365 Pink Feather Boas All in a Row - Day 73 (Sunday 14 March 2010) : Days of Dumplings, Delirium and Daquiris

Man I love Yum Cha.

What's not to love? Food that comes to you on trolleys in cute bamboo baskets, tastes exotically different from the run of the mill flavours, carries with it the chance of a fun new taste discovery, like the sweet sticky rice treats I had yesterday for dessert (along with the usual delicious custard tarts and mango pancakes), allows you to talk to your friends knowing that the food is spread before you and you can dine at your leisure... there's much to kiss, hug and embrace with ardour, and I love it.

Oddly though I hadn't been for ages, with all the many and varired Summer activities consuming all available time like a locust plague on the march, and so today, with my gorgeous guys, 4 friends from the group we do our Fair Day extravaganzas with, and two of their friends, we hit one of my favourite Yum Cha haunts, Marigold on George Street, for one of the culinary experiences, of many, that Sydney does very well. We ate our way through all sorts of dumplings, sticky rice, beef tongue (no, it doesn't taste like chicken, and no, I didn't pick it off the cart but it had a ginger zing and wasn't as bad as it sounds!), and the aforementioned desserts, and all for just $25 a head. YUM!

Full as a goog - no, I have no idea what it is either but it seems they have overwhelming gluttony issues needing 12 step therapy and/or an intervention - we wandered through the backblocks of Chinatown to the IMAX Theatre in Darling Harbour to see Tim Burton's take on that iconic childhood tale, Alice in Wonderland. Fed on rather ordinary reviews of the movie, I was expecting a visual feast - and it was stunning and imagantive in ways that delighted me in ways I can't even describe - but a rather lacklustre film experience otherwise, but what we got was a movie with a delightfully wacky sense of fun, more substance that you'd expect, and a whimsy and silliness that didn't belie any of the serious issues of tyranny and cruelty than it sought to address. We were entranced, even if the 3D effect was a little blurry at times, and I walked out absolutely in love with a funny, clever, visually rich cinematic feast.

Once we'd overloaded on pixels and fabulous imagery, we headed to the Watershed pub for a 2 hour wine and beer drinking fest - well Coca Cola for the most part for me since I was driving - looking out on the City and calm blue waters of Darling Harbour on what was a perfect Autumn day. All around us, Indian people surged, covered in bright dyes, celebrating Mahotsav, the festival of friendship, colour and harmony, and we drank in a quintessentially Sydney Sunday.

After a brief lie down and kiss & cuddle at my place, my gorgeous guy and I headed back out, this time to the Union pub in Erskineville where we caught up with very good friends, Stephen, Fahmi and John. The food here is wonderful - much better than you'd ever expect pub food to be - and once again, we sat outside in the courtyard, soaking up the dying embers of light, and the richness of friendship we enjoy. It didn't take much convincing to collapse into bed when all the talking and drinking was done, and the day ended in my gorgeous guys arms, pretty much as it had begun.