Observations

Listening to: Ummm, Australian Idol in the hostel lobby. Yerrrgh. I feel unclean.

The details make the difference when you are not at home.
Sydney observations:
-The soil is a different colour. Red mainly.
-Given that the earth is a different colour, so is the majority of the brickwork. So the houses are a different colour. And they mostly appear to have shades above the windows and airconditioning.
-Eftpos here is very new and novel. I have seen several signs, mostly handwritten, explaining how it works.
-Drivers appear to be more aggresive, yet safer. This is based on two observations. Horns are more prevalent here. But when I have driven here (a few years ago) it felt less at risk from other road users.
-The public transport in this city rocks. It is efficient and works and easy to use for a noob.
-Everything is on a different scale. There are no earthquakes here (the 1989 Newcastle event/abberation aside), so nothing limits the height of the buildings. The Sydney suburbs go on forever. Around the train tracks at least, tagging is almost everywhere, including some impressively dangerous locations.
-It is odd being an islander to travel west and know if I kept doing so the next ocean I saw would be the Indian, a few thousand miles away.
-Going to an airshow by public transport is a novelty. Previously I have always driven or flown.
-Also novel is entering the airshow by crossing the only runway.

Airshow recap

Day two saw me use two more rolls of film, and pick up all the shots I missed yesterday. I also shared fence space with a cool Japanese guy with a grunty camera kit. Two Canon digital SLRs, at least four 16GB memory cards, a 400mm lens on one SLR, and a 200mm on the other. Moving between the two was a 4x teleconverter. Being digital both SLRs would likely have built in magnification ability as well. While quite expensive, the zoom capability on hand was awesome.
My 300mm lens looked quite inadequate. I tried to find a teleconverter (basically a magnifier for your zoom lens) to fit my camera before I left but this proved tricky as my camera is technically obsolete.

Still I think I got some good shots for an amateur.

Having done most of my photography yesterday allowed me more time to relax and gawp at planes the way I used to before photographing them became a hobby. "Damn thats cool" crossed my mind several times.
If any are adequate, shots will be posted later on.

Another early start tomorrow, this time to come home. I have Tuesday off. Most of it I think I will be asleep.