Brisbane night 1

I’ve narrowed it down to a science. My ability to move from place to place has been developing over the past few months. It’s always difficult to say goodbye, even when you’re just moving from one city to the next. I’ll enter the next city with a leaden heart, heavy and dark and miserable. It’s the hardest part, really, just to pick up and go. I’d like to think I leave a bit of myself behind in each place, perhaps because I know I in turn take a little bit of each place with me.

It’s only for 2 weeks. I keep having to tell myself that.

The night I arrived in Brisbane, it was raining. Not a normal east coast chilling rain that I am used to back home. No, this was tropical rain. Rain that you feel even when you are under shelter. Rain that makes the air thick and heavy, forcing you to swallow it in gulps so big you can’t remember the last time you were thirsty. Rain that makes you sweat and forces bedsheets to stick to your body.

It was a dark, hot rain, as if the sky was sweating. A steady stream of thin drops like persperation fell from the black sky as I scrambled into a taxi waiting to take me to my apartment. Heavy heart, heavy sky. Heavy clothes, heavy backpack. The apartment was cool and white. Slightly too much white. Energized by the crisp air conditioned room and color, I tossed and turned, trying to sleep, feeling isolated and hospitalized.

It’s only for two weeks. Tomorrow I will explore the city.