first stop: Chatswood

When we first arrived in Sydney, our temporary accommodations were in a northern suburb of Sydney called Chatswood. It's really not that far from the center of the city--maybe a 20 minute train ride. It was actually a nice way to ease into being in a big city, since Sydney is definitely a lot bigger than Seattle.

The good thing about being in Chatswood is that there are a lot of shopping centers. We could easily walk to one of the many Westfield malls here. (Westfield has purchased a couple of the malls in Seattle. I'm not sure if they have also purchased malls in other parts of the US. They are Australian-based, and it seems like they are aiming to rule the world's shopping center business.)

The other good thing about Chatswood was that we found this yummy Malaysian place to eat: Mamak. We had seen a lot of people in the place the night before--which made us curious. So, we decided to check out the menu. Turns out, this is the second branch of the restaurant--and the reviews posted outside were glowing. So, we went in.

We had their standard roti, with two curry dipping sauces. The roti was similar to other roti that we've had before. Perfect for soaking up the dipping sauces. Personally, I thought one of the curry sauces was interesting: spicy, smoky and sweet. Fede, on the other hand, didn't think it was very different from other curries that we've had before.*

The chicken curry was also very good, although difficult to eat because the bones were still in the chicken. Definitely not something you want to eat with someone you want to impress. Pictures of the curry also aren't particularly impressive.

But I think the best was the fried chicken. Admittedly, there is nothing interesting about fried chicken. And there didn't seem to be anything particularly Malaysian about it. But it was delicious!

So, our short stay in Chatswood was a good introduction to Sydney. But now, we're staying in a super-fancy place right in the CBD (aka downtown). (I think our temporary accommodations were supposed to be in the CBD the entire month, but there wasn't any availability for our first couple days.) We're currently looking for a permanent apartment. But it will be difficult to move after staying in such a nice place.

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*Yesterday, Fede's new boss, Andrew, took us on a tour of Sydney. Andrew had some great stories, and some great expressions. One of the expressions I liked was the use of the word "differ"--as in "Fede and I differ in our opinions about whether Malaysian curry is unusual." It seems to be a more neutral way of saying that we don't agree.