I’ve somehow been whirlwinded into classical music and had decided to browse performances at the Sydney Opera House, and stumbled upon Maxim Vengerov performing a recital! And I decided to buy premium tickets to see how a violin master plays in real life! It was also good for a short trip to see if my pigeons can survive unattended for a few days, in case I decide next year that I want to do Singapore for a few days.
The owner of Steam Tank coffee still recognised me after all these years! And this espresso was really good!
Last year my lemon plant gave me a single delicious lemon, so I was super excited and tentative when it made five lemons all in one go! I wasn’t even sure that a plant in a pot could sustain so much fruit, but luckily I have both supermarket fertiliser and my special supply of pigeon-poop-water, lovingly provided by my pigeons, which I’m sure is the secret ingredient!
Firepop is very new; my friend mentioned it to me amongst other hip and cool restaurants in the Newtown/Enmore area, and this one appealed to me quite a bit – I love places that cook with fire, and the description of the place sounded right up my alley – chicken hearts! Chicken tails! Padron peppers!
Finally, a chance to redeem myself! When I realised I had the chance to come back to Hobart and revisit MONA, I was determined to do this properly this time! Look at mustardy MR-II, though I ended up going on the grey MR-I, just like last trip. I’ve tried not to double up too much on my previous content, and I had a lot of fun properly exploring the outside too!
I visited a bunch of restaurants and wine bars during my hobart visit, including a fantastic dinner at Sonny where I had a lovely conversation with two other solo diners, but Fico was the only one I had booked in advance since it seemed interesting. It was fantastic!
Went to Hobart for work for a week, which was the perfect opportunity to explore the city and see how the specialty coffee scene has evolved since my last visit in 2017!
A lot of cafes don’t open until 7 or 7:30AM so my choices on weekdays were quite limited, but I still I found some nice ones! Staple Coffee was one I kept returning to; their bagels and croissants are really tasty (and cheap?! A coffee and bagel/croissant was only around the $12 mark!).
I feel like in the last decade, I’ve done so much that I thought I’d never actually do in my life. Going to a classical concert is one of them! Once again I have Twoset to thank for that inspiration. I really want to actually have a better understanding of the violin, something I never cared about as a kid. This concert caught my attention because I feel like I would enjoy the intensity of Shostakovich. I’d never heard any of Elgar’s stuff before but the sample I heard sounded interesting.
I guess I’m a ballet enthusiast now? I really enjoyed watching Swan Lake and Echoes of Van Gogh last year and was looking into this year’s lineup.
La Bayadere, it turns out, has a very high degree of technicality and it was super impressive! WA Ballet’s interpretation is different from the original, and I enjoyed the plotline. I think I was holding my breath for most of it, especially during Act II, The Kingdom of the Shades, the arabesque train down a slope!!! Omg! All the ballerinas were trembling, it must have been so intense! I have so much respect for the strength of ballet dancers!
This time I also paid some attention to the orchestra too, I feel like part of the magic of ballet is also that the conductor is watching the ballet in order to make sure the orchestra is in sync. So cool!
There’s nothing quite like the intensity of watching live performances!
