Serendipity

.... picking up the story where I dropped it....

keep reading, there are some good stories this time!

as soon as I came back to Laurie after chatting with Morgan in the Sydney CBD, I made my way straight out of the city. Sydney's beautiful and exciting, no doubt, but no doubt I am NOT a city person either. After one week, I couldn't wait to get out of there and used the late Wednesday night to avoid the city traffic on my way south.

I found a hidden spot between a river and a tennis court when I got too tired to drive, and the next morning made my way to Sutherland, a little town a bit south of Sydney, where I ... spent a most exciting day in the library with the free WiFi...

I had 5 days until I was meant to arrive at a place in Kangaloon, which is another hour further south, to do some wwoofing (work for food&accommodation). The plan was to slowly explore things on the way there, but I didn't feel like being alone until then, so I decided to try to do some couchsurfing.

I wrote to some people in the area... and within half an hour, I got a lovely invitation from Chris from Bowral - just down the road from my wwoofing place in Kangaloon. :)

Happy and anticipated about soon meeting friendly sounding new people, I enjoyed the following day in a wonderful place called Stanwell Park - a little village on a pretty beach lying hidden and secluded behind surrounding hills.

Such a beautiful place! 

This day was a pretty good one.

Camping with a nice elderly French couple right next to the beach, waking up looking over the ocean.  The beach almost made me feel like I was in Buddina and eased my homesickness a bit. 

Sunbaking in the morning, a shower on the beach and drying in the warmth while painting on Laurie.

Bushwalks in the afternoon, with waterfalls, sunny bushtracks, getting lost, pretty views (and my first leech...urgghh).

Then driving in the evening sun, rushing over highways surrounded by forest towards Chris' house in Bowral.

And that house is so awesome... probably the flashest place I've ever stayed in, and certainly more than what you're expecting when you are couchsurfing. It was almost intimidating for me, but thanks to Chris' warm welcome, I very soon felt at home. Laurie even got a space in the big garage! Maybe for the first time in his car-life... ;)

On the back verandah, Chris and me sat in the hot bubbling water of his outdoor spa, under the stars, listening to music and sharing a wonderful conversation for hours until late in the night.

I went to bed feeling welcome and safe, happy, exhausted and with loads of interesting things to think about. I really felt like I scored!

Pictures from Stanwell Park

!!!!!!!!

So there is something that I definitely have to write about now!

You guys who have read the last blog post ("On the road again") know the story of my experience doing the blindfolded yoga at Wanderlust Festival, where we blindly had to find partners in the crowd of blindfolded yogis, then take our blindfolds off and stare into each other's eyes for a couple of minutes - being total strangers.

The following Sunday, the most random thing happened: I bumped into Suzanne, my "stranger" in front of a McDonald's in Mittagong, a little town about 1 hour south of Sydney.

 I was couchsurfing with Chris, who took me and a bunch of kids to a trampoline park and then for a snack to Maccas.

Suzanne and her folks, who usually live in Sydney, had been going for a weekend trip south in their campervan, and also stopped at the very same Maccas in Mittagong for a snack. At the same time I was standing outside waiting for Chris and the kids, they walked across the carpark and past me.

I smiled at Suzanne... as I would smile at anyone walking by, not recognizing her. 

She of course did, (luckily not everyone's got such a terrifiying memory for faces like me - I really mainly stared at her eyes that day!). She couldn't believe it and and quickly reminded me of our unusual first meeting, and with a proper look and a hug my memory was back, and I also couldn't believe the absolute serendipity of how we met for a second time.

In the quick chat we shared I learned that she had really enjoyed that unusal eye-staring-experience with a then-stranger, me, and that she hadn't felt uncomfortable at all! She remembered our very short conversation on that day just as well as I do. It was along the lines of

"I'm Annie, what's your name?"

"I'm Suzanne. Nice to meet you Annie."
"Yeah nice to meet you. You have very beautiful eyes."

"Your eyes are very dark."

As I already wrote in my last post, after this, we lost each other in the chatter of the excited crowd, and went our separate ways.

I thought the experience finished and how unlikely it would be to meet her again, but what I didn't know was that she kept on thinking about me the whole week after the Festival, wondering and worrying if I might have misunderstood the "you have very dark eyes" thing and be displeased and huffish about it. She even tried to find me on facebook to tell me that it was not meant in a bad way at all...

And then one week later she bumped into me in front of some random McDonald's.

As Chris suggested (and I certainly agree with him), the appropriate word for this would be serendipity. And - isn't it definitely just as much serendipity that I ended up at Chris' place at all? That I ended up at Penny's home, too? That they are so close together and their kids even attend the same school?
And just as a note on the side - Jarome, Dom's 14yo son, he has been living right here all this time before he went to live with his Dad last December. Without planning on it, I somehow ended up in just that village that used to be Jarome's home - among all those places in New South Wales...

Trampolines? Trampolines! Right, there was that Sunday trip with Chris, his two kids and his brother's two kids, to a hall full of trampolines in Moss Vale... what a childhood's dream?!
I was coming along, meant to be helping Chris with the "babysitting"... but it was more as if I was one more, too grown-up big kid. Who cares how old I am, I certainly had just as much fun as any 10 year old bouncing around in that springy paradise

And as you see, Chris did, too :D

Totally exploited sweaty and huffy puffy after less than one hour.. but happy. The kids were less inspired by having to pose for a photo... ;)

I didn't want to leave Chris' place, and Chris didn't want me to leave. This couchsurfing experience was, most definitely, exactly how it is meant to be. Probably even better. Within four days, I got to know and befriended one of the most interesting, kind and hospitable people I have ever met. Among lots of other things, I got given a book, I was being assured that this home would always be a "safe haven" for me if I should ever need it, and I got rained on by more praise than I could ever take, or properly return. Two strangers became great friends. Couchsurfing/ travelling at its best!
Thank you, Chris.

But, as I had already confirmed my wwoofing place in Kangaloon, with Penny and her family, Laurie and me left to see what this would be like.

Penny and her family live on a couple acres of beautiful soil, have a huge vegie garden, some 20 chooks, a hidden spring and a pond in the bush, a cat, a cow and a calf, and a beautiful palomino pony...
And for a few hours of gardening a day, I get fed well and healthy and have my very own shipping container to live in! A very liveable shipping container, I want to point out. Including kitchen, fridge, two beds, internet AND a wood stove!
And right outside the door are Laurie and Flossy, the pony. She is Ivy's pony (Penny's 11yo daughter) and both of them remind me very much of  the white pony I used to have and myself when I was younger, little her and me in the forest.
Flossy and Ivy at the Robertson Show.

While I'm gardening and pottering about with shears, rakes, shovels and wheelbarrow, I stuff my little travel speaker safely inside my hair and listen to A LOOOOOT of music...

I know the runner's going to tell you
there ain't no cowboy in my hair
so now he's buried by the daisies
so I could stay the tallest man, in your eyes babe

Run to the bedroom, in the suitcase on the left you'll find my favourite axe...
Don't look so frightened, this is just a passing phase, one of my bad days...

Who will love you? Who will fight? Who will fall far behind?

Boy, now you are really, really bugging

Yes you are bugging me

Can you just shut right up?

Your cup is overflowing

and you think it's empty.

You don't even know what side you are fighting for

boy, won't you turn your game boy off

stop pretending it's you against the world

I am sick, and I am tired of hearing you always say

"I really got a good excuse to complain

my parents got divorced, can't heal the pain"

Go take a step outside

see what's shakin' in the real world

I lose my wish to drown
and aimless flee
what you've thrown to lose
is still right here with me.