left-hand traffic

It still feels a bit like a vacation, a bit is an understatement. That will disappear as soon as I've been to work today. At the moment I'm still suffering from jet lag. Either that or I'm going through a depressive phase. At the moment I fall asleep at around 4 or 6 pm during the day and wake up at around 2 or 4 am and am in top form. That's just the way it is, it will pass as soon as I get back into the rhythm of work, I hope. In the meantime, I've arrived at an AirBnB accommodation and am sharing the house with Bime, a really nice hostess who is also an immigrant from America. To be precise, we don't bump into each other much, either she's at work or I'm sleeping or out on my bike. That's right, a bike, I bought one because the routes here in the suburbs are very long and I don't fancy the bus. But from the beginning. After I checked out of the hotel on Saturday, I took a cab to the AirBnB in the suburbs. We had written beforehand that it would be fine if I arrived early, which was fine with me as I wanted to do something. The cab driver was also an immigrant, from India, a big Trump fan and told me that Bill Gates bred gene-modified mosquitoes here in Australia and that there are only two genders. Sure man, I'm just saying seahorses, but I kept my mouth shut in the cab. The Australian government monitors everyone with cameras and sends tickets through cameras on the highways, even if you're not wearing a seatbelt. So much for the 20 minutes. Then I met Bime and she is wonderfully nice, as is everyone here, including the Indian cab driver. She showed me around and I settled into the small room. Then I was already on my way to the train station, on foot, Bime would have driven me too, but I wanted to walk and what can I say, it dragged on. Endlessly. Luckily Bime reminded me to bring sun cream, which I had almost forgotten. She said she gets sunburned here and she has very dark skin. I also forgot to put some cream on the back of my neck and what can I say? Burnt. I also missed the train by 3 minutes so I was condemned to sit around for a whole 27 minutes. When the next train finally arrived, the sun had also reached its peak and it was pleasant to get on the air-conditioned train. I went back to the hotel in the city, which didn't want to issue me with an invoice, not even this time, they referred me to the online portal, which didn't respond either. Anyway, I didn't have to be annoyed forever and then went to a bike store to look around and lo and behold I found what I was looking for in the 2nd shop at Indoorpooly (I love these names here). For the price, excellent, not much is broken if it gets stolen. By the way, everyone here tells me that there is a lot of theft. Bime and also Thomas, the bike salesman. In the bike store, I immediately noticed a salesman who, in my opinion, had an accent that I couldn't quite place. Not German, certainly not French, maybe Swiss? No, Thomas is Belgian and immigrated 13 years ago and he made the cheap bike even cheaper for me. I fitted the pannier rack and was ready to go. Thomas wanted to know what I was going to do tonight. I answered truthfully, sleep. He gave me another tip: Mount Coot-Tha nearby, which I had already chosen at home. 200 meters in altitude. Thomas's colleague doubted that I would make it by bike, I smiled and was already on my way, in left-hand traffic. And that demands full concentration from me. As soon as I'm distracted and turn off, I'm riding the wrong way. When I cross a road, I look to the right first, but also at oncoming traffic. That's still critical, so I drive very slowly and carefully. I drove at least the 14 km back to my AirBnB very slowly through the suburbs, accident-free. As soon as I got home, I wanted to do so much that I went to bed and woke up in the middle of the night in a cool room and stayed awake until the early morning. Well, I made a virtue of necessity and got on my bike early, had a look at the area, especially the two gyms from the outside, I think I already have one of them in mind and then I set off towards Mount Coot-Tha. I took a bike path along the motorway, it went up and down quite a bit and the cheap Klepper underneath me was whooping quite a bit. The motorway is quite busy, smells of exhaust fumes and is relatively loud. Things you also get on the fast cycle path towards the city. Anyway, at least no cars, only at some crossings, but a lot of cyclists. Mostly racing bikes and, more importantly, people don't say hello here. I cycled past small villages and various malls. I had to get used to the fact that everything here is fenced off. The motorway, the cycle path, the villages, the playground - everything is fenced in, sometimes the fence has a fence, that's how it feels here. City 20 km, city 10 km and city 5 km and then it was off to the left for me. And what can I say, up to Mount Coot-Tha and that was a serious climb in the now high sun. I sweated on the 3 km to the summit, was overtaken by racing cyclists from time to time, but only slowly, was probably okay on the way. After arriving at the restaurant and taking the obligatory photos of the beautiful view, I ordered a cake, mistake. I couldn't stomach the fat, my stomach immediately rumbled and I felt weak. The viewpoint was already well visited, lots of tourists, but everything was still at a bearable level. I also made the acquaintance of the local wildlife, here and there an unfamiliar animal scurried through the undergrowth. The way back dragged on and I stopped at a mall, I even found asparagus and fruit and vegetables actually seem to be cheaper in Australia than at home, the rest rather more expensive. How clever. I got what I wanted at Aldi and was back at my accommodation by the afternoon and what can I say, I fell asleep again straight away, I also had a stomach ache, still from the cake or from the unhealthy lifestyle at the moment? Anyway, I woke up in the middle of the night in top form again, so I had time to write these lines before I went straight to work! On that note.