Poor Stevie

The past couple of days have made me really dispair of the human race.

-  Australian Story on Monday was about the Morcombe family whose son Daniel went missing on the Gold Coast about three years ago, and it’s widely believed he was abducted by the side of the road while waiting for a bus. They did an Australian Story on the family about a year after it happened, and this was a catch-up episode about how they are doing and any progress in the case. The family have done amazing things like set up a foundation and worked with their community to make it safer for children. But, this year sometime, they got an anonymous call from a woman who said she had been in the car the day he was abducted and said she knew where he was buried. She went on to tell the family horrific details like how he was sexually abused, he had been made to witness two girls being raped, he was beaten up and eventually killed by being hit over the head with an iron bar.The police investigated the whole claim for months, and found it to be entirely false. Why would you do that to an already distraught family, who know nothing about their son’s presumed death and are grasping at anything. Why would you want to torture people who are already incredibly disturbed and screwed up?

- In the morning I was watching 9am with David and Kim (I could write an entire essay on these two, at first I hated him because I thought he was a jerk and now I hate her since she tried to attack Chris Masters over writing about Alan Jones’ homosexuality and then admitting to Masters she had only read ‘large chunks’ of his book) and they were interviewing David Hick’s lawyer Michael Mori. Kim started kind of attacking him saying he was going against American law, and how could he betray his army and didn’t he feel like he was unloyal to his country. I wanted to cry. Michael Mori, the amazing character he is, said that he feels Australians wouldn’t let America test out a new drug on an Australian that wasn’t safe for Americans, so why are we letting them test out a new legal system on an Australian that isn’t safe for Americans? Seriously, why does this woman get to interview amazing people and feel like its her duty to be hard hitting, and just quietly, offensive. David Hicks has nearly been in solitary confinement for a whole year. I rest my case Kim Idiot.

- I worked in the service desk yesterday. And although clearly this has nothing on being in solitary confinement for a whole year,  it was one of the worst days I have ever had in there. And that includes post-Christmas whinging. My very first customer was returning something she bought on credit card. Credit card companies request us to refund items back onto the credit card, pretty simple…

Me: explains this wildly ridiculous phenomenon. 
Woman: You have to do it for $12?
Me: Yes, sorry, your credit card company says we have to.
Woman: sighs all over the place.
Me: Asks to see her credit card to first make sure she’s using the same one, and to secondly check her signature and the credit card number, as is usual during credit card transactions
Woman: Why do you want to see it. I’m hardly going to put a refund onto a false credit card am I? *under her breath* stuuupid
Me: Well, sorry its part of my job. 

I had people whinging and whining at me all day long including a lady who yelled at me for picking up a pile of clothes to refund that weren’t hers. I have millions of refunds a day, sometimes I make simple mistakes. It’s not like a picked up her child and tried to shove it into the cash register.

These incidents seem pretty megre when I write them down. The thing is, I can’t remember a single time I have been outraged by something a salesperson/checkout chick has done. They accidentally give me the wrong change, I gently point it out to them. They forget to give me a docket, I kindly ask for one. They don’t ask me how I am, so I ask them how they are. They need to price check something, I wait patiently while they serve other people. I have perspective on life - its actually not that big a deal when someone asks to check my signature, or makes a mistake that takes one second to resolve. It makes me realise why the world is the way it is, because people want things to go exactly as they planned it, and even a slight variation will cause them to take out their semi-automatic in a shopping centre.

-  When I came home I saw on smh.com that a man had cut off the ears of his 8 week old puppy with a pair of scissors.

My favourite animal: 

You know why? Because they are like the T-Rex of the sea. Plus, I was watching Killer Sharks narrated by shark/lady expert Daniel McPherson and when they come upand do as shown above they acually make a noise like a choking duck. Really, they are just big and cuddly, and most of all killer. Also, happy two and a half years to my lovely boyfy:

oh crap, sorry, here he is:

He loves invisible food.

 The Bill is blaring out of my olds’ teevee as we speak. The Bill and I go way back – I remember mum and dad used to send us to bed on Saturday nights before The Bill. I assumed it must be full of sex and other interesting things so a couple of times I hid behind the couch and watched it. When I was finally allowed to hang out with the coppers down the nick, I could hardly keep my eyes open until 9:30. But now, CID, the ‘scrotes’ in uniform and the ‘top brass’ are like my family. And also like my boyfriends. Here are a few of my favourite characters….just don’t grass me, or I’ll give you a right bollockin’

Oh Jack Meadows. You always have been my favourite. You’re so strong and manly and personally, I think you’ve gotten more sexual as time has gone by. I remember when you hooked up with the prozzie, but I forgive you. Just hold me close, that’s all.

Mickey Webb. Again, I’d like to shack up with you and be your missus. It’s unfortunate you were sexually assaulted in a park, but we can work through it together over a few pints down the pub. 

Phil Hunter – pronounced ‘Phiw Hunna’. I think its the whole bad boy, ‘I cheated on my wife, snogged a crim’s laydee, cared for my illegitimate child’ thing. A man with a coupla kids always gets me. He’s also really good at his job and also has awesome lines like, ‘why were my arrestin’ officers sittin’ around pickin’ their noses!’.

Zain Nadir – Oh yeah, a new boy on the block. And just like Marky Mark, I think he’d look good in an underwear ad. Only a top secret undercover underwear ad operation though. 

Steph: Please, take me down the nick. I have something I want to show you all….and it’s in my pants. 
Mickey: Oh yeh, darlin’ what’s that about?
Phil: I bet I could tell ya Mickey
Jack: A little bit of respect for the lady. You are under arrest. You have the right to remain silent. You do not have to say anything when questioned…
Zain: *pouty*
Steph: *grenade in pants explodes killing all*  

In fact I think that may have been a plot line when Daniel McPherson was still around.

I have finally decided to fill you all in on my amazing trip to Vietnam. For reasons known only to myself, I didn’t have the heart/balls to do it until I found out what my future held. Now that I’m employed, I feel I can gloat about my trip as much as I want. I have some advice for you – go to Vietnam, it is the bomb.

Observe: 

This, as my myspace readers know, is my new mottoin life. 

This was our guide around the Mekong Delta. She was massively fiesty. Her pants were really high and really tight. I never expected her to love big snakes as much as she obviously does. 

Fishing boats along the Mekong. They had massive piles of wriggling prawns on them. And pirates. 

Check it out! A real live Vietcong dude. This was at the Cu Chi Tunnels outside of Ho Chi Mihn City. We got to crawl through a tunnel which was about 50 metres long. It was really horrible and humid, musty and small even though it had been enlarged for fat Western tourists. My leg muscles hurt for days afterwards. I am not cut out for the military. Except for the whole donkey slapping initiation thing…

This was our cute Intrepid leader Tuan. He was so lovely and super hilarious. He doesn’t drink and he was doing ‘magic tricks’ like going cross-eyed after one beer. This was also the night he said that I could be a ‘moe-delle’ and said Sophie (my cousin and travelling companion) could be a ‘newspaper’. 

Everywhere you go the beer changes. This was the beer I was drinking in Nha Trang which was the local beer of the Saigon region. It tasted amazing. Even more amazing was the price which was 5000 dong (oh don’t worry, I was full of dong jokes). That works out to be less than 50 cents. Oh.My.God.

This was an old lady we met on a bridge in Hue. She is around 70, and had married an American solider after the war. She moved to America and after he died she went back to Vietnam and made a living as a palm reader. She got lots of things wrong, but she was still really sweet and entertaining. She talked like Elmo. You could also tell she was influenced by American fashion and beauty. Check out her ruby red fingernails! 

Outside of the Imperial tombs were a whole heap of manky dogs biting each other and barking at us. I thought they were cute, plus I thought maybe they had rabies and therefore took a photo. 

We went on an all day motorbike ride. My driver was the guy in the camoflague shirt. He was one of the only chubby Vietnamese people I saw. He helped me take my helmet off everytime, giggled at me and honked his horn (which sounded like a cat with a toad caught in its throat) all the time. At one point, in the middle of a busy intersection, something fell out of the bike’s engine, he stopped in the middle of the road, picked it up and kept riding. Traffic in Vietnam is so funny. Clearly, the only rule is to try not to hit anyone. 

In Hanoi, they made headstones and stuff on the street. This one was for Britney, poor poor bald Britney. 

We went cave exploring on a cruise along Halong Bay on our way to Cat Ba Island. This formation is called ‘The finger’. Yeah. Right.

The view from the cave. Halong Bay was the most amazing thing I have ever seen. It was definitely one of the all time highlights of the trip. We cruised around for about five hours. There were little floating villages, Vietnamese people who obviously lived on their boats because they were loaded down with all their possessions. The best part was before the trip we were warned about pirates! Wow. 

More Halong Bay…

See? house boat

The. most. amazing. dessert. ever. See the little thing that the ice cream is sitting in? That’s Vietnamese coconut bread which is like heaven in bread form. 

In Hanoi, they have streets called ‘shoe street’ ‘book street’ ‘toy street’ etc. This photo was taken on ‘Tet street’. We were in Hanoi about two or three weeks before Tet festival which is like Chinese New Year. They celebrate by putting peach blossoms and cumquats in shop windows and decorating their houses with stuff like this. Pretty.

Lunch on the boat. I did not stop eating for about two hours. Vietnamese spring rolls are amazing. You can also see fish, a big plate of spicy tofu, some heavily salted peanuts, french fries and rice (and cola).

This is me hanging out on an overnight train. The first sleeper we went on was horrible because we had the end cabin which we shared with an elderly woman and her son. Her son had huge burns all over his body and was moaning all through the night. She kept farting. It turns out the son was working on a building, and the electricity had been turned off for him to work on the wires. Mid way through the electricity was turned back on. So I shutup about feeling uncomfortable. We had two other overnighters, which were fun because they were like a big moving slumber party. And I love slumber parties. 

I freaking loved Vietnam

Best place: Hoi An – famous for its tailors and French quarter. I had two dresses and two pairs of shoes made. There is an amazing French bakery in the middle of town which got me hooked on mint tea and tasty bakery treats. In Hoi An we had an all day bike ride, and a boat tour with an amazing barbeque and cocktails! Man, I did it tough.

Best food: Hoi An was pretty good bakery wise, but we had several horrible dinners which saw a Norweigian travel buddy go to hospital. Tuan kept talking about diarrhea really loudly all the time and used hand motions to accent his thoughts on squirty bum. Hanoi had amazing food and by that time I was over the fear of catching a horrible case of exploding bum (which you’ll be happy to know, I never got! Alright me!) and ate everything I could. The fruit juices were great and Vietnamese coffee is my husband. We went to a swanky restaurant one night and I ordered fried pumpkin buds which I expected to be fried balls of pumpkin. Oh no, they were fried stalks of pumpkin vine. I still ate them though.

Best experience: If I was any kind of person with a heart I might say ‘when we took a bag of rice to a poor woman in a fishing village’ but personally I thought it was a massive wank fest and I felt like a horrible fat insensitive Western tourist. I loved going to the Ho Chi Mihn Mauseleom which was pretty much like a mini Communist state in itself. There were soldiers immecably dressed carryng guns with bayonets. We had to line up in single file, have our hands by our sides, surrender our cameras, luggage and weapons. One of the guys I was travelling with was yanked out of line and made to empty his pockets. He had a hanky and his passport. Ho Chi Mihn didn’t look so crash hot and I personally think he’s a fake. There were lots of other amazing experiences though…like the whole fecking trip.

Weirdest person: One night, I think it was between Nha Trang and Hoi An, we took an overnighter. We were all safely snuggled into one cabin chatting when a woman who looked and spoke like Courtney Love came in with a bottle of wine and offered ‘company for wine’. She was originally Canadian and had been living in China. She seemed pretty intelligent and did most of the talking. I like to listen to people speak about things I have no clue about…like the future of Mandarin as a language. She was also saying how much she loved Vietnam and the culture and had complete respect for it. A few hours later, I was woken by her sceaming, ‘don’t you understand money!? Moooneey!! This is fucking retarded! moooney!’. Turns out she was yelling at the train crew for not stopping the train to let her get out and buy some beer. Oh yeah, that’s respect. 

Best mode of transport: I went on a cyclo, several boats, horse and cart, row boat, motorbike, bicycle, overnight train, basket boat (which is like a dingy except made from woven reeds and covered in cow poop, bus and taxi. I loved the bicycle the best, it was totally fifties and I felt like I was in Now and Then with Christina Ricci and Demi Moore. 

Worst toilet: Well the toilet on the train was horrid. It was a squatter and the hole went straight out onto the tracks. There was also blood on the walls. 

Worst movie watched in hotel: I should look it up. It was about a two dudes who (one was played by Paul Giamatti) went away for a bucks weekend and met some sweet-ass hos (one of whom was played by Sandra Oh). Anyway, Paul Giamatti struggles with his feelings towards his lady friend and also his man friend’s cheating ways. It was weird seeing big Paul make out with a babe. It made me uncomfortable.

Best Intrepid guide quote: ‘You can pretend my mouth is an envelope, put anything in it and then seal it with kiss.” it was Tuan’s way of saying the only time he would ever wear lip gloss is if he kissed a girl who was wearing it, after I offered some to him. 

Vietnam rating out of ten: 10

So my big two-one is coming up. You know, that birthday where people’s parents throw a massive party complete with catering, circus performers, a live rock band and a round the world ticket as a present? I figure, I’ve had a pretty hard life – I’ve never been to Paris, I haven’t seen Michael Jackson perform live, my parents never bought me a terrace house in Glebe like I asked them to and hey, I recently roughed it in Vietnam so I know what poverty is all about.  I reckon I deserve a massive party plus some massive presents which I think you should organise. 

So here is my official 21st birthday wish list:

1.  The Vivienne Westwood ‘I am not a terrorist’ t-shirt but I would settle for the necklace.
2.  Some Marc Jacobs flats.
3.  A ticket to a Christian Dior fashion show in Paris.
4.  A round the world trip. Here is where I would like to go – Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, Japan, China, Russia, France, Germany, Greece,   Italy, Spain, Brazil, Argentina, Mexico, Morocco and Dubbo. 
5.  A blank cheque.
6.  A job at Vogue magazine, ring and ask for Anna she knows all about me.
7.  A farkin’ terrace house in Glebe.
8.  A tour around Versailles.
9.  A stint in rehab.
10. A brown refurbished Kingswood.
 
If y’all don’t buy me at least one of these things, I’ll take all 6 of you off my friends list.

Dear everyone,

I am employed. Look out big smoke, here I come. Also, I’m hot.

Love, Steph

Dear Babel,

You really made me want to go back to Japan, hang out in Mexico and go to Morocco. Awesome.

Best, Steve

Dear Brad Pitt,

You look pretty sexual as an older man. I think its weird that you pashed Cate Blanchett while she was peeing in a pan.

Sincerly, Stevie

Dear Orange,

See you later suckers!

Up yours, Stephanie