XVIII Commonwealth Games

The vibe in this city is so unbelievable right now - its just buzzing with excited energy. Melbourne is the host city to the 18th Commonwealth Games going on from the 15th to the 26th of March. On the 15th we went out to the city by the Yarra River for opening ceremonies. The Yarra is such an ideal place because it has fish situated along the river that represent each country around the world. There are 72 Commonwealth countries that take part in the games. During the opening ceremony I cheered for Tanzania, Pakistan, Bangladesh, India, Canada - it was crazy. I got to see the queen through the jumbotron - she looks exactly the same as when I was 10. Same colour clothes, same hat, same voice....


Then there were fireworks coming out of the fishys as she declared the start to the games - it was all pretty exciting! I even sang God Save the Queen for the first time since elementary school assemblies!

The next day we got patriotic to go cheer on Canada during the Rugby 7s games.


On the way there, we were forced to leave our train because it wasn’t going where it was supposed to. But man, am I glad we did...while waiting outside Flinders St Station we saw this random tram that was decorated in some sort of overdone fobbed out Indian type look.


We got in the flashing lighted tram to see the sign "MADE IN PAKISTAN - by IQBAL".

I was like...what is going on! Then i heard the Pakistani/Indian music and I was in heaven. All i could think about is how much Mummy would love it!! The tram is called W-11: Karachi 2 Melbourne and basically it was a copy of a fleet of particularly vibrant mini-buses that ply the Karachi route called W-11. The buses are "characterized by sculpted stainless steel, bright coloured plastic collages, flashing light patterns, infectious music beats and exuberant conducters." So basically a team of Karachi vehicle decorators have transformed a Melbourne tram to bring the experience of a journey on W-11 to the streets of Melbourne, during the games. After that, the tram gets auctioned off to the highest bidder!

This emblem was on the back of all of the seats. Anyways then we got to the Telstra Dome to start watching the games. The Rugby 7s games are really short - only 7 minutes per half. But it was super fun - we had a huge flag and got to meet all the players after they won their game. There was a point in time when Uganda (the underdogs) were playing Tonga and actually won, and the whole stadium was chanting "YOU - GAND - AHH, YOU - GAND - AHH". It was so loud it felt like the stadium was shaking but it was just incredible hearing all these people from so many different countries rooting for the underdawgs...

So basically the rest of the time left there are tons of events going on around the city and people here from all over the world. I found out that there is a jk near by so I am going on Navroz - kinda excited about that! This weekend surfing and penguin parade at Phillip Island :)