I count myself lucky to be living in a multicultural city that is well known for its foodie and cultural scenes.

Today I decided to drive ten minutes down the road to the suburb of Clayton. Clayton Road is full of Asian restaurants and cafes. Korean, Chinese, Vietnamese, Japanese, it’s all here.

I’ve never tasted matcha so I headed to Chayo, a cute Japanese cafe in Clayton to try their matcha latte using matcha from Kyoto.

Before stopping at the cafe, a quick stop to the library nearby to renew my membership.

What I like about this library is that it’s in a community centre with a swimming pool and cafe.

However, it also has the largest range of international language collections. I guess it has to given the multicultural makeup of this suburb.

There was a great range of Greek, Italian, Spanish, Vietnamese and Chinese books.

The children’s musical session was in progress at the time and they made me laugh as they giggled through the song. Their minders mainly seemed to be older Asian women who I assumed were the grandmothers looking after them.

For the last few years, I’ve been chatting weekly with a girlfriend who lives in Spain. (She helps me with my French language learning and I with her English).

I sent her photos of the above shelves. It’s a pity I don’t speak Spanish….

After I renewed my membership, I headed to the Japanese cafe and ordered the Matcha Latte and watched the world go by.

The cafe is part of the Mini Maru Japanese retail store which was next door. I had a bit of a look around to see the various Japanese kitchen ware and goods. I liked the match bowls and other ceramic dishes.

Then a quick stop at the Greek grocery store to buy rusks from Greece…..

I’ve been around the world in a couple of hours!