Melbourne Birthday Weekend I

We can't stop here, this is bat country.

Hey fam, it's been a while.

A lot has happened since I have actually spoken on my blog. And surprisingly I actually received a bit of feedback that my blog posts lately were lacking some words, so I guess here you go. 

I won't address the last 6 months yet because I think I may do that in my first vlog/ video. Yes, you heard that correctly. After many a year of tossing it up, I am going to step into the big wide world of youtubing. I have been putting it off for so long because to be honest, I am not a big watcher of youtube videos. I know, weird right? But then I remembered that I was never a blog reader, and I'm still not. I admire certain people and their various talents online, but I have never actively followed any youtubers except for Jenna Marbles because lets be real, she is hilarious. 

My actual first videos will be from Melbourne to test the water. Once I finish writing these posts/ upload the videos I will hopefully by then have got all my shit together, put it in my back pack so it's together, maybe take it to the shit store and sell it or put it in the shit museum I don't know. Like when I went to London, I want to take y'all with me on my journey via the internet. Because I think in the end, that's what we are all trying to do, get our shit together. I may be currently unemployed and back to studying full time doing a 'bachelor of I'm still not sure what my career goals are', but at least I'm having fun. I will catch you up about everything soon, but until then here's what happened on my birthday long weekend. Apparently Easter also happens then but pschht. 

Nearly a quarter of a century old, and still not sure what I am doing. But at least now I have some pretty amazing people to help me out along the way. Two of these angel souls accompanied me to Melbourne, Ray & Anja. Anja was meeting us the next day but R & I decided to drive the night before. Most of the drive was spent just relaxing with tunes until I decided to take over the music, spending the last couple of hours being 23 playing karaoke to an array of my favourites (earth, wind & fire, Elvis and everything in between) to the best songs we all forgot about from 90's and early 2000's (S-club, Backstreet Boys etc). At midnight we pulled over on a dark bit of the highway, the moonlight was so bright and hauntingly beautiful. We played Elvis while I looked at the stars and reflected on the great year I had, and the wonderful people who had stepped into my life. I couldn't have asked for a nicer way to kick off my birthday weekend.

Due to bad planning we arrived on Paige's (Paesh) doorstep at 3:00am. I met Paige at Splendour in the Grass in I think 2014 and we have been best friends who are horrible at texting ever since. We stayed the night and the next morning we took her to our hotel and basically kidnapped her for the weekend.

It hurts having someone you love so dearly so far from you. One of my new age/ 24 resolutions is going to be to reply to texts more because we really are both quite awful at texting, but when we see each other it's like butter and bread. Obviously to celebrate seeing each other for the first time in probably a year, we took a heap of obligatory photos standing in front of a wall covered in graffiti art. Just in case people had doubts I was in Melbourne and all. 

jumper / Interval

skirt / Vintage

bag / Cue

sunglasses / Beginning Boutique 

shoes / Daisy Street

Paige is wearing

sunglasses / Ray Ban

jacket / Gorman

top / H&M

jeans / Lee

shoes / Doc Martens

NEVER.LETTING.YOU.GO.

After we checked into the Jasper Hotel we had a mini scope of the area. Turns out we were right down the road from the greatest party store I have ever been to. You could honestly find something for every party outfit under the sun. Anja was arriving around 2pm so we decided to get a snack at a darling little joint called 1000 £ Bend. This was my first time trying to get more video content, plus it was my first drink (a Bloody Mary) in Melbourne, hence why no photos. But all the more reason for you to go and check it out for yourselves.  

jacket / Topshop

skirt / Boohoo

shoes / Windsor Smith

Once Anja arrived and had settled in we were finally able to properly kick on, or so we thought. Thanks to my birthday being on the same day as Good Friday and our bad planning skills, all bottle shops were closed, which in short meant tequila shots at the hotel bar. We then left it far too late at 8:00pm to put our name down for dinner at Chin Chin, which resulted in us all being on a liquid diet that night. To be fair, we did get a text from Chin Chin that our table was ready, at 11:00pm.. 

We spent the majority of the night at the Rooftop Bar at QT and it was perfect. We made friends with our bartender who frequently joined us for shots and I bought a 40 year old woman a shot because we were sharing birthdays. I guess to sum up, a lot of tequila was had. The ultimate highlight of probably the next year for me was when my friends did speeches for me, which is something I didn't even get at my 21st! This truly meant the world to me. I locked every single word they said deep in my soul and tried not to cry as my friends told me the reasons they loved me. And for someone who has dealt with low self esteem issues for what feels like forever, this just mushed me all up inside. I spent the rest of the night/ weekend as a happy bubble just in absolute bliss. 

How are you so perfect?!

Bae Bae Ray Ray

After QT we walked to Madame Brussels, which we found out upon arrival was unfortunately closed. No problem, I had a Melbourne bar bucket list and next up was Berlin Bar. I expected a little more theatrics upon arrival. Most places talk about how you will be either placed in East or West Berlin upon arrival, I was expecting a big thing but really it was just a line for a nicely decorated bar. We ended up in the nice part of Berlin, we even got a nifty little booth. I must admit at this point I was exceptionally drunk so what remains of my memory of the night is hazy. I believe I did spend a fair portion of my night trying to test my french skills with our french waiter. I think he got me back by recommending a bad tasting cocktail. Probably for the better though, gave me a reason to chill on the drinks. Below is the menu. I can't express how confusing it was on the night. It looked like someone had just regurgitated words onto a piece of paper, none of it made sense. 

All in all, my first full 24 hours of the best long weekend of the year was spent with some of my favourite people in my favourite city, what more could I ask for. Thank you Ray, Anja & Paige for spoiling me to bits, I am so lucky to have such wonderful people by my side,

#ericasbirthdaybender

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