Seeing Red

May 20, 2013, a day that I’ll never forget just because…it never was. I went to sleep on the 19th and woke up on the 21st. It wasn't any alcohol or drug induced stupor...only a plane ride to Sydney. I didn't mind much; after all, I wish I could make every Monday disappear so painlessly.

Had I gone to Sydney some 200 years ago, I'd be going to prison. The city started out as a penal colony - in early 1788, the so-called 'First Fleet' landed at Sydney Cove (where ferries run from Circular Quay today) bringing seeds, animals, soldiers and 736 criminals from Britain. Over the next 80 years, some 165,000 convicts were brought to Australia but their ultimate fate might not be so dire: once they served out their sentence, they became free and were entitled to a 20-hectare grant of land.

Sydney today couldn't be further from its jailhouse days. Ranked as one of the top ten most livable cities in the world, Sydney is cosmopolitan, vibrant and home to one of the most iconic structures in the world – the Opera House. Conceived by Danish architect Jørn Utzon, its design mirrors the harbour on which it sits (though some locals jokingly say it looks more like the sexual congress of turtles): the shells covered in over one million off-white tiles mimic the white sails of the yachts on Sydney Harbour, and the glass walls of the foyers are angled so they can reflect the waters. It is a well thought-out, brilliant, groundbreaking design but so complex that it took years until the team figured out how to build the shells, required the use of computer-aided design (CAD) in structural analysis (one of first ever done), and opened the way for the elaborate shapes of some modern architecture. Brilliance has its price though: while initial projections placed costs at $7 million and construction completion in 3 years, it ultimately took 16 years and $102 million! Furthermore, controversy surrounded the project and resulted in Utzon's resignation in 1966, seven years before opening. He never returned to Sydney but was re-engaged in 1999 to develop guiding principles for all future changes to the building. He died in 2008 at age 90 and his son Jan, also an architect, has led renovation projects since then.

There is another well known icon in Australia, this one not man-made: Uluru, also known as Ayers Rock. Many say it is just a rock. While that may be true, it's one hell of a big rock - it is the world's biggest monolith with a total circumference of 5.8 miles (9.4 km) and while it rises only 1,142 ft (348 m) above ground, it is estimated to extend some 3.7 miles (6 km) underground. Just a rock, huh? But Uluru is more than just a rock in other ways. For the Anangu, the aboriginal people of the area, Uluru is a key element of Tjukurpa (Dreamtime), the sacred era when ancestral beings created the world and laid down laws for caring for one another and the land. The monolith is believed to have been created at the beginning of time, and virtually all its features are associated with a creation story. You can take the 6.6-mile (10.6 km) walk around the base of Uluru to see its geological features and learn the related stories. Photography is prohibited in some sections though as they contain 'scriptures' not meant to be disseminated. Also, the Anangu request that you don't climb the Rock. People still do but the truth is that doing so is comparable to climbing the altar of a Christian church.

Like Uluru is not just a rock, the outback is not just a desert. The term is usually associated with the red center of Australia, but in reality is used loosely to describe empty, vast and remote inland areas, and it is these qualities that make it so attractive. While the outback is increasingly drawing tourists and lodgings spring up here and there, there are still areas with no cell phone reception or electricity where kangaroos, wild horses and camels outnumber people, where you can sleep in open air looking at a sky so clear you discover stars you never thought existed, where the howls of dingoes lull you to sleep. Does the word dingo give you chills? I don’t think they can take your baby…they are too small for that. But they may take your shoes. Just like any other mischievous dog.