Day 279! After a late couple of nights, it was time to try and sleep in. Today consisted of running an errand and hanging out in the TV room. I also had my first Philly cheesesteak in quite some time! Overall it was a nice and relaxing day in Melbourne.

I woke up this morning around 9:30am and slowly made my way out of bed to get ready for the day. I definitely could have slept more and probably should have, but I also wanted to get the day going.

I went downstairs and made myself my usual breakfast but just as I sat down to eat, it was getting very close to 11am. 11am to 12pm is when the hostel staff clean the kitchen… so I had to scarf down my food so I could do my dishes before they started their cleaning.

After I ate, I made my way to the TV room with my book. I started with playing the guitar for a bit first, but then switched over to a bit of reading as well. It’s a really nice way to start the morning!

My friend Callum came into the room and turned on an Adam Sandler movie called Blended, which quickly took my attention. But I didn’t end up seeing it to the end as Immy and I wanted to go on our weekly Aldi run.

I ended up spending just under $50 for the week of food. I might need to come back for a thing or two but it’s still a really good price for a bunch of meals!

With the food I got, I went back to make myself some lunch. My friends Tia and Paris unfortunately left the hostel the other day… but they did leave me their bottle of mayo. So I made some tuna sandwiches.

Unfortunately, I didn’t realize the toaster was on the wrong setting… so two of my slices got burnt. But it was nothing my new big jar of hummus couldn’t fix!

I also had some crackers and hummus and a couple of clementines as well to finish off my meal.

After lunch, I received two missed calls from the manager at the gelato place. I did a trial shift there a few weeks ago and hadn’t heard anything since… so I was a bit surprised. I immediately called her back after I saw the missed calls and when she answered she asked, “is this the tree cutting service.”

I said, “what??”

And she repeated herself, to which I responded, “no… this is Elie, the guy that did a trial shift for you a few weeks ago.”

I could tell she was fairly uncomfortable on the other end of the line… but she apologized, said she got the numbers confused somehow, and then finally decided to tell me why they didn’t hire me. Apparently there weren’t enough hours for the position… who knows… but it was a very odd interaction.

I went back to the TV room where I found Callum watching the first episode of a Netflix series called Heartstopper. It’s a teen coming of age show about some high schoolers figuring out their sexuality. It’s a very good show and I was pretty hooked on it… we eventually watched all of the first season throughout the rest of the day.

But before we did that, my friend Charlie asked if I wanted to go get cheep beer and Philly cheesesteaks at a nearby pub. Even though I just got groceries, I wanted another excuse to leave the hostel and I also wanted to enjoy a nice meal that I didn’t have to cook. So Callum, Charlie, and I headed out into the cold and over to the pub.

We went to a pub called the Catfish. On Mondays it has $10 Philly cheesesteaks and $9 lagers. So we enjoyed a beer, a sandwich, and nice chatter.

The chatter didn’t stop here, we went back to the TV room for movie night and watched the movie Sing! I somehow hadn’t seen this movie before and it ended up being way better than I expected.

After the movie though, we got into a good, civil conversation about politics and government systems in Australia, England, and the US. Now granted that we’re all travelers, it was easy for all of us to agree and keep it civil, but it was still nice to see this type of conversation stay that way. And it’s one of the reasons I love traveling so much! I really enjoy getting to hear new perspective on different topics.

I didn’t do a ton today, but it was still a very enjoyable day! The next couple of days will be a bit lowkey and I have intentions on doing some more planning as to my next moves in Australia!

– Elie