The flight was relatively uneventful – a few bumps and shunts and a couple of movies which were interesting as they were in English, but had Chinese subtitles (which was good as I have picked up a couple of their words now, at least in written Chinese).

I spoke with one of the other passengers, Christine, who was travelling wih her two children. They live in Macau, with her husband, who works for The Venitian – the largest casino in the world. Christine is from Australia, as is her husband, and they both work in the gaming industry. When we were leaving the aircraft (and as I know it is what I would have wanted done for my Mum if she had been travelling with myself or my brothers at that age) I gave her a hand with her luggage. Mine was pretty simple to grab – the wonders of travelling light.

After seeing Christine off, I managed to find a free WiFi access point and get into my email to find the address details of the guys who were putting me up in Macau. I exchanged some money and then headed for the cab ranks where I ran into yet another Australian, who works as a project manager for another casino which is under construction here. It seems every Aussie in Macau is working for the casinos.

I met Lena and James at “Kun Yam Tong” – a temple in their neighbourhood and they showed me back to their apartment where I met Patrice (“Pat-rees”) who is a Frenchman living in Hong Kong who was Couchsurfing at their place whilst working on a short film with James.

Whilst James and Patrice worked away on the movie, I sat down with Lena and had a chat about life, the universe and everything. And, any converation is always more interesting over a couple of ANZAC biscuits (which my Mum had cooked up for me, and were enjoyed by all the housemates).

At about midnight Macau time (and 3AM Sydney time) we walked down the road in the brisk, single-digit degree air, to a local sushi place for dinner, which was nice, and needed. Then walked to a McDonald’s, as James had a craving for a sundae, and then back to the apartment. Once back at the apartment, we had some Whiskey, lemon juice, honey and hot water which burnt the tongue but probably also means that I will not have a cold for some time to come.

Then it was time to crash out on the couch/futon and get some very overdue sleep.

First night Macau.
First night outside of Australia.
First time to a sushi place.
First step of my journey.