AUSTRALIA OPENS WITH OPERA

Photo by Vidar Nordli-Mathisen on Unsplash

Thank you for reading along with my journey to Australia when I was 20 years old and had all the good sense of a goose.

The memoir continues...

From Fiji, it was just a hop, skip and a jump to make it across the ocean to Australia. I had no idea what to expect when I got there, but one thing was for sure, I hadn't planned on opera.

Landing in the airport at Sydney, the border control guard said, “Step this way, please.” His accent was so strong and so nasal, to be honest, I had no idea what he said. I must have looked like a deer caught in the headlights.

“STEP.THIS. WAY. PLEEEEZE!”

Oh, OK, got it! Perhaps he used gestures as well to get the message across.

I had flown roughly 8,000 miles from Canada, to arrive with as much preparation as if I had gone down the road for an overnight stay. I didn't even have a proper knapsack. All I had was my little overnight suitcase, and of course, the all-important telephone number of my friend's mother, who lived in Sydney.

It never occurred to me that she might not be home when I called, or that she might not be welcoming, or if she even knew to expect me. I had the lifeline of her phone number, and it never crossed my mind that it wouldn't work out. The one human being in the whole continent that I could call, might or might not even be home!

If that's not innocence, bordering on stupidity, I don't know what is!

In fact, my first few hours in Sydney were like landing on the moon, except without an astronaut's suit. It was thrillingly different from anything I'd ever experienced. The noise, the hubbub, the strange accents. It was the biggest city I'd ever been in all of my life. It was immense. It made my living in Calgary look like being in a village.

Naturally, I had to find a place to stay. So where did I go? A hotel? That would have eaten up all of what was left of my $50 that I arrived with. So, no, I went to the YWCA. I had lived in the Y before, both in Calgary and in Yellowknife, so I naturally gravitated there.

Did I even know there was a YWCA in Sydney? Of course not. I just presumed there would be one there, that there would be room, and that I'd stay there. As assumptions go, I was in the Olympics league.

When I called my friend's mother, she graciously invited me to come and stay. (Another assumption, of course, that she was going to say that!) She could just as easily said, “Who?” and hung up. But perhaps the mention of her daughter's name was enough for her to throw out the welcome mat.

When I found her house and rang the doorbell, what she saw was a skinny, 20 year old Canadian with luggage the size of an overnight case. Enough for a weekend, if you packed sparingly.

“Is that all you brought?!” she said. She practically fainted. She couldn't believe it.

At that point, either I was still a bit jet-lagged, or perhaps just as clueless as ever, because I had no idea what to do next. Completely without plans of any sort.

However, Mrs. Higgins had plans of her own for that weekend. She was an amateur opera singer, and was going to be singing at an out of town venue. She invited me to come along, as there really wasn't much else for her to suggest. She could hardly leave me behind on my own.

Even though Mrs. Higgins was an amateur, she took opera very seriously. Oh, yes she did! Which is of course, perfectly fine. I probably would have enjoyed her performance, except for the following: I couldn't stand opera, and I didn't appreciate hearing it at full volume in the front seat of a tiny VW beetle, as we hurtling along towards the town where she was singing.

Her enthusiastic “warming up her voice” as we drove for miles, and miles, and miles out of town, was like having a dentist's drill piercing your eardrums. On and on and on we went, shrill arias filling the confined space.

Her voice must have been white hot by the time we got to the venue, as she warmed it up with the gusto of a blowtorch.

Unfortunately, I do not have a poker face. My “enjoyment” of her performance was plain to see. Perhaps if I had learned to cover up my feelings and look delighted, I would not have had to find alternative accommodation so soon!

The next day, after the trial-by-opera, we parted company.

And there I was, once again, alone and without much money in one of the world's largest and most cosmopolitan cities. Needless to say, no other contacts, no job and not much in the way of plans either.

The guardian angels that had been with me up to that point were definitely working overtime.

Have you ever had youthful adventures as foolish as mine? When I write about what I did when I went to Australia, it chills me to think of the disasters I could have encountered. How naïve and stupid I was. How I'm lucky to have survived it all.

I look forward to your comments, if you'd like to add them. They DO make my day.

Until next Monday,

Rose