This weekend marks the beginning of the Sydney Festival, a celebration of culture and art. We kicked off our experience with a visit to Carriageworks, a huge multi-arts center in a neighboring suburb, to see an installation called the Sydney Buddha. The piece, created by artist Zhang Huan, consists of a larger-than-life aluminum sculpture of Buddha and a casting of the same made of over 20 tons of incense ash from Chinese temples. The installation will persist through mid-March, though the incense Buddha will deteriorate over this time. I wanted to visit early on to see the piece in its entirety and hope to revisit toward the end of the organic Buddha's life. It was really an amazing spectacle. |
We were briefed before entering and told we would be led into the "blue room" first where we would suit up in white paper lab coats. The blue room turned out to be a backstage area with a large projection screen that simply had a periwinkle light flooding it, devoid of motion or design. After donning our lab coats, we were handed a large wad of paper, which we were asked to hold to our ear. A barely audible narration could be heard upon doing so. I couldn't make out all of what was said...something about a beach and the smell of cinnamon...After the narration was over, our paper balls were collected and we were released into "the maze", which we were told we could move through freely.
I failed to mention that there was a woman in a costume of white ruffled organza dancing throughout the maze. The voice of the paper wad narrator was more audibly coming from her as she navigated the white walls. Other visitors, who had been silently watching her in the center of the maze, followed her away as she left, giving Pickle and I a brief reprieve in which to confer with one another about whether we had just been inducted into a cult...
Unfortunately, after documenting this state of confusion (we took a second pic for good measure), we turned to notice that the white-coated crowd had returned and that preeeeeetty much all of our fellow cult-goers were snickering at our selfie faux pas as a second dancer utilized the center space behind us.................woops.
We'd not seen the second dancer (see photobomb, pic 2) nor the crowd that had gathered to our left. We decided we weren't likely to regain our status in the cult after such an incident and sheepishly left the maze to rejoin society. To add insult to injury, we were faced with three exit options, all which said "automatic door" in red, yet looked unnervingly similar to fire exit doors in the States. (This wasn't part of the exhibit - just the way the automatic doors looked at the gallery.) I gathered my courage and opened one, but it wasn't the way out. Pickle open another and (because it was an automatic door) it made a jarring sound, which we both thought was going to be an alarm. I'm not gonna lie, my "flight" instinct beat our my "fight" as I turned to run. Luckily, the episode did not end with an alarm..............only a little additional shame on my part.
I selected a dessert of gelato...one scoop of matcha green tea and and another of black sesame, prompting Pickle to question why we couldn't get "at least one good flavor?" He decided to give them a try though. We'd had green tea ice cream before, but I was keen to try the black sesame. I LOVED it. Pickle did not, and, exasperated, noted that he would "LET THIS BE A LESSON!!!" as he grudgingly shoveled tiny spoons of green tea gelato into his mouth. | We'd planned to go to Paddy's Markets after Carriageworks, but all of the embarrassment really worked up an appetite, so we decided to eat first. Pickle selected a lunch of mall-quality Chinese fare, which we decided to split 70/30. He chose honey soy wings, mongolian BBQ beef, and honey prawns. This all came in a heaping mound with fried rice and egg drop soup on the side for the bargain price of $9.50. He was a happy camper! |
| After our late lunch, we headed down to Paddy's Markets. It ended up being a lot of cheap Aussie souvenirs, heaps of UGGs, knock-off handbags, sunglasses, mobile phone cases, Halloween costumes, Asian knick-knacks and women yelling at you not to take photos of their booth's contents. Definitely not as unique as the Rozelle treasure trove, but Pickle scored a sun shade for our car with a metallic Aussie flag design and I picked up some purple aviators....and when we're looking for brand new luggage for $30 or HDMI cables once our household goods arrive, we'll know where to go! |