On the 2nd of October, we got to visit with the lovely Pam Conrow, sister-in-law to my Great Uncle Brown.  Uncle Brown was born in the US, but his family moved to Australia when he was still an infant.  He remained here until he was 25, and then returned to the US to find work (and also found my Aunt Claire!).  In learning about our move, Aunt Claire and Uncle Brown were ecstatic, and they passed along the information for Uncle Brown’s family that remains here in Oz.  Pam is the wife of his older brother, Robert, and resides about 45 minutes northwest in Castle Hill.  There are other family members in the Central Coast that we have yet to meet but hope to contact sometime soon, now that we’re more settled.

Leave a CommentPam and Andrea outside of Pam’s house

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Aunt Claire and Uncle Brown, doing the bridge climb on a past visit to Sydney… A Photo Booth reproduction of a print they recently sent me in the mail.

It’s amazing to me that there are family ties, even in far-flung regions of the world.

It was High Zero weekend, and we were feeling super sad about missing what we both consider to be the most magical occasion of the year in Baltimore.  The usual four days of performances had turned to six, and we could only witness through FB the festival that had been our steady work and haunt for the past however many years.  There was no way, we felt, that Sydney could ever measure up…

And then, we stumbled upon a back-alleys and streets party billed as part of the Festival for Free Spaces, a wild, month-long homage to freedom of expression, neon, and well, straight-up weirdness.  From junk bands to solar-powered rubbish can sound-systems, chalk graffiti to face paint, this back-alley Newtown party took over the King Street in a rain drenched ode to joy.  It was like the High Zero Fells Point parade, only massive.  And most bizarre, coming from a town like Baltimore where an event like this would be populated by our friends, we didn’t know a single soul.

So who were those weirdos anyway?  Perhaps we need to move to the Inner West to find out…

P.S.–Baltimore, we still think you’re tops.

Gorgeous sea-side walk from Coogee Beach to Bronte Beach, 18th Sept.