Hi guys! I'm very excited to play hostess to the wonderful Ellen Gregory, a writer from Melbourne, Australia. Ellen and I are taking a class together and we totally bonded over the fact that I recognized she was on email or Facebook or something in the middle of the night, Melbourne time. Heh. Like minds think alike, I guess. Now, Seattle's no slouch in the 'liveable city' department, but Melbourne is one of my favorite cities in the world. I'm going to step aside and let Ellen convince you of what a great place it is.
Peace,
Liv
This will be a
slight change of pace on the Liv Rancourt blog… because I’m here to talk
about what it’s like to live in the world’s most livable
city—Melbourne. I know you might have tuned in to hear about something
more literary in nature, but if you’ve never been to Australia, perhaps I
can entice you to visit. (For the record, I too am a writer, working on
my first novel.)
Now to the world’s most livable city. First of all, this is not an idle claim. Apparently Melbourne was indeed nominated by The Economist as the world’s most livable city for 2011.
Yes, OK, it’s very subjective, but it’s not the first time we’ve made
it to the top of the list, despite Vancouver having held the mantle for
the last decade. Melbourne is indeed a great place to live.
One
of my favorite aspects of Melbourne is the café – and coffee – culture.
It isn’t until you travel to other parts of the world that you realize
how something you take for granted is indeed unique. It’s not the
presence of the cafes, it’s the style and the vibe. For the most part
they are independently owned, as opposed to chains or franchises.
Starbucks has failed here. There is simply too much awesome competition –
cafés with quirky and unique décor, innovative cuisine, individual
character...
To get a ‘coffee’ in a Melbourne café means without fail
an espresso with or without milk – unless you’re somewhere really fancy
that offers coffee prepared in a gazillion different ways like one of
my locals. My standard order is a ‘Large Skinny Flat White’ – which
means two shots of coffee in a large cup or mug with steamed skim milk.
There is no drip filter coffee to be found in a café anywhere (at least,
not that I’ve seen). Our coffee is strong and smooth and aromatic and
flavorsome. On a recent trip to San Diego, I worked out that I needed to
ask for an extra shot of coffee in my Starbucks, for it to taste more
like ‘Melbourne coffee’.
Mmmm, I think I’d better go make myself a coffee with my nifty Nespresso machine… (The George Clooney adverts worked!)
The
good cafés in Melbourne offer all-day breakfasts (brekkies), and this
is my absolutely favorite thing. I’m lucky enough to live in a
neighborhood with a host of fabulous cafes, and a friend and I share
ourselves among them from week to week. Most Saturday mornings will find
us at one of four or five places, always ordering a Large Skinny Flat
White and usually ordering some concoction of eggs. I tend to go for
scrambled or poached, with sides of mushrooms, spinach or tomatoes… or
French toast. I love French toast! One of our favorite brekkies is
called ‘The Olive Bread Brekky’, which has bacon and avocado and fresh
tomato slices and poached eggs on toasted olive bread… Yummy.
Around
a year ago I travelled a bit in Europe – France, Spain, the UK and
Germany – and was greatly fascinated by the differences in coffee/café
culture. In each country, working out the best way to take my coffee was
a new adventure.
But
I digress… and I seem to have spent a lot of time talking about coffee
and cafés. Oops. It’s because I’m a writer of course. Which reminds me
of something I haven’t mentioned, which is my love of writing in my
local cafés! Sometimes I just need a change of scene, a 15 minute walk, a
spot of lunch (eggs!), and I toss my baby netbook into my satchel and
hike off to the local for a few hours. (I also have a penchant for
meeting fellow writers for pub sessions, which is another story
entirely…)
There
are lots of other great aspects of Melbourne that I’ve run out of space
to cover. But I am fairly certain that our cafés and our coffee must be
directly responsible for us being nominated the world’s most livable
city. Don’t you think?
But just in case you’re not convinced, I’m willing to take questions. What else would you like to know?
To hear more from Ellen about Melbourne and many other subjects, leave questions in the 'comments' or check her out on her blog, http://ellenvgregory.com/.
;)
