perth

Designer Vagina

There’s something fishy going on in Western Australia, and I’m not talking about the sharks. Over the last few months, I have seen many ads in newspapers and in the windows of medical clinics for something called the Designer Vagina.

Apparently our vaginas have been bad. Very bad. They have had sex and many of them have birthed babies. Our vaginas work hard and sometimes feel a bit bushed. As our vaginas get older, they want to rest, eat frozen Snickers bars, and watch The Golden Girls.

But ladies, our vaginas are evidently in danger of becoming a bunch of lazy koalas. That is why God invented the Designer Vagina. And by “God,” I mean doctors. And I’m not putting this one on the guys, because let’s face it, we women are perfectly capable of coming up with new ways to torture ourselves.

Unfortunately, the Designer Vagina is not a store that sells Gucci tampons and Prada vibrators. According to one Perth clinic’s website, the Designer Vagina is, “a surgical procedure that involves reducing the labia minora or inner lips to achieve an aesthetically more pleasing shape or appearance.” In other words, a vajayjay nip and tuck.

Obviously there could be functional reasons for getting a labiaplasty, and by all means, vaginas should not hurt and hooray for doctors who can help vaginas feel less ouch-y and more chillax-y. But Designer Vagina ads are not directed at women who have serious cootchie issues. With phrases like “youthful appearance,” “regain your femininity,” and “feel more confident in your appearance,” you and I both know what’s going on down under. One ad promises, “Feel more comfortable in a leotard.” Thank god. I’ve been feeling so uncomfortable in my leotard. I’ve always assumed it’s because I’m wearing a fucking leotard, but now I see that it’s my un-designed vagina.

Apparently the Designer Vagina procedure became popular following the advent of the Brazilian wax. Because, you see, once you remove all of your pubic hair, your vagina might look, um, kind of weird. And clearly, the most logical response is not to simply regrow your hair, but instead undergo major surgery. That’s like spilling a glass of grapefruit juice, and rather than cleaning it up, you paint your table pink.

Have I been living in a warm, wet cave? Is this happening everywhere? Sadly I assume it is. But the in-your-face advertising strikes me as very Australian. Get your snatch stitched mate, don’t be such a pussy. Like driving on the left side of the road or living in a world without burritos, I’ll get used to it. Our first few weeks living in Singapore, I was startled by all of the ads for whitening creams, as well as packs of cigarettes featuring photos of cancerous tongues. But soon, all the weird stuff started to feel normal, and before I knew it, I completely regained my femininity.

What’s On

Almost every night after the kids are in bed, Dave and I refill our wine glasses and settle in for some TV time. We are trucking our way through Veronica Mars, a show that somehow we missed when it first aired. Kristen Bell is a private detective, solving and resolving crimes in 42 minutes. Veronica is sassy, brainy, and locks up date rapists. It’s just too bad that she keeps getting back together with Logan Echolls, the mopey son of a man who once trapped her inside a refrigerator and set it on fire.

I love Gogglebox, a show about people watching TV. Like many great reality shows, it is originally British. I’ve been watching the Australian version on Thursday nights on Channel Ten. The marketing for Gogglebox was clearly the last agenda item at the network meeting, after “Clean Up the Scan Folder on the Shared Drive.” This is the only explanation for Gogglebox’s tagline: “The TV Show About People Watching TV.” Each episode begins with the following:

Every evening in Australia, more than four million of us choose to spend the night in front of the telly. But have you ever wondered what other people are watching? Find out what people thought about what was on in the last seven days.

Rolls right off the tongue, doesn’t it? But who cares that the promotion of this show was cobbled together by interns. It’s awesome!

Gogglebox depicts ten different living rooms across the country (to represent a cross-section of Australian life?). There’s a couple in their fifties who like to poke each other adorably, surfer-looking best mates Adam and Symon, Wayne and Tom who drink martinis and stroke their lapdogs, two embarrassed teenage girls on the couch with their parents, you get the idea.

All of these good-natured people are watching an equally diverse set of shows: the news, an episode of Real Housewives, a cooking show, Game of Thrones, a rugby match. We simply watch them watch and respond to the TV. It’s like Beavis and Butt-Head, except they’re not cruel idiots.

The Gogglebox households are filmed via remote-controlled cameras with the crews in a separate room. As a result, the people seem very natural. They comment on the shows, occasionally being snarky but mostly just being curious. They turn to each other, sometimes to say things that have nothing to do with what they’re watching (“Love, are you picking up the kids tomorrow?”). I know they know I’m watching. But I swear it feels like spying on nice people having a cozy night on the couch. OH MY GOD MAYBE THEY’RE WATCHING ME WATCHING THEM WATCHING TV.

Willa’s favorite show is called Letters and Numbers, a game show where two contestants compete to unscramble words and solve math problems. One refreshing aspect to the show is its Game Show Pretty Lady is a mathematician. The losing contestant gets a dictionary. The winner gets to come back and compete on the next show. And if you win six times, you get kicked off and… wait for it… a dictionary.

I am thankful for many things lately and one of them is television. This might be an outdated notion, but I believe the purpose of television is entertainment. A show doesn’t have to mean anything more than that. Mad Men, Girls, and Modern Family are considered to be important shows, carrying the weight of historical and cultural evolution. Good for them. They’re great shows. But if I’m in a place (say, Perth) where I need a distraction (say, from a major life change), give me a show about people watching TV.

Bloody Hell

Commonwealth nations can easily be identified in two ways – their excitement about the birth of a royal baby, and their passion for netball. Just a few months ago, I had never heard of netball, a sport similar to basketball but with no dribbling. Netball’s like a game of catch and shoot, with lots of running in between. In primary school here in Perth, netball is a popular girls’ sport. The players wear their school uniforms with their hair pulled back in high ponytails. At a glance, a netball game appears as if the cheerleaders have taken over. Give me an F! Give me a U! Everyone off the court so we can show you how it’s done!

Willa inherited her dad’s attitude towards new activities: if other people have learned this thing, that means it’s learn-able, and therefore I can learn it. It’s one of my favorite things about her. Netball sounded like fun, so she decided to “have a go.” She had her first game this morning.

We woke up at 6:25 a.m. so we could get to the court in time for the pre-game warm up. It’s Saturday. Willa is nine years old. But we are in Perth, and we are not going to be the lazy Americans that sleep past sunrise and miss out on all the sportaliciousness.

The game was held at Matthews Netball Centre, a sports facility that, like many gyms and fields in Perth, is large enough to host five simultaneous Super Bowls. Getting in and out of the parking lot was like Pearl Jam at the Shoreline, circa 1995. There were approximately 50 netball games going on at once. It was a sea of ponytails and skorts.

The game was fun to watch. Except for the part when Willa flew through the air and landed face-first on the court.

I like Australia. So far, living here has been thoroughly enjoyable. But today, when I saw my child slide across the cement on her bare knees and chin, my inner voice became a raging xenophobe. Fucking Australia with their fucking version of basketball and their fucking giant crows that wake me up at dawn.

I ran over to Willa, rested my hand on her back, and asked her to lift her face off the pavement. It was bloody. But I could see she’d be ok. She spent the rest of the game on the sideline, icing her chin and knees. Her teammates kept calling out to her during the game. “You ok, Willa?” They were worried. After the game, they shared their own stories of blood and bruising. Parents were just as kind and concerned. One mother told us every scar on her body is from netball, and she loves the game.

Simone likes to touch the scar on my knee from when I fell off my bike when I was 10. She wants to hear about the blood, and how my mom was running a bath and couldn’t hear me crying. We talk about how our bodies tell the stories of our lives. Willa might end up with a scar. She’ll tell people she used to live in Perth and she played netball. It’s an Aussie thing.

Little Aussie Shop of Horrors

One gift that comes with moving to a new country is the ability to play with identity. No one here knows me. I can be anyone I want. I recently donated my Banana Republic work slacks to Good Sammy’s, and I am considering lavender hair. I am drinking flat whites. Last week, someone asked me for directions, because apparently I look like I live in Perth.

But one thing will stop me from a complete transformation. My mouth.

Four out of five dentists agree. I have the teeth and gums of a 94-year-old man who hasn’t flossed in 50 years. Except I do floss – twice a day in fact. I have excellent dental hygiene habits. I have adopted the electric toothbrush lifestyle. I wear a night guard to bed, blatantly ignoring the well-established link between sexless marriages and mouth apparatus. I have a weird mouth in a it-stresses-me-out-I-don’t-want-to-talk-about-it way.

Interestingly, my dentist appointments in San Francisco always seemed to coincide with high self-confidence days. I’d waltz into the clinic, joke with the receptionist, and settle into the chair with People Magazine thinking, I’ll be out of here in 25 minutes. Fifty-five minutes later, I’d be getting a lecture on grinding and acid build-up, and making an appointment to come back for fillings.

Back in December, I had a four-hour deep teeth cleaning. The only consolation was that I could bring DVDs to distract myself from the coal mining operation happening in my mouth. Six Gilmore Girls episodes later, my mouth was numb and bloody but apparently… cleaner? Later that day, the pain medication I took made me throw up. It was a magical day all around.

We have been in Perth for more than three months now, and, BECAUSE I AM DEEPLY DEDICATED TO DENTAL HYGIENE, I booked family teeth cleanings. The clinic I chose is in a neighborhood called East Perth, which overlooks the Swan River. I figured in such a picturesque location, the dentist would be too distracted by the black swans to make me feel inadequate.

After the dentist treated both girls in 30 minutes (“Nice brushing, good on you!”), she turned to me cheerfully, “Your turn!” I told the girls, “Mom will be right back,” and then advised them to watch the Godfather trilogy.

Dentists everywhere have the same sigh. It is a disapproving, slightly exasperated sigh. I always hear it when the dentist is poking my gums with that unbent paper clip on a stick. It is a sigh that asks, “Do I need to get out my plastic jaw to show this moron how to floss?”

I left the office with a $33 tube of something called tooth mousse. My evening routine now consists of applying tooth mousse before popping in my night guard. Meow.

I don’t mean to sound disrespectful. The dentist in East Perth was great. She even made the girls latex glove balloons. But, and I ask this with the utmost respect for the profession, do dentists tend to exaggerate?

For years, I’ve been telling myself that America has irrationally high standards for what constitutes a healthy mouth. But now I know for certain. I can dye my hair purple and grill shrimp on a barbie, but I am who I am. Apparently there’s a reason dental records can identify a body.

Something Awful

Last week, two Australian men were executed in Bali. Ten years ago, they tried to smuggle a massive amount of heroin out of Indonesia. As a result, they have spent the last decade in a Bali prison, awaiting an execution date, appealing, then awaiting another execution date.

Everything about this is awful – trying to sneak drugs out of a country that will kill you for doing so, waiting ten years to be shot by a firing squad, boarding a boat to a special island dedicated to executions, and deciding whether or not to wear a blindfold when you are killed.

Since we arrived in Perth, I’ve gotten to know the faces of Myuran Sukumaran and Andrew Chan – their crime, their lives in prison, their appeals, and finally, their executions. The West Australian newspaper prints its cover story headline in such a large font that I won’t leave it out for the girls to see. So I keep the paper in my bedroom where I read their stories with shameful curiosity.

I thought of Myuran and Andrew when we recently toured the former prison in Fremantle. Like Alcatraz, the Fremantle Prison is a tourist destination. We learned about some of the prison’s most famous convicts and escape attempts. We sat in the cramped cells and visited death row. We looked out the tiny windows, up at the watchtowers, and imagined how we’d escape. Feign illness? Steal a guard’s uniform? Dig a hole? Sarah, our Tig Notaro lookalike tour guide, relayed every fact and fable in an enthusiastic whisper, as if we were all sitting around a campfire. “Some people say they’ve seen the ghost of Moondyne Joe wandering the streets of Fremantle.” It was a sunny day, and after the tour, the kids frolicked in the prison yard.

People become stories and prisons become playgrounds. Something so awful can’t last forever.

Cereal Killer

1 Comment /

When I was around ten, my family went on a trip to Italy. Walking through one of many town squares eating one of many gelatos, my mother pointed toward a fountain, at another family eating gelato. She leaned down and whispered in my ear, “Where do you think they’re from?” Then she said something that has stuck with me. “Look at their shoes.”

My mother was right. You can tell a lot about people from examining their footwear. Russian ladies enjoy bejeweled sandals. The French prefer a simple ballet flat. Chinese men have been wearing the equivalent of Toms Shoes long before they were cool. No one wears a sneaker like an American.

Breakfast cereal, like footwear, is an anthropological marvel. If I ever get fooled into thinking I’m still living in the states, I can walk down the cereal aisle of an Australian grocery store. I always see my friend Uncle Toby and the sadistic pleasure he gets from taking iconic American cereals and coating them with even more sugar. Uncle Toby has a twin brother, Weet-Bix, who lives on a high-security organic farm called Sanitarium, where he manufactures tiny bales of hay and markets them as cereal. Sanitarium is a large Australian food company that is owned by the Seventh-day Adventist Church and therefore does not pay taxes. I am not kidding. Its tagline is “Good nutrition is part of the journey to a happy, healthy life.” The other part of the journey is learning how to properly digest cardboard.

I am more of a peanut butter on toast kind of girl. The whole concept of cold breakfast cereal is odd. Let’s process a whole mess of random grains, add vitamins and sugar, pour it in a bowl and drown it in milk. It seems like a lot of work when you could just rip off the end of a baguette. But I live in Perth, and I am already eating kangaroo salami. I will own you, Australian cereal. YOU ARE MINE.

I have tried several kinds of cereal in Perth. Uncle Toby’s Cheerios taste like Froot Loops – best suited to a late night snack. Last week I bought a cereal called Alpen, a “Swiss style muesli.” The box has a picture of a pretty snow-covered mountain, and the list of ingredients is written in both Malay and Arabic, so I felt fancy popping it in my cart. Apparently the Swiss start their day with a bowl of gray flour with a few oats and stale raisins.

Finally, there’s Weet-Bix, the Shredded Wheat of Down Under. (Uncle Toby also makes a version of Shredded Wheat, which I assume is actually chocolate covered marshmallows.) How can I become an honorary Australian citizen if I don’t like Weet-Bix? Unlike Vegemite, which seems more divisive, I have yet to find an Australian who does not love Weet-Bix. I have tried several varieties in the past couple of months– original, hi-bran, crunchy honey bites – and they all make me feel like I am being held hostage in a barn and my captor forgot to feed me the daily gruel so I am forced to eat wood shavings. Weet-Bix is survival food. Australians are pretty hard-core so it makes perfect sense that their attitude would be, “Crikey mate, stop crappin’ on and hand over the sawdust.” I refuse to try the gluten free version of Weet-Bix because, let’s face it, gluten free versions of normally tasty products tend to leave one questioning the very meaning of human existence. I fear the gluten free demon and what he will do to a box of Weet-Bix.

We Americans have our own types of Weet-Bix. I once caught my mother eating a bowl of Grape-Nuts on Yom Kippur, a day when many Jews fast and repent. With a mischievous twinkle in her eye, she told me her snack didn’t count as breaking the fast. She was right. Grape-Nuts is technically not food.

One Minute in Perth: Dylan

Dylan lives up the block from us in Perth. He and sister sometimes drop by our house in the morning before school. Dylan is very sweet, and has impressive eye contact for a ten-year-old. He likes soccer. A lot.

Thanks for chatting, Dylan.

Windy Day

My husband possesses a unique quality that his close friends refer to as present nostalgia. He is able to be wistful for a moment that is currently in progress. It is not unusual that Dave and I are doing something incredibly ordinary like cleaning up after dinner or reading in bed, when he’ll catch my eye and say, “Life is good.” It’s different from gratitude. It’s more like his future self is visiting his present self and reminiscing about this particular moment in time. He does it with friends too. Our friend Sarah is particularly adept at recognizing when Dave is about to fall into one of his ephemeral trances. In the middle of a round of Cards Against Humanity, she’ll smile knowingly and ask, “Dave, are you having one of your moments?”

It is one of the qualities I love most about my husband. It is right up there with his dedication to paying bills on time and his willingness to crack my back on demand. I will miss all of this when he is killed by a giant Perth wave.

My special quality is a unique ability to sense danger regardless of whether or not danger is present. Of course motherhood has thrown this quality into overdrive, because obviously, any minute now, my children will be killed in a car crash. It is exhausting, constantly rescuing my family members from imagined accidents.

Last Sunday, my family and I went to Swanbourne Beach in Perth.

[The beaches in Western Australia are so magnificent that not mentioning that seems deliberate. I once shook Nicole Kidman’s hand at a work event in New York. I was supposed to tell her something about my job, but who cared about my job when the only thing that mattered at that moment was NICOLE KIDMAN IS VERY TALL AND PRETTY. Perth beaches are Nicole Kidman in Far and Away.]

Swanbourne Beach was, like all the parks and beaches in Perth, conspicuously uncrowded. Sunday was blustery and the surf was rough. The conditions were perfect for burying your feet in the wet sand and laughing hysterically while running away from the crashing waves. No one was in the water, with the exception of a few twenty-something surfers who were getting tossed around like tortellini in a pot of boiling water.

After a power nap in the sun, Dave popped on his goggles and announced he was going for a swim. To me, it was as if he declared he was going to cartwheel across the Mass Pike. As he sought out the perfect spot to embark on his dubious adventure, I tentatively called out “Be careful!” while mentally planning his funeral. What will I do with his body? We’re in the middle of nowhere, for god’s sake.

I watched my husband like a hawk as he made his way out beyond the break. I lost sight of his head once, as he dove into an oncoming wave. But then it appeared, popping up on the surface like a piece of fuzzy seaweed. I have to hand it to him. Once he made it out past the tsunami, he seemed to have a nice leisurely swim. He even stopped to smile and wave at me a few times. I took careful notice, as that was the last I’d ever see of him. I continued to track him as he bodysurfed his way back onto shore.

Dave looked a little hunky as he walked out of the sea – Poseidon in Lands End evergreen swim trunks. It could have been his brush with death. He was probably thinking, “Life is good.”

Nobody puts circumcised baby in a corner.

Imagine you wake up and there’s no Christmas. You still celebrate the birth of Jesus, but no one else has heard of this funny holiday with its jolly bearded man, piles of presents, and songs about sleigh bells. You have one week to find a suitable pine tree, chop it down, and drag it back to your house. You try to explain mistletoe and you sound like a crazy person.

Welcome to being a Jew in Perth. Jews might be the chosen people, but apparently they were not chosen to live in Western Australia. Where are they hiding? Is hiding the wrong word? WHERE ARE MY PEOPLE AND WHAT HAVE YOU DONE WITH THEM?

Passover is fast approaching and I am up for the challenge. There will be a Seder in my house if we have to substitute a Tim Tam for a shank bone. Unlike the Safeway on Taraval Street in San Francisco, our grocery store does not have an ethnic section. I regret my decision to not swallow a condom full of matzah ball soup mix before I boarded the plane to move here.

Last week, a waitress in Perth told me I don’t “look Jewish.” I have been hearing that my whole life. Yes, all you sweet goofballs out there, I know. It’s very complicated. I don’t “look” Jewish. My husband doesn’t “look” black. Our children don’t “look” like sisters. That’s because we are aliens who have come to Earth to enjoy your Woody Allen movies and smoke all of your salmon.

At my daughter’s swim meet last week, I met a Hungarian Jew and we high-fived. She politely inquired if I’m the American who just moved to town. Then she leaned over and asked cautiously, “Aren’t you Jewish too?” I stood up, hooted, and then held up my palm so we could exchange our ancient tribal greeting. A bit much perhaps, but meeting her felt like waving your hand around in the dark and finally locating the light switch.

Evidently there is a sizable community of Jews in Perth. They’re just not in my neighborhood. They live in a suburb called Menora. Swear to god.

One Minute in Perth: Helen

Helen is gorgeous, which in Australian means awesome (although she’s gorgeous in American as well). She spent her childhood in Papua New Guinea and now lives with her family in Perth. In this one-minute chat, I tell her I love her feisty attitude and she responds, “It’s a bit of a worry, I’m trying to subdue it for this.”

Helen refers to “swimming at Cottesloe,” which is a reference to Cottesloe Beach. It has ridiculous turquoise water, tropical fish, and white sand.

Thanks for chatting, Helen.