Miss Marmalade, Bondi Junction

"Decaf coffee is like kissing your sister!" The wall, Miss Marmalade

8am, Monday morning. I walk briskly to Bondi Junction station to catch the train to work, an icy wind biting the tip of my nose. At 8 degrees Celsius, my head is down, scarf tightly wound and gloved hands jammed into my pockets. Oxford St is a peripheral blur of sleepy shops, loud buses and early morning commuters. 

 

A warm blast of air and chilled music jolts me out of my determined stride as I pass Miss Marmalade. An oasis of warmth in the Sydney chill, Miss Marmalade is a surprisingly cozy vintage haven, chalk scribbled all over the walls with irreverent quotes amongst the art. The walls may be cheeky but this establishment is clearly serious about its coffee, and appeals to the demand for organic and fair-trade that is flourishing in Bondi but surprisingly scarce in the junction itself. 

I break my mad rush to order a coffee from the dimpled waiter who grins and banters with me while I wait. A laugh, a sensational coffee and a moment of serenity in an otherwise routine trip to work; thanks to Miss Marmalade for a gentle reminder to stop and smell the coffee beans.

 

Bondi boot camp

Pop down to Bondi at 5.45am, and you would be forgiven for thinking you had entered an alternate universe where the gym has hit the beach. Yogis perform downward dog, surfers catch waves, as soft sand runners count laps. Couples walk dogs, as goggled swimmers breast stroke from north to south. Muscled men compete to see who can complete the most pull ups on the outdoor bars, while backpackers doze on the sand in an attempt to recover from the previous night.

There may be a winter chill in the air, but that hasn’t stopped the perky crew at Bottoms Up Fitness and their trademark girly boot camp on the sand. One of only two fitness groups allowed to exercise on the beach itself, the signature red and white of the group’s trainers is a familiarly cheerful sight to locals in the morning.

Providing motivation for heeding an inhumanly early alarm clock, Head Trainer Libby is always ready to greet the “Bottoms” with smiley enthusiasm. With wrenching myself out of bed proving the most challenging part of my ordeal, watching the sun rise over the ocean as we run through a variety of drills is an uplifting reward to kick-start the day.

Tailored specifically to ladies, the Bottoms Up crew provide a series of high intensity workouts that continually keep the body guessing. They recognise that girls have unique goals and physiology, and focus on making the sessions fun to generate a positive association with exercise and fitness.

They mix cardio, movement, boxing and weights with yoga and dance classes, targeting the problem areas of women’s bodies and focusing on health and well being.

With a mission to get us fit and healthy, Libby, Ali, Jay and the crew have found an effective combination of ingredients to encourage exercise during the colder months – fun and different workouts to keep us guessing, spectacular sunrises to make us smile, and constant contagious energy and enthusiasm.

My first early start feels like torture, but after a week of jumping, burpies and boxing on the sand, I’m feeling motivated, energised and ready to join the alternate universe of fitness on the beach!

Read fitness tips from Head Trainer Libby Babet, and the full article at liveeverylastminute.com.au.

Libby is the founder of Bottoms Up! Social Fitness and is a passionate advocate of health, nutrition and fitness. You can read more from Libby and her team at bottomsupfitness.com.au

Guest Post: Big (city) love

Guest post by Julia Grundy

London in Summer

I’ve had more spare time recently. The kind of time that lets me watch a French cooking show on TV, consider actually baking madeleines, and from there googling the show’s host, then drifting from one website to another, following links, reading blogs, until I found myself looking at photos of some woman’s favorite caesar salad in San Francisco - from every angle. 

At this point I stopped. Photos of lettuce leaves covered in cheese are sad.

 
But along this meandering online journey I did find several pretty websites and blogs dedicated to “loving Paris”, and similar fan sites for London, and of course, for New York. Do you know anyone who doesn’t LOVE New York? Expressing dislike for New York is like saying you don’t drink, people accept it but mentally mark you as a fun-hating weirdo.

I do like New York. A week there last summer left me tanned, happy, well-fed and slightly better dressed. But I don’t LOVE New York. I’m sure I’d be perfectly happy living there, but I’m not hell-bent on making it happen.

As for Paris, it totally defeated me as a cold, tired and broke 21- year-old backpacker. Anyway, my point is all these fawning blogs and websites made me think about the hole in my life that is a beloved city.

How many colorful books have been written by people who fled to a foreign city, fell in love with the people, the food, the culture, the architecture, whatever, and in the process found love, found themselves, blah blah blah? Heaps. Then why haven’t I experienced this?

I've been places, I get inspired, I’ve made the effort to fly everywhere from Istanbul to Berlin to LA…but no one city has really and truly grabbed me. 

I like cities; I like big galleries, big bridges, big parks, good coffee, noise, local food markets and overpriced restaurants. I like being anonymous in a city, I like the variety of people, houses and character that a walk through any city brings.  But I haven’t found MY city.

It took me over 20 years to figure out Sydney isn’t it. I totally get its appeal, and parts of it I love – like North Bondi, Bronte baths, and cheap, delicious Thai food anywhere- but there are too many things I dislike about Sydney. Given the nature of this blog I won’t bang on about them.

I really like my new city home. London is wonderfully low-key when you need it to be, but also open for any kind of fun, at any time, in all costumes and price ranges. And anyone who’s been here in summer gets it. The mood of the city completely lifts, the sidewalks outside pubs fill with happy drinkers, and every park turns into an unofficial music and cider festival. It’s so great. 

So, London has a lot going for it, but I’m not gaga enough to write a blog about it.  Is it me? Am I not open or daring enough to fully launch myself into a city? Is there a language barrier? Or, like a lot of relationships, is it more a case of being at the right place at the right time?

I recently married a lovely Englishman, so I can happily tick that relationship box. But after years of travelling, I’d love to find that “special” city too. There are still plenty I’m yet to see – Amsterdam, Budapest, Buenos Aires, Tokyo…. maybe it’s a numbers game, like that 100 cities thing people are doing on facebook. In the meantime, I’m giving Paris another shot this summer, hoping a better budget and serious interest in French food (thanks to that cooking show) will make all the difference.

Julia Grundy is a writer who is searching for her one true (city) love.

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