Flowers and Rejection

I took a walk to the botanic garden this morning, partly because I wanted to see it and partly because I wanted to call some wwoofing hosts without the threat of interruption from a goon sodden Irish type. That sounds a bit harsh, I know, but I'm a bit bothered about my stagnating travels here in Melbourne and an Irish girl in our room managed to conform to the drunk and thick stereotype of her kin by forgetting her key, banging on the door at 1am, then going back out after waking up her friend (and everybody else) to help find her phone, then banging on the door at 3am because she forgot her key. Also that age old annoyance of turning the light on when the room is trying to resume sleeping is a sure fire way to insure nobody gives you sympathy when you stumble out of bed, walk into a fan and then say you have a headache. I guess it's to be expected in such a 'hostel' environment? Ahahaha...

Needless to say the wwoofing thing isn't looking too rosy. I've emailed a few places and called a few more today with all replies being of the negative persuasion. I have answered a thread post on the wwoofing website so hopefully that will yield a result.

After those bouts of rejection on the phone I walked into the Anzac shrine, a huge war memorial near the botanic garden, and took my time walking around and admiring the place and having a chance to think about just what a stupid thing humans really are sometimes. The Last Post echoed through the building as I made my way to the balcony and I must say it is an odd feeling to walk around a place of remembrance like that after developing the notion that The Great War was little more than a massive waste of life.

You're right. I wouldn't be able to capture that bird in a shot like this again if I tried.

The pillar to the right was for WW2 servicemen as the main building was opened before Hitler started to act up. The flame on the ground in front of it was lit by Queen Elizabeth II

The view from the balcony

I also re-read some war poems that I haven't seen since I was in A Level English Lit. But the poetry books at college didn't have artwork quite like this...

Picture taking and walking ensued as I wandered through the botanic garden, it is a lot larger than the one in Sydney so it took a good few hours to wander the paths. The colours and scents are, as always, able to calm one's very soul as the sun warms the air, then gets blocked by cloud, then comes out aga... Nope back to cloudy. Such is melbourne's weather.

May be worth a watch?

Scratched into some bamboo, please don't turn it into one of those lame 'inspirational' posters!

This was 'The Wind In The Willows' which is a twice daily show, but it isn't free so I didn't see it.

That's an impressive tree

Note: Doesn't taste like lamb.

Not a bad way to spend a day, though a wwoofing job would have been nice, but I'm still waiting on a few replies so fingers crossed!