My Suburb Day and Night

If I dropped from the sky randomly, like leaves during autumn, and I found myself in this suburb of Melbourne where we live now, I’d first think I was back in my hometown in Romania. If I painted the landscape, it would look like this: cookie cutter, old fashioned, one-level brick houses void of embellishments; old wooden fences leaning under overgrown vegetation; a labyrinth of small residential streets leading eventually to a shopping area; silent sidewalks; and electric poles holding hazardously low electric wires. At a closer look, I would likely notice the differences: long strips of green that crisscross the suburb allowing people to stroll, bike or walk their dogs; round-abouts and traffic islands slowing down the dangerous, rushing drivers; tall eucalyptus trees decorating the streets with white, yellow, orange and red flowers that feed flocks of parrots all year round; and new two-floor houses with garages, pools and big, flashy “Sale” or “Auction” signs you could see from the Moon. A walk through this suburb at night is an entire new landscape, more alive with night creatures than during daylight. Possums travel on the electric wires between lampposts, like fearless circus tightrope walkers. Perched on chimneys, hills hoists, or lampposts are owls and tawny frogmouths. Flying foxes (largest species of bats in the world) fly with such stealth among fruit trees and eucalyptus that you have to scrutinize the night sky to spot one. Garden spiders lay sail-sized webs in daring places between trees and lampposts on the sidewalk; I often wonder if I am the next prey. Huntsman spiders spread their supermodel long legs on fences or roofs ready to ambush the first of the thousands of moths flying into their territory. The photo shows a tawny frogmouth using our hills hoist as hunting post.