Living the big city life!

Monday, June 27

I went running and got so lost! I got lost last time I went running.. but this time I got REALLY lost. I walked the path the night before and thought I was cool.. but then I missed and turn, but figured I could run the route in reverse.. big mistake!

It was a beautiful run but I ended up in some suburub. I went into the police station and asked for directions to Circular Quay and the guy was like.. uhh.. do you have enough for bus fare? But two hours later.. I made it back.

Class started and it's pretty okay. We're going through the Australian short stories book. It is very frustrating that we have to write journals and essays though.

I went to a cafe to write some of my journals and started talking with the waitress.

She told me that the place was so busy on last Saturday that they just shut down. I asked why she didn't stay open to make the extra money and she said, well after awhile, I just got annoyed with running around so much so we just closed down.

I was like.. if only my Ben and Jerry's manager could hear that now. I love Australia.

Tuesday, June 28

I finally got to do a little shopping, and there are so many places to go! Basically, Sydney has the whole underground shopping mall the covers a large part of the city.. it's insane!

The a few of the group members went to the zoo but I decided I wasn't really up for walking around in the rain (it's been raining all week!). So I got off the ferry, intending to head back to the hotel, when a group of union protestors marched by. So I was like, eh, what the heck. So I joined the march and walked down the business part of Syndey.

It was a small little rally of only one union I think. A reporter came by and stood next to me, so after the rally we started talking (because I'm so nosey). She invited me up to her office! I was pretty excited. She told me about a huge union demonstration on Friday (which I just came from).



There's a lot of stuff going on right now with Unions in Australia. The republicans recently attained full control of the senate and when they reconviene in August will vote on several key union issues including lowering minimum wages, AMA contracts that Australians will have to sign, and the abolishment of wrongful termination protection for business under 100 members (everyone here calls it "getting sacked").



Wednesday, June 28

A few of us hit the aquarium which was underconstruction. But the best part was the oceanarium.. it was a amazing! There was this huge manta ray that was just hanging out right above our heads.




Jessica and I went to the botanical gardens and it was so beautiful.. right in the heart of the city.





They had a place though, the home of the flying foxes. It's like... your walking along and then you look up and you're like.. hmm.. what kind of fruit is that.. and then you're like.. AHHH!! giants bats!!! they were huge!



The literature class that evening went to see a play at the opera house called "Two Brothers." It is a poltical drama that is widely known to be based on the life of a former Aussie prime minister (but of course the author denies it to avoid lawsuits). The play painted a pretty negative picture of politics, but the play has been one of the Opera Houses' most popular in years. Interesting. It was really wonderful! It was really suspensful at times.

Despite the fact that we were crazy tired afterwards Sarah and Kathy and I went exploring and found a salsa bar!! I'm so excited. I think we're going back tonight.

Thursday, June 30

The literature class went to the oldest churches in Sydney and to the New South Whales art museum.. it was pretty awesome.



It's been raining though.. which made walking around pretty miserable! Sydney hadn't had any precipitation in three months, then we arrived, and now they are having the worst flooding in June since 2001!


More shopping, but I haven't been too bad. We went to this place for dinner that had steak and pasta for five bucks! It was really delicious (a nice change from the PB&H I've been eating twice a day). But it was a really swanky club.. they get you in with the food but then get your money with the drinks (16.50 for a long island iced tea!).

Then we went to the casino. It was my first time, but some guys had already been and lost a lot of money.. apparently though last night they were getting closer to where they started. The girls mostly stayed at the bar.

Speaking of the bar.. a lot of my classmates are going broke already! Drinks here are pretty expensive. So some have taken to buying wine before hand and getting buzzed in the room.. then going out to get drunk (because it's more efficient and cost effective). But everyone is getting along really well!

Learning to walk upside down...

It's more difficult then it sounds.
Saturday, June 25.
The 14 hour plane ride went straight from Thursday night to Saturday morning. As if the plane ride wasn't bad enough.. then we had to stand in a horrific line at Customs. Everyone had to declare their nutri-grain bars or pay a $500 penalty. As much as the Aussies are famous for being laid back.. let's just say .. the Customs workers were not interested in being anyone's mate.

Sarah's suitcase was lost. We got to the hotel and she went up to the desk and the male clerk said the hotel was due to call in the morning and bring the suitcase by. When he recieve'd it he'd just go up to her room and knock her up. Apparently, in Australia, that means to call someone on the phone. Interesting.

The excitment of the city kept us most of us awake until about 9PM.. then we all passed out.


Our hotel is right by Circular Quay, which is the main tourist harbor area in the city. There are so many different kinds of languages spoken it kind of makes your head spin.

Of course, the most idiotic street preformer on the pier was American. Jessica and I stopped to watch.. because he was playing with some fire tourches and we were hoping he'd burn himself. But alas, he stayed unharmed. Unfortunately I made the mistake of making eyecontact with the bloake and he grabbed me out of the crowd and I became his safety girl/cheerleader. It was not too much fun.. but I got the fame I've always dreamed of. At the end of the show he took a long nail and hammer and drove a nail into his nose.. I had a close view and thought I was going to have to resign my position as safety girl and throw up. But I survived.



Sunday, June 26.
We had a tour of the city and then of the Opera House.

The city tour was wonderful. I hope to explore many of the places further. We saw Nicole Kidman and Russel Crowe's house. The neighborhood was so swanky it hurt my head.

Bondi Beach was great too! There were only surfers out there.. the water wasn't too cold though.





By the way, the psuedo mo-hawk is really in style down here.

The Opera tour was interesting. The place is really interesting on the inside.. not as glamorous as you may think. They also have a wild bird that lives in there and flies around. The wood inside is all Euclyptus... pretty crazy.



The inside of the auditoriums were so beautiful. We walked in during a Sydney Symphony rehersal and the sound was absolutely perfect. It was overwhelming.

At night we had a real fancy dinner on a boat. The food was pretty good.. the crab was really good. The fillet was just okay. But the chocolate dessert was SOOO good. I was still kind of hungry and basically enhaled the thing before I noticed that no one else liked theirs. Oh well.. losers.






That night I was so tired but most of the rest of the group was going out.. so I was like.. eh.. why not? Three of the girls were so adament about going to this one bar (St. Patty's).. it was all I heard that evening. So we get there and there are two tables of all males, and no one else.. but the group decides to get a new table! I was like.. what are they thinking!!

So after a few minutes of politely sitting with my group, I rallied Jessica and Jacienda and though they thought I was crazy, they said they would come with me to talk to the other tables.

Well as it turns out we happened to approach five rugby players from New Whales (the one in Britain!). They were so friendly. We all started to have a really goodtime, and my roommate Anne, joined us quickly. Then after about 30 minutes half of the other group left (including the three girls that dragged us there in the first place). But the three other students migrated over to the other table of guys, who were from Ireland.

We got there around 10:30 and ended up staying there until after 1 AM! The bar singer played singalong classics such as Free Fallin', Coldplay, U2, every Oasis song that ever existed, The Gambler, Country Roads, and Stand by Me (3 times!).. and every single person in the bar knew all the words to every song.. that blew my mind!



I have to say that I was quite impressed with the rugby guy next to me, David. He works at an animal rescue place in Whales and seemed really cool. His accent was crazy.. half british half keltic! He taught me some Welsh words too.. that is the craziest language. He knew a whole lot about American music.. apparently the stuff is everywhere. The guys knew about Nashville too.. though they didn't know where it was on a map. But we taught them how to say Yee-haw and everyone was happy.

The final countdown!

Four more days until I leave the good ole western hemisphere.. and I think I'm going to miss the little things.. you know.. the time zone.. the four seasons... the canadians. Well, maybe not the canadians so much.

And since I have lots of getting organized to do.. cleaning.. packing.. I am planning a party the night before I leave... just because I'm really good at picking inappropriate times to party.