I cannot speak for all of humanity but there comes a point in life where one questions their purpose of existence. Some are homemakers taking care of families, some choose high powered careers to work toward, some even try to save endangered species and then there is that small minority of people who coast along with any opportunity as long as they can drink or smoke their problems away afterward.

What about the person who wants to do it all but ends up doing nothing?

(10) Lost In The Woods

When I was seven or eight, I made up a game I used to frequently play with my younger siblings and neighborhood children. The gist of the game was disappearing from parental supervision into whatever surrounding woods we had close to home and pretend we had no parents and were children left to live in the forest. We would find empty water bottles and cracked dishes in the woods and food (onion grass and berries) in order to stay alive in the forest. Almost every time we played there was a stolen pot from our mom’s kitchen and we would throw in grass, berries, leaves and colorful flowers and make our favorite dish – Stone Soup.
Call me a little suburban hippie child but I truly loved that game and the past 6 days truly reminded me of my childhood tendencies.
Sam took us to a little town a few hours from Melbourne called Mathoura. There had been a huge party at the Sharehouse on Friday night (I played bartender) and the boys wanted to detox after the stress and wearisome effort of throwing such an amazing party. The party was an incredibly interesting experience. You had a couple teenagers, one man who was in his late sixties, a large MILF crowd and then a heap of 20 – 30’s in the diverse crowd. I connected with a few really cool people who gave me their business cards with promises of fun nights, private parties, job offers and one guy even wanted me to be a model (!) but I think that was the booze talking (although I did look hot).
Moving on now, early Tuesday morning – about 11 AM, the car was packed to the gills with camping gear (Sam has every kind of camping chachka) and we head off into the sunset (literally by the time we left it was about that time) and we made our way to our new home.
Turns out our new home is right on the Murray River and we are about 25 kilometers from the nearest main road or gas station. This was totally awesome because you’re in complete seclusion and you have the quiet company of the huge Red Gum trees. We saw hundreds of wild kangaroo which are so cute and when I tell you the sky was something magical at night, I am not exaggerating. There are no lights for miles around so when you lay down and look at the stars at night there are millions of them and they are all sparkling brightly and winking down at you like they are enjoying the warmth of the fire with you.
We took little day trips as well to little local towns, sometimes to fill up on random supplies and one time I got lucky and we got ice cream! We prepared a lot of awesome meals on our little gas stove and everyone had a favorite tree where they went to the bathroom armed with baby wipes. You have not had a true camping experience until you have gone to the bathroom outside consistently for 6 days.
It liberates you.
That’s the thing about camping out though. Reducing the amount of materialistic items and unnatural aspects of life diminishes distraction. You have more time to think of yourself. Suddenly trivial things don’t matter as much and you just have all this time to get to know the people you’re with and the only task at hand is to keep the energy warm and vibrant.
Enough of that hippie shit. We left our little village on Sunday morning and it started to rain which created a slight problem for our little traction-less Toyota. The car even bogged down with camping gear started to fishtail on the muddy dirt roads. Eventually we came to a complete stop when the car slipped off a bridge leaving one tire was hanging off the bridge and the rest of the car sitting patiently.
Sam got out immediately and started off running in the direction of the main road. Dovi and I looked at each other and the same thought crossed our minds. The main road was at least 20 kilometers from where we were, so we had plenty of time on our hands. Dovi reckoned he would take a walk but I opted to read a book and started giggling to myself all cozy and warm in the car when it started raining again. I know – I’m a bad person.
By the time Dovi came back (soaked) a pick up truck came up behind us. Now this guy John was a true Blue Aussie and plainly told us that he would not rest that day until we were safe and sound on the main road. Long story short, he rescued us and picked up Sam on the way to town for rope and also spent almost two hours escorting us back to the main road in order to make sure we got there safely.
I love the Aussies.
Well, now we’re back in civilization and I must say the hot shower felt wonderful and it’s nice to be back in touch with friends.
Tomorrow we go to Sydney for the next adventure……

(9) Do Your Time At The Cellblock!

Bundaberg which has begun and ended was the most intense experience I have had as of yet in Australia.



Allow me to begin.



The 21 hour bus ride passed pretty easily. We met a couple new friends, one being a guy who just got out of jail for armed robbery (who seemed really nice but we dropped him off halfway to Bundaberg) but the other two were Emma from England and Lindsey from Ireland who were in the same position as us and needed to find work. The two bus drivers, apparently needing to compensate for lack of power or control in their life, demanded the bus passengers act in accordance with military school guidelines. No legs in the aisle, no smoking or drinking, beware if I find you with so much as a toe in the aisle and we will kick you off this bus before you can say "I'm an asshole".



Nevermind that. We arrived in the fair city of Bundaberg (fair being the overstatement of the century) with the intention of staying in a working hostel. A working hostel provides backpackers with a room, bathroom, kitchen and a farm to work on. Well, we arrived at City Hostel only to find the office was closed for the next few hours and the four of us (The two girls joined us) were sitting outside in the sunshine trying to shake off the remnants of sleep, dirt and starvation.



Eugene showed up shortly after, a pot-bellied and angry looking man and demanded to know why we were occupying space on his property.



"We were told to come here for work, sir." I replied as politely as possible. He checks his watch impatiently and told us we will have to wait because he is a busy man and he will come back and check us in after he picks up some backpackers from a nearby farm.



"No problem," I oozed with a huge sarcastic smile. I had turned into the spokeswoman for the group. As soon as he runs into the office with his large behind wagging behind him, we all turn to each other with horrified looks on our faces - it was pretty comical.

We whisper amongst ourselves and decide to check out our other options while Eugene is away picking up backpackers. He comes back and barks that he can service us now but it has to be quick.

"You know Eugene, we're going to wait for a fourth friend so you can go..." I say sweetly. Eugene looks at us suspiciously and warns us not to be fishing around for a better place. Then he finally leaves and we pack our bags to go to the next hostel which is supposed to encourage drinking and have better management.

We strap on our two ton backpacks and walk the 4 blocks to the Cellblock.

Let me just paint the picture for you...

There is a pool on the side with shrieks of laughter eminating from the bar area and topless boys walking around with jugs of beer at 11 in the morning.

We checked in as quickly as possible and inquired about work (they had work for us) and then got straight down to the important business of donning our bathing suits.

I started this article last week and now I'm too lazy to finish in detail but the extent of the rest of my stay in Bundaberg and the Cellblock was tres interesting. I met a lot of cool travelers from germany, England, Ireland, Holland and Canadia. No Americans.

I worked in a packing warehouse on a tomato farm sorting and packing tomatoes - not very exciting. The next day I was assigned to work on a sugar cane farm and it was the most back breaking work I have ever done. We spent eight hours a day cleaning the sugar cane sticks from the fields so the farmer could replant. The sun was baking down on us, the dry dust was sticking to my clothes, boots, skin - there was seriously dust in almost every opening in my body.

I worked with two other girls, one French and one German both of whom were super nice and sweet and we got to know each other a bit but my favorite was Carlos.

Carlos is an import from Africa. He is part Portuguese which explains his whiteness but he left Angola, Africa when he was 16 during a civil war. his family fled to South Africa and had to live in the desert for days with no food or water. He's traveled to Asia and then to Australia where he's been living for 21 years. He was our supervisor on the farm and regaled us with numerous stories of his childhood and stories of an Indian doctor who grew cocaine in an underground lab and killed his father with a botched operation.

Carlos kept the work interesting and fun so the fact that my hamstrings and back were sobbing with pain by the time 3:30 rolled around wasn't so much of a bother. And for the two days I did this work, let me just tell you how good you feel when you're done. It's meditative work, honest work and good for the soul.

Anyway, we were getting calls from Melbourne during this time from the Sharehouse, telling us about a crazy party and then a week long camping trip, almost entirely paid for if we flew our little rear ends back to Victoria (That's the state). Dovi and I were planning to try out Sydney because we decided the environnment at the hostel was too much drinking and partying and we wanted to find jobs that weren't back breaking and paid more.

I had managed to continue running, I found a small park on the river across the street from the hostel and was doing about 5K a day but no yoga. There was no quiet place for me to practice yoga and after a week at the Cellblock (it's called that because it used to be a jail before being transformed into a backpackers farming brokerage. Seriously the managers brokered backpackers out to farmers like they were refinancing mortgages.) we decided to make the trip to the internet cafe to book a ticket to Sydney after work.

As it happens we received yet another phone call from the sly Sam and Company who persuaded my traveling partner Dovi to change course.

So after thanking the quirky Aussie nerd manning the internet hub, we were granted a connection and tickets to Melbourne were booked (do not ask how I am paying for things, small amounts of money are just coming from G-d somehow) and a train ride and flight ensued.

A nice day stop in Brisbane and a lucky find of 7-11 slurpees there, Dovi and I found ourselves in transition to a new experience....Melbourne, we're coming back!

(8) Initiated into Backpackerhood

Apparently there has been a "cold front" for all the crops in Queensland. The farms that we are supposed to be working at are all delayed by 2 -3 weeks and that means work is delayed and that means money is delayed.
No matter. Dovi and I harassed the Harvest Trails hot line every hour or so until we got a farm who had space for us! We are pretty much done with Cairns so as soon as the farm confirmed with us we rushed to book a bus ticket. The previous evening had not been so successfull. We met up with a group of 5 English guys who had fork burns on their stomachs from "Who is the most manly" type of games. It was a little depressing to sit their and watch them time their friend stick his hand in a bowl of ice for 5 minutes so we left and went to bed early. It's a good thing too because it is sunny and beautiful and there were so many more interesting people to meet! Two French guys throwing a football around, a cute Asian girl and even poor Margaret who is a 70 year old (I am not kidding) backpacker. She's been backpacking for 22 years....

Last night Dovi convinced me that we should have a BBQ (they have them available right on the Lagoon) and he ended up having a lot of extra meat. We noticed a group of backpackers sitting at a nearby table drinking Goon (cheap boxed wine) out of McDonalds cups so we invited them to finish off the lot.

Little did we know that this diverse mix were loud, fun and genuinely uncaring of consequence were going to initiate us into the official hood of Backpackerism. They taught us about Goon, rollies and how to meet the cool people. We all ended up meeting a bunch of guys also throwing a BBQ who offered to move the party to their house nearby which we did (don't worry it was like 7 against 3).

The girls were wasted and cracking funnier and dirtier jokes (I chose not to drink the nasty looking Goon). We arrived at their house and I indulged in a beer. The guys whose house it was started twirling fire batons and started a bonfire in the yard. Aimee, the loudest and funniest of the English girls was making self deprecating jokes about her black bank statements and Annie, the hippie from Washington State was creating rollies every couple minutes. Rollies, btw are hand rolled cigarettes - a backpacker special....

Cont....

After saying good bye to our new found friends it was time to say good bye and move on to a place where we could find work. So we booked a 21 hour bus ride to Bundaberg, packed a huge load of food and began making our way to Backpackerhood.

(7) The Lagoons of Cairns - Sunny Skies and Cute Guys!!!

Now where did I leave off? I know I have become such a space cadet because nothing matters anymore - there is no such thing as time, you live by the sun. If you don't like one place, you leave and you move on to the next one.

I will fill you in on MINIMAL details of the weekend before I left. If you notice I have been quite preoccupied in the past few days. What is today anyway....? So I spent a lot of time with a certain individual that we decided to call Sam. Sam and I hit it off and in perfect conjunction with the Universe, I flew off to Cairns last night. If anyone wants the juicy details, you will have to e-mail me because they are unbloggable.... ;-)

We arrived into Cairns at about 1 AM and went to the only open hostel which was really big, really expensive and the snooty German in his mid-20's didn't seem to be interested in helping us. He did provide us with info regarding jobs though. Dovi and I want to go up about 200 miles from Cairns to find a farm to work at. But I digress....this morning we quickly bounced out of there because there didn't seem to be such cool backpackers there anyway. Thank G-d we did because we stumbled across this amazing hostel right on the beach which YOUNG people and a much more chillin vibe.

The beach in Cairns City is actually a Lagoon. I haven't asked about it yet but it seems as if when it's low tide there is no water for about a miles out - it's like marshy almost. If anyway saw the Tsunami movie, it looks exactly like how Thailand looked right before the huge wave crashed. But it's cool because this evening, the high tide came in and there is a beach!

Dovi and I decided to explore today. We wandered around, spoke to some locals (Aborigians, the original Native Australians) and got on a bus to head to "the most beautiful beach in Cairns". Palm Cove was a tiny little town with resort hotels and a clean beach....the water was too cold so we ended up just chilling and then (YAY!) Dovi and started doing Yoga on the beach for the amused and reserved Australians....

This feeling of freedom is more than anything I've ever experienced. Dovi and I were trying to define it...it's not quite bliss but it's this surreal otherlife type of feeling. We have nowhere to be, no responsibility except to feed ourselves and provide ourselves with shelter (and carry our lives on our backs). I do feel myself changing. Even back in Melbourne, my mind is constantly opening and my heart is just becoming more and more filled with love for people.

You meet new people, you add a new perspective to that little brain of yours. What would have happened to my mind had I stayed in one place for to much time????

Of course, that is not an option for me. When you live in a world with so much opportunity and so much freedom, I cannot help but take advantage.

Now it's dinner time and hostel guests get a free dinner at the bar when you buy a drink.

I told you everything is backwards here!

(6) Desperate Men and How to Deal

Well, I am sorry to say that I went out with someone more for the fun of it and to test the waters. I have been abstinent for almost 4 months and I really wanted to know where I am holding in that area.

Well, it happened a few nights ago when I was chilling with one of the dancers on Sam's dance crew and we happened to get into conversation and we really connected. Sam and Co. (his brothers) warned me about him but I thought perhaps they may just not really know him.

Well for one thing, once he had my number my phone was blowing up with text messages and phone calls and being that I'm leaving on Monday, I figured Ray just wanted to get a chance to hang before I left.

Shows how much I know about not-so-hidden signals....I need to get my radar checked because last night was a worse disaster than Mr. Pretentious from last week.

I am feeling really amazing and open and Sam has been taking me to yoga every day so I'm in a good place and I agree to a date for last night.

Well Ray picks me up in a cab and we head off to Chapel street (he is Israeli and is studying/working here and arrived five months ago) which is the only place we really know where to go.

Well, I was completely unprepared for what he told me after the cab dropped us off and we were strolling down the avenue.

"You know I need to tell you something," he says with his Israeli accent. He is taller than me and very thin with a real charming personality.

" I feel like since I let you know that I like you, you feel like you have the power and you're in control."

Needless to say, I did not agree at all with that (I know I can be a little controlling at times but this was not the case in this situation).

"Ray, I have had many bad experiences with men and I have not been with anyone in a long time," I explained as patiently as possible. "I need to be cautious with who I am with because I have a habit of making bad decisions when it comes to men."

"Well, I am not just any man," he shoots back.

Well, I won't bore you with any more useless dialogue but after almost a half an hour of trying to get him to explain that I didn't miss him that day because I don't KNOW HIM WELL ENOUGH, I just said,

"Look, I just met you, let's enjoy the evening and we'll see how it goes." Sounds rational, yes?

Well, we share a bottle of wine and talk about this and that and then we leave once the bottle is finished.

Well by that time, I knew I wanted to go home, get back into sweatpants and josh around with the brothers. Too bad that is when he decided to kiss me (I won't lie - I did indulge a bit) and after a little of that, I begged off that I was too tired to go to another place and I needed to go to sleep.

For those of you who know me well, midnight on a Friday night is not a time when I want to be heading to bed. I am usually good and ready to shout, shout and let it all out (well, not all of it).
It even sounded so false to my ears that "I have yoga and running tomorrow and I am so so so tired because I usually go to bed at ten". It sounded convincing to him though and after almost 30 minutes of asking to go home and then (like and idiot) promising to go out with him again - even though I am doing so with gritted teeth, we get a cab and I get dropped off.

The brothers are surprised to see me so early and they invited me to share some roasted potatoes and they want to hear about my night. All three of them share their comments and then my phone starts vibrating and I have two text messages and three missed calls from him.

Guys, I just left the dude under an hour ago - this is not normal. But I feel bad because he just took me out so I call him back and say good night.

Today was shopping day! Dovi and I bought backpacks, sleeping bags, flashlights - even thermals and a spiffy Swiss Army knife. I couldn't even handle the seven missed phone calls and eight unanswered texts (I am not exaggerating the numbers) and even as I am writing this I just received another one.

I do know that begging off that I am sick will not work and I believe that honesty is always the best policy. Ray, you are coming on way too strong, you are scaring me, I need space, I do not want to hang out tonight. I just need to gather the balls to say this though.

Other than the crappy dating experiences (I am done with it, I am not ready for a guy, I want to backpack, travel and not be held down) life is great! The past few nights have been so chilled. I am teaching basic yoga to the brothers who are very enthusiastic and we spend a lot of time in discussion (I will admit there is almost always a lit joint around). I feel like they are the older brothers I've never had. They treat me like a sister and I feel safe around them - probably due to the family dynamic.

All in all ladies and gents, I now have had my first stalker experience and a very big wake up call that I am not in any way interested in pursuing anything other than friendly connections.

Hear Hear!

(5) A Tornado Hits....

WHEW!

I have not expected events to change as they did. It's interesting how much power one person has - and I'm not talking about me.

The "Invisible Brother" arrived last night. We'll call him Sam for privacy purposes. Well Sam has been in Sydney for a week so I did not meet him until yesterday. Sam is one of my brother-in-laws brothers, about 30 years old, long hair and an extremely vibrant energy. Very intelligent, very philosophical and very intense.

But still with all these qualities happens to be a very amiable chap and we hit it off which I am relieved about since the younger brothers have not stopped talking about him and every other sentence its "Sam this" and "Sam that".

Let me get to the dirt. Sam comes home from Sydney and changes the entire energy in the house. Instead of this being a crackhead sharehouse it is now a more sophisticated center for an older crowd, sharper and wittier men. Yes, there are men parading in and out of the house for me to converse with, argue and debate and there is plenty of drinking and pot to go around.

I have taken a puff here and there, no hard drinking though and I find that the weed here is not to my taste. Besides, it's even fun to be sober here now. Things have changed drastically - I no longer feel alone, Sam is a total trip and even saying one sentence to him besides 'Good morning' will spur a full on philisophical debate.

I had a conversation with a cute Israeli guy last night who shared his story with me and we totally connected. He 'dug my vibe' shall we say...Ray has been in Aussie for five months studying at Uni (as University is called here) and working in random coffee houses. He experienced the same type of loneliness since arriving and also was into hard drugs in Israel before going clean.

Nevertheless, he invited me out to chill this weekend before my trip to Cairns and I will definitely be taking him up on his offer.

After haggling over moral subjectivity and the difference between animals and plants, I went to bed last night with a mindful of new perspectives to ponder and a satiated feeling of human connection.

I woke up early and Sam took me to a fabulous park with a beautiful lake.

"It's a complete 5K around (3 miles) and then we'll grab a coffee," Apparently in Australia, little Lululemon shorts and a tight, tight sleeveless Lulu top was no indication of one's sexual preference. He had no qualms about how he looked and after some stretching we began our run.

It was beautiful. I was smiling the whole time even as cramps hit and I pushed myself to run the entire way (Sam ran ahead of me but then tired before the finish line, I kept a slow pace). After the run we sat down at a little cafe for some coffee and tea and the topic of faith, Western spiritual cannibalism and Torah were discussed.

Friends, the shit that was coming out of his mouth was something unheard of to me! He has a total view of Love and Fear. Choosing to utilize his brains and energy to enjoy life, this guy could be a professor, lawyer or doctor - anything he chooses. He chooses to start a dance company that is hired out for parties and bar mitzvah's.

Craziness you would say? He does not agree or care. He just wants to chill, party and enjoy life as he sees fit.

I did suggest Yoga which we will be going to this afternoon (alas! he has a car...).

As happy as I am to meet 'soul' people as Sam calls it and to connect with people who appreciate my lifestyle choice of love and spirituality, I am still excited to get up to Cairns where it will be warmer (it's about 60 degrees here) and I will meet other travelers.

I suppose any place you go whether it may a different country, continent or simply another person's home, you need to be aware of how you are judging and what your judgement is based on.

Meeting new people and looking at their perspectives with an open mind is truly what molds you as an evolved human being. Not necessarily do you have to adopt their point of view but it never hurts to be educated.

And the journey of growth continues....!