Da Orlando Italian, Wollongong NSW

The owner's name is Orlando.  The restaurant has a family like setting in a light industrial area along an extended Keira Street just maybe ten to 15 minutes stroll south of Wollongong City Centre and its main rail station.  Nearby are Delaney's , an institution of a cake shop for the region, a BP station and Europa, a reliable supplier of eastern European groceries that I use.


Is the cooking style from Rome?    The popular item is freshly fired pizza, with toppings from Margarita to veg to meat, attracting many take aways and delivery runs.  One can see the wood fired stove immediately in front of the entrance.  The venue provides some outdoor seating, but the internal tables are often packed at every meal time.  Da Orlando is open every day now, after a few years of operations.  Vehicle parking is street side, with the restaurant a hub of lit buzz on evenings when the neighbours only open for the day, due to the inherent nature of their businesses.

It is a pleasure to see another culinary outlet do well in a region with not more than perhaps 300,000 people, an area south of Sydney that attracts residential lifestyle whilst the money is made in the Big Smoke up north.  Parents may come home from Sydney side and find no time to cook for the family, so off they go to Da Orlando.  The menu has remained relatively unchanged all this time, and this can apply even to the black board items.   Diners sit snugly with tables of various sizes and the staff has also remained not much changed.

Italian culinary, I believe, is meant to be shared with mates and family.   The rich nature of its sauces, its creams and  its toppings make it more sensible and a pleasure to partake them communally.   You may not want to be stuck with just a huge size pizza unless you are hungry or still growing up fast.   Diners do take pizzas here as their mains but i prefer some variety in degustation.   I must say the pizzas at Da Orlando are consistently rewarding.


Often when we arrive, Remmie is there, busy with customers or behind the counter.     There is also Molly who used to work at uni and is now pursuing a wholesome degree.  There is the hard working young man with light hair who usually takes our orders and arranges the wine.   The walls of the dining hall are graced with posters and photographs suggesting of the old country. 

Favoured entrees are Arancini and Gnocchi.   The former offering, literally referring to "little oranges", are filled with a gratifying yummy risotto still warm inside, with the outer skin dark brown and almost crispy.  Three are served on a plate for starters.   The former are like dew droplets to tease the appetite  -  they are not my favourite but are served with a sauce that does get us going.


I am always happy with two particular mains at Da Orlando.  I have a soft spot for their Linguine Fruits of the Sea, presented with a heady mix of rich tomato sauce, and for a comparatively lighter option, their Penne with chicken pesto.
Both dishes could not be so different, and yet complete a delightful experience.

Wollongong is a town with several Italian restaurants of note.  
I like the Pecorino cheesewheel pasta at Cin Cin in Thirroul; 
look forward to the pizzas crafted at Pizzeria 50 in downtown Wollongong and Gambino's in Fairy Meadow; and love the scenery looking out from the North Beach Pavilion in North Wollongong Beach.  Servings are generous at the Costa Azzurra in Fairy Meadow and there is a community atmosphere at Cucinas along lower Crown Street in down town Wollongong.   


So there is much competition and choice for Wollongsiders as far as Italian fare is concerned.   Yet at most meal times, Da Orlando is packed with a happy buzz. The quality of their offerings is consistent, the service is quick and you do nicely bump into your mates at the place.My weakness here is for the Calzone packed tightly with Nutella choc spread, again best eaten to be shared with teenagers.  

There is a notable absence of meat dishes though, with the menu emphasising pizzas and pasta.   So what are my overall impressions of Da Orlando? 


Ambiance  8 out of ten
Taste  8 out of ten
Staff Engagement  8.5 out of ten
Culinary Variety 7.5 out of ten
X Factor   8 out of ten
Overall Score    8 out of ten


Da Orlando is located at 348 Keira Street, Wollongong NSW.

Vinh Phat Restaurant, Cantonese Yum Cha, Cabramatta NSW

Preceding my recent visit to Vinh Phat, I had my imagination and expectations already fired up for a few months  by now.


The restaurant, located in the heart of Cabramatta, south-west of Sydney CBD, had been recommended and occupies an upper floor, not far from the traditional Chinese gates of the nearby mall.  I had seen queues of more than hundred individuals line up patiently at lunch time on weekends, the eager customers spilling out definitely on to the outside 
pavement and then up the stairs.


So what was it that created this demand for the cooking here?


At this stage I have not had a dinner at this venue, but at one lunch time, I did flip through the menu, which emphasised on lots of seafood cooked Southern Chinese style and on duck, all icons of a sumptuous dinner.  Here I offer my reflections of this Yum Cha session with two mates, one who only restricts his consumption of exotic East Asian to prawns and chicken, while the other friend has a more eclectic taste.

The two types of dumplings served for us were of generous size.  They were freshly made and the quality showed when we bit into them, they had excellent texture and the skin was thin enough.  They reminded me of the Siew Mai at Sunny Harbour, Restaurant, Hurstville NSW.


The fried rice had aromas of sufficient wok heat, but to me lacked the eggy over lay that I prefer and find at Sha Kee Restaurant, Cronnula Sharks Club, Woollaware NSW.

 The Har Cheong or steamed prawn rolls showed finesse, was tasty and provided a slurping satisfaction.  Asian uncles and aunties would of approved.


Interesting enough, Vinh Phat oferred chicken spring rolls  - I prefer those from veg or pork.     The chicken was snugly packed within the deep fried rolls and turned out to be all right after all.


Best of all was the serving of mango pancake, two on the small plate  - the egg white mixture enveloped the mango in a sophisticated style and was the fitting end to a session of Dim Sum, a touch of the heart.  This may possibly be the best mango pancakes I have tasted in the greater Sydney region.

This was a Yum Cha or drink tea session as well  - and we had chosen the well smoked but still smooth Pu'Er blend, which was a good change from what you get in most Chinese lunch time gatherings.   The venue was almost full house by 1pm, with a solid Asian demographic, emphasised by elderly couples, family groups and Millennials.   People were walking up the stairs seemingly every minute.


As expected, the tables were placed tightly against each other in such an establishment.  The washrooms were clean and the lighting just right.  The audio level of chatter corresponded with the size of the lunching crowd.   The trolley ladies were friendly, spoke both Cantonese and English and moved about their offerings with a purpose.


For those customers not willing to venture outside their Aussified tastes, the selections can be limited, but there was enough variety if you are keen on braised chicken feet, fish maw, steamed yam cakes and the like.   What was disappointing to me and a fellow luncher was the absence of roast pork cuts.   There was a belly pork dish at dinner time, but this may echo the lack of varied meats at Vinh Phat when compared with seafood.


Would I return for the dinner menu?  Most probably yes.  
My impressions of lunch here are as follows.

Ambiance  7 out of 10
Taste  8 out of 10
Staff Engagement  8 out of 10
Culinary Variety  7 out of 10
X Factor  7 out of 10
OVERALL    7.5 out of 10


Vin Phat Restaurant is at level One of 10-12 Hughes Street,
Cabramatta NSW.   Best to go there by train on weekends, vehicle parking can be a challenge nearby.

Europe Through The Centuries

Europe has always been a hotbed of conflict, opportunity and new ideas in history.

Feudal age saw the conflict within Christianity itself, amongst Catholics, Orthodoxy and Protestants and involving royalty, the military and Machiavellian politicians.

After that, the rise of the Ottoman Empire threatened Christian Europe with territorial and cultural conquests - but this interface also brought new learning and influences in science and mathematics from the Arabs and Persians to the continent.

Discovery of the compass and how to harness winds for long distance sailing offered several European powers the opportunity to enhance trade, discover cultures not hitherto known to them and exploit the economies of other lands through colonisation.

The relatively stronger technology, military capability and political strategies of these European colonials made them eventually control and subjugate other populations, except in old Siam.

The negatives and positives of European rule is etched across the globe from Africa, India, The Americas, Oceania, south east Asia and East Asia.

There was no such thing like today's political correctness in the period from the 16th to the early 20th centuries, when the advent of economic competition and the spread of missionary religion from Europe were first imperatives. There was an urgent race to "discover" non- European lands for resource exploitation and strategic ports.

In the process, various Euro languages, cultural practices and DNA were disseminated throughout the colonies in what was an Euro carve up of the world at large.

It can be strange to reflect now that the descendants of colonial powers take an overwhelming approach in the 21st century, being careful not to discriminate on various fronts like disability age, gender, race and religion. Is this a new age of enlightenment with liberal democracy?

A diverse variety of migrants coming to settle in Western societies in the past 50 years appreciate enjoying the relative freedoms and high level of human rights experienced in their new countries of adoption.

Questions do arise if some groups of migrants do exploit such liberal options for their own purposes in these Western countries. Is it better for migrants to integrate with the mainstream, or do we encourage such migrants, many from former colonies, to strike out their different way of life arising from their source cultures?

This matter can come to a head when globalisation forces in trade, finance and economics displace the jobs in the heartland and disenfranchise mainstream Caucasians of their past lifestyle and standard of living.

So in reaction, populist governments have taken control in Europe and the USA, changing past assumptions of the political landscape for the future.

Is this anything new, or is the world going through a recycling from royalty and dictatorships to liberal democracy to manipulated electoral systems and hardened right wing conservatism?

Political governance can always be an evolving matter as it cannot remain static. Like evolution according to Nature's laws, politics and social interaction must make society viable enough to be sustained and to grow.

The house has to be rebuilt, gradually or with a sudden change.

The so called Old World of Europe must continue to reinvigorate itself on all fronts. 

The Things You Used To Do

This may sound like a love story, but maybe it is not.


On a welcomed weekend, can you recall what your routine was many years ago?   We change our life, career and social status as we go through the phases of growing up, building a career and enhancing a network of family and close mates.  Such changes have been wrought because of our own reckoning, imposed on us and gradually as a result of world wide or local trends.

Do you still tend a garden?  Many Millennials live in bricked up, artificial spaces high up above the local street.  The greenery around more often than not belongs to Council, the body corporate or a neighbour.   The twenty somethings thrive on minimalising possessions even before the Marie Kondo lessons, keeping themselves nimble for travel, transfer to another country or to elope with the love of their lives on a moment's notice.

Oh yes, what about the sports and activity routine?  For parents  with young kids, it is de rigour on a Saturday morning to join the traffic bottle neck, watch other cars loaded with sports enthusiastic passengers and to continually manage the time schedule.   Do you still look forward to putting up your legs on the sofa by evening of the day?  

I put my bet that a contemporary life for most of us is to check the smart phone apps and social media buzz, not just on a lazy weekend, but whenever we can.  No more feeling the rustle of newspapers as we browse through what the media says with a cuppa.  The cuppa is still there, but now more likely with a barista made thing at a hipster cafe.  The throw of newspapers on to your front door is disappearing in most suburbs.

The drive to other suburbs is now littered with more vehicles, competition for parking and the greater chance to encounter unsettling drivers.   The nearest main road in my neighbourhood used to be a pleasure to pass by, now it is chock a block at major junctions with vehicles as if it is rush hour to work on a weekend.   Yet the parks remain well kept and green, an opportunity to relive past strolls with loved ones or to continue to smell the grass and roses with them.

When you used to open on to an electronic screen, I take it that it was television.   Yes, TV is still alive but the buzz word is now streaming to consumers, albeit with still passive viewing habits.   

The future is moving on fast, especially in South Korea with 5G enabled streaming of on line real time and inter active gaming on screens.   You Tube has challenged production of content and is more accessible as long as you are willing to pay for Wi-Fi (or have good reliable Wi-Fi).   

People rarely get the experience of watching some fascinating programme together.  More likely viewing good content has become a personal and lonely experience, watching on the go, whenever there is spare time commuting, waiting for something at home, or when unexpectedly getting stuck somewhere away from home.  It is only a memory when family and friends watched something terrific on screen physically assembled together, unless it is back to the cinema hall.

And oh yes, there are several screens in our daily routine these days.  Tablets, smart phones, giant digital versions, desktops, laptops and the so called Tv screen.

Pets have always been a traditional bonus of home life.  Do you still take the doggie to walks twice a day, to heighten their spirit with new smells, to increase the pleasure of exercise and to give more opportunity to encounter the new?   City dwellers have smaller pets to correspond with their smaller apartments, but they can be so flashy busy as well to find time to just walk the dog.  

Do you still connect with your neighbours?  Or some of them do not want even to have anything to do with you.   In Australian suburbs,a walk down the hood still confronts us to darkened fronts of houses, as opposed to the frolic and bright buzz in other countries and cultures.  Is there anyone really occupying dark units in fast tracked high rise units?   Residents still tend to huddle at the back of Australian dwellings and this has not changed at all.

So the family gathers in rumpus rooms near the kitchen, but the variety of cooking ingredients has definitely widened to a comfortable extent.   The  availability of so called exotic things to buy in Australian cities would astound many baby boomers, but we all take it in our stride.   Concepts and methods of preparation for culinary cooking have also changed.   We now have more easy access to smashed avocado, freshly made gnocchi, Baklava, Asian styled roasts, freshly prepared Rogan Josh, Brazilian grills, Granola breakfasts, gratifying coffee blends, tapas and Chinese hot pots, as if they have always been part of the Australian landscape.

On a not so positive front, there are more processed foods, opioid and other manufactured prescriptions, increased gambling options, use of more chemicals and more stuff for which we as consumers are not told the whole story when regularly using them.

Society seems to have suffered a lowering of trust and conviction levels, across many fronts like news, medical advice, matters involving politics, messages from commercial advertisements and promises from providers.  A higher level of cynicism has corresponded with inflation in the cost of daily living.   Each of us increasingly deals with software, robotics, artificial intelligence and the whole cohort of impersonal communication to get things done.

We text more with our fingers than exercise our vocal chords.
We get engrossed more with ourselves rather than sharpen our skills and instincts to interact face to face with others. 

Commuting using public transport may feel the same in between rush hours, but not so otherwise in Australian capital cities. The growth of population has overwhelmed the capacity of infrastructural growth.   Commuters seem to rise up more early to catch the express  - and come home later.  The niceties of civilised politeness goes down the more jam packed is the train cabin or bus spot.

Do you still say "Thank You" to your bus driver?   Driverless trains introduced in Sydney now do not grant you to speak to any driver.  

Air travel used to be one of elegance, privilege and civility.
Not so these days, after an explosion of growth in airlines and passengers in an industry that has made mobility and quickness the buzz words.  More get to travel by such means, but there are also more risks and chances of getting mucked up at airports, face delays of aircraft and more tension in over crowded flights.

It looks like the more people we have in our community, we find ourselves speaking less to each other.  We used to stimulate our brains and senses by working on craft with other people, but now we immerse ourselves with zips and dots of light, heat and analytics.   We allow machines manage so called mundane chores but we have not found a full and satisfying range of what we can do ourselves.  We want things delivered and fulfilled faster than ever - and forget to appreciate that the best things in life take time to nurture and grow.

So if you sense a rising helplessness of tension in your daily life, stop and think.   What can you do to revive the pleasures you found yesterday?   It takes a conscious effort to reflect and change  - and not just join the race determined by commerce, technology and business alone.

Blocked Number, Forwarded, Dissemination and Not Picking Up

With a smart phone, there are so many ways to connect and communicate with.

Examples are text, WhatsApp, Facebook, Email, Instagram, Snapchat, WeChat, Twitter, Line, Messenger, voice call and voice message. The last two means are increasingly in disfavour or less used, especially with those under 40 years old. Every individual can be contacted in all these separate ways - and may inadvertently miss important communication simply because he or she had no time to or simply does not check every such channel on a regular basis.

Many have turned off audio or visual notifications as their regularity can raise our stress levels, due to the sheer volume of messages, mostly unimportant, received.

Twitter encourages wording a short message quickly, perhaps with not much forethought and with a risk of messaging in the heat of the moment. Traditional letter writing may be passe but usually allows our minds and emotions to have sufficient time to settle down first.

Snapchat allows you to display images for a short while, while you can keep a long running gallery of images in Instagram. Both play on our visual responses and a picture is really worth more than a thousand words.

What is posted in cyberspace is there forever, even after the act of deleting them. The smart phone makes it so easy to post. Just reflect on Facebook, utilised by so many who are brought to grief many years later with mutterings of long ago when they were younger, not so wise and more outspoken.

Every major and minor workeable invention of humankind has been subject to perpretations of fraud, deceit and abuse. Sad but true. 

Social media crimes cover the spectrum from finance to love to taking advantage of another person in various other ways. Traditional telephone landlines have already been used to manipulate on the pyschology of call recipients. So now the same bastardly approach is utilised to target social media recipients.

It can be as simply starting with the phone callers blocking out their identities or phone numbers. Therefore the recipient sees a Blocked Number on his or her phone. I am reduced to being filled with uncertainty, higher risk and hesitation to answer in such a situation.
What do you reckon you would do in a similiar scenario? Why would people block out their phone numbers when calling you?

It may be nothing sinister. Not so long ago, a previous generation picked up the landline phone naturally when it rang, with no means of knowing who called.

Yet many now do not pick up such calls. The logic now is that if it is urgent or valid enough, the caller will contact you in other ways.

Many who pick up calls with a Blocked Number can be confronted with unknown and menacing voices from the other side, a kind of Twilight Zone of experience. Worse are initial seemingly kind voices trying to eventually solicit personal data, or play on the inherent kindness and trust of innocent and well behaved citizens of our society.

Threats and scams made include a veil of extortion, a play on our potential greed (the strange caller promises of monetary gain in exchange for your personal data) and auto recorded voices stirring up fear and discontent. Seduction techniques include grooming target recipients to develop an emotional attachment to the caller to eventually extort or make the recipient part with money.

The first premise for responders like us is to quickly realise that there is no level playing field when dealing with such callers. The key response is to realise it is a dangerous game, every word of your voice can be recorded and you can fight back by contacting the entity or company the call is claimed to be made from.

This serious situation started with marketing calls made at dinnertime many years ago, with call staff pressured or induced to make hard to earn commissions at call centres. More people these days do not have a landline at home, so such calls and even more risky ones have now moved to the smart phone, which supposedly accompanies the owner everywhere.

Risky and manipulative calls and contacts are used increasingly by specific political parties to literally drive their message to the masses. These can result in fake news being disseminated by people whom you know share similar strong views with you. Think of WhatsApp. We have to really think more for ourselves and respect our own intelligence, especially when facing a barrage of cleverly modelled news communicated so easily and fast on your hand held daily companion.

This over use of such approaches have turned many people off, until they limit the use of their increasingly expensive phones. 

The inherent expectation held by many that you are always by your phone has to be smashed. Even if that smart phone is on your side, there should be no expectation of users checking their phones all the time. The quality of life is enhanced when I begin to only check my smart phone at limited stages of the day.....unless it is a phone call.

If it is urgent enough, do make a normal phone call or drop by for a face to face meet up.

The easy and instantaneous delivery of videos and images can be a two edged sword. They can result in pleasure and pain - and definitely a running out of storage space on your hand held device.

Weren't we told before that hacks and non-benign viruses can be spread through email attachments, whether in text, picture or video, many years ago? Now WhatsApp offers that risky channel.

It is said the dangers are elevated the more captivating and well made the WhatsApp messages are. Just like being at a snake oil show, we as the audience must increase our caution when we are faced with loud content, less signs of validity and no acknowledgement of source ( usually "forwarded").

Do not be a used party in spreading a wildfire we may regret or really do not want to be part of.

#yongkevthoughts

Partitioning

Partitioning involves moving populations, dividing and conquering human beings.

The governments of the USA, Canada and Australia historically moved indigenous peoples into reservations, in a version of containing and corralling groups, minimising their cultures and not allowing them to fully participate in the fabric of the nation.

This involved not only physical partitioning, but emotional, social and economic alienation.

During World War 2, Americans of Japanese and German ancestry were interned in specially set up camps, after they were forcibly removed from their homes.

The human pysche of nations can go to extremes in times of war, religious divide or when there is competition for resources.

Partitioning was both a strategy and solution deployed when decolonisation swept the world in the mid 20th century. The worst consequences of such political and socio- religious partitioning was experienced in south Asia in 1947, when the Mountbatten Plan gave rise to the modern nations of India and Pakistan - a million people, Sikhs, Hindus and Muslims, died in the ensuing mass migration between the two newly formed states, due to man made hunger, inter religious fighting and social violence.

The colonial British deployment of divide and rule to manage diverse ethnic groups
within their colonies also arose in Malaya, which lay the seeds for continuing racial discrimination even today in a nation that is overly conscious and emphatic of racial and religious differences. The Afrikaners imposed apartheid in South Africa, which officially ended late last century, but still casts a shadow on inter ethnic relations in today's Rainbow Nation.

In both the Malaysian Federation and the Republic of South Africa, partitioning of hearts and minds to the exclusion of more significant things has not been optimal or beneficial for both societies.

Ireland saw the partitioning of their island due to religious and political factors intervening from London. The Cold War between the Soviet Union and the USA saw the unnatural partitioning of Germany, which recovered and reunited after the fall of Communism in Europe.  

Europe has seen a chequered history of changing boundaries and territorial partitions, think of Yugoslavia before 1990 and new nations arising after 1990 - but Italy was federated on the late 19th century and the EU was created in the late 20th century.

The most intense and yet unresolved conflict resulted from the creation of Israel in 1948 from a partitioned Palestine. The heady mix of entrenched cultures, beliefs and geopolitical interests add to a cauldron of shifting military balances, outside interference and historical alliances and enmity.

Russia remains unpartitioned. Yet Koreans remain separated geographically and politically between North and South. Vietnamese reunited as one nation after the French and American Wars. Thailand was never partitioned and colonised.

Partitioning can mean being reunited, but at what cost?

Social Media Messages and News - Stop First to Think

It is usually in our human nature to share experiences, knowledge, news and information.

One may expect human beings to gather around physically and face each other to do so, but this is no longer necessary.

They come in various forms in our contemporary world. We need not even speak to each other, but transmit almost instantaneously what we share in graphics, videos, pictures, text and more. Such startlingly efficient sharing communication is enabled by code, artificial intelligence, analytical cookies, wi-fi, gateways and monitored channels.

We do so with rising expectations of the quick and easy. The convenience can come with a cost.

We learn to lower our trust levels when messages in whatever format can be tampered with an intent to manipulate.

Racial, religious and political matters are especially vulnerable to be disseminated with an intent to arouse our deep set emotions, stir our beliefs and shake our convictions.

Hence the rise of the risks in whether things shared are authentic.

What are the signals that alert us to a higher possibility of receiving mischevious, false, compromised and tampered messages?

1. Messages featuring provocative negativity or over rated hope on an uneven emphasis.

2. Messages with no ownership and attachments with no trace of a time stamp.

3. Messages with sensational graphics and tone of voice over.

4. Messages with images that cannot be authenticated and so can be put out of context.

5. Messages from unknown and highly dubious websites.

6. Messages that test your inner instinct of being too good to be true, or make you want to authenticate further.

7. Messages from parties known to slip through fake news to you.

8. Messages sent instantaneously to groups of recipients can signal higher risks.

9. Messages from unknown or untraceable parties and yet claims to originate from famous persons.

10. Messages that intensify matters when every one should step back and calm down.

Each of us can just respect and utilise our own level of intelligence to avoid being sucked into furthering the progress of social media messages that cause problems if shared.

Step back from a message received if the first gut feel is bad on a suspicious message.

Always question the agenda of the party who shared the stirring message to you.

You can be the only person to break the chain of such suspicious messages. In the end, it is best not to respond.

Haphazard and Hopeless in Haymarket

Rough edges, sudden bumps, grey blotches.
Unfriendly fences, bored workers, negative vibes.
Paths keep changing, dust in the air and no one cares.
There is a warzone for quiet battles, long delays in completion and accumulating hidden costs.

The character of a once vibrant place has been degraded.
Its denizens wander like zombies, the throbbing soul of the earth beneath scarred.
The promise, the beauty and the delivery as seemingly hopeless now as snow on Sydney streets.

"Haphazard and Hopeless in Haymarket"
Laying new tram tracks, Sydney 2017-2019