You know you had been in Australia for a long time when a AUS$ 5.50 cup of coffee feels cheap and affordable to you.
Just felt like yesterday when it hurts to spend $3.50 for an ice-cream. Man is indeed a very easily adaptable fellow.
Come to think of it, I had been away from home for the longest time in my life - a total of 9 months. In this 9 months I had assimilate pretty well into the Australian culture, starting to appreciate their unique holidays, passions and obsessions. For example, where else in the world where there is a public holiday just for horse racing? The first Tuesday of November is exclusively horse-work only, where the whole city are glued to the TV for the 3pm Melbourne Cup race. In just around 3 minutes, fortunes are to be made and lost as the horses galloped away to the finishing line.
I had also widen my interests in sports in this city rated as the most 'Sports Mad' city in the world, gaining an appreciation for seemingly obscure sports from a Malaysian viewpoint such as Australian Rules Footy, Rugby and most recently Cricket. A few months ago it is hard to fathom me sitting in front of the tellie for succesive afternoons trying to figure out what the heck is runs and wickets about. But now...cricket is fast entering into my repertoire of must watch sports.
Oh yeah..Australian Idol. At last it finished. Been faithful to the TV show since the first day and it is somewhat a relief to see it finish, coz it had been a long 16 Sundays. The results somewhat surprises me coz its an Irishman that won the coveted Idol instead of a local girl. I conced the Irish guy had slightly superior vocals, but the ability of normal Australians to differentiate between talent and nationality is amazing. Heck, he had been to Aussie roughly the same duration I had been here... wonder how will he fare in Malaysian Idol. I guess he wouldn't even pass selection.. cannot speak Malay language bah!
Well, sometimes studying outside your home country can really open your eyes and alter your perceptions about how you see your own country. As roughly translated from a Chinese saying, the view from outside is always clearer. Since being here, I had noticed some glaring deficiencies as well as some good points about Malaysia that I never realised before, even though the deficiencies somewhat outweigh the good points a little bit. It is tempting to adopt Melbourne as my home after I graduate, but in the end, it is more rewarding to go back to Malaysia to change it for the better. No matter how far or deviating the branches reach, the roots will always stay firm on the ground it germinates.
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