Melbourne and Sydney, Runes and Moonlight

In October 2001, I stayed in Melbourne for a week as a foreign delegate in the 6th International Congress on AIDS in Asia and the Pacific held at the Melbourne Convention Centre.

I did not book accommodations before going to Australia, so I stayed with the leaders of the international branch of our NGO (non-government organization) billeted at the Grand Hotel.  I felt a loss of privacy, so I left a day after and lodged in a backpacker hotel for $50 a day (way too affordable compared to Sydney's backpacker scene).

I had the option to get another room at the Grand Hotel, but that would have reduced my pocket money.  My stay in Australia was a personal expense not sponsored by the NGO.  I could only get sponsorship from funding agencies if I presented a paper at the Congress.  I just presented my passport to my mother –  no interest, no late fee, no need to pay back if forgotten.

I experienced four seasons in a day.  Melbourne weather was uncomfortable and erratic.  The place was beautiful, though, and the people were friendly.

I noticed the word "Batman" plastered in different places.  And, there was a Batman Park.  I initially thought Australians loved superheroes, but the ubiquity of the name made me question the association with the superhero Batman.  I learned from people at the Congress that John Batman is one of Melbourne's founding fathers.

I bought a copy of The Wild Man by Patricia Nell Warren and other books from Hares & Hyenas <www.hares-hyenas.com.au/> which set up shop temporarily and was the only merchant, as I recall, to sell LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender) books at the Centre for the duration of the Congress.

I saw billboards of the movie A.I. Artificial Intelligence directed by Steven Spielberg on buildings and ogled the hunky Australian men rowing boats along Yarra River.

My colleagues and I would eat at a Chinese restaurant near the railway station for lunch.  The servings were so large that my colleagues would take half of their order home for dinner.  I forgot the name of the station.  I just called it King's Cross (after Harry Potter's Platform 9¾).

I distinctly remember that I could not find a Wendy’s fast food restaurant.  I wanted to eat the resto’s chicken breast fillet which I had for lunch everyday in my first semester, first year, in medical school in the 1990s.  In college and in medical school, I would choose one restaurant to have lunch in for the entire semester or trimester.  So yes, I had lunch daily for at least a term in Shakey's Pizza, McDonald's, etc.  I was told later (by a friend in Sydney) that Wendy’s did not operate in Australia.  My favorite chicken burger was the one from Cindy’s, but there was no branch near the medical school.  My current favorite is a toss-up between the breast fillet of Wendy’s and the McChicken of McDonald’s.  Cindy's was a local fast food resto that I no longer see in malls and restaurant complexes I go to.

There was a specialty bookshop in Melbourne that only sold books related to aviation and the military.  I forgot the name of the shop.  I went there as often as I could just to browse.  I could not bring home any more books.

I went to Sydney after a week.  Sydney weather was much better.  Temperatures were consistent.  At the time, I think it was around 18 °C during the day.  It was spring.  Summer (December) was not too distant.

I find Sydney especially memorable because nearly every corner had an adult shop.  The shops had rooms where men could meet and mate or sleep in.  A colleague who also attended the Congress in Melbourne used the shops to doze off.  For $10 a shop, a customer could go in and out of the rooms for 24 hours.  A shop either stamped the forearm or issued a ticket for verification.

In one of the shop visits, a loud voice suddenly boomed over the microphone upon my entry saying, "Minors are not allowed!"  I gazed at the camera oriented towards me and roared, "I'm not a minor!  I just look great in my 30s!"

I never slept with anyone while in Australia.  I only bought adult stuff like videos featuring American performers in action.

Oxford Street also made Sydney an extremely lovable place for me.  Oxford was (still is I hope) the LGBT street where my Australian siblings could express themselves freely.  It was not unusual to find two women or two men holding hands while walking.  I had fun looking at two shirtless hunks walking by, holding hands, with a dog in tow.

In a bookshop along Oxford Street, I purchased beefcake calendars and non-adult videos that included Billy's Hollywood Screen Kiss starring Sean Hayes, cast member of the American sitcom Will & Grace.

While in Sydney, I liked to stay in my hotel room or walk around, alone, to peruse the city.  I rarely took pictures.  I always told myself, “My heart took a picture that should last a long time.”

Backpacker rooms were pricey in Sydney, so I might as well lodge in a hotel.

It was in Dymocks Sydney where I first saw an issue of FHM magazine (which was inaugurated locally around a year earlier than my Sydney trip).  Dymocks had a Philippine branch at Robinsons Place (a super mall in the City of Manila), but the bookshop did not last long.

I did not go to places my friends had wanted me to visit like the Olympic Stadium.  I did visit the Sydney Opera House and Taronga Zoo.  I love animals, and Taronga Zoo is a must-see for people like me.

I ate at different places like KFC, McDonald’s, a few upscale diners (where my friend liked to swipe my – not his – credit card) and the Vietnamese restaurant along George Street in the direction of the University of Technology Sydney.

Outdoors in areas near water, feral birds – I think they're silver gulls – liked to grab food from people.  Australian law prohibits their capture.  Australians are generally law-abiding.  If those birds were here in the Philippines, their audacity would earn them a place in cages for the pet trade or a place on the table as food.  The law of poverty takes no prisoners.  We, Filipinos, are generally hungry.  Our charming little islands still belong to the Third World.

After sundown, Alfeo a.k.a. Al and I stayed at the Mountbatten Hotel to chat the night away.  Al is a colleague and friend who regularly traveled to Australia and is now an Australian citizen.  I first met Al in 1993 at the Remedios AIDS Foundation where we served as volunteers and hotline counselors and where we began our lifelong involvement with HIV/AIDS work.  Al did not attend the event in Melbourne, due to a prior commitment, but he did spur me to use plastic money in Sydney.

It was at Mountbatten that I realized I had traveler’s diarrhea.  The establishment’s comfort room had been intimate with my mixed Chinese and Filipino bacteria (through my explosive excreta).

Al introduced me to the bartender who was a model.  The model’s looks made my loins palpitate incessantly, compounding the intestinal spasms.

Oh, I was so enamored of that young male model.  Let’s hide him by the name of Rune.  Al gave me a fashion magazine with Rune in it months after I had left Australia.

I chose Rune as a pseudonym for that dishy model because runes are supposed to be mystical, and that’s how Australia was to me.

I expect Australia still is.  Mystical.  Bewitching.  Utterly beautiful.

I wrote Rune a letter when I got home from Sydney.

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22 October 2001

Dear Rune,

I wonder if this letter will reach you considering the anthrax threat that grips the world in fear at the moment.

My stay in Australia was, in many ways, wonderful.  You contributed to that enriching experience.  How?

Songs strike a tune that brings us back to the past.  Old songs echo in the depths of our hearts.  You will one day become an old song.  And, I will celebrate the moment.

How is the moonlight in Sydney?  When you have time, take a look and give me a smile.

I wish you a lifetime of joy and wonder (and great sex)!

Always,

Robert

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Mushy, puerile crap.  Well, my crap grazed Mountbatten once upon a spring.

Al told me Rune had read the letter with a smile.  I never asked for a reply.

The smile was already the reply.