Sunday June 4 - Helter Skelter

We landed at 7:15 am and were met at the airport by friends from Artarmon, the family of Tatsuya's best mate from primary school. After a bit of a break and a cup of coffee, I decided I felt good enough to run the Great NOSH Footrace, and the weather was glorious (after a couple of rainy days I was told). So the omens were such that I was compelled to run. I got changed and my very understanding friend gave me a lift to the start. Tatsuya went back with them to catch up with more old school friends while I met up with new friends, Cool Runners Go Girl, The Owl, Jen_Runs, Don Juan, MPH, and some others beyond the capacity of my memory (sorry to anyone I met but have not mentioned). It was really nice being able to just stroll up to the start and register and pay for the race on the day. How different is that to Japan where we have to be registered and paid anywhere from three weeks to three months before the actual race.

The race was great. It consisted of a 15-km run through Sydney Harbourside bushland with some rather steep little scrambling uphills and precarious downs. Standing at the start I could hear cockatoos and honeyeaters and gazed at the glorious salmony bark of the Angophera costata and the scaly-trunks of the casuarinas. Soon the gun went and we were off like rabbits through the undergrowth. Unable to push aside thoughts that I might be compettitive in my age group, I probably went at it too hard and found myself racing it rather than just running for pure enjoyment (the latter is what I probably should have done). A few times when I found myself really out of breath and buggered, I did check myself a little and say that it was not really worth killing myself over. I finished in a little over 72 minutes, 39th out of a couple of hundered starters and a little out of the placings in my age group. Can't complain about that under the circumstances.

As pre-arranged, my former boss, and still good friend, Alastair met me at the finish. A funny way to meet up after five years. I picked up my bag and got changed, waited for GoGirl and a few others to finish and, since there was no need to hang around for the presentations, said my goodbyes -- time was of the essence. (After coming back to Japan I was very disappointed to discover that had I waited a little longer I would have met up with the ever-popular effervescent and irrepressible Cool Runner and blogger, Mr Twopenny. But it's OK, he has promised he will come for a visit to Japan.)

We headed back to Tunks Park between Cammeray and Northbridge to meet up with the Artarmon friends and some old uni mates. Picked up some yummy prawns along the way and ate those along with great chunks of steak and some snags washed down with fine Tasmanian lager. Ahh...I was either home or had died and gone to heaven. One or the other, it was hard to tell. Tatsuya's mates tried a bit of fishing. I think they were trying to catch a fugu.

Around 4:00 Tatsuya and I were dropped off in Crows Nest. My wife and the kids had regularly attended a Japanese church there for years and years when we lived in Sydney. So we called in to meet up with the old gang. Most of them didn't know we were coming and got quite a shock. It was fun.

Tatsuya went off with some of the church friends to the house of one of them where we would spend the night. I was not, however, finished on my itinerary and caught a train into the city to meet up with my brother Diamond Dave the Mayor of Bar Cleveland. We met at the Australian in the Rocks and spent an enjoyable three hours necking a few ales and then a goumet pizza and a bottle of good Aussie red. I got back to our Japanese friend's house in Chatswood around 10:00. We sat up for a while watching Australia play the Netherlands in soccer. I drank some sake with Yutaka-san (a sushi master) and, after a day of many meetings, joyful reunions and too-soon farewells, I finally crashed out at half time in the soccer and slept the sleep of a dead man.