Kindly Yours

On a winter's day in August, I found myself back in the same lolly, preserve and soap shops that formed part of the cottage tourism of Berrima in the NSW Southern Highlands. This time around, Mui Na was window shopping with me. Mui Na was on the last leg of her six week chill out around the eastern seaboard of the Australian continent, having been to Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne in the preceding weeks. She had caught up with our other university classmates, Chao Chin and Kwi Wah. The nights had been cool, and when the winds blew, temperatures had plummeted in varying extent. This was a far cry from the equatorial climate of our campus days. We had a leisurely lunch at a cafe of her choice. Berrima is a a one-main street village, and the sun shone with blue skies over the cool air. It offered a casualness that thrived on familiarity and a lack of a sense of time. Maybe it epitomised what Mui Na wanted on this holiday, with no schedule and just flowing with spontaneous conversa...

Today's Telegraph Mirror recounted how a twenty year old Macquarie University student was hit by another young fellow with a skateboard in the small hours of the night in the main campus. Epping rail station has been transformed into a glittery version of its old self. Couples buy dinner in reasonably priced packs in the Carlingford Asian Village upon coming back from work - and do not have to cook anymore. The main thoroughfare of Epping Road is more choked with traffic than ever before during weekday and weekend rush hours. Higher density housing have cropped up beside the six-lane road. Prices of groceries in Eastwood are apparently a better bargain than Cabramatta and Flemington, the other competing suburbs of similar fare. As the nineties began, I loved walking in the mornings to the then unassuming rail station just two streets away in Epping. I had my first taste of autumn biting winds standing on the platform. I cooked dinner amazed at the stillness and darkness of the ro...