Melbourne (The City of Brides)

So I am currently staying in Melbourne with Barb, my honorary godmother, in a lovely one-storey (definitely could not describe it as a bungalow) house. Initially, I spent quite a bit of time enjoying the house and meeting Barb's grandchildren (Henry and Bridget, excellent names) and children, rather than exploring Melbourne. This was particularly the case on Thursday when it reached 39 degrees, followed by the hottest night since 1901.

However, I have now seen some more of Melbourne and am really enjoying it. I can't help but compare it to Perth and the contrast is very striking. Melbourne is a bustling city, much more cosmopoliatan with a big mixture of architecture (see below) and often feels quite European. This is partly because it has a ridiculous number of cafes and they seem to be full nearly all of the time. Perth, by comparison, has hardly any independent cafes and the architecture is really very similar all over.

Firstly, I did a tour of the 'laneways' of Melbourne, with lots of cafes, arty shops and old warehouses that have been made into various things. There's also a lot of street art or graffiti (depending on who you're talking to) with brides having their wedding photos next to them! You see these women dressed up in full wedding dresses crossing the road on a week day to have their photos done while their groom is on his phone texting, very strange. I then went to the Ian Potter Centre, which is all Austrlian art, as opposed to the gallery opposite which has International art. The Ian Potter Centre is an amazing building near the River Yarra. (Incidentally, the Yarra is very bendy and narrow when you consider how many boats do the Head of the Yarra and, apparently, it almost all bends one way - bad luck bowside over 9k!) I also went down to the beach and looked at the beach huts (bathing boxes here) with a view over the bay.

On Saturday, Barb gave me a tour through parts of Melbourne, which seemed to be a tour of bridal photos as well! To start, we wandered through the Botanic Gardens. These are really spectacular and very big, you would completely forget that you are in a city (two weddings). The War Memorial Shrine is very impressive as well, on the edge of the gardens and absolutely vast. We walked to the top and had a brilliant view over Melbourne. We then drove down to the sports area with some huge stadia, all very close to one another, where the Aussie Rules Football is a big deal, along with the Australian Open etc. Then, driving through the city, virtually every park, of which there are a lot, church and town hall, of which, again, there are a surprising number, had more brides.

We finished in Fitzroy, which is a suburb that was obviously once quite grand, as evidenced by the large and ornate town hall (more brides), but is now a bit more edgy. It has lots of independent shops, cafes and winebars, and reminded me quite a bit of London. All the shop facades were quite old and impressive with, again, various bits of street art.

Finally, today Barb and I went on a tour of architecture with courtyards. There were some extraordinary houses, particularly Robin Boyd's house in Wash Street. The house with bare brick inside reminded me of the tour we gave Barb of post-1970s Cambridge, when I'd last seen her.


Ian Potter building





Federation Square

 





A shop in Fitzroy



Fitzroy



Walsh Street



Walsh Street

 

Walsh Street



Victorian ironwork that is quite common



Edwardian style that is quite common





Bathing boxes on Brighton Beach



Flinders Street Station

 

Other than that, I've also managed to visit the Australian TF briefly, including a school. It happened to be on the very hot day and a strike was planned for the next day so attendance was low but there were still students outside the headmaster's office 'they're not allowed to throw water, so they were throwing milk'. I was lucky enough to watch a class and was vaguely reminded of Jonah... I also was lucky enough to visit the university's education faculty, through a friend of Barb's, which is linked with TfA and that was very interesting. Barb's daughter, Julia, showed me a bit of Melbourne's pub culture (I found out they do not call them halves, but a 'pot' or, in Sydney, a 'mini') and Barb and I went with a friend to the cinema as well (to see 'Argo', very tense), so all round I've been very busy and am very much enjoying Melbourne.