I, Nadia, Dion and Benny went to Hurstbridge. Took Hurstbridge train and got off at the last station. It was another pleasant trip and I really hope, we can do it every weekend. Haha..

When we first arrived there, we weren’t expecting that much. We didn’t think we can take lots of good photos (and I found out that my photos don’t satisfy me this time), but what’s wrong with exploring new place? Then Benny was hungry and we found this old cafe. It’s a 100 years old cafe called Wattle Cafe. The building is so cool and I think the interior is magnificent. It is run by a family and they have delicious meals. The milkshakes were great, banana toast also and Benny ordered this HUGE burger and it tasted DELICIOUS! You can actually visit their site here.

After having our lunch at Wattle Cafe, we went looking for a place where we can find lots of green field. Actually there are lots of them in Hurstbridge but it turned up that they are somebody’s property so wherever we went, we saw this ‘no trespassing’ sign. Sigh…

We walked and walked until we finally decided to go back to the station. We stopped for awhile and had our snack (apple and sandwiches), then we went back to Melbourne Central. We met Benny’s friends the photographers and went to St Kilda Beach.

It was a very fun day especially when the professional flash photographers from Flickr asked me and Nadia to be their model. Well. I’ll show you later our photos (haven’t received their email yet). Those are great photos! Haha.. definitely a new experience.

Monday 07 December 2009, there was fire burning the old station of Gardenvale.

I don’t know what’s the reason of those teenagers burning down the station but I do know that there are some people who get excited by fire. Anyway, I and Nadia were walking down our daily road, going to Gardenvale station when we saw those people standing on the busstop, all wearing black suit. We thought that someone’s dying or what but it turned out that there was fire at the station.

We waited for the replacement bus to take us to Elsternwick station and we thought we’re going to be late. Luckily we arrived on time at Prahran Station.

In the afternoon, I went back from school and Gardenvale station has been opened. I didn’t know why, I didn’t even pay any attention to the station condition at all. When I arrived at home. Nadia asked me whether I saw the burned station or not; and that was the time when I realized that the station has been burned.

Today (08/12/09) was a funny day. I and Nadia were overslept. Hahaha. We were both late for the 1st class. Again, I passed Gardenvale Station and didn’t pay any attention to the burned station.

At last, when I got back from Einy’s house, I decided to take some photos of the station and well… the station is in a bad condition.

We have planned our day since Thursday that we would go to St Ali Cafe and somewhere to do a photo hunt. So we got home and looked for a place to do the photo hunt. Well we found one : Upper Ferntree Gully. It is located near Dandenong Ranges in Dandenong Mountain, which means : ZONE TWO.

After recharging my camera’s battery -because I forgot to recharge it the day before- we took the train to Melbourne Central, walked to Collins Street, took tram number 96, and changed to number 112 in front of Crown Casino. We got off not so far from St Ali Cafe and thanks to the GPS on my beautiful iPhone (haha.. so snob), we weren’t lost.

St Ali Cafe is a very nice place, well… Nadia loves it so much! So we ordered some drinks and food. Poor Dion, he was very hungry but at this time, he really has to save money… sooo… he didn’t ordered anything.

I took some photos in the cafe after I ate the delicious pizza and drank the ‘fusty’ tea. Nadia told me her cappuccino was great. Well, it turns out that St Ali is popular for its’ coffee.

From St Ali we took another tram to Southern Cross Station. It is the nicest train station in Melbourne I suppose, I will surely do a photo hunt there next time. Then we got in the train directed to Belgrave. 25 stops before we reached our destination. It was a long journey but a definitely fun one.

In Upper Ferntree Gully, we found this national park. We stopped and opened our lunchboxes before we continued our trip. Note that everybody was already tired of jogging and we were kinda lost for a while in Upper Ferntree Gully. After we ate our sandwiches and biscuits, we continued to WALK and we found this ‘dirt road to heaven’. WOAAAA!!! it was very steep!!! We reached ‘stop’ number 5. When I said ‘stop’, I mean a flat surface. We decided that we should go back. It was already 6pm after all. We had been walking for about 2 hours and we were exhausted.

Before we went back home, we bought some drinks. The mineral water I’ve bought is still in my room SEALED! Haha.. Anyway, it was a very great day.

For the original text, please visit my deviantart website.

For more photos, please visit my facebook album.

Actually I’m not that kind of religious person. hahaha.. When I was in Jakarta, I barely attended the masses, but I don’t know why since I’ve been in Australia, I have only missed 1 mass because I was moving out by then. I actually love being in a mass and in a church. They give me peace somehow. hehe..

Today I was attending the mass with Nadia, Angie, and Danika (not sure how to write her name. Sorry Dan..) hahaha..

Thereafter we went to a chinese restaurant which speciality is egg chiffon. I’ve been there before with Adi and Tep. When I went there with them, I ate the whole plate of egg chiffon alone, and it was HUGE! hahhaa.. while Adi couldn’t finish his meal and Tep finished after me. Woho… I realize that I eat a lot in a very short time! and today…. AGAIN!!! I finished up first! I loooveee the food very much and will sure be back someday!

I realize there are sooo many stories I can share with people out there about the way of living in another country. This is probably the main reason why I want to create a new blog.

First of all, let me introduce myself properly, as you already know before, my name is Dina Budiarto, I’m an Indonesian and have 1 handsome brother. Until next February, I will still be a 20-years-old girl. I’m getting older.. Yea… I know it. Hahaha

I have 5 wonderful best friends one could have! They are Edith, Edwin, Daniel, Yessica, and Budi. I’ll tell you later about them. Then I’ve found some close friends in Australia: Benny, Dion, Nadia, Adi, and Angie.

Ah yeah, one more thing… I loooovee to eat. hahahah who doesn’t?

Greetings from Australia, Dina Budiarto