Surfing into Finals and a Sinus Infection

I'm actually kinda proud right now. I'm only a week behind in posting my activities here! This is pretty impressive considering my past track record with this stuff. Last weekend Dickinson took us on our last group trip to Byron Bay. Byron is basically a sweet surfer tourist town and it was a freaking blast! I had recovered from my sunburns for the most part and the weather was great all weekend after another week of ran. Ann wasn't able to come with us sadly because of some lame excuse like her parents were visiting or some likely story so instead we were treated to a lovely tour guide Gayle, working for Byron Bay Skydiving.

They picked us up good and early so after a short two hour drive we found ourselves in a great beach town. We then proceeded on a beach walk along the Bay up to the lighthouse which is supposedly the Easternmost part of Australia. Cool I suppose but really not overly exciting. We went to a brewery called the Buddha Brew for dinner (steak!) and to top it all off, the beer was actually really good! And since we were there during happy hour it was actually some of the cheapest beer I've got at a bar since we've gotten here. Win-win situation right there! Afterward we went to a pub called Cheeky Monkeys where we spent the night dancing on tables and other good fun.

The next morning we all pulled up and got ready to go surfing! We got to the beach wearing our wetsuits and carried our surfboards out and just stared at the waves. Side note: those surfboards are way heavier than I realised, I now understand why surf bums are so freaking jacked. Looking out at the waves I couldn't imagine actually getting up on one of those crazy things. But our instructors had us doing the silly "Jump Up" routine on the beach and next thing we knew we were heading out into the water. Tried a couple times to get up on my own with pretty epic failures ensuing. The instructors came around and helped us out by shoving us off and letting us know when was the right moment to get up. All of a sudden, I was surfing! In about three seconds, I went from being terrified of the smallest little waves to wanting to seek out bigger and sicker waves! This led to a good mix of larger crashes (my knees are still pretty skinned up from bouncing along the bottom) but also some really sweet rides. After what felt like an hour, it was time to pack up... Lame.

After lunch we then continued our fat camp training by going out on a sea kayak expedition to see whales and dolphins. Honestly, it wasn't all that fun though maybe it just paled in comparison to the surfing we had done just a few hours prior. We got out into the water and paddled like maniacs not quite sure what we were doing (we didn't know about the whales and dolphins) and then all of a sudden someone pointed and we could see dolphins jumping up in the waves mere meters away from us! They left after a couple minutes later though and it was back to just plain exercise. After another 30 hrs of paddling Megan and I were pretty tired of just floating out in the water and not seeing anything of much interest. Our wonderful tour guide had basically abandoned us so we decided to turn back in ourselves. About halfway back we hear some whistling and turn to see some frantic waving. Thinking they had spotted a whale or something we turned back only to find out that the guide was upset at us for leaving. Whoops. Surprise surprise though they were just turning back anyway. Reentry to the beach didn't go so well though... First wave came up and knocked us sideways and flipped us pretty quickly and we had to swim to shore. Apparently it helped fix Megan's seasickness so I suppose it had some benefit?

We went out to another place called Cocomangas which wasn't quite as cool as the first pub but still a good time for sure. The next morning some of the girls went out skydiving which I had been considering but it was simply way to expensive and I promised myself I would do it sometime in the next few years. We went all around the town that afternoon and enjoyed a nice barbie on the beach before we had to say our goodbyes to Byron.

The next week commenced studying or at least after a few days I managed to start studying :P I had two finals and a paper which as of now I have completely finished! However, over the weekend I started getting an increasingly painful toothache and was having some serious allergies. After finishing my last final this morning I went to the dentist and the doc on campus to have my fears confirmed, I had a lovely sinus infection. $100 later I now have antibiotics and nasal steroids to help me out but I'm looking forward to a fun couple flights tomorrow morning (or rather 8 hrs from now!) when Taylor and I fly to Alice Springs where we'll go on a backpacking tour around Uluru. We're super super excited for it. I can't remember the last time I went camping and now a few days out under the stars in the Australian Outback sounds amazing.

Getting up in a few hours to catch a ride to the airport and I'll be pretty much incommunicado for a good week at least. The final countdown is on and is ticking down fast. Uluru trip, back to Brizzie on Saturday for our Farewell dinner with Ann, flying out to Melbourne the next morning, back to Brisbane on Thursday and then flying back home on Sunday the 21st. Its insanity. and I need to stop thinking about it and just enjoy my last couple weeks here!

Here's some pics as always:

Pretty sure this lil guy speaks for himself

Not a great pic, but you get the idea

Pro on land

Taylor, Trevor, and myself

Lobster Status - Pt 2 The Day/Week of Recovery

So getting back from Heron was a bit of a bummer, we'd had a blast and it also meant that it was time to get back to school, woohoo! The first week flew by and we actually had our last class for Australian Marine Environments, apparently they realised that this was class that kids were basically taking for the cool trips and with them over, what was the point of further class? Anywho, like I said class was class but the big things I was looking forward to was a string of 3 good nights out, the usual Thursday night at a pub, King's Conclusion (themed Heaven and Hell), and lastly ICC Recovery.

Thursday night was a typical night out with the Cromwell folk. Dancing, drinking, ice cube fights broken up by security, all around good times ya know? Fuster and I hadn't initially planned on going to King's Conclusion because we'd assumed that it would be dominated by the all guy's colleges King's and Leo's. Then a couple of our friends informed us that this was the mentality of most of the other guys, thus producing a wonderful ratio of girls to guys. So we got tickets.

Good choice on our part, Conclusion was a blast! We dressed up as devils between the sheets (wore a bed sheet with devil horns) which not to brag too much was an awesome costume that required minimal effort. Can you guess who came up with the costume idea? :P In Heaven was a great band from St. John's while down in Hell lay the bar and a DJ bumping some dance tunes. Being the white boy that I am, I found myself much more at home rocking out in Heaven than on the dance floor in Hell. It started to rain a bit but by then most of us were having such a great time we didn't particularly care. The band ended their set before we were ready to go so we found our way back down to Hell which ended up being a good time as well. By the time they ran out of drinks and they started telling people to go home, the entire place was Mud City. Some crazy kids were literally slapping their shirts into the mud to make it splash for a good 5 minutes...

Got up earlyish the next morning to get ready for ICC Recovery which was themed Incredible Childhood Cartoon Heroes so Fuster and I went as Fred Flintstone and Barney Rubble complete with plastic clubs. This was where the destruction of my epidermis begins. The weather for the past week had been cloudy/rainy so we weren't expecting Saturday to be any different. Wrong. It was gorgeous. Good thing right? Yes/No. Yeah for good weather, boo for stupid me forgetting sunscreen. Not til we had arrived at this golfcourse overlooking the Brisbane River and plopped down with our first beers did the thought occur to me that crap, I am screwed in this sun. Faced with inevitable sun burn I did the only thing I really could do, I pushed the thought aside and made sure I had a good time to make it worth it.

Apparently it is college tradition at Recovery events like these to put food coloring into your drink and then spit it on each other. The idea had naturally grossed us out when we first of it but we went in with the mentality that if someone should start doing it to us we'd of course have to return the favor. Enter the Dickinson females. Taylor and I were idly enjoying our drinks and some convo with some other Crommie folk when all of a sudden we were attacked by the Ninja Turtles! However, rather than their typical sais, bo staff, nunchuks, and katanas they came at us with colored goon! Sans any food coloring of our own the Flintstones duo was helpless against their onslaught.

Later though we managed to get our hands on some dye and then the battle was on. Next thing I know there is red, blue, and yellow beer and goon flying everywhere and we are covered head to toe in it. Moving past the slightly gross nature of the act, it was ridiculously fun! We ran into a couple of the other Dson guys and for the rest of the day sneak attacks occurred over and over again. Also available was a huge bounce castle with ginormous boxing gloves. Of course in order to maintain our manliness the guys had to duke it out. Thankfully with the aid of alcohol, large boxing gloves, and the general insanity of jumping around in a bouncy castle trying to box I was able to hold my own ground.

The entire event lasted about 6 hours and was an absolute blast. When we got back to Cromwell we promptly passed out and didn't wake up until 7:30. My first waking thought was oh man I am in soo much bloody pain. Taylor and I both got up and all I could do was stand there shaking muttering about how much pain I was in while all he could was stare at the lobster I had become. The pics I took of it didn't turn out particularly well and I can't say I'm too proud of the way I looked so I shant be putting them up.

I don't want to spend the rest of this post complaining about the pain caused by my own stupidity but just to put things in perspective, for the next four days my existence was basically made up of eating, sleeping, and watching South Park when I couldn't fall asleep. Though it made for a great excuse not to go to school! Within about a week, the pain was pretty much gone and I would ecstatically say to people, "Look what I can do!" whilst jumping around and waving my arms in circles. I was pretty darned happy to be able to move painfree let me tell you.
Anywho, enough writing, time for a couple pictures!

Me and my two ninja turtles, Megan and Maia at ICC Recovery

Fuster and I with a couple Crommie gals, Jamaica and Nacho at Conclusion

Much Ado leading to lobster status pt.1 - Finding Nemo

Well many an adventure has occurred since my last post. When we last left our protagonist, he was on his way to catch a ride to the paradise, I mean research station, at Heron Island. This turned out to actually be a claustrophobic box on wheels, aka a coach bus, in which I was unable to get much sleep but with my good friend Solitaire and an iPod full of music I managed to make it through the trip to Gladstone. A well rounded breakfast at Maccas and a new pair of sunglasses later our group found itself on the long awaited ferry to the island! We played card games to pass the time and before we knew it, Heron Island was spotted on the horizon.

We were met at the dock by the first group that had been there and the excitement on their faces got us all pumped up despite our exhaustion from all the travel. The tide was starting to go out and our prof had promised us a snorkel on our first day so we quickly got ourselves suited up and headed into the water. I'd never snorkeled before so I was a bit unsure but it was actually pretty easy to pick up the basics. It was an amazing experience, there seemed like there was nothing but the second we got our heads under the water there were fish, coral, and other lil critters everywhere! Even saw a little Nemo out there, which is of course whats more important than anything else right?We were supposed to be thinking of ideas for a research project but I was too busy looking at the cool stuff all around...

I could go on for ages with everything that we did on the island but I'll try to condense it for this blog post. The food was actually quite good aside from the dubious custard that showed up three nights in row. We knew it was leftover night when we our dessert was jello (they call it jelly), custard, and ice cream. what the heck!? Anywho, the weather the first few days wasn't all that great but we managed to make the best of it. Our project was going to look at the little gobi fishes that lived in little holes in the ground but the wind was making pretty serious waves that we simply couldn't deal with. So along with most of the other groups, we had to change our project. What to you ask? Well like mature college kids that we were, we decided to study the excrement of holothurians, aka sea cucumber poo. It was the best of both worlds, it was not only an easier project but there was an endless stream of jokes to go with it!

We took every opportunity to go snorkeling and it was well worth it. Stingrays, sharks, and turtles. Enough said right there I dare say. The only real disappointment was not seeing Bruce and the other sharks saying, "Fish are friends, not food" during our snorkel to a boat wreck. There was supposed to be a night snorkel, but the weather didn't allow it so instead our tutors organized a marine biology trivia night for us. It shouldn't come as any surprise that of course, myself and the other awesome Dson folk took first place and won a bottle of wine!

On our last night, the weather had cleared up a bit so we went out to the beach and stargazed for hours. Everything was so beautiful and serene on the island you couldn't help but have a great time. Sitting on the beach watching sunrises and sunsets over the ocean horizon were some of the best I've ever seen. The sea turtles starting to mate on the beaches were simply amusing though. There was one particularly unfortunate couple that kept getting flipped over by the waves that had us in stitches for a good ten minutes at least.

Turtle sex aside, by the time our last day came around we were sad to say goodbye to the island. Its not an experience I'll soon forget, thats for sure.

Now for some photos from Heron Island and other places for your viewing pleasure!

This is Maia, Taylor, and myself at the World's Greatest Overlook in the Hinterlands

Sunrise

The triumphant Dream Team of Trivia Night

Going BALL-istic all the way to Heron Island

Its been a crazy past few weeks (nothing new there really) and I've got loads to update on. Two weekends ago I travelled up to Hervey Bay for our Ask Weekend with the other Lockley guys and all of our partners for Ball. It was about 5 hours of travel but my friend B1 has an awesome house right on the beach that definitely made the trip well worth it. The gals had already had a bit to drink on the ride so we were all rearing to get our weekend started by the time we finally arrived.

We quickly unloaded the two cars (the third would come later because a couple of the people had exams to take that day and ran out to the water and played out there for a good few hours. The water got a bit chilly for us so we went inside to get some dinner and to play some good old drinking games (Taylor and I had been put in charge of those since being the resident Americans it was assumed we had an extensive knowledge of them :P). The next day a few people had to go back to college because of school/work obligations but the rest of us spent the start of the day lazing about watching TV and laughing at the pictures from the day before.

Eventually we managed to corral the energy to go outside but since it was low tide we had to walk a good couple kilometers out to even get to the water. B1 and Boomer taught Fuster and I how to play a backyard version of cricket which was alot of fun as well. We had a fire that night on the beach and we introduced our Aussie friends to the best version of s'mores that we could create. Apparently they don't have graham crackers here!? So we had to improvise with some cookie/cracker things I figured would do the trick. And their marshmallows are about the 1/3 of the size of ours so we had a bit of difficulty roasting them over the fire but we made it work and everyone was quite happy with the result.

Took us about 9 hours to travel back because of troubles with the train schedule but it was all well and good as I got to converse with B1 quite a bit. He's a pretty chill guy and we had endless chats about the weekend, his friends who had visited us and the shenanigans they used to have, and he taught me quite a bit about how the Australian government works. Needless to say, its got some similarities to American government but its got quite a few interesting distinctions (a part from being a part of the commonwealth of course). People vote for parties and not the candidates that the party endorses so if a party is voted in and they decide they don't like what the candidate is doing then they can oust them for somebody new. This happens even to the Prime Minister, most recently Kevin Rudd having been replaced by Julia Guillard.

Anywho, thats a whole conversation and a half to itself that I shant be getting into now. This last Friday we had our Ball and everyone first gathered in the Dining Hall for some predrinks and hors d'oeuvres. Everyone was up in their finest and looked absolutely amazing! It was still a secret at this point as to where we were going but we piled onto the buses and eventually found ourselves at the Rydges Hotel downtown. An elevator took us up to the top floor where we were greeted by waiters with champagne and the most beautiful view of the city and the river that I could've imagined. There was a live jazz band playing, two balconies, an endless stream of wine, beer, and champagne, a delicious meal of steak and potatoes, an amazing brownie type dessert, basically a phenomenal evening all around. I sadly didn't have my camera but others got pics and I'll be sure to get some up once I've gotten them myself.

The next morning we all got up early for the day after event called Recovery, basically a fun hair of the dog kind of idea. Everyone got dressed up in absurd clothing, started drinking out on the front lawn and then hopped on a bus to a local pub called the Down Under, aka the Dunda.

Sunday I travelled down to the Gold Coast with Fuster and Jeeves where we stayed with our friend Mussels. We had really only expected a ride down there but she and her family were wonderful enough to let us stay with them and Mussels played tour guide to us through Tuesday (now). We were well and knackered after two solid days of drinking but we managed to get out Sunday night to enjoy the beach a bit. Monday avo we went out to the Hinterlands (bushland = country) where we drove up into the mountains and did a fair bit of hiking. The Gold Coast and the surrounding area was actually a massive volcano some 20 million years ago but has since eroded leaving a web of rivers and a circle of mountains. We went to a place called the World's Best Lookout which though a rather immodest name it offered a spectacular view of the entire area. We also went on a 4km walk around a sweet waterfall before having a nice picnic lunch in the park. After an afternoon power nap we went into the city to get dinner with our friend Echo on the beach. We also ran into another Cromwellian Towel, who was having dinner with his parents.

Its been a busy past few weeks with class, trips and such, and it continues tonight. I'll be leaving for Heron Island in bout an hour and will be up there for bout five days snorkelling with the fishies, turtles, sharks, and such! Should be a great time and there'll be plenty of pics and stories once I return at the end of break. Until then, I bid you all adieu!

Ugh its sparkling water!

So I started this post a good week ago but forgot to post it... whoops! Anyway, here it is now:

Saturday marked the beginning of Brisbane Festival, which is basically just three weeks in September with a bunch of random concerts, theatre performances, etc. semi-organised throughout the city. The real exciting thing was the fireworks display to kick it off Saturday night, known as Riverfire. Met up with Taylor and Megan at South Bank and we decided that we had a pretty good spot right where the City Cat stop was. We were promised an aerial show at 5pm but unless one helicopter appearing for about 2 minutes is something to get excited about, it was pretty lame/nonexistent. So we chilled on the waterfront for another couple hours waiting for the fireworks and watching the area fill up with people thousands of people.

Eventually 7pm rolled around and any doubts that the show wouldn;t be worth the wait vanished instantly as a F-111 jet flew overhead and performed a "dump and burn". Basically the F-111 has its fuel tank located behind its afterburner so literally the jet dumps some of its fuel which is ignited behind it in a gigantic stream of fire! People complain about it being wasteful (which it most certainly is) but I have to say it was freaking awesome to see this jet all of a sudden disappear into a gigantic fireball cruising through the sky! Supposedly this will be the last "dump and burn" performed in Australia as the F-111s are being phased out of their air force and its also mad expensive/wasteful.

Then began the actual fireworks, accompanied by a soundtrack. Not sure if I'm just that much of a country bum but I had never seen fireworks that were actually synchronized with music so between having just seen the flying fireball and this new novelty I was already blown away. Every public event in Australia is begun with an acknowledgment of the "rightful land owners", the Aboriginals, so the first music that was played was a beautiful Aboriginal song. Very nice and all but I couldn't help but be amused by the irony considering it was following a performance that consisted of burning fuel and blowing up tens of thousands kilograms of fireworks over a river. Thanks for the land guys, we're gonna go blow some shit up over it k? The comparisons to America never end!

But in any case, the fireworks display itself was easily the best fireworks show I have ever seen. There were 6 barges (3 of which we could see from our spot) shooting off fireworks from the river, fireworks being launched from the bridges crossing the river, and even fireworks being launched off the tops of the skyscrapers downtown! The F-111/ball of fire cruised around at different parts as well. Best free entertainment I've had here/possibly ever.

Afterward we realised that getting onto the City Cat back to campus was not going to be easy as we'd thought despite being right next to the stop. There were literally thousands of people waiting to get on and the system wasn't even running because apparently the river had become clogged with people watching the fireworks from their boats. So after about 40 minutes of indecision, we decided to fight our way through the crowds and get some food since it was after 8pm and none of us had had dinner. Taylor had remembered some pizza place so we grabbed that and chilled in the grass. This is only the second or third time I've had pizza here but I have to say, it sucks. Apparently Australians don't believe in sauce and there's just something about the pizza itself that just isn't great. It confuses me because the Australians I've talked to get excited about this chain called New York Slice which sells good old American pizza. So why they don't just all make good pizza, I have no idea.

The next morning, Taylor, Maia, Megan, Liz, and I got up earlyish to check out the "French" Sunsupper Breakfast. Basically we were pumped for a free breakfast that wasn't at college. We got to the Goodwill Bridge where it was being held and got excited because they were giving away free water and we were all really thirsty. Little did we know that it wasn't plain water, but in fact sparkling water. There was a big line for the food and I had had to go to the bathroom for some time so I volunteered to take all 7 of our bottles (we'd taken a few extra, we were THIRSTY) and dispose of them while they stayed in line. Didn't find any recycling or rubbish bins on my way to the portapotty so the people to go in after me were probably pretty confused by the bottles that were taking up half of it! The event itself wasn't quite as cool as I'd expected but was still good. Basically the gave out free croissants, strawberries, yogurt, and cheese, had some really good sidewalk chalk drawings of French places/paintings, and we bought some crepes (decent) before making our way back to college. Spent the rest of day doing homework, woohoo!

Monday brought the usual class, homework, and our last two basketball games. Got our butts handed to us by International House which was a bit demoralizing as they're not usually good at sports but apparently that wasn't the case for basketball. I had contemplated going to the gym between games but ended up staying for the ladies game, GREAT DECISION! It was their last game and they didn't really have anyone who was good or had played much ball before and they were fully aware of it. So they instead decided to just have a good time with it. Memorable quotes included "IMA GET ALL UP IN YOUR GRILLS!" (Bounty jumping around like a crazy) and my favorite came from the ref, "Foul is on... Giz!?" That put me in a good mood for our next game against Kings (one of the all guys college's), which we knew we were going to get spanked in whether we liked it or not. Was a little worried at first because we had mysteriously lost some players and were down to four. Then Kplus showed up to save the day so we had a whopping five players, one of whom didn't even know the rules. Despite this, we held our own and played a decent game.

One final note, My pics from Riverfire and the dump and burn didn't turn out too well but I recommend just doing a youtube search. It'll be well worth ten minutes of your day to check them out a bit!

Peanut Butter and Vegemite!?

I'm getting pretty used to hearing that on a daily basis. The Australians are very happy that I am one of the few nonAustralians who likes (in my case, love) Vegemite and despite the fact that they pride themselves on using it in strange combinations, I've apparently broken the limits by creating PB & V. Thus, every morning when i make my typical bfast of toast with PB & V and often an egg or two on top, I'm met with awestruck faces and "You eat peanut butter AND vegemite!?" Yes, yes I do. And its freaking delicious thank you very much :P

In other news, it is now September. Holy shiznit. One of the girls on our program actually counted it up and we've been here over 50 days now. On one side this is cool because I definitely feel like I've fallen into the rhythm of school life here but it also means that our number of remaining days is rapidly dwindling. With that in mind, my recent dilemma has been trying to figure out where I can both afford and have time to travel to. Places on the list of possible travel locations include: Tasmania, Melbourne, Uluru/Ayer's Rock (the huge red rock sticking up in the middle of Australia), Cairns, more NZ, Singapore, etc. etc... Basically everywhere and anywhere which is causing me some prioritization issues. That and I won't know what free time I'll have during the exam period cuz we're at a bloody large university that doesn't post exam dates and times until freaking october. But as the Aussies say, "She'll be right" and I'll get it all figured out... eventually.

Aside from that all is going well. We've reached that point in the semester where there are all kinds of assignments due and my procrastination is catching up with me but its nothing I haven't dealt with before. People are getting more and more excited for Ball here at Cromwell now that there are only three weekends of Asks left followed by Ball. Fuster and I were invited to our friend Boudjoo's house for a weekend over midsemester break but unfortunately its during our trip up to Heron Island. Other than that there's not all that much to report. Finally won a basketball game, sang "Party in the USA" with the other Cromwell Dson folk at karaoke last night (we rocked it), going to be accompanying Impulse on the song "Stars" from Les Miserables on Tuesday, and hopefully jamming with a couple guys sometime next week. Just gonna keep on rocking down under!

Kiwis and Squeaky Sand

Soooo I fail at updating this regularly but I'm at least going to attempt to catch up from my last post here. To sum up my kiwi adventure, I had a hell of a great time and hope to find myself there again someday. Had my first bball game Monday night which considering basketball's popularity here and the state of our team went pretty well. We played better than I think any of us expected and only ended up losing by a few points. Got two games tomorrow night, which I'm sure we're going to rock!

The week cruised by pretty quickly as usual. Got to see Taylor play in his first rugby game Wednesday night and other than a long overdue haircut nothing overly exciting happening until the end of the week. Friday morning, Fuster, Shazza, and I boarded a bus to the Moreton Bay Research Center on Stradbroke Island for our first research field trip for our Australian Marine Biology course. Jeeves and a few other Dson girls had gone the prior weekend and had brought back rave reviews of beautiful beaches and constant feedings so we were pretty pumped. We had ended up going out to a club the night before so after hopping on the bus at 7:30 I slept for the majority of our 90min bus/ferry ride to the center but once we got there it was go Go GO!

The weather was absolute crap and on the beach it was even windier and colder with some intermittent rain but we all braved the elements to go out while it was still low tide. We were broken up into groups of 8 and went out with PhD students who showed us all the cool things to be found in the sand, seagrass, and rocks. We were literally fed every three hours so of course despite going in and out of the cold I was quite happy! Just before dinner we went out during high tide to do some seining and actually were able to catch a bunch of different fishies as well as a male and female sting ray which were doing ummm male/female things prior to us catching them. Sorry!

The next day was nonstop research: we formulated a hypothesis that on the pipes running into the water we would find more different species the further away from shore you went, created an experiment with random sampling to test our hypothesis, analyzed the results (we were right of course :P), and then had to create and give a powerpoint presentation to the tutors and other students. We did all of this in ONLY 10 HOURS!!! By the time we had made it through the the last presentation I basically walked back to our room, flopped into bed, and promptly fell into a deep sleep.

The next morning (Sunday/today) we roused our tired selves, got some bfast, packed up, and headed out on the bus to Point Lookout to do a gorge walk along the shore. Found out that Moreton Bay is home to the largest permanent population of bottlenose dolphins and is a popular spot for whale watching! The views were spectacular and we actually saw a few humpback whales playing around out in the distance. We stopped for some delicious homemade gelato (I had passionfruit cheesecake along with strawberry mango cream!) before heading to the beach. The sand was some of the whitest and most beautiful sand I've ever seen and was so fine that when you stepped in the dry areas it actually made a squeaking sound! It was a bit chilly because of the strong winds coming off the bay but I allowed myself to be coaxed into swimming around in the water for a bit before relaxing in the sun and "tanning".

We didn't have anywhere near as much time on the beach as we would've liked but eventually it was time to head back. Before long we were back at Cromwell College and Fuster and I had to catch up on what is called Ball LineUp. At the end of September, Cromwell is going to have its ball, called Ballistic this year, which is basically like a sort of prom/formal. Each semester the guys and gals take turns with which gender will do the asking to ball and this time around it was the guys turn. Basically what happens is that all the guys lined up to ask to bring their preferred partner. The catches are that people were allowed to start lining up nearly a week ago, though only a few guys started that early. Most started lining up on Friday or Saturday so for most of the weekend there was a line of guys chilling in the hallway outside of the room of the guy, Randy, who was in charge. Now people weren't expected to stay there the entire time, most guys worked as a pair taking turns standing in line so they could have the option of eating, going to uni, etc. So by 4:00pm today when the asking actually started, most of the Cromwell guys were lined up, aside from Fuster and I who only got back from Moreton Bay just after 5. This actually worked out alright for us, because although we missed all of the fun of lining up we arrived after the line was completely gone and simply had to walk in, take a look at the list of remaining girls and make our pick. Despite being so late in the process, we were quite happy with our partner choices.

So now all of the Cromwell guys have their partners but the gals currently have no idea who asked picked them and I'm not entirely clear on the details but we'll be giving them clues and such for awhile leading up to Ball. Some weekend before ball, Fuster, the other Lockley guys, and myself will be taking our dates on a little trip up to either the Sunshine Coast or perhaps even a bit further north than that. As I said, the details of everything are still quite fuzzy for me but as things progress I'll be sure to update things here.

Continuing on with the busyness of this weekend, after picking dates for ball, and having dinner, I went to my first Dancefest practice. Dancefest is going to be sometime in the first week of October where each of the residential colleges will put on a dance and I'm assuming there will be judges and a winner of some sorts. Anyway, I am about as white as they get when it comes to dancing and prior attempts at taking part in a dance line have been compared to a mentally challenged bird of some sort. Nonetheless I feel like I did fairly well and it should be a lot of fun.

Anyway, that about catches things up though as always I know I've left thousands of cool things out and will be kicking myself about them for the next few days saying I should blog about them but in two weeks when I get around to actually doing my next post I'll kick myself for not being able to remember them. Buuuut so it goes I guess! tomorrow the Dson crew is going to have coffee with Ann, which is always fun, then back to the crazy thing called class, then my two basketball games! In summary, its barely after 9pm here and I'm bout set to head to bed. Night y'all!

Rocking with the Kiwis

After such a great weekend in Sydney, I was still super pumped for my next weekend... in New Zealand!!! The week went by pretty quickly: had class on Monday, work training for my new job as a social science interviewer (I'll explain later) on Tuesday, Pub Crawl for Ekka holiday on Wednesday, then struggling through class on Thursday before hopping on a plane to Christchurch. I was bummed that I wasn't able to get a window seat but it was dark out anyway so there wasn't much to see anyway. Best part of the journey was getting through customs to see Phillippa, Tessa (two of my fellow blueshirts from Dson), and Tessa's sister Georgia waiting for me.

It was rather late but we went back to Tessa's house for a couple beers and played in a park, then watched some crazy NZ tv show called "Outrageous Fortune" before passing out. Tessa and I spent Friday checking out downtown Christchurch and the local museum with the infamous Paua Shell House. Paua shells come from abalone and when shined have a beautiful iridescent blue, green, purple color to them. Back in the 1960s, Myrtle Flutey got tired of her husband leaving his shiny paua shells lying around the floor of the house so she started hanging them up on the wall. Next thing they knew they had over 1200 and they opened their house in 1963 to tourists for free. They started collecting other "Kiwiana" as the kiwis like to call their local knick knacks and after they died a recreation of their house was made and the entire collection moved to the Canterbury Museum for our viewing pleasure :)

After the shiny shell house, Tessa and I got some delicious souvlaki before meeting up with Phillippa for a ride up into the "hills" surrounding Christchurch. By most Americans they would probably be termed mountains but by kiwi standards they apparently didn't quite make the cut. In any case, the views were absolutely beautiful. It was a foggy day but we could still easily see the ocean on one side, the Canterbury Plains, the neighboring bay of Lyttelton, and off in the distance a vague outline of the Southern Alps. Wasn't quite LOTR territory but it was amazing nonetheless! There are a few hiking trails running through the hills, most notably the Bridle path which the original British settlers used to cross the Port Hills.

Friday night took us downtown again for the local pub scene and to see some band that Phillippa's friend was lead singer for. Very chill (and chilly) place, the music wasn't quite my thing, but there was a delicious organic brew on tap which I'm kicking myself for not remembering the name of but so it goes!

Went into town again with Tessa intending on actually checking out the Botanical Gardens. Seeing as Christchurch is nicknamed the City of Gardens it would make sense to check them out right? Instead we got sidetracked and went down to New Brighton Pier to get some ice cream and check out the ocean. After that I went with Tessa's family to a couple malls (very similar to American malls). Tessa's dad made us some delectable homemade pizza. Kiwis scoff at American pizza and our happiness to have just cheese or one/two toppings and so instead we had some three really good types ranging from shrimp with brie, peppers, etc to a simpler bacon and veggie pizza. Super good!

Even though the legal drinking age is 18, kiwis (and aussies) still like to celebrate 21st birthdays. Phillippa had turned 21 a few weeks earlier but had only just managed to organize her bday party that night, lucky for me! It was a really cool experience, its traditional to invite both family and friends to a 21st bday party and to have a few people give speeches about the lucky birthday gal/guy which can range from sweet anecdotes to embarrassing stories. Somebody asked me if we did anything similar in the states and I couldn't come up with anything similar aside from maybe at weddings or perhaps at someone's graduation party. One way or another it was very cool to hear more stories about Phillippa as well as to get to take party in this kiwi tradition.

I've only barely settled back in here at college but I've actually got a basketball game in about 15 minutes so I'll have to continue my tales later. Never stopping!

Opera House, Dugongs, Harry's Cafe du Wheels, and other Sydney Wonders

Not typically a big city sorta guy but Sydney was freaking awesome! We left early Friday morning out of Brisbane and after a short hour long flight we were there. As a quick aside, security for domestic flights in Australia is a bloody joke/nice reprieve from the crap we deal with in the states. No liquid restrictions and they didn't even ask us for ID for our tickets! Crazy...

Since we were only there for the weekend we quick dropped off our stuff at our hotel and then took a bus to a nice park overlooking the harbour for some lunch. I haven't been to cali but it reminded me a lot of pics that I've seen of San Fran or Italy with winding streets and beautiful houses on the hills overlooking the bay. The scenery was absolutely gorgeous with huge trees like this guy below all over the place. To put it in perspective that tree would take about 5 or 6 of me possibly more to wrap my arms around it!

Next we took the bus back into downtown where I was amazed by the number and size of they parks that they have right in the city. This is thanks to the last governor of New South Wales, Lachlan Macquarie, who had the commendable foresight to not only plan out many of the city streets but also to set aside large chunks of land to serve as parks and gardens in order to keep the natural beauty alive and well inside of the city. Made the country boy in me quite happy! In the Botanical Gardens we had a blast getting to feed the cockatoos which happily hopped up on our shoulders and/or heads and walked around with us for ten plus minutes even after we'd run out of food for them. Though one did try a bite of my sunglasses but figured out pretty quickly they were a bit less tasty than the banana bread that I'd been feeding it!

A short walk along the harbour then took us to the famous Sydney Opera House. Pictures did not do justice the phenomenal place that it is. Our tour took us through the impressive and ingenious design and construction of the opera house. They started with a design contest and the design they picked was actually rejected initially because it was extremely abstract and had absolutely no actual construction details but they went for it anyway. Construction was originally estimated to take only a few years a 7 million dollars but ended up taking an extra 10 years and a total of 102 million! Being the musical person that I am I was in constant awe of everything that I saw and was able to get into a brief discussion with our tour guide who was excited to talk with someone who had actually helped move a piano before. Here's me inside the main concert hall! (I admit I had to keep from drooling when I heard about the organ which has over 10,000 pipes going back over 8 meters into the wall)

My only regret is that we didn't have time to catch a performance there...

That night we went out to dinner at a cool little pub where you could grill your own steak (delicious) and then proceeded on a pub crawl through some of the more historic pubs e.g. Sydney's first hotel, first pub, etc. Enjoyed a really great local porter (I'm realising how big a fan of dark beers I am) at one of the place's called Nelson's Blood, as you can imagine it was a grand evening :)

The next morning we got up early to walk along the coast listening to our tour guide, Russ, explain a bit of the history of the harbour to us. Apparently when the British first came to Australia they completely missed Sydney Harbour and it was only during a return trip that somebody thought hey! I feel like there's something more in here! If you wanna check out the pics they'll be on FB soon and eventually I'll get around to getting my pics posted up somewhere more easily accessible for peeps who haven't caught up to the 21st century :P The water was the most amazing blue I've seen due to the water being pumped into the harbour and Pacific being filtered of any human caused pollution before being allowed back out. Once again I have to commend the Aussies on their efforts to try to keep green. They're also quite proud of their environmental work and almost everywhere you go you'll see some kind of sign explaining just what is going on.

We walked by a few different beaches until we made it to the infamous Bondi Beach where you can find the Iceberg Club which has its own pool situated right alongside the water! It was founded in 1929 and in order to become a full member you have to take part in a winter swim with the "IceCubes" where they actually fill the pool with ice. I suppose this the Aussie version of the Polarbear Plunge though we've definitely got it a bit easier since our beloved Lake Superior conveniently freezes over every winter for us!

We then spent the afternoon exploring a local Aussie market (read great authentic souvenir opportunity) where we also stopped at a famous chocolate shop, Max Brenner: Chocolate by the Bald Man. Pure decadence this place was. Taylor and I indulged in the "Exploding Chocolate Shot" which consisted of a shot of pure milk chocolate mixed with pop rocks and some white chocolate chunks. I can easily say I've never had such good chocolate before and fingers crossed they'll get around to opening up the store they're working on in Brisbane before we leave! Next we had a bit of downtime before getting dinner at a nice Malaysian restaurant. A few of us headed over to the aquarium only to find out it had closed ten minutes before we arrived but our spirits were quickly raised by a street performer by the name of "Toy". He wasn't particularly talented but was absolutely hysterical with terrible "Engrish" and a lovely cache of lewd jokes. A bottle of wine back at the hotel also helped to raise spirits for the evening and a bunch of us ended up wandering around the city having another grand evening in the Harbour City.

Sunday morning we quick checked out of our hotel (which I forgot to mention was easily the nicest hotel suite I have EVER stayed in, read thank you Dson) and scurried over to the aquarium. I can't remember the last time I was at an aquarium but I had a great time there. Sharks, dugongs, octupi, huge sea turtles, and endless Finding Nemo jokes made for a happy Phil. The shark feeding was less than exciting though, they just kinda swam up to the fish grabbed it and then continued swimming around. LAAAAAME

Russ had told us about this famous meat pie stand called Harry's Cafe du Wheels (conveniently located by Russell Crowe's less than humble abode) that with my growing taste for Australian foods I had to try out. This meat pie was a heck of a meal piled with mashed potatoes, mashed peas, and covered in gravy and was delicious beyond words! Time was ticking down though and we made a quick foray into the Paddy Markets which boasted loads of cheap merchandise sold my lovely Asian folk. 'nough said there. Thus ended our time in Sydney and before we knew it we were back at college eating the much less appetizing food wishing we were rich and could have just stayed there forever (kidding i promise) It was an absolutely unforgettable weekend, though it was all too short and with any luck someday I'll find my way back there.

For now its been back to class and then off to New Zealand on Thursday! Didn't you know I don't ever stop?

Off To Sydney

Hey y'all,

haven't posted recently because I've been a. lazy b. busy c. fighting off an ear infection d. recovering from an unfortunate kangaroo boxing accident. Okay so I haven't gotten into any fights with a kangaroo but the other three are actually valid. Don't have time to catch up on everything right now as I'll be catching a taxi to the airport in t-minus 8 hours then flying to Sydney for the weekend with the rest of the Dson folk. Not sure what we'll all be doing there but I promise I'll get back on my game here and get some posts up about this last week+ as well as the Sydney trip. Until then, miss everyone back in the states and hope you're doing well.

Cheers, Phil aka 'Cluck'

CroWeek Craziness Continued

Did I mention how awesome alliteration is? Didn't have a chance to finish up my last post yesterday due to said craziness but I'm currently sitting in an absurdly simple introductory lecture so I figured it'd be a good time to continue on!

Monday I had my first class in Australia! At noon... Having been out the night before I made the (at the time) great decision to sleep through bfast. Theeen after I actually got up did I realise that my class was going to knock out lunch time at the college. Not a terribly big deal I just had to buy lunch on campus but I've found myself turning into a bit of a scrooge with my money. Everytime I look at something I can't help but think "that's not worth that!" For example I won't be eating at McDonald's or Maccers as the Aussies call it anytime soon, they don't even have a dollar menu! At the same time its made me more aware of how cheap a lot things really are for us in the states and then the mind can't help but wander into thoughts of the reasons that we're able to get such cheap food, clothing, etc.

But back to class or rather back to academic class, my first and only class Monday was Second Language Acquisition, a pretty self explanatory title I think. I knew I was going to like the professor when a student started saying something "Surely..." and the prof cut her off saying "Don't call me Shirley!" Oh you silly Australians and your theft of American culture.

The Monday night Croweek activity was an Irish pub crawl. At dinner they seated people at different tables that each had Irish last names on them (and some with more creative "Irish" last names). The tables had watered down goon (dyed green of course) and loads of green confetti all over the tables (which still appears all over the college in new places every day). The food was decent, nothing particularly Irish unless you count potatoes, the only other really interesting bit was a limerick contest and let me tell you, college students are nothing if not extremely inventive at creating lovely sexual rhymes.

After dinner, more goon drinking ensued. Fuster and I were introduced to the Australian goon equivalent of a keg stand, called a "liedown" which basically consisted of you lying down and have goon poured into your mouth. Let it be known that I rocked that (thanks for the good drinking blood mom). We had been informed time and time again that Australians were not into drinking games but in my brief experience it seems like many of them have actually been very interested in learning our drinking games. I was more than happy to introduce them to a simple game called "Up the River, Down the River".

The actual pub crawl was sadly rather anticlimatic. The first pub was not particularly exciting and the second and third pubs were actually CLOSED! Never found out what was up with that, we'd arranged our pub crawl with the pubs ahead of time so who knows. It worked out in the favor of the Victoria or Vic where wandered to instead (keep in mind you have to picture a mob of about 100-150+ drunken college students streaming through the streets). It had a pretty sweet dance floor and Dj as well as pool tables so we had no lack of entertainment there.

Oh jeez lecture just ended. I'll have to finish this post up back in the room...

Alrighty back at it. So tuesday I had Advanced Bioinformatics (basically using computers to do genetic sequencing, VERY cool stuff) which I had originally thought would be out of my league because I haven't had any bio-ish classes since high school but I've had two lectures now and think it should be doable. Followed that up with Australia Marine Biology. Now let me start off by saying that Dickinson basically tells us to take this course not so much for the actual course but more for the two field trips you go on, one up to the Great Barrier Reef and another to Moreton Island. Key part: THEY PAY FOR IT! So most of us Dson students are in it as well as large number of other international students with a decent number of Aussies too. Met a girl from Germany who with any luck I shall be seeing more of in my time here :)

Next came Artificial Intelligence. I was pretty pumped for this course but had a heck of a time finding the bloody lecture room. It was located in this complex of 4 or 5 buildings but no map would tell me which one it was in... So I wandered around and finally stumbled across some arrows written in chalk on one of the buildings that managed to get me there. I sat in the lecture for about 30 minutes and then walked out. Two main reasons: I couldn't stand the lecturer's voice and I remembered being explicitly told by a couple friends who had been here last year saying "Phil, don't take AI, the prof is terrible and you will learn nothing." Sweet deal for me really, I had been signed up for five classes and had been worried I wouldn't be able to pick one to drop (I can only take four courses). So thank you miss, you made my life much easier!

Tuesday night's event was called Black and White night, which was a bit more complicated than the rest of our activities. Basically it was like all the stages of marriage crammed into one night. Interested parties had to arrange some sort of public proposal and whichever proposal the exec board deemed the best would be married that evening. That night we had formal dinner, which I'm just going to call Harry Potter dinner. We all wear our wizard gowns and have a "nice" dinner with a little music and speaker. Cool but not overly exciting. At dinner one guy had his friends pick of the chair of his fiancee-to-be and carry her up to the grand piano where sang in the most terrible of voices. It was hilaaaarious (and they ended up getting married that night). One of my faves though came after the dinner. My friend, Spread had walked into this girl's biology lecture, apologised to the lecturer of course, and proposed right in the middle of this 100+ person lecture hall. Some girl in the crowd actually booed! The video of the thing was really funny.

Wednesday brought my Contemporary Australia course and more marine biology. It was karaoke night but people were pretty drained after the prior night's festivities so most of us didn't go out. We'd been rocking out since Sunday and had just had a wedding the night before so who could blame us! Today has been pretty relaxed, only had two classes and now I'm done for the week! Tonight is a big party at the Chalk again, they're apparently going to make over 40 tonnes of snow and it's also our All college exchange so people from each of the 10 UQ colleges will be there as well as whoever else might come. Fingers crossed we actually get in!

Whew that seemed like a lot, hopefully its not too boring of a read. I'll try to make my future posts a little more exciting for my two followers haha. Cheers!

CroWeek Craziness

Been busy since my last post though I suppose that seems to be my trend lately so I really shouldn't be surprised! Classes started Monday and I've been out every night since Sunday so its been exceptionally crazy. The weekend was fairly relaxed, the Cromwell students finished moving back and so most of my time has been spent meeting people. Watched Master Chef again Saturday night and have decided that its actually a pretty cool show. The season ended Sunday night though so no worries about getting hooked on it.

Sunday night during dinner the Cromwell student president gave a little welcome back speech and then she called all of us "freshers" (which was just us Americans and a few other Australians new to the college) up to receive our "fresher" names. Thus Maia became Jeeves, Megan became Shazza, Taylor became Fuster, and I became Cluck. I haven't heard the origin of the girls names but apparently the exec board decided it would be funny to have a play off the phrase "cluster fuck", so Taylor and I became the lucky two. Like I said before, ridiculous! This was the start to what they call CroWeek, which is basically a Sunday to Sunday week of ridiculous nights out with transportation arranged by the college.

Sunday night was called Chalk night where we all went out to dance at a place called the Chalk Hotel, which had some beautiful drink specials :) Alcohol is still absurdly expensive but the Chalk had some of the cheapest drink I've seen yet aside from "goon" aka box wine. Everything else has had ridiculous taxes put on them over the years by the Aussie govt in their efforts to reduce underage binge drinking. True to teen spirit, the Aussie teens and college students have just moved from one drink of choice to another leaving them with "goon" as the only remaining cheap alcohol.

Toilet Spinning

While watching Master Chef (watched regularly by approximately 2 million Australians) we started discussing some of the differences between Australia and the US. One of the first things I'd noticed here was that the water doesn't spin in their toilets! Apparently in an effort to conserve water the Australians devised the "dual-flush" toilet with a smaller flush for going #1 and a larger flush for #2. Great, I'm all for conserving water; especially in a country that seems like its constantly in drought. My problem, all of the Aussie students thought it was a myth that toilet water spun! So for all of us Americans who were pumped to actually see the old tale in effect, we're simply s*** out of luck.

In other news, Thursday morning, Taylor knocked on my door and lo and behold my door now read "Katrina Philps". Similar, but definitely not me. We were summoned to the Dean of Students office and learned that apparently he wasn't keen on having guys on a gals floor. He listed a few other BS reasons (we know that they've had guys in the exact same rooms in the past) but we didn't really have a choice in the matter so we hauled our stuff across college to our new room. Maybe somebody above really didn't want us to live in our original rooms cuz man did we luck out. Taylor and I are now living in the same room but we have our OWN bathroom and shower! So we decided that in an effort to be accommodating we'd just smile and nod and make the best of our new surroundings. Don't want to feed the terrible American stereotype right? :)

Took part in a really cool study yesterday morning. Earlier in the week had been looking around for some simple employment to help me get by here when I stumbled upon a paid Deep Trunk (lower back) muscle study at the UQ and thought what the heck, why not! So yesterday morning I walked across the street to the Physiology building and learned what I was in for. Started out with a simple ultrasound of my back to make sure my muscles were in good shape (they were) and then they stuck me with 4 needles to implant 4 wires in different spots in the muscle. Then I was hooked up to a machine to record my muscle activity and then had a bunch of little 3d modeling thingers taped on me. If you've ever seen those cool suits that they use for 3d modeling in movies and video games then imagine that minus the suit.

So now that I looked like a christmas tree I got up on a treadmill with a bunch of cameras around me and a computer screen showing a little 3d me on the screen. Did some reeaaaally slow walking increasing in speed up to a light jog for about 30 minutes. Then did some more intense movements with resistance to really make my back muscles work. Oh and I forgot to mention throughout all this I had a neverending supply of gummy candies or lollies as they call them. I was getting paid but dang I would've done it just for all that candy I ended up eating! That about summed up everything, the wires and all the tape were pulled off and I was good to go. In retrospect I should've asked for some pictures cuz I must've looked pretty ridiculous. Now everybody has been asking why the heck I put myself through that for a small bit of money but the way I look at it, it wasn't about the money. Physical therapists and scientists have thought that these muscles might be the main source for many untreatable lower back pains and so far the results from the study have been positive that strengthening these muscles might be a way of alleviating that pain. So if I could be a part of the research that helps somebody and their pain then I'll count my time and very minimal discomfort well worth it.

Anyhoo, I was surprisingly pretty exhausted after that and laid low for the rest of the day with just a little bit of shopping for necessities. It looks like the majority of people are moving back into the college today and everyone has been eager to meet us "seppos" (google it yourself but don't worry its all in good fun). There was a rumor that Taylor and I might have to move again but we promptly went to the Dean and shut down that idea. The principal had gotten it in his head that we wouldn't meet people if we lived together but thankfully the dean agreed that we were doing just fine socialising with the Aussies and didn't need to move us AGAIN for us to get a good Aussie experience.

In other news, our group has been very bummed to find out that Cromwell's biggest party of the semester and coincidentally the biggest college party in the ENTIRE southern hemisphere is scheduled for the same weekend that our program will be going to Sydney. Talk about being stuck between a rock and a hard place. As of now its looking like we're going to make the responsible decision to go to Sydney but its oh so difficult for us. I'm sure the two people reading this will commiserate. So it goes though, can't have it all as much as we'd like. I just recently booked my flight to visit a couple friends from Dickinson in New Zealand for the following weekend. There's definitely going to be no shortage of adventures here!

About 200 Hundred Indigenous Languages..

Answering that question at orientation this morning got me a free thing of white chocolate Tim Tam's! Tim Tam's are chocolate biscuit (cookie) perfection, so perfect in fact that the Aussies designed a way of eating them called the Tim Tam Orgasm. Basically you eat off two opposite corners and drink coffee through the chocolatey middle part like a straw. I've yet to try this myself but I am definitely going to give it a go in the morning! Its been neat trying the different foods here and Tim Tam's have definitely been one of the best discoveries so far. My friend Taylor and I spent a good half an hour just wandering around the grocery store earlier tonight laughing at some of the outrageous things we saw and some of the Australian equivalents to US foods. Many things are the same but for whatever reason they just gave them new brand names such as Lynx = Axe, Hungry Jack = Burger King.

Spent most of last weekend hanging out with the Dson group. As college students, we've latched onto the cheapest form of alcohol, box wine. The exchange rate is slightly in our favor but most everything and especially alcohol is pretty expensive compared to the states. So finding $8 four liter boxes of red wine was a definite win for us. Monday, we toured the XXXX brewery, which is Queensland's beer. Apparently there is a strong pride for the particular beer brewed in each state (Victoria from Victoria, Tooheys from New South Wales...) and so most Queenslanders will vouch for XXXX as the best beer around. The tour itself was pretty cool, getting to hear a bit of the history of beer itself as well as the intertwining histories of XXXX beer and Australia/Queensland itself. Personally, I don't think its anything particularly special (ssshhh don't tell anyone!) but I do think its cool that they use only Australian products to brew it. I will say that its definitely better than the Fosters that they export off to us in the states... Best part of the tour was definitely getting to pour our own frothy brew from the tap, Australian style. Unlike England and other such places they don't like the head so they fill glasses in two steps. Fill and flick off the head, then fill to the brim! More beer that way they say and I'm inclined to agree with their logic! My friend Taylor and I took tally and realised that in the 6 days we'd been in Australia, we'd tried 13 different beers (my fave so far has definitely been a James Squire Porter) Don't worry mom, we party hardy but we're keeping it safe down under :)

Speaking of being safe, as part of our study abroad orientation today we had a session on every sort of safety while we're here from going out to swimming to the various creatures we should be careful of. Poisonous snakes galore, stinging jellyfish, sharks, etc. but as usual my big fear is still easily spiders. The lady giving the talk put up a picture of a huntsman spider, which are about the size of your hand, and explained to us that it was harmless. Then she showed us pictures of the little spiders which are absurdly poisonous. Herein lies my problem with spiders: the big ones are scary as heck and the little ones will kill you. Why the heck would you not be freaked out by them!?

Aside from all that, all is going pretty well. It looks like Taylor and I will be moving into another building because our college goofed up and put us on a girls floor. We tried explaining to them that this really wasn't a problem at all buuutt apparently they want to abide by their rules. Silly rules I say... Its been nice though, other students are finally trickling back into the college and by Sunday all 200 or so of them should be back and then things should liven up quite a bit. There's a really cool college culture here that I'm pumped up to join in on. Part of the tradition at Cromwell is that each student goes by a nickname that they're given as a "fresher" and they range from mild to downright ridiculous. For instance, one student (from Canada!) apparently looked seedy in his app photo and so he became Multigrain. Genius right?

I've also been really excited to be able to play piano again and was suckered into agreeing to play at one of our formal dinners. I hadn't played for two months before coming here and I have absolutely no idea what the heck I'm going to play so it ought to be interesting. Hopefully they like the Entertainer or some other fun little pop tune that I can pull out of my ass... Anyhoo its off to bed for me. I've promised myself that I'll actually check out the gym tomorrow before lunch so we'll see how that goes. Going to some play called "I love you bro" with the Dson group in the evening as well and that should certainly be interesting. Cheers!

G'day Y'all

Hello to anyone who may have the (mis)fortune to be reading this little travel blog of mine. I've never really done this before but in the interest of keeping track of my adventures here and sharing it with any family and friends who might be interested I realised I should make an effort to work on this. Soooo here goes!

Its been a crazy summer so far jumping from the end of the semester at Dson to spending 8 weeks in Alabama with a research program at Auburn University to ~40 hours back home in the Land O Lakes to flying off to Aussie land. Craziness but its been a great ride so far. Anyhoo, I left Duluth on July 11th after a short weekend with the fam and flew Chicago where I ran into the head of Dickinson Dining Services. It was funny because he was on his way back to Dson from some conference in Cali while I was on my out to Cali because I wouldn't be heading to Dson this fall. Small world much? I was delayed a couple hours out of chicago so I had to hustle biiiig time when I got to LAX but got to my terminal maybe ten minutes before they started boarding. Everyone else from the Dickinson group was already there (of course) and there are 12 of us in the program. By this time i was utterly exhausted (it was about 1am Central time) and starving because I hadn't had a chance to grab food in LAX like I had planned so I managed to conk out pretty quickly after watching Clash of the Titans and having a much needed dinner. At the time I thought it was pretty good for airplane food but I learned later that it must have been my hunger because it didn't sound like anyone else was particularly impressed. I'm realizing that this is dragging on, I haven't even landed in bloody australia yet so I'll pick up the pace here!

We actually had to refuel in Noumea, New Caledonia, which was absolutely beautiful. Picture Lord of the Rings mountains and other scenery. We finally landed in Brisbane about 9am local time for a total travel time of about 29 hours. Our awesome program coordinator, Ann, met up with us and we got on a bus into the city. Brisbane seems like a pretty sweet city and our bus driver was a good tour guide as well. Best part of the drive though was maybe thirty seconds after he was telling us how there are only two levels of police in Australia and what their vehicles look like we heard a quick police siren. We'd been in Brisbane maybe 10 mins and we'd already been pulled over! What was interesting was that rather than sitting and waiting for the officer to come up, apparently here you're expected to get out and go to them. Strange.

We're living in what are called "colleges" which are basically the University of Queensland's on campus residence halls. I and three others in the group are staying at Cromwell College, which is of course the best one. There are only a few other students here right now as we've arrived a couple weeks before the semester actually starts. Everyone has been really nice, the friendly Australian stereotype has definitely been correct in our experience. the rest of the day was basically spent getting settled in and such. Wednesday morning we all met up and a bit of orientation and we went on a bus tour of the city. Public transport is great here, the bus system runs everywhere and they have the CityCat which are catamarans that run up and down the Brisbane river, which the city is built around. Since then we've done some exploring around the city, gone out to a couple bars etc. I was a little bummed to find out that they're really big on American music so I haven't really heard much cool Australian music but I still have hopes.

Yesterday was an awesome day. We went to the Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary where we got to see and PET kangaroos, emus, and even hold a koala! For those of you aren't aware, koalas are the chillest animals and are only active for about 5 hours a day, 3 of those spent eating. I'll have to see if I can get a pic of me with one up here at some point. We then spent the rest of the day on a "scavenger hunt" through the city, which was effectively us doing ridiculous things at different places. Examples include singing the US national anthem at a bus stop, staging a public break up on a street corner, and stopping for drinks at a few pubs along the way.

I think that about catches me up with a quick and dirty synopsis of my past 5 days here. I miss everyone in the states dearly but am very much enjoying myself here. Cheers from abroad!

Edit: here's that pic of me and the koala I promised