Sunday, August 07, 2005

Fremantle

We rode the train to Fremantle the other day. It was an exciting ride to say the least.
A stop or two out of the Perth city centre, we heard a drunk yelling at a guy in the back of the car that he would smash his head through the window and how arrogant the guy is. The guy must have been in his 50's and the drunk in his 40's.
The old guy got up and went to the security speaker and called for some secuirty guards to come help him as he'd been threatened with his life. Then a few seconds later, he came to the front of the car looking for back up. He found a guy willing to help him and sat down.
The drunk didn't quit yelling how arrogant the old guy was and threatened him some more. Then the old guy and his back up went back to the back of the car and started shouting back at the guy.
The train up until halfway through the route was stopping at every stop, but then was schedueled to go straight though to the end of the line.
In any case suddenly the drunk realized that he was about to miss his stop and he had to race to get himself and his bike off the train.
When the old guy realized what was happening he and his buddy and about 10 witnesses all started loud fake laughing as the drunk got stuck halfway out of the door. He started thrashing to get free and then only his bike was stuck halfway in and halfway out.
Everytime the door giggled a little the roused another round of loud laughter from the crowd. The conductor came on the loudspeaker and asked someone to press the button to let the guy off, but nobody did. They were teaching that guy a lesson. Finnally after loud banging on the door, the engineer must have hit the switch that activated the buttons on the outside of the train, and the drunk hit the button and got away.

We got to Fremantle and started walking toward to ocean. Theweather was pleasent, like a warm spring day. We came to this beach and decided to go wading. It was a small protected beach and so the waves didn't go over a foot or two high. The water was pretty warm, a lot warmer than the water in Vancouver was. It would make for fine swimming on a warm day.
We're thinking of getting a surfboard and a bodyboard to have a good time. It seems to me that I could learn pretty quickly. I'm not sure if I want to go with a longboard or a shortboard but it will be a couple of weeks before we've made enough money here to cover it anyway.
I'm really enjoying backpacking here in Western Australia so far. It will be even better when I can find some temporary work here in Perth.
One major difference I've noticed between here and Calgary is the amount of public drunkeness. Lots of people drink as they walk down the street, and there are way more actual drunks one the street here. In Calgary the only drunks are the homeless people and the underage kids that aren't allowed to go into the bars. Here working guys on their way home are drunk in the street.
Maybe we live in the party neighbourhood and more poeple are walking to and from bars drunk.
In anycase there is more of it here than Calgary.
-Gary Milner

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