo Island, the Great Ocean
Road and a flight in helicopter,
fruit picking... and Priscilla,
the way you wanted us to cross the
Continent.
If
you want, you can still read or
watch all these moments by looking
in the Journal's archives or by
clicking on Video.
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Last
day in Australia :-(
We'll
leave a sign, as we did in Africa
and in Asia, and try to meet
people in the streets...
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Guide our next steps,insert contacts & info on
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