Walk. Mall. Tea Slime.

"Are you sure we're going the right way?" I asked Nick this question, as we walked... and walked... and walked... and walked...

"Nope," came his response. I stared at him blankly.

"Great," I said sarcastically.

"It is! It makes it more of an adventure!" Nick's that kind of a guy. He doesn't mind walking an extra few kilometers first in the wrong direction and then having to pull a big U-turn in order to get headed the right way again. To him, it's just a chance to see more, discover more. And that's just what we did today on our way to the Top Ryde Shopping Centre, aka the local mall.

Fortunately, today was an overcast day, staying around 21°C all day (that's around 72°F) without any beating sun. Occasionally a slight breeze blew our way, as we wandered the hills that split Gladesville and Ryde City. We were in no hurry. Going to the mall was purely to go see what we saw and to get out of the house for a while. Thus, the pace was casual as we meandered through the neighborhoods. We took note of the general silence of our surroundings. Occasionally, someone would be out sweeping his or her driveway, but that was the extent of the goings-ons for most of the walk. We saw hardly a sole outside of an occasional passing car. We came across bus-stops for bus numbers we'd never seen before--not that we were seeing the actual buses go by most of the time. So, after a while, we simply began to reassure ourselves: "If we just keep walking, we're bound to get somewhere eventually, right?"

Right, actually. We came to a larger street with much more traffic. After a brief moment of debate, we turned left and walked... and walked... and walked... Finally, we came to a man who was loading his truck with various items from his house. I walked passed him without a second glance. Nick, however, stopped and asked, "Excuse me sir, do you know how to get to the mall?"

"Just keep walkin'," the man said in a strong accent. "Yer 'bout half a k away, I'd say."

Nick thanked the man and we were on our way again. And within ten minutes, we'd found our destination. Now, we'd been to this place once before very briefly; Ross had taken us there, but we'd gone in one entrance and into one store right next to that entrance. So, it was an utter surprise when Nick and I turned the corner and found a long, open air corridor of stores with incredible iron and wood art decorations before us. We paused and stared for a moment. Both of us were in awe. This was a shopping mall, but it was a gorgeous shopping mall. We turned into the main building and discovered a complex web of levels, connected in some places by escalators, in some by travelators (escalator ramps), and of course some elevators. First we made our way up the nearest travelator, looking around in awe at the sheer magnitude of the building we'd entered. It did not look nearly as big from the outside. We then continued going upwards, taking a long escalator to the cinema at the utmost height of the mall. We had no intention of watching a movie, but we wanted to see what was on and we glad to see a fair selection of recent films were available. We returned to the floor below, wandered through a couple game and hobby stores--both of which were far better than most I've seen in the US, and then began to cross the building for the first time.

Imagine a gigantic mall with no two stores that have the same things. No, I didn't think it was possible either. Until today. This place just kept going and I felt like none of it was overly repetitive in the products being sold. Each store specialized in something specific. We wandered down a level. And we walked around for a while, discovering the entrance we'd first used with Ross--in the one corner of the place that doesn't show you how huge the rest of it is. We then went down to the next level--keeping track? That's 3 main floors so far, not including the cinema floor. Here, we discovered the food court, which we were glad to see had all sorts of different cultural food for decent prices. There was hardly a thing I wasn't interested in trying. Then, we entered one of the handful of supermarkets we had to choose from in the mall--that's right, this mall had supermarkets in it; fresh fruit, frozen meat, drinks, you name the food item, they had it. It was like a bunch of Earth Fares with a handful of differing items each were all located in the close proximity of the same building.

After Nick bought some tuna--he apparently loves tuna a lot; he was super excited, we head down to lowest level (before you get into parking garage territory). So, 4 main floors to this place--oh and did I mention the architecture was beautiful? This place was not only full of wonderful stores, but it was a feast for the eyes. Artistic and aesthetically pleasing. And there before us was bakery with cheap bread and pastries. But first we were offered free samples of sausage, which was phenomenal sausage; one bite was full of flavor that instantly made me want more. However, we turned our attention from the samples to the bakery. We each bought a snack: Nick got a chocolate claw--he said it was like a croissant filled with chocolate mousse, and I got a blueberry pastry--mine was essentially like heaven; that's the only way I can describe it. We then wandered around searching for potential drink options--this place had like 7 or 8 different coffee shop choices (none of which were Starbucks, thank God).

I finally decided on this interesting looking place called Chatime Tea. It had a list of its most popular items and so I decided to just go with the #1 seller: the Grass Jelly Roasted Milk Tea. Yeah, I know the name sounds disgusting, but it looked intriguing and I figured it must be the #1 seller for a reason. So, I got this tea, which was pretty good. It was similar to chai, though with kind of a grassy taste rather than a spice taste (in a good way). Then, I discovered the jelly part of the name wasn't kidding. Suddenly, I felt this weird, slimy thing in my mouth. I stopped in my tracks. I pulled the jelly out of my mouth with my fingers. It was a disgusting blackish yellow color--through the clear cup, it had looked like greenish leaves floating in the tea--I'd just thought it was tea leaves. No. It was legitimate jelly, mostly flavorless that would come up through my straw all of a sudden, because it was so slick that it created no more tension than a liquid. It was bizarre, to say the least. So, there I was in the most incredible shopping mall I've ever been to, drinking the strangest tea I've ever had, thinking of The Lion King: "Slimy, but satisfying."

And that it was. Though I probably won't get that particular tea again--it wasn't bad, but it was awfully weird. I fully intend to return to the mall, hopefully by a better route than the one we took to get there (we caught a bus back home after, btw). The fact is... that mall was the kind of place I would love to hang out. That's not something I'd say about most malls. I was amazed. Still am. It seemed like a place of fantasy. I look forward to my next trip there.