Parliament, Pizza & Melbourne Cup - Week 45

On Monday, I had an early shift at the restaurant for the first time. My shift started at 8 o'clock, which meant that I had to leave our apartment at 7 o'clock. However, there wasn't much to do in the morning at the restaurant and it was actually nice to work so early. Time flew by, the atmosphere was relaxed, and I had already forgotten about the early wake-up. Since I started so early, I also finished early and Ben, who started later that day, brought me a chicken burger from the restaurant for dinner. Occasionally, he gets food from the chefs as a gift, so I was thrilled to try the burger that I serve to customers about 50 times a day. I have to say, it tastes good. Highly recommended.

On Tuesday, I had an even earlier shift. It started at 7 o'clock, which meant leaving at 6 o'clock. However, it was very interesting to see Melbourne and Brighton so early in the morning. Everything was still closed, the whole street smelled of freshly baked bread from bakeries, and the sea was very calm. As Tuesday was the start of the Melbourne Cup, we had a lot of staff at the restaurant. We were expecting a big crowd because there is a public holiday specifically for the Melbourne Cup. However, the restaurant was quite empty and I finished work at 12 o'clock. The Melbourne Cup is a horse race. However, these horse races are so popular because they appeal to all social classes and not just to a wealthy sport as in Germany. Occasionally, we saw people on the streets who were dressed up elaborately. Hats are typical for horse races, similar to the Royals. The Melbourne Cup started at 3 o'clock, and Ben, Karen, Marie, and I watched it on TV in our apartment. The focus of the broadcast was not on the horse races, but rather on the outfits of celebrities. It was quite interesting to watch, especially considering that there is a public holiday for it.
We spent the rest of the day shopping, baking and eating pizza, and having a movie night.

On Wednesday, Ben and I had the day off, which meant we could sleep in. The weather was also quite bad that day. It was raining a lot, but that didn't stop us from doing a short outdoor workout. Afterwards, we made ourselves comfortable again and used the leftover pizza dough to have pizza again. We all liked it very much. And of course, we also watched a movie again.

On Thursday, Marie and I went into town quite early. First, we went to the Victoria Market. The Victoria Market has very delicious and fresh apples, which are even the cheapest of all. So we bought some more to stock up. Then we looked for more vegetables for next week. After that, we went to the Parliament with all our shopping. The Parliament offers a free tour. The one-hour tour was very informative. The Parliament has a chair for the Queen. The Queen actually sat briefly on this chair.

There were two different rooms. One was a red room, which represents the monarchy, the Queen, and the dependency of the former colony. However, we were told that Australia can theoretically do almost anything, but the Queen has to sign everything. According to the tour guide, she even signs every single thing.
Furthermore, there is a green room, which represents democracy. The royal family is not allowed in this room because they do not represent democracy.

Then we looked at the Parliament library.
On the way back, Marie suddenly got very hungry. She bought a small sandwich from Subway and devoured it on the way home. What's noteworthy about this: We were walking along Flinder Street. There are many tourists eating there, so there are also many seagulls that want to steal food. Marie was just about to take the first bite of the second half of her sandwich when a seagull flew next to her head and fought her for the bread. Let's just say that the seagull was happy. Marie was sad and I just had to laugh. It was very surprising how daring the seagulls are here as well.
On the way back, we went shopping at Coles. Coles is already decorated with glitter and other Christmas items. It feels very strange and ironic to see a grocery store decorated like this in early November, and especially for us, seeing it in shorts and t-shirts feels even more ironic. We will probably feel like this throughout December...
When we got home, we had dinner and watched another movie.

Unfortunately, my work was canceled on Friday because it wasn't very busy at the restaurant. I was really disappointed. Since I finished early on Tuesday, I was looking forward to work again. But oh well. None of us did much that day. The weather wasn't great and we all focused on planning our further travels.

Fortunately, I was able to work again all day on Saturday.

And on Sunday, I worked for more than 10 hours in total. The weather was over 25 degrees and many people came to the restaurant.