A Turtle Stranger

The Final Empire (Mistborn Book One)

I used to have this old roommate a couple of years ago, and whilst I love him, he is in the best way a big nerd. He used to read these huge fantasy books that were 600 pages long and part of this intricate and complicated world, and I used to pick on him almost daily about this. I have always loved reading but these books just seemed like the epitome of nerdy books and I always thought they weren’t for me. Then all of my friends started reading these books, and swore by how fantastic they were, so eventually I got to the point where I decided I had to see what all the hype was about.

Enter The Final Empire by Brandon Sanderson. The sheer idea of this book intimidates me, more than 600 pages long and the first in a much longer series. I was sceptical but I started to dig in. By about page 100 I was absolutely hooked and couldn’t put it down. It got to the point where I had a sick day from work (I was actually sick, I swear), and I read about 400 pages and finished the book this day. I did nothing else.

I don’t know what it is about Brandon Sanderson’s writing, but he has a way of building this extremely complex world with so many sub plots and characters, and yet it is easy to read and follow. You find yourself enraptured by the mystery of what’s to come, and whilst some storylines (I won’t be giving away any spoilers) are slightly predictable, the overall story and ending was not at all. It also had a way of exploring real world issues, like class systems, slavery, discrimination and political systems, in a really though provoking way.

I have a pile of books I need to keep on reading, but I must admit I was close to just buying the second book of this series and keep on going right away, because I am now addicted to this storyline. I haven’t been this sucked in by a book series since Harry Potter, and I can assure you, Brandon Sanderson’s world that he is building seems much more complicated than that world.

So I want to thank my friends for introducing me to these books, but at the same time be mad. I can foresee that I am not going to have much of a life for the next few years trying to catch up on all these books. And the other amazing thing about Brandon Sanderson is how quickly he pumps these books out, I am talking multiple 600 page books a year, it’s really impressive.

I give The Final Empire 5 out of 5 stars. If you haven’t read it yet, then what are you waiting for? Start now, you won’t regret it (unless you have a very busy life and like sleep, then you might).

Grounds of the City

Anyone that knows Sydney knows of the Grounds of Alexandria. If you can brave the crowds then it’s always a great experience, but this weekend I got the rare chance to check out the little sister, Grounds of the City. I have visited here before for the odd coffee here and there, but this was the first time I have been here for food. I potentially also picked the worst day for going here, Saturday morning. Not only are most of the cafes in Sydney CBD closed on a Saturday, but also then you have the added attraction of a Grounds venue, so we ended up waiting 40 minutes for a table.

We finally got seated, right next to the waiter’s stand, which means that as the waiters hustled and bustled past, one of my companions kept getting hit by the drawers or the waiters themselves. At the same time, the service wasn’t particularly great. Ordering was slow and things like getting water at the table was a bit of a chore. Don’t get me wrong, the staff was pleasant, just a little slow and understaffed.

The vibe of the Grounds of the City is its main appeal, as they call it, the ‘old-school charm’. It makes you feel like you have stepped back into the time of prohibition, and honestly they have done a really fantastic job creating that vibe. I would love to check this place out at cocktail hour, because I can imagine the atmosphere is even more magical then.

In terms of the menu, the choice of coffee is so diverse; cold brew, filtered, batch brew, and then all your usual suspects like your Cappuccinos and Long Blacks. The coffee is good, maybe not the best in Sydney but definitely a good quality. The menu is fairly ritzy too. You know how normally you can go to a cafe and get a nice bacon and egg roll for $8? Not here. Here, a bacon and egg roll served on a pretzel bun will set you back about $20. Not to say that’s a bad thing, but just to give you an idea of the menu. Myself and one friend went for the Hash Potato Stack, which was poached eggs and a manchego sauce with wilted spinach and a potato hash. It was delicious. I am pretty partial to a potato hash but this met my high standards and I devoured it quickly. Our other friend got the steak and eggs, which is certainly not something that I would ever opt for at breakfast time, but he said it was all cooked well, and he is a chef himself so I would tend to trust his judgement and might have to check that out myself next time.

Overall, Grounds of the City was a great meal. Service could be better and I definitely know to book a table in advance next time (or go in an off peak time), but I would definitely be very keen to go back and check it out again. If anyone wants to take me for cocktails there, then that would be very much appreciated!

I give it 3.5/5 stars.

Shiba’s Restaurant

On the main street of Pyrmont (Harris Street), there is a new Japanese restaurant in town. It has been there for a few months now admittedly, but it is still relatively new. I drive past it a couple of times a week and always think to myself, I should go there, but now finally I got the perfect excuse to go. I was catching up with an old friend from uni and she suggested it and how was I to say no to that?

It’s certainly not a fine dining institute there, in fact with the soft toy Shiba’s scattered throughout the restaurant I would say it’s pretty kitschy. You know it’s not a high class establishment when the wine options are house white, house red and that’s it. I ended up getting an Asahi because the $5 house wine didn’t sell it to me.

There is a very extensive menu, with lots of options to make it a set and add lots of different things. I opted for a Chicken Katsu donburi (on its own) whilst my friend got the Chicken Katsu set with Sashimi and rice. My Donburi was pretty yummy, the sauce was good and the chicken was cooked well, but the amount of rice in it was too much. I couldn’t finish it, and I am not someone who doesn’t finish my meals regularly. Mine also came accompanied with Miso Soup. I normally turn my nose up at Miso soup as the Miso is a very distinct taste which I have not adapted to, but the Miso soup here was the best I had. They had toned down the flavour just a bit, so it was much more palatable.

Overall, it was a satisfactory meal, especially for the prices. I wouldn’t say it was the fanciest establishment, but it was still great. If you’re around Pyrmont and you need a quick and easy dinner, this would be the place to go. I give it 6 out of 10!

Piato Restaurant

This cafe/restaurant is one of Sydney’s best kept secrets. There are a lots of cafes in Sydney and it’s impossible to know them all, but normally a cafe this good would be one of those popular ones that everyone has heard of. Don’t get me wrong, it’s still very busy, but it definitely isn’t one that’s plastered all over social media, and where people head to just because they have seen it in their feeds.

For those Aussies (or even those from overseas), the actor who plays Carbo in Packed to the Rafters (AKA George Houvardas) is the owner of this establishment, and it has strong family vibes, with his brother and what I can only assume is his uncle or Dad, running the shop with him. I have been there twice now for breakfast, after someone who was new to Sydney invited me there as she had stumbled across it on a walk one day. Both times I was there for breakfast, but as the name suggests, this place is a restaurant and serves up Italian food for lunch and dinner. Next time I am heading back I am planning on going for dinner to see if the later meals are just as good.

The popularity of this place means their cafe spreads out down the street. You walk up to grab a table and you get taken to tables and chairs in front of stores two doors down. The service is lovely, over the top helpful, and even though they are popular and busy, they never make any attempts to rush you out of there to free up your table.

The breakfast menu is extensive, with everything from bircher muesli, to the big breakfast, to more unique Mediterranean style dishes. Last time I was there I got the Tomato & Basil scrambled eggs which were fantastic. My only qualm with the food is that the portions are mismatched. I got two huge pieces of sourdough for a moderate size of eggs, and only ended up using one piece of bread. My friend next to me had the opposite, where she had too much avocado for everything else, and had half an avocado left in the end. The food was delicious though, and I would have to go back a couple of times to try everything I was interested in as there were so many good options available.

On top of the food and the service, the other great thing about this place is the vibe it gives. You feel like you could be out having a long, lazy day in the streets of Italy. I don’t know how they have managed to create that vibe, but it is inescapable. Something about it makes you want to spend your entire day there chatting with friends and eating delicious food.

I am now a huge fan of this place, and if I ever had friends or family visiting Sydney and I wanted to take them somewhere, this is where we would go. Without having tried their lunch or dinner menu, it seems hard to rate them fairly but based just on breakfast, this is undoubtedly one of Sydney’s best kept secrets.

I give Piato 4 out of 5 for its breakfast and vibes.

The Lost Symbol

Starting full time work again has really slowed down both my reading and my blog writing. Luckily I had some spare time this weekend and I was able to finish the book I have been slowly working on for a few weeks now. I was a little suprised. Normally I get so caught up in Dan Brown books that even if I am busy I somehow devour them quickly, this one was a little different though.

I am a huge Dan Brown fan, and I think Inferno was one of the most fantastic, thought-provoking books I have ever read (the movie butchered it, if you haven’t read the book then do it now). I was excited to jump into another mystery of Robert Langdon, and learn more about the world, art and history on the way. I was a little let down by this book if I am honest. It just didn’t grip me, or make me want to tear into the book. By the last 100 pages I was hooked and ready to finish, but the 400 pages before that were a little slow.

The setting of this book, Washington DC was the perfect choice, and I never realised how much symbology and meaning surrounded the city’s design. It has inspired me to want to go to Washington DC soon. If the storyline was a little simpler or more accessible, I think the book would be enthralling. I don’t know whether it is because I am less familiar with Masonry or the layout of Washington DC that I couldn’t get sucked in, or whether this storyline was just a little too chaotic for everyone. Maybe it’s because Masonry is not as widespread or important in Australia so it didn’t have as much meaning for me, or maybe there were just too many important characters spiralling into chaos to follow. Maybe the problem was also that I guessed the big plot twist at the end in the first 100 pages. It’s hard to say what the reason was.

What I can say is that it was interesting, and it certainly made me question a lot of what we know accept as commonplace (recognising the fact that Dan Brown’s books are pieces of fiction and not fact). It was still an interesting read, and you can never go wrong with a Dan Brown book, but it certainly wasn’t his best work.

Overall, I have to give it a 3 out of 5. I am hoping his others are much more like Inferno and Da Vinci Code so I can reignite my love of Dan Brown.

Filicudi- the romantic italian

Valentines Day, the infamous day that sends boyfriends and husbands scurrying to the florists, and single people trying to fill their time with anything to prove that they are ok with being alone. It’s a night love by some, and hated by a lot more. Now, I have to admit, I went out for dinner on Valentines Day, but not for the reason that everyone would expect.

My boyfriend and I have been dating for 6 months now, and so this would be our first Valentines Day. He warned me early, he was not a Valentines Day fan, and since I am not that fussed on over the top romantic gestures, we decided we would skip it, and not celebrate it. The difficulty is, his birthday falls on the 15th of February, and because of the kind-hearted person he is, my boyfriend was spending his birthday doing a charity climb to help a child with Cerebral Palsy and his family climb Mt Kosciuszko on this day so we couldn’t celebrate together on the day, so our only option was to celebrate the night before on Valentines Day.

I must admit that part of me kind of hoped my boyfriend would suprise me, but he is a man of his word and there was no suprise. On thinking about it all though, a nice dinner is all I need. Anyway, we did indeed go for a very lovely dinner at a nice little authentic italian restaurant in Five Dock called Filicudi. The place catches your heart from the moment you step into the cosy little restaurant, with empty bottles hanging from the roof (a bit of a hazard for those tall ones like my boyfriend), the walls covered with newspaper clippings and eclectic paintings and artworks, and cosy little tables of two everywhere.

It was recommended to us, and so we were looking forward to checking it out. We booked a few weeks in advance, luckily, because it was packed and people were rolling in and out all night, some even getting turned away at the door. The only drawback of this setup, was we had a couple sitting right next to us, only about 40cm away. This wouldn’t normally be so bad but this couple was probably on their 2nd ever date, and I don’t think they were quite yet 18 so their conversation as Annoying. As. Hell. I am sure on any other night this wouldn’t be a problem, but listening to these young guys call Calvin Harris the best musician of our lifetime really didn’t set the scene well.

Luckily, I realised that cocktails were so cheap, so before long I was sipping on a $12 Aperol Spritz. We decided what we wanted pretty quickly; pasta for me, pizza for my bf, and some garlic bread as well. Carbs on carbs. I went for the Diavola pasta; penne with mushroom, chilli and a creamy tomato sauce. My bf went for the classic Meatlovers pizza.

We had barely ordered before our garlic bread was out. As far as garlic bread goes, it was pretty good but it was a little too soggy in places, and a little too oily. Certainly not the best I have ever had, but pretty good nonetheless. It was at this point that my bf realised that the back kitchen in charge of everything that wasn’t pizza was literally being run by Nonnas (the pizza oven was in the front run being run by some middle age men). The Nonnas were dishing up the pastas, breads and mains. You know it’s an authentic meal then.

It wasn’t long at all before our mains were out as well. Now, my pasta sounded pretty basic but the taste of it was anything but basic. The kick of the chilli is the first thing that grabs you, but before long the smoothness of the homemade penne catches up. It was delicious, and my whole plate was gobbled down in a minute. I have never enjoyed pasta quite this much, and whilst I put a sprinkling of parmesan on it, it didn’t even need it. The pasta stood up on its own. I nearly had to lick my bowl clean at the end, the sauce was so good.

I also got to taste a little bit of my boyfriends pizza, and I am not normally a meatlovers pizza fan, but this pizza was delicious. The base was solid and tasty, but didn’t have a strong enough flavour to drown out the actual toppings of the pizza. The tomato sauce was garlicky and full of flavour, and the meat added even more taste explosions to your mouth. It wasn’t long before the pizza had disappeared too.

So over the course of the dinner, we had a large pizza, a main size pasta, garlic bread, a cocktail, and two beers. Now we were expecting a pretty decent bill to come out, but were shocked when the bill was just $80. Yes, $80 for the best authentic Italian I have had outside of Italy including drinks. The bill was even accompanied by a love heart shaped chocolate. It was a little touch but it rounded out the night perfectly.

We decided on leaving that this was going to become our go to place whenever we had something big to celebrate. It was an intimate enough setting that had good atmosphere, great service and delicious and authentic food. I would 100% recommend everyone to check it out, even if it is in the obscure neighbourhood of Five Dock.

I give Filicudi 5 out of 5.

The Tattooist of Auschwitz

So this book had been on my list for a while, and is one that has been extremely popular in Australia. My order for this was put on back order as they had sold out. I finally got it, though, and it was worth the wait.

This is one of the hardest book reviews I have tried to write so far, because I am struggling to articulate how anything relating to World War II affects me. I have no family that suffered (that I know of) through World War II, but yet I still feel the pain of what happened there. I still feel disgust and dismay at what those people are put through, and I struggle to understand how anything like that could ever happen here in this world. In saying that, I realise that there are parts of the world that still see these horrors every day, but we just don’t see them as much here in the Western world. Whilst travelling through Europe, I visited one of the concentration camps. It is a memory that is seared into my brain. I was there with a friend of Jewish heritage, who lost family during this time, and honestly, it was heartbreaking to see her there in a place where people of her kind were put through conditions no one could ever believe possible.

The Tattooist of Auschwitz is a true story, about a man who survived Auschwitz, a man who one of the Nazis called ‘a cat’ because he had so many lives. Lale was never meant to survive Auschwitz, but his perseverance and determinedness meant that aganst all odds, he did. The book is bittersweet, as it tells you of a love story in the backdrop of inhumane conditions. It tells you of survival of a Jewish man, who seemingly partners or works with the Nazis in order to survive. It tells you of death without conscience, and acts of humanity throughout it all. It tells of a man who was rescued by the kindness of others, who in turn risks his life many times to save others.

Because of the love story, it is easy at times to imagine that this book is fiction, that all these things didn’t really happen, but then you are told a story of death and inhumane killing or torture, and you are reminded that this world did exist, and we lost so many innocent people because of it. There is no sugar coating in this book, the stories are real and raw, and they have impact.

The writing was good, the story was good, and there was so much emotion weaved throughout this book. I can’t say anymore about it, except that it really touched me and I think books like these are so important for everyone to read, so we can understand the mistakes made before, and hope to never let them happen again. I am glad that Lale decided to share his story with the world.

I give this book 9 out of 10. I would definitely recommend it to everyone, except maybe those with a weak stomach.

Force of Nature

As I have a little time off from work I have really been powering through the books recently and for that reason, also really pumping out the book reviews. I have a Good Reads (Social Media for book lovers) Challenge of 20 books for the year and I am already past a quarter of that challenge and the first month of the year hasn’t even finished! Luckily for me, a couple of my closest friends are also book lovers so I have been able to borrow most of these books, and I am thinking about signing up to a second hand book subscription service so I am able to minimise the financial and environmental impact of my reading.

The latest book that I have powered through is the second instalment in the Aaron Falkes books by Jane Harper. I read the first book quite recently, so the story was still fresh in my mind before reading the sequel. Reading both close together is not necessary at all though, it just provides more character development for the cop Falkes. I think that was what was missing from Force of Nature too, because it was very disconnected from his backstory, it was a very tenuous link as to why he was involved in and investigating the crime in the first place. Don’t get me wrong, a link is made, and the story is good, with all the twists and turns I am starting to expect from Jane Harper, but the link between the narrating and main character Falkes with the victims and suspects isn’t really there like it was in The Dry.

The setting of the Australian country continues to provide the perfect backdrop for this crime fiction story, albeit it a very different type of landscape. The contrast between the dry outback described in Harper’s last novel as compared with the lush and overbearing forest in this story is dramatic. One thing that is rather annoying at the end of the book as well is that we never get an answer to one of the key questions throughout the book. I am unsure whether Harper couldn’t find a way to wrap it up, or whether there will be a follow-up in another book. If it is a follow-up book it will be a move into a different type of crime fiction, with a lot more focus on the finance I would assume.

This absence of finality for part of the storyline doesn’t take away from the story though. It was still a great read, I devoured the book in only a couple of days. The ending was unpredictable, and full of exploration of the relationships in dysfunctional families. The writing captured me, and was good at sucking you in so you wanted more.

Overall, I give Force of Nature 7/10.

Don Taco @ Redfern Social Club

I was lucky enough over my long weekend here in Australia to attend the newly opened Don Taco. This little kitchen is found at Redfern Surf Club, which for anyone unfamiliar with Sydney is ironic because Redfern’s inner west location is anything but close to the beach. Redfern Surf Club is as ironic as you would think when you get inside, with a very grungy hipster vibe, including an old-school set tv, fairy lights, and even a stuffed bin chicken (commonly known outside of Australia as an ibis). It’s hard to even find this place, as the outside of the building has some old upside down ‘Grill King’ home, which I assume suggests its historic roots.

This location is where the boys from Ume burger, a Japanese burger restaurant in Sydney, have opened up their next adventure, Don Taco. Opening just last Friday, they are very much in their early days of operation. Redfern Surf Club is a very fitting home for the restaurant serving up fusion Japanese and Tex-Mex food, as it’s all kind of a jumble, but somehow it all fits together.

It’s a pretty limited menu, but what is there packs a punch. We each got the Taco bowls (one with beef and one with 3 bean chilli), which was basically if sushi met a burrito bowl. The dish felt mostly Mexican, but with the addition of sushi rice and some Japanese flavourings, but was delicious, and suprisingly filling for the bargain amount of $12. We also got a share of beef and chilli tacos. The beef was the star for the tacos, and was pretty much the taco bowl but with a soft shell taco instead of rice. It was also good, but the Japanese flavours didn’t really come through.

As for Redfern Social Club itself. It is a place that is hard to categorise, and don’t be honest I don’t think they want to be categorised. You walk in and you are met with a wide audience of patrons, from large groups having a Sunday arvo sesh, to older families, to women meeting up for a drink, to a few couples who were probably just there for the food (like us). One thing that really suprised me was most people were sitting up at the bar, voluntarily. I find that the bar is often the last place everyone wants to sit, but there was plenty of chairs available and the patrons still chose to sit there, which lets you see the friendly vibes they are serving up there. The drinks were decently priced and great too. There are only a couple of tap beers, but a wide range of craft and normal beers as well. I tried a Sourpuss beer, as well as the Local Grifter Pale Ale, whilst my boyfriend tried the other tap beers. Our favourite was the on tap Cucumber kolsch by C-Brook. It was so different, and yet so delicious and refreshing. I am just kicking myself that I didn’t try one of their instagram-worth cocktails, but I know that we will be back there again because we loved the place.

Good location with good vibes, fantastic staff, good drinks at affordable prices, and delicious food. The only thing that could make this place better is if they offered a trivia night.

I give Don Taco and Redfern Social Club 8/10.

The (not so) long debate about Australia Day

For everyone in Australia, we are fast approaching the most tension-fuelled day of the year, Australia Day. Whilst in many countries around the world, there are days of Independence, and days to celebrate their country which everyone enjoys, in Australia our day is always filed with controversy.

The reason for the controversy comes from the date, January 26. The day that the First Fleet arrived in Australia and changed the lives of the native people on the land forever. This is the day that we choose to celebrate every year, not the day that we became our own country, but the day that the first white man settled on the land. What followed this day was mass genocide of the indigenous people, the effects which are still being felt today.

I am not an indigenous person, so I admit, I am not the most educated of people about the impacts that white settlement has had on their culture. For years I celebrated Australia Day in ignorance, without realising that this day was a problem for so many. I have to be thankful to the people that are finally speaking up, who are raising their voices, because without them I would have no idea of the day’s impact on them.

Now that people are becoming aware of the issues, though, the tide is turning. More and more people are calling to #changethedate. There is basically one demographic that is choosing to resist this, and they are the most powerful. Yes, you guessed it, it is the white man. The white man who feels threatened for anyone ever thinking that one of his kind might have done the wrong thing. They feel scared to admit that another white man could ever make a mistake, or make a bad decision, so they continue to bury their head in the sand. Don’t get me wrong, not all white men are like this, just mainly the ones in power in our country, particularly some of our politicians.

We always make a big deal about our ‘multiculturalism’ and I grew up believing in that. Believing that as an Australian we are a diverse community, not realising the irony that in my small country town, everyone was either white or indigenous, and our indigenous people for the most part were doing it pretty rough. We had no multiculturalism, but yet I believed the messaging around me. As a kid you don’t know any different, and you listen to what the adults are telling you. You think that Australia Day is an important day and we have to stick with it, without realising there could be another way. I only hope that now as an adult, I can educate other kids as to what the right way is, and hopefully others around me can do the same.

All hope is not lost though, plenty of people are making positive changes. For instance, Triple J (the Australian radio station) now holds their annual ‘Hottest 100’ on another day, the annual lamb ad that often raises eyebrows for its controversy this year took its turn calling for us to change the day, and even at a local level there are many indigenous groups trying to hold events to remember the time before the First Fleet landed and celebrate indigenous culture, such as Enoch being held at Barangaroo Reserve this year on the 25th of January.

We have come such a long way, but there is still so much further to go. We need to find a way to make Australia Day a day that we can all celebrate, instead of one that just white men can celebrate. We need to educate our children so that they are aware, and they can make better decisions. Finally, we all need to stand up for what is right and best for everyone. Instead of saying not our problem, we should stand with our indigenous friends and call for change until finally, we #changethedate.