Monday, February 27
First day of school, first day of school! The way classes work here is that each class has a lecture and a tutorial. The lecture is huge and the tutorial is much more personal with about 20-25 students in it. For Week 1 each class only meets during the lecture time so this week was pretty light. I only had one class today from 10-12 and it was my Live Entertainment & Popular Culture class. The first 20 minutes of the class we watched a presentation our teacher put together about Britney Spears. Not complaining. We also talked about the Kardashian's and watched the Super Bowl half time show. After class Morgan and I became the ultimate poor college students and walked 20 minutes to a liquor store that we heard had reasonable prices. It was a success.
Tuesday, February 28
Early morning. I had Media, Culture & Everyday Life from 9-11. The whole time I was thinking that the teacher looked SO familiar. Before class ended he showed us his twitter page and asked us "Who knows who my profile picture is of?" It was Jacob from Lost. He looked SO much like Jacob from Lost and I guess people tell him that a lot and he doesn't like having pictures of himself on the internet so he just uses a picture of Jacob. I was okay with this. Because we didn't have tutorials this week, I did't have anything to do till 4. I hung out on the quad on campus for a while but it was SO HOT. It hit 93 degrees. I decided to move into the library and catch up on my emails, etc. It was the perfect time to be on because everyone at home was on too! I was able to talk to my mom, sister, Allegra, Susan and finally email Tara and Emerson back! The time actually flew by. Before class I got a spinach and feta wrap from one of the cafes on campus. I think this is my third one and we've only been on a campus a couple of weeks. So delicious. I also got a super intense ice coffee which also had a scoop of ice cream. I just kept thinking about how much my dad would enjoy this refreshing snack! From 4-6 I had Managing Organisations and People. I was so exhausted by the time I got home. MK and I (mainly MK) cooked stir fry for dinner which was so delicious. We watched some Gossip Girl and had an incredibly relaxing night which also included watching random videos from Freshman year.
Wednesday, February 29
NO CLASS! I was already ready for a day off. I'm clearly out of shape for this whole going to class thing that's happening. I woke up and went to the gym. I'm still trying to get used to the whole kilometers thing. (Same with using celsius instead of fahrenheit.) After my workout I video chatted with my parents FINALLY (and Greta and eventually Jen, too). Morgan and I went to the market to get stuff for dinner. We decided to make fajitas. Every outing we have is always such an ordeal filled with stupidity and laughter. For example, not realizing the elevator doors opened until they were closing. Guess you had to be there. After dinner we gathered in Morgan's room to watch 10 Things I Hate About You. It was pretty fitting considering it stars Heath Ledger and as we all know he is... was... Australia. It was an even more perfect viewing than normal!
Thursday, March 1
First can we discuss how crazy it is that it's March!?! I can't even believe it. It feels like I was just getting ready for my trip to Israel and now my Study Abroad adventure is in complete full swing! Today I had one class: Music and the Mind. This is the class I'm planning on dropping once everything with the internship falls into place. I really didn't want to go and it kind of felt like a waste of time. It's also super awkward because we got placed into groups for a group project that'll be ongoing during Weeks 2 and 3 but i'll be dropping the class before then so it's just sort of awkward. The class definitely seems interesting but I learned after this past semester in my Emotions class that psychology seems great until you get overloaded with heavy ready and projects that prove the class isn't what you thought it was going to be. Maybe that's just Columbia but now I'm pretty turned off from those types of classes. Anyways, after class I headed home and hung out for a bit. We ate the rest of our fajitas for dinner and then ended up playing a lot of cards games with Morgan and her roommates Jenna & Chelsea (the twins from Cranston) and Naina and her boyfriend Josh. It got pretty heated during Spoons and eventually we sat down and watched Night at the Roxbury while Jenna, Chelsea and I stalked some Cranstonians and figured our some weird mutual connections. Small world.
Friday, March 2
Woke up and went to the gym. I got there at the perfect time. There are only 2 treadmills and literally 3 minutes after I walked in probably 6 other people came in. I had a fantastic run! I went to the first meeting for the photo club which seemed pretty cool. Basically it'll be like taking free photo classes which is fine with me. I probably won't go every week but it's good to know I can if I want to! For dinner we made the most delicious burgers. MK had a veggie burger while Morgan and I feasted on some kangaroo burgers. Just delectable. We also made potatoes and while we were waiting for our burgers to be done we put a cover over them to keep them warm. BAD IDEA. Next thing we knew the cover was suctioned in to the pan and we could not get our potatoes out. We tried everything. We froze the pan. We banged the pan. We poured oil on it. We even tried using a wine opener to open it. The handle broke off. We embarrassingly went down to the front desk to ask their advice. FINALLY we got our potatoes out by simply reheating the pan and then pushing and pulling, etc. on the cover. By this point we were too full from our burgers to even eat them. FAIL. Friday night we did some serious bar hopping which wasn't even our plan at all. We decided that'd we stay in Bondi Junction and go to a bar called Tea Garden which is literally 3 minutes from our apartment. We were there for a little bit, someone bought Morgan a shot and we danced around. Morgan, MK, and I ran back to the apartment briefly because (just being honest with all my readers) we weren't even tipsy and we were not in the mood to spend a ton of money on alcohol at a bar and our shots were awaiting us back home! One problem: no entry into the baar after 1 AM. We tried to get back in because the twins were still there but there was no budging on the bouncer's end. They kept telling us if they let us in they would be fined $10,000 and there were cops all around so we accepted that fact and headed to The Eastern which was another 2 minutes away. LAME. Oh my gosh it was practically empty. We walked around Bondi and a cop came up to us and said "Are you guys looking for bars?" we admitted that we were and they told us about a few places in an area called Kings Cross which is downtown. The last train into the city was leaving in minutes to we rushed to the station and bought tickets only to find that the gates were open so we paid for no reason... ANNOYING. The five of us were going into the city completely clueless of where to go. This was definitely not the night we were expecting. We sat across from a group of guys from Brazil on the train ride so that was pretty entertaining. When we arrived in Kings Cross a lady was handing our wristbands for a bar/club place called Tunnel so we ended up going there. It was pretty fun, drinks were discounted because we had the wristbands, and the music was good. However, the DJ was OBNOXIOUS. Every 10 seconds he'd yell "OHHH SHIIIT!" for absolutely no reason. There were also gay guys everywhere since it's Mardi Gras weekend so that was obviously entertaining. We danced here for awhile and then decided we'd try and go to SOHO which is the bar that the cops suggested to us. Once we got there we realized there was a $10 cover charge and normally that'd be fine but it was already about 2 am and we knew we wouldn't be out much longer so we decided to go to a bar called Goldfish which had no cover. This place was pretty classy and neat but we weren't here very long. By some miracle we found a bus from Kings Cross right back to Bondi Junction FOR FREE. All the driver asked for was a train ticket which WE HAD FROM EARLIER (because we didn't have to use it, remember?) Everything worked out and we made it home in one piece by about 4 am. MK and I obviously ate toast and watched Dawson's Creek before hitting the hay. The usual.
Saturday, March 3
Well, the first time I woke up it was 10 AM and after going to be past 5 AM I knew I needed more sleep. I think I finally fell back asleep around 1130ish and then slept till after 1. It was fantastic. I made eggs and relaxed for a bit. Before we new it it was time to start getting ready! Saturday night was the huge Mardi Gras parade which is in Sydney is basically a gay pride parade. It didn't start till 8 but we wanted to get down there early. Our goal of leaving at 5 was a fail and we didn't catch a train till 7. Oops. It was also raining so that was pretty annoying. We didn't have much stuff to dress up with and we didn't really want to spend money buying ridiculous accessories for just one night so we kind of just wore bright colors and didn't really try matching our clothes. We got downtown and walked around forever to get to the parade route. It was a really weird system and it was PACKED and raining. We saw a few floats but decided to give up on this whole parade thing and catch a cab to Kings Cross since we were planning on meeting up with the kids from the sailing club later on anyways down there. Morgan, MK, and I took one taxi and the twins took another since the cab drivers here don't like squeezing people in to their cars. Pretty annoying. So the three of us get in the cab and tell him we want to go to World Bar. This is baasically the dialect for the next 5 minutes...
"World Bar, please."
"Okay, World Square."
"No, World Bar. How much do you think it'll cost?"
"$20 to World Square."
(We knew this was way to high for where we going so we sat in the car slightly confused. The bar we were trying to go to is in Kings Cross. We see a sign that says Kings Cross pointing right and he turns left.)
"Um, World Bar is in King's Cross."
"You said World Square."
"No, we said World Bar. How much to World Bar from here?"
"Well, now it's going to be $25."
"Nevermind, let us out here."
The guy was such a jerk and he's lucky we even gave him $5. We found another cab and got there for $7. The twins decided to go home but the three of us decided to meet up with the guys from the sailing club at Hugo's Pizza. MK and I were totally expecting to show up at a pizza place that resembled Pauly's Pizza or something of the sort. WRONG. We were legit at the classiest bar/pizza place EVER. There were huge comfy boothes and private birthday parties all over the place. It was $5 pizza which rocked so we split two among the three of us. For $5 pizza it was pretty delicious! We'll definitely have to go back! We sat with Hubert who is originally from France and a couple of his friends. Eventually Ajay who is basically the leader of the club arrived. We ate and then headed across the street to World Bar. We got free entry somehow which was fantastic. This bar was GIGANTIC. I think were at least 3 floors and probably 6 bars. At least. It was gigantic and everywhere you went different music was playing. There was a pretty large group of us which was fun. At World Bar they sell these teapots that are full of alcohol and like juices. It's basically a mixed drink that you take shots of. The first pot that the three of us got gave us 15 shots. But each one didn't have much alcohol. I swear we weren't out of control. All of a sudden our table had about 12 teapots on it and we drank them non stop till they were gone. These guys are seriously SO nice. Australian's in general are super nice and everyone always buys for each other and eventually it's your turn. It's a fair system and it's pretty cool I think. We also met another kid from Chicago who is in the club which was neat. We all started losing each other about half way through the night due to events such as meeting Australia guys, choosing different areas of the bar to dance in depending on music, going to the bathroom, etc. I couldn't find Morgan anywhere for like 45 minutes causing me to climb up and down the stairs of these bar probably 10 times. Eventually we found her and she was completely fine, obviously. Somehow one of my tank top straps ripped while at the bar so I had to quickly make my shirt a tank top. I swear this event happened completely on its own. Before we even left for the night there was a tear and I was just hoping it would make it through the night. Let down. It was only my first time wearing it too. Thanks Target. Finally a group of us gathered together again: MK, Morgan, Clint, Patrick, Ajay, and Justin (the boy from Chicago) and we were trying to find a cab back to UNSW. Ajay worked some serious magic and got us a Maxi Taxi which fit us all. We cut in front of like 30 people who were waiting for us. The cab ride back consisted of hilariousness. I wish I had it all filmed. I think the driver thought we were CRAZY. We went back to Ajay's dorm and hung around the common area for awhile and some other people met up with us too including Liam who was probably drunk for his first time since he just turned 18 a couple of weeks ago. He was hilarious and I just adore his Australian accent. Finally around 3 AM we decided we'd call it a night since we needed to find a cab home anyways. Being on campus at this time was definitely interesting. Finally our FOURTH cab ride of the night and we're home. Again, MK and I ate toast and finished season 1 of Dawson's Creek. We had a fantastic night. Everyone I've met through the sailing club and been so incredible nice. I'm so glad I'm meeting students who aren't American. I mean, the kids in our program are cool and all but I really wanted to meet "locals" so I'm glad it's sort of happening!
Sunday, March 4
Today I was planning on sleeping late but around 10:30ish announcements kept going off about a power outage in the building and in all of Bondi Junction. Since we were awake and there wasn't much else to do we decided to go lay out in the sun since today was literally the first day we had sun in a week. It's been raining SO MUCH. Blegh. At least I can sport my super cute new rain coat! Anyways, we were outside for awhile until it got too windy. Morgan and I succumbed to our craving and went and got some sushi. We are addicted. No exaggeration. I've already had it I think four times since we've been here. It's just so good and rotating sushi bars are so neat and they are EVERYWHERE. We hung in her room until we decided to make burgers for dinner since we still had buns and lettuce and avocado. They were delish per usual. Since dinner we've just been relaxing and I've been writing this blog/uploading photos for hours. The internet is awful here and it takes forever to upload anything. Blegh.
Everything has been great except for all this rain. At least we had some sun today except I am going to bed with my legs completely burnt. They are partly tan, partly white, and party burnt. MK told me they look like Neapolitan ice cream. I can't even get mad because it's the most accurate description. This weekend was fantastic but now it's time for classes to pick up and homework to start. EW.
Hopefully this entry is appropriate for all my readers and I apologize to any family members who are caught off guard, hhaha. I mean, it is study abroad and I'm just making sure I keep you up to date with everything!
Oh, a few more things I have learned this week:
Whinging is what they say instead of complaining.
"Let's queue up" instead of "Line up." So queue = line which I obviously knew but they never use the word line here.
Also, the song of the weekend: Call Me Maybe
Okay, I think i've covered everything for now! It's 2:30 AM and my alarm clock is set for 7 so I should probably get some shut eye.
Goodnight from Australia! <3
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