Skip to content

Feb 27

6 Comments

An asparagus field in the country without colour

Hundreds of colourful balloons lifted off all at once and flew into a clear blue sky, it must have been some time in spring. I recall that I tried to follow the one balloon which had a message from my brother attached to it, but once he had let go of the string it had sailed off and become indistinguishable from all the others up there.

The idea was similar to a message in a bottle. The balloon had a brief note with his details on it attached to a string and it asked the finder to send my brother a letter or postcard. I’d love to know how many children actually got a message back. My brother and I certainly had forgotten all about it when months later he did actually receive a letter from a young boy his age.

We were all thrilled. Not only had someone taken the time to write he also told a marvelous story of how he had come into the possession of my brother’s note.

Imagine an older lady bent down over a field of asparagus in late spring. This was the time in the year when asparagus started growing and required a lot of maintenance.  Without machinery it was backbreaking work and slow the old lady was making her way down the long rows.

When she looked up from her work she saw a brightly coloured balloon that had landed only a few metres away from her. It must have lost a bit of its helium content as the string and piece of paper attached to it were weighing it down. The lady moved towards the balloon to take a closer look when a breeze was blowing back life into the coloured messenger almost lifting it off again. Quickly the lady captured it by the string before it got blown away further.

She read the note and was thrilled to realise her grandson was almost the same age as the composer of the message. He must have been thrilled when his grandma brought him her find and enthusiastic to sit down and write a letter.

I don’t remember the letter at all, but what I do remember is my mother explaining where the boy lived, which was in the GDR – the message had travelled hundreds of kilometres across the border before landing on the asparagus field.

Like many people in West Germany we knew hardly anything from the neighbouring country and to have a personal contact with someone was fascinating – all I could picture was a brightly coloured balloon in the country without colour.

I do recall my mum helping my brother packing a parcel to send to his new pen-friend. It contained coffee, biscuits and a few other items, but I didn’t understand why the boy and his family would have need for such everyday items.

Feb 21

7 Comments

The country without colour

The other day my friend Roza showed me one of her newspaper articles. It retells her horrific experiences of surviving the war in Iraq when she was only eight years old.

It’s a fascinating story that sends shivers down my spine. At the same time when Roza and her family where struggling to stay alive I was growing up completely protected and oblivious to the war only a few thousand kilometres away. In fact, I didn’t even know there was a war – of a very different nature – happening right where I was.

Let’s travel back in time. We’re going back 24 years in the past to a small German town watching a primary school teacher at work educating her students in geography. At the front of the room the teacher has put a gigantic map on display.

The shape of the German state is outlined with a big red border, the eleven little states in it each have a different colour and a red dot inside each marks the location of the individual state capital.

Diligently the teacher goes through all of the eleven names and capitals. She is satisfied with the student’s responses. Most know all of the names, she’s doing a good job.

Peculiarly one section of the shape on the map is retained in grey. Although it seems to be part of the country – the big red line includes it – there is also a finer border separating the colourful from the grey states. Only one pink spot sits inside the grey and the students all know this is Berlin. The other grey spots have no names.

One little hand is lifted, there is a question.

“Yes?”

“What are those grey states on the map?” a little boy asks. He is pointing at the obvious part of the map that looks like the colour monster has bitten a chunk out of Germany.

“Do they not have any colour there?”

The teacher bites her lip and looks around the classroom. Silence is an unexpected response from her. The students feel there is something wrong; a secret that she is not sharing. They stare at her in anticipation.

“Well, you will have to go home and ask your parents,” the teacher says. Disappointment replaces tension. Without awaiting further comments the teacher skips to the next part of her lesson. Only the scent of mystery lingers in the class room.

Did many of the students remember to ask their parents about the map at home? Perhaps they did. Maybe I did, but I can’t remember my mum’s answer. It probably was a convoluted reply that left no or little excitement about the strange map.

I’m not surprised because how was I to understand the intricacies of German ‘domestic policies’ that occurred before the end of the cold war? I imagine me going in my head “so, there are two German countries almost sounding the same – the German Democratic Republic and the Federal Republic of Germany – but one of them isn’t actually all that democratic and the other doesn’t recognise the first’s existence…and what is a democracy anyway?”

I don’t recall when I found out why my primary school teacher gave such an evasive answer, but I know today that it was official policy in the 80′s that dictated teachers to say nothing.

A few years later I remember seeing people on TV climbing overjoyed on top of crumbling walls. David Hasselhoff was there singing about freedom in a black leather jacket that had little light bulbs flashing. I didn’t know why (and still have no answer to this).  There were fireworks, tears of joy and a spirit of change.

Feb 21

5 Comments

Wohooo! Prizes!!!

The wonderful Emma has nominated me for two (two, thank you!!!) Awards:

Kreative Blogger Award & One Lovely Blog Award

Part A of this honour entitles me to bestow the same pleasure on to my favourite blogs, so please check out:

Part B entails me sharing a few details about myself:

  • The first 21 years of my life I didn’t speak English. (I did speak though. A lot)
  • My best friend says that I have “a very low threshold  to bs”. True
  • I prefer sparkling water over sparkling wine, red wine over white wine, beer over cider, but only on hot days
  • I could never get a tatoo. I love editing too much and could never cope with the permanency of ink on my skin
  • When I travel I feel the most at home
  • As a youngster people mistook me for a boy regularly because of my short hair
  • Above mistake isn’t possible anymore despite my short hair
  • If you’ve made it this far through my boring list you deserve to know that I got engaged recently. I have told hardly anyone because I can barely fathom my own luck

Feb 16

3 Comments

Travelling with joy – part 2

It wasn’t too long after lift-off from Sydney that Milan my 18 months old bundle of joy finally fell asleep hugging his “blankie”. Despite his head laying on my lap and his legs extending onto my mother’s lap my mother and I managed to get some eyes shut too, but not for long.

It must’ve been about four hours later when Milan started tossing and turning and my efforts of trying to get him comfortable failed. Frustrated my little angel turned into a monster. He screamed the loudest, lungful, highest pitch scream I’ve ever heard. I am positive every single person on that airplane turned towards us at that point. Yes, they were all giving us dirty looks for waking them up.

So I grabbed the little one and took him to the very back of the airplane to calm him down. Hoping to put him back to sleep I was singing songs and telling him stories. He eventually did stop crying, but he was still embarrassingly loud. Milan decided it was playtime and all he wanted to do was to explore this very strange place; running up and down the aisle, playing with the airplane door and attempting to go up the stair to the staff only and kitchen areas.

I was able to trick him to return to our seats but of course he wasn’t going to sit still or just lay-down and sleep. Instead he was standing up checking out people sitting behind us and tapping on the others’ heads sitting in the row in front of us. To add more to the embarrassment he’d scream when I sat him down.

Since he didn’t want to sleep I thought his toys could come in handy. However, little Milan was not interested in these very familiar objects, but he gladly discovered the little T.V right in front of him. He fiddled with the remote control for a little while then turned the lights on and off then discovered the button to call for flight attendants.

To make him give up the remote control I called for a nappy change and took him to the bathroom. Since it was a different bathroom to the one at home he wanted to explore that as well, of course. Once that battle was over it was time for his early morning bottle and Milan finally fell asleep in my arms. Only it was shortly before landing in Bangkok. We did manage to get a few minutes of sleep though.

The one hour transit in Bangkok was another nightmare. After getting so comfortable on the plane we had to pack everything again and take it with us.  So off the plane we got with all our bags close to snapping our backs yet again. I was already telling my mother “what have I gotten myself into?”  We weren’t even half way there yet.

The next leg to Dubai was somehow smoother. My mother and I took turns entertaining Milan and going on walks and feeding him. He also managed to get some more sleep.

Landing in Dubai we were happy to be at least a little closer to our destination and nervous that we had to collect our luggage. We had 9 hours to get our luggage, go through immigration and security and make our way from terminal 3 to terminal 1.

Terminal 3 was exclusive to Emirates Airlines and a shiny sparkling place. Still, we made our way to terminal 1, where we thought our next flight would be.

Here we asked around and found out we were actually at the wrong place, but we weren’t panicking as we still had quite a lot of hours to spend. So we used the free time to exchange some money and ordered food. We also freshened up and changed as the weather here was already very humid even in the early hours of the morning. We let Milan run free and wild taking turns in chasing him while one of us stayed with the luggage.

After spending about three hours we wanted to catch a taxi to go to terminal 2, where our flight was leaving from. The weather outside was quite humid and hot by now. We were surprised how far this terminal was away. It took at least 20 minutes to get there.

Arriving at terminal 2 we slowly but surely came to a shocking realisation. The terminals were clearly segregating people, destination and countries according to their socio-economic standards. Terminal 1 was a completely different world from terminal 2 let alone to the exclusive and luxurious terminal 3 we had initially landed at.

At this very aged terminal 2, we travelled alongside people from not so well off Asian and Africans countries including Iraq and Kurdistan. But to add our shock passengers were also treated differently here. Staff working at this terminal was very commonly yelling and insulting passengers if they entered the wrong queue, and were very openly making fun of the travellers’ dress and appearance.

Both my mother and I speak Arabic well and we could understand everything that was said. Even though most were kind towards us not everyone received the same treatment. There was one instance in which a couple of immigration officers were making fun of a woman of African appearance. As one of the officers checked her passport he told his colleague “this one turns out to be holding a Canadian passport damn it” as if it was something she wasn’t worthy of. We were absolutely appalled.

As we waited at the gate we met a Kurdish family from Melbourne who shared our shocked about the treatment of travellers. Soon the waiting area was filling up by Kurdish speaking passengers and this made us feel closer to home than we had anticipated. Thanks to Milan we were soon speaking to everyone as he was running around and attracting everyone’s attention.

We boarded a very old and small passenger plane, which seemed fully booked out. We got a little worried as this plane looked very shaky. This time the air pressure really affected Milan’s ears. Before we knew it he was being passed around like a parcel between fellow travellers wanting to comfort Milan. I was a bit worried at first, but the warmth and friendliness of the Kurdish people around us was overwhelming.

The four-hour flight from Dubai to Sulaymaniya was coming to an end and we landed at 8pm local time and 7 degrees Celsius – quite a difference to the climate in Sydney and Dubai.

We were here; this was it, finally arriving home. It felt like there was a familiar smell in the very cold air.

The following days and weeks were full of emotional reunions with family and old friends. We did many road-trips to other areas and cities in Kurdistan including our home town of Kirkuk (the orphan abandoned city, which I won’t talk about here as it is a whole other story).

Unfortunately Milan started suffering from diarrhoea, which meant he was using up a lot of nappies, nappy rash cream and body wash very fast. He was eating almost everything that was offered to him for the first time in his life. He was sharing and wanting everything his little cousins were eating. During the whole time I was unable to find let alone control the cause of his diarrhoea. As a result he started getting a severe nappy rash.

So we ran out of nappies, nappy cream, and wipes by week three. I was recommended many different brands of baby products that were available. Surprisingly the range was huge; you could find many international brands in most super and mini markets. Huggies seemed to be the only product that wasn’t available though. I tried all brands yet nothing was really helping. We did make it through the month and a half of travelling though.

I think you can never be prepared enough when travelling with young children. Part of it is to go with your gut instincts and hope for the best. With my experience of travelling with Milan here is a checklist of:

Things I don’t regret having packed (plenty of)

  • Baby formula. I had packed the right amount so that on the day we left I had about half a can left, just enough for the trip back.
  • Gifts for all of my family and friends.
  • “Blankie”, Milan’s favourite blanket.

Things I packed (way) too much of

  • Baby food. They were also very heavy because of the glass jars.
  • Clothes, shoes, and make-up for myself which I could have done without.
  • Toys that everyone had recommended to take on-board. They were no use what-so-ever because there were so many interesting things for an 18 months old to explore.

Things I wish I’d packed more of

  • Huggies, they seemed to be the only brand of diapers that could have prevented Milan’s nappy rash.
  • Nappy rash cream that worked for Milan as it wasn’t available in shops.

Feb 9

Message from a Perthling

If people living in New York are New Yorkers, residents of Paris equal Parisians than surely now that we call Perth home I can refer to myself to as Perthling, right?

I admit becoming a Perthling feels strange. I miss the travels. Besides I frankly admit that I still have plenty to learn about this city.

For example, a few days ago we found an offer for a second-hand outdoor seating. It looked simply too good to refuse. Little did we know what an epic journey we’d have to travel to get to the place. It wasn’t just at the other end of town, but way way out of town.

Even if we hadn’t liked the seating we would have bought it anyway. The thought of returning empty handed was too bleak and we simply had to make the long long journey worthwhile.

Transporting the outdoor seating home turned out to be not so easy either. Yes, our van looks big, but the furniture didn’t want to fit in and Thorsten (wise as he is) had brought our roof racks.

Well, the roof racks weren’t actually on the roof. We had dismantled them a few months ago to fit under our current car port. This meant Thorsten had to attach them first and then performed a bit more of his packing magic and tied everything down…

I shall keep you posted on how our transition of turning into Perthlings  continues!

Feb 2

1 Comment

Travelling with joy – part 1

Today’s guest post by Roza Germian tells all about her backbreaking adventures of travelling to Kurdistan with Milan, her then 18 months old son and explains why some good travel advice may not work for everyone every time.

After reading “What to take and what to leave – a guide for packing your suitcase (or car)” I was sure I definitely couldn’t travel like this, not in a million years, particularly with my two little children (four years and 11 months old now). It also brought back memories of my 2009 trip to Kurdistan in northern Iraq. I planned a two and a half months trip to visit family there only accompanied by my dear mother and my, then 18 months old bundle of joy, Milan.

We planned to fly from Sydney directly to Kurdistan. This was the first time we could go directly by airplanes as our previous visits were before the fall of Saddam’s regime. Previously we could only fly to Turkey and then spend endless hours going by car and waiting at least six hours at the border trying to cross into Iraqi Kurdistan.

So we were very excited of how this time travelling was going to be much more convenient, hence I decided it was ok to travel with my toddler… However, I must admit I was quite nervous at the same time. So I did a bit of research about travelling with a young child. Every article I read and everyone I asked shared one piece of advice. They all said “take your favourite toys onboard with you”, which I remember very well as the flight was what I was dreading the most. I wasn’t sure how I was going to entertain this kid for so many hours sitting upright in such a confined space. Hence, I packed quite few toys to take on board.

Since Milan was still drinking formula milk, that was another must to take along, and I packed plenty of supplies (six cans to be precise!). Little Milan also has sensitive skin, was still in nappies and teething. This meant that I had to take one and a half months supply of special moisturizer, treatment cream for eczema breakouts, special body wash, shampoo, nappies (had to be Huggies), teething relief, pain and fever relief medication as well as the bottle steriliser and at least four pairs of pacifiers.

Back then Milan was already the fussiest kid I had ever seen when it comes to eating. Reality was we were travelling to a third world country. I was reminded by this fact when I told my GP where we were planning to go and she brought up the longest list of life threatening diseases that I was recommended to get vaccinated against if I had to travel to that part of the world (which I only laughed at, and just made sure the little one’s vaccinations were up-to-date).  So yes, I packed HEAPS of baby food jars that Milan could still eat in worse case scenarios; this totalled the baby food bag to 26kg which was six kilograms over the weight limit per passenger. I still had all his clothes and nappies to pack, plus my luggage, plenty of gifts and souvenirs for family and friends back home.

To make things even more complicated we left mid-March and were going to stay until about the first week of May. This meant the weather would still be quite cold in that part of the world and warm up towards the end of our stay. So I had to pack coats and boots as well as some lighter clothes and shoes for spring. I ended packing an even larger suitcase for our cloths, gifts, nappies, shoes and toiletries.

The bad news was the second suitcase was also over the weight limit (of course)! I kept taking out more and more of my own cloths, so that I only had two pairs of jeans, instead of four, two coats, instead of three and so forth. But the weight was still over the limit. I decided to stuff some of Milan’s clothes and about half of the nappies in a nappy bag that we could take on-board, now we only had about 2.5kg too much which we hoped to get away with…

Finally came the time when we were ready to leave to the airport with our two suitcases to check-in.  To take on-board I had my large hand bag which had all documents, travel size skin-care and my make-up kit. I had the biggest nappy bag imaginable, and another little bag that had toys, “blankie”, a couple of dummies and eight sterilised formula bottles, with four of them already filled with pre-boiled water, a can of formula and a few jars of baby food.

My mother on the other hand, had a suitcase to check-in, one mini suitcase to take on-board her handbag (of course) and most importantly her memory-foam pillow (aka VIP pillow) – for those who have never seen, tried or owned one of those things they are a little heavier than your regular pillow.

At the check-in counter, we were to find out that we had about six kilograms over the weight limit. And the very grumpy person at the counter was not going to allow any exceptions. This was a DISASTER!!! Left with no other choice we had to step aside, unpack, and take out things out of the suitcase. More of my clothes and shoes had to go out (luckily my husband was there to take them home). When re-weighed, we still had just over 2kg too much. No, there was no way I was taking out anything else. This was ok as long as we paid $150 per extra kilogram. Well, at least this worry was over; finally we got rid of our heavy luggage for the time being.

After saying goodbye to our loved ones too, and going through customs, we could not wait until the time when we could just take our seats on the plane. The little one was now very tired already; it was way past his bedtime, and he did not want to walk any more, and definitely had no patience to stand quietly in the endless queues before getting on-board. When I picked him up he was wriggling so much that he just slipped out of my arms. I tried to keep him entertained for a little while, playing little games and singing him songs, but it wasn’t long before he had enough of that too. When on his own two little feet and “off my spine”, he was running around everywhere between people and up and down the queue.

Did I mention I was also carrying a humongous “nappy bag”; a hand-bag that felt like it was full of bricks! I also had the other bag with all the toys and all other stuff in it… Now imagine chasing a toddler up and down a moving queue.

My mum, who already had her own carry-on luggage, a hand-bag, her VIP pillow and also suffers from a bad back. I tried my hardest not to let her help me with my bags or carry Milan, but she ended up doing both as there came moments when I thought my back was definitely going to break and I was on the edge of collapsing. It surely felt like we were never going to make it to our seats, but we were still able to laugh at ourselves in disbelieve. The even funnier part was walking between the narrow isles on the plane and taking our seats with all our hand luggage and Milan in arms.

AT LAST!!! I got Milan into his PJs gave him a bottle and wasn’t going to worry about brushing his teeth that night, and hoped he was tired enough to just fall asleep. But yet again, it wasn’t going to be that rosy! There was too much going on that was much more interesting than closing his eyes. How was he supposed to sleep in this very strange place far from his bedroom and cot?! It wasn’t until after lift-off, when the lights went out that he was finally K.O.

Part two to follow

Jan 29

The turquoise water
3 Comments

Sharing a rat’s nest – part 2*

(Part 1)

The yabby must have felt the noose and was starting a little dance to the left and right.  David followed the creature knowing that only his need for oxygen would shorten this battle. He backed it into a shallow side of a crack and placed one hand in their path while gently nudging it over with the loop. Then he grabbed it as it run right into his waiting hand. David pushed himself of the ground needing to get up now quickly to catch his breath.

The yabby was not impressed to be pulled out of his cave and splashed around on the surface. David held the lobster tight thankful for his thick gloves and pushed it through the slots of the lid into the mash bag. “A nice catch,” David thought looking at the yabby’s size. He’d be allowed to catch five more, but he’d probably only have the strength for two or three more dives today.

With his bag full David had returning to shore satisfied and tired. He’d found four more yabbies, but could only get three of them noosed and had to let go of the last one. The pain in his lungs had forced him to turn around and have a rest at the beach. The crustacean’s claws were scratching on the inside of the bucket. David had filled it with a bit of water and tied it back onto his penny-rack.

With the midday sun burning down it was time to find some shade. Mostly brushwood and thornbushes were covering the island that provided no shelter from the sun at all. There was one place, apart from the little settlement where the ferries landed, where David knew he’d find cover and have his lunch. That’s where he headed next. Squeaking up the hills past the lighthouse David was looking forward to the quick descend on the other side that would give him a cool breeze.

Here at the bottom of the lighthouse were a few remaining trees. David climbed off his bike and carefully leaned it against one of the trees; his cargo was too precious to let the bike tip. Sitting down he was already awaited by three little hungry fellows that hopped towards him. These little marsupials, called quokka, were native to the island and David knew they were expecting him to drop one or two crumbs of his sandwich.

Another group was stopping to find shelter under the trees.  They looked terribly overheated and struggled to climb off their bicycles. It wasn’t until one of them almost stumbled over one of the quokkas that they noticed the creatures. “Oh what’s that! It looks like a giant rat,” one of them said. Eyes turned to David who was eating his sandwich and had tried to ignore the quokkas and tourists alike. “They’re called quokka,” David said. “When a Dutch fleet landed here during the seventeenth century and found these marsupials the Dutch also mistook them for rats,” David said shooing a curious quokka away that was sniffing out his sandwich. “The Dutch then gave this island the name ‘rat’s nest’ and obviously people cottoned onto it and still call this place Rottnest Island.” David’s explanation was taken in with nodding and approval, but he had enough of sharing the shade and continued his trip back to the ferry.

He passed the salt lakes that were the last reminder of the island’s agrarian history where once salt was harvested and shipped to the mainland. Back at the settlement’s shops were now filled with tourists trying to find a place to rest and eat. On the way home on the ferry, with his bucket of yabbies between his legs and his hands folded in his lap, David already imagined how he’d cook the brown creatures at home, peel off their buck tails and dunk them into a nice tartar sauce.

*this story is a figment of my imagination

For your own visit of Rottnest Island:

← Older Entries
Newer Entries →