Thinking Allowed: Urban Dysphoria

Some people feel as if cities are the be all end all: sought-after destinations, hives of culture, endless fun. We often tend to avoid them or treat them as landing pads to better, more beautiful places. Cities are so vast and crowded and loud that they make me feel small and solitary and meek. They sometimes make me wince with sensory overload while my brain yells 'retreat retreat run until it's green!' Not always, though. Other times I feel charged by their vibrancy and euphoric by their opportunities. Last weekend in Sydney was more of the latter and hence was revealing in helping me figure out what makes a city visit a good city visit. Especially as conditions were right for failure - it was hot, I was solo with four little kids and it was a long weekend so even busier than usual.

So what was the key to success? Location. Transport. Planning. Mindset. We stayed in in a house in Newtown which is a fun place to be. We were within walking distance of lots of parks, playgrounds, a climbing gym, restaurants and really it's a nice place to wander. We not only didn't stay in the central core we avoided it completely. We drove to Sydney but immediately parked our car and ignored it choosing instead to travel by public transportation. It was a lot of time on transportation to get to some of our chosen sights but on the upside I read about half a chapter book to the girls. Knowing that I don't always enjoy cities I made sure to figure out ahead of time everything we wanted to do and made a schedule that the kids knew about in advance. This helped us stay motivated and in decent moods. Finally, mindset is always important and I set out to have a good time. I also let the girls know that we were to have a good time and not whine because then it wouldn't be fun. It probably also helped that most of our time was spent doing things they liked like eating, playing, climbing and swimming. We'll have to test out my theories during our next big city visit.