Jeff Bezos and his wife, Lauren Sanchezthey are in Australia – Sydney to be exact.
For what purpose, we do not know. But if nothing else, how the fourth richest man in the world one chooses to spend his time in the Emerald City it has made a good joke.
After being seen on Friday out to lunch at Mimi’s restaurant, in Coogee, Bezos was spotted that evening slipping into a bar at the Park Hyatt, where he was photographed by a CBD spy with what appears to be a black man. Billionaire founder of Amazondressed in black and sporting Cuban-heeled boots, she was with an unshaven man, who has yet to be identified.
That is to say, travel and accommodation aside, Bezos has been living like the rest of us.
If Sánchez’s Instagram is anything to go by, the pair may be staying at the Park Hyatt, whose 350-square-meter Sydney Suite bears a striking resemblance to the balcony Sánchez shared a photo of with her 1.1 million followers on Sunday morning. The daily group rate is not listed by Hyatt, but it reportedly starts around $21,000.
Then there is transportation. Flight tracking data shows that one plane widely reported to belong to Bezos, a luxury Gulfstream G700 private jet, landed in Sydney at 1.15pm on Friday after taking off from the Pacific. Bezos, whose real value is valued by Forbes at around $260 billion ($372 billion), reportedly owns four private jets.
Just what the couple are doing in Australia, though – and whether they will visit Melbourne – remains a mystery. Amazon is doing good business in this market, and is one of the largest technology companies involved in building data centers in Australia. The company already operates more than a dozen on Australian shores, and last year beat Elon Musk’s Starlink to a multimillion-dollar contract with the National Broadband Network to provide satellite internet to rural and regional Australians. Amazon Australia did not respond to a request for comment by deadline.
So our guess is Bezos, who no longer leads the company as chief executive but remains its executive chairman, would no doubt have a few meetings in the diary, vacation or not.
The ‘Magician’ truck returning to the road
Twice, trouble and trouble … the famous escape truck featured split banner ads that goal the Prime Minister Jacinta Allan is back on the streets of Melbourne.
truck, which as first reported by Age it was order from the street earlier this month after being served with a defect notice by the police, it was spotted by the CBD on Friday evening turning from Exhibition Street to Bourke Street and around towards the Houses of Parliament. and slogans “It’s time to get rid of this witch” with his doctored photo of Allan in full view.
The billboard truck, well known for advertising Gotham City on its screens, was issued with a notice of defect related to the billboards and ordered off the road for inspection on July 8. The notice followed a complaint to police made by a citizen in April.
The compliance issue was dismissed and the car was deemed fully roadworthy by VicRoads last week.
It seems no time was wasted getting it back on the road with the added slogan: “The truck is sitting! The wizard needs to go.” We get a drift.
Franco Puleo, owner of adult agency Gotham City in South Melbourne, has taken out a loan before for organizing the campaign “Toa Mchawi” which has has been widely criticized and analysts and all sides of the political divide including the PM Anthony Albanese and former PM Julia Gillard as misogynistic, sexist and offensive.
The police confirmed to the CBD that no further action will be taken on the issue of defects.
“The notice of defect follows the investigation of the addition of posters on the car which is not outside the control standards.
“Police have been advised that the truck was submitted to VicRoads for inspection and the vehicle was found to be roadworthy. Therefore, police will not be taking any further action in relation to the vehicle.”
The defect notice had called for the car’s three large LED display screens to be removed, and an accompanying email to police said a complaint from a member of the public had occurred before the anti-Labour adverts started appearing on the screens.
“Instead of worrying about fixing this situation, they are busy looking for small businesses like me and everyone else who wants to talk about this government by advertising on trucks,” Puleo fumed at the CBD on Sunday.
“There was nothing wrong with the truck. We have been told by the police officer who issued the notice that Vic Pol will not bother us anymore and will not take orders from other authorities. Jacinta should use her energy to find 15 billion dollars and help businesses and family people instead of increasing her salary.”
where is barnaby
Last week it was great for One Nation. It was revealed permanent kitchen of the Senate Malcolm Roberts he had explained Alex Jonesa fountain of conspiracy theories including that the Sandy Hook school shooting was a false flag, as a “light of hope around the world”.
Then came the leader Pauline Hanson‘s Mediterranean sojourn with a billionaire Gina Rinehart. Which sparked an appearance on Hanson’s podcast as well as a controversial far-right freak show Tommy Robinsonwho has proved to be too cunning even for the leader of the British Reformation Nigel Farageand has been named “bandit” by Andrew Bolt.
So when our colleagues revealed late last week that Hanson and Barnaby Joyce were in “constant disagreement”There will always be an analysis of the tea leaves of the court. Joyce and One Nation, of course, pressed the former National leader and his new boss have a relationship of trust.
Such was the case over the weekend when attention was drawn to the absence of Joyce’s name on the “team” page on the One Nation website, and the absence of the party’s name on Joyce’s own website. It is not known if Joyce ever accessed the One Nation website or if it has been changed. Of course, as with One Nation, our guess was that the absence would probably have more to do with a lack of professionalism and short staffing than, say, the impending split. But then again, who knows.
When it came to Sunday, Joyce was “trying to get the pump going”, which we took to mean working out, maybe lifting weights. He was angered by a masthead report last week, which revealed a disagreement between him and Hanson. “From what?” he asked. When asked about the absence of his name on the One Nation website, he said there was nothing. Happy to be of service to clean that up.
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Fiona Byrne is the CBD correspondent for The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald.Connect through email address.
John Buckley is the CBD correspondent for The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age.Connect through email address.
