We pile into the Tarago at 11pm. When the rest of the world is sleeping, our family makes the hour-long journey from western Sydney to Blues Point in the city.
Driving into the heart of the city in the middle of the night is magical. In the daytime driving in the city is a nightmare. Sydney is congested, noisy and polluted. But my night-time experience of Sydney is otherworldly.
The roads are empty. The tall skyscrapers look like they are floating in the distance with no more than a handful of their windows illuminated by office lights. Empty roads mean there are no horns or screeching of cars and buses braking every two minutes.
As we cruise along Victoria Road, the city’s skyline comes into view, street-lamps twinkling against the velvety midnight sky. We see the road that leads to the entrance of Sydney University, now empty. During the day, the same paths are filled with stressed students and commuters.
My parents and I immigrated from Hyderabad, India in 2002. Crossing oceans ignited a dream of Dad’s and that dream today, is fifteen years old. It is a restaurant in Harris Park or better known as Sydney’s ‘Little India’. I was seven when dad opened our restaurant, and it was the first of its kind in Sydney to serve authentic Hyderabadi cuisine. For my parents it was a slice of their childhood in their new Western home.
Lina Ali. Source: Supplied
Despite living in Sydney for twenty years, no one in my family has ever watched the New Year fireworks over the Harbour Bridge in person. Growing up with a family business, I was taught to see the world through a different lens than my peers. It also meant that the schedule of fun and holidays that my family adhered to growing up was vastly different to my friends’ schedules. Heading to the restaurant after school, picking up a weekend cashier shift to make a little pocket money in high school, I learned the value of money and hard work.
My dad and mum run a tight ship. Our family business operates 7 days a week from 11.30am to 10.30pm.
While most teenagers remember Christmas and New Year trips overseas and family gatherings to celebrate the end of a year, I remember my family’s restaurant at full capacity, the clanking of pots and spoons, and the chatter of patrons dancing with the low hum of cicadas.
My family’s late-night drives to North Sydney’s water point seem strange to others who do not exist within our world. But it was on these drives growing up my siblings and I understood our parents’ lesson of finding beauty in small, spontaneous moments. It allowed my brother to discover his passion for photography. It was on these drives that I discovered my love for Elton John, Celine Dion, Roxette and Bryan Adams.
With cups of hot chocolate and coffee in our hands, bundled in Kmart jackets, the drives give Mum and Dad room to breathe away from the hustle and bustle, and spend time with us.
But we don’t just drive all the way to North Sydney to stare at the soothing lull of harbour waves and the gentle bobbing of parked yachts. As a hospitality family, late-night dinners are a necessity. On the way, we have dinner at Faheem’s Fast Food in Enmore. We stop on the way home at Darling Harbour for ice cream. Mum gets macadamia nut, Dad gets pistachio, my younger brother and sister love vanilla. I am crazy about cookies and cream. Some nights when the exhaustion from the day’s work is too great – legs are aching, blisters beginning (and if we had to smile and interact with anyone else, we might just collapse), we grab drive-through at Maccas or Hungry Jacks on Parramatta Road.
Lina Ali. Source: Supplied
Our drives are one of the few ways we know how to be the Ali family, not the Ali family who own the Indian restaurant in Harris Park. Away from restaurant and home responsibilities, my parents relax. They become Shireen and Rehan, not Mum and Dad. We all sit together on the edge of the look-out, feet dangling a couple of metres above the water and listen to our parents narrate stories about their lives.
My siblings and I fire questions at them. Did you guys have coloured television growing up? Are there beaches in Hyderabad? How did you guys talk to your friends without phones? Wait, you mean you talked on the house phone where anyone could listen?
These drives were a central part of our family-bonding tradition growing up and one we still fulfil. They helped me learn about my roots and connect with my parents. They are a gift I will always treasure.
Lina Ali is a freelance writer and arts/literature student at Sydney University. You can follow her on Instagram @_lrali, or LinkedIn.
She is also a 2022 Createability Intern, working as a Diversity and Inclusion Research Assistant in the SBS Television and Online Content Division.
