Circular Quay Sydney

After a good sleep at my brother's comfy home in Sydney's south eastern rim, not far from the Brighton Le Sands Hotel where I spent the weekend, I am into the hustle and bustle of the the Sydney Summer Festival, but first a visit to City Extra Cafe on the Quay, one of my favourite places to hang out. After a forty five-minute bus ride from Matraville, I arrive at the Quay and see a cruise ship docked with the iconic Harbour Bridge right behind it, you couldn't get a better image of the Sydney scene.  I am meeting PK to visit his sister later today but first I have to get a local sim-card to facilitate my mobile communications while in town. 

Sydney's quay

Cood coffee...

A happy customer...

With entertainment at my front door

Just outside the cafe is a performance artist, a man of a certain age, besuited and smart looking with a Fedora, who is pulling a wheelie luggage bag. He strikes a pose every few minutes to accentuate the fact he is on his way somewhere, the 'wind' is blowing his tie, which is an inflated snake-balloon sweeping up behind him. Kids stop and he shows them how to blow up a snake balloon, others also stop to take a photo, he is patience incarnate, with a ready smile and a great desire to entertain and please his public.

I see here the Golden Tongued Wisdom from yesterday's final talk by our visitor from Alaska...there is Soul, Spirit, God, whatever you may like to call it, anywhere you care to look. This man, who would receive a pittance for his art, gets so much more just from the appreciation of the public. He is doubtless a show biz veteran who now strikes a pose each day reminding people that although he seems to be in a hurry, the wind blowing his tie and all, he is actually frozen in time, where nothing means anything. He has a constant smile on his face as though he habours a secret that no-one else knows about, except me that is, 'cos I share with him the delight of being alive in this free country of Australia and New Zealand, in the face of all the turbulence wrought by religious extremists around the globe. The newspapers are full of more murders in Paris in the name of Islam and  what a travesty this is of a religious teaching.

I finish my large and excellent mug of hot coffee, well espressed, and now move on to the next moment of my Sydney stay. Each time I do something in the next few days I am aware that in eight months time I will be a resident near to this throbbing metropolis. 

City Extra news in the toilets 1931!

Vivo!

Late brekkie...

With a stroke of 'luck' I found such a helpful young Chines mam in the Optus shop to give me a new prepaid $20 sim card and even more good advice. So I am now officially in Sydney, and connected.

I feel I want to sit and write so I call into Vivio, ('I Am Alive') on George St., for  some protein, as I have been eating too many carbs and must cut down. Then on to Tempe to meet PK and sister.

 Sydney is alive and buzzing!

At  Cafe Vivo on George