What did I do to deserve this??? Mar 2009

That’s what I ask myself every time I think about my friendship with Cornell. I have no idea what I did to deserve such a loving, honest, nurturing, funny, supportive, intelligent, creative friend like Cornell. It had been 9 months since I last saw Cornell and I was so nervous in seeing him again. Have we changed? Will it be the same or will it be weird? Will we still like one another and laugh all the time? That’s all I thought about when I walked over to meet him during my lunch break. I remember seeing him on the Corner of Park and George street and feeling my heart race just a little bit. He saw me and smiled and I smiled and from that very moment I knew NOTHING HAD CHANGED.

Me and Cornell were once again a duo that no one could mess with. I took him over to my favourite sandwich spot (big bite) and walked over to the harbour for a sit down. I have no idea what we laughed about but we just laughed and laughed and laughed. I have come to terms that whenever me and Cornell are around one another we act like 10 year old boys. We are super childish and just make the most out of any situation. We laugh at ourselves and at other people. We talk about our past trips and laugh about that. My mission for Cornell while he was in Sydney was to make sure he had an amazing time. I wanted him to meet all the people that I had become friends with.

Cornell trip to Sydney wasn’t just to have fun and see how Kangaroos get down and dirty. He came down to also help build me up again. I was still feeling really low and I had lost a lot of weight because of the break up. I would cry all the time and anytime I saw a “happy” couple I would just get into the wrong head space. I just felt a lot of pain inside and to me I felt like I had lost my bestfriend. The good news is that because of the break-up I had forced myself to go out and meet people and build friendships. Build on existing and new ones. Cornell timing was perfect. He always knew the right thing to say. He was there when I needed a hug. He pumped me back up with food and nutrition. I just felt really good when he was near by.

Anyways Cornell had a blast in Sydney and we did way to many things to possibly write about so instead I am going to make a list of things we did while he was here. Its not in order but who cares and this doesn’t include Mardi Gra.

1: We took a ferry over to the zoo and saw koalas and kangaroos’.

2: I cooked dinner for him and Christians house (I know we broke up but I still went over) long story

3: We went over to Kenny’s house for dinner. (Cornell liked Kenny and Kenny really liked Cornell)

4: went to the movies with my good friend Dennis and Stephanie (we saw slum dog millionaire which is amazing)

5: We went to dinner in surrey hills with my Citigroup friend Raoul and also to Bondi beach for dessert.

6: Went to Cronulla to have dinner at Steve and Wayne’s place. (The salad they made was amazing)

7: went to have breakfast at boy Charlton pool

8: went to breakfast with Kenny and Ben. Then we did the Coogee to Bondi walk and then got sunbaked at the beach

9: Had after work drinks at Cruise bar with Cam, Wayne, Steve, and Justin

10: Cornell went to the Chinese Gardens

11: Had after work drinks with my buddy Ruslan.

12. We walked around Paddington, Rushcutters bay, Surry hills.

Ok so the list is getting long and I can’t remember every detail since I have a horrible memory. Cornell was in Sydney for 12 days and I still left out all of Mardi Gra Weekend. So stay tuned because that is coming up next:

Enjoy
Jonathan Vargas

This is Our Sydney song

Steve's Birthday Feb 2009

Being late is never cute FYI!!!! Back in February Steve invited me and a few of his friends for a birthday dinner at darling harbours Waggamamma. As always I got there right in time. If anything I had 2 minutes to spare. I bumped into rock star Justin and we both waited for Steve and Wayne to arrive. I had just spoken to them both and they said they were only a few blocks away. An hour later they finally appeared grrrr. I hate it when people are late and especially when they lie about where they are. Anyways it was Steve’s birthday so I let it go this time.

Waggamamma is a large chain-restaurant here in Sydney. I can’t say I was impressed by the food and that’s probably why I allowed myself to drink so much. That and the wine was super nice. The conversation at dinner was interesting and everyone was enjoying themselves. We later then walked over to another bar and that’s when things got crazy. Justine ended up ordering like 15 bottles of wine and everyone but me was playing these fun drinking games. I stopped drinking since I was already feeling funny and wanted to sober up. Especially since we were going to a club after and I hate feeling blah.

Later that night we ended up at this club named Chinese laundry…. It was off the hook!!! The music was sick and the beats were just kicking my ass…. I loved it. It was one of the best nights here in Sydney when it came to music. The crowd was a different story. I wanted to take my top off since I did get hot but it was a str8 club and the hetros would have probably looked at me funny. In the end the night was fun and we all had a good time.

Here are a few pictures that I have taken of my area when I have walked around. Its not much but I thought it was cute

Enjoy
Jonathan Vargas

The Big Two Four Jan 2009

I am almost a quarter of a century old lol…. Whoo hoooo.
Being in Sydney for my birthday was a big change for me. Instead of being pale and cold I was tanned and warm for once.
This year I didn’t plan anything major… I invited a few friends for dinner at this thai restaurant called Opium Den located in Potts Point.
We had a nice meal and a few laughs plus a couple of drinks. After dinner we walked over to get some ice-cream which was perfect

That following Sunday I went to the Beresford for a few birthday drinks and celebrated with Justin since it was his Birthday too.
It was really simple birthday weekend and I really enjoyed myself too. The only thing missing was Ruslun since he too was supposed to be celebrating his birthday as well, but he decided to be silly and stay home.

I also got some really sweet gifts from my friends too.
I got this stuffed penguin I really wanted, an amazing drawing in a frame that a friend did for me, money, t-shirt, cards, and a few package from back home.


Laterzzz everyone
Jonathan Vargas

Central Coast fun Jan 2009

In mid January my friend Steve invited me to go up with him and his boyfriend Wayne to their friends Justin’s vacation home up in the central coast. The central coast is less then a 2 hour drive north of Sydney and I really did need to get away for a little bit. I was feeling really down and I just wanted to spend time away from the city and bond with my buddies. This is also the first time that I met Justin and can I say he in an amazing person!!! He has battled cancer twice and was going through therapy when I met him, but he never complained if anything he was always beaming with positive energy. He can take any situation and turn it around. He really is an inspiration to me. Justin you ROCK!!!!

Anyways on our first day there we went up to beach for a swim and some sun. We took a few boogie boards from Justin’s vacation home. After the beach we went to get some food and then headed back to the house. At the house there were tennis courts and we all decided to play. We played tennis for a few hours and it was so much fun. I hadn’t played tennis since I was in the 5th grade so I was rusty but still a lot of fun. I actually play once a week now if I get a chance. Anyways then we headed back to the house just to sit back and relax. Had a few beers and just talked and took a few silly pictures. It was really helping me take my mind off CT, but then I would see Steve and Wayne cuddle and I would sort of loose it and go upstairs for a second just so that they didn’t see me like that.

It was especially hard since to me it felt like I had lost my best friend. But anyways enough of that ……. We later on we all joined in at cooking and made a nice meal. I hadn’t cooked anything since I moved out and being back in the kitchen was great. I made my favourite tarragon mushroom chicken casserole. We drunk some more and ended up watching a movie.

The next day we drove up to New Castle which is a small town just 30 minutes north of where we were. I can’t say I really liked New Castle, but it could have been because the weather was very cloudy and blah. We ate lunch there and headed back down.
The trip ended up being a positive and wonderful experience. I got to know Wayne a lot better since I usually just hung out with Steve. And also rock star JUSTIN!! There all cool peeps !!

Anyways time for me to go

Hope all is well
Jonathan Vargas

Xmas + New Years - family = ehh dec/jan 08-09

Right around this time period things got pretty bad pretty quickly between me and Christian.(it was actually right around the time that Erica left if I was being honest) I don’t want to get to details into what happen but it wasn’t jolly for me at all.
For Christmas we stayed at home and open gifts at 12 on Christmas eve. That’s the way me and my family celebrate and I thought it would be nice for us to celebrate in the same way. I also cooked these amazing
empanadas that we had for Christmas dinner. I remember feeling really sad on Christmas because things weren’t going to well and I didn’t have my family close by.

A few days later Christian left for Byron bay and I stayed in Sydney. For New Years I went over to Ben's place since he had an amazing view of the harbour bridge. I later then went over to Nick and Jason’s to see the fire works since they also had an amazing view of the city and harbour. At 12 we saw the fire works go off and everyone had someone close to them near by. I wasn’t feeling really happy so after the fire works went out I said thank you to nick and Jason and went home to go to bed.

For New Years day I went to a party with Ruslun a good friend from Citigroup and Andoni and Allen. The party was nice and we all had a good time. At that party is where I also met my good friend Dennis who you will hear about a little later. This is also the first time me and Ruslun had gone out to party and let me tell you he had a great time. We all did really.

I also moved out of Randwick into Rushcutters bay around this point too. I moved to a studio apartment on my own and fixed it up.

Anyways I don’t want to write about this point in my life to much since it does bring back painful memories.

Hope all is well
Jonathan Vargas

PS Paris Hilton was at Bondi beach and thought I would take a quick picture for the hell of it.