Crossing the road.

I arrive in Melbourne to the best coffee of my life. It's 6:30am and it's still dark, I withdraw some money from the cash machine and make my first Australian purchase: a flat white. Don't say a white coffee here or they'll get mad, it's a flat white. It was gloriously smooth. I thought it was a product of my two days of travelling that made me enjoy it so much. As it turns out that's just coffee in Melbourne. Back home I hardly ever drink it, today I'm on my second and it's only half eleven.

I get the skybus into town as the sun was rising over fields of green and gold. A verdant landscape stretches into forever from either side of the bus. Trees line the road, interlocking branches forming a tunnel that we speed through. They are, I later discover, Red River Gums, a form of Eucalyptus and the most common tree in Australia. We pass over a railway and a streak of silver flashes in the sun, straight as an arrow, heading for the horizon. We pass through an industrial suburb. Lines of small coloured boxes form buildings and offices along the edges of roads. I start to see trams criss-crossing the streets.

I am so excited at this point that I can barely sit still. There is a huge grin on my face, anyone on the tram must think I'm some sort of crazy. I can't even listen to my music. I don't want to be distracted. I don't want to miss out on anything around me. Instead I listen to the bad electro-pop playing in the background of the welcome to Australia video. I love it.

Around the land is green and the sky is clear and blue. Then we turn a corner and I see the city, silver towers shining in the distance, and I know Amy is waiting for me. My friend on the other side of the world. We pass under a bridge and huge blocks of red and yellow form a sculpture over the road. I love the architecture here, there is so much variety. Patches of colour abound. On one side there are trees; Eucalyptus and pine and London plane, interspersed between churches and rows of houses. On the other there are huge cranes and a power converter for the national grid. What looks like a huge incomplete Ferris wheel looms over Costco.

 Apparently it's Melbourne's response to the London Eye but it was never completed. I see a stretch hummer pass us at half past seven. Who needs a stretch hummer at half past seven? I look out the other window and there is another one, but even bigger. And bright pink. I see trains and realise we are approaching Southern Cross station, our destination. And Amy. We pull in and I get out of the bus and who do I find waiting to meet me?

The Queen.

She is everywhere, all over the money. Now the money is extremely odd. It's as if someone has tried to re-create British money without ever actually seeing it, only hearing descriptions. The 50 cent coin has far too many sides, the 10 cent is a bit too small and I'm pretty sure they've forgotten about the 20 altogether. And bizarrely $2 coins are like $1 coins but slightly smaller. I think the dollar feels less weighty too, but that's probably just me. Give me a pound any day.

The song 'Oh my god I can't believe it, I've never been this far away from home' rattles round my head while I frantically look from side to side like some sort of meerkat, trying to find the face I'm looking for. Eventually she arrives and we do the classic run and hug.

We spend the day around Melbourne, me taking in the sights like the tourist I am. I decide that I love the city. There are interesting buildings everywhere and (for now) it is sunny and warm. It feels like early June back home which considering we're in the final vestiges of winter is pretty good going.
Within four hours of being in Australia I get roped into a street performers show. I am made to wear an afro wig and do silly dances. I left Edinburgh fringe festival and flew to the far side of the world only to get instantly caught up in street comedy. What is the point.

Melbourne is a city of wide tree-lined streets with trams gliding through the middle and of tall narrow alleys covered head to toe in graffiti. Apparently these are set aside specifically for that purpose. And the trees are almost all London plane which greatly excites me. These trees are much planted in cities due to their high tolerance of atmospheric pollution and are so named because they abound in our capital. In some aspects Melbourne feels surprisingly similar to back home. The wind for example reminds me of Edinburgh. Biting and cold. And when the sun goes behind a cloud (yes it does happen here) it is freezing. It's cloudy today and I'm wearing three whole layers!

We have lunch squeezed onto a tiny table in a small café up an alleyway. It's lovely. The food is amazing. The tea is amazing. I discover that the Australians call peppers capsicums and nearly have a fit. Amy tells me they also call pepper spray capsicum spray which I guess follows but I still find it hilarious. As it turns out Capsicum is the name of the genus to which both sweet and chilli peppers belong. I guess it makes sense.

The strangest thing I have found so far though is crossing the road. There are a surprising number of differences involved in this seemingly simple task. Firstly I am told that jay-walking is a crime, I'd like to see them try and introduce that one in Edinburgh. Secondly here the red man flashes not the green. Thirdly is crossing the road in the rain (yes that happens too). All the Australians freak out. There is often a covering over part of the pavement so you only need to get wet when crossing from one pavement to another. When this happens they all wait under the edge of the cover in a huge mass a good three meters back from the edge of the road. Meanwhile I stand like a true Scotsman on the kerb getting soaked. Then as soon as the green man turns on there is a mad dash where they all run at top speed across the road until they are under the cover at the other side.

But the strangest thing of all is the noise the crossings make. There are two options here. The first one I call the Star Wars Droid. The crossing makes a sudden shooting noise, reminiscent of a laser beam, followed by what I can only describe as the noise of a small droid walking quickly. A sort of buh-buh-buh-buh-buh-buh-buh. The second one is much more stressful. You can hear the crossings building up to it. There is a sort of ticking as if someone is winding a crank up to breaking point. Then it is released and suddenly there are clappers going off all around. It is almost like the sound the old departure boards used to make in railway stations. When each letter was on a different tile and they would spin round and clatter whenever the information changed. Only that sound is gentle and nostalgic. This is not. They might as well have someone screaming 'Cross the road!' right in your ear.

We have a drink in a bar on the top of a building. Ten dollars for a pint. Classic. Some things are so expensive over here and alcohol is one of them. Some are surprisingly cheap, the trams for example. At the weekend it's impossible to spend more than £2 travelling around the city, and that covers trams trains and buses. Also eating out really isn't that pricey either, especially considering how nice all the food seems to be.

It's hard to believe that I truly am this far away from home. I wander around town by myself listening to 'Sailor Song' (First Aid Kit again, what am I like) and decide that it seems a pretty good place to live. I have an Australian SIM card now and a bank account and a flat. Just a job to go then I guess I'll be officially settled in. Whether I'll feel settled or not remains to be seen, but I reckon I will. Despite all these things it is still hard to comprehend that I will be away for so long. And that I am actually in Australia. It almost feels like I'm just visiting Amy for a weekend in England somewhere. Until I have to cross the road.

And the afternoon embraces you like a million worried hands,
And I want to look forward go discover foreign land