Austin, Texas: where the beer is in the healthy living section.

I headed to Texas honestly with little expectation. In my time travelling I’ve learned to throw most stereotypes out the window and I knew that this would particularly be the case in Austin, being one of the least ‘extreme’ Texas cities. When I decided to go to Austin rather than Houston or Dallas I’d contemplated this fact; whether I’d be missing out on seeing something critical. But I knew I wanted to visit Austin for a number of reasons (Melanie, whom I know from my online life, lives there; University of Texas; the funky music culture) and decided that I’d just have to forgoe the stereotype. I arrived at the airport and immediately smiled at the giant guitars decorating the middle of the baggage carousel. After getting my bag, getting a map from the information counter and getting direction to the bus stop; I was on my way into Austin city. I’d made arrangement to stay at an off-campus college housing place which was actually recommended by my guide book because there isn’t really a youth hostel in Austin city. It was SO HOT and the walk from the bus stop to Laurel House was reasonable but longer than is enjoyable while even pulling a suitcase along behind you. I had arranged to call Chelsea from the house when I was on my way from the bus stop; I called and she didn’t answer. I found the building, from the outside it just looked like an apartment building, and she still hadn’t answered her phone. I’d left a couple of messages and called maybe five times. I was waiting outside the building and then waiting inside the elevator lobby. I asked a guy as he was going in if he knew if Chelsea was around; he was new and said he didn’t know Chelsea. Guy #2 who came in was more useful – he said that he’d find her for me and send her down. Thank you, guy.


It was a pretty sweet set up. They charge $20 a night for a hosteller; if you want to take advantage of it you could in theory get three meals a day – there’s cereal and bread and spreads and fruit left out so you could do breakfast and lunch out of it; and they provide dinner. There’s a gym, tv lounge, computer room. I had my own room which was far bigger than the Albuquerque shoebox I stayed in; my own bathroom. I was out and about and so I only took advantage of breakfast but even then it was brilliant value and an interesting insight into what college life could potentially be like. It was a few blocks from the University of Texas; and in the neighbourhood there were dozens of other off campus housing apartment buildings and what not. UT is the biggest public university in the US; and as I learnt on my UT tour the next day, it isn’t compulsory to live on campus in freshman year like it is at lots of other colleges and in fact there isn’t enough housing for everyone on campus. So that’s why there’s so much off campus living.


I’d been in contact with Melanie via text message – we met through fanfiction.net, have both been around on ZA Angels and since have been on Facebook – and she and Troy (Yes. Married to a guy named Troy. Jealous much? :)) and bubba Cole were going to come pick me up and take me to dinner. They took me to this place called Rudy’s. It was... an experience, in the best of ways. You go in and queue up to order your food at the counter. It gets put into like, a basket thing, you go sit down and you use your fancy wax paper as a plate. It was very... simple? Like, meat, bread, potatoes. Texan. It had such a fantastic vibe, funky signs and decorations (i.e. above the kitchen entry for staff: “you don’t want to cook, get out of the kitchen”) and I got to sample my first brisket – I still don’t really know what the difference between brisket and roast beef is (mental note: google it). After dinner Melanie & Troy took me to Amy’s to get ice cream – it was like Cold Rock/Cold Stone but cuter and the Mexican Vanilla was yummmmy. (I had it with cookie dough). On the drive back to Laurel House Troy took a scenic route, pointing out some of the main things along Congress Avenue and going past the UT football stadium and such.


On Monday morning I was awake and leaving the hostel just after 9am. I had to go pay my fees at the Housing Office a couple of blocks away (I was so surprised that when I booked via e-mail they didn’t ask for my credit card or a deposit or something given I was arriving on a Sunday when the office was shut; I could so easily have just left on Monday without having paid, and I really don’t know what communication Chelsea has with the office, she never asked me if I’d gone and paid or even instructed me about how to get to the office to pay or anything) and to my annoyance I arrived and they didn’t open til 10am. Anyway so I wandered in the neighbourhood and found a little convenience store and had a look at some of the other college co-op houses. My fees were paid without hassle; next stop – University of Texas for a campus tour due to begin at 11am. As I waited for the tour to begin I was sitting near a family with what seemed to be the parents, a six year old daughter, a daughter just finished high school starting at UT in the fall, and a son who is in the midst of transferring to UT from somewhere else. I couldn’t help but overhear their conversation – they were right next to me – and I was very amused by a few things I heard. The mother was admonishing the little girl with a warning to basically shut up and behave because the tour wasn’t about her, it was about the daughter who is starting at UT. And then they proceeded to have a conversation that went like this –
Mother – “when you grow up, you’re gonna be an Aggie like mommy.” (note: Aggie is Texas A&M {Agricultural and Mining} which I actually know a bit about because I met some girls who went there while I was in Europe. It’s in Hicksville, a place called ‘College Town’ and it literally is that – a town that is the college and the students and that’s pretty much it.)
Little Girl – “Nooo I’m gonna go to UT like Kirra!” (the older sister)
Mother – “As long as you don’t go to Oklahoma, that’s okay. You’re not allowed to go to Oklahoma. Oklahoma is a bad word. You can’t go to school there, you can’t vacation there, you can’t marry anyone from there.”


The mother was then commenting on how she’d been careful when picking her wardrobe that day to not pick colours that were those of any direct rivals of UT. This whole college rival thing is still highly fascinating for me, ridiculously fascinating. The more I hear about it, the more that my mind is bewildered by it. College life is one of those areas where I think that Australia is the most culturally removed from the United States. The students that go to UT, they live and breathe UT and school spirit and supporting the sports teams.


The tour began – one of the tour guides was total eye candy which helped immensely – and it was catered for potential students. It was interesting because the guides had to find that balance between talking about fun and social culture and clubs and activities; but then to appease the parents they aren’t talking about bars or drinking or parties, they’re throwing in references to the library and study areas, there’s a whole part where they take you to the gym and they’re talking about healthy lifestyle. I tended to try to walk near the guides as you’re walking from place to place because people ask them questions – like about housing and things like that. The tour went for just over an hour, after which point I headed over to look at the Student Union building with like the food outlets. Apparently the highest grossing Wendy’s in the United States with a transaction every seventeen seconds during peak periods is the one on the UT campus – and the second highest grossing Wendy’s in the United States is the OTHER Wendy’s on the UT campus. I then went over to The Drag, which is like, the strip of shops and food outlets on the street across from UT, so I could go into the Co-Op store. At the tour they’d been all ‘if you want to get textbooks, stationery, anything school related, this is where you go.’ You go inside and there’s this MASSIVE store with UT merchandise, any sort of merch you could imagine you can buy it here, for mainly football but also basketball, volleyball and plenty of other sports. Not just standard shirts and keychains and stickers but automotive and wall decorations and mousepads and ugh, just like everything. And then down the back there’s a sign and a staircase ‘textbooks here’. I feel sorry for girls who wind up at UT having to wear this horrible orange colour all the time. It isn’t even a bright sunny orange, it’s like a mustard orange. Every other person on campus was wearing a UT coloured shirt. This is over summer, where they’ve just lost the big football game, it’s not like school spirit is presently at its height, it is the opposite – this is the quiet period, and it’s all GO LONGHORNS.


From there I headed to walk down Congress Avenue to look at the Capitol Building. In Texas they live by the motto that bigger is better and better is bigger and the Capitol is one of those examples of that very fact – it’s bigger than it’s Washington DC counterpart. I was like, starving at this point (I’d had a tiny bowl of cereal for breakfast) and I stopped at Quiznos – my first Quiznos experience – and omg it was soooo yummy! It’s like Subway but fancier and more sort of, predesignated combinations. The cookie was super yummy too :) I kept wandering and in a reflection of its eclectic mix of residents, Austin feels really eclectic as you’re walking, you go from government area to a few streets later being surrounded by funky bars and the music scene of the Sixth Ave entertainment district. I was snapping photos of all sorts of stuff (a sign saying ‘what time is it? Shot time!’) and wandering for a good few hours, looking in some of the music stores.


I went back to my accommodation for a little while, I’d been sweltering in the heat and I wound up napping briefly while I recharged my camera which was almost dead battery. I then headed back out, I had a specific plan for later but in the mean time I got on the bus sort of without much intent other than to find something I could get for dinner. I was watching out the windows for something that tickled my fancy. On gets onto the bus this homeless man wearing a bright pink beaded necklace, like fake pearl looking, the kind that a six year old girl would have for costume dress up jewellery. Of course he sat next to me. He was mumbling about food stamps and the US government and Chase bank and I was sort of not sure if he was expecting me to reply or if he was just mumbling because he could. Then he started singing. Glancing out the window I could see a bunch of shops coming up and as the bus pulled up a bunch of people were lining up to get off so I figured there must be something there so I excused myself and he let me out. Turned out I’d found a major budget grocery store called HEB so I was able to obtain budget dinner – a cheap premade sandwich, a donut, a banana and a drink. They were in the midst of moving things around in the store, and I was highly, highly amused by a sign which read “The Beer is now located in the Healthy Living section.” At the checkout, the girl was fascinated by my accent, like I’d said ‘I’m good thanks how are you today?’ or whatever and she said ‘oh my God, talk again!’ and I told her I was from Australia and she literally squealed and jumped up and down and said I’d made her night. I got outside and I saw coke vending machine – well it wasn’t coke, it was HEB cola – for a quarter! 25 cents for a can of soft drink! Insanity.


I headed back on the bus heading for the Congress Ave bridge. There is this bat colony that lives beneath the bridge and it’s this major tourist attraction that people wait every night at sunset for these bats to wake up and see them fly off together. The night before as Troy had driven me back to the house, he and Melanie had pointed it out to me and it is referenced in my guidebook. I got there pretty early, sunset was just starting. I wasn’t the first there though, there were bunch of people already on the bridge and also in this grassy park beneath the bridge. I eventually wound up chatting to this young couple who wound up standing beside me – I never got their names but the girl, omg, she looked SO MUCH like Sami who I went to high school with. (I suppose in theory Sami might read this, if she gets the link from my Facebook, in which case – Sami, I met your twin!) We chatted a bit and the night went on and the sun went down and it got dark and the bridge was packed and we could hear these bats making noises and a few of them were flitting about but it got completely dark, nothing had really happened and a people were starting to leave. There had been tour cruise boats waiting in the river but they were starting to leave. One of the people who’d been standing near us had commented that they’d come out waiting the night before and waited until 9:15pm and nothing had happened. So it was kinda disappointing.


Tuesday morning I slept in a little later; I started out the day by heading out to the West End area with the specific intent of going to the Whole Foods store, it’s meant to be like the Whole Foods flagship store. Whole Foods is a grocery store that sells what it sounds like – it’s kind of like if you take that organic/health food one aisle that Woolworths has and the WHOLE STORE is that sort of thing with heaps of brands and options and a massive deli and fresh food and things. It’s not cheap, but the variety was insane! Oh, and the self serve machines were pretty much exactly like the Woolworths ones; I mean they’re all about the same (I’ve used quite a few in my time) but these were the most similar that I’ve seen, they must use the same software package just with a different voice and slightly different graphics. I got the bus back to Congress Avenue and then another bus down south on Congress which was where I’d been with the homeless jewellery singing man the day before but bypassed this area of sort of funky shops. I wandered through the ‘Warehouse district’ of downtown and then got the bus back up to near UT where I was staying and walked along The Drag and then through UT over to look at the precious beloved UT football stadium from the outside.


For my last night in Austin; Melanie, Troy and Cole came again to take me to dinner; this time we went to Chuy’s which is like a Tex Mex (Texas Mexican) restaurant. It was really eclectically decorated, I saw some stuffed animals hanging from the ceiling, there were bowling pins, and then the room that we actually wound up in for dinner had a whole ceiling of like, motorcycle wheels. It was a Tuesday night and it was packed, we had about a half hour wait time – they told us as we were seated that it had taken a little longer for us because we had to wait for a table that was appropriate for a high chair to open up. American restaurants really want you to fill up, like seriously. They provided corn chip type things and dips like in the way that Lone Star Steakhouse provides peanuts. I couldn’t decide what to eat and so eventually I decided to get a combination plate. For an extra dollar than the average meal I was going to get to sample just about everything major – a taco, some enchiladas, rice, refried beans, some other little doodahs that I’d never heard of and cannot remember the name was. I made a solid effort, I got through the majority of it but I felt physically stuffed, incapable of consuming anything more.


I regretfully have to say that I did not manage to make it to a movie theatre while I was in Austin, Texas. I very genuinely had intended to and it just didn’t happen. The reason I wanted to make it there is because of Holden and her damn obsession with pickles at the movies. However, I did see giant solo pickles for sale both in New Mexico and Texas which for me was enough. Holden, if you’re reading this, I’m sorry that I couldn’t go to the movies for you and hopefully you get the chance to eat a pickle at the movies when you come out here in August :)


Austin was a pleasant experience; good cheap food, amazement learning about college life and culture, lots to look at. I didn’t ‘DO’ much per se but I felt constantly stimulated as I looked around at things around me. The accents around you vary from the extreme southern Texan sort of accent to what to me is the classic American accent (I’m not good with differentiating many American accents, it’s pretty much either a southern accent or normal to me lol) to hearing foreign accents – I guess being summer, perhaps there are a few students who come over to do summer semester exchanges abroad? There were business suits but not in a New York City rushed madness sort of way. It feels like more of a city than Albuquerque but not in a crazy madness kind of way.


Anyway so I’m about to land in Orlando now... if the flight had been on time then we would’ve been at the ‘time to turn off your electronics’ stage now but it was delayed for 40 minutes which was frustrating mainly because I was already supremely early to the airport so being delayed just made it worse. You’ll hear from me next after Orlando, I imagine, where I’ll hopefully have all sorts of stories about fun with Jess!